Knife skills with the Brownies

When you're cooking with children and restricted time-wise, there's undoubtedly the tendency to concentrate on bakes or icing. Those low effort high excitement activities. However, one of the things I'm quite keen on is instilling the fact that cooking isn't just baking and involves other things. This week we tried new fruit and practiced our knife skills.

Brownies is an excellent opportunity to do just this - our meetings last for an hour and a half and we go away at least once a year on a Brownie holiday. This week we were doing an Island hopping night - playing games and doing activities from different places around the world. The gorgeous weather leant itself to our planned food activity brilliantly. 

Fruit kebabs is an oft repeated activity with Brownies, but one they love (and chose themselves). We try to vary the fruit on offer to encourage them to try new flavours and textures. The only rule is that if you haven't tried it before you give it a little taste, and you do your own chopping and assembling. As you can see from the photo above we use table knives for the chopping and cocktail sticks for the kebabs (of course you could use kebab sticks, but we find that 4 mini kebabs are more attractive than one huge one)

We assign one adult to each table, and demonstrate the bridging technique to each girl. 

Making sure they're holding their knife correctly and using two fingers of the other hand to hold the fruit stable (to make a bridge), 

If it's a round fruit, often we or an older girl will make a flat end to make it more stable. 

Holding the knife below their 'bridge' they chop each thing into bite sized pieces before threading it on the sticks. 

For kiwi fruit, they make a little incision into the skin first to help make the cut

Fruits we tried this week were: mango, pineapple, kiwi, and oranges. Everyone tried everything and we had 2 coverts to kiwi fruit - apparently they had refused to try it previously because it was green! 

Practicing knife skills may seem like a small thing, but when we go away on Brownie holiday we get the girls to help chop carrots, potatoes, and even fruit for their elevenses so being able to do so safely is indispensable. 

You can see on the tables we use plastic mats for hygiene (these are dishwashed afterwards), and table mats. Hands are washed before and after the activity. Hair is tied back, and when made we put the kebabs onto paper plates (to reduce washing up as much as anything else!) 

I don't like... marmalade: Sticky marmalade cake

Apologies for the lack of cake plate and shocking lighting - this was pre transport to the in-laws and, well it's February

I have a confession to make. I don't like marmalade. I made ten jars of it yesterday from 3lb of Seville Oranges, and before I went in to hospital I made another 8 jars from 5 types of citrus fruit I had leftover from Christmas. I know, I know, I need to get out more.

So what do you do when you have 18 jars of marmalade in your pantry and hate the stuff on toast? I mean, I give plenty of it away as thank you gifts, birthday presents, Christmas presents, but my direct family attest they don't like it (or they think I'm rubbish at preserving, I don't know which.) I've thought about selling it, but just wouldn't know how to go about that or what to do. I was planning on sending a jar or two to the Marmalade Awards, but think i've left it too late, and that would still leave me 16 jars.

First stop was, quite obviously cake. Out came the cookbooks, on went the glasses, and over those the sunglasses (I still have the migraine) and I started to pore. What could I adapt, amend to include marmalade? And then I remembered - well you might too. On my Christmas list was the Great British Bake Off Cookbook. And on my first, swift perusal on Christmas Day afternoon a recipe for a Sticky Marmalade Cake had caught my eye. Bingo!

GBBO inspired Sticky Marmalade Cake

175g softened, unsalted butter
90g Tate and Lyle white Light at Heart white sugar (I was being experimental so I thought I'd give this a go in another recipe)
3 eggs, beaten
175g self raising flour
pinch salt
1/2 tsp baking powder
3tbsps Seville Orange Marmalade (I used the 5 fruit marmalade I made back in January - and probably used nearer 4-5 as my spoonfuls were really heaped)
2 tbsps milk, skimmed as that's what I had - I wouldn't ever go out and buy specific milk for a recipe

Drizzle:
3tbsps Seville Orange Marmalde, warmed through with 1 tbsp water to loosen

Icing:
Couple of tablespoons of glace/ water icing (they're both the same thing, people just call it glace icing if they're being fancy and water icing if they're a Guider)

Butter and flour a cake tin, line the bottom with greaseproof (I forgot) - about 20cm ish

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees
Beat the butter and then the sugar with a mixer until it's light and fluffy
Add the eggs, one at a time, with a spoonful of the flour each time you add an egg. Beat them in thoroughly - the flour will stop your batter curdling
Sift in the rest of the flour, salt and baking powder and gently fold in with a metal spoon  
Add the marmalade and milk and stir again to make sure it's all combined

Bake for about 45 mins until golden brown - you need it to spring back when you press a finger on it. Don't necessarily worry about the actual time, cooking - a lot of the time is about your senses; touch, taste, smell, sight, sound. Use them, they're better than any timer.
I use a loose bottomed cake tin, as I find that my cakes pop straight out - if you need to you can loosen the cake around the edge of the tin with a knife. If you let the cake cool for about 10-15 minutes in the tin first, it should shrink back from the edges of the tin.

Leave your cake to cool on a wire rack (if you don't have one use the rack from your grillpan) and pierce it lots of times - not right through though, just about halfway - with a skewer
Warm the marmalade with a spoonful of water to loosen it a little. Pour the warmed marmalde over your cake, like you would the drizzle for a lemon (or satsuma) drizzle cake.

Make up your water icing - After years of making it up for Brownies to ice biscuits I don't really have a recipe, I just put a couple of tablespoons of icing sugar into a bowl, and then add about 2 teaspoons of water, and beat it up until I have a consistency I'm happy with. Here, you want it to be flickable/ drizzleable (is that even a word?) Flickable is infinitely more fun, but drizzleable (I'm making it a word) is cleaner. I just flicked the icing over the cake, first one way, then crosswise, then diagonally across. I was quite happy, but stopped before it looked like one of my Brownies had been add it (if you ignore the splodge at 3 o'clock)

This is one of those cakes, that stores brilliantly, as it gets damper day by day the flavours seem to intensify. And even I, a self-confessed marmalade avoider, really like it. What more can you say?

More Marmalade: Sevilles not required

Last weekend I knew I wanted to stay in, stay warm and potter. Hopefully you've already read the slow roast shoulder of pork that was one part of the outcome of this. If not, please do - it really was a simple, slow cooked wonder.

I found myself in that post Christmas position of having a fruit bowl with clementines, lemons, limes and oranges in. Also, randomly a grapefruit, which I don't eat, because  the fruit and juice make you metabolise medications more quickly which can a real risk with some conditions. I guess it turned up in a veg box and I hoped that inspiration would turn up for it, hence it was starting to look slightly sad in the fruit bowl. My original plan for this week just gone being that I was going to be working away all week I didn't want them to go to waste.

Post Christmas my jam cupboard was looking somewhat bare, preserves had been sent out as Secret Santa presents, gifts to my assistant Guiders and pretty much anyone else I could foist some off on! I was originally holding out for the Seville's but Mark's mum had mentioned to me a five fruit marmalade and I thought I'd give it a bash.

I didn't use a recipe as such. but used my original post on Marmalade as a guideline, ending up with gloriously rosy marmalade punctuated by the green and yellow shreds of the different fruits. It's lovely on toast, and my Great British Bake Off book has a lovely recipe for a Sticky Orange Marmalade cake that I think it would work beautifully in. I'll link back when I make that.

Fruitbowl marmalade

2lb of mixed citrus fruit - I used oranges, satsumas, limes, and a grapefruit
4lb of sugar
4 pints of water
3 lemons, juiced

You will also need:

Sterilised jam jars
Either lids or waxed discs and cellophane toppers
Heavy based pan and long handled wooden spoon
Muslin and string.
Sharp knife (I used a paring knife which was perfect for the job)

Wash your fruit.
Now cook the fruit (except the lemons) whole in 4 pints of water for 2 hours on a low heat. This softens everything and gives you your liquid for later (you need at least 2 pints left at the end of the cooking time, so top it up as necessary).
Take your oranges off the heat, and out of the pan using a slotted spoon or similar, and pop them on a chopping board. Quarter them as this will cool them down faster.

Take out the pips and pop these in a saucer or dish - you'll need them later

Scrape out the flesh from each quarter and pop that in the pan you're going to cook the jam in
Then really really finely (unless you like chunky marmalade of course) shred the skin. Because you've cooked the oranges this is much much easier than it would be otherwise, but it's still fiddly and takes a while. I have to admit my fruit is a bit randomly shredded as one arm is still in plaster.

You need to do this to all the oranges. Yes, all of them. Time to start up http://broadwayworld.com/radio.cfm

Ok, so the oranges and the flesh is all in the preserving pan. Add 2 pints of the water from the water you used to cook the oranges in (you can top it up if you've not got enough) and bring to a boil. You do need some extra pectin and for this I just added the lemon juice, I left out the pips as I completely forgot about them.

Add the sugar - just granulated is fine.

Put an old saucer or little plate in the fridge now
Put the pan on the heat and bring to the boil whilst stirring. You want a rolling boil - biggish bubbles that pop on the surface.

Continue to cook whilst it bubbles, stirring all the while until it 'flakes' This took about 40 minutes in total, although I tested after half an hour despite knowing it was still too light in colour, but not wanting to wreck it I thought I should check.  Depending on the fruit you use, it will be faster or slower - If I remember rightly the Seville Orange and Whiskey marmalade only took about 20 minutes.

Once it's done this, take a teaspoonful or so and put it on your saucer that's been in the fridge. You want after a minute or so, the top to wrinkle as you run your finger over it but the underneath to be jam like in consistency.

While all of this is going on, sterilse your jars by washing them in hot soapy water and then drying in a low oven. Fill them with the marmalade and when slightly cooler, add lids or waxed circles and damp cellophane.

Mine is unlabelled as yet (I'm embarrased about my handwriting because of my broken wrist) but be sure to label it with the date, year and what it is.

I find that I always have a tiny bit left over that I pop in a ramekin and eat on toast over the coming days (keep it in the fridge).  If I know if it's sharp or sweet or how it tastes I'm going to be able to give it to the right recipient - or keep it for myself.

There you have it, one Saturday afternoon happily spent preserving in the warm. Result, jars of Fruit bowl marmalade in my jam cupboard.

Lady Marmalade

OK, I know that Moulin Rouge isn't a stage musical, but this is my blog and I'm allowed to bend the rules should I wish (or need to).

This regular blogging lark is beginning to get easier, although I should announce a likely hiatus after this weekend as I'm moving house. Yes dear reader(s) I have finally managed to sort myself out and find a flat of my own to live in. Hurrah. Boxes are being packed in Hertfordshire and Essex, and all my beloved cookery gubbins will be being returned from storage on Monday. I may weep I'm so happy. Small matters such as not actually having a bed as yet, and being terrified of how I actually work out what wardrobes I need so the boyfriend (patient beyond the call of duty) can build them and of course Ikea reducing me to a gibbering wreck are being ignored as we push on, hopeful of cupcakes, salads, Mabel bread, and Ingredient challenges. I reckon with a little bit of luck I'll be settled properly by Easter and should I manage to purloin the Hamyln cookery book of my Mother's will bake a Simnel cake in honour of the occaision.

So, marmalade. Indeed. Not something I've attempted before. Although I have done chutney, and a kind of redcurrant liqueur. Did I ever blog that? I must check. No preserves have been attempted until this weekend, owing to a great deal of fear. Fear of burning myself on the sugar, of getting it wrong and wasting all those ingredients, and of not knowing when it's done. Having had a go, I can safely say there were no burns (although I suspect the preserving pan and jam spoons - thank you Lakeland - helped), it didn't go wrong, and it was really easy to see when it was done. So, in my usual style I'm going to try and do this as an idiots guide to making marmalade, because that's what I needed and what Mark's mum was brilliant at. I always talk at work about making learning accessible, and sometimes when you're doing something new you need that same approach.

Seville Orange and Whiskey marmalade

2lb Seville oranges
4lb sugar
Quarter of a pint of whiskey
4 pints of water
3-4 lemons, juiced

Sterilised jam jars
Either lids or waxed discs and cellophane toppers
We used a proper preserving pan, and spoon and whilst I don't think these are necessary, I would certainly want a long handled wooden spoon and a very sturdy pan.
Muslin and string.
Sharp knife (I used a paring knife which was perfect for the job)

Now you may well be aware that the season for Seville Oranges is long gone. But as I had just managed to damage myself at the end of January, Mark's mum very kindly froze the oranges (whole) so that we could do this when I was better. She took them out of the freezer to defrost on Friday, and then we began the marmalade on Saturday morning.

First off wash your oranges. Fruit is routinely waxed for transport, storage and to preserve it and no one wants Seville Orange marmalade with whiskey and wax do they?

Now we cooked the oranges (whole) in 4 pints of water for 2 hours on a low heat. This softens everything and gives you your liquid for later (you need at least 2 pints left at the end of the cooking time, so you might need to top it up) We did this in a saucepan with a lid on.

Now, take your oranges off the heat, wash hands, don pinny (absolutely necessary) and off you go.
Take the oranges out of the pan, and pop them on a chopping board or similar. Quarter them so that they cool down. They are really really hot at this point. I have asbestos fingers and I squeaked a bit.

Take out the pips and pop these in a saucer or dish - you'll need them later

Scrape out the flesh from each quarter and pop that in the pan you're going to cook the jam in
Then really really finely (unless you like chunky marmalade of course) shred the skin. Because you've cooked the oranges this is much much easier than it would be otherwise, but it's still fiddly and takes a while. My chopping got finer as I went along.

You need to do this to all the oranges. Yes, all of them. Put the radio on, or if you're me, find http://broadwayworld.com/radio.cfm and sing away happily all the while annoying your boyfriend who just wants to watch the cricket.

Ok, so the oranges and the flesh is all in the preserving pan. Add 2 pints of the water from the water you used to cook the oranges in (you can top it up if you've not got enough) and bring to a boil. You do need some extra pectin and for this we added the lemon juice, and (and I promise this is the only fiddly bit) put the pips in a muslin square which we tied up with string and then dangled in the cooking marmalade much like a bouquet garni.


Now, add the sugar - we just used granulated sugar, but you can buy jam sugar that has extra pectin added. However, talking to Mark's mum we agreed on this fundamental point. If you're making something like marmalade from scratch, it's probably because you love cooking and you're not one for unecessary chemicals in your food - so why use something that has those in?
 
Put an old saucer or little plate in the fridge now

Right, you now, put the pan on the heat and bring to the boil whilst stirring. You want a rolling boil - biggish bubbles that pop on the surface, but it really doesn't need to go mental.

You continue to cook whilst it bubbles, stirring like a mad person (not beating) until it 'flakes' This took us about 15 minutes, but we're working with fruit here, it's going to be slightly different for everyone. Now not being experienced with preserves the best way I can describe this is - the jam has got darker, a lot darker - ours was probably closer to the colour of toffee than anything to do with oranges, and it leaves little flakes on the side of the pan and the back of the spoon. It's also like a loose cake batter in consistency when in the pan.

Once it's done this, take a teaspoonful or so and put it on your saucer that's been in the fridge. Oh yes, if you make this on the right hand burner of your hob then whenever you need to take it off just slide it over to the left. That way you don't need to lift it. You want after a minute or so, the top to wrinkle but the underneath to be jam like in consistency. Ours wasn't ready so we put it back on for another 5 minutes.

Leave your burner on, but with your pan off the heat add the whiskey, and put it straight back on the heat. I think my precise words at this point were "WOAH!" as it bubbled insanely like something out of a chemistry experiment. Give it a minute and then take it off the heat again.

You have made marmalade. Applause, tea, biscuits, all shall rain down on you. I demanded Mark come see, as did his Dad. Everyone was very impressed. It felt a bit like riding my bike without my stabilisers for the first time although that ended up with me crashed in the strawberry plants so maybe that's not the best analogy.

Jars, need to be sterilised whilst you're doing all of this. Having done this with Mark's mum, I can't imagine doing it by myself as this is one of those points where it felt like you needed an extra pair of hands. But, that's not going to stop me trying. Says she gamely. We washed them in hot soapy water, rinsed them and put them in the oven on low whilst we made the jam.

Put the now (really quite hot) jars on the side, pop a jam funnel in the top of one and fill it up. Fuller than you think. Almost to the first line of the thread for the lid. If that makes sense. Repeat until they're all done (mine made 7 jars of varying sizes)

Once this is all done you can pop your lids on. If you're using wax discs, these need to cover the top of the jam and be pressed down so they're resting completely on it. Then dampen your cellophane, turn it over and put that over the top of the jar with an elastic band to hold it - the water helps to stretch it out so as it dries it's taut.

Pretty jar toppers and labels now follow. Demand people admire and eat your marmalade. I did. Oh and before I forget, I had about a tablespoon that we couldn't fit in a jar, we just put this in a cup and used it over the next couple of days on toast. Yum.

I know this is a long method, and there's less rambling than usual. But I have to say I really enjoyed the whole process of making marmalade, and can imagine that on a cold wintery morning, it's a lovely snug way to stay toasty and be busy in the kitchen.

Huge thanks to Mark's mum for her never ending patience, apparently we're doing strawberry jam next. Watch this space (well wait for June time first as we're picking the strawberries too. Is it sad that I've never been to a PYO farm? Actually don't answer that).

It's going to be a Happy New Year

As always for me, New Year was a quiet affair, it's a celebration that I don't really have much time for; parties make it feel anticlimactic, I can't bear the prospect of paying to get into pubs and then paying more for drinks and London itself is just bananas, and not having been part of a couple of late I am excluded from the nights in a lot of my peers indulge in. Anyway this year I decided to spend it with someone and just have a night in. I made us comfort food - cottage pie with lots of green vegetables, and bought some cava for midnight. It felt exactly right, relaxed, cosy and intimate.

I used the cottage/ shepherd's pie recipe I always revert to, which came from one of my Mum's Good Housekeeping recipe books from the 1970's. It was one of those books that was designed to help you use up your leftovers, and told you what you could freeze, and what could be made in a slow cooker and things. I have no clue where it is now, which is a shame as it would be really useful. Apart from the section on cooking things in aspic, I don't think anyone will ever want to revive that trend *shudders*

Anyway, so that was my new year, cottage pie, some winter Pimms (which I deserve commision on because I am encouraging so many people to try it!) and the heating on.

So, with a post title that finally bears some resemblance to lyrics from a musical (I'm hoping the launch of Glee will provide me with some new inspiration as of late I've been reduced to titles that actually resemble my recipe and not some vague allusion!)

Not making the Nigella cornbread stuffing had left me with a single orange and a pack of fresh cranberries. A morning spent googling for muffin recipes hadn't come up with anything much, and I wasn't sure where to go until a friend pointed me back to Nigella, and Domestic Goddess this time (I know I've been all about Feast of late). The Christmas Morning muffins were just what I had in mind, and took about 20 minutes to knock up.

Christmas Morning Muffins

200g plain flour
3 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
75g demerara sugar
good grating fresh nutmeg
1 clementine or small orange - I would grate and add the zest aswell if making again
approximately 50ml milk
60g unsalted butter, melted
1 large egg
150g dried cranberries
12-bun muffin tin with papers

for the topping:
2 teaspoons demerara sugar
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon


Preheat the oven to 200ºC/gas mark 6.

1. In a large bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, bicarb and sugar, and grate over a generous amount of fresh nutmeg.
2. Squeeze the orange or clementine juice into a measuring jug, then pour in milk on top till it comes up to the 150ml mark. Add the melted butter and the egg, and beat to combine.
3. Pour the jug of liquid ingredients into the bowl of dry ingredients and stir till the ingredients are more or less combined, remembering that a lumpy batter makes light muffins.
4. Last of all, lightly fold in the cranberries and fill the muffin cases or cups. The amount of cranberries specified here makes for heavily fruited muffins; if you want them sparser, use half the amount.
5. Mix together the demerara sugar and ground cinnamon and sprinkle over the tops of the muffins.
6. Stick them in the oven and bake for 20 minutes

Nigella says to split them open and spread them with butter and marmalade, but we just ate them as they were. The cranberries make for fantastic pockets of tartness in what would otherwise be a quite sweet, but very light muffin, which is quite nice with a coffee for a late breakfast.

Next time, I need to find a way to use up the huge bag of oatmeal I bought to make facepacks with the Guides, and also more exploits in bread with Mabel the leaven.