Sweet and fruity pork

It's funny where ideas for recipes come from. Sometimes you stumble upon a recipe online which looks so great that you just go out and buy all ingredients that are needed to make it. Some other time you have things at home you need to use up, and try to think of ways to combine them in a way that won't make a disgusting mess. Other times you run across something you know you really want to use in a recipe but have no idea how but go ahead and buy it anyways because you assume you will think of some way of using it up at some point. Today's recipe is a bit of a combination of all of those. And one more very important element, the financial factor. This is the very detailed (and probably very boring) story of how today's food came to be. And yes, it's another Crockpot recipe. I won't apologise for that anymore, what can I say, I heart my Crockpot. I know it will lose it's appeal at some point, but until then, I'm a Crockpot gal.

It all started a few weeks ago with some sort of fair at Parker's Piece. There was a petting zoo for kids, some local crafts and a huge tent with all sorts of food. Me and Best Friend went to have a nose around, obviously aiming for all the foodie goodies. And you know when you walk among a display of all sorts of food from baked goods to cheese, from meats to alcohol and from candy to all sorts of strange condiments that you won't walk away with all your hard earned money intact. And it's great when there are usually samples available of everything, so you have the chance to try things out ahead of buing. We took our time strolling down the lines of stalls craving pretty much anything they had on sale. We also strolled around having a look at the animals, and made a few new friends.

The most interesting thing I ended up buying was two jars of pachadi, an onion one and a garlic one. They are made by a company called Manjira from West Sussex. Wikipedia tells us that pachadi is "refers to a traditional South Indian side-dish. Broadly translated, it refers to food which has been pounded." On the jar, it says use as a chutney or like a pesto. Stir into pasta or rice. Basically it's an oil based paste with onion or garlic and some other flavouring stuff in it. I used the garlic one for stir frying prawns in, and that turned out delicious. But I wasn't sure what to do with the onion one.

Part two on the journey to get to today's recipe: I was browsing crockpot recipes online and came across this recipe for ribs and pineapple. Basically you just mix mustard and smoked paprika, smear that over the ribs, put the ribs in the slow cooker and put the pineapple on top and cook for eight hours. That was what I was going to cook, the only problem was that I was too lazy to head out to the big supermarket and the smaller grocery store downtown didn't have rack of ribs, so I had to skip the whole rib idea. However, they did have pork loin steaks on sale for half price, and as we are close to the end of the month and I'm trying to budget to make the last pennies go as far as possible, that sounded like a good deal to me. Pork ribs or pork loin, it's all pork anyways. I'm not a great connoisseur of meats, but I have learned that you can throw pretty much any piece of meat in the Crockpot. Slow cooking will make anything taste delicious. I'm pretty sure I could trow in a pair of my old shoes if I get really tight for money, cooking them slowly for eight hours should produce something perfectly edible. Although thankfully I'm not quite broke enough yet to test that idea.

When I came home from the grocery store and was going to start mixing the Dijon and smoked paprika, I thought why not add some of the onion pachadi to the Dijon. And I thought Tandoori curry would go better with the flavours of the pachadi than paprika. And I added a bit of warmth with a pinch of Cayenne. While I was preparing the pork I was snacking on a raisins. After adding the pineapple on top of the pork steaks I thought why not throw in a bit of raisins as well, as I have to use up the whole pack today anyways (otherwise I will just end up eating all the raisins in one go, I think I might have mentioned my raisin addition a few times before as well. I just can't let them be if I have any at home). So that was the long and winding road that gave rise to this particular recipe.

Sweet pork with fruit (serves 6):

1 kg pork loin steaks (6 steaks)

2 tbsp onion Pachadi 

2 tsp Dijon mustard

2 tsp Tandoori curry poweder

1/2 tsp Cayenne pepper

432 g tin of pineapple in juice

1/2 cup raisins

1 tbsp cider vinegar

The howto:

Mix the onion with the mustard, curry and Cayenne. Coat the steaks with the paste, and place at the bottom of the Crockpot. Add the pineapple (including the juice), raisins and vinegar. Cook on low for 7-8 hours. Serve with a nice fresh green salad.

The verdict:
To be honest, I'm not a big fan of pork. Or to be more accurate, I wasn't a big fan of pork before the Crockpot. I have cooked pork a few times now, because they have been good value for money buys at the time. And I have liked it every time. The difference between pork and beef is that the fat on pork is easier to remove whereas in beef it's between the muscle fibres so you can't remove it. In case you wanted to that is. I'm still sticking to the bootcamp mantra "Fat doesn't make you fat, sugar makes you fat". Well of course that's fat in moderation, but still.

Fat or no fat (and I do think a thin little strip of that fat makes the meat all the more delicious), this pork turned out perfect. The slow cooking made it amazingly tender and I'm a huge fan of fruit with meat, here I love the sweetness from the pineapple juice. The mustard and onion pachadi gives the dish great flavour but it's subtile enough not to overpower the pineapple. Once again the Crockpot produced a winner. With about two minutes of prepping time, this is another recipe for anyone who is super busy and thinks they don't have time to cook. The only thing that could have been done better is that I think the dish would have been even better with fresh pineapple. Unfortunately I couldn't find any decent looking pineapples in the grocery store today. And I tend to pile on the tinned food, so it's good to try to use it all up every once in a while. I'm pretty sure I would survive a nuclear winter with the amount of food I stockpile in my kitchen. With such a tiny kitchen I should really try to avoid to buy anything beyond the groceries I know I will need that week, but I just can't live without having some basic stuff in my kitchen. But I do feel slightly relieved that I was able to use up the last of my Dijon for this dish, that's one less half filled jar of stuff in my fridge as well as one less tin of pineapple. Now if I could only figure out what to do with the ten packs of chickpeas I have accumulated in the recesses of my food cupboard... I guess next week will be hummus week!

It's still summer

For some reason, I got a flashback to a really annoying Finnish song that is played all through August on all the major radio channels. Every single bloody year. The lyrics go something like "There is still days of summer left, there will still be beautiful days, you can still find a friend, you will still get your chance". I absolutely hate the song, given that for the first 30 years of my life, I had to listen to it about a gazillion times. Ok, not the first 30 years, as it's probably from sometime in the late 90s. Anyways, the point was that it's probably one of the most annoying songs ever, and I can't understand why people keep requesting it. But the other point is that summer is clearly coming to an end. And I decided it bloody well won't end yet! I'm making summer muffins!! I know I have been wearing a jacket in the mornings, and today I was wearing a scarf as well, and it's not too hot to wear boots anymore. But summer can't be gone yet. Today when I went outside, it was almost warm in the sun. If you happened to be standing in a place where there was no wind at all.

Actually one thing I have wanted to bake with for quite a while is the Fazer strawberry chocolate. And by some miracle, a bar of said chocolate has managed to stay alive in my apartment for the last four days since I came back from Finland. However that happened I have no idea, but I decided I have to take the chance and bake with it right now before I mistakenly inhale it. I knew I wanted to bake some sort of muffins. Strawberry chocolate muffins. But clearly the muffins need something else as well. Strawberry chocolate and what? Strawberries of course! Duuh!! But not just any strawberries. Roasted strawberries! And then of course the hard choice of which muffins recipe to choose. Well, actually that wasn't a hard choice at all, as I made some super quick white choc and fudge muffins in the weekend. I really loved the muffin recipe for two reasons. First it's so quick to make, no whisking needed just a quick stir, and the second one is that the creme fraiche brings a nice sourness so that the muffins don't get too sweet even with the super sweet add ins.

Since I liked both the original muffins, which I shamelessly stole from the blog The English Kitchen and my own summer variation, I thought I would post both recipes so you can try them both. By the way, I really love The English Kitchen, it has amazingly good recipes and great pics. Do pop over there for a look. I love the idea that the blogger is a Canadian who moved to the UK and tries out traditional classic British recipes. And takes beautiful photos of the food as well. I think I should start a section of my blog where I make all sorts of Finnish stuff that I would buy ready made if I was back home, but have to learn how to make from scratch now that I'm living in the UK.

White chocolate and fudge muffins from The English Kitchen (makes 12):
300g self raising flour
1 tsp baking powder
a pinch of salt
115g of golden caster sugar
85g of fudge chunks
85g of white chocolate chips
125ml of whole milk
100ml of half fat creme fraiche
1 large free range egg, beaten
1 tsp vanilla extract
60g of butter, melted

The howto:
Preheat oven to 200 degrees C. Mix all the dry ingredients in one bowl and the milk, creme fraiche, egg, vanilla and melted butter in another. Combine but mix as little as possible. Scoop into silicone muffin moulds and bake for about 20 minutes.

"It's still summer" chocolate and roasted strawberry muffins (makes 6):
For the roasted strawberries:
400g strawberries
1.5 tbsp lemon infused rapeseed oil
1 tbsp pomegranate balsamic
1 tbsp strawberry vinegar
a pinch of salt
1/2 tsp black pepper
1 tsp vanilla sugar

For the muffins (makes 6):
150g self raising flour
1 tsp baking powder
a pinch of salt
60g light muscovado sugar
100g strawberry chocolate (chocolate with freeze dried strawberry chunks)
60ml of whole milk
50ml of half fat creme fraiche
1/2 large free range egg, beaten
1 tsp vanilla extract
30g of butter, melted

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees C. Hull the strawberries and chop up into smaller pieces, mix all the ingredients of the strawberry marinade and coat berries in it. Spread out on an oven tray and roast for about 30-40 minutes, or until the strawberries are somwhat desiccated and the juices start to thicken and turn dark at the edges of the tray. Let cool.

Chop up the chocolate, mix it with the dry ingredients. Chop up the strawberries, and mix them with the milk, creme fraiche, egg, vanilla and melted butter. Combine with the dry ingredients, mix as little as possible. Scoop into silicone muffin moulds and bake for 20 minutes.

The verdict:
Like I already mentioned before, I love this recipe because it doesn't require you to get any kitchen equipment like electric whisks or food processors out of the cupboards. Sometimes a girl just needs a quick fix for a sugar craving. This most certainly is it, in less than half an hour from starting you will already have warm muffins on your plate. Or in my case, in my stomach.

Of the two flavour combinations, I have to admit the white choc and fudge was my favourite. Not saying that the strawberry and choc ones were bad, quite the opposite, I ate most of them in one go. And the roasted strawberries were perfect, but the muffins themselves did not turn out quite as good as I splashed a bit too much milk in them so the batter was a bit too runny I think. The great thing with both muffins was that they get really crispy on top, so it's a joy to dig into them. I think the strawberry ones would also have turned out better with white chocolate than milk chocolate. As an added bonus when making the strawberry variety is the amazing smell of roasting strawberries which fills the apartment.

 

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Severe pain and quick beer bread

If you have never experienced extreme pain, count yourself lucky. It's absolutely mind-boggling how much pain a human body can create. I had the bad fortune of getting to know severe pain when I had a rather bad bout of back pain a few years ago. In fact it got so bad I actually fainted twice. Once on a bus stop and another time at the pharmacy, picking up painkillers (how's that for irony). For a few weeks, my life consisted of nothing but timers. I had to get up every 20 minutes to walk, as my physio told me I need to keep the back moving. When the timer went off, I got out of bed, which took several minutes, then walked to the kitchen and back. When I got stronger I walked across the kitchen, first once, and then forcing myself to walk across the room twice and three times. The other timer was counting down to when I was allowed to take another dose of painkillers. Sometimes I just stared at that timer, willing it to go faster. Which of course it wouldn't. Nights were a waking nightmare as I couldn't sleep, and it felt like time would pass even slower. I can remember the joy and relief when the pain started to let go, and I was able to go outside for a walk in the park around the corner from where I lived. I walked slower than the old ladies with their walking sticks and bent backs, but I was able to walk outside without fainting. I still feel a bit freaked out when I walk past the bus stop where I fainted. The feeling of helplessness when you realise what's about to happen but you can't do anything about it. I was lucky nothing happened, and two ladies in the store right next to the bus stop helped me lie down on the floor of their store while waiting for a taxi to come and pick me up. 

I was reminded of the whole fainting from pain experience as I've been suffering from a rather sore neck for the last few weeks. Just like the back pain, I have no idea what set it off. I'm extremely lucky that the neck is only sore during the night, during the day when I move around, it's only stiff and uncomfortable. But oh my how it stiffens up during the night. This morning when I woke up and carelessly turned my head while trying to get out of bed the pain just shot right through my head, and I would probably have fainted if I wasn't already lying down. So currently I'm back to staring at the timer counting down to the next dose of painkillers. I was hoping doing some exercise would help, as the pain goes away when I work out, but I realised it comes back worse afterwards. So today I decided to skip my morning bootcamp. Well, it wasn't so much a decision as a realisation that I'm physically incapable of getting out of bed. Instead I had to lie still until the painkillers kicked in. So I thought maybe I should skip pump in the evening as well. So I came straight home from work for the first time in ages, and was faced with the problem what to do. No way I could just go to sleep or park my ever expanding behind on the sofa as that would stiffen up the neck. So I walked off to the grocery store to get some ingredients for baking, one of the few things to do that are guaranteed to make me forget about the pain. Oh, and I have the newest episode of Great British Bakeoff to watch as well. 

Earlier today I was browsing through my pins trying to decide what to bake (yes, of course I was listening during the telecon I was participating in. I can browse recipes and participate in a meeting at the same time. Women are good at multi-tasking!). My worst craving currently is bread. It has certainly surpassed chocolate as the object of my sinful food daydreams. There is one recipe that keeps fascinating me. Beer and cheddar bread. I've wanted to bake it ever since I saw the recipe. I was going to save it for some lazy Saturday or Sunday morning. But I'm miserable and in pain. So I thought, what the hell, why not go for it. Actually, I have pinned two beer bread recipes, one of them was a beer and cheddar bread and the other was a beer and butter bread. In the end I settled on the cheese one. I stumbled upon the recipe on Pinterest, and it's from a blog called Dine&Dish, and I used it with just some minimal modifications. The other beer bread I was considering, from the same blog in fact, is here in case you want to try it out.

Beer and cheddar quickie loaf:
3 cups flour (I used 1 cup whole wheat and 2 cups all purpose)
1 tbsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1 tbsp sugar
1 cup grated cheddar
1 bottle (0.33 l) beer

The howto:
Preheat the oven to 190 degrees C. Mix all the ingredients apart from the beer. Add the beer to form a sticky dough, put in a loaf pan and grate some cheese on top. Bake for about 45 minutes, or until golden brown and toothpick comes out clean.

The verdict:
The most important thing to start with is a disclaimer. I hate beer. I never drink it. I think it's disgusting and vile and I absolutely cannot understand why anyone would choose to drink it while there is any other drink available. Yet for some strange reason the beer bread recipes caught my attention and I felt like pinning them on my board "Bread, biscuits and scones". I guess the first thing that caught my attention was the beautiful picture of the bread on the blog. I was certain my bread would not turn out nearly as pretty. You know, that's what always happens, you see a great picture of a food, and then your version turns out to look like a mutated blob. But it didn't! It turned out so pretty, probably the prettiest bread I ever made. And it was super quick to make. No proofing, no messing around with yeast, no waiting around. Just give the ingredients a quick swirl with a spoon, and off into the oven it goes. Talk about fast food. 

The bread does have a distinct flavour of beer. But interestingly, I didn't find it bad at all. In fact, the flavours were really nicely balanced. I did use a strong cheddar. I also think blue cheese would go really well with the beer. Next time I will add in some bacon and onion as well, I think those will go perfectly with the beer and cheese. Or maybe just serve this with a slice of bacon. The bread also had the most amazing crisp crust but was nice and soft inside. It is of course not as fluffy as a yeast dough bread would be, but I'm surprised at how nice and light it turned out. I managed to inhale a quarter of the loaf in one go. Well, everyone knows bread is best straight out of the oven, so you got to enjoy it while it's hot. I had to try it again when it cooled down. It's very good cold as well. It still tastes like beer, but in a good way (talking about words I never thought would come out of my mouth). The only problem with the bread is that it didn't seem to cure my neck pain. Have to see if my chocolate and roast strawberry muffins would be more helpful. More about them in my next post. 

Lake District culinary gems

Lake Windermere from the top of Wansfell Pike

I know it might seem like I've been abducted by aliens or something, but I kind of have a good excuse... I've been away on holiday and just didn't get around to update the blog as I mostly ate out, and after I got back catching up with work has taken pretty much all of my time. Then I had to go back to Finland for work for a few days. Excuses, excuses. I'll try to be better, I promise.

During my holiday, I spent a few days hiking and biking in the Lake District. I got plenty of warning beforehand about the weather. I think it's fair to say that in general the UK isn't exactly the driest place on earth, and apparently the Lake District is the wettest region in all of the UK. So I packed lots of warm and waterproof clothing. In the end, it turned out that we were extremely lucky with the weather as 2.5 of 3 days were totally rain free. Well, the remaining half day was a thunderstorm with heavy rain, so I guess we got our rain quota filled nonetheless.

I love sheep! And they were everywhere. I had a huge grin on my face for most of the
holiday, as I was so happy about seeing sheep everywhere. And the beautiful stone
walls, another thing that just screams British countryside. They make the landscape
so unique and beautiful. I can't even imagine the work that has gone into building them.

Anyways, my intention was not to go on about the UK weather, although of course you know how much the Brits love to talk about it. Much more interesting, I want to mention a few amazing food experiences that I happened upon more or less by accident during the all too short a holiday.

Let's start with the drive up to the Lakes. We stopped for lunch in Harrogate, a small and super idyllic town about halfway through the 4.5 hour drive from Cambridge to Windermere. The original reason to stop in Harrogate was that I would have loved to lunch at Betty's. You might remember me and Best Friend had afternoon tea there a few months ago. However it turned out that despite it being Tuesday and midday, the queue to get in to Betty's was so long that we quickly gave up on the idea as we would probably not have gotten a table until dinnertime. We did however get us a Fat Rascal from the bakery shop for later. I'm not exactly sure how to classify this huge bun type of thing, I would say it's basically a huge scone filled with dried fruit goodies. Anyways, another thumbs up for Betty's, the displays in the bakery shop were full of delicious looking breads, cakes and scones that I would love to sample. The service was super friendly as well. And the Fat Rascal, which was enjoyed later that night with hot chocolate, was delicious and sweet and crumbly.

I hadn't done much research on places to eat beforehand, so we picked our eateries by chance, based pretty much on the look of the place and the menus. And we did run into a few gems. The first one was a pub in a tiny village called Troutbeck we hiked through on our way to cross Wansfell pike. Good thing the pub, called The Mortal Man, was great, as it was the only one in the village. The menu was large enough to be variable and included the obligatory soup of the day, pie of the day, a sausage of the week and a large selection of sandwiches. I had a salmon and cream cheese on dark bread, and my hiking companion had the special of the day, a roast beef sandwich which enough meat to satisfy even the most dedicated carnivore. The sandwiches were absolutely wonderful, although I guess my judgement was slightly clouded by being crazy hungry after getting fresh air poisoning by hiking all morning in the sunshine. I have made no secret of my disdain of British bread, I think it's pretty much impossible to find good bread in this country, but I have to say the thick slices of brown bread in my sandwich were really delicious. I should have asked if it was local produce. As good as the sandwiches were, there was another gem in our simple lunch. The chips. They were the most golden brown and crunchy chips I have ever come across. They were probably deep fried multiple times, and contained more fat than you should have in a month. But oh mine, how good they were. So if you ever happen to have your way around Troutbeck, don't miss out on the chips in the Mortal Man.

Being the only pub in the village, they really needn't try so hard...

The second restaurant worth mentioning was the Village Inn in Bowness-on-Windermere. We walked in without a reservation on a Wednesday night around dinnertime, and the place was packed. However, we managed to find a cosy table for two in the back corner. The restaurant was very atmospheric and the decor was great including large fake antique mirrors with metallic frames, red and white walls, a low wood beamed ceiling and buddha statues, not to mention the huge wooden tables and wicker chairs. We were first told to order at the bar, but a waiter did appear and took our order. I was delighted to find mussels on the menu, and of course had to order them, with a side of garlic bread. My friend ordered a T-bone steak, which turned out to be huge and served with loads of sides including tomatoes, onion rings, chips, mushrooms and a pepper sauce. The food was absolutely divine. The mussels were perfectly cooked and the broth was deliciously flavoured with white wine, onion, garlic and herbs. I was in seventh heaven, and so was my friend whose eyes lit up at the sight of the oversized chunk of meat. And the mushrooms served as a side with the steak also got a rave review, they were very unusually flavoured with what I would have said was a smoky, BBQ-y aroma and lemon. Very unusual combination, but it worked really good and was oone of many details that definitely made us decide to come back if we are around those hoods again. I also had a cocktail called Death by chocolate, which indeed was delicious and richly chocolate-y. The only complaint we had was that the service was excruciatingly slow, and we never got the bill despite trying to catch the attention of the waiters seval times. In the end, we actually had to go up to the bar to ask for the bill, which I found very disappointing after the wonderful meal. Afterwards, I have browsed restaurant reviews for the Village Inn on Tripadvisor, and turns out this seems to be a common complaint, so don't expect to go there for a quick meal. However, the restaurant has a very wide variety of reviews, and I can't understand how some people have deemed the food vile and horrible. The food was definitely top notch!

Possibly the largest steak ever seen on this side
of the Atlantic. The T-bone at the Village Inn.

The second eatery worth mentioning was Heidi's Grasmere Cafe where we had lunch on our last day. Again, we just randomly picked a restaurant in Grasmere and ended up finding a gem. We were extremely lucky as the restaurant was very busy, but there was a table for two free right as we walked in. The restaurant was very quirkily decorated with paintings of cartoon cows, and lots of cute little things all around. The menu was variable but not too big. As soon as I saw they were serving barbecue ribs, I knew that was what I had to have, although we were supposed to just have a light lunch. My friend had the Cumberland sausage with mashed potato, a huge Yorkshire pudding and gravy. The food was absolutely amazing, I can't stop raving about my ribs. They we're cooked to perfection, so that the meat just fell off the bone and covered in a tasty BBQ sauce. The servings were certainly big enough, as neither of us could finish ours. The service was also very friendly, and I think the fact that the place was constantly full says a lot. Again, I was surprised when I had a look at trip advisor reviews as they ranged from excellent to terrible. I think some of the reviewers might not have visited the same place as we did. At least I know I will definitely be going back.

Then on to the sweets. Just to leave the best for last, let's start with Kendal mint cakes. Or as someone so eloquently put it, sugar covered with sugar. Obviously, the combination of mint and chocolate is a classic, and oh so great. According to Wikipedia, the source of all wisdom in the world, it is a popular energy source with mountain climbers. I'm not sure I would like to be halfway up a mountain when the sugar high from this baby kicks in, but maybe iyou should give it a go if you like to live dangerously. Basically the mint cake is a slab of mint flavoured glucose (i.e. sugar), covered in dark chocolate. This is an absolute classic that you just have to sample if you visit the Lake District. Well, if you don't have a freakishly hight tolerance for sugar like me, maybe you should stay away. However, the strong mint taste actually makes it seem less sweet than it is. At least that's what I think. Best Friend agrees with me, but maybe I should get the opinion of someone with a normal sugar tolerance.

The second place I absolutely loved, was the chocolatier in Ambleside. It's called Old Bank House Chocolates because the shop is located in the old bank house (how surprising), but the company is actually called Hutton's. I almost ran past the place (I don't know how that is possible, but I was chasing a bus, busy to get back to the B&B after a full day's hike up Wanfell pike). Anyways, the main point was that luckily I ended up inside the chocolate shop (and this was only the first time out of two visits during a three day holiday. Yes, as I have said so many times before, I have a problem, and I'm aware of it). The shop was filled with all sorts of wonderful chocolate goodies, including chocolate shoes, chocolate footballs, handmade chocolate pralines and giant slabs of chocolate. The most amazing thing to me however was the truffel logs. Big compact logs of the sweetest truffle in so many flavours, and covered in a thick coating of chocolate. There were so many flavours to choose from. Rum, champagne and white chocolate, Cointreau, Cognac and Irish Cream, probably more than that but I think my brain went into a bit of overload when I saw all the truffles so my memory of the place is a bit hazy. The truffle logs seemed to be for sale in several places, I also stumbled upon them in a chocolate shop in Keswick, so probably you will be able to get some even if you don't happen to be around Ambleside. Another thing I had never seen before was the honeycomb toffee, a chewy and crunchy type of toffee. The  toffee is made with baking soda and an acid such as vinegar which together form carbon dioxide which get trapped in the sugar liquid, and form holes giving the toffee it's unique structure. The toffee I got was further dipped in milk chocolate to form a thick coating, adding to the sugary decadence. I really liked the toffee, it was crunchy and not sticky at all.

Above: the honeycomb toffee
Below: Bailey's truffle log, both from Old Bank House Chocolates

And then to the grand finale, the pièce de résistance. We were supposed to stop by this particular little gem on our way from Windermere to Keswick, but we were too late as it had already closed and I thought that was it, end of story. However, on our way back home, I thought we were in a hurry to hit the road and get on home, but instead the car took a turn to Grasmere. And in retrospect, I'm eternally grateful to my culinary consultant for making the choice of stopping by Grasmere, and particularly The Grasmere Gingerbread Shop. I had read about them in travel guides, but thought "Oh well, it's gingerbread, how exciting can it be". In general I'm a fan of the extremely thin, call it Nordic (you know Anna's pepparkakor? The ones you can buy at IKEA) type of gingerbread which has a lot of other spices as well, and not so much ginger, and only dried ginger, not the chunky, preserved kind. But now I have seen the light. If you are anywhere in the Lake District, it's worth it to drive to Grasmere just because of the gingerbread. I kid you not. It's hands down the best gingerbread I have ever had. It's crumbly and crunchy and sweet in a strange, not-too-sweet way, and above all, it's gingery. But not in an overpowering way, just in a perfect blend of ginger and other spices. The consistency is crunchy and chewy at the same time, although you better eat them quickly as they get pretty hard after a few days. I was trying to see how they would keep in the freezer but they never got around to being there very long as I ate my two packs in just a few days. But the Gingerbread shop doesn't only sell gingerbread. It also sells rum butter. And I'm a sucker for any spread, be it marshmallow fluff, nutella, nut butter (except for peanut butter, that stuff is vile), lemon curd or jam. I can't resist a jar of any sort of gooey spread, I just have to eat it all in one go, often just the spread itself with a spoon straight out of the jar. The rum butter was no exception. It was ridiculously good. Super sweet, with a nice strong rummy flavour. And it was perfect on the gingerbread. It would also have been perfect on ice cream, or in a cake or possibly on muffins. Now that I think of it, some nice saffron and ginger muffins with a rum butter topping... wait, have to wipe off the drool. So actually, I showed great restraint in not eating the whole rum butter in one go, but only ate half at first and then the second half the next day. Incidentally, did I mention that I put on a stone and a half during the summer. Working hard to shed all that now, but let's just say it's not a mystery how that all happened. The scary thing is, that the Gingerbread Shop has an online store, and I'm afraid some day when I'm having a weak moment, I will hit the online store, and pile up on gingerbread and rum butter. Have to stay strong. Have to! Is there some way of blocking certain web sites on your browser so that you can't look at them? That might be the only solution to this particular problem. But I have promised myself, if I ever re-visit the Lake District, I won't settle for the small packs of gingerbread (which I stupidly did this time). I will most certainly get the large ones!

Well, I guess that concludes tonight's long ramble about things to eat in the Lake District. Somewhat heavy on the sweet stuff, but then again, if you were surprised by that, maybe you haven't followed my blog for very long!

Too bad the pub was out of Unicorn ale, so we didn't get a taste. Although,
 I'm convinced it would have been just as vile as any other beer. I
f you couldn't guess, I'm not much of a beer drinker...

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Awesome but ugly Crockpot chicken

I love my Crockpot. I know I've only had it for a few weeks, and it seems a bit extreme to be in love after a few weeks. But like I said before, when you know you just know. There has been so much going on in my life lately, and finding time for cooking has been really tough. And as usual, I'm on a serious mission to shed the blubber I managed to accumulate during my summer holiday binge, so I really need proper, healthy food. And the Crockpot can do that for me. In the evening, I load it up with veggies and meat, and in the morning I wake up to a Crockpot full of dinner. Or lunch. Well, healthy, proper, good food anyways. The only problem is, sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night to the drool-inducing scent of cooking meat. And I just want to grab a spoon and dig in. So far I have been able to resist, but I'm sure one of these nights I will sleep-eat. You know, kind of like sleep walking, but eating instead of walking. Oh, how I wish I could sleep-burpee. That would be great, being able to exercise in your sleep, and then have it all over and done with in the morning. Well, sometimes when I wake up before six am for bootcamp, and head out to the park for a 6.15 am start, I almost feel like exercising in my sleep. Of course, after being made to run for several minutes with a tyre on my back, I don't feel quite like I'm asleep anymore.

Well, enough about working out and back to the more interesting things. I just got home from the gym, and had the first taste of the Crockpot chicken I cooked recently. And I just had to write a post on it immediately. The best thing about this recipe is that it's absolutely failsafe. Even if you never cooked anything in your entire life, there is no way you can fail with the Crockpot. Meat, veg and some fluids, whichever you prefer. Give it a good eight hours, and it's done. Kinda like magic. There is just one downside with Crockpot food... it looks terrible. It tastes great, it's easy and convenient, but it most certainly doesn't make the most appetising photos. Sorry about that. But trust me, beauty is only skin deep!

Crockpot chicken (serves 4):
1 small chicken (mine was 1.3 kg)
6 parsnips
2 onions
1 glass white wine
1 chicken stock pot
1-2 tbsp mustard
1 tbsp black pepper
big bunch of thyme

The howto:
Put the chicken at the bottom of the Crockpot, and top with thyme. Peel parsnips, and chop them in half. Place on top of the chicken. Slice the onions thickly and place on top. Mix the white wine with the stock pot, mustard, pepper and pour over. Add some water if you feel like you want more liquid in the pot. Cook for eight hours on low.

The verdict:
There is no easier way to cook. It takes five minutes or so to set everything up, and then you can go on with your life for the next eight hours. The chicken cooks until it literally falls off the bone. I had problems getting it out of the cooker, it just kept disintegrating. I guess some people would prefer to take the skin (or at least the majority of it) off before cooking to make it more healthy. But keeping the skin on gives a wonderful, albeit quite fatty, broth. If you feel like being a bit fancy, you could strain the broth, and maybe cook it with a bit of cornflour to make it thicken into a proper sauce, the juices from the chicken with the thyme and mustard make a wonderful sauce. I couldn't be bothered to actually do all of that, so I just used the juices from the bottom of the crockpot and poured them over the meat. Oh and the parsnips, did I already mention the parsnips? They seem to be perfect for cooking in the Crockpot. They don't go all soft and too mushy like many other veg I have tried, but they came out perfect. Perfectly cooked, but not too soft. And wonderfully flavoured from the broth and the chicken juices. This is definitely my new favourite way of having chicken. And I'm pretty sure you can do the same in the oven if you don't have a slow cooker, just make sure you have a good tight fitting lid and make sure there is liquid in the pan at all times and cook in low temperature until the chicken is super tender. Although, I wouldn't leave it in over night. Which is why I lovelovelovelovelove my Crockpot.

Maca-loony

I have been very ambivalent about making macarons. I have heard from various sources that they are very tricky and temperamental, and only turn out well in the hands of expert pastry chefs. However, I absolutely love eating them, and I have been intrigued by making them ever since my sis's significant other made some which were absolutely delicious.
Macarons are amazing, I fell in love with them when I was in Paris a year ago, and all the bakeries had their window displays full of macarons in every colour and flavour you could ever imagine. Last winter, I went skiing with some friends to Chamonix, and was mesmerised by the beautiful display of colourful macaroons.

So of course I had to try making macaroons, sooner or later. To make a long story short, the first batch was a total disaster. However, I was unwilling to give up, and found a few really useful websites with hints and troubleshooting tips. So, after finding another recipe which worked much better in my hands, and after adjusting my technique a bit I was actually able to produce macaroons which distantly resembled macaroons. They are by no means perfect, but compared to the first disastrous batch, they were a big step in the right direction. So my hint for anyone trying to make macaroons? Make sure you have enough ingredients to try a second and possibly a third time. The other big problem is to pipe the macaroons equal size. I made a template drawing with perfectly sized circles, which I placed underneath the baking parchment and tried to keep the piping within the templates, and they turned out a bit better. There are macaroon moulds you can buy in kitchen supply stores, but I have heard that they actually don't produce very nice macaroons as piping by hand onto the parchment paper. One of the key secrets seems to be to handle the batter as little as possible. When you mix the egg white meringue with the dry ingredients, you should do it quickly, but surprisingly enough, as long as you keep the number of strokes low, you can actually mix rather forcefully. The batter should not be too soft as that will make the macaroons lose their shape after piping, but it should be soft enough that the tips that form when piping will even out. So, try to mix the batter as quickly as possible, and handle the piping bag as little as possible when piping. The easiest way to fill the piping bag is to make it stand in a glass, and spoon the batter in the bag. Then try to pipe as quickly as possible, and squeeze the top of the bag instead of the part of the bag holding the batter.

The biggest change, in addition to changing the proportion of meringue and flour, between batches one and two was leaving the macaroons to dry for almost an hour instead of just half an hour before baking. This keeps the macaroons from cracking when they rise on their "feet" during baking. I really recommend looking at MisoHungry's blog for troubleshooting if you have any problems. Also, one more point I noticed a bit too late was that the colour of the batter will get very much lighter in the oven. So just make the batter quite brightly coloured, to make sure the macaroons will have some colour still after baking. To keep the batter from getting too moist, colouring should be done using colouring paste, not liquid food colouring.

Macaroons (makes about 30):
3 egg whites
50g caster sugar
200g icing sugar
110g ground almonds

The howto:
Using an electric whisk, whip the egg whites. When peaks start to form, slowly add the caster sugar while beating to make a glossy meringue. Combine the icing sugar and ground almonds, and pulse in a food processor until smooth. The more you process the dry ingredients, the better. Add the dry ingredients to the meringue by mixing rapidly, but using as few strokes as possible until the batter is smooth. Pipe small circles onto parchment paper, making sure not to pipe the macarons too close to each other as they will spread. Leave to dry for an hour. Preheat the oven to 150 degrees C, and bake for 10-12 minutes. Apparently, in humid weather, the baking temperature should be 10-15 degrees lower, and baking time 2-3 minutes longer. 

The meringues are the perfect consistency
 when you can turn the bowl upside down 
and the meringue stays in the bowl.

All ready to make some macaroons. Nice, shiny meringue, 
processed ground almonds with icing sugar, ready for
 sieving into the meringue.

Rapidly mix the meringue and dry
 ingredients to make a smooth batter.

Let the macarons cool for a few minutes on the parchment paper. Then remove the macarons and let cool on a rack. When macarons are completely cool, add filling and sandwich two macarons together. For this batch I used store bought fudge sauce for the disastrous chocolate macarons, clotted cream and raspberry jam for the pink ones and lemon curd and mascarpone for the yellow ones. Only your imagination is the limit for fillings, and there are great ideas out there on the interwebs. 

Piping skill still need honing, but the batter is a good
 consistency as the macarons keep their shape, 
and the tips from piping flatten out  nicely.

After failure, research and improved technique, 
the pretty little feet appear!!

The verdict:
As I said, the first try I made was a total disaster. The first recipe I tried had a slightly different ratio of meringue to dry ingredients, and the one I have listed above worked much better in my hands. Also, the first batch contained cocoa, which I read somewhere can be a bit tricky. The second and third batch turned out better, the meringues had a nice crispy crust but were soft and chewy inside. The problem was that I had to keep them in the fridge for a while as I had mascarpone and cream in them and the day was hot and I didn't want my guests to get food poisoning. The macarons got a bit soggy in the fridge. So on a hot day, make sure to use fillings that don't need to be in the fridge, and fill the macarons as close to eating time as possible. In addition to that, I think it's worth accepting that the first batch(es) won't be perfect, and just use the internet for some research and subsequent batches will improve. And the joy of seeing a few macarons come out of the oven perfectly smooth and with a beautiful foot around the edge... it's definitely worth the trouble!

Raspberry jam and clotted cream macarons.

Lemon curd and mascarpone macarons.