What a glorious weekend we have had, I hope it has been as lovely for you wherever you are. I enjoyed the sun with a glass of ice cold Pimms in my hand. I really like the new blackberry and elderflower flavour. Our garden is perfect for slouching in the sun as it gets sunlight pretty much all through the day, although I did have to move into the shade of the plum tree for a while when it got a bit too hot for my delicate tastes.
We also had our first al fresco brunch on Saturday with the Culinary Consultant, enjoying these amazing BLT waffles. My family will come and visit in July, so I have been working very hard (what a chore it is, poor me!) to identify acceptable brunch recipes. So far I have found way too many, and this one will go onto the ever growing list. And there was another great one this weekend as well, watch this space...
 |
| Brunch in the garden |
On a completely different note, am I the only person who can't understand why computer games have to be so incredibly loud? Most of the sound effects are just soooo annoying. I can't understand how the other inhabitant in this house can stand them for hours and hours on end. Either the sound of fighting, shooting and grunting or car chases and sirens. Luckily the house is large enough so there are places to go where the noise doesn't follow (perchance the craft room...), but I can't imagine listening to it non-stop for two days. Just goes to show the male brain is wired differently.
Today's recipe for our al fresco brunch is from Joy The Baker, and the photos over there are just amazing so pop over and have a look! As soon as I saw this recipe, I knew Claude (the waffle maker, aka. the love of my life) would come out of the closet this weekend. But even with my less impressive photos, these waffles are still amazing. I adore a good weekend brunch, usually we go and get the weekly grocery shop done and then I make something delicious for us to eat and get the weekend started for real.
Cheddar and buttermilk BLT waffles (makes 6):
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
1/2 tsp salt
pinch of black pepper
1 tbsp sugar
1/3 cup (75 g) melted unsalted butter
2 large eggs
1 1/4 cup buttermilk
1/2 cup grated cheddar (I added a few tbsp of grated parmesan as well)
For the sandwiches:
Mayonnaise (I used a cracked pepper and garlic mayonnaise)
Tomatoes
Lettuce
Cooked bacon
The howto:
Mix the dry ingredients in a bowl. In another bowl, mix the butter, eggs and buttermilk. Mix all ingredients together and add the cheese. Or if you are lazy like me, mix all the ingredients together in one bowl, seemed to work well enough and saves time and washing up.
Let the batter rest while the waffle maker is heating up. Cook according to instructions. For me that meant six minutes on 2/3 of the maximum heat. The batter makes six large waffles. Keep the waffles hot in the oven while cooking the rest of them. While the waffles are cooking, cook the bacon either in the oven or in a pan depending on your preference.
I didn't make proper waffle "sandwiches", just topped the waffles with mayonnaise, tomato, lettuce straight from our own greenhouse and a few slices of bacon.
The verdict:
This waffle recipe was really great. It has enough butter to give the waffles that slightly crispy crust after you let them rest for a minute or two on a wire rack after cooking. But there isn't too much butter to make them too buttery. (As a sideline, why on earth do all US recipes give butter measurements in cups? Would you really just melt a random amount of butter and then measure up 1/3 cup? I wouldn't! I certainly want to have my butter measures in weight, not volume to avoid any waste of perfectly good butter). The cheddar brings loads of flavour. I think out of all the savoury waffles I have made, so far these are my favourites. I also love BLTs so no wonder I loved this brunch. They went down a treat with the Culinary Consultant as well. I guess you could always add a bit of scrambled egg or an egg sunny side up if you wanted, but for us this was a substantial enough brunch on it's own. I popped a few of the leftover waffles in the freezer and took the last leftover waffle to work and enjoyed as my Monday morning breakfast treat. It sure made the start of the week better!
I really need to get out of my latest bad habit. This very self destructive pattern of behaviour, i.e. writing my blog posts in bed, is proving very unproductive. Mostly because I fall asleep within ten minutes of snuggling up in bed with my warm laptop. Even as I'm writing this, I'm struggling to keep my eyes open mid-Sunday afternoon. Which possibly explains to you why the contents of my posts are never really mindbogglingly intellectual. Eat and sleep seems to be pretty much all I do these days. And obviously struggle to get through the days at work, four more weeks to go and I'm so ready to give up on it all. Three month notice periods should be illegal.
Ok, I'm back, I did fall asleep for a full hour. This will mean there is no way I will be able to go to sleep on time tonight.
Today's recipe is a side I made for the delicious apple and cider roasted chicken I wrote about earlier. This dish would work either as a vegetarian main or a side to something nice and meaty. It is rather decadent with all that cheddar. But we had a big chunk of leftover cheddar which was starting to look like it would try to make it's way out of the fridge on it's own unless I used it up rather soonish. The recipe is again from the great The English Kitchen blog, and I have used it pretty much unaltered, I just doubled it as I wanted to have plenty of leftovers to feed us during the week.
Potato, cauliflower and cheddar bake serves 4-6 as a side (from The English Kitchen):
4 large potaoes
1 small head of cauliflower
1 large or 2 medium onions
2 cups of cheddar (this was not doubled from the original recipe as I thought it was more than plenty)
2 tsp dried thyme
black pepper
150 ml chicken stock
The howto:
Peel and slice the potatoes and onions into 1/2 inch thick slices. Similarly, slice the cauliflower. In a large saucepan, cover the potatoes generously with water and bring to a boil. Then add the cauliflower and onion and cook for 8-10 minutes, until potatoes start to soften. Discard water and let stand for about 10 minutes.
Preheat the oven to 220 degrees C. Transfer half of the potato, cauliflower and onion mixture into an ovenproof dish, sprinkle over the thyme, some black pepper and half of the cheese. Add the rest of the veg, thyme and some black pepper. Pour the chicken stock into the dish, and top with cheddar. Bake for about 25-30 minutes, until golden and bubbling.
The verdict:
This was a really nice side to go with the chicken. For me, it would have been enough as a main dish in itself, but I don't think it would have been quite substantial enough to keep the Culinary Consultant happy. But with all that cheese in there, it definitely isn't a light and healthy vegetarian choice. But boy did it taste good.
My very one sided love affair with Paul Hollywood continues. I keep browsing through his book and I want to bake every single bread in there. I thought this was a really nice and manly bread, so I baked it for my Chief Culinary Consultant. Come to think of it, I have been cooking loads of things with bacon lately. Like this man pleasing chicken, and these amazing cooked sprouts. Guess that's what happens when you hang out with a guy. No wonder I have put on a buttload of weight. Literally. Oh and a tummyload as well. But much more important than my ever expanding physical presence, this is without a doubt the best bread I have ever made. And after doing proper yeasted doughs a few times, I'm not at all intimidated by them anymore. It's not at all as hard as you would think. And kneading the dough can be quite relaxing.
Manly bread (makes two loaves):
400 g strong white bread flour
100 g strong wholemeal bread flour
30 g softened butter
10 g instant yeast
1 tsp salt (the original recipe says 10 g salt, which would be around 1.5 tsp, but I think with the cheese and bacon, this was more than enough)
330 ml water
6 rashers of bacon
150 g cheddar
The howto:
Mix flour, yeast, salt, butter and three quarters of the water. Mix with your fingers until all ingredients are incorporated. Add more water if needed. You want a soft but not soggy dough. Knead on a lightly floured surface for 5-10 minutes until the dough is soft and forms a smooth skin. Let rise for at least an hour. In the meantime, cook the bacon, let cool and chop finely. Grate the cheese. When the dough has at least doubled in size, punch the air out of the dough, and knead in the cheese and bacon. Form into two loaves and slash deeply lengthwise. Let rise for another hour. Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 220 degrees C. When loaves are done rising, bake for about 20 minutes, or until golden brown. Eat warm.
The verdict:
This is the first time I think I have managed to make really great bread. The texture of the dough turned out perfect. I didin't use all the water, but the dough was still nice and soft. I took my time kneading it, and actually, it's not all that hard work if the texture of the dough is right. You need to put some effort into it, but it's really enjoyable. Also, the dough didn't stick to the table or my hands at all. And I could really feel the change in the dough as the gluten started to develop, and the dough became more stretchy and smooth. It rose beautifully. This could also be because I bough myself a fresh pack of yeast as I wasn't so sure my previous one wasn't going a bit ancient on me. I'm really bad with throwing away any cooking ingredients, but I guess old yeast is really useless, so give yourself a chance to succeed with yeasted doughs and buy fresh yeast. Also, remember that not all dry yeasts are equal. Active yeast is different from instant (or bread machine) yeast. Active yeast needs to be activated in warm liquid to make it functional, whereas instant yeast can be mixed directly with the dry ingredients. For more info see here.
I managed to bake the bread nicely, it got a golden crust, and it was really soft and spongy with a bit of a crust. The bacon and cheddar are both strong flavours, so it was really tasty. I served it with a side of omelette, and it seemed to go down well with the target audience. And I loved it too, I love bacon so much that I often think I should have been born a man. Although I do love my chocolate too... maybe I am some sort of hermaphroditic life form?
