Fast strawberry jam

I am off in France this weekend. So let me leave you with this small project.

Jamie's strawberry jam

I remember seeing this more than ten years ago on TV. I love it because it's quick, easy and the quantities are almost impossible to forget.

The only thing I changed is that I cut the strawberries instead of squashing them...

Give it a go for the perfect sweet treat for your Sunday brunch!

Beef stew with lemons and mushrooms

Staying with the subject of preserved lemons, this is a stew using them as flavoring.
A stew is quite a simple thing, everyone has their own template which they use, so I guess this is mine. I am sorry that I can't give you the exact quantities for everything, it's a case of using what you have...

Ingredients:
Beef (roughly 400 gr.), in larger chunks ("Voressen" in German)
1-2 tablespoons of flour
Olive oil
A couple of onions, roughly chopped
A couple of garlic cloves, finely chopped
Brown button mushrooms, sliced
1/4 preserved lemon, only the rind, finely chopped
One bay leaf
A couple of thyme sprigs
One sprig of rosemary
One glass of red wine
Ca. 1/2 l of stock
Salt and pepper

Toss your beef in the seasoned flour. Brown in a little bit of oil on all sides and put to one side.
Add a little more oil and fry your mushrooms. Put them with the beef.

Add a little more oil and fry the onions and garlic until translucent. Add your aromatics (herbs and lemon) and fry them for a couple of minutes until fragrant.
Add the beef and mushrooms back in and deglaze with the red wine. Let the alcohol cook off and add your stock. When the stew has come back to the boil, reduce the heat and partially cover with a lid. Let this cook for at least 45 minutes. Check the seasoning.

Serve with polenta and a sprinkle of roughly chopped parsley for color and taste.

Preserved lemons

This is a really fun project that doesn't take a lot of time to do but will give you a fantastic ingredient to cook with... You just need the patience to wait for four weeks.


You don't need a lot of ingredients. The two basic ones are just lemon and salt. But these two simple and everyday components will give you something extraordinary in four weeks time. The result is rinsed, de-pulped and sliced or diced (i.e. you just need the lemon rind) and will give any dish you add it to a flavor intensity that the two raw products on their own could not have achieved.

You can add further flavorings by adding spices. The possibilities are endless; fennel, cumin, coriander, different peppers, cinnamon, star anise, dried woody herbs, etc, etc.

The basic ratio to keep in mind is that you need one to two tablespoons of normal salt to every lemon you want to preserve. The lemons should be organic and ideally unwaxed. If you aren't sure about the wax, wash them thoroughly.

This gives you the option of making a smaller batch to try this out, if I haven't convinced you yet.
I made a portion if one and a half lemon with a bay leaf, coriander seeds and Szechuan pepper this time. I also added a bit of pink salt, so the coloring is slightly off.

So this is the basic "recipe":

Lemons (you may need one or two extra for the juice)
1-2 tablespoons salt per lemon to be preserved
Aromatics to taste
Jam jar or other preserving receptacle

Wash your jar(s) in hot water to sterilize. Quarter your lemons lengthwise.* Start by putting a layer of salt into your jar. Take your lemon quarters, squeeze their juice into the jar and start layering them. Add salt when each layer is finished.
When all your lemons and salt are in the jar, add your aromatics and top up with extra juice if needed. The lemons should be well covered.
Put them somewhere out of the way and give them a shake from time to time.

*The other technique is to quarter them but not cut through completely and them fill the salt into the cavity. I prefer the quarters because you need less space and extra juice and I find that you only need the preserved lemons in doses of one quarter most of the time anyway.

Roast Chicken; Part II aka Banh Mi Sandwich

The roast chicken dinner from my last post left me with two uneaten chicken thighs. As you know I am not a big fan of leftovers as such. I just don't want to eat something that I've already had the night before... But roasting chicken has a big draw for me for an additional reason to that erstwhile meal: Homemade chicken soup! Therefore I never through away chicken bones or carcasses. If I know I will not be able to make the soup in the following days I freeze them and get round to it later on. But that is a tale for a different time.

I took the meat off the bone of those two thighs and froze them separately since I knew I would be out of town for a couple of days. I had seen a recipe of these Vietnamese sandwiches on the foodgawker App and knew this was something I wanted to try. It sounded easy enough except for the pickled carrots. But I soon discovered that this could be made with ingredients found in every household.
This is what I did:

Pickled carrot:
1 cup of hot water
1 tablespoon of vinegar
1 tablespoon of kosher salt
2/3 of a tablespoon of sugar
1 carrot, cut into juliennes

Mix the water, vinegar, salt and sugar so the last two can dissolve. Put the mini carrot sticks into a jam jar of appropriate size, top up with the brine you've just made and put on a lid. It's that easy.
I used red wine vinegar (seriously, who keeps distilled white for anything other than cleaning purposes?), you can use whatever you have or like.

This jar should be left for three to five days.

The sandwich:
One baguette sliced in half, a little bit of mayonnaise, the leftover chicken, sliced cucumber, your pickled carrots, some slices of spring or red onion and some fresh coriander*. I won't give any quantities as it comes down to your taste and sandwich making abilities (i.e. how much can you fit in). The finished composition is fresh and satisfying. I will be eating this again for sure.

*Dear people-who-hate-coriander, don't whine, substitute! It's a recipe, not the European Convention on Human Rights. You are allowed to adapt and diverge. Use any fresh herb you fancy: Basil, parsley, chives... I would especially recommend mint.

Chicken with Lemon, Herbs and Maple Sirup

This is a dish that was drawn together by the necessity of a low maintenance dish that didn't need to many complicated ingredients (e.g. anything I had lying around the cupboard was fair game). The finished result was a real hit for the dinner party guest and myself. Will definitely be putting this together again very soon!

Ingredients:
4 chicken thighs, with bone and skin on
ca. 15 gr of butter
1/2 tablespoon olive oil
1/4 pickled lemon, just the rind finely chopped* (substitute with fresh zest)
2-3 sprigs of thyme, finely chopped
4-5 sprigs of sage, only roughly chopped
1 tablespoon of maple sirup (Maybe a little more for later on)
salt
pepper

1. Preheat your oven to 180°C. While it is heating up you can add all of the ingredients (except for the chicken) into a small bowl and let the heat from the oven melt the butter. You  want the butter to just melt and this will only take a few minutes.
2. Put your chicken thighs into a baking dish and spread the sauce over them with a brush. Make sure the thighs are covered with it on all sides. Put them into the oven and let them roast for 40-45 minutes.
3. I pulled mine out ten minutes before they were done and drizzled them with an additional teaspoon of maple sirup per thigh.

Side dishes
Forked potatoes: Cook the peeled and diced floury potatoes until thoroughly soft. Drain them well and let them dry out in the pan for a minute. Crush them roughly with a fork and add salt, chopped spring onions and a little olive oil to taste.
Spring greens: Fry off one finely sliced garlic clove in a little olive oil. Add a couple of handfuls of frozen peas and two defrosted spinach cubes (or fresh). Give it a stir, put a lid on top and let it warm through. Season to taste.


*Making your own preserved lemons is really easy and so quick. My apologies for not having posted the directions yet. This will soon be remedied. They are fantastic to cook with and can to my current experience be added to any dish you would add zest to; stews, roasts, soups, etc.

Pink Rhubarb

The color of this wonderful plant is enough to make you buy it on a whim. Especially if you come across it early in Spring when nothing else is yet as luminous and enticing in the produce section.
That is certainly what happened to me.

I had the presence of mind to grab a packet of puff pastry too and just followed my usual blue print for a delicious fruit tarte.

I did take the extra step of stewing the rhubarb first... It might have been tender enough to skip it in hindsight but I didn't want to take any chances.

Ingredients:

3 stalks of rhubarb (Of course I went for the pinkest ones to be had)
2 tablespoons of sugar
ca. 1/2 a cup of water

Puff pastry, go for the unrolled one as it will rise better
2 tablespoons of sugar
3 tablespoons of ground almonds (If you are allergic you can substitute these with crushed cereal, for example Special K)

1. Chop the rhubarb roughly and add the sugar and water in a pan. Let it come to the boil and then simmer until tender with the lid on. It takes 15 to 20 minutes.

2. Preheat your oven to 180°C. Roll out your pastry to fit your tin. Measure it generously as Puff pastry tends to shrink in size while baking. If you feel so inclined you can sprinkle a bit of sugar into the tin before placing the pastry on top. This will give you a lovely caramelized crust. Spread the ground almonds evenly, these will help soak up the additional moisture in the fruit.
3.With a slotted spoon transfer your cooled rhubarb out of the pot and onto the pastry. Sprinkle with sugar.
4. Bake in the middle of your oven for ca. 25 minutes. In the meantime cook your remaining stewing liquid to a sirupy texture.
5. Serve your rhubarb tarte with a coulis of the sirup and a dollop of whipped cream.

Perfect Easter snack

Or lunch.
Or dinner!

You need:
Bread (toasted pita is a treat)
Butter
Radishes*, sliced
Cress, although it is also tasty without
A hard boiled egg, sliced
Salt to taste...

Assemble and enjoy!
*Keep then in a little bowl of water in the fridge, to keep them crunchy longer.