Mushrooms in the Micro

Mushrooms in the Microwave

Mushrooms are delicious: but they are one of the most absorbent foods. If you cook them in butter (delicious!) or garlicky olive oil (yum!) - well, they soak it up like sponges. Tasty, for sure: but very fattening and may give you heartburn.
So how can you cook a mushroom to be tasty and savoury but without adding too much grease to it?
You microwave them, using just a minimum of fat.
This method works for some other foods as well, of which Potato Wedges are the most obvious example.
Now the recipe!



Start with about 500 g of mushrooms (they shrink a lot)
Clean and trim the mushrooms.

(The ordinary kind from the supermarket work just fine.)

You need a Pyrex bowl or similar to cook them in.

In the Pyrex bowl, melt together
2 Tablespoons water  30ml
1 Tablespoon butter  15ml

When liquid, add the mushrooms: small ones may be left whole, +medium ones quartered, largest ones can be sliced.
Place them into the buttery liquid and stir to coat.

Add salt, pepper, a squeeze of lemon and a scrape of nutmeg and stir again.
Cover the bowl with a plate and microwave for 2 minutes: juice will run and a small pool should form,
Stir again.

Sprinkle over 2 teaspoons of plain flour, stir thoroughly to disperse and coat.
Microwave again, for about 2- 3  minutes.with occasional peeping and stirring, until the flour has mixed with the liquid and formed a kind of small sauce and is cooked.
Taste and if done, and savoury, serve.

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Ingredients - summary

Mushrooms
Scoop of butter, some water
Salt, pepper, nutmeg and lemon to season
A spoonful of flour

A Pyrex bowl or similar to cook them in / a lid to keep steam in.
A microwave - just normal heat and setting.

Hot Whiskey

Hot Whiskey
 

A comforting Irish toddy for a winter's night.

Cut a thick slice of lemon, halve it, stick 4 cloves into one half, and place this spiked crescent into a deep strong glass.

Add a rounded teaspoon of white or brown sugar

Pour over this a measure of Irish whiskey, (35 ml.)

Pour in very hot water, just off the boil, 100 ml.  (3 or 4 fl. oz. or, in USA: a scant half cup) 

Stir briskly and serve.

(Traditionally wrapped in a napkin to make the hot glass safe to hold, and with a long spoon to poke the lemon slice)

Always available in any Irish pub worthy of the name.

Ingredients:

A thick slice of lemon

4 cloves or as wished

A rounded teaspoon of sugar

Irish whiskey, 35 ml measure of. (2 tablespoons plus a teaspoon, USA)

 3 1/2 fl.oz. just-boiled water (scant half-cup, USA)

For the sweetening, honey can be used but usually is not.
Also very curative for a case of the 'flu, etc

Sláinte Mhaith!

The Pancake Pan; 2 recipes

The Pancake Pan.

(2 recipes)

There is a lot to be said for pancakes: they are cheap, quick, filling, tasty, popular and immensely versatile.
In Ireland they are often served on the last Tuesday before Lent; in the USA they are a popular breakfast, in France a dessert, and everywhere a sustaining light meal for children.

One of my children liked pancakes so much that he wanted to make his own, at about the age of 9.
For him I evolved the first, extremely simple recipe, based on an ordinary teacup that we had in the house. Still do - they're Pyrex- virtually indestructible!

The second version was developed when I was minding children and they came in ravenous from school. A pancake with a rasher of bacon, perfect warming food to keep them going all afternoon.

VERY SIMPLE PANCAKE RECIPE (Child-Friendly)

Use a common teacup (or a measuring cup, or measuring jug.)

Put 1 full teacup of plain flour into a large bowl
Add a pinch of salt
Make a hollow in the middle with a wooden spoon
Break an egg into the hollow; stir it round just a little bit to break it up
Gradually stir into the egg-hollow
1 full cup of milk...(use the same cup.)
..and half a cup of cold water,

Stir round and round until all the liquid has picked up all the flour. Mix it all up well.
Leave it to stand in its bowl for ten minutes while you get the other things ready:
(leave it longer or even for hours or overnight if you want - this improves both texture and taste)

Then heat a pan, grease it with an Oil-well, (see note below) and cook the pancakes the way your mother showed you.


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After-school pancakes


Sieve together 10 oz plain flour (This is 2 brim-full teacups, see previous recipe)
with half a teaspoon of salt, into a large wide bowl
stir in a good handful of brown flour (wholemeal)
make a hollow in the middle.
Break 2 eggs into the hollow, mix round a little to start.

Liquid
in a measuring jug, mix together 100 ml of natural yogurt, 200 ml of milk, and 200 ml of water. whisk together to mix.
Add this liquid gradually to flour mixture, stirring into the egg-hollow, gradually picking up the flour as you go round and round. Finally whisk briefly to get out lumps. Leave to stand for an hour if possible

To use
Stir, add a little more milk if it has become too stiff.
Medium heat under pan, heat pan.

Grease with an oilwell (see below) and pour in a ladleful of batter; it should lightly hiss. Watch until the edges go dry-looking for 5 mm, then turn carefully or toss, etc. Keep warm to serve.
The first pancake is always a dud #natural law

(This is a slightly thicker and more substantial pancake than the usual "crepe" kind so you may make them just a little smaller and thicker than the dessert kind, if you wish.)

Protect the counter with newspaper and soak utensils promptly - pancake batter for some reason hardens on and is quite hard to wash off if left to dry on.

Great with a rasher of bacon, grated cheese, applesauce, chocolate spread or any other favourite topping.

What is an oil-well?
Pour a tablespoonful of cooking oil into the dear old teacup.
Fold a tissue or piece of kitchen paper into a strip, then into a wad: grip one upper edge with a clothes peg to be the handle. Use this to rub a layer of oil lightly over your pan between pancakes.

Chocolate Biscuit Cake

12 oz good quality chocolate (not too milky, not too bitter: 50% is good)
4 oz butter
1 can (397g) Condensed Milk
10 oz biscuits: Rich Tea, or Digestive, or a mixture of both, broken into pieces but not into dust

Melt chocolate and butter slowly together in a large bowl, over, (not in,) barely simmering water.

When runny all through, mix in the condensed milk.

Then the broken biscuits

Spread into shallowish tin lined with silicone paper.  (not flat like a Swiss-roll tin, but not deep as a cake tin. You know the sort of thing: many small roasting tins are about the right size and depth)
Cool.

Chocolate Mug Cake

Chocolate Mug Cake
 

(made in a mug, for those bakers in a bedsit who only have a mug, a spoon, and a microwave)

You need....

A Mug, a tablespoon, a microwave

Ingredients: -

4 Tablespoons of ordinary sugar

4 Tablespoons of self-raising flour (OR plain flour, if it’s what you have. It just won’t rise as much)

2 Tablesp of cocoa powder (use a good brand if you can; cheap ones don’t always taste very chocolatey)

1 egg

3 Tablesp milk

3 Tablesp mild cooking oil (not olive, preferably)

A dash of vanilla essence

(2 Tablespoons of chocolate chips, optional) (or chopped nuts, etc.)

 METHOD:-

Spoon into your Mug the first three ingredients,  - the flour, sugar and cocoa: mix them together.

Then drop in the egg and mix around as best you can. Then the milk and oil, and vanilla: mix all together thoroughly.

You may now add chocolate chips if using, or nuts, or a dash of cinnamon.

Place the Mug in the microwave and cook on HIGH (about 1000watts) for three minutes. (Or four minutes if wattage is lower)

Keep an eye to the micro while it cooks, stop if you smell burning!
Turn out of the m#ug onto a plate to cool, or else eat out of teh mug with a spoon - but there is enough for two people really. 

Mine billowed up out of the mug, I turned it out and it made a quite convincing small roll-shaped cake, a little moister than a baked one. Quite tasty but not very chocolatey, which I blame on the cheap cocoa powder. Cinnamon would have helped, I think.

Posted by the wondering watcher at 5:10 PM No comments:

All About Fudge

A Guest post, by a talented composer of sweets:

ALL ABOUT FUDGE

In common with caramel and toffee, fudge has three ingredients - sugar, water, and fat. Milk is fat and water. Golden syrup is sugar and water. Condensed milk is all three, which is why you can make caramel out of it without adding anything else. So it's pretty simple. Simple is not the same as easy.

Sugar, water

The sugar-to-water ratio makes your caramel more or less runny. Equal parts by volume gives you simple syrup.

Sugar, water, fat

Adding fat (butter, unless you don't eat cow-juice, in which case probably coconut oil behaves the same way) changes the way the finished thing behaves. Fudge breaks into chunks, while toffee stretches a bit before breaking. Those gorgeous long crisp filaments that simple syrup makes if you cook it golden? That's what happens with no fat at all. It's similar to the way that shortcrust pastry breaks while bread dough stretches out. It's called shortening for a reason*

Sugar, water, fat, heat

Heat alters organic things. Proteins denature, and sugars caramelise. Applying heat for longer does two things - it drives off water, making a thicker finished product, and it caramelises the sugar. The colour changes to gold and then to brown, and the taste deepens and gets richer and more complex. Just don't go too far and let it burn.

Sugar, water, fat, heat, stirring

When sugar is liquid it is very, very hot. When it cools it wants to crystallise again, but in a smooth pan of itself that's difficult. When you stir, you start off lots of little crystalline nubbles that grow more crystals. So the whole thing gets that good fudgey texture. If you add chopped nuts or raisins, you effectively make the stirring stirrier so you needn't do it for as long.

The recipe, at last

1 lb demerara sugar

2 oz butter

1/2 pint milk or cream or a mixture of milk and cream

A few drops of vanilla extract

Line a tin with baking paper. Put all the ingredients except the vanilla in a large pot. Melt them over a low heat. Gently increase the heat until it starts boiling, then reduce the heat again so it simmers. Now, it'll rise up in a huge froth of bubbles which can be a little alarming, but don't worry; it's supposed to be doing that. Keep stirring it gently, every now and then, so the bottom doesn't burn.

After ten minutes or so, start testing it (it could take another twenty minutes to be done, though, so don't get impatient here.) Now, this is the point where the recipe books start talking about the soft ball stage, and I am here to tell you that there is no such thing.

If you're of a sensitive disposition, skip this paragraph and buy a sugar thermometer instead.

Testing fudge for done-ness results in something remarkably like a poo. Early on - before enough water has been boiled off - the stuff will disperse in the cup of water like the kebab you should have known better than to eat in the first place. If you overcook it, the fudge will hit the bottom of the cup in a scatter of hard little nuggets. And when you see in the bottom of the cup a smooth, comfortable turd shape - a poo you wouldn't mind having yourself, and don't pretend not to know what I mean - then your fudge is done. If you're not sure, reach in and gather it up with your fingers. It should hold together and feel soft almost chewy when you eat it, assuming you still want to do such a thing.

Or just wait until a sugar thermometer reads between 112 and 116 C.

Anyway, when you've arrived at this happy state of affairs, take the fudge off the heat, add a dash of vanilla, and stir like a maniac. At first it'll seem as if you're just sloshing liquid around for no good reason, but then it will thicken and start to look creamy. The track left by the spoon will be slow to close up. At this point you can pour it into a tin and let it set. By all means lick the pan, but for goodness' sake let it cool first.

If it doesn't set properly, don't worry. Just use it as delicious caramel sauce and next time, cook it a bit longer or stir it a bit more. If it sets too much and is a crumbly mess, bash it up some more and sprinkle it on icecream, and next time stop cooking a bit sooner or stir a bit more gently.

* I have no idea whether this is the real reason it's called shortening, or if there's any relation between the effect butter has on pastry and the effect it has on fudge. It could all be a string of coincidences.

Cumin Potatoes

(For barbecuing) - prepare in advance

Carefully boil some even-sized potatoes in their skins until just tender but not breaking up. Drain, let dry off and cool a little.

Halve the long way: score the cut surfaces; lay out on dish, cut sides up.

Next, prepare some Cumin Butter:

 

Melt a 1/4 lb of butter over a low heat (or microwave) and in it place 2 teaspoons of ground cumin; salt and pepper as preferred, and a well-mashed clove or two of garlic (if you like it) 

[Irish butter tends to be quite salty. If your butter is not, you will need some salt)

Stir all together and gently heat again until it smells savoury and delicious.

Brush or baste the scored tops of potatoes with this; maybe repeat so that it sinks in thoroughly.

(Grease the undersides - the skin side - with the butter so they don't scorch when grilled)

Store until needed on the dish with more of the butter around, if there's any left over. If it is a foil-lined tin, the washing-up will be less messy.

Barbecue!

Brush more onto the scored sides as you like it, and if there is any left for the purpose.

PS The spicing of the butter can be varied, though Cumin has a natural affinity with potatoes. Mustard is a useful one for a little tanginess.

I sometimes add Turmeric for a good yellow colour. or paprika for redness, etc: to get a nice barbecued bronzing

but the Cumin/(garlic) is the best base flavour.

They only need to be put on the grill long enough to heat through and to absorb a whiff of the smoky taste; Maybe 7 minutes, depending on the heat. They should be eaten while good and hot. Whether you turn the spuds over to grill both sides or cook them on their rounded bottoms only, is entirely your personal decision.

There are NEVER any left over!