Post the Fourteenth (in which our heroine apologises yet again)

Ok, I know this song is starting to get really old, but I am sooooo sorry for the extremely sporadic nature of my posting recently.  Two days of temping in Dublin turned into two weeks, so all routine has gone out ye olde fuinneog.  I've been living out of my sister's wardrobe in my parents' house, and my mother seems to have some kind of fundamental mistrust of my cooking, so there hasn't been a whole lot of kitchen action in my life recently.  Fear not, however - I'm going to make up for it by giving you not one, but TWO recipes today.  Never let it be said that I'm a dirty welcher.

First up is pesto.  The end of our (abysmal) summer approaches, and with it comes use-it-or-lose-it time for my basil.  You can grow basil indoors all year round, but I have mine in huge pots outside, so rather than watch it wither and die on the plant, I decided to make pesto.  Homemade pesto is almost ridiculously easy to make.  I'll be honest, though, it's not worth doing unless you have the basil to hand - if you were to make it using those stupid flat-pack packs of basil you buy in the shops, it would cost you a bleedin' fortune.  But, on the off-chance you happen to be looking at a huge basil plant right now and wondering what to do with it, here you go:

Pesto - makes one large jar

110g basil                           200ml extra-virgin olive oil
50g parmesan, grated          25g pine-nuts, lightly toasted

1) Wash and dry your basil.  110g doesn't sound like a whole lot, but believe me, it is.  I scalped two whole plants and still managed to come up 2g short.  So here's what 108g of basil looks like:

2)  Whizz the basil, cheese, pine-nuts & oil in a food processor.  Taste, season & add more oil if you need to.  Give the whole lot another good stir, then spoon into a sterilised jar*, wipe the neck of the jar clean, cover the surface of the pesto with a layer of olive oil, and enjoy.

NOTE:  If any of the surface of the pesto is exposed to air it will oxidise and go a horrible brown colour.  Every time you use the pesto, wipe the neck of the jar clean again and re-cover with a layer of olive oil.  This sounds like a righteous pain in the hole, but to be honest with you, you'll use the pesto so quickly (cause it's bleedin' gorgeous, like) that you won't have to do it very often.

*How in god's name do I sterilise a jar?  Boil the jar and the lid in loads of water for ten minutes.  Allow them to cool completely before putting the pesto in.  Handle the lid with tongs and only touch the outside of the jar.

And today's second recipe is authentic French baguettes.  Thanks to Jude at http://www.applepiepatispate for this recipe.

A word of warning  - this recipe looks a bit intimidating at first glance, simply because there's so many steps. Please, please, please don't be put off trying it.  There's literally four ingredients in it and apart from taking a bit of time, it's not at all difficult and the end result is, to borrow a phrase from my friend Niamh, totes amazeballs.  Give it a go, that's all I ask.

Pain a l'ancienne Francais - makes 3 baguettes

500g plain flour                        325ml cold water
9g salt                                      5g dried yeast
50ml cold water

Day 1
1) In a large bowl, mix the flour and the 325ml water with a fork til you get a rough ball of dough.  Turn out onto a floured surface and knead for 4-6 minutes until smooth & elastic.  Stick in an oiled sandwich bag and refrigerate overnight.

Day 2
1)  Remove the dough from the fridge an hour before using.  Mix the 50ml of water, salt and yeast in a bowl, add the dough and knead well until all the extra water is absorbed.  You'll be looking at it initially going "This is never going to happen" but believe me, it will, and quicker than you'd expect.

First Improvement  -cover and stand at room temp. for 90 minutes

2)  Stretch and fold the dough over itself a few times.

Second Improvement - re-cover and stand at room temp. for another 90 minutes.

3) Stretch & fold again.

Final Improvement - cover & stand at room temperature until doubled in size, about 3 hours.

4) Cut the dough into three pieces.  On a floured baking tray, gently shape into loose ovals by tucking the sides under.  Allow to rest for 15 minutes, then gently stretch into baguettes. Preheat your oven to 240C while they're resting.

5) Cut 3 or 4 diagonal slashes into each baguette.  Place a pan of boiling water on the bottom of the oven (don't be tempted to skip this part, it's very important!) and bake the loaves for 9 minutes.  Rotate by 180 degrees & bake for another 10-15 minutes, until the crust is a gorgeous deep reddy-brown.  Cool on a wire rack, then devour with real butter.

Yet another tip:  My life changed for the better the day I thought to wear surgical gloves (which I always have at home for handling chilies) while handling dough.  No more icky-goo between your fingers.  No more spending days picking concrete-hard bits from under your fingernails.  I genuinely wouldn't bother making bread anymore if I hadn't copped onto doing this.  Oh, and rather than using a fresh pair of gloves every time you handle this dough (cause let's face it, you'd fly through them) simply wash & dry your hands while wearing them, and re-use them for the next stretching & folding/kneading/whatever.  You're welcome...


Today's Top Tip: Regular-sized Mars bars make great fun-sized Mars bars for giants.

Post the Ninth (in which our heroine has a moan about the weather)

Have a look out your window there.  Go on, a good long one.  If you are staring at an unbroken vista of slate-grey cloud, then you are obviously one of my Irish readers.  According to my stats, I have a reader in the Maldives.  I kind of hate that person a little bit.  Here we are in August, supposed to be the apogee of Irish summer (even though it's technically Autumn) and all we have is rainy wind and windy rain.  Which we also had in July, June and May.  There was a nice week or two at the end of April, but that was pretty much it.  I, for one, would love to know what the Irish as a people have done to offend the weather gods so much.  It must have been heinous.  I will admit to having dropped history like a hot snot after the Junior Cert., but even still, I'm pretty sure there aren't any genocides or rape-of-the-Sabine-women type episodes in our past that would merit such a punishment.  It's enough to make you wish for winter again.  But only if it's another brilliant winter like last year - bring on the snow!

The shite weather is causing a phenomenon called the Curryolis Effect in our house.  This is a little-known natural occurrence whereby you crave the sweaty armpits, red face and runny eyes that should really be supplied by hot weather, but which you have to generate artificially with hot food because summer has apparently abandoned us for all time.  I'm only a week into this blog and I'm about to post my second curry recipe.  How depressing.

Chicken & Chickpea Curry - serves 4

2 onions, quartered                       4 fat garlic cloves
3cm ginger, peeled                        1 large red chili, roughly chopped (seeds & membrane left in)
Bunch fresh coriander                    2 tbsp hot curry powder
Half tsp turmeric                            2 tsp paprika
1 tsp salt                                        1 chicken stock cube
500ml boiling water                        4 or 5 chicken fillets, cubed
Tin of chickpeas, drained

1) Stick the onions, garlic, chili, spices, salt, curry powder and half the coriander into a food processor and blend to a puree.  Tip the mixture into a large pot and cook over a low heat for 10 minutes, stirring frequently.

2) Crumble in the stock cube, add the boiling water and bring to the boil.  Add the chicken, stir, then lower the heat and simmer for 20 minutes, until the chicken is tender.

3) Chop the remaining coriander and stir into the curry along with the chickpeas.  If, like me, you love chickpeas and if, like me, you've already eaten half the first tin out of the colander, feel free to add another tin.   Heat through and divide between four bowls, swirl over some natural yogurt and serve with rice and poori breads.

Poori - makes 10 (WARNING! WARNING! WARNING!  Highly addictive little bastards, these)

175g self-raising flour                      1 tsp salt
1 tbsp vegetable oil                         1 tbsp natural yoghurt
3-4 tbsp water                                Oil for frying

1) In a large bowl, combine the flour, oil, yoghurt and salt.  Mix well and add enough water to make a soft dough.  Cover with a tea-towel and leave to rest for 15 minutes.

2) Turn onto a lightly floured board and knead well for 3-4 minutes or until smooth.  Divide into 10 balls and roll each into a very thin disc around 8cm in diameter.  Like-a dis:

3)  Heat about an inch of oil in a deep frying pan til it browns a cube of bread in 30 seconds.  Or, just guess when it's hot enough, like I do.  Carefully slide a poori into the pan.  When it puffs up (isn't that cool!) turn it over and fry for another minute.  Drain on kitchen towel and keep warm til they're all done.  They should be lovely and soft, not crispy at all.  Serve immediately.

You can thank/curse me later, when you're spreadeagled on the couch wondering whether it was really necessary to eat four of the damn things...

Post the Seventh (in which our heroine abandons her dinner plans)

So, yesterday's dinner was supposed to be Chicken & Chickpea curry.  I had everything organised for it, even remembered to take the chicken fillets out of the freezer on Saturday night, but then, as is my wont, I changed my mind at the last minute.  You see, I remembered that my sisters were going to Tribeca for lunch.  And that got me thinking about Tribeca's smoked turkey BLT.  Specifically, how much I wanted one.  So the curry went out the window (not literally, mind) and I decided to try and make STBLTs instead.  Now, you should probably be aware that the last time I tried to make these, it resulted in an all-out Kitchen Episode (patent pending).  The cause was my inability to "stack" the sandwich properly, and the upshot was that I refused point blank to eat the resulting, and, to my mind, mockingly flat, sandwich.

Yesterday's attempt, thankfully, was much more successful.  Here's a rather boring photo of one:

I'm not going to insult you by giving you the recipe.  It's a sandwich.  With smoked turkey, bacon, lettuce and tomatoes on it.  Not exactly rocket science.  Although I do like to live dangerously by putting melted cheddar cheese on mine.  Oh, and there's guacamole on it too.

Anyway, I thought I'd use this opportunity to post the flatbread recipe I was too lazy to give you on Wednesday.  At least I think it was Wednesday.  The days tend to all jumble into one when you're an unemployed bum with no job, vim or vigour.  These are really easy to make, go beautifully with curry and are also lovely to have with a barbie, or with kofta, lamb skewers or falafel.

Easy Flatbreads - makes at least 12, so feel free to halve the recipe

500g plain flour                            1 scant tbsp dried yeast
1 tsp salt                                      300ml hand-hot water
4 tbsp extra virgin olive oil            Drizzle of runny honey

1) Sift the flour into a large bowl, mix in the yeast, salt, water, olive oil & honey.  Work together with a fork until it forms a ball, then turn onto a floured board and knead for 5 - 8 minutes, or until smooth and elastic.  Pop the dough into an oiled bowl, turning it so that the dough gets a sheen of oil, cover with a damp cloth and leave in a warm spot to prove.

2) Once the dough has doubled in size (about an hour), knock it back and knead lightly again.  At this stage, you can add extra flavourings if you like.  If I'm serving it with curry, I tend to leave it plain, but if it's being used for kofta, falafel, etc., I like to add a tablespoon of cumin seeds, or maybe a heaped teaspoon of chili flakes.  Simply place the spices in the middle of the knocked-back dough, fold up the sides, and knead until they're evenly distributed.

3) Divide the dough into pieces around the size of a satsuma and, using a little extra flour, roll them into very flat breads about 6" long.

4) Have a very hot pan or griddle ready (they can also be done on the barbie) and cook the bread for about 1-2 minutes without touching it, until you can see bubbles forming on the surface.  Turn over and cook the other side.  Do the bread in batches and keep warm until needed.

I've just noticed that all my followers have disappeared.  I'm choosing to believe that this is the result of a ghost in the Google machine, and not that I'm such a crap blogger that they've all abandoned me.  Only time will tell.  Until tomorrow, dear reader, I bid you adieu.