A-Pizza Style Pie

Last weekend when I was rolling out my usual pizza dough, I thought I would try lining a dish with pizza dough (in a similar style to pastry) and putting the pizza topping inside with cheese on top.  It tasted amazing and was a little less messy to eat than my usual Saturday night pizza, so I thought I would share it with you.

Ingredients:

Saved home made bread dough - 350g  (Bread Recipe)
Tin chopped tomato
Wet garlic - 12 cloves
Pesto - table spoon full
Sweet Pepper
Ground chilli pepper - 2 good pinches
Chopped spring onion
Cumin flavoured buffalo cheese - 50g (or your favourite crumbly goats cheese)
Cheddar cheese (for grating over the top)

1.  Roll out the pizza dough until it is large enough to line your oven dish.  Leave the dough to prove in the dish while you make the filling.

2.  Pour a tin of chopped tomato into a saucepan and start to heat on a low heat.  Add a table spoon of your favourite pesto.  Add the cloves of garlic.  Chop the sweet pepper and add to the sauce too.  Add a few pinches of ground chilli pepper (preferably from home grown chillis if available).  Turn up the heat a little so that the sauce simmers and thickens.  When it has thickened to your satisfaction, it is ready to put into your dish of pizza dough.

3.  Add cubes or crumbles of the cheese of your choice on to the tomato sauce filling and the chopped spring onions.  Grate some cheddar cheese (or other favourite hard cheese).

4.  Place in the oven preheated at 200 degrees centigrade.

5.  When the cheese topping looks nicely browned, its ready to eat.  (I find it takes about 10-15 minutes, but I keep checking every 5 minutes to see if its ready just so I catch it when its cooked exactly to my liking)

Enjoy!!

Funnily enough, as soon as I got it out of the oven, my neighbours knocked on the door.  They obviously smelt my pizza pie!!  And this is what happened ...

I wouldn't let them finish it all though as wanted some left overs for myself!

Potato Salad

I've just harvested about 900g of salad potatoes from my garden.  All perfectly formed and fresh.  My favourite thing to make with salad potatoes is a potato salad.  Here's my recipe.

Ingredients:

For the mayonnaise:
2 egg yolks
Rapeseed oil (about 200ml)
Tea spoon of mustard
Table Spoon Lemon Juice
Salt & Pepper

500g Potatoes




1.  Par boil your potatoes.
2.  While the potatoes are lightly boiling, make your mayonnaise.  Start with mixing the 2 egg yolks with the mustard.  I like to mix in a pyrex measuring jug but a small bowl will do just as well.
3.  Next you will start to mix in the oil.  Add a drop of oil and mix it in.
4.  When its fully mixed in add another drop of oil.
5.  Keep adding just a drop of oil and mixing in until it starts to look like the mixture is starting to thicken up.
6.  Check if the par boiled potatoes are soft enough to eat for the salad.  If they are, drain them and then continue making the mayonnaise.
6.  When the mixture is thickening up you can start to add larger amounts of oil (about a tablespoon at a time but no need to measure it).  Mix in each addition of oil before adding more.
7.  When you have made the amount of mayonnaise you need, place it in the fridge for half an hour.  This will help it thicken up even further.
8.  After half an hour fetch the mayonnaise out of the fridge and taste the mixture.  Add lemon juice to taste and the salt and the pepper to taste.
9.  Now your mayonnaise will be ready to add to your potatoes and you have a lovely potato salad.

Matt and I like to eat it on sultry summer evenings alongside barbecued steak and to eat it in the garden with a nice chilled glass of cider.

A Basic Bread Recipe

My friend Astor in Hong Kong asked me for a simple bread recipe so I thought I would share the method I use.

Ingredients:

Bread Flour 1000g   (you can mix flours. I like 50% white bread flour, 25% brown, 25% grannery)
Water 600ml
Dried Yeast 10g        (or as per instructions on the packet)
Salt 20g                     (I like a bit more but that's my personal taste)
Oil  20ml                   (suggestions: olive oil, rapeseed oil, vegetable oil)

1.  First prepare the yeast.  Follow the instructions on your yeast packet (some yeasts are instant).  I use dried active yeast which is dissolved into 150ml water at blood temperature as the yeast will activate at this temperature.  Be careful not to use water too hot as this can harm the effectiveness of the yeast.  A way of obtaining this temperature is 50ml boiling water to 100ml cold water.  Leave the yeast to start foaming for about 10-15 minutes.  When it has a head on it like beer, it is ready to use.

2.  While the yeast is activating, measure your flour, salt and oil and put it into a mixing bowl.  For the water measure out 450ml as the rest of the water will be provided by the yeast/water mix that is still activating.  Make a well in the flour and add the 450ml of water.  Mix together with a big wooden spoon.

3.  The yeast should be ready now.  If it hasn't activated, dip your finger in the water and if it feels luke warm add a touch more hot water until it feels like a nice warm temperature on your skin.  This should be about right for the yeast to activate.

4.  Add the yeast mixture to the bowl and mix this through with the wooden spoon.  When it all looks like its combined together nicely (take any rings off!) and start kneading with your hands.  If the dough feels a little dry add a touch more water, if it feels too wet add a little flour.

5.  Now knead or stretch the dough on a work surface or table for about 15 minutes.  You want to have one end held by the heal of your hand and really stretch the dough across the table with your other hand.  Make sure each bit and part of the dough all gets a good stretching.  The more stretching now, the more the loaf will rise in the oven.

6.  Form the dough into a ball, place in the bowl to let the dough rise.  This is called proving as you are trying to prove that the yeast will rise when it is placed in the oven.  Either coat the dough with the same oil you used in the bread ingredients or lightly coat with some flour.  Cover with a tea towel or cling film and leave for about an hour.  (You can leave it for longer if you wish - sometimes I leave for about 2-3 hours)

7.  After at least an hour check the dough.  It should have roughly doubled its size now.  Get the dough out of the bowl and back on the table.  Squash all the air out of the dough and shape into the loaves you will bake.  Place them on a tin tray dusted with flour and leave in a warm place to rise once more.  Leave for about an hour.

8.  15 minutes before you are ready to bake your bread, get the oven ready.  Crank it up to the highest temperature available.  Mine goes up to 220 degrees centigrade.  Place a bowl of boiling water at the bottom of the oven.  This will provide steam in the oven.

9.  When your loaves are nicely risen and ready to go in the oven, slash the tops of the loaves with a serrated knife (about 2 inch deep depth).  This will expose some of the dough (and yeast) that has not been exposed and will help the loaf rise even more when baking in the oven.

• Small rolls 10 - 20 minutes baking, 
• 3 loaves     30 - 40 minutes baking
• 2 loaves     40 - 50 minutes baking

10.  Now place the loaves in the oven.

11.  After 10 minutes, check the colour of the loaves and adjust the temperature accordingly:

• Crust is pale - adjust to 200 degrees centigrade
• Crust is browning nicely - adjust to 180 degrees centigrade
• Crust is browning quickly - adjust to 170 degrees centigrade

12.  Continue to bake for the remainder of the cooking time.

I find each batch you bake you get better and better so don't feel too disappointed with the very first batch baked.  I've been baking for about 6 months now and never, ever buy bread.  All the bread I eat has been made at home.  This might sound time consuming, but I bake a batch of bread every fortnight and freeze any extra loaves.  I also freeze some dough for pizza and have not bought pizza for a very long time as it just doesn't compare!  Each batch I bake is just that little bit different.  I find it a really organic process and it is even more fun if you bake with a friend as you can sip tea and chat while waiting for the loaves to prove.  A great way to catch up!

Welcome Home Garden Salad

I've just come home from a lovely holiday with my boyfriend Matt and returned to a garden that looks like its been on steroids for the week I've been away!

Walking round I could see lots of things ready to eat, so I thought a welcome home salad would be in order.


Here's what I made my salad with:

Radishes
Kai Lan
Giant Red Mustard Leaf
Pea shoots
Squash flowers