First, Catch Your Turkey

I grew up in the country, which meant that my first experiences of turkey involved wild turkeys.  Wild turkeys are generally fairly large, bony birds with a gamey flavour and a tendency to dry out on cooking (not to mention that they arrive intact, feathers and all).  They don’t roast particularly well, and are usually boned out or casseroled.

I’ve only ever cooked bought turkey a couple of times and have been lulled into thinking that they can be treated like chickens.  Despite experimenting with brining, I have been vaguely dissatisfied with the results – too dry and lacking any depth of flavour. 

I recently found myself gazing into the local butcher’s freezer at his supply of turkeys… and before I knew it, the smallest size turkey was coming home with me.  I spent my time on the bus to work thinking about my problems with cooking turkey, and eventually came to the conclusion that the turkey would benefit from braising.  So what does one do when faced with a turkey dilemma?  Turn to the experts!  One little search on the interweb and I discovered a Mr Michael Ruhlman, and his braised turkey recipe.  There wasn't a lot I could do to improve on it, so here it is, with a few little adjustments!

Tender Braised Turkey

1 turkey (that will fit in your braising dish – mine was around 3.5kg)

1 lemon, quartered
2-3 cups white wine
1-2 litres chicken stock
1-2 carrots, roughly chopped
1-2 onions, roughly chopped
2 stalks celery, roughly chopped (including leaves)
Handful of fresh parsley, thyme and oregano sprigs
Salt and pepper, to taste

Preheat the oven to 200 C.

Place the lemon inside the turkey, along with some of the herbs and some onion.  Place the turkey into the braising dish, along with all other ingredients (I only add a pinch of salt at this stage and adjust at the end).  The liquid should be covering about 2/3 of the turkey.

Place into the oven, uncovered.  After 15 minutes, turn down to 180 C.  Baste with cooking liquid about every 15 minutes.  After 1 hour, remove from oven and rest for 5 minutes. It should be nicely browned.

Carefully remove the breast, including the ribcage.  To do this, I used a sharp knife to cut diagonally from the neck across the top of the wings, and then used kitchen scissors to cut around the sides of the breast and lift it off.  Cover the breast and rest.

Return the braising dish to the oven, with the remaining parts of the turkey submerged in the braising liquid.  Cook for another 30 minutes.  Remove the turkey from the braising liquid and scoop out all the flavouring vegetables (I didn't sieve the liquid as I like to have a slightly rustic gravy).  Skim off any visible fat.  Bring the braising liquid to a boil for 5 minutes, then add 1 tbsp cornflour dissolved in a little water, and stir until thickened.  Taste the gravy and adjust to taste – some redcurrant jelly (or cranberry) for sweetness, salt and pepper. Remove from the heat.

Joint the legs and wings and place in the gravy.  Remove the breast meat from the bones, slice, and place in the gravy.  We served it straight away, but it would easily keep for another 30 minutes on a very slow element, or in the turned-off oven.

Serve with potatoes and green vegetables.

Leftovers freeze well in the gravy, and make for a delicious emergency dinner on rice with vegetables!

Food in Focus – Could I be a Food Photographer?

No.

But could I have a lot of fun learning what it is that food photographers do?

Yes.  Especially when Ruth Pretty is cooking the food and I get to eat it!

I had chosen to do the Food in Sharp Focus event as part of Wellington on a Plate – hosted by Ruth Pretty, with guidance from professional photographer and tutor Murray Lloyd.  I thought that I might learn a bit about taking photos for the blog, and have the added bonus of trying some of Ruth’s fantastic food.

Our day started at 9.00am with coffee, a selection of perfectly ripe cheeses, crisp kiwifruit salad, and delicious peach and raspberry pastries.  We settled in with our classmates, sharing stories about the combination of food and photography that brought us together.

Ruth and Murray arrived and, using the peach and raspberry pastries, talked us through the process of photographing food – from choosing the background colour/fabrics and the plate or dish, to the arrangement of the food, the lighting and the careful placement of a fork.  It was an incredibly informative two hours, with plenty of opportunities for questions.  We rounded out our introduction with a slide show of food shots, showing the different ways that food can be highlighted by the use of colour, composition and lighting.

Then we got hands-on – three different “pass-arounds”, an assortment of plates, backgrounds, fabrics and Ruth Pretty’s gardens to use for our own attempts…

Chicken and Pistachio Pies with Cranberry Chutney

 

The allocated 30 minutes was far too short to do justice to the food!  Although I have to say that many of the attendees turned out fantastic photos, so I can only accept operator incompetence on my part.  Happily, we then had to eat the photography subjects, with a drop of bubbly to assist.  Murray chose a selection of photos after each session, and talked us through the successful aspects of our shots.

Next up, was Cold Poached Salmon with Ginger Coriander Dressing and Black Beans.  Yum.  Here, I had a little more success (I think).

I’m not sharing my very much less successful photo of the Oven Braised Pork Shoulder with Cavalo Nero, Apricots and Prunes, as it doesn’t do justice to a spectacularly successful dish.  Along with the salmon, this is definitely on my list of things to cook as soon as possible. Other photographers did manage to take a good photo.

We finished with Baked Rhubarb and Rose Geranium Compote with Little Pavlovas, Whipped Cream and Brandy Snap Cigars.

The verdict?  It was a great day – I learnt a lot about food photography, including how time consuming it is, if you aspire to the perfect photo.  This blog may benefit from some improved composition, but as my first audience is usually sitting at the table waiting while I photograph, it will have to be done in 5 minutes or less!

Dinner Party Club Degustation Menu

A while ago, I introduced you to the founders of the dinner party club – the Urban Gardeners.  The other members include the Visitors from Hawkes Bay, the Creative Cooks, and the Bean Counters (Mr Sporting Bean Counter and Mrs Shopping Bean Counter).  MOTH has been talking for a long time about having a Degustation Menu as a theme, so we sent out a menu that went like this: amuse bouche, vegetable, soup, fish, salad, fowl, palate cleanser, meat, fruit, dessert.

This is what it looked like…

Course 1

Amuse Bouche: Salmon tartare, with crème fraiche in a poppy seed tuile

Wine: Dibon Cava Brut Reserve or Framingham F-Series Viognier 2010 (Marlborough)
By: Mr Visitor from Hawkes Bay

Course 2

Vegetable: “Toad in the Hole” – kumara poached in stock and saffron, with beetroot centre on jus reduction

Wine: Church Road 2009 Cabernet Merlot
By: The Creative Cooks

Course 3

Soup: Iced plum tomato soup with mozzarella and basil oil

Wine: Casco de la Cruz Pedro Ximenez Sherry
By: Your Friendly Blogger and the MOTH

Course 4

Fish: Poached salmon with beetroot relish and basil mayonnaise

Wine: Lawsons Dry Hills 2008 Riesling
By: The Urban Gardeners

Course 5

Salad: Roasted artichoke and pea salad

Wine: Esk Valley Hawkes Bay Pinot Gris 2010
By: The Bean Counters

Course 6

Fowl: Herbed chicken on rocket

Wine: Peter Yealands Pinot Gris 2011

By: Mrs Visitor from Hawkes Bay

Course 7

Palate Cleanser: Raspberry and pinot noir sorbet

Wine: Matahiwi Wairarapa Pinot Noir 2010
By: The Creative Cooks

Course 8

Meat: Eye fillet and blue cheese on parsnip puree, with parsnip crisps and baked onions

Wine: Taylors Clare Valley Merlot 2010
By: Your Friendly Blogger and the MOTH

 Course 9

Fruit: Rhubarb fool

By: The Urban Gardeners
 
Course 10

Dessert: Rich chocolate on crème anglaise

Wine: D’Arenberg Noble Botryotinia F*ckeliana 2011
By: The Bean Counters

When small is better

Think of a very small dish of something delicious placed in front of you.  It just invites savouring, taking small bites, lingering over every mouthful. 

When I dived back into cooking this year, I revisited old recipes as I dusted off techniques and remembered the tricks I’d learnt over 20 years ago.  A classic lemon soufflé was one of the first recipes I tried, followed by chocolate, then raspberry (if I’d found some gooseberries they would have been next).  The classic way of serving a cold soufflé is to tie a paper “collar” around the soufflé dish, fill to about an inch higher than the dish, and remove the “collar” just before serving.  However, I’ve found some small glass dishes, so I thought I’d try the next soufflé on the list as a very small dish of delicious dessert.

For a cold soufflé recipe, I can’t go past Cordon Bleu Desserts and Puddings – I’ve adapted their recipe here.

Cold Orange Soufflé

Serves 8-12, depending on the size of the serving bowls

3 large eggs

170g castor sugar
6 tbsp freshly squeezed orange justice
Finely grated rind of 2 oranges (make sure that you avoid the white part of the rind, as it is bitter)
300 ml cream
2 tsp powdered gelatine
Juice of 1 lemon, made up to 5 tbsp with water

Sprinkle the gelatine over the lemon/water mix and leave to swell (do this in a small heatproof dish).

Whisk* the egg yolks, sugar and orange rind at high speed until thick and mousse-like.  To really get the maximum amount of air in this step, you can do this over a pan of simmering water – but make sure that your bowl doesn’t touch the water, or you’ll end up with sweet scrambled eggs. 

Once they are lovely and thick, place the bowl on the bench, add the orange juice, and keep whisking until the bowl is cool.  The mixture will thin out quite a bit when you add the juice, but just keep on whisking!

*In case you think I’m mad, I should really say “whisk with electric handheld beater”, but you can use an actual whisk if you prefer.

Place the gelatine dish into a pot of water (the water in the pot should come about halfway up the gelatine dish), and heat gently until the spongy gelatine dissolves.  Set aside to cool for up to 5 minutes – you don’t want it to reset, but it is better to be warm, rather than hot, when you add it to the other ingredients.

Half whip the cream – so that it just holds its shape, but is not stiff – it should be the same consistency as your egg yolk mixture.  Fold together.  Gently stir the liquid gelatine mixture through the mixture.

Whisk the egg whites until they are stiff but not dry.  I use a copper bowl for whisking egg whites, as they hold more air, but an ordinary bowl will be fine.  Whatever you use, make sure both the bowl and whisk are spotlessly clean, otherwise the egg whites will refuse to whisk up nicely.  Place the bowl of soufflé mixture into a sink of ice/water (to assist with rapid cooling/setting) and mix in a good spoonful of the egg whites (this will loosen up the mixture so that you can gently fold in the remainder without losing all the air you’ve just been beating in to them).  Fold in the remaining egg whites.  Slowly stir the mixture once or twice a minute, until it is thickening.  Turn into the bowl or bowls and refrigerate until set.

You could add a blob of whipped cream and some finely chopped pistachios for a bit of colour when serving.  But it tastes great on its own, in a small dish with a small spoon.  A nice dessert wine (even if it does have a rather provocative name) will round out the evening nicely.

A roasted flattened chook

Several years ago, I was introduced to the concept of a flattened chook by the recipe books of Donna Hay.  Donna also provided the entirely sensible suggestion of putting some baking paper under the flattened chook before cooking, which makes the cleaning up part of the day MUCH quicker.  So here’s my version of a flattened chook – which finds its way into the oven almost every week.  The advantages over a traditional roast chicken are that it cooks faster, the breast doesn’t dry out, and it just tastes great!

Roast Flattened Chook

Serves 4-6 – in our house, that means it serves 4 for dinner, with enough leftover to provide the basis for another dinner for 2 of us.

1 chicken

1-2 lemons

About ½ a head of garlic

Handful each of fresh thyme and oregano

Olive oil

Salt and pepper

Pre-heat the oven to 180-200 C.

First of all, line a flat roasting dish with baking paper.  Chop one lemon into quarters, separate the cloves of garlic (don’t worry about peeling), and pile them all into a rough bed for the chicken to lie on.  Sprinkle with salt, pepper and olive oil.

Place your chicken breast side down on your bench, with the backbone closest to you.  Using sturdy kitchen scissors, chop through the bones along one side of the backbone. 

Pull the cut sides apart and flatten the chicken out – it won’t be perfectly flat.  Turn over, place on top of the prepared bed of herbs etc, and gently flatten with your hands.

Wash your hands and then sprinkle with olive oil, salt and pepper, some thyme leaves, and cover with slices of lemon.  Roast potatoes can also be added – as long as they are small enough to cook in 40-50 minutes.

If you’re feeding a slightly larger than usual army, then the quantities can be doubled and stacked in the oven.

Bake for 40-50 minutes – I usually rotate the dish halfway through.  Once the chicken is cooked, leave to rest for 5-10 minutes before carving.

The juices are delicious - scoop the potatoes into a serving dish and then drain the juices.  They can be poured straight over the chicken once carved, or kept for stock.