Lemon and Cumquat Curd

Photo by Steve Shanahan

First published Canberra Times 14 December 2011.

Lemon and Cumquat Curd

4 eggs

¾ cup sugar

½ cup lemon juice

juice of 3 cumquats

2 tspns of finely grated lemon rind

125g chopped unsalted butter

Place the eggs and sugar into a heatproof bowl. Place bowl over a pan of barely simmering water and whisk the egg and sugar mixture constantly until the sugar has dissolved.

Add the lemon and cumquat juice, lemon rind and butter. Whisk mixture for 20 minutes until smooth and the butter has melted and thickened enough to coat the back of a wooden spoon. 

Do not allow the mixture to boil as it will split.

Pour the mixture into hot sterilised jars and seal immediately. The curd will thicken when cooled. 

Cherries in Vanilla Brandy

Photos by Steve Shanahan

First published Canberra Times 14 December2011

It’s believed the tradition of exchanging gifts at Christmas time began with the story of the Three Magi who offered the Christ child frankincense, gold and myrrh. Since then, giving has worked its way into many stories. Across Europe St Nicholas and his friends were known for their charity and gift giving and the tradition of giving gifts started in their honour in the thirteenth century when French nuns gave presents to the poor children. The day for giving was December 6 and pronounced as feast day. This day is still celebrated in Europe but the traditions of gift exchanging and feasting are more likely to occur on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day.

It sounds like a good story to me. So to celebrate Christmas and the tradition of feasting, I usually make gifts of food and start on this couple of weeks before Christmas. This year, I included traditional Dutch Speculaas in my collection of cooked gifts, which keep well or get better with age. All you will need is an airtight container to store the Speculaas in to keep them from going too soft in the summer humidity.  Apart from them being delicious with coffee or tea, these crispy and spicy biscuits can also be used as wafers to sandwich ice cream together as an easy summer dessert.  Some preparation is needed when making  the dough, which needs to be chilled for 3 hours.

To end a meal or to accompany coffee, I also made Italian Biscotti. These are always gratefully received as gifts, and again, keep for a long time in an airtight container and work well with ice cream as wafers. However, their perfect match is alongside a strong coffee. They take about half an hour to bake and if sliced very thinly you will get about 30 pieces out of the recipe.

If Christmas cheer is more your thing, the French Cherries in Vanilla Brandy could be your special gift. You still have time to put down a couple of bottles to cure before Christmas. We are fortunate living in Canberra, with access to such quality fresh cherries. When I was making these cherries in brandy, the smell floated right through the house and I was sorely tempted to keep a bottle aside for myself. Because they need a few weeks to develop their flavours, if you are giving them as a gift, hand write a little note to go with them indicating when they will be at their best. The quantities in the recipe fill about a 1 litre jar or divided the quantity between smaller jars.

Lastly, as a tribute to an Aussie Christmas, I made Lemon and Cumquat curd. This is great to spread on bread or toast, but it is also really lovely when added to whipped cream or mascarpone to have with desserts or fruit.  Recipes are on the following pages.

Cherries in Vanilla Brandy

750g fresh cherries

1½ cups of sugar

½ cup water

½ cup brandy

1 vanilla bean per bottle

Prick the skins of the cherries with a fine skewer and heat the sugar with the brandy and water in a pan, stirring until all of the sugar has dissolved.

Add the cherries and a vanilla bean and heat until boiling. Place the cherries and syrup in a heatproof, warm, sterilised jar, seal while hot and turn upside down for 2 minutes. (you can sterilise the jars by either boiling them in a large pan of water or pouring boiling water over the jars and lids and allowing to dry turned upside down on a rack.).

Store the filled jars in a cool place for 6 weeks, turning every couple of days for the first 2 weeks. Serve the cherries in the liqueur. Refrigerate after opening.

Strawberry mousse with rhubarb compote

First published Canberra Times 2 November2011

A sure sign that summer is on its way is the arrival of the berry sellers at the Capital Region Farmer’s Markets.  Although you can buy strawberries in Canberra all year round from supermarkets, they are generally not from our local area and surrounds.

I prefer the smaller, more compact, sweet strawberries, to the large misshapen and watery ones. Call me suspicious, but it looks as if they’ve been force-fed with growth hormones. The other thing I love is buying them in a brown paper bag, rather than a plastic punnet, because the strawberry smell leaks through the bag.

On my last trip to France, I discovered the name of the amazingly perfumed little berries that are so prolific over there. They are called Gariguettes, and famously hail from the southwest of France. The first taste is a revelation. The beautiful thing about French strawberries is that you will smell them before you see them, so just follow your nose. It’s a complete sensory experience.

In France, strawberries are mostly grown on slopes and hand picked. It takes three years to train a picker to cut the fruit at the right place and at the peak of its ripeness. Interestingly, women do the bulk of the picking. Perhaps, as a female neighbor in Chatenois suggested, it’s because it’s a work of patience and rigor?

The work-day begins at 7:00am with an obligatory café-au-lait and stops for lunch at midday. The berry gathering ends around 4:00pm to get the fruit to the market as quickly as possible.

During my cooking classes in Beaune earlier this year, we made mountains of Gariguette strawberry jam. The strawberries were bought from the berry seller’s market stall earlier that morning, right outside the door. We made jam all day, using the traditional French method. I left there smelling of sweet, sticky, strawberry jam that was still lingered in my clothes and hair well into the night.

The classic French way to eat a bowl of these gorgeous globes is in salade de fraises - just a bowl of these luscious Gariguettes with sugar and a little lemon juice. Nothing else is needed, although, maybe sitting in a little café on the streets of Paris wouldn’t go astray.

One of my all time favourite summer desserts is Strawberry Mousse. It’s an easy family classic from the 1980’s and comes from my sister Sue Barben, who often served it at summertime dinner parties. I’m not sure where she sourced this recipe from, but it’s worked its way into my favourites’ list.

There’s no cooking required here, so it’s a no fuss dessert for summer or Christmas time. Because this recipe is prepared in advance and set in individual ramekins, it’s ready to go when you need it. All you will need is a blender or food processor. The individual mousses will keep covered in the fridge for 4 to 5 days.  One regular punnet of strawberries will make a quantity to serve 4 to 5 people.

I’ve given this recipe a re-vamp and added a rhubarb vino cotto compote with just a hint of cracked pepper, to serve with the mousse. This does need cooking, but, like the mousse, can also be prepared in advance. Any left over compote goes beautifully with Greek yoghurt, honey and roasted almonds for brekky.

If you don’t feel like cooking the compote, serve the mousse with a dollop of honey-sweetened mascarpone or yoghurt.

1 punnet ripe strawberries

½ cup castor sugar

1 ¼ cups fresh cream

1 tbsp lemon juice

1/3 cup boiling water

2 tspn powdered gelatin

2 egg whites

1 vanilla bean, scraped or ¼ tspn vanilla paste

Strawberry mousse

Wash and hull the strawberries. Place the strawberries, lemon juice, sugar, vanilla paste and cream into a blender or food processor.

Place the boiling water into a small bowl, add the gelatine, stirring until dissolved.

Add the gelatine to the blender, and mix on medium speed until combined. This should only take a few seconds.

Whisk the egg whites in a separate and clean bowl until peaks form. Fold the strawberry mixture gently into the whites until combined.

Pour into 4 to 5 ramkeins and chill until set. This should take a 3 hours or so.

Rhubarb compote

6 stalks of rhubarb, washed and chopped (no leaves)

3 tbsp icing sugar

2 tbsp of vino cotto, (you could use 1 ½  tbsp balsamic vinegar instead, just increase the sugar content)

¼ cup boiling water

cracked black pepper

Preheat the oven to 180C. Prepare a baking tray lined with baking paper. Spread the rhubarb in one layer on the tray and dust with 2 tbsp of icing sugar. Roast in the oven for 20 minutes.

Remove the rhubarb from the oven and place in a small saucepan. Add the remaining icing sugar, boiling water and vino cotto (or balsamic vinegar and extra sugar) and a good pinch of cracked black pepper. Taste for sweetness, you may need to add a little more sugar.

Heat on medium heat, uncovered for a few minutes until the mixture turns syrupy.

The flavour balance should be piquant, but slightly sweet. Serve the compote on top of the strawberry mousse.

Photos by Steve Shanahan

Preserved Lemons

Photo by Steve Shanahan

First published Canberra Times 15 December 2010.
Although you can buy preserved lemons, there is something particularly satisfying and tastier when you make them yourself. If you are lucky enough to own alemon tree or you can befriend someone who does, why not confit a crop for yourself, or give a jar as a Chrissy gift?

When preserving lemons yourself, try and buy the smaller ones, which might mean having to dig through the lemon mounds in the vege shop or market. While searching for the perfect lemons, don’t do as I did, and upset the artfully arranged lemon mound in search of the elusive sized fruit.

Preserved lemons bring an exotic flavour to simple salads, couscous, lentils or warmed olives, although their standout role is the piquant, lemony infusion they give to marinated meat. Preserved lemon and meat, are meant for each other especially when used in dishes, such as chicken tagine, marinated lamb, beef kebabs and fish dishes. They can also be used to flavour sweets, such as biscuits, cakes, macarons and ice cream. Use your imagination, but use it sparingly as their flavour and saltiness can be quite intense. If you find the lemons a little too salty, wash them before using them in your cooking.

Aside from their many uses, there is something nurturing about watching your lemons mature, a friend of mine said to me it’s f like watching a bottle of sea monkeys come to life, or a bud coming into flower. I think I’ll go with the flower thing, I’ve never been terribly fond of sea monkeys.

I choose unsprayed lemons because the skin of the lemon is used in cooking, rather than the flesh.. You will need about 5 to 6 small lemons with about 8 or so large lemons extra, used for juicing. Keep a few extra lemons on hand for topping up the bottle with juice a couple of days later as the lemons need to stay submerged in liquid while they mature. Use sea salt as this provides a better flavour than regular table salt. To preserve 5 to 6 lemons you will need a sterilised 1.2 litre jar.

5 to 6 small lemons, washed
8 larger lemons for juicing (to make about 500ml juice)

6 to 7 tbsp sea salt

2 cinnamon sticks

4 to 6 bay leaves

6 cardamom pods, just split

1 tsp black peppercorns

2 to 3 tbsp olive oil

Quarter the small lemons without cutting all the way through. Open up a lemon and sprinkle 2 teaspoons of salt inside. Close tightly and place in the sterilised jar, sprinkling with another teaspoon of salt. Repeat process with the remaining small lemons.

Cover the lemons in the jar with a round of baking paper. Squash down with a clean weight, such as a large stone wrapped in foil. Put the lid on and leave in a warm place for 2 to 3 days to let the juices run out.

Remove the weight and add the cinnamon, bay leaves, cardamom pods and peppercorns randomly through the jar. Top with the freshly squeezed lemon juice, covering the lemons entirely. Pour over the olive oil which acts as a seal. Top up with extra lemon juice after a few days if needed. Replace the lid and store in a cool, dark place for a few weeks.

To use, remove a lemon and rinse with water. Scrape out and discard the flesh, and use the finely chopped skin in your cooking. Once opened, store in the fridge for up to 6 months.

Moroccan Dressing

Use this dressing with grilled chicken or meat.

100ml extra virgin olive oil

40 to 60 ml of lemon juice

1 birdseye chilli, chopped

1 clove garlic, crushed

1-2 tbsp finely chopped preserved lemon

Whisk together all of the ingredients in a medium bowl. Adjust the lemon juice according to taste and season with salt and ground black pepper.

Strawberry Jam

One of my favourite things to do is to get along early to the Farmer's market on a Saturday morning and grab the freshest and best produce for the week.  There is something very special about that time at the market, there's a particular smell and a buzz, even the conversations with the stallholders is a little more relaxed at that time of the morning before the rush. 

I had gone along with a list of ingredients to buy for a dinner party and on my list were strawberries.  When I got to the strawberry farmer he offered me a large box of very ripe strawberries which I bought, and decided then and there to make strawberry jam.  While on a Strawberry theme I also made Strawberry Soup and Strawberry Salad.

Photo by Steve Shanahan

Strawberry Jam

1 large lemon

200ml water

1 kg strawberries, washed, hulled and chopped

zest from 1 small lemon

800g sugar

Thinly slice the large lemon, removing pips and simmer in water for 3-5 minutes. Remove slices, squeezing juice from each back into water and discard them. Add strawberries to water and bring to boil. When boiling rapdily, add sugar and zest and stir continuously till sugar has dissolved. Continue to boil, this took one and half hours, and when mixture thickens, (check this by putting a spoonful onto a saucer and running a finger through it and it should wrinkle) pour into sterilised jars and cap securely, then turn upside down till cool (this helps to keep an airtight seal).