Festive Season Food Diary

I'm always a bit bemused about the Christmas/Festive Season hysteria. And yes, it really is hysteria. Why people blindly buy in to it and put themselves through the ringer about this time of the year I just don't know. In our household we take a very laid back approach to the whole thing. For us, it's less about parting with large amounts of cash to buy "stuff" most people don't want, or putting pressure on yourself to cook what all the glossy mags or smug TV chefs tell you that you should be cooking - and more about having much valued time off work and enjoying each other's company. Usually we bypass the traditional Christmas palaver altogether, by heading off on our own somewhere quiet, and staying there till new year. The downside to this of course is that it tends to be expensive staying anywhere in December, and as we are currently in saving money mode, (to buy our longed for plot of nature in Tasmania) we stayed home this time around.

Instead, we headed up to the NSW Central Coast to enjoy a laid back Christmas Day with my in laws, Kate and Peter. I volunteered to cook the four of us Christmas lunch, and thought that I would take a "mystery box" approach to the cooking, bringing with us a selection of seasonal ingredients that I liked, and then making up a menu pretty much on the day. Until Christmas morning I wasn't 100% sure what I was cooking - I had a few ideas in my head - but I just ended up cooking according to the ingredients and my mood. The exception to this was the dessert, which I did make the day ahead. Having one of the courses already sorted made the rest quite easy. Only cooking for four people also helped a lot too of course, and I could focus on quality over quantity.

Kate had requested a fairly light menu, so I thought that seafood and a fruit based dessert were obvious choices. We have recently returned from Western Australia, and thanks to my Mum's boyfriend John, had been given some beautiful W.A Rock Lobsters that he had caught for us. These became the basis of the main course. We grabbed some fresh local prawns on Christmas eve from the local fish lady at Ettalong Beach, and along with an esky full of bits and pieces - and what was growing in Kate's garden, created our lunch menu.

First up was a bit of a take on the Prawn Cocktail, but with a salsa of home grown tomatoes, avocado, lime, chilli and herbs from the garden. As I was preparing this, I noticed a leftover bread roll from lunch the day before in the bread basket. I turned this into crispy, oven baked parmesan toast to serve on the side. It was tasty and gave a nice crunchy textural element to the entrée. I served the cocktails in insulated coffee glasses that I found in the cupboard. Great to keep the cocktails nice and cold.

Prawn Cocktail with Avocado Salsa

and Crispy Parmesan Toasts

Main course was based around that gorgeous W.A lobster. I didn't want to mess with it too much, so just sautéed it gently with a little butter, a touch of olive oil, salt, pepper and a small squeeze of lemon. I served this with grilled asparagus, a super velvety cauliflower puree spiked with a little cream, and Red Oak and Sorrel micro herbs. I drizzled the pan juices over the lobster just before serving. It was really delicious and a big hit with the family.

Sauteed W.A Lobster

with Cauliflower Puree, Asparagus and Micro Herbs

My do ahead dessert was based on mangoes and passionfruit, which are great at the moment. I made a passionfruit and mango mousse and layered it in a big bowl, with fresh mango and Savoiardi sponge fingers soaked in Limoncello (from New Zealand, that I had picked up at the Sydney Food and Wine Show last year.) I served the dessert with some fresh cherries and raspberries for a bit of a festive touch.

Mango and Passionfruit Mousse

with Italian Sponge and Limoncello

 

 

So that was Christmas day. Two days later, we ended up having what looked a lot like a traditional Christmas dinner when I decided to cook some free range, organic turkey breast that we had bought from our favourite meat supplier, Feather and Bone. I stuffed the turkey breast with some left over zucchini and parmesan stuffing I had in the freezer (I always do a big batch of stuffing when I make it and freeze some. Really worth doing, and it freezes very well) Served it with all the trimmings - vegetables, cauliflower and broccoli gratin and gravy -  and also invited friends over to share it with us. It was really delicious and made us all ponder why we don't eat turkey more often.

 

 Stuffed Turkey Breast

with all the trimmings

 

 

Andrew has been asking me for what feels like forever (years!) to a make pavlova, so I thought I would finally give it a try. I was a bit unsure about it, so consulted Stephanie Alexander's "The Cook's Companion" (aka "The Bible") to find out what to do. I was really thrilled with the result - crispy on the outside, marshmallow on the inside, just as it should be. Stephanie rules. I topped the pavlova with a vanilla cream, and more mangoes and passionfruit.

 

Stephanie Alexander's Classic Pavlova

Only down side to my pavlova success is that now I think I am going to have to add it to the regular cooking repertoire. Andrew loved it. I have an idea to do one with a salted caramel and fresh fig topping at some stage.

Ready to eat - Summer Pavlova

Now, I really hate wasting food, and I am the queen of recycling ingredients and turning leftovers into another meal. After our turkey dinner, we had turkey and some of the cauliflower and broccoli gratin left, so I turned it into brunch the next day - made into fritters with the addition of sweet corn and herbs from the garden. Served with a quick tomato salsa and a spoon full of light sour cream, it made a lovely tasty summer dish.

Turkey and Corn Fritters

with Tomato Salsa

So that is what I have been cooking and eating over the festive season. There is a whole lot of really wonderful produce in season at the moment, and I would encourage you all to enjoy it while you can. The season will be over before you know it. My favourites are stone fruit, berries, cherries, mangoes and fresh pineapple - and seafood of course.

New Year's Eve is only a few days away, and we have a tradition of ringing in the new year by having dinner at Restaurant Atelier, our favourite local eatery and an exceptional place to dine. This year will be a little sad as the evening of 31 December will be their last service ever, after over a decade of consistently serving magnificent food and wine. This restaurant is very special to us, as they have shared in so many celebrations and great meals - we even visited on the night before we were married. We will be sitting at our favourite table on New Year's Eve and raising a toast to Chef Darren Templeman and his wife, Maitre d' and Sommelier extraordinaire Bernadette in gratitude for the amazing meals and evenings we have spent at Atelier. They will be sorely missed. Word is, they may be heading south to Melbourne. Lucky Melbourne!

I wish all of my Gourmet Goddess readers a very happy, healthy and delicious 2014. May it bring you all of the good things.

Me, enjoying a swim in the rain on Christmas Day,

 while everyone else was having a nap

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Glazed Quince Ham with Cherry Relish

Christmas is fast approaching and although there is usually lots to be done cooking and entertaining wise at this time of the year, this festive season I'm not lifting a finger. Because our household doesn't really celebrate Christmas (Summer Solstice for us!) Andrew and I have decided to pack our bags and spend the Christmas break by ourselves on the beautiful South Coast of NSW. We will be spending 7 glorious days by the sea at Bannister's Resort in Mollymook - which as luck would have it, also houses Rick Stein's famous seafood restaurant.

I have always admired Rick Stein's no nonsense approach to food and his love for seafood in particular. It is going to be a real treat to see what his restaurant has to offer while we are away. I have been keeping my eye on the menu online and it all looks great. We have also made a booking for dinner during our stay, so we get both the lunch and dinner experience. I will be sure to take notes and photos for a review on my return.

In the meantime, I thought that I would prepare a very simple Christmas style dish for those of you who are actually cooking Christmas lunch this year. It is incredibly simple and really delicious - a ham baked with a beautiful fragrant quince glaze and served with a lip smacking cherry relish. I used a very small ham for this, as I was only cooking for two - if you are using a big one, I would make double or triple the amount of glaze to be sure that you have enough. Same goes for the cherry relish. If you aren't a ham fan, you could just make the relish and it will go beautifully with turkey, chicken or roast pork.

The cherry relish uses dried cherries that have a lovely rich flavour. They are sometimes labelled "sour dried cherries". Any store or market that stocks dried fruit should have them. For those in Sydney, I bought mine at Addison Road Organic Market in Marrickville. The quince glaze uses quince jam that I buy from a middle eastern grocer. If you can't find this, a good substitute would be quince paste that has been warmed in the microwave. If you can't locate either, just use apricot jam.

A baked ham is a really fabulous stand by if you need something that is easy, looks great and can feed a lot of people easily. A beautifully glazed ham served with crusty rolls and a generous selection of condiments is a real crowd pleaser. Fabulous party food that frees up the host but is still generous and sustantial.

Ham with Quince Glaze

and Cherry Relish

 

You will need:

(for the ham) 1 small to medium sized ham, 2 tablespoons quince jam, 2 tablespoons brown sugar, 1 Tablespoon Dijon mustard, 1 tablespoon port, pinch of salt, pinch cayenne pepper, black pepper.

(for the cherry relish) 2 cups dried cherries, 2 large red onions, 1 tablespoon salted butter, 1 cup caster sugar, 1 cinnamon stick (or a couple of pieces of cinnamon bark), 1 tablespoon sherry, salt and pepper.

Method: Begin with making the relish - you may prefer to make this a day or two ahead if you want to. Soak the cherries in hot water for about half an hour. Drain them and set aside.

Chop the onions into thin slices. In a pan, melt the butter and cook the onions on a low to medium heat until they soften and are semi transparent. The aim is to cook them gently, so they become soft and sweet. Do not brown them.

Add the drained cherries and the cinnamon. Combine and cook for about 5 minutes. Add the sugar and season with salt and a generous amount of pepper. Allow to simmer, stirring often for about 10 minutes. The mixture will turn to the consistency of jam. Add the sherry and mix well. Keep stirring as it bubbles up and simmer for another few minutes.

Allow the relish to cool before removing the cinnamon and transferring to an airtight container or a small sterilised jar.

Now to the ham - preheat the oven to 200C.

Combine the quince jam, Dijon mustard, brown sugar, port, salt, pepper and cayenne in a small bowl with a teaspoon of warm water. Mix well.

If you are using a ham that has skin on it, gently peel the skin off and discard it. Cut a criss cross pattern into the exposed fat. (You may choose to do the traditional thing here and press a clove into the centre of each diamond shape)

If you are using a smaller, skinless and boneless ham like I did, all you have to do is make sure any string/packaging is removed and pat it dry with a paper towel.

Brush the ham all over with the glaze. Bake in the oven for 15 minutes. Re glaze every 10 minutes or so until it is golden and caramelised on the top and warmed completely through. Remember that ham is already cured, so you do not need to actually "cook" it as such. You just need to heat it. A large ham can take up to an hour to glaze and cook through - mine only took about 25 minutes as it was very small.

Allow the ham to rest for 10- 20 minutes before slicing and serving with cherry relish on the side. After the ham has been glazed, it is also great served cold.

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Christmas 2010

Merry Christmas everyone! I've just woken up from the mandatory post Christmas lunch nap (2 hours is still just a nap, right?!) and thought I would get in early with posting the pics and the menu from our lunch today. With this being the first Christmas that I have had with Andrew and my lovely inlaws Kate and Peter, I wanted to do something special and a little luxurious. Degustation was the obvious choice, offering variety and the chance to use a great selection of the wonderful seasonal produce availabe right now. So, here is my Christmas menu for 2010....

The Christmas table -

and my first hand at flower arranging!

No celebration is complete without bubbles, so we started with a bottle of Moet & Chandon Champagne, served with a starter of Pacific Oysters with a blood plum and chive dressing.

Next was handmade Prawn and Scallop Ravioli which I served with sauteed asparagus and a butter sauce. To make it something super luxurious, I topped the dish with a sprinkling of Tetsuya Wakuda's truffle salt - you can't get more luxurious than flecks of gorgeous aromatic Italian truffle to take a dish to another level.

The third dish was a salad of pan seared quail breast which I had marinated for 24hrs in olive oil, lemon verbena from our garden, bay leaf, garlic and juniper berries. The quail was cooked quickly over a high heat to create a dark crust and was served with baby spinach, ruby grapefruit and a citrus dressing.

Course number four was twice cooked pork belly with a decadent creamy cauliflower and potato puree which I flavoured with parmesan and a sinful amount of butter and a splash of cream. Instead of a traditional gravy, I made a salsa verde of fresh herbs, adding plently of capers, lemon and a touch of anchovy. The pork went through two cooking processes - the first the day before serving - when it was poached in a broth which included fennel seeds, lots of onions, parsley, garlic, black and white peppercorns, lemon rind and lemon thyme. After poaching, I allowed the pork belly to drain and dry out a little, before scoring the skin and putting it in the fridge ready for process two. Step two was easy - I just rubbed the skin with olive oil and plenty of salt and cooked the pork over coals (I used a coal BBQ with a lid) until it was succulent and the crackling puffy and golden. I basted the pork a few times during cooking and allowed it to rest for 10 minutes before carving it.

And for the finale? A creamy white chocolate, pistachio and morello cherry semi freddo which I served with fresh cherries and Persian fairy floss. A frozen dessert is a great option, not just because everyone loves icecream, but also for it's versatility and the bonus of being able to make it the day or even a week ahead. It really frees you up in the kitchen and you have a sophisticated dessert in minutes - no last minute fussing. I chose the sour morello variety of cherries for this dessert, to balance the rich sweetness of the white chocolate. Serving the semi freddo with fresh cherries and delectable Persian fairy floss added new textures and flavours to make this dessert something out of the ordinary.

We all really loved our first Christmas together and I was happy with how the menu panned out - you will recall that I was having trouble settling on what to cook right up until a day or so ago! To drink, we enjoyed a few of bottles of Moet & Chandon champagne and Italian sparkling mineral water. With people having to drive home, wine matching was out of the question - but if you are going to have a celebratory drink, why not make it French fizz? After all, it's bloody Christmas!


And look what I got!!

Both volumes of Julia Child's iconic culinary classic - "Mastering the Art of French Cooking". I think I see more French dishes in my future! The books are chock full of fantastic French recipes that take me back to earlier in the year when I had the privilage of visiting Paris, attending cooking class in Montmarte and sampling the delights of French cuisine. Right now, I'm planning on doing a bit of holiday reading with Julia!

Well, that was Christmas 2010 - hope that yours was fabulous and that it involved plenty of laughter and tasty morsels. Now I'm off to fossick around for leftovers. I'm sure there is more of that pork belly in the fridge somewhere....... Bon appetit!

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