Pan fried Bream on chilli and chorizo risotto

Last weekend I catered for a party in the Costwolds and on my way there I decided to give Stroud market a go and see how much of my ingredients I could get from it. Well it turns out Stroud market is a bit good and I managed to get most of my ingredients from Gilt headed bream to various cured meats and locally produced cheeses. I liked it so much that I got some ingredients for myself and here's what I did with them.

Fillet of bream on a chilli and chorizo risotto with beer battered scallops and balsamic reduction

Ingredients: (serves 2)
1 whole bream scaled and gutted
8 scallops (roe removed)
1 cup of risotto rice
Splash of white wine
1 pint of fish stock (or cube, see below if you want to make your own)
10 slices of chilli and garlic chorizo
1/2 red onion finely diced
1/2 green chilli finely chopped (seeds removed)
1/2 green pepper sliced
3 garlic gloves finely chopped or through a garlic crusher
1 knob of butter
Beer batter (lager mixed with self raising flour-the consistency should be thick enough to cover the back of a spoon)
1/2 pint of vegetable oil
Balsamic reduction
Salt and pepper for seasoning.

Method
First remove the two fillets from the bream. You can ask your fish monger to do this for you but ask for the carcass if you want to make your own stock. To make a fish stock fill a pan with cold water add the fish and any root vegetables you have to hand, a few garlic cloves and fresh parsley if you have any. Slowly bring the pan up to simmering point and simmer very gently for about an hour. Strain this through a very fine sieve or muslin cloth if you have one. To get perfectly clear fish stock freeze it then defrost it through a muslin cloth.
To make the risotto firstly fry the slices of chorizo with a little olive oil then add the rice making sure that each grain get covered in the olive/chorizo oil. Then add the onions, garlic, chilli, pepper and white wine. Simmer the wine so it burns off it's alcohol. Pour in the fish stock and let it simmer, when the rice is cooked add the butter, season and set aside with a lid on it. Dip the scallops in flour then into the batter, in a sauce pan carefully heat up some vegetable oil. Season the fillets of bream and heat up some butter and olive oil in a frying  pan. When it's bubbling cook the bream, skin side up first. Cook for about 2 minutes on each side spooning the oil from the pan over the fillets as you cook them. As they are cooking test the heat of the vegetable oil by dropping a bit of the batter in, if it starts bubbling then it's ready. Cook the scallops for about a minute then drain on kitchen paper. To plate I used a circular cake cutter for the risotto, then placed the fillet on it, poured some balsamic reduction around the risotto and placed the scallops on that, as you can see from the photo! Give it a go and bon appetit!

Wiltshire food producers - Bush Farm Bison Centre

Local food producers are my heroes. It takes a lot of effort and determination to get a product out into the market when all the big corporations are swamping us with their cheap deals and special offers. (A short rant which is now over).
I recently paid a visit to Bush Farm Bison centre in Wiltshire (http://www.bisonfarm.co.uk/index.htm) where I met the very friendly and informative Colin Seaford and his wife Pepe. Colin has had an interest in Bison since a young age and now has over 74 on his secluded farm that is open to the public in the summer months. They also have elk, red deer and prairie dogs!

One of Colin's impressive Bison

Bison are big, big and fast. They are built more like a horse than cattle and on a sprint start they can out run a  horse. All the Bison were in from the fields kept in yards sorted by age, I was a little bit nervous when Colin suggested we go into one of the yards to get a better look. We toured round 3 different yards the last one containing the biggest Bison (not that my back catalogue of Bison is that big - my dad and I crept quite close to one to get a picture in Yellowstone Park in the US). He was massive towering over the rest of the Bison and apparently weighed in at over a ton. 'He's alright' said Colin 'but I wouldn't trust him. She's a nice Bison I can get quite close to her' pointing out a rather impressive female, 'That one however, I would trust her at all, she once chased me on my quad bike out of a field. She was gaining so much ground on me that when I got to the gate I had to jump off the bike straight over it!' Bison aren't for milking then? 'Why would you want to get near an armed animal?' Wise words indeed.

The one not to trust!

One thing Colin was adamant about is that Bison meat does not fall under the 'exotic meats' category. Bison once roamed all over Europe and when Britain became an island they were hunted to extinction. The meat itself has a sweeter flavour than beef, it's not gamey or wild tasting. Bison carry very little fat and the meat has no marbling unlike beef or lamb, it is very high in protein and lower in fat, cholesterol and calories than most other meats. With less than 50 calories per ounce Bison meat has been used by several weight loss programmes.

I came away with two sirloin steaks and really wanted to do them justice and rather than have steak and chips. So after racking my brain I came up with a dish that would compliment the Bison.  

Sirloin of Bison

The Bison meat doesn't take much cooking and we had ours rare. I served it on sweet potato mash with wilted spinach, caramelized baby beetroot, oven roasted baby carrots, parsnip crisps and a red wine and redcurrant jus. It was without doubt one of the tastiest steaks I've ever had (on par with kangaroo fillet) and now I'm a big fan. I would definitely recommend a trip to Bush Farm Bison centre and whilst you're there get some meat. All purchases come with a leaflet with Bison cooking tips and some information about the animals, their sirloin is so good that it won the Guild of fine foods three star award in 2011 and 2012. Just don't get too close to the Bison!

Private dining - a selection of starters

Some of our most popular starters, bespoke menus are designed for each and every function

• Malaysian style squid satay with chilli sauce
• Wiltshire goat's cheese tart with red pepper confit
• Smoked mackerel and horseradish parfait with melba toast
• Pan seared scallops in their own shell with a chive cream glaze
• Chicken liver and port pate with melba toast
• Warm salad of black pudding with smoked bacon and poached egg
• Seared pigeon breast with garlic croutons and raspberry vinaigrette
• Thai style chicken satay with a spicy coconut and peanut dip
• Tempura king prawn tails with a pineapple and coriander jam
• Salmon and coriander fish cakes with sweet chilli sauce
• Rope grown Scottish mussels steamed open in a garlic and white wine cream
• Classic Caesar salad with parmesan croutons
• Cornish crab and lobster salad with vegetable juliennes, coriander, chilli and lime dressing.

Email us to discuss your requirements

Steak night!

Steak night in our house is my favourite night, and pretty much whenever we eat out I'll order steak. You can always tell how good a chef is by how well their steak is cooked (I don't mean well done!). Everyone has their favourite cut of steak, mine is rib-eye. Here's a quick guide to the different cuts of steaks:

Fillet: The prime cut of steak and the most expensive! Slightly over rated in my opinion. It has very little fat and is very tender, used in dishes like Beef Wellington and for the cuts known as Tournedos and the famous Chateaubriand.

Rib eye (or Scotch fillet to my antipodien friends) : My favourite cut of steak, it rivals the rump steak for flavour. The 'eye' of fat in the steak helps to maximise the flavour when cooking.

Sirloin: Spoiler alert!....It was never knighted by an English king! Not the most tender of steaks but it still packs a punch in terms of flavour. A whole strip loin is also great for roasting.

T-bone: For some the T-bone steak is the best of the lot (especially dogs and cats in cartoons!). It has on the one side of the T bone some fillet steak and on the other some sirloin. Cooking food on the bone in my view always enhances the flavour.

Rump steak: The unsung hero of steaks due to it's great flavour and being the least expensive cut. It needs to be cooked quickly as it can become quite tough.

Beef needs to be 'hung' on the bone for at least 28 days good quality butchers would have hung their meat for this long. Most super markets hang theirs for 18 to 21 days. The hanging process really helps to let the flavour of the meat mature gaining greater flavour as it does so. An easy way of seeing how long the meat has been hung is to look at the colour. It the steak is a light red then it hasn't been hung very long. If it's dark red then it has! When buying a steak you want to get one that has a light marbling of fat through it (little specks of fat) this really helps to enhance the flavour during the cooking process.    

Cooking process
Steaks are best cooked at room temperature, if they're cooked when they are cold the proteins in the meat tense up causing the steak to become tough. Take the steak out of the fridge a few hours before cooking to get it to room temperature. Just before you are about to cook the steak brush it with olive oil and season well. Get your griddle or frying pan very hot and begin cooking the steak to your liking, here's some timings to get your steak to how you like it (for a steak that's about 2cm thick) :

Blue: 1 minute each side
Rare: 1 1/2 minutes each side
Medium rare: 2 1/4 minutes each side
Medium-well done: 2 1/2 - 3 minutes each side

When you steak is cooked to how you like it it is important to let it rest for at least 3 minutes to let the juices that have been drawn to the surface to relax back into the meat. I like to serve my steaks with at least one type of veg and homemade game chips-super skinny ones. I also like to top it with a baked field mushroom filled with Stilton, but that's up to you!

8oz Rib Eye steak, with garlic green beans, game chips and Stilton stuffed mushroom.

Pumpkin time!

It's that time of year again super markets are bursting with pumpkins. While most people carve scary faces and put a candle in them there are plenty of ways to cook with them. From pumpkin pie to pumpkin risotto the possibilities are endless. We had a carving competition in our house (I think I won) and had lots of left over pumpkin 'guts'. Rather than throw it in the bin a quick sift through results in a lot of pumpkin seeds. Keep a few back for the garden next year and put the rest on a baking tray drizzle with olive oil and sea salt. Slow roast them at 100C for an hour stirring them as you go and the results are divine. Eat them as a quick snack or sprinkle them over salads.

Slow roasted pumpkin seeds with olive oil and sea salt

Tonight is roast chicken night in our house, I always roast our chickens in a tagine pot it helps to keep the chicken moist and you can add vegetables into the tagine to cook along with the chicken. Tonight I tried chilli pumpkin in the tagine and whenever they are in season we are having them in our roast! Here's how I did it:

Serves 4
Ingredients
1/2 pumpkin skinned and cut into cubes
4 garlic cloves finely chopped
1 red chilli seeded and sliced
1 tsp paprika
Salt and pepper
Splash of olive oil

Method
Put all of the ingredients into a bowl and mix well, when the chicken has been cooking for about 20 minutes add the pumpkin to the tagine cover and cook for a further 45 minutes. If you don't have a tagine use whatever you are cooking your chicken in and cover it with foil. The added bonus of cooking the pumpkin in with the chicken is that as it cooks the pumpkin will soak up all the chicken juices. After 45 minutes has passed remove the tagine's lid or foil, turn up the oven a bit and cook for another 15 minutes to crisp up the pumpkin and chicken skin. Serve with your choice of vegetables and gravy and enjoy!

Roast chicken with goose fat roasted potatoes, steamed broccoli and chilli roasted pumpkin 

Oriental style duck pancakes

As I've mentioned before growing up in Hong Kong really gave me a passion for Chinese food, both cooking and eating it. As a pub chef I often used to put on themed nights and Oriental night was always very popular both with the customers and my brigade of chefs in the kitchen.
These duck leg pancakes are a version of the great Peking Duck, you can opt to use a whole duck (if your feeding a few people!) or duck legs as I've done here. Another option is to buy the Oriental pancakes but if you prefer to give making them a go it's really simple.

Ingredients (serves 2 people)
2 large duck legs
180g Goose fat
2 tbsp honey dissolved in warm water
Sweet chilli sauce
Hoi sin sauce
1/2 cucumber sliced finely
8 spring onions sliced finely
For the pancakes:
225g plain flour
155ml boiling water
1 tsp vegetable oil
Roasted sesame oil

Method
Place the duck legs on a wire rack over a plate or baking dish and pour boiling water over them to tighten the skin. While the duck legs are still warm brush them with the honey and water solution and leave to stand in a cool and airy place for at least 6 hours or over night in a fridge.
Heat some oil in a frying pan and seal the duck legs. Place them in a roasting tray skin side down with the goose fat, cover with foil and roast in an oven at 150C after an hour turn the legs over, cover with foil and roast for another hour.
As this is going on it's time to prepare the pancakes. Sift the flour into a bowl, slowly pour in the boiling water, then add the vegetable oil and knead into a firm dough. over with a damp tea towel and set aside for 30 mins. Turn the dough onto a floured surface and knead for 10 mins or until it becomes smooth. Divide the dough into equal sized balls, the picture below will give you a rough idea of how big.

Dough balls ready

Press the dough balls with the palm of your hand into a flat disc. Brush one disc with a little sesame oil and put another disc on top. Using a rolling pin flatten each pair of discs into a 15cm pancake. Heat an ungreased  wok or frying pan over a high heat, then reduce the heat to low and put the pairs of pancakes (one at a time) into the pan. When brown spots start to appear flip them over and cook the other side.

Pancakes cooking

When the second side is cooked lift the pancakes out and carefully peel them apart (they will be HOT!). Fold each pancake in half with the cooked side facing inwards and set aside under a damp cloth. 

Just before serving steam the pancakes for about 10 mins. When the duck legs are cooked heat the oven up to 220C take off the foil and cook for a further 5 mins to crisp up the skin. Take them out of the oven and place them on a wire rack.

Crispy duck legs!

When the legs have had a minute or two to cool a bit shred them with a fork, serve with the pancakes, spring onion, cucumber, sweet chilli and Hoi sin sauce and enjoy! Man man chi!

My most popular lamb dish

As the Wiltshire chef I do a lot of fine dinning dinner parties in peoples homes. Needless to say the host always wants to 'wow' their guests with the food, the most popular main course dish is Rack of lamb with a goat's cheese and rosemary crust served on dauphinoise potatoes with a redcurrant and port jus. A bit of a mouthful (no pun intended) I know but below I'll talk you through each step.

 Ingredients (serves 4)
4 x 3 bone rack of lamb
Dijon mustard
2 x slices white bread
1 x sprig of rosemary
2 x slices goat's cheese
4 x maris piper potatoes
1/2 x sliced onion
1/2 pint double cream
1 x garlic glove crushed
2 x shots of port
2 x tbl spoons of redcurrant jelly
1 x pint quality beef stock (thickened)

Rack of lamb with a goat's cheese and rosemary crust

Method

Firstly ensure there are no bits of meat left on the exposed bones by scraping them off with a knife. Then seal the racks in a hot frying pan ensuring all of the lamb is seared on the outside. In a food processor blitz together the rosemary (taken off the stalk), bread (tear it up, makes things easier), goat's cheese and seasoning. Brush the side of the rack opposite the the bones with the Dijon mustard then press the processed mixture onto the mustard and ensure it sticks. Roast the racks in an oven at 220 C for 15 minutes (serve pink, if you don't like pink meat then roast them for a further 5 minutes).

To make the dauphinoise potatoes peel and thinly slice the potatoes. Fry the sliced onions in a little olive oil (keep some back for the sauce) for a minute then add the garlic and double cream add the potatoes and bake in an oven proof dish at 220 C for half an hour or until a knife slides though the potatoes. 

To make the sauce (or jus if you want to sound like a pro!) heat some olive oil in a sauce pan then fry the onions for a minute then add the port (careful it might ignite!) and let it simmer for a minute to burn off the alcohol, add the redcurrant jelly, beef stock and the stalk from the rosemary and simmer. Reduce by a third and strain through a sieve into another sauce pan. 

When I cook this meal I would prep the lamb first, then make and cook the potato. Then I would make the sauce and finally roast the lamb. When plating up I use a circular cake cutter in the center of a plate and fill it with the potatoes. Then I would cut the lamb in half and place it on the potatoes and spoon the sauce around the potatoes. I normally serve it with purple sprouting broccoli and garnish it with a sprig of rosemary or thyme. Good luck and have fun!