Recipe of the week - Tarts

Hello food.....

 

These are really good to have as a starter, or just as little snacks. You can make a supply and have them as canapés. The beauty of these is that you can literally put any flavour you want. I’m putting onions and thyme, but the rest of the mixture is a base. So put anything to replace the onions and thyme and you have a custom tart!

 

Baking What do I need? 2 Portions of Shortcrust Pastry 10g Butter 2 White Onions 10g Thyme 100ml Double Cream 1 Egg 30g Parmesan Salt and Pepper   How do I do it? 1. Roll pastry out and cut into small discs. 2. Place in greased ‘fairy cake’ moulds. Tart bases 3. Place baking beads on the pastry and back for 10 minutes at Gas Mark 5 (180˚ c) until dry. 4. Meanwhile melt butter in frying pan and slice onions thinly. 5. Cook onions and thyme in butter with a sprinkle of salt until onions are softened. 6. Place onions in pastry mould. 7. Whisk together cream, egg, salt, pepper and parmesan until smooth. 8. Pour over onion in pastry mould. 9. Place in oven at gas Mark 7 (220˚c) for 10-15 minutes, until golden brown on top. 10.You can eat straight away, or cool them and eat later, and then heat them up again if wanted. Make sure they are thoroughly cooked through if you reheat them though!

Jess's Messes - The Cookbook

Hello food.....

The Cookbook

Jess's Messes - The Cookbook is complete!

I have one copy on the way to me as I type this, I can look through it, check all is fine and then it is free for you guys to get a copy of!

Here is the current front cover, but I will put a picture of the actual book when I recieve it and you can see if it's the book for you! :)

Thanks everyone for all your support and recipe requests!

Love Jess
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Ravishing Red Onion Marmalade - Recipe of the week

Sticky, tangy, heaven in a jar!

Hello food.....

After the success of the hampers, I have had a few people ask me for the 'Ravishing Red Onion Marmalade' recipe, therefore I thought it would be miles easier to put it on here! If you like cheese (and let's be honest, which sane person doesn't?) then this is perfection on toast with it! It's so easy to make also. Cut things up, measure things out, put in pan, leave to cook, cool, eat!

Ingredients

1 Clove Garlic

1 Stick Lemongrass

10g Fresh Ginger

2 Red Chillies

10 Red Onions

1 Orange (zest)

1Lemon (zest)

1 Lime (zest

Put things in pan

      1 Cinnamon Stick

750ml Red Wine

500ml Balsamic Vinegar

500g Dark Brown Sugar

Method

1.      Finely chop garlic, ginger, chillies and slice red onions. Bash lemongrass with rolling pin. Place all in a heavy based pan.

2.      Grate zest of orange, lemon and lime into pan.

3.      Add cinnamon, red wine, balsamic vinegar and sugar.

4.      Heat slowly and stir occasionally until all has melted down together and made a lovely gooey marmalade.

More things in pan

5.      Place in jars and keep in fridge until ready to use.

Sorry!

Hello food.....

I apologise for my lack of action on here recently! I am returning as of now with many photos, food stories and recipes!

Recipe of the Week - Chocolate Orange Fondant

Hello food.....

Fondant time!

Le Fondant du Chocolat et Orange

This recipe is another that was made during DriveWorks Masterchef, but as it went down well I thought it would be a good one to share.

People seem to think that fondants are hard to create - but as long as you give the mixture enough time to set (which we didn't in DriveWorks Masterchef) then it will be perfection on toast!

Ingredients

• 150g Unsalted Butter
• 25g Cocoa Powder
• 150g Dark Chocolate
• 1 Orange (zest and juice)
• 3 Eggs
• 3 Egg Yolks
• 180g Caster Sugar
• 150g Plain Flour

Method

 1.Melt together the chocolate and the butter in a glass bowl over a pan of boiling water (make sure the bowl doesn’t touch the water - otherwise DISASTER)!
2.Whisk together eggs, egg yolks and sugar until pale and thick.
3.Sift in the flour and cocoa powder and fold in.
4.Add the orange juice, zest and chocolate mix and make sure nicely combined.
5.Leave in fridge to set enough that you can roll it into lovely little balls - almost doughlike.
6.Grease ramekins with butter and dust with icing sugar. Place in small ball of fondant mix.
7.Cook at 190˚c/Gas Mark 5 ½ for 9 minutes.
8. Serve with Unctuous, creamy custard (you'll have to come back next week to see this recipe!)

Enjoy!!

Cak Fail

Hello food.....

I made cake for work's 11th birthday! It may have tasted ok - I am not a decorator by trade, utter Cak Fail!

Why I just do the cooking!

A Curious Creation - Sweet Potato and Coriander Gnocchi

Hello food.....

A Curious Creation

So after discovering how easy it was to make gnocchi last week in DriveWorks Masterchef, it was time to get interesting with flavours. I've been reading the flavour thesaurus and has decided to do a sweet potato and gnocchi combination, then it struck me - do it with gnocchi. Then I didn't know how else to make it - wanted to include some chilli because of my love for coriander and chilli in curries, then i remembered how feta cheese works with chilli. I was scared too many flavours were being added, but then reasoned Gnocchi and Feta = mediterranean, Chilli and Coriander = asian, so it was onyl 2 cusines really. I think it was pretty successful! I'll be having it for my lunch tomorrow anyway..... :)

Semolina, Flour, Coriander

Ingredients

3 Sweet Potatoes
175g Plain Flour
75g Semolina
15g Fresh Coriander

1 White Onion
1 Lemongrass Stalk
1 Red Chilli
2cm cube Ginger

The dough

10ml Sesame Oil
10ml Fish Sauce
2 Pak Choi
1 Green Pepper
200g Feta Cheese
1 Lime
15g Fresh Coriander

Method

1.  Make the Gnocchi - boil the peeled and chopped sweet potatoes until soft enough to mash.
2. Combine with flour, semolina and coriander and make into a soft dough.
3. Shape into small 1cm spheres and press with fork. 
4. Boil pan of water and place gnocchi in, heat rapidly until gnocchi rise to surface then drain and place in baking tray.
5. Finely chop - onion, ginger, chilli and bash lemongrass. Fry in sesame oil then add fish sauce.
6. Add pak choi and green pepper and cook until softened.
7. Add mix to gnocchi, sprinkle over feta cheese, squeeze the juice of the lime over and mix well.
8. Place in the oven at Gas Mark 6/ 200 degrees celcius for about 10 minutes.
9. When out the oven finely chop and sprinkle the reaming coriander over.



Don't make them this big

10. Serve.  

Let me know what you think via the Jess's Messes Facebook page!

Any other gnocchi ideas you'd like me to experiment with first - just let me know!

Ready

Thank you lovely people for reading!!

The finished product

xxxxx