jackal10

Not just wedding cake, but also Christmas cake, birthdays and anniversaries. Simnel cake at Easter (strictly Mothering Sunday) has marzipan on top and inside, and can also have glace apricots ob top. I think Simnel cake is one of the finest. You might be thinking of a Dundee cake (almonds on top) or a Genoa (Florentine mixture on top). FItzbillies make some of the finest fruit cakes in the known universe: http://www.fitzbillies.co.uk/v2/index.php

I'm sorry. I want none of this light citrusy fresh fruit nonsense. Fruit cake has to have dried vine fruit - rasins, currants, sultanas. It should also be brown, and gently spiced. Candied peel is optional, as are nuts - leave them out for me. However I do like Marzipan, either as icing, or in the middle, as in a Simnel cake or a Stollen. If you want it light make a hot fruit cake flavoured souffle, but don't serve it with tea, honey scones and cucumber sandwiches at four o'clock (although that might give you a riff for plating)

Modern Daube Pt 2 (Warning; my plating is poor, but I hope it conveys the idea) The meat: cooked sous-vide for 8 hours at 75C, then cooled and reheated Also carrots (a bit big), poached, and smoked bacon julienne fried off, The ramekin with the pastry brush has garlic and parsley puree, as a take on a persillade Spaghetti squash, a low carb play on pasta Onions roasted in the bacon fat Wine sauce: Wine reduced to half, demi-glace, reduced again to a syrup. Note the clarity. The whole put together Cooking each component separately allows for much greater precision. For example it would be hard to get the sauce that clear and intense conventionally.

Modern style home cooked Daube Part 1 Nothing is critical in this recipe 500g stewing beef (this is chuck from a local organic Dexter) 150ml drinkable wine (Australian Cabernet/Merlot blend) Aromatics (garlic, bay thyme) Reduce the wine with the aromatics to half Cube the meat (trimmings to the stock pot). Seal in a sous vide bag (home version: food saver) Cook at about 75C/175F for anything from 8 hours to overnight. When cooked, since its effectively canned, you can store the sealed bag in a fridge or freezer. Meantime prepare some demiglace, starting with stock from roasted bones and veg, which is covered elsewhere on eG If you were in a restaurant this would be on hand; at home you may be able to buy it from a good supermarket. Back tomorrow for the rest of the story.

I wish some real French experts would reply... A ragout to me although a stew, is more of a thick sauce, often with the meat minced or finely chopped and strongly seasoned. For example a Bolognaise sauce is a ragout. An old term, derived from old French "ragouster", meaning to revive the appetite, in turn from the Latin for taste.

I'm not French but to me a pot au feu is basically soup and does not have wine as a major component, The meat is usually in one piece, and served as separate dishes, - soup and the meat, even at separate meals. The soup is the glory of the pot au feu, with the meat, the boulli, almost an afterthought and used up in various dishes, such as salads, miroton, rissoles and croquettes A daube is a wine based braising liquid and the meat is in cubes or rectangles, say 2 inch x 2 inch x 0,5 inch, where the meat is the main point, and the liquid reduced to a sauce

Freeze the liquid first and add it frozen

The key characteristic is long slow cooking in a wine flavoured sauce, If the wine is Burgundy is a Bourguigonne, otherwise its a Daube. Pretty much everything else is up to the cook. Its a rustic dish originally, and I guess everything went into the pot that was available.

I like the recipes in Elizabeth David's French Provincial cooking, She gives both a classic Provencal version, and a Creole version with Olives and rum instead of wine. In modern restaurant cooking you are likely to get a travesty, with all the components cooked separately. There are several components of the dish: a. The meat Traditionally, but not necessarily beef. Ideally it should be a stewing cut, such as top rump, so that the long slow cooking converts the collagen into melting tenderness; a roasting cut would just fall apart. It can be whole or in cubes or rectangles. In modern practice this might be cooked sous vide, and since its not cooked long enough to gelatanise, could be steak. b) The juice: Reduced wine, and good stock, Some pork rind adds additional gelatin. c) Aromatics: Much choice: Some of bouquet garni, Thyme, rosemary, bay, onions, carrot, celery, garlic, parsley stalk, tomatoes, olives. dry orange or lemon rind d) Garnishes: Bacon cut into matchsticks and pearl onions browned, persillade of finely chopped garlic and parsley. Traditional mehod: Put everything except the garnish into a pot or saucepan, and barley simmer for anything from 2 to 8 hours; remove the boquet garni and any tired veg, defat the sauce and add garnish. Eat with pasta, good bread and wine and maybe a plain salad. Even better reheated next day. Modern restaurant way: Cook the meat sous vide with the aromatics If you are using stewing meat cook at 75C for 12 hours; for steak at 57C for an hour. Make a sauce separately, with wine reduced to syrup and demi-glace, more aromatics Prepare brunoise of vegetables (carrot, tomato, celery etc) Prepare garnish (bacon, pearl onions browned, persillade) At service hot assemble...

Make biffins: Put them whole is a really low (plate warming) oven at about 90C for 24 hours; you are really part drying them rather than cooking - concentrates the flavour and they end up creamy, like custard. A Victorian delicacy

Saint perhaps?

Yes, it will freeze

Freedom = fries? (corn shapes)

http://www.naturally-yours.co.uk/ http://solstice.co.uk/

Corn can be sweet, and is a precusor for corn syrup. Maybe 5 corn based dishes: Popcorn (e.g. butterscotch) Corn pancakes with thyme honey or corn souffle Corn pudding/Indian pudding Sweet polenta/grits/creamed corn Corn flakes/chocolate clusters with corn liquor...

Turkey broth with lots of diced veg If you are upmarket you can make a sophisticated version as a clarified consomme, with sherry, and a nice garnish - maybe a royale or cubes of butternut custard, or julienne... On Consomme: http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=26540 Big list of consomme names: http://www.egullet.com/imgs/egci/consomme/consommenames.html Consomme Esterel seems suitable

Bravo! I still don't understand why stove manufacturers don't include something like this as standard. The ability to hold low temperatures precisely for extended periods is important for many cooking processes, not just sous vide, but also sauces, egg cookery, bread proving, confit, canning in addition to the ones you mentioned, The additional cost is small, and the range of things it enables is large. Any stove manufacturers listening out there?

Camdan: Welcome to eG (and Emma)! Jon: Since the College was founded in 1584 http://www.emma.cam.ac.uk/about/origins/ I imagine Jane Austin named her heroine after it, rather than the other way round. Mark: The ducks are fellows of the college, since they walk on the grass. Eating them would be unthinkable. More seriously it shows that college catering can be of a high standard, and providing a better living environment is one of the ways the College supports its students and competes for the best talent

Less proof gives more oven spring and more total volume. Salt looks a bit high 2% is more usual. Main issue is the dough is not nearly wet enough for true ciabatta. They are more usually around 90% hydration or even 100%, rather then the 74% you have. That's why the dough is tricky to handle, and he loaf slipper shaped You pretty well pour it out. I find it easiest to handle on silicone paper like you do.

Stuffings for boned shoulder: Sausagemeat plus softened onion and white pepper or Bread/breadcrumbs, garlic, parsley, bound with egg (the bread adsorbs the fat) Need to cook this over 62C to set. Season well. Also trim off the "bark" - the tough membrane covering the meat

Lamb is very tolerant. You can roast it rare at 58C/130F or take it all the way to 75C/165F. These are two different styles, so you should be at one temperature or the other rather than in the middle Since shoulder has a lot of connective tissue hold at your desired temperature for 8 hours so the collagen softens. My personal choice would be to bone and stuff it, then cook at 60C/140F or thereabouts for 8 hours

I'm pleased to say that a team from my college has this week won the Steward's cup, proving once again that Emmanuel is the best Cambridge College. The team was Matthew Carter - Head Chef Tom Jeffery - Junior Sous Chef Nathan Aldous - Junior Sous Chef Eddie Cook - Chef de Partie Kevin Balaam - Chef de Partie Against stiff competition the silverware included Two Gold Medals Two Silver Medals Three Bronze medals Three best in class And overall winner for most points: The Stewards Cup. This is the first time the competition has been run since 1985. The winning dishes from Emmanuel were Best plated starter: Pork Knuckle and Foie Gras Terrine Best flatted Main Course: Ballotine of Chicken with a Butter Bean and Tomato Cassoulet Best plated Main Course: Trio of Autumn Rabbit Congratulations to all concerned.

It was excellent, although I would have preferred more science and explanation of why. I have a few nits: mainly that the ultimate treacle tart is the Norfolk or Walpole version that does not have any breadcrumbs: http://norfolkdumpling.blogspot.com/2006/0...and-and-st.html Other nits: Why make toast water, and then add rusk and bread? Why not just grind the toast and add that? I felt he could have explained the grinding process better: as I understand it, the way the sausagemeat is ground at cold tempratures is important for texture, otherwise you just get mince in a tube. I felt Hal McGee was a bit wastedjust being a foil., and the conversation could have had more depth. Indeed an hour or two of those two just chatting wouild make fascinating TV.

Fire Engine House in Ely for tradtional UK food, but it got slated in the Sunday papers recently

Cambridge and Midsummer House http://www.midsummerhouse.co.uk