eG Foodblog: Sheepish (2012) - Eating and drinking in a Welsh farmhous

[Alcuin]

Why are they ribs from pigs and cattle but 'breast' from lamb?

My guess would be that a lamb is small enough to sell the entire breast whole, as with veal, but with pork this is not done because the resulting breast would be too big (same with veal breast to cow ribs). The reason's probably practical: the breasts of bigger animals like pigs and cows are broken down into more manageable pieces, the ribs. Both "breost" and "ribb" are solid Old English words used very generally across dialects throughout Middle English as far as I know (used the MED), so I'd be surprised if the reason were dialectical.

(Oh boy sorry for the geeked-out overkill there, but sometimes I can't resist, especially when it makes for such great procrastination...)

Great blog by the way, really enjoying following along. I love those shots of the countryside, and its a bit of a dream to have a farm like you do.

[rlibkind]

Great blog! Reminds me of a trip to North Wales -- primarily Anglesey -- 10 years ago. Saw lots of sheep and drooled like Pavlov's dog each time.

Lamb breast is a fav of mine. It's quite good finished on the grill with a BBQ sauce after braising, served on the bone. Lately I've taken to low temperature slow roasting, tightly covered in foil then, after cooling, stripping meat off ribs and shredding. At that point you've got any number of possibilities: treat it like North Carolina pulled pork by finishing in a mustard base sauce, shepherd's pie, eat in soft tacos with Mexican condiments, Sichuan stir fry with cumin. Yum!

[sheepish]

This evenings update. I'm making a hare casserole. I ordered a whole hare. They sent me a jointed one. No biggie, I was going to joint it anyway. Plus what I think is streaky bacon I made earlier in the year.

Hare jointed

Mise, mised.

Floured hare in the pan. Note my clever overfilling of the pan to prevent that pesky even browning.

And time for a spoon or four of nutritious Scottish ice cream

Water still out so fluid intake vital. I had the other bottle of this 2 years ago with mallard duck and it was lovely. High expectations generally lead to disappointment. We'll see.

Also finally making a start on Saturday's birthday dinner. I'm going to need some fish stock. Luckily I have a stash of fish bones.

And another lot of mise, mised.

[sheepish]

Lamb breast is a fav of mine. It's quite good finished on the grill with a BBQ sauce after braising, served on the bone. Lately I've taken to low temperature slow roasting, tightly covered in foil then, after cooling, stripping meat off ribs and shredding. At that point you've got any number of possibilities: treat it like North Carolina pulled pork by finishing in a mustard base sauce, shepherd's pie, eat in soft tacos with Mexican condiments, Sichuan stir fry with cumin. Yum!

Thanks! Now that's a lot of options to try for a cut I admit does often get left to last in the freezer as I have demonstrated.

[sheepish]

Obligatory recipe book collection in eGullet blog time.

And because it looks like several days after the earthquake and the Red Cross have been in tidying up, a couple of shots of the other side of the kitchen.

[johnnyd]

God Bless The Red Cross, I always say. They seem to show up and take care of things when my lobster bakes get out of control.

Sheepish: I note some savvy use of ingredients and deft mise prep with a gourmet bent in mind. Was this gleaned from your 20 year stint there inquiring among locals, or was it self-taught through cook books, or have you spent some time in a commercial kitchen? Better put I suppose, from where did your choices of culinary direction come from?

Outstanding blog, Ser. It's an honour tagging along this week

[sheepish]

Last update today. So cracking on with Saturday dinner. I'm attempting the Jerusalem Artichoke dish from EMP. I call it EMP now I've seen Ulterior Epicure refer to it as such on Twitter. I'm down with the movers and shakers. And by the way, Sunchokes. I really should have Googled them before. I assumed they were some kind of exotic root veg we didn't get here. So one element of this dish is the pickled JERUSALEM ARTICHOKES. And that needs white balsamic. Seems Sainsbury's have had a run in with the Balsamic AOC lawyers.

Here's a picture of some JERUSALEM ARTICHOKES for the dish.

Look. I chopped them so fine. A mandoline may have been involved.

And back to dinner. I made pan haggerty. It's a dish from the north of England. Grated veg, onions and Wensleydale cheese. Sort of like a rosti, with a bit of cheese. And thyme.

And dinner ready. Hare casserole with pan haggerty. Recipes lifted from 'Loose Birds and Game' and excellent book from Andrew Pern.

Edited February 9, 2012 by sheepish (log)

[sheepish]

Sheepish: I note some savvy use of ingredients and deft mise prep with a gourmet bent in mind. Was this gleaned from your 20 year stint there inquiring among locals, or was it self-taught through cook books, or have you spent some time in a commercial kitchen? Better put I suppose, from where did your choices of culinary direction come from?

Thank you for the kind words. I think I just like food. It's way more interesting than computers. If I've learned stuff from anywhere it's books. And Mrs S for deep frying tips. In fact I don't deep fry. Dangerous to let me near hot fat. Not sure the mise is very deft though :-)

[JeanneCake]

What a wonderful blog! Thank you for taking the time; looking forward to the next installment.

[andiesenji]

Why are they ribs from pigs and cattle but 'breast' from lamb?

My guess would be that a lamb is small enough to sell the entire breast whole, as with veal, but with pork this is not done because the resulting breast would be too big (same with veal breast to cow ribs). The reason's probably practical: the breasts of bigger animals like pigs and cows are broken down into more manageable pieces, the ribs. Both "breost" and "ribb" are solid Old English words used very generally across dialects throughout Middle English as far as I know (used the MED), so I'd be surprised if the reason were dialectical.

(Oh boy sorry for the geeked-out overkill there, but sometimes I can't resist, especially when it makes for such great procrastination...)

Great blog by the way, really enjoying following along. I love those shots of the countryside, and its a bit of a dream to have a farm like you do.

Sometimes there are unique regional terms for certain parts of an animal and some of the terms in my medieval (facsimile) cookbooks are downright incomprehensible without the translations.

I'm not a huge fan of lamb, except when I drive up to a favorite Basque restaurant. They roast a stuffed saddle of lamb that is so much tastier than most lamb dishes. They marinate it in a "secret" process before it is stuffed and while roasting is basted with something that leaves a residual flavor reminiscent of pomegranate syrup. They will not divulge any of the "secrets" of preparation.

When I was still catering, I ordered a saddle of lamb as requested by a client - it cost $95.00 ordered from a specialty butcher and was very well received and the client was happy.

I used essentially the same technique as with a saddle of venison.

However you do it, your results are beautiful and certainly look tasty.

At one time I had a cookbook, "Traditional Food from Wales" that I lent to someone who promptly lost it some ten years ago. From time to time I've thought about replacing it but until reading your blog, I simply haven't had enough reason. Currently checking availability...

Edited February 9, 2012 by andiesenji (log)

[onrushpam]

Sheepish, as one who enjoys coursing my dogs on hare, I'm curious about yours... Is it wild hare or farmed? (I know hare are notoriously difficult to farm, yet turn into pests left to their own devices on farms where they are unwanted!) I've only eaten hare two ways... just the little back strap marinated and then grilled, sliced and served as an appetizer, and chopped up with other game (partridge and venison) in a game pie.

Edited to say, the few hare the dogs ever catch usually go into a pot, bones and all, to cook for a long time and then are fed to the dogs that made the catch.

Edited February 10, 2012 by onrushpam (log)

[SylviaLovegren]

Sigh, this is just wonderful. Love it.

[sheepish]

For the first time this week, breakfast that isn't black coffee. And my very favourite breakfast. Devilled lamb's kidneys.

Kidneys need the cores removing and cutting into three or four pieces.

Fry in butter until they colour. Throw in a small glass of port and let it bubble. Add a teaspoon of redcurrant jelly and let it dissolve. Add a good teaspoon of English mustard, a pinch of cayenne and a good glug of Worcestershire sauce.

Then good grind of black pepper and a pinch of salt. Finally a dribble of cream to mollify what is a pretty assertive sauce.

Serve on toast

[Anna N]

....

And my very favourite breakfast. Devilled lamb's kidneys.

....

Now that is the REAL Breakfast of Champions. Looks delicious.

[Blether]

Now I have a Jones going for kidneys. I feel like Hannibal Lecter. Seriously speaking, those do look good and it's been a long time since I had them devilled.

[nikkib]

I am loving this!!! The words you use to describe the kidneys are just perfect!!!

[sheepish]

Been to the big smoke today. Cardiff. Capital city of Wales. Rotten day, cold and wet. I have a lumbering old SLR not really suited for pictures of market and shop produce I'm afraid. Cardiff has some lovely architecture and a long history of trading and as such has a few hundred years of international influence. I'll get back some time soon and get some pictures to do it justice.

First stop, one of the Chinese supermarkets to pick up another couple of litres of light soy sauce, some green bean jelly sheets and a few serving bowls to replace those the children drop. The slightly more modern structure behind is the Millennium Stadium, home to the Welsh rugby union team. Site of many famous victories, and every time I've been there, close but disappointing losses.

Moving on into the city centre. Cardiff has several arcades, all built around 120 years ago. For my money a much, much nicer place to shop than a big "mall". Cardiff has those too though.

Of food interest here is Wally's delicatessen. I've always known it in this location, but only been here since 1981. Owned by the descendants of Austrian immigrants. It's always strong on cured meats.

St Mary Street is decked out with flags of the "6 Nations". The annual rugby union competition featuring Wales, England, Scotland, Ireland, France and Italy. Rugby Union is a very big deal in Wales. Scotland play here on Sunday. You'll struggle to get in the door of any of the pubs on match day. The stadium is right in the centre of the city so you can't easily escape the match atmosphere.

Cardiff market has some great butchers and a good fish monger. Sadly fish mongers are a dying breed in the UK. There's one very small stall in Bridgend market. Bridgend is the nearest town to me. But compared to pictures from other people's blogs in the last few months it's really nothing special. You're not missing too much from the lack of pictures.

I picked up a gurnard for dinner tonight, and a john dory for tomorrow. Plus some beef cheeks and beef bones for tomorrow too.

Finally the Bwyty Hayes Island Snack Bar. This part of town has been redeveloped extensively in the last 5 years, but it's nice to see this has been left alone. Bwyty is Welsh for restaurant or cafe.

Edited February 10, 2012 by sheepish (log)

[sheepish]

Sheepish, as one who enjoys coursing my dogs on hare, I'm curious about yours... Is it wild hare or farmed?

Only wild. I know of farmed rabbits, but not hares. Hunting hares (or any wild mammal) with dogs has been illegal for a few years in the UK. Although it still goes on. I doubt any would be coming through reputable game dealers though. I think hares I buy are shot, but I'm not certain. I really should ask. Didn't find any shot in the one we ate last night, but we didn't eat it all.

[sheepish]

Have you ever replaced bits of you car? Did you use a workshop manual. They're quite like high-end recipe books. You quickly glance at what is involved in changing your steering rack and it's only 6 steps so you make a start one Saturday afternoon.

Step 1. Remove battery earth lead.

Step 2. Drain fluid from steering rack.

Step 3. Remove engine. See steps 1-114 in Chapter 4.

So I'm having a go at star anise and muscavado parfait with bergamot cream and parkin puree from "Dessert" by David Everitt-Matthias. We went to his restaurant in Cheltenham a few months ago. I'd had his "Essence" book for a few years. Some great savoury course in there. The desserts at the restaurant were great so I bought the dessert book. Anyway hidden in the ingredients list are spiced bread crumbs (see page 20). There are loads of links like this in the Eleven Maddison Park recips I'm going to give a go. I might ignore quite a few of those! But I thought I'd give this a bash. I never bake.

You have to dissolve honey in milk. Anyone done that before? Did it look like curdled milk in honey?

If you see me trying to use this machine I'd usually ask you stop me for the sake of the poor unfortunates who'll get to sample the output.

I'm a real dab hand at lining a loaf tin. I'm not, Mrs S had to do this lest I use up the entire roll of baking parchment.

But the result seems pretty good. I haven't tasted it. But it's not black. Or flat.

Also got my black garlic discs on the go for the EMP john dory dish. The one I'm going to ignore many of the fiddly see page 312 ingedients.

Passed black garlic through a tamis.

And pressed between two sheets of acetate. If your as old as I am you will remember using this stuff on overhead projectors before Powerpoint was invented.

Oh yes, and I have some beef stock on the go. I'm making beef bourguignon as my meat course tomorrow. Couldn't find any "posh" meat I really liked the look of today. And this will buy me some time when I'm doing all that see page 372 stuff.

Edited February 10, 2012 by sheepish (log)

[sheepish]

Last post today. Tonight's dinner. Gurnard.

Couldn't remember how to fillet these fellas. Has to consult Rick Stein book. It's sort of like this.

While Mrs S was cutting chips and cooking that I took on the priority job. We've just started extending our cocktail repertoire beyond gin and tonics, and whisky sours. This is a favourite based on the last couple of weeks of research. Tequillla fizz. Tequilla (as you might guess), lime juice, grenadine and topped up with ginger beer.

And finally dinner is ready.

Beef stock is made and chilling. I couldn't run to a bucket full of lobster bodies for the lobster bisque used with the John Dory in EMP so I've made a prawn bisque. I also realised I don't have any syrup from preserved ginger to use in the desert so have made that too. Black garlic looks less good than I'd hoped, but it's drying in the oven. We'll see what it looks like tomorrow.

Nos da.

[Blether]

I once changed the clutch in a transverse-engine-front-wheel-drive car. That was pretty much an engine-out job, except you only used your crane to lift the engine up a few inches, not all the way out. I chose to do it overnight, between work one day and work the next, but it didn't seem to involve any baking. D'you think Haynes missed a bit ?

Nice looking dinner. In between bench-pressing gearbox/bellhousing assemblies at 4am in lieu of possessing the correct jack cradle, I like gurnard for robust things like curry because it stands up to them in both flavour & texture.

Looking forward to tomorrow.

Edited February 11, 2012 by Blether (log)

[SylviaLovegren]

Home made candied ginger with syrup for a dessert? Can't wait to see what that is. Sounds divine.

[sheepish]

Cooking this morning.

Started off adding veg and then a bottle of red wine and reducing that down to almost nothing.

While thats reducing I make a batter for my cheese crisps. This is gruyere and egg white in my favourite kitchen "gadget". All it does is chop, but it's so solid and had the kind of switch I'd expect to find on a 1950s power station control board.

The batter gets rolled thin between two silicon sheets. After 15 mins in the oven it's cut to crisp shapes and then returned to the over to brown (a little bit too much in my case)

And get some chopped lemons and sugar slowing melting down for lemon jam to go with the cheese crisps.

Then get some meat ready for my beef bourguignon. I'm using ox cheeks which I think work really well in a slow cooked stew. They're cheap so I bought plenty yesterday and vac pack up what I don't need for the freezer.

The cheeks I cut up and trim of too much fat and then brown.

Fresh veg added to the wine reduced stuff

And the meat goes in on top of muslin to keep it from making the broth round the veg too cloudy

And thats one into the oven for a couple of hours. Desert needs mandarin juice. I couldn't find any so I have clementines. The juicer gets used frequently enough that it took me 5 minutes to find it. Wasn't even in the kitchen. But it still seems to work.

After that lot I need some breakfast. I thought I'd share about as Welsh a breakfast as you could fine. Bacon, laverbread and cockles.

I make my own back bacon. Because I grow my own pigs I can let them grow a decent bit of back fat. Back fat is almost non-existent on any pork you buy in the UK. Because as we all know fat is an evil force that drowns kittens and pulls the wings off flys.

That cooks and renders out enough fat to cook the laverbread in. Laverbread is just boiled nori seaweed. In the summer the fishmongers, sometimes even in supermarkets have it fresh. But it's always easy to find in tins. I like it on toast with melted cheese, or an egg. But the traditional preparation is to mix it with oatmeal and fry it.

Cockles come from just down the coast at Penclawdd, near Swansea. Popular with a dash of vinegar and pepper and eaten from the tub. Also a breakfast accompaniment.

Anyway all fried up and on the plate. I've got a pile of washing up to do now and then press on with desert, and JERUSALEM ARTICHOKES.

Edited February 11, 2012 by sheepish (log)

[mutt on]

Why shout about the JERUSALEM ARTICHOKES? That's the second time you've done so. Was it to try to find out how many of your avid readers knew this interesting fact:

Despite its name, the Jerusalem artichoke has no relation to Jerusalem, and it is not a type of artichoke, even though both are members of the daisy family. The origin of the name is uncertain, but believed to come from Italian settlers in the USA who called the plant "girasole", the Italian word for sunflower because of its resemblance to the garden sunflower (the flower part that is, not the tuber that Sheepish is preparing for tonight's dinner!). And if that info is wrong you'll have to blame the TV show where I heard about it earlier this week - may have been Stephen Fry on QI.

[mutt on]

I hope you don't mess up tonight's meal by concentrating too much on the rugby this afternoon. With vested interests in all three games this weekend your blog will probably have to take a back seat too. I also hope the games are as good as last weekend's Ireland-Wales match (who was Mrs S supporting there?)