eG Foodblog: Jackal10 III - Smoking Bacon and a May Week picnic

[Swisskaese]

Why does cheesecake always sink?

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Jack! With all this talk of bacon I thought you might forget about Shavuot .

I've never used cheese other than cream cheese.. do you process the cottage cheese to smooth it out?

Cheesecakes are like custards - if you bake it in a waterbath, it may help with the sinking. Do you pull it right out of a hot oven or let the cake sit in the oven as it cools?

Sinking or not sinking, it looks great.

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Here in Israel we make them with white cheese, the consistency of a very thick yogurt. I make mine with half white cheese and half mascarpone.

I use a waterbath and it never sinks and never cracks.

You may have cooked it a too high a heat or too long.

I am getting ready to make one for Shavuot. I am making a lemon cheesecake with lemon confit.

I have never had an elderberry cordial before. How does it taste?

Edited June 11, 2005 by Swisskaese (log)

[jackal10]

Fruit growing in the garden

We met the Mara du Bois strawberries earlier - on page 2.

Here is the fruit cage. These are giant strawberries, a variety called Maxim. Just forming fruit, but look at the size of the leaves. Probably more dilute flavour though.

]

Raspberries have a way to go. These are Autumn Gold, yellow late raspberries. There are also early and late red ones. Redcurrants (also white and black currant but they all look the same at this stage. mmm Summer Pudding...also jellies

Pears and apples coming. Fruit set is patchy this year, This is a conference pear, and a Tydmans Early apple, but other varieties look much the same at this stage.

Crystal apple and Damsons

Victoria as a representative plum (also purplel and yellow ones); Greengage

Gooseberry(soon, still hard); Quince (Autumn)

Rhubarb. The bed was here wehn we came. Its in the wrong palce, now at the back of a flowerborder, but still productive

Loganberries (also tayberries, blackberries, andlots of brambles)

Some more random stuff

The field next door with oil seed rape; note the typical brassica flowers

Catmint (Nepeta) and Sweet Pea Jilly

There are also walnut and hazelnut trees, but the squirrels get them before we do

Edited June 11, 2005 by jackal10 (log)

[jackal10]

I am getting ready to make one for Shavuot. I am making a lemon cheesecake with lemon confit.

I have never had an elderberry cordial before. How does it taste?

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Its elderflower, not eldeberry. Elderberries come in the autumn and taste very differnt.

The flower is very floral, with a distinctive taste. Some say a little like champagne, but it can be like cats piss if too old. You can probably buy the cordial, but I don't know if they make a version with a kashrut mark. http://www.belvoircordials.co.uk/page.php?pid=78

[Chufi]

The ironic thing is that I took a course in Middle English lit

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me too! And middle german, and middle dutch. Ah never mind.

Jack.. I am loving this blog very, very much. I love how all these little snapshots (of your garden, the coffeestall at the trainstation, the Aga, the sausages for dinner, your musings on what to do with bacon.. ) somehow create this wonderful image of your life. It looks like a great life from where I'm sitting. Thanks for sharing it with us.

[jackal10]

Thanks. I've been lucky, and been at the in the right place, and managed to start and sell IT companies when the market was up. That insulates me from a lot of real life. Cambridge is a civilised place, and my college one of the better. We should give thought to those not able to enjoy the things we do.

I'm not that good. My food presentation is awful, and the spelling in these entries is a bit random. There are people who contribute to eGullet who are more fortunate, much richer, who have much greater IT expertise, commercial acumen, more food knowledge and who cook better than I do. And their food presentation and typing is better.

Edited June 11, 2005 by jackal10 (log)

[jackal10]

Tonights supper was Filet of Scotch beef. Very rare for me.

New potatoes (I apologise for so many spuds, but straight from the garden at this time of year they are sooo good)

Fava bean tops

Broccotini (purple sprouting broccoli)

Elephant garlic

very baby carrots

Red wine pan reduction (a bit of meat glaze as well)

The wine was a Cotes de Rhone 2001 that someone brought,

Edited June 12, 2005 by jackal10 (log)

[SobaAddict70]

C'est incroyable!

Soba

[Pan]

Thanks. I've been lucky, and been at the in the right place, and managed to start and sell IT companies when the market was up. That insulates me from a lot of real life. Cambridge is a civilised place, and my college one of the better. We should give  thought to those not able to enjoy the things we do.

I'm not that good. My food presentation is awful, and the spelling in these entries is a bit random. There are people who contribute to eGullet who  are  more fortunate, much richer,  who have much greater IT expertise, commercial acumen, more food knowledge and who cook better than I do. And their food presentation and typing is better.

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You really are too modest. You are one of the best bloggers of them all. And really, some spelling mistakes are the least important thing to worry about in a foodblog, and I say that as someone who's usually a real stickler for spelling.

[helenjp]

Surprising number of nostalgic items in this blog! My family kept bantams when I was a child. They laid remarkably well, and were much cleverer than the Leghorns, which used to lay eggs on bare branches in the lemon tree with expected results.

Small new potatoes - they really are too good to pass up when they are new because they are young and just grown, not ground-stored potatoes from plants whose top-growth was killed off with defoliant .

I see you have loganberries. The general wisdom in northern New Zealand is that loganberries withstand warm humid conditions without succumbing to mold much better than raspberries do. Is there much difference in ease of cultivation between the two in Cambridge?

wryng out þe wheyze

Middle English? Leave it to me! Just as Jackal10 tells us in his instructions, this means "bring out the blender"...

[jackal10]

Good morning!

Cool and grey again today. However the forecast says it will stay dry, so we might get away with it tonight. However looks like something hot in a thermos flask might be good soup or more likely strong black coffee with a shot of brandy in it.

View from the kitchen window over the sink. Turning circle at the top of the drive to the left.

Note the nettles, now too big to eat.

Raspberries seem to do better than Loganberries here. Brambles (blackberries) do best of all, and are wild in the hedges, or anywhere else they can. The loaganberry I have is a thornless variety, but needs to climb. Last year it fasciated - like three stems fused together to form a broad flat stem, Indicates the roots are more active then the top, - its not in that good position an I keep having to prune it heavily

wryng out þe wheyze

literally is wring out the whey - press out the liquid from the curd cheese by twisting it in a cloth. Not quite bring out the blender, but close.

Edited June 12, 2005 by jackal10 (log)

[arbuclo]

My goodness, I really don't know how you keep up with that garden! I do love to be able to make things using herbs, fruit or veg that I grow myself but I've mostly been limited to growing herbs and a few chillies and tomatoes. Amazing stuff you're doing!

[jackal10]

What happens if you don't cut the grass. Actually I seeded this bit a few years ago with a wild flower mix. It was a spoil heap left over from some building work. The large plants are teasels, the brown heads being last years. Normally we cut the meadows in May and September, but this bit got left last year. Its important to remove the cuttings to lower the fertility if you want wild flowers, otherwise the grasses out compete them.

The pond. I think the purple flowers are marsh mallow, but I'm not sure. There is a resident moorhen family.

More edible wild flowers and berries, taken this morning

Dog rose (petals, rosehips in autumn)

Haws coming on hawthorn. Dominant hedgerow species. Very thorny, do good hedging. The haws used for jelly in autumn.

Sloes: sour wild plums. Sloe gin, sloe jelly

Rowan or mountain ash. Not native here. You can just see the white flours. Decorative orange berries in autumn used for rowanberry jelly.

Wild garlic or Jack-by-the-hedge or ramps. Dying off now.

A wild orchid. Small purple flowers in May. Only a common early purple, but not that common. Spotted leaves. Glad to see its setting seed.

Edited June 12, 2005 by jackal10 (log)

[Pan]

Orchids grow wild in England? I wouldn't have imagined it. And the orchids I know are parasitic.

[jackal10]

Orchids grow wild in England? I wouldn't have imagined it. And the orchids I know are parasitic.

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Yes. The UK orchid is small, ground growing, a bit like a bluebell is size and general demeanor. The flowers are clearly orchid shaped, but wouldn't win prizes/ They depend on particular soil micro-fauna to thrive, so don't transplant well.

I just looked up

http://www.the-tree.org.uk/EnchantedForest...ottedorchid.htm

They are not that common anymore, but apparently the tubers were once used for food. The site quote Richard Mabey's excellent "Food for Free"

"It would be criminal to dig up any of the dwindling colonies of British orchids, let alone for food. Yet this lilac-flowered species deserves a place for completeness' sake, as it has been one of the more fascinating and valuable of wild foods. The tubers contain a starch-like substance called bassorine, which has in it more nutritive matter than any other single plant product, one ounce being sufficient to sustain a person for a whole day.

In the Middle East, where the plant is more common, it is still widely used. The roots are dug up after the plant has flowered, and are occasionally eaten as they stand, either raw or cooked. But they are most usually made into a drink called Cahlab. For this the tubers are dried in the sun and ground into a rough flour. This is mixed with honey and cinnamon, and stirred into hot milk until it thickens.

In Britain a similar drink called Salop was a common soft drink long before the introduction of coffee houses. In Victorian books it is mentioned as a tea-break beverage of manual workers. They made it with water more often than with milk, sometimes lacing it with spirits, sometimes brewing it so thick that it had to be eaten with a spoon." (Mabey, Richard - "Food for free", Harper Collins, 1992.)

Edited June 12, 2005 by jackal10 (log)

[jackal10]

Chicken stock for soup. I fancy we might need some hot nourishing soup when we get in late tonight.

Chicken carcass, onions, carrots, celery (the leafy bits), bayleaf, thyme, peppercorns.

Often I use a pressure cooker for half an hour, but this lot I'll let seethe slowly in a low oven.

Braised Pork Hock. Normally I have a roast on Sunday, and use the leftovers as the basis for meals in the early part of the week. However since we have the picnic today, instead I'm braising a pork hock. Good eats, and cheap too. Good food need not be expensive. This one was 72p or about $1.30, and will provide enough to feed four easily, and stock and components for other meals. Versatile. Braising provides lots of gooey sticky porky goodness, but you can roast it for sensational crackling. This one I think I might bone and stuff with a chicken mousseline forcemeat, like a big coarser version of Koffman's pied de cochon, but you can eat just as is with potatoes and cabbage, or in a Chinese version with rice flavoured with anise and other chinese dishes, or with dried beans, cassoulet like.

Yummy. The chicken breasts (organic, free range yada yadya) come from the chicken carcass then is in the stockpot.

This one is plain braised/pot roast, on a bed of vegetables (carrots, onions, celery; garlic and 2 tbs each of Maderia and light Soy). Doesn't need much liquid, as it makes its own. Long time low temperature cooked, of course - 90C or so overnight, so the collagen dissolves into unction.

Heston Blumenthal, in his column in yesterday's Guardian, claims that star anise enhances the Umani or meat flavour. http://www.guardian.co.uk/weekend/story/0,,1502642,00.html

Never works for me - I just taste aniseed. I prefer to use soy and sweet wine, originally Mirin, but instead I use a Madeira or sweet sherry. The natural glutamate in the soy enhances the meatiness of the dish.

Edited June 12, 2005 by jackal10 (log)

[Adam Balic]

Jack - the food blog is great, thanks for the detailed and informative posts. You live in a very beautiful area and it has been great to see you discribe the seasonal produce that you have coming along.

One question: can you eat marsh mallows and if so, are there any particular British dishes that you would use them in?

[MelissaH]

Fruit growing in the garden

We met the Mara du Bois strawberries earlier - on page 2.

Here is the fruit cage. These are giant strawberries, a variety called Maxim. Just forming fruit, but look at the size of the leaves. Probably more dilute flavour though.

]

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Ah, strawberries! Ours will be few and expensive this year, since we had a freeze as they were flowering, and lost a good chunk of the crop to that. But Jack, yours look beautiful! This entire blog has been a delight to "eat" with the eyes!

MelissaH

[Chris Amirault]

Jack, this is wonderful, and it deepens my appreciation both for you and for the English garden. To that end, can you tell us a bit about how it is that you've developed the garden over the years? I'm particularly interested in the aesthetic decisions you've made concerning your land, plant selection, and the overall aesthetic.

[jackal10]

Not sure the garden has a deliberate aesthetic.

The area was originally a market garden small holding. Although there is some archeological evidence of Bronze age settlement in the field next door, and later of Roman settlement and possibly a vinyard, the current use, and for example the trees in the Orchard probably date to land settlemet after the first world war. There is aslo some evidence of the original ridge and furrow cultivation, with the old main road of the village nearer the house than it is now.

Most of the land we just leave, or do minimum maintenance, so most of it is wood, or rough meadow or pond and orchard. The vegtable gardens are fenced against rabbits and pigeons, and in principle run on a deep bed four rotation system, with 4ft beds so you can cultivate from the path without walking on the bed and destroying the soil structure, which is important in this heavy clay. In practice things get plonked in where there is a space. The house itself dates only to about 1960. Apparently before that there was a former railway carriage that the smallholder lived in.

The herb garden is loosely adapted from a 1930s design from "A Garden of Herbs" by Eleanour Sinclair Rhodes. I thought about a desing based on an eighteenth century parterre, but a design with straight edges is much easier to maintain, The roses were designed and supplied and planted by Peter Beales Roses http://www.classicroses.co.uk/ whom I cannot praise too highly.

The main garden is I guess goverened by the views from the house, and by the exisiting trees. Since its big, we need to do everything on a fairly large scale. Delicate plantings just get lost. Also its vital we can maintain as much as possible by machine - cut the grass with a tractor, for example.

I've been here about 10 years. The main thing we've done is to re-align the drive, and effectively turn the house round, so what was the back is now the front, with a new entrance way. What is now the kitchen was the garage, and there is a new garage with a new road to it though the wood. The big border, and the herb garden (next to the kitchen) were my additions but otherwise we work with it as it was.

Edited June 12, 2005 by jackal10 (log)

[jackal10]

Brunch; Egg Bacon, Tomato, Mushroom.

Toast and marmite

Coffee and the Sunday paper

Edited June 12, 2005 by jackal10 (log)

[jackal10]

Time to make the sandwiches.

Slice the salmon. I can use the scraps for scrambled eggs and the like.

Slice the top off the loaf, then slice out the middle. Its a big loaf!

Slice off the crust, then butter (President Unsalted) and slice. I've cut it in half for easier handling.

Make the sandwiches ...mmm...

Pack them back into the loaf somehow...

Cram the lid back on...just an ordinary loaf of bread...

Wrap in clingfilm for ease of handling.

Edited June 12, 2005 by jackal10 (log)

[jackal10]

Check for th Picnic:

Nibbles: My home made salami (saucisson menager fume)

Sausages, radishes. Only bought cocktail sausages, but always popular.

Smoked Salmon Sandwiches (see above)

Smoked eggs (we met those before)

Roast asparagus (someone else is bringing; last of the season)

Following on the Elizabethen them;

Roast chicken legs (bought- the shop makes them as well as I do)

Faggots (meat balls; and for the less adventurous mini Scotch eggs, also bought)

Sambocade (now portioned); Strawberries

[Smithy]

Faggots (meat balls; and for the less adventurous mini Scotch eggs, also bought)

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Did you address Scotch eggs farther up? I've forgotten what they are.

Oh, I can't help myself. Just how hot are these faggots? Or, to put it a different way, is there something aside from the name that requires a sense of adventure to try them?

Edited June 12, 2005 by Smithy (log)

[jackal10]

Time to pack the hampers:

Working toolbox: only plastic champagne flutes, but nice ones.

Wines;

Champagne: Cuvee Reseve Gallimard Pere et Fils with Creme de Peche de VIgne for those who want

Scharzhofberger Kabinett 2001. This was a present in return for giving a lecture in Germany; interesting to try it.

Rolly Gassmann (Alsace) Gewurstraminer 1996. What else to drink with Smoked Salmon? Rolly Gassmann wines are I think the best in Alsace; even better than Zind Humbrecht. Full and lucious. 1996 was a hot year.

Paradise Ranch 2000 Merlot Icewine Okanagan Valley; Sweet but not too sweet to finish.

[jackal10]

Forgot the Pork Pie; the inheritor of all those Elizabethen Meat in Cofins...

and a thermos of extra strong coffee...