Rustle up a Red Nose Pudding!

If you’re organising a Red Nose Day tasting tonight here’s a zany idea for a pudding that I devised for a Sainsbury’s magazine feature a couple of years ago when I interviewed TV presenter Phillip Schofield for Comic Relief.

It’s based on the classic French cherry dessert Clafoutis, a crisp sweet batter with cherries - or rather, red noses . . .

serves 8-10

2 x 425g cans of black cherries
3 tbsp of kirsch, cherry brandy or brandy (optional but good!)
4 medium eggs
60g (2 1/2 oz) caster sugar
110g (4 oz) plain flour
A pinch of salt
400ml(14 fl oz) whole milk (i.e. not skimmed or semi-skimmed)
Finely grated rind of one medium unwaxed lemon
A little flavourless oil for the tin
Icing sugar to serve

You will need a shallow rectangular cast iron dish or baking tin about 30cm x 20 cm or 1.5 litres (2 1/2 pints) in capacity

Get the cherries and batter ready two to three hours before making the pudding. Drain the cherries and place in a bowl with the kirsch or cherry brandy, if using. Mix lightly together with a metal spoon and leave to macerate, stirring the cherries into the juice a couple of times. To make the batter put the eggs in a food processor or liquidiser with the sugar, flour, salt and half the milk. Whizz together until smooth then gradually add the rest of the milk. Add the lemon rind and whizz again then pour the batter into a large jug, cover, and leave in the fridge until ready to use.

To bake the pudding preheat oven to 190°C/375° F/Gas 5. Brush the baking dish or tin lightly with the oil and put in the oven for 5 minutes to heat up. Drain the cherries (reserving the juice - a treat for the cook!) and tip into the base of the dish. Give the batter a final stir, pour over the cherries and bake for about 25 to 30 minutes until nicely puffed up and brown. (Check after 20 minutes and if it seems to be browning too quickly turn down the heat to 180°C/350°F/Gas 4.) Sift icing sugar over the pudding and serve with pouring cream or vanilla ice cream.

Recommended match: A cool cherry-flavoured fruit beer (Kriek) would be the perfect match with this although you could drink a southern French Muscat or other dessert wine.

Don't forget a number of retailers are selling wine in aid of Wine Relief which is contributing to the Red Nose Day charities. You can find my pick of what's on offer in the Guardian though some are no longer available as part of the promotion.

The photograph which is not of my recipe but one very like it is © Lilyana Vynogradova - Fotolia.com

Rose petal cupcakes

I call these cupcakes but in fact they're more like old-fashioned English fairy cakes which seem more appropriate for the Jubilee. I must say I prefer them. Made with butter rather than oil they taste more natural and 'cakey than an American-style cupcake and have about a third the amount of icing.

Makes 24 cakes

250g soft butter
250g caster sugar
4 large eggs, beaten with 1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
250g self raising flour, sifted twice
125ml whole milk

For the icing
50g soft butter
a few drops of pink food colouring
200g icing sugar, sifted twice
1/4 tsp rosewater
a small pinch of salt (about 1/3 of a tsp)
2-3 tbsp whole milk

You will need two shallow muffin tins and some pretty paper cases and some rose petal-shaped cake decorations

Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/Gas 4

Tip the butter into a large bowl and beat with an electric hand whisk until smooth. Add the sugar about a third at a time and continue to beat until pale yellow and fluffy. Add the beaten eggs and vanilla essence gradually, adding a spoonful of flour with the last few additions. Fold in the remaining flour alternately with the milk taking care not to overmix. Spoon into the paper cases and bake for about 20- 25 minutes until well risen and firm to the touch. Remove the baking trays from the oven for 5 minutes then transfer the cakes to a wire rack to finish cooling.

Rinse and dry the beaters then make the icing. Beat the butter until soft. Pour a few drops of pink food colouring onto a teaspoon (easier to control than pouring straight from the bottle) then carefully add to the butter, pouring back any excess into the bottle. Gradually add the sifted icing sugar 2-3 tablespoonfuls at a time. Add the rosewater, salt and enough milk to make a spreadable consistency. Spread on the tops of the cupcakes and decorate with the sugar roses. Leave for 2 hours before stacking them into a tiered cake. Scatter real pink rose petals around the cake.

What to drink: Pink moscato or a nice cup of tea.

Pomegranate Eton Mess

To round off National Vegetarian Week here's a recipe from one of the most inspiring vegetarian cookery books I've come across: Sally Butcher's charming, idiosyncratic Veggiestan.. Sally runs an Iranian food store called Persepolis in south-east London so the recipes - which are terrific - all have an middle-eastern slant. It's also a cracking read!

This is how she introduces it:

Now I’m a bit cross about this dish. ‘Cos I sort of invented it. And then a friend of mine in Oz said she’d read a similar recipe in the Melbourne Times or some such. And then the divine Nigella came out with another version of it.

Anyway, this is my recipe. Completely unauthentic but drawing upon the very finest ingredients of the Middle East. And the perfect conclusion to a Middle Eastern feast.

Eton Mess has to be the easiest sweet in the world to prepare. And, as this recipe shows, it is so easy to tart up.

Rose syrup is easy to find in Greek shops – ask for ‘triandafilou’.

Serves 4

2 egg whites
100g/3½oz/½ cup caster sugar
¼ teaspoon baking powder

(or replace the above 3 ingredients with 4–5 shop-bought meringue nests)

2 medium pomegranates
250ml/9fl oz/1 cup whipping/double cream
2 tablespoons rose syrup
handful of rose petals (optional decoration)

Meringues first. Preheat your oven to 160ËšC/325ËšF/Gas mark 3. Whip the egg whites until they start to peak, and then fold in the sugar little by little, followed by the baking powder. Line a baking tray with baking parchment, and then spoon the mixture on to it in random blobs – the finished product is to be broken up anyway, and so appearance and uniformity are irrelevant.

Turn the oven down to 120ËšC/250ËšF/Gas mark ½, and pop the tray in there for 2 hours. If you have time on your side, and the luxury of an airing cupboard at home, take the meringues out of the oven a little earlier, cover them lightly with a cloth and leave them in the airing cupboard overnight – this will get you the perfect, light finish.

Next to the pomegranates. Take one in both hands and gently knead it all around with your thumbs: you will be able to feel the seeds inside popping as you go. Do not do this too vigorously, as you may burst the skin, which will at the very least splatter you with largely indelible red juice. After a couple of minutes, make a small incision in the skin of the pomegranate, and invert it over a glass: you should now be able to squeeze out the juice from all the seeds you have burst. Now that the tension in the skin has been eased, it will be easy to pry the fruit open, and you will be able to crumble all the intact seeds into a bowl. Repeat this exercise with the other pomegranate.

Next, whip the cream together with the rose syrup and the pomegranate juice. Such a pretty pink, no?

Assembly time. Don’t do this until just before you want to serve – the whole thing will sink slowly if you do it too early. Break the meringue roughly into the rose cream, and then stir in most of the pomegranate seeds. Arrange a few rose petals around your chosen serving dish, pile the Eton mess into the centre, and strew with the reserved pom seeds.

Note:
Never choose a pom because it will look good in your fruit bowl; generally speaking the ones with the tauter, drier skins and the slightly angular shape are best. Size is immaterial – the smaller ones are often the sweetest.

What to drink:
You need a fresh-tasting young dessert wine with good acidity for this. A late harvest Sauvignon Blanc or Riesling would be ideal or, echoing the rose syrup, a vendange tardive Gewurztraminer

Recipe from Sally Butcher’s Veggiestan, published by Pavilion. Recipe photography by Yuki Sugiura.

 

Zarzuela

A robust Spanish fish stew from Stevie Parle's fabulous new Dock Kitchen Cookbook. Stevie is one of the best -travelled and most original chefs in London with a well-honed magpie tendency of picking up ingredients and techniques from every country he visits. He also writes a weekly column in the Daily Telegraph.

Catalonian fish stew with mussels (zarzuela)

Serves 6

This Catalonian recipe first caught my eye because of its extraordinary name. A beautiful saffron-laced fish stew, it is baked in the oven with a picada of almonds, garlic, saffron and parsley. Picada is a useful tool, a way to add punch, usually with raw garlic, sometimes paprika or almonds.

Zarzuela is also the name of an operetta or a variety show in Spain; I imagine the name comes from the many kinds of fish in the stew.

500g monkfish tail

1 small red onion, roughly chopped

½ small heart of celery, roughly chopped

olive oil

2 bay leaves

2 sprigs of thyme

1 tsp paprika piccante

400g can of whole plum tomatoes, washed of

their juice

200ml white wine

50g coarse breadcrumbs

2 garlic cloves, green sprouts removed

sea salt

a few sprigs of parsley

pinch of saffron

50g blanched almonds (preferably Spanish)

1 red mullet, filleted

400g wild bass fillet, cut into 4 pieces

200g small, clean rope-grown mussels

If it hasn’t already been done by your fishmonger, pull the skin from the monkfish: you should be able to do this with your hands and the occasional nick with a sharpknife to help you on your way. Cut the fish through the central bone into four pieces.

Fry the onion and celery in a heavy-based pan in olive oil with the bay leaves, thyme and paprika. After about 10 minutes, once the vegetables are soft, add the tomatoes, increase the heat and add the white wine. Simmer for 20 minutes. Preheat the oven to 200°C/400°F/gas mark 6.

Meanwhile, make the picada. Fry the breadcrumbs in a generous splash of olive oil until golden and crunchy. Crush the garlic with salt, parsley and saffron, add thealmonds and pound until coarsely ground. Add the fried breadcrumbs and set aside while you assemble the dish.

Place the monkfish, red mullet and bass in an earthenware oven tray and pour over the tomato sauce. Add a little water and the mussels, then sprinkle over thepicada. Bake in the hot oven until the fish is easy to flake apart and the mussels open (about 15 minutes).

Serve with a plate of greens or potatoes liberally dressed with olive oil and sherry vinegar.

What to drink:
There are several ways to go with this robustly-flavoured dish. My own preference, I think, would be for a dry Spanish rosado from Rioja or Navarra but you could drink an Albarino or even a young red like the increasingly fashionable Mencia or a young (joven) Rioja. Chilled manzanilla sherry would be great too.

You can visit the Dock Kitchen website here - it's a little out of the way but has a great atmosphere and fabulous food. Well worth a visit.

Photograph © Toby Glanville