Honey and Soy Grilled Rainbow Trout

Ingredients;

3 Tablespoons Dark Soy Sauce
4 Tablespoons Honey
4 Tablespoons White wine Vinegar
1 Tablespoons water
2 x Rainbow Trout Fillets

Serves 2

For an island nation we eat a pathetically small amount of fish and most of what we do eat comes from the frozen food aisle in the supermarket. This recipe is very easy to prepare and cook, it’s quicker and tastier than a lot of those frozen options, so give it a go!

To make the marinade/sauce just mix the soy sauce, honey, white wine vinegar and water together.

Place the trout fillets skin side down in a container just big enough to them fit them flat and side by side, then pour on the marinade mixture, making sure the fish are completely covered and leave to marinade for at least twenty minutes. Don’t add all the honey soy mixture as you’ll want to keep some to use as a sauce/dip.

While the fish are marinating, turn your grill on to its highest setting and allow it to warm up. Then prepare a grill tray for the fish. You want a flat grill tray with raised sides, the height of the fish should be fine but you want the base to be as close as possible to the size of your fillets. If your tray is larger than you can make a smaller tray to sit inside your regular grill tray from tin foil.

Once the fish have marinated for at least 20 minutes remove them from the marinade and place them in your grill tray, then pour the marinate over the fish so that it coats them but only comes about half way up the fillets. Next, put it under the grill for about 5-8 minutes, depending on the thickness, until cooked through.

In the picture above I have served the fish on a braised rice pilaf made like this recipe with a finely chopped stalk of lemongrass added instead of the turmeric, this gives a wonderful delicate lemon flavour that complements the fish. I then poured some of the sauce over the fish before sprinkling some chopped spring onion on top and garnishing with a lime. Nyomtastic

Poached Egg

Ingredients;

1 egg
4 tablespoons of distilled malt vinegar
Water

Place a saucepan on a high heat and add about 2 inches deep of water to it. Add the vinegar and bring to the boil.

While the water is heating, crack the egg into a small bowl. And set your timer for 3 minutes.

Once the water has come to the boil reduce the heat so the water remains just below boiling point.

With a slotted spoon, stir the water to create a vortex in the centre of the saucepan, then quickly pour the egg into the centre of the vortex and start your timer.

Once the 3 minutes are up, use the slotted spoon to remove and drain the now poached egg and serve – for example on a slice of ham on toast, garnished with balsamic vinegar and some dry herbs.

Hard Boiled Egg ready to be mashed for egg mayonnaise

Ingredients;

1 Egg
water

This is very handy thing to do as we are now in the summer months, a hard-boiled egg is a great way to add flavour and protein to even the simplest of salads, or for making egg salad for sandwiches or egg mayonnaise.

Fill a saucepan with enough water to fully submerge the egg but do not put the egg in the water yet. Place the saucepan on the heat and bring to the boil. While the water is coming to the boil get a kitchen timer or use the countdown timer on your mobile phone to set a timer for 8 minutes.

Once the water comes to the boil reduce it to a simmer, use a slotted spoon or spider to lower the egg into the water. If you drop the egg in, there is a good chance that it will crack on the base of the saucepan and you will have to start again. Once the egg is in the water start your countdown timer.

I’ve said 8 minutes as this usually provides a good result for me. However if you are using large eggs you may need a little longer and smaller eggs will need a little less time, but the only way to be certain is trial and error.

While you are waiting fill a large bowl or basin of cold water, the colder the better and as soon as the timer goes, you want to lift the egg out of the saucepan and plunge it directly into the cold water. The idea here is to cool the egg as quick as possible.

This serves two purposes, first, it stops the egg cooking immediately and second it prevents that black ring forming around the yoke of the egg which spoils the look and flavour of your hard-boiled egg.

Once the egg has cooled simply roll it across a hard surface with enough downward pressure to crack the shell. Then just peel off the shell and your hard-boiled egg is ready to use.

Choconana crumble: Photograph by Redmum

Ingredients;

225g Plain Flour
60g sugar
145g butter
a pinch of salt
195g Dark Chocolate
6 Tablespoons of cream
1 tablespoon of sugar
half a teaspoon of vanilla essence
1 tablespoon of cognac
115ml Water
6 medium sized bananas

Serves 6

Making the crumble

Take your flour, 60g of sugar, 115g of butter and a pinch of salt and place them in a bowl, simply scrunch the lot together with clean hands until it looks like breadcrumbs and put this to one side.

Making the chocolate sauce

Take a small saucepan and place it on a low heat, to this add 115ml of water and a tablespoon of sugar. Bring this to a low simmer while stirring. Keep it simmering until all the sugar has dissolved.

Once the sugar has dissolved, remove the pan from the heat and add 30g of butter and the dark chocolate while stirring constantly. It’s best to break the chocolate and butter up into small chunks as they will melt quicker this way. Keep stirring until all the chocolate and butter have melted completely.

Next, add the Vanilla essence, cognac and cream and keep stirring until they all combine to give a smooth looking sauce.

Assembly

Peel the bananas and split each of them lengthways into 3. This is done by gently pushing your finger into the end of the banana where that tough seed like lump has been removed and running your finger to the other end. This should leave you with 3 separate segments.

Arrange all the segments in a large oven-proof dish and pour the chocolate sauce over them, making sure that all the bananas are chocolate coated.

Unless you are planning on cooking and eating immediately stop at this point and cover both the crumble and the chocolate+banana and refrigerate until ready to cook.

When you are ready to cook, get your oven up to 200C. Sprinkle the crumble over the chocolate+banana making sure to spread it out evenly. Then pop it in the oven for 30 minutes. If the crumble has not turned a golden brown at this point simply pop it under the grill for a minute or 2 to brown the top and let it stand for a few minutes before serving with a few scoops of berry ice-cream.

Berry Ice-cream

Berry ice-cream

The Berry Ice-cream I make to go with this is based on Kieran’s Banana Ice Cream with Chocolate Shavings recipe over on Ice-cream Ireland. Many thanks for sharing this recipe Kieran, I would have given up on trying to making ice-cream myself long ago without this.

I follow this recipe exactly except for 3 things…

1. I use 150g of Raspberries and 170g of Blackberries instead of the Bananas
2. I mash the Rasperry & Blackberry mixture through a sieve as I add them to the custard
3. I don’t add the chocolate shavings

This gives an ice-cream that while it is sweet and creamy, it is also tart enough to balance the sweetness of the rest of the dish.

Please give this a try, it’s a wonderful dessert. As always we’d love to here about your results and your thoughts on the dish as a whole.

1 knob of butter
1 good lug of olive oil
1 kg turkey thigh meat, diced
1 handful of fresh thyme leaves
1 large leek, chopped
2 sticks of celery, chopped
2 carrots, chopped
1 large sweet potato, diced
1 parsnip, chopped
2 large onions
1 handful of plain flour
1 wineglass of rosé or white wine
1 wineglass of milk
1 wineglass of water
1 small tin of sweetcorn
8 pork sausages

Serves 6-8, can be frozen

Take your Largest Saucepan, and get it on a Low heat, add a good lug of olive oil and a knob of butter.

Next add your turkey meat, fresh thyme, leek, celery, carrots, sweet potato, parsnips, onions and give it about 15 minutes at a simmer, stirring occasionally so nothing sticks.

Get your pan up to a high heat and add a good handful of flour and stir it in, keep stirring for about 2-3 minutes, then add the wine, let it simmer for a minute. Then add the milk and water and stir throughly until all the ingredients combine.

Then bring this to a simmer for about 1 hour or until the leeks and onion have started to break up.

Add the sweetcorn for the last 10 minutes of the hour.

Take your pack of sausages and squeeze all the sausage meat out of the skins. Roll it into a large marble sized balls (wet hands work best). Do this with all the sausage meat and then stir fry them until cooked and add this to the rest of the stew, stirring them in well.

Serve in a bowl with a warm crusty bread roll or some mashed spuds.

Ingredients;

1kg of strong white bread flour
1 teaspoon of sea salt
2 x 7g packets of dried yeast
1 tablespoon of golden caster sugar
4 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
625ml of tepid water (tepid = 2 parts cold to one part boiling)
1 handful of cornmeal

Makes 6-8 Pizza bases

Sieve the flour and salt into a large bowl or onto a clean work surface and make a well in the middle of it.

Mix the yeast, sugar and olive oil into the water and leave for a few minutes, then pour into the well. Using a fork (or your hands) start to stir the liquid in the well while bringing in the flour until the dough starts to come together. Then work the rest of the flour in with your clean, flour-dusted hands. Knead the dough for about 5 minutes until you have a smooth, springy dough.

Place the ball of dough in a large flour-dusted bowl and flour the top of it. Cover the bowl with a damp cloth and place in a warm room for about an hour or until the dough has doubled in size.

Now place the dough on a flour-dusted surface and knead it around for a 2-3 minutes to push the air out. As you are doing this, work the dough into a giant sausage shape. Divide the dough into six or eight pieces (eight if you like a thin and crispy base) and put them to one side.

Take one of the portions and make it into a ball, then stretch that into a roundish shape about 3-4 inches across and place on a floured surface and grab your rolling pin. Rolling away from you and turning the pizza regularly, roll the pizza base out until it is thin (about an eighth of an inch or less) then flour the pizza base and place on a baking tray lined with cling film – if you don’t have a suitably-sized baking tray, you can substitute with a chopping board or any flat surface that will fit in your freezer.

Fold the cling-film back over the top of the pizza base ready for the next one to be placed on top and repeat until all the portions have been rolled out.

At this point, you can dress one of the pizza bases (simply using passata and cheese) on a baking tray or preferably a pizza stone, either way you will need to sprinkle some cornmeal on before placing the pizza on it to prevent it from sticking.

Then place in a hot oven (approx 220 degrees C) for about 8-10 minutes and enjoy.

You can wrap the cling-filmed pile of bases in tinfoil and put them flat in your freezer to be used later.  The bases, once dressed, will cook from frozen in 8-10 mins as well – perfect for a quick dinner when coming home late from work.