Hungarian goose and barley (Ludaskasa)

I have a great colleague who is really into cooking, so it is a real pleasure to meet and discuss new cooking ideas. I really like Hungarian food, and he’d been experimenting with confit wild goose leg. So this is where we ended up. 

This is a traditional Hungarian recipe, I’m sure there are many versions. I made mine with dried porcini mushrooms, but there are recipes that don’t use them. It takes a while to make, so be prepared. 

First of all, when presented with a wild goose, peel off the skin without plucking it. Take off the breast meat and save that for another day, in the freezer. Next, take the legs, trim them and cook them in hot duck or goose fat. The legs should be completely covered, and then put in a covered dish in a very low oven, around 90C for 4 to 6 hours. 

Next, while the goose legs are being cooked slowly, make a goose soup. 

INGREDIENTS FOR GOOSE SOUP

  • 1 goose carcase, including liver, heart, gizzard, if possible
  • 2 tbsps goose or duck fat
  • 1 large onion, cut into wedges
  • 2 large carrots, peeled and chopped
  • 4 sticks of celery, chopped
  • 2 red peppers, chopped
  • a couple of bay leaves
  • 15g dried porcini mushrooms
  • Salt and pepper

METHOD FOR GOOSE SOUP

  • In a large stock pot, melt the fat and fry the onion. As it starts to soften, add the celery, carrots and peppers, and cook until they are beginning to brown
  • Add the goose carcase, enough water to cover, salt and pepper, bayleaves and the porcini mushrooms. 
  • Bring to a low simmer, and simmer for four hours. When the soup is made, cool it and remove the remains of the carcase. Strain the soup. Any cooked meat on the carcase, plus the heart and liver can be shredded and reserved. 

Now you are ready for the next step. You won’t use all of the strained soup, and it is good in its own right. It also freezes well in case you want to make more of the Orzotto. 

INGREDIENTS FOR THE LUDASKASA

  • Goose fat
  • Hot stock
  • Saffron
  • White wine
  • Confit goose legs
  • Shredded goose meat from the soup preparation
  • 160g pearl barley soaked in water for 1 hour or more
  • Chopped parsley

METHOD: 

  • Reheat the soup
  • Take a cup of hot goose stock and add a pinch of saffron
  • In a large pan, heat 2 tbsp goose fat on high, and add the soaked and drained barley. Toast it for a minute or so, and then add a glass of white wine. Let this cook away and then start adding the stock, a ladleful at a time. I started with the saffron stock first. Simmer away the moisture from each ladleful before adding the next, just like making a risotto. Keep adding the stock until the barley is well cooked and tender. 
  • Serve in a deep bowl, stir in the shredded meat, and top with the confit goose legs and chopped parsley. 

I found the barley part of the dish to be the bit I liked the best, and I had plenty of goose soup left at the end, so I can make that again. 

Grilled lobster with charmoula butter

Thanks to a kind gift of two very lively lobsters, we had this delicious meal during the week. In honour of the lobsters, we also had a bottle of champagne, the whole evening was very messy and delicious. 

We learned several lessons. First off, we split the lobsters before grilling them. It is better to use a finer grill support. The claws are best boiled in a separate pan for around 10 minutes. The half lobster tails need to be grilled on high for 10 minutes, with the butter poured on before serving, with slices of brown bread. 

If you don’t have a grill, you could boil the lobsters whole for ten minutes, and then split in half. 

INGREDIENTS:

  • Two local lobsters, claws removed and cut in half
  • 100g butter
  • 2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
  • 2 tbsp chopped coriander leages
  • 2 tbsp chopped parsley
  • 2 tsp lemon juice
  • a pinch of Aleppo chilli pepper, or other mild chilli pepper
  • 1/2 tsp ground cumin
  • 1/4 tsp hot smoked paprika 
  • Salt, to taste 

METHOD:

  • Boil the claws for ten minutes. Grill the tails for ten minutes under a hot gril
  • While the lobster is cooking, melt the butter in a small pan, and add the garlic, and simmer in the butter for a minute. 
  • Add the rest of the ingredients, season with salt. 

To serve, pour the dressing into individual ramekins. You can pour the sauce onto the lobster, or dip the lobster in. Mop up the juices and the left-over sauce with thick slices of white bread. 

 

Goose and paprika

The flavour of green sweet peppers and goose just go so well together. This is a rich stew with a Hungarian twist, rich with paprika, peppers and tomatoes. After I made this, I found lots of recipes from Hungary using goose, but this is not a classic. I think there is a similar dish using chicken but it has a lot of sour cream in it, unlike this rich stew. 

I think it should probably be served with Hungarian nokedli, a sort of pasta. I had mine with linguine. 

INGREDIENTS:

  • 2 tbsp lard (or olive oil)
  • 3 wild goose breasts,
  • 1 large onion, chopped
  • 3 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
  • 1 red bell pepper, chopped
  • 1 green bell pepper, chopped
  • 4 heaped tsp sweet paprika
  • 2 tsp caraway seeds
  • 1 tsp cumin seeds
  • 1 tsp coriander seeds
  • 1 tbsp tomato paste
  • Chicken stock
  • 1 can chopped tomatoes
  • salt and pepper
  • chopped parsley to serve

METHOD:

  • Heat the oil or lard in a casserole dish, and fry the chopped peppers and onions. Once they begin to soften, add the garlic and spices, and continue to cook over a medium heat. 
  • Add the tomato paste, paprika and tinned tomatoes and bring to a simmer. Cook until the sauce is nice and thick. Season to taste. If the sauce looks a bit thick, add chicken stock and then cook it down. 
  • Version a: I fried off the goose meat, cubed, added to the stew and cooked it in a slow oven, around 120C for 4 hours. The goose was very tasty, but it took a while to get tender. 
  • Version b: I cut the goose meat into goujons, fried them quicky and put them onto the pasta and sauce on the plate. Version b was quicker and the goose was tender, but the flavour was not as good. 

Served with noodles and garnished with chopped parsley. 

 

 

Smoked haddock and parsnip fishcakes

I managed to get a bag of parsnips at a reduced rate from our local supermarket, as they weren’t beautiful. It was a good bargain, I got about 500g of parsnips. I made this recipe from Ottolenghi’s book, Simple. I halved the quantities, and substituted dried dill, on account of not being able to get fresh dill. I had enough for six large fishcakes. 

INGREDIENTS:

  • 300g peeled parsnips
  • Olive oil
  • 250g smoked haddock fillets, skinned
  • 2 tsp dried dill
  • 10g chopped chives
  • 1 clove of garlic, crushed
  • zest of one lemon, cut the lemon into wedges for serving. 
  • a large egg, beaten
  • salt and pepper 
  • butter

METHOD:

  • Preheat the oven to 190C fan
  • Chop the peeled parsnips into chunks, toss with 3 tbsp olive oil and a pinch of salt. Roast in the oven for 30 to 45 minutes, until soft and browned. Sit to cool slightly. 
  • Put the cooked and cooled parsnips into a food processor and blitz to a coarse mash. I had some extra parsnip, so I put this into a container for the freezer for use later. Put the parsnip in a large bowl
  • Put the fish into the same processor, and blitz again intil roughly chopped.
  • Add the fish to the parsnip mash along with the egg, garlic, chopped herbs, 1/2 tsp salt, ground black pepper, and the lemon zest. Mix well, and shape the mixture into fishcakes. Mine were about the size of a crumpet or small burger. You can also put the mixture in the fridge for use the next day. 
  • Put a bit of butter in a frying pan along with a bit of olive oil, and heat to medium, with the butter melting and foaming. Add the fishcakes and fry them, around 4 minutes on each side. Two fishcakes is plenty for one person. Serve with a wedge of lemon. 

Iced Gingerbread

This was made by special request. My grandson wanted help making it for his mother’s birthday, so that is what we did. We started from Nigella’s book, ‘Domestic Goddess‘. If you’ve ever made any of her recipes, they are well written and with latitude to adapt, and the final result is excellent. There’s a very similar recipe in ‘The Farmhouse Kitchen Book’, which has several recipes for gingerbread from around the UK. 

INGREDIENTS:

  • 150g butter
  • 125g dark muscovado sugar
  • 200g golden syrup
  • 200g treacle
  • 2 tsp ground ginger, or fresh grated ginger
  • 1 tsp ground cinnamon
  • 250ml milk
  • 2 large eggs, beaten
  • 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
  • 300g plain flour
  • A tin measuring 30x20x5 cm (a medium roasting tin) greased and lined with greaseproof paper
  • 1 tbsp lemon juice
  • 175g icing sugar
  • 1 tbsp warm water

METHOD:

    • Preheat the oven to 170C
    • In a saucepan, melt the butter, sugar, treacle, golden syrup, ginger and cinnamon. Once everything has combined, set aside to cool
    • In a bowl, beat the eggs, and add the milk. Mix bicarbonate of soda with a little warm water, about 2 tbsp and add to the eggs and milk. 
    • Measure out the flour into a large bowl.
    • Pour the egg mixture into the sugar mixture, stir together to combine and then tip the whole lot into the flour. Use a hand whisk to mix everything together, making a runny batter
    • Pour the batter into the tin, put it into the oven and bake for around 50 minutes. 
    • Let the cake cool in the tin for at least 10 minutes before attempting to lift it out onto a wire rack. 
    • Once the cake is cool, you can ice it. Sift the icing sugar into a large bowl, and mix in 1 tbsp water and 1 tbsp lemon juice, plus any food colouring that you wish. We used yellow, on account of that being a favourite colour and the lemon being yellow. Pour the icing into the middle of the cake and spread out a little, using a flat knife. It will tend to flow out so you don’t need to be too precise. 

Once the icing has set, you can cut the gingerbread into fingers or squares. We cut ours up into 24 squares, but then we all ate at least two squares, served with Earl Grey tea, 

Stewed broad beans with tomatoes and bacon

I am testing broad bean recipes, many of them involve bacon, or herbs, or both. This is a robust stew from Umbria, for when you have a lot of broad beans. 

INGREDIENTS:

  • 1kg shelled broad beans
  • 1 large carrot, peeled and diced
  • 1 onion, peeled and chopped
  • 2 stalks of celery, diced
  • 200g smoked pancetta, chopped
  • 4 cloves of garlic, peeled and chopped
  • olive oil
  • salt and pepper
  • Dried pepperoncini flakes (or any chilli flakes)
  • 2 cans of chopped tomatoes
  • Fresh parsley

METHOD:

  • Heat some oil in a large casserole dish or heavy saucepan, and slowly fry the pancetta, carrots, onions and celery for around 10 minutes, when the pancetta should be starting to brown. 
  • Add the garlic and chilli flakes and cook for another couple of minutes, before adding the beans and tomatoes. Season with salt, pepper and parsley. 
  • Simmer for around 20 to 30 minutes, when the beans should be tender. Take off the heat, and garnish with a swirl of good olive oil and some chopped parsley. 

I had this with bread and pecorino cheese. There are variations as well, you can add some chopped chard, or cooked peas, or artichoke hearts, or use fewer tomatoes. You can substitute basil or mint for the parsley. You could stick a poached duck egg on the top. 

Sausage, black pudding and parsnips

This is a recipe from Nigel Slater’s Kitchen Diaries. This is a splendid book of cooking day by day through the year. The dishes are generally quick, easy, delicious, and easy to adapt. The book is also well-indexed so finding a recipe for an ingredient is simple. 

For this recipe, the first time I tried it, I was a bit frustrated. My roasting tray did not heat evenly on the gas hob, and turned out to be too small for all the ingredients. I singed the onions, and ended up with too much stock at the end. I have adapted the recipe to suit my kitchen. In the original recipe, everything is fried off in a roasting tray and then stock added, before putting in the oven. 

INGREDIENTS:

  • Four thick sausages, cut into thirds
  • A small black pudding, around 250g to 300g, in thick slices
  • 2 medium or one very large onion
  • Vegetable oil
  • Parsnips, around 4 (400g-500g) – peeled and cut into large chunks
  • A pinch of dried thyme
  • 250ml chicken stock

METHOD:

  • Set the oven to 190C
  • Peel the onions and cut into slim wedges, around 8 pieces for a medium onionc. 
  • Heat some oil in a large casserole dish over a medium flame, and add the onions, and let them soften. 
  • After about five minutes, add the parsnips and cook them until they start to colour. 
  • In a separate pan, fry off the sausages and then add them to the casserole dish. Do the same with the sliced black pudding. Make sure the sausage and the black pudding are a good colour on the outside before adding to the casserole dish. 
  • Stir in the chicken stock and thyme, and bring to a simmer. 
  • Put the dish into the oven without a lid for thirty to forty minutes. The parsnips should be really tender, and the stock should have cooked down to a sticky glaze. 

We served this with sprouts, because I love them. However, with the parsnips and all the flavour, you don’t need anything else. To help it stretch to feed more, serve with mashed potato. 

 

Salmon in Chraimeh sauce

I’m still cooking my way through a supply of salmon which needs to be finished, so for the last filled, I cooked this recipe from Yotam Ottolenghi and Sami Tamimi’s book, Jerusalem. The sauce was delicious, and because I was only cooking for myself, I poached each portion of fish in a serving of the sauce as I needed it. 

INGREDIENTS:

  • Vegetable oil
  • 3 tbsp plain flour
  • 4 portions of salmon, preferably salmon steaks
  • 6 cloves of garlic, chopped
  • 2 tsp sweet paprika
  • 1 tbsp caraway seeds, dry-toasted and then ground
  • 1 1/2 tsp ground cumin
  • 1/3 tsp cayenne 
  • 1/3 tsp ground cinnamon
  • 1 green chilli, chopped
  • 150ml water
  • 2 tbsp tomato puree
  • 1 to 2 tsp caster sugar, to taste
  • 1 lemon, cut into wedges, and 2 tbsp lemon juice
  • 2 tbsp chopped coriander leaf
  • Salt and pepper

METHOD:

  • Put the flour in a dish and season with salt and pepper. Coat the fish steaks or fillets in the seasoned flour
  • Heat 2 tbsp of vegetable oil in a large frying pan for which you have a lid. Sear the seasoned fish on each side for a couple of minutes, so that the coating is gold. Once the fish is fried, cool the pan and wipe it clean. 
  • Put the garlic, spices, chilli, and a couple of spoonfuls in a processor or pestle and mortar, and grind to a thick paste. You may need to add a little more oil.
  • In a small jug, mix the tomato puree and water, and have this ready by the hob.
  • Into the freshly cleaned pan, heat another couple of tbsp oil, and when it is hot, add the spice paste, stir and spread this out so it cooks for around 30 seconds. 
  • Add the water and tomato puree. This will spit a bit and it will stop the spices burning. Bring to a simmer, and add 3/4 tsp sugar, lemon juice, salt and pepper to taste. That is the sauce made. At this point, you could store it for cooking later. 
  • Put the fish into the sauce, bring to a simmer and cook for around 10 minutes, or maybe less. The fish should be hot and tender when it is done. Take the fish off the heat and leave it to cool slightly, before serving warm, garnished with coriander and a wedge of lemon.

I served this with super-quick couscous and some steamed green beans. I put 50g of couscous in a wee jug with a pinch of marigold stock powder, and then poured in 75g boiling water, covered and let it sit for 3 minutes. 

Grilled Salmon Masala

This was the destiny of the second of four large salmon fillets. Again, this is from ‘Curry Easy‘ by Madhur Jaffrey, and it made me consider whether salmon tandoori could be a thing as well. The salmon would not need to be tenderised in yoghurt…

However, on with the main item on the menu – this was delicious, the combination of Dijon mustard and salmon is a revelation. It made two servings, with rice and green beans, which I cooked as suggested in the recipe book. Best to prepare the rice before grilling the salmon, it takes minutes. 

INGREDIENTS:

  • around 340 to 400g salmon fillet
  • a pinch of salt
  • 1/4 tsp of ground cumin
  • 1/8 tsp ground coriander
  • 1/8 tsp ground turmeric
  • 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
  • 2 tbsp Dijon mustard
  • 1 tbsp rapeseed oil
  • 2 tsp lemon juice
  • 2 tbsp chopped coriander leaf

METHOD:

  • Mix the salt, cumin, coriander, turmeric and cayenne pepper and rub this over the salmon. Cover and put into the fridge for 1 to 4 hours. 
  • Heat the grill to a high setting and set the oven to 180C
  • Mix the mustard, oil and lemon juice with the chopped coriander, and rub this mixture all over the fish. 
  • Grill the fish for around 4 minutes, and as it starts to brown, transfer it to the oven for around 10 minutes. 

 

Salmon in a Mustard Sauce (Bengali)

I defrosted a very large chunk of fresh salmon and filleted it. I am going to try this four ways, the first is from ‘Curry Easy‘ by Madhur Jaffrey. This is a very easy recipe and especially quick and delicious. I served it with plain rice and dal. Because it is so quick to cook, around 5 minutes, best to sort out the rice and dal first, and have all of the ingredients prepped and ready to go. This made two large servings. 

INGREDIENTS:

  • 400g approx fresh salmon, boned and skinned
  • salt
  • turmeric
  • cayenne pepper
  • 1 tbsp dijon mustard
  • 2 tbsp rapeseed oil
  • 1/4 tsp mustard seeds
  • 1/4 tsp cumin seeds
  • 1/4 tsp fennel seeds
  • 2 whole fresh hot green chillies, slit lengthways

METHOD:

  • Cut the fish into chunks around 2.5cm x 5cm, and put into a plastic container with a lid. Add 1/4 tsp salt, 1/4 tsp ground turmeric, 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper, mix well and cover. Leave to sit in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.
  • Put the mustard into a small bowl, and add 1/4 tsp salt, 1/4 tsp ground turmeric, 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper, mix and then add 7 tbsp water, and set aside for later.
  • When you are ready to cook, heat the oil in a medium saucepan, and when the oil is hot, add the mustard seeds, stir until they start to pop, and then add the cumin and fennel seeds. Stir again and add the mustard mixture. Add the chillies and bring to a simmer.
  • Place the fish into the sauce in a single layer, and simmer gently for 4 or 5 minutes, until the fish is just cooked through. Spoon the sauce over the fish as it cooks. 
  • And you’re done, ready to serve.