A quintessential British pudding, this is real winter comfort food, but we’ve also been known to wolf it down at the end of a Sunday lunch in May. The recipe here, to which I’ve made very small tweaks, jumped out to me on Instagram (@gastronomybyjonathan) back in January and has rapidly qualified for family-favourite status.Continue reading “Sticky toffee pudding”
Author Archives: motherrach
Portobello steaks & butter bean mash
Occasionally, a new addition to the repertoire is rapidly elevated to family-favourite status. Such is this superb recipe, for which I’m indebted to Yotam Ottolenghi and Ixta Belfrage: it was published in their wonderful book Flavour at the end of 2020. This is a perfect meal to serve to vegetarians (vegans, in fact) and meat-eatersContinue reading “Portobello steaks & butter bean mash”
Chicken in pancetta
Zita has pointed out an omission in the blog’s chicken section, and I agree that no family recipe collection would be complete without ‘Chicken in pancetta’. It is a comforting, home-made invention that often served as a special meal when we marked rites of passage: birthdays, heading off on travels, returning home from university. FeelContinue reading “Chicken in pancetta”
Chocolate Crunch
On the Tarnóy side of the family, this is known as ‘Auntie Alison’s Chocolate Crunch’, whereas the Wilsons and the Chandlers call it ‘Granny’s chocolate’. Evidently, Great-Granny got the recipe from her sister-in-law (Auntie Alison) and it then became her own. She would invariably produce it as a tea-time treat whenever the grandchildren visited. IContinue reading “Chocolate Crunch”
Hungarian Christmas Eve dinner
Last year, catapulted into Tier 4 and confined to London for Christmas, we had to fend for ourselves for the first time ever on Christmas Eve. Granny came to the rescue with this guest blog post, now recorded for posterity so that you will be able to carry on a vital family tradition. Baby Jesus,Continue reading “Hungarian Christmas Eve dinner”
Pavlova wreath
This is a great pudding at any time of year (we had it once for Sam’s birthday in May), but ideal at Christmas because it’s eye-catching, wreath-shaped, feeds large numbers and can be made well ahead. Most fruits work well with it, so just use whatever’s in season. I first saw Mary Berry making itContinue reading “Pavlova wreath”
Christmas stuffing
Christmas is the only time we ever deviate from our traditional Scottish oat stuffing. This sausagemeat one is packed with Christmas flavours and goes with turkey, goose, even roast beef (at a push). If you want to control the cooking time of your meat it’s probably best to cook the stuffing separately, shaped into individualContinue reading “Christmas stuffing”
Butternut, orange & sage galette
This one’s stretching the rules a bit again. Galettes have become quite trendy and I’ve only started making them recently. A galette is a single crust, free-form pie, which can be sweet or savoury – this eye-catching vegetarian one comes from Ottolenghi’s Flavour, published in 2020. We’ve eaten it twice and although the list ofContinue reading “Butternut, orange & sage galette”
Meringue roulade
We’re approaching the end of the two-year publishing period earmarked for this blog back in January 2020. Reviewing the collection, I find relatively few pudding recipes, so here’s a trusted favourite to redress the balance. The source is Darina Allen’s excellent Ballymaloe Cookery Course book, a present from Grandma in 2007 which has proved toContinue reading “Meringue roulade”
Raspberry coulis
This is so simple that it hardly warrants a whole post. Whizz one up if you want to add zing and a pop of colour to all sorts of puddings: chocolate roulade, meringues with fruit and cream, even a lemon tart. Ingredients400g raspberries1 tbsp lemon juice3 tbsp icing sugar Method Put all the ingredients inContinue reading “Raspberry coulis”
Years of Practice 