Beetroot & Pecorino Spelt Pizza with Parsley, Anchovy and Walnut Pesto

This is a delicious alternative to my favourite homemade pizza. Saying that, it is actually a completely different, more virtuous beast. Wholesome, nourishing and full of wintery autumn flavours, each slice is packed with health to fight the cold-weather bugs coming our way: a kick of iron from the parsley, vitamin C from plenty of garlic in the pesto and beetroot to cleanse the system.

For the spelt base
In a bowl combine 500g Organic Spelt - I used Sharpham Park's Seeded Spelt Flour, 2tsp Salt and 7g Instant Active Yeast. Stir in 300ml Warm Water and bring the dough together. Knead on a floured surface for a few minutes. Place in a clean bowl, cover and leave to rise in a warm place for for 1-2 hrs.

For the beetroot
Preheat the oven to 180C. Wash and slice 6 large Beetroot into quarters. Toss with 2tbsp melted Coconut Oil, Salt and Pepper and place in a baking tray. Cover with foil and roast for an hour or until soft.

For the parsley, walnut and anchovy pesto
In a food processor blitz together: 1 large bunch of parsley (with stalks), 1 large clove of Garlic, a handful of Walnuts, a handful of grated Pecorino cheese, 6 Anchovies, 1tsp Coconut Oil and seasoning.

To finish
Preheat the oven to 200C. Punch back the dough. Divide into two, and freeze one for another day. Roll the dough into a thin circle or rectangle and place on a baking tray. Spread generously with the pesto, top with the beetroot and shavings of pecorino cheese. Drizzle with oil. Cook for ten minutes until crisp and the beetroot has caramelised.

Buttermilk and Sage Pork Schnitzel with Pickled Cabbage and Potato Salad

Recently I was given a snazzy Lumix LX7 camera. As I haven’t a clue what all the buttons do so I had planned to experiment outside today but the weather was far from ideal: see below my very wet donkeys! At the moment my skills do in no way match such a camera but here are a few attempts:

Nevertheless the duvet-day weather did dictate today’s lunch: Schnitzel. This is my ultimate comfort food and something I could eat over and over again. The idea for marinating the pork comes from the food writer Jane Lawson, and it makes the meat meltingly tender. The addition of almonds into the crust also makes this incredibly moreish and I love the combination of the crispy meat with the smooth comforting potato salad and sharp, caraway-spiked cabbage. It isn’t the prettiest of foods but the taste takes me straight to the snow-capped mountains of Austria!

Serves 6

Taken from Snowflakes and Schnapps by Jane Lawson

• Thinly slice 1 Green Cabbage. Place half in a large non-metallic dish and sprinkle with 3 Tbsp Sea Salt. Cover with the remaining cabbage. Massage the salt into the cabbage until it begins to release water. Mix in 1 tbsp Caraway Seeds, 1 tbsp Juniper Berries, crushed, and 2 Bay Leaves, crumbled. Cover and leave for 24 hrs.

• With a meat mallet, bash 6 Pork Escalopes until very thin. Place in a bowl and cover with 200ml Buttermilk, 1 Tsp English Mustard, 2 Garlic Cloves, crushed, and some chopped Sage. Cover and leave for a minimum 2hrs.
• Melt a knob of Butter with 1 tbsp Vegetable Oil in a large sauté pan. Gently fly 1 Onion, sliced until golden. Rinse the cabbage and take out the bay and berries. Squeeze out the excess moisture and add to the onion, season and cook gently for 20 minutes.
• Mix 200g Ground Almonds with 150g Breadcrumbs. In a separate dish whisk together 3 Eggs. In another dish have ready 200g of Flour, seasoned. Wipe of the majority of the marinade and dip each escalope first in the flour, then the egg, then the almond mix. Chill until ready to cook.
• Heat one or two pans to medium high with 1 tbsp Olive Oil and 1 tbsp Butter. In batches, fry the schnitzel for 3 minutes on each side.
• Add 80ml White Wine Vinegar to the Cabbage and cook for 5 minutes.
• Serve the schnitzel with the cabbage, crispy sage leaves, a parsley-heavy potato salad amd lemon wedges. Guten Appetite!

Feeding the boys: Homemade Pizzas and Summer Fruit Pavlovas

Nothing tastes as good as homemade pizza.

One gloriously hot weekend I travelled home to find a house sans parents…and in their place two hungry boys, aka my brothers. There was nothing for it but to get some pizza dough rising and raid the fridge for potential toppings (regardless of being related we all have very different views on the perfect pizza flavour). Pizza dough is so easy as it only needs one rise. The critical part is getting the oven to it absolute hottest when cooking.

I always find Jamie Oliver’s dough recipe brilliant. You can get about six large pizzas out of it and left overs freeze perfectly for when you next need a quick pizza supper. 

Mix 2 x 7g Dried Yeast Sachets into 640ml Lukewarm Water and 4 tbsp Extra Virgin Olive Oil. Leave for several minutes until it is frothy and you can hear it fizzing.  Sift 1kg White Bread Flour. 1 tsp Caster Sugar 1 tsp Sea Salt into the bowl of a mixer with the dough hook attached. Begin mixing and gradually add the yeasty liquid. Mix until a smooth dough is formed and the dough springs back when poked. Put in a oiled bowl, cover with clingfilm and leave to rise in a warm place for about an hour.

Meanwhile, to make a tomato sauce, all I do is heat 2tbsp Extra Virgin Olive Oil in a saucepan and gently cook 2 Crushed Garlic Cloves until soft. Then add 2 Cans of Chopped Tomatoes (Cirio have the best flavour). Add as much basil leaves as you can afford (save some for the pizza). Heat for a couple of minutes to let all the flavours mingle and season with a little sugar, salt and pepper. Whizz in a food processor until you have a lovely smooth passata.

Once the dough is risen all you need to do is punch it back, divide into 6 balls and let everyone shape their dough. The more irregular shaped, the better tasting in my opinion! Place the base on a baking tray and spread a thin layer on tomato onto the dough. Then bespoke-up your pizza with anything you fancy.

AJ went for a classic americano with added anchovies and olives.

Toby likes his dough thick and plain with mozzarella and pepperoni.

I did a kinda Fiorentina with mozzarella, spinach, a cracked egg (do this in the last 2-3 minutes of cooking for a runny yolk) and anchovies. 

All were sprinkled with Parmesan, basil and lots of olive oil. We also completed our feast with Prosciutto and Melon and Pimms. 

On the off chance that they were still hungry, later on, I found some of my individual pavlovas left over from a party and topped them with a healthy mound of cream, cherries, strawberries, a raspberry sauce and violas. They were monstrous but wolfed ridiculously fast!

Summer Fruit Individual Pavlovas with a Raspberry Sauce

Makes 6

Preheat your oven to 180C. For the meringue base whisk 2 egg whites until soft peaks form. Gradually whisk in 150g Caster Sugar until the mix is glossy and firm. Lastly fold in 2 tsp Cornflour and 1 tsp White Wine Vinegar. Line a baking sheet with parchment and spoon on 6 large mounds. Place in the oven and immediately turn it down to 120 degrees. Cook for 1 hour, then turn off the oven and leave in to cool with the door slightly ajar.

To finish, whizz a punnet of raspberries with a little sugar to taste in a processor. Loosely whip some double cream, spoon onto the pavlovas and top with sliced strawberries, cherries, a drizzle of the sauce and any edible flowers. I stole some violas from my mum’s pots.

Fresh and Smoked Salmon, Spinach & Dill Terrine, Watercress & Quail's Eggs

Recently I have been working. A lot. With barely time to wash my clothes (the machine is spinning as I type) I haven’t had a chance to do much of my own cooking. What with catering for several canapé events, a couple of buffet lunches this weekend and the little café that offshoots from the kitchen I work at, the last week has been a whirlwind of juggling numbers, my time and dozens of different new recipes and techniques. So much so that my head is still spinning.

So I thought I’d share a recipe for a terrine I made a couple of for a buffet lunch being held in the city today (thankfully I won’t be attending!).  With no experience of making a fish terrine before my only inspiration were those little packets of smoked salmon and cream cheese parcels you buy as a treat from somewhere like M&S. With these in mind I lined a ring mould with smoked salmon and then filled it with smoked salmon, fresh salmon and spinach cream cheese layers to create a stripy look when cut. I hope it worked!

I have given rough measures/quantities as I found it easier to guestimate as I went along.

• Oil and line a medium ring mould with clingfilm, making sure to leave some overhang.
• Cut long, wide strips of Smoked Salmon and lay them in overlapping lines in the mould, making sure to keep the ends long to fold over once the terrine has been filled.
• Next, blitz any smoked salmon cutoffs and a bit more with a handful of Dill. Add in about 200g Cream Cheese, a few tbsps Sour Cream, the juice of 1 Lemon and lots of pepper.  Remove to a bowl.
• Next blitz about 500g Raw Spinach, 200g Cream Cheese and  a pinch of Nutmeg. Remove to a bowl.
• Poach 1 or 2 Salmon Fillets. Flake the salmon.
• Now fill the terrine with a layer of half the smoked salmon mixture, then half the spinach mixture then the flaked salmon, the remaining spinach mix and finish with the smoked salmon mix.
• Fold the smoked salmon ends to cover the bottom and pull in the cling film to cover.
• Leave overnight to set.
• Invert onto a large plate. Fill with lots of Watercress, a handful of Quail’s eggs and some deep-fried Capers.