Odlums Coconut Buns for baking with kids

Category

Baking with Kids

Cook Time15-20 mins

What you need:

  • 225g/8oz Odlums Cream Plain Flour
  • Pinch of Salt
  • 1 teaspoon Odlums Baking Powder
  • 75g/3oz Butter or Margarine
  • 75g/3oz Shamrock Golden Caster Sugar
  • 50g/2oz Shamrock Desiccated Coconut
  • 1 Egg, beaten
  • 150ml/¼pt Milk

To Decorate

  • Fruitfield Raspberry Jam
  • Extra Shamrock Desiccated Coconut

How to:

  1. Preheat oven to 200°C/400°F/Gas 6. Lightly grease 2 flat baking trays.
  2. Sieve the flour, salt and baking powder into a bowl.
  3. Rub in the butter or margarine until mixture resembles breadcrumbs.
  4. Add the sugar and coconut and mix well.
  5. Mix to a fairly stiff consistency with the egg and milk. Drop dessertspoonfuls of the mixture, spaced apart on the prepared tins. Makes about 12.
  6. Bake for 15-20 minutes until risen and golden brown. Remove from oven and transfer buns to wire tray to cool.
  7. Brush the top with jam and dip in the extra coconut.

Coconut Buns

Ulster Crab Risotto

Ulster Crab Risotto

Serves: 10

Ingredients

  • 2 large Portrush Brown Cock Crabs
  • 4 litres pre-prepared crab stock
  • 500g Lakeland Dairies Butter
  • 400ml Millac Dairy Whipping Cream
  • 1kg arborio rice
  • 8 banana shallots
  • 200g wild rocket
  • 300g Parmesan cheese (Parmigiano Regianno)
  • micro red amaryth cress and parsley to garnish
  • 4 red peppers
  • 50ml aged balsamic vinegar
  • 100ml olive oil

Method

In a large, flat-bottomed pan melt 250g of Lakeland Dairies Butter. Add the shallots and braise before stirring in the rice.

Pour in the crab stock, a little at a time, until the rice is half cooked. Remove from the heat.

Place 2 red peppers in the oven with a little olive oil, salt and pepper. When they have blistered all over, remove them from the oven, cool and deseed. Remove skins with a small prep knife and cut into thin strips (equal lengths).

Deseed the remaining 2 red peppers and blend before passing through a fine chinoix or muslin. Discarding the pulp, transfer the juice into a small pan, adding the balsamic vinegar and reduce to a thick consistency. Allow to cool, before whisking in olive oil to make a pepper dressing.

Purée the brown crab meat and pass through chinoix to remove any shell. Set aside.

Pick out the white crab meat, ensuring there are no pieces of shell remaining. Mix together with the brown meat.

Place the remaining 250g Lakeland Dairies Butter into a large pan and add the half-cooked rice mixture. When it is almost cooked, add the Millac Dairy Whipping Cream, Parmesan and crab meat and simmer gently.

Season to taste. Add the rocket and stir until soft.

Serve the risotto as 2 or 3 quenelles in the centre of a suitable bowl.

Arrange slices of red pepper around the risotto and drizzle the red pepper dressing on top before garnishing with the amaryth and parsley.

 

Molly Malone’s cockle and mussel chowder

molly malones chowder

Molly Malone was a beautiful girl who sold cockles and mussels and died tragically of a fever while still young, or so the song goes. Molly may not have been a real girl, but since at least the 17th century, there have been fishmongers on the streets of Dublin who sell ‘Cockles and Mussels, alive, alive, oh!’

Cockles, with their distinctive flavour and lovely curved shell, are traditionally eaten in Ireland with Oatcakes. If you can only find mussels, this chowder will be just as good.

Serve either as a substantial starter or with chunks of crusty bread as a meal in its own right.

Heat the sunflower oil in a saucepan over medium-high heat. Add the bacon and sauté for about 1 minute, until crisp and golden. Add the butter to the pan and melt. Then add the leek, carrot and potato. Reduce the heat to low and sauté gently for 4–5 minutes, until soft but not browned.

Meanwhile, prepare the cockles and mussels. Scrub the shells clean and discard any that remain open when you tap them against a hard surface. Remove the beard – the little fibrous tuft – from each mussel. Bring the wine to a boil in a large saucepan and add the cockles and mussels. Cover with a tight-fi tting lid and cook for 3–4 minutes, shaking the pan occasionally, until the shells have opened.

Remove from the heat, drain the shellfi sh in a colander, reserving the cooking juices, and discard any shells that remain closed. Return the shellfi sh to the empty pan to keep warm. Place a fine sieve over a measuring jug and strain the cooking liquid. You should have at least 600ml (1 pint); if not, add water to make up that quantity.

Add the pan juices and the milk to the bacon and vegetable mixture and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat and simmer for 6–8 minutes, until the potato is tender. Add the cream and simmer for another 2–3 minutes, until the soup is reduced and thickened slightly. Season with salt and pepper.

Meanwhile, remove half of the cockles and mussels from their shells and add them with the remaining cockles and mussels still in their shells to the chowder. Stir in the parsley and serve at once.

http://www.rachelallen.com/post/molly-malones-cockle-and-mussel-chowder

 

Farfalle with red pepper sauce – Catherine Fulvio

farfalle-red-pepper-sauce-266x266

It’s great over steamed fish and equally tasty over roasted garlic and courgettes.

Ingredients

  • 350g farfalle
  • 1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
  • 3 shallots, finely chopped
  • 1 tbsp tomato purée
  • 100ml white wine
  • 2 red peppers, roasted and chopped
  • 50g crème fraîche
  • 200ml fresh cream
  • salt and freshly ground black pepper
  • 100g ricotta salata (or feta), crumbled, to serve
  • chives, to garnish

Directions

1 Cook the pasta according to the instructions on the package.

2 In the meantime, prepare the sauce. Heat the oil in a medium saucepan over a low heat and sauté the shallots until softened. Add the tomato purée and cook for 1 minute. Add the white wine and cook for a further 2–3 minutes. Add the roasted peppers and cook for 1–2 minutes, then stir in the crème fraîche and cream.

3 Remove from the heat and allow to cool slightly. Remove half the sauce and blend it to a purée, then mix both back together again. Season to taste.

4 Toss the drained, cooked pasta into the sauce, sprinkle over the crumbled ricotta salata and garnish with some chive lengths on top.

KEEPING IT LOCAL: THIS SAUCE IS ESPECIALLY TASTY SPOONED OVER STUFFED LOCAL FREE-RANGE CHICKEN BREASTS WRAPPED WITH LOCAL DRY CURED BACON.

http://cookwithavonmore.ie/recipe/farfalle-with-red-pepper-sauce-catherine-fulvio/