KIKKOMAN SOY SAUCE RECIPE CHALLENGE

I love cooking and pretty much cook from scratch every day. I find that even if it's only me, it's much nicer to sit down and eat something fresh, than eat a ready meal, a bowl of cereal or nothing at all.

So when I saw the information about a cookery challenge using soy sauce I thought I'd give it a try.

Most people have a bottle of soy sauce in the cupboard and we use it at least once a week. Stir fries are the obvious choice and then it goes really well in all sorts of marinades. We especially like the Nigella Lawson one that uses soy sauce, apple juice, star anise and maple syrup for a marinade for ribs and chicken. It also great to add a bit of a kick to gravy with the Sunday roast.

So a stir fry and rice dish...oh, then I looked at the criteria....the recipe had to be a "one pot" or "one pan" recipe and it couldn't be oriental in style.

So back to the drawing board!

I then set my own criteria.....

1. It had to be a recipe that the whole family would eat.
2. It had to be simple to prepare and cook.
3. It had to use tasty ingredients that were easily obtained and not expensive.
4. It had to be "one pot".

My teenagers are great fans of anything with a barbecue flavour, so I decided to make my own "pulled pork".

INGREDIENTS

A piece of boneless shoulder of pork (this recipe assumes it is a 1kg piece, but obviously you can just multiply up the other ingredients if you use a larger joint)

5 fl oz tomato ketchup

4 fl oz cider vinegar

1 fl oz apple balsamic vinegar

2 heaped tablespoons soft light brown sugar (you can use dark brown, but the pork will turn out darker)

1 tablespoon soy sauce

Then the nice easy part (ideal to put on in the morning before you go to work). Mix all the sauce ingredients together with 5 fl oz warm water. Stir until the sugar is dissolved. Then put the piece of pork in a slow cooker, pour over the sauce, put on the lid and cook on low for 6 to 8 hours, until the pork is soft and melting and will shred with a fork.

The sauce can be boiled down to a thick consistency in a pan to use as a barbecue sauce. You can use arrowroot to thicken if necessary, but I generally find that just boiling it up for 5 or 10 minutes is enough.

This pork can be served in a number of ways - with jacket potatoes and salad, in a bread roll, with pasta or rice. Whichever it is DELICIOUS!!

This blog post is my entry into the Kikkoman Best Blogger Recipe Competition 2014.

POTATOES - VERSATILE, EASY AND DELICIOUS

If like me you are always feeding hungry teenagers, then potatoes are a godsend. Easy to prepare and they can be used in so many different ways - baked, chipped, boiled, mashed....but sometimes when I look in the fridge there appears to only be a boring mixture of ingredients, so I started to look for a different way to use up potatoes and vegetables at the end of the week and this is one of the recipes I came up with.

Potato pastry pie with leeks and mushrooms

Ingredients

Shortcrust pastry - you need to make your own, so a standard recipe is twice the amount of plain flour to butter/margarine, but with this recipe you substitute half of the flour with mashed potato. So 4 oz flour, 4oz mashed potato and 4oz butter/margarine

Leeks - three good sized
Mushrooms - 6 to 8 oz
Cream cheese or mascarpone - three/four large tablespoons
Seasoning to taste

Method

This is a great recipe for using up mashed potato leftovers, but you can make fresh. DO NOT mash the potatoes with butter or milk if making fresh as the mash will be too soft.

Rub the butter into the flour until it resembles breadcrumbs and then mix in the mashed potato, Mix with your hands (or a wooden spoon) until it forms a ball of pastry dough. If you like you can add some mustard to the mixture at this point, which gives a great flavour when cooked. I found some honey mustard in the cupboard and used a large heaped tablespoonful.

 Leave the dough in the fridge to chill for at least half an hour.

In the meantime, thinly slice the leeks and mushrooms. Fry the leeks gently until soft (about 5 minutes) but not brown and then add the mushrooms for another 3 to 4 minutes.

 Cool slightly and then stir in the cream cheese (a flavoured version if you like) or mascarpone.

Roll out the chilled dough into an approximate circle and place on a baking tray. Pinch the sides to make a saucer shape and add the filling. If you prefer to use a flan dish that makes it slightly easier, but there is no real need. If you like the base really crispy you can bake blind before adding the filling for about 10 minutes.

Bake in a hot oven - 180° C - for about 20 minutes until the top is browned and the potato case crispy.

I like to eat this with a green salad and a sharp tasting chutney ( I had some homemade apple chutney that was just right), but it is also a good accompaniment for sausages or chops.

This post is an entry for #FluffyMarisPiper Linky Challenge sponsored by Potato Council. Learn more at bit.ly/18rWnaB.

PACT COFFEE - fresh coffee delivered to your door

I love to drink fresh coffee. It was a habit that I picked up whilst living in Austria many years ago as a student.

Austria (and Vienna in particular) are famous for their coffee houses and Austrians like nothing better than to sit with a cup of coffee ....and usually a delicious pastry or cake of some sort. Sitting in a coffee house in Vienna is a luxurious unhurried pastime. There is always a newspaper to hand and the waiter will bring you a fresh glass of iced water to accompany your coffee. Many coffee houses in Austria open in the evenings with piano music and some host literary evenings. Very cultured.

When ordering coffee in Austria you are generally given a menu and get to choose the bean type as well as the way it arrives - espresso, cappuccino, mocha, latte, ristretto. I found this a complete novelty at first, but I ended up trying out many different coffee bean types than I would ever have done had I been buying the beans myself. One of my favourite drinks on a cold Winter's day was the Einspaenner - a strong black coffee served in a glass with lots of whipped cream on top and a small bowl of powdered sugar on the side.

Finding good quality coffee has been a bit hit and miss in the UK, although it has improved tremendously over the years and there are now specialist shops that will grind beans to your taste. The range in some of these shops (especially in the larger towns) is excellent, but it is not always possible to travel to buy the coffee and the cost of travel can often offset the value of the purchase. I believe that fresh coffee should be bought in small sizes, so that it is used at its freshest and has no opportunity to go stale.

I was quite excited then to see a leaflet in a magazine for a company that offers fresh coffee delivered to your door. PACT say that their mission is to get us all drinking better quality coffee by making it accessible to everyone. They roast in small batches and post out within seven days so that the coffee is at its very freshest.

The leaflet I saw offered a trial first order for £1.00 (usual price £6.95) so I thought "Why not? At that price it has to be worth it". 

The process of ordering coffee is very straightforward and you can choose to receive beans or ground coffee (tailored to your own type of machine). The frequency of deliveries is again your choice and there is no ongoing commitment. I elected to receive different coffee every time and to let the team choose for me. I was a bit concerned when I saw the first choice was El Retiro (Roasted hazelnuts) as I don't like hazelnuts (!!), but I decided that I should give it a try. And I'm glad I did.

The coffee arrived two days later in a brown bag suitable for storage. The label clearly shows both when it was roasted and ground, so you can be sure it is fresh as can be.

I am glad I stuck with this choice of coffee as it is very smooth and flavoursome. Not too nutty and very mellow. It's a great breakfast choice with a warm croissant and some homemade jam.

The coffee arrived with a little coffee magazine - the first edition as it happens - that contains some great tips for improving your cup of coffee.

I was just thinking about writing this post when I received a call from Brendan at Pact checking I had received the coffee and that I was happy with it. We had a discussion about how I liked the strength of my coffee and he offered to adjust the type of grind of the coffee sent to me to suit my particular liking. He also suggested a different coffee for the next time than the one originally chosen for me following our discussion. Truly a personalised service!

I will definitely be continuing with this service and am already looking forward to the next package!

If you would like to take advantage of the same £1.00 trial that I used, then just leave me a comment with an email address and I will send you a code.

Happy coffee drinking!!

FRONT DOORS

The first time I opened my front door was the start of a new phase of my life – just me and my two children. I walked through to what I hoped would be happiness and a bright new future. The door was shiny and clean – gleaming in the Spring sunshine and with reflections from the glass hitting the driveway to the delight of my dancing three year old daughter.

Over the first few years, that door saw my children coming in and out – tiny in their nursery and first school uniforms, clutching teddies to help them get through the day at school; bringing “Piggy Wiggy” home from school for the weekend!! It saw my daughter pirouetting through in ballet gear, tap dancing through in her noisy tap shoes and trying to somersault through after gymnastics classes. It saw my son in his football boots, knocking off the mud against the uncomplaining glass front, smashing his tennis racquet against its frame to demonstrate his winning volley.

School bags have bashed its shiny surface; shopping bags full of clothes have been delightedly brought in and then there have been the shopping bags full of food, food and more food!!!

The door has stood firm when we have been away – letting the suitcases bash against its sides with no murmur of complaint, but keeping out all unwelcome visitors until our return home.

The seasons come and go, but as the years have passed my faithful door likes the changes less and less. In the Summer the heat makes the door expand so it is hard to close fully and in the Winter the cold contracts and its very frame creaks and moans; and however valiantly it tries, my lovely door can no longer keep out all the chill winds. It has protected us against the Autumn rain and the Winter snow, the ice and the hail, but has always let in the welcoming Spring sunshine and the warming Summer breezes.

A few more years passed but the door still did good service – opening to friends and family – a new sister-in-law, then a nephew and two nieces with prams, car seats and changing bags. The postman came every day, sometimes with cards and presents for birthdays and Christmases, flowers from admirers (oh well a bit of wishful thinking never hurt anyone!), but more often bills, bills and yet more bills.

One day it opened to let in a girl hammering frantically on the door. She had been beaten up on the street by her boyfriend and the closing door provided her (and us) with the comfort of security and warmth. It then later opened again to the policeman who came to take her to safety.

Now my children are teenagers the door seems to open more and more – friends  coming and going, me popping in and out being a taxi driver. The door opens later and later each morning (teenagers should get a prize for sleeping) and later and later at night.

But the door never complains …much….a new lively puppy has finally seen the seal on the door give up and give in. Where it had become worn out, now it is broken in two – a puppy’s sharp teeth are no match for the long suffering rubber seal on the old door. A well aimed stone – kicked to show me a football move!! – has left a large chip in the glass front. And the framework needs a lot more tender care than in the past – the lustre has gone from the frame, the sheen has disappeared…my door is slowly getting old and losing its joie de vivre.

It is sadly time to say goodbye to this door – it has seen laughter and tears over the years, but I will always remember it fondly as the beginning of new times. Farewell my wonderful door – you have done us proud over the years.

This is my entry for a blogger competition being run on the blog page Yale Doors.