Diamond Jubilee Armed Forces' Tribute Meal (Part Two)

This is part two of the three course meal I have devised to represent the three major branches of the Armed Forces in celebration of the Queen's Diamond Jubilee. Yesterday's post saw the concept introduced and a starter of pheasant casserole prepared in honour of the Royal Air Force. Today, we move on to the main course, in tribute to the Royal Navy. Despite the obvious temptation to simply prepare a variation of the British classic, fish and chips, I instead prepared this seafood platter thinking along the lines of representing the many different fruits of the sea.

Please remember - although these dishes are published for and dedicated to the occasion of HM Queen Elizabeth II's Diamond Jubilee, they can be enjoyed by anyone, at any time or on any occasion!

Some of the ingredients for this dish were bought ready to eat and some cooked in advance. This means that the meal is served in the form of a cold salad, suitable for what will hopefully be a beautiful, early summer weekend at the beginning of June when the main Diamond Jubilee celebrations will take place. This also means that most of your preparations are done in advance, earlier in the day, saving you time when it comes to service.

The ingredients you could incorporate in a seafood salad are of course many and if there are certain items you don't fancy in this combination, simply substitute them for others.

Ingredients

1 4oz salmon loin fillet (skin on)
3 whole langoustines
3 large King scallops
6 to 8 fresh, live mussels
Approximately 1/2 pint cold milk
1 medium onion
1/2 tsp black peppercorns
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
1/2 tsp dried dill leaves
1/2 pint white wine, plus 2 tbsp extra
1 large slice of smoked salmon
1 smoked mackerel fillet
1 rollmop (pickled herring)
2 or 3 small lettuce leaves
1/2 medium tomato
Lemon wedge for garnish

Directions

Whether you leave the coral (orange portion) attached to the main muscle of the scallop is entirely up to you. It is entirely edible, though admittedly not as tasty as the white meat of the main part of the scallop. When I am cooking scallops to eat them warm, I like to sear them in a pan but I prefer this method of cooking them when I intend to eat them cooled.

Put the scallops in to a pot and pour in enough cold milk to cover. Put the pot on to a medium heat. As soon as the milk starts to simmer, the scallops are ready. Lift them from the milk with a slotted spoon to a plate and cover.

While you are waiting for the milk to reach a simmer, check the salmon for any remaining pin bones and remove where necessary with tweezers. Lay the fillet in another pot (skin side down) and season with salt, a little pepper and the dill. Pour in the half pint of white wine and enough cold water to ensure the salmon is comfortably covered. Put it on to a high heat until the water just starts to simmer. Turn off the heat, put the lid on the pot and simply leave the salmon to cook in the cooling liquid for a couple of hours. This will see it served deliciously moist and tender.

Peel the onion and cut it in half. Slice one of the halves and add it to a pot, along with the peppercorns and a good half teaspoon of salt. Add cold water to a depth of about three inches and put it on the heat until it reaches a rolling boil. Carefully add the langoustines to the pot and cook for two minutes. Remove them from the water with a slotted spoon and lay on the plate with the scallops.

Note: If you are intending collecting and cooking mussels yourself, ensure that you do follow the many associated and appropriate safety procedures.

Ensure that all the mussels are closed. If not, tap them lightly on a hard surface and discard any that still fail to close. The mussels should be cooked in a minimum of liquid in a large pot. Remember, they are to be steamed, not poached. Slice the remaining onion and add it to the pot with the 2 tablespoons of white wine and three or four tablespoons of cold water. The depth of liquid in the pot should be slightly less than half an inch. Put the pot on a high heat until the liquid boils. Add the mussels and put the lid on the pot. Steam for two to three minutes.
 

Remove the lid from the pot containing the mussels. Any mussels which have not opened should not be eaten. Remove the rest to a plate with a slotted spoon.

When the salmon poaching liquid is cool, remove the fillet. The skin can now carefully be peeled free and the cooking for your seafood platter is complete.

The smoked salmon and smoked mackerel are commonly purchased in vacuum packs but the rollmops will be in brine, usually in a plastic tub with onion and other spices. Remove a rollmop from the tub and carefully pat dry with kitchen paper. A little bit of the onion is good to serve with the herring.

The seafood is plated on a traditional plate at the top of this post but the image above shows just one alternative way of plating, depending upon preference. Begin by laying the shredded lettuce leaves, tomato and lemon on the plate and simply build the seafood around them as desired. Don't forget to pour your Victory Ale, if desired, the beer which marks Admiral Lord Nelson's victory at the Battle of Waterloo and one of the Royal Navy's greatest triumphs.

Hopefully, you are a seafood lover and this meal idea appeals to your taste. The third and final part of this post, representing the British Army and the meal pudding, will be published in the next couple of days and I hope you'll come back again to see what I came up with.

3 Course Diamond Jubilee Meal Tribute to the British Armed Forces (Part One)

This is my second post dedicated to celebrating the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II with appropriate food and meal creations. Given that Her Majesty is Commander-in-Chief of the British Armed Forces, I felt it was essential to come up with something to pay tribute to the British Army, Royal Navy and Royal Air Force on this extra special occasion. I thought long and hard about how to achieve this and decided to create a three course meal, each course representing a major branch of the services. I very much hope you like what I finally came up with and prepared. This first part of the meal is the starter, dedicated to the Royal Air Force, and today's post is the first in a mini-series of three.

Not in the UK? No problem! Why not adapt these ideas to include food items native to and popular in your own country to toast your nation's Armed Forces on a special day in the calendar? It's also a great way of finding innovative new ideas for the family table!

It may be that you normally enjoy a glass of wine with a special meal. If you are a beer drinker, however, and enjoy a beer with your dinner, below are three ideas you may wish to consider. Failing that, you could of course enjoy the beers before or after your meal...?

These beers are Spitfire Ale (symbolic of the RAF), Victory Ale (symbolic of the Royal Navy) and Bombardier Ale (symbolic of the Army). They are all widely available in supermarkets in the UK.

It was fairly obvious to me that this course had to centre around something which flies. I finally settled on pheasant, which had to be purchased online in frozen form, due to it being out of shooting season. I considered a number of pheasant recipes but finally prepared a simple pheasant, vegetable and cider casserole.

Ingredients (Serves Two)

1 whole prepared pheasant (fully thawed, if applicable)
2oz unsalted butter
1 stick of celery
1 medium carrot
1 Granny Smith apple
1/2 small white onion
1 large clove of garlic
1 pint fresh chicken stock
1/2 pint apple cider
Sea salt and black pepper
Torn basil leaves to garnish (optional)

Directions

The pheasant should be portioned by firstly cutting off the leg portions then halfing the carcass horizontally to separate the breasts from the backbone. The breast portion should then be halfed down through the central bone. Alternatively, you may wish to remove the two breast fillets from the bone. The back of the pheasant can be used to make stock.

Melt the butter in a large pot and season, brown and seal the breast and leg portions. Remove them to a plate with cooking tongs or a large slotted spoon.

Peel, core and chop the apple. Wash, dry and chop the celery stick. The carrot should be topped, tailed, scraped and chopped, while the peeled onion half should be finely sliced. The garlic clove should be peeled and finely chopped.

Add the vegetables to the pot from which the pheasant pieces were removed and sweat them off in the juices for a minute or two, stirring with a wooden spoon.

Re-add the pheasant portions to the pot and pour in the stock and cider. Bring to a simmer, cover and leave for twenty minutes to gently cook.

Remove the pheasant pieces from the pot and test with a skewer for tenderness.

If you are going to be enjoying a beer with this course, now is the time to get it poured.

A soup ladle is best used to lay some stock and vegetables in the bottom of two serving plates.

Lay a leg and breast portion in the centre of each plate and garnish (if desired) with the basil leaves.

I hope you like the look of this starter idea and it has whetted your appetite for the main course and pudding. Parts two and three of this meal will both be published in the next few days and I hope you will come back again to see the creations for yourself.

Passion for Pork Meaty Mixed Grill Feast

Mixed grills are probably more often comprised from not only different cuts of meat but different types of meat. Beef and pork may be the most common but we could equally have chicken, lamb, turkey or more thrown in to the mix. If you have a passion for a particular type of meat, however, such as pork, why not have a go at this recipe or an equivalent creation with such as beef? It definitely makes for a satisfying and interesting change.
 

Pork Mixed Grill Ingredients per Person

1 4oz leg of pork steak
2 pork sausages
2 large middle bacon rashers (or bacon as available)
1 slice of black pudding
2oz minced/ground pork
Generous pinch of dried sage
Salt and white pepper
Vegetable oil for frying
5 cherry tomatoes on the vine
2 small to medium mushrooms
2 slices of onion
1 slice of bread
1 egg
2 tbsp baked beans in tomato sauce

Directions

This mixed grill only takes about half an hour or so to make from start to finish but it is all pretty much hands on cooking. This means you should take care to have everything laid out and ready before starting to cook.

First of all, heat up some oil in a large, non-stick frying pan. Season the leg of pork steak on both sides with salt and white pepper and put it in the pan. Add the un-pricked sausages and cook on a low heat for a total of twenty minutes, turning the sausages frequently and the steak half way through.

Put the minced/ground pork in a bowl, season and add the sage. Mix thoroughly by hand, roll in to a ball and flatten in to a mini burger patty.

Remove the pork leg steak from the pan to a preheated plate and replace with the burger and black pudding. Add the tomatoes on the vine and the mushrooms. Remove the sausages to the plate with the steak and cover with foil to keep warm. Fry the black pudding and burger for five minutes each side, adding the onion rings when they are turned.

Cut a hole in the centre of the bread with an egg cup. Break the egg in to a small bowl and season with salt and white pepper.

Pour some more oil in to a second frying pan and heat. Just before the burger and black pudding are ready, add the bread and carefully pour on the egg, ensuring that the yolk slips in to the hole.

Take the black pudding and burger from the first pan and tuck them under the foil beside the sausages and steak. Replace with the bacon to fry for about a minute and a half each side, moving the onion on top of the mushrooms if you are short of space.

Carefully turn the eggy bread after about three minutes' frying, to fry for about a minute on the second side. Put the baked beans in to a small saucepan and on to a gentle heat to warm through.

Plate the eggy bread with the bacon alongside.

Lay the burger and the black pudding on top of the bacon, the steak on top of the bread and the sausages along either side.

Lay the tomatoes (still on the vine) on top of the steak. Spoon the beans in to the centre of the plate and add the mushrooms and onion on top of the black pudding and pork burger.

As usual, the HP Sauce is optional...

Big British Pasty with Northern Irish Champ (Food for Diamond Jubilee Celebrations)

It can scarcely have failed to escape the attention of anyone in the United Kingdom - and many far beyond - that 2012 is the year in which Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II celebrates her Diamond Jubilee. Celebrations have been taking place, are taking place and will continue to take place throughout the year but it is on Tuesday 5th June that the United Kingdom formally celebrates the occasion with a special national holiday.

A big part of any celebration is of course the food we eat. While most of us can only dream of sitting at the table to partake of one of the many lush state banquets which will take place, this does not mean that we cannot create and enjoy meals appropriate to the occasion. Bearing this in mind, I wanted in the run up to the big day to look at some simple food creations that anyone can prepare at home, symbolic of the Queen, the occasion, or simply of the United Kingdom.  Where better to start in this respect than with a simple, inexpensive dish, the principal ingredients of which represent the four component parts of Her Majesty's Kingdom.

The beef in this pasty is Scottish, the pork is English and the cheese is Welsh cheddar. The prepared pasty is then served with that delicious, creamy comfort food from Northern Ireland, champ, and a glass of Victory Ale, created to commemorate the achievements of the great British naval hero, Admiral Lord Nelson.

Full Ingredients List for Two Servings

4oz Scottish minced beef
4oz English minced pork
2oz Welsh cheddar cheese
8oz puff pastry
Salt and black pepper
Flour for rolling pastry
Beaten egg for glazing
1lb floury/starchy potatoes
3 scallions/spring onions
2oz butter, plus extra for greasing baking tray
2 fl oz milk
White pepper

Directions

Put your oven on to preheat to 200C/400F and grease a baking tray with some butter.

Dust a clean, dry surface with flour and roll out the pastry to a square of slightly more than 13". Use a 13" dinner plate as a template to cut a circle in the pastry. Mix the beef and the pork together and season with salt and black pepper before laying on one half of the pastry - leaving a 1" border - as shown in the photograph below.

The cheese should then be coarsely grated and carefully laid on top of the meat.

Glaze the border of the pasty around the meat and cheese with a little beaten egg. Fold the empty half of the pastry over the filling and carefully crimp the edge to seal. Be wary of stretching the pastry too much - you don't want it bursting in the oven!

A spatula or fish slice is ideal for carefully lifting the pasty on to the baking tray. Glaze it fairly liberally all over with more beaten egg and be sure to make a 1" slit in the top with a sharp knife. This is imperative to allow steam to vent during cooking. Otherwise, the pasty will burst. Put the tray in to the oven and cook the pasty for about thirty-five minutes, until the pastry is beautifully crisp and golden.

When the pasty has been in the oven for about fifteen minutes, it is time to start preparing the champ. The potatoes should be peeled and chopped in to fairly large chunks before being added to a pot of cold, salted water. Bring the water to a boil before reducing the heat to achieve a simmer for about twenty-five minutes until the potatoes are soft.

When the pasty is ready, remove it from the oven and leave it to rest for about ten to fifteen minutes while the champ is completed.

Just before you drain the potatoes, chop the scallions/spring onions and add them to a small saucepan with the milk. Gently heat to bring to a simmer.

Drain the potatoes through a colander and return them to the empty pot. Leave them in the hot pot for a couple of minutes to help them dry out before mashing them with 1oz of the butter. Stir in the milk mix and season to taste with some more salt and white pepper.

Carefully cut the rested pasty in half before transferring to two serving plates with a spatula.

The champ can now be spooned on to the plates beside the pasty halves and half the remaining ounce of butter added to the top of each pile for some extra creaminess and Northern Irish authenticity.

I hope this is a dish you will try at home, whether to celebrate the Diamond Jubilee or simply to enjoy a tasty and nourishing meal. Please also come back soon to find more food ideas relevant to the big occasion in the run up to 5th June, all interspersed between the more usual and universal postings to this blog.

Pan Fried Herring Fillets on Bruschetta with Summer Salad

Herring are a late spring and summer fish here in the UK and with summer (hopefully) on its way, herring are starting to appear more frequently in supermarkets and fishmongers, albeit very much the smaller ones for now. This recipe for one includes two small herring, from which the two side loin fillets have been cut and pan fried.
 

Ingredients per Serving

4 small herring loin fillets
1 small tomato
2" piece of cucumber
2 garlic cloves (1 for salad, 1 for bruschetta)
8 to 10 pitted black olives
Handful of fresh rocket/arugula
1" thick slice of farmhouse bread
Extra virgin olive oil
Flour for dusting fillets
1 tbsp vegetable oil for frying
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 or 3 basil leaves to garnish

Directions

It is advisable to begin by preparing the salad. Chop the tomato in to six wedges and the cucumber in to six even sized pieces. Peel the garlic clove. Add the tomato and cucumber to a small bowl with the olives and grate in the garlic clove. Pour in some extra virgin olive oil, season with salt and pepper and stir well. Cover with clingfilm and refrigerate until required.

Use a proper filleting knife to take the fillets off each side of the two herring. If you wish, you could ask your supermarket assistant/fishmonger to do this for you.

Scatter some flour on a plate and season with salt and pepper. Wash any blood and innards from the fillets in cold water and pat dry with kitchen paper. Pat the skin side only in the flour and shake off the excess.

Add some vegetable oil to a frying pan and fry the herring fillets on the skin side until you can see they are almost done. This will only take a couple of minutes. Turn off the heat and turn the fillets over to complete cooking while you toast the bread.

Toast the bread on both sides until nicely golden. Peel and crush the second garlic clove and rub it over what will be the top side of the toast. Drizzle with olive oil and season with salt and pepper.

Lay the bruschetta on a serving plate. Arrange the rocket/arugula alongside and spoon on the salad mixture.

Carefully place the herring fillets on top of the bruschetta and garnish with some freshly torn basil leaves before serving.