Only_Oli (The O_Zone)

This weekend it was the First communion of my youngest son, Noe.

We made a feast with the family, I roasted a small piglet in the BBQ. It was my first roast and it was very nice. Very sweet and nicely cooked all the way through but still very juicy and tender. I am very pleased with the results.

We also had some very nice wine…

Made some foie gras from a fresh duck liver. The recipe is very simple.

1- Leave raw foie gras in milk overnight in fridge.

2- Take out of fridge, let it rest 30 minutes then separate the lobes and remove the veins. There is a big lobe and a small one, the veins travel differently in each. Simply use fingers or small knife. This is an important part, a thorough job here will make a very smooth foie gras at the end.

3- Put all the foie bits in a terrine and poor a couple of table spoons of Ports and a couple of table spoons of Armagnac. Sprinkle a few spoons of spices as you like. (I like 5 spices and pepper). You can put salt now but would recommend salt on the finished product rather than in the cooking. Back in fridge for the liquids to get absorbed in the liver.

4- Cook in the terrine in the oven at 160 degrees celsius, “au bain marie” ( poor boiling water around the terrine in a bigger container). I cook with the terrine “open”, so I can see what is going on and check the temperature of the foie. I usually wait for the foie to get to at least 55 to 60 degrees celsius. This might take 20/30 minutes ()?

5- Take the terrine out and let cool down. You can press the foie slightly so that the meat is all at the bottom and the fat comes to the top. For this you can use a small piece of wood of the appropriate size wrapped in cling film and let it rest on top of the terrine with a small weight on top.

5- When cooled, put in fridge overnight. The fat will go solid on top and provide a “air-tight” protection for the foie gras.

6- Eat the foie gras on a toast of bread with a bit of salt and a sweet wine.

Again a good old family traditional.

Shallots / Spring Onions

A few cloves / Ground Ginger / Pickling Spices

Malt Vinegar.

Very nice with “Hate Levee”, to be done next week sometime once the shallots have pickled a bit more.

This morning it is raining. Well it’s the UK so what do you expect. Actually, we played almost all winter, cold and windy it is still ok, rain …no.

Note that in the UK there is less rain than in most European countries. Actually London does not even make it to the top 10…(???) How can that be, I hear you say. Well, it is all down to how you measure it. If you measure the amount of rain or the number of days of rain. London gets less rain than Paris, but if you measure the number of days of rain, then London is 3rd after Copenhagen and Oslo. Check it.

Although London is thought of as being a “rainy” city, the top city of Zurich, Switzerland receives almost twice
as much precipitation as London (42.3 to 23.3 inches). London is among the driest of Europe’s capitals.

So, I was bored by 7h30 this morning and decided that if I could not get fit, I should get fat. So I decided to make some butter. Yes, real butter from scratch.

Recipe is very straight forward :

1. Take some double cream and pour in mixer. Add Salt to your taste.
2. Beat the cream until fat separates from the buttermilk, this will take probably 20 minutes. So go and watch the rain fall on the garden…
3. Rinse in a muslin under cold water
4. Squeeze and Shape into a small cube. Keep the butter cold by rinsing it under cold water as you shape it.
5. It’sReady !
6. Put on warm toast…watch rain falling on garden and think about summer hosepipe ban…