Today we got in the river for the first time this season and dragged for white bait, it was raining, but not too cold! and yippee 70 gm, enough for a patty. There are dozens of ways to cook them, this time I’ll beat an egg, drop them in it and fry all in a little butter. A pattie like this between two slices of bread and you can’t get a better sandwich. The trouble is once you get a call for the wild like this it’s hard to stay home, and if the tide is right I'm on the river.
Well apart from the bait life seems rather ordinary, though somehow also unsettling after being shaken backward and forwards until you think the house is going to fall down, by a 7.1 earthquake, centred 300ks from here. We are very grateful that friends and family closer to the epicentre are safe although it will be sometime before normal life returns for them.
This week I brought a bacon hock to make soup and then googled “hocks”, and found a recipe on Best Recipes for “ Roasted Ham and Beans’ which adapted easily for bacon, by boiling the hock instead of roasting it, it was very tasty and just as good the next day. The first night we had a “Potato & Corn” pie with it and the next day some “Cornbread” also from Best Recipes. I really like cornbread with any Southern USA style food, it just seems to set it off properly.
On Friday night we had a friend to dinner and had one of our favourites from The Wednesday Chef “Mustard Baked Chicken legs” it’s very finger lickin’ good, and much better than the Colonels.
Dessert was a slice of Smitten Kitchens “Austrian Shortcake” with a dollop of whipped cream, baked earlier in the week to have with coffee, it served just as well heated up again for dessert. All this was well washed down with simple bottles of “Shingle Peak” and Vidals” Sauvignon Blanc, both of which are available at the moment in New World for around $10 a bottle.
HAM & BEANS adapted from Best Recipes
Ingredients
1 ham or bacon hock
2 tbsp oil
1 large onion chopped
1 clove garlic chopped
1 tsp English dried mustard
2 tsp sweet chilli sauce
500 gm tomatoes canned or fresh, skinned
100gm concentrated tomato paste or 425gm can of puree
1 tbsp brown sugar
2 tbsp treacle
2 tbsp cider vinegar
6 cloves and 1 cinnamon stick, tied into a piece of cheese cloth
1 or 2 400 gm cans of cannelloni beans [or similar] .
Method
Simmer hock for 2 hours, changing water once in case to salty.
30 mins before hock cooked.
Pre heat oven to 180c.
On stove top, heat oil, add garlic, onion, and cook a few min.
Add mustard and chili. Stir in.
Add rest of ingredients except beans and simmer 20mins.
Place hock in oven proof dish, cover with sauce, and bake covered for 1 hour.
Remove hock and add beans, return to oven and bake 20min uncovered.
Remove meat from hock, and after 20min add to rest of mixture and bake further 5 min or until heated through.
Don’t forget to remove the bag of spices before serving.
POTATO CORN PIE
Mix a couple of cups of mashed potato with 1/2 cup of grated cheddar, and a 1 cup of whole corn kernels. place in a greased pan and bake 20mins at 180c. Brown under grill for few min before serving if you like.
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CORN BREAD adapted from Best Recipes
Ingredients
100 gm of coarse cornmeal
50 gm of flour
25 gm of sugar
1 tsp baking powder
1 egg
100 ml of yoghurt
150 ml of milk
30 gm butter
½ cup creamed corn [optional]
Method
Heat oven to 180c
Place dry ingredients in bowl.
Place milk and butter in pot and heat till butter melts, cool and stir in creamed corn.
Whisk yoghurt and egg into dry ingredients.
Stir in milk, butter, corn.
Pour into loaf tin [approx 24x14cm]
Bake about 20 to 30 min until firm.
Serve thick warm slices alongside baked beans.
CHICKEN LEGS ROASTED WITH MUSTARD adapted from The Wednesday Chef
Ingredients
6 to 8 chicken legs
A good handful of fresh, chopped herbs, such as a mixture of sage, thyme, chives
1 tbsp of Dijon mustard or similar for each leg
1 tbsp of crisp crumbs for each leg
2 tbsp melted butter or oil
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
Method
Heat the oven to 180c
Rub the mustard over the skin side of each leg, dip in herbs, lay in a shallow baking dish, leaving space between them.
Sprinkle evenly with breadcrumbs and pat on.
Drizzle evenly with the melted butter or spray some oil on.
Sprinkle a little coarse sea salt over and black pepper.
Roast about 45min or until the meat is very tender and the coating is crisp.
AUSTRIAN JAM SHORTBREAD adapted from Smitten Kitchen
250 gm unsalted butter, slightly softened
2 egg yolks
1 cups castor sugar
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoons baking powder
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup jam [any kind, I used Boysenberry]
Cream the butter until soft and fluffy. Add the egg yolks and mix well.
Mix the sugar, flour, baking powder, and salt together. Add to the butter and egg yolk mixture and mix just until incorporated and the dough starts to come together.
Turn the dough out onto a floured work surface and form into two oblongs that will fit down your blender tube.
Wrap each tube in plastic wrap and freeze at least 2 hours or overnight (or as long as a month, if you like).
Heat the oven to 180 degrees.
Remove one tube of dough from the freezer and coarsely grate it with the coarsest grating disk in a food processor.
Sprinkle loosely into the bottom of an approx 23x33cm greased baking pan [I lined mine with tinfoil and sprayed it with oil].
Make sure the surface is covered evenly with shreds of dough.
Melt the jam a little in the microwave and drizzle over the surface as evenly as possible, to within 1/2 inch of the edge all the way around.
Remove the remaining dough from the freezer and coarsely grate it over the entire surface.
Bake until lightly golden brown and the centre no longer wiggles, 30 to 40 minutes.
Cool, then cut in the pan with a serrated knife.
Keeps well in an air tight container.
Later In the month Pootle and I are joining friends in a crib on the west coast at Okura just south of Haast, we have done this for the past few years, it includes a big stand running out into the river with a huge net, and we take our smaller set nets as well and have loads of fun.
Well apart from the bait life seems rather ordinary, though somehow also unsettling after being shaken backward and forwards until you think the house is going to fall down, by a 7.1 earthquake, centred 300ks from here. We are very grateful that friends and family closer to the epicentre are safe although it will be sometime before normal life returns for them.
This week I brought a bacon hock to make soup and then googled “hocks”, and found a recipe on Best Recipes for “ Roasted Ham and Beans’ which adapted easily for bacon, by boiling the hock instead of roasting it, it was very tasty and just as good the next day. The first night we had a “Potato & Corn” pie with it and the next day some “Cornbread” also from Best Recipes. I really like cornbread with any Southern USA style food, it just seems to set it off properly.
On Friday night we had a friend to dinner and had one of our favourites from The Wednesday Chef “Mustard Baked Chicken legs” it’s very finger lickin’ good, and much better than the Colonels.
Dessert was a slice of Smitten Kitchens “Austrian Shortcake” with a dollop of whipped cream, baked earlier in the week to have with coffee, it served just as well heated up again for dessert. All this was well washed down with simple bottles of “Shingle Peak” and Vidals” Sauvignon Blanc, both of which are available at the moment in New World for around $10 a bottle.
HAM & BEANS adapted from Best Recipes
Ingredients
1 ham or bacon hock
2 tbsp oil
1 large onion chopped
1 clove garlic chopped
1 tsp English dried mustard
2 tsp sweet chilli sauce
500 gm tomatoes canned or fresh, skinned
100gm concentrated tomato paste or 425gm can of puree
1 tbsp brown sugar
2 tbsp treacle
2 tbsp cider vinegar
6 cloves and 1 cinnamon stick, tied into a piece of cheese cloth
1 or 2 400 gm cans of cannelloni beans [or similar] .
Method
Simmer hock for 2 hours, changing water once in case to salty.
30 mins before hock cooked.
Pre heat oven to 180c.
On stove top, heat oil, add garlic, onion, and cook a few min.
Add mustard and chili. Stir in.
Add rest of ingredients except beans and simmer 20mins.
Place hock in oven proof dish, cover with sauce, and bake covered for 1 hour.
Remove hock and add beans, return to oven and bake 20min uncovered.
Remove meat from hock, and after 20min add to rest of mixture and bake further 5 min or until heated through.
Don’t forget to remove the bag of spices before serving.
POTATO CORN PIE Mix a couple of cups of mashed potato with 1/2 cup of grated cheddar, and a 1 cup of whole corn kernels. place in a greased pan and bake 20mins at 180c. Brown under grill for few min before serving if you like.
.
CORN BREAD adapted from Best Recipes
Ingredients
100 gm of coarse cornmeal
50 gm of flour
25 gm of sugar
1 tsp baking powder
1 egg
100 ml of yoghurt
150 ml of milk
30 gm butter
½ cup creamed corn [optional]
Method
Heat oven to 180c
Place dry ingredients in bowl.
Place milk and butter in pot and heat till butter melts, cool and stir in creamed corn.
Whisk yoghurt and egg into dry ingredients.
Stir in milk, butter, corn.
Pour into loaf tin [approx 24x14cm]
Bake about 20 to 30 min until firm.
Serve thick warm slices alongside baked beans.
CHICKEN LEGS ROASTED WITH MUSTARD adapted from The Wednesday Chef
Ingredients
6 to 8 chicken legs
A good handful of fresh, chopped herbs, such as a mixture of sage, thyme, chives
1 tbsp of Dijon mustard or similar for each leg
1 tbsp of crisp crumbs for each leg
2 tbsp melted butter or oil
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
Method
Heat the oven to 180c
Rub the mustard over the skin side of each leg, dip in herbs, lay in a shallow baking dish, leaving space between them.
Sprinkle evenly with breadcrumbs and pat on.
Drizzle evenly with the melted butter or spray some oil on.
Sprinkle a little coarse sea salt over and black pepper.
Roast about 45min or until the meat is very tender and the coating is crisp.
AUSTRIAN JAM SHORTBREAD adapted from Smitten Kitchen
250 gm unsalted butter, slightly softened
2 egg yolks
1 cups castor sugar
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoons baking powder
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup jam [any kind, I used Boysenberry]
Cream the butter until soft and fluffy. Add the egg yolks and mix well.
Mix the sugar, flour, baking powder, and salt together. Add to the butter and egg yolk mixture and mix just until incorporated and the dough starts to come together.
Turn the dough out onto a floured work surface and form into two oblongs that will fit down your blender tube.
Wrap each tube in plastic wrap and freeze at least 2 hours or overnight (or as long as a month, if you like).
Heat the oven to 180 degrees.
Remove one tube of dough from the freezer and coarsely grate it with the coarsest grating disk in a food processor.
Sprinkle loosely into the bottom of an approx 23x33cm greased baking pan [I lined mine with tinfoil and sprayed it with oil].
Make sure the surface is covered evenly with shreds of dough.
Melt the jam a little in the microwave and drizzle over the surface as evenly as possible, to within 1/2 inch of the edge all the way around.
Remove the remaining dough from the freezer and coarsely grate it over the entire surface.
Bake until lightly golden brown and the centre no longer wiggles, 30 to 40 minutes.
Cool, then cut in the pan with a serrated knife.
Keeps well in an air tight container.
Later In the month Pootle and I are joining friends in a crib on the west coast at Okura just south of Haast, we have done this for the past few years, it includes a big stand running out into the river with a huge net, and we take our smaller set nets as well and have loads of fun.
Just had the mustard chicken legs and they were divine.I toasted some fresh bread crumbs for crunch and used a handful of parsley, chives and oregano with a sprig of mint thrown in to compliment the new potatoes and peas I served it with. Smelled and tasted incredible.
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