Jen's Kitchen offers a fresh approach to home cooking with exciting recipes and blog posts that emphasise hands-on cookery using local and organic produce.

The Marshmallow Experience

marshmallow book

The kids purchased a marshmallow recipe book recently from a discount book store.  I couldn’t say no, who doesn’t enjoy marshmallows in chocolate fondue or hot chocolate?

I had made them once before, quite successfully, so wasn’t particularly fazed when they wanted me to make 3 different types! They decided on caramel, cinnamon and baileys flavoured.

They are not actually that difficult.  Lots of stirring and boiling and whipping is involved.  I certainly wouldn’t even consider them unless I had a mixer.  I don’t think its possible to mix these by hand unless you are built like Arnold Schwarzenegger.

2 pans on the go

2 pans on the go

Ingredients;

450g Caster sugar

2 x 7g sachets gelatine***

sunflower oil for greasing

50g Icing Sugar (plus extra for dredging)

50g Cornflour (plus extra for dredging)

Various flavourings; cinnamon, caramel, Baileys etc etc.  These are added at Stage 5, you can also soak some cinnamon sticks in thr boiling syrup.

  1. Place the gelatine and 100ml of cold water into a bowl. Set aside for about 10 minutes, or until softened.
  2. Meanwhile, pour the sugar and 175ml of cold water into a heavy-based saucepan and bring to a rolling boil on a medium to high heat, stirring continuously, until the sugar dissolves.
  3. Reduce the heat to low and simmer the mixture gently for 15-20 minutes, until a sugar thermometer dipped into the mixture reads 113C (NB: At this temperature, the sugar syrup will have reached the soft-ball stage.) CAUTION: This mixture is extremely hot and can be dangerous. Do not leave unattended, under any circumstances.
  4. As soon as the sugar syrup reaches the correct temperature, place the softened gelatine and water into the bowl of a food mixer and blend on its lowest setting. Gradually pour in the sugar syrup in a slow, steady stream, avoiding pouring the sugar syrup on the beaters as it may splash. Whisk continuously until all of the syrup has been fully incorporated in the mixture.
  5. Add the vanilla extract/ flavourings, then increase the blending speed and blend for 18-20 minutes, or until the mixture has thickened, cooled and is beginning to set.
  6. Meanwhile, grease a 20cm/8in square, deep-sided cake tin with some of the sunflower oil. Line the tin with baking parchment and grease this paper with the remaining oil. Mix together the icing sugar and cornflour and dust the tin with a little of the mixture to evenly coat the base and sides. Reserve the remaining icing sugar and cornflour mixture for later.
  7. Pour the marshmallow mixture into the prepared tin and smooth the surface with a palette knife or spatula that has been dipped in boiling water. Dust the top of the marshmallows with a little more of the icing sugar and cornflour mixture, then cover the tin with cling film and set aside in a cool, dry place for 1-2 hours or overnight to set. (NB: Do not chill in the fridge.)
  8. Once the marshmallow mixture has set, turn out the marshmallow slab onto a clean work surface dusted with the remaining icing sugar and cornflour mixture. Peel off the parchment paper and cut the marshmallow into 36 cubes. Dredge the marshmallows in the icing sugar and cornflour mixture to coat.  Store in an airtight container in a cool, dry place.

But here’s the krux- these WILL NOT WORK if you use vegegel, or any vegetarian substitute.   At ALL.  You just get a gluey mess.  It is the protein that whips up the syrup to the light texture associated with marshmallows.  Trust me on this one.

Appreciate Yourself

I think those two words are very difficult to achieve, well for me personally anyway.  I can appreciate beauty, food, my kids, wonderful hubby, friends, music… I could go on and on.  But  appreciation of my achievements and qualities, I really struggle with this.

I’m not sure why though? I don’t like being the centre of attention, but am not shy, I’ll talk to the wall if I’m standing beside it for long enough.  But to talk to myself, and say, well done, that was really great.  Never happens.

I have only recently agreed to call myself a “good” cook.  This was a major milestone for me, and I need to remember that if they eat your food, make appreciative noises and are NOT related to me then they are probably telling the truth that the food is nice.

My appreciation for pounding the pavement as a stress reliever has forced me into admitting I’m now a runner also.

All these labels?? Yet as a adult these days, we are drivers, teachers, cleaners, diplomats, nurses, comforters, cooks and many more.  I think to really appreciate ourselves we need to relax our self imposed conditions.  For me this means not to raise the bar quite so high. From early on I always demanded perfection in myself, in every thing.  Be it work/ relationships/ sports/ music.

So as I am ageing gracefully I think that this year will be the year for self acceptance of my achievements such as they are.  So this year I will be all of the above, and an orienteerer, show jumper, wedding cake baker- everything but a candle stick maker!

The new gear

The new gear

 

My Strawberry Cake- Summer is coming.. isn’t it??

I love strawberries, they’re a sure sign for me that soon I’ll be eating lots of fruit (with cream obviously) and salads and beans and peas… I could go on and on.  I wanted to make a cake for a group of friends this evening that would keep for the day, and still be soft and inviting tonight and easy to cut.  I struggle sometimes to find an appealing recipe that DOESN’T contain chocolate.  This one definitely fits the bill.  This recipe is based on Lisa Faulkner’s Fantasy Cake.

Summer is starting today!

Summer is starting today!

175g soft butter,

150g caster sugar

150g plain flour, sifted

1 1/5 tsps baking powder

2 eggs

3 tablespoons milk

100g ground almonds

1 teaspoon almond essence

200g strawberries,  quartered depending on size,

75g  raspberries

icing sugar, for dusting

 

1 Heat the oven to 160oC, grease and line a 23 cm loose-bottomed cake tin.

2 Cream the butter and sugar together in a large mixing bowl until light and fluffy. Then add in the flour, baking powder, eggs, milk, ground almonds and almond essence and mix well. Stir in 75% of the fruit.

3 Pour the mixture into the cake tin and put the remaining handful of fruit on top of the cake.

4 Bake in the preheated oven for about 1 hours. Test with a skewer.

5 Leave the cake in the tin on a wire rack to cool and dust with icing sugar before serving.

6 Lovely served with a cup of tea on a sunny day, or just a cup of tea.

 

Birthday Parties- and Cakes

We love having all of the family over for dinner when it’s a birthday occasion.  We hadn’t managed to do it for my 40th, so last Sunday we had a family get together for Nigel’s birthday.

Nigel is a big fan of pork, so after he managed to source two beautiful pork shoulders, we marinaded them in mustard, maple syrup and brown sugar on the Saturday night.

7 hr cooked maple marinaded shoulder

7 hr cooked maple marinaded shoulder

For starter I wanted to do something with the gorgeous venison that Ni’s brother provides, so I decided on trying my hand at a hot crust pastry, and filled it with slow cooked venison flank, cooked with wild mushrooms and chestnuts (and the obligatory red wine)

Flank of Venison, wild mushrooms, chestnuts and red wine

Flank of Venison, wild mushrooms, chestnuts and red wine

The finished product was very tasty indeed, I had made enough for everyone, not thinking the children would partake, but they ate every morsel, no leftover pies for Monday night!

Dessert was birthday cake of course, with a side offering of cake pops, with various toppings, the most popular of which were the popping candy.  I really enjoyed my first foray into cake pops, and will blog separately about this “journey”.  The birthday cake consisted of vanilla sponge filled with raspberries, blueberries and fresh cream.  And decorated with rosewater meringues.

Vanilla Sponge

Vanilla Sponge

 

 

 

“Cooking songs”

When I started “running”, I downloaded a great album to my phone, “100 best running songs”. I love to run to music, I think that it really helps me focus on the singing voice inside my head, and not the screaming lungs/muscles/feet that usually accompany the running.  As an aside I find that it is better if I run alone, in the countryside, so that should I get carried away with my vocal accompaniment to my road abuse, there is no-one to “appreciate” my dulcet interpretation.

For my birthday yesterday.  40.  I can now say it. Without choking. I got a fabulous present from my better half.

Songs to cook to

I think this album is a GREAT idea, as not only can I listen to it while cooking, but there are songs on it that I think will be good to run to.  As another aside, this is my favourite card, would love the dress…..

pity I can’t see the shoes…..

So what’s your favourite cooking song?  I’ll get back to you about mine, though it’ll probably be like asking my to pick my favourite recipe/book/film.  I never can pick just one.

This is also a wonderful present …. a truly original idea, and as she is a very dear friend, was complicit in my wish to ignore the impending doom *, so we agreed to celebrate Easter!

 

*joke!

 

 

WBD logo

World Book Day

Every year the kids in primary school get a voucher on world book day.  I think that this is a most wonderful idea.  I love books.  I read constantly, although the books beside my bed my change monthly.  I really need to get back to the library again, but Christmas usually brings a lorry load of books my way, and I often give Nigel some books for presents too so we have lots of choice.  He is better than I am at trying out new authors.  He introduced me to Robert Ludlum, and although he no longer reads them, we really enjoyed them for years.

When I was younger I read all the time, I loved the Famous Fives, and also the Chalet girls.  I recently introduced my youngest to “I wanted a pony”, by Diana Pullein-Thompson. I think this book really touched me- I always wanted a pony, I think I’ve read it over a hundred times.

I’m not at all fussy when reading, Nora Roberts, Stephen King, Susan Hill, Karin Slaughter.  There is a slight trend though.  I do not like to read books older than me.  A dislike of older literature that stems from school.  Its unfortunate really, but I know I’m not bookclub material.  So much so that if I’m reading the dust-cover of a book and it says- recommended by such and such a book club. I know its  not for me!

 

 

 

 

 

 

*they are now, as Robert Ludlum has passed away written by Eric Van Lustbader, I always loved his books too, so am very happily plodding through these.

pim family

Pause Part 5

 

Saturday 5th March Nigel came home.  The journey was great thanks to the motorway to Waterford.  Jordan is currently doing a course in Medicine on Saturdays with the CYTI (www.dcu.ie/ctyi) and we collected her on the way home.  She thought he was coming home on the Sunday, so was thrilled to see her Dad again.  It was really hard to leave Alan & Sue behind, it’s been such an emotional rollercoaster that we have taken together, to be apart at this stage was really hard for us all- especially as Sue couldn’t send texts!  I really enjoyed texting and chatting to Alan during his dialysis sessions and it became second nature.  I miss it.  The two men still have to finish off the Health of the Nation filming, I believe Dr Mark will be coming to visit, Sue and I are looking forward to that!  Of course being a born worrier I will now spend all my time worrying if Alan has taken his tablets and is not overdoing it! Mind you while visiting him the other day, he came home on Monday, he was chatting to a friend saying the next thing was to get his knee replaced.  Nigel said that he can’t have one of his- Barbie- Ken you’re up next?? So as I write this Nigel is gradually getting back to work, I am so grateful to have such a dedicated team of staff with us so that he can recover in his own time.  It will take time, but we are moving forward instead of being stuck on pause.

Addendum: 01/03/2013

As I sit here, on the two year anniversary of their operation, I really am thankful and emotional for all we have achieved in the last two years.  I tried to ring Alan’s surgeon, but he was in surgery so couldn’t take me call.  He has changed our lives.  Alan is in flying form, and is busy replanting strawberries.  Nigel continues to run, and has successfully completed one marathon and is planning his next.  We are planning all our orienteering trips, and as a family are all very much healthier.  Here’s to the next TEN years!

Fostering Animals

We regularly “foster” animals for a local animal welfare group.  We are very lucky to live in the country, and have stables for our horses, so they are perfect for putting dogs/ ponies etc in that are in need of emergency shelter.  We have housed too many dogs to remember.  We normally get the most damaged animals, either psychologically or physically.  We have dogs on the farm, a collie, a lab and a terrier, all of whom are incredibly tolerant, to be fair, on the newcomers.

The kids love getting the puppies, I am not fond of all the clearing up that puppies entail.  We once had 17 greyhounds for one night.  That was interesting.

 

One of my favourite fosters was a collie called Ellie.  She was the spit of our own collie, and they were like peas in a pod.  She had been found after a night of a severe thunderstorms.  We thought that perhaps she had run away in fright.  We have the rule that we never ever adopt any of our fosters, as if we took them all in, we wouldn’t have room for any more.  But back to Ellie.  We had just decided that we would adopt her, and a friend was visiting, she had seen a “lost dog” poster in the local co-op, of a missing collie.  Turns out it was Ellie.  I remember wishing fervently that when the people arrived, that Ellie would not want to know them, or go with them.  But not so.  Broke my heart, but ultimately they were so grateful to get their dog back safe and sound.

Two other favourites were a mare and foal that were rescued in Dungarvan .  The mare had been left on a really steep hill, and when “Frankie” was born, she went off to the top of the field and got caught in barbed wire, leaving the foal unable to climb to the top.  When we got the two of them in, the foal was too weak to stand, and the mare’s chest was badly torn.  But it took just a few weeks for them both to come back to health.  It was miraculous really.  I know they went to their new home healthy as we had enormous problems getting Frankie into the horse box as he was in SUCH good form he just wanted to run around bucking like a mad thing.

with Jordan

At the moment we have a donkey foal.  Eddie.  Our youngest is in love.  He is just so cute.  We were only supposed to have him for a week, but its turned into two weeks, and heading into our third week.  We were hacking the ponies through the farm and suddenly we heard the Hee Haw, ponies got a huge fright, what on earth was that!  Eddie is now well enough to live outside again, he is out with the sika deer herd, who are not too sure about him, but he  has company, shelter, and an enormous field of grass.  What more could a donkey want, well maybe a donkey friend……

 

 

shortbread, caramel and chocolate

Chocolate Biscuits…..and Alien Invasions.

I was tweeting with @diamondsirl about our impending alien invasion.

Friendly biscuit eating aliens

And how I feel that if the end of the world truly is nigh, then really I could justify eating a biscuit with my cup of tea.  And I’ve been thinking, very seriously, that if I had to choose a “last” biscuit, what would it be? I’m partial to digestives, and chocolate, but I think the

chocolate millionaire is the winner.  I always use the old reliable Mary Berry recipe, with a few small adjustments, so kudos to the queen of baking.

 

 

Jen’s Kitchen version of Chocolate Millionaires

Ingredients

For the base

For the topping

  • 175 g butter
  • 175 g caster sugar
  • 4 tbsp golden syrup
  • 1 x 397 g can condensed milk
  • 200 g dark / (or  milk) chocolate, melted.

 

Method

1. Set the oven to 160oC.  Lightly grease a Swiss roll tin.  I use a reusable paper.

 

2. Place all the ingredients for the base into a food processor and whizz together until they form a smooth dough.

 

3. Press the mixture into the base of the tin and prick with a fork.  Bake for about 30-40 minutes until golden and firm.  Set aside to cool.

 

4. To make the topping, place the butter, sugar, syrup and condensed milk into a saucepan and stir over a low heat until the butter has melted.

 

5. Bubble the mixture gently for about five minutes, stirring all the time until thick and fudge-like.  Pour over the cold shortbread in an even layer. Leave to cool, but not in the fridge.

 

6. Pour the chocolate over the toffee and leave to set. Cut into small squares and store in an airtight tin.

 

7. Enjoy with a cup of tea.

 

Pancake Tuesday

J announced last night that she’d like pancakes for breakfast.  As Nigel is the chief breakfast chef in our house (I’m usually STUCK to the leaba), it was his decision.

We woke this morning to the lovely wafting smell of pancakes;

American Pancakes with Raspberries

The pictured one is cooked with raspberries inside, it was delicious. I was very polite and had just one and a half of these hearts, it would have been rude not to try the blueberry one!

 

Jeni Pim

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