Saturday 28 June - Richard Corrigan Cookathon

Monthly Cookathon Time in the Facebook group, and this month the chosen Chef was Richard Corrigan.
I don't own any of his books, but a quick Google showed a wide choice of recipes available online.

We chose Duck with Apples, Calvados and Black Pudding, and two puddings - Creme Brulee (because I can never get this right), and a Flourless Chocolate Sponge. The other advantage of these two is that I can use up some of the egg mountain that is growing in my kitchen.

I started with the brulee as this needs to be served chilled.

Cream and vanillla were heated, and then added to egg yolks and sugar to make a custard

This was poured over some fresh raspberries and cooked in a bain marie until set but not firm, and then chilled until ready to add the crisp topping.

The chocolate cake was effectively a chocolate mousse, cooked for a very short time so it set slightly.  Melted chocolate was stirred into egg yolks and finally egg white folded in before baking

 

Next the duck, we had some frozen duck breasts from Lidl which weighed 450g, so rather than serve one per person, we had one between three of us.

I deviated slightly from the recipe here due to the size of the piece of meat, and started it off skin side down to crisp it in a frying pan, but finished off in the oven. Once cook it was rested and sliced.

For the sauce wedges of apple were fried in butter, before flambeeing in calvados, then chicken stock and cream were added.

The duck was sliced and  served with some fried black pudding (the recipe called for Morcilla but we used Bury Black Pudding) and some shredded blanched leeks along with the apple wedges.

Although not in the recipe, we served some veg along with this as we had been to the allotment earlier and picked loads of beans and courgettes.

After this the Creme Brulee was finished off with a blow torch.

The chocolate cake cut into big wedges, and served alongside.

As my ramekins are quite big, the brulee would have been better with a few more minutes cooking, but considering the previous disasters I've had with this I was pretty pleased with the result!

Sunday 8 June - Spicy Bean Burgers

These bean burgers are based on a Jack Monroe recipe, but with a few little twists.
I was delighted to be able to use the borlotti beans that we grew on the allotment last year and dried. They cooked loads quicker than supermarket beans too.

The beans were mashed with grated carrot, onion, garlic, chillies, chopped pepper, and some cumin and chilli powder which were fried together until soft.

The mix was chilled, then formed into burger shapes, and  dipped in egg and panko crumbs before frying

I made burger buns, topped with sesame to serve them in

and some potato wedges, tossed in semolina and cajun seasoning before oven roasting

The burgers were chilled and fried, then served in the buns with cheese, mustard, tomato slices and gherkins, with the wedges  on the side

We made enough to be able to freeze both the buns and the burgers for another meal later in the week.