Slow-Cooked Pork Belly with Apple Purée

Pork belly is one of those cuts of meat that are relatively inexpensive to buy and provided you show a little bit of care and attention, you will be rewarded with meat that when cooked is meltingly tender and delicious to eat.

Pork belly is a very fatty cut of meat, but before you dismiss it, it is important to know that it is this fat which renders down during long, slow cooking at a low temperature which makes the meat so tender to eat. In addition, this is the type of dish which  you don’t have to be as exact about in terms of the cooking times as you would with more expensive cuts like pork fillet, where over-cooking results in dry, tough meat. As such, it is an ideal recipe for the less confident cook and I promise you everyone will be looking for second helpings, when you present it because it is just so darn tasty!

The glaze is easy to prepare and can be made in advance. I use a mixture of apple juice and cider because I feel that it lends the dish a very pleasing apple ‘edge’ which is then emphasized by serving the pork with an apple purée. The addition of vinegar in the glaze cuts through some of the richness and adds balance to the finished dish. I used white wine vinegar, but cider vinegar would also work well for obvious reasons.

This is an absolutely fabulous recipe and incredibly tasty; the aromas in my kitchen as I was cooking this recipe were just heavenly. As the pork is finishing cooking in the oven, the glaze thickens and darkens in colour and swathes the meat in the most beautiful sticky syrup and adds a slightly caramel bitterness which also cuts through the richness.

Finally, I should say a word or two about the apple purée… because it is really delicious! It is simple to make but so velvety smooth which creates a lovely texture contrast to the meat. Be careful not to over-sweeten the purée – you want it to be slightly tart. Taste it after puréeing it and if you think it is slightly too sweet, add a few drop of lemon juice to balance it out. As usual, taste as you go along and adjust seasoning as necessary.

Ingredients:

1kg pork belly with skin on
A little vegetable oil
Glaze:
500ml Apple juice
500ml cider

100ml white wine vinegar

125g caster sugar

125g Demerara sugar

1 cinnamon stick

3-4 cloves

2 bay leaves

A few springs of fresh thyme
½ tsp smoked paprika

1 red chilli pepper bruised

Apple Purée:

4 large cooking apples, peeled cored and cut into chunks

50g butter

1tblsp soft brown sugar

30ml water

A pinch of salt
 

Method:

Glaze:
1. Put all the ingredients for the glaze into a medium sized saucepan over a moderate heat. Allow to bubble away gently for about and hour until it has reduced and turned syrupy. Strain through a fine sieve into a clean bowl. Discard the contents of the sieve.
Pork Belly:
2. Preheat the oven to 180C/Fan Oven 160C/Gas Mark 4. Separately heat a little oil in a large frying pan and when hot, add the pork belly and sear on all sides until golden brown all over. Transfer to an oven proof dish and place in the preheated oven for 30 minutes. Remove from the oven and using a pastry brush some of the glaze all over the pork belly.
3. Reduce the oven temperature to 160C/Fan Oven 140C/Gas Mark 3 and return the pork belly to the oven for a further 90 minutes, glazing it every 15-20 minutes.

4. Remove the pork belly from the oven and cut into portions. Gently heat the remaining glaze and spoon some over the top of each portion just before serving.

Apple Purée:

(The apple purée can be made at the same time that the pork is initially roasting and then set aside in a warm place once made).

5. Place all the ingredients for the apple puree in a small roasting pan and cook in the pre-heated oven until the apples have just softened (about 30 minutes).

6. Place in a blender and purée until smooth. Taste and adjust seasoning as necessary. Pass through a fine sieve and set aside until ready to serve.

To serve:

7. Put a spoonful of apple purée on each plate alongside 3 or 4 pieces of pork belly cut into large bite-sized chunks. Serve with steamed broccoli.

Serves 4-6.
      

Pan-Fried Hake with Braised Butter Beans

There is no doubt that eating a range of foods and sampling different cuisines, whether it be as a result of travelling or eating in restaurants does broaden your food knowledge. Being someone who loves cooking and experimenting in the kitchen; and more importantly being someone who enjoys eating, I particularly enjoy trying out different cuisines and incorporating this into my cooking. Although I enjoy the challenge of technical dishes I am always drawn to recipes that are simple to prepare and which are packed full of flavour.

In the final analysis, it doesn’t matter how beautiful a plate of food looks, if it doesn’t taste delicious also. Yes – it is absolutely true that you don’t feel inclined to eat something that looks unappealing, but I regret to say that many times (and I seem to have experienced this more with desserts), I have chosen something in a restaurant or shop and it has failed to live up to the promise shown. When it happens I always feel so disappointed.

Flavour doesn’t always have to assertive and in fact, some of the most beautiful dishes are based on subtlety of taste and balancing the different ingredients. This is why it is so important to keep tasting whilst you are cooking; adjusting seasoning and other elements of the dish as you go along. Some people lack the confidence to do this and it can make them less inclined to take out the pots and pans and cook something different, but the more you cook and the more you taste different flavours, the better and more confident a cook you will become. The most important tip I would give anyone when cooking is – have confidence in yourself and trust your own judgment!

 

I may sound a little evangelical at this stage, but I love cooking and the greatest pleasure I get is seeing the people I love enjoying the food that I have cooked.

I have recently been trying out some Spanish influenced recipes and will admit that I really love the foods and dishes that I have been sampling. I particularly love some of the tapas recipes. What’s great about Spanish food is that it is, in the main, so simple to prepare and yet, it is packed full of punchy flavours.

The following dish employs some classic Spanish ingredients including hake – a white-fleshed fish that I’m using more and more often in my cooking, as it has a lovely firm but still slightly flaky texture, similar to cod, when cooked.

Ingredients:

Braised Butter Beans:
2tblsp olive oil
4 slices of Serrano ham chopped into small dice

1 Spanish onion, finely chopped

4 garlic cloves, crushed

1 red pepper diced

100ml dry white wine

50ml brandy

1tblsp tomato purée

2 x 400g tins of butter beans, drained

A generous pinch of smoked paprika

1 bay leaf

½ tsp saffron threads

Finely grated zest if 1 lemon

2tsp fresh thyme, chopped

500ml vegetable or light chicken stock

To finish:

4 x 150g hake fillets, skinned

Small amount of olive oil for frying

1-2 slices of Serrano ham cut into thin strips

Salt & freshly ground black pepper
 

Method:

Braised Butter Beans:
1. Heat the olive oil in a large pan over a moderate to low heat and gently sweat the diced ham and onion until the onion is soft but not coloured (roughly 7 – 10 minutes). Add the crushed garlic and red pepper and allow to cook for another 2 minutes.
2. Increase the heat slightly and add the white wine. Allow to gently bubble until most of the wine has evaporated and then add in the brandy, flambéing it if you feel comfortable doing this. Once the flame has died down, add the tomato purée and cook stirring continuously for 1-2 minutes.

3. Add the drained butter beans and the rest of the ingredients for the braised butter beans to the pan. Bring up to simmering point and then simmer for 10-15 minutes. Do not cover the pan. Taste and adjust seasoning as necessary.

To finish:

4. Heat a small amount of oil in a frying pan. Season the hake and place into the hot oil. Allow to cook for 2-3 minutes and then flip each fillet over. Allow to cook for a further 2-3 minutes depending on the size of the fillets and then remove from the heat. Allow to rest for a couple of minutes, making sure that the fish does not go cold.

5. Spoon some of the braised butter beans onto warm serving plates and top with a piece of cooked hake. Sprinkle over some of the Serrano ham strips. Serve with a wedge of lemon.
 

Serves 4.     

Fillet Steak, Baked Onion & Shallot Purée

This is my play on steak and onions. Onions are one of those basic ingredients that practically everyone always has in their kitchens. We are all used to the brown-skinned so called “cooking onions” which are available in every grocery store and supermarket. But there are loads of other types of onions available; - spring onions (aka scallions), shallots, Spanish onions, red onions etc. All of these have their own particular characteristics which can be used to good effect in a range of dishes. I also love the vaguely oniony taste of leeks and chives and use them regularly in my cooking.

When cooked or sweated slowly, onions become incredibly sweet, but retain their savoury edge, a feature which can be exploited in cooking to create balance in a dish.

One of my favourite dishes to eat is a classic French onion soup – it is a perfect example of how something so simple can taste so good. It is warming and comforting to eat and whilst very much a casual bistro dish, there is something so elegant about it. I absolutely love it. From time-to time, I also like to make a cream of onion soup, gently flavoured with thyme and decorated with thyme or chive flowers. This is a perfect soup for a spring or summer’s day and I promise to post the recipe for it in the near future.
 

In the meantime, I wanted to create a dish that celebrated onions in their own right and focussed on their versatility. I think this dish does that really well. Here I have made a baked stuffed onion which I have paired with a shallot purée. The stuffed onion is really tasty and along with the shallot purée it would make a substantial vegetarian starter to a meal. However, in this instance, I wanted to include some protein and make something more suitable for presenting as a main course – so I decided that I would serve my onions with some fillet steak.

This was absolutely delicious to eat and whilst there are some processes and steps involved in making the stuffed onions and the shallot purée, these can be prepared in advance with the stuffed onions being baked while you cook and rest the steak, during which time you can also gently re-heat the shallot purée. As such, it would be an ideal dish to serve at a dinner party.

Ingredients:

4 x 125g fillet steaks
A little vegetable oil for frying

A splash of balsamic vinegar

Sea salt & freshly ground black pepper

Shallot Purée:

50g butter

500g shallots peeled and sliced

1 bay leaf

200ml double cream

Sea salt & freshly ground black pepper

Baked Onions:

4 large onions, peeled but kept whole with root still intact

25g butter

Stuffing:

50g butter

2 shallots, peeled and finely chopped

1 clove garlic, peeled and very finely chopped

1tblsp finely chopped curly leaved parsley

1tblsp finely chopped thyme

100g fresh white breadcrumbs

Sea salt & freshly ground black pepper
 

Method:

Shallot Purée:
1. Melt in the butter in a large saucepan over a moderate heat and add the sliced shallots and the bay leaf. Season well with Reduce the heat and continue to cook, stirring occasionally for 40-45 minutes until the shallots are soft and translucent but barely coloured. Pour in the double cream and allow to simmer for 3 minutes. Remove from the heat. Extract the bay leaf and discard.

2. Transfer the creamy shallot mixture into a blender and blend until smooth. For a really velvety purée, pass the mixture through a sieve into a clean saucepan. Set aside and keep warm.

Baked Onions:

3. Preheat oven to 180C/Fan Oven 160C/Gas Mark 4. Heat the butter in a non-stick oven proof frying pan. When the butter is sizzling, add the onions, turning them so that they turn golden brown on all sides. Transfer to the oven and cook for 15 minutes or so until they are cooked through but not soft. Remove from the oven and allow to cool for about 15 minutes so that you can comfortably handle them.

4. Cut about a third off the top of each onion and set aside. Using a sharp knife, scoop out the inner layers of each onion leaving 2 or 3 layers intact around the outside. Chop up the inner layers  which you have removed. Set aside.

5. In a separate saucepan, heat the butter over a moderate heat and sweat the shallot and garlic until they have softened and turned translucent. Stir in the breadcrumbs and herbs and season well. Finally, mix, in the chopped reserved onions. This is your stuffing.

6. Divide the mixture evenly between the four onions, stuffing it in firmly. Replace the top of the onions and bake in the oven for 15 minutes until hot and a rich golden colour.

To finish:

7. Heat a large oven-proof frying pan with a little vegetable oil until very hot. Sear the steaks for about 30 seconds on each side, add a generous splash of balsamic vinegar and then place the frying pan in the hot oven for a further 3 - 5 minutes (depending on how you like your steak cooked). Remove from the oven and allow to rest.

8. Put a smear of warm onion purée, sprinkle over a few individual thyme leaves and place a baked onion on each plate. Slice the rested fillet steaks and place on the plates along with some of the pan juices from cooking the steak.

Serves 4.

Chocolate Biscuit Cake with Maltesers

Chocolate biscuit Cake sounds like one of those things that is easy to make…and yes, it is; you basically bash some biscuits around, and then add some melted chocolate, stick it in a tin and allow some time for it to firm up – what could be easier? There is no baking involved and no complex procedures or processes. However, I think that chocolate biscuit cake perfectly illustrates one of my fundamental beliefs regarding food which is that the better the ingredients you use, the better the taste of the finished product.

Chocolate biscuit cake very much relies on the quality of the ingredients used and, as such, I believe that you must use a good chocolate, real butter and strike the right balance with the biscuits you choose to include. Many chocolate biscuit cakes use only Digestives but I like to use a selection; Digestives, Rich Tea, Malted Milk and Bourbon Creams. The key to a good biscuit cake is to avoid bashing up the biscuits too enthusiastically so that they become a crumb. I feel that you need to leave a good few chunks so that you retain some texture as opposed to a mealy biscuits mush. Although this tastes pleasant it doesn’t have the biscuity crunch that I believe is mandatory in a biscuit cake.

I have made chocolate biscuit cakes which include condensed milk, and others which don’t. Personally, I prefer to leave it out as it creates a more fudge-like grainy end result. I do like to add a couple of tablespoons of golden syrup because this prevents the biscuit cake from becoming over-firm. I will concede that adding golden syrup also increases the sweetness levels of the finished cake, but this cake is meant to be sweet and rich and not intended to be eaten in large quantities in one sitting.I have decorated the top of the biscuit cake pictured with Maltesers, because I love the look of them all lined up and also because I love the malty crispy crunch of these sweets. This is easy and quick to make and a lasts for ages, stored in an air-tight tin in a cool place. You can store it in the fridge but this can cause the chocolate to ‘bloom’.

 

Ingredients:

220g butter
450g dark chocolate, broken into pieces

220g milk chocolate, broken into pieces

4tblsp golden syrup

450g broken biscuits (I use equal amounts of Digestives, Rich Tea, Malted Milk and Bourbon Creams)

To finish:

50g milk chocolate melted

75g Maltesers
 

Method:

1. Line a 20-23cm square tin with non-stick baking parchment and set aside.
2. Place the butter and chocolates in a large bowl and place over a saucepan of simmering water, making sure that the bottom of the bowl does not touch the water. Stir the butter/chocolate mixture occasionally until it has full melted and then remove the bowl.
3. Stir in the golden syrup making sure that it is fully incorporated and then mix in the biscuits making sure that they are well covered with the melted chocolate mixture.

4. Empty the biscuit mixture into the prepared tin and smooth the top with the back of a metal spoon. Set aside in a cool place for ten minutes to firm up slightly.

To finish:

5. Pour the melted milk chocolate on top of the chocolate biscuit cake in the tin and then arrange the Maltesers on top embedding them in the melted chocolate covering. Set aside in a cool place for a few hours to firm up.

6. Serve, cut into small slices.

Serves 12-18.     

Koeksisters – Doughnuts, South African style!

I was extremely fortunate to visit Cape Town in South Africa as part of the final of MasterChef Ireland 2014. It was an experience that I think Diana, Edel and I will always remember. South Africa is a truly beautiful country and the people are so warm and welcoming.

This was not the first time that I had visited South Africa. I was born in Zambia and as a child, had lived there and in Zimbabwe, sometimes taking trips down to South Africa. I have very vivid memories of my childhood spent in Africa and have always said that I would like to revisit. However, even in my wildest imagination, I don’t think that I ever thought that I would return to the African continent as part of a televised cookery competition. I still cannot believe that it happened and looking back on it all, there is definitely something surreal about the whole experience. One thing remains true; I still consider myself to be one of the luckiest people to have had the privilege to have been part of MasterChef Ireland. It sounds incredibly corny but it really made so many of my dreams come true and I owe a huge debt of gratitude to all the production team with special thanks going to Niamh Maher, the series producer.

Whilst in South Africa we were exposed to some of best ingredients we had ever encountered, many of which we had never used before and which were completely alien to us. The fantastic produce coupled with meeting two truly inspirational chefs – Margot Janse of Le Quartier Francais and Luke Dale Roberts of The Test Kitchen, made the whole trip to South Africa a truly memorable experience.

I have been playing around with quite a few recipe ideas inspired by the trip to South Africa and will be posting them over the coming weeks, but to kick things off, I have chosen to give a recipe for Koeksisters, which are a syrup drenched doughnut much beloved throughout the whole country but particularly around the Cape. The braided doughnuts, glistening after having they spicy syrup bath look so tempting, almost as if they are begging to be eaten.
 

I’m not going to lie… these doughnuts ARE sweet, but they are so delectable. I dread to think of the calorie count, but in my humble opinion a little of what you fancy every now and again is good for the psyche. And eating these definitely makes me feel that all’s right with the world!

 

The main tip when making these is to make sure that the syrup into which you plunge the just-fried doughnuts is well chilled. The syrup needs to be made at least a day in advance, but once made it will keep, refrigerated, for a week or more. The finished doughnuts keep relatively well, but taste at their very best if eaten within a few hours of being made.

I love the slightly peppery ginger flavour of the syrup which I think counteracts some of the overall sweetness of the doughnuts but I also think a syrup with extra lemon included would serve the same purpose. To be honest, I am normally such a lemon addict; I decided that this time I would try something a little different.
 

Ingredients:

Syrup:
500ml water
800g sugar
½tsp salt
2½ tsp cream of tartar
Juice of half a lemon
1 cinnamon stick

30ml ginger syrup (or 1tsp ground ginger)

Doughnuts:

150g self-raising flour

100g cornflour

2tsp baking powder

25g caster sugar

25g butter, melted

25ml cream

1 large egg

To finish:

Vegetable oil

Method:

Syrup:
1. Put all the ingredients in a large saucepan and place over a moderate heat. Bring gradually up to the boil and then reduce the heat, so that the syrup is gently bubbling away. Allow to bubble for about 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Remove from the heat and allow to cool completely. Refrigerate overnight so that the syrup is well chilled.
Doughnuts:
2. Sift the self-raising flour, cornflour and baking powder together into a large mixing bowl. Add the caster sugar mix it in. Make a well in the centre and add the butter, cream and egg. Using a wooden spoon, mix everything together to form a dough. Bring the dough together into a ball, wrap in cling film and allow to rest in the fridge for 30 minutes.
To finish:
3. Remove the dough from the fridge. Roll out strips of the dough about 12-15cms long and 1cm thick. Taking three strips at a time, plait the dough together by tucking the strands together at the top and folding the outer strips over in turn into the middle, repeating until you reach the end. Finish my tucking together at the end.
4. Heat the vegetable oil in a deep-fat fryer (or carefully in a large saucepan, filled one third full of oil) until it reaches 170C-180C. Fry the doughnuts in batches of three or four for about five minutes, regularly turning them with a slotted spoon so that they cook evenly. Remove from the oil using a slotted spoon. Briefly place on some kitchen roll to soak up excess oil and then soak in the syrup for a couple of minutes before removing to a wire rack to finish cooling completely.

 

Makes 10.