eBook
Available on Compatible NOOK devices, the free NOOK App and in My Digital Library.
Related collections and offers
Overview
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781741762419 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Allen & Unwin |
| Publication date: | 04/01/2009 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 608 |
| File size: | 1 MB |
About the Author
Read an Excerpt
The Basics
A Really Useful Cookbook
By Anthony Telford
Allen & Unwin
Copyright © 2009 Anthony TelfordAll rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-74176-241-9
CHAPTER 1
Breakfast
BIRCHER MUESLIServes 2
1 cup rolled oats
½ cup fresh orange juice
½ cup natural yoghurt
¼ cup currants or sultanas
¼ cup chopped dried apricots
pinch of ground nutmeg
large pinch of ground cinnamon
1 Granny smith apple, grated, to serve
2 tablespoons natural yoghurt, extra
1 cup seasonal fresh berries, to serve
Method:
1. Combine the oats, juice, yoghurt, currants or sultanas, chopped apricots, nutmeg and cinnamon in a large bowl and stir well. Chill overnight.
2. To serve, stir in the grated apple, put into serving bowls and garnish with the extra yoghurt and the berries.
HINTS AND TIPS:
* You will need — large bowl, vegetable peeler, grater, cup, liquid and spoon measures and a large spoon.
* When in season, passionfruit is a wonderful addition to bircher muesli, so try adding the pulp of 4 passionfruit to this recipe. If you cannot wait for the season to begin, use a small can of passionfruit pulp, readily available at the supermarket.
* There are many varied recipes for bircher muesli and it should be remembered that this recipe — like all recipes in this book — is just a guide and so the addition of a favourite ingredient or removal of any ingredients that are not so liked is easy and encouraged.
* For gluten intolerance, the use of 'oat' style cereals can be substituted. One in particular is made from rice-meal; however, like most foods that are a gluten substitute, the end result will certainly have a different texture, one which coeliacs are quite used to.
* For a dairy-free option, simply replace the yoghurt with the same quantity of orange juice, or any other fruit juice, like apple, pineapple, mango, apricot or peach.
* Fruit yoghurts can be substituted for natural yoghurt, the only difference being that the end result will be just a bit sweeter.
* Any dried fruit can be substituted for the ones mentioned in the recipe, as long as the overall quantity for this recipe doesn't exceed ½ cup.
* Other spices that could be used in this recipe include mixed spice or allspice to replace the cinnamon and nutmeg. If no spices are on hand, simply omit from the recipe altogether.
* As much as bircher muesli is intended for breakfast, it makes for a great after-school snack for very hungry children.
* Once made, store the muesli in an airtight container in the refrigerator for 2 days. Even though it may last up to 5 days, it does begin to break down too much by day 3 and is considered a fresh product once the orange juice is added.
* Mixing in freshly grated apple adds a refreshing crunch to the bircher muesli. Topping with yoghurt and berries is just one example of how to serve this dish. Serving a dollop of bircher muesli with cold milk is simple and still delicious. Chopped fresh banana or melons can replace the fresh berries.
BOILED EGGS
hens' eggs, room
temperature water
Method:
1. There are many written methods for boiling an egg — see Hints and tips for why this one is the best.
2. Gently place room temperature eggs into a saucepan and cover with cold water by at least 5 cm.
3. Bring the water to the boil, then turn down to a barely recognisable simmer for 8–10 minutes for hard-boiled eggs. For the best results, the water should not be boiling. See Hints and tips for soft-boiled eggs.
4. Remove from the water with a slotted spoon and drop into cold or iced water to stop the cooking. Boiled eggs in the shell will keep in the fridge for 7 days.
HINTS AND TIPS:
* You will need — saucepan and slotted spoon.
* As tempted as you are to drop eggs from the fridge into boiling water, stop now and read on. The main reason eggs crack when boiled is due to temperature difference. A cold egg cooked in hot water will most probably crack, and no amount of salt or vinegar in the water will prevent this. All salt and vinegar can hope to achieve is to quickly set the egg white that flows from a cracked egg. The other reason is that eggs cooked in a rapid boil are knocked about, causing the egg to crack.
* The only reason why eggs are hard to peel once boiled is because they are very fresh. The fresher the egg, the harder it is to peel. The best eggs for boiling and then peeling are those that are about 2 weeks old. Keep the really fresh ones for poaching, frying or scrambling and for making cakes.
* For really soft eggs — both yolk and white — use the method mentioned, but remove the eggs after 2–3 minutes instead of 10 minutes. These are also known as 'coddled eggs'.
* For soft yolks and set whites, cook for 5 minutes. For a medium cooked yolk, cook for 6–7 minutes.
* All these times are approximations and much depends on the size of the egg, temperature of the egg and even the temperature of the water added in the beginning.
FRENCH TOAST
Serves 4
4 eggs
250 ml milk
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
2 tablespoons caster sugar 1
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
150 g butter
4 slices of sourdough
bread or thickly sliced white bread (French bread
stick and Turkish bread will also work)
Method:
1. Place the eggs, milk, cinnamon, sugar and vanilla essence in a bowl and whisk.
2. Heat a frying pan or the flat plate of a barbecue (on lowest setting) and melt the butter. Soak each slice of bread in the egg mixture until wet through.
3. Place the soaked bread in the pan or on the flat plate and cook until golden brown. Turn and cook the other side. It is important to cook on a low–medium setting so the egg mixture cooks and sets, rather than cooking on a higher heat which will burn the outside and leave the inside soggy.
4. Once cooked, transfer to a plate and serve with your choice of toppings — bacon, maple syrup, honeycomb butter, fresh berries, ice-cream or lemon and sugar — or simply eat it on its own.
HINTS AND TIPS:
* You will need — cutting board, bread knife, weight, spoon and liquid measures, sauté pan or frying pan.
* French toast, like pancakes, is great for a special weekend breakfast. French toast is certainly much easier to prepare than pancakes and is a great place to start for beginner cooks.
* This dish is also known as 'eggy bread' in the UK; and in France, it is known as 'pain perdu'.
* Cooking French toast in butter adds to the richness of the dish.
* Adding milk to the eggs is optional. Using just eggs mixed with the spices and sugar will give a richer and more eggy flavour.
* You could take 2 pieces of bread and sandwich sliced bananas or grated apple between them, then dip the sandwich in the egg mixture before frying.
* For a child's birthday party, use star- or people-shaped cutters to cut shapes from the bread before cooking.
* Try serving French toast as a dessert instead of a breakfast dish.
* French toast is often served as a sweet dish but can work as a savoury alternative. Try replacing the cinnamon, vanilla and sugar with 1 cup grated parmesan cheese and salt and pepper to taste. Dip the bread in the egg mixture before cooking.
FRUIT SALAD
Serves 4
¼ rockmelon (cantaloupe), peeled and seeds removed
¼ pineapple, peeled and cored
1 apple, peeled and cored
2 bananas, peeled
1 cup green grapes, washed
2 passionfruit
natural yoghurt, to serve
Method:
1. Cut the rockmelon, pineapple, apple and banana into roughly 2-cm pieces.
2. Mix all the fruit in a bowl then serve with fresh, natural yoghurt.
3. Store the fruit salad (without the yoghurt) in an airtight container for up to 2 days.
HINTS AND TIPS:
* You will need — cutting board, cook's knife, peeler, paring knife, cup measure, bowl and storage container.
* This is the most basic fruit salad recipe and can therefore be adapted to any fruit, but please consider the following tips.
* When cutting fruit, it is recommended that all fruit is cut the same size, but not necessarily the same shape. This means fruit can be cut into large pieces, about 5 cm, or into small pieces, 1 cm or less — but don't be tempted to mix the two sizes as it will look odd, and the smaller pieces can become damaged and mushy from the size and weight of the larger pieces.
* Never be tempted to add many fruits to a fruit salad to make it impressive. Sometimes a combination of 3 well-matched fruits is better than having a mixture of 10.
* Fruit salad is best eaten on the day or, at the very latest, the next day. Some fruits will certainly last longer; however, once mixed, some soft fruits will rapidly break down.
* Bananas, being a very soft fruit, should only be added just before serving. Once mixed and then stored, banana in a fruit salad will begin to soften quickly and become brown and mushy, making a great fruit salad look unappetising the next day.
* Think about matching hard fruits (as in the recipe) or soft fruits (as in the examples below).
* Melon fruit salad — a mix of equal parts watermelon, rockmelon and honeydew.
* Mixed berry and mango salad — once in season, make the most of fresh berries and counter their tartness by adding a mango cut into small pieces.
* Pineapple, papaya and mint salad — mix ½ pineapple, 1 pink papaya (peeled and black seeds removed) and ¼ cup shredded mint.
* Citrus fruit salad — 4 oranges, 6 mandarins, 2 pink grapefruit and 1 lime (mint would go well with this salad).
* Banana, strawberry and passionfruit salad — 3 bananas, 300 g strawberries and 3 passionfruit (the passion fruit will prevent the banana from browning).
* Strawberry, grape and mango salad — 500 g strawberries (hulled and quartered), 500 g green grapes (washed) and 3 mangoes (cut into 2-cm pieces).
* Tropical fruit salad — make use of any tropical fruits like papaya, lychee, mango, longan, dragon fruit, pineapple, star apples, carambola (star fruit), chocolate pudding fruit, mangosteen and bananas.
HASH BROWN POTATOServes 4
500 g (about 2 large) potatoes
2 tablespoons vegetable or canola oil
2 tablespoons butter
salt and pepper, to taste
Method:
1. Scrub the potatoes — they do not need to be peeled — then coarsely grate. Squeeze the grated potato slightly to remove some of its water (this makes for a crispier end result).
2. Heat a 30-cm frying pan, preferably nonstick, over medium–high heat. Add the oil and butter.
3. When hot, add the potatoes and push down with a spatula to spread evenly in the bottom of the pan. Sprinkle the top with salt and pepper. Cook until the bottom is browned and crispy, about 10 minutes. Do not try to flip until it is browned, or the potatoes might stick.
4. Flip the hash brown, cut into sections if necessary, and cook another 10 minutes, or until browned and crispy on the other side.
5. Serve immediately, or cool and simply reheat in the microwave or preferably in a hot oven (210°c) for 5 minutes.
HINTS AND TIPS:
* You will need — grater, bowl, weight and spoon measures, nonstick frying pan and spatula.
* There are many different styles of hash browns. This recipe is about as easy and as fast as they come — and is, in fact, that of a Swiss potato dish called 'Potato rosti'. Other recipes suggest boiling and mixing the potato with all kinds of ingredients — they're not wrong. So the term 'hash brown' becomes quite loose, especially when made with sweet potato or even carrots.
* A standard supermarket potato is all that is required, this usually means a Sebago, Coliban or Nadine.
* To avoid discolouration of the grated potato, work quickly and squeeze the moisture out as soon as possible. If making a large batch, keep the grated potato in water until ready to assemble, then be sure to thoroughly squeeze out all the water before cooking.
* If using a nonstick pan, the use of oil and butter can be eliminated to reduce fats in the diet.
* For a variation, after squeezing excess moisture from the grated potato, try adding 1 egg yolk, 1 onion (finely chopped) and ¼ teaspoon hot (or mild) paprika. Instead of paprika, ½ teaspoon of finely chopped herbs like rosemary or sage marry well with potato.
* Or add the kernels from a cob of corn to the recipe with 1 tablespoon chopped parsley, ½ red capsicum (chopped) and 1 fresh red chilli (chopped). Then top this with Guacamole and bacon.
* Once cooked, top regular hash browns with crispy bacon then grated cheese and finish in a hot oven for 5 minutes.
* Remember, if using a nonstick pan, use a plastic spatula not a knife to flip the hash brown and cut it.
* Here's an easy way to flip the whole hash brown: slide the hash brown out of the pan and onto a plate. Invert the pan over the plate and the hash brown and turn the whole thing over together. The browned part is now on top.
* A large disk of hash brown can be used as a pizza base for those with wheat and gluten intolerance — simply top with all your favourite pizza goodies.
* When cooking individual hash browns, do not overcrowd the pan at the risk of the hash browns sticking together as they cook and tearing apart as they are turned.
* Individual hash browns can be used as a base for eggs Benedict, instead of an English muffin; in which case it becomes quite a different dish, especially if ham is replaced with smoked salmon — yum! This is especially good for those with wheat and gluten intolerance.
* For a cocktail party or dinner party, cook small hash browns then top with smoked salmon and crème fraîche, or trout dip and chives, or sour cream and salmon roe, or simply mayonnaise and capers.
OMELETTE
Serves 1
3 large eggs
2 tablespoons warm water
large pinch of salt flakes
pinch of ground white pepper
2 tablespoons butter
1 teaspoon olive oil
Method:
1. Combine the egg, water, salt and pepper in a bowl and whisk until well combined. The water evaporates as the omelette cooks making it light and fluffy.
2. Place a nonstick frying pan over medium–high heat, add the butter and olive oil and heat until the butter begins to bubble without browning.
3. Add the egg mixture to the pan. As the egg begins to set, use a rubber or plastic spatula to move the egg from the outer part of the pan to the middle, to allow the uncooked egg to fill any exposed parts of the pan.
4. When half-cooked and still runny on top, add any flavours you like (some ideas are listed opposite) and continue to cook until set or better still cook the top of the omelette under the grill section of the oven. This will only take 1–2 minutes.
5. Remove from the heat and shake the pan to loosen the omelette from the base of the pan. Shake the omelette to one side, tilting so that the top third can be folded over, and then turn onto a plate.
HINTS AND TIPS:
* You will need — cutting board, cook's knife, bowl, spoon measures, whisk, spatula, shallow frying or sauté pan or crepe pan.
* This recipe is a classic French-style omelette which means it is folded as it is served. Another version is the Spanish omelette which is not folded, but served flat from the pan. Fans of the Spanish omelette have been known to cook their omelette in a shallow terracotta baking dish, eating it straight from the dish.
* A simple mixture of chopped fresh herbs can be added to the egg mixture. A quantity no more than 1 tablespoon of chopped herbs like parsley, thyme, sage, oregano, mint, chervil or tarragon can be used in any combination.
* Bacon, spinach and goat's cheese omelette — 1 rasher of bacon (chopped and fried), 1 cup spinach (chopped and wilted by cooking it in the pan after the bacon), and ¼ cup goat's cheese (crumbled). Loosely mix all ingredients in a bowl, ready to place in the middle of the half-cooked omelette. The goat's cheese can be replaced with fetta, ricotta, brie or grated cheddar.
* Mushroom, tomato and spinach omelette — 1 cup sliced Swiss brown mushrooms (cooked in 2 tablespoons olive oil), 1 ripe tomato (peeled, de-seeded and chopped), and 1 cup spinach (chopped and wilted by cooking it in the pan after the mushrooms). Loosely mix all the ingredients in a bowl, ready to place in the middle of the half-cooked omelette. Fresh tomato can be replaced with ¼ cup semi- or sun-dried tomatoes. Spinach can be replaced with rocket. Mushrooms can be replaced with grilled artichoke hearts.
* Try other fillings like some of the combinations mentioned in the hints and tips list for frittata.
* An omelette is considered a benchmark for any good chef, a sign of solid training and of a good understanding of the basics. In some kitchens, fail the omelette test and you fail to get the job. Domestic cooks need not place so much pressure on themselves, just remember practice makes perfect.
SCRAMBLED EGGS
Serves 2
4–6 eggs (depending on size)
2 tablespoons thick cream (35 per cent fat)
salt and freshly ground pepper, to taste
75 g butter
chopped chives, to garnish
Method:
1. In a bowl, crack the eggs, add the cream and season with salt and pepper.
2. Whisk lightly with a fork — the whites and yolks don't have to be completely mixed and the mixture should contain some air; over-whisking the mixture expels the air and makes for heavier scrambled eggs.
3. Melt the butter in a heavy-based nonstick pan over medium heat. When the butter begins to bubble, add the egg mixture and reduce heat to low. As it begins to cook and thicken, fold the thicker bits towards the centre of the pan — uncooked egg will moat around the cooked egg. Repeat this process until the eggs are close to ready but still a little runny, then remove from the heat and move the mixture once or twice more as the heat of the pan will complete the cooking.
4. Serve immediately — scrambled eggs become tough and dry if you attempt to keep them warm. Garnish with the chives or other fresh green herbs.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from The Basics by Anthony Telford. Copyright © 2009 Anthony Telford. Excerpted by permission of Allen & Unwin.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
Table of Contents
Contents
INTRODUCTION,THE USEFUL RECIPES,
1. BREAKFAST,
2. DIPS AND ACCOMPANIMENTS,
3. SOUPS,
4. SEAFOOD,
5. POULTRY,
6. MEAT,
7. VEGETABLES,
8. SALADS,
9. GRAINS AND PULSES,
10. DRESSINGS, SAUCES AND BUTTERS,
11. DESSERTS,
12. CAKES, BISCUITS AND PASTRIES,
13. TOPPINGS,
14. DRINKS,
15. BASIC RECIPES,
THE REALLY USEFUL INFORMATION,
THE INDEXES,
RECIPE INDEX,
GENERAL INDEX,