Spring is on the way!

  Keeping going with the EatingBritish thing has been a bit difficult for the last few weeks.  I think the unusually harsh winter led to very difficult growing conditions for British farmers.  Anyway, I noticed today that I am no longer limited to cabbage, carrots, potatoes and Brussels sprouts!  No, pak choi and tomatoes are back on the menu!  Woo!

 So, there they are, just in case you didn't believe me.  I was quite hungry after my shopping trip and needing something quick, so I opted to a stir fry, with bacon, pak choi and tomato.  I know it might sound odd putting tomato into a stir fry, but it works, trust me.  The trick is to slice the tomato (fairly thickly will do) and then add close to the end of cooking, but give it enough time to dissolve to give a thick, rich sauce.  Awesome!

 Serve on a bed of rice.  Nice.

'Underground' Farming?

 Hello!  And, sorry for not posting for so long.  What with Christmas and New Year and everything, it's all been a bit hectic just recently and I'm afraid to say the blog has taken something of a back seat.  This hasn't been helped by the loss of my digital camera owing to an unfortunate incident involving a plastic carrier bag and a half-drunk cup of coffee.  Suffice to say, the digital camera is no long with us.  I'm working on buying a new one so I can get back to blogging properly, but in the mean time we'll just have to stick to words.

 I came across this article in The Guardian today:

 http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2011/jan/23/diy-food-producers

 The idea of 'underground' food producers is really interesting and not something I've come across before, but I think this kind of cottage industry endeavour is exactly what the country and in particular the countryside, really needs right now.  Although, by the sound of it many of the people mentioned in the article are from an urban environment, but still, this has to be a move in the right direction.  I would love to try out some of these things myself, such as making cheese or curing my own ham, but I just don't have the space at the moment.  I am working to find a solution to this though and if successful, it should certainly give me a bit more to blog about.

 I feel I can't post to my blog at this time of the year without mentioning Burns Night, which is coming up on the 25th January.  Whilst this is a big thing in Scotland where people are keen to celebrate the work of one of their national heroes, Robert Burns, it's very rarely heard of down here in England.  So I was rather surprised to see one of my local butchers having a large banner advertising Burns Night and encouraging people to order a home-made haggis for the occasion.  I don't know how successful this will be, judging by people I've spoken to down here, many are reluctant to try haggis because they've heard that it's disgusting.  It doesn't even seem to matter that they have no idea what goes into it!  It's a shame, haggis is really very nice and I would encourage anyone who hasn't tried it before to give it a go.  And, what better occasion than Burns Night?

Strawberry Jam

 Well, it would seem that Autumn is well and truly upon us now!  Although, it has been unseasonably warm for the past few days down here, the leaves on the trees have more or less all turned now.  I really like Autumn, I love the colours of the  leaves on the trees, I love wading through the piles of fallen leaves and I would go as far as to say that I love the crisp, fresh Autumn mornings when there's a hint of frost.  We haven't had too many of those yet, though.  Anyway, I've had a bit of a break from blogging, which has prompted some complaints from some of my friends, but you know what?  When something is a hobby, I think it's really important that you can put it down and walk away from it for a while, without feeling guilty.  If you can't, then that activity ceases to be an enjoyable hobby and becomes a chore.  Well, that's my opinion anyway!

 Strawberry jam isn't perhaps the most autumnal subject really, but I was really surprised to notice in my local the other day that they are still selling British strawberries!  Amazing.  And, right now, they were on a buy one get one free offer, so I thought, why not?  I bought a couple of kilograms, thinking I could eat some and make jam from the rest.  Strawberry jam is super easy - you need one kilogram of fruit, to one kilogram of sugar.  A bit of fresh lemon juice helps to freshen everything else and I believe helps it to set.  That's it!  I must admit that, for the first time ever when I make jam, I used a specific jam sugar this time.  Jam sugar has added pectin, the agent that exists naturally in fruit and which makes jam set.  So, it shouldn't be possible to create jam that doesn't set when using this type of sugar.

So, to make jam.  First weigh out 1 kilogram of strawberries.

 Then, wash them and remove the green stalks and leaves.  Add them to a decent sized, heavy base saucepan and heat gently until they go all soft.  Don't worry about it being dry, the amount of liquid that comes out as you do this is amazing and very soon will be higher than the level of the strawberries originally!  Once they are all soft and mushy, this will probably take about 10 minutes or so, with occasional stirring, add 1 kilogram of sugar.  I prefer to add it a bit at a time and to stir the mixture around until it is all dissolved before adding more, but I guess you could put it all in at once.  It's probably easier to stir if you add a bit at a time.  Anyway, once the sugar is added, stir it around and let it simmer gently.  As it is doing so, you will notice a foam forming on the top.  This should be carefully removed with a spoon, taking care not to remove too much of the jam as well!  It will seem like this is an unwinable battle because more foam will form as you remove it, but keep going.  The foam is formed by water coming out of the strawberries and if you leave too much of this in, the jam won't keep for as long.  Simmer (and keep removing foam) for about 10 minutes or so.  After 10 minutes, remove a small amount of jam with a tea spoon and pour it onto a cold plate.  Wait a minute or so and then gently push the blob of jam with your finger.  If the surface of the blob wrinkles up when you push it, the jam is ready.  If not, simmer for a bit longer and try again.

 It is important to sterilise the jars you are going to keep your jam in, which should be done with boiling water.  Be very careful not to scald yourself doing this!  Also, watch that you don't put too much boiling water into the jars all at once, or they might shatter.  Pour in a little at a time and swish it around to ensure the glass heats up evenly.  Once you've swished a good amount of boiling water around inside the jar, taking great care not to scald yourself, pour the water out and set the jar into a bowl, or the sink, filled with hot water.  Take care that there isn't so much water that the jars float!  This is to ensure that the glass stays hot so that when we pour in the jam, we don't risk it cracking.
 When the jam is ready, simply pour it very carefully into the jar, more or less up to the top and seal immediately.  As the jam cools, this will cause a vacuum to form around the top, which will help to preserve the jam.  It is better to use proper jam jars with rubber seals for this purpose.  Allow the jam to cool in the jars and then that's it.

 As an aside, you should now have a bowl of foam that you scrapped off the top of the jam as it was simmering, which should have set by now.  If you take off the thick, foam layer from the top, underneath should be a nice, clear, red liquid.  This is really just strawberry syrup and it's lovely with some natural yogurt, or even rice pudding.  I prefer not to waste anything if I can!

Good news if you like apples!

 I just came across this article on The Guardian website:

 http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/sep/08/apples-growers-hail-tastiest-crop

 It seems that the weather this year has conspired to produce a better than average crop of British apples!  Good news indeed.  However, apparently the blackberries have not been doing so well.  I tried making blackberry jam last year from wild blackberries, but it didn't work out very well.  I was hoping to have another go this year, so I shall have to see what the local, wild blackberries are like.

Vegetarian Britain?

 As anyone reading my blog will quickly realise, I eat meat.  I don't think anybody could be unaware that there has been some discussion about the environmental impact of meat production recently, with many arguing that we could feed many more people if only everyone were to become vegetarian.  This is an interesting argument, which I think is based on the issue that we currently grow a lot of food that could be eaten by humans and then feed it to animals.  In my opinion, in this case the point is a valid one, this is an extremely wasteful practice.  However, I would argue that if we used more traditional farming methods, where cattle are left out to graze in fields and hence eat grass all day, then the problem is significantly reduced.  After all, a cow eating grass is doing something truly amazing - converting grass, which humans can't eat, into meat and dairy products, which humans can.  This, of course, applies to livestock other than cows as well.

 The other side to this argument is one of sustainability and environmental impact.  How much of our countryside would have to be ploughed up to grow crops if everyone in the UK were to become vegetarian?  Since the original EatingBritish project, I have often wondered if it would even be possible to be a vegetarian and eat only food produced in Britain.  I think it would be very difficult, if not impossible, because as far as I am aware we simply can't grow the right kind of crops here.  So, if we were all to go vegetarian, it would surely mean that we would have to import an even greater proportion of our food.  Would that be sustainable?  The recent dry weather and wild fires in Russia have prompted them to ban exports of wheat, which of course has already pushed up wheat prices around the world.  I see this as being the problem of relying too heavily on food imports, if something happens to the supply chain, if you can't produce enough food yourself, you've got serious problems.

 I have found it very difficult to reliably find grass fed meat in the shops, otherwise I would choose this option all the time.

Roast topside of Water Buffalo

This was something of a surprise find in the freezer section at Sunnyfields - Water Buffalo meat!  The Water Buffalo are reared here in the UK, at Broughton Farm in Hampshire (more info here).  They had buffalo mince and topside joints available, so I though it would be good to do a version of the British classic, roast beef.  But with buffalo.

  To start with, defrost the meat.  It is best taken out of the freezer in the morning of the day you plan to cook it, assuming you'll be having it as an evening meal.  When it's defrosted completely, pre-heat the oven to 220C.  Liberally season the meat with salt and freshly ground black pepper.  The piece I bought had some string tied around it to keep it all together, I left this on until it was cooked.  Next, roughly chop four or five carrots and three small onions and place in the bottom of a roasting tray.  Drizzle the vegetables with a little oil (I used rape seed oil) and place the seasoned meat on top.

  Now, place this onto the middle shelf of the pre-heated oven and immediately turn the temperature down to 180C and leave for around 2 hours.  Baste the meat with the juices which will collect in the roasting tray about every half an hour or so.  After 2 hours (the exact cooking will depend on the size of the piece of meat, so you'll have to use your own judgement a bit here), turn the temperature down to 160C for a final half-an-hour.  Then, remove the meat from the oven.

  Take the meat out of the roasting tray and put to one side, strain the vegetables and juices into a suitable container (this makes very good gravy!).  Now, put the meat back into the roasting tray and cover with kitchen foil.  Now leave it for 10 - 15 minutes to rest before serving.

 

  To test if it's cooked properly, before removing from the oven completely, use a metal skewer to make a hole right through the thickest part of the meat, from the top.  Remove the skewer and watch the juices that come out, if they are clear and not cloudy, the meat should be cooked.  Repeat the test in several areas to make sure.  There are fancier ways of doing this, a meat thermometer is probably the best way, especially if you want you meat anything other than well done, but I don't have one of those.

 Anyway, that's it!  Serve with whatever vegetables you like.

  It has a really excellent flavour, kind of like beef, but also quite different.  The fat, in particular, tastes very different.  Buffalo meat apparently contains less than half the fat of beef, so it can't be bad!  I would recommend trying it.  I intend to have a go at making burgers from buffalo mince at some point, so I shall certainly blog about that when I do.

Sunnyfields chicken, ham and leak pie

 I was back at Sunnyfields farm a little while ago, actually my first visit this summer!  I have often wished that it was easier to get British made 'ready meal' things like pizza and pies, made with British (and preferably local) ingredients.  Much to my delight, I found that you can!  Although, if I hadn't been at Sunnyfields anyway, it would have been a bit out of my way just for a pie.  But still, I could hardly resist giving one of these a try!

 It was an excellent pie!  It had nice, big pieces of chicken and good sized cubes of ham.  The pastry was good too.  All in all, a thoroughly good pie.  More info on Sunnyfields Organic farm here.

 While I was there, I also picked up some locally grown corn-on-the-cob, which was very nice.  I had some of it done on the barbecue and it was really sweet and delicious.