lebre con castañas…

LEBRE CON CASTAÑAS (HARE WITH CHESTNUTS)

As i have mentioned in the past, am a firm believer in being able to deal directly with whatever it is you choose to eat…especially meat. My mum (a professional chef for more than 50 years now) was given a brace of wild hare recently and this is how she chose to deal with them.

OVERNIGHT
Having already been hung for a few days for the meat to mature, you must skin your hare (it has already been gutted – you do this in the field directly after you have killed it – just as you should to with venison). You split the skin at one hind leg and run the slit along to the other back leg, cutting off the tail as you go…then you pull the skin down, this should allow you to pull it all off with a bit of effort right down to the head. I am for chopping off the head personally, in the butchers where i sometimes live in Italy they like to display their rabbits skinned, head in tact, with eyes…well it’s all a bit too David Lynch even for me!

So, now you joint your hare and marinade it overnight in some good olive oil, white wine (v important that it’s white for the marinade as it helps to draw any remaining blood from the hare), red wine, fresh parsley, chopped onion, carrot and celery and some black pepper…

NEXT DAY
Shake off the marinade and roll your jointed hare in some seasoned flour and brown well in a heavy based frying pan.

In another roomy casserole gently saute some chopped onion, leek, garlic, celery, carrots and red pepper till softened. Add your browned meat to the casserole, meanwhile de-glaze the frying pan with some dry white sherry (Tio Pepe is excellent), some red wine and add a tablespoon or so of the seasoned flour mixture along with a tablespoon of sweet Spanish paprika.

Add this to the casserole along with some good stock and allow to come to the boil, salt to taste and  place in a slow oven for around 2 and a hall hours or until the meat is tender.

When the casserole is almost done you can add a generous splash of port to the dish along with some whole chestnuts (frozen are fine) cook for five minutes and then garnish…

Garnish the dish with croutons made from bread and potatoes…

other foody posts on this blog:

callos a la gallega

ossobuco vs xerrete

in praise of colombian food

restaurant still lives

few flowered recipes

first forage of the season

nose to tail and farajullas

flloeira

cocido gallego

albariño wine genius

chorizos

returning to the matanza

chocolate con churros

pani puri sunday

cicchetti tea-break

baracca

empanada

revelations in a milanese restaurant

further adventures in foraging

cooking the haul

foraging2

foraging

nose to tail,

(s)light relief,

pulpo a la gallega

the matanza

morcilla and dying arts

jamòn serrano

callos a la gallega…

Callos a la Gallega…i know that callos or tripe as we know it is not top of most peoples culinary lists, but this recipe could convert some of the more squeamish. The tripe in Callos a la Gallega is just one part of a layered, rich, complex and completely delicious stew and is a fine example of traditional Galician cuisine…

Spanish food can be quite complex and even labour intensive and this dish requires a bit of preparation…but it’s worth the effort. There are no amounts in the recipe below, use your own judgement…but make plenty as Callos are even better on the second or third day after cooking…

THE EVENING BEFORE:

Wash the tripe, chop into bite sized pieces and put it in a pan of cold water and bring to the boil for 2 or 3 minutes. Drain, cool and rinse with cold water and plenty of lemon juice. Rinse again with more cold water, dry and then marinade along with a piece of the hoof of a calf or cow (from the knee down – ask your butcher to slice into thick rounds). This hoof part provides plenty of gelatine which will thicken and enrich the final sauce. For the marinade itself use some olive oil, fresh parsley, chopped garlic and black pepper – leave overnight.

At the same time soak some dried chickpeas overnight in cold water.

NEXT DAY

Add a chopped salted pigs trotter to the tripe (in a large saucs pan with lid), a whole unsliced piece of pancetta or smoked bacon, the pre soaked chickpeas and cover it all with some COLD stock or even water give it a stir with a wooden NOT metal spoon… Put on to boil and leave to cook for around 20 minutes, removing any scum that rises to the surface from time to time. Now you can add your spices:
1 teaspoon of cumin
1 teaspoon of mixed spice
2 teaspoons of callos spices (you can make your own by blending cumin, cayenne pepper and a little salt together)
3 whole cloves
1 teaspoon of pimiento picante or chilli pepper
2 envelopes of saffron – powder or strands
Carry on boiling till the meat and the chickpeas are tender…it should all smell very aromatic by now..

Make a rostrido – in a frying pan with some good olive oil, gently fry some sliced garlic till golden brown (be extremely vigilant, it burns very easily). Take the the pan off the heat and allow to cool for a minute or 2 – then add a couple of teaspoons of SPANISH sweet paprika – this cooling off minute is important, if you don’t do it the paprika will burn (incidentally, stick to Spanish for this, it’s way better than the Hungarian variety).

Add this rostrido mixture to the pan of boiling chickpeas etc… At the same time also add to the big pan 3 or 4 chorizo sausages and leave them to cook slowly till the sauce begins to thicken. Also to aid thickening you can add some torn up bread (white, no crusts) to the sauce. Now you can salt to taste and add a little more chilli for an extra kick

Like i said before…make a big pot as callos in my opinion is way better, reheated a day after cooking when all the spices hav had time to develop and the sauce has become even richer…

other foody posts on this blog:

lebre con castanas

ossobuco vs xerrete

in praise of colombian food

restaurant still lives

few flowered recipes

first forage of the season

nose to tail and farajullas

flloeira

cocido gallego

albariño wine genius

chorizos

returning to the matanza

chocolate con churros

pani puri sunday

cicchetti tea-break

baracca

empanada

revelations in a milanese restaurant

further adventures in foraging

cooking the haul

foraging2

foraging

nose to tail,

(s)light relief,

pulpo a la gallega

the matanza

morcilla and dying arts

jamòn serrano

ossobuco vs xerrete…

A few posts from Galicia follow, as i went there directly after India…and as the weather was terrible and i was in the middle of nowhere, my thoughts (naturally) turned to food…well my mum’s food to be precise…

I posted about a mythical plate of ossobuco i had in a Milanese restaurant once…and Italians sure know what to do with ossobuco, but my mum can match them with her Spanish take on this cut of the hock of beef or veal…Xerrete vs Jarrete*

* Xerrete is the Galician term for the hock (ossobuco) or Jarrete in Castillian (standard) Spanish

How to cook it:

Marinade the meat (preferably overnight) in chopped garlic, black pepper, some herbs like parsley/thyme/oregano good olive oil and white wine.

In a heavy based frying pan brown the meat till golden, meanwhile prepare another pan with olive oil and one roughly chopped onion and half a red pepper. When the meat is browned add it to this pan…

and strain into this the juices from the browning pan. Now you can add some salt and some saffron infused in white wine. Give it all a bit of a mix and add some good stock till the meat is half covered. Once boiling, cover the pan and put  in a slow oven to cook for an hour and a half or until the meat is tender.

Once the meat is tender, you can remove it from the sauce and set it aside then add some peeled potatoes to the sauce, replace the lid and place back in the oven till cooked, right at the end you can add some peas to the potatoes if you like.

Arrange the meat with the potatoes and serve:

This recipe works well for any kind of meat – chicken – veal – lamb…to create the classic Spanish dish of “carne asada”.

other foody posts on this blog:

lebre con castanas

ossobuco vs xerrete

in praise of colombian food

restaurant still lives

few flowered recipes

first forage of the season

nose to tail and farajullas

flloeira

cocido gallego

albariño wine genius

chorizos

returning to the matanza

chocolate con churros

pani puri sunday

cicchetti tea-break

baracca

empanada

revelations in a milanese restaurant

further adventures in foraging

cooking the haul

foraging2

foraging

nose to tail,

(s)light relief,

pulpo a la gallega

the matanza

morcilla and dying arts

jamòn serrano

few flowered recipes…

So following on from my previous post on foraging for few flowered leeks by the Braid burn, here is what i did with my free haul…

few flowered leek and walnut pesto

(these amounts are all approximate you can adjust them to your taste)

100g wild garlic or few flowered leek leaves

80g walnuts

80g parmesan cheese

good extra virgin olive oil (i prefer Tuscan for the fruity flavour)

So i don’t have a food processor, so this was all done by hand. First crumble the walnuts into a dry, hot frying pan (no oil) and lightly toast them, keep them moving otherwise they will burn. Set aside to cool in a large bowl. When cooled, pound them to a bread crumb like consistency in a pestle and mortar and return to the large bowl.

Meanwhile finely chop your wild leaves and then pound them in a pestle and mortar with a little sea salt, add them to the bowl with the now cooled, crushed walnuts. To this mixture also add the finely grated parmesan.

Now all you have to do is glug in the oil and mix, so that it all incorporates, keep adding more oil till you achieve the consistency you like with your pesto. Taste and add a little more salt if required… And there you have it, delicious and really simple using just 4 ingredients.

I like it with linguine, or as crostini in oven toasted ciabatta slices  or even in a baked potato. It freezes by the way, though you should apply a thin top layer of oil to the container it’s in to “seal” it and stop it oxidising.

Sweet Potato and Few Flowered Leek Soup – A take on the classic leek and potato soup, i thought I’d experiment…it works!

ingredients

1 large onion

1 large sweet potato

300 g few flowered leeks

good stock

nutmeg, a bay leaf, salt and pepper

Sauté the onion till transparent, add a bay leaf, salt and black pepper and some freshly grated nutmeg. Pour in some hot stock (vegetable, chicken or ham) and add the peeled sweet potatoes which have been cut into chunks. The stock should comfortably cover the sweet potatoes. Simmer till the potatoes are cooked. At the last minute add the washed few flowered leek leaves and cook for 1 more minute. Fish out the bay leaf and liquidise the soup till it is smooth. Taste and adjust seasoning. It should taste sweet and savoury and earthy from the wild leaves.         

other foody posts on this blog:

callos a la gallega

ossobuco vs xerrete

in praise of colombian food

restaurant still lives

few flowered recipes

first forage of the season

nose to tail and farajullas

flloeira

cocido gallego

albariño wine genius

returning to the matanza

chorizos

chocolate con churros

pani puri sunday

cicchetti tea-break

baracca

empanada

further adventures in foraging

revelations in a milanese restaurant

braid burn

cooking the haul

foraging2

foraging

more foodie questions

foodie questions

nose to tail,

(s)light relief,

pulpo a la gallega

the matanza

morcilla and dying arts

jamòn serrano

nose to tail and farajullas…

Ok this was fascinating, for me at least. Just when i thought that i knew all the nose to tail tricks of the matanza in order to use every scrap of the animal, my mum tells me of a new one. Believe is or not, they even found a way to use the membrane that contains the intestines of the pig; the “farajullas” of the title of this post. Click on the film below for the full explanation:

other foody posts on this blog:

few flowered recipes

flloeira

cocido gallego

chorizos

returning to the matanza

chorizos

chocolate con churros

pani puri sunday

cicchetti tea-break

baracca

empanada

further adventures in foraging

revelations in a milanese restaurant

cooking the haul

foraging2

foraging

more foodie questions

foodie questions

nose to tail,

(s)light relief,

pulpo a la gallega

the matanza

morcilla and dying arts

jamòn serrano