Colcannon

I love it when I find an incredibly easy and tasty dish. Don't get me wrong: for the most part I still love spending a couple of hours in my kitchen, carefully dosing out ingredients, slowly folding and rubbing and waiting for volatile oils to release and scent the air. The truth is I don't always have that sort of time to devote to feeding myself (sad, isn't it?). I'm normally on the lookout for something quick, delicious and slightly different from the same-old same-old, but one that can be completed in those fleeting moments between work, meetings, going out and sleep. From time to time I find a solution so elegant in its simplicity, I wonder why I didn't try it before. Colcannon is one of those foods. A traditional Irish dish, it's simply sauteed greens stirred into mashed potatoes. As someone who loves sauteed kale, cabbage and other deep leafy greens almost as much as I love creamy (and garlicky) mashed potatoes, this is pretty much a happy foodish marriage to my tastebuds and gullet. What makes it better (I think) is that it's pretty much a non-recipe recipe. Don't believe me? Here's proof:

• Step one: Saute some kale (or green cabbage or other leafy green).


• Step two: Mash some potatoes (preferably with milk/cream and butter).


• Step three: Mix everything together.

Still don't believe me? Read the painstaingly recorded instructions which follow this bit of expository. To summarize:

• Step one: Saute some kale (or green cabbage other leafy green).


• Step two: Mash some potatoes (preferably with milk/cream and butter).


• Step three: Mix everything together.

See? Colcannon Serves 4-6 Ingredients 250g (0.5lb) Kale leaves, chopped (one bunch) 1 shallot, thinly slivered 4 spring onions, green parts only, finely chopped butter, for sauteing and mashing 500g (1lb) Yukon gold potatoes (or any mashable potato) 125ml (0.5c) milk 1 clove garlic, smashed salt pepper Method: Fry the shallots in butter until golden. Add the kale and spring onion greens and a couple of tablespoons of water to the pan. Give it a stir and lid the pan and let the greens steam lightly--the green will be vibrant, but the veg won't be limp. Remove the lid and let the water evaporate, stirring occasionally. Season with salt and pepper. Set aside

Parboil potatoes in salted water. When they are about half-cooked, drain off 2/3-3/4 of the cooking water and retun to the hob, put the lid on and steam over low heat until an inserted knife blade or fork easily slips in and out of a potato. When the potatoes are about ready, heat the milk with the smashed garlic. Mash the potatoes to your liking, using the garlic-infused milk and butter. Stir in the cooked greens. Balance flavours to taste. Notes:

• You can substiute cabbage (savoy or green) for the kale.


• If you have bacon fat on hand, use that to saute the greens.

cheers!

jasmine

I'm a quill for hire!

Corned Beef

It all started off innocently enough.

Visions of home made corned beef and cabbage along with the inevitable sandwiches and hash danced in my head, in the same way that sugar plums make their obligatory appearances at Christmas.

Recipes abound online and it all looked simple: let a beef brisket soak up a spiced brine for a week or two, boil it up and then eat.

Easy, right?

Wrong.

Well...not really wrong. Just not as easy as I thought it would be.

When little, the only corned beef I knew was canned: salty, fatty, PeptoBismol coloured with a particular pre-digested texture similar to Spam. The cool part was you had to open the can with a key. Later I discovered corned beef sandwiches made of sliced cured beef. Wow. The difference was akin to contrasting 1970s polyester to pure silk.

A couple of years ago I bought a "make your own corned beef" brisket--a plastic-encased brisket, swimming in a slightly viscous, but spiced brine. Snip the end and boil. It was okay at best, chemical at worst.

This year I decided to corn (or cure) my own brisket for St. Patick's Day. I looked at a number of recipes and for the most part it seemed doable. I was starting early enough in the month that a corned beef supper shouldn't have been an issue.

It was all good, except for what turned out to be an elusive ingredient: saltpetre.

Unfortunately my favourite haunts' can't get it in. Many pharmacies either don't carry it or have had it on back order for months. (As an aside: I was more than concerned when I had to educate one pharmacist about it. Yes, I'm pulling my prescriptions from there).

Saltpetre has been used as a curing agent since the Middle Ages to keep a lovely slice of charcuterie from turning into a petri dish of nasty bacteria. It's also primarily responsible for corned beef's and salami's characteristic pink colour.

Saltpetre is used in compounding and has been used to alleviate various conditions.

Saltpetre is a nitrate. Nitrates are, from what I've read, safe to eat, but they become unsafe when they turn into nitrites which can spur cancer-causing chemicals in animals.

Saltpetre is also an ingredient in black powder and some fertilisers

Saltpetre is a legal substance in Canada and you do not need special permits to buy it (for curing meat--not sure about fertilisers and other uses).

My butcher and I had a chat about this. He told me it's difficult to find around here as are substitutes such as InstaCure No. 1 (aka Prague Powder No. 1), Pink (curing) Salt and other curing salts such as Tender Quick is just as scarce in these parts. Hrmm...

I was willing to make a brown corned beef, but I'm tenacious (read: stubborn). Up popped Canada411 and I reached for my phone. Several calls later I found a bottle, tucked in the back of a cupboard at an almost out of the way drug store. Even the pharmacist who sold it to me didn't realise he had a bottle as he's shooed off several people emptyhanded over the past few months.

It's pretty obvious. The kitchen deities were on my side. Appropriate offerings will be made, in thanks. Thank goodness they like chocolate.

I looked at a few recipes and came up with my own, scaled down to a 1kg (2lb) brisket (thank you, my darling butcher for cutting a reasonably-sized piece for me)--unlike other recipes I've seen, I wanted something that would feed four people...not 10.

It mostly went to plan. A couple of minor SNAFUs occured: the container it was in didn't let me weigh the meat down, so I turned the brisket over daily to ensure both sides were brined. I was a little worried when I took it out of its poaching liquid--the outside browned a bit, but as I sliced it, its pink interior made me smile. And...of course... I carved with the grain, as opposed to against it.

Again, the kitchen deities smiled upon me. The brisket was tender and the spice combination was absoultely delicious. I'm quite happy with this attempt and I'll do it again--I'll get a bigger container and play with the spicing a bit. I may even see how long it's safe to brine the meat without using saltpetre (apart from freezing the meat in the brine)--there's nothing wrong with brown corned beef. Until then, here's the recipe I used.


Corned beef
Serves 4-6
Adapted from recipes by Lobel, Alton Brown and about.com
Brining time: 2 weeks
Cooking time approximtely 3hrs

Ingredients
For the brine:
0.5tsp whole black peppercorn
0.5tsp mustard seed (black or yellow--I used black)
0.5tsp whole coriander seed
6 juniper berries
4 allspice berries
4 whole cloves
2 whole cardamom pods
2.5cm (1") cinnamon stick
120g (0.5c) kosher salt
65g (0.33c) brown sugar
1 bay leaf
0.5tsp chilli flakes
0.5tsp ground ginger
0.25tsp ground nutmeg
17g (1Tbsp) saltpetre
1.25L (5c) water
1kg (2lbs) beef brisket

To cook the brisket:
water
1 onion, quartered
1 carrot chopped into large chunks
1 celery rib, chopped into large chunks
2 garlic cloves, smashed

Method
To brine the beef:
Dry toast the peppercorns, mustard seed and coriander seed in a hot skillet until the mustard seeds begin to splutter and pop. Tip onto a cutting board and juniper, allspice, cloves and cinnamon and lightly crush with a rolling pin or pot bottom (or simply lightly crush the lot with a mortar and pestle).

Combine crushed spices with salt, sugar, bay leaf, chilli flakes, ginger, nutmeg, saltpetre and water. Bring to a boil and then turn down the heat to a simmer, stirring occasionally until the salt and sugar fully dissolve. Remove from heat cool and room temp. Pop into the fridge to cool thoroughly.

Pour into a container or a zippy bag that's big enough to hold all the brine and the brisket. Submerge the brisket in the brine. If the brisket floats, weigh it down with a saucer or quarterplate so the meat is completed submerged.

Refridgerate for 14 days, checking daily to ensure the meat is totally submerged.

To cook the brisket:
Remove the meat from the brine (keep the brine!) and rinse it thoroughly in several water changes.

Strain the brine, saving the pods, seeds and spices.

Place the brisket in a pot that's just large enough to fit it. Add the brine's spices, chopped carrots, celery, onion and garlic. Cover with about 5cm (2") water. Give it a stir. Bring the water to a boil and then turn the hob down and let the pot simmer for 2.5-3 hours.

To check for doneness, insert a sharp, thin-bladed knife or a carving knife into the thickest part of the meat. If it inserts easily, then the brisket is done.

Carefully remove the meat and let sit for about 15 minutes before carving. Serve thin slices, cutting across the grain.

cheers!

jasmine

I'm a quill for hire!

Potatoes and bacon and cheese oh my!: Panhaggerty

My bibliophilia is not a secret.

I love well chosen words, committed to paper, bound in paper or cloth.

I love the scent a recently-printed book releases as I flick through it.

I love the light texture of the paper fibres on my fingertips as turn each page.

Even though my collection numbers in the four-digits (and that's after I lost a few hundred because of a tragic-to-me flood two Christmases ago), like the men I who keep my company, I am rather choosey about the ones I bring home.

I peruse bookshelves, pick up a title and skim its pages. More often than not, it's reshelved. At most I'll spend 30 seconds with a book--like resumés, fundraising asks and online dating profiles, that's all the time an author has to wow me into adding their title to my basket.

The same goes for cookbooks. I read them in the same way as I do novels. Actually, it's more than that. Not only do these writers need to wow me with their food, but they also have to understand the music of language--of food language--before I'll consider adding them to my cookery book collection. They need to weave tales and transport me to their kitchens and times as well as support me on my journey there. Few pass the test.

Which is why when I found myself curled up in one of those wooden armchairs, in one of those ubiquitous big box bookstores, with a cookbook for more than 20 minutes, I knew I had a gem in my hands. When I realised I had a Cheshire Cat-like grin plastered to my face, I knew Colman Andrews' The Country Cooking of Ireland would come home with me.

I spent most of this weekend with the book--reading about Ireland's seafood and cheeses, potatoes and game. I've marked more recipes to try than I have in a very long time. It's not pretentious. It doesn't break down ingredients into molecules, nor does it try an elevate food to an esoteric level. It celebrates food. It celebrates the land and waters. It celebrates the Irish.

What more do I want from a cookery book?

I've marked a number of recipes to try. Some, because the ingredients sound wonderful (filet mignon and mushrooms in whiskey sauce). Others because I've heard of, but never tasted them (colcannon). And still others because their names just make me smile (parapetetic pudding, anyone?).

Panhaggery definitely falls into the last of these categories. And the first. And the second.

I took Colman Andrews' original recipe as a guide, adjusting the amounts of fat and potatoes, adding in some sage and garlic. It's easy satisfying and adaptable. I can see myself making this again, but with sweet potatoes and bleu cheese, or playing with charcuterie.

But really, more importantly, this dish made me smile.

Panhaggerty
adapted from The Country Cooking of Ireland by Colman Andrews

Serves 6-8 as a side dish

1 Tbsp butter, plus more if needed
100g (3.5 oz) streaky bacon, chopped (four rashers)
1 medium onion, slivered into lunettes
1 garlic clove, minced
black pepper
0.25-0.5 tsp dried sage
225-450g (0.5 lb-1lb) Yukon Gold potatoes (or any boiling potato), (see note)
175g (1.75c) grated cheddar cheese

Preheat oven to 180C/375F.

In a 20cm (8") cast iron frypan fry the chopped bacon in the butter until crisp. Remove the bacon pieces to a kitchen toweling-lined bowl.

Pour off the fat, leaving about a tablespoon in the pan (do not discard fat). Add the onions and garlic. Stir until the onions wilt and begin to caramelise. Mix in a couple of pinches of pepper and the sage. Remove from the pan and mix with the crisped bacon.

Remove the pan from the heat and brush the bottom and sides with oil (adding more from the poured-off reserve, if needed).

With one third of the potatoes, shingle the slices over the bottom of the pan, leaving none of the metal exposed. Layer half the onion mixture overtop the onions and then layer a third of the cheese overtop the onions. Sprinkle with pepper.

Layer half the remaining potatoes on top, repeat as above with the rest of the onions and half the cheese and pepper. Top with remaining potatoes. Dribble the remaining fat over the potatoes, dotting with butter, if necessary.

Pop into the oven and bake for 40-50 minutes or until an inserted knife easily pierces each potato layer.

Turn on the broiler. Sprinkle with the last of the cheese and broil for 1-2 minutes or until the cheese has melted thoroughly.

Note: The quantity of potato depends upon how thinly you slice them and how large the potatoes are. Start with slicing half the potatoes (225g/0.5lb) and judge after the first layer if you need to slice any additional potatoes.

cheers!
jasmine

I'm a quill for hire!