Canada Food Day: A tray full of sunshine: Jamaican Beef Patties

I know there are those who complain this summer is too cold.  We've only had one heat wave, the lawns are still green and relatively few people have collapsed of heat exhaustion.

And they think this is a bad thing.

Me, I LOVE this year's summer.  It's been a comfortable temp, I don't really have to have my air conditioner on, my little front garden is plumptious with blossoms and well...I'm still on my first bottle of sunblock.  The sun is shining and the birds are singing.  What more can I ask?

This past weekend was the August long weekend and it was gorgeous (again). Perfect to celebrate Canada Food Day.

What I really like about this day of food is that whatever you decide to make is perfectly okay. As far as I can tell, there aren't any real rules, except it must be food and part of the Canadian fabric.  And really...with a country that's embraced multiculturalism, that means every cuisine is welcome.

I'll admit this year, I decided to satisfy a bit of a craving I've had for a while: Jamaican patties. A friend made some last month, and I realised it's been a couple of years since I last had good Jamaican patties. Almost every patty has come from the freezer aisle of the decidedly non Jamaican market.  Having my friend's version sort of set off a lightbulb...I could make my own.

Jamaican patties were never something I'd contemplated making...and gosh...they're just savoury handpies.  I've had some good ones--flavourful and zingy...and I've had some bad ones--bland, tough...I even had ones that were decidedly sour.

So after some research, I came across this 2005 recipe from the New York Times and decided to give it a go.  It's pretty easy--no curveballs thrown.  But then I tasted it during the simmering stage.  Hrmm...it was decidedly lacking, if not a little boring--don't get me wrong.  It was hot, but that's all it really was. It needed a bit more sweet, a bit more sour and some deeper flavours.  Out came three bottles: nam pla, HP sauce and Worcestershire.  Et voila...my first Jamaican patties.

A relatively quick trip into the oven and out popped trays full of spice sunshine.  Nummy, nummy spicy sunshine. A friend who's favourite snack are these zesty little handpies tried one.  His opinion: definitely better than the grocers and he preferred my pastry because the others are too flaky for his liking.  I'll take that victory

Jamaican Beef Patties
adapted from Jamaican Beef Patties by the New York Times.  

Yield 12

Ingredients:

Pastry
500g (860ml/3.5c, less 1Tbsp) ap flour
1.5tsp (10ml) salt
1dsp (10ml/2tsp) turmeric
1tsp (5ml) curry powder
250g (320ml/1.25c plus half tablespoon) lard (see notes)
100ml ice water

Filling
500g (1lb+ 2oz) lean ground beef (see notes)
15g (1Tbsp) butter, melted and cooled (see notes)
1dspn (10ml/2tsp) dried thyme
vegetable oil
1 onion, finely chopped
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 Scotch bonnet pepper, seeded and finely chopped, divided
0.5tsp (2.5ml) paprika
0.5tsp (2.5ml) ground allspice
0.75tsp (3.75ml) salt
1tsp (5ml) black pepper
1tsp (5ml) sugar
1tsp (5ml) nam pla
1Tbsp (15ml) HP sauce
1dspn (10ml/2tsp) Worcestershire sauce
375ml (1.5c) water

Instructions

Pour the melted butter over the meat and sprinkle with thyme. Lightly mix and set in refrigerator for at least five minutes or until the butter is solid

For the pastry:
Mix flour, salt, turmeric and curry powder in a large bowl.

Grate in fat and rub together with flour, until the mixuture looks like fine rubble, with some pieces the size of peas, and others smaller.

Pour in iced water and lightly mix with your hands or a couple of forks, adding more ice water, a tablespoon at a time, until mixture forms a slightly sticky dough.

Knead dough for two minutes, form into two disks, wrap in plastic and refrigerate while you make filling.

For the filling

Slick the bottom of a large pan with oil and heat over a medium flame. Add onion, garlic and half the chili pepper. Sweat the ingredients, stirring often.

Add paprika and allspice and stir to coat. Add beef mixture, breaking up any lumps.

Add enough water water to cover meat. Mix in salt, pepper and sugar. Bring mixture to a boil and set to simmer for 30 minutes.

At the 15 minute point, stir in the nam pla, HP and Worcestershire sauces, and chilli. Adjust flavours to taste--it should be slightly sweet, earthy, hot with a hint of acid. Simmer until the meat is soft and the gravy reduces to a clingy sauce-- about another 15 minutes.

Remove from heat and let cool.

To make the patties

Heat oven to 190C/375F/moderately hot oven/ Line two cookie sheets with aluminum foil. Pour some water into a small bowl and have a fork on hand.

Remove one disc of dough from the refrigerator and divide in half.

Lightly flour the board and quickly roll out the pastry to about 2mm thick or large enough to cut three 15cm/6" circles (approximately the size or a teacup's saucer).

Divide the filling into 12 equal portions (approximately two generous tablespoons). Place one portion of filling on the lower half of one circle.

Damp your finger with the water and run it around the edge of the circle. Fold over the pastry, so you have a half moon (or rising sun!). Crimp the edge with a fork and transfer to a prepared pan.

Repeat with remaining dough and filling to produce 12 patties.

Bake for 25 minutes, or until the top is firm and slightly tinged with brown.

Serve warm, or in a soft potato or hamburger bun.

Notes:

• The Jamaican patties I've had have had a flaky pastry. This pastry is more like a shortcrust, than a flaky crust--to add flake, use half lard and half butter.
• If you have a flaky pastry crust you like, make enough for 1kg/2lbs of pastry, adding the salt, turmeric and curry powders to the mix. 
• If you are using regular minced beef, do not add butter.

Chocolate chip pecan toffee cookies

Oops!  I mean Lacey Chocolate chip pecan toffee cookies

Even though it's only been about five or six weeks since I last posted, it feels longer...much longer.  I fully admit to a bit of sheepishness about the length of this past break.  My usual two or so week break stretched to three...and then a month...and then it became...umm...a wee bit longer.

I think I have good reason.  The fact is...I really didn't cook or bake a lot this summer. Between this and that, this food fete and that dinner, most of my kitchen activity seemed to be microwaving or simply pulling a cold drink...erm...salad fixings from the fridge.

That's the way it goes sometimes.

This week I made a very conscious effort to reacquaint myself with my kitchen and create something to write about.  I decided upon chocolate chip cookies.

Goodness knows I've made hundreds of dozens of them over the years.  That should be a nice, easy way of easing me back into the swing of things.

Ermm.

You know what it's like to take a yoga class after not doing a Dwi Pada Viparita Dandasana for five years?  That feeling that even the corpse pose is well beyond capabilities?

Okay...maybe you don't.  But I do...and it's weighing heavily as I'll be unfurling my mat for the first time in half a decade on Tuesday.  No...I'm not concerned...overly.

Yeah.  That's what it was like baking these cookies.

I looked at a few recipes, including the Alton Brown's Chocolate Chip Cookie #10 (aka the Toll House Recipe) and a couple of community even cookbooks and came up with another way to build a chocolate chip cookie (because, of course, the world needs another chocolate chip cookie recipe).

It all came together nicely and I scooped out the first tray of cookies.

After eight minutes I took out the first tray of cookies from the oven.

The first tray looked more like crocheted lace doilies by someone obsessed with the popcorn stitch.  Half the tray was one lacy cookie ooze of sugar and butter, held together by the occasional molten pool of toffee and studded with softened chocolate, as well as the just scant amount of flour I used.

Don't get me wrong, they were buttery and soft and nummily sticky with melted toffee bits...but they didn't have  the toothsome weight that I wanted.

Thank goodness I can fix things on the fly.

Based on the amount of dough left, I measured out some flour.  Presto!  Cookies that keep their shape without being too cakey (the bane of My Dear Little Cardamummy's cookies (but you didn't hear that from me)), lovely and chewy and just salty enough to cut through the combined sweetness of the dough, the chocolate and the toffee.

Not bad for my return to the kitchen, I think.

Chocolate Chip Pecan Toffee Cookies

Chocolate Chip Toffee Pecan Cookies 
Yield 3-4 dozen

175g (1.25c/300ml) all purpose flour
0.5tsp (2.5ml) bicarbonate of soda
0.5tsp (2.5ml) salt
115g (0.5c/120ml) soft butter
125g (10Tbsp/150ml) brown sugar
75ml (6Tbsp/90ml) white sugar
0.5tsp (2.5ml) vanilla extract
1 egg
175g (1c/250ml) chocolate chips
100g (0.5c/125ml) chopped pecans
75g (0.5c/125ml) toffee bits

Preheat oven to 180C/350F/Moderate. Line cookie trays with parchment paper.

Sift together flour, bicarb and salt. Set aside.

Cream together butter, both sugars and vanilla for about five minutes or until light and fluffy. Beat in the egg. Mix in the flour until just combined. Fold in the chocolate, nuts and toffee.

Roll into teaspoon-sized balls and place about 4cm (1.5") apart on the prepared cookie trays. Do not flatten.  Bake for 7-9 minutes, or until the cookies have spread and are golden around the edges and on the bottom.

Let cool on the the tray for about five minutes and then transfer to a wire wrack to cool completely.

Note: for the lacey version, reduce the flour by about 35g (0.25c/60ml); when you portion them out, flatten then slightly before baking.

cheers!

jasmine
I'm a quill for hire!

A tale of two cookies: part two

Where was I?

Oh yes, the second cookie...

So there I was baking butterscotch pecan cookies for the workaversary when I was struck by a moment of brilliance...or insanity (it's sometimes difficult to differentiate between the two):

Why make just one kind when I can make two kinds of cookies?

OOOOH...

I don't know what made me more excited--the idea of offering my colleagues a choice of flavours or the possibility that I might have some left over for ME (the term "ravenous hordes" has been bandied about).

Okay, but what about the second flavour? I was baking at My Dear Little Mummy's as Beelzebub hasn't yet learned to behave like a good little oven, so I was a bit short on options...except for the tub of Nutella I bought on the way over (along with the butter).

For those of you who haven't been enlightened: Nutella is a food of the gawds.

There, now you know. Pass it on.

So there I was, staring at the 400g pot of Nutella, wondering what to do, when it suddenly dawned on me: Nutella cookies.

It may have been the most brilliant thought I'd had all year.

A quick riffle through my Mum's cupboards procured a part packet of milk chocolate chips--she wouldn't mind--she's told me to use up as much of her food as possible while she's away...and I'm a good girl who always obeys her Mummy :)

The only thing was...I didn't have a recipe. Think think think. Nutella is sort of like peanut butter. It had been a while since I last made PB cookies, but I figured I could muddle my way through.

The cookies that emerged weren't cloying. Truthfully, I was worried that they'd take on the supersweetness brought by Nutella, but because I held back (a bit) on the sugar--totally omitted the brown sugar, and just stuck with brown--and added more salt than I'd normally put in a cookie. These weren't chewy as some pb cookies, but they aren't as crispy-dry-hearty as others. They were a nice cross between the two, with a little teeny cakeyness thrown in. I wound up with a chocolaty, slightly nutty-flavoured cookie that went really well with coffee. In that way they were reminiscent of Dorie's World Peace Cookies.

I think they were a hit--I definitely like them. They were very popular in some circles, but others (those poor, deprived souls who weren't brought up with the joys of choco-hazelnut spread) did not go near them. A couple of people who'd never tried the spread ate a cookie...and then another...and then another (even my very young neighbour, who received some of my biscuitty bounty, came knocking on my door--several times--over the weekend wanting the recipe so she could make them with her mum).

Nutella Cookies
Yields about six dozen cookies, depending upon your cookie spoon.

170g very soft butter
200g granulated sugar
2 eggs
1 dsp vanilla extract
250ml Nutella
420g plain flour
1 dsp bicarbonate of soda
1/2 tsp salt
250g milk chocolate chips (but I suppose you could use an entire packet of 270g)

Preheat oven to 375F/190C and prepare your cookie trays in the usual way.

Stir together the flour, bicarb and salt. Set aside. In another bowl, beat together the butter, sugar, eggs, vanilla and Nutella until smooth. Mix in the flour and then fold in the chocolate chips. You will get a fairly stiff batter.

Drop by teaspoonful onto the aforementioned prepared cookie trays. Press slightly and bake until done, about 12 minutes.

cheers!
jasmine

edit: Thanks Dana! I left out half the info on the sugar and texture...they're in now.

Related Post: A tale of two cookies: part one

A tale of two cookies: part one

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times; it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness; it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity; it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness; it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair; we had everything before us, we had nothing before us; we were all going directly to Heaven, we were all going the other way."

--Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities

That's in the top two best opening lines I've ever read. The other one is from Iain Banks' The Crow Road--"It was the day my grandmother exploded." Now whether or not I'll use the great Mr. Banks' works for titular inspiration remains to be seen.

As apt a present-day commentary as Mr. Dickens' words are this post isn't meant to be a discourse on current events. No, instead it is the first of a two part series on cookies.

This week was one of my work-related milestones: seven years at the company. For whatever reason, the tradition is whenever you have something to celebrate (birthday, engagement, wedding, birth of a child, divorce, whatever) you have to provide the treats...the same goes for workaversaries.

"Harrumph!" I say and "double harrumph!" at that.

Have they not yet realised that they should be fêting me? Didn't they know that they should have laid a rose petal carpet from my prize parking spot to the front door? And what about the balloon bouquets gracing every doorway? How about having Gerard Butler, Colin Firth and Richard Armitage available at my beck and call? Jeans day??

No, apparently not.

Sigh...

So I need to bring a treat in for the workaversary. I usually do a cake or cuppycakes but this year I decided on cookies. The only thing I knew was I didn't want to bring in regular chocolate chip cookies. Not saying anything bad about chocochip cookies--I've had more than my fair share of good ones--I just wanted something different.

What made my cookie making adventure slightly more annoying was the fact we have a Timmys in our office. Which means we have Timmy cookies...and Timmys makes good cookies (IMO)...especially their caramel chocolate pecan ones. Mmmmmmm....caramel chocolate pecan cookies. Not that I'd make caramel chocolate pecan cookies...just be inspired by them

I rummaged through my cupboard and found some butterscotch chips and pecan bits and added them to the basic cookie recipe I use (which happens to be based on the one found on the milk chocolate Chippits bag). What I like about this particular cookie recipe is that you don't have to use a mixer to do the dough--all you need is a bowl and a wooden spoon.

Fresh from the oven they are a little poofy, but chewy and just so buttery good. Cooled they are on this side of butter-pecan. By far, they were a hit at the office...

Butterscotch Pecan Cookies
Yields about 5 dozen cookies, depending upon your cookie spoon.

150ml melted butter
340g light brown sugar
2 eggs
1 dsp hot water
1 tsp vanilla extract
375g plain flour
1tsp baking powder
1tsp bicarbonate of soda
1/4tsp salt
250g butterscotch chips
150g pecan bits

Preheat oven to 375F/190C and prepare your cookie trays in the usual way.

Stir together the flour, baking powder, bicarb and salt. Set aside. In another bowl, mix together the butter, sugar, eggs, hot water and vanilla until smooth. Stir in the flour and then fold in the butterscotch chips and pecan bits.

Drop by teaspoonful onto the aforementioned prepared cookie trays. Press slightly and bake until done, about eight to 10 minutes.

cheers!
jasmine

Related Post: A tale of two cookies: part two