Salaric Cooking

*filo pastry sheets *mince meat – if cooking for veggis check its not made with suet! *milk, water, egg or chosen – glaze/binding agent *icing sugar

Cut the sheets into squares – they normally come in rectangles you can pretty much just cut in half – do all the sheets together as they are prone to falling apart. Lay a few squares of pastry so that they are making a star shape Spoon a desert spoon full of mince meat into the centre Brush water/milk around the mince meat in a largish circle on the pastry. Gather the pastry into a bundle being careful not to rip it You may have to put some binder between each layer Do not use less than 3 layers or the pacels rupture in the oven. Put them on a baking tray and bake for about 8 mins in a pre heated oven at 180 degrees C When they come out you can place them on a plate and dust with icing sugar and serve.

Alternatively if serving cold at some later date you may mix up some icing sugar with water and drzzel the icing over the parcels.

For that special Christmas meal we like to make a horse raddish dip which goes very well with roasted vegatables.

We make our own yogurt too so I make up a batch of Greek style yogurt and we put about a mug full into a bowl. We then simply spoon in three or four teaspoons of horseradish into it and mix.

This is definatly an add to taste type of dip! Also value horseradish suace turns out to be so weak we had to put the entire jar in and it still wasn’t the nice tangy suace we were aiming for.

My neighbour Maureen gave me this recipe along with a tub of rosehips from her garden – I then went and got alot more rosehips from my garden to make it worth while putting the preserving pan on – but then I have a huge pan!

Her recipe goes: *1 lb rosehips *1/2 pt of water *3/4 lb sugar per 1lb of pulp

Wash and cut tips off the rosehips (she’d already done this on the ones she gave me!) Simmer until tender Press through a sieve – this is the nasty hard work bit Put pulp in pan with sugar Simmer till thick – this bit takes suprisingly little time

*2 artichokes (jurusalum) *2 small broccilis *5 medium sized dried chillis *1 medium onion *1/2 teaspoon of dried chopped garlic *1 cup of sunflower oil *1 1/2 teaspoons of cumin powder *1 teaspoon of Turmeric *1/4 teaspoons of cinnamon

Use the Indian method of Chaunce – fry the spices then add onions until slightly brown add the other stuff and simmer.

Its really tasty.

One of things I miss about now living in the country were I do is that when me and my husband lived in Essex there was this fantastic Indian Take Away – it was so good that we ordered a huge vat of veggi and a huge vat of meat curry for our wedding reception from them!

They sent us lots of complementary popadoms with that order but then it was right on the train plateform so normally once a week we got something from them – even if it was just a naan bread to munch on the walk home.

They are situated in one of the old station buildings actually on the plateform!

So if you are ever in the Harold Wood area then give it a wirl!

The address is:

Jasmin Indian Take Away Platform 4 Harold Wood Station Gubbins Lane Romford Essex RM3 0BL

My friend Andy sent me these dip recipes.

Mayonnaise Pesto Dip Mix 3 tablespoons mayonnaise with 1-2tsp green/red pesto.

Mayonnaise Sweet Chilli Dip Mix 3 tablespoons mayonnaise with 1tsp sweet chilli sauce.

Mayonnaise Mustard Dip Mix 3 tablespoons mayonnaise with 1-2tsp wholegrain mustard.

My husband sent me this link, its chips enacting the Titanic and it is so funny – the site it comes from looks quiet good too. Its called:

http://www.lovechips.co.uk/

It also has lots of chip recipes which maybe useful.

Pear Oat Crumble

Another scrummy desert from Becca!

Ingredients

Filling 2 pears peeled, deseeded and sliced 4 tbsp water 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

Crumble Topping 100g rice flour sifted 3 tbsp soya butter 50g dark muscovado sugar 80g oats 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

• Put all the filling ingredients into a saucepan and simmer for 10-15 mins untill pears are soft.
• For the crumble topping sift the flour and add chunks or cubes of the soya butter and rub in to make “beradcrumbs”. Add the sugar, oats and cinnamon and mix well.
• Divide the pears and juice into 4-6 ramekins, top with the crumble mixture.
• Bake in preheated oven at 180oC for 15-20 mins untill the topping is golden.

Tips • Can use apples instead of pears. Can use plums and nutmeg instead of pears and cinnamon. • Poach the pears in 4 tbsp of cherry brandy or tawny port instead of water. • Add 1tbsp of grated fresh ginger to the crumble topping for extra spice.

*Dash of veg. oil *5 juruselum artichokes *4 potatoes *2 medium onions *4 cloves of garlic *1 teaspoon of turmeric *1 teaspoon of curry spice *1 jar of Morrisons stupidly cheap curry suace in jar – 5p! *5 cardamon pods

Peel the artichokes and potatoes Cut them into chunks Chop and gently fry the onions and garlic (a large wok type pan is good for this) Add the potatoes and artichokes Cover in water and mix in spices The cardamon pods should be in a muslin bag hanging over the side of the pot (we however do not have such a bag and so had to remember how many pods we had put in, in the hope of fishing them out later!) Cook slowely for an hour Add sauce And cook a bit longer on a slightly higher temperature.

To continue on from last weeks post I thought I should mention the other book that I picked up along with the WI Jam book and Food For Free and that is Favourite Country Preserves, Traditional Home-made Jam, Chutney and Pickle Recipes compiled by Carol Wilson.

This contained recipes for things like quinces and medlars which I had previously never heard off but have been subsequnetly given baskets full off – to ‘do something with’. Its a nice little book as far as I’m concerned and I have used it muchly!