Playing with my new camera :)

Got a new camera this week, so thought I would take a few pictures at work of the various starters and desserts on the menu this week.


Starting at the top we have my chicken terrine from last week, im slowly refining my recipe each time I make it, almost happy with it now and when I am finally satisfied with it will update the recipe below.

After that we have portobello mushrooms, raspberry vinagrette dressing, poached pears and pine nuts; I can't stop eating the pears off this one, they are slowly poached in just white wine and sugar for about 30 minutes until soft and the wines starting to reduce.

Third is a dessert, warm cherries (in port and kirsch) with vanilla icecream rolled in toasted almonds and a caramelised cherry on top, the twin sauces are a cherry liquer and a light cherry syrup

Next we have some chocolate dipped strawberries for one of our romance packages.

The Next two photos are of our chocolate marquis, served with a lime creme fraiche, caramel sauce and some sugar work/garnish.

Finally the last two are of some of the starters and preparation for them, on there is the mushrooms dish from before; a tomato/smoked bacon bruschetta; pea, poached egg & peashoots soup; seared tuna nicoise salad & last the home made gravlax with a horseradish cream and dill scone.

Got a busy week ahead then looking to do some home cooking next monday for here :)

Chicken, Leek & Pistachio Terrine, grape chutney, pistachio oil

Heres my new terrine for our menu at work this week, a chicken, leek & pistachio one, don't really have a recipie as just went with it, but I shall jot down the jist of it!

Main base is a chicken parfait, I cooked the breasts in the oven over leeks submerged in white wine, then blitzed them down with cream, white wine, butter (amalgamated with a few egg yolks), there own stock, seasoning and a few chives for colour. You want a good thick paste, with about 60% Chicken 20% Butter 10% double cream 10% Wine & stock mix as a rough guide, but I did it to taste more than measurements.

For the internal pistachios I blanced them, then coated them in salt and sugar and roasted them till they crisped, but still had a soft inside. About 15 minutes on 160

The Leeks were stripped, washed, then sauteed in butter and seasoning and left to soften for about 15 minutes on a low heat

Chicken strips were chargrilled and then roasted, cooled and sliced into thin strips.

Then I slowly filled the terrine mould with the parfait at bottom then stripped leeks lengthways and the chicken and a small handful of pistachios, then another layer of parfait, and so on until full. then chilled overnight.





The outer crust is roasted pistachios ground down and rubbed into the chilled terrine then re moulded and clinged tightly to help set. Hoping to use some better pistachio kernels to get a greener colour next week when there remade.

For plating, I used home-made grape chutney (which Ill add the recipie at a later date), a pistachio oil dressing (blitz pistachios down in a bit of herb oil and sieve) and dressed the plate with pea shoots and micro red amaranth.

Enjoy :)

Pineapple and lime sorbet, spiced berry smoothie, strawberries in citrus cream

I brought a blender last week and have been blitzing anything I can get my hands on!

Heres a fun dessert ive created today, which is quite simple to make in large quantities and very interchangeable with the ingredients.

For the pineapple and lime sorbet:

- 1 Whole pineapple
- 2 Limes
- 100g Sugar

Peel and core the pineapple, then coarse chop the pineapple and add to the blender, zest and juice the 2 limes, dicing the zest as fine as possible and also add with the pineapple.

Create a sugar syrup to the soft ball stage (120 celcius on a sugar thermomometer) and let it cool slightly.

Blitz the pineapple mix down, then slowly add the sugar solution to the mix blitzing bit by bit, when fully mixed, scrape out and freeze, with the sugar solution and the various acids of pineapple, this is a good sorbet to freeze without the aid of a churner as it wont solidify into a solid block like most frozen fruits and will be quite malleable and scoopable, theres nothing worse than making your own frozen products to find you have to break them with a chisel and hammer!



For the spiced berry smoothie

- 1kg of whatever berries you have to hand, strawberries, blackberries, blueberries, raspberries etc
- 250g caster sugar
- juice of 1 lime
- 5 spice
- 100ml double cream (coconut milk is a fun and healthier addition too)

blitz all down to a puree, chill and serve




Citrus cream

Whip double cream with a handful of caster sugar to a very light peak, then slowly whip in either lime or lemon juice, as if you were making a syllabub, adjust the sugar quantity to keep the tartness of the citrus at bay