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Press and Media Mentions

June 4, 2014

Press Images for The After School Cookbook

Press Images for The After School Cookbook

I’m very much looking forward to the publication of The After School Cookbook by friend and author Nick Coffer this Thursday 5th June 2014. Firstly, because this is Nick’s second book, following on from the huge success of his first book My Daddy Cooks, which means I have a brand new stash of family-friendly, super easy recipes to try. Secondly, because I was asked by Nick’s publishers Hodder and Stoughton to take some press and publicity images for the book which are now finding themselves across the media. Yesterday began with a front page spread in EAT (Metro supplement) with a double page feature (pages 34 & 35) of a couple of recipes from the book, with some of my photos to illustrate – a very proud moment for me! It was a great project to work on and from the minute I received my copy of the book I was eager to get stuck into cooking some of the recipes and to start photographing them.

After School Cookbook Press Images by Ren Behan for Hodder & Stoughton
The After School Cook Book Press Images by Ren Behan for Hodder & Stoughton

 

The recipes from the book that I cooked and photographed (above) were –

  1. Italian Eggy Bread Croque-Monsieur
  2. Cheddar, Parma Ham and Courgette Scones
  3. Pork Chilli Con Carne (pages splashed already!)
  4. Tuna, Carrot and Courgette Salad (MY new favourite lunch, never mind the kids!)
  5. Salmon Courgette and Tomato Linguine
  6. Chicken and Olive Pasta Bake
  7. Cheese and Sweetcorn Pudding
  8. Absolutely Instant Chocolate Mousse

There are a stack more that I can’t wait to cook and so far, every single recipe I’ve made worked first time and has been woolfed down by my family.

After School CookBook

Nick first came to the public’s attention through his video blog called MyDaddyCooks.com in 2009, which led him to his first cookbook deal. Since then, he’s been busy on BBC Three Counties Radio, presenting his Saturday Weekend Kitchen show as well as his five-day-a-week afternoon slot. There’s also recently been a brand new addition to the family, another baby boy, which means that mealtimes really do need to be made as easy as possible to pull off for Nick and his wife, Jo.

The After School Cookbook is really a handy manual for parents, not only of school-aged kids, but of toddlers and older children, too. All of the recipes are suitable for the whole family and there are some very clever recipes and chapters including Mind the Gap – to bridge the gap between home time and dinner time, Inspired Lunch Boxes, Genius Treats and Saving Your Bacon – frugal recipes packed with flavour. Nick shares his tips for cooking with children, with symbols by each recipe to indicate whether the recipe is ‘Very Very Easy,’ –  ‘Very Easy,’ or ‘Easy’ and in terms of timing, ‘Really Really Quick,’ ‘Really Quick,’ ‘Quick’ or ‘Slow’.

The book itself is text only – meaning that it is practical enough for the kitchen with inevitable splashes and stains. Nick’s trademark ‘quick-to-throw-together’ style means that you can make many of the recipes with ease when you are short of time. Nick’s six-year-old son Archie and three-year-old daughter Matlida can very often be found getting stuck in with the cooking. As many of us know only too well, after school patience levels and concentration levels can be a challenge, so the food that makes it to the table needs to be quick and easy yet nutritious, too.

For more updates on the book, you can follow Nick on Twitter @NickCoffer and don’t forget to look out for more press features and recipes to try!

The After School Cookbook By Nick Coffer
120 quick, easy and affordable recipes for your hungry kids
Published: Thursday 5 June 2014
Hodder & Stoughton Trade Paperback & eBook £16.99

Disclosure:

Press & publicity recipe photographs taken by Ren Behan commissioned by Hodder & Stoughton.

Amazon affiliate link included. 

With thanks to Hodder and Stoughton for the commission and to Nick Coffer for writing such a lovely book!

Giveaway

Hodder and Stoughton have also kindly provided three copies of the book to giveaway to my readers –

ENTER THE AFTER SCHOOL COOKBOOK GIVEAWAY HERE

May 25, 2014

3 Quick Cheese Snacks for the Good Food Channel

3 Quick Cheese Snacks for the Good Food Channel

Today is officially the last day of National Vegetarian Week 2014. In case you’ve taken the challenge and are in search of some simple and tasty recipes to round off the weekend, I thought I’d highlight three recent quick cheese snacks, created for the Good Food Channel. Really though, who needs an excuse to indulge in a little melted cheese?! Of course, you can also use any of your favourite vegetarian alternative cheeses in these recipes…

Three Cheese Snacks
3 Quick Cheese Snacks created for the Good Food Channel

Firstly, a super-quick Mexican inspired snack – my Cheese Quesadillas with tinned black beans, tomatoes, spring onions and grated cheese. Use a chilli cheese if you fancy, and any beans – black, pinto or fava beans – drained and washed.

Cheese Quesadillas

Cheese Quesadillas {Recipe Here} for the Good Food Channel

Next, one of our favourites for a quick cheese snack, are my Three Cheese Toasties, with leek, garlic and thyme on sourdough. They take around ten minutes to make, and I simply used a griddle pan to make mine, weighed down a little with a heavy lid. If you have a panini machine or a toastie maker, you can use that instead. I usually like to use a combination of cheddar, mozzarella and Gruyère or Comte – but really, use any cheese that you like or have in the fridge to use up – or a vegetarian alternative.

Three Cheese Toasties

 Three Cheese Toasties {Recipe Here} for the Good Food Channel

Finally, if you have hungry kids, you can’t go wrong with these Cheese and Marmite Swirls. Simply keep a packet of ready rolled/ready to use puff pastry in the fridge or freezer, then unroll, spread with Marmite, sprinkle over the granted cheese and roll up. Once sliced, place them on a baking tray lined with paper, brush with a little beaten egg and bake for fifteen minutes. Serve when warm, but not too hot for little fingers!

Cheese and Marmite Swirls

Cheese and Marmite Swirls {Recipe Here} for the Good Food Channel

I hope that’s given you a little inspiration for the Bank Holiday weekend, or perhaps, for an after school snack or quick lunch.

How did you get on with the challenge to “go green” for National Vegetarian Week?

Recipes commissioned by the Good Food Channel – recipes, styling and photography by Ren Behan. 

March 28, 2014

On blogging and being featured in Woman and Home

On blogging and being featured in Woman and Home

This post is definitely a coffee break read! It’s been a challenging few weeks, although on the whole, March has been a month full of excitement in terms of family life, as well as more opportunities for recipe work, setting new goals and even an exciting print feature in Woman and Home! Sometimes, particularly when things pick up pace, it’s good to sit back, take stock and to really examine your journey to see how far you’ve come. It can be all too easy to assume that the end-result of something has been quick or effortless, when, in fact, a great deal of hard work has gone on behind the scenes. Sometimes, when I’m writing up a blog post in the haste of everyday life, I forget that as a reader, you might be new to my blog and that you might know nothing about me at all. Other times, as I catch up with comments and social media, I am reminded that blogging has brought me many new friends and that I’m surrounded by lots of fellow creative souls who have supported me right from the start. My goal, always, is to come across as the sort of person who constantly seeks to better herself – whatever I put ‘out there’ or on my blog – I hope it is the best that it can be. I enjoy innovation and experimentation and I’m a sucker for courses (I’m taking three online courses at the moment!) Perhaps sometimes I don’t share all of my hopes, dreams and wishes through my blog, but I do constantly try and share things that I hope you find interesting, inspiring, creative or helpful.

Fabulicious FoodI started writing this blog in November 2010 – originally called Fabulicious Food! It was winter and I had given up a career in criminal law to become a stay-at-home mum. I spent much of my time doing baby-related activities; there wasn’t a group or class we didn’t try. I had the support of a wonderful antenatal group (still my closest ‘early years’ allies seven years on) and I volunteered for my local branch of a parenting charity, which slowly brought back some of my confidence and skills, which had long been buried under a pile of never-ending washing. Motherhood presented me with a steep learning curve and became a lesson in both letting go and of adjusting – to a new life dedicated not to my career, but to my family. Soon, our second baby came along and just at the point of considering a return to legal work, the prospect of redundancy and a move to a new work location followed. After much deliberation, I closed the chapter on law and began to look for a more flexible and creative way of staying at home, supported by my family who were keen to help me stay out of the courtroom!

Fabulicious Food

At first, there were lots of people who really didn’t get what blogging was all about. Everyone assumed I would run out of things to say, or that my enthusiasm would run out. There didn’t seem to be a purpose for blogging, other than having a place to spill out various elements of your life for all the world to read and comment upon. I always knew that I wanted a clear focus and direction and to maintain an air of professionalism; I was keen to develop my writing style alongside sharing my love of cooking and creating. Having grown up in a food-loving family, the topic of food had always been close to my heart, but I had no real idea where I was going with it all in terms of starting a blog. In some ways, the best way of starting something new is to venture into the unknown. In other ways, it’s a more risky process to start something from scratch with no guidance. I signed up to a distance-learning course in Food Journalism, which confirmed that starting a blog was a good thing to do, as well as teaching me all about creating a brand, writing strong copy and finding new and modern ways of engaging with an audience. I moved my writing platform from Blogger to Word Press, eventually going self-hosted for greater control and I slowly learnt more and more about food and blogging, writing and taking photographs.

Fabulicious Food

During the last three years, I’ve taken additional courses, such as an evening course in food styling and have attended numerous blog conferences, such as IFBC in Seattle, always with the aim of growing and learning. More recently, I’ve given talks and lectures on blogging and on getting published in magazines. I became a member of The Guild of Food Writers and I’m currently writing my first E book. The reason I continue to blog is because blogging is fun, immediate and fast-paced. Creating recipes is always thrilling and challenging, taking photographs of food has become a bit of an obsession, but the hours and hours of time spent dedicated to my blog and my recipe work have proved themselves to be worthwhile. I suppose if I were to look back to the start of my journey in 2010, I have come a long way and I’m living a life that I have created through blogging. My recipes and writing are now good enough to be published on sites away from my own blog and I’m lucky enough to get paid to do all the things that I love doing – cooking, writing and taking pictures. During this last year, I also left the name ‘Fabulicious Food!’ behind and created a business called Ren Behan Food, changing my blog name, too, to reflect a fresh chapter and a new period of self-employment.

Ren Behan Food

As we await the arrival of our third baby in June, more changes are on the way, but somehow, I feel happy knowing that I have a place to come to and be creative for a while, when time allows. Hopefully, more opportunities will follow, too.

Woman and Home

I’m just in the nick of time to share one final bit of news – my story is featured in the print edition of Woman and Home Magazine – the April 2014 edition, but very soon to be replaced by the May edition, so hurry if you want to buy a copy! It was a huge privilege to be contacted by features writer Nathalie Whittle, who approached me to take part in a feature on women who blog for “Fun, Fame & Fortune,” alongside fashion blogger Josephine Lalwan and travel blogger Heather Cowper. All three of us had experienced new adventures through blogging and were excited to share our stories. Twenty four weeks into my third pregnancy, I can tell you that the very last thing I expected to happen was to be whisked away to a shoot house, to be pampered, made up and styled for a feature, but nevertheless, this was an experience that will stay with me for a long time to come! Thank you for all the hugely positive comments so far on this piece – I hope you find a quick moment to grab a cuppa and have a flick through!

Although unintended, this post has been a chance to indulge, though I also hope that it reflects on how far we can go if we push ourselves and work hard. I’ve had the opportunity of working with some truly talented people who have helped turned my vision of a creative home on the web into a reality – from the early days of Fabulicious Food! and a blogsite created by Barney Thom, to badges, headers, site design and more by Violet Posy, Sharnee, Jo at Callia Web, friend and fellow blogger Regula Ysewijn aka Miss Foodwise. Most recently, I’ve worked with an amazingly talented lady called Shay Bocks, whose Foodie theme is taking the world by storm! It has been an incredible journey so far, I continue to learn something new every day and I am hugely grateful to all of my readers – old and new.

It’s time to put the kettle on again. Don’t forget to pop over to JamieOliver.com to read my latest post on Cooking for Mum this Mother’s Day.

I’ll also be back a little later with a new recipe for the weekend, too.

One final note, I have recently realised that my newsletter sign up form hasn’t been working very effectively – so there is a new box to add your address to for email updates on the right hand sidebar or along my footer. If you have already subscribed, it should let you know now, rather than duplicating.

Have a great weekend!

All links within this post are editorially given. 

March 21, 2014

Five spring recipes in BBC Good Food Magazine

Five spring recipes in BBC Good Food Magazine

I’m back with more exciting news, this time of a feature in BBC Good Food Magazine, within the April edition – on the shelves (in the UK) currently. I was asked to create these recipe back in November, shortly after contributing a recipe and some words on Polish cuisine in a feature on the Global Kitchen published in January. Magazine and print schedules are organised so far in advance, which is quite strange when you are used to the medium of instant publishing and blogging! So, it was a lovely surprise to finally get to see my ‘storecupboard spring clean’ recipes featured in the April edition.

BBC Good Food Magazine Ren Behan

My recipes fit into the ‘Everyday’ section of the magazine, under the banner of ‘Make it Tonight’ – so they are designed with ease and speediness in mind, with minimum ingredients. Spring is obviously a great time of the year to purge those storecupboards of all the ingredients leftover from Christmas. So on that note, my recipes include plenty of nuts, seeds and dried fruits, pulses, grains and pasta, brightened up with window box herbs and extra veggies.

Supper from your storecupboard

Recipes (starting on page 54) include –

  • Lentil and Sweet Potato Curry (£1.30 per serving)
  • Fruity Tabbouleh with Feta £(1.03 per serving)
  • Tomato and Rice Soup (just 58p a serving and one of my go-to recipes)
  • Macaroni Cheese with Bacon and Pine nuts (£1.57 per serving)
  • Salmon with Sesame, Soy and Ginger (£2.04 per serving)

All of the recipes were tested by both myself, the kitchen team and by some of the taste team, with beautiful photographs by Sam Stowell.

I loved the fresh flavours, and the pesto was a really tasty addition. A great soup to freeze or take to work the next day, too.” Sky – Taste Team on the Tomato and Rice Soup.

I hope you find the time to pop to the shops to pick up a copy of BBC Good Food Magazine April – let me know if you spot it, or if you try any of the recipes within.

BBC Good Food Ren Behan

With thanks to Sarah Cook at BBC Good Food for commissioning these recipes. PDFs/Photographs all copyright BBC Good Food Magazine. Photographs by Sam Stowell. 

December 19, 2013

Polish Apple Cake – BBC Good Food Magazine

Polish Apple Cake – BBC Good Food Magazine

It’s almost time to wish you all a wonderful Christmas break. There are presents to wrap and people to see – we’ll all be getting busy. Without doubt, I’m ending the year on a food writing high and this particular feature in BBC Good Food Magazine couldn’t have come at a more special time. If you are able to get your hands on a copy of the January edition of BBC Good Food Magazine – out now – you’ll see an exciting feature called Global Kitchen, with some vibrant ideas for New Year cooking. The BBC Good Food team love to spot new trends and they’ve picked out six cuisines they think we’ll be eating more of and hopefully cooking more of in 2014. Favourites include Pakistani food, aromatic Lebanese, the food of Vietnam, homely Polish food, the Inca-inspired Peruvian kitchen and fresh Korean flavours. What a line up!

GlobalKitchen (1)_01

To celebrate these ‘up-and-coming’ cuisines, BBC Good Food selected six recipes – including my very own Polish apple cake (Szarlotka) – for us all to try our hands at. I’m incredibly excited to be featured alongside some of my favourite food writers of the moment, including Bethany Kehdy (author of The Jewelled Kitchen highlighted here), cookery teacher and writer Sumayya Jamil. entrepreneurs Van Tran and Anh Vu, Martin Moore (author of Ceviche:Peruvian Kitchen) and Judy Joo, who is about to begin a new series of Korean Food Made Simple.

Polish Apple CakeSpot my Polish apple cake recipe…

Credit: Photograph by Will Heap for BBC Good Food Magazine

So, what do you all think about the cuisines that have been highlighted by the feature? Whilst I am of course biased and hope that Polish and Eastern-European food may make its mark on global cuisine (Poland recently achieved it’s first Michelin star via Chef Amaro in Warsaw.) I am also intrigued by Korean food and I would also love to explore more Lebanese food in my own kitchen as well as trying out some Vietnamese dishes.

I also spotted a recipe in the previous edition of BBC Good Food Magazine for Piernik – a Polish gingerbread cake, by Edd Kimber, which is stuck to my kitchen cabinet with a ‘must-make’ post-it note attached.

I’m more hopeful than ever that I can tempt you all with more Eastern-European baking here on my blog and elsewhere next year.

In the meantime, I’m signing off now for a festive break. Please do leave me a comment in the box below if there are any particular recipes you’d like me to share in 2014, or cuisines you think I should be exploring in my kitchen!

With thanks to Sarah, Helen, Will and the BBC Good Food Team for inviting me to be a part of this feature and for styling and photographing my cake so beautifully. 

Wishing you all a Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

July 24, 2013

Easy Chicken Recipes – Good Food Channel

Easy Chicken Recipes – Good Food Channel

I’ve been a little busier than usual, creating some easy chicken recipes for the Good Food Channel . A particular highlight, I’d say, was cooking Buttermilk Fried Chicken on the hottest day of the year – a cold beer was necessary at the end of that shoot, I’ll tell you! It’s hard to pick a favourite recipe out of this batch – we loved the Easy Chicken Pie (it was slightly cooler that day!) and I think the Caribbean-inspired Jerk chicken has become a firm summer favourite, too.

Click through the links below the photos to go straight to the recipes.

Easy Chicken Pie

Easy Chicken Pie {Recipe Here} for the Good Food Channel

Lemon Chicken

Lemon Chicken {Recipe Here} for the Good Food Channel

Buttermilk Fried Chicken

Buttermilk Fried Chicken {Recipe Here} for the Good Food Channel

Chicken and Parmesan Pasta

Chicken Pasta with Parmesan and Basil {Recipe Here} for the Good Food Channel

Jerk Chicken

Jerk Chicken {Recipe Here} for the Good Food Channel

You can keep track of all my recipes for the Good Food Channel by checking out my profile here.

Earlier on this year, I was also interviewed by the lovely food journalist Katie Bryson and created a Rhubarb and Almond Cake to accompany the feature.

Ren Behan is a freelance contributor to UKTV Food/Good Food Channel – styling, photos and recipes author’s own.

Will any of these recipes take your fancy over the summer?

June 14, 2013

Salted Caramel Chocolate Fudge Cake – Great British Chefs

Salted Caramel Chocolate Fudge Cake – Great British Chefs

This cake almost needs no introduction. I called it the ‘Big Daddy’ Salted Caramel Chocolate Fudge Cake because we made it for Father’s Day. Four layers of chocolate cake with salted caramel buttercream and a chocolate fudge topping. The tallest cake I’ve ever made. Half a jar of Bonne Maman ‘Confiture de Caramel’ left to eat and a cake to feed the whole family. I know at least one ‘daddy’ who will be very happy this Sunday…will you have some time to make this, too?

Salted Caramel Chocolate Fudge Cake

Find my recipe for the Salted Caramel Chocolate Fudge Cake and the full post over on Great British Chefs here.

Here’s your ingredients list –

  • Caster sugar
  • Soft brown sugar
  • 4 large eggs
  • Vanilla bean paste or powder (I use Ndalli)
  • Vegetable oil or mild, light olive oil
  • Self-raising flour
  • Cocoa powder (I use  Green and Blacks)
  • Baking powder
  • Bicarbonate of soda
  • Sea salt (I use Maldon)
  • Plain, natural yoghurt
  • One packet unsalted butter
  • Icing sugar
  • Caramel sauce (I used Bonne Maman Confiture de Caramel from Waitrose or Ocado)
  • 200g good quality dark chocolate (I used Lindt 52%)
  • Double cream
  • Chopped fudge pieces to decorate

Off you pop to the shops!

Happy Father’s Day to all the great dads out there!

Salted_Caramel_Chocolate_Fudge_Cake

June 6, 2013

A Rhubarb and Almond Cake for the Good Food Channel

A Rhubarb and Almond Cake for the Good Food Channel

Just before going away to Italy, a large pile of rhubarb was left on my doorstep by my good friend Alex Bray fresh from her mum’s farm and on the same day, a neighbour came round with some from his garden. So, rhubarb is plentiful at the moment and in season, meaning that I was able to bake this this tray bake to be featured by the Good Food Channel blog. The recipe runs along side an interview, put together by the lovely Katie Bryson from Feeding Boys and a Firefighter, for a new section highlighting the Good Food Channel’s favourite blogs. I hope you get a chance to try the recipe. I sweetened it with Agave nectar, so it isn’t excessively sweet and if you have plenty of rhubarb, you could layer up more slices as you add the batter to the cake pan.

You can find my Rhubarb and Almond Cake recipe here

You can read more about my blog and some of my favourite foodie things here

Rhubarb

Rhubarb and Almond Cake

Rhubarb and Almond Cake

With thanks to the Good Food Channel and Katie Bryson for the feature. This was a paid recipe commission. 

Linking up to Simple and in Season, the seasonally-inspired community blog event.

Simple and in Season


April 17, 2013

Ren’s Polish Recipes in the Press

You can see my featured polish recipes and press credits on my Press features page, which includes two features in delicious. magazine and a feature in Foodie Niche Collective.

Bigos

I also reviewed From a Polish Country House Kitchen, by Anne Applebaum and Danielle Crittenden, for The Foodie Bugle

 

December 7, 2012

Spot a familiar face in delicious. magazine January 2013

Spot a familiar face in delicious. magazine January 2013

All I want for Christmas is…a copy of delicious. January 2013!  I know it’s not particularly humble or ladylike to shout from the rooftops about personal achievements, but I am so proud to share this with you. If you flick through a copy of the latest edition of delicious. out now – it is the January 2013 edition with a sublime red velvet cake on the cover – you may well spot a familiar face or two inside. I was asked by the very talented Persian food writer and supper club host, Sabrina Ghayour, if I’d like to take part in a feature and bring with me a Polish recipe. The idea for the party was that we’d each bring an individual dish, inspired by our heritage, to share. The result was an afternoon filled with great merriment, friends and cheer!

Delicious Magazine January It’s time to party like its 2013!

It was such a brilliant experience to be able to take part in such a fun-filled shoot, with the delicious. magazine team, including food editor Lizzie Kamenetzky, as well as the hugely talented photograher Dan Jones. I was able to see first-hand how a feature comes together, from making the food, to styling it, photographing it and yes, eating it!  It must have been like herding cats, as those of us who took part in the shoot were highly excitable particularly as we were being served some of the most wonderful cocktails by Michael Stringer from Hire the Barman.

Added to the champagne and dark chocolate and espresso martinis we were able to dip into a wonderful selection of food, as part of a menu described by Editor Karen Barns as, ‘ flamboyantly eclectic.’  Dishes and recipes within the feature include Prawn and water chestnut dumplings from China made by Ning Ma, Parsnip, celeriac, pea and potato samosas from India made by Asma Khan, an Artichoke, jamón and pine nut salad from Spain made by Chuse Valero, Stuffed chicory from Italy made by Emanuele Barrosso, Spiced lamb with chickpeas, orange zest and black garlic from Iran made by Sabrina and my very own Potato pancakes from Poland.

Dessert really was the pièce de résistance, as brilliant French baker Bruno Breillet had contributed his Salted caramel and cream cheese apple parcels. Let me tell you, they must definitely feature on your New Year’s Eve pudding list!

Salted Caramel Puds 

Aside from our very lovely feature, the January 2013 edition is packed full of recipes I can’t wait to try. To begin with, I’l be trying some of Trine Hahnemann’s Scandinavian treats. On the page before our feature you will find Diana Henry’s Beetroot-cured gavadlax. Having already made that for my sister’s 50th birthday party, I can assure you, it’s a real showstopper. The Frosted red velvet layer cake on the cover and on page 74 is a festive must-try, too.  

I was really delighted to have been part of this feature. Delicious. magazine had previously featured my mum’s Polish Pierogi with Blueberries and Whipped Cream over the summer. Watch this space for more Polish food related news to come. 

I do hope you pick up a copy, if you are not already a subscriber. If not, add a subscription to your Christmas list, pronto!  

With many thanks to Sabrina Ghayour, Dan Jones and to the delicious. magazine team for putting together such a fun feature.

So, who is coming to the party next time, and what are you bringing?!

 

September 19, 2012

Food on BBC Three Counties Radio and a Mushroom and Thyme Cream Bruschetta Recipe

Food on BBC Three Counties Radio and a Mushroom and Thyme Cream Bruschetta Recipe

On Saturday I was very lucky again to be invited back onto BBC Three Counties Radio as a guest on Nick Coffer’s Weekend Kitchen. What fun! It’s always such a great show to listen to and even more enjoyable to take part as a guest. The show involves two hours of food, talk and music along with host Nick Coffer. What’s not to love?! I was slightly thrown by the fact that it was a vegetarian-themed week, but I managed to pull three tasty and easy recipes out of the bag and luckily, there were no Bridget Jones-type moments live on air. 

My veggie offerings included a Mushroom Bruschetta with Thyme Cream, a Roasted Farmer’s Market Vegetable Penne Pasta with Local Goat’s Cheese (Childwickbury) and to finish, Victoria Plum & Almond Muffins with lashings of warm vanilla custard.

Three simple vegetarian, seasaonl treats

My two co-pilots were local foodies too, a lovely lady named Kate Keane who has impressively launched her own company called Whole Food Creations making wholemeal pizza and wholemeal pizza bases. Kate cleverly spotted  a gap in the market for wholemeal pizza and started her company by making them from home and selling them at her local farmer’s market. The pizzas are now produced on a larger scale and can be found in shops and online. They were thin, crispy and delicious and Kate was kind enough to share her recipe for the wholemeal bases, too. I’m definitely a convert and the kids would never know they were eating something that is good for them, especially piled high with lots of veggies.

We were also joined by Frances Hale who runs at vintage tea room at the Copper Beach Art Gallery in a Hertfordshire village called Little Wymondley. Fran made a Spinach, Pesto and Ricotta Quiche as well as her brilliantly named Disgustingly Gorgeous Chocolate Cheesecake. The best tip I took from the show was from Fran who said that she lines a deep cake tin with tin foil first, before lining the tin with pastry – letting the edges of the pastry hang over the edge. After blind baking the pastry until it is almost fully baked, she then spoons a layer of red or green pesto in the bottom before filling with the pastry with the creamy quiche mix. Once cooked, she takes the quiche outside and gently chops away the edges, leaving the crumbs for the birds! Adding pistachio to the crumb of her cheesecake was also a great tip, too.

To say that we were well and truly spoilt and well-fed would be an understatement. I made two new friends and am looking forward to visiting Fran and her fellow artists at the art gallery and tea rooms soon.  

Fran’s ‘Disgustingly Gorgeous Chocolate Cheesecake’

You can find all the recipes via the link to the Weekend Kitchen Fact Sheet here. In the meantime, I’ll leave you with my Mushroom and Thyme Cream Brushetta recipe in case you are in need of some inspiration for tonight’s supper.

You can listen to a recording of the show here on iPlayer up until this Saturday.    

Ren’s Mushroom Bruschetta with Thyme Cream

Ingredients

Serves 4

  • 4 slices artisan baked bread, such as sour dough
  • 300ml double cream
  • 2 springs fresh thyme
  • 1 garlic clove, whole
  • 50g vegetarian Parmesan cheese, grated
  • 3 tablespoons olive oil
  • 1 small onion, finely chopped
  • 2 cloves garlic, finely chopped/minced
  • 500g mixed mushrooms, such as chestnut, oyster, finely sliced

Method

  1. To make the thyme cream, pour the double cream into a small pan, add the thyme springs, whole garlic clove and grated vegetarian Parmesan cheese and leave to boil gently. The cream will reduce and become thicker.  
  2. In a separate frying pan, pour in two tablespoons of olive oil, add the onions and gently fry for 2-3 minutes, then add the garlic and cook for another 2-3 minutes. Add the finely sliced mushrooms and stir well, cook gently for five minutes, or until the mushrooms are soft.
  3. Take the double cream off the heat and carefully take out the thyme sprigs and garlic clove. Stir well. Pour the thyme cream over the mushrooms, stir well again.
  4. Toast the sourdough bread and drizzle over a tablespoon of olive oil. Spoon the creamy mushrooms over the toast and serve immediately.  

 

Thank you to Nick, Emma and Alex at BBC Three Counties for inviting me back onto the show.

 

December 18, 2011

Celebrating Polish Food on Nick Coffer’s Weekend Kitchen

Celebrating Polish Food on Nick Coffer’s Weekend Kitchen

This week I was invited back again as a guest on Nick Coffer’s Weekend Kitchen on BBC Three Counties Radio. I’ve really enjoyed popping into the studio over the last year with my ‘Ren Recommend’s’ slot, where I let people know what seasonal treats to put in their basket for the week, but it’s always extra fun to be invited in as a guest. If you haven’t heard the show, it’s a two-hour dinner party over the radio, where three guests come in each week with food that they’ve cooked, to chat about their foodie interests and backgrounds with host Nick Coffer of My Daddy Cooks, who is a keen cook himself and a cookery book author. Guests are usually local and based in the Three Counties, but anyone can tune in online via iPlayer and the show is available up to the following week too. 

For the last couple of weeks, the food during the show has had a festive feel to it, featuring Italian Christmas food, as well as vegetarian Christmas food by fellow St Albans food blogger Clare Rudd of The Vegetarian Experience. Nick and producer Emma thought it would be interesting to tap into my Polish roots to talk about Polish Christmas food, so off I went to the studio to warm everybody up, armed with a Winter Mushroom Soup, Pierogi (stuffed dumplings) and a Sernik, a Polish Baked Cheesecake with Raisins and a Cranberry Compote.

Great fun was had by all as this week, the usual wine matching element had been replaced by festive cocktails mixed by Islay Kennedy. Islay knocked our socks off with her Christmas Fizz cocktail, well worth making on Christmas Day! We also tried a wonderful cocktail made with Islay’s own Griffith Park Sparkling Wine, with an added dash of elderflower cordial and a slice of cucumber.  All the cocktail recipes are also on the fact sheet.

Fellow guest Lee Moynes, also a food blogger at  Grub “n” Grog had cooked some fantastically tasty food which would make a great alternative to Christmas dinner, or even a festive dinner party. Lee made Parma Ham Wrapped Turkey Escalope with a Spiced Butternut Squash Stuffing and a Tomato and Mushroom Sauce, as well as Apple and Cinnamon Puffs with Vanilla Cream for pudding. Both courses were delicious, the plates were polished clean!

The fact sheet containing all the recipes is available here – it really is worth downloading the fact sheet every week as you usually get at least five free recipes that the guests have brought into talk about. 

It was quite a challenge bringing in Polish Christmas food, not least because the Poles begin their Christmas celebrations with a twelve (!) course meal on Christmas Eve, called Wigilia, or the Vigil meal. Obviously, we didn’t have time for twelve courses of food, but I was able to talk about some of the symbolic elements of the meal, for example, how the twelve courses represent the twelve apostles. Also, when setting the table, we set an extra place for the unknown guest and traditionally we would lay hay or straw under the tablecloth to remember the manger.  The meal begins when the first star appears in the sky and we start the meal by sharing oplatki, Christmas wafers, which would have been blessed by the priest. We then go on to enjoy a warming bowl of barszcz, a beetroot broth with uszka, mushroom filled ravioli. In some houses, there might be an alternative, such as the wild mushroom soup that I took in. Although the meal on Christmas Eve is meatless, fish features heavily, usually pickled or creamed herrings and fried carp. The meal also includes pierogi, which are Polish filled dumplings, a little bit like Italian ravioli or an Asian dim-sum, though boiled rather than steamed. On Christmas Eve Poles would traditionally have pierogi with cabbage (sauerkraut) and mushroom, although I took in my favourite kind that my Mama had made with cream cheese and potato, as we’ve always enjoyed them the most on Wigilia. 

As you can imagine, there usually isn’t a lot of room for dessert, but traditionally a poppy seed cake called Makowiec would be served along with a fruit compote. I decided to put my own twist on things and take in a Sernik, which is a baked cheesecake, as it is one of my favourite Polish desserts and one which I have always wanted to try making myself having eaten it in many Polish households over the years.  

My advice to Nick was to try making the pierogi himself in the New Year, or to befriend a Polish person to make them for him. Luckily, he has just moved into a new house with a Polish neighbour next door so I’m sure he’ll be in for more Polish treats soon!

If you’d like to listen to the whole show, it is available on iplayer for 7 days, the fact sheet should stay up for longer.

In the meantime, here’s the recipe for Pierogi with Cream Cheese and Potato

Pierogi with Cream Cheese and Potato

My Mother’s Recipe

Ingredients:

For the dough:

500g plain flour

¼ teaspoon salt

1 egg + 1 egg yolk

1 tablespoon olive oil (optional)

250 ml warm water (possibly a little more)

For the cheese and potato filling:

1 kg potatoes

150g curd cheese or use cream cheese

1 white onion, finely chopped and lightly fried in butter

1 egg yolk

For the topping

1 large white onion, finely chopped

100g butter

  1. To make the cheese and potato filling – peel and boil the potatoes in a large pan of salted water until soft. Drain and mash them.
  2. Mix the cheese into the mashed potato, add salt and pepper to season. Add in the cooked onion and egg yolk and mix well. Make sure the filling is completely cool when you use it to fill the dough. The filling can be made up to a day before you need it. 
  3. To make the dough, pour the flour onto a large wooden board or clean work surface. Mix the olive oil, egg and egg yolk together. Add it to the flour and start mixing and add a little warm water at a time to the dough. You can use your fingers or a fork to bring the dough together. Mix in the warm water, a little at a time, until you have a soft dough. Once the dough comes together, kneed it on a floured surface for a couple of minutes just until it comes together. The dough should be quite elastic. If it is too wet, add a little more flour. Put the dough in a bowl and cover with a tea towel so that it doesn’t dry out while you prepare the filling.
  4. When you are ready to use the dough, roll half of it out until it is around 3mm in thickness. Use an inverted glass tumbler to cut out circles and lay them on a floured surface, again covering with a tea towel until you are ready to fill.   Roll out the rest of the dough and do the same.
  5. Take your circles of dough and fill each one with a teaspoon of the filling. Fold each circle in half to enclose the filling into a semi-circle and crimp the dough together with your fingers so they are sealed. You can also use the back of a fork and press down around the edges to make sure they are sealed.
  6. To cook the Pierogi, drop them into a big pan of boiling, salted water. Don’t overload the pan. They are cooked when they float back up to the top, usually a couple of minutes.  Take them out carefully with a slotted spoon.
  7. To make the topping, in a separate pan, melt the butter and cook the onion in the butter very slowly until soft. Pour a little butter over the Pierogi or serve with soured cream.

Thank you very much to Nick and Emma for inviting me back and to Emma for taking the photographs.

Wesołych Świąt!

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