Addicted to Canning!

Indian Carrot dessert

Posted on November 19, 2022 at 8:33 pm in

Also known as gajar halwa, this is a delicious dessert that also allows you to sneak veggies into the veggie-hesitant!

1kg / 2lb carrots, shredded

1 can sweetened condensed milk

1/2 tsp ground cardamom seeds

3 tbsp butter

1/2 cup / 120ml chopped nuts OPTIONAL

sufficient raisins, craisins, or similar fruit OPTIONAL

pinch of salt OPTIONAL

Shred your carrots. I used my food processor’s shredding disk. If you have a child who is keen to help you can always hand them the carrots and a hand grater!

Melt the butter over medium heat. Quickly fry the nuts and raisins until they are golden and aromatic and remove from the pan.

Saute the carrots in the butter until they are soft and starting to express their liquid. Add the salt if using. Add the can of sweetened condensed milk and bring it to a boil. Turn down to a low simmer and cook until most of the liquid has cooked out. Add the cardamom powder and stir well to incorporate. Add the nuts and / or fruit and stir well to incorporate.

Serve hot or cold.

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Mulled apple juice / cider

Posted on December 23, 2021 at 4:17 pm in

In the USA, crushed cloudy apple juice is called “cider”. In most of the rest of the Commonwealth, cider is an alcoholic beverage made from apples. You can make this with either type of cider.

This is a non-recipe. My intent is to inspire you to experiment and go with what sounds good to you. As always, adjust to account for preferences and allergies.

Cider. 1 quart / 1 litre.

Sugar. 1/2 cup / 120ml. Yes, by volume!

Whole cinnamon. One chunk or one stick.

Star anise. One whole one.

Cloves. Start with 5 or 6.

Small oranges. Tangerines / clementines / satsumas. Give a little scrub and skewer with the cloves.

Black peppercorns. Start with twice as many as the cloves.

Nutmeg. 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon ground.

Add everything to a suitably sized pan. Bring to an active simmer then turn down low. Let everything simmer for 30 minutes to an hour, then cut the heat. Let everything steep for an hour or more, then filter into a suitable container to store in the fridge. Serve hot or cold.

For an additional winter warmer, serve warmed and with a little of your favourite brown liquor added.

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Cranberry and apple jam

Posted on December 23, 2021 at 4:00 pm in

This is the perfect accompaniment for a baked brie. Or for any other purpose you might want some jam for, such as a PBJ.

1 packet cranberries, fresh or frozen

1 cup / 240ml sugar

1/2 cup / 120ml orange juice

3 small, 2 medium, or 1 large apple, peeled and chopped into small bits

optional – orange zest and/or 1/4tsp ground cinnamon

Add first 4 ingredients to a saucepan. Bring to a boil then turn down to medium. Simmer till the cranberries pop. Add optional extras if desired.

Note on texture – if you like, you can serve the jam as-is, which gives a nice chunky texture. I like to zap it a few times with a stick blender to make a mix of smooth and chunky. You can take it further and blend it smooth. However you prefer the texture you won’t be disappointed with pairing it with a nice baked brie!

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Vegan brownies that don’t suck

Posted on June 6, 2021 at 12:41 pm in

A daring title, but I have cracked it. I can also make them keto friendly. Oh, and by the way? It’s gluten free, too!

4 tablespoons ground flax

1/2 cup / 120ml water

1 tablespoon vanilla

4oz / 112g cocoa butter

1 cup / 200g allulose or similar keto friendly sugar

1 cup / 220g brown sugar or keto friendly substitute

1 and 1/3 cups / 125g almond flour

2/3 teaspoon xanthan gum

2/3 teaspoon psyllium husk powder

85g cocoa powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 tsp baking powder

Blend the ground flax with the water and vanilla and set to one side.

Cream the sugars with the cocoa butter. Add the flax and vanilla mix.

Sift the remaining dry ingredients together. Slowly add the dry ingredients into the creamed ingredients until fully incorporated.

Pour your batter into a well greased square baking pan, and only then start preheating your oven to 350F / 180C. By waiting till now to heat the oven you give the binder time to activate, which will contribute to the lift.

Bake for 35 to 40 minutes, remove from oven, allow to cool for 10 minutes before turning out. Cut a slice and enjoy.

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Pickled Eggs

Posted on June 6, 2021 at 12:15 pm in

Pickled eggs. Easy, right? Eggs, vinegar, how hard can it be?

That’s a fair point. It’s pretty much that easy. But as always, there are some details that can help to know.

Pickle brine ingredients for 12 large eggs.

1 cup / 240ml water

1 cup / 240ml vinegar

1 tablespoon pickling spice

1/4 teaspoon salt

Put all ingredients together in a saucepan. Bring to a boil, cut the heat, and let the brine steep overnight while your 12 hard boiled eggs are chilling out in the fridge.

Next day, peel the eggs and place in a suitable container. Pour the brine over via sieve to remove the spices. Allow the eggs to steep in the brine for between 1 and 7 days. The longer they steep, the deeper into the egg the brine flavour will penetrate. Eat out of hand, chopped into a salad, or turn it into pickled egg salad.

Simple, right? Hah! Hold on a minute. Which vinegar do you use?

Unsurprisingly the vinegar you use directly affects the flavour. Here’s the ones I tested with:

white vinegar: sharply tangy, the gold standard of vinegar, but no real flavour
white wine vinegar: a touch more flavour than white vinegar, but not a lot more
red wine vinegar: more flavour than either the above, also stains the eggs a fetching red
malt vinegar: richer than red wine, stains the eggs a rather nice brown (NOTE: NOT GLUTEN FREE)
balsamic vinegar: oh, so much going on here! Caramel flavours as well as staining the egg white an astonishing black! Also astonishing is what happens to the vinegar: it goes transparent as the eggs absorb almost all of the colour from the vinegar

Over to you. What vinegar do you prefer?

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Keto friendly British sponge pudding

Posted on March 25, 2021 at 2:25 pm in

What I’m writing here is an incomplete recipe. This is because the sheer diversity of British sponge puddings is ridiculous, so I’d rather give you the basic recipe that you can tweak with any of the eleventy zillion different options.

Chocolate sponge, jam sponge, chocolate, and did I mention chocolate? Yum yum. All tweaks from this base recipe.

And yes, it’s keto friendly and gluten free, not that you can tell once it’s cooked. It’s just delicious.

1 stick of butter – 4oz, 112g

4oz / 112g monkfruit, erithrytol, or other keto sweetener

4oz / 112g almond flour

2 tablespoons coconut flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

Optional add-ins such as chocolate chips, cocoa powder, etc

1/2 teaspoon xanthan gum

1/2 teaspoon psyllium husk powder

1/4 tsp salt

2 large eggs

Cream the butter and sweetener together. Add all the dry ingredients and blend until fully incorporated. Add the eggs at a time and blend until fully incorporated.

Place the sponge into a suitable pudding basin – plastic or glass – that you have lightly buttered. If you’re adding extras such as jam, place it in the bottom of the pudding basin.

Allow the batter to rest for 20 minutes before you move to the next step. This will allow the binders to activate.

Microwave on full power (based on 700 Watt microwave) for 6 minutes. Allow to rest for 5 minutes while you whip up a batch of fresh custard.

Enjoy!

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Keto friendly chocolate sponge pudding

Posted on March 8, 2021 at 10:24 am in

Look, America, you are responsible for lots of good stuff.

But your understanding of “pudding” is desperately bad. It’s not just yellow flavour or brown flavour. It’s so much more.

And here’s an example. It’s rich, decadent, chocolatey goodness. It’s keto friendly, so low carb. And it’s … well, it’s brown. Shut up!

6oz / 170g unsalted butter

6oz / 170g erithrytol or other keto friendly sweetener, or sugar

3 large eggs, beaten

140g / 1.5 cups almond flour

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp xanthan gum, or equivalent

1.25oz / 35g cocoa powder

1 tsp vanilla (optional)

heavy pinch salt (optional)

cream the butter and sugar together. Beat in the eggs. Stir the next 3 ingredients together and beat into the butter and eggs. Add a little milk, cream, or water if the mix doesn’t come together or if it seems dry.

Allow the batter to sit for 15 minutes before cooking to allow the xanthan gum to activate.

Place in a greased bowl, pudding bowl, or basin that can accommodate at least 1 litre / 1 quart, to allow room for any expansion. Steam for 1 hour, or microwave for 5 to 10 minutes or until the top is just set.

Allow the pudding to sit in its cooking container for 10 minutes while you whip up some cream or custard to serve it with.

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Cheese pie

Posted on March 2, 2021 at 9:02 am in

What kind of filling should you put into your lovely keto friendly pie crust? A keto frendly filling, such as cheese pie.

To pre-empt a possible question, “what is the difference between cheese pie and quiche?” Simply the ratio of ingredients and the intention. With quiche the intention is to showcase and enhance the custard. With cheese pie it’s all about the cheese, with the other ingredients being there to support the cheese.

This is a non-recipe. Ingredients are very much played by ear. Allow yourself to go with what feels good, rather than sweating precision – just like quiche and frittata, cheese pie is fridge velcro.

SHREDDED CHEESE
You want a bunch of it, at least a half pound / quarter kilo. What cheese? Up to you. I usually have young Cheddar, aged Cheddar, and bulk parmesan. Want to make it with cream cheese and blue cheese? Go for it! Just make sure the cream cheese is softened and beaten so that it will integrate properly with the rest of the ingredients.

EGGS
You’ll want 3 or 4 large eggs. Beat them with a little milk, cream, or water. Season lightly with salt and pepper.

OTHER INGREDIENTS
You can bulk out the ingredients by addition of pantry staples such as dried potato flakes, cooked crumbled bacon, or any fresh or cooked veggies you have lying around the fridge. Only add herbs and spices where they will enhance the cheese. Spicy chili peppers will drown out most cheeses, so this is not the recipe for them.

ASSEMBLY
Assemble your cheese in your crust in reverse order of strength, from weakest flavour to strongest. I put the bulk orange Cheddar in first, followed by parmesan, then the strong mature Cheddar on top. You might want to keep a little of the strong cheese back to sprinkle artistically on top of the eggs.

Pour the eggs over the cheese. The eggs are here to provide support for the cheese, not to be the feature ingredient.

COOKING TIME
You want to cook this hotter and longer than a quiche, because you have a lot of cheese to melt. I generally go with a 375f / 190c oven for 30 to 40 minutes, or until the cheese topping has picked up some nice colour. The custard should be firm set.

SERVING YOUR CHEESE PIE
Serve it hot or cold. Feel free to put on whatever fancy toppings you like such as chopped parsley, crumbled bacon, or even more cheese. I won’t judge you!

CONCLUSION
Cheese pie is all about making a lot of food dirt cheap for those times when there is a bit too much month left before payday. Play around with the ratios and the cheese blends, but always bear in mind this is cheese pie. Allow the cheese to stand front and centre.

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Keto friendly pie crust

Posted on March 2, 2021 at 8:36 am in

Low carb, flaky pie crust. Just what you need!

This recipe makes one 9 inch pie crust.

1.5 cups / 144 grams almond flour

4 tablespoons / 56 grams butter, cubed

1 oz / 28 g cream cheese

1 tsp apple cider vinegar

1 large egg

1/4 tsp salt (optional)

Add the first 3 ingredients to your food processor or mixer. Mix until they form something that looks like coarse wet sand. Add the rest of the ingredients and blend until they come together.

No food processor or mixer? No problem, use a pastry knife or a couple of table knives to chop everything together into a lovely mess.

Roll the dough into a ball and cover with plastic wrap. Chill in the fridge for a couple of hours to allow the butter and the cheese to get completely chilled.

To make your pie crust, form it into your pie pan with your hands. Rolling it out is a spectacularly messy process, so go for the more rustic look of hand shaping it in place.

Preheat your oven to 350f / 180c and blind bake the crust for 15 minutes – place baking parchment or foil over the crust and fill the parchment with weights such as baking beads, dry beans, or dry rice. After 15 minutes pull the parchment / foil and weights off the crust and bake for another 5 to 10 minutes or until your crust is golden brown and delicious looking.

Fill and bake as normal with your preferred fillings.

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Paggis – pork haggis

Posted on February 18, 2021 at 8:02 pm in

Shh, don’t tell anyone in Scotland but… I made haggis from pork instead of lamb. I know, it’s probably sacrilege, but pork is a fraction of the price of lamb, and simple economics dictate that if I want delicious haggisness, it needs to be in a reasonable price bracket. So… paggis! (And thank you to kiddo for naming it – good job, kiddo)

The strangest thing about making this was that as soon as I added the spices to the oats, I knew it was haggis. Some dishes are defined by their spice mix, and haggis is definitely one of them.

2 lb / 900 g coarse ground pork

1/2 large onion, chopped however you prefer

2 tbsp butter

1/2 lb / 225 g oats

1 tsp ground allspice

1 tbsp coarse salt

1.5 tsp ground black pepper

1.5 tsp mustard powder

Cook the onion in the butter until it is softened and slightly translucent. Add the spices, seasonings, and oats. Add a little water to wet the oats very slightly, a couple of tablespoons or so, then set to one side to cool.

Grind the pork coarsely. Add the oats and spices mix and blend with your hands until it comes together into a sticky mess.

Place the sticky mess into a zip top bag, or seal into a sous vide vacuum bag. If you aren’t going to cook it immediately, place it in your fridge until you’re ready to cook.

Set your sous vide to 180F / 82C, or set a large pan on medium-low heat. Cook for 3 hours. Let it rest for 10 to 20 minutes while you get the side dishes sorted. Traditional haggis is served with neeps and tatties (turnips and mashed potatoes), but this is paggis. I served it with mixed veg and braised cabbage, but you should serve whatever side dishes you prefer!

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Addicted to Canning! cooking, preserving, and canning food at home

Addicted to Canning!
cooking, preserving, and canning food at home