In my neverending quest for lunches that don’t involve something dull stuck between two bits of bread I came across this recipe by The Cozy Apron on Pinterest, and immediately fell in like with it.
Persuading Hubby to try this was a doddle. He loves coconut almost as much as he loves variety so asking him to have a go at something new really didn’t require much persuasion at all…
That and there’s something fun about having finger food for lunch. Hubbyquite likes to raid the deli counter in summer and have a picnic, even if that’s indoors which given the usual state of Scottish summers is usually the case. But as it’s not summer yet (or even remotely close) we decided to indulge in some hot finger food, courtesy of this recipe which we tweaked just a wee bit.
The original recipe also had a honey-mango-mayo dip but it didn’t really work for us. I suspect that might have been down in part to the overpowering honey that Hubby had used, but I’m not comfortable recommending something I didn’t actually like so instead let me suggest a honey-mustard dip or maybe a sweet Thai chilli dipping sauce, or mix the Thai with some mayo. Or even have them just as they are because really, the flavour of the goujons themselves was fantastic what with the quite lovely savoury and sweet coconut coating.
If you’re harbouring any doubts, or looking at these and thinking nasty nuggets from the yellow arch, you couldn’t be further from the truth! Although these are deep fried they’re not even remotely greasy, and the chicken inside was perfectly done and properly tender. We had ours for lunch but they’d be just as good as a starter or a badly behaved snack 🙂
Crunchy Coconuty Chicken Goujons
2014-08-15 19:22:14
Grown up chicken "nuggets", coated in coconut and insanely moreish
Into a medium-sized shallow bowl (we used a pasta bowl) put flour, a couple of pinches of salt, pepper, 1/2 tsp each of onion and garlic granules and a pinch of cayenne pepper and give it all a good mix. Into another medium-sized shallow bowl crack the eggs and beat. Spread the shredded coconut onto a dinner plate. Set all three side by side and in this order.
Fill the saucepan to half-way with vegetable oil and heat slowly up to 175C/350F.
Coat and cook!
While the oil is heating, cut each chicken breast into 4 strips, then cut those in half to give you 8 strips per breast of roughly equal size.
Place them into a bowl before adding 1/2 tsp each of curry powder, onion and garlic granules, another pinch or two of cayenne pepper, and then season with salt and pepper before tossing the strips so that they’re coated in the seasoning.
Take one strip at a time and roll in the seasoned flour you prepped earlier until the strip is coated well. Next, dip it into the beaten eggs, and finally press into the shredded coconut until both sides are coated thoroughly. Set aside onto a clean plate and then repeat with until all the strips have been coated.
When the oil is at 175C/350F add 4-5 strips of coated chicken to the oil and allow to fry for 1.5-2 minutes or until they are a deep golden colour. Remove and place onto kitchen roll to blot the excess oil, seasoning with salt and pepper while they’re still hot. Repeat until all the strips have been fried, taking care to check the heat between batches and reheat back up to 175C/350F if it’s dropped before adding more chicken – it’s the key to keeping the goujons from being greasy.
Dish up with the chives sprinkled over the top, something to dip on the side, and go to your tropical place 🙂
Things to look forward to in January – Awards season, restaurant offers, Chinese New Year (this year), 6 Nations (but not this year) and Burns Night! Not that I need The Bard’s permission, but tucking into a plate of haggis in honour of his birthday on the 25th is as good an excuse as any 🙂 I usually run in the opposite direction of anything involving offal, but haggis is the one shining exception. It is a wonderfully savoury eat, all spicy and peppery, and with that fantastic texture that manages to be crumbly without being dry. Can you tell I’m a fan…?
Of course, it has to be Macsween’s. I have the most wonderful butcher at the end of my street that does their own haggis, but I just can’t quite bring myself to be unfaithful to Macsween. So when I was challenged by @Eat_Scottish to get #InspiredbyBurns and put a new spin on the immortal trinity of haggis, neeps and tatties I was beyond delighted to find a Macsween’s haggis in the box of goodies they sent to inspire me!
But what to do with it?? Hubby and I spent a night brainstorming ‘things to do with haggis’ and came up with this! Or a variation of, elements of which didn’t survive the testing weekend (thank goodness for a testing weekend!)
I love haggis as a main course, either in a traditional style or as a part of something else like balmoral chicken, but I adore it as a starter with something sweet and sticky. Stac Polly on Dublin Street is to blame for that, their haggis parcels in filo pastry with a plum sauce is the stuff of legend. And The Magnum’s haggis spring rolls with Thai sweet chili sauce inspired me to try making them myself. So I knew I wanted to try my hand at a starter or something finger foody.
I have to say, the blini-esque tiny tattie scones were an inspired idea, and credit has to go to Hubby for coming up with (and cooking!) that. We actually made a giant tattie scone first time round and then took a cookie cutter to it, but the edges weren’t as clean or, most importantly, as crispy as when you cut first and then cook. It’s a wee bit more fiddly but well worth it. Alternatively, buy ready-made tattie scones and cookie cutter out what you need before warming them up.
We cheated a wee bit with the neeps by adding a few carrots for colour, but it contrasted nicely with the tattie scones and tasted good to boot.
The red onion marmalade you can make beforehand as it keeps for about 2 weeks covered properly in the fridge (or buy a jar of ready-made, there are some good ones out there) Our original idea was to actually top the haggis with it but it ended up hiding too much of the good stuff so we shifted it down a layer, but made sure to still show it off.
I’m afraid, though, that we didn’t keep a track of actual measurements so please excuse my somewhat vague recipe below. The only consolation I can offer is that whatever is leftover is scoffable in any combination of whatever is left – Hubbyand I were merrily left downing tattie scones and red onion marmalade, hardship!
Which just leaves me to say…
“Fair fa’ your honest, sonsie face,
Great chieftain o’ the pudding-race!”
Stuff you’ll need:
Haggis (Macsween’s microwaveable haggis provides a good amount for making lots of these)
Cold mashed potatoes
Flour
Mashed neeps and carrots
Red onion marmalade (recipe here)
Chives, snipped for decoration
Butter
Milk
Salt and pepper for seasoning
To make the tattie scones:
This is all about mashed potatoes but firm mashed potatoes so don’t make it fluffy and creamy like you’re going to eat it, with lashings of butter and milk. You don’t want to add anything to the potatoes when you’re mashing them except seasoning and a little butter.
Once the mash is cold, mix with flour using a ratio of 5 parts mash to 1 part flour. Get stuck in with your hands and work it until it feels like a ball of dough – drizzle a little oil if it’s still crumbly to help bind it together. Divide into tennis ball sized amounts and chill for 30 minutes to 2 hours.
Place the cold mash dough ball between two sheets of baking parchment or wax paper and roll out until it’s about the thickness of a pound coin. You want scones that are blini sized so use your smallest cookie/pastry cutter (or shot glass) to carefully cut out your scones.
Homemade tattie scones | fifigoesnom.com
Put a frying pan over a medium heat and add a little bit of oil. When hot, fry the scones for 4 minutes on each side.
Excess dough can be rerolled , but store any dough you’re not using in the fridge between rolling as you want it to be chilled and firm when you’re ready to roll it out.
To make the neeps:
Aim for a 3:1 ratio of neeps to carrot. Peel and cube, then boil for 20-25 minutes or until a fork goes easily through a cube. Drain and roughly mash (the bits of carrot poking through look great I think!) with some butter, milk and salt, and pepper to taste.
Roughly mashed neeps and carrots | fifigoesnom.com
Assemble!
Cook the haggis according to the packet instructions and then break up in a bowl.
Grab a tattie scone and spoon/smear the mashed neeps and carrots on top. Take care not to overload it otherwise you’ll lose the taste of haggis, and make a mess when you’re trying to fit it in your mouth!
Add some red onion marmalade on top. It’s tempting to load this on but again you’ll risk losing the taste of haggis if you whack too much on.
Top with haggis and then sprinkle with snipped chives for a little colour.
I defy you not to eat your own body weight in these…
Inspired by Burns | fifigoesnom.com
Haggis, Neeps & Wee Tattie Scone Canapes with Red Onion Marmalade
2014-08-15 21:14:05
A bite-sized take on the traditional Burns Night supper.
Haggis (Macsween’s microwaveable haggis provides a good amount for making lots of these)
Cold mashed potatoes
Flour
Mashed neeps and carrots
Red onion marmalade
Chives, snipped for decoration
Butter
Milk
Salt and pepper for seasoning
To make the tattie scones:
This is all about mashed potatoes but firm mashed potatoes so don’t make it fluffy and creamy like you’re going to eat it, with lashings of butter and milk. You don’t want to add anything to the potatoes when you’re mashing them except seasoning and a little butter.
Once the mash is cold, mix with flour using a ratio of 5 parts mash to 1 part flour. Get stuck in with your hands and work it until it feels like a ball of dough – drizzle a little oil if it’s still crumbly to help bind it together. Divide into tennis ball sized amounts and chill for 30 minutes to 2 hours.
Place the cold mash dough ball between two sheets of baking parchment or wax paper and roll out until it’s about the thickness of a pound coin. You want scones that are blini sized so use your smallest cookie/pastry cutter (or shot glass) to carefully cut out your scones.
Put a frying pan over a medium heat and add a little bit of oil. When hot, fry the scones for 4 minutes on each side.
Excess dough can be rerolled , but store any dough you’re not using in the fridge between rolling as you want it to be chilled and firm when you’re ready to roll it out.
To make the neeps:
Aim for a 3:1 ratio of neeps to carrot. Peel and cube, then boil for 20-25 minutes or until a fork goes easily through a cube. Drain and roughly mash (the bits of carrot poking through look great I think!) with some butter, milk and salt, and pepper to taste.
Assemble!
Cook the haggis according to the packet instructions and then break up in a bowl.
Grab a tattie scone and spoon/smear the mashed neeps and carrots on top. Take care not to overload it otherwise you’ll lose the taste of haggis, and make a mess when you’re trying to fit it in your mouth!
Add some red onion marmalade on top. It’s tempting to load this on but again you’ll risk losing the taste of haggis if you whack too much on.
Top with haggis and then sprinkle with snipped chives for a little colour.
A bit of a random recipe choice to blog at first glance, I know but it’s ahead of a wee Burns Night Challenge I’ve been given so watch this space to see how I use this 🙂 In the meantime… this sweet sticky stuff is a wonderfully versatile accompaniment to so many things – cheese, pates, terrines, cold meat, hot meat (steak sarnie or burger anyone?) – stir it into a quiche mixture, or make a tart out of it and top with goats cheese, and its a fab wee crostini or canape topper. And it’s so easy to make that I’m actually a little ashamed at how often I’ve bought it ready made… New year’s resolution #147 – never again!
There are so many recipes online, all variations on a theme, but the one I’ve adapted substitutes pomegranate juice for the more traditional red wine, and I’m much happier drinking leftover pomegranate juice than I am red wine 😉
Depending on the size of onions you’re using this should make about 1 cup. If you know what you’re doing making jams and marmalades from scratch (I don’t!) then pop this into a steralised jar and it should keep in the fridge for up to three months. Otherwise, it will last in the fridge covered for up to two weeks.
Caramelised Red Onion Marmalade
2014-08-15 21:21:41
A sweet, sticky, versatile accompaniment to all sorts of savoury noms.
Heat the oil in a medium saucepan on a medium-low heat before adding the onions. Saute for 10-15 minutes until they are soft and translucent.
Add the sugar, stir well, and cook for a minute or so. When the sugar has dissolved add the vinegar and juice, season with salt, and turn the heat up. Bring it all to a boil before reducing the heat back down to a simmer.
Cook until the liquid has evaporated, which should take somewhere between 30-60 minutes, stirring frequently to make sure the marmalade doesn't burn.
I’ve had this Nigel Slater recipe, courtesy of a blog called Simply Delicious, pinned On Pinterest for almost as long as I’ve had boards there. There’s just something about the blogger’s mouthwatering photo of the dish that made me long to a) make this, and b) in a lovely shallow Le Creuset. As I didn’t have a lovely shallow Le Creuset the recipe went unmade, but I’d look longingly at it on Pinterest every now and then, and then go and check the price of my object of desire in the vain hope there was a sale on. Patience finally paid off on Christmas day when Hubby managed to find one online for almost half price, so we splurged for it (it still wasn’t cheap!) and my beautiful new piece of cookware finally arrived this week. And I knew exactly how to christen it…
I love creamy white wine sauces. Once the alcohol burns off it leaves behind an awesome sweet note that just tastes of indulgence. And if there are mushrooms they always manage to soak that indulgence right up so that you get randomly intense hits of it whenever you bite into one. The chicken itself was perfectly tender and moist, which was a relief as we’d used chicken breasts rather than the acknowledged (and rightly so) more flavoursome thighs or legs.
Which reminds me!
Along with my lovely le crueset, I also got a fantastic Christmas present from an even more fantastic friend of a subscription to Cooks Illustrated – an American foodie mag – that had an article in it recommending that you start chicken and duck breasts skin side down in a cold skillet if you want properly crispy skin. It’s a French technique apparently, and gives the skin time to render its fat before the meat overcooks. I suspect I got impatient and turned my chicken too quickly, but even still the skin was definitely less soggy and sad than some of my previous attempts to brown it.
I’ve adapted the recipe to feed two to four by halving the ingredients in the original, so if you’re looking to make this for a larger group then it should happily scale up. And you don’t need a posh pan to cook it, a large frying pan should do just as well – I think a deeper sided pot like a stockpot, however, might now allow the alcohol to burn off as easily but that might just be me making stuff up (!)
We had this on rice which was absolutely perfect for soaking up all that delicious jup (an awesome Chinese word for sauce), not that my Chinese half is being biased or anything. And whilst January is supposed to be the month for under-indulging after the holidays, it’s miserable enough if you ask me without stinting on comfort food every once in a while.
Hubby had already requested this again before he’d finished his plate so it’s probably safe to assume this was a success! I’m giving at least half the credit for that to my lovely new Le Creuset 😉 If you fancy a look at Le Creuset’s beautiful casserole range, check their website out and prepare yourself for some serious cookware desire!
Coq au Riesling
2014-08-15 21:30:15
Serves 2
Chicken and mushrooms in a lush white wine and cream sauce, comfort food in a French stylee.
Pop the butter and oil together in a large shallow pan or frying pan and while it's still cold place the chicken breasts skin side down. Turn the heat on and up to high and brown the chicken on both sides, then remove to a plate.
Turn the heat down to medium and in the same pan add the onions and bacon. Fry until the onions are soft and translucent and the bacon is browning nicely. Add the sliced garlic and fry for another 30-60 seconds before removing it all from the pan, tilting to leave as much as of the cooking fat behind.
Now add the mushrooms to the pan and fry for 5 minutes or so, until they've shrunk and started to brown. Then add the onion, bacon and garlic back into the pan. Season and give everything a good stir before popping the browned chicken on top, skin side up.
Add the wine and turn the heat up until it comes up to a boil. Give it a couple of minutes before turning the heat down so that the liquid is simmering. Cover and leave to bubble gently away for 15 minutes.
After 15 minutes, take the cover off and turn the heat up. Let it bubble madly for a couple of minutes and then taste. If it's still too boozy then let it bubble for another couple of minutes and taste again. Repeat until the alcohol has burned off (I probably needed 5 minutes or so) and season again if it needs it. Add the cream and cook for another 10 minutes, by which time the sauce should have thickened up a bit - if not, add a wee bit of cornflour mixed with cold water and stir through.
Finally, scatter generously with parsley and dish up.
When Hubby first moved over from the States he would bake up a storm at Christmas – we’re talking every type of cookie under the low winter sun, and staying up into the wee hours making sure the batches were as fresh as they could be before we parcelled them out on Christmas day. As a non-baker it was all a bit of a novelty for me, but there is something properly magical about the smell of freshly baked gingerbread cookies filling the house on Christmas Eve, and it is now the smell of Christmas for me, not to mention Hubby’s gingerbread cookies are zomgscrumptious… But! That’s for another post, because this post is for something else entirely 🙂
The only non-cookie baked goods that get a look in at Christmas are these tray bake bars which are simply amazing. They are the perfect marriage of contrasts; sweet and salty, soft and crunchy, with one of those moreish digestive biccy bases and then topped with bits of Daim bar on top, and soooooo ooey and gooey that you can’t help but lick every last bit off your fingers and then hope you find a bit you missed!
He assures me they are easy to make, and I assure you they are every bit as delicious as they look and then some. And they freeze like a dream so your batch could last for months (if you have the willpower, that is!). Chase with a glass of cold milk for optimum nom…
Before I hand you over to Hubby for the recipe, I hope you all had a lovely Christmas, and that your turkeys were plump and your stockings well and truly stuffed 🙂
Sticky, sweet & salty pecan bars
2014-08-15 21:38:41
Sweet and salty, soft and crunchy, all on top of a moreish digestive biscuit base.
2-3 bars hard toffee (Heath bars in the US, Daim bars in the UK), roughly chopped
coarse sea salt
Bake!
Begin by preheating your oven to 350F / 175C.
Spread your pecans in a single layer on a baking tray, and roast in the oven for 8-10 minutes. You don’t want them to actually blacken.
Set aside the pecans to cool, and then roughly crush them in a bag with a rolling pin, or in the food processor, once cooled. Be careful not to get too carried away, you don’t want to end up with a bag of pecan crumbs or, worse, pecan dust!
Grease your baking tray with butter before topping with a layer of non-stick baking parchment (the butter helps to hold the parchment in place which you’ll be thankful for when you’re trying to get the bars out neatly).
Prepare the base by melting the butter and then adding to the digestive crumbs, mixing as you go to incorporate fully. Now press the mixture into your baking tray, spreading evenly in one uniform layer. Pop into the fridge and chill for a minimum of 30 minutes but up to 2 hours if you can.
When the base has chilled, prepare the caramel by combining the sugar, butter and cream in a medium-size saucepan. Bring the mixture to a boil over a medium heat, stirring occassionally. Once the mixture is smooth and well-mixed, remove from the heat and stir in the vanilla extract and add your pecans. Stir to combine.
Now pour the caramel-pecan mixture over the base, tilt & angle the pan until the mixture is as evenly distributed as possible.
Give this a few minutes to set, and then drizzle the condensed milk all over the top.
Pop in the oven and bake for 12-16 minutes, until browned and bubbly.
Remove from the oven, and while the bars are still hot, scatter over the chopped Daim bars and lightly press into the mix (non-stick implements are best for this) to help set, and then scatter with sea salt. If you have any eddible stars or glitter to make the bars even more festive then now’s the time to scatter them on top too.
Allow the bars to cool for about an hour before refrigerating overnight. This will help to ensure that the base is fully set and the bars are gooey and delicious. Don’t try to cut them until they’re fully cooled (try being the operative word), you’ll thank me for this later.
Enjoy!
Hubby’s notes on the recipe
This recipe really is an amalgam of many parts; thrown together to create the Frankenstein’s monster of baked goods.
After trying the salted caramel bars at Starbucks, I thought I’d have a go at making them at home. After doing a bit of research, I stumbled across this (http://www.eat-drink-smile.com/2010/12/salted-caramel-pecan-bars.html) blog post which credits the recipe to Southern Living magazine.
Inspired, I thought I’d have a go. But, I couldn’t resist tweaking it a bit, and so I decided on using a standard cheesecake base for this. 200g digestive finely crushed digestive biscuits to 150g butter is a good base to start with. This will be ok for most baking sheets, but I up it to 300g/200g for the larger baking tray I have at home.
To cap it off, I remember my mum making these really delicious tray bakes when I was a kid, and so I incorporated elements from what I could remember of her recipe, which included adding the condensed milk and the toffee bars.
