Christmas Bean and Turkey Pies

So my dad's wife is not a big meat eater, so like last year, this Christmas will be a pescetarian affair. For a glutton like me, this is kind of a big deal, so I'm going to try and get as much stodgy traditional yule time fare before the main event so I won't feel like I'm missing out.
What, what I ask you is more festive and Christmassy than baked beans? You know, when I get home from school, I ask mum 'What's for tea?' and she goes 'Heinz Baked Beans' 'cos they're the beans for me! I love beans, not enough to try making them myself or anything, but enough to buy this ridiculous recipe book.
I might have mentioned this before, but the boyfriend hates overly sweet food. The bird he was with before he met me blew her chances at life long happiness by serving him pasta baked with mango chutney and turkey pieces. He had two bites, made his excuses and disappeared into the night. In light of this, maybe it's a subconscious message from me that it's time for us to call it a day when I get the compelling urge to serve him turkey baked with sweet tomatoey beans and cranberry sauce. We've had a good run, but enough is enough. Lets see what happens!
Look at all this crap, are you drooling already at the prospect of putting all these condiments together?
I mix everything in a bowl and start having second thoughts. No wonder he left that girl, this is really gross! FYI my pulling dish was Thai Green Chicken Curry - which he loved - and that's how to keep your man, ladies.
Result: Christmas Bean and Turkey Pies, best served with your hand, straight into the bin.

OK, well not really, but very nearly. The taste is just so unpleasant that no amount of cider will fix it. I ended up draining my portion in Tabasco.
The pastry was fine, obviously, since I had no hand in making it. But somehow all the other ingredients conspire to blend to the point of canceling out any flavour at all. You can't taste the cranberry, which is a plus, but you don't get a taste of anything until you bite into a piece of turkey - which turns out to be revolting. You know how turkey tends to be really dry at the best of times? Well that should be the first hint to not overcook it. Having said that , I'm not sure if having fresh turkey inside would have improved it any. Maybe a combination of freshly roasted turkey, home made cranberry sauce, a dash of spices and no baked beans would have been better.
Experiment fail! There are just some things that you are not meant to eat baked beans with. I'll stick to having mine on lobster thermidor, thanks.

Bacon Roly-Poly

No I'm not dead after eating all those maggots, better luck next time!

I have been busy lately though, what with celebrating the shit out of my birthday, and then paying for my overindulgence. But I'm back in business and will hopefully be a lot more regular in posting about my gastronomic journey of self discovery. Food is so interesting, and you end up learning so much about a culture from the food they eat. For example, I wasn't born in England, and first time I went to a friend's house and their parents gave me a boiled pudding to eat, I thought they were cracked. But if I've learned anything it's that first impressions are always wrong, and Spotted Dick is not as nasty as it sounds.

I borrowed this little book from the boyfriend's mum, and if ever there was a tool conceived to lure the many bacon fetishists away from their favorite foodstuff, it might be this. The thin volume includes a guide to purchasing the bacon, curing methods, history and appropriate accompaniments, followed of course by the recipes. "Not just bacon & eggs!" boasts the back cover proudly, and proud it should be as stuffed into a mere 70 pages are recipes that fit into the following categories - Breakfast, Lunch, Tea Time, Supper, Party Bacon and Outdoor Bacon. Cold Pressed Bacon, anyone? How about Crusty Bacon? No, not in the mood? Strange. Nothing a few Bacon and Pineapple Kebabs won't fix, I wouldn't worry about it.

My Bacon Roly Poly sits in the Lunch section, but check out what happens at Tea Time in the illustrator's house.
'Helloooo there! Got any bacon spare for me and my horse?'

OK, fun is fun, but lets get down to business. For some bizarre reason I couldn't find suet in the supermarket. What, are you trying to say it's not a popular ingredient? Apparently you have to be considerate as to the age of the recipe when buying suet, real ye olde cooks would render their own from a giant hunk of beef fat, but the pellets of ready made stuff you can find in dry form on the shelf has flour added to make it stable so you might need to adjust the amount of flour in the recipe. None of this applies to me because I have to make do with vegetarian suet made from palm oil.
So, cooked bacon mixed with raw onion (which of course was a lot of fun to grate), and a miniscule amount of dried herbs, rolled up in a mixture of flour, water and palm oil pellets.
I didn't have any pudding cloth so used foil to wrap my little baby, and after boiling it looked like this
Now, I'm not the brightest tack, but my general rule is - when food has turned black that's a bad sign. Lets see how accurate the omen was.
Result: Well, what did you think it was going to taste like? Salty
And also, for something that's been boiling for an hour and a half it's surprisingly dry. Maybe I should have used less flour, or real suet, or a better recipe.
I'm going to go ahead and assume that the resoning for putting raw onion as opposed to cooked into the mix is to keep as much of the sharp overpowering taste as possible so that the strong sweetness of the onion can battle with the saltiness (and nothing else) of the bacon in your mouth.
If like me you don't find such sensory assaults pleasant then pile your plate high with vegetables, drown the whole thing in gravy and take a big sip of cider after each bite. Seriously, the more you drink, the better it tastes. I can't explain why, I'm not a scientist, but after 2 litres - right about when pronouncing 'roly poly' becomes a challenge - it be some tasty stuff.
Peace out, blud.

Pastitsada kerkiraiki and maintanosalata me pligouri

Oh my God, what a fricking mouthful. I'm a little perverse, I guess, there are English names for these dishes in the book, but I like the original titles. It makes it harder for people to stumble on to my blog, and I only want hardcore die-hard fans! I signed up to Google Analytics to be able to check how many hits I get a day, and found out that besides refering sites like the amazing Foodie Blogroll, the only other source of traffic I had was people Googling 'klops' and stumbling on my failed attempt at the Jewish classic. Try Googling 'kerkiraiki' and see how far you get, even if you spell it right...
Anyway, in case you couldn't tell, the book I'm using is Vefa's Kitchen (from my birthday trousseau!)
I'm not sure I asked for this for any reason other than to complete my Phaidon cookbook set. The only experience I have with Greek food is blurred drunken memories of the office Christmas party at 'The Real Greek' last year. I occasionaly have a lump of feta in my fridge, and I quite like teramasalata - the end.

Like it's Spanish compatirot, this book provides the recipes in the simplest possible format. Two or three to a page, with a few photographs here and there, both of which elements make it almost impossible to know what the final product is meant to look like. Perfect for a novice!
I decided not to make the pasta, and instead of basil I had fresh thyme, um... and canned tomatoes are just as good as fresh, right?
I'm not really a big fan of beef, it always makes me super bloated, and there is a not in the book to say that Greeks tend to eat veal rahter than beef - good luck finding it, blah blah blah, changer le disque! I'm going to stop bitching about stuff, I'm a little older - SERENITY NOW!
Grating the onion was no fun, and it's a little crazy to me to put cinnamon in savory dishes, but what do I know.

The bulgur salad was an afterthought, so I don't have a photo of the ingredients. But I'm I'll give you some cradit and assume that everyone knows what, you know, tomatoes and parsley look like. To be honest, I was pretty hungover when I was making this, and the memory of the new camera was kind of messing me about as well. Excuses excuses...
Result: The salad is that little lump in the background, roasted vegetables on the side and the big pile of stuff right at the front is the beef stew. The colour is pretty amazing, and the grated onion melted into the sauce - so good!
You don't really get anything particularly 'Greek' until you try the salad, the parsley and lemon juice are really tangy and refreshing. I would like to make a point of not mentioning the bulgur, but I just can't keep it to myself... so disgusting... well I'll just say it:
I've never really cooked bulgur wheat, I heard it's good for you and all that crap so I bought a bag ages ago, I tried cooking it like porridge, wasn't impressed with the results, decanted it into a pretty glass jar, and forgot abou it at the back of the cupboard.
I now know that you're actually meant to prepare it like cous cous by soaking it in water. So, I put the dusty old bulgur in the bowl, fill it with water and forget about it for 30 minutes. I'll type the next bit slowly because it literally made me stop in my tracks - when I came back to drain it there were a dozen maggots floating on the surface of the water. Ew. I ran out of the kitchen screaming, I don't care how old I am, I'm still a girl! 'It's all protein' said my dad. No way!

Beef Stew with Pata from Corfu
1/4 pint olive oil
1.5 kg lean stewing beef or veal cut into serving pieces
1 large onion, grated
1kg tomatoes, peeled, seeded and chopped
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
1 teaspoon sugar
1 small cinnamon stick
2 cloves
1 tablespoon chopped fresh basil
salt and pepper
500g thick tube shaped pasta
grated cheese to garnish

Heat 120ml of the oil in a heavy pan over high heat. Add the meat and cook, stirring frequently, for about 8 minutes, until browned all over. Add the onion, reduce the heat, and cook, stirring occasionally for 5 minutes, until softened. Add the tomatoes, tomato paste, vinegar sugar, cinnamon stick, cloves and basil and season with salt and pepper. Cover and simmer, adding water if necessary, for 1 1/4 - 1 1/2 hours, or until the meat is tender and the sauce is reduced.
(then there are instructions for boiling the pasta too, but I didn't do it)

Parsley and Bulgur Wheat Salad
80g medium bulgur wheat
80g finely chopped fresh parsley
15g finely chopped fresh mint
1 large tomato, peeled, seeded and chopped
4 finely chopped scallions
50ml freshly squeezed lemon juice
3 tablespoons olive oil
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper

Put the bulgur wheat into a bowl, pour in 250ml water, and set aside for 30 minutes, then drain off any excess liquid. Transfer the drained bulgur wheat to another bowl and stir in parsley, mint, tomatoes, scallions, and half the lemon juice. Set aside for another 30 minutes. Best the oil with the remaining lemon juice, the salt, and pepper and pour the mixture over the salad.