Food

Mega! What was your chosen prep/cook method?

Slice into strips, salt & dry in the fridge for a day or two, lay on greaseproof on a tray, keeping the strips separate, the roast at 200 for 30 - 50 minutes, draining off the fat regularly and removing pieces as they are done.

Not sure if good / bad parenting, but the kids ate crackling for breakfast...

Could be awesome could be terrible. Did they dip in sauce or pure?

Actually one for the air fryer people, would crackling be a good thing in the air fryer for the lazy.

This could be my death row meal. Lack of pineapple (tinned) admitted. Skin in the fridge for crackling a la Thames.

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Looks great man.

For all my failings as as a parent, apparently i'm raising kids who think that a stake cooked rare is thee big friday night treat.

Where do we stand on crushed potatoes? As in small/new puds par-boiled, smashed flattish with fluffy bits sticking out and then roasted till crispy. Ideally with a drop of olive oil at the end and lots of flaky salt, chopped rosemary and some lemon zest.

Me and the kids are firly on the BETTER THAT CHIPS side at the moment.

You’re doing great 👏 it’s so nice when kids love real food and not ultra processed slime.

Next level

Am reminded of going for an English...

Think you mean steak, well I hope you do unless you are a van Helsing.

Now, when asked the question daddy or chips...what do they say? ;) This is also an age check if you gre up in the UK.

Nothing beats food deep fried in dripping. Growing up we cooked potatoes in the oven in lard and either fried or ovened as that what we had.

Those potatoes are the only way we consume them in our house now (sans rosemary and lemon). On rotation at least twice a week.

I miss potatoes.

Beef with carrots.

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Decided to do a test run on the salted caramel basque cheesecake as didn’t want to mess it up on Christmas Eve.
Was going ok until pouring the cream into the caramel and all the caramel went a rigid mess and the recipe didn’t mention anything about keeping the heat up while you mix, was worried about the cream splitting but keeping it moving under a gentle heat melted it back.
Annoyingly I banged it on the hob taking it out of the oven so don’t know if it’s sunk like a sponge cake, will have to wait until tomorrow to try.

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how does the cross section look?

Well I’m not supposed to cut it until it’s cooled properly but seeing as I’m hungry…
This is a 9-1/2 inch tin and you are supposed to use a 7inch plus the cream was in a 300ml pot and the cream cheese (3 packs of Philadelphia) so down 30ml cream and 40g of cream cheese so less volume.
I really like it as it’s light not fatty/sickly sweet, that kind of cheesecake makes me feel sick.
Some would want more sugar, 160g in recipe could easily take 200g but I’ll have this with something else like a few maraschino cherries, some raisins soaked in pedro-ximenez or walnut vodka mixed with mr black coffee liqueur.
Warmed up with some decent ice cream would work.

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that looks stunning bravo

Pasta mista with beans and mussels.

So I used the wrong beans, white instead of borlotti and the mussels were boil in the bag Lidl tomato and chorizo mussels. As Lidl had the mussels for 50% off and 900g of Scottish mussels for £1.50! 500g of pasta and 300g of beans.

Now to let it rest at room temp! For a day or two ;)

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Thanks! but was pretty easy, fancied having a go as it’s £4.50 a slice at the bakery, ingredients were about £5-6 ish.
Most difficult thing was the caramel.

Is there a better cream cheese than Philadelphia?

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Longley-Farm-Full-Cream-Cheese/dp/B07TNH414B

Having tried plenty of recipes for traditional Basque Cheesecakes the below recipe is the best I've found. Main thing to test is cooking time in your oven as that's the thing that seems to vary the most between kitchens.

https://www.tastecooking.com/recipes/basque-cheesecake/

Possibly but I just had Sainsbury’s to pick from, there was their own brand and the Philly was on offer, the website has a posh French one but not available in my local store.

@Saffronspokes the ingredient proportions look similar it’s just the caramelised sugar and having a domestic oven with 220° max that’s different.

Can we start gearing up for Christmas porchetta chat?

Booked my 5ish kg pork belly with the butcher. He recommended splashing out on fennel pollen if I'm going full traditional