Series One Recipes - Episode One
Whitebait by Betty
Eggeling
Ingredients
- 400g whitebait
- 2 eggs
- Salt, pepper
- (If frozen; a couple of Tbls flour)
- Have the whitebait as dry as possible.
- (I'm certain Betty doesn't mean you should hand dry each one with a paper towel, just drain it in a sieve for a good period, shaking every so often.)
Method
Separate the eggs.
Add the yolks to the bait, season with salt and pepper and stir
together.
Beat the white until they peak and then fold together with the
seasoned bait and egg yolks.
Cook immediately in clarified butter in a moderately hot pan.
Serving
Betty's special regional secret is to serve the patties with
white bread, lemon, salt and pepper, a glass of red wine and MINT
SAUCE!?!
I found the combination to be strangely delicious.
Richard Till
Ingredients
- 100g whitebait (Draining not required, after all you paid for it)
- 1/4 cup flour
- 1/4 cup beer
- Salt/pepper.
Method
Mix together flour beer salt and pepper.
(It will be a gloopy mixture.)
Add the whitebait and combine.
(This will be unattractive)
Cook just before you serve in oil and butter in a moderate
pan.
Spoon the mixture into the hot butter/oil mixture and spread out
bait by poking it around with the tip of the spoon. Get them one
bait thick. Thay can have holes in them, they can be big or small,
(I make them small and more plentiful and serve them as snack food
because I can really afford enough for "a feed")
Cook them until brown and crisp, drain briefly on paper towel.
Serving
Serve immediately with white bread and lemon, and for Betty's
sake give the mint sauce a go!
Roast Leg'o'sheep by Geva
Innes
Geva's recipe for a good roast is all in the killing of the animal. If you are about to kill your sheep, you already know more about it than me. Good luck.
Richard Till
Ingredients
- 1 leg of hogget.
- 3 lg onions
- 1/2 bottle of red wine, plus some more for gravy.
- Salt and pepper
- Flour for gravy
Method
This is important! Slice onions into thin crescents. Slices from
top to bottom rather than across into half rings. The onions break
down, sweeten and brown much more easily when cut this way.
Make a bed of onions in the roasting pan.
Season onions with 1 1/2 tsp salt.
Place leg on onions.
Tip over 1/2 a bottle of red wine.
Cover and seal tightly with foil.
Put into 160 C for 5 hours.
Loosen the foil in a corner, to allow steam to escape, for the last
hour.
Roast Vegetables
Method
Roast vegetables in a separate dish.
Cook in oil and spoon some fat from the meat dish, unless you are
fat phobic.
Season the vegetables by tossing them in 1/4 cup flour, 2 tsp
salt, and pepper to taste.
Get the oil/fat hot in the oven and then add the vegetables. I like
them crisp and well browned, so I put them in 2 hours before I'm
going to serve them.
Gravy
Method
Take meat from pan, cover and rest in warm place.
Carefully tip of excess fat, but leave some in the pan to brown the
flour in.
Put on an element and add flour (about 4 Tbl)
Cook, stirring and taking great care that nothing starts to burn in
the pan, for a minute, until the flour is cooked, then add water
and a cup of red wine.
Simmer, check seasoning, tip into gravy boat and lick pan.
Serving
Meat will cut with a blunt spoon.
Serve with roast vegetables, boiled peas, maybe a nice cauliflower
cheese, under a pool of gravy.
Spanish Cream
I used a recipe from a 1940s New Zealand Women's Institute recipe book and it is so close to Michael's it isn't worth quibbling about.
Ingredients
- 2 large eggs.
- 2 dessertspoons vanilla
- 2 cups milk
- 2 dessertspoons of gelatin dissolved in 1/4 cup boiling water.
- 1 Tbl vanilla (or to your taste)
Method
Separate eggs.
Set aside whites in a clean bowl.
Beat together the yolks and the sugar, and the vanilla.
Bring the milk to the boil and then beat together with the
yolks/sugar and vanilla.
Place back in pot on the stove for a short time, stirring
constantly.
You must be careful not to boil this! Just give it a little bit of
a cook, stirring constantly.
Take off the heat and add the gelatin (dissolved in 1/4 cup
boiling water.)
Combine and set aside to cool.
When cool, I'll put mine into the fridge until it it JUST about to
set, then
Beat up the egg white to stiff peaks and fold together with the
just-about-to-set vanilla custard.
Tip into a mold, be it fancy or just a glass bowl, set it in the
fridge to set fully.
Serving
Un-mold and serve by itself or with stewed fruit.
Note the sugar levels in this recipe are from a different era and
given our sugar heavy diets, may taste short on sweetness. I'd
suggest you double the sugar if you like your desserts sweet. Test
it at the custard time and add more while the custard is hot if you
find it too bland. Same for vanilla.
