pastry

Apple pie in the Aga

21 Comments / apples, pastry, pudding, The Ordinary Cook /

A lady called Una contacted me to ask how to cook an apple pie in the Aga as she could not find a recipe online. Well I do love apple pie, it definitely ranks up there as yet one more of my favourites ( well I like my food, so there are a lot of favourites).  So as soon as I was given some apples by a friend I made this and have now finally got around to blogging about it so hopefully rectifying Una’s dilemma.

Apple pies, in my opinion, need a shortcrust pastry and a good cooking apple – preferably a Bramley.  Now I like my apple pie to be on the tart side of things so I am more sparing with the sugar, if you prefer yours a little sweeter then add another 25g (1 oz) of sugar.  You can make shortcrust with all butter, but I do like it with half butter/ half shortening or lard.  Make sure both are straight from the fridge and that your hands are cool, as warm pastry is not a good thing.

50g (2oz) vegetable shortening or lard
50g (2oz) butter
225g (8oz) plain flour
203 tbsp of cold water

2-3 cooking apples, peeled, cored and cut into chunks
50-75g (2-3oz) granulated sugar

Method

If you are using a food processor then tip the flour into the bowl of the processor, add the diced butter and shortening/lard and pulse for a few seconds until the fat is incorporated into the flour and the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs.  Add 2 tbsp of water and pulse again (you may need a little extra water or not quite that much) until the mixture starts to come together.  Try not to over process, you need to stop as soon as it starts to come together. Remove the blade and form the mixture into two flattened discs. Wrap in clingfilm and place in the fridge for 30 minutes to chill.

If you aren’t using a food processor then make sure your hands are cool by running cold water over them.  Then place the flour and the diced fat into a bowl and using the tips of your fingers rub the fat into the flour until it resembles fine breadcrumbs.  Add the water and then mix using a pallet knife at first and then your hands until it is a smooth dough.  Try to handle it as little as possible.  Divide into two flattened discs and cover with clingfilm and refrigerate for 30 minutes.

You will need a pie dish or plate. Mine is 20cm in diameter and 3cm deep.

Remove the pastry from the clingfilm and lightly flour the worktop and your rolling-pin. Roll the first disc of pastry until it is big enough to cover the bottom and the sides of the dish. Press it carefully into the dish.  Place your chopped apples into the dish and sprinkle with the sugar.  Roll the second disc until it is large enough to cover the dish. Brush a little milk around the edges of the pastry and place the lid of pastry on top and crimp around the edge to form a seal with two fingers.  Cut off any excess pastry. You can brush the top with milk too.

Place the pie on the floor of the roasting oven of the Aga for about 20-25 minutes until the pastry is golden. In a conventional cooker, place in a preheated oven at 220°c for about the same amount of time. Allow to cool slightly before enjoying warm with lashings of cold double cream or custard. My mouth is watering at the very thought.

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Sausage and sage pie

11 Comments / pastry, pie, sausages, The Ordinary Cook /

This is one of my all time favourites.  I can’t remember a party from my childhood, or adulthood, when one of these beauties hasn’t been invited.  The pie in the picture is one of mum’s creations and it is from my mum that I have this recipe.  My mum makes the best sausage pies in the world!

I made one for a party we had over the May bank holiday weekend, but with all the pre party chaos I forgot to take a picture of my creation, so I have waited until my mum made her next sausage pie before posting this recipe.  Luckily for me she makes then quite often.

It is always popular and I rarely get a chance for leftovers.  It is important though that you get very good sausage meat from a very good butcher for this pie to be top notch.

500g ready-made all butter puff pastry
1 egg, lightly beaten, to glaze

1kg top quality sausage meat
6-7 tips of sage (by tip I mean the top 3 or 4 leaves of a sprig)
200g onion
salt and pepper

Method

If you don’t have a food processor then chop the onion and sage finely.  If you have a food processor, throw them both in and whizz until finely chopped.   Add them to the sausagemeat in a bowl, add a little salt and pepper and using your hands mix really well together.

Roll the puff pastry out into a large rectangle.  I forgot to measure mine to help with this but think about the baking tray you are going to use and it will probably be about the same size as that.

Place the sausagemeat in the centre of the pastry in a line, leaving an edge of about 3cm.

Fold the pastry over to meet at the top and crimp the edges well.  Place the pie onto a lightly greased baking tray and brush all over with a lightly beaten egg.  (You may have some spare pastry that you need to trim away.  If you do then brush this with egg and sprinkle with grated cheese and cut into fingers, place onto a greased baking sheet and cook for about 8-10 minutes for lovely cheese straws)

Place in a preheated oven at 220°c for about 30 minutes until golden brown.

You can serve this hot but I like it much better cold as the flavours really develop.

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Eccles cakes

8 Comments / cake, pastry /

My parents have an old friend who makes the most wonderful Eccles cakes.  Since I was little I have looked forward to the appearance of Joan’s old Roses tin with a batch of the most sublime cakes inside.  Her pastry is wonderful, so delicate, and that combined with the crunchy caramelised sugar topping and the sweet spicy bite of the currants and you are transported to cake heaven.

As a result of Joan’s marvellous cakes I have always been a bit put off from trying to make my own Eccles cakes in fear that they wouldn’t even come close to comparing to hers with her years of experience and pastry skills.

This weekend though I thought I would jump in at the deep-end and give it a go.  The girls were asking to make mince pies and the mincemeat from Christmas has all been used up.  I thought these may be an acceptable alternative.

I am really pleased with how they turned out and to my surprise they were nearly as good as Joan’s.  My youngest daughter, at three, surprised me with her pastry folding skills, some that she made were better than mine. It was a lovely way to spend an early Sunday morning.

I used Delia’s filling recipe as a basis for mine, but this did provide a little too much filling for the amount of pastry I had.  This isn’t too much of a problem though as I have just put the leftover filling in the fridge and I will make some more cakes with it, hopefully later today if I get a chance.  I have fetched it out of the fridge in anticipation.

Delia and Rachel Allen both use mixed peel, so you could substitute 50g (2oz) of the currants with mixed peel if you wanted to, but as I was trying to recreate Joan’s wonderful cakes and I have never discerned mixed peel in her filling I kept to a currants only filling.

500g (1lb 2oz) ready-made all-butter puff pastry (fully defrosted if frozen)

For the filling;

75g (3oz) butter
150g (5oz) soft brown sugar
200g (7oz) currants
1 tsp ground cinnamon
½ tsp freshly grated nutmeg
grated rind of 1 orange (or of 2 clementines)

For the glaze:

2 tbsp milk
2 tbsp demerara sugar

Method

To make the filling, melt the butter and add all the rest of the ingredients and mix well.  Leave to one side.

Roll the pastry to about 3 mm think and using a round cutter (mine is 8cm) cut out circles, re-rolling the dough as necessary.

Place a teaspoonful of filling on to each circle. Using a pastry brush, brush a little water all around the edge and fold one edge over to the other and seal well.  It should look like a little Cornish pasty at this stage.  Turn it over so that the seal is underneath and roll carefully with the rolling-pin to flatten it into a round.  Place on a baking sheet.  Repeat with all the other circles. Make three slashes in the top of each with a sharp knife and brush lightly with milk and sprinkle with the demerara sugar.

Bake in a preheated oven at 220°c (gas mark 7, roasting oven of the Aga) for 15 minutes or until golden brown.

Transfer to a wire rack to cool.

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Jam or lemon curd tarts

26 Comments / pastry /

It’s the simple things in life which bring us most pleasure! This is definitely the case when it comes to enjoying a jam and a lemon curd tart with a cup of tea. These tarts are very easy to make and taste delicious, especially if they are still a little warm from the oven.

We were making mince pies and I had some pastry left and my mum had given us a jar of her very lovely homemade lemon curd so these were begging to be made.  My eldest daughter loves lemon curd and my youngest loves jam, so I made some of each.

You can make the pastry with 50g of butter or you can use half butter and half lard, it will depend on what you have in the fridge or indeed whether you are catering for vegetarians. I used half lard and half butter this week as we always have lard in the fridge in the winter ready for making the birds some seed cake.

You can use whichever jam is your favourite.

This will make 12 tarts.

25 g (1oz) lard or vegetable fat
25g (1oz) butter
100g (40z) plain flour
cold water to mix ( about 2 tablespoons probably)

12 teaspoons of the jam or curd of your choice ( I used 6 teaspoons of raspberry jam and 6 teaspoons of lemon curd to make 6 tarts of each variety)

Method

I always make my pastry in my food processor because it means less handling and so a flakier pastry. Dice the butter and lard and place in the bowl of the food processor, add the flour and pulse the processor until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs.  Add the cold water and pulse again until a dough just begins to form.  Take the dough out of the machine and shape into a flattened ball.  Wrap in a food bag or clingfilm and place in the fridge to chill for 20 mins.  Roll out on a floured worktop and stamp out rounds using a 7cm fluted cutter.  Press each round into a hole of a patty tin. Place a teaspoon of jam in each tart.  Don’t overfill as the jam will spread as it cooks.

Place in a preheated oven at 200°c (gas mark 6) for 15 -20 minutes until the pastry is golden brown.  Leave to cool a little before placing on a wire tray.

The tarts ready for the oven

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