The Cookery Thread

[gill216]

Two more tortilla bread wrap ideas. I've taken these straight off the back of the packet I just bought so I can't recommend them as yet. I'm sure any ingredients would work well in either but I think cheese is a must for number 2..

1. Rolled club sandwich. Arrange lettuce over the wrap leaving about an inch around the edges. Put chicken and tomatoes across the middle of the wrap from one side to the other. Fold one side of the wrap inwards to cover the ingredients. Now put cheese and ham on top of that and fold the other side of the wrap to cover.

Cut the rolled sandwich into pieces and hold together with a cocktail stick. Discard the roll ends.

2. Quesadilla stack. Heat the oven to 180'C. Use a baking tray big enough to hold the wrap flat. Coat 2 wraps with spready cheese, tomato paste, herbs or what ever and put one of those wraps on the baking tray. Add ingredients (something and cheese) and place an uncoted wrap on top. Add more filling on top of that, then put the the other coated wrap on top. Sprinkle with more cheese and bake until the cheese is melted (8-10 mins). Cut into wedges and serve.

[LAT]

Anyone got any good recipes involving cooking apples? I'm OVERWHELMED with cooking apples and have so many I don't know what to do with them all!

Lucky you!
Almost everything I have tried to grow this year has been a dismal failure. Not sure what I've been doing wrong.

[Bunnylump]

This isn't even my apple tree, it belongs to the old lady next door. She lives alone and always insists we have all the apples which grow over our garden. I'm getting to the stage of being all "appled out". I have NEVER seen the tree have so many apples ever before. Bizarrely, I have also had hundreds of tomatoes too, but my carrots all went weird and my spring onions and rhubarb all died. Must be a fruity year...

Gill, does it matter if it's cheap brandy you use for apple brandy (it's not something I usually drink, so only have some fairly cheap stuff)?

[LAT]

hrmph.
If I'm lucky I'll get about 10 tomatoes total out of about 9 or 10 plants. And they are tiny ones too.

[Bunnylump]

That is so odd. I never have tomato success. But this year they have been unbelievable. Seriously, I must have had at least 60 tomatoes just off one plant, and there are still loads to go. I've also grown peppers for the first time, and there are about 8 peppers growing per plant. Mind you I don't know if we'll have enough sun left for them to ripen enough.

[LAT]

Whereas I have a few chillies and peppers that are only just starting to form. They certainly won't ripen.

[Bunnylump]

Obviously it's the Mediterranean climate we have here in Hemel Hempstead...

[giraffe]

I'm still drowning in cucumbers and raspberries. I've given so many cucumbers away because we just can't eat them fast enough.

[LAT]

Must be my ungreen fingers I guess. I've just been having to buy everything. Bar a few potatoes which did moderately well.

[gill216]

For Bunny- I meant to say to use cheap brandy. In fact use cheap spirit of any kind if you are making fruity spirits. Apple gin or vodka would be nice too.

[LAT]

Apple vodka is lovely. Makes a really refreshing drink with lemonade. About the only way I drink lemonade!

[Bunnylump]

Have you ever tried Chilli vodka? Sounds bizarre, but it's alarmingly moreish!! I wouldn't ever have bought it, but I went to a party for a friend who employs lots of Latvians and Estonians. He likes employing them because they work really hard and never complain. There were a number of them at said party, and I think it is also true to say that they REALLY know how to party. They had bought lots of Chilli vodka, and were insisting everyone tried it. I tried rather a lot of it, as I recall...

[LAT]

Oh yes, I used to really like that too but I haven't had any for years and years. I think we first bought some on a visit to Russia about 25 or more years ago!

[gill216]

Update on the strawberry brandy and a bit of advice please. The brandy is dripping through my jelly bag very nicely now. Give it another month or so and it will be dynamite by xmas. Its a lovely reddish colour and one sip was enough to blow my head off. Very small measures I think.

What I have left is the strawberries I originally put into the brandy. They are wicked in themselves .

What I want to know is how much of a boozy trifle I can freeze and keep. I was thinking of making cup cake trifles. A bit of sponge and a bit of pulped boozy strawbs. Making some strawberry jelly out of the remains of my summer produce, topping with custard and whipped cream. At what point int do I stop before I start freezing? I can cook/bake but freezing leaves me in a quandary!

[Bunnylump]

I would be very careful with anything with custard or cream. That's the kind of thing which could go horribly wrong, I would have thought. Not that I've ever tried freezing trifle, mind. But cream can definitely go a bit of an odd consistency.

[gill216]

Yes, plan B I think.
I have the sponge and boozy strawberries setting in jelly and I'm going to make custard soft scoop ice cream for a topping. Then I'm going to stick them on a baking tray to freeze. I'll let you know how they turn out!

I've also made a Bavarian griestorte. Cake without flour or butter. Wow, I think it might be gone before anyone else has a chance to taste.

[Bunnylump]

This is going to sound like a strange thing to say, but has anyone tried roasting cauliflower before? I often roast things like peppers, aubergines, courgettes, onions, carrots etc., but I'd never thought of trying cauliflower. I popped raw cauliflower on a baking tray along with some cold new potatoes in their skins, some trout (wrapped in foil, in the middle, with a little lime juice on it) and sprinkled a little bit of olive oil and some Bratkartofel (German spice mix, but I would think any herbs you fancy would be just as good) and just stuck the lot in a hot oven for about half an hour. It was really, really easy, and really, really yummy. And virtually no washing up, too.

[Laura]

Not tried it, but I'm afraid in my world, the only reason for eating cauliflower is as an excuse for eating all the lovely cheesy sauce! Can't see the point in it otherwise!!!

[Bunnylump]

Yes, but that's probably because you've always boiled it. It's MUCH nicer when it's roasted - sort of crisp and caramelised. But then I'm not a fan of boiling most vegetables - a little overcooking and they are just horrid, tasteless mush. I prefer to eat them raw.

[clvrlad]

Yes, but that's probably because you've always boiled it. It's MUCH nicer when it's roasted - sort of crisp and caramelised. But then I'm not a fan of boiling most vegetables - a little overcooking and they are just horrid, tasteless mush. I prefer to eat them raw.

but thats english cooking ....and you are a rabbit really