Cider

There are a few avenues that can be used to justify the brewing of cider... The fact that the colleges alcohol ban has just been lifted, I come from the west country so it's almost mandatory, we were given a crate of pairs for free or the fact that brewing alcohol has been a tradition within Christian institutes  for centuries. But the fact that it is just an interesting/amusing thing to do was probably a more significant factor in this evenings activities.

It takes a surprisingly short amount of time to conceptualise, plan and execute the production of cider. From the discovery that a crate of pears was up for grabs to sealed jars of pear juice waiting to ferment was no more than an hour. Tidy work for a Wednesday evening.

While making cider is an art form; developed, tweaked and perfected by professionals (monks) over the years it is actually very simple to make a plain old brew. With a 5 minute google search it is easy to find a recipe that involves less than 3 ingredients (results may vary)

Of course when a whole crate of fruit presents itself, it comes with the opportunity to experiment! For the first batch we decided to go purist - no added yeast, nothing fancy just pear juice and touch of sugar... okay a fist full of sugar.

Things seemed to go our way, we happened upon an old juicer (it required a thorough cleaning) which saved us the curfuffle of pressing the pears by hand. In hindsight it would have probably been a pretty spectacular fail if we hadn't found the juicer.

Juicing pretty much anything tends to leave one in possession of rather a lot of pulp, we have thought about it a bit and a few ideas have been banded about including pear flavored home made sausages, pear jam, pear cake?! Anyway if you have a good idea for what to do with it and better still if you can provide proper instructions/ recipe then maybe we will make it ... maybe.

Until then David is going to have to figure out a green solution for disposing of it.

This is the slightly disgusting-looking result of 'juicing' the pairs... then just to sieve and store it

In other news our South African got bored of waiting and raided our warm dry cupboard full of meat ... the results were rather enjoyable...

So now you can know that the instructions in my previous post do actually result in delicious biltong. We now have room to experiment with some more exotic recipes.

Title font used: 'Lost Highway' 

Biltong

My time in South Africa gave me a taste for a number of different things but among the most treasured flavours lies biltong. South Africa is famed for its love of red meat (something that I get along with just fine) and it is therefore unsurprising that they have managed to produce some of the more creative ways of preparing it. At its invention biltong was purely a practical solution to the problem of storing meat for long periods of time without the ability to freeze it. What it has now become is something of an art form of infusing meat with the richest and most mouth watering flavours. 

For this reason when a friend at college asked me if I would be interested in constructing a 'biltong box' it didn't really require much deliberation. (Yes he is a South African)

While meat in the UK is still WAY more expensive than it is in SA it is still significantly cheaper to make your own biltong than it is to buy it from a south African food dealer - plus it is a lot more fun.

So before term started we decided to get the real work out of the way first and construct ourselves a biltong box and put it to use. As I type 2kgs of beef is gently marinating in the fridge patiently waiting to get strung up and dried out. 

Making biltong is actually very easy and taking inspiration from another friend who likes to blog about her recipes I though I would give you a little run down of how to produce this legendary snack ...

Constructing the box:

• a cardboard box
• some doweling
• some form of hook (we are using paperclips) 
• a fan
• a dry, well ventilated room
• some duct tape (endlessly useful)

The idea is to construct a small structure that allows you to hang pieces of meat that will be able to dangle freely without being contaminated with bugs, dust or any other less tasty substance.

We simply poked doweling through both sides of the cardboard box and taped up all the joins to make it more stable.

Cutting a hole that the fan will blow through to circulate air

Preparing the meat:

Beef is a pretty safe bet and you should probably stick to that, get as much or as little as you want but it is likely that whatever amount you buy you will later regret not getting more.

• Salt (really quite a lot but it depends on the amount of meat you have)
• Spices - this is where it gets fun because you can really do whatever you want, whatever you think will taste good as a marinade then you can use that. A fairly safe bet is to go for black pepper, whole coriander and chili powder but many will also add vinegar sugar and a whole host of other ingredients.

First cut your meat into ribbons, the size will probably depend to the size of your box but a decent steak thickness should be about right. Place the meat into a tray for marinating. Rub the salt evenly into the meat, now take your various spices and rub them in too.
If you do use black pepper it is best to get the actual seeds and crush them with a pestle and mortar rather than using a pepper mill as this will be too fine, the same goes for the whole coriander.

Put the tray into a fridge (cling film it unless you want your fridge to stink of meat) and leave it there for a day or two. Now take it out and hang it in your box and leave it to dry for between 5-10 days depending on how dry you want it.

You can also simply search for others biltong recipes to find one that takes your fancy more than this one - there are a whole host of them out there.



Title font used: 'Ultimate Midnight'

Home

If you know me then you know I have recently moved out of my parents and in with Dave (the living legend) Hewer. This transition has been just about as much fun as I had anticipated and also just the amount of effort I had been expecting but it all comes with the territory.

One of this weeks discoveries: the bright side to dampness. The flat we are in is prone to some pretty bad damp as it's in an old building, we knew this before we moved in so no big deal but one thing I had not foreseen was the view of sunset from the bay window in it's overly condensed state.

The above is looking down our street from the window at sunset with the drops of water setting off the bokeh.

Oh and as promised :- the pumpkin scones turned out beautifully ... Well done Helen

Halloween

I can't remember ever doing Halloween, I have never been over keen on eating my own body weight in sweets and generally fancy dress is not my thing. That and my parents saw no point in it, not that they discouraged me from celebrating it but more that they just never encouraged it.

Any way carving pumpkins is a pretty novel thing for me as I had never done it before now (at least I don't recall ever doing it) and to be honest seems pretty pointless when you consider the time and money put into it (really not a lot) and the amount of time it serves it's purpose (maybe 4-5 days?)

So you may be asking "Why did you do it then Ben, why!?" well let me tell you ...

Pumpkins - strange as it may sound - are actually edible and it happened to come up in conversation that my new flat mate Helen had always wanted to make pumpkin scones. So, not being one to hinder an entrepreneurial baker I seized the opportunity to produce a flat bonding session that combined perfectly with me being able to eat and purchased 3 pumpkins at 80p a piece.

(which makes me wander how much they are when it's not Halloween because those prices have to be inflated or the person running the veg shop has no business sense.)


So if you're thinking "Wielding a knife with no particular skill in an attempt to carve a scary looking face out of a fairly tough vegetable with 2 other people doing the same thing in close proximity is a recipe for disaster endless entertainment." Then you are on about the same lines as me.

This one was Daves' first attempt (he is my other flat mate in case you hadn't picked that up) and I think it's rather wonderful. Interestingly, upon completion of this creation Dave notified me that the good thing about carving pumpkins is that you can pop a face on the other side if your first one wasn't so great. which he promptly began to do ...

This was my first attempt and yes that huge slice down its face which I have tried to carry off as a scar was actually my first cut which was meant to be the length of the right eye ... yea, moving on.

No points for guessing who designed this. This was actually Helens second attempt - I didn't even take a picture of the first, in fairness she was using a blunt knife. For this one she drew the face on at which point I offered to do the cutting in the interest of everybody involved.

So in both of the above from left to right it goes Ben - Helen - Dave.

The pumpkin scones have not yet been made but an update will follow on that one, hopefully soon.
So far Plan Pumpkin - Success!
Happy Halloween everybody.

Title font used 'October crow'