Trotter Gear, by Fergus Henderson

If you like pies and stews, and if you like adding that little bit of extra flavor to your hearty winter meals, then you should always have a jar of trotter gear in your fridge.

What exactly is Trotter Gear?
Trotter Gear is a rich gelatinous stock made out of pork trotters.

By adding Trotter Gear to stews, sauces or soups they become richer, creamier and more flavorful.

pig's trotters - they are in fact good for something.

I know, some of you may be grossed out by this, but I share Fergus Henderson's opinion of using all the parts of an animal, rather than just picking favorites or the best looking ones. 

A piece of steak to most people does not appear to be disgusting, at all. But pig's ears, bone marrow or beef tongue are? In the end you are eating parts of an animal, whether it is a filet mignon, trotters or gummi bears.

Don't get me wrong. I would never force someone to eat something they don't feel comfortable with.

In fact, I would have a hard time eating eyes for example. Actually, I don't think I could at all...

But I do think that by being aware where your steak and BBQ-ribs come from (a whole animal with eyes, a heart, organs and, yes, feelings) it allows you to respect and appreciate (animal) life and therefore your daily piece of meat much more.

So, here is what you need for Fergus Henderson's recipe of his so-called "Healthy Jar Of Trotter Gear":

pigs' trotters (all hair removed) 6
onions 2, peeled
carrots 2, peeled
celery 2 sticks
leeks 2, split
garlic 1 head
thyme a bundle
peppercorns a handful
Sercial Madeira ½ bottle (Sherry works fine, as well)
chicken stock enough to cover the trotters


Directions:

Shave the trotters! You want to get rid of all the stiff hairs...

Place the trotters in a large casserole. Cover with water and bring to the boil. Boil for 5 minutes then drain. This removes the initial scum given off by the trotters. 

Now place the blanched trotters in the pot with the vegetables, thyme, peppercorns and Madeira and cover with the stock. Cook for at least 3 hours until the trotters are totally giving. At this point, strain the cooking liquid and keep. 

After 3 hours the pig's trotter has mutated into an alien and is ready to get pulled apart...

When the trotters are cool enough to handle (but don't let them go cold, as they become much harder to deal with), pick all the flesh, fat and skin off them tearing the skin to shreds. 

I love pulling all the flesh, skin and fat off the bone

Add to the cooking liquid, seal in a jar and refrigerate. 

You now have trotter gear – giving, wobbly trotter captured in a splendid jelly.

For more information on Fergus Henderson and how to eat the whole beast check out his books
'Nose To Tail Eating: A Kind Of British Cooking' and 'Beyond Nose To Tail', as well as his restaurant St. John in London.

Duck Breast With Winter Spice Rub And Maple Syrup Glaze

If Wil and I were to create a hitparade of meats, beef would be No.1 directly followed by duck  at second place, game ranging somewhere in the middle...
Anyways: DUCK!
We've been eating so much duck breast lately and have constantly been trying to perfect our cooking method.
Oh, how much I love duck!

We served the duck breast on arugula salad.

Preparing a duck breast is pretty simple.

First thing to do is to throw on the broiler in your oven cause we want to crisp up the skin in the end.
Now prick the skin of your duck breast with a fork. The easiest way to do this is to lift up a section of skin with two fingers and push one of the fork tines through the lifted skin horizontally. That way you avoid damaging the meat.


















After you have pricked the breast skin several times rub with salt, pepper and/or a spice rub. You can be completely creative in this. Given that christmas is approaching we decided to rub it with a mix of ground cinnamon, clover, salt, pepper and crushed juniper.


Heat up the pan to the lowest temperature possible. That would be 1 on our oven.

Now place the breast skin-side down in a pan. Greasing the pan is not necessary, but if it makes you feel better, you can slightly grease the pan with olive oil...

It is very important that the temperature stays low. We don't even want to hear a sizzle!

We just want to let the breast sweat out all the unnecessary fat. Sear for approx. 20 minutes.

Flip the duck breast and sear on the other side for 3 more minutes.

Remove all the surplus fat from the pan by draining it into an empty jar. 

Slightly brush the skin with some maple syrup, honey or orange jam (approx. 1-2Tbsp)

Now put the duck breast skin-side up in the top shelf of the oven and let it broil on high upper heat for about 2-4 minutes. Watch carefully because the skin will easily burn.

Pull the duck breast out of the oven and let it rest for about 6-10 minutes. Then slice and serve.

The duck breast should now be perfectly medium to medium-rare!

Quak.

Notes:

While the duck breast is resting, you can make a nice quick sauce from some of the remaining fat and spices in the pan.

Just add some red wine (and broth if you have some) and some mustard powder and let reduce over medium heat until thickened. Season with salt, pepper and other spices if necessary.

Making yoghurt!

One of the first things I realized after moving to Canada was that it seems to be incredibly hard to find good yoghurt here. 

Whether you look at the dairy section at Coop, Sobeys or Safeway, most yoghurts here either have 0% or 1% fat. 

You can even get Greek Yoghurt with 0% fat (???). That, my dear friends, is not yoghurt. This is bullshit.

Well, I can hear you saying: But we do have 10% Greek Yoghurt, as well! 

That is correct, but have you risked a look at the ingredients list? 

Most of them are made with skim milk (powder) and other awful things. 

No whole milk or cream at all! 

I even once bought a vanilla yoghurt that didn't have vanilla aromas in it, but caramel flavoring (???).

Ok, yoghurt should always, ALWAYS be made of whole milk, means the fat content should be at least at around 3.5%.

I read that you can use milk powder to thicken the yoghurt and make it creamier.

I prefer letting the culture grow for longer, straining it and/or replacing parts of the milk with cream.

Homemade yoghurt can be a bit runnier, indeed. But it's still yoghurt and tastes fantastic.

Making your own yoghurt is fairly easy. And no, you don't need one of those bulky yoghurt machines to do it.
All you need to do is to make sure that you follow the instructions correctly, that your preserving jars are clean and sterilized,
and that you use exceptional good yoghurt and whole milk.


For 1l of homemade yoghurt all you need is:

2-3 tbsp plain yoghurt made of whole milk
1l whole milk
preserving jars

Sterilize your preserving jars and the lids by putting them in a sink with boiling water.
A few minutes should be ok. You can also wait until the water has cooled of a bit.
That way you don't burn your hands. Let them dry completely.

Heat up the milk to about 35-38°C/95-100°F.

Then stir in the yoghurt.

Fill everything in the preserving jars, close the lids and put the yoghurt at a warm spot for at least 8 hours.
I usually let it sit for about 24hours. That helps making the yoghurt firmer and thicker.
You can wrap the jars in a towel and put it next to the heater or even put them in your bed with a hot-water bottle next to it.
Just make sure that the yoghurt doesn't get hotter than 50°C/122°F!

Once you have yoghurt, you may want to strain it (not always necessary) to get rid of surplus whey,
in ordert o make the yoghurt firmer.
Let it chill in the fridge for a couple of hours and it's ready to be enjoyed.

Eat it plain or add fruits, granola, sugar or maple syrup...whatever you prefer!

The yoghurt cultures you grew by making your own yoghurt will last 5-7 yoghurt-making sessions.

Notes:

As you can see, making yoghurt is really easy. Still, sometimes it just won't work, for a reason. Could be the milk, could be that the yoghurt you bought wasn't fresh enough, the jars were dirty or something went wrong with the temperature. I don't know.
Just try again! I promise it works.

Instead of using store bought yoghurt you can use yoghurt cultures.
They come in a bag, are usually more expensive, harder to get (I saw them on ebay), but the result may be firmer and more dense and intense...

Pumpkin Pie and Northern Lights

As you all know from one of my earlier posts I made a ton of pumpkin puree the other day.
In order to give all that left-over puree a good home I decided to be a good North american immigrant and bake a classic pumpkin pie.
Therefore I dug out a pretty good recipe on the internet, for both, a crunchy pie crust that won't get soggy and a delicious pie filling and topping.
I altered the pie filling and topping a tiny little bit, and it turned out delicious!

For the pie crust you'll need:
(the pie crust can be made two weeks ahead)

2 1/4 cups all purpose flour

1/4 cup sugar

1/4 teaspoon fine sea salt

1 cup (2 sticks) chilled unsalted butter, cut into small cubes

1/4 cup (or more) ice water

Combine first 3 ingredients. Add butter. Using your hands, knead everything until crumbly. Sprinkle with 1/4 cup ice water; mix until dough is even, adding more ice water by teaspoonfuls if dough is dry. For two 12-inch round crusts, divide dough in half. Roll out each dough half on floured surface to 12-inch round. Wrap each crust in plastic, then foil, and freeze. Thaw in refrigerator overnight before using.

When preparing the crust, preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F. Transfer crust to 9-inch pie dish. Fold edges under and crimp decoratively. Evenly prick crust with a fork several times. Freeze crust 20 minutes. 

Line crust with nonstick foil and fill with dried beans or pie weights. Bake until crust is set, about 20 minutes. Gently remove foil and beans. Return crust to oven and bake until partially cooked and golden brown around edges, pressing down on crust with back of spoon if bubbles form, about 15 minutes. Cool crust on rack. Maintain oven temperature.

For the pie filling of one 30cm/12inch pie crust (which will fit into a 20-24cm/9inch pie dish) you'll need:

1 cup (packed) golden brown sugar

• 2 large eggs
• 1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
• 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla extract
• a dash of allspice
• a dash of ground nutmeg
• a squeeze of lemon juice
• 1 cup pumpkin puree
• 1 cup heavy whipping cream

Whisk brown sugar, eggs, sea salt, cinnamon, vanilla extract, allspice, nutmeg, lemon juice and cloves in medium bowl. 

Add pumpkin and cream and whisk until well blended and smooth.

Pour filling into crust. Bake pie until filling is firm, covering crust with foil collar if browning too quickly, about 30 minutes.

For the topping I used roasted and ground pumpkin seeds and some leftover dough for decoration.

But as the original recipe suggests you can also use walnut pieces or any other nuts...

Sprinkle topping evenly over top of pie. Reduce oven temperature to 160°C/325°F; continue to bake pie until filling is set and slightly puffed in center, about 15 minutes longer. Transfer pie to rack and cool completely. 

Serve!

Note:

I know it's not as orange and bright colored as the pumpkin pie fillings you get when using canned pumpkin puree. But it tastes way better, and you actually know what you're eating...

PS:

We saw Northern Lights over Calgary last night! So beautiful...

Meanwhile In Our Garden...

This morning we had a visitor in our garden. It's not the first time him or his other friends popped by. 

But today I was actually able to capture him with my camera.

Him and his buddies are after the last crabapples hanging in our tree. 

For the winter we decided to tolerate the visits. 

But in spring we'll need to figure out how to keep them from eating our veggies...

If he only knew how much we like deer...for dinner...