For my last
birthday I was given a beautiful Nose to Tail cookbook by a good friend (the
one with the weird egg intolerance), so thus inspired I decided to have an Offally
Good Luncheon and invite all my girlfriends round (Himself was off golfing in
Tasmania, much to his relief). The date
was set, invites sent out and goodies ordered from F&B. The menu was a challenge – stuff that was
using secondary cuts but which would still be mainstream delicious and not too
challenging visually, to eat. To be
honest, I’m not a big offal person; I find organs very hard going indeed (with
the exception of pate, but I actually had to teach myself to like it so there
you go).
After much
deliberation and dithering I decided on the following menu:
Pho Jelly with
Oxtail Croquettes
Brawn on Toast with
Crispy Ear Salad
Crispy Rabbit with
Truffled Chips
Beetroot Sorbet
with Dark Chocolate Chips
Cheese
Put my order in
with F&B and excitedly awaited my box.
Box came, everything as ordered including a pig’s head sawn in half – incredibly
confronting! Damn thing watches you as you walk around the room like a well-painted
portrait. But not to be deterred I froze
one half and put the other half in the fridge in an empty vegetable crisper
awaiting transformation into something beautiful1. The issue with dishes like brawn and pho is
the sheer amount of time they take to cook.
Obviously when these dishes were invented:
a. You couldn’t afford
to waste anything, what with you being starving and all, and
b. You had plenty
of time on your hands when these things were invented/cooked (no boring office
job for them).
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| Oxtail looking decidedly unattractive |
I alas, do not have
plenty of time on my hands but luckily did decide on a Sunday Luncheon because
I ended up cooking from Friday night to Sunday lunch pretty much straight. Am I exhausted? Totally.
I was planning on
cooking my oxtail for my beef croquettes on Friday night when I suddenly
realised I’D FORGOTTEN TO ORDER OXTAIL. Bugger.
So I let my fingers do the walking and found a butcher near work who had
them in stock. Funny thing about oxtail,
every cow has one, people hardly use them (and if they do it’s more in the
winter than the summer) and yet butchers don’t always stock them. The ones at the butcher I found were actually
fresh and unsliced, so I asked for one, cut into pieces. I had a work colleague with me when I
ordered; he looked a little dubious when it was taken out. I told him “fear not!
When cooked it is a thing of beauty, a more unctuous, melting stewing beef you
cannot buy.”
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| Starting the pho stock |
So oxtail in hand2
I returned to work then finally after a long day trotted off home (after dropping Himself off at the
airport) and put the oxtail on to cook (I will put the recipes online
soon). Oxtail takes an age but I just
left it alone to simmer in water and got on with the pho stock, which is a two-day
process. I used Luke Nguyen’s recipe (of
Red Lantern fame) for the pho stock. Back
to the oxtail… After it was cooked I
stripped the meat and fat off the bone and left it in a bowl covered in its
broth to keep the meat moist until I was ready to make the amazeballs3
filling. The pho stock was left
simmering on a very low heat overnight.
On Saturday morning the house smelt strongly of the simmering stock, a
fairly funky smell I have to admit. Not
to be deterred I continued with the stock.
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| Rabbit hiding in trotter gear |
Happily, BFF had
offered to be my sous chef for the weekend, which was great. Her Saturday consisted of racing around
trying to find things for me I’d forgotten or needed – her most important trip
was finding me a nice new shiny stock pot as I did not own a pot big enough to
contain even half a pig’s head – who knew?
There was lots of picking over bones and simmering of meats. The Rabbit was confit in ‘Trotter Gear’ which
is pig’s trotters simmered in stock and Madeira and then cooked until soft,
bones removed, rest retained as a vehicle for confit. As an aside, I really don’t enjoy jointing
rabbits or chickens, but only because I don’t have a cleaver so it’s very hard
work for me. The doggies and cat did
enjoy the rabbit’s kidneys though, which I removed, along with the suet fat
before jointing them. The pho was then finished4
so I clarified with egg whites then put in the chest freezer for a few hours so
I could remove the very substantial layer of fat. Once I removed the fat it was ready to make
into jelly and also for use in the amazeballs.
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| It's amazing how that eye watches you... and check out my new pot!! |
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| Jelly Pho Teacups |
For the amazeballs
I gently re-heated the oxtail to melt the gelatine that had set around the meat
then strained off the liquid. I made a
roux and whisked in some pho to make a thick sauce. Stirred through the oxtail and put it all in
the fridge to set overnight. I then made
the pho jelly using gelatine leaves and poured the jelly into teacups to set
(it was a ladies luncheon after all!)
After that the pig’s
head was ready to be brawnafied. So once
again, picking over bones (this time the head), peeling the tongue and dicing
the cheek and jowl meat. After browsing
through some other recipes I decided to mix through some finely chopped curly
parsley – I’m glad I did, it really gave the flavour a lift, plus I added some
coarsely ground white pepper corns. The
meat was placed into a plastic lined loaf mould then the reduced cooking liquid
poured over the top. Finally ready to put
the brawn in the fridge to set overnight.
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| Brawn ready for the fridge |
A lot was achieved
on Saturday, but by the time it was dinner I couldn’t face any kind of meat. My kitchen was covered in a layer of animal
fat and my pots were filthy. I Loaded up
the dishwasher, cleaned down the benches and decided to order my favourite Gnocchi
Royale from Mama Barone’s in Mortdale (which BFF was awesome enough to pick up
for me on her way back over with a bottle of wine) hooray! I passed out at 9:30…
Sunday morning and
I woke at 7:30 and bounced5 out of bed. BFF and I had done a list the night before of
things left to do and last minute shopping.
Before she arrived I crumbed the amazeballs and shredded the pigs ears…
the end was nigh! We raced out to get
boring stuff like flour and oil, but also cool stuff like white material for a
table cloth (which still needs to be hemmed!) and a candelabrum. We’d decided Vinnies was the place to go for kitsch
candelabras6 so in we went.
Success!! A lovely Czech Crystal jobbie.
Perfect. Once home the candelabra
was washed and polished the put on the ‘tablecloth’ ohmigod, it looked
beautiful! What a revelation, it looks gorgeous!! I think I’ll keep it!!
BFF crumbed the
rabbit while I crispified the pig’s ears and blanched the chippies in the
mammoth pot. Just in time we finished
for the other girls to arrive. After a
cheeky drink, I was back to the kitchen to fry the amazeballs. Once fried they were cracked open and popped
onto the pho jelly. They looked really
pretty and were a hit (but this is a tried and tested recipe, so no surprises
there). Lots of gossiping and catching
up was going on. I tore myself away for
the next course primping and presentation.
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| Pho Jelly Cups with Amazeballs |
The big moment, it
was time to turn out the brawn, I had a taste – delicious! phew! What a relief, or it would have been a salad
course. The idea was to win people over,
not scar them for life. I cooked some toasts and cut them into hearts with a
biscuit cutter. I then cut the brawn
with the same cutter to fit on top (very pretty!) and served with a radicchio
and baby spinach salad, topped with the crispy ears. It also went down well, with everyone
surprised about where the meat had actually come from (we are so sanitised in
our eating) except for my one English friend who knew exactly what it was and
was still happy to hoe in. It was at
this time that I explained they had eaten nose (snout in brawn) and tail (in
amazeballs) best not to let these things out of the bag too quickly one
finds. Girls were happy, brawn was
eaten. Again, more drinking and
gossiping. Another reluctant retreat to the kitchen.
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| Brawn at its most beautiful |
The chips and rabbit were
served with aplomb on share platters on the table along with more salad and
lots more wine. A ketchup heart was
squeezed onto each plate (home-made ketchup from an earlier FBJ adventure).
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| A Cheeky Pink Tongue |
Finally, groaning
we turned our attention to dessert. I
had decided to go simple and had made a beetroot sorbet (will also attach
recipe), which had dark chocolate chips through it. I should have taken it out of the freezer
earlier, it was more like a granita than a sorbet but a fantastic colour and
the flavour was certainly different and delicious. A lot of time was spent admiring the colour
of each other’s tongues after finishing the sorbet.
We finished on a
high7 note of cheese. I love
cheese plates but they can add up as good cheese is expensive, so I got around
that by asking the girls to bring 150g of their favourite cheese. Unbelievably, every cheese was different and
they were all delicious! All served on
the gorgeous camphor laurel cutting board the Wee Girl gave me for my birthday. The cheese came from all over with the
highlight being cheese fresh from overseas (Tasmania).
The wine was
finally finished and everyone departed (very full) at about 5pm. What a lovely Sunday afternoon! Also, being the considerate friends they are
they had washed as we ate so the kitchen was almost clean.
Would I do it
again? Probably not all those things at the same time – way too labour
intensive, but I will do the brawn again for my Dad, he will love it. The pho is definitely also worth the
effort. The chips? Of course! And the
rabbit was delicious – although I think I would ask for it to be jointed for me! The dogs did enjoy the discards though, especially
the brawn trimmings on their biscuits for dinner!
A long blog for a
long three days… J
1. Anything
was an improvement to be honest
2. I
wished it wasn’t cut up – I could have practiced my lightsabre moves on the way
back to the office
3.
You could call them croquettes – but
when you taste them you’ll understand
4. OHMIGOD MULTI-TASKING HELL
4. OHMIGOD MULTI-TASKING HELL
5. Only
very small bounces
6. To
be returned after the luncheon
7.
Stinky
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