Birthday Dinner Fun (AKA Neck is the New Shank)

It was Himself’s birthday a couple of weeks ago so of course a three course meal was on the cards.  I needed it to be fairly simple as I’ve been a little under the weather, but awesome anyway.  The first hurdle in my grand plans was that Himself’s birthday was on football training night, would he sacrifice football for food? The question was presented.  The answer that came back in short order was ‘yes’ but then he had to arrange an alternative coach (alas, he also coaches said team).  So he called a mate and explained.  With much disgust on their part they responded...

“What do you mean you can’t come?”

“Well, the wife said she was cooking me birthday dinner so training is out”

“Oh, under the thumb are we?”

“Is it any different in your house?”

The sound of crickets greeted him…

“Thought so – well, enjoy training, see you on Saturday”

Truffled fadge, bacon and eggs

But enough about Himself, back to me.  I decided that for something really fun I’d made a teeny tiny Ulster Fry to start with, truffled fadge (Irish potato bread – usually not truffled but if you can’t improve on perfection what’s the point of cooking?), soft boiled quail eggs and Flying Pig maple bacon.  To make fadge you start with mashed potato, mix in butter (or in my case truffle oil), salt and flour until your mix becomes soft dough.  Knead and roll out into little rounds.  Cut the rounds into six or eight pie shaped pieces, depending on how big (or small) they are and then cook in some oil in a frypan until golden.  Here’s the trick though.  You have to let them cool down completely and then they need to be re-fried again just before serving.  Apparently it’s just not the same otherwise.  As I wanted to lean the bacon across the fadge at a jaunty angle I needed it to be flat, SO in the interests of attractiveness I cooked the bacon in the oven between two baking sheets until they were crispy (and flat).  I cooked the quail eggs for 2 min 30 seconds (for a soft boil) and put them straight into cold water so they stopped cooking.  Fried up the fadge then placed it all artfully on a plate with dots of HP Sauce down the side.  It was a huge winner – Himself loved the fadge (I have had fadge failures in the past, so high praise indeed) and it made for a quirky starter.

Brown and remove the lamb

For the main, a simple slow cooked lamb was on the cards, maximum flavour for minimal effort.  A big family favourite is a Gordon Ramsey Slow Cooked Lamb Shanks recipe, but as lamb shanks appear to be the ‘new black’ the cost has shot up along with demand.  So I decided to be sneaky and use neck instead.  It cooks up exactly the same, and while you don’t get the nice white bone for show, if you slip the meat off the bone when it’s cooked and serve it in its syrupy sauce no-one’s the wiser ;-) tastes the same and half the price.

Cook up the vegies then return the lamb
with wine and stock - cook 3 hours

So I cooked up the meat and served it with a white bean mash.  I think, on reflection, that some crusty bread would have been a great crunchy, textural addition but in the interests of eating three courses I didn’t think we needed the extra filler.  Of course the family agreed about the lack of texture (great, Greg and John are back) but were also very interested in scoffing dessert so didn’t complain too loudly.

Macerating the strawberries

Dessert was Himself’s favourite – pavlova! And a simple pavlova indeed, individual nests with macerated strawberries and cream. Devine and deceptively simple – make up your meringue mix (I have a secret ingredient to make mine uber delicious – don’t ask, it’s my secret and the guarantee of a long and happy marriage) and bake.  Quarter the strawberries and macerate in lemon juice and caster suger for several hours.  Just before serving add a slosh of red wine (I left the wine out for the Wee Girl’s – not that you can taste it but she’s a bit of a nanna when it comes to things like that) and some freshly whipped cream.  I’ve stopped buying thickened cream now, I only go with the single cream, it doesn’t take long to whip and doesn’t contain weird stuff like gelatine – just saying.

Anyhoo, huge success, they all loved it - yet another home run by Team FBJ.

Stop Being so Spineless!

I hate jointing chickies.  When I use chicken shears it makes my hands hurt.  I think I suffer from mild carpal tunnel syndrome or RSI or harden the f**k up or something, so the cutting action hurts me.  But I also don’t like only buying chicken joints as a. they’re more expensive and b. it’s that whole ‘use the whole animal’ issue I’ve got going on.  So I ordered two chickies from F&B and asked if they’d joint them into breasts and marylands for me.  Due to my unhappy jointing history I also know that when you joint a chickie you’re left with almost the entire back unused.  So I asked them to keep this for me thinking I’d use it for stock or to give to the doggies as a treat.

Too good to give away...

When I picked up my order and brought it home I noticed HOW MUCH delicious meat was left on the chickies’ spines! I couldn’t waste it by giving it to the doggies or using it for stock (besides, I already had lots of stock from a roast chickie the week before) so I decided to channel my inner Indian and use it to make a delicious Biryani.  Indians use meat with bones a lot in their cooking (so Pushpesh Pant tells me) not the sanitized, boneless bits of meat for them, like we get in the local Indian takeaway.

For the doggies!

When I weighed up the left overs there was over a kilo there! So I set to cutting the actual meatless bones off (and giving those to the doggies – they didn’t complain) and chopping up the rest into bits of meat with the bones still intact, this also included the wings, which had been cut off the breast (will have to ask them to leave them on next time).  I’m not sure how many of you are privy to the oysters which lurk on the back of the chicken, like little nuggets of chicken goodness, to be dug out of a roast when no-one’s looking, but they’re there and they’re delicious.

So, with the meat cut up I used Pushpesh’s Lucknow Biryani recipe which was rich with cardamom, cinnamon, cloves and cumin.  Made up the chickie curry mixture, cooked up some rice then layered it in a large pot pouring over milk soaked saffron as I went.  In the oven for half an hour then I took it out to rest while I fed the family mussels for a starter.  Himself declared he didn’t like mussels, but I told him to eat them anyway, and he did, and decided he liked them.

After a wee while I served up the Biryani with yoghurt and pickles.  It was delicious! The fam were not sold on the bones but humoured me and said they enjoyed it bones and all.  To be honest, picking bits of bone out before I can eat isn’t high on my list either, so I did it all before I started eating, which made it easier.  After we’d cleaned up and I was ready to serve lunches Himself asked me to pick the chicken off the bones for his lunchbox (for ease of office eating) I told him he was dreaming if he thought I would and didn’t.

The Biryani was duly taken for lunch, apparently lots of office and school comments on aroma and taste (aroma from the office – “ooh that smells delicious!” and taste from the Wee Girls friends – sharers are carers).

So use a little backbone in your life. You won’t regret it (and you’ll smugly feel the smugness of not wasting a bit of your chick.)