Not Quite Four Weddings & A Funeral

So it’s been a while since I last rambled, moaned, whined, ranted or whatever you want to call it. Most of you were probably glad to see the back of the ‘here’s this week's blog – read it if you want’ tweets. Well sorry to disappoint.

I was the never the most prolific blogger, ten posts and bang I was gone. To be honest prolific has never been a word associated with me, thinking back there was that one season for Wigton Moor Under 9’s where I scored about 30 goals. But as they say even a blind squirrel finds a nut occasionally.

Why the hiatus then? Three months and no expletives fired in the direction of TV chefs or councils? It’s not like there hasn’t been plenty of ammunition. Listening to my favourite baking lothario make yummy noises in the direction of a dough-eyed philosophy student can surely only be one more muffin tasting away from landing him in trouble of the Yewtree kind. (See what I did with dough, clever hey?!)

No not even that, which in the past would have given me weeks worth of material, could stir me from my inactivity.

Here goes then.

My last attempt at this blogging lark saw me waiting for the council to make a decision as to whether or not I deserved a place in their market. Well after about four months of little or no contact they finally told me I’d been successful. Not quite the 4-6 week timescale but then did we really believe local government would work to a deadline?

By this time I’d decided to look elsewhere for premises not actually thinking I’d get the place in the market.

The paperwork was signed and my tenure as premier pie maker in Leeds was to begin on 26^th July 2013. Here’s where things took a slight turn for the worse.

This next part of the story isn’t a 'woe is me' cry for attention nor is it some macabre marketing ploy.

Slight turn for the worse may be an understatement, as my Dad died on July 23^rd 2013.

There we have it 3 days before I was due to open the business and on Mrs.L and my 13^th Wedding Anniversary.

Not that these events have any bearing on anything, I mean stating the bleeding obvious but there’s really never a good time to lose a parent.

Though the timing of the wedding anniversary did lead me to wonder if it was the final comment on me marrying a non Jewish girl, I’m joking of course. My parents have always liked Mrs.L far more than they like their miserable grumpy son.

At the point of his death and until very recently everything pretty much stopped, for the first time in a very long time I ran out of words. Nothing seemed very funny anymore.

I don’t do emotion, I’m not very good at it but this did kick me right in the nuts.

It led to a period of reflection and I guess made me question my own mortality.

Leading to two answers :-

Firstly I am getting old, something which has been reiterated to me today when my barber suggested he ‘tidy up’ my eyebrows, a service I thought reserved for the more senior patrons.

Secondly I don’t believe in God, not that I’m getting into this one it’s a personal (non) belief and I don’t hold anything against anyone that does. That’s not strictly true but calling all believers fools seems a bit harsh and I wouldn’t want to offend. I would but won’t.

I did find that it’s probably harder not to believe than it is to believe especially at a time like that.

As I said this isn’t a "My Dad Died So Buy A Pie" marketing ploy, no that comes later.

A month later I managed to open. 

Feedback has been good, if you discount the guy who tweeted to say his pie contained dog excrement and onion. I resisted the urge to say it was the special of the week. I try to keep a modicum of professionalism on my business twitter feed.

Things were going well until the Scarlet Fever hit, sounds like something out of a 19^th Century novel doesn’t it? Sadly not. I actually managed to contract Scarlet Fever, fuck knows how or where from. Head to toe in a rash and laid up with a course of Penicillin for 10 days. I felt sorry for myself, while many people asked whether Rickets, TB or Small Pox would be next?

So there you have it the story of my blogging absence, apologies that this isn’t funny, although many may argue that there’s no change there then.

I’m back open now, the adage what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger seems to hold some truth. Death and disease haven’t stopped me and fingers crossed there won’t be any famine.

Here comes the gratuitous plug in the form of our catchphrase, “Eat Pie So My Kids Don’t Have To!” The poor buggers get the leftovers each week it’s got to the stage where they’d rather go hungry than see another Chicken, Ham & Leek.

A recipe for this blog has been a tough call, should it be pie related or something for my old man? Obviously the latter won. (Pie related doesn’t sound quite right, what could possibly be pie related apart from pie? – good to see I still know how to waffle.)

In fact bollocks to it, there’s no recipe this week. 

Go and buy Fish and Chips from your favourite Chippy, cover them in salt, vinegar and ketchup. Serve with white bread and butter and drink a cup of tea. Afterwards go and smoke a cigarette. 

It’s what my dad would have done and it never did him any harm. Oh, on second thoughts, don’t smoke and eat fish and chips in moderation.

A

x

Me & Dad the late 70's

Revenge Is A Dish Best Served Cold - Cheesecake

It’s been a quiet week really, nothing happening out of the norm, nothing that really got my juices flowing I was even considering sparing you the chore of reading this old shite.

I say that, there’ve been the obvious stresses of daily life that for some reason take some comedic series of events for me but hey ho.

There was a child’s birthday party, we all know how much I love those, where I encountered the biggest baby I’ve ever seen. This isn’t an exaggeration and I’m not trying to be mean but this lad was huge a behemoth if you will. He must have been a sextuplet but ate his five siblings as a post breakfast snack. I took a picture but Mrs. Vino said that was going a step too far. I couldn’t stop staring though, like some Curio in a turn of the century Travelling Circus.

Very much like the time I was sunbathing and an attractive woman was by the pool, she only had one leg, I tried so hard not to look as I walked back to our apartment but failed miserably my eyes boring into her and the words “one leg, one leg, one leg” ringing in my brain. What can I say, I don’t get out much, rather I shouldn’t be allowed out much.

Nothing has really got my juices flowing on the TV, yes I know the Apprentice is back on but I don’t watch it.

You’d think it would be right up my street, I mean me and The Sugar have so much in common. Both born into the Jewish faith, backgrounds in sales, a predisposition for grumpiness and both have faces like an old bulldog licking piss off a thistle.

Come to think of it I’ll have to check if Mum made any trips down to London in the 70’s, that rich old bugger could be my Dad and I may be in line for a few quid to not sell my story.

This is of course completely fabricated, more worrying is the fact Mummy Vino was given free tickets to Top of The Pops in her youth by a popular DJ in Leeds and my uncontrollable urge to jangle jewelry, wear tracksuits and smoke cigars. 

11 Years Ago in Vegas

Anyway there’s my usual digression, back to the Apprentice, I can’t watch it. Not because as a twitter friend suggested they remind me of me. Simply put they’re a bunch of cocks (maybe they do remind me of me), I think that’s the collective noun for the contemptible arses that try and ‘win’ the poisoned chalice. There aren’t enough swear words available to me in the English language to be able to watch it and without the naughty words spilling forth from my mouth I fear the anger may bubble up to a level where my head would explode and I would die. Fear of death has to be a good enough reason not to watch surely?

By now you’re probably asking yourselves why I'm wittering on at you? Why the change of heart? What could possibly spark me into picking up my virtual pen?

Only the classes being announced for the W I Open Produce & Handicrafts show taking place in the Village Hall Saturday 14^th September 2013. That's bloody what!

If that wasn't enough which it is, there is more. A tale of revenge, retribution, unfinished business, call it what you will.

Let’s just say me and the blue rinsed old dears of the Women’s Institute have got previous!

More of that later.

You may have rightly gathered that Village life is very quiet and uneventful, putting aside the perennial swingers nights, car keys in the middle and all that.

Our Village doesn’t have a pub, this wasn’t a consideration when we were buying I was pretty much tee total at that time, nowadays I’m never more than 3 feet from alcohol at any given time.

There’s no shop, with the phone box being utilised to sell eggs and produce from.

There’s Table Tennis club on a Monday, I’ve already said too much about this, the first rule of table tennis club is….

Think a darker Royston Vasey and you won’t go far wrong, we’ve lived here 8 years and people didn't talk to us for the first 5.

It’s a beautiful place to live, nice and quiet with a lovely park on our doorstep. This does throw up a slight problem for me at this time of year as the cows are back.

Those cud-chewing motherfuckers scare the bejeesus out of me. I’m sure they’ve got it in for me, I’m not being delusional. I think they can smell cow on me, or to put it bluntly, steak. They can sense the amount of meat I’ve consumed in my life and want payback. 

To be honest I don’t even know if they’ve got teeth. How stupid is that? I’m an adult who doesn’t know if cows have teeth. What I do know is that they’re bloody big and every time I set foot in the park they want to kill me.

Yes as Mrs. Vino says I’m a townie at heart and although I try I’m not great at country living, it’s taken me 8 years to succumb to buying a pair of wellies, now the sheep are worried, there’s no escape.

Anyway back to the show, obviously due to the lack of anything going on this is THE biggest event in the village diary.

There are 35 Classes with prizes awarded in each, 1^st, 2^nd & 3^rd, there is an overall Best in Show and a Reserve Best in Show.

These classes are varied and encompass, produce, flower, flower arranging, preserves, baking, handicraft and children’s classes.

The rules within each are very specific and you will be disqualified for not adhering to them. There are also some odd ones, a collection of herbs displayed in an unusual container no larger than 15 inches. I found out last year that having a few sprigs of rosemary hanging out of your arse is frowned upon, only being good enough for 3^rd prize.

To say it’s competitive is an understatement, people have committed unspeakable crimes for a 1^st prize certificate. One competitor carries a tape measure and reports her fellow competitors to the judges should they contravene any guidelines. My neighbour’s collection of 3 types of vegetables was thrown out because of her grassing him up and he has never entered again.

My issue is two second prizes, second prizes???? You’ve all seen my cakes there is no way they were second prize entries. No the only explanation is that judging is fixed, rigged, bent whatever you want to call it.

Two years running I’ve been beaten by an 80 year old, once in the Victoria Sponge class and the following year in the Gateaux Class. Now I’ll admit refusing to accept my certificate, like it was an MBE I was turning down as a political statement then upturning the baking exhibit table, may have been a slight overreaction but I cannot stand corruption.

Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely, yes W I judges I’m pointing my finger at you. They’re the rural mafia, think Mary Berry meets Tony Soprano but meaner. It’s ok raising money for charity and all that but deep down I know there lies a dark underbelly.

This year will be different, this year will be my year. Watch this space a first prize certificate will be adorning the walls of Vino’s Kitchen. Even if I have to steal one.

The recipe this week should really be an entry for the show but there’s not a chance I’m sharing this. I know there is a very slim chance that out of the 3 people that read this any of you will be entering the show but I’m not willing to take the risk.

So here’s a favourite recipe of mine, it’s a Hugh Fearnley baked cheesecake with some of the steps removed. It’s amazing, although you can feel your arteries clogging with every mouthful.

New York Cheesecake

Ingredients

For the base


100g butter –15g softened and 85g melted


170g digestive biscuits


1 tbsp caster sugar


Pinch of flaky sea salt

For the filling


200g caster sugar


3 tbsp plain flour


Pinch of flaky sea salt


900g full-fat soft cream cheese, at room temperature 


200ml sour cream


2 tsp vanilla extract


3 large eggs, plus 1 yolk

Method

Heat the oven to 190C

Generously grease the base and sides of a 23cm springform cake tin with the soft butter, line the base with baking paper and butter the paper

Wrap the cake tin in several layers of tinfoil – it needs to encase the tin completely, with no holes or gaps, because you're going to cook the cheesecake in a bain-marie and you don't want any water to sneak in at the base and ruin it – I have only once succeeded to stop water getting in once and it hasn’t ruined it. Try a foil and oven proof cling film combo , it may be the only way

Next make the crust

Put the biscuits into a food processor with the sugar and salt

Pulse to fine crumbs

Pour the melted butter through the feed tube and pulse until the mixture looks like wet sand

Press it into the bottom of the cake tin in an even layer (use the bottom of a glass to smooth it out)

Bake for 10-12 minutes until firm, then leave to cool on a wire rack

Reduce the oven temperature to 170c

Whisk together the sugar, flour and salt

In a mixer or a large mixing bowl with a handheld electric mixer, beat the soft cheese until light and fluffy, scraping down the bowl and beaters a couple of times

With the mixer on low, beat in a third of the sugar mixture, then half the sour cream

Repeat, then beat in the last of the sugar mixture

Beat in the vanilla extract

Beat in the eggs one at a time, and the yolk, beating well after each addition, until smooth and creamy

Brush the inside of the cake tin above the biscuit base with more butter and place in a roasting tin

Pour the filling into the cake tin

Put the roasting tin in the oven and pour in boiling water to come halfway up the outside of the cake tin

Bake for an hour and a half to an hour and three-quarters, until just set in the centre

Let the cake cool

Refrigerate overnight

Run a thin-bladed knife around the sides of the tin to loosen any stuck edges, then release the sides of the tin

Carefully slide the cheesecake on to a plate and gently slide the parchment out from underneath – I have never achieved this, I slice the cake and making sure I don’t get the paper

Enjoy.

A

Their Method, My Madness - Ginger Honey Cake

The purpose of these ramblings, rants, blogs or embarrassing insights into our daily life as Mrs. Vino calls them, through gritted teeth, is to share my love for cooking and baking.

Any of you who follow me on twitter will see I hate this and hate that, I bake this and bake that and most of all drink this and drink all of that.

On Instagram you’ll be bored senseless with endless photos of what I’ve made and now on Vine you can see six-second videos of the cooking process.

It really is awfully dull and I can’t believe any of you actually look at or read any of it. To be honest I bore the arse off myself with it.

So this week to celebrate my passion for the culinary art I’ve decided to turn my attention back to recipes namely those of our celebrity chef friends.

I make no apologies for this, after all these people are meant to entertain, inspire and educate us.

However as Frank Costanza my favourite comic character says, "I've got a lot of problems with you people, and now you're going to hear about it!"

A recent report in The Metro stated "TV chefs 'adding to obesity crisis by encouraging us to eat fatty dishes'," with similar stories blaming celebrity chefs for our bulging waistlines in much of the media.

I kind of wished the story had been in The Mail, I’m sure they would have taken it to the nth degree characterising Worrall Thompson as a carcinogenic gnome.

This is not the issue I have though. Anyone that has watched a cookery programme or owns a recipe book can’t be surprised to find out that when on a Saturday our James, oozing manliness, adds 14 packets of butter to a pan of double cream to make a sauce to pour over his extra Belly Belly Pork, it isn’t particularly good for you.

With Nigella, yes I'm once again fixating on her, it’s more a case of being slightly concerned as to where her hands have been. Watching her seductively dip a finger in to taste the food rather than using a spoon may stir ‘those’ feelings but I’m surprised the council haven’t been round to shut her down or at least given her kitchen a low hygiene rating. 

I’m waiting for the day she dispenses with using her fingers altogether and simply dunks her left breast in, come on we all know that’s where it’s heading.

Now if you don’t realise that eating this 'celebrity way' all the time isn’t healthy then you’re probably already 38 stone. I actually look forward to watching the future channel 5 documentary about you. I’ll sit there with baited breath waiting to see if they can remove your front window so they can airlift you to McDonalds for your breakfast while a soundtrack of Elbow’s One Day Like This plays, “throw your curtains wide and stuff 24 McMuffins down your gullet before 8:30."

Please be aware this blog isn’t sponsored by Maccy D’s and in the interest of fairness and balance there are other fast food chains available who can make you equally as fat should you eat breakfast, lunch and dinner there every day.

No my issue isn’t with chefs making me fat it’s with their bloody recipes not working. They're meant to work, I've paid a fortune for all these posh ingredients.

A perfect Tag Line would be - You’ve seen the show, you’ve bought the book, you’ve thrown the bastard cake in the bin.

I’m obviously exaggerating a touch here, lumping all chefs in to this bracket, when really I have only one man in mind, Paul ‘the Hollywood’ Hollywood - I'm sure his real name is Paulo Avanti, he just fancied something altogether more ‘glitzy’.

I’ve tried to get on with his book, thinking I’d done something wrong. Was the oven too high? Am I using the right tin? Had I misread the recipe?

Yes I’m man enough to admit making a mistake or cooking something distinctly average. Case in point was this week I tried a new curry recipe out on the family. 

N marked it 4 out of 10 and then made me promise I would never ever make ‘that’ again. Everything in our house is bloody marked and judged out of ten these days, I blame Strictly, N loves it. I just find it a little off putting that Mrs. Vino has adopted this scoring system. I'm not telling you what I was given a 3 for the other day.

So with Paulo I have tried the same recipes numerous times and I’m glad to report that it’s definitely not me it’s him.

He makes it so bloody hard to dislike him though, sauntering on to our screens with his piercing eyes, chiseled good looks and well coiffured silver hair. Looking down the camera lens setting many a middle-aged woman’s knees a trembling. He might as well just open his shows with this line - “Before we get started I apologise for making you moist.”

Well Hollywood I’m glad something is because your bloody cakes aren’t.

One person I’d like to admonish from this piece and all future pieces I may write is Mother Delia. The woman can do no wrong. The funny thing is I have no ulterior motive with Delia, she’s one of the few women on TV that I don’t want to do unmentionables to. Maybe it’s because she’s a bit too Mumsy or Saintly. Now Mary Berry on the other hand, I’d give my left nut for a couple of minutes with her.

In my book Delia has indeed inspired a generation of people to cook and her recipes are foolproof. If she says it’s 100g of flour it’s exactly that, no more no less. As her tirade on the pitch at Carrow Road proved, you don’t fuck with Delia.

I toyed with the idea of using a Hollywood recipe and seeing if it worked for any of you. However I know one person who has no problem with them and I couldn’t bare the *smug face* comment that would undoubtedly follow.

So I’m going to go for a recipe from my current favourite baker – Dan Lepard. His recipes are usually in the Guardian each week. The fact that he’s replied to me on twitter, commenting that my cakes made with his recipes look good, may also have a little to do with this favouritism. What can I say, I’m fickle.

Ginger Honey Cake

This is quite a fiery little number with 3 types of ginger but not so much so that N & M didn’t enjoy it. To be honest though I’m yet to find a cake M doesn’t like.

Ingredients

300g Honey – runny

75g Unsalted Butter - Melted

50ml Sunflower oil

3 Medium size eggs

400g Stem Ginger – Chopped (the jar I bought was 350g and this had no ill effects on the cake)

2 cm Piece of Fresh Ginger - peeled and finely grated (this is what I like about Dan’s recipes they’re very prescriptive- most people would say a thumb sized piece but whose thumb?)

4 Teaspoons Ground Ginger

1 Teaspoon Ground Cinnamon

250g Plain Flour

2 Teaspoons Baking Powder

Extra Butter

Extra Honey to glaze the cake

Loaf tin – anything you’ve got will do

Method

Line the tin with Baking Parchment

Set the oven to 170c or 150c on a Fan Oven

Put the Eggs, Honey, Oil and Butter in to a bowl and beat until it is smooth and everything is incorporated. I used a hand whisk.

Stir in the Stem and Grated Gingers plus the spices. Finally add the flour and baking powder.

Stir really well the spoon the mixture in to your tin.

You then want to lay a thin line of butter centrally down the length of your cake. I cut a thin strip off the end of a pack of butter then cut that in half, repeating until the length of the cake was covered. Apparently this butter technique forces the cake to crack along this line and gives you an even bake.

Put the cake in the oven for 70-80 minutes, don’t touch it before 70 minutes as this cake will collapse if you as much as look at it wrongly.

Test it with a skewer after 70 minutes and it should come out clean. Mine was done after 70 minutes and didn’t need any extra.

The cake may look a little burnt on top – mine didn’t.

While it’s still warm brush the top with some honey to glaze and soften the crust.

Enjoy.

A