Monthly Archives: March 2018

Hot Pepper Vinegar

Pepper vinegar is another food item to file under “things I’d never come across until I moved to the Deep South”.

As the name suggests, it is simply vinegar infused with peppers and is a staple item on many a Southern table, but despite it being relatively easy to make it is a versatile condiment, adding a great hit of sour spicy flavour to anything you put it on. Collard greens are the classic partner for it but once you start using it you’ll be sprinkling it on all sort of dishes.

You can vary the flavour profile by playing about with the vinegar you use as well as the quantity and spiciness of the peppers you choose. My personal preference is for apple cider vinegar and a pretty potent heat level, so I like to throw some habanero peppers into the mix. A little of the resulting vinegar goes a long way.

Once made, the vinegar gets better as it gets older.

Hot Pepper Vinegar

12oz hot peppers (I used a mix of jalapeno, serrano, habanero and fresno peppers)

3 cups apple cider vinegar

1.5 tbs salt

Wash and drain the peppers, then make a small incision in each one.

Place the peppers in a sterilised quart jar. You can sterilise a jar in boiling water.

Put the vinegar and salt in a pan and bring to a boil over medium high heat, stirring until the salt dissolves.

Pour the hot vinegar over the peppers in the jar. Seal the jar and leave for a couple of weeks for the peppers to infuse the vinegar.

I decant the vinegar into a smaller pourer to use at the table and top up the jar with more vinegar / salt mix as I deplete the original vinegar.

Baked Cheese with Black Truffles

There is something magical about melted cheese.

Well I think so anyway. I have a weakness for cheese in pretty much any shape or form but I find melted cheese particularly irresistible, whether it is a fondue, a bubbling rarebit or is oozing out of the side of a grilled cheese sandwich or panino.

Occasionally I like to indulge this passion and take a whole brie or camembert, stuff it with truffles and bake it in the oven. Spooning the resulting mix of gooey cheese and pungent truffles onto crusty bread is a delicious treat, especially on a cold evening.

This time around my cheese of choice was Green Hill, a beautiful soft ripened creamy cow’s milk camembert style cheese from Sweet Grass Dairy in Thomasville in the south of Georgia. Green Hill comes in a neat 7.5oz wheel, making it a perfect starter for 2.

Preparation is simple. Just take your cheese and slice it in half. Generously cover one half with truffles. I used black truffle peelings which come in a can and are a useful pantry staple. If you want to make this during truffle season and have suitably deep pockets you could use fresh black or white truffles.

Then simply wrap up the cheese and stick it in the oven and you are just minutes away from a luxurious dish.

Baked Cheese with Black Truffles

One 7-8oz soft ripened cheese (Brie, Camembert or similar)

Approx. 2oz black truffles

Preheat your oven to 350F.

Slice the cheese horizontally across the middle.

Put a generous layer of thinly sliced black truffle on one of the cut sides of the cheese.

Put the other half of the cheese on top of the truffled side. Wrap in parchment paper and then wrap again in aluminium foil.

Place this package on a baking sheet and bake in the oven for about 20 minutes.

Carefully open the package to reveal the molten cheese.

Spoon out onto crusty bread to enjoy.

Bara Brith Truffles for St.David’s Day

March 1st is the feast day of St. David, the patron saint of Wales, and in honour of my wife’s Welsh heritage we always prepare a Welsh related dish to celebrate the day, such as Welsh cakes or bara brith.

Bara brith is a spiced fruity loaf made with dried fruit, which is traditionally soaked overnight in tea to boost the flavour. It translates from the Welsh into “speckled bread”.

It’s great as it is, especially when sliced and buttered, but I thought it also made a great candidate to turn into a chocolate truffle.

I used a technique I’ve used before to turn a cake or a loaf into a truffle, making the centres with a mixture of crumbled cake, syrup and chocolate before rolling them in yet more chocolate to produce the final truffle. You can experiment with any cake you like to make your own creations – the only limit is your imagination.

The bara brith truffles were great: moist and tasty and a perfect way to celebrate St. David’s Day.

Bara Brith Truffles

8oz bara brith, crumbled (click here for recipe)

2oz agave syrup

1oz unsalted butter

Pinch of salt

4oz milk chocolate (I used Guittard 38% Organic Milk Chocolate)

6oz dark chocolate to cover (I used Ghiradelli 60%)

Place the crumbled bara brith into a bowl. Melt the agave syrup and butter together in a small pan over medium heat.

Pour the syrup mixture over the crumbled bara brith and mix well to combine. Add a pinch of salt.

Melt the milk chocolate over medium heat in a double boiler or a glass bowl over a pan of water. Add the melted chocolate to the bara brith and syrup mixture and stir until combined.

When cool, place in the refrigerator for an hour or two until the mixture is firm.

Taking a teaspoon full of the mixture at a time, roll into balls to form the centres of the truffles. Place on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper, then return to the fridge to firm up again.

Melt the dark chocolate for the coating in a double boiler. Dip the truffle centres in the melted chocolate to coat and place on baking parchment to set before enjoying.