This weekend I headed interstate to
Pot-Roasted Poussins agro dolce
Minted Peas Under Oil
Creamy Butternut Squash
Good Old Bread & Butter Pudding with a Marmalade Glaze & Cinnamon &
In the absence of some poussins (we did try a few butchers, but no dice), we substituted with one large chicken. Jamie says to eat this roast in the colder months, which at the end of November, you would think was a badly timed decision, but funnily enough it was actually freezing in Adelaide this weekend and in the end, with the smells from the oven, the flavours on the plate and the weather outside, this late lunch almost felt like a Christmas lunch.
I started by making a sauce with saut̩ed red onions, celery, rosemary, sultanas, red wine vinegar, sun-dried tomatoes and red wine. I sat the chicken (stuffed with oranges and cinnamon Рyep, very Christmassy) on top of the sauce, covered and put it in the oven for an hour. After an hour, I took the lid off, sprinkled with pine nuts then laid slices of prosciutto across the chicken, to cover it like a second skin. It went back in the oven til the prosciutto crisped up.
Meanwhile, I tossed the sliced butternut pumpkin in dried chilli, nutmeg, ground coriander seeds, S&P and olive oil and popped them in the oven, covered tightly in a baking paper pocket. After half an hour, I took the paper off and poured over cream and parmesan cheese, then back in the oven til creamy and brown.
Lastly, while all this was going on, I boiled peas with fresh mint leaves, drained them, poured over a good slug of olive oil and a bit of red wine vinegar. I was actually supposed to completely drown the peas in the olive oil, but in my opinion, this was simply not necessary – there was enough richness and fat going on elsewhere in this meal – so I made an executive decision to ignore Jamie on this particular occasion. He would be particularly pissed off about this rebellion, I think, because he specifically makes a point about the quantity of oil and says “trust me”. Nope, sorry Jamie. Not today.
And so, we served up our imitation Christmas dinner. The flavours were rich and intense, but incredibly well matched together. Agro dolce means sweet and sour and there was definitely an element of that in the chicken, complimented by the creamy and crowd-pleasing pumpkin bake, topped off with the minty/oily peas. All we needed was a mountain of prezzies, paper crowns and bad cracker jokes and I would have believed that Santa was going to walk in the door at any second.
Along the way, I’d been preparing the B&B pudding for dessert. White bread, buttered with a butter flavoured by orange zest, cinnamon and nutmeg, then sliced diagonally in half and stacked pointy end up in a baking dish. The custard, made very distractedly, seemed to pass the test – just – and was poured over the top of the bread and left to soak for 20 minutes while we ate our lunch. After a good soaking, it went into the oven in a bain-marie style tray, for 40 minutes. Plenty of time for us to digest the main course or go back for seconds…
About 10 minutes before serving up, I quickly pulled the B&B pud out of the oven and brushed it with marmalade, before putting it back in for a last minute blast. Served with a scoop of ice cream, I have to say I was pretty damn happy with the crispy glaze of marmalade on top and the creamy, sweet, custardy, mushy, bready pud under the surface. Do you think I could describe myself in that way – crispy glazed outside, mushy pud underneath? Dating classifieds eat your heart out. Pardon the pun…
My weekend and the faux-Chrissy lunch was fabulous. I had a lovely time with Sarah, Aido & Anna and the food was sensational. I think the pumpkin bake will get a second run in a certain
Plus, I hit a milestone over the weekend. With the four recipes cooked for Sunday lunch, I’ve now done 59 recipes. Leaving me with 99 recipes to go. Woohoo! I’m under 100 – bring on the countdown.
Xx
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