Cornish Pasties – well Cornish-ish anyway !

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If you are from Cornwall, shut your eyes and block your ears for I am about to commit sacrilege. First though, here’s a little bit about the Cornish pastry, the traditional fare of Cornish tin miners. It is simply a half-moon-shaped savoury pastry containing diced beef skirt, onion, turnip (swede), potato, maybe some parsley, and little else. In some places there was a tradition of putting the initials of the owner on the pasty so that in mines where an oven was provided, the miner could pick out his own pasty from the hoards.

The Cornish pasty has recently been given Protected Geographical Status, meaning only pasties made in Cornwall and containing only the traditional ingredients can be called Cornish pasties.

As my humble pasty is not made in Cornwall, it is only Corn-ish.  These Corn-ish pasties went down a storm at a picnic last weekend. As they cannot be truly Cornish I didn’t feel so bad about going off-piste with ingredients like sweet potato and chorizo. I’ve used a mixture of meats because that’s what was in the fridge. You could use all beef mince if you prefer.

For 10 one-person pasties you will need...

... to pre-heat the oven to 175°C at step 4

Pastry

500g plain flour

1 teaspoon fine table salt

150g butter, chilled and grated

175mls iced water 

1                    Place the flour, salt and grated butter in a large mixing bowl. Rub the butter into the flour. This simply means taking pinches of the mixure and rubbing it between thumb and fingers until it resembles fine breadcrumbs (or use your stand mixer). Mix in just enough of the iced water to bring the pastry together in a ball – you may not need all the water. Cover with cling wrap. Refrigerate until needed.

 Filling

250g minced beef

150g finely diced veal

75g onion, finely chopped

75g potato, finely diced

75g sweet potato, finely diced

25g chorizo, finely diced (optional)

1 tablespoon finely chopped fresh parsley

½ teaspoon finely chopped fresh thyme

¼ teaspoon fine table salt

¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper 

Egg wash

1 egg, beaten and mixed with a pinch of salt

2                    Place all the filling ingredients together in a large mixing bowl and mix together until the vegetables and herbs are well distributed throughout the meat.

3                    To assemble the pasties, roll out the pasty to about 3mm thick. Stamp out 13cm circles (5 inches). I don’t have a pastry cutter this size so I use a small bowl as a template, resting it on the pastry and cutting around it with a sharp knife.

4                    Pile approximately 2 tablespoons of the mixture on one half of each pastry round, leaving a margin of at least 1cm at the edge. Fold the other half of the pastry over the filling and press the edges together.

5                    Either crimp the edges of the pastry together using a fork, or try this crimping technique: Stand the pastry up so that the joined edges are at the top. Starting at one end, clamp the pastry join between a thumb and forefinger and twist it through 180 degrees, then using the other hand, hold this twist in place while with the other hand you move along the top of the pastry, a thumbs-width at a time, pinching and twisting. Tuck both ends under to seal the pastry.

Cheap therapy: Pinch and twist. Repeat.

6                    Place the prepared pasties on a baking sheet lined with non-stick baking parchment. Brush lightly with egg wash and transfer to the preheated oven.

7                    Bake for about 35 minutes or until golden brown. If like me you are rushing out the door to a picnic, wrap the hot pastries loosely in a clean tea towel – they’ll get soggy if you seal them in aluminium foil or cling wrap. Otherwise place them on a cooling rack and leave them to cool. They also freeze beautifully. 

Corn-ish pasties - ok who wants to fight over the last two?

If life is too short to take the time to fill and crimp 10 individual pasties, you could always supersize them and make four large ones instead, for sharing. The larger ones need about 50 minutes in the oven.

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Onion and Orange Marmalade – it’s time to magic up a pot

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I have three amazing sisters who I would choose as friends if they weren’t already in my world. We have completely different lives, different styles, different ways of looking at the world. However we also have a lot in common. We have the same smile; the same wicked sense of humour that sometimes operates only on our wavelength; and thankfully most of the tears that are shed between us are tears of laughter.

We share a love of food, in particular a love of decent chocolate – my youngest sister even keeps chocolate in her first aid kit. We have been known to drive to the next county for proper fat chipper chips when a collective craving hits; and the jar of Sainsbury’s onion marmalade my mother keeps in her fridge mysteriously vanishes after a visit from the girls.

I’ve been experimenting however, and my taste buds think this onion and orange marmalade improves upon the Sainsbury’s version. It is a sweet and sour relish that loves cold meats, barbeques, cheese etc and is a doddle to make. As the picnic season draws near, it is time to magic up a pot.

For 1 small pot of onion and orange marmalade you will need...

4 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
500g onions (prepared weight), peeled, cut in half from top to bottom and then thinly sliced into half moons

zest of an orange, (best removed using a vegetable peeler to slice off just the orange part, leaving the bitter white pith behind) finely shredded then cut into approximately 2cm lengths

160g granulated sugar

½ teaspoon fine table salt

¼ teaspoon ground cloves

100mls fresh orange juice

100mls white wine vinegar or cider vinegar

1 hot chilli (optional), left whole, but pierced through with a sharp knife

Simple ingredients...

1                  In a medium-sized heavy-based saucepan, heat the olive oil over a medium heat. Add the onions and the shredded orange zest and cook gently for about 10 minutes until the onions are translucent.

2                  Add the sugar, salt and cloves and continue cooking gently until the sugar has dissolved into the onion juices. When no sugar crystals remain, add the orange juice, white wine vinegar and chilli (if using). Turn up the heat and cook, stirring occasionally, until the onions are honey-coloured and no liquid remains. This will take about 15 minutes. (The mixture will burn the instant you step away from the hob so resign yourself to being there for the duration –treat it as therapy if necessary.)

3                  If you’ve added the chilli, remove it before carefully transfer the mixture into a sterilised jar. Seal when cooled and keep in the fridge for up to three weeks.  

Best eaten in the company of exceptional sisters (and/or brothers).

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