Taunton and South Somerset Living Aug - Sep 2021

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TIME FOR tea With Afternoon Tea Week taking place from 9-15 August, plus the MacMillan Coffee Morning on the 24 September, it’s time to don your apron and get baking! Recipes from Clarence Court Eggs CLASSIC TEATIME SCONES MAKE 18-22 SCONES INGREDIENTS 450g self-raising flour 1 teaspoon baking powder 100g cold butter, cut into cubes 50g caster sugar 2 medium Clarence Court Hens Eggs plus 1 beaten and a little milk METHOD Pre-heat the oven to 200˚C/400˚F/ gas mark 6. Line two baking trays with greaseproof paper. Put the flour and baking powder into a large mixing bowl, add the butter and rub it into to the flour with your fingers until you create a fine breadcrumb texture. Stir in the sugar. Crack the eggs into a measuring jug and top up with enough milk to get to 270ml. Make a well in the centre of the flour mix and pour in the eggs and milk. Stir using a dinner knife to start then use your hands to form a rough dough. Tip out on to a lightly floured work surface and roll to a rough oblong about 2cm thick. Use a 5cm cutter to cut out as many scones as possible then arrange over the 2 trays making sure they aren’t too close to each other. Roll out the remaining dough and cut out more scones. When all the scones have been cut out, brush the tops with beaten egg and place the trays in the oven to bake for 12 - 15 minutes or until pale gold in colour and nicely risen. QUAIL SCOTCH EGGS SERVES 4 INGREDIENTS 12 Clarence Court quail eggs 250g good quality British sausages, removed from skins Fresh thyme 1 egg beaten 100g panko breadcrumbs 100g plain flour Vegetable oil for frying Tarragon Mayo: 2x egg yolks 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard 1 teaspoon white wine vinegar 250ml olive oil (or rapeseed) Juice of 1/2 lemon Handful of fresh tarragon, chopped METHOD Boil the quail eggs in a pan of boiling water for 2 minutes. Then plunge into an ice bath - this will stop them cooking further and ensure you have a runny yolk at the end. While they are cooling, make your Mayo. 16 | www.minervamagazines.co.uk Place 2 egg yolks in a large bowl. Add the mustard and vinegar and whisk them well until they are paler. Slowly drizzle in the oil in a steady stream, whisking continuously - this will emulsify the egg yolk and it will thicken and become glossy. Keep slowly adding until you have added half of the oil. At this stage squeeze in juice of ½ a lemon. Then drizzle in remaining oil, whisking continuously until all is added. Season the mayonnaise with the chopped tarragon, salt and some more lemon or mustard to taste. Set aside. Peel the quail eggs carefully as they are delicate. Time to assemble: Add fresh chopped thyme to your sausage meat. Season the plain flour well with salt and pepper. Place a small amount in the palm of your hand and press to flatten, place a quail egg in the middle and cup your hand to enclose the egg in the meat. Gently press the sausage meat around the egg so it is completely covered and there are no air pockets. Next place the egg into the flour and coat, then dust off the excess. Do the same in the egg, and then followed by the panko. Repeat with all the quail eggs. Heat vegetable oil in a high sided pan so it comes up 2 inches high. Heat until it reaches 180˚C. Fry the scotch eggs in batches for 2 minutes until golden brown on all sides and crisp. Remove carefully with a slotted spoon and drain on kitchen paper to remove excess oil. BLUEBERRY AND PEACH CAKE SERVES 6-8 INGREDIENTS 150g softened unsalted butter (plus 50g softened unsalted butter for frosting and for greasing) 100g caster sugar 4 tablespoons thick peach puree or blitzed tinned or fresh peeled peach 2 Clarence Court Braddock Whites 150g self-raising flour, sieved 50g ground almonds 1 sprig of rosemary, finely chopped 1 teaspoon baking powder 1 teaspoon vanilla extract 4 tablespoons natural or peach yoghurt 2 x 120g punnets blueberries 250g icing sugar, plus extra for dusting 250g full-fat cream cheese 1 whole peach METHOD Pre-heat the oven to 160˚C/ 320˚F/ gas mark 3. Grease and line the base and sides of a 20cm, deep round cake tin. Cream the butter and sugar together in a mixer or with a wooden spoon until soft and fluffy. Crack the eggs into a jug and whisk with the peach puree. Stir in a little at a time until incorporated. Mix the flour, salt, ground almonds, chopped rosemary and baking powder in a mixing bowl then fold into the butter and egg mix then stir in the vanilla extract and yoghurt. Scatter in half of one punnet of blueberries into the prepared tin, followed by half the sponge mixture. Top with the remaining ½ punnet blueberries and finish with the rest of the cake mix. Place the cake in the oven and bake for 45-50 minutes until golden and risen or if a skewer is poked in the middle it comes out clean. Remove the cake from the oven and place on a cooling rack for about 40 minutes, then release from tin. Place the icing sugar and 50g of softened butter in a mixing bowl and mix well until soft and fluffy. Mix in the cream cheese until you have a whipped, stable frosting. Transfer to a small bowl and pop in the fridge to chill whilst the cake cools. When ready to assemble place the sponge on a serving plate or board. Destone and slice the whole peach into thin slices. Spread the frosting over the top, scatter over the remaining blueberries and peach slices. Sprinkle over a few rosemary leaves and dust over a little icing sugar. Serve with a cup of tea or a fresh, crisp sparkling wine.
the kitchen garden ADVERTISING FEATURE You cannot learn to be a good cook without learning how -and how not- to eat and without an abundance of greed and curiosity. It’s not just about eating the best chefs’ food or cooking with the finest ingredients. You need to eat bad food to know what good food is, and to burn and ruin a lot of your own food and learn from your mistakes. And learn from the chefs who follow food fashion and scatter micro-herbs over everything, even sticky toffee pudding, who paint and glaze, drizzle and dribble, fiddle and faddle with tweezers and puddles on plates rather than make the ingredients taste simply and intensely of themselves. I was lucky enough to discover French and Italian food at an early age. My mother would drive crazy distances in search of a good restaurant when we were children. We would roam the back streets until we found ourselves in a fish market where they were hosing down and closing and she would demand the best bouillabaisse in town. We ate L’Aioli and Soupe au Pistou in a tiny village restaurant in Murs in the Luberon. We picnicked in cherry orchards on ripe cheeses and rabbit pates bought in a deli in Apt, on rillettes and brandade from Carpentras, melons from Cavaillon. When my mother wrote The Art of the Tart I was her sous chef helping cook for the photographs for the book. ‘But I’ve never made a tarte au citron before,’ I wailed. ‘Nor will the readers of the book have,’ she replied, ‘if you can’t understand my instructions I’ll re-write them.’ I was twelve at the time! recommended Paul Merry at Panary. I went on Paul’s wood-fired course first and was instantly hooked. Next came, German, French, Italian and sourdough courses. I moved on to Paul’s professional course, baffled by the hydration maths and ratio of flour to water to yeast yet determined to understand it. When I had my first baby, Alba, I left her on a Thursday to become the sorcerer’s apprentice, even though, to begin with, Paul only let me grease the bread tins. Finally he allowed me to make croissants, christening me ‘the croisssie girl.’ They were tough, cheesy, and a little yeasty to my taste buds, something wasn’t right, wasn’t French. I snuck in a little more sugar, then a little more, and they turned out buttery, golden, flaky. Paul upgraded me to ‘oven girl,’ to weigh, fold and knead the dough and by the time I left Panary I was a fully fledged baker. When we set up the pub restaurant our pizzas were, I like to think, the best between Taunton and Yeovil, in fact if I dare, the best between Taunton and Bath. But the highoctane life of a pub kitchen is not a place for the mother of two small children, so when I had Rory in 2018 I quit the seventy hour weeks and cooked for my family. The daily round of purees, packed lunches, teas and supper. Until a year later I went back to help Paul. But what did I really want? A bakery? A restaurant? A cafe? Photo © Tom Waller Food Envy Photography sourdough loaves after seven years of baking. And I started a business with Carol, my former chef at the pub. We called it The Kitchen Garden. It wasn’t long before we were catering private dining and had opened a cookery school. In the let-up from lockdown we catered holiday lets through Sleeps 12. We eat breathe and bake dough and rise to every challenge. Baking is a labour of love. There are no short-cuts, and dough is as temperamental as two small children. You never know quite what it is going to do next. We’ve driven loaves across Somerset sometimes for a single figure profit. It is only sustainable with our private dining and cookery school, now booked up until the autumn. I do not regret the long, hard slog for a minute. I’ve met some amazing people and cooked for people who really appreciate good food. And the joy is, we don’t operate behind closed doors like chefs, we can see people enjoying what we’ve produced and almost taste their pleasure. My passion for bread baking took longer to mature. At home as a child we were always fed dense, branny, organic wholemeal bread. Baguettes on holiday were a treat. So were our nanny Gladys’ ‘scooby snacks’ made with crusty cobs when Mama was away filming. That sense of wickedness: giant sandwiches piled with ham and cheese, lettuce, tomato, mayonnaise, coleslaw; we could hardly get our mouths round them. When I was asked to set up a new kitchen in a pub in Somerset I decided it was high time I learned to bake and my mother I started doing cookery demonstrations at my husband’s wood-burning stove shop. I baked my way through Dan Lepard’s ‘Short and Sweet.’ Customers stopped by, tasted, asked for lessons. I set up an Artisan Bread Baking Airbnb Experience. Pretty soon I had 5 star reviews and a full order book. I taught Wonderful Walkers Picnics. And then... You all know what happened in March 2020. Stuck at home with the children I refined my skills. The kitchen was stacked with flour sacks. I mastered the perfect bagels, baguettes, brown, white and finally “We eat breathe and bake dough and rise to every challenge. Baking is a labour of love. There are no short-cuts, and dough is as temperamental as two small children.” Miranda Shearer Perfect Neapolitan Pizza and Fresh Pasta Class Sandpits, Curry Rivel, Somerset Wednesday 8th and 15th September are limited to 4 spaces. 10am-3pm lunch included £150pp. Artisan Bread Baking Sandpits, Curry Rivel, Somerset Thursday 9th, Friday 10th and Thursday 16th September at Sandpits in Curry Rivel, Somerset Classes are limited to 4 spaces. 10am-3pm lunch included £150pp. The Art of the Tart - perfecting pastry Wednesday 22 September 10am to 4pm. Cost £175 pp lunch included Venue to be confirmed. To book please visit www.thekitchengardensomerset.com Miranda: 07899 665635 www.minervamagazines.co.uk | 17
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Taunton and South Somerset Living Aug - Sep 2021

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