Author Archives: annelifaiers

About annelifaiers

Chef and Food Blogger at www.delicieux.eu

February 15, 2013

A guest post by Anneli from Delicieux – Slow Cooked Blue Cheese Pulled Pork with a Cider and Apple Sauce

Comfort Food Makes You Feel Good!

After the fun we had on our last blog challenge (Traditional French Christmas), Louisa and I decided to embark upon round two! We settled on the theme of ‘Comfort Food’ this time as it seemed fitting for this time of year and the kind of food we have been wanting to eat.

Comfort food is a great phrase. It can mean many things to many people. Ultimately, for me it represents food that makes me feel snuggly and happy. Food I like to eat in front of the TV whilst cosy on my sofa. It’s not fancy or frilly, it’s hearty and honest and leaves you feeling satisfied and content.

I have been cooking a lot in my Slow Cooker this year, lots of delicious stews and curries. Meat cooked in the slow cooker becomes incredibly soft and tender which I find very comforting. I also appreciate that it does not take much effort, I love having popped dinner on in the morning and just forgetting about it until the evening. Fantastic food, fuss free, that makes me very happy indeed!

The dish I have decided to share with you was one that I made on a Sunday (officially the best day for comfort food!) whilst I was actually not feeling particularly well. I was wearing my comfy trousers and had spent a fair chunk of the day curled up on the sofa under a blanket snuggling with my kids. The fire was roaring whilst outside the wind was blowing and it had been raining all day. I just about managed to throw a few things into the slow cooker that morning so I had a minimal amount of work to do to get dinner onto a plate. Oh yes, this was a day when comfort food was exactly what the doctor ordered.

Slow Cooked Blue Cheese Pulled Pork with Cider & Apple Sauce served with soft buttery mash and garlicky courgettes was my finished dish and my oh my, it was a heavenly combination. I think mashed potatoes might actually be compulsory with all comfort food, not much can beat them when served with a lovely hot sauce or gravy.

For this dish, pork shoulder is cooked in the slow cooker covered with cider on a bed of apple and onion for 8 hours, or even longer if you like. This creates such tender pork that you can take a fork to it and just pull it apart into juicy strands, super succulent and delicious. The sauce is simplicity itself, the apple and onions are just blitzed into the cider with a hand held blender and then boiled to reduce a little. Meanwhile, some roquefort cheese is crumbled over the pork and melted under the grill before serving with that wonderful mashed potato and lashings of hot cidery sauce. This takes comfort food to a whole new level of contentedness!

So if you are feeling under the weather or out of sorts, then I have the remedy for you. Just follow these instructions and you will be on the road to recovery in no time…

Slow Cooked Blue Cheese Pulled Pork with Cider & Apple Sauce

Serves 4

Ingredients:

1 small shoulder of pork around 1kg
1 onion, chopped
1 apple, peeled, cored and chopped
500-600ml of cider
150g Roquefort cheese
1 tbsp cornflour
1 tbsp creme fraiche

Method:

Place your chopped onion and apple in the bottom of your slow cooker. Cut any string off from your pork shoulder and lay it on top of the onion and apple.

Pour over enough cider to go half way up your pork shoulder. Don’t be mean, the more cider, the more moist!
Put your slow cooker on to high and cook for 8 hours or low and cook for 12 hours.
Once cooked, remove the pork and take two forks and ‘pull’ the pork apart, tearing it into shreds. Place on a baking tray and crumble your Roquefort all over liberally. Put under the grill for 5 minutes or until all your cheese has melted over the pork

Whilst your pork is under the grill, pour the remaining cider, apple and onion into another saucepan and using a handheld blender, blitz until smooth. Then spoon a little of the sauce in to a small bowl and add your corn flour and mix to combine.
Meanwhile, bring the sauce to a simmer then stir in the cornflour mixture to help thicken. Let the sauce bubble away and reduce until you are happy with the consistency. You may find you have a lot of sauce…just freeze what you do not use for the next time you have pork. Just before serving, stir in a tablespoon of creme fraiche

Finally serve the pork with some creamy mash and vegetables and pour the cider sauce all over the pulled pork and bubbling blue cheese

And you will surely be comforted!

If you enjoyed this post then be sure to hop over to check out Louisa’s take on comfort food on www.delicieux.eu

Thanks for having me over again Louisa. Always a pleasure and I look forward to ‘Round Three’!

Louisa: I’m entering this gorgeous guest blog to a couple of challenges for Anneli. Firstly, being a slow cooker wonder recipe, to Credit Crunch Munch, an event co-hosted by Helen from Fuss Free Flavours and this month by Camilla from Fab Food 4 All. And secondly, being a made from scratch lovliness, to Javelin Warrior’s Made with Love Mondays.

13 Comments | tags: Apples, Blue Cheese, Cider, Credit Crunch Munch, Delicieux, French, Guest Post, Made with Love Mondays, Mash, Pork, Roquefort, Slow Cooker, Slow Cooking | posted in Dinner Party, Family Dinners, Grown Up Dinners, Mains, Weekend Slowies, Winter Warmers

December 21, 2012

A Guest Post by Anneli from Delicieux – A Very Merry French Christmas!

By annelifaiers

Finished dish Louisa and I both live in South West France in the rolling countryside of Gascony. Although we have never met in the flesh, we soon found that we have a lot in common; both being food bloggers, both growing our own vegetables, both having two small children of similar age, and of course, both having up and left the UK to pursue the good life here in France.

And what a good life it is too! I have been here now for five years and I absolutely love it. I feel spoilt to live somewhere so beautiful. I am touched by the unhurried way of life and the sense that time has almost stood still, both in the architecture of the villages and also in the mentality of the locals!

By that I mean this wonderful sense of doggedness that the French have about their traditions and their food. Always French wine, always local produce, always French cheese. And why not when what they have is so goddamn good! Why import goods when they have all they need right here?

I live in ‘duck’ country. Foie Gras, Confit and Magret are a staple on every restaurant menu in the Gers I think! And yet I am never bored by them. They are so quintessentially ‘French’ and they do them so well that they always delight. When I think of traditional French food, for me, it must include duck in some form or another.

Louisa and I got together to think of a blog challenge ingredient or subject we could both get our teeth into and Louisa suggested something for a traditional French Christmas. I immediately knew that I wanted to use duck so I did a bit of research to see how the French like it at this time of year.

It seems that they like to roast a whole duck and use chestnuts in the stuffing. In fact, upon further investigation, it would appear that chestnuts are a very traditional ingredient in Christmas cooking. I guess not so different from the British roast turkey with chestnut stuffing…

I decided to have a go at putting these traditional Christmas ingredients together in my own way and an idea began to form. I chose to use duck breast in this dish, for me it is the Rolls Royce of duck meat and it allows you to have more control when cooking it, keeping it nice and pink and moist.

To accompany my juicy duck meat, I made a chestnut puree with a little ricotta to make it super creamy. And I added a few ‘devilled chestnuts’ as well – just fried off in some paprika. These added another dimension and texture to the dish. All served alongside a crunchy yet soft potato rosti and some stir fried cabbage. It was winter on a plate. Rich, nutty, juicy and yummy. I would be very happy to eat this at Christmas – or any other day of the year!

Here’s how I did it:

Duck Breast with Chestnut Puree & Devilled Chestnuts served with a Potato Rosti & Cabbage

Serves 2

1 large French duck breast or 2 British duck breasts

4-5 smallish potatoes

1 egg yolk

1 tbsp olive oil

250g vacuum packed cooked chestnuts

1 tbsp Ricotta cheese

100ml milk

1 tsp paprika

1/3 of cabbage, shredded

First of all, peel your potatoes and par-boil them for 7 minutes in salted water. Then drain them and set aside to cool. Once cool, coarsely grate them and add the egg yolk and mix
Heat your oven to 150 F/180 C. Heat your olive oil in a frying pan and then split your grated potato in half and press into two metal rings if you have them. If not, just make two balls and then press each one flat to make the rosti. Fry on each side until nicely brown, 5-7 minutes each side. Then place them in the oven to keep warm and to ensure they are cooked all the way through.
Meanwhile, re-heat your chestnuts according to package instructions. For mine, I just pierced the vacuum pack and then cooked them in boiling water for 5 minutes.
Release your chestnuts and set aside 10-12 to ‘devil’ later. Leave the rest in the pan and add the milk and using a hand held blender, blitz to make a thick puree. Add the ricotta and stir through. It should be as thick as cream cheese and a pale beige colour. Season generously. Set aside to heat though just before serving.
Now prepare your duck – score the skin in a criss-cross as in the picture and season on both sides of the duck. Heat a non stick frying pan and place the duck in the pan with no oil, skin side down and leave without touching it for 10 minutes to cook. Then turn the duck over and cook for 5 more minutes. Then remove, cover with foil and leave to rest for at least 5 minutes – longer if you want.
Meanwhile, to cook the cabbage, take a table spoon of the duck fat from the pan cooking the duck and add to another pan. Then fry your cabbage in the duck fat for 10 minutes until wilted and cooked through. Season well.
Chop your reserved chestnuts and toss them in the teaspoon of paprika. Heat another spoonful of duck fat in a small pan and fry your chestnuts in it for 4 minutes to ‘devil’ them. Also, gently reheat your chestnut puree.
When you are ready to slice your duck, pour any juices that have collected whilst resting into your chestnut puree. Then slice into at least 8 diagonal slices.
To serve, spread some puree across the middle of your plate. Place a potato rosti on one side and some cabbage on the other. Top the rosti with 2 slices of duck and the cabbage with 2 slices of duck. Finally, sprinkle the devilled chestnuts down the middle of the plate and serve.

Blog by Anneli Faiers from www.delicieux.eu

Biog: I am a Private Chef living South West France. I am a 36 year old, mother of two, living the rural dream. I love to cook all food and am inspired by fresh produce and the cuisine here in France. From rustic traditional dishes, to vegetarian, to fine dining, I try to cook it all and share my journey with you. Stop by and check it out.

Thanks for having me Louisa and Happy Christmas everyone!

And if you want to check out my own guest blog on Anneli’s site then please drop by to: www.delicieux.eu. Mine’s a very naughty but festive Chocolate & Chestnut Bûche de Noël.