Cooking With Cider

[Airgead]

Folks

Not exactly cooking with beer but is still home brewed so what the heck.

I had a few litres of cider left over after I kegged the missus a new batch on Friday. I made some into applejack and got creative in the kitchen with the rest -

Chicken casserole with mustard and cider

Brown some onions in a heavy casserole
Add enough chicken to feed everyone (I uses some casserole pieces which I skinned first) and brown that up
Throw in a good dollop of dijon mustard
Add a good splash of cider
Throw in some herbs (rosemary, thyme, bay, maybe some garlic if you like)
Season with salt & pepper
Cover and cook in a slow oven until cooked.
Thicken sauce if necessary with arrowroot or cornflour

I served it with gratin potatoes & steamed vegies

Baked monkfish with almonds

Take a chunk of monkfish (or other meaty fish)
Find a small baking dish just large enough to hold the fish
sprinkle finely chopped onion and garlic ion the bottom
Place fish on onion and garlic
sprinkle with herbs (thyme & sage.. tarragon would have been nice but I was out)
Season
Pour about 1cm of cider in the bottom
cover fish with slivered almonds
Bake in moderate oven until done. The almonds should be nice and browned.

Served with baked spuds in herb butter and cabbage steamed with cider vinegar

Cheers
Dave

 

[Mercs Own]

Slow Cooked Boned Leg of Lamb in Cider and Olives


1 Boned leg of lamb tied up
2 cloves of garlic cut into quarters
Salt and pepper
Olive oil

Stab lamb with a sharp knife and insert the slivers of garlic into the slits. Rub lamb with salt and pepper then seal in a hot pan with the olive oil. Brown on all sides then remove from pan.

1 onion sliced
2 cloves of garlic sliced finely
4 anchovie fillets
Olive oil
2 carrots diced
2 sticks of celery diced
650 mils of alcoholic apple cider ( I prefer sweet one for this recipe but you can use dry also)
250 mls of beef stock
1 can chopped tomatoes
cup each Black (kalamata) and green olive (Spanish queens with pip)
Rind of one orange
Juice of one orange
Fresh Thyme
250g button mushrooms
250g of green beans

Soften the onion garlic and anchovies in olive oil in the same pan as you browned the meat for several minutes dont burn them. Add carrots and celery and cook for 5 minutes to seal and colour a little. Put lamb back into the pan including any juices that have come from the lamb. Pour in Apple cider, beef stock, tomatoes, orange rind, orange juice and olives. Season with the thyme, salt and pepper and then bring to the boil.

When at boil turn off heat cover pan with lid or alfoil and place in an oven at around 160 170 and cook for around 1 and a hours. Remove lamb from oven and give a stir adding the mushrooms return to the oven for another 30 minutes. Then remove from oven again and add the beans and then return to the oven until cooked.

Serve on its own or with polenta or mashed potato/pumpkin. If the sauce is still a little watery you can remove the lamb and keep warm and then return the pan to the stove top and reduce the sauce to the desired consistency.

 

[tangent]

Pork with cider

poach pork bellies in cider, then transfer to BBQ or oven to finish and caramelise the edges. Throw in some star-anise or 5 spice for more aromatics.

 

[Rod]

Dave ,

what is applejack

Rod

 

[Airgead]

Dave ,

what is applejack

Rod

Its cider that has been made stronger by partial freezing and removing the water (the water freezes before the alcohol).

the traditional method was to leave the cider in a trough outside in the winter and remove the crust of ice on top every morning until it no longer freezes. My way was to put jugs in the freezer till it was part frozen then remove the ice. Repeat until its is reduced by about half in volume. I suspect though that the freezer freezes too quickly and it traps the alcohol in the ice rather than concentrating it. If it worked I should have about 1l of applejack at about 10-12%. If not then I have 1l if frozen and thawed cider at 5%. I'll try it next weekend and see how it tastes.

Cheers
Dave

P.S. Those recipes look good guys.