Nigella Christmas: Food, Family, Friends, Festivities (7 page)

Cook, cool and freeze the cooked pumpkin for up to 1 week. Thaw overnight in the fridge. When ready to use, assemble the lasagne and cook as directed.

CHRISTMAS COLESLAW

For someone who doesn’t consider herself a regular coleslaw eater, I seem to be peculiarly compelled towards this Germerican salad. Generally, I find a way in for myself by leaving out the onion, and throwing in the odd chopped spring onion instead, as earlier recipes of mine will testify. So you have my blessing to leave it out here, but consider this: I am a complete wuss about raw onion and yet I love this coleslaw. Flecks of spring onion look very seasonal alongside the overwhelming rubied redness of the rest of the slaw, so either way, it’s a go-er.

Serves at least 20 as part of a spread

1 head red cabbage (approx. 1kg)

1 red onion

250g beetroot

1 head fennel

FOR THE DRESSING:

100g Sharwood’s Green Label mango chutney

75g mayonnaise, preferably organic

1 teaspoon garam masala

60ml buttermilk (see note, below)

salt to taste

• Finely shred the red cabbage; it should be very fine, so if you’re patient and dextrous use a knife, otherwise use the slicing disc of a processor.

• Peel and slice the red onion into fine half-moons.

• Peel and cut the beetroot into matchsticks or juliennes. You might want to wear CSI (vinyl disposable) gloves to do this.

• Finely slice the fennel, then combine the cabbage, onion, beetroot and fennel in a big bowl.

• Mix the chutney, mayonnaise, garam masala and buttermilk (or yogurt) in a bowl. Dress the coleslaw with it, and check the seasoning, adding salt – or whatever you want – to taste.

NOTE:

If you can’t find buttermilk, use a runny plain yogurt, such as Activia.

MAKE AHEAD TIP:

The day before, mix together the dressing ingredients, cover and store in the fridge. On the day, about 3 hours before serving, mix together the shredded cabbage, sliced onion, beetroot and finely sliced fennel in a sealable bag. Store in the fridge. Toss the salad together about 30 minutes before serving.

CHOC CHIP CHILLI

I’ve always made chilli with minced meat and added a dash of cocoa to bolster. This time, I wanted to play a little, to achieve something more along the lines of a dark, spicy-sauced cassoulet: that’s to say, together with the beans, I use beef cut into fairly small chunks and fiery Spanish sausages. In place of the cocoa there is a sprinkling of dark, dark chocolate chips, which adds real depth and a velvety savouriness. This chilli is not for light eaters but something spicy and substantial is just what you need to soak up seasonal excess.

The Fully Loaded Potato Skins obviously beg to accompany this, but a splodge of the brightly hued Christmas Coleslaw goes very well alongside, too. Under normal conditions, I’d also dollop out an unchillied guacamole with this, but I worry about having avocados sitting around going grungy, so only make this if you know it won’t be hanging around: simply mash 3 ripe avocados with 3 finely chopped spring onions and add the juice of a lime or two and some salt to taste, stir in 3 × 15ml tablespoons of chopped coriander, spoon into 2 or 3 bowls, and sprinkle a little extra coriander over.

Serves 12

550g chorizo sausages (not the salami sort), to give 10 sausages or 5 linked pairs

1.5kg boneless shin of beef, cut into 1.5cm cubes

500g onions (about 3), peeled

3 cloves garlic, peeled

1 fresh long red chilli, deseeded

4 × 15ml tablespoons vegetable oil

seeds from 3 cardamom pods

2 teaspoons ground cumin

1 teaspoon ground coriander

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon dried crushed chillies

4 × 15ml tablespoons tomato purée

4 × 15ml tablespoons tomato ketchup

4 × 400g cans red kidney beans, drained

3 × 400g cans chopped tomatoes

50g dark chocolate chips

250ml water (swilled out in one of the chopped tomato cans)

• Preheat the oven to 150°C/gas mark 2.

• Finely chop, or process the onion, garlic and chilli.

• Heat the oil in a large ovenproof pan (with lid) or flameproof casserole and fry the onion, garlic and chilli until soft, on low for about 10 minutes, then add the cardamom seeds, cumin, coriander, cinnamon and dried chillies.

• Stir the oniony spiced mixture together and then add the chorizo sliced into 5mm coins, letting them ooze their paprika-orange oil.

• Drop in the cubes of beef, turning them in the pan with the chorizo and onion mix to brown the meat.

• Stir in the tomato purée, ketchup, drained kidney beans and chopped tomatoes. Add the water and bring the chilli to a boil.

• Once it’s started bubbling, sprinkle the chocolate chips over the chilli and give it a good stir. Put on a lid and transfer to the oven.

• Cook at this low heat for 3 hours. Once cooked it is best left overnight to improve the flavour.

NOTE:

If you’re not buying your meat from a butcher, you can use regular stewing steak from the supermarket, but you’ll need to cube it smaller and it is unlikely to get quite as tender as shin. I often buy shin of beef frozen and vacuum-packed online to stash in my own freezer (see Stockists).

MAKE AHEAD TIP:

Cook the chilli in the oven for 2½ hours only. Cool, cover and store in the fridge for up to 2 days. When ready to use, tip the chilli into a pan and bring slowly to the boil on the hob, stirring occasionally. Cover tightly and return to the oven for 1 hour until piping hot.

FREEZE AHEAD TIP:

Cook the chilli for 2½ hours only. Cool and freeze. Thaw overnight in the fridge, then reheat as above.

FULLY LOADED POTATO SKINS

The first time I did these – having longed to write my own recipe for Fully Loaded Skins – I didn’t bother with the bacon. I was eating them alongside meat, so it didn’t seem necessary. But then I figured, without bacon they’re only partially loaded, and that wouldn’t do at all. So here I’ve gone, as you can see, the whole hog. However, in the seasonal spirit, you might want to serve them without the bacon, or with the crisp bacon bits in a separate bowl for sprinkling, since it seems unnecessarily antagonistic to make potatoes that your veggie friends can’t eat at a party.

Makes 20 stuffed potato skins

10 baking potatoes

225g strong cheddar, or red Leicester

250ml sour cream

4 spring onions

1 teaspoon Maldon salt or ½ teaspoon table salt (or to taste)

good grinding of black pepper

1 × 15ml tablespoon Worcestershire sauce

10 rashers American-style or thin-cut streaky bacon

oil for frying

• The day (or up to 2 days) before you load them, preheat your oven to 200°C/gas mark 6 and bake the potatoes (pricking them first) for about 1–1½ hours, or until the skins are crisp and the insides floury.

• As soon as you can bear to tackle the hot potatoes, cut them in half lengthways and scoop the insides into a bowl.

• Put the husk-like skins of the potatoes on a tray and, when cool, cover until you are ready to fill them. Let the potato cool in the bowl, and then cover until needed.

• When you are ready to fill the potatoes, preheat your oven to 200°C/gas mark 6. Grate the cheese, and add 200g of it to the cold potato along with the sour cream.

• Finely chop the spring onions and add to the potato, with the salt, pepper and Worcestershire sauce.

• Spoon the potato filling into the potato skins, and lay each half on a baking tray so they fit snugly together. Sprinkle over the remaining cheese, giving each potato skin a light covering, and cook for 20–30 minutes until golden.

• Fry the bacon rashers in oil (or grill them) until crispy, then crumble them and sprinkle half a rasher’s worth over each potato skin to make them fully loaded.

MAKE AHEAD TIP:

Fill the potato skins, as directed, and sprinkle with the cheese and crispy bacon (or add the crispy bacon after cooking if preferred). Cover loosely and keep in the fridge for up to 2 days. Cook as directed.

FREEZE AHEAD TIP:

Fill the potato skins as above, wrap in clingfilm and freeze for up to 1 week. To cook, lay the frozen potato skins on a baking sheet and cover loosely with foil. Cook in the oven for 35–40 minutes, removing the foil after the first 15 minutes.

THE BOOZY BRITISH TRIFLE

I think this really says it all. I have written so many recipes for trifle, I scarcely dare reiterate my love for it, but this, perhaps the most traditional of my offerings, shows the sensational, time-honoured pud at its glorious, many-layered best: the jam-slashed and sherry-sodden sponge, the sharp fruity layer of flavour-oozing berries, the eggy custard and the whipped cream. On top, my favourite colour combination: the Victorian pink of crystallized rose petals with the tender green of chopped pistachios. Perfection.

Enough for 20 portions easily

FOR THE CUSTARD:

1 litre double cream

8 egg yolks (I use the whites to make the

Prodigious Pavlova

, but you could freeze the whites in an airtight freezer bag for up to 6 months)

2 whole eggs

50g caster sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

FOR THE BASE:

2 packets trifle sponges (8 sponges in each packet)

1 × 340g jar strawberry or blackberry jam

500ml cream sherry

2 × 380g packets frozen summer fruits, thawed

zest of 1 orange

25g caster sugar (needed if using

fresh

fruits)

FOR THE TOPPING:

500ml double cream

50g pistachios

1 × 15ml tablespoon crystallized rose petals (or crystallized violet petals)

• To make the custard, heat the cream in a large, wide, heavy-based pan and while it’s heating, whisk the egg yolks, whole eggs and caster sugar in a bowl.

• When the cream’s at boiling point – though don’t actually let it boil – take it off the heat and pour it over the eggs and sugar, whisking as you go.

• Wash out the pan (boring but it does have to be done), then pour the uncooked custard back into it and return to the heat.

• Cook over a medium heat (people will tell you it should be low heat but that is just too tedious for words), stirring all the time, until it has thickened. It must never boil!

• After 10–15 minutes, it should be thick enough, so straightaway pour it into a cold, clean bowl, add the vanilla extract, and whisk a bit to help bring the temperature down.

• Cover the very top of the custard, as well as the bowl, with clingfilm and leave to cool, while you start assembling your trifle.

• Split the 16 trifle sponges in half and make into sandwiches with the jam. Squidge these into the base of your trifle bowl. A trifle bowl should, I feel, be glass so you can see the layers from the outside. The proportions vary and, since the point of a trifle is the layers, the dimensions of your bowl will determine how these build up and the amount of sponge
etc.
you will need.

• Pour the sherry over the sponge sandwiches and let it soak in.

• Now tumble in the thawed summer fruits, with a little of their liquid. (It might seem unseasonal to use “summer” fruits, but I love their tartness against the sweetness of the custard that will drape over them.) Then grate the zest of the orange over the fruit and sprinkle with the caster sugar; if you’re not using frozen fruit (which tends to be sour), don’t bother with the sugar. (And you could bake a layer of pink, forced winter rhubarb, instead. Use 1kg rhubarb – about 800g trimmed and sliced into 4–5cm pieces. Put the slices in a baking dish, sprinkle with 300g caster sugar, cover tightly with foil and cook, without adding liquid, for 45 minutes in a 190°C/gas mark 5 oven. Once the rhubarb’s cold, use that as your fruit layer and boil down the juices to make a syrup for ice cream, or to drizzle – reduced and then chilled – over the cream with the pistachios and roses, later.)

• When the custard’s cool, remove the clingfilm. Pour and scrape the custard on top of the berries. It will be soft-set: thickened but far from solid. Cover the bowl (not the custard this time) with some fresh clingfilm and refrigerate for at least half a day or up to 2 days – it’s this standing time that makes the difference.

• When you are ready to serve, take the trifle out of the fridge to stand for about 1 hour. Whisk the cream until softly whipped. You don’t want it to merge with the custard, but nor do you want it stiffly peaking.

• Remove the clingfilm from the trifle bowl and spread the cream on top of the custard with a rubber spatula.

• Finely chop the pistachios, sprinkle over the top of the trifle and adorn with a few, beautiful crystallized rose petals (or crystallized violet petals, if you prefer).

NOTE:

If you really don’t want to make custard from scratch, you can use good shop-bought “fresh” custard, 2–3 × 500ml (500g) cartons. Crystallized rose petals or violet petals are easy to find at specialist cake decoration stores or online (see Stockists).

MAKE AHEAD TIP:

Make the trifle (without the cream) up to 2 days ahead. Keep, covered, in the fridge. When ready to serve, finish with the cream, pistachios and crystallized rose (or violet) petals, as directed.

PRODIGIOUS PAVLOVA

This is indeed prodigious: a billowing, regally magnificent mega-meringue, marshmallow within, crisp and almost candied at its sugary edge, dolloped with whipped cream, lychees and passionfruit and drizzled with a vividly red, vibrantly sharp raspberry sauce.

If, like me, you live in the northern hemisphere, this being the deep midwinter, I presume the raspberries will be frozen; and since these berries tend to be sharper, I don’t spritz fresh lemon juice into them as I blitz them into a sauce. If you’re using fresh raspberries, add a squeeze of lemon as you blend.

I do think the raspberry sauce (coulis to those who remember the 1980s) makes a difference: I love the note of Christmas that the lucent redness brings, and the way, when you cut into it, you get a streak of winter raspberry ripple.

Makes 14 generous slices