Recipe: Scotch Eggs

A good few years ago my family got 6 chickens, just as fun pets for the garden and to have some fresh eggs. Little did we know, they are pretty addictive animals to keep and nowadays their numbers fluctuate between 20 - 30! 

Over the winter we were lucky if we got an egg a day (out of all of them combined) but now that it's spring they are shaking off the dust and revving their engines and producing 9 or 10 eggs most days. It might not sound that many for the number of chickens we have (currently 23 I think) but boy does it add up over the week. 

We are overrun with eggs and are running out of places to put them! I'm trying to come up with as many egg based recipes as I can and we're even giving some away to the neighbours just to get through them and make room for the next lot. For instance: breakfast = omelette, lunch = scotch egg, dinner = egg fried rice…

I'd wanted to try making scotch eggs for a while and I figured this was the perfect time to give it a whirl. This recipe was another of Jamie Oliver's.

Scotch eggs: Makes 8

10 eggs, 2 beaten

800g pork mince or sausage meat

salt 

pepper

seasonings such as:

mustard

chives

parsley

nutmeg

plain flour

bread crumbs

2l vegetable oil

First things first, start with some eggs! These were eggs from our bantam hens, so they are about 2/3 the size of a standard medium egg. I boiled these till they were medium hard, just a little creamy in the centre of the yolk still, and then I cooled them down under cold water to stop the cooking and got peeling. Very fresh eggs are notoriously hard to peel as the whites don't become as rubbery when cooked (notice how a few have chunks out of the outer layers).

I used plain pork mince and added my own seasonings. I also added a few stale breadcrumbs and a small egg just to improve the texture, this wouldn't be necessary with ready made sausage meat. I would suggest you cook a tiny bit of the mince at this point and taste it for seasoning so you can adjust it, my first lot of eggs were a little under seasoned so I had to add more salt for the last few. 

Put your flour, beaten egg and breadcrumbs in bowls.

Take a chunk of mince and flatten it out in the palm of your hand.

Dust a peeled egg in flour then place in the middle of the mince patty. Carefully bring the meat up around the sides of the egg until you can close it together, completely encasing it.

I got this step done all at once because it is surprisingly clean compared to the rest of the process.

Now prepare yourself to make the biggest mess of your kitchen! Coat the balls in flour and shake off the excess, coat in the egg, then roll in the breadcrumbs. For an extra crunchy coating follow this with a second coating of egg and breadcrumbs. I strongly suggest using one hand for flour and breadcrumbs and the other for the egg or you'll end up with a big, sticky, clumpy mitten of goo.  

(I don't have pictures of the egg and breadcrumb steps because my hands were pretty messy and Arjan kept getting distracted)

Then came the deep-frying, which only took a few minutes because the meat 'shell' is fairly thin and the heat keeps it cooking even after it's been removed from oil.

I let them cool before we tried them (well mostly, but we were a bit too hungry to wait) and I must admit, they were beautiful when they were still a little warm. Crispy crusts, juicy meat and slightly gooey eggs, they were perfect with a dollop of mayonnaise or wholegrain mustard, and just incase you were wondering, they are still delicious a day later after a night in the fridge.

These were superbly delicious and incredibly simple to make, more of an assembly task than proper cooking! I would definitely recommend trying these out if you get the chance (or simply need an excuse to use up some eggs).

Recipe: Strawberry Jam

I'm back in York for the next couple of weeks, looking after the house whilst my parents are away. So now that I have free reign of the kitchen I wanted to try out a few new recipes that I've discovered recently. 

One of those recipes was strawberry jam, a classic favourite of many and as Jamie Oliver revealed, deceptively easy! 

Into the kitchen I went, grabbing a pan, an empty jar and my 3 ingredients (yes, just three!). 

I will save you the suspense, it is the best strawberry jam I have ever eaten and so simple.

Strawberry Jam: makes 4 - 5 400ml jars

1 vanilla pod (I didn't have any so substituted a dash of vanilla essence)

1 kg strawberries 

500g jam sugar

• Before starting you need to sterilize the jars. This can be done by submerging in boiled water in the sink, heating in the oven or using a hot cycle dishwasher. 
• Take the tops off the strawberries and place in a pan.
• Halve the vanilla pod and scrape out the seeds, add to the strawberries. (If using essence instead, add this to the strawberries now) 
• Add the sugar to the strawberries, using a potato masher roughly mash the strawberries to a pulp, leaving some larger chunks for a better final texture. 
• Over a medium heat, bring the pan to the boil then simmer for 5 minutes.
• Turn off the heat and skim off any foam from the surface. Leave to cool for about 15 minutes.
• Divide the jam between the jars and leave to cool completely before putting on the lids. Place the jars in the fridge. 

This was the perfect breakfast on a toasted, buttered crumpet with a hot cuppa! 

The texture is beautiful, slightly runny with big juicy chunks of strawberry.

I never thought making jam could be so simple, I'd only ever heard scary things about jam thermometers and that was enough to put me off.

This is a brilliant recipe and I am now desperate to try it out with a variety of other fruits! I hope this has inspired a few of you to get in the kitchen and start jammin'!