How to gobble up those
SOME OF MANCHESTER’S TOP CHEFS ON WHAT TO DO WITH THE REMNANTS OF YOUR CHRISTMAS DINNER
IS there any meal more gloriously excessive than Christmas dinner?
Pork, pork and more pork in the form of pigs in blankets and sausage meat stuffing, three types of sauce, roast AND mashed potatoes, five kinds of veg, cauliflower cheese and that’s before we’ve even got to the turkey.
Pudding AND cake for afters? You’ve twisted our arms. Oh go on then, we’ll have a cheeseboard too.
Such gluttony means Boxing Day leftovers are more or less guaranteed. But what to do with them?
We asked a few of Manchester’s top chefs and restaurants how to use up some common Christmas dinner leftovers.
Here are their recipes. CONSISTENTLY one of Manchester’s top dining experiences, Adam Reid at The French earned its fourth AA rosette this year and climbed up four places in the Good Food Guide to be named the 13th best restaurant in the UK.
Adam has shared this recipe using up any leftover veg along with what’s left of the turkey. Serves 4 Ingredients Leftover turkey carcass 100g pearl barley 250g unsalted butter 300g sprouts (leftover or fresh or both) Sliced leftover parsnips 2 large leeks 2 white turnips (swede is fine) 5 large banana shallots 1 tin sweet corn 40g chopped fresh herbs (or a sprinkling of mixed dry herbs) 2 tsp ready chopped garlic 1 tsp miso paste (optional) Salt and black pepper to taste Crusty bread/baguette 250g fridge cold unsalted butter Method Remove any meat from turkey and shred as small as possible along with skin. Boil the bones for a few hours to make a stock (throw in a chicken stock cube as well).
Strain the stock through a fine sieve and use to stew the barley for 2-3 hours or until your preferred bite is achieved.
Slice the sprouts, leeks, turnips, parsnips and shallots and cook quickly on a high heat in butter in a wide based covered pan.
Add corn, herbs, garlic (and miso if using) and season liberally with salt and black pepper (I like it really peppery!)
Serve in a bowl alongside sliced crusty bread and cold butter. by Simon Wood at Wood IT’S been a busy 2018 for Oldham-born MasterChef star Simon Wood, who’s opened a second restaurant in Cheltenham while his First Street restaurant, Wood, goes from strength to strength.
But he still found time to share this recipe for Boxing Day flatbreads with us, using up any leftover turkey. Ingredients Leftover turkey Cucumber Spring onions Flatbreads For the sauce 8 large fresh red chillies, roughly chopped 3 garlic cloves, peeled and crushed 300g granulated sugar 170ml white wine vinegar Method Make the sauce by chopping the chillies and garlic in a food processor or by hand until you have a paste (you will need to stop the machine and scrape down the sides a few times).
Put the sugar into a heavy-based pan with 6 tbsp water and place over a medium heat. Heat until the sugar dissolves.
Increase the heat and boil until the syrup becomes sticky and loose, then add the vinegar – stand well back as you do so as the mixture will hiss and spit. Then add your paste and then turn the heat down and simmer for 5 minutes.
Leave to cool and pour into a sterilised jar. When cool, put in the fridge. It will keep for a couple of months.
Heat the flatbreads in a dry frying pan while you toss the turkey in another pan with some of the sauce until crispy and evenly coated.
Pile the turkey into the warmed wraps and garnish with cucumber sliced into batons (remove the seeds with a teaspoon to stop the wrap getting soggy) and chopped spring onions. Roll up and enjoy. TURKEY curry is a Boxing Day leftover classic (just ask Bridget Jones) and this fragrant dish from Dishoom’s executive chef Naved Nasir is perfect for using up any you’ve got from Christmas dinner.
The sauce is bursting with flavour so you shouldn’t need to marinate the meat beforehand, just add it to the sauce and cook. 3 tbsp sunflower oil 2 - 3tsp green cardamom 2-3 tsp black cardamom 1 inch cinnamon stick 2 small bay leaves 1 tbsp ginger paste 1 tbsp garlic paste 5-6 ripe tomatoes, puréed 2 tbsp tomato paste Salt ½ tsp degi mirch (red chilli) powder 2 tbsp butter Garam masala powder 1 tbsp sugar 1.5 tsp acacia honey Generous pinch of cumin powder ½tsp dried fenugreek Leftover cooked turkey (allow around 150g-200g per person of white meat cut into bite-sized pieces) Green chilli and coriander to garnish Method Heat the oil in a heavy bottomed frying pan, and add the whole spices. Fry for 1 min.
Add the ginger and garlic paste, and cook until the oil starts to separate.
Using a blender or a hand-mixer, blend the chopped tomato, tomato paste, spices, ginger and garlic mixture together.
Add to the pan, and add salt and red chilli powder. When reduced by half, add the butter and keep cooking until the oil starts to separate.
Add garam masala, sugar, honey and cumin powder and continue cooking.
Add dried fenugreek and remove from the heat.
Take the cooked turkey and the makhani sauce, add to a pan and cook over a gentle heat for 10-15 minutes.
Serve in a bowl and garnish with green chilli and coriander. by Sam Buckley at Where the Light Gets In IT’S not so much a recipe as a ritual when it comes to leftovers for Sam Buckley, of Stockport’s acclaimed Where the Light Gets In. Over to you, Sam...
“In our family we take Christmas leftovers very seriously. But our leftovers never survive until Boxing Day. By around 9 o’clock we start to get our second wind and that’s when it’s time to construct ‘the Tower of Love.’
“Every year I jump into the kitchen and lift the foil wrappings from plates of cold cuts, veg and sauces. The ‘Tower of Love’ is a sandwich of magnitude, invoking the true spirit of Christmas unity. Here are the rules:
The sandwich must be too high to take a reasonable bite
You must not be able to eat the sandwich without a knife and fork
The sandwich must contain all sauces that were present on the dinner table.
“You can improvise a variation but here is my take. Potatoes and yorkies are rewarmed in the oven until crisp. Reheat the mash in a pan, veg can be steamed along with meat using a little gravy to keep in the moisture. Heat the gravy to a gentle boil in a pan.
“To assemble, take 3 or 4 pieces of sliced white bread and on each side smother a different sauce - horseradish, apple, cranberry and mustard.
“Start with mash, spreading it thickly onto an already mustard spread slice. It’s a good paste to hold the components, add a good glug of gravy.
“Build in the veg; carrots, parsnips and sprouts and then add a good glug of hot gravy. A few pigs in blankets, sticks removed, are a good addition here.
“Add another slice of saucefilled bread and another glug of gravy and then Yorkshire puddings for that inner crunch. Add more gravy in preparation of the meat.
“My auntie cooks pork, turkey and beef because she’s a feeder. I recommend a slice of all three and in the unlikely event that there is any crackling leftover add a few pieces. Pour another glug of gravy and then a piece of bread.
“Now work in reverse to construct a perfect palindrome of fillings, ending in the mash and bread to secure. And lastly a good glug of gravy over the whole thing.
“Serve the ‘Tower of Love’ with a handful of napkins, a knife and fork, and a can of pilsner in front of ‘Die Hard’ the movie.”
And then sleep until the New Year, presumably. by Gary Usher at Hispi GARY Usher owns Didsbury bistro Hispi and is opening a Manchester city centre restaurant, Kala, next year. He’s shared this recipe for a ridiculously simple snack making use of those leftover roast potatoes - perfect with a few beers on Boxing Day.