Simply pore over
Whether you’re looking for comfort food or new Italian dishes, these three cookbooks will provide oodles of inspiration as Christmas gifts.
James Martin’s Valencia beans and red prawns
Serves 2. Ingredients: 75ml olive oil, plus extra for drizzling; 2 garlic cloves, chopped; 1 onion, diced; 1⁄4 leek, diced; 1⁄2 carrot, peeled and diced; 1⁄4 green pepper, cored, deseeded and diced; 3 bay leaves; 2 whole smoked chilli peppers (or a pinch of chilli flakes); 300g cooked butter beans; splash of white wine; small bunch of flat-leaf parsley, chopped; 8 red prawns, split lengthways; sea salt.
If you want to use a barbecue, heat it until hot and the coals are white.
Heat a medium paella pan and, when hot, add the oil, then add the garlic, all the vegetables, the bay leaves and the smoked peppers. Cook for two to three minutes, then stir in the beans, 50 millilitres of water and the wine and cook for three to four minutes. Season with salt and finish with the parsley.
Meanwhile, pop the prawns onto the barbecue, drizzle with oil and season with salt, then cook for two to three minutes until charred, turning once or twice. Alternatively, grill on high for three to four minutes.
To serve, remove the smoked peppers (if using) from the beans and then pile the prawns on top of the beans and drizzle with extra olive oil if desired.
■ James Martin’s Spanish Adventure by James Martin is published by Quadrille, priced £27. Photography by Dan Jones. Available now.
Russell Norman’s spinach and ricotta dumplings
Serves 4. Ingredients: 500g baby spinach leaves, washed; 50g 00 flour; 250g ricotta; 1 large freerange egg, beaten; 150g grated Parmesan; flaky sea salt; black pepper; ½tsp freshly grated nutmeg; 250g semolina; 100g butter; a large handful of sage leaves.
Steam the spinach for three minutes over a large pan of boiling water. Thoroughly drain and squeeze to remove the excess water, then chop the leaves finely. Set aside.
Mix the flour with the ricotta in a large bowl until it resembles lumpy breadcrumbs. Stir in the egg and two-thirds of the Parmesan. Add a pinch of salt, a twist of black pepper, the nutmeg and then add the spinach. Combine thoroughly with a wooden spoon or with your hands.
Put half the semolina into a bowl and shake the rest on to a baking sheet or a tray. Take small lumps of the flour, egg and spinach mixture and form them into small balls by rolling them between your palms, to the size of large olives. Turn each ball through the bowl of semolina, then place on the tray you’ve prepared with the rest of the semolina. When finished, you should have 24-30 little balls.
Fill a very large pan with water and bring to a rolling boil. Place the gnudi in the boiling water as quickly as possible, bringing it back to the boil on the highest heat, and continue to simmer for about three minutes.
Meanwhile, in a small saucepan over a medium heat, melt the butter and add the sage leaves. When it bubbles, reduce to a very low heat. This should take no more than two minutes, while the gnudi are cooking.
The gnudi will float to the surface when they are ready. Turn off the heat, remove them with a slotted spoon and drain the excess water on kitchen paper. Place on four warmed plates, pour the butter and sage over the top, then evenly distribute the remaining Parmesan. Add a flourish of black pepper.
■ Brutto by Russell Norman is published by
Ebury Press, priced £32. Photography by Jenny Zarins. Available now.
The Hairy Bikers’ Chocolate eclairs
Makes about 8-12. Ingredients: For the choux pastry: 115g plain flour; 100g butter; 2tsp caster sugar; 1tsp vanilla extract; pinch of salt; 3 eggs, well beaten; 1tbsp icing sugar. For the filling: 300ml double cream; 1tbsp icing sugar; ½tsp vanilla extract. For the chocolate glaze: 100g dark chocolate; 50g whipping cream; 50g butter; 25g golden syrup.
Preheat the oven to 180°C/Fan 160°C/Gas 4 and line two baking trays with baking parchment. Sift the flour on to another piece of baking parchment.
Put the butter, sugar, and vanilla extract in a pan with 225 millilitres of water and a generous pinch of salt. Heat gently until the butter has melted and the sugar has dissolved, then turn up the heat until the mixture is boiling. Remove the pan from the heat.
Pull up the sides of the baking parchment and slide the flour into the butter and sugar mixture. Stir the flour into the wet ingredients to form a thick paste. Put the pan back over a gentle heat and continue stirring with a wooden spoon for two or three minutes, until the mixture is slightly steaming.
Leave to cool for a couple of minutes, then beat for a couple of minutes more. You will see steam escape from the dough at this point. Keep beating until the steam has subsided.
Gradually work in the eggs, just a couple of tablespoons at a time, until you have a thick glossy dough.
Fit a large star or plain round nozzle into a piping bag and scoop the dough into the bag. If you don’t have a nozzle, simply snip off the end of the bag off – the hole should be about 2.5cm wide.
Pipe tiny amounts of the dough under the corners of the baking parchment on the trays to keep the parchment in place. For large eclairs, pipe eight lines of dough, as evenly as possible, on to the baking trays, making each one about 15cm long. To make sure they don’t spread to an oval shape, pipe them slightly wider at each end. To make slightly smaller eclairs, pipe 12 lines of about 10cm long. Wet your fingers and smooth out the ends of the eclairs if peaks have formed. If you haven’t used a star nozzle, run a fork along the length of each one.
Dust the eclairs with the icing sugar. Bake for 25 minutes, by which time they should have formed a crust. Use a skewer to poke holes in each end of the eclairs so steam can escape from their centres, then continue to bake for another eight to 10 minutes. Turn the oven off and leave the door ajar. Leave the eclairs in the oven for about half an hour.
To make the filling, whip the cream until it is stiff, then fold in the icing sugar and vanilla extract. Chill for half an hour.
For the glaze, put the chocolate, cream, butter and golden syrup into a bowl over a saucepan of simmering water. Melt together gently to make a fairly thin ganache.
To fill the eclairs, cut three holes in the base of each one. Fill a piping bag with the cream and pipe it into the holes. Squeeze the eclairs lightly – they should feel nicely full. Dip each filled eclair in the chocolate glaze – this gives a much better coverage than trying to spread it – then leave them in the fridge to set. These are best eaten on the same day they are made as the pastry will eventually soften, but they will keep for up to 48 hours.
■ The Hairy Bikers: Ultimate Comfort Food by Si King and Dave Myers is published by Seven Dials, priced £25. Photography by Andrew Hayes-Watkins. Available now.