Moo Brew Dark Ale, Beef and Mushroom Pie

At the moment I am looking for recipes to stock the freezer with the impending little person arrival.  Why not a pie?  And my favourite pie is a stout and beef pie.  Here is my version.

1 kg of diced beef

2 tblsp of flour

2 carrots chopped

2 celery sticks chopped

2 onions diced

4 cloves of garlic finely chopped

1 bottle of Moo Brew Dark Ale

500 mL of beef stock

A bag of mushrooms, quartered

Herbage, 2 bay leaf, sprig of thyme, sprig of rosemary

Puff pastry

Put the diced meat in a baggy with the flour and coat.  Fry up the carrots, celery, onions and garlic.  Remove and put aside.

 Brown the meat with a knob of butter, being careful not to burn the flower coating, and put aside.  Deglaze the pan with the beer.  Let all the CO2 come out and reduce it a little to remove the alcohol.

Put all the ingredients back into the pot, along with the "Herbage" and the beef stock.  This will be quite "liquidy".  Bring to the boil and reduce the temperature to a very gentle simmer.  We want the liquids to evaporate and concentrate, the sauce to thicken and the meat to be tender (could be a few hours).  As soon as the sauce is thick and goopy, turn the heat off, and add the mushrooms.  Allow to cool, cover, and put in the fridge overnight.

The next day separate the frozen pastry sheets and allow to thaw.

This is what I didn't do but you should: If freezing the pie, line the pan with baking paper or bake in a disposable tin.

You will need to blind bake the pastry.  I used some beans that are kept for the purpose, but what I didnt use is baking paper to help remove the beans.  The blind bake will take about 10 minutes at 220°C

Once out of the oven put yesterdays filling into the pie.  Cover with pastry and bake until golden.

I pulled my pie out of the oven early as I will freeze it, then when it goes back in the oven, I can cook it to the right colour.

Why bake one when you can bake two.  Same time, only a tiny bit more effort.

Julia and Kevin Disagree Over Noodle Soup

Well, I don't actually know if they have ever talked about it, but Julia loves a pie:

and Kevin likes dumplings:

But the subtitle to this post amongst all this crazy, silly politics is:

Frozen Pho

Pho is a Vietnamese noodle soup that I fell in love with while travelling there a couple of years ago.  And it is the perfect soup to freeze.  It is basically a clear, light beef stock, cooked with a few Asian ingredients.  What I have done this time is to make the broth/stock and freeze it.  When I want some Pho I can heat the broth, get my fresh ingredients and voila. I have seen Luke Nguyen's recipe in his "Secrets of Red Lantern" cookbook and it is very complex.  I prefer Charmaine Solomon's "The Complete Asian Cookbook" recipe and here it is:

3 kg of beef bones
500g of gravy beef
2 onions, sliced
thumb size piece of fresh ginger
stick of cinnamon
1 tsp of black peppercorns
salt

For this batch I could only find lamb rib bones

And I used 2 chicken carcasses, halved, instead of gravy beef

Spices

This is not a dark stock so nothing is fried of first.  Put all the ingredients into the pot, top with cold water, bring to the boil and very lightly simmer for a long time.  Recipe recommends overnight, but I did it for 8 hours.

There is one trick I learnt from the Red Bridge Cooking School in Vietnam and that is to get a pot of boiling water and blanch the meats before they go in, only for a few seconds, just to wash them

Pull the bits of used meat out with tongs and then strain into containers.

Now it is quite oily so put in the fridge overnight so the fat can be taken off when it solidifies.

Separate out into labelled containers and put in the freezer.

So what to do when you want to have soup?  That is for another time, when I next eat Pho.

But here is a link to Luke Nguyen's Pho Bo from the SBS website. Enjoy

My favourite mid week curry, Egg Curry

Whenever we are having a big week our favourite, quick, easy and tasty recipe is Egg Curry, or Anda Kari. This recipe comes from a favourite book of ours, The Complete Asian Cookbook by Charmaine Solomon.  Find this old book and buy it, Absolute Gold!

Anda Kari
serves 4-6
6 eggs
2 medium onions, finely chopped
3 garlic cloves, finely chopped
2 tsp ginger, finely grated
3 tsp ground coriander
2 tsp ground cummin
1 tsp ground tumeric
1/2 tsp chilli powder
1 can of tomatoes (recipe calls for 2-3 ripe tomatoes, but this is quick and easy)
(Crushed or Chopped canned tomatoes? Read this)

Soft boil the eggs, you want them set so you can peel them but a little undercooked.  I recommend the Egg-perfect Eggtimer. Very handy.

While the eggs are boiling/cooling, prep the rest of the ingredients.  Heat some oil in a heavy based pan, fry up the onions, garlic and ginger.  Once a little coloured, add the spices and fry to "activate", then add the can of tomatoes and simmer gently for a few minutes.  Peel the cold eggs and pop them into the curry and turn the stove off.  The heat in the curry will set the eggs.

That is it.  We had this last night but threw some beans in and served it with grilled zucchini, yoghurt and diced cucumber, and rice.  Buon Appetite!

Ardmona Canned Tomato: Chopped or Crushed?

I was out shopping this morning, doing the once a month visit to the big supermarche to stock up the larder and was selecting the canned tomatoes.  I always buy Ardmona as they are based in Shepparton, Vic, and use only Australian tomatoes.  The parent company SPC Ardmona was formed by a merger between Ardmona and SPC (Shepparton Preserving Company) in 2002 but are now owned by Coca Cola Amatil.

So the choice I am left with is Chopped or Crushed, flavoured or not.  Well I am not buying flavoured, no thanks, but I decided to have a look at the back label and investigate the difference between the Chopped and Crushed.  I was shocked, I had to take a photo:

On the left is Crushed, 97% tomato, on the right is Chopped, 60% min tomato plus tomato juice.

Robbed!  I never knew the chopped was bulked up with tomato juice.  And I bet the Whole Peeled has added tomato juice to "fill in the gaps" in the can.

Now I had a bit of a think about this and I worked out why there is added tomato juice.  You see, I have experience in this area as I was once a tomato harvester in 2006 before I moved to TasVegas.  Now I know what you are thinking, tomato harvesting, knotted handkerchief on the head:

But no.  We were harvesting 80 tonnes of tomato AN HOUR, 2 semi trailers an hour, with one of these:

These tomatoes go off to the factory to be processed and produce different streams, chopped, crushed, canned and a big proportion goes of to make tomato paste.

There is a by product from the paste operation, "Tomato Condensate", as the water is extracted from the tomato pulp be evaporation.  I believe that the juice in the canned Chopped tomato is this condensate so they get another use of this "waste" product.

I would love someone who knows more to tell me I am wrong.

But for now I will stick with the Crushed.

A Pictorial Ode to Bolognaise

With the "impending" only a few weeks away we have turned on the deep freeze and started to make a lot of cooked meals.  First job is to put in some Bolognaise.  And not just any, but 5 kg worth.


First start with a spotless kitchen and more importantly, clear benches

Suit up.

Peel carrot

Trim and wash celery

Peel onions

Peel garlic.  I love my garlic peeler, get one

Sharpen knife/ves

Meat. 4kg of blade roast.

Cut into long 2cm strips, then put in the freezer

I used a mandolin to help slice the carrots.  Very fast, very dangerous

Chop the celery

Finely slice the garlic

Dice the onion, mandolin helps a lot here

Use a large stock pot and fry pan

Fry onion, put in stockpot

Fry celery, put in stockpot

Fry carrots, put in stockpot

Take meat out of the freezer and mince

Fry meat in batches

Put it into the stockpot along with some beef stock and herbage.  Simmer it down until stock evaporates

Add the tomato gear and simmer until it reduces to the consistency

Allow to cool and fill LABELLED containers

But what to do with this now Bolognaise.

Found some of these funky looking mushrooms at Hill Street.  Fried them up tossed it into some warmed bolognaise and over the top of spaghetti.

Done.  Buon appetit

ICCS - Posters

The International Cool Climate Symposium finished up yesterday, but I wanted to do one final post on my highlights of the poster displays.  I have included the links to the abstracts so that you can track down the authors for a full copy.

I will start with the winner of the poster Competition:

Predicting Sauvignon Blanc Yield in Marlborough

I passed over this poster because I thought, "hmph, NZ SBL", but went back to it after they won.  Quite clever.  They have found a temperature model to predict the yield of Sauvignon Blanc based on the previous season flowering temp and this seasons flowering temp.  One decides bunch number the other berry number, 2 vital parts of the yield equation.

Student Winner:

Is Pinot Quality Skin Deep?

Angela Sparrow, from TasVegas, micro fermented Pinot Noir under several trials, with or without skins/seeds/etc.

The timing of fruiting zone leaf removal in Chardonnay and Pinot Noir and the impact on fruit for sparkling wine production and base wine composition

Long title.  I am sure PhD students spend some of their time making up really long titles.  Fiona Kerslake, from TasVegas, is probably the first people to investigate leaf removal and its impact on sparkling fruit.

Would you like a short red, Sir?

Bob Dambergs describes how his "Bodum" coffee plunger winery works. Very novel and the prelude to ...

Mighty Little Fermenters

Richard Smart has come up with ultra small fermenters, we are talking 50 grams of fruit!  and at $3 a fermenter, very cost effective.  I am considering using these for our trials at Pressing Matters.

A web-based portal for the analysis of wine tannin and pigment

Bob Dambergs, did I mention he lives in TasVegas, discusses the AWRI Tannin Portal.  Nifty, plug in 5 UV/Vis numbers from your spec and gives you anthocyanin, tannin, pigmented tannin, etc.  Shame it costs money to use.

There were a few more I was interested but didn't get photos of them.  Will have to re read them when I get mailed the preceedings.

No quote of the day, but I will mention one from the workshop I attended previously.

Andrew Landers:

"Don't roger your nozzles!"

ICCS - Day Four

Last day of the International Cool Climate Symposium. Phew.  A Viticulture Colloquium.

Glen Creasy presented 2 papers for colleagues.  Both were about rootstocks.  He quoted a 1926 paper on how the root architecture affects performance (does someone have a link for this, or the author?), shallow vs deep rooted.  An interesting point, when comparing rootstocks to own roots, the own rooted vines need to be grafted on to themselves, to remove any effects of the graft union, clever.  I don't think I have ever heard of that being done.  In Chardonnay, rootstock had no effect on numbers of flowers, but did on fruitset and numbers of small berries.

Rob Agnew proposed that the average Dec temperature was an indicator of bunch number for the following season.  If last years Av Dec temp is less than the long term average, then you get less bunches. How simple, we will use this at Pressing Matters.

Larry Bettiga has investigated the effects of using an under vine cover crop.  Barley was sown and was herbicided at 20cm tall.  They found that it:

• lowers soil moisture in spring
• raises soil moisture in summer
• increases OM in the 3rd year
• reduces available soil Nitrogen 
• Roundup timing needs to be early enough to avoid competition

Mark Krasnow found that if you remove all the leaves before flowering you can reduce the incidence of botrytis.  This could be due the reduction in compactness, reduces berries/bunch and bunch weight.  It could also have something to do on the increase in UV.  He may need to try some shade cloth ground truthing.

Robert Beresford spoke about the development of the Botrytis Decision Support website, predicting bunch rot in grape vines.  It looks great, but is only for NZ.  Sad face.  How about an OZ mirror?

Dion Mundy is trialing the use of mechanical harvesters to thin fruit at pea size in NZ.  It is reduces bunch weights and opens up bunches.  There is a reduction in Botrytis, but this could be due to the reduction in bunch trash.  He may need to trial removing some of the trash with air on a couple of panels.

And then lastly, Dean Metcalf spoke about his Trichoderma flying circus (I imagine the Trichoderma doing mini circus tricks like a flea flying circus).  Sounds like he has some good organic products.

Done and dusted. A great seminar.  Time to go put these things into use at the vineyard.

ICCS - Day Three

Day three of the International Cool Climate Symposium.

I had a gander at the program for the morning's session and reading the tittles of the presentations, I looked forward to listening.  But unfortunately it was a bit underwhelming.  There was just nothing to take back to the vineyard to use.

But the funniest bit was when three guys from Brighton, England got up to pitch to us to come to the next ICCS in 2016.  It was just like the "Top Gear Wine".

In the 2nd session Ross Brown from Brown Brothers got up and told us why they bought the largest producer here in TasVegas.  This was a great chat. Highlights:

• spread there risk from just Victoria
• chasing lighter consumer tastes
• wine cycles last 15? years
• 70's Cabernet
• 80's Chardonnay
• late 90's Dirty Kiwi Sauvignon Blanc
• Pinot Noir will be their champion
• barriers to entry
• tough taskmaster
• Iron Fist in a Velvet Glove
• must have power and flavour, not thin
• all about excellence, no short cuts

Robyn Lewis of www.visitvineyards.com got up to speak about new media.  She showed us a slide from Gartner, the Hype cycle of new technology:

Other bits of info:

• older consumers are now using mobile phones on the internet, and increasing
• social media is a platform for dialogue (yes!)
• need to invest time in new media
• conversation rules and everything else drools
• new media is not free
• must have a strategy
• be consistent, authentic and persistent
• define your message

Quote of the day is from Robyn Lewis:

"A relationship is just like the Hype Cycle.  There is the peak of inflated expectations at the beginning, but then comes the trough of disillusionment.  After this is the slope of enlightenment, when you might get married to reach the plateau of productivity" 

ICCS - Day Two

Day two of the International Cool Climate Symposium and it is the biggest day yet.  But it may have the biggest night the previous night.  I arrived at 9am for the start, but not everyone did:

Here are my favourite tidbits of info from today.

Brian Jordan has done a whole bunch (pun) of research on the effects of UV-B light on grape bunches.  Southern cool climates, like TasVegas, have a lot more radiation, by up to 40%.  A plant responds to this light by synthesising UV-B absorbing compounds and antioxidants, and down regulating primary metabolism.  But these responses vary between plants.  Increase your UV-B by leaf plucking and you increase your flavonoid concentration, but you also reduce amino acids and (for all you Tasmanian Cabernet lovers) methoxypyrazines.

Olga Makhotkina had a presentation titled "Why drink NZ Sauvignon Blanc Young?".  My question is why drink NZ Savauge Blanc at all?

Elizabeth Tomasino gave an interesting chat about four chemicals that influence the aroma of Pinot Noir.  Ethyl Octanoate (red berry fruits), 2 Phenyl Ethanol (violet), Ethyl Decanoate (works with ethyl octanoate to produce dark fruits) and Benzaldehyde (fruit, jam, oak?).  Don't actually know how to affect the concentrations in the vineyard or winery, yet.

Kevin Kerr chatted about ladybug taint, yeah these guys:

Multicoloured Asian Lady Beetle.  Under stress these guys produce 2 isopropyl 3 methoxypyrazine, IPMP, and has aromas of peanut, asparagus and capsicum.

The threshold for this is 1 part per trillion or 0.00000000001 gram for every litre.  Once this gets in the wine there is no way to treat it.  In one season  the Canadian wine industry dumped 1 million litres of tainted wine.  The researchers then tried to find out what attracts these guys onto the grape bunches.  They connected a ladybug antennae between 2 electrodes to make an "antennaelectrogram", weird hey.  It was found that PMS is a good deterrent.  (By the way these guys don't hang out in TasVegas)

I then attended a workshop titled "It's all to do with technique and timing", I know, sounds sus.  But it is all to do with spray timing and technique.  It is probably the best workshop I have ever attended.  It was given by Kathy Evans and Andrew Landers.  Best points were:

• measure how effective your spraying is with water sensitive paper or "Surround", or how do you know
• spray droplet size for insecticides/fungicides needs to be between 119 and 216 um (how you measure this I don't know), bigger particles bounce off the leaves.  Yeah bounce
• Air induction nozzles are a must, bigger particle size, but contain air bubbles which help to shatter the droplets on impact
• 25% reduction in PTO speed on an airblast sprayer reduces drift by 75%, 540 -> 400 rpm
• For Powdery Mildew:
• sulphur not needed before 5 leaves
• use your big guns, best sprays, from pre-flowering to early fruit set
• berries are resistant to new powdery mildew infections, 10 days after set.  But flowering can take 3 weeks

Quote of the day is from Karl Forsyth, an engineer:

"Forest fires destroy the environment. Strip mining prevents forest fires.  Mining Engineers are good for the environment."