Ingredients (serves 4):

• 2 heaped teaspoons of fennel seeds
• 2 teaspoons of chilli flakes
• Olive oil
• 600g Cumberland sausages
• 1 tablespoon dried oregano
• 1 glass of white wine
• Zest and juice of 1 lemon
• 500g of fusilli
• Salt and pepper
• Some grated parmesan
• 1 tablespoon of dried parsley

Start by crushing the chilli flakes and fennel seeds in a pestle and mortar; place to one side once done.  Squeeze the sausage meat from the sausages and discard of the skins.  Heat up a griddle pan (or normal pan) and add some olive oil followed by the sausage meat.  Spread the sausage meat out and pat it down.  Cook for a minute or so before bashing the meat to turn it into mince.  Once the meat starts to brown off add in the crushed chilli flakes and fennel seeds.  Keep stirring the meat and cook until it’s just going crispy.  Pour in the oregano and white wine, stir and allow to simmer until the wine has reduced by half.  Grate the zest of a lemon and then cut it in half and squeeze the juice in being careful not to let any seeds drop into the sausage meat.  Reduce the heat to a gentle simmer while you cook your pasta.

Cook the pasta in lightly salted water until al dente.  Drain the pasta off and return it to it’s pan.  Pour the sausage meat mix in along with the parsley and stir around so that that sauce covers all the pasta.  Serve up straight away with a sprinkle of parmesan.  Enjoy!

Ingredients (serves 4):

Crumble

• 300g plain flour
• 1 pinch of salt
• 175g unrefined brown sugar
• 200g unsalted butter – at room temperature and cubed

Filling

• 450g cooking apples – peeled, cored and cut into 1cm pieces
• 50g unrefined brown sugar
• 1 tablespoon of plain flour
• 1 pinch of ground cinnamon

Heat the oven upto around 180 degrees C.  Pour the flour, sugar and a pinch of salt into a large bowl and mix well.  Then you’ll need to rub in the butter a few cubes at a time.  This involves putting the cubes of butter into the flour and then getting your hands into the mixture, lifting some up in your hands and rubbing the butter and flour through your fingers.  Keep repeating this until all the butter is in the bowl and the mixture resembles bread crumbs.

In another bowl, mix the apples, sugar, flour and cinnamon together lightly.  Pour the apple mixture evenly into a greased oven dish.  Next, pour the crumble mix over the top, making sure that you create an even crust.  Pat the mixture down lightly.

Place the dish into the oven for 40-45 minutes or until the crumble is nice and golden and the fruit is starting to bubble up through the crust.  Serve with custard, cream or icecream!

I picked up some nice looking black pudding on the market today so decided to do this dish.

Ingredients (serves 2):

• 2 cloves of garlic – crushed and finely sliced
• 1 teaspoon of thyme
• Olive oil
• 3 pork loins
• 4-6 circles of black pudding
• 2-3 cooking apples – peeled, cored and sliced roughly into cubes
• 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon
• 2 teaspoons of sugar

Put the oven on to 200 degrees C.  Put the apples, cinnamon and sugar along with a dash of water into a pan and heat until you can squash the apple mixture into a sauce.  Whilst the apple sauce is coming together you first need to prepare the pork.  Cover both sides of each loin with some olive oil, garlic and thyme.  Allow to sit for a minute or so before frying off on both sides for 2 minutes until they are browned off on the outside.  Place them on a baking tray and put them into the oven while you cook the black pudding.  Put some more oil in the pan you did the pork in and fry the black pudding on both sides until crispy (or to your preference).  Once the pork has started to crisp around the edges, remove it from the oven.

To serve up, spoon out the apple sauce equally, cut the pork loins in half and place in an alternating pattern with the black pudding.  Eat straight away, lovely!

Ingredients (serves 3-4):

Casserole:

• 500g diced venison
• 30g plain flour
• Salt and ground pepper
• 4 tablespoons of sunflower oil
• 1 onion – sliced
• 2 carrots – peeled and diced
• 2 sticks of celery – sliced
• 2 garlic cloves – crushed
• 100ml red wine
• 500ml chicken or beef stock
• 1 bay leaf
• 1 teaspoon of dried rosemary

Dumplings:

• 100g of self raising flour
• 50g of vegetable or beef suet
• 25g of grated mature cheddar cheese
• 1 heaped teaspoon of dried chives
• 75ml cold water
• Salt and pepper

Heat up the oven to around 170 degrees C.  Place the plain flour in a bowl and season with salt and pepper.  Put the venison in the flour and coat evenly.  Heat a pan up over a medium heat and put half the oil in then add in the venison.  Once the venison is browned off remove it from the pan and place it into a casserole dish.  Add the rest of the oil to the pan and return it to the heat.  Throw in the carrots, celery and onion and cook for five minutes until the veg is slightly brown around the edges.  Add the venison back into the pan and add in the garlic and red wine.  Simmer until the wine reduces a little.  Pour everything back into the casserole dish and add in the rosemary, bay leaf and stock.  Put the casserole dish into the middle of the oven for around 20 minutes.

After the venison has been in the oven for 15 minutes you’ll need to make the dumplings.  Combine all of the ingredients and mix together briefly.  You don’t want to knead the mixture but mix it enough so that it’s consistent.  Wet your hands before grabbing a golf ball sized amount of the mix and pat into a ball shape.  Repeat this until you’ve used all the mixture.  Now that the venison has been in for 20 minutes it’s time to add in the dumplings.  Remove the venison from the oven, give it a quick mix and then place the dumplings over the top of the mixture, making sure that they’re not touching.

Return the venison and dumplings to the oven for a further 10-20 minutes or until the dumplings start to go a lovely golden colour.

Serve up straight away with some veg and crusty bread.  Enjoy!

Ingredients (serves 4):

• 400g of a good cut of steak
• 1 onion – sliced
• 1 red pepper – sliced
• 3 large mushrooms – sliced
• Mature cheddar cheese
• 1 French baton
• 1 clove of garlic

Heat up the oven to around 180 degrees.  Heat a pan up and add a little oil and fry off the onions and garlic for a couple of minutes.  Add in the sliced beef steak and cook until just browned off.  Add in the pepper and mushrooms and stir for 3 minutes.  Season as necessary with salt and pepper.  Pour the mixture into an oven dish and top generously with sliced cheese.  Put the lid on and place it into the oven for around 5 minutes or until the cheese is nicely melted.

To serve, simply slice the batons in half and fill with the steak and cheese mix.  Serve with chunky chips for a filling indulgent meal!

Ingredients (serves 3):

• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 1 onion – finely chopped
• 200g smoked salmon – shredded
• 100 ml drywhite wine
• 300 ml double cream
• 2 tsp paprika
• 2 tbsp dried dill
• 450g tagliatelle
• Salt and pepper to taste

Bring one pan of water to the boil.  Heat another pan over a medium heat, add in the olive oil and fry the onions for 3-5 minutes until nice and soft.  Add the smoked salmon and cook for a couple of minutes, stirring constantly.  Pour in the white wine and allow to simmer for a minute until the alcohol has evaporated off.  Next, sprinkle over the paprika and dill and pour the cream evenly around and stir until it’s well mixed in.  Add the tagliatelle into the boiling water and cook until done to your preference; preferably not fully soft.  Drain off and return it to it’s pan.  Pour the creamy salmon mixture over the tagliatelle and stir throughout the pasta.  Serve up straight away with a final sprinkling of dill.

Ingredients (serves 2):

• 1 ripe banana – sliced
• 120g plain flour
• 1 1/2 tea spoons of baking soda
• 1/2 tea spoon of salt
• 1 tea spoon of sugar
• 1 egg
• 250ml milk
• 50g of cream cheese
• 1/2 tablespoon butter (slightly melted)
• 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla extract
• 1/2 punnet of blueberries
• Golden syrup
• Juice of 1 lemon
• Extra sugar to sprinkle over the pancakes

Start by mixing together the flour, baking soda, salt and sugar and then creating a well in the middle.  In another bowl add the egg, milk, cream cheese, melted butter and vanilla extract and whisk well for a minute or so.  Add about half of the milk mix into the well of flour and stir around a little.  Once it’s fairly consistent add in the rest of the milk mix and stir until it’s fully smooth.

Warm a good non-stick frying pan, melt a knob of butter then add in a little of the mix into the centre of the pan.  After 5-10 seconds sprinkle in some blueberries.  Cook until golden brown underneath (you should see tiny craters appearing on the top when it’s close to being cooked underneath) and turn over for approximately half the time it took to cook on the first side.  Once cooked, put to one side on a plate covered with tin foil and start on the next one.  Repeat until all the mixture has gone.

To serve, stack the pancakes with alternating layers of bananas, lemon and sugar and cover with golden syrup!

PS: Check out the super slow motion pancake flipping video below!

Ingredients (serves 3):

• 5-6 chicken thighs
• A dozen new potatoes – halved
• 1 carrot – sliced
• 1 medium onion – sliced
• Olive oil
• 1 teaspoon of rosemary
• 1 teaspoon of thyme
• 1 teaspoon of parsley
• 3 cloves of garlic – finely sliced
• Juice of 1 lemon
• Half a punnet of cherry tomatoes
• 1/2 glass of white wine

Pre-heat the oven to around 180 degrees C.  Get an oven bowl and put in the halfed new potatoes, cherry tomatoes, sliced carrot and onion.  Place the chicken on top of the veg. Cover with the rosemary, thyme, parsley, garlic then squeeze over the lemon juice and pour a good glug of olive oil over it all and finally the wine.  Stick it in the oven for 30-50 minutes covered with tin foil, stirring half way through, until the chicken is done to your liking.  Enjoy!

Ingredients (Serves 1):

• Enough spaghetti for one
• 4 anchovy fillets – chopped up
• 2 shallots – finely sliced
• 1 garlic clove – crushed and finely sliced
• 1 tablespoon of green pesto
• 1 teaspoon of dried parsley
• Olive oil
• Salt and pepper

Bring a first pan of water to the boil.  Heat a second pan up over a medium heat and add in the oil shortly followed by the anchovy fillets, garlic and shallots and simmer for a couple of minutes until the anchovies start to break up.  Add in the parsley, a tablespoon of green pesto and season with pepper (you shouldn’t need any salt due to the anchovies).  Keep on a low heat whilst you add the spaghetti into the first pan and cook until al dente.  Drain the pasta off, return to its pan and stir in the anchovy mix.  Serve straight away with a sprinkle of parmesan if you have any.

Ingredients (serves 1):

• 1 english muffin
• 3 large eggs
• 80g of butter
• Dash of salt
• Dash of paprika or cayenne pepper
• 2 tablespoons of hot water
• 4 thin rashers of bacon
• Juice of half a lemon

This is quite a tricky dish to do (and explain) as there are several things that need doing at roughly the same time but I’ll try my best to put it into words! 🙂

Bacon

Fry until crisp 🙂

Muffin

Toast 🙂

Poached Eggs

Line a glass or ramekin with cling film and rub a little vegetable oil on the cling film.  Crack an egg into the film and bring up the sides around the egg to make a cling film parcel.  Use a clip or bag tie wrap around the top and drop into boiling water for 4 minutes.

Hollandaise Sauce

Put the butter in a pan over a very low heat and allow to fully melt.  Crack an egg and add only the yolk to a mixing bowl along with some salt, pepper and paprika/cayenne pepper.  Also add in a squeeze of half a lemon.  Whisk lightly for around one minute.  Once the butter is melted add the hot water into the egg yolk and begin whisking.  Slowly add the melted butter whilst whisking steadily.  Continue to whisk until all the butter has been poured in and the sauce should thicken up.

Serve

You should plan all of the above steps so that they come together at the same time.  Sit down and enjoy your creation!  I used an extra muffin to mop up the sauce. 🙂