Recipe corner: Parkin

Parkin is a glorious bake which appears to be particular to the North of the country, where it is a Bonfire Night staple. I first encountered it nearly thirteen years ago, at The Star Inn at Harome. The chef there, Andrew Pern, is a tremendous champion of all things Yorkshire and he served slabs of warm parkin as a dessert, with spicy poached rhubarb and rhubarb ripple ice cream. A very beautiful thing.

But, as I said, for many Northerners, parkin is chiefly associated with Bonfire Night and I suppose the inherently comforting sticky, dense spiciness is ideally suited for wintry nights. The addition of oats give it a slightly rougher, more interesting texture than gingerbread, the dark treacle lends a liquorice depth to the sweetness. It's well worth making it a couple of weeks before you intend to eat it as, like Christmas cake, it will sit quietly, wrapped in foil, and do nothing but improve.

Now. I've baked Andrew Pern's recipe several times but, until this year had not made it in my current oven. My current oven is a BEAST. And I foolishly ignored my instincts and adhered to the cooking time thus ending up with a sadly over baked parkin which tasted familiar but had a texture somewhere between flapjack, cake and Hobnob. I have suggested an hour in my recipe below, but just keep an eye on it. It is ready when it is lightly springy to the touch and the top is gaining a tawny, caramelised look.

Edited August 2018 to add: if you are following the Weight Watchers Flex programme, this parkin works out at 8 Smart Points per 16th portion. Steep, but worth it.

Ingredients

175g golden syrup
50g black treacle
100g butter
100g soft brown sugar

100g self raising flour
Pinch salt
2 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
1/2 tsp mixed spice
75g rolled oats

Egg
Splash of milk

Grease and line a 20cm square tin and preheat your oven to 140.

Place the syrup, treacle, butter and sugar in a saucepan and set over a very low heat. The aim is to melt these together into one golden liquid. Keep the heat low to prevent it from boiling and avoid stirring - pick up the pan and give it a good swirl every so often to ensure it melts evenly.

Meanwhile, sieve together the flour, salt and spices into a large bowl, then stir through the oats.

Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and combine. Stir through the egg and a little milk - just enough to ensure that the batter has a semi-pouring consistency.

Put the mixture in the prepared tin and bake - mine took 45 minutes and Andrew Perm says 90. If you have a relatively normal oven, I'd start checking after an hour.

TWTWTW: Winter is coming

It appears to be one of the depressing truths about getting older that time is permanently getting away from you.  I am sure that when I was a child, a single weekend would stretch out for days, summer lasted pretty much forever and a year was a lifetime.  And now, at the grand old age of thirty-ouch the whole play reel has sped up to an alarming degree.  I don't know how it can possibly be nearly the end of October, and 2017 approaching its final throes. 

I mean, I understand logically that we must be nearly into November, and thus practically at Christmas, because I made my Bonfire Night parkin today.  It was my second attempt, I am very sorry to say, the first being an abject lesson in trusting my cooking instincts.  Basically, we have an absolute beast of an oven and always have to reduce both cooking temperatures and times whenever we make anything to ensure that it isn't overdone; even bearing this in mind, I still managed to over bake my first parkin until it resembled nothing so much as a big, spicy HobNob biscuit.  Nothing wrong with the flavour, and, if you're happy to lose a few teeth, perfectly edible.  But not squishy, sticky parkin.  For those unfamiliar with this particular bake, I'll stick the recipe up next week.  The key thing to remember is that if it looks ready, smells ready and is only slightly springy to the touch DO NOT PUT IT BACK IN THE OVEN.  Even if you've only baked it for half the specified time.

I've titled the post, winter is coming, but last night's weather - full on wind and rain screeching and battering at the windows - made me think that it is pretty much here.  It was a perfect night to be inside, with all the sparkly loveliness of Strictly on the TV and a fire blazing in the log burning stove.  That stove, which we had fitted back in early summer, finally seeing off the Gawdawful 70s-style gas fire monstrosity, has proved to be our most worthwhile purchase of the year.  It was the first real stamp we put on this house after we bought it from our landlord and it's fabulous. Every home should have one, plus a cat to stare wistfully into the flames.  Example:

I say wistful.  That particular emotion might be slightly beyond her but she does a good impression, no?

In addition to the fire, we were also warmed on the inside by the delicious Rafi's curry that we had for supper (do you see how elegantly I segue into food chat?  Seamless!)  It had been quite a few years since we'd used one of their curry packs, but, now they have a permanent presence in Kirkgate market I can see us buying them much more regularly.  The Xacutti curry, which we made with chicken thighs, red peppers and onion, had a wonderfully rich, almost smoky quality to it.  We both agreed that we could have taken more heat, so, if we repurchase will request the mix be made hot rather than medium.  Served with nothing by rice and a supermarket naan bread it was a perfect Saturday supper.

TWTWTW: Bangers

This week it was Bonfire Night in the U.K. An occasion on which we celebrate, through the respective mediums of bonfires and fireworks, the fact that a bunch of nefarious Catholics were foiled in their attempt to blow up the Houses of Parliament.

(Desperately tries to resist urge to make ironical comment on this given the current state of British politics).

Anyway, certain foods are traditionally associated with Bonfire Night. Sausages, or bangers, for obvious reasons. Chilli con carne (slightly less obviously). Parkin - a rich, sticky, spicy cake (again, don't grasp the significance of the connection. But any excuse to eat gingery cake). Our household being nothing if not predictable, all these foodstuffs were on the menu for the weekend.

I was thwarted in my attempt to make parkin by Waitrose rather rudely failing to provide adequate stocks of black treacle, but I produced a damp gingerbread loaf instead which was almost an acceptable substitute. It was D who really triumphed in the food stakes this weekend though, by using some of the new kit he got for his birthday to produce his very own sausages:

Just look at these plumptious little beauties! At my request, he made a batch of boudin blanc, which is a traditional French sausage consisting of pork and chicken, a combination of warming spices and milk and eggs which give it a light, moussey texture. It turns out that making sausages is neither easy nor clean nor quick, but it does give a person a certain smug glow. Also on the agenda for the next couple of months, plans are afoot to create a house sausage recipe (he is thinking pork and juniper) and some spicy merguez.

In other news, we leave for Paris at 5am on Thursday morning, for a long weekend of Gallic indulgence. And when we get back, we have plans in place which will hopefully mean that this blog goes back to being as much about weight watching (as opposed to Weight Watchers-ing) as it is about food. Colour me excited.