Old News - Kitchen Press

Flavoured Butters

From The Seafood Shack – Food & Tales from Ullapool

by Kirsty Scobie & Fenella Renwick

Flavoured butters are really quick and easy and are something Kirsty & Fenella use all the time to boost flavour and jazz up their seafood. In the Shack they use them instead of plain butter in most of their dishes. And they’re not just good for fish dishes – put a slice on a steak after cooking, stick some in your baked potatoes, stir into pasta. Whatever you’re cooking, these little flavour bombs will take it to a different level of tastiness. You can store them in the fridge for weeks or pop them in the freezer to take out when needed. Some of the flavours Kirsty & Fenella make at the shack include Chilli, Paprika and Lime; Mixed Herb; Lemon, Caper and Dill; Pesto and Saffron and Sweet Shallot but here’s the recipe for one of our favourites, Roast Garlic and Chive.

Roast Garlic & Chive Butter

1 whole garlic bulb
250g salted butter, softened
small handful of chives, chopped

To make your butter

First roast the garlic.

Preheat the oven to 120°C. Slice the bottom off the garlic bulb so the ends of the cloves are exposed. Now get a sheet of tin foil, scrunch it into a small bowl, and put in your olive oil and a good amount of salt and pepper. Put your garlic bulb on top of the oil, cut side down. Wrap your tin foil over the top of the bulb to seal in a parcel and cook in the oven for around 45 minutes to an hour.

Check if the garlic’s ready by removing from the oven and giving it a wee squeeze – it should be super soft. If it’s not, put it back in the oven for another ten minutes or so and cook until soft but make sure you don’t burn it. Remove the garlic from the tin foil parcel. Once it’s cool enough to touch, flake off any loose peel and squeeze the soft garlic cloves out of the skin. They should slide out easily.

Place the roasted garlic flesh in a bowl with the softened butter and the chives and mix with a wooden spoon. We always season our butters with just a little amount of salt and some fresh black cracked pepper.

To roll your butter

Get some clingfilm and cut it about the size of an A3 sheet of paper. Lie this out flat on your worktop and spoon the butter mixture across the middle in a horizontal line, leaving about
a hand space on either side. Now hold the corners of the clingfilm closest to you and fold over the butter. Run your hands along the butter to the edges to smooth out and remove any air holes. Twist the clingfilm at either end and gently roll your butter to form a good cylinder shape. Perfect for storing in the fridge and freezer! Now why not try some more flavoured butters with your own favourite seasonings?

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November 19, 2020

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Soup is Simple

‘Soup is simple!’ says Fraser Reid. Well, he would know – he is the author behind one of our favourite and perenially popular titles, Seasonal Soups. Fraser runs Fraser’s Fruit & Veg in Dundee which focuses on supplying the most local produce that he can source. The aim, he says, is ‘to get produce harvested that morning and onto the shelves within the next couple of hours’ from local farms, allotments and even local gardens.

Here is Fraser’s vegan-friendly recipe for Butternut Squash, Coconut and Apple Soup which makes very tasty use of some autumnal staples.

Butternut Squash, Coconut & Apple Soup

The apple in this soup acts as a sweetener and can easily be replaced by using a pear, peach or apricot (depending on the time of year).

Ingredients

1 tbsp olive oil or butter
1 onion, peeled and roughly chopped
1 carrot, peeled and roughly chopped
1 teaspoon garam masala
1 butternut squash, peeled, deseeded and diced
1 apple, peeled, cored and roughly chopped
2 stock cubes
1.5 tbsp creamed coconut
salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

Method

Heat a pot on a medium-low heat and add the oil or butter. Fry the onion, carrot and garam masala for 5-10 minutes.

Add the squash and apple and continue to cook for 5 minutes.

Pour in 1.2 litres of boiling water and add the stock cubes and the creamed coconut, stirring to make sure it dissolves. Bring to the boil, then turn down the heat and simmer for 20 minutes.

Blend the soup until smooth, then season to taste.

Serves 4

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November 17, 2020

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How to Dissect a Crab

Do not be afraid of crabs! Once you have mastered the art of how to dissect a crab, then a world of amazing recipes from crab bisque to hot dressed crab to creamy crab linguine and beyond opens right up for you. So no need to worry if you can’t tell your dead man’s fingers from your white meat because The Seafood Shack-ers Kirsty & Fenella are here to tell you exactly what to to!

Take One Cooked Crab

Twist off all the legs, small and large. Sometimes the feathery grey gills called ‘dead man’s fingers’ will come out with the large claws – these are not good to eat and will make you feel sick so make sure to discard them. Most of the time they will be in the body.
Put the crab on its back so its tummy is upwards. You will see the crab’s two eyes, and below these there are two small flaps. Move these aside and push down on the slightly softer shell underneath with both your thumbs.
Push hard to crack through…
Then you can pull out the middle section of the body.
Inside it looks like a bit of a mess, but you can eat everything EXCEPT the dead man’s fingers.
Don’t worry – they’re so distinctive you can’t miss them – they look just like feathers.
Pick through the rest of the meat and put it in a bowl. This is where you will find most of the brown meat.
Now have a wee tidy up and start on removing the white meat from the leg and claws. Get the larger legs first and tear the claw from the leg. There will be two small pieces of cartilage – just make sure they don’t go into your crab meat bowl. Use a pick or a claw tip to get the meat from the leg.
Now for the claw. Get a large, heavy spoon or a knife (choose one you’re not that fond of). Place the claw flat on a board and crack it in the middle with the blunt side of your knife or the curved side of the spoon, then turn it over and do the other side. Remove the bottom part of the shell and you should be left with half a cracked claw. Give it a rinse to remove any loose shell. You can either leave it like this or get all the meat out with a pick – just watch for the large think piece of cartilage in the middle.
Always make sure you thoroughly pick through your white crab meat as you’ll often find small pieces of shell in it. There’s nothing worse than chewing down onto a hard piece of shell! You now know how to dissect a crab and need never be scared again.