Waste not, want not ... a new dessert is born!
(or 2 for the price of 1)

Seeing as I was going to be serving in Church on Christmas Day, I thought it would be nice to give the rest of the crew some small treats as Christmas presents. I counted at least eight persons - and thought - some form of home made edible gift would go down well.

Jams? cookies? fudge? cake?.. After a bit of deliberation, I decided to fall back on good old Cabernet Wine Jelly. Inexpensive (it can turn a very mediocre / cheap wine into a scrumptious treat), quick and easy to make.

Cabernet Wine Jelly

Great! that settled the issue of what to give. Now, I had to find suitable containers. As it was such a last minute decision, it was too late to hunt around town for bottles (in any case,  I had no time, pre-holiday work being rather busy). Hmm. hmmm. hmmm .. What should I use... whizz up and down supermarket aisles thinking hard and doing the weekend grocery shopping at the same time.. Ah-ha! baby food bottles! Small and cute, with an estimated volume of 150 - 200ml, they would be ideal. As luck would have it, a range of Organic babyfood was on specials - 3 for $4. Grabbed a dozen - all fruit flavours - apple, pear, mango - and loaded them into my trolley.

Wine: found 2 bottles on specials as well, unbranded Cabernet Merlot, locally produced in Hawkes Bay. Can't be too bad.

Not wanting to waste food, I enlisted the help of a good friend to help me eat up some of that fruit puree. But as you might have guessed, 12 bottles is a lot of fruit puree to eat. They were surprisingly tasty (we had expected bland, bland, bland). After 2 bottles each, we gave up and decided empty the remaining bottles in a clean ice-cream tub to freeze. (with the initial idea to use them in smoothies) As we were doing so, it struck us that the pure fruit would make a rather nice sorbet - a light summery dessert for a Kiwi Christmas dinner.

Fruit Puree

Converting baby food into (an alcoholic) dessert:
What we did - to the fruit puree, we added a whizzed up can of mango slices, added icing sugar (to taste), zest and juice of one lime and a few shot glasses of cointreau and vodka (not too much, as the alcohol will make it difficult to freeze). Gave it a stir and chucked it in the freezer. Removed every 3-4h, used a fork to break up the ice crystals and mix in some air. Did this a couple of times and we got a half decent home made sorbet. We plan to serve it up in salt crusted glasses - like a Margarita.

Apple-Mango Margarita Sorbet

Whilst the sorbet was freezing nicely, the bottles (nearly forgot those in the excitement of creating this alcoholic dessert) were then washed clean and placed in a 110C oven for 30min to sterilise them.


Cabernet Wine Jelly

• 4 cups of wine 
• 4 cups preserving sugar (with pectin and acidity regulator)
• juice of 1 lemon

1. Warm the sugar and add all of it to the wine in a large stockpot
2. Add lemon juice
3. Stir the wine-sugar mixture over low heat until sugar is completely dissolved
4. Turn heat up high and bring the mixture to a roiling boil
5. Boil for 4-5min or until mixture reaches 105C, skim off any scum
6. Test for set point by placing a teaspoon onto a cold dish - place it in the fridge till cold
7. Set point is reached when the test jelly creases or wrinkles when a finger is run across it
8. Remove jelly mixture from heat
9. Bottle in warm sterilised jars 

Easy as!

Once jelly is cool and set (takes a few hours), enjoy it on crackers with a strong blue vein cheese!

Cuban Roast Pork Christmas Dinner

It's sometimes hard to think of Christmas when the weather is hot and sunny. Our minds are so conditioned to dream of a Northern Hemisphere White Christmas, with chestnuts roasting o'er an open fire, warming ourselves with hearty meals to ward of the wintry blasts....

But I'm not complaining, we were blessed with a fantastic weekend of weather down in New Zealand this Christmas. To set the scene for a very tropical Christmas, I scoured the internet and decided to try a Cuban theme: Cuban Roast Pork Shoulder (Lechon Asado), accompanied by Beans and Rice (Moros y Cristianos).

Ground cumin, pepper, garlic and salt

Cuban Roast Pork
Ingredients:

• 2 tsp cumin seeds
• 1/2 tsp whole black peppercorns
• 4 cloves garlic, chopped
• 2 tsp coarse salt
• 1 tsp dried oregano
• zest of 1 orange
• 1/3 cup orange juice
• 1/3 cup dry sherry
• 3 Tsp lemon juice
• 3 Tsp fresh lime juice
• 2kg pork shoulder, trimmed and tied

Pork shoulder and marinade

Method:

1. Toast the cumin and black peppercorns in a dry pan, then grind them up with coarse sea salt, oregano and chopped garlic
2. Add this to the orange, lemon, lime juices and sherry.
3. Score the skin of the pork shoulder, then trim and tie.

   

   Pork shoulder, trimmed and tied

4. Place meat in a large zip-lock bag or non-reactive bowl, pour over marinade and leave for 24h -36h in the refridgerator (minimum 6-8h). Turn over 2-3 times to ensure marinade gets to all parts of the meat.
5. On the day that you are going to roast the pork, take it out of the 'fridge and let it come to room temperature - this will take about 2h at least. 
6. Preheat the oven, 165C
7. Transfer pork and marinade to roasting pan, cover tightly with foil and roast for 1h.
8. Remove foil cover and roast for another 1.5h, or until an instant read thermometer inserted into the centre reads 70C. Baste the meat (not skin) every 20-30min to keep it moist.
9. At the end of the cooking period, if the skin has not become nice and crackly, crank up the heat to 200C for about 5-10min. (Keep an eye to prevent the skin from charring).
10. Remove from oven and rest for 10-15min before carving.

Cuban Roast Pork

Rice and beans are a common accompaniment. This dish has many variations and is sometimes called Moro's y Cristianos, with the black beans representing the Moors and White grains of rice, the Christians. Not very PC, but heck, it's delicious, just call it by the humble moniker, Beans n Rice.

Cuban Beans and Rice

Beans and Rice

• 1 cup long grain rice
• 2 cups water (approx)
• 1 can black beans, drained
• 2 cloves garlic finely chopped
• 1 tomato, chopped
• 1/2 red bell pepper, finely chopped
• 2 finger pinch of salt

1. Fry the garlic in a bit of olive oil till golden, add the rice, fry in oil till all the grains are coated with oil, add the water. (I was taught to add enough water so that if I placed my middle finger on the surface of the rice, the water level will come up to the first finger crease - ie just enough to submerge the distal phalanx. This works with any quantity of rice in any sort of pot)
2. Add remaining ingredients, give it a good stir and bring it to boil. 
3. Simmer for 10min over low heat (lid off), then
4. Cover with lid, turn off the heat and let the rice steam for another 10min before eating.

A nice bit of salad to serve alongside this meal would be beetroot and citrus salad or just a simple green salad.

Enjoy!