Home Cook Liverpool 6: Bread, brownies & beef curry on the menu this week

It’s a Bank Holiday Weekend – and you’ve got more time on your hands than ever so tuck into our nest instalment of Home Cook Liverpool.

Each week we have been getting Liverpool’s best chefs to send us the recipes to the dishes that we all know and love! Check out over 35 different recipes from Liverpool restaurants in our full Home Cook Liverpool series here.

Don’t forget you can also tuck into our Delivery Directory which now has over 600 local restaurants, bars and more featured with 90% of them delivering to your door. Choose your next meal here.

So what not get cooking up a storm with some classic recipes from a few more of our favourite chefs and restaurants?

Rosa’s Thai Café – Beef Massaman Curry

A bonafide classic, says Rosa – and we wouldn’t disagree. This is super easy and makes a delicious meal for two…

Ingredients:

½ teaspoon cumin
5 cardamom pods
5 cloves
1 small cinnamon stick (or ½ a teaspoon ground cinnamon)
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
2 generous tablespoons Massaman Curry Paste
3 bay leaves
1 medium onion, roughly chopped (or 5 very small onions, peeled and used whole)
400ml (14fl oz) coconut milk, plus extra to serve
2 tablespoons palm sugar
1 teaspoon caster sugar
2 tablespoons Thai fish sauce (use 2 teaspoons of salt instead for a vegetarian version)
2 tablespoons tamarind paste
1 potato, peeled and cut into bite-sized pieces
200g (7oz) beef sirloin, cut into bite-sized pieces
2 tablespoons beef or vegetable stock (optional)
2 tablespoons roasted cashew nuts
5 pieces of chopped pineapple
Sea salt
Steamed rice, to serve

How to make it: Roast the cumin, cardamom, cloves and cinnamon in a dry frying pan set over a medium heat, stirring continuously for a few minutes, until their aroma fills the air. Crush the spices using a pestle and mortar and set aside.

Heat the oil in a saucepan over a medium-high heat. Stir in the curry paste, crushed roasted spices, bay leaves and onion and cook until it is fragrant and the oil separates and rises to the surface.

Reduce the heat to medium and simmer for 2 minutes.

Add half the coconut milk and stir for 1 minute.

Add the palm sugar, caster sugar, fish sauce and a pinch of salt. Cook for a minute, then stir in the tamarind sauce.

Add the potato and the beef. Simmer for 10–15 minutes until the beef is tender.

Add the rest of the coconut milk. If the sauce still seems too dry, add a little stock.

Cook for another minute until everything is mixed well, then add the nuts and pineapple.

Season to taste. The curry should have a perfect balance of salty, sweet and sour.

Ladle into a serving bowl and drizzle over a little coconut milk. Serve with steamed rice.

Siu Yukh Lamb Skewers – Dash Liverpool Restaurant and Bar

Try out another one of Dash’s ‘famous recipes’ at home. “This one may not have the infused smoke this time,” say Dash, “but we will be back giving you all a theatrical dining experience very soon!”

Ingredients:

1kg lamb mince

300g finely diced white onion

20g garlic minced

30g ginger minced

10g ground cumin

5g ground coriander

4g smoked paprika

30g red chilli paste

25g fresh coriander shredded

20g fresh basil shredded

50ml vegetable oil

Saute the onion, garlic, ginger and chilli paste in a hot pan with the oil until the onion is softened. Next, add the ground spices and cook on a low heat until the grainy texture has gone. Remove from heat and allow to cool.

Mix the lamb mince and the onion mixture in a large bowl. Add in the shredded herbs and a pinch of salt and pepper. Beat the mixture in a kitchen aid/food mixer with a paddle attachment until a semi-smooth paste. Portion into 80g balls and mould into sausage shapes before skewering.

Grill on a hot BBQ until 75C, turning regularly. Or roast in the oven at 180C for 8-10 minutes. Brush with the Molasses glaze to finish.

(Molasses glaze: 360g pomegranate molasses; 290g maple syrup; 25g garlic sliced; 12g red chillies sliced; 125ml water; 20g Thai basil. Method: Place all the ingredients into a pan and bring to the boil. Lower the heat and simmer until reduced by a quarter. Remove from the heat and add the basil. Allow to stand for 30 minutes, then pass through a sieve and cool.)

Everyman Street Café – Brownies

Happy to share the Everyman Street Café Brownie recipe, Chris Wardle from the Everyman and Playhouse says there’s only one proviso, that after you’ve made them, you ‘make yourself a cuppa, grab a book and a comfy chair – and devour!’.

Think we can all do that…

Ingredients:

200g good quality dark chocolate

250g Unsalted Butter

80g good quality cocoa powder

65g plain flour

1 tsp baking powder

360g caster sugar

4 Large free-range eggs

Method: Pre Heat oven to 180 °C/350 °F/Gas 4 and line a 24cm square baking tin with baking paper.

Next, melt the chocolate and butter in a bowl over a pan of simmering water until smooth and silky.

In a separate bowl sift together the dry ingredients flour, cocoa powder, baking powder and sugar in a bowl. Add the dry mixture to the chocolate and butter mix.

Beat in the eggs to the mix until silky smooth.

Pour the mix into the line baking tin and pop in the oven for 25-30 mins until springy on the outside and gooey in the middle.

Allow to cool and then cut into rectangles.

Then…it’s time for that cuppa!

Room Forty – Soda Bread

Room Forty is famous for its delicious afternoon teas and you can’t make a better sandwich than with this delicious soda bread. You might think it’s a little too difficult, but Jen from Room Forty is happy to take you through it, step by step…

Ingredients:

500g flour (this doesn’t have to be bread flour, you can use any but if you use self-raising flour add one tsp baking powder extra to the mix )
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda (if you haven’t any Bicarb, use 4 x tsp of Baking Powder – see the note above if you are using Self Raising Flour just add 1 x tsp extra Baking Powder)
1 tsp table salt
1 tbsp sugar (it can be any sugar but dark muscovado, or preferably treacle give the loaf a richer taste)
40g soft butter (We prefer to use 40 ml of rapeseed oil. It’s healthier and you can just pour it in to the mix)
300 – 340ml of either plain yoghurt (the value stuff is fine), milk with an added tsp of lemon juice to sour it, milk that has gone off and is starting to smell (seriously – this actually gives it a superior creamy flavour), or buttermilk.

Method: Set your oven to 200 degrees.
Into a mixing bowl weigh in your flour and chuck in your salt. Carefully measure in your bicarbonate of soda or baking powder and drop it into the bowl. Give the ingredients a rub through to mix them together.

Then add in sugar, if you decide to use treacle first smear your measuring spoon with vegetable oil before you plunge it in to the treacle as it will just drop off the spoon leaving it (fairly) clear. Then take a butter knife and swirl it through the dry ingredients in the bowl to mix it in.

Next add in soft butter or rapeseed oil. Swirl and cut it through the mix, then get your hands into the bowl and rub in the butter/oil and sugar/treacle. At this stage, if you like, you could chuck in up to three tablespoons of seeds – poppy seeds, pumpkin seeds and sunflower seeds go nicely.

You’ll need to work fairly quickly now. Check your oven is hot enough and pour a bowl of clean warm water ready for your hands. Dust some flour onto your baking sheet.

Take your liquid; yoghurt (or milk and lemon juice, or sour milk, or buttermilk) and pour it in to the mix and stir it in quickly with a butter knife. When you have stirred it in as much as you can you’ll need to get your hands in and finish it off. It needs to be a sticky mess which you’ll need to shape into a rough ball and pace on the baking sheet.

Now plunge your hands into your bowl of water to wash off sticky the mix. While your hands are still slightly wet shape the ball some more. Dust the top with some flour then grab a knife and give the dough a cross-cut across the top.

Quickly put the sheet and dough into the centre of the oven and set the timer for 30 minutes. Check it after 30 minutes – oven gloves on of course – it should sound hollow or drum like on the bottom and, pressing lightly into the cross cuts these should feel firm and not soft. If the ‘cross’ is still a bit soft stick it back into the oven again for another five minutes.

Put it on a cooling rack and leave it to cool.

The Smugglers Cove – Scotch Eggs

It’s a Bank Holiday weekend which means a picnic for two lockdown style – and how about these delicious Scotch Eggs in your basket?

Ingredients:

5 eggs
250g sausage meat
100g plain flour
egg wash (1 egg mixed with 250ml milk)
200g panko breadcrumbs
salt and pepper

Method: Boil eggs for 6 minutes. Then remove from the boiling water and place carefully into ice water to cool.

Once cooled, peel the eggs. Then season the flour with salt and pepper, before gently rolling the eggs in the flour to coat.

Evenly divide the sausage meat, allowing enough to seal and surround each egg. Then with wet hands, work carefully to wrap the eggs in the sausage meat. Be careful not to break your egg!

Dip the sealed eggs into the egg wash, then coat in panko breadcrumbs. Repeat on each egg.
Deep fry for 2 minutes until golden. Then bake in the oven at 180C-200C until crispy and the sausage meat is cooked through.

Serve with tangy brown sauce and English mustard!