Thursday, June 18, 2009

Good gravy



I don't know how you guys all feel about this silly looking guy who appears on the television all the time, but I have to admit that his recipes in his last two books have actually been bloody good. The Jamie Oliver at Home one is full of some great feeds and may also have some appeal to our more rural members such as Flinthart, Squire Bedak and Ms Hughes with it's romanticised look at rural rustic cookery and the Ministry of Food is just chockers with good old fashioned nosh up meals.
The weather down here in sunny Melbourne is partuicularly cold and crappy at the moment and lends itself to the old Sunday roast so on Sunday I tried my hand at this gravy recipe from the latest book, which had taken my imagination.
It was truly awesome - I can't stand the old tinned gravy powder stuff and always make a gooey hash of it when I try to make it the traditional way. What you do for this recipe is add an extra layer of veges underneath the roast as a 'trivet' and then after you have cooked the meat, put it aside to rest, take out the veges you want to include in your meal (I actually cooked them seperately) and then mash the hell out of the ones that have been sitting right underneath the meat - in my case that was a lot of old garlic, onions and a couple of taters. Add flour, mix in some wine and put over the heat - you then add some stock and cook until it all thickens up. Stain the liquid through a strainer and hey presto you have the most awesome gravy ever...
It ain't rocket science as they say - although you do end up with some mushy mess to chuck in the compost.
If you want a truly amazing roast meal try this recipe as well - although you need a good oven and lots of time...

2 comments:

  1. That lisp fools people, JO is one of the best chefs for writing cookbooks that are useable, you should see the state of my naked chef ones!
    I do my gravy like that when i could be bothered and it is just a step above, the more garlic the better.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I'll throw in acouple of tool tips. Take that anyway you like.
    The blender beats the masher, but does mean washing up 4 things not 1.
    When straining skins & garlic plugs out I use my(insert foodie correct name)wire basket on a stick used in wok deep fry. It leaves some chunks without bits - if you get the difference.
    I'm still struggling for a "thickener" as good as wheat flour. Everything I cook ends up really rice-y or corn strach-y. Damned kid.

    ReplyDelete