Easy summer catering ideas

Having friends over, particularly in these anxious times, is more about the conviviality and conversation than the worship of food and wines. Heat with fires and busyness, drought and the general state of affairs, let alone interpersonal stresses, all mean that we need to commune with our friends more than ever.

If you have bubbles ready to go, you are fortunate to generate instant good mood. (Bubbles are my go to anti-depressants.) Who can stay down with ice cold bubbles bursting under one's nose? If bubbles can't be found, head straight to the chilled Rose or Riesling. Nothing says summer more than these two wines.

RECIPE

Starters

Pate of some sort. Duck liver, mushroom pate or duck rillettes. Only need a tasty morsel.

Serve with 2009 Bloodwood Chirac

Shortcuts: Buy pate from good deli or duck rillettes from Essential Ingredient

Entrée

Smoked trout and celeraic salad

Serves 6 entree or 4 for main

Thinking about the Riesling and what would go with it… I love smoked trout and happened to have half of a nobbly celeraic and some watercress in the fridge. Ah I thought, that would make a perfect salad with a lemony mustardy mayonnaise. Easy. I then googled these ingredients to see if it existed already and sure enough, Lorraine of Not Quite Nigella has a lovely recipe already. She has added pickled onions, eggs and caperberries- all good.

Serve with 2017 Bloodwood Riesling

Ingredients

• 1 smoked trout (de-skinned and de-boned)

• 1 bunch watercress (rinsed thoroughly and pick out the tender green bits)

• 1/2 large celeraic (grated)

• 1 zucchini (grated)

• small sprigs of parsley (chopped)

• salt and pepper to taste

Dressing

• 1-2 lemons (grated rind and juice )

• 4T home made mayonnaise (if you can. I use grape seed oil)

• 2T Dijon mustard

• splash of Riesling

 Method

Thin the mayonnaise with more lemon juice and/or Riesling if it gets too tart.

 Squeeze some lemon juice over the grated celeraic to prevent oxidation. Toss to combine ingredients ie grated celeraic, zucchini, lemon rind and chopped parsley. Have all components ready in the fridge. 

 At the last minute dress the celeraic mix with just enough mayonnaise (avoid being gloopy.) Assemble the salad with a base of watercress, topped with the  celeraic mix  and top with pieces of smoked trout. Finish with cracked black pepper. (Victorian salmon roe would add some luxury to the dish.)

Shortcuts

Buy Dijonnaise rather than making your own mustard mayonnaise, already de-boned smoked trout and packets of watercress already edited of grassy stalks etc.

 Main

ROASTED CHICKEN WITH POMEGRANATE JEWELS & WALNUTS & BUCKWHEAT KERNELS

Side dishes of spiced Dutch carrots; roasted Spanish onions drizzled with pomegranate molasses topped with goat's fetta.

This Persian chicken dish references the elements in the richer and more wintry Khacsh Fesenjan. Roasts are great, just prepare and wait until ready and serve from the oven.

Serve with 2015 Pinot Noir if you keep spicing to this subtler level or add some more and the dish works better with the richer 2015 Cabernet Franc.

Ingredients

Serves 4-6

• 8 chicken thighs (your choice of skin on or off)

• Olive oil or both oil with some butter

• Salt & pepper to taste

• 1 cinnamon stick

• 1 T sumac mixed with 1 T cinnamon and grated rind of 1 orange

• 1 cup boiling chicken stock or mix of water/pomegranate juice/wine

• garlic (as little or as much as you prefer -keep cloves whole)

• 1 ripe pomegranate (seeds removed)

• 125 g fresh walnuts (toasted)

• 1 bunch of flat leaf parsley (leaves roughly chopped)

Method

TOASTED WALNUTS

Gently roast walnuts in an oven at 150 degrees for 10 mins or until nicely toasted. Remove and reserve for later. Pre heat oven to 200 degrees C.

POMEGRANATE SEEDS

The one good thing that Malcolm Turnbull taught me ... was how to deseed a pomegranate on Annabel Crab's TV programme Kitchen Cabinet. It's amazing when you know how. For years I followed Nigella's method by cutting the pomegranate in half and thwacking the skin hard with a wooden spoon to expel those seeds. And yes we did look like we'd committed the bloodiest of murders with the concomitant juices which flowed.

Cut around the protruding belly button and ease the plug of skin with pith off, then slice along the white veins and gently tease open the fruit into flower petals. Remove

the pith core and voila, clumps of perfect intact jewels. Release the seeds from the skin and hold for later use.

CHICKEN

Pat the chicken dry with kitchen paper. Oil and season with salt & pepper. Cover the bottom of your greased baking tray with boiling chicken stock (with a cinnamon stick added.) Place chicken pieces skin side up in one layer on top of the stock. Pieces shouldn't be submerged in liquid.

Sprinkle the chicken lightly with sumac, cinnamon & orange zest and cover tray tightly in foil. Place in the oven to roast @ 180 degrees for 30 mins. Remove the foil and cook uncovered for a further 30 mins. There shouldn't be too much liquid left. If there is, just drain that liquid into a sautee pan and reduce to a syrup with which to finally anoint the chicken. Sprinkle over the walnuts, pomegranate seeds and parsley and serve in the middle of the table.

BUCKWHEAT KERNELS

There are many ways of cooking buckwheat. One of my favourite recipes is by Natasha Kravchuk and can be found on her cooking blog: https://natashaskitchen.com/how-to-cook-buckwheat-kasha/

VEGETABLE SIDE DISH

The colours of these veg are extraordinary together. Orange on red with purple. Place down a "mat" of red capsicum, top with the spiced Dutch carrots and create a border with the pomegranate molasses onion halves.

DUTCH CARROTS

Preparation.

Cut tops and scrub dirt off carrots. Place in pan and cover in cold water. Par boil the carrots and drain them before they are too tender. (I include this step just in case I've left some grit on the carrots.)Toss the carrots in an oil & butter mix with cumin and coriander and the juice of that orange relieved of its zest.

Last minute preparation.

Roast until cooked, then serve.

ROAST CAPSICUM

Line your tray with baking paper or alfoil. Arrange cut and de-seeded capsicum skin side up and place under the grill. Blister until all the capsicum skin is black. Then fold in half and seal the edges of the paper and allow to sweat until cool. That way the skin just slips away from the flesh.

ROAST RED ONIONS with Pomegranate Molasses (optional- see short cuts)

A consistently good Middle Eastern Sydney restaurant is Kepos & Co and chef Michael Rantissi's Hummus cook book has this simple side dish recipe with shaved haloumi. I have used crumbled fetta.

Peel enough red onions and cut into halves across. They grill them on a hot plate but I've just sauteed mine in a smear of olive oil and then arranged the intact halves on a baking tray. Salt and pepper and drizzle with some pomegranate molasses. Roast until cooked through. Crumble the fetta on top.

Shortcuts

 CHICKEN STOCK

Can use bought chicken stock or stock cube dissolved in water.

ROAST CHICKEN

Buy takeaway. If you have access to a roast chicken shop, get them to cut the chicken into 8 or more pieces. (Hopefully they've just used salt and pepper for seasoning. you don't want the one with 43 spices)

COUSCOUS

Combine with some roast veg like carrot / pumpkin/ capsicum/ zucchini pieces and eliminate the vegetable side dish. (This will help the couscous's being eaten.)

ROAST CAPSICUM

You can buy a large jar of already pre-prepared  skinned capsicum.

BIGGEST SHORTCUT OF ALL

Buy a mix of sliced cold meats, a variety of cheeses, olives, some quince paste, fresh and dried fruits and green leaves, all served with crusty bread and a range of wines and have fun working out which wines goes with which foods.  See recent  "cheeseboarding" article in SMH Good Food Section.

Cheese

• A wedge of Comte

If your conversation needs a good red,  an aged comte is always wonderful companion

Serve with 2014 Bloodwood Cabernet Sauvignon or 2015 Shiraz

Note:- If you want to support Australian cheese, Maffra is my go-to.

Dessert

FRUIT TARTS 

Easy when you have the biscuit pastry case ready to bake in the freezer (or even already baked and stored frozen.) Make your favourite shortcrust pastry recipe. (Maggie Beer loves her sour cream pastry for sweet and savoury uses.) Buy pastry already made and rolled into sheets or if you are time poor and asset rich, buy ready made tart shells from Essential Ingredient.  Add filling and decorate top with soft fruit of your choice like berries, cherries, mango slices, passionfruit pulp, figs, melon and kiwi fruits etc.

 Don't forget to refresh/flash the pastry cases in an pre-heated oven to make sure the pastry returns to crisp when it cools. While you are waiting for this make the filling.

Serve with 2016 Bloodwood Silk Purse

Ingredients for custard/ cream filling

 SIMPLE

• 300 mls Greek yoghurt /quark /ricotta

• 300 mls mascarpone

• 1 lemon (rind & a teaspoon (t)of  juice)

• 1 t vanilla extract

 Method

Mix ingredients

Note

This simple mixture references Silvia Colloca who uses ricotta with orange juice & rind to cream the ricotta. She then sweetens the cream mix with a little caster sugar. Her recipe used a de-seeded cherry topping I think. (You can if you wish make a citrus cream patisserie)

(Ricotta and quark will be more textural than the smooth yoghurt. Go with this because if you blend the filling, it will lose its thickness and become runny.)

Shortcuts

Just use mascarpone flavoured with some vanilla and lemon rind and juice