Apples and Pears Hairy Bikers' Best of British

We believe Britain has the best food in the world!

'Our glorious country boasts some fantastic ingredients.'

Start eating it, will you?

It's home to some amazing producers...

My goodness gracious. That is epic, isn't it?

And innovative chefs...

But our islands also have a fascinating food history.

The fish and chip shops of South Wales

are running out of chips.

BOTH: Yes!

'And in this series,

'we're uncovering revealing stories of our rich culinary past.'

Now there is food history on a plate.

As well as meeting our nation's food heroes,

who are keeping this heritage alive.

'Let's have them enjoying themselves, it's a short life,'

let's make it a happy one like they always have had.

'And of course we'll be cooking up a load of dishes

'that reveal our foodie evolution.'

Spring, summer, autumn or winter, it's brilliant.

BOTH: Quite simply, the best of British!

We have an amazing range of fruit in this country,

from sweet, plump strawberries,

to prickly, spiky, sharp little gooseberries,

but no fruits are more traditionally and sturdily British

than the good old apples and pears.

We've been eating apples since Neolithic times,

and in fact, we love them so much,

that we've cultivated over 2,000 different varieties.

Well, pears as arrived a little later with the Normans.

Its cute, sexy curves, its deliciously sweet flesh,

soon made up for its tardy, late arrival on our shores.

So, today's show is a homage to our favourite native fruit...

the apple and the pear.

'On today's show, we're going to explore

'why these British beauties

'were at the heart of our most ancient traditions.'

And became the pride of our food heritage.

That is the mother of all comfort foods.

From savoury delights...

To classic desserts.

We're going to show you

why apples and pears are truly the best of British.

Spring, summer, autumn or winter, it's brilliant.

Apples are as much a part of the British countryside

as men with wax jackets and tractors.

The sheer number of British varieties

is thanks to the Victorian obsession with growing new ones.

But our proud apple heritage is under threat.

We're on our way to Audley End in Essex,

to discover more about the history of our love for this humble fruit.

Us Brits chomp through billions of apples every year.

But unfortunately,

about 70% of the apples that we eat today are imported.

There was a time when British gardeners

were masters of the apple, from the garden to the kitchen.

And here at Audley End, they're keeping that grand tradition alive

by preserving some of the most intriguing varieties.

Audley End is a 17th century country house

that was built to entertain royalty on a grand scale.

Its derelict walled kitchen garden

was painstakingly restored to former glory in 1999,

and is now as it would have looked in late Victorian times,

growing 125 varieties of apple that all date from before 1914.

This orchard was designed so that different varieties of tree

fruited at different times of the year,

meaning you could eat British apples all year round

without having to import anything from the continent!

Ooh, clever old Victorians!

Head gardener Bob Sherman helped bring the garden back to life

and he's going to show us around his beloved collection of heritage apples.

Bob, I've never seen apples grown like this before. Beautiful.

It is, isn't it? But this is typical of a productive kitchen garden

from a private estate, somebody who is fairly wealthy,

eh, up to probably about the First World War.

More sunlight gets in, they get more colour.

And also, of course, you screen off the labourers

from the rich posh people who would not wanted to be contaminated by seeing them.

So Bob, when we were masters of the world of the apples,

how many varieties would we have grown?

I would think it would be reasonable to say that there were at least

1,500 varieties which people could choose from.

And they would have, they would have gone to the trouble

of finding things that were a bit unusual and nobody else had,

so they could show off to friends, bring them around and say, "This is such and such an apple",

which they wouldn't have heard of before.

What is this beautiful variety of apple we see before us?

This is Laxton's Epicure, sometimes just called Epicure.

This is typical of the sort of apple they would have been eating at about this time of year.

It's absolutely delicious but it has quite a short season.

The name Laxton tells you where it comes from, cos there was a nursery called Laxton,

where they produced many varieties. And this is one

that's generally thought of very highly, even nowadays.

-So this is an eater then?

-You should try it.

-Oh, thanks Bob.

-If you were a child, that's how you'd draw an apple, isn't it?

-Yes!

-It's beautiful.

-Mm. Superb, isn't it?

-Yeah.

What's great about this project is that all the apples grown here are available to buy in the UK.

So how did we go from producing the most varieties of apples

in the entire world, to the worrying situation of importing 70% of them?

The focus of apple growing changed after the Second World War,

away from apples grown mainly for their flavour,

towards more durable varieties that give larger crops and greater consistency.

When they weren't in season, more were simply imported from overseas.

The native apple declined. Shoppers' demands for a clean, unblemished

and uniform shape led to them buying more imports.

'No apples in the world have the flavour and crispness of those grown in England.

'Yet the housewife always seems to prefer the imported.

'The reason, says this shopkeeper, is that foreign ones are more carefully packed.

'And that if English growers paid the same attention to appearance,

'their fruit would be in demand.'

But we're missing out on a whole range of flavours

that the Victorians had right on their doorstep.

Not only were they masters of the apple in the orchard,

they were pretty inventive in the kitchen as well.

So food historian Annie Gray is going to take us through

some Victorian recipes that would have been cooked at Audley End.

Annie, what do we have here? It looks like a veritable orchard of Victorian apple goodies.

-Who's this little fellow?

-This is an apple hedgehog.

Underneath you've got apples which have been boiled,

slightly stewed, I suppose, in white wine,

piled up and then stuck together with a sort of thick apple marmalade

in the shape of a hedgehog.

And, erm, what we've just done is covered it with a bit of meringue, given it some spines.

You know, I'm getting the idea that apples were a very important,

versatile ingredient for the Victorians?

Yes, they were. They're one of the few fruits that you can get to last virtually all year round.

Because they'll keep and because there is such a variety of flavours

within the apple, they're really important for Victorian kitchens.

Right, well, we've got a gateau de pomme here,

made stewing down the apples for probably about two hours on this one.

-We'll de-mould it and you guys can have a go at Victorian decoration.

-Oh, great!

Annie, where do you find all these recipes?

We're quite lucky here at Audley End, because we have in our possession

the manuscript cookbook of the cook who worked here in 1881.

-Oh, wow!

-A brilliant thing to have.

We're able to cook the actual recipes we know were being cooked here.

Hold on.

Right. Reveal.

-Yes!

-Et voila!

Hey, Annie - there's always great pleasure when it comes out, isn't there?

It's like, yes! Right, so what do we do now?

Right. Well, the original recipe calls for it to have almonds studded

throughout all these lines to mark it out.

So we're going to go a bit mad with the sliced almonds.

It would have been served at table with a custard poured around it.

But there's no reason not to use cream or cherries or anything that you fancy.

The main thing is it needs to be visually stunning,

-and something that you really want to eat.

-OK.

The Victorians were apple crazy and supposedly, you could have had

a different variety every day for about six years.

I feel a bit like Mr Bates out of Downtown Abbey!

Some more cream. Look at that - a handful of rubies.

Twinkle off everything?

Aah!

-That looks lovely.

-Doesn't it?

-It does.

But what's wonderful is, that's a single variety apple jelly,

-So it's not all good looks, is it?

-No. It's not.

-I'd suggest in that case you taste it and check it's not all good looks.

-Thanks, Annie.

Mmmm. It's lovely.

It reminds me of quince jelly.

Oh.

I think that's remarkable.

In the last few years,

sales of English apples have made a bit of a comeback.

And we think it wouldn't be a bad thing if a few more of those

50 billion we eat a year had a link to our culinary past.

Thanks to places like Audley End,

we're able to hold onto those heritage varieties

and all the expertise and know-how growing within them.

That Victorian passion for British apples has given us

some inspiration for a great recipe that takes full advantage

of the flavours they have to offer.

We're going to make a dish

that really lets those heritage varieties shine.

One of the traditional soups you have

is the curried apple and parsnip soup.

We're going to make a soup but we're taking it that step further,

and this is an English heritage apple soup.

That means good English eating apples, not bakers, with celeriac.

-Yes.

-Ooh, it's lovely!

We finish that off with a garnish of bacon,

kind of creme fraiche, a little flat leaf parsley.

Oh, yes. And, Dave, what have you got to have with soup?

A bowl.

We're going to have bread.

You cannot have soup without bread, can you?

And it's not just any bread, this.

It's about the most indulgent, comforting bread,

with a collar of British Stilton.

It's very easy to make, tear-and-share blue cheese bread.

And, actually, the word "soup" refers more to the bread

than the liquid content in the bowl.

-Indeed.

-But more about that later.

First off, I've got two Coxes and a russet.

Now there's two things that's going to make you happy.

I'm going to peel them, core them, quarter them

and fry them in butter till they're caramelised.

And that's the appley engine room of a very great soup.

While Dave's doing that, I'm going to get on with the first stages

of preparation for our lovely bread.

If you've got one of these machines at home, use it, with a dough hook.

We have, so I am.

If you haven't, just put it in a bowl and crack on with your hands.

'For the bread, put 450g of plain flour into the bowl

'with a pinch of salt and 7g of dried yeast.'

Obviously you can't do anything with yeast unless you feed it.

And when you feed yeast, what does it do?

It comes to life.

-It does.

-It expands.

A teaspoon of caster sugar will get it going nicely.

So we've got the dry ingredients in there.

Now we're going to combine them nice and slowly.

MACHINE WHIRRS

It shouldn't take too long.

I'm putting some butter in the frying pan.

A big knob of butter. I'm going to caramelise the apples in butter.

I've got the apples, which have been peeled, cored. I'm quartering them.

That's how I'm going to cook them.

I'm going to cook them until they are nice and brown.

-Simon.

-Yes.

Do you know why soup is called soup?

As we said before, it's more about the bread than the liquid.

Go on, enlighten me.

Because soup, the word,

comes from the ancient German word "sop" or "suppe".

And the "sop" was the piece of bread in the bottom of the bowl

-that sopped up all the liquid.

-Aha!

-And also the word "supper"...

-Yes.

-Comes from the very same word.

Now that.... I bet you didn't know that.

I didn't.

-That's super.

-Do you know what, though.

There's a great British tradition with soup.

We're really good at making it.

Because it's part of our, it's part of Northern Europe's climate...

-But Scotland...

-That makes soup just so lovely, doesn't it?

-Yes.

Well, Scotland are the most prolific soup makers and soup eaters

in the world, apparently.

-Ah, now there's a thing!

-Oh, aye.

The Scottish broth and the Cock-a-Leekie.

Now, little top tip here. We've combined all the dry ingredients.

We're now going to start to make the dough and add some of the liquid.

So there's 300ml of warm water, that's to activate the yeast.

But I'm going to take two tablespoons of olive oil,

and I'm going to add it to that warm water.

I'm going to give it a bit of a shake.

Then turn your machine on and just add the water and olive oil mix.

And that'll form your dough.

-These are caramelising beautifully.

-Yeah, they look good.

There's no sugar needed because there's natural sugars in the apples

that turn them a lovely hue.

PAN SIZZLES

GENTLE WHIRRING

Right, so... We've formed a ball of dough.

What we need to do now is knead it.

We need to knead it for about five minutes.

Kneading the dough releases the gluten which is what gives

you the spring in your bread.

If your bread ends up a bit cakey, that's because you haven't put

enough elbow grease and knuckle time into your kneading.

Lovely texture, this dough.

This is me soup pan.

I want some more butter and a splash of sunflower oil.

Into that I'm going to add four small carrots chopped,

two chopped onions

and about two-thirds of this fine head of British celeriac.

These need to cook together, just moulder away for about 15 minutes.

Celeriac is, believe it or not, from the same family as celery

with a flavour that's quite similar but with a milder,

sweet and nutty taste.

You know, celeriac...

It reminds me of him with a stocking over his head.

Lumpy.

Grease a Pyrex bowl with some olive oil.

It will come in handy later, you'll just have to trust us on this.

This needs to double and a bit more in size,

so I'm going to put that somewhere warm.

We're going to cover it very loosely in some oiled cling film.

Right, the onions are cooked through

and celeriac and carrots have a nice sheen on them.

'Adding the large diced potato to the pot will give it some body

'when you blend it.

'Then in go our fried apples,

'a couple of crushed garlic cloves, a bunch of fresh thyme and a bay leaf.'

-Straight in, Dave?

-Straight in, mate.

Now that is the substance of a very fine soup.

What we need now is the liquid.

I've got about a litre of good chicken stock.

Leave it to simmer for about 20-25 minutes.

Take the herbs out, puree it and you'll have fantastic soup.

Is your bread ready?

Yeah, it probably is by now, dude.

'Tell you what, time moves fast in the magic world of telly, doesn't it?'

Stop nicking the cheese!

-Yer toad!

-It's so good.

-It's lovely.

Yes, now. You we were talking about double the size?

-Well, that's a bit more.

-Wow!

How fantastic is that?

We're going to knock this back.

What we mean by that is just kneading it gently,

just to knock some, not all, but some of the air out of it.

Just fold it over a couple of times.

You see the reason that we oiled the bowl.

What we're going to do

is literally tear off balls about that big.

Just rustically, just one in the centre.

-And we're going to build that lovely...

-Tearing, sharing bread.

-Exactly.

-Do you want me to cut you some Stilton chunks?

-You could, mate, that'd be great.

-How much cheese do you want?

About 150g.

Mmmm.

-So that's what you're looking for. About 10 bits.

-Nice!

And then what we'll do, we'll take these chunks and just push them

into the gaps.

It's like planting seedlings of pleasure.

It is such a nice bread, this.

Now we need to cover that with oiled clingfilm again, just lightly.

Set it aside for it to prove. And that'll take about 20 minutes.

Look at this, man.

-Oh! Pimp my cob!

-Isn't it lush?!

-Yeah.

-Get in!

'Tear up a few sage leaves and place them on top

'along with some caraway seeds and a dribble of olive oil.'

-Bit of a foccacia vibe going on as well.

-It's lush.

'Season with a bit of salt and it's ready to go.'

Then that goes into the oven.

220 degrees Celsius for about 20 minutes.

Which gives me just enough time to puree the soup.

'Of course, don't forget to take out that bay leaf and sprig of thyme

'before you blend it,

'or else your soup will be rough as a bag of spanners!'

Oh, man!

That is one fragrant bap.

Look at that boy-o!

That texture is just about perfect.

I want a substantial soup but I don't want wallpaper paste.

Decorate the soup with some creme fraiche.

Nice one, Dave, that looks fantastic.

-Look at that, it's like a plasterer's radio, isn't it?

-It is, aye.

With a bit of bacon and chopped parsley,

we're soon to arrive in appley nirvana.

Oh, look at that.

-What do you reckon, fab?

-About as good as it gets, mate.

Oh, hey!

Dave, mate, that is epic.

The sweet/savoury balance is perfect,

but it's amazing the sweetness you get out of three caramelised apples.

The very best of British ingredients.

With, I think, our heritage apples at centre stage.

This velvety sweet and savoury soup is a taste of appley heaven

and, what's more, it's simple to make.

And to show off even more,

the sage, onion and Stilton tear-and-share bread

is the perfect thing to enjoy with it.

Of course, the juicy awesomeness of apples was recognised

a very long time ago.

Well, Eve wouldn't have gotten into all that bother

-if they hadn't have been so delicious, would she?

-Indeed.

And in Britain we have a strong, centuries-old history

of creating apple dishes that includes the most famous one of all.

# Bye-bye Miss American Pie...#

Now we've all heard the phrase, "As American as apple pie".

NEEDLE SCRATCHES ON THE RECORD

MUSIC: Born In The USA" by Bruce Springsteen

And you'd be forgiven for thinking they originated in America.

Will you stop that?!

NEEDLE SCRATCHES AGAIN

Oh, I don't think so, my American chums!

Today, with our resident food historian Ivan Day,

we're going to be reclaiming them for good old Blighty.

It's a tradition that goes right back.

Us Brits have been making them for centuries.

We've had apple pies in this country before there was anyone

from Europe living in America.

If we go back to the time of Shakespeare,

what did an apple pie look like to him?

Well, I've got one here. This is an apple pie made from a cookery book

that was written during Shakespeare's lifetime.

"To pie, or not to pie, that is..."

Please don't, you're embarrassing!

The thing that went with it that Shakespeare would have recognised

was what we might think is custard.

So you've got this classic combination, apple pie and custard,

but this custard, it's made with wine.

I'm not sure about the booze custard,

but I wouldn't mind a slice of that!

They didn't cut it into slices like we do,

they actually cut the lid off.

Instead of serving this out and giving everyone some custard,

they actually poured the custard, or the cordle, into the pie.

Mind you, that pastry looks tougher than a rhino with a flick knife!

It's a good start, but Ivan is going to show us the most indulgent,

the most opulent, the most fancy apple pie ever made.

So fancy, it's not even got a recipe!

It's recorded in a poem written in 1704,

by English poet Leonard Welsted.

What's wonderful about the poem

is that he actually addresses the kitchen maid,

who he refers to as "Nelly".

"Dear Nelly,

"learn with care the pastry art and mind the easy precepts I impart.

"Draw out your dough elaborately thin,

"and cease not to fatigue your rolling pin."

He's no Delia, our Welsted, is he?

Well, no matter how posh your apple pie is,

it's still got to have apples in it.

One of my favourite objects in the universe

is this lovely little English apple peeler.

Which dates from about 1880.

The Jacobeans had the recipe

but those canny Victorians had the gadgets!

I then mount it onto this special spike.

# I often sit and gaze into the sky

# And dream about a slice of apple pie...#

And you just get one amazingly long,

sort of seven foot long strip... of peel.

Look at that all the skin off in a oner!

I've got a perfectly peeled apple.

So far, Nelly's dish is a pretty humble pie.

But not for long.

And he says to Nelly, "In the dessert, perfuming quinces cast.

"And perfected with cream, the rich repast."

Quinces are only around really in the autumn for a short season,

but what they did with them was make lots of quince preserves.

In the 18th Century, cloves were worth their weight in gold.

So wise old Welsted says only to use a couple with your candied peel.

Use only a just reserve, because cloves are incredibly strong.

Our Jacobean super-pie calls for some brown muscovado sugar,

to give the apples a lovely colour and flavour.

"Nor can I blame you if a drop you take of orange flower water

"for perfuming's sake."

Now this makes it all fancy.

Orange flower water is a classic Jacobean ingredient

made from blossoms of the orange tree.

Just a little bit to seal the lid with, mind,

cos it's a bit more Byron than Biker.

Very carefully rolling it across the top of the pie.

"Hence we proceed the outward parts to trim,

"With crinkumcranks adorn the polished rim."

Crinkum-whats?!

The word "crinkumcranks" is not even in the Oxford English dictionary.

What it is, it's a beautiful decorated edge

that was obtained by using one of these things.

This is a pastry jagger.

It's possible to create little ornaments by stamping designs.

But it also joins the top to the bottom really effectively,

so hopefully you don't get any leakage coming out.

That's handy, having a jagger for your crinkumcranks!

"Of all the delicates which Britons try to please the palate

"or delight the eye. Of all the several kinds of sumptuous fare,

"there's none that can with apple pie compare."

We tend to think of people in the past

not being very sophisticated when they ate,

but this poem tells us that they had very high expectations.

We have forgotten just how good food was from the past.

Verily, Sir, we have a cracking pie!

What's extraordinary about this sort of food is that we've inherited it

from these nameless people from 300, 400 years ago.

They're the people who really put together our food as we know it now.

And anyone who tastes this would know immediately that it was English.

That is the mother of all comfort foods.

Experts like Ivan help keep us in touch with our food heritage

and remind us that we have claim to some of the very tastiest around.

Like this mighty apple pie, an amazing dessert,

and despite what you might have thought, the Best of British too.

1940s SWING MUSIC

# Don't sit under the apple tree with anyone else but me...#

From the beginning of time,

the apple hasn't always just been a healthy, nutritious treat.

It's also one of the world's most symbolic fruits.

From Adam and Eve to William Tell,

it's been at the heart of many of our beliefs and folklore.

It's been associated with love, health, comfort, pleasure,

wisdom, temptation, sensuality and virility.

When it comes to us British,

no other fruit can claim such a mythical status

or have led to so many of our oldest customs and traditions.

Some more unexpected than others.

Take apple bobbing.

The person in charge has a porridge stick,

with which he stirs the apples and keeps them on the move.

-Teeth only. Les, have a go.

-All right then.

Now you might be forgiven for dismissing it as a hilarious

way to humiliate your friends.

Wheeee!

ALL LAUGH

Or a breeding ground for many germs.

But this Halloween custom

actually started out as a pagan mating ritual.

# I-I-I love you

# I truly, truly love you...#

The first person lucky enough to get a bite of the apple

would be the next one to marry.

# You're the apple of my eye-eye-eye...#

Ooh! That's a big bite!

Not only might apples have kick-started many a relationship.

Would you Adam and Eve it,

they're also behind one of London's most famous traditions.

The Pearly King and Queen.

# Any time you're Lambeth way...#

These elaborately buttoned, flamboyantly dressed

characters emerged from one of the capital's most popular trades.

# Doing the Lambeth walk

ALL: Oi!

Costermongers were the hardiest of all London street hawkers,

and got their name from selling the Costard Apple,

which was grown in abundance in the orchards all around the capital.

Tell me, Sadie, if one had enough pearl buttons,

could one just put them on a suit and become a Pearly King or Queen?

Well, I could become a Pearly but not a Pearly King,

because that's handed down from father to son.

-And you've got to be a costermonger to be a true one?

-Oh, yes.

# Knees up, Mother Brown...#

The pearl buttons came in around the middle of the 19th century

when the costermongers began to decorate their work clothes,

with a view to mimic the fashions of royalty

and music hall stars, and make them stand out in the busy markets.

A young street cleaner then took the bling a stage further

by decorating his suit from head to foot with buttons he collected from

the streets where the costermongers worked, and the fashion caught on.

ALL SING BAWDILY

It was the start of the charitable institution

that would come to represent cockneys the world over.

# If I catch you bending

# I'll saw your legs right off

# Knees up, knees up!

# Don't get the breeze up

# Knees up, Mother Brown # Woooh! #

Now from the beautiful to the downright ugly.

OK, I know what you're thinking.

What has putting a horse's collar around your neck

and pulling your bottom lip over your nose got to do with apples?

Well, the great British tradition of gurning

is the highlight of Egremont Crab Fair in Cumbria.

Thought to be one of the oldest fairs in England, it has been

held since 1267, to celebrate the region's apple harvest.

The Lord of Egremont began the tradition

by giving away crab apples to the people of the town.

-ANNOUNCER:

-For centuries local children have pushed and squealed

after the free apples.

One thought is the "gurn" mimicked the face people pulled

as they bit into the sour tasting apple.

MAN: This is Toffee, five-times World Champion.

Nine times.

LAUGHTER

-It's good that, Dave.

-I haven't started yet!

-You look like that when you're having a poo.

-I don't!

It's gurning, it's Cumbrian. It's good, it's a sport!

It's a sport?!

-It is.

-It helps if you've got no teeth, though.

Because what they do is top gurners take their gnashers out,

because, of course, then your head collapses and everything.

You can lift your jaw up.

I've got fine... So it doesn't work, really.

Anyway, enough dallying.

We're combining two of Britain's greatest ingredients.

-Beef.

-And...

Apples.

You see, the other great part of British cuisine

is our cosmopolitan plethora of recipes.

So we combine those two great ingredients with a Moroccan vibe.

We're going to do a beef and apple tagine.

This tagine combines an amazing Moroccan recipe

with two great British food specialities.

Britain was the first country to breed cows specifically for beef,

and one of the few cultures that distinguished between cooking and eating apples.

Bring them all together and you have magic.

Don't be put off by the fact we're using the term "tagine".

A tagine is the vessel to make a casserole.

If you haven't got a tagine, just use a good, heavy casserole pan.

Tagines are good

because what happens is the steam condenses at the top with

the flavours, and all the flavours go back into the dish,

so you don't lose anything with a tagine.

They're worth having.

To start things off, I'm slicing up a couple of onions,

while Si chops 750g of braising steak into chunks.

Cheaper cuts of meat, like the chuck steak that we will be using,

need longer to cook to release its great flavour.

It's just the same as with a casserole,

which is basically what a tagine is.

Beef and pepper were born to be together, weren't they?

They absolutely were.

And, of course, you can't cook your beef without pepper.

Sprinkle on a bit of salt and mix it up.

Now, don't forget...

get the oil to a good temperature, it needs to quite hot, this.

And don't overfill your pan.

If you put too much in, it'll reduce the temperature of the pan

and it'll just stew, which is minging.

Eugh, poached beef - it'd be like eating your shoes!

Let's just have a listen to it. The pan will tell you when it's ready.

-SIZZLING

-Perfect.

'Then, fry up the chunks until they're nicely browned,

'then add them to the tagine dish.'

-You know when recipes just take your fancy?

-Yeah.

Sweet and savoury, it's a classic Moroccan/British kind of love.

SIZZLING

Right, mate, that's me done.

'Put a bit more oil in the pan

'and then gently fry the onions for a few minutes.'

'Next, chuck in two cloves of thinly-sliced garlic.'

They're beginning to go translucent, colour up a bit.

Let's play with the aromatics.

'In goes two teaspoons of cumin, two teaspoons of coriander

'and one teaspoon chilli powder.'

-That's Morocco, isn't it?

-Oh, yeah.

-The holy trinity of spice. Lovely.

But when you've got this one on the go,

because it needs to cook for about three hours in total,

the whole house becomes filled with appetising fragrance.

-Champion.

-Happy?

-Yeah. That goes in with the beef.

'Deglaze the pan with 150 millilitres of water,

'then add the meaty juice to the tagine.'

'We're piling up the flavours now,

'adding in 400 grams of chopped tomatoes, 400 grams of chickpeas,

'three tablespoons of delicious honey and a cinnamon stick.'

'Now, pour in another 350 millilitres of water.'

I know it's a cheat, I know some people'll complain...

(..we're going to put a stock cube in!)

DRAMATIC MUSIC

-(Say nowt, say nowt!)

-Say nowt.

-We haven't got any rendered-down fine beef stuff.

-No.

-We've got a cube.

-And what are going to use?

The same as what Dave and I would use.

-SI MOUTHS

-Honest, it works fine.

Just crumble one in. Ooh!

'Put the lid on the tagine and let it simmer away

'for an hour and a half.'

SIMMERING

Oh, that smell. It's where the Cotswolds meet Casablanca.

BOTH SNIFF AND SIGH

-In all the bars in all the world, you had to walk into this one.

-Aye.

-I won't come again.

-BOTH CHUCKLE

Right, competition time, Mr King.

-Two apples are needed in there.

-Yeah.

-Peeled, cored, quartered.

-Yeah.

-Right?

I'll give you a competition to see who can peel the apple

without breaking the peel in the shortest possible time

to produce the longest uninterrupted unbroken apple peel.

Go!

MUSIC: "Eye Of The Tiger" by Survivor

-Close one, I nearly lost one there.

-I know, I nearly did an' all. Ohh!

-And it's got to be clean, there can be no bits left.

-No.

-PANTING:

-Not that I'm competitive or anything(!)

-Oh!

-You're out!

-I'm not out.

-Yes, you are.

-I've got that long. Come on, then.

Don't come over here and try to put us off.

-Boo!

-No.

-You cheating toad!

-I have not, mine's longer, look.

It's not longer, that's my bit. Howay.

SI CHUCKLES

'Cut the apples into eighths and lay them on top of the meat.

'Chop the sweet potato into chunks and add it in,

'with a bunch of chopped coriander.'

-Over the top, mate?

-Over the top, as ever.

-BOTH CHUCKLE

-Ooh, that's enough.

'Next, in go 75 grams of halved prunes. That'll keep you regular!'

And leave you for another 35 minutes.

What can we go and skin now?

-Rabbits.

-In a oner?

-Yeah.

-Excellent.

-Shall we have a look, mate?

-Yeah, go on, mucker.

Hoo-hoo-hoo! Look at that.

'To make the garnish, slice a red eating apple like a Red Windsor

'or Shropshire Pippin and caramelise it in butter.

'Add them to the tagine with some more chopped coriander,

'then drizzle on a bit of decadent honey - sensational.'

-How's that?

-That's lovely, isn't it? And there we go.

Hee-hee! The beef and apple tagine.

I think that really shows off our apples.

A perfect, warming dish. Mmm!

For...spring, summer, autumn or winter. It's brilliant.

Here, Kingy, let's test your culinary knowledge.

-Go on, then.

-What is a Merrylegs?

-You, after a few pints.

-Incorrect. Huffcap?

Doesn't ring any bells, no.

-Painted Lady?

-Err...

-Hedgehog?

-I know that one, a thing with spikes.

I know what you're thinking but they're actually

all types of British pears used for brewing perry.

Perry pears are a British classic but many

of the 100-plus recorded varieties were close to being lost entirely.

That is until Great British food hero Charles Martell

stepped in to save the day.

Charles lives in Dymock in sight of May Hill

in the border area of Gloucestershire, Herefordshire

and Worcestershire where most of Britain's perry pears grow.

For the last 40 years, he's been gathering cuttings

of the very rarest British varieties and bringing them back

from the brink of extinction by growing them in his orchard.

I was talking to an old farmer one day and he said,

"There's a cowslip there." It was this time of year. I said, "What do you mean?" I looked on the ground

He said, "No, you fool, the tree!"

I said, "That's the cowslip pear." He said, "yeah."

Then, the next time I went to see him, he wasn't there. He'd died.

He was the only man who knew what that tree was.

If I hadn't spoken to him and happened to have been standing there,

that variety would've been lost for ever. And that pear is just there.

In this orchard, we've got the rarest perry pear of all which is

the Speart or Spirit pear and it's...where is it? Just there.

Incredible, probably five trees in existence.

That's rarer than any wild animal.

Extraordinary that it's here and it's still working.

We're using it to distil.

Five left in world?! That's rarer than a panda!

Charles is one of the few pear spirit producers in the country

and his distiller, George Lewis, is one of the youngest around,

at the age of just 23.

Although they look tempting,

you really don't want to eat a perry pear.

With more tannin and acid than cooking or eating pears,

they're ideal for turning into booze.

But you still have to pick them at the right time.

It's critical to be picking the pears when they're at their optimum.

My palate is very faded now, faded and jaded

so George, who's a distiller

and has made a lot of cider in his time, has an excellent palate and

he can taste the sugars and everything that needs to be ready

for us to pick it.

Wow. As most perry pears, they suck all the moisture out of your mouth.

It's very dry. You can taste a bit of sweetness

-but it's definitely not ripe yet, Charles.

-No, no.

Thankfully, some of the other trees are ready.

Making distilled pear spirit is a complicated scientific process.

Gathering up the fruit isn't.

That's the only one... Oh, there's one up there with a lot of fruit on.

I'll get the hook up there. There's a good branch there, George.

-We'll get him onto that and give them a damn good shake.

-Give it a shake.

PEARS THUD ONTO THE GROUND

Yep, we've bloomin' nearly got enough, you know.

If you shake them too much, you'll get unripe ones coming down

so don't overshake them, we want the ripe ones.

Got to leave a few for the birds.

-All right, then?

-Yep.

-Let's go on up, then.

The farm's distillery was built in around 1650 and produced booze

until it closed in 1810.

Charles reopened it in 2010, and they haven't looked back since.

The pears are left to ferment, then loaded into the still

and heated by a wooden fire.

The basic recipe for distilling is the same.

You heat up a mash with alcohol in it and you condense the alcohol out.

Being a distiller is not about getting sozzled.

You really do need a good nose.

I can't taste or smell. He's the one who's got all that.

A condensed liquid comes out of the still in different parts

called heads, hearts and tails.

Heads and tails aren't the right stuff so George is looking

for hearts, the good perry-tasting bit in the middle.

Ooh, and it's strong!

After 50 minutes, the liquid changes from unwanted heads to hearts

which is what George is after.

When we go from the heads to the hearts,

then it's tradition to ring the bell here.

BELL RINGS

The bell lets the owner know that the hearts have arrived

and the brewer hasn't got drunk on his profits.

What I'll do now is I'll water it down slightly

because it comes off at about 86%.

'I'm looking for a fruity sort of pear flavour.

'It's very sweet and smooth.'

As I don't want to get drunk on the job,

I'll usually use the sink here as a spittoon

so I'm constantly spitting it out and swilling my mouth out.

It's a powerful and tasty pear drink,

but Charles has another use for it in mind.

Charles's farm also makes Stinking Bishop,

an award-winning cheese with a distinctive aroma.

Stinking Bishop won the prize for the smelliest cheese in the world

so there's something that is... There really is stink there, yes.

-That's the drink we've just made. Still warm.

-Is it?

-Yeah.

POP

Normally the cheese is washed in perry,

but recently Charles has been experimenting with pear spirit.

I reckon that's probably enough, for now.

There's a perry pear called Stinking Bishop which in turn was named

after Mr Bishop who earned himself the accolade of being stinking

because of his riotous behaviour and doubtless unhygienic ways.

So I'm told by members of his family.

He lived in the 1800s so he's long gone and can't take any offence.

Alcohol helps the stinking cheese bacteria to grow

and the flavour soaks in too. But using pear spirit is unique.

Time for the first ever tasting,

with the farm staff and their families.

So we're going to all try it.

Right. There we are.

Look how squidgy that is, girls. Look. Isn't that lovely?

-Come over, everybody, help yourselves.

-I've had a little drop.

-It's very good.

-Just delicious. I want more.

Nice and mellow and very flavoursome.

All I can say is from what I know, that's a very good cheese.

It's a great cheese that wouldn't be possible without a great pear

to give it its flavour.

-Two local ingredients...

-..and a food hero...

..brought together to make one mighty British treat.

Apples are at the CORE of some of our most ancient food traditions.

And one of the oldest and oddest of the lot

shows us how loved they were in days gone by.

There you are, gentlemen.

This is how we country kids warm our drop of scrumpy up.

Takes the cold off your belly, and that puts a foundation through

so you can drink more and more and more!

-LAUGHTER

-Very good!

# I am a cider drinker... #

In the cider-producing counties of England,

where the apple's alcoholic alter-ego

was central to the way of life,

it was particularly important to try and get the best crop possible.

To make sure they had a plentiful supply

for the long months of winter,

the locals would head down to the nearest orchard

to partake in an ancient ritual.

GUNSHOTS

For the softy townies among you, this might all look a bit alarming

but don't worry, no-one is going to get sacrificed.

Well, except maybe a piece of toast and a bit of cider,

but it's all in a good cause.

This is the ancient ceremony of wassailing,

a pagan ritual believed to have been practised since Anglo-Saxon times.

GUNSHOT AND CHEERING

CHEERING

The word "wassail" meant "good health" in old English

and the ceremony literally involved blessing the apple tree

to encourage it to bear fruit.

Old apple tree...

ALL: ..we wassail thee, and hoping thou wilt bear.

Hatfuls, capfuls, three bushel bagfuls,

and a little heap under the stairs.

-Hip-hip...

-ALL: Hooray!

-Hip-hip...

-ALL: Hooray!

The idea was to awaken the cider apple tree

and scare away evil spirits by singing and shouting

and generally making a bit of a kerfuffle.

-Hip-hip...

-ALL: Hooray!

A cider-soaked piece of toast was then placed

in the bough of the tree as a gift to the good spirits

and cider poured around the trunk.

And just to be on the safe side, why not finish off

by shooting a few more rounds into the air?

Well, you do need to be doubly sure that all the evil spirits have gone.

Well, that should do the trick.

The ritual might seem strange business today

but it was once thought of as simple good husbandry.

And when your cider supply is at risk, anything is worth a try.

Apples might hog the culinary limelight

but pears are as versatile an ingredient as you can get.

You can use them with meat, in salads or on their own.

But quite possibly the very best thing about pears is using them

to make desserts.

We're going to be making a pear and chocolate frangipane tart.

This almond-flavoured tart uses the winning combination

of British Conference pears

and naughty dark chocolate to create a delicious dessert.

-This is patisserie for plonkers.

-It is really, really simple,

which is why we're doing it.

'Sometimes, the simplest things are the biggest crowd-pleasers.'

-I tell you what.

-What, mate?

You cook it for a dinner party, it's very rich.

You have a sliver of it but the next day,

when it's cold with a little coffee,

-it's proper.

-Ooh, nice.

-It's elegant.

-Nice, nice.

'And a top Hairy Bikers tip is to use -

'wait for it - pre-made puff pastry.'

You wouldn't normally think of lining a tart tin

-with frozen puff pastry because you think it's going to go soggy.

-Why would you?

It doesn't puff up too much but it gives you a wonderful crispy

patisserie tart base with no hassle and it's so easy to handle.

-There's none of that flaking off and causing grief.

-No.

-It just works.

'Pat the pastry into a round ball and roll it out.'

'For the filing, melt 100 grams of dark chocolate broken into pieces.'

-What's this? "Hello?"

-Hello.

-It's a CONFERENCE call.

-Ha-ha!

'Crack three eggs into a large mixing bowl

'along with 150 grams of caster sugar,

'150 grams of ground almonds, and 50 grams of self-raising flour

'and 150 grams of melted butter, broken into chunks.

'It's a bit on the naughty side, this recipe,

'but it's well worth it.'

And guess what you do? You take one of these -

or a hand whisk if you haven't got one of these -

and you do that.

Right. Time to line the tin.

Take one loose-bottomed non-stick tart tin.

-Take your leatherette pastry, slap it in.

-I like a loose-bottomed tart.

And press it down quite firmly.

The thing is you don't really want it to puff up, so actually,

the rougher you are, the better.

-How simple is this? It's brilliant.

-It is, isn't it?

-It is.

I don't mind simple when the results kind of are still good

and this works really, really well.

It's a real kind of dinner party pleaser, this.

And if you're going to knock up a tart, it might as well be this one.

So easy, so quick and it's a lovely thing to do.

Take a fork...and that's it. That's the pastry work done.

And how neat and tidy that looks, it's fab. Put that over here.

What I'm going to do is the baking tray,

I'm going to pop in the oven because when we start to bake the tart, this

is just going to give us a bit of a boost so always warm the tray first.

-That's a good tip, that, isn't it?

-Yep.

-Now, the crowning glory for this tart is the Conference pear.

-Oh!

We import so many pears but our native Conference pear

-is probably the finest, crunchiest, loveliest pear you can get.

-I love it.

While he's smoothing in the filling,

there's time for a quick bit of history.

Frangipani was first mentioned in a 17th century French cookbook.

According to some, it gets its name from an Italian aristocrat

called Don Cesare Frangipani who invented an almond-scented perfume

that Louis XVIII used on his gloves.

The patissiers of Paris caught onto the name of the fragrance.

Et voila! It definitely tastes better, though,

than the gloves smell.

Next up are the stars of the show,

three firm and lovely Conference pears.

I'm just taking care with the pear. It's a simple recipe

but we just want to give it a bit of respect it deserves.

'Pop them into a bowl of lemon juice to stop them going brown.'

'Then, it's time for the choccie.'

Good 70-odd percent cocoa solid chocolate

and you want it to look like a Jackson Pollock.

'That's like chocolate-y torture at home, isn't it?'

Ooh!

Now, there may not look to be much batter,

much frangipane in the bottom but it will rise up

and it's going to rise up and embrace the pears,

which we're now going to put in a radiating fashion on the tart.

And obviously, with the process of geometry,

you want the pointy ends in.

Now, at the moment, it looks like a pear pizza

but we pop that into a preheated oven, 180 degrees Celsius

to bake for about 30-35 minutes.

Now, we don't want to take this completely out the oven

cos we don't want it to collapse.

After that time, pop on all those flaked almonds, back in the oven

for another half-hour for the almonds to toast

and the baking to finish.

-Lovely. Oh, yes.

-Yes!

-Now, this is a multipurpose tart.

You can serve this hot or cold, which is just a good job

because it is a big 'un so you can half now and half after.

That looks fantastic.

Top tip, so you don't burn yourself - Pyrex, tart, on...

-and off she pops. Look at that.

-Oh!

Now, how many of you thought that pastry's going to be dead soggy?

It's not. One of the reasons is that we put it on a hot baking sheet

so the heat has gone through to the bottom of the tin.

All that remains, a little dusting with icing sugar.

Doesn't that look like a really accomplished piece of patisserie?

-It does.

-And it's so easy, and the pastry's perfect

and it's just basically deadened puff pastry.

Well, I, for one, am a convert of deadened puff pastry

because that's brilliant.

-Oh...

-PASTRY CRUNCHES

..listen to that.

It's great with cream, ice cream and it's nice cold with a cup of coffee.

And it's a good cutter.

Bit of fromage frais for that grown-up sophistication?

Absolutely, mate, yes.

Actually, a fat-free fromage frais isn't bad either.

I suppose if you're going to eat this,

-you ain't going to be bothered about your fat-free fromage frais!

-No.

-Thank you.

-Thank you.

-Seems a shame!

-It does, kind of, doesn't it?

All right. Aww!

I love this.

It's a real nice, grown-up dessert. It's not too sweet.

We've used dark chocolate, it's quite bitter,

it's quite lovely with the pears and the frangipane, again,

it's the right sugar balance.

-And the almonds are fabulous, aren't they?

-Mm.

You've got that fantastic big hit of pear - fruity, soft -

then you've got the light fluffiness of the frangipane filling.

-Totally, totally brilliant.

-Mm.

-You see, great British fruit...

-Aye.

-..is the best in the world.

-Aye, and you can't beat a good pear.

Apples and pears are fantastic,

and by buying traditional British varieties,

you'll be doing your bit to keep our delicious fruit heritage alive.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd