For a Crowd Mary Berry Cooks

'I'm Mary Berry, and, in this series, and sharing with you

'my very favourite recipes.

'The sort of food I cook at home, for my family and friends.'

I passionately believe in recipes that are easy to follow

and use simple ingredients.

Food you can rely on.

'I'll be giving you ideas for posh dinners and Sunday lunches,

'weekday suppers, afternoon tea,

'and even a summer party.

'But now I'm cooking for a crowd.'

'In my house, cooking for a crowd means it's a celebration.

'Whether it's a birthday or an anniversary,

'I like to serve a variety of dishes laid out on the table

'so guests can help themselves.

'Today, I'm making a hearty beef and mushroom stew with mustard mash.

'For pudding, individual chocolate and orange panna cotta

'and my favourite party pud, meringue tranche

'with berries and yoghurt cream.

'But, to start, it's my Mediterranean twist

'on the classic salmon en croute.

'It's a great centrepiece and a real crowd-pleaser.'

I just love roasted vegetables. I love all the colours,

all the flavours, and that's what I'm going to put with my salmon.

'Start by slicing three courgettes.

'Then place them in a poly bag,

'along with two red onions, cut into wedges

'and pour in three tablespoons of olive oil.'

Now, you needn't have expensive olive oil, virgin olive oil.

It loses its flavour with heat.

So fold the bag up and just toss them around

and that will get a nice even coating of olive oil,

and I haven't got my hands all dirty!

Tip that in the roasting tin ready, like that.

Next, I'm going to do three beautiful, ripe red peppers.

First of all, take out the stalk.

And, to do that, you just take the knife all the way round...

..and then just give that a pull.

Do you know, it's only in the last 15 years that roasted vegetables

have become so popular?

And don't we love them?

Peppers were quite difficult to come by.

To start off with, all you could buy were green peppers.

I remember in about 1966, when I was first married,

the greengrocers were full of green peppers,

and now I think most people like the red ones

because they're the sweeter variety,

and I think you can get black ones now.

Who would want a black pepper?

'Lay the half peppers cut side down on the other vegetables,

'then place in the oven at 200 degrees fan.'

'After about 30 minutes, remove and leave to cool,

'covered with clingfilm.'

That clingfilm created steam so that the skin of the peppers lifted.

Now they're cold, the skin will come off.

It's so thin, but it's not very nice to eat.

So you see how that comes off quite easily.

'Once the peppers are chopped, set to one side.

'For the next stage, you will need 640g of puff pastry,

'enough to make two sheets to cover a 1kg side of salmon

'that's been skinned and boned.'

So, glancing over there at my fish,

I need to get it a little bit bigger,

and I will have a little spare pastry on the bottom piece,

which I shall be able to roll out to make some decoration.

'Once the bottom sheet has been rolled out

'until it's larger than the fish,

'place it on a sheet of parchment paper and season well.'

Then I'm going to carefully lift the salmon into the centre of this.

And now, to give it a Mediterranean twist, some red pesto.

Keep it within the fish, don't let it drip down the side.

And a tip that I've only just been given is,

once you've opened the jar, float some olive oil on top of it,

and that stops any mould coming.

So that's fairly even all the way down.

And then come the roasted vegetables.

And it wants to be stacked high.

It's essential to have those stone-cold.

If you put the hot vegetables on there,

the next load of pastry would all melt.

'Now brush with some beaten egg,

'all the way round the outside of the fish,

'to help glue the two pastry layers together.'

Now, here's the pastry.

Normally, if it wasn't so warm in here, I'd be just lifting it,

but I'm going to roll it round the rolling pin.

That's going to help a lot.

That's it.

And I'm going to let that touch down there,

and pull it over the top.

'Next, seal the parcel by pushing the two layers of pastry together

'around the edges. Then trim off any excess to use for decoration.'

Now, I'm going to put fish on the top,

because I think it's nice to see the fish,

and it reminds you that it's fish inside.

So, just cut those out.

I'll just get three on the top there.

'To avoid a soggy bottom, preheat a baking tray in a hot oven.

'Meanwhile, flute the outside of the pastry.

'Next, using the beaten egg, stick the pastry fish on top,

'and finish off by glazing the whole thing.

'And then it's onto the hot baking tray,

'and into the oven at 200 degrees fan.'

'After about 35 minutes, it's ready.'

There we are. How about that?

It's important to leave that to rest now,

and it will go on cooking right through to the middle of the salmon.

While that's happening, I'm going on to make the sauce.

'Start by adding four tablespoons of red pesto

'to 600ml of pouring double cream,

'along with the juice of one lemon and a handful of chopped basil.

'And then heat gently.'

So, stir all that basil in.

In the chef's terms, it will wilt down.

There it is, that's all ready to go with the salmon en croute.

'Once the fish has rested for ten minutes,

'transfer to a serving plate, and it's ready to go.'

There we have salmon en croute,

roasted vegetables, and a wonderful pesto sauce.

A great centrepiece for the table.

'When I'm catering for a crowd, I often like to serve a stew.

'My beef and mushroom stew is perfect.

'Everyone can help themselves, you can make it ahead,

'and when you heat it up again it's even tastier.'

I've chosen to get shin of beef.

It's not very often you see it in the piece,

but it's a wonderful cut of meat.

It's the hind leg of the beast,

and it can be very tough,

but, if it's cooked gently and slowly for a long time,

it's absolutely wonderful.

'Remove any sinew and surplus fat,

'then cut it into bite-size pieces.'

'Place around 50g of plain flour into a plastic bag,

'then add the meat and shake well to ensure an even coating.'

'Next, fry it up in some very hot oil.'

Do it in batches. If I put the whole lot of this meat in a pan,

unless you've got an enormous pan, which I haven't,

you couldn't brown it, it would just sort of stew

and wouldn't take a nice colour.

It's essential to get it a lovely golden brown,

so it should be this colour on both sides,

and that makes a lovely colour in the gravy,

seals the meat, and adds flavour.

'When all the meat's done, remove from the pan and set to one side.'

'Next, place eight roughly-chopped carrots into the pan,

'with six celery sticks and ten peeled shallots.

'Stir for a few minutes, and then return the meat.'

Now, in goes the wine.

We're always told to add the leftover wine

to stews and casseroles.

In our house, there never is any.

'Add 600ml of the red wine, allowing it to boil

'to drive off the alcohol and intensify the flavour.

'Having soaked 25g of dried porcini in 300ml of boiling water,

'drain the mushrooms, making sure you reserve the liquid.'

Look at that wonderful colour. It's dark, it's rich...

SHE SNIFFS

..and it smells of mushrooms, very strong.

These are rather big pieces of mushroom,

and even though they look tiny before you soak them,

they swell up, and, if you chop them up,

you're just making the flavour go throughout the whole of the stew.

'Next, add the chopped porcini, along with the reserve liquid,

'and 300ml of beef stock.'

All that I need to add now is some fresh thyme.

'Add three sprigs of thyme, bring to the boil,

'then pop it in the oven at 130 degrees fan for about 2½ hours.

'If you like your meat in larger chunks,

'you'll need to increase the cooking time.'

There we are.

The smell is just wonderful.

'Finally, add 500g of button mushrooms -

'no need to chop these -

'and a generous helping of redcurrant jelly.'

Because I'm cooking for ten, I'm going to add two tablespoonfuls,

give it a good stir, and it really will enrich this dish.

'Now, place the stew back in the oven for a further 30 minutes.'

'While that's cooking, boil up 1½kg of floury potatoes

'for the mustard mash.'

So, I've drained the potatoes, they're nice and steamy.

You want to make sure that they are really well cooked.

'Next, heat 100ml of milk with 50g of butter

'before adding the potatoes.

'Then, it's ready to mash.'

It's quite a heavy job, especially when you're cooking,

as I am today, for a crowd.

Thomas, my son, is very strong.

Well, he's a tree surgeon, he should be.

And he's very good at mashing,

and more is tasted than goes in the final dish.

"Needs a bit more butter, Mum."

"Oh, I think we could add a bit more pepper."

So I'm not too willing to have him help, because he'll eat too much.

'Once it reaches a fluffy consistency,

'add two tablespoons of wholegrain mustard,

'whisk it all together,

'then transfer it to a serving bowl.

'And, with the 30 minutes up, remove the stew from the oven.'

Gosh, it weighs a tonne, as well.

Well, all the things I like. It looks warm and comforting,

but I need to taste it.

I want the meat to be lovely and tender.

Just trying to get a little bit of everything.

The meat absolutely melts in the mouth.

All that wonderful sauce, and its natural browning

because we've troubled to brown that meat really well.

And the porcini mushrooms have given it real strength and flavour.

The whole combination is absolutely delicious.

And, mustard mash? Well, that's the bonus.

'There are so many ingredients on offer these days,

'but I firmly believe you don't need hundreds of jars and tins

'cluttering your cupboard.

'There are some ingredients I use time and time again,

'my store cupboard essentials.'

Every day, I use sunflower oil.

It's a flavourless oil, and it'll take a good heat.

Also, I use olive oil, but when it comes to those fancy oils,

like nut oils, walnut oil, almond oil,

I don't keep those, because they go off so quickly.

In a couple of months, you unscrew the lid, sniff,

and you have those off flavours.

And gravy browning. That might surprise you. I've always used it.

You know when you make gravy and it's a little bit light in colour,

because you haven't browned the onions enough

or the stock wasn't good enough?

A little bit of gravy browning makes it that gorgeous dark brown colour.

And then redcurrant jelly.

I really couldn't be without redcurrant jelly, often home-made.

I have it in the cupboard to add to things like spaghetti Bolognese,

believe it or not, or anything that's got tomato in

or tomato puree, that's a little bit sharp.

Add a little redcurrant jelly, and it'll bring it back

to give a gorgeous flavour, and it's simple,

it's always there on your shelf.

'When you're serving large numbers,

'a big bowl of fresh salad makes a perfect accompaniment

'for almost any main course.

'My foolproof green salad is simple to make

'and, even better, it can be made hours ahead.'

Nobody ever believes me, but you can make your salad dressing

and then put your salad on top, assemble the whole thing,

pop it in the fridge, and it'll still be fresh eight hours later.

Let me just show you how to do it.

First of all, I'm going to make the dressing.

'To serve ten, mix three tablespoons of white wine vinegar

'with one tablespoon of balsamic.'

Balsamic vinegar is, I think, great.

I'd pop it in gravy or sauces, dark sauces.

But remember it's very strong. It's aged vinegar.

Then, mustard.

I find English mustard just a bit too strong,

and I think Dijon mustard is lovely and mellow.

So, a tablespoonful of mustard.

Now, the French very rarely add sugar to their dressings, but I do,

and I like a touch of sweetness.

Add one tablespoon of caster sugar, then whisk it all together

before adding eight tablespoons of olive oil.

My rule of thumb is twice as much oil as vinegar.

As you whisk it, because of the mustard and the sugar,

it emulsifies a bit and becomes slightly thick.

So that can go into the dish there.

And I'm going to marinate some of my salad vegetables in it.

Then finely chop eight sticks of celery, eight spring onions

and one small bulb of fennel.

So we've got a nice mixture of flavouring vegetables there.

The idea is to put in the dressing the things that give it flavour.

If I put all the lettuce in there, it would just wilt and be sad

and it wouldn't be able to be done ahead.

Next, add some chopped dill,

stir well to ensure that all the vegetables get a good

coating of the dressing.

Then add sliced romaine lettuce

followed by half a slice of cucumber.

The key, really, to layering up the salad is to

choose your toughest leaves and put it next to the dressing.

Then the lighter leaves, then I've got the cucumber,

then I've got a couple of bunches of rocket here.

And I saved a bit of dill to go over the top.

And I'm going to put, just at the very, very top,

a bought packet of mixed salad leaves.

And these are the most delicate,

which would go limp if they were sitting in the dressing.

Now I need to cover that with clingfilm.

You can put that in the fridge for up to 12 hours,

so when the time comes to serve it, all I've got to do is

whip off the clingfilm and toss the whole thing together.

So, pop that in the fridge

and it just shows you that you can do the dressing and the salad ahead.

When we've got a big crowd of people coming, I often make two puds.

I believe a special occasion deserves two very different-looking

and tasting puddings.

My first is the luxurious chocolate and orange panna cotta.

Panna cotta is set cream with gelatine and, in this case,

I'm flavouring it with chocolate and orange. It is very special.

First, take nine sheets of quick-dissolving gelatine

and soak them in cold water.

This is crisped now, and as soon as you put it into the water,

it begins to soften.

And then I will be able to add them to the recipe.

Break up 200g of plain chocolate and add to a litre of double pouring

cream that has been brought to a simmer, then taken off the heat.

That's it.

And that will melt on its own.

Zest four oranges with a fine grater.

It takes time to do this, but it's well worth it.

And it gives such a lovely, fresh flavour.

Now add the orange zest and 100g of sugar to the cream.

Give that a good stir.

All that needs to be added now are eight tablespoonfuls

of fresh orange juice.

It's worth measuring the orange juice,

because if you put too much in, it won't set.

After six minutes soaking,

the gelatine is ready to be added to the mixture.

It feels a bit like frogspawn.

In that goes, and it'll dissolve with the heat of the pan.

This should be a velvety, smooth pud, so it's important to

strain the liquid to remove all the bits of orange zest.

Then pour the creamy chocolate mixture

into ten lightly oiled pudding basins,

being careful to fill them equally.

Once they're all done, transfer them to the fridge to set.

And leave them at least six hours before timing out.

I've got here some very, very hot water, straight from the tap,

and just take the bowl and drop it into the level of the panna cotta.

Hold it for a few moments, and it'll start to melt on the outside.

Then let's see how it's doing.

It helps to put in wet fingers until you can just start to see it out.

Let's see if it'll plop on the plate.

I'm talking to it very nicely.

There it is.

Once released, centre the panna cotta on the plate and serve

with some orange segments and a brandy snap to add a little crunch.

So, there it is, orange panna cotta.

I think it's a dream.

I love using chocolate in my recipes, but I'm a home cook,

no chocolatier, and so I always try and keep things simple.

Today, I'm meeting Flo Broughton, an artisan chocolate maker

who is going to teach me how to use moulds to create something

rather special - chocolate cupcakes.

So, what you need to do is dip your brush into here.

We call this a pokey stick.

And we poke it into the little hole where the cherry is.

And this is just white chocolate that we are using now,

but we just put a little bit of red colouring in it, just gives us

a nice red cherry on the top.

They look quite professional.

Oh, I can do this!

Once the red chocolate cherries have dried,

it's on to the next stage, filling the moulds with the white chocolate.

What we're going to do now is we're going to use some of the white

chocolate that we've got here.

So we're going to catch the chocolate coming out of the spout there,

and we're going to run it just nice and slowly across our moulds.

Just so that all the squares are nicely filled.

I'm quite good at putting batter into Yorkshire pudding tins.

Do you think it will be the same? Let's try.

OK. And you started here...

Doesn't matter that you go over the edge?

-No, not at all, because we are going to scrape it.

-Is that all right?

-That's perfect.

-I think you've done it a few more times than me!

-Right.

-Scrape very slowly across the board and the mould.

Just clean down the sides.

-That's very good, because you don't get any waste.

-Absolutely.

We'll take them over to the table, and we'll need to give them

a little bit of a vibrate or a bang on the table, and that will help

reduce any air bubbles in there so that we have nice, perfect cakes.

Flo's father, Kerr, designs all of the chocolate moulds in the factory,

including our little cupcakes, which are now ready to turn out.

The impression is very, very clear.

The paper case lookalike, it is absolutely perfect.

When Dad is making the moulds, he really carves into them quite deeply

to try and make sure that we can really get all of this detail.

So those look absolutely perfect. I'm really proud of those.

Key to making good quality chocolate is a process called tempering.

Whether in a factory or at home, the process is essentially the same.

Now, I've got some chocolate here that I previously heated on the hob.

So, once you've got it to 45 degrees,

-you've got this lovely liquid chocolate here.

-Just a minute -

-are you doing that over warm water, or how are you doing that?

-Yes.

So, I did it over a pan with boiling water underneath it.

So, in order to temper it, we need to reduce that down to 31 degrees.

So, what we're going to do is just ladle some of this on to the slab.

-That is cooling it down, right?

-Yes.

We're going to add this back to that chocolate,

which will help cool it down.

'Tempering reduces the size of the crystals in the cocoa butter,

'ensuring the chocolate has a nice shine and a crisp bite.

'There seems no limit to the clever designs that can be made with

'silicon moulds.

'But Flo has an ingenious idea for making chocolates at home

'using brown sugar and some fridge magnets.'

Because we're going to put the chocolate into sugar, what

we don't want is the chocolate and sugar all to mix and stick together.

So what I've decided to do is put hundreds and thousands in first.

And don't they love those hundreds and thousands?

And they just make everything look so pretty.

And then we're going to get our piping bag.

The smaller the hole, the better.

And then we're just going to go over each letter and fill it up.

-And children can do this themselves.

-Yes.

And it's not too messy, because it is in a bag.

-Can I do a bit?

-Absolutely.

And the good thing is, those hundreds and thousands

don't sort of come up and mix in with the chocolate.

That's it. That's the "R". Now we go to the "Y".

'Once all the letters have been filled with chocolate,

'it takes just 15 minutes to set.'

So, we're just going to dig out our letters.

Obviously, where it had enough hundreds and thousands,

it just leaves those behind.

And we can dust off any excess sugar once we've got them all out.

You can just imagine how much children would enjoy doing this.

You could have "Happy Birthday" and the children could make it

themselves and put it across the top of their birthday cake.

That's such a good idea.

BIRDSONG

When I'm cooking for a crowd,

I always like to serve a centrepiece pud.

And my meringue tranche with berries and cream really hits the spot.

Some people have a real difficulty with meringue,

but I've got a foolproof way, so let me show you.

Start with four eggs.

So, separate the eggs carefully into a very clean bowl.

So, there's the first egg.

Separate the eggs one at a time, so if you break a yolk,

you won't ruin all the whites.

Then whisk the egg whites until they look like puffy clouds.

Now add 225g of caster sugar a little at a time.

The mixture will become thick and shiny.

That's it.

I need to just give it a little beat round.

I'm just going to show you that that has got the most wonderful

gloss to it.

Next, transfer the mixture to a piping bag

with a 1cm hole cut off the end.

Then pipe onto baking parchment laid out on an oven tray.

Do you know, I have been making meringue for years

and enjoying every minute of it.

And if you stop in the middle, it gives you a breather

and you can give it a twist before you get going.

And off we go again.

You will need two of these meringues for a party.

I have marked out two rectangles, 12x40cm long,

to ensure they are both the same size.

I have made this many times.

I can't really claim that this is my recipe.

Lucy, who has helped me with all my books and all sorts of things,

it was her idea, and I think she made it for her 30th birthday.

Once you have lined each edge with a row of lovely little

peaks of meringue, it's into the oven at 100 degrees.

And after about two hours, it is ready for the finishing touches.

This piece of wood, just covered in foil, makes a wonderful silver tray.

So I'm going to take the meringue and lift it onto there and join it.

Bit of a shake there. That's it.

So the next move is to put the lovely, rich,

decadent cream in the middle.

So, I'm going to put a few blobs along and then spread them.

So, some there.

You can make this meringue a fortnight ahead,

if you wrap it carefully.

But you only want to fill it a few hours before actually serving it.

The creamy layer, made up of 300ml of whipped double cream,

mixed with 200g of full-fat Greek yoghurt,

is spread evenly over the meringue to form a base for the next layer -

wonderful rows of fresh blueberries and raspberries.

It's quicker as I go along to just take a handful of blueberries

and drop them in that hole.

They go in a bit more neatly.

I think that looks pretty marvellous.

And I can't wait to carry it in and everybody to think,

"How did she get that in the oven?"

'So, there you have it,

'my collection of dishes to serve large numbers at a celebration.

'I hope that you will try these recipes when your friends

'and family come round.'

Next time, it's weekday supper -

pasta with Parma ham that takes just 15 minutes, a sharing platter you

can make in advance, an elderflower posset with just two ingredients.

Simple food that's made to share.