Nice and Easy The Best Dishes Ever

Today's show is all about staying in our cookery comfort zone,

with our chefs all showcasing recipes that aren't

terrifyingly tricky.

Now, that might mean on occasions trusting them when they say you can

do it, of course, but overall the message is, let's keep it simple.

So, we'll have Nigel Slater's lazy loaf.

'Dive into your loaf when it is fresh out of the oven, if you can.'

There's a nice bit of haddock from James Martin.

This is beautiful, it smells like lovely and smoked,

-it's just delicious.

-We have butterfly cakes from Mary Berry.

These are the wings of the butterflies that transform them

from cupcakes to butterfly cakes.

There are fishcakes from The Hairy Bikers.

It is a marriage made in heaven.

But we start with some sausage rolls and palmiers from Lorraine Pascale.

And her secret to keeping it simple is to pay for your puff pastry.

I find one of the best shortcuts

when you're baking is shop-bought pastry.

It's not a dirty word, and there's no shame in it at all.

You can get everything, from filo to shortcrust,

but the one I need today is puff.

Now, what I've got in mind are some short-cut canapes

made with puff pastry.

I'm thinking a sun-dried tomato palmier...

and some good old-fashioned sausage rolls.

God, you know, I haven't had sausage rolls for ages.

So, puff.

Start off with lots of flour. We don't want it sticking to the board.

And I'm going to roll it into an oblong.

And before you start to use it, get it out of the fridge...

about five minutes before, so it is not too hard.

It does take a little bit of experience to get

it into a perfect rectangular shape.

So don't worry if it goes wonky because you can just trim it down afterwards,

it is not a problem at all. OK. Now, the sausages.

So, I've got these lovely pork and leek sausages.

You can use any sausages. Venison, lamb, what ever you like,

or even veggie. I'm going to cut them in half.

OK. So, I'm going to put my sausage down there.

And then cut all the way down, because I need 16 of these.

OK, I like to flavour my sausages.

Even though these taste really good already.

You can use some rosemary or thyme. Anything you want.

Just get creative.

I need to give it one little line of egg wash

so the pastry sticks nicely round the sausage.

So I need one egg. A nice whisk.

And just brush it like that.

Roll it up.

Ah.

There you go, one gorgeous sausage roll.

Now for the next 15.

So, quick hand wash, and then I'll pop the sausage rolls in the

fridge for about 20 minutes so they keep their shape in the oven.

So, these have been chilling for 25 minutes.

And now they are lovely and firm.

Just take off the clingfilm.

I'm going to prick them with a fork,

for no other reason than I think it looks pretty.

Then they need this egg glaze.

The glaze makes the sausage rolls look so lovely and shiny.

I can't wait to eat these.

OK, so into the oven for 25 to 30 minutes, at 200 degrees.

So, sausage rolls aren't the only superfast canape

I can make with puff.

These little beauties are called palmiers.

And I've made them with sun-dried tomatoes and rosemary.

This is where I'm up to so far.

First, I got the 500g of puff pastry onto a well floured board,

and then I rolled it out into a large rectangle

until the pastry was about as thick as a pound coin.

I chopped up a jar of sun-dried tomatoes that were drained,

and spread them all over the pastry, sprinkled it with some rosemary.

And with the shortest edge facing me, took the long

edges of the pastry and rolled them up to meet in the middle.

Put it onto a baking tray,

and let it chill in the fridge for half an hour.

Now get a really sharp knife and slice them

into about one centimetre...pieces.

And they need to go on a baking tray...

and get glazed.

You can put the egg wash all over it.

And these need to go into the oven for 15 minutes with the sausage rolls.

SHE LAUGHS

So there we are, sausage rolls, palmiers in no time at all.

I like her style.

Now, unless you are a baker, most people tend to

think of home-made bread as something that's not too easy.

Well, think again.

Here's Nigel Slater with what he calls his lazy loaf.

'I make an old-fashioned loaf that is done and dusted within the hour.

'And when it is fresh out of the oven,

'I've got the perfect filling in mind.

'To start with, mix 225g of plain flour,

'and the same again of wholemeal, to add some texture.'

You know, there is this idea that baking bread...

is complicated.

That it involves so many processes.

And yes, it is very different to everyday cooking.

Partly because you're weighing things, partly because there's

a little bit of chemistry involved, and sometimes a wee bit of magic.

But it is a question of getting in there and having a go.

And no, it doesn't always work.

My first loaf ended up on the lawn for the birds.

My father just chucked it out of the window.

But then it got better and better. Easier.

'Add a teaspoon of salt and sugar,

and then here's the bit that makes this lazy.

'I'm using bicarbonate of soda instead of yeast to

'make my loaf rise.

'Which means I don't have to leave it for hours before cooking it.'

It's sort of an ingredient that just sits there on the shelf.

But watch the sell by date.

It is actually quite short on bicarbonate soda.

If it has passed the sell by date, put it in a little dish,

in the fridge, and that will make the fridge smell lovely and fresh.

'Every loaf need some liquid, and the usual thing is warm water.'

But I like my loaves to have a little bit of flavour,

something slightly sharp in the background.

So I tend to use buttermilk, sometimes yoghurt.

'You need to use natural yoghurt here,

'without any flavourings or sugar.

'About 300mls will do.'

Make sure it is live yoghurt.

Because that's what will help to make it work.

'A dribble of milk will make the yoghurt a bit more pourable.'

I simply pour that into the flours - the salt, the sugar and the bicarb -

and then just bring all the ingredients together.

A bread dough should be quite soft.

You should get the feeling that there is something

happening inside, and that doesn't really make sense until you actually

start to do it and you get your hands in there.

And you will feel there's kind of something going on.

I always like to think I can feel its heart beating.

'Because I'm not using any yeast,

'I can stick my loaf straight in the oven.

'I've already preheated a pot, just to help to create a crackling crust.

'Dust the pot with flour to stop the dough sticking.'

Pop it in there. Just to make it easier to break open.

Just put a little cross on the top.

And then let's just pop this in the oven for about half an hour, 25 minutes or so.

'While that's doing its thing, here's a quick recap.

'Don't forget, you can download full details

'of all my recipes on the BBC website.

'Dive into your loaf when it is fresh out of the oven, if you can.

'This is when I usually dabble with an assortment of fillings.

'Depending on what's in the fridge.

'Today, I've got some bacon crisping under the grill.

'A good dollop of chutney will give a sweet and fiery kick.

'Then a crisp, cool lettuce leaf,

'and finally, silky smoked salmon adds a bit of luxury.

'That's it.

'My salmon, bacon and chutney sandwich.'

Yes, it is an unusual combination.

Soft, silky salmon. Hot, crisp bacon.

But it works.

It so works.

Now, how easy was that?

You thought you'd get one of Nigel's recipes,

and then without any extra effort from you,

he slipped in the sandwich at the other end. Lovely.

Now, another dish that is good, solid

and traditional with no-frills or complications. It's over to

James Martin, who's poaching a beautiful piece of haddock.

'It was my granny's favourite.

'Poached haddock with egg and spinach in a mustard sauce.

'Rich in flavour and packed full of protein,

'it's my perfect prescription to get back on track.'

Really, for this, it's all about the quality of the smoked haddock.

This is beautiful, it smells like lovely and smoked,

it's just delicious.

My gran would actually queue up in York at the market to get the best

smoked haddock. What we are going to do is just poach

this nice and easily.

'I'm using a basic poaching liquor of milk, sliced onion and bay leaf.

'While that's doing, I can get on with the egg.'

What we are going to do is bring this to the boil.

With a good pinch of salt.

And just a small amount of white wine vinegar.

I use white wine vinegar instead of malt vinegar, purely

the fact that it flavours the egg too much if you use malt vinegar,

and it also colours the water too much.

You end up with a slightly grey looking egg.

The great thing about these eggs, you can make them in advance.

And to do that, just take a bowl with some ice in it.

Just a little bit of cold ice water.

And really, the secret with poached eggs is plenty of water,

rapidly boiled.

And what you do with this is just create a little swirl, a little

vortex in the middle, and then crack the egg on the side of the pan.

In the centre.

And what's happening is, as it swirls around,

you get this sort of egg white seal the egg yolk, which is

exactly what is happening in our pan now.

And the most important thing with this is we use fresh eggs.

Because if you use old eggs,

the whites actually start to separate and end up being very thin and watery.

When you break them in a pan, they just go everywhere.

Now, what you want to do is just, basically, very carefully flip

the fish over...

..at this point.

Be careful with it, really, because you don't want it to break.

That's why it is really important to keep

the skin on the haddock as well, that way it will hold it together.

It only takes about two minutes on one side, turn it over,

and two minutes on the other side.

The egg is actually nicely cooked like that.

Ice cold water.

It stops to cooking. That means the yolk inside stays lovely and runny.

And you can keep those in the fridge now for about 24 hours.

Now, at this point, really, we can take the haddock out.

The key to this is not to overcook it.

Obviously you've got to make sure it is cooked.

Now, there is a really distinct smell

when you are doing natural smoked haddock like this.

It just smells fantastic.

The best way to tell

whether it is cooked is just basically by pressing it.

If the flesh of the haddock starts to break just ever

so slightly, that's cooked. Just keep it warm in the oven.

And then we can turn our attention to the sauce.

'It couldn't be easier.

'Melt some butter in a pan, add a sprinkle of flour...

'..give it a stir, then hey presto, you've got a roux.'

And then we can just literally decant

some of our milk into the pan.

Don't add too much of the milk at the same time.

'And it will come together a treat.

'A dollop of English mustard will give it a bit of added bite.'

Pinch of salt. Nice crack of black pepper.

And then it will need a squeeze of lemon.

Just a nice little bit of lemon juice.

'It's the perfect mustard sauce, just like my grandad used to make.'

Now, I'm going to serve this with some spinach.

My grandad was a fantastic guy.

He used to go to the local pub, and he was

so infamous around the local pub that they built him a chain all across.

The chain went from the bar with a bell on it, all the way,

right across the ceiling and down to his special seat.

And he used to pull the chain like a toilet pull

whenever he wanted another pint.

HE LAUGHS

He was a character, he was an amazing bloke,

and how the hell my grandmother coped with him. He was just a...

But your typical old school bloke, really.

He used to go to the Conservative club, purely for the fact

their snooker tables were better than the Labour club.

But he used to vote Labour.

You know. He was a bit of a legend, really, was my grandad.

Died, like most legends, far too soon in life, but top man.

So, a little bit of spinach on the plate.

Before I take the haddock out, the great thing about doing an egg like

this is when you get the egg, and you can see it is perfect like this.

Lovely and poached in the middle.

And then all we can do is just drop it back into the water.

And all it wants is about 20, 30 seconds in there.

We can then take our haddock out.

Onto the plate like that.

Lift it out. You can see it is hot. You've got a perfectly cooked egg.

'If you are cooking for more than one, the beauty of having prepared

'eggs in advance means everybody gets theirs perfectly cooked.'

You've got this lovely sauce to go with it over the top.

And to be honest, there's nothing better, is there, really,

than just simple ingredients cooked like this?

And when you crack the egg...

See, that's what it is all about.

Beautiful, rich yolk in the centre, but this combination

of the mustard, the spinach, the beautiful poached haddock...

This is what it's all about.

Almost as good as my grandad's. Not quite, but almost.

'Gorgeous. Just what the doctor ordered.'

Thanks, James. And do you know what,

we're sticking with fish for our next recipe, too.

These Hairy Bikers' fishcakes may sound like worryingly hard work

because they've got cod, salmon and haddock in there, too.

But all you're really doing is binding them together.

In the Best of British kitchen, we've got a recipe that

celebrates fish on a Friday in style.

We're making lush salmon,

cod and smoked haddock fishcakes in a buttery parsley sauce.

-Who doesn't love a fishcake? It's fish without the hassle.

-It is.

And it makes whatever fish you buy go an awful long way.

-It's a good easy eat.

-Right, all I've done,

cos we need some mash obviously to base our fishcakes round, I've cut

some potatoes into 3cm chunks, boil the...daylights out of them

and then mash 'em.

There's fish galore in this recipe.

Place a 250 gram salmon fillet, 250 gram cod fillet

and a 100 gram smoked haddock fillet into a shallow pan.

I remember, Dave, on a Friday morning,

what you would hear is you would hear a horn go in the street...

-Fish, fish!

-That was the fish man.

Pour in 500ml of milk, season...

..then add in a bay leaf and heat up till it starts to bubble.

So, Dave, when is a fish not a fish?

Since medieval times, we've always had a boom on a Friday for fish.

And actually, the rules were relaxed

a bit as to what was defined as fish.

Beavers and seals qualified as fish

because they live predominantly in the water.

-Oh.

-That's one way of getting round religion, isn't it?

You can logic your way out of any argument.

When the milk has started to bubble, cover it up

and turn off the heat immediately.

Leave it to stand for ten minutes, which will cook the fish

and infuse it with flavour.

The spuds should be ready now, so once drained, get mashing.

When it's cooked, take the fish out.

Make sure there's no bones and flake it into a bowl.

So, that's the cod, the smoked haddock and the salmon.

Right, I've got my fish there. I'm just going to strain off the milk.

And set this aside, ready to make the parsley sauce.

You get the most wonderful rich tasting sauce.

Chop up six spring onions and whack them

in the mash with a load of salt and a load of pepper.

Add the zest of half an unwaxed lemon.

Once the zest goes in, mix well to combine.

Preparing ahead, put about 25 grams of flour

and two beaten eggs on to a plate,

alongside a bowl of breadcrumbs.

Add the potato mix into the flaked fish and mix it up.

So, take a handful of the fishcake mixture and form into...

I think about that size.

That, to me... What do you think?

I think that's spot on.

That's a good fishcake.

Heat a glug of oil in a frying pan,

then coat the fishcakes in the flour.

Roll them in the egg, not forgetting the edges.

And then cover them with the breadcrumbs.

And place them in the frying pan to cook.

-SIZZLES

-Ooh, that's too much. Can you turn that down, Kingy?

When you've browned them on both sides,

pop them on to some baking parchment.

As my mother used to say, it should be the size of a hockey puck!

The thing is, I didn't know what a hockey puck was.

I don't think she did either!

Now, you've got to have a sauce with these fishy bundles of loveliness.

Grab a handful of parsley and finely chop it.

You know, Kingy, it is said that parsley grows better

-if it's planted by a woman?

-Really?

It's also said that if a woman plants parsley, soon after,

she'll fall pregnant.

Eh, I tell you what, there'll be loads of lads

getting off their settee now, going, "Get out the garden!"

I tell you what else as well, you sprinkle parsley on the head,

it's said to be a cure for baldness, you know?

Why would that be of interest to me?

One could not say.

Put the fishcakes in the oven for about ten minutes to

finish them off.

Now, back to our luscious parsley sauce.

Melt 25 grams of butter into a saucepan

and sprinkle in 25 grams of flour.

Just like making a basic white sauce, really.

Now, start to trickle in that strained fish poaching liquor.

And this is going to be a lump-free experience.

Add in the parsley and simmer the sauce for three minutes,

until it's thickened.

Look at this. As if you put an emerald in a blender.

After ten minutes, the fishcakes are ready.

Serve them up with a lovely bit of kale and the parsley sauce.

Job done.

Got to get some of that sauce.

Oh, man!

It's a marriage made in heaven.

Well, mate, thank goodness it's Friday!

Oh, I tell you what though. This would be great any day of the week.

Friday happiness on a plate and no doubt,

we've been encouraged to experiment with recipes like this, thanks to

fish being a brilliant alternative to meat in years gone by.

And thankfully, we didn't have to go near a seal.

Ah, wonderful!

And we're going from fishcakes to regular cakes for our final

dish of the day. These are from Mary Berry

and they're definitely not technically challenging.

In fact, they are child's play.

I used to bake scones

and cakes for afternoon tea with my daughter Annabelle.

Now, I'm doing the same with my granddaughters.

They enjoy making these orange butterfly cakes

as much as they love eating them.

Abbey and Grace are here today to help me.

I wonder how much they've remembered since the last time we made them.

So, we need 100 grams of baking spread. That's it. Caster sugar...

It's a simple all in one recipe that uses equal amounts of baking

spread, sugar and self-raising flour.

So we have a little bit of baking powder and... A level teaspoon.

Make it level. Level... You can put your finger on it.

That's it.

If you add more baking powder, it will rise up in the oven

and fall down again, so never add too much.

That's it.

So, what's missing out of that then?

-Orange.

-That's right.

Can you find an orange over there?

-I think you'll find it easier to actually grate on the table...

-Yes.

That's it. Get as much as you can and turning it all the time.

-Grates much more easily than our one at home.

-Does it?

-What happens to your one at home?

-We have to go...

-It's got a bit blunt, has it?

-Yeah.

I think you've done pretty well with that. Got maximum out of it.

When I was doing this with your young cousins, I have to put

a plate underneath because they drop most of on the table.

So, we're going to mix that. Now, that's Granny's mixer

and I've had it for more years than I've had you.

And it does make an awful lot of noise, but it still works.

Turn that off a second.

So, how about Gracie coming and having a go?

-Keep it straight and upright, otherwise it'll go on Granny.

-OK.

-Do you think that's done?

-Yeah.

And after all these years, it still works.

Once the cake mix is ready, spoon it into individual paper cases,

a bit at a time, making them as even as possible.

Are you doing one or two scoops, Grace?

I did do two and then I saw you doing one, so I did two... One.

OK.

That's it. So, what does it taste like?

Delicious.

Next, put the cakes into the oven at 160 fan

and bake for 15 to 20 minutes.

They smell good.

You know, you've got those just right.

They're all beautifully evenly baked.

For the butter icing, sift 100 grams of icing sugar

and beat it into 50 grams of softened butter.

So, these are cool now,

so you're going to have to take the tops off

and you've done this several times before,

but what are the important things to do with this?

You have to cut them in half to make the wings and put them

-the right way round.

-That's it.

These are the wings of the butterflies,

that transform them from cupcakes to butterfly cakes.

Once all the cakes are cut, it's time for my secret filling.

-There you are. Off you go.

-Thank you.

A dollop of orange curd.

Sometimes, they can be a little bit dry underneath, so a little spoon

of orange curd for orange butterfly cakes makes them quite different.

Cover the cakes with a generous swirl of icing.

Place butterfly wings on top

and finish with a dusting of icing sugar.

Are you going to have a go first, Abbey? Take those knives away.

And the rule in my house is, if you've made it, you get first try.

So, what's the verdict?

-Mm!

-You can definitely taste the orange in there.

They're nice and crisp on the top.

I think well done. I think they're near perfection.

Thanks to Mary and family and to all our chefs.

I hope you've enjoyed today's selections and do join me

again for more helpings next time.

Take care. Bye-bye.