Christmas Pudding Recipe From Morten's Kitchen

A recipe  that must be at least 20 years old. Hope you like it.
½lb currants
½lb sultanas
½lb raisins
2 oz candied peel
6 oz suet
6 oz self Raising Flour or 4 oz S.R.Flour and 2 oz ground almonds
½ teaspoon each of mixed spice and ground nutmeg
8 oz brown Sugar or 6 oz brown sugar and 1 tablespoon black treacle
8 oz bread crumbs
rind and juice of a lemon
2 large eggs or 3 medium (recipe states 2½ eggs!)- beaten
½ pint rum or try Guiness or Stout
6 tablespoons milk

Combine the fruit with the rum or stout and soak overnight. 
Put all the ingredients a in a mixing bowl and add the beaten eggs and place in the size (s) of pudding basins you need for Christmas. The recipe does not give any steaming times but, from memory, it would have been about 8 hours for a 1lb pudding then reheated on the day for 2 hours.
If you are going to use a pressure cooker check your instructions for cooking times.
To save washing up why not use foil puddings basins like the ones done by Caroline?

Bosch Indego Automatic Lawnmower

This is advance warning of an outbreak of lawn laziness! Gone will be the days of looking out and dreading getting the mower out, because you won't have to.

Bosch are introducing the Indego - and automatic lawnmower  with Intelligent LogiCut Navigation - think of it! Look out and see the lawn has been cut without a drop of sweat or effort on your part. Even stripes! Just set up the perimeter wire around the lawn and it will map out your garden and calculate the most efficicient route to mow.

Now here's a few details for those of you who want to know the nitty gritty:
Power - 32 V/3.0 Ah
Cutting width - 12 in
Charging time - 70 mins
Running time - 22 mins
Coverage per charge - 160 square metres
Memory - 8mb
Alarm - yes
Auto Charging Function
No Base Station stop/Home Functions
HMI - Human Machine Interface
Tactile Sensors, floating shell set up and designed engineered wheels
Ergonomic height of cut dial and manual stop button
2 years parts and labour guarantee

The price seems to be around £1400 at the moment. Mortens will get one as soon as they are in the country! Nothing to stop you pre-ordering though. Just email us at mortens@btconnect.com for more details.

Central Heating System Inhibitor

Does your central heating system make some strange noises? Do your radiators heat up at the top but never at the bottom? Could be your radiators are full of corrosion and scale which reduce their efficiency and the gas given off can cause knocking and rattling.
But don't give up. You could attempt the job yourself if you have a medium skill level and a good friend. To be really thorough you should remove each radiator, drain out the rubbish inside it in the garden then flush through with the hosepipe. A mucky job but think of the money you're saving. To flush a central heating system can cost £600+.
When you've done each radiator and refilled the system then put in system inhibitor in the header tank and enjoy a warmer (and quieter) winter.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BI3S8B7f_vY go to this link for a visual and helpful tutorial
 Mortens stock system inhibitor online and in store.

Don't Over Soak!

Many of you probably know this, but if like me you don't, you can save wear and tear on your dishes by NOT over soaking them.
Porcelain, terracotta, stoneware, ceramics - what ever your dish is made from the trick is to leave water in the dish if you need to and not leave it fully immersed. Dishes can absorb water, especially if they have any unglazed areas, so the dish will look dry when you come to use it next but there may be a chance that as soon as it is placed in the oven the absorbed water expands and you run the risk of cracking it. Have you ever discovered the glazing has crazed? This may be one of the causes.
The other is placing the dish into cold water while it's still hot. That funny faint crackling sound is the glaze breaking.
So leave to soak with water IN the cooled dish and leave it to dry propped up and you'll find it will last longer.

Marrow Chutney

This recipe has been copied from an old recipe note book belonging to my mother. As with all her recipes it seems to have evolved over the years. I will give you her changes and leave you to make your own mind up.

1. 2 firm marrows chunked , sprinkled with salt and left to stand overnight
2. 2 quarts of vinegar
3. 1lb lump sugar
4. 1oz turmeric
5. about 6 shallots
6. a few chillies to taste

Method :
Drain off liquid from the marrow. Mix  lump sugar, turmeric and shallots (though she hasn't written it, take it that they are chopped) and chillies in the vinegar ( again personally I'd leave the chillies whole) and boil for 10 minutes. Add marrow and boil for further 20 minutes and put into jars.

Again, though she hasn't written it I'd leave the chutney a while before eating. If I remember correctly it will keep for months though it was so delicious it never lasted long enough! Wonderful with Cornish Pasties straight from the oven.

1986: 4 lbs marrow, 12 small onions,2 pints vinegar, 8oz sugar,½ teaspoon chilli powder,1 level teaspoon ginger, 12 peppercorns,1oz turmeric.
1989:  1 marrow, 6 shallots, ½oz turmeric, 6 tsp curry powder, 2 pints vinegar,½lb sugar and chillies
1993: 5 lbs marrow,12 oz sugar, 6 chillies,½ teaspoon curry powder, 6 small onions, 1oz turmeric and cornflour to thicken it. Vinegar must be the same as before.
2002: 4 lbs marrow, 6 large shallots,6 birds eye chillies, teaspoon curry powder, 1oz turmeric, 2 pints vinegar, 12 peppercorns, 10oz sugar

Working from memory I think the chillies were left whole then removed before putting into jars. The marrow was always in ½"/ 2.5 cm chunks and never too soft to be unpleasant. How much was actually made in each batch I never knew but it was always in big Jam Jars or in earthenware brown jars.

All I can say is, do try it and 'make it your own'. It's a gorgeous golden colour due to the turmeric and spicy. Even marrow haters ought to try it.

What Does 'BPA Free' Mean?

BPA, or to give it it's full name Bisphenol A, is a chemical found in hard plastics and the internal coatings of food and drinks cans. BPA is used to make such things as water bottles, dental fillings, lenses for spectacles, DVDs and CDs, household electronic and sports equipment.

When food containers products such as Lock & Lock, OXO Good Grips POP Containers and Stewart Plastics state they are BPA free you can rest assured that you can use the food containers without risk.

Bisphenol A is an endocrine disruptor - a substance which interferes with
the production, secreetion, transport, action, function and elimination of natural hormones. The chemical behaves in a similar way to estrogen and other hormones in the human body.

To avoid exposure many consumer groups have advised not to eat
or drink from cans unless labelled BPA free . You should not microwave foods in plastic containers and not place plastic containers in the dishwasher or clean them with harsh detergents if you are in any way doubtful about them.

For more details on BPA there are many useful sites on the Web.

Strawberry Jam Making

Having had a go at making strawberry jam for the last 2 years I've discovered that the one vital ingredient for success is patience not just strawberries, lemon juice and sugar.

I've looked at 3 recipes and they are all different. The recipe from a 1950s book gives the ingredients as 4lb strawberries, juice of 4 lemons and 3½lb preserving sugar. The Good Housekeeping Cookbook (1972) states 3½lb strawberries, 3 tablespoons lemon juice and 3 lb sugar (no mention of it being preserving sugar). The Queen of Cooks - Delia Smith - lists 4lb slightly under-ripe strawberries, 3lb sugar and the juice of 2 large lemons. 

It may be a case of averaging out the ingredients, adding more lemon juice and sugar if required. The main thing is to not lose patience with the boiling process - the 1950s book states about 15 minutes, Delia suggests around 8. The thing to do is keep at it until the jam sets on a cold saucer!

You'll also need jars, a decent maslin (jam pan) pan and some labels. Home Made Strawberry jam will keep for ages and make a lovely present if you make your own covers.

If you have a failure don't despair. Runny strawberry jam is wonderful on top of ice cream!

2014 update. Tried again this year and discovered a trick Wait until the colour of the jam changes from bright red to a deep ruby red colour and it's ready! So much easier than constantly testing. It took a good 30 minutes+ to achieve the colour.