Boiling, Poaching, Simmering, The duffer’s guide to wet heat.
The duffer’s’ guide to cooking with wet heat. Discover the correct way to use wet heat.
Tag: how-to
Make Your Own,- Welsh Cakes.
These homemade Welsh Cakes are easy to make and are a great addition to an afternoon tea spread. They are a variation of a griddle scone and shortbread, lightly spiced and finished with a coating of sugar.
How to portion a chicken on the bone.
How to portion a chicken on the bone? It’s not as hard as you think. This is a perfect way to prepare a chicken for a casserole, quick oven roasting, or curries. This is the cutting method I use for the barbecue or making my Tandoori Chicken joints. I much prefer to have my chicken on the bone, when possible, it gives the meat a better flavour and helps keep it juicy. I’m using a free-range bird to get the best flavour from the meat.
The advantage of doing this yourself is that you have control over the type of chicken you use. It also works out cheaper to buy a whole bird and dissect it yourself rather than buy chicken joints of an unknown origin ready prepared. And as a bonus to get the bits to make a great stock. This method of cutting will provide me with ten pieces of ready to cook meat. And the ability to give each guest both white and dark meat if wished.
Get friendly with your chicken
The last thing we want is to have bone fragments floating around in our food. You can avoid this by cutting naturally though the joints as much as possible. Before you start getting your hands dirty have a look at the bird and familiarise yourself with the layout of the bones.
I find the best way to explain this is to compare the bird with your own body. Now imagine the bird sitting up on its parsons’ nose. From the top you have the neck, down to the shoulders, then the chest with the spine at the back. Right down to the hips leading on to the thighs, knees and finally shins.
Looking at the bird in this way it’s a lot easier to find the joints and separate them rather than trying to hack through bone. These instructions are for a right-handed person. If you’re left-handed simply reverse your starting point.
Getting organised.
You will need a sharp knife; I am using a small cook’s knife and a pair of strong kitchen scissors. Always use a separate board for cutting meat and place a damp cloth under the board to avoid it slipping when you are working. Wood is not ideal surface for meat as meat juices can seep into the wood. I use a red plastic board that is easy to clean and can go into the dishwasher.
Have a tray large enough to take all the chicken pieces and carcase. And it’s a good idea to always wear a pair of disposable gloves to keep your hands clean. Before you start read through the instructions twice and have a look at the video. If you are on a laptop follow the pictures for reference.
Hygiene
We need to be aware that while eggs are safe to eat underdone. The chicken meat itself may well be harbouring bacteria which are dangerous to us, unless cooked through. The last thing we want to do is spread these bacteria all around the kitchen. When dealing with raw meats, always do this before, and separately to any other cooking you may be doing.
And the big no-no DO NOT WASH YOUR POULTRY!!!! Washing the bird particularly in your kitchen sink will simply transfer the bacteria all around the kitchen. I mean would you take the raw bird and rub it all over the worktops and utensils in the kitchen? Of course not, but washing the bird will have the same affect. It the bird is damp or has juices inside dry it off with kitchen paper and immediately throw it away. Make sure you dispose of any packaging as well and don’t leave it hanging around.
OK, less of the lecture. Let’s get started.
First the legs.
Take the bird and place it on the board with the legs facing towards you. Pull the left leg away from the body and slice down through the skin between the leg and the breast. Using the left hand, bend the leg downwards away from the breast then twist the bird on its side.
This will allow you to bend the leg right back and dislocate the hip joint. To remove the leg from the carcase we simply slice the skin away between the thigh and pelvic bone. If you can, try to capture the piece of meat known as the ‘oyster’. This sits on the pelvic bone in a small depression at the head end of the bone. It’s a shame to leave good meat on the carcase and boosts the size of the thigh. Rotate the bird and remove the other leg. Then place both legs on your tray
On to the wings.
Open out the wings but don’t pull them right out or they will be more difficult to cut. Place your knife on the left-hand wing (assuming you are right-handed) just on the tip of the first joint out from the body and slice downwards. Your knife should slice though between the bones removing the wing and wing tip.
If it won’t go, don’t push harder, try repositioning the knife making sure you’re not pulling the wing outwards. Put the wing onto your tray, we can use these for the BBQ, have them spiced as a party snack or use then to boost a stock. Rotate the bird around and repeat the process on the
Make a wish!
Turn your attention to the breast meat. One of the key skills to learn with poultry is removing the wishbone. It’s a small bone running from one side of the neck to the other and down to the breastbone. It’s quite small but if not removed will trap quite a bit of good meat on to the carcase. Even if you’re just going to roast the bird whole, remove the wishbone. If you are picking up your Christmas turkey from the bitcher, ask him to do it, it makes the carving so much easier.
At the neck end of the bird, trim off any excess skin and examine the cavity. You should see a faint line just under the meat at both sides of the breast. Use the point of your knife to scrape back the covering and you will see the bone below. With the bird flat on the board carefully place the tip of the knife under the bone and cut down. The knife should slice down with very little resistance. Repeat this on the other side, then with index finger and thumb you should be able to twist the bone out.
Almost there!
All that’s now left to do is deal with the breast meat, we are going to remove two mini chicken Supremes first. Put the bird with the neck end towards you. Each side of the breast will still have a wing bone attached. Place your knife on the left-hand side of the bird sitting on the skin where the wing bone joins the carcase. The knife should be slightly angled out from the breastbone, then slice down.
Once again don’t use pressure to cut through, let the knife be guided by the carcase. All been well the knife should find its way down to the wing joint when we can cut though. Release the supreme and add to the tray.
To remove the second supreme, it’s the same process but don’t rotate the bird, keep it facing towards you.
The centre section.
The next thing is to cut off the centre section of meat still on the carcase. If you are skilled with the knife that will do the job. If you’re not 100% sure use a good pair of kitchen scissors for this.
Put the carcase on its side and snip down the bones from the parsons’ nose end to the neck just where the meat finishes. Turn the bird over and repeat, lift off the meat section and one or two small snips should release it.
Place the section horizontally on the board skin side up and simply cut straight down across the joint to create two equal pieces. Then add to your tray.
Separating the legs
It’s a good idea to separate the thigh and drumstick of the legs. The meat on each cooks differently and benefits from been used correctly. The drumsticks again can go on the BBQ, roasted, or be poached, skinned, breadcrumbed, and fried for the classic fried chicken. The thighs are the best part of the bird. If you are looking to make a chicken casserole or curry, its thighs every time. Breast meat is dry and stringy by comparison.
Take one of the legs and lay it on the board skin side down. Place your finger on the hip joint of the thigh and slowly run it longways towards the middle of the leg. You will notice a line of fat following the same line. This directly over the thigh bone and is a major help in locating the bone if you wish to remove it later. Where this line finishes is the ‘knee’ joint. There, you should then see a second line of fat running across the leg. This indicates the line of the joint between the bones.
Place your knife on this line and slice down. With luck you will separate the drumstick and thigh without cutting through any bones. If you can’t get through, try a slight repositioning of the knife. Make sure you are slicing, not just pushing the knife through. When done add to your tray and bingo – you have just mastered dissecting a chicken.
Congratulations! You made it.
Well, that’s a very long explanation of a reasonably straightforward job- honestly! Do try it you wont regret it and after a couple of goes you will do it without thinking. There are other options in breaking down the bird, ill cover these on other pages or its just toooooo much information.
But here’s the good news, the configuration of all poultry and feathered game is similar. So once you have mastered a chicken you are set up to tackle a duck, pheasant, pigeon, or turkey, its just a matter of scale.
Enjoy Life,
John.
Hi, my name is John Webber, award winning chef and tutor, now retired to the west coast of Scotland. Welcome to our blog focusing on food, cooking, and countryside. My aim is to pass on my years of skills and knowledge together with an appreciation of the countryside.
Join us to experience the beauty of the west coast, cook some great food and be at ease in the kitchen.
Join The ‘Westcoaster Newsletter.
Sign up to our newsletter to receive regular updates of what’s new and upcoming at ‘The Westcoaster.’
©John Webber2025
Stunning, Mango and Coconut Tarts,
Delicious, mango and coconut cream tarts. Great for entertaining. Light,crisp almond pastry filled with fresh mango and coconut cream.
How to use perforated tart rings
Learn the technique of making small crisp tart shells using perforated rings. Great for entertaining with a variety of fillings.
Make your own, Indian flavouring Pastes .
Indian Flavouring Pastes
These basic Indian flavouring pastes take minutes to prepare and can be frozen or refrigerated to last you for weeks. Ginger- Garlic paste is a must have in the kitchen to make a professional curry without the fuss. Ginger paste and Chilli paste are both ideal for enhancing and giving added depth to your spiced dishes.
You can of course buy most of these, but they will be full of preservatives and will lack the vibrance of homemade versions. The best storage for these pastes is to freeze them in blocks. I use ice cube trays which make blocks of 2tbsp which is a handy size for most people. Once frozen the blocks can be emptied out of the trays into freezer bags and labelled. Make sure to read our post on Indian Onion Pastes to complete the picture and be ready to make some great curries.
Ginger Paste.
300g Peeled Root Ginger (chopped or grated)
30ml Water
For ease of preparation and economy choose large pieces of ginger without many knobbly bits. To get the best from these pastes wait until the shop gets a fresh delivery of roots in, the fresher the better. Trim off any dark pieced then peel the ginger with a spoon. No, that’s not a typo, scraping the skin off the root with the edge of an old dessert spoon is the quickest, safest, and most economic way to peel ginger
Chop the roots into small pieces then pop into the food processor. Blend the water and ginger together to a smooth paste and freeze until required.
You may notice I am using water here to blend the paste rather than oil which appears in the next recipes. The reason for this is the pastes below will general be cooked in or added to a savoury dish. By using water here this paste could equally find its way into a dessert such as a steamed pudding or cake.
Ginger-Garlic Paste
100g Peeled Ginger Root
100g Peeled garlic
20-30ml Vegetable oil
Peel the ginger as outlined above and roughly chop. Blend the oil, ginger, and garlic together to a smooth paste and freeze until required.
The paste may also be stored in the fridge in a sealed container in the fridge by adding 1tsp lemon juice to the mix and covering the surface of the paste with a thin layer of vegetable oil.
Green Chilli Paste
10 Green Chillies
2tsp Vegetable Oil
¼ tsp salt
Trim the stem of the chillies then cut them in half long ways and remove the seeds and central core. Coarsely chop the chilli flesh then blend to a paste with the oil, salt, and water.
While we call this a ‘paste’ you will find its actually very small pieces of chilli that will disappear when used in a curry. And while we’re taking Indian cooking here this paste would be equally useful to lift a Thai dish or dip.
The best way to store the paste is to freeze it. I use a silicone ice cube tray which makes 1cm cubes so I can add the chilli to a dish in small amounts.
You can make all the above in just a couple of hours and have a bundle of flavour sitting in your freezer ready for use. I would use three months as a ‘use by guide’ to storage but I bet once you get into using these they won’t hang around that long.
Enjoy Life!
John.
Hi, my name is John Webber, award winning chef and tutor, now retired to the west coast of Scotland. Welcome to our blog focusing on food, cooking, and countryside. My aim is to pass on my years of skills and knowledge together with an appreciation of the countryside.
Join us to experience the beauty of the west coast, cook some great food and be at ease in the kitchen.
If you enjoyed your visit with us, please subscribe up to our newsletter to receive regular updates of what’s new and upcoming at The Westcoaster. Subscribe Here
©John Webber. 2023
HOW TO MAKE INDIAN ONION PASTES
The making of Indian onion pastes. Often used in restaurants to enrich and thicken a curry. Easy to make at home and give your curries a professional finish.
All you need to know about – Eggs
All you need to know about _Eggs. Learn about the egg itself. what each part of an egg can do, and how we can use it in our cooking.
Demystifying Perfect Pastry.
Demystifying perfect pastry is not as daunting as you may think. We will begin by looking at the ingredients and what they do in a dough. We can then move on to understanding how the method of making a dough and how it affects the final result. For this article we are focused on basic sweet and short pastry. Future posts and Food Files will cover more advanced doughs such as Choux, Puff, and Hot Water pastries as well as yeast doughs and breads.
The Basics.
In a nutshell pastry is a dough containing flour, fat, and liquid (water and or egg). Sugar is also used when making pastry for sweets and desserts. While this may seem limiting the variations in combining these ingredients provides us with a range of products with both sweet and savoury uses. Before we begin to dive deeper into the pastry itself, let’s get a understand the ingredients used. If you haven’t already, Look up our posts on Getting to Grips with Pastry and Blind Baking to get a deeper insight into great pastry.
Flour.
Most commonly (but not always) in terms of pastry we are discussing milled white wheat flour. The main characteristic of the wheat/flour we are interested in is its protein content and it’s important to use the correct flour for the job in hand. In kitchens we refer to cake flour, plain flour, and strong flour. This is simply a useful reference to the amount of protein in the flour.
Cake Flour. 8-9% protein. Not that easy to find now, most people use plain flour as a replacement. If you want to try it out add roughly 15-20% cornflour to plain flour and sift together, semolina or rice flour can also be used. This is quite a common technique in making shortbread.
Plain Flour, 10-12% protein. Readily available and possible the most common flour found at home. Self-raising flour is simply plain flour with chemical raising agents added.
Strong Flour, 12-16% More commonly used for bread or leavened products. We will cover this in more detail with a later post on bread making.
There are of course many other types of flour available to us including wholemeal versions of the above but rather than get into too much detail here I want to focus on the pastry itself.
For more flour facts look up https://fabflour.co.uk/
Fats.
For pastry butter, margarine, or lard can be used. They all do a similar job but in diverse ways.
Butter is best for flavour and should always be unsalted. This can seem odd when most recipes will add salt to the mix be it sweet or savoury but by using unsalted butter, we have total control over the salt content of the dough. Butter also melts at a reasonably low temperature in the region of 30˚c to 35˚c. Now this can be a pain in making the dough if rubbing in the fat, but it means that the fat will melt in the mouth during eating. Other pastry fats like lard melt at a higher temperature 36˚c + which means the fat can solidify in the mouth as if cools.
Not all butters are equal, have a look at the butters on offer where you shop. The use by dates of the salted versions will be much longer than the unsalted versions. Salt is added for flavour but also as a preservative to lengthen the life of the butter. We want our butter to be as fresh as possible with a rich cream natural flavour.
Also have a look at the fat content of the butters, but surely butter is fat? Well not all of it, the fat content will differ according to manufacture and origin. Why is this of interest, well most of the weight of the butter that’s not fat will be moisture. If you have ever melted butter, then poured it into a dish you will have discovered a layer of milky water sitting below the fat.
Now would you just add more liquid into your pastry just for the hell of it? Well, that’s what you are doing by using butter with a flow fat content. Aim to buy a butter with at least 80% fat. Preferably 83% or more if you can.
Lard
If we decide to use lard as our fat source, we don’t need to worry about the moisture content, but the flavour suffers. Also been a firmer fat then butter it’s easier to get a light crumbier pastry. Some chefs like to use half butter, half lard in savoury pastry. I do this for my Christmas mince pies. It gives just the right texture and the last thing I need it a sweet pastry shell combined with a very sweet filling.
Margarine
If using margarine, it must be a hard margarine produced for pastry making, not one of the many blended or soft margarines available. For cake making the margarine can be softer but in pastry we need the firmness of the fat to produce a light finish. This also has the advantage of a very low moisture content which is important as we will see later.
Eggs or Water?
The choice of using egg or water to bind a dough really depends on the method of making the dough and the characteristics you want the dough to have.
A large egg is made up of about 9% fat, 12% protein, and the balance been water and minerals making up the remainder.
Water is of course 100% water and has no ability to hold back gluten or bind a dough together.
The protein in egg will add structure but overdoing it will make the pastry tougher. look up our Food Files page on All you need to know about – Eggs to get a deeper insight on the egg itself.
The fat in the yolk assists the fat in the recipe to hold back the gluten and the yolk also acts as an emulsifier to help hold the water and fat in the recipe together. This in the case of beaten mixes (see my sable recipe) binds the dough together and gives volume
So, in a nutshell using egg will give a dough more structure and reduce the amount of pure water needed to bind the dough. However, the egg will also take away some of the crumbly nature of the cooked pastry. Using water will provide a crumbly texture as long as the dough is not overworked, and the gluten toughened making the pastry chewy.
For more information on eggs look up https://www.egginfo.co.uk
Sugar
Adding sugar to a rubbed in pastry will of course sweeten the dough but will also make the pastry colour more in baking. Using an unrefined sugar will also enhance the flavour of the pastry.
When making a dough by the creaming method it does both of the above and also cuts though the fat allowing it to distribute though the flour more efficiently and hold back the gluten.
Now if your still with me Well Done!
That’s a lot of info which I hope will allow you to make informed decisions when choosing or amending the pastry recipes you decide to use. Grab a cup of coffee, take a breath and we can more on. Let’s now have a look at the physical process of making the dough.
Going back to the flour information of this post I mentioned the protein content of the flour and how this defined which flour we would use for a particular job. The reason for this is that when hydrated these proteins begin to form a product known as Gluten. Think of it as an elastic bungee holding the dough together.
Gluten can be an advantage to us or a bit of a pain, it forms naturally in a dough, so all a bread dough needs to begin forming gluten is time and water. Working the gluten strengthens it and makes it more elastic. This is an advantage in doughs where we need to the dough to stretch as the gasses in the dough expand in the heat of the oven as in making bread.
With basic pastries this strength is the last thing we need. If you have ever found your pastry has shrunk back down the tin in baking, it’s a sure sign that the dough has been overworked in ether the mixing or rolling out or often in both! When rolling out your pastry, don’t just roll in one direction. Turn the dough as you are rolling to even out the stressing of the dough. If the dough springs back as you try to roll it out, its already too elastic. The best you can do is to pop it into the fridge on the rolling mat to rest for 20 minutes then have another go. Always rest a rolled dough before baking to minimise shrinkage.
So, a key thing is to handle our pastry as little and as lightly as possible. If making the dough on a machine I prefer to let the machine do any rubbing in or creaming but then bring the dough together by hand, so I am in control of the mixing.
Demystifying perfect pastry, the Creaming method.
If you haven’t already check out my Best Sweet Pastry post for a recipe to produce a versatile tart dough. The process is like making shortbread but uses icing sugar which fully incorporates into the dough and has egg for a binding. Any additional moisture needed to bring the dough together is provided by double cream. The net result of this is to use the least water possible to bring the dough together. This gives us a pastry robust enough to be cut and support a filling while not been tough.
The principle of a creamed dough is that the fat having been mixed right through the dough forms a barrier to the gluten forming long strands and toughing the pastry.
Demystifying perfect pastry, the Rubbing in method.
This is the normal procedure for producing shortcrust pastry, the ‘short’ part of the term referring to how well the pastry breaks up in the mouth. Again, controlling the gluten is important to avoid toughness but the primary factor is how we combine the fat into the dough. Temperature is important. Whereas in our creamed dough room temperature is ideal when rubbing in, we need the fat and our tools be Again, as cool as possible.
The idea is to rub the fat into the flour to form fine particles without the fat melting into the flour. Now as I said before butter melts below blood heat so unless you have nimble quick fingers there’s a chance the butter will begin melt before it totally worked in. Dicing the butter then returning it into the fridge helps and a cold mixing bowl is essential.
The easy option is to use a high melting point fat, and this is the most popular option for manufactured pastries. It may say butter on the packet, but its not butter as you know it.
Think of short pastry as a brick wall, if everything is firmly combined it has strength and toughness and is difficult to break though. Now imagine we have gaps in the mortar and the bricks are sandy. The wall is weak and will collapse easily without using a lot of effort.
This is what the fat in the pastry does, having small particles of fat in the dough prevents the gluten forming together while the dough is raw. Then when cooking the fat melts to leave weakness in the pastry which gives the finished pastry its light crumbly nature.
Dealing with pastry, best practice.
In making creamed doughs keep everything at room temperature.
In making rubbed in doughs keep everything cool and use a pastry knife to cut in the fat.
Rest the dough after making and before rolling to give the dough time to bind and relax
When rolling a dough cool the work surface and rolling pin if it’s a warm day. A polypropylene rolling pin is the best option.
Don’t overdo the amount of four used when rolling out, just a dusting should be enough. Too much flour will embed itself into the dough and spoil the pastry when baked.
Work quickly but carefully, turn the dough during rolling to even out the stress of stretching the dough out.
Always rest the rolled dough before baking.
Have the oven preheated to a slightly higher temperature that needed to cook the pastry. Place the goods into the oven then turn down the heat to the cooking temperature. This will help counteract the loss of heat when opening the oven door.
I hope all that information hasn’t overwhelmed you, take a little time to work through it all. Practice makes perfect so give it a go and remember to enjoy your cooking.
Enjoy life!
John.
The Cutting Edge, The knives to choose, and use.
How to choose the best knives for the kitchen and improve your cooking.