PRIME RIB PERFECT EVERY TIME

This Involves A Tiny Bit Of Maths!

How to cook the perfect prime rib, this does involve a simple hint of maths!  Really easy cooking this is a gorgeous steak and a easy way to feed several people at once.  When cooked very slowly at a very low temperature it may look very rare (blue) almost under cooked but it is not and this steak is just melt in the mouth tender, what’s even better is the au jus dipping stock gravy that is the bonus of slow cooking and resting, this steak is going to rest in the oven for 2 hours.  If you like your steak more towards medium all you have to do is warm the steak in the au jus to your liking.

The Maths

I recommend a joint of fore rib, (ribeye) bone in around 3kg / 6.61lbs which would also equate to being 3 bones in wide, but any size of fore rib or even a 2 kg / 4.41lbs sirloin will still result in perfect cooked prime rib due to this equation!

Preheated Oven to the highest 250 C / 482 F

The Cooking Calculation

6.61lbs x 5 (minutes) = 33.05 Cooking Minutes + 1 minute = 34.05 Exact Minutes

(+1 minute is for oven temperature adjustment from the door being opened)

Prep time 10 minutes / Cooking time 3 hrs

Equipment deep roasting tray with a rack

Ingredients 

(serves 6)

Prime Rib

Fore rib of beef (ribeye) on the bone

250g butter room temperature 

1 tbsp Himalayan sea salt 

1 tbsp fresh ground black pepper 

Au Jus

4 carrots roughly chopped

1 onion in quarters

1 leek roughly chopped

2 ribs of celery roughly chopped

1 bulb of garlic cut in half

1 bay leaf

3 sprigs of thyme

10 whole black peppercorns

1 ltr water

Bring your steak out 4 hours before you are going to cook, this is really important to successful prime rib.  Next pre heat your oven to is highest setting, 250 C / 482 F for at least one hour in advance.

Take your roasting tray and layer the bottom with all of the au jus ingredients, add the water then place on top the roasting rack.  Generously spread the soft butter all over the fore rib of beef, season with salt and pepper all over and place on to the roasting rack.

Place in the oven as fast as possible and from this point forward DO NOT OPEN THE OVEN DOOR, if you do you will get roast beef not prime rib.  Set the timer for your maths cooking time, when this time is up, TURN THE OVEN OFF !  DO NOT OPEN THE DOOR AT ALL!  After two hours your prime rib is ready to serve, it will be luke warm.  If you want your steak cooked more rare medium then just heat the steak in the au jus to your liking.

Thinly carve the edges off the fore rib and keep for fridge nibbles or chefs perks!  

Carve your prime rib into approx 227g / 8oz steaks and serve, thats it.

Summary

Ingredients 

Prime Rib

Fore rib of beef (ribeye) on the bone

250g butter room temperature 

1 tbsp Himalayan sea salt 

1 tbsp fresh ground black pepper 

Au Jus

4 carrots roughly chopped

1 onion in quarters

1 leek roughly chopped

2 ribs of celery roughly chopped

1 bulb of garlic cut in half

1 bay leaf

3 sprigs of thyme

10 whole black peppercorns

1 ltr water

Method 

Pre heat oven 250 C / 482 F

Cover rib with butter, salt and pepper

Fill roasting tray with au jus ingredients

Maths x timing roast

Turn off oven and do not open

Leave for 2 hrs

Serve prime rib steaks

If you want the steaks cooked to a more medium, heat in the au jus

Serve with your choice of fixings 

WILD MUSHROOM GNOCCHI

Glorious creamy white wine, garlic, turmeric, lemon, wild ceps, chanterelles and chestnut mushroom sauce sumptuously draped over light and fluffy goats cheese gnocchi.  These are little pillows of heaven they just melt in your mouth a buttery light potato gnocchi with the creamy sharp tang of goats cheese smothered in the rich cream, white wine and delicate lemon wild mushrooms sauce, finished with Parmesan shavings, this should be eaten with a spoon so you can get the maximum gnocchi and sauce in your mouth in one go and eaten in private or with people you love as they are lip smacking gorgeous. 

Super easy to make allow 1 hour

Make all of this up to one day in advance, to serve just heat the sauce and cook the gnocchi for 2 minutes in salted simmering water, drain and toss in the sauce and serve, Ta Da... 

Ingredients 

(serves 4 as a main or 8 as a starter)

Gnocchi 

500g King Edward floury potatoes

240g 00 gnocchi Italian flour (caputo)

More flour for dusting 

1 egg beaten 

100g soft gooey goats cheese cut into chunks

Himalayan sea salt

Fresh ground black pepper 

Wild Mushroom Sauce 

1 tbsp olive oil

1 tbsp butter

1 small shallot finely diced

2 cloves garlic finely chopped 

100g wild ceps sliced

50g wild chanterelles sliced

100g sliced chestnut mushrooms 

1 zest lemon

1/2 tsp turmeric 

1/4 tsp grated nutmeg

250ml white wine

600ml double cream

Himalayan sea salt 

Fresh ground black pepper 

Gnocchi 

Boil your potatoes with the skin on, drain and leave to steam dry in a colander, once cool enough to handle peel the skins off and either discard or roast or fry sprinkle with sea salt for crispy skin chips!  Mash the potatoes then gently fold in the beaten egg, goats cheese chunks, flour, salt and pepper until just combined.  Divide the slightly crumbled mixture into four, on a floured work top mould, shape and roll each quarter of the mixture into a long sausage around one inch thick.

Cut one inch sections off the gnocchi sausage, these then will need to be rolled to create grooves in the gnocchi that will hold the sauce creating these gorgeous pillows of heaven.  To do this you can use a fork or butter pats, or a proper Italian gnocchi rolling board.  I have used a fork and butter pats.  The gnocchi will only take two minutes to cook.

Gnocchi made with butter pats and a fork

Wild Mushroom Sauce 

Before you cook the gnocchi make the sauce, heat the olive oil and butter add the shallot and garlic, soften for five minutes, add the mushrooms and cook for three minutes, remove from the pan and reserve to one side, add the wine and deglaze the pan and reduce the wine by half, the add the cream, lemon zest, turmeric and nutmeg.  Simmer until slightly thickened, add back the mushrooms, garlic and shallots, taste and season with salt and pepper, that’s the sauce done!  Keep warm while you cook the gnocchi. I 

To cook the Gnocchi bring a pan of sea salted water to a gentle rolling simmer, drop in the gnocchi and cook for around two minutes, the gnocchi will float as soon as it’s cooked, remove from the pan with a sieve and add to your warm sauce, toss and serve immediately, finish the dish with a smattering of Parmesan shavings and a mixed side salad tossed in a olive oil, lemon and mustard dressing.

This also goes great with some nutty garlic sage butter, a simple sauce of melted butter, garlic and sage leaves cooked for a couple of minutes until the butter starts to lightly brown, toss in the gnocchi and serve.

FERMENTED SRIRACHA

Fermented Homemade Chilli Sauce

This is an outstandingly easy recipe for a fresh vibrant sriracha hot chilli sauce that may have you leaving that Famous rooster bottle named after the ship Huy Fong that he travelled with his family in to the United States of America in the store, I know it is for my family!  Only because we like to be as self sufficient as possible, but we are honest and sometimes we just need to grab a bottle of the best stuff as life is super busy.  We grow and raise most of our food and finally this year I have succeeded in a bountiful yield of Serrano chillies just for this recipe.

Fermenting 7 Days To Make 

Fermented Sriracha Sauce

Ingredients 

(Makes approx 300ml)

Store brought or make your own...

 700g whole red jalapeños 

1 tbsp Himalayan sea salt

3-4 tbsp light brown sugar

4 large cloves chopped garlic

125 ml apple cider vinegar 

The Fermenting 

Place all the ingredients except the white wine vinegar into your food processor or magic bullet and blitz, blitz and then blitz some more until you have as smooth a mixture as possible, around three minutes.

Decant into your kilner jar scraping every bit out from the food processor, pop on the lid and just leave on the side somewhere safe where the jar won't get knocked over and out of direct sunlight for 7 days, after 3-5 days you will see the exciting start of the ferment, there will be some movement in the chilli mash like cracks in a wall, this is good.  

After day 5 gentle shake the jar to mix all the fermenting chillies back to a smooth consistency and again on day 6.  Day 7 over a saucepan strain the mixture through a sieve and using the back of a spoon push through as much of the mixture that will go through, you want a really dry pulp left in the sieve.  Add the vinegar and bring to a rolling simmer, reduce the sriracha sauce down to the thickness you require, I like the sauce to coat the back of a spoon well this way it sticks to food better so you get more of a bang of flavour with each mouthful.

Take off the heat and decant into a hot sterilised ball mason jar, pop on a lid and store in the fridge for up to 6 months, IT WON'T LAST THAT LONG!  Enjoy. 

PALEO JALAPEÑOS POPPERS

Keto Poppers Nitrate Free 

Fabulous slightly healthier swap out for my most beloved crispy panko fried cream cheese stuffed jalapeño poppers, I do love my poppers, but I’m trying to find low carbohydrate way of having some of my favourite foods still loaded with flavour, these seem to be a winner as there are never any left when I make them for my family!  

Fresh jalapeños halved, seeds removed and mixed with sour cream cheese, I like Philadelphia, stuff the jalapeños with the cream cheese, toss in freshly grated Parmesan and wrapped in bacon, bake for 15 minutes and enjoy, these are a great alternative, not as great as a crispy panko fried popper, but still a good alternative.

Preparation time 10 minutes / Cooking time 15 minutes 

Ingredients

(makes 20)

10 fresh jalapeños 

20 rashers streaky bacon nitrate free

250g cream cheese

100g grated Parmesan 

Pre heat your oven 180 C / 356 F

Very simply cut the jalapeños in half long ways, scoop out seeds, mix with the cream cheese, stuff the jalapeños with the cream cheese, roll in the grated Parmesan then wrap up in the rasher of bacon, that’s it, pop in the oven and bake for 15 minutes and enjoy.

These are super quick to assemble and a great family treat.

PERFECT CRISPY CRACKLING EVERY TIME

It’s All in the Method...

It’s very simple to successfully ensure crispy crackling every time, take your side of belly pork, score the skin but not all the way through to the meat, pat dry really dry with paper towel then liberally sprinkle Himalayan sea salt all over the dry skin, pre heat your oven to 220 C / 428 F.  Place the pork in the oven and cook for approx 45 minutes until the skin is crispy all over, that’s it.

Alternatively you can remove the skin from the belly as I did for this crackling and cook with the same method to make these crispy crackling strips.  This method will also render down a little of the fat, save this to use as your lard for your next roast or for adding to pastry giving your pastry a gorgeous roast crispy crackling flavour.

PORK PIE HAND RAISED CRUSTLESS AND GLUTEN FREE

This is a odd one for me for years I have made and sold 1000’s of my hand raised homemade pork pies with my own raised rare Gloucestershire Old Spot pigs meat and old fashioned crispy crackling hot water lard crust pastry, along with homemade pork stock jelly.  But I recently I became allergic (anaphylactic) to wheat after a Venom spider bite, so no more sumptuous decedent gorgeous mouth watering bites of my beautiful pies.  I stuffed these with a wonderful quails egg.

Well like that’s going to stop me, all I need to do is deconstruct and find another way and this glorious crustless pork pie is a winner with all the melt in the mouth pork pie filling I genuinely did not (almost) miss the melt in the mouth crackling hot water crust pastry.

The bonus here is no weight gain as no gluten and glucose so it really is a winner all round!  

10 minutes prep / 15 minutes cooking time

Ingredients 

(makes 8)

1 kg pork shoulder finely diced

500g pork belly minced

250g streaky bacon minced
10 fresh sage leaves finely chopped

4 fresh sprigs thyme finely chopped

2 fresh sprigs marjoram finely chopped

1/2 tsp ground mace

1/2 tsp cayenne pepper

1 tbsp Himalayan sea salt 

1 tsp white pepper

1 tsp ground black pepper

8 pullet or quails eggs soft boiled 

Bring a pan of salted water to a rolling simmer add the quails eggs and simmer for two minutes, remove immediately and cook in cold water, if using pullet eggs (hens 1st laying eggs) cook for four minutes and cool as above once cooled peel.  Mix all the pork pie ingredients together, take a large golf ball and press in to a small muffin tin in the base and up the sides creating a well in the centre, place the egg in the well then taking a whole walnut size of the pork pie mix roll in to a ball, press out in between your palms to creat your pie lid, press on your pie lid.

Bake for 17 minutes 180 C / 356 F and remove to cool.  That’s it...

Trotters Jelly Stock

Ingredients 

2 trotters

1 bay leaf

5 peppercorns

2 sprigs thyme

1 pinch sea salt

1 ltr water

Place all ingredients in a pan and bring to a gentle simmer for a couple of hours until reduce by two thirds, strain and leave to cool.  This is your jelly, now technically there is no gap for the jelly in these crustless pie as the jelly fills the gap between the meat and pastry!  However you can squeeze a hint in to these pies and paint some over the top if jelly is your thing.