FLOWER POT KITCHEN: CHRISTMAS AGA BAKED WHITE WINE GARLIC THYME CAMEMBERT

11 Oct 2023

CHRISTMAS AGA BAKED WHITE WINE GARLIC THYME CAMEMBERT

Ooey Gooey Gorgeousness

Elevate your baked Camembert with white wine, garlic and thyme infusion and serve with roasted baked pear wedges wrapped in jamon serrano, warm crusty sour dough or for me just a spoon.

There is not many things that rival a spoon and a ooey gooey baked Camembert, this is not to be shared!

Oven baking 30-40 minutes / Aga residual warming 1 hour

When choosing your Camembert if your going to bake in the box make sure the box is stapled not glued as the heat of the oven will melt the glue and you will end up with a mass of melted cheese.

Alternatively you can use a Camembert ceramic baker, there are lots a pretty designs available, the advantage of using a ceramic baker is the cheese stays hotter and gooey for longer, great if your serving on a Christmas buffet.

Ingredients

(one)

1 Camembert in a stapled box room temperature

150ml dry white wine

2 large cloves garlic sliced in to 3 lengthways

2 sprigs fresh thyme cut into 6 pieces

To serve with

2 pears quartered

8 slices jamon Serrano

100ml apple calvados

Warm crusty sourdough torn in to pieces

A spoon…

Take the cheese out of the fridge at least 1 hour before baking.

Un wrap the cheese, place back in the box or ceramic baker, pierce holes with a knife, approx 12 in the top of the cheese, push the garlic slices in to half the wholes, push the thyme in to the remaining holes, pour over the wine slowly making sure most of the wine soaks into the holes. Pop the lid on, you can do this hours in advance.

If your using a Aga, place the Camembert on the hot surface of the Aga not the hot plates! Leave to bake for around 1 hour until ooey, you can move the camemberts to the warming plate to keep warm or for a slower bake time. My Aga has a piano back which is a wide shelf at the back of the Aga which is great for warming mulled wine and baking camemberts.

If your baking in a oven heat to 180 C / 356 F, pop the Camembert in and bake for approximately 30 minutes, possibly 40 minutes for a ooey Camembert.

For the pears

Quarter the pears, soak in the calvados, wrap a slice of jamon Serrano around each quarter, bake in the oven 180 C / 358 F for 20 minutes.

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LIFE MY PASSION

Welcome to my daily life of cooking, one winters day many years ago my family and I were all inspired by a back to back rainy day of River Cottage this got us to stop talking about and start actually doing, suddenly three weeks later eight vegetable beds were dug, greenhouse erected and our first vegetables were propagating, this was the start to raising and growing our own food, our fabulous son Oscar changed our path in life which lead us to sell our small thriving restaurant of 10 yrs and to start our new life (Terrifying!) a life of the self sufficient in touch with nature and seasons, taking a step back and looking forward to a slower change of pace and making the most of every moment.

My passion for cooking was stronger than ever and having time at home with Oscar I found I had a new direction and I was no longer striving for perfection, I was suddenly very passionate for the enjoyment of the other side of food, something I had not realised, being the Chef/Cook and every other duty of your own small restaurant made me see that I never actually took time to cook what I wanted!

So there I was muddy boots and hands digging deep in more than one sense and I found myself transported back in time to where everyone grew some of their own food, it is a wonderful world with a real sense of achievement and loss, Slugs Snails and Caterpillars! But thats another story! Childhood memories of summers when I lived with my grand parents reminded me of so much that I had learnt about the make do and mend generation that I had forgotten.

Now as a family we love our free wild food days where we gather what nature has provided, have gone from being mini mini garden urban small holders, who did raised pigs at home because we could not wait to find land and supporting ourselves from our garden to now owning a very small farm that allows us to grow more vegetables for the whole of our family and neighbours, raise our own gorgeous Gloucestershire Old Spot pigs, (Sausages!) and pets! Dorset Down sheep, chickens for eggs and pet goats! Suddenly having large quantities of produce started to wake up the Cook in me!

The Cook was awake that part of me that wants to cook for the masses and I found myself setting up Flowerpot Kitchen, a Farmers Market Stall, I wanted to use our honest raised meats and make old fashioned pork pies, rabbit pies and game pies from the local game keeper along with old fashioned techniques and the best hot water crust pastry. This in turn grew to a small cottage industry from home weekly supplying three farm shops and a deli along with also attending three farmers markets A few years later there came a time when my son Oscar's health changed and it was an easy decision to stop.

I still hold the occasional pop up 40 seater restaurant or gourmet lunch which we do for local charities for the love of sharing food and to remind that Cook in me why I love our go slower self sufficient life!

So here I am sitting amoung the vegetables watching the chickens loving that every season nature teaches me something new and that nature is in charge! She has taught me to just go with it and grow. Give it a try from a tray of salad on your windowsill to a few tomato plants it all counts.