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British Tourism Week

The second annual British Tourism Week (BTW) takes place from 10 - 18 March 2008. His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales has confirmed that he will once again be the Patron for this series of inter-related events, which will raise national and international awareness of the size, value and importance of Britain's £85 billion visitor economy.

British Tourism Week 2008 marks the start of a year in which Britain prepares for the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games, taking the torch from Beijing ahead of the four-year Cultural Olympiad. Building on the success of British Tourism Week 2007 which featured over 50 events across the country, British Tourism Week '08 will highlight the contribution made by businesses large and small, public and commercial and galvanises the commitment of organisations and individuals to further improve and develop the industry.

To celebrate British Tourism Week '08, we have decided to collaborate with Taste Lancashire '08 and provide some mouth-watering local recipes provided by some of the District's top Chef's:

Pan Fried Sea Bass on a Bed of Caramelised Red Cabbage
From Steve Saxon, Head Chef at The Shireburn Arms Hotel, Clitheroe.

Ingredients: (Serves 4)
4 X 175-200 gms thick, meaty portions sea bass, with skin left on
1 medium sized red cabbage, shredded
75 gms unsalted butter 300 ml red wine
85 ml crame de cassis 150 ml veal stock
Salt and pepper

For the sauce:
300 ml fish stock 150 ml dry white wine
150 ml noilly prat 150 ml veal stock
1 clove garlic, crushed 1tsp chopped shallots
300ml double cream

What to do:
Make three incisions on the skin of each portion of fish with a sharp knife. Place the cabbage in a saucepan with 25g of the butter. Add the wine, cassis and veal stock. Bring to the boil and simmer gently on a low heat for approximately 45 minutes until the liquid has reduced and the cabbage has caramelised. Stir occasionally. Check for seasoning and keep warm.
To make the sauce, place all the ingredients except the cream in a pan and reduce by two-thirds by fast boiling. Add the cream and reduce again until the sauce is thick enough to coat the back of a spoon generously. Remove from the heat and pass through a fine sieve.
Heat the remaining butter in a pan until hot and seal the sea bass on the flesh side, then turn over on to the skin. Cook over a medium heat until crisp, about 10 minutes.
To serve, divide the cabbage on to four plates. Lay the sea bass skin side up and pour the sauce

Barbecued Lamb Shoulder with Lebanese Taboule
From Stosie Madi, Head Chef at Head Chef & Proprietor at Weezo's Clitheroe

On a hot summer day the perfect Mediterranean meal al fresco with the advantage of not doing much while your guests are there, what can I say but hostess heaven, also use local lamb from your local butcher for maximum taste.

Ingredients: (Serves 4)

1 kg lamb shoulder cut into 1inch chunks (ask your butcher to trim off as much fat but leave a little layer to self baste the meat as it cooks)
100 gms chopped thyme and rosemary
50 of fresh ground seven spice mixture
50 ml extra virgin olive oil
50 ml pomegranate molasses (available at your local Booths)
50 gms fresh ground garlic
Salt & pepper to taste

What to do:
Combine all the above ingredients several hours in advance and let marinade until ready to barbecue. Thread the meat on the skewers and when the coals on the barbecue are white barbecue for 6 minutes each side for medium .rare or longer if you like your meat cooked more. Take off the barbecue push the meat off the skewers and (very important) douse while hot with the lemon vinaigrette and let rest for 10 minutes so the juices meld , serve with crusty barbecued pitta bread and bowls of zingy taboule.
Lemon dressing to serve with the lamb
50 ml very good extras virgin olive oil blended with 1 crushed garlic clove and 150 ml freshly squeezed lemon juice season with salt and pepper to taste and toss in some chopped chilli for extra zing.

What you need for the Taboule
1 kg very red juicy but firm tomatoes diced as small as you dare making sure you conserve all the juices that run
200 gms flat leaf continental parsley
1 large bunch spring onions peeled and chopped
75 gms deseeded and chopped red chillies
100 gms mint leaves
6 large lemons juiced
50 gms fresh ground very good quality cumin
50 ml pomegranate molasses
100 ml very good extra virgin olive oil
100 gms extra fine bulgur wheat (available at your local Booths) rinsed in hot water for no longer than a minute to keep the crunch
Salt & pepper to taste

What to do:
Pick all herb leaves off the stems (get the kids to do it and keep them busy), wash the herbs and put through a salad spinner and chop down as small as you can maybe using a mezzaluna if it helps but the herbs must be hand chopped to keep it rustic and with texture.
Toss the herbs, the spring onions, the chilli and tomatoes together taking care not to over bruise the salad. Rub the cumin salt and pepper into the bulgur wheat and toss into the tomato and herb salad, add the rest of the ingredients taste for seasoning and keep refrigerated for no more than two hours.
To make this fuss free pick the herbs the night before when marinating your meat and just chop it all down an hour before lunch. Thread the meat skewers two hours before lunch and this should leave you plenty of time to relax and enjoy lunch. I recommend a very good chilled rose or extra cold Prossecco.

Breast of Goosnargh Cornfed Chicken with Wild Chanterelle Mushrooms
From Paul webster, Head Chef at Green's Bistro, Lytham St Annes

Ingredients: (serves 4)
4 Corn fed chicken breasts
Mushrooms 3tbsp olive oil
3 cloves of garlic finely 100 gms unsalted butter
500 ml vegetable stock 1 small onion, finely chopped
200 gms risotto rice 150 gms grated Parmesan cheese
1 small bunch basil chopped

What to do:
Clean the mushrooms with a dry pastry brush and then hand tear them into strips.
In a large pan heat 2tbsp of olive oil until hot, add the mushrooms and half the garlic and fry until cooked.
In another pan heat half the butter with the remaining oil, add the onion and garlic, cook until soft.
then start adding the stock ladle-by-ladle stirring constantly. Allow each ladle of stock to absorb before adding the 4. Add the rice and stir until all the grains are coated in butter, next one.
Continue this until the rice is cooked, usually about 20 minutes. Finish by adding the cooked mushrooms, Parmesan cheese, basil, the rest of the butter and season.
For the chicken, heat a frying with a little oil and butter; add the chicken breasts and seal until golden brown, season and finish cooking in a hot oven for about 20 minutes. When cooked slice each breast into 4 pieces.
To serve place the risotto in the centre of 4 large plates and arrange the chicken on top, finish by dribbling a little extra virgin olive oil around the side of the risotto.

Lytham Sea Bass Fillet, Green Pea & Smoked Bacon Risotto, Rhubarb Jam
From Michael Weston-Cole Head Chef at Foodworks, Lancaster House Hotel.

Ingredients:

4 large pin-boned & de-scaled sea bass fillets
50 mls of olive oil Pinch of salt & pepper
200 gms of fresh green peas 1 pint of good quality chicken stock
6 rashers smoked Bowland bacon 200 gms of Arborio rice
1 medium diced onion 2 cloves of crushed garlic
100 mls of a good white wine 2 sticks of rhubarb
200 gms of sugar 20 mls of cold water
200 mls of double cream

What to do:

Peel the rhubarb and cut in to 1cm batons, add to a thick bottomed pan, add the sugar and water and add to the heat, watch carefully and allow the rhubarb to go soft.
In a separate pan add the finely chopped smoked bacon, onion, garlic and a small knob of butter, cook till soft but do not colour. Now add the rice, de-glaze the pan with the white wine, and slowly add the chicken a little at the time constantly stirring. When cooked, the rice should have a slight crunch and be transparent. Now add the peas and cream, mix thoroughly and leave to rest.
Take a frying pan and allow to heat on the stove. When hot add a little olive oil and, making sure the fish has been scored, place the fish skin side down and apply pressure to the back to stop the skin from shrinking. Cook for 2 minutes on each side.
Serve the risotto on a plate, top with the sea bass and then the rhubarb jam.

Fresco Fresco Tiramisu
From Giovanni Iozzi, Head Chef at Fresco Fresco Italian Ristorants, Croston

Ingredients: (Serves 6-8)
3 eggs, separated
100 gms mascarpone
75 gms (2½ oz) caster sugar
200 ml espresso/black coffee
60 ml Marsala wine
12 sponge fingers
Cocoa powder to dust

What to do:
Separate the egg yolk from the egg white into two separate bowls.
Using an electric mixer, cream the egg yolks and caster sugar together until pale and fluffy. Add the mascarpone and whisk together to combine.
In a separate bowl, whisk the egg whites until they form stiff peaks, and then fold them slowly into the mascarpone mixture with a spoon.
Dip the sponge fingers very quickly into the coffee so that the sponge fingers don't disintegrate. Use them to line the base of a serving dish or individual glasses.
Spoon the mascarpone mixture over the sponge then place another layer of sponge fingers dipped in coffee on top, and then add another layer of the mascarpone mixture. Then dust the top with cocoa powder to finish. Refrigerate
for at least eight hours (ideally overnight) to chill thoroughly before serving.

Oven Baked Chicken Breast in a Creamy Leek
& Stilton Sauce
From James Cowell, Apprentice Chef at Ye Horns inn, Goosnargh

Ingredients:

1 Chicken breast (Skin on)
20gms of leek (finely sliced)
20gms of mushrooms (finely sliced)
20gms of stilton (grated)
50ml cream
1 knob of butter

What to do:
Cook the chicken breast in a sealed dish, half covered with water at 180C for 30 - 35 minutes. Place the butter, mushrooms and leeks into a frying pan and cook without colouring, on a medium heat.
Add the cream and stilton to the sauce with a pinch of salt, and allow thickening to a gravy consistency. Peel the skin from the breast, and spoon over the sauce.

Gluten Free Summer Pudding by Marco Calle-Calatayud

Ingredients:
Homemade juvela bread rolls (Cut Discs)
1 Punnet Blueberries
1 Punnet Blackberries
1 Punnet Strawberries
1 Punnet Redcurrants
1 Punnet Raspberry
2 cups of water
1 cup of sugar

What to do:

Pour into a saucepan the sugar and water, bring to the boil and reduce the sugar syrup by half with a quarter sprig of vanilla bean.
Add your berries to your sugar syrup removing any stalks and boil for five to ten minutes until thick fruit syrup.

Place in sieve a piece of muslin and a bowl underneath and pour the contents from your sauce pan into the sieve and allow the bowl to catch the juice and leave to cool.
In a 6cm diameter metal ring, take a disc of juvela bread dip in the juice and place in the centre of metal ring. Add few berries and repeat again twice. Pour two tablespoons of juice over the top and remove the metal ring and serve with a quenelle of vanilla bean ice cream.

Fillet of Extra-Matured Pendle Beef with Lancashire Blue Cheese with Herb-Scented Crushed Potatoes and a Port Sauce

From Ash Reman at The Red Pump Inn, Bashall Eaves

Ingredients:

A decent sized fillet of extra-matured local Lancashire beef (It should be dark red in colour, not bright red!)
Potatoes boiled or steamed in their skins
Freshly picked thyme (ours are from the garden at the back of the Inn)
Butler's Blackstick's Blue cheese
Sml glass of port
Butter
Salt and pepper

What to do:
Get your pan hot, add a little oil and sear your fillet steak, cooking it no more than medium rare (2-3 minutes per side)
Season the steak and leave to rest a little with a little crumbled Blackstick's Blue cheese on the top.
De-glaze the pan and the fillet steak juices with some port, season and reduce this sauce a little
Roughly crush the hot, skin-on potatoes with some butter, salt and pepper and a teaspoon of the freshly gathered chopped herbs and pile into a stack in the centre of your plate
Place the fillet steak with a little of the melting Blackstick's Blue cheese top onto the crushed potato stack and drizzle your port sauce around the beef, finishing with some fresh herb leaves.
Enjoy this with a glass of hearty red such as Chateuneuf du Pape.

Potted Goosnargh Duck
From Anson at The Millstone at Mellor

Ingredients: (Serves 15)

5 Goosnargh duck legs
1 kg clarified butter
8 cloves of garlic
Handful of fresh thyme
Handful of chopped fresh parsley
250 g Goosnargh duck breast
250 g chicken breast
Salt and pepper

What to do:
Place duck legs, butter, garlic, thyme and salt and pepper into a roasting pot, cover and slowly bake for 2-3 hours at 150c.
When cooked strip the duck meat of the legs but save the butter mixture, the duck meat should just fall of the bone.
To form a smoking pan, place 1 teaspoon of rice, 1 teaspoon of brown sugar and 1 teaspoon earl grey tea leaves in the bottom of an old pan. Loosely cover with tinfoil and place over a low heat, Place the duck and chicken breasts on the foil the tightly seal the pan with a lid or foil. Smoke for 12 minutes then remove the chicken and duck breast from pan and finish in a hot oven for 7 minutes.
Once cooked shred all duck breast and leg meat with the chicken breast.
Add the meat to the clarified butter and mix in the parsley.
Spoon the mixture into ramekins and cover with an optional layer of clarified butter on top. Place in fridge to set overnight.
Serve at room temperature with warm toast and green tomato chutney; why not try it with a nice Rioja wine.

Slow Roasted Pork Belly with Apple and Sage Mash, Cider Gravy and Green Beans
From Norman Price at The High Moor Restaurant, Mellor.

Ingredients:

1 slab pork belly 3 cloves garlic
Flaked sea salt 25g rosemary
3 round shallots, peeled 10 chopped sage leaves
10 fine green beans, topped and tailed 1 baking potato
1 diced Bramley apple 50g unsalted butter
5 fl oz cider reduced by half Salt and pepper
1 tbsp redcurrant jelly 10 fl oz pork stock
2 tbsp cornflour, mixed with a small amount of water

What to do:
Rub chopped garlic and rosemary all over pork and marinate for 2 hours.
Place pork on roasting tray and roast for 3-4 hours at 140C / gas 2.5 - 3.
Saute diced apple and sage with a knob of butter and a sprinkling of sugar until just cooked. Put to one side.
Peel and quarter potato. Just cover with salted water, put on hob and boil until just cooked. Drain and mash. Season with salt and pepper. Mix in cooked apple and sage. Put to one side.
Cook green beans in salted boiling water for 5 minutes.
To make the sauce, place stock, cider, redcurrant jelly and a sprig of rosemary in a pan and reduce by half. Add a knob of butter, thicken with cornflour / water mixture and season with salt and pepper. Remove rosemary from pan.
To assemble, place apple and sage mashed potato on a plate, layer the green beans on top and carefully place pork belly on green beans.
Surround with cider gravy and serve immediately.

Warm Red Onion and Goats Cheese Tart
FromGreig Barnes at The Spread Eagle, Sawley.

Ingredients: (Serves 4)
4 large red onions
8 stoned and chopped black olives
4 fl oz olive oil
8 oz soft goat's cheese (cut into 8 slices)
300 g puff pastry
8 oz gooseberries
2 oz sugar
Salt and pepper

What you do:
Roll out the pastry to thickness of 5mm, prick all over with a fork and cut into rectangles of about 5 inch x 2.5 inch, rest the pastry for 20 minutes on a baking sheet.
Place in a pre-heated oven and bake for 10 minutes, place another heavy baking sheet on top to keep the pastry flat, continue cooking for a further 10-12 minutes until golden and crisp.
Next thinly slice the onions, warm the oil in a thick bottomed pan and add the onions and stew (do not fry) over a low heat until all the liquid from the onions has evaporated. Add the chopped olives and season with salt and black pepper. Leave to cool.
Stew the gooseberries with the sugar until a dry puree is obtained. Liquidise with equal amounts of olive oil (i.e. 4 fl oz oil to 4 fl oz puree), strain.
Neatly arrange the stewed onions on the pastry base, topped with the goats cheese and place in a moderate oven until the goats cheese just starts to 'fall' (5-8 minutes), serve with the dressing

Lancashire Hotpot
One of the best known traditional English recipes. In the 19th century mutton was one of the cheaper cuts of meat. This meal could be left cooking all day while all the family worked at the factory or mill.

Ingredients:
6-8 pieces of neck lamb. (Mutton is traditional but hard to find )
2 lambs kidneys

½ pint water
8 organic potatoes 1 large organic onion
pepper & salt butter to grease the bowl.

What to do:

Grease a casserole and put a thick layer of sliced potatoes in (about 1 pound )
Cut the meat into cubes and place on potatoes
Cover the meat with sliced onion, sprinkle with pepper and salt, add the water.
Cut remaining potatoes into chunks and place them in order to top off the whole dish: brush with a little butter.
Cook for two hours @ 190c.

Eccles Cakes
Ingredients:
Shortcrust Pastry, 1 oz ground almonds, 4oz golden syrup, a little nutmeg,
a little lemon juice, 4oz currents, 1oz ground coconuts.

What to do:

Line some patty pans with shortcrust, put in each a layer of syrup,
Then currants, spice, lemon juice and almonds. Cover with pastry.
Roll over with a pin, very gently. Bake in a moderate oven for 30 mins.

Manchester Pudding

Ingredients:
Shortcrust Pastry, 20oz butter, 1oz castor sugar, rind of 1 lemon, jam (stoneless),
2 eggs, 1 tablespoon brandy,½ pint milk, 2oz breadcrumbs.

What to do:

Boil the lemon rind in milk and pour over the breadcrumbs. Take the rind out after 5 mins and beat in the egg yolks with butter sugar and brandy. Line a pie dish with pastry and spread some jam over it. Cover with the breadcrumbs mixture and bake in a moderate oven for 45 minutes. Whip the egg whites with some castor sugar and lay over the dish. Return to the oven for one minute to set. Serve cold.

Parkin

Ingredients:

1/2lb oatmeal, 8oz brown ugar, 1lb treacle, 1 teaspoonfull of ground ginger,
8oz butter, 1 teaspoonfull of allspice

What to do:

Mix the dry ingredients. Heat treacle and butter; add to the dry mix and leave to overnight. Place in well greased shallow baking tin and bake in a moderate oven for two hours. It is done when the parkin springs back when touched.

Tripe & Onions

Ingredients:

1lb tripe, ½ pint water, 2 onions,1/2 pint milk, a little flour,salt & pepper

What to do:

Wash the tripe well, cut into square pieces and bring to the boil in water.
Throw the water away and add water and milk, chopped onions, salt & pepper.
Thicken with flour, after boiling the tripe for three hours, by stirring in with a little milk. Bring to the boil again and serve.