Hello and sorry for such a gap between blogs but my wife and i took leave of our senses and have taken a lease on a restaurant within a pub! Seriously though its now starting to get enjoyable as we are settling down a bit as it was first taken on in November then Xmas was upon us which just whissed by..though busy and stressful.
Anyway for any of you that like dining out to eat fresh tasty and reasonably priced food why not come along and try us. We are open Tue-Sun for lunch 12-4 and all day on Friday and Saturday. Its the Auld Hooose in Windygates so we look forward to seeing you.
Other than the restaurant it has not been busy for the outside catering and havn't had the time to drum up business with the restaurant taking up all our time. But we are still doing catering especially private dinner parties and weddings.
Well its winter time and its cold so what better way to warm yourself up than sit down to a tasty(very),cheap,hearty filling dish of Braised ox cheek,roast root vegetables and creamy mash....mmmmm i hear you say or maybe yuch don't fancy that.
Well that is on our special for today so if you don't want to tackle the forthcoming recipe come along to the Auld Hoose and try it!

For the adventurous cook:
From a quality reliable butcher i use Hendersons 01592 770555
4ox cheek an onion peeled and chopped couple of carrots peeled and chopped stick of celery sprig of thyme bulb of garlic crushed with back of knife glass of red wine and glass of port and the essential salt and pepper

Ask the butcher to trim of any sinewy and fatty bits then pass through flour while your doing that have a pan on and an ovenproof casserole dish ready to stick in oven. touch of oil into the hot pan then lay gently in the pan your ox cheek nicely brown then turn over and do same on other side. Take out pan and place in casserole dish then empty dirty oil out pan wipe dry with cloth place back on heat put in some fresh oil and quickly saute all your prepared vegetables and herbs pour this over your ox cheek cover with some stock and red wine and port. Cover with foil and slowly braise for three hours or so until tender.
While thats in the oven out the road make your mash then peel another couple of carrots and parsnip then cut lengthways through them in oven with touch of butter and honey sprig of rosemary and roast for ten mins or so.(on a tray of course)

When ox cheek is ready serve up with your mash and roast veg smother with the cooking liquor and thorougly enjoy the fruits of your efforts of which you will not be dissapointed!

And by the way Happy New Year....you know what they say better late than never!!!

Happy cooking.