Crear Kitchen

Perfection on a plate

Here are some images of Alan Boslem’s cuisine at a recent Crear wedding.

Smoked salmon starter - simply superb!

Preparing the sorbet

The lamb just melts in the mouth, succulent and sweet

Divine dessert

A dessert to die for - couldn't resist a second helping (if only photographically)

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An Ode to a Dinner Roll

Behold the humble dinner roll, it’s often overlooked

Rarely mentioned on a menu, it’s ripped up and dunked in soups

But this dinner roll is special, with it’s soft and crusty bread,

Alan adds a touch of Crear Love, to ensure your soul’s well fed

“Keats? Wordsworth?” I hear you ask. Well funnily enough no, it was me…

Alan, our Crear Kitchen head chef, has decided to share another of his recipes with you, the humble dinner roll. Alan often serves his little, unassuming dinner rolls as an accompaniment to the Wedding breakfast and they always go down a treat. Perfectly soft in the centre and with a nice crusty top, we guarantee that you will never again feel the need to rip it up into tiny pieces and stir it into your soup.

Tear it in half, give it some butter (if you’re so inclined) and savour its freshly-baked texture.

Ingredients: 

1000 G STRONG FLOUR

20 G SALT

50 G YEAST

60 G DEXO

20 G ADD

600 ML LUKE WARM WATER

A HANDFUL OF CREAR LOVE (not available in the shops)

Method:

1. PREHEAT OVEN TO AROUND 200 degrees (every oven is different!)
2. MIX ALL DRY INGREDIENTS TOGETHER WITH THE DEXO
3. DISOLVE THE YEAST IN A LITTLE OF THE WATER THEN ADD TO THE DRY MIX.
4. ADD MOST OF THE REMAINING WATER AND KNEAD FOR AT LEAST 10 MINUTES.
5. IF TOO DRY ADD A LITTLE MORE WATER.
6. RIP OFF PIECES OF DOUGH AND SHAPE INTO YOUR LITTLE ROLLS (remember that they will increase in size!)
7. BAKE FOR APPROXIMATELY 10-15 MINUTES OR UNTIL GOLDEN BROWN.

Alan’s top tip:

For a perfectly soft roll, don’t try to cut down the time spent kneading!

Hmmm, we have a poets’ residency at Crear in August. Given my new found poetry skills, I wonder if they would let me attend?

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Crear Cuisine par excellence!

Our wonderful chef Alan Boslem is the most modest of men. He does not boast of the many famous and influential people for whom he has provided 5 star catering – although the list of names is as stellar as you will find.

As we have seen already on this blog, he has the talent and flair to win major food awards, yet remains unflappable under the pressures of achieving culinary excellence. Not for Alan the Ramsay expletives or the celebrity chef tantrums.

Alan’s forte is good food beautifully prepared, with fantastic visual flair and tasting ‘out of this world’. And I speak as one having tasted some of Alan’s magnificent creations.

Over the coming months, we hope to let you see some more of Alan and his amazing team’s first class catering for Crear weddings as more and more of our wedding couples choose Alan’s Crear Kitchen menus.

These impressive images are from Tim and Lucy’s recent wedding, where Alan’s associate (or maybe Sous-Chef is the correct term) Stephen took charge of proceedings.

Stephen putting together an apparently simple thing like a cheeseboard was an education in itself – and extremely pleasing to this cheese-lover (I must show you my photographs soon). Stephen prepared the sugar spirals in the dessert shown above. To me it was Crear Cuisine par excellence! I commend it to you for your delectation.

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The best Chocolate Fudge Brownies in the world…ever. Even if we do say so ourselves!

Our chef Alan is normally very secretive about his recipes, especially his wonderfully moist and taste bud tantalising cakes. Hence, it comes as a shock to all at Crear that Alan has decided to share some of his favourite recipes with you on our blog.

If you’re currently attending a Boot Camp fitness course or weight loss class it’s probably best if you stop reading now because when it comes to cakes, Alan doesn’t mess around!

For those of still reading (and of course those who have quite rightly just though “well, one won’t do any harm”) here is Alan’s recipe in all it’s yummy glory.

Ingredients: (makes approximately 24 portions)

115 GM BUTTER

115 GM PLAIN CHOCOLATE

300 GM CASTOR SUGAR

PINCH SALT

1 TSP VANILLA ESSENCE

2 LARGE EGGS

140 GM PLAIN FLOUR

2 TSP COCOA POWDER

100 GM WHITE CHOCOLATE CHIPS

Method:

1. PRE-HEAT OVEN TO 180oc/GAS 4. LINE THE BOTTOM OF A 7INCH SQUARE CAKE TIN.
2. PLACE THE BUTTER & CHOCOLATE IN A BOWL & GENTLY MELT OVER A PAN OF SIMMERING WATER. STIR UNTIL SMOOTH. COOL SLIGHTLY.
3. STIR IN THE SUGAR, SALT & VANILLA.
4. ADD THE EGGS ONE AT A TIME  UNTIL WELL BLENDED.
5. SIEVE THE FLOUR & COCOA INTO THE MIXTURE UNTIL SMOOTH. STIR IN THE CHOCOLATE CHIPS THEN POUR THE MIXTURE INTO THE TIN. BAKE FOR 35-40 MINUTES UNTIL TOP IS EVENLY COLOURED & A COCKTAIL STICK INSERTED INTO CENTRE COMES OUT CLEAN. ALLOW TO COOL BEFORE PORTIONING.

Alan’s top tip:

You can add anything you like to this brownie recipe. Try topping it with pecans or stirring in some raisins. Even little marshmallows can be added to make gooey pools of sweetness in the centre.

So there you have it. We’re off to make a batch of quadruple chocolate, raisin and marshmallow brownies with a pecan and honey drizzle topping.

Has anybody seen the number for that boot camp?

Happy baking!

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Sugar Lobster wins gold for Alan – 28th February 2011

Congratulations to our brilliant chef Alan, who has won GOLD, SILVER and FIRST IN CLASS at ‘ScotHot’, the Scottish Hospitality, Catering and Tourism Awards in Glasgow, for his amazing sugar work – Wow!

A winning confection for Alan's sugar

The Gold (an incredible sugar lobster) is on the table of honour and is up for the Scottish Industrial Trade Exhibition trophy this coming Wednesday.

The incredible sugar lobster

One piece represents over 150 hours of work so Alan is off for a well earned sleep! Actually, Alan – when did you fit all this work in? You seem to be working 24 hours a day already.