The church biscuit: 42. Stilton and walnut nibbles

Stilton and walnut nibbles - from Miranda Gore Browne's book 'Biscuit' (Ebury, 2012)

Stilton and walnut nibbles
– from Miranda Gore Browne’s book ‘Biscuit’ (Ebury, 2012)

 

These savoury biscuits were baked for a wine and cheese evening in the church for the launch of The Friends of Ipsden Church (see below). The recipe comes from Miranda Gore Browne’s book Biscuit (Ebury Press, 2012).

Ingredients

200g plain flour, sifted

a good half tsp mustard powder

pinch of salt

freshly ground black pepper

100 g mature Cheddar or Parmesan roughly grated

100 g Stilton cheese roughly grated

200 g unsalted butter straight from the fridge

100g walnuts

Line 4 baking trays with baking parchment (or you could bake them in 2 batches).

Preheat oven to 180 degrees C/ 160 degrees C for a fan oven/Gas Mark 4

Makes about 60

Stilton and walnut nibbles - from Miranda Gore Browne's book 'Biscuit' (Ebury, 2012)

Stilton and walnut nibbles
– from Miranda Gore Browne’s book ‘Biscuit’ (Ebury, 2012)

Put the dry ingredients (flour, mustard powder, salt, pepper) into a bowl together with the cheeses (keeping about 25 g of one or both of the cheeses to one side for later). Grate the butter into this and add all but 1 tblsp of the walnuts. Rub the butter into the mixture with your fingers (or pulse in a food processor) until it forms a dough.

Turn the dough out on to a lightly floured work surface and roll into 4 logs of about 3 cm diameter. Wrap each log in cling film and put in the fridge for an hour (or for about 20 minutes in the freezer).

Cut the chilled dough into discs about 5 mm thick and place these on the baking trays and sprinkle with the cheese and walnuts set aside earlier.

Bake for 10 minutes or until biscuits are turning pleasantly golden. Transfer immediately to a wire rack to cool, although they are delicious warm.

These keep well in an air tight container. The dough also freezes well.

DSC03936

Stilton and walnut nibbles – from Miranda Gore Browne’s book ‘Biscuit’ (Ebury, 2012)

 

Friends of Ipsden Church was formed for 2 main reasons and, let’s not be shy about it, one of those reasons is financial. The parish share comes from money covenanted as well as that given in Sunday collections during the service. This goes towards local and national church administration, clergy stipends, clergy houses and pensions. But an ancient building and its furnishings require upkeep and these must be paid for in other ways. We are fortunate at Ipsden that the church, though dating back to the C12th is basically a sound building and at the moment requires minimal attention. It would be rather nice, though not really necessary, to paint the ceilings (many of us would love to see that above the choir painted blue) and if we wanted to do this, we could only go ahead if we raised the necessary money. The Friends of Ipsden, should it be agreed, could go ahead and raise money for this. Already the Friends have put on 2 very successful markets in Ipsden Barn (incredibly beautiful and possibly the longest continuous barn in England with 24 bays and 5 entrance porches).

The second reason for forming the Friends is to open the church up to a wider community, including to people who have no interest in coming to church for the services and to those who feel a connection with the church because family lie buried in the churchyard or because they just like a building with a bit of history. And the visitor book shows that people come from all over the world and for all sorts of not always apparent reasons. Concerts, exhibitions, talks  and plays already take place regularly in the church and up until now these have been down to a few motivated individuals. The Friends may add similar things  to the church’s calendar or they may decide to do something different, like researching and mapping out the graves in the churchyard (ideal in summer with a picnic thrown in). There’s no fixed agenda. It is all very exciting. But if Saturday is anything to go by when the food and wine were excellent and the organisation ran on smooth and friendly wheels, the village and church will be very well served.

 

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13 Comments

  1. Posted February 3, 2015 at 11:16 am | Permalink

    It certainly sounds promising and exciting!

    • Mary Addison
      Posted February 3, 2015 at 11:46 am | Permalink

      We may only live in a small village but events like this always throw up someone you haven’t met before, which is great.

  2. Becky
    Posted February 3, 2015 at 8:41 pm | Permalink

    I’d love the chance to see the altar frontal once it is finished. Could be another idea for a fund raiser?

    • Mary Addison
      Posted February 3, 2015 at 11:10 pm | Permalink

      Becky, I’m aiming for the frontal to be finished in the summer when we should have a little bit of a celebration revealing it. Keep an eye on my blog for more details and come over and celebrate with us.

  3. Penny Cross
    Posted February 4, 2015 at 11:14 am | Permalink

    Beautiful, sumptuous imagery – biscuits, plates, textiles – as well as rich text to be feasted on without gaining calories or breaking a no-sugar or no-carbs rule. Delicious and satisfying to the eye.

    A book I value for nibbles with wine is “Zest For Life” by Connery Middelman Whitney. I use her recipe for Savoury Aperitif Loaf to make into tiny muffins. These disappear very quickly.

    • Mary Addison
      Posted February 6, 2015 at 10:31 am | Permalink

      Very kind of you.
      I’ve just googled the book you mention and her blog is very interesting – I’d really like to try her homemade hazelnut chocolate spread. She hasn’t blogged since early 2013. I find it unnerving when blogs stop suddenly and with no warning. I hope it’s because she stopped blogging to write her book and nothing more final.

      • Penny Cross
        Posted February 6, 2015 at 10:16 pm | Permalink

        I, too, hope all is well with Conner. Perhaps she’s just busy writing another book.

        You may like Sarah Wilson’s recipe for Sugar-Free Nut-Ella from her book “I Quit Sugar”.

        • Mary Addison
          Posted February 7, 2015 at 3:43 pm | Permalink

          Sarah Wilson’s recipe looks a bit complicated to source for me living in a small village, but thank you for pointing me in her direction. I too hope Connor is well.

          • Penny Cross
            Posted February 7, 2015 at 8:42 pm | Permalink

            I live in a very small village in north Norfolk but source all my ingredients from the wonderful Healthy Supplies in Brighton.

  4. Posted February 4, 2015 at 12:21 pm | Permalink

    I really like savoury biscuits, and particularly anything with nuts. I will be earmarking this recipe, thank you Mary x

    • Mary Addison
      Posted February 6, 2015 at 10:33 am | Permalink

      I love nuts too and often substitute some of the flour in recipes for ground nuts.

  5. Penny Cross
    Posted February 7, 2015 at 10:28 am | Permalink

    Mary, Apropos nothing at all – as a good friend used to say – I’ve just been on the website of The American Museum at Bath, reading about a forthcoming exhibition (14 March), ‘Hatched, Matched, despatched, Patched”. I found the text below so moving that I wanted to share it with you:

    “Another textile treasure on display with a wartime connection is a tablecloth from 1945, embroidered with the names of friends and colleagues of an American soldier who took part in the D-Day landings. His British fiancée stopped embroidering the cloth when she heard that he had died in combat. The stitched decoration remains unfinished, the needle still pinned to the cloth.”

    • Mary Addison
      Posted February 7, 2015 at 3:51 pm | Permalink

      I used to love The American Museum at Bath but haven’t been since they re-did it. The exhibition sounds fascinating and I’d like to have a bit more of a peak at what will be included. (I do love that early C20th daffodil decorated day dress that keeps cropping up when I try to find out more about the exhibits.) Thank you for drawing my attention to this – the 1945 tablecloth sounds so poignant.

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