Roast potato and parsnip will be extra crispy and crunchy if coated in 1 ingredient
Widely celebrated for her culinary expertise, Mary Berry is renowned for her dessert recipes, but she's equally adept at creating savoury dishes.
The renowned cook has revealed her kitchen secrets to followers, including her foolproof method for achieving perfectly crispy potatoes and parsnips. It appears that simply coating these root vegetables in oil won't guarantee that coveted crunchiness.
Mary has shared how semolina is the crucial component for flawlessly roasted vegetables. She generously coats potatoes and parsnips with it to create that delightful crunch and incorporates a hint of thyme.
Plus, parsnips are a wonderful complement to any Sunday dinner, reports the Express.
In her cookbook Love to Cook, she explained her recipe: "Crunchy sweet parsnips are the perfect side dish. The addition of semolina gives them a lovely crispy outside."
"With the addition of semolina, these golden parsnips become extra crisp in the oven. Throw some in with your roast potatoes for something a bit different this Sunday."
Mary's method for preparing roast potatoes and parsnips is "easy" and can be completed in less than 30 minutes.
Mary Berry's crunchy roast potatoes and parsnips recipe
Ingredients
Four large parsnips
Three tablespoons of sunflower oil
25g of semolina
One tablespoon of paprika
One tablespoon of chopped fresh thyme
Method
Then, heat your oven to 220C/200C fan/Gas 7. Pour a tablespoon of oil into a roasting tin and place it in the oven for five minutes to warm through.
Pour the remaining oil into a separate bowl and season your parsnips with salt and black pepper.
Mix the semolina, paprika, and thyme in a small bowl and cover the parsnips with this mixture.
Next, lay out the parsnips in a single layer in the roasting tin containing the hot oil.
Roast them for roughly 20 minutes, flipping them halfway through until they turn golden and crisp.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Daily Mirror
18 hours ago
- Daily Mirror
Fried eggs are 'levelled up' if you add 1 simple ingredient to the pan before cooking
Fried eggs are a classic breakfast favourite - but if you're looking to jazz them up a bit, there's one cooking staple you should add to the pan before you cook them Eggs are a breakfast staple not just in the UK, but globally. With so many ways to cook and serve them, there's always a new tasty addition or topping combo to enjoy. While scrambled, poached and boiled eggs are all cracking choices, nothing quite hits the spot like a perfectly fried egg with a golden yolk. If you're looking to elevate your egg game, the culinary experts at Sift and Simmer suggest adding sesame seeds to your pan for a delightful crunch and an extra hit of flavour and texture. These tiny seeds, a staple in Asian cuisine, lend a satisfying crisp to your fried eggs. Pair it with a drizzle of chilli oil for an extra flavour kick, and you've got yourself a tasty twist on your usual breakfast or brunch. This recipe calls for just a handful of pantry staples. As for the sesame seeds, feel free to use white, black, or a mix of both. And these eggs aren't just for breakfast - they'd make a delicious topping for a rice or noodle dish for dinner. Fans of the recipe have been leaving rave reviews, with one person saying: "Woah - those eggs look amazing!! And I love how you leveled up the flavor with the sesame crust. These need to appear in my now. " Here's how to make them at home, reports the Express. Sesame fried eggs Ingredients Two tablespoons sesame seeds One teaspoon vegetable oil Two large eggs Chilli oil (optional) Salt & pepper to taste Method Warm a frying pan over low-medium heat. Toss in the sesame seeds and toast for about 30 seconds, then drizzle in the vegetable oil over the seeds. Crack the eggs over the sesame seeds and pop a lid on the pan, leaving a small gap for steam to escape. Allow the eggs to sizzle away for roughly four to five minutes, or until they reach your desired consistency. When the time's up, utilise a spatula to gently lift the eggs from the frying pan. Put them onto a plate and garnish with additional sesame seeds or chilli oil, along with a sprinkle of salt and pepper to suit your taste.
Daily Mirror
a day ago
- Daily Mirror
I spent years trying to keep weeds off my drive — then I tried a new method
I have tried all kinds of methods for keeping the weeds off my drive over the years - and now I've found one that actually works Lifestyle opinion Steffan Rhys Deputy Content Hub Director Steffan is Reach PLC's Deputy Content Hub Director. He is also Reach's Head of Spare Time. He writes, edits and oversees content across Reach's large portfolio of websites, including some of the UK's largest national news websites like the Mirror and Express to its biggest regional websites like WalesOnline, the Manchester Evening News and Liverpool Echo. He covers everything from food, cooking and recipes to gardening, cleaning and DIY hacks to travel and places to go both inside the UK and abroad. He is particularly interested in healthy eating and ultra-processed food, as well as amazing places to go within the UK (he knows a lot about Wales). He also loves discovering and writing about pubs, restaurants, beaches and historic places to visit. He has won several awards, including Story of the Year at the Wales Media Awards for his work on a 50th anniversary tribute to the Aberfan disaster, as well as Website of the Year and Digital Initiative of the Year at the Regional Press Awards and News Website of the Year several times at the Wales Media Awards. He has been shortlisted for several more awards, including Online Editor of the Year at the Online Media Awards. He has also spoken at events, including most recently at the Welsh Crucible where he advised researchers on engaging with the media. If you think you have a story, get in touch by emailing He is a Welsh speaker who grew up in Carmarthenshire, joined Reach in 2006 and has worked in our Pontypridd, Bridgend, Carmarthen, London and Cardiff offices. He grew up supporting the Scarlets in rugby and Liverpool in football, and now cycles and runs to keep fit. The pesky weeds on my driveway have been a constant thorn in my side for years. My block paving driveway, composed of thousands of individual bricks, is often besieged by an unsightly mix of weeds, grass and moss. When it's weed-free (a rare occurrence), it's a sight to behold - I absolutely adore it. But when the weeds stage their takeover, it's a sorry sight that leaves me too embarrassed to even step outside. One kind-hearted neighbour even offered to tackle the problem, spending days weeding, only for the green invaders to return swiftly. It was a crushing blow for both of us, reports the Express. I've tried everything from laboriously scrubbing around several thousand bricks with a wire brush (which left my back crying out in agony) to filling the gaps between the blocks with setting sand and kiln-dried sand. I even gave vinegar a go after neighbours mentioned that the previous homeowner swore by it (though they did caution that it left the street reeking of a chippy for weeks). At one point, I was just a mouse click away from purchasing a fancy gadget designed to incinerate weeds. It resembled a litter-picker but with a flame or very hot element at the end. Despite the clear time commitment involved in singeing thousands of weeds individually, I was rather keen to give it a whirl. However, I decided to try one last method before resorting to this. I'm chuffed to bits that I did. This method was not only quicker than any other, but weeks later, only a smattering of weeds have dared to reappear, a stark contrast to their previous rampant regrowth. Here's a rundown of the methods I tried before stumbling upon the one that actually did the trick. Scrubbing with wire brush I gave the wire weeding brush method a go more than once. After the second or third attempt, it dawned on me that I needed to do something to stop the weeds from sprouting in the gaps between the bricks. Someone suggested trying setting sand. This is sand that you sweep into the cracks and then lightly water so it hardens like cement, preventing any weed growth. Kiln-dried and setting sand I also tried kiln-dried sand, a fine, dry sand that fills the joints and supposedly creates a strong, interlocking structure that keeps the weeds at bay. It looked much better than the setting sand I'd used, but it didn't halt the weed invasion. Weed killer It was obvious very quickly that this method would be incredibly inefficient, time-consuming and ultimately pointless. After buying a bottle of weed killer and starting to spray each individual weed by hand, I realised that I would need several bottles and hours of time to get it done. And I also knew that given it would only kill the weeds currently there, it would do nothing at all to prevent new weeds growing. The spray did kill the weeds it touched, but it was not the right solution for my problem. Bleach The thought of dousing the garden in bleach was off-putting, not to mention the sheer volume needed to tackle the weeds. Concerns also arose about rinsing away the bleach after its weed-killing spree. Plus, online gardening gurus suggest that while bleach may zap surface weeds, it doesn't get to the root of the problem, rendering the effort somewhat futile. Vinegar, lemon juice and boiling water Phoebe Cornish applied vinegar to weeds and said"the weeds looked colourless and shrivelled within a few hours of soaking them in the vinegar solution". She said: "And when I checked back the following morning, I was truly impressed with the effectiveness of this gardening hack. It's a great way to flatten and weaken weeds before pulling them out of the ground, but it doesn't replace the need to dig out the roots to prevent them from growing back." Another person tried using lemon juice only to find it ineffective, noting: "If anything, the weeds seemed to have grown 24 hours later." The logistics of securing enough lemon juice for a large area would be baffling – you'd practically need a lemon orchard. Boiling water was another tactic tested; it caused an immediate wilting of dandelion leaves and flowers, yet the pesky weed persisted a day later due to the intact root. The winning method: salt She wasn't alone in championing salt's effectiveness: "Salt really does make a great weed killer as it will kill just about anything that grows." National Garden Bureau member and Laidback Gardener, Larry Hodgson, told Homes and Gardens, though he cautioned: "But [it's] so toxic it simply can't be recommended in most garden settings." However, salt doesn't just destroy the foliage when sprayed on - it would also eliminate the roots if watered into the soil. Across various websites, gardeners claimed salt "essentially sterilises" the ground "preventing vegetative re-growth". On another platform, someone declared: "If you salt the soil, no plant will ever grow there again." How to use salt to kill weeds This sounded amazing to me so I went for it. I bought 20kg of rock salt from Amazon (which turned out to be an awful lot of salt — you can buy it here). I already had a pressure sprayer with a large capacity of at least 10 litres ( you can see an example here). The initial approach I tried involved adding a substantial quantity of rock salt to my sprayer, followed by several litres of warm water. I mixed it with a large wooden plank to dissolve the salt as thoroughly as possible before starting to spray the weeds. Like several of the techniques mentioned earlier, I quickly realised this would be quite time-consuming (although considerably faster than targeting individual weeds with a handheld weedkiller bottle). So, I opted to remove the lid from the pressure sprayer and pour out the salt water mixture over as wide an area as possible. With just a few refills of my large pressure sprayer, I managed to cover the entire driveway in no time. I added extra clumps of rock salt to particularly weed-infested areas around the edge of the drive, where years of accumulated dirt and sand had created a haven for weeds. Within a matter of hours, the weeds were withered and appeared decidedly dead. Granted, large sections of my drive were now strewn with piles of rock salt or the white residue left by the salt water. However, I simply rinsed this off a few days later using a power washer (a garden hose would do the trick too). Most crucially, the weeds were undeniably dead. It's been several weeks since I tried this method and, while some new weeds have started to sprout, their growth rate is nowhere near as fast as before. So, it seems there's some truth to the notion that salt renders soil inhospitable to plant life. Obviously, you wouldn't want to use this method in a garden where you're aiming to kill weeds but preserve other plants and flowers, as the salt would obliterate everything. But for a patio or driveway, it could be just the solution you're after. My colleague, Angela, also found success with the same method. After using salt to tackle weeds, she reported: "Nine hours later, the weeds were completely dead, so I was easily able to dig them out. I didn't use a fancy tool for this; a regular screwdriver sufficed. Curious as to whether the weeds would reappear, I checked back in on the area over the next two weeks, and no weeds seemed to have grown back."
The Guardian
a day ago
- The Guardian
Too much moose meat was factor in plane crash that killed Alaska lawmaker's husband
Antlers strapped to a wing and too much moose meat on board caused a small plane crash that killed the husband of then Alaska Democratic congresswoman Mary Peltola in 2023, according to a US national transportation safety board (NTSB) report that was recently released. Though the report doesn't name him, Eugene 'Buzzy' Peltola Jr was the pilot and lone person on the Piper PA-18 plane involved in the deadly wreck, which occurred near St Mary's, Alaska, on 12 September 2023, officials had previously said. Peltola Jr, 57, had taken some hunters to a remote wilderness area where they killed a moose, said the NTSB report published Tuesday. When the crash that ended his life happened, the report said, he was flying alone while carrying enough moose meat to push the plane past 'its maximum certified gross weight' by nearly 120lbs. The doomed pilot had also installed 'an unapproved external load' – in his case, antlers tied to the right wing strut – at the time the plane went down. Peltola Jr ultimately ended 'degraded takeoff performance and flight characteristics', leading to his losing control of the plane, shortly before the fatal wreck, NTSB investigators said. As the NTSB recounted, it was his second trip flying moose meat that day. Peltola and the hunters had loaded an initial batch of meat on the plane that afternoon, and he had uneventfully ferried it to a local airport. He flew back to the hunters about four hours for what was supposed to be a second and final load of moose meat. The group strapped into the rear passenger seat as well as packed it into the airplane's belly pod, 'which did not have tie-down provision', the 16-page NTSB report noted. Peltola Jr then tied moose antlers to the right wing strut, the report said, leaving them 'cupped upward and perpendicular to the direction of flight'. The report said the pilot had weighed the cargo with scales, and it turned out the plane was 117lbs – roughly 6% – over its maximum takeoff weight. Investigators wrote that the hunters watched Peltola Jr as he evidently struggled to take off and were relieved at first to see his plane become airborne, watching it vanish from view behind a ridge. But the plane did not reappear from behind the ridge and 'had crashed just beyond their view in the opposite direction of takeoff,' the NTSB report recounted. Two hunters provided first aid to Peltola Jr, who the NTSB said initially survived the crash. However, he died from his injuries within hours, according to the agency. Peltola Jr was the former Alaska regional director for the Bureau of Indian Affairs. He had also spent more than three decades working for the US Fish and Wildlife Service, and he served as vice-mayor and council member for the city of Bethel, Alaska. Shortly after her husband's death, Mary Peltola's chief of staff at the time, Anton McParland, said in a media statement that Eugene was 'completely devoted' to his family. 'And he simply adored Mary,' McParland's statement said. Peltola became the first Alaska Native in Congress when she won her US House seat in a special election and then retained it in the 2022 midterm elections, twice beating the former governor and Republican vice-presidential nominee Sarah Palin. She lost her November 2024 re-election bid to Republican opponent Nick Begich III and is now the senior director of Alaska affairs at the Holland & Hart law firm.
