Food for Fort: Booze-free Christmas cake and other culinary stories

Do you have to put brandy in a Christmas cake? Why do some bread recipes call for milk powder? Plus a novel way with quince
Christmas cake
Do you have to 'feed' your Christmas cake with booze in the run-up to the big day? Surely there's an alcohol-free alternative… Photograph: Alamy

I got a bread machine for my birthday, and now make a loaf every two days. Most recipes in the book that came with it include four to six teaspoons of skimmed milk powder. I've tried with and without, and prefer the latter. What's the purpose of the milk powder? How vital is it? And can it just be left out?
Like any sensible person, I referred your question to that walking encyclopedia of a baker, Dan Lepard, who said: "The milk powder helps the crust to colour easily without too much baking, keeping the crumb extra moist; and to toast quicker, so the middle of the slice stays soft. It makes the crumb slightly tighter, less likely to tear when sliced and gives a distinct milk flavour to what is essentially a very quick, bland process. It can be left out without adjusting the recipe. Another way to improve the flavour is to replace a fifth of the white flour with wholemeal." And so we are all the wiser.

In an Uzbek home, I recently ate cooked whole quince, peeled, that had a fluffy texture like a naked baked apple. It was served as a vegetable. How would you cook it – microwave, steam, poach? And would you peel it after cooking?
It just so happens that I served quinces with roast pork only the other day, and very good they were, too. I've also used them alongside roast duck. But then, this fruit's astringent freshness is a wonderful foil to any rich meat. Claudia Roden pops them into a lamb tagine in A Book Of Middle Eastern Food (Penguin), while Marika Kaneva-Johnson stuffs hers with beef or veal in The Melting Pot: Balkan Food And Cookery (Prospect Books). I peel, quarter and core mine, and add them to the pork or duck for the last 45 minutes of roasting, so they absorb some of the juices. In Roden's dish, they are not peeled and are added for the final 30 minutes, so they're "only just tender". Kaneva-Johnson doesn't peel hers, either; she surrounds them with hot stock or water one-third of the way up their sides, and braises them for 30 minutes or bakes them at 180C/350F/gas mark 4. You could just peel and bake them for an hour or so at that temperature, but they soften more readily with a bit of liquor around them.

Somehow, I have ended up with two meat thermometers. For medium-rare beef, one says it should read 63C, the other 71C; and earlier this year you said it's 52C (it was very rare, but tasty). What is the right temperature?
Yes, it does look rare, but that's because it has kept all its juices inside, and they haven't changed colour because they haven't been, in effect, boiled into grey submission. Rare and medium rare aren't technical terms; interpretations of each will depend on personal taste. If you have doubts, and prefer medium rare, bring the internal temperature to above 52C – to, say, 56-58C (or even 63C, though that's a bit high for my taste; 71C is definitely too high for medium rare). You will lose some of the juices, and so juiciness, of beef cooked at lower temperatures, but never mind.

Most recipes recommend "feeding" a Christmas cake with brandy. Is there an alcohol-free substitute?
True, brandy is the traditional spirit to add to Christmas cake, but in terms of flavour I can't help feeling others would do just as well, if not better – madeira, say, or even port. Either way, most of the alcohol will have evaporated by the time you get round to eating it. Should you wish to pursue the alcohol-free path, just leave it out. I don't think it's a  critical ingredient (challenge others to identify what you've left out – I doubt they'll get it). Incidentally, Mary Berry has three Christmas cake recipes in her Ultimate Cake Book (BBC Books), one of which, the classic Christmas cake, has brandy in it; the other two, Victorian Christmas cake and fast Christmas cake, don't.

MasterChef Australia recently used a gadget that turned a potato into spaghetti-style lengths. What's it called, and where can I get one?
I missed that particular episode, but suspect the gadget in question is a julienne peeler – something that looks like an ordinary swivel-headed peeler, except that the peeling head has teeth. You drag it down the surface of the potato (or carrot or courgette, come to that), and away comes the flesh in long, spaghetti-like strands. Very ingenious. I use one from time to time. There are all sorts out there, from the Oxo SoftWorks version at £3.19, from Argos, to Wüsthof's £30 one from the Richmond Cookshop, by way of Goodgrips at £5.79 on Amazon. I like my Zyliss model. I can't remember where I bought it now, but Divertimenti has it at £9.25 and the Original Cookware Company at £7.91.

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