Return of the Risotto

It was a scorcher of a weekend...you know, the kind of weekend when all you want is a salad and a never ending bowl of ice cream...it was gorgeous, we had all the windows open, the sun was shining bright...the bread rose oh so fast and...I made a risotto for dinner.

That's right...it was hot hot hot and I decided to stand over a hot stove stirring my little heart out.  Those of you who have been reading for yonks will know that I love a good risotto and I am rarely happier than when chopping and stirring one up for myself.  I won't give you the whole tirade again, but for me the perfect risotto is a personal thing.  I can't abide by food snobs telling me that my risotto should be loose and al dente and...even worse...eaten with a fork.  I like it the way I like it (and will rarely order it at a restaurant).  

Right, so...way back before this freakish heat wave attacked us I was busy menu planning in single digit weather and came across a pretty spectacular sounding (and looking) recipe for fennel risotto in my copy of Jamie's Italy.  While fennel isn't technically in season at the moment in those dreary middle days of May it just screamed summer.  A fennel risotto, how perfectly different. 

If you like fennel and risotto this is a sure fire winner.  I made a few adaptions to the recipe...like I couldn't find firm ricotta so used the stuff in the supermarket and substituted chilli flakes for ground dried chillies at the end, but for the most part it was pretty easy to whip up (in the time it takes to slow cook fennel and make a risotto) and even easier to devour.  

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Pizza for One (one greedy gal that is)

Homemade pizza is taking over my life.  Slowly, it has gone from a monthly treat to a weekly event.  Friday nights are now pizza pyjama movie party nights.  It honestly does not get much better than that.  There is nothing that I look forward to more after 5 days of running around after small children, mediating arguments, improvising lessons and wiping snotty noses.  Peaceful bliss comes to me in the form of soft elasticy dough smothered in tomato sauce, cheese and a rotation of toppings.  

I've been experimenting with different flours for the bases as well...but have to admit that there is nothing quite like a dough made with type 00 flour...stretchy, soft and so smooth.  All of my dough "recipes" are based on my mum's basic pizza dough recipe...In a big bowl I mix 250ml of warm water, 2 TBSP oil and 1 TBSP dry active yeast with a good pinch of salt and 1 1/2 cups of flour and then gradually add more flour until the dough is soft and not sticky.  I didn't use to knead it at all, since there is a good amount of yeast, but I've been kneading recently and it has resulted in a much softer dough (with a much more dramatic rise).  If I use a mixture of brown and white flours I tend to use 1 cup of brown and 1/2 cup of white to start and then add in more white flour (and often another splash or two of warm water).  This isn't a finely tuned recipe...it is always changing. 

SO, back to the point of this post.  This weekend's pizza feast was postponed to Saturday night to coincide with the big Chelsea footy game...pizza and sport and pyjamas. Everything was set, the dough was rising the toppings were prepared and then the footy fan was invited out.  I greedily encouraged him to go (more pizza and the tv remote to myself...need I say more?) and got on with making MY pizza.  

Normally I just toss on whatever I have to hand, and some pepperoni purchased especially for the occasion.  Last night I followed a recipe...from Jamie's Italy for potato pizza.  It was seriously delicious.     Tomato sauce based covered with cooked New Potatoes sliced and tossed in oil, rosemary, thyme, salt, pepper and a little lemon juice and then topped with mozzarella cheese.  

I had made enough dough to make a second pizza but seeing as I was dining alone last night (and I managed to restrain myself) I popped the left over dough into a container and into the fridge and there it sits waiting for lunch today...

Homemade pizza and a couple of cold beers is totally the new staying in.   

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A Sweet Potato Kind of Day

The weather up here has been horrible, it has been cold and wet and windy and on the few recent days the sun has come out...it has still rained.  I am wearing my winter clothes for the most part and have just realised that the heating bill will definitely be eating into my social money this month.

On the way home from work yesterday I mentally zipped through my meal planner to determine what would be perfect for a Friday night dinner in front of the tv, wrapped up in a number of blankets.  On a Friday we usually make a pizza and settle in for the night, but this week the pizza has been reserved for the big football match Saturday night...so something else needed to jump to the rescue.

Sweet Potato Cakes.

Yotam Ottolenghi's Sweet Potato Cakes are delicious, filling and comforting. Think about it, soft sweet sweet potato mashed up with chili and green onion and then pan fried in blobs until crispy on the outside. A plate piled high with these orange fritters, tangy greek yoghurt herb sauce, a big salad and some fresh homemade flatbreads just screams "it's the weekend" to me.  

The recipe says to steam the sweet potato in large chunks.  I don't have a steamer and I did my best to steam them in about a cm of water in a saucepan...but next time I think I would bake them in their skins in the oven and then scoop out the flesh still leaving it a little bit chunky.  

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Real Bread @Breadshare Community Bakery Part 2

Along with the little bready treats I picked up at Whitmuir on Saturday I also bought a gigantic loaf of Border Country Loaf.  

This loaf is made with a french wheat leaven and has a lovely soured aroma and taste with a really soft chewy texture.  The loaf I bought was a day old and still super soft.  I purposely bought it day old because I had planned on making a panzanella for my supper...something to make the bread the centre piece of my meal.  

Traditionally panzanella uses stale bread but I never seem to have any of that in my house so I just use fresh bread.  This loaf was perfect.  I had planned on making enough for one dinner with some leftover as a snack...but, well...I ended up eating it all.  

In a large salad bowl I put half a thinly sliced red onion with 1Tbsp of red wine vinegar and 1 small clove of minced garlic.  I let the vinegar soften the onions for a few mins while I seeded and chopped 2 largish tomatoes and then added those into the onions with some salt, sugar and then about 1/4 of the loaf of bread cut into cubes and a good glug of walnut oil.  I mixed it all up and let it sit while I fried 4 rashers of streaky bacon and then added the bacon and the oil into the bread mixture.  

And then sat down to enjoy!

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Meal for One

When David is out for the night I like to treat myself.  Nothing too fancy, mind you, but something that feels like a treat...you know? 

Pasta with loads of chilli and garlic, and loads of prawns

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A Quiche

There is something satisfying about a quiche.  It looks delicate but can actually be a very substantial meal...oh and of course it is encased in pastry.  I love pastry.  

At the Edinburgh Cake Ladies event last month I tasted one of the best savoury tarts...ever.  Bacon, brie, tomatoes and rocket.  It was incredible, I could have easily devoured the entire thing.  I was polite, and minded my manners, and shared, and vowed to use the flavours in my own quiche...sometime.  

"Sometime" finally came yesterday.  My quiche does not do its inspiration justice.  Don't get me wrong, mine was so yummy (to the point where I gobbled a tester piece before taking a picture) but the original was to.die.for.  

I decided to try Dan Lepard's Mustard Pastry from S&S for the crust.  It was ok.  It was flakey and baked nicely, but it wasn't mustardy.  I halved the recipe though...so perhaps it was an oversight on my part.  The filling was sauteed red onion and bacon with halved cherry tomatoes and huge chunks of brie topped with a 3 egg and cream mixture. 

Very tasty and very substantial.  

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Fish Pie @home

I love pie...well I love pastry...but there is something so comforting about a piping hot meat (or fish) pie served up straight from the oven.  When I saw the horrible weather that was forecast for yesterday I just knew that it was going to be a pie day.  

Normally fish pies are topped with mashed potatoes but after I spied a recipe for a puff pastry topped fish pie in the new issue of delicious magazine I thought...I'll have me a big scoop of that! I made the creamy sauce from the magazine recipe...it was so easy, basically a white sauce with a dollop of cream cheese, chopped parsley and lemon zest.  Into that I added salmon, haddock and a handful of tiger prawns. Topped with a fancy puff pastry top and into the oven it went until puffed up and gorgeous.  

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Easy Stuffed Mushrooms

I planned to make stuffed mushrooms this week...and when it came around on the meal planner...I couldn't find my flipping recipe.  I think it might have been in a recent Waitrose Weekend, or maybe in a delicious magazine...I don't know. 

I had a whole bunch of ingredients...cherry tomatoes, spring onions, breadcrumbs, chilli, ricotta, parsley, cooked chopped spinach and of course some gigantic mushrooms.  I roughly guessed what might fit into two large mushrooms...mixed it all together...crammed it into the mushroom and then wrapped it with a piece of bacon and baked until the bacon was crispy(ish).  

I still can't find the recipe.  

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Toad in the Hole

I love yorkshire pudding...but I am really picky about it.  I like it pudding-y...thick and stodgy with just the slightest crisp to the outside.  Of course it has to be cooked through, but it can't be a shell...you know the crisp outside with not a smidgen of puddingy goodness in the middle...no no that will not do for me.  It has to be because yorkshire pudding has always been cooked in a loaf tin in my family...we fight over the middle bits...the stodgiest bits.  Anyway...because of that I am always dubious of a toad in the hole recipe not in a loaf tin.  

I've been thinking about (and then forgetting about) making Nigella's recipe from Kitchen for a while now.  There were a few things that caught my eye ages ago...rolling the sausages in to patties, cooking in a round baking tin...and of course the food styling in the book.  But for some reason I've just not made it...

Until last night, that is.  I only had about 250ml of milk in the house so the batter was slightly thicker than Nigella's recipe calls for...but much closer to the proportions my parents and grandma use.  I was really impressed with my attempt and the perfect balance between stodgy and crispy.  

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2 easy weekday meals...that I ate on the weekend!

I don't know why I do this...all the time...plan out my meals without really reading the recipes and end up slotting in super easy dishes on the weekend (when I've got the time to chop, stir, braise, rest...). 

This weekend I tried my hand at two new dishes: Prawn Tom Yum Soup, and Corn Fritters (not together, of course).  Both recipes came from the speedy supper section of some magazine, and now that I think about it the clue that they were speedy was right there on the page...staring at me...but of course I only noticed that when I actually dug the recipe out and got organised, oops! 

This Prawn Tom Yum Soup was so simple to make/adapt.  I rammed it full of veggies, noodles and prawns to make it a substantial meal...which took me back to the awesome Tamarind Broth rustled up by Tony Singh at the event I went to on Monday.  Not that I am comparing my thai broth to his, it was more the spice, noodles, ginger and meaty prawns that I was comparing.  So...how is this for simple...boil a litre of chicken stock, stir in 2 tbsp of tom yum paste and then chuck in your veg (sliced green beans, frozen peas, frozen corn, sliced ginger) and simmer until tender, then in with rice noodles and cleaned prawns (I used cooked prawns cause they were on sale) simmer until prawns are cooked...serve up and devour! 

The corn fritters took a bit more preparation...grating 2 medium potatoes and then squeezing the water out of them...but other than that you mix the potatoes with a cup of thawed frozen corn, a chopped red chilli, 2 tbsp sweet chilli sauce, tbps flour, handful chopped coriander, and an beaten medium egg.  All you have to do is pan fry spoonfuls of the mixture in a little veggie oil until brown on each side! We ate them with a green salad and some sweet chilli sauce.  

Easy Peasy

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Falafel at Home

I am terrified of shallow or deep frying at home...that or I am too cheap to pour a vat of oil into a pot...I haven't decided yet.  Anyway, due to that I shy away from making all sorts of things that I would love to try.  One of them is falafel.  I love love love falafel.  I love the falafel themselves and I love the mixture of sauces and pickles and...if you are lucky cabbage...but I've only made them at home once before, and on that occasion they were baked.  

Trawling the internet last week I came across this recipe for pan fried Falafel Burgers.  Despite not having a food processor to whizz all the ingredients up I thought I would give it a go.  

These falafels were really good.  The ingredients are minimal, and there is no tahini involved (something that I don't like buying cause it sits at the back of the fridge for ages).  The only down side to pan fried or oven baked falafel...they are patties instead of lovely little crisp balls.

Oh...the flatbreads...they are Dan Lepard's Corn Oil Flour Tortillas...incredible as always!


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White Chilli

I love chilli, really love it...I love the heat, I love the beans and I love the sour cream and shredded cheese topping. Oh! and the tortillas of course.  My problem is that of the few meat chillis I have attempted in the past I have never really been impressed.  It is most likely because I have gone for speedy versions and a really good chilli takes hours for the meat to really break down.  For this reason I usually stick to making a vegetarian chilli that calls for Bulgar Wheat to thicken it. 

Last night I tried something different...

White Chilli.  I am not exactly sure why it is called white chilli, since it is more of a greeny colour.  I can only assume the name comes from the fact that white beans provide the bulk of the meal.  

If pressed I wouldn't actually call this a chilli.  It does have all the heat and punch of a good chilli but...as a description I would say that this is more of a Mexican spiced bean stew...but hey, that's my opinion. Regardless of what it is called this is a good recipe.  You use a bottle of Corona (the recipe says Mexican Beer but I think that Corona, or Sol, has a very distinct flavour) to boil chopped peppers, jalapenos and onion with some chilli flakes and ground cumin to make a stock...that is gorgeous on its own (I'm trying to think of ways I could use it...shredded chicken soup maybe?).  

This chilli recipe calls for a lot of liquid...the bottle of beer and 400ml of stock.  It looked far too wet when I added the beans in so at the same time I sprinkled in 4 Tbsp of Bulgar Wheat.  I think that the addition of the bulgar really made a difference, with out it the chilli would have been far too liquidy.  The next time I make this I'll make up the whole 400ml of stock but only add half at the beginning and then I can add more if it seems to dry.  Or, more beans. 

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mac n cheese...with a twist...and a crumb!

I don't have to tell you how much I love mac n cheese...in fact I think that I have told you all more than enough how a meal or snack of mac n cheese just does it for me.  I am not a huge fan of messing around with a classic like mac n cheese...i mean...if it ain't broke and all that...but when I saw this recipe for a funked up (no you didn't just read that...read it again...slowly...)version of my all time favourite I just knew that it was time to get off my mac n cheese snobby high horse and try something totally different (butternut squash AND a crust!!!). 

This mac and cheese is fantastic! It is jammed packed with roasted butternut squash that just seems to flake apart when mixed with the cooked pasta...and then topped with a crunchy green crust.  When I bought the ingredients to make this Mac I was prepared to follow the recipe to the T...but one thing lead to another, cheese got eaten, basil totally wilted and well...you know.  So when it came down to actually making the Mac I had to get a little bit creative, actually a lot creative.  

The crust was made by finely chopping a handful of broccoli tops and an end piece of seeded bread and mixing that with a fair shake of chilli flakes and some olive oil.  The pasta was no problem, but seeing as I halved the recipe I decided that half the pasta wasn't going to be enough for my greedy guts and upped it to 200g.  The cheesy mixture was 100g grated cheddar and then about 3/4 of a cup of sour cream (2 Tbsp just didn't seem enough). Everything else was followed more or less to the letter.

I will definitely be making this again and urge you to too!


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Homemade Flour Tortillas

Fajitas are something that I can easily gorge myself on.  There is something so satisfying about that hot hot hot sizzle of meat, onions and peppers, the cool creamy sour cream and guac and...of course the chewy warm tortillas.  Except that more often than not the experience is let down by the dry or cracked or cardboard textured store bought "wraps".  Don't get me wrong, I love me a good wrap but unless they are totally fresh, or warmed through in the micro they just fall flat.  

When I spied the recipe for Corn Oil Tortillas in Dan Lepard's Short & Sweet I knew fajitas were on the dinner horizon.  Planning ahead, of course, it has taken a few weeks for fajitas to come up on my meal plan...but finally they arrived on Saturday night! 

These tortillas are super easy to make and they taste unbelievably fresh... I can't believe I have never made them before.  At first the dough was really stiff, but...after 10 mins resting it was super soft and easy to work with.  The recipe isn't online, but I've had a quick look through quite a few and they seem pretty similar.  Flour, salt, baking powder, hot water, milk and some kind of fat...these used Corn Oil.  So easy.  

Fajitas can actually be an expensive craving to satisfy if you go for the sachets of seasoning, store bought guac, and store bought wraps...not to mention the chicken, peppers, sour cream and tomatoes.  I stopped buying fajita seasoning ages ago, after discovering Jamie's recipe in Ministry of Food, using smoked paprika and ground cumin instead (already in the cupboard).  I never buy store made guac...but this means that the avocado have (bought about a week in advance) HAS to be perfect, or no guac for me! And now, I've discovered the homemade tortilla, also made with ingredients always in my cupboard!! This once expensive meal has become budget friendly, so I suspect we will see it on the meal plan more often! 

ps Jamie uses 2 breasts, but I have found that if they are a decent size 1 is often enough for the 2 of us.  

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Caldo Verde...or cabbage soup with chorizo

Cabbage, Potato, Beans, Chili and Chorizo how does that sound on a cold afternoon? Perfect? Perfect! Yesterday when I looked outside I just knew it was cold out.  Hold up...rewind...that should read...yesterday when I looked outside (after I had wiped the rivers of condensation off my windows) I just new that it was cold outside.  Perfect! I thought...Cabbage stew it is! 

And so, while Davey baked his usual seeded loaf I got to making a huge pot of Caldo Verde, Portuguese green broth, using the recipe I spied in January's edition of delicious magazine (no link on website, sorry).  Slices of Chorizo are fried with onions and garlic and a green chili, and then simmered with chunks of potato until just cooked.  In goes slices of winter cabbage and a tin of haricot beans and that is all.  Simple, rustic and perfect for a cold Sunday afternoon.  

I am not sure why the chorizo went a bit anaemic looking...but the flavours were certainly there! 

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Nigella's Sweet Potato Supper

This meal, although really easy to throw together, is slightly grander than most of our regular Friday night dinners....you know...pizza...burgers...trashy "it's the weekend" kind of grub.

Bright orange sweet potatoes roasted with asparagus, pancetta and cloves of garlic...what is not to love? The recipe comes from Nigella's Kitchen...recipe sadly not online...you basically wash and dry the sweet potatoes, cut them into 1/4s (rounds) and then roast with asparagus spears, whole cloves of garlic (in skin) and cubes of pancetta...all tossed in a few Tbsp of rapeseed oil.  The recipe says to roast it all for 30 mins and then turn sweet potatoes over and put it all back into the oven for another 30 mins.

When it came out the sweet potatoes were tender and caramelised and just gorgeous...the asparagus was crispy....it wasn't inedible, but it was pretty crispy. I'd say it was down to the spears being too thin for the length of time they were in the oven...or they were in the oven too long...next time (and there will be a next time) I'm going to toss the asparagus in a little oil and add them after the first 30 mins.

This dish is sweet and salty and...crispy, and surprisingly filling.

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Bonfire Chilli for a chilly bonfire night!

It gets dark early up here in Edinburgh.  By 4:30 last night the sky was almost completely dark and the first fireworks could be heard (but not seen...weep) and although I wasn't going out to a bonfire party I thought I'd prepare a warming chilli full of heat and a little BANG! 

I had been looking at Nigella's Cheesy Chilli recipe from Kitchen, she uses some ingredients like chorizo and cocoa that I wasn't prepared to go out and buy especially for this recipe...so I compared it to the quick chilli recipe in my stand-by Canadian Basics cookbook and another in Jamie's Ministry of Food and thought...hey! I can do this... 

It wasn't like that gloopy...possibly from a tin...chilli you get at pubs on baked potatoes, it was chunky and tasted fresh (if I do say so myself).  I basically softened a finely chopped onion and finely chopped green pepper in a little bit of oil and then added a couple of really fat cloves of minced garlic and the spices....smoked paprika (to replace Nigella's chorizo), cayenne pepper, ground coriander and cumin, and a little dribble of oil to keep the spices from burning.  Once that was all mixed up I chucked in the mince, browned it all and then a tin of tomatoes, about 125ml of water and a tin of kidney beans (drained). After 15mins of boiling with the lid on I added a grated carrot and a really fat green chilli sliced into rounds.  That all simmered with the lid off for about 30 mins, until it was thick and everything was soft...and then...salt and pepper and chopped coriander (which I found lurking in the back of the fridge...still fresh!).  

I have to say I just eyeballed the measurements.  The recipes I looked at all called for one tin of tomatoes and about 125ml of water or stock to 500g meat.  I used about 2 tsp of paprika and a good sprinkle of cayenne.  I doubted the amount of heat...but thought...well I can always add Tabasco later...I didn't need it though!! 

Served with tortillas, plain yoghurt and grated cheese this warmed me right up! The only thing missing...the guac :( I had a huge serving and still managed a little bit left for lunch today and 3/4 of a large ice cream tub full in the freezer for another night! 

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Wholewheat Pizza Crust...a Friday night treat!

David and I used to treat our selves to delivery pizza a lot when we lived in Chelmsford.  Sure, it was a treat...but it seemed to happen pretty often...you know, often enough that we started to get coupons mailed to us personally...anyway...once in a while I would make my own dough from scratch, but now that we've moved up here I have been making it more often.  

I remember my mum making fresh pizza dough when I was little...mixing the dough up in the morning, putting it into a covered bowl and letting it rise all day on top of the fridge.  Simple right? how more simple does it need to be? Well...I haven't quite managed to master the making the dough in the morning bit...but in reality pizza dough tends to have more yeast in it than bread anyway...so it doesn't need more than 45 mins to rise...

So...in the door...warm water, sugar and yeast mixed together before even taking off my coat...and then relax for 10 mins (take off coat...unpack bags...etc etc etc.) Once the yeasty water mixture is all frothy you just add it to a couple of cups of flour, with a pinch of salt, and mix...adding a bit of flour at a time until soft and doughy. Then...you have a good 45 mins while it rises to get toppings ready...unload the dishwasher...put on a load of laundry...etc. etc. etc. 

Last night I used 1 3/4 cup white flour and 1 cup wholewheat flour to make my dough, and once the dough had pretty much come together in the bowl I kneaded it for about 5 extra mins by hand...you know...get that gluten working.  

I wouldn't say the dough doubled in size...but I suspect that was due to the combination of flours. I will say that it was soft and stretchy and...once cooked...really light.  

When I plan on making a pizza I like to buy a jar of spicy tomato pasta sauce (something chunky more than saucy)...I use about half and then freeze then rest for next time...same with pepperoni...use half, freeze half. It might seem a bit stingy, but it means that for about £2.50 I can sauce and meat two pizzas...the rest of the toppings...a few mushrooms and a bit of green pepper were left overs from during the week. For this pizza (number 2) the only thing I had to buy especially for it, was the cheese.  

Thrifty and tasty!


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yum yum aubergine with buttermilk sauce

My visit to Ottolenghi last weekend has had me furiously flipping through Plenty selecting and prioritising new recipes to try.  Hands down number one just had to Aubergines with Buttermilk Sauce especially after the amazing aubergines I had last Sunday.  

I love aubergines, but sometimes I find that I have trouble cooking them just right...you know, so that they are soft and not spongey or bitter...anyway, this recipe is simple to follow and totally worth the effort it takes to bash the pomegranate seeds out.  

This dish is meant to be served as a starter, but it is so easy to eat as a main course with some...oh I don't know...falafel or couscous...I halved the recipe, seeing as I'm home alone this weekend...but kept the whole clove of garlic in the sauce (good thing I'm sleeping alone...that's all I have to say)! I can't wait to eat the leftovers tomorrow!

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Quick Chicken

I've had this past week off from work and have managed to get all sorts of housewifey things done in that time.  Don't get me wrong, I love my job...but sometimes I secretly yearn for the days when my visa prohibited me from working...those were the days that I could potter in the kitchen, I could make grand meals, I could bake during the week...sure sure I was bored out of my mind half the time and miserable being on such a tight budget...but still...

Wednesday night I made one of those dishes...those I've-been-at-home-all-day-so-I-have-the-time dishes. Except it turns out it didn't take me all day, it took an hour...when I planned the meal I just assumed that it was a dish a couple hours in the making...and then when I took a peek at it Wednesday afternoon...well it turns out I only needed to start it at 5.  The recipe is a scrap stuck into one of my notebooks, it might be from delicious or olive magazine...

This truly is a one pot dish...and with some selective shopping, it needs very little "prep".  Chicken pieces, baby new potatoes, trimmed green beans and a creme fraiche mustard sauce.  On Wednesday I added in some chunks of butternut squash left over from making Pumpkin Cluster Bread earlier in the day, and did have to cut the thighs away from the drumsticks...so a little bit of work, but in theory all you have to do is...

Place 6-8 chicken thighs in a baking dish, scatter about 500g baby new potatoes and a large handful of trimmed green beans around the dish and then pour over the sauce...mix together: 150ml chicken stock, 4Tbsp creme fraiche, 2 Tbsp honey, 2 Tbsp grainy mustard, and salt and pepper.  Bake in 200 degree oven for about 40-45 mins, until juices run clear.  

When we sat down and started to eat I said to David..."see what I can do if I don't have to work..." and he said "I was just thinking that..." and, well, I couldn't tell a lie..."actually, it only took me an hour start to finish..." 

I'll be back at work on Monday.