The forgotten jar....Tahini

I have a jar of tahini in my fridge...it is waaaaaaay at the back of the top shelf, behind some curry pastes and tom yum paste and a couple of different mustards....it sits there unused, forgotten.  Every once and a while I remember about it and wrack my brain for ways to use it up.  It was pretty expensive considering I have probably used one tablespoon maximum from it in the last however many months it has been since I bought it.  I don't even remember what I bought it for...it is just there.  

I hadn't planned on using it in last night's Asian inspired supper...but as I was waiting for the water to boil to cook my soba noodles (I know...get me) I spied the recipe on the back of the package for a miso tahini dressing...ah ha! I didn't have miso but I sure had some tahini...and an idea.  

I loved this dinner the moment I started daydreaming about it on the bus...soba noodles tossed in some sort of asian dressing with shavings of a soft cabbage, red endive and spring onions...piled high on a plate and served cool-ish.  The cabbage and endive part came from an Asian slaw my aunt made while I was visiting her...with napa cabbage and radicchio...perfect for mixing with buckwheat noodles.  The dressing was the component with the most potential of letting me down...the part that would either bring it all together or have me ordering a pizza.  

Brown sugar, soya sauce, lime, oil, tahini and a pressed garlic clove...easy. 

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Adding a little summer to my life...fresh herbs

The weather is still more autumnal than late spring here in Edinburgh, which means that all the lovely salads and al fresco dining I've been dreaming of the last few months are still on hold.  At this rate, I fear, they will be on hold indefinitely.  To add a little bit of summer to my meals lately I have been using loads of fresh herbs...especially dill (scandi influence) and mint...to boost the flavours and give my food that straight from the garden feeling.  

Tonight's dinner came from Jamie Oliver's Jamie's Great Britain cookbook (a gift from my SIL), a warm salmon salad.  The recipe jumped out at me when I was flipping thorough my book on the plane home from Essex...baked salmon served over buttery new potatoes and topped with a cucumber/yoghurt/herby sauce. In pure Jamie-style the potatoes and salmon are supposed to be piled high on a platter...I couldn't be bothered (plus I would be eyeing up how much David was helping himself to). 

The summery hit was the yoghurt sauce.  It was a bit like a tzatziki without the garlic.  Grated cucumber is added to finely chopped mint and dill, salt and pepper, lemon rind and juice and the some plain greek yoghurt.  It is tangy and fresh and totally perfect with the salmon and potatoes.  

This really isn't a salad (although I am having some leftovers for lunch tomorrow, and they will probably be at room temperature) it is salmon on potatoes with a sauce...but it was perfect.  

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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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Avocado Salad

On Tuesday I made Nigella's Mexican Lasagne (layers of flour tortillas, beans and corn, cheese and a spicy tomato sauce).  It was tasty...it didn't look as lovely as the picture in the book...but it went down a treat.  

Nigella's recipe suggests serving the lasagne with an avocado salad, and I couldn't have been happier to oblige.  Avocado is something I just can't get enough of...but am often put off buying a) because of the cost and b) because they are rarely ready when I want to use them or go from hard as a rock to overripe in a matter of minutes (well overnight but you know...) 

Before I set out to start the lasagne I gently prodded the three avocados sitting in my fruit bowl.  One was very soft, one was softish and one was hard...if they had all been hard I would have had to scrap the lasagne and juggle around the meal planner.  Thankfully two were good enough so on I ploughed.  

Lasagne done and resting I sliced up the two avocados (after a messy wrestling event trying to peel them) tossed them in some oil and lime juice, salt and pepper and then covered with loads of chopped coriander and some red chilli.  

In all honestly, I could have happily eaten the whole salad with a hunk of bread and thrown aside the lasagne...that's how much I love this salad.  

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Veggies Veggies Veggies (and a bit of cake!)

Yesterday was all about the veggies...well...anything not sweet.  I think I actually had a headache from sugar withdraw!! I only managed four small slices at the Cake Club but that was enough to totally crash my system...amazing! 

I turned to the trusty For the Love of Food and greedily flipped through the salad pages to find something...anything...that would restore balance to my body (and prepare me for a cake treat in the evening...yes I managed to hold off until then!).  The weather somewhat forced my hand (cold, wet, dreary) to choose Denis Cotter's Warm Broccoli, Aubergine and Chickpea Salad.

Like most of the recipes in this book the ingredient list is exhaustive, and I used pretty much every pot and pan in my cupboard...but the finished product was...as always...amazing!

The aubergine is roasted in the oven until soft (and crispy?), the broccoli is steamed, and the chickpeas are warmed through with garlic, chilli and cumin seeds...this is all tossed together with bulgur, spring onions and chopped tomatoes and then dressed with a yummy lemon yoghurt dressing.

My favourite bit was the addition of toasted sunflower seeds coated with soy sauce...amazing in this salad and a new "trick" to add to my repertoire.

DO NOT FEAR Cake Eaters...we enjoyed two largish portions of left over devil's food cake last night! Enough to return me to a sugar coma...

Giant couscous and baby tomato salad

I accidently ordered GIANT couscous a month or so ago with our groceries.  When it arrived I wasn't quite sure what I was going to do with it...and then...Yotam Ottolenghi came along (surprise surprise).  In Plenty he offers a Tomato Celebration, different tomatoes tossed with loadsa herbs and Giant couscous.  Perfect! I thought, and got to creating my own version based on what I had to hand...

The giant couscous is cooked differently to regular itty bitty couscous (you know...in a bowl, boiling water poured over and left, covered, to plump up) and is slightly chewier in my opinion, but mixed with regular couscous it can offer an additional texture to a salad like this one.  So, once cooked...the GIANT couscous is mixed with the regular couscous, a little olive oil and then, a heap of baby tomatoes sliced into quarters, handfuls of parsley and basil chopped up, some minced garlic, chopped green onions and some balsamic vinegar...oh and salt and pepper of course!

Beluga Lentils with Quinoa

When my Auntie Sandi was here visiting for the wedding she brought me a package of the cutest little lentils I have ever seen.  Perfectly shaped and jet black these legumes are called Beluga because they resemble little gems of caviar.  I have been waiting for the perfect recipe to use the 2 cups of lentils (I want to use them sparingly!who knows when I will come across these lovely lentils again?)

I have been totally drooling over the grain and pulses recipes in the Ottolenghi cookbook and have been looking for similar recipes on the internet.  I came across this recipe for quinoa and lentil salad the other day and thought that I would try something similar but warm for our dinner tonight. 

The deep black colour, which totally survived the boiling process, works really well with the creaminess of the pale quinoa.  Essentially you could put anything you wanted in this "warm" salad, if I had had cherry tomatoes I would have thrown them in.  The ratio is about 2 parts lentil to 1 part quinoa...but again...do what feels right to you.  I wanted this to be more lentil than quinoa.  With that I added 1/2 a red onion thinly sliced in half moons, a handful of chopped parsley and about 1/2  block of feta cheese cubed.  I tossed it all with come lemon juice, a bit of chili oil and fresh balck pepper...

et voila

This warm salad was really tasty paired with french style pan-fried potatoes (par boiled and cut into cubes then pan-fried in a little bit of butter with paprika), and a bit of warmed pita.  I also had half an avocado... David did not...his loss because it was simply...divine!