It's been unusually cold here in Manchester. It looks like mid May outside, beautiful and green and fresh, but temperature-wise it feels more like March. Therefore soup is definitely still featuring on the menu regularly.
I was making books in Lucy's studio, while she was engaged in skill sharing excercises with M and as a thank you for letting me use her space and time I brought along Carrot and Ginger Soup for lunch. We all needed it as it was decidely brass monkeys in the studio and it helped to warm our bellies and the cockles of our hearts.
Carrot and Ginger Soup (serves 4)
2 onions, peeled and chopped
a large knob of butter
2 large potatoes, peeled and diced
6 carrots, cleaned and chopped
3cm piece of ginger, peeled and chopped very finely
1 litre vegetable stock
salt, to taste
pepper, to taste
a pinch of cayenne pepper, optional
Melt the butter in a large stock pot and sweat the onions over low heat until softend, but not browned for about 15 minutes.
Add the potatoes, carrots, ginger and stock and season with salt and pepper to taste.
Bring to a simmer and cook until the vegetables are tender, about 20 minutes.
Blitz in a food processor or with a stick blender until you have a smooth, creamy consistency.
Add this point I like to add a pinch of cayenne for a little extra heat, but that's entirely optional.
Serve hot with crusty bread.
Enjoy!
Monday, 17 May 2010
Carrot and Ginger Soup
Sunday, 2 May 2010
Vegetarian Chili
On Friday night, L and H came round for pre-cinema dinner, before going to watch Io sono l'amore. (One of the best films I have seen in a long time by the way, so if you haven't seen it yet, do!)
I felt like all I'd been feeding them the last few times they'd been round was roast vegetables with couscous, so I wanted to do something different. My problem was that I'd left my purse in the bookbindery and only had a few coppers in the penny jar, so I had to make something that didn't involve much shopping. I checked my cupboards and found that they contained most of the ingredients needed to make a chili. All I had to go and buy was a courgette and a red pepper and there was enough change for those. Perfect.
Vegetarian Chili (serves 3-4)
olive oil
1 clove garlic, finely chopped
1 onions, diced
3 cm ginger, grated
1/2 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp paprika
1 tbsp tomato purée
1 red peppers, diced
1 courgette, diced
1/2 tsp dried red chilli flakes
1/2 can canned chopped tomatoes (with jalapenos)
1 can kidney beans, 400g
1 small can sweet corn
pinch salt and black pepper
In the oil in a large frying pan and add the onions. Sweat for a few minutes until they begin to soften.
Add the garlic and the grated ginger, together with the cumin and the paprika.
Fry for another couple of minutes, before adding the tomato puree. Stir well and fry a little longer (the tomato puree should turn dark reddish brown), before adding the rest of the ingredients.
Bring to a simmer and cook for 20 minutes, until the vegetables are tender.
Serve with rice, as a topping for a jacket potato, or just in a bowl with some torillas or nachos.
Enjoy!
Wednesday, 21 April 2010
Monday, 19 April 2010
Torta di spinaci (Spinach Tart)
Okay, it's about time I got this show back on the road. Sorry for the prolonged absence. I'm not sure what happened. Usually when things are a little crazy and don't go according to plan I seek refuge in the kitchen. So far this year that has not seemed to happen, despite there being quite a few stones cast that caused ripples of varying magnitude.
But enough of the prose, back to cooking. I've been invited to H's surprise birthday meal tonight and was asked to bring some food along, so what better opportunity to try and get my cooking mojo back. I got some of my cookbooks out for inspiration and decided to make Torta di spinaci from Angela Hartnett's Cucina. Well, I don't want to comment on the book just yet, as it has great reviews and as this the first recipe I tried from it, but it needed a bit of adaptation to make it work. The ingredients are fine, but if I didn't already have a clue what I was doing in the kitchen (well, at least most of the time), I think it would have left me very frustrated. The recipe calls for 1kg of roughly chopped fresh spinach to be mixed with some other ingredients and then placed into a 20cm shallow flan dish. There is no way that would ever fit without wilting the spinach first, so I cooked my spinach and also reduced the amount to 750g and it just about fit.
I also didn't have any '00' flour, so used normal flour, but of course that made the pastry more bread dough like and maybe wasn't the greatest idea I ever had. So next time I'll get on my bike to get the right flour. See, I don't always know what I'm doing in the kitchen, or to put it correctly, I'm aware that I'm doing not quite the right thing and carry on despite my better knowledge. I seem to do that a lot in life. It was good anyways though.
Anyways here's the recipe with my own cooking instructions and adapted measurements, but with the correct flour:
Torta di spinaci (serves 8-10)
400g '00' flour
1/2 tsp salt
4tbsp olive oil
100ml ice-cold water
for the filling:
750g spinach, washed, stems removed, roughly chopped
4tbsp olive oil
200 fresh parmegiano reggiano, grated
2 eggs, beaten
1/4 tsp freshly ground nutmeg
salt, to taste
freshly ground black pepper, to taste
In a large bowl ix the flour with the salt and add the olive oil and water.
Mix lightly until it comes together to form a smooth ball.
Wrap in cling film and chill in the fridge for at least one hour.
In the meantime you can make the filling.
Heat the olive oil in a large pan and add the spinach, stir until wilted quite a bit.
Remove from the pan and set aside to cool, pour off excess liquid.
Add the grated parmesan, the eggs and nutmeg and mix well.
Season well with salt and pepper.
Preheat your oven to 200C/Gas 6.
Remove the pastry from the fridge and roll out quite thin on a lightly floured surface. It needs to become big enough to line a 20cm shallow pie dish and fold back over the top of the filling.
Once it's rolled out, carefully line your pie dish, letting the dough hang over the edges.
Spoon the filling into the dish, it should fill it all the way to the top.
Then fold the dough over the top to cover the filling and bake in your preheated oven for 30-40 minutes until golden.
This can be served hot or cold.
Monday, 22 March 2010
Glazed Carrots with Thyme and Garlic
Okay, this is me trying to get my mojo back. I've still not really been cooking much new stuff, but here is one I made earlier (and it didn't involve fairy liquid bottles, scissors or glue). Oh, and before I forget, thanks for hanging in there with me.
The recipe comes from Gordon Ramsey's Sunday Lunch cookbook. I know many people don't like him because of the language he uses, but that doesn't bother me and I've never yet tried on of his recipe to be left disappointed.
Glazed Carrots with Thyme and Garlic (serves 4)
600g small carrots, peeled (I used Chanteney, so no need for peeling)
1-1.5 litres vegetable stock
1 sprig of thyme
1/2 bulb of garlic, cut horizontally
1 bay leaf
olive oil
salt
black pepper, freshly ground
a few knobs of butter
1-2tsp caster sugar
Place the carrots in a large pan and cover with vegetable stock.
Add the thyme, garlic, bay leaf and simmer for 8 minutes.
Remove from heat and allow the carrots to cool in the stock, before draining well.
Use some kitchen towel to pat them dry.
Heat some olive oil in a pan and add the carrots. Sautee for a few minutes.
Season with salt and pepper.
Add the butter and sugar and baste the carrots.
Continue to cook for 3-4 minutes until the carrots are glazed well and tender.
Serve as a perfect side with roast lamb or beef.
Wednesday, 24 February 2010
Wednesday, 10 February 2010
Unearthed goodies
I was sent some continental deli goodies from Unearthed a couple of weeks ago and am only just getting around to blogging about it. Where does the time go?
The people at Unearthed source quality food from all over Europe and were kind enough to send me some Barrel Aged Greek Feta, some Hot Chili Olives and some Spanish Chorizo to try. What can I say? It was great food, full of flavour and perfect to have with a glass of wine and friends. The olives were really hot, but went perfect with the soft, salty feta and the chorizo tasted just like chorizo should. I'll definitely be looking out for their foods next time I'm in Waitrose.
The pictures I took really don't do the food justice, as I couldn't wait for daylight, but devoured everything on the night it arrived, so I've borrowed a picture from their website.
Tuesday, 2 February 2010
Sunday Roast
A couple of weeks ago a parcel from the wonderful people at Tiny Farmer arrived on my doorstep. I opened it and found some great hand-reared, welfare friendly beef, a huge rump steak, some shin of beef, some minced beef and a lovely silverside to be precise.
So what was a girl to do? Invite Lucy, Jean-Marc and E for a roast dinner of course!
I think it's safe to say that everyone enjoyed it greatly, even though the roast was a little less pink than I wanted it to be. I forgot to set my timer.
Roast Beef
olive oil
1 silverside of beef
2 carrots
1 onion, halved
salt, to taste
black pepper, to taste
for the gravy (serves 4):
4 cloves of garlic
4 plum tomatoes, halved
1 glass of red wine
600ml beef stock
Preheat your oven to 200C/Gas 6.
Heat the oil a heavy based roasting pan on top of your stove.
Season your beef and brown for about 3-4 minutes on all sides.
When browned briefly remove the roast from the pan and put 2 carrots and the onion halves in the pan and than place the beef on top.
Transfer to the oven and roast for 15 minutes per 450g for rare or 20 minutes per 450g for medium.
When the roast is done, put it on a warmed plate, loosely wrap it in tin foil and set aside to rest while you make the gravy.
Place the roasting pan on the hob. Remove any excess fat and add the garlic and tomatoes. Cook for 4-5 minutes before adding the wine and the beef stock.
Bring to a simmer and bubble for about 10 minutes. The liquid should reduce by about half.
Pass the gravy through a fine sieve. Make sure you really press all the juices out of the vegetables to get all the flavour.
Return the gravy to the pan and bring back to a boil until you reach gravy consistency. If you like you can thicken it with a little cornflour.
Enjoy!
