Roasted Potato Salad with Black Olive & Roasted Garlic Gremolata

This week at I Heart Cooking Clubs we're Serving Up Salads with Nigel Slater.  This is the kind of theme which is right up my alley, given that I like to eat salads pretty much all year round.  This time of year, in the New Zealand winter, my salads take on a more substantial bent and usually comprise some kind of root vegetable, or pulses and grains of some description.

In Tender, Vol. I, I came across Nigel's recipe for Roasted potato salad with garlic and rosemary - new potatoes are roasted with garlic and rosemary then tossed, while still warm, in a mustardy vinaigrette.    It was sounding pretty good to me, but I felt it wanted a little "something else".  And then I remembered this recipe for Herbed Crispy Smashed Taters that I had seen ages ago on my friend Toby's blog, Plate Fodder.  Toby combined smashed potatoes with herbs, garlic, black olives and lemon before roasting them, and this was exactly the inspiration I was looking for.  And, by the by, if you haven't checked out Toby's blog before you are in for a treat - Toby's writing is witty and entertaining, sprinkled from time to time with family stories, and most of all his food is stuff that you totally want to eat.

Roasted Potato Salad with Black Olive & Roasted Garlic Gremolata Recipe
Inspired by recipes from Nigel Slater, Tender Vol. I
and Toby at Plate Fodder
Click here for a printable copy of this recipe

8x whole baby potatoes (I used baby Red Jackets), washed & unpeeled
1x medium-sized sweet potato, washed, unpeeled & cut into quarters
1x head of garlic, cloves separated but unpeeled
2x stalks of fresh rosemary
olive oil
flaky sea salt & freshly ground black pepper
8x black Kalamata olives
zest of 1/2 a lemon

for dressing:
2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
1 tablespoon whole grain mustard
5 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

Preheat oven to 220 degrees C (425 degrees F).

Place potatoes and sweet potato into a medium sized pot, cover with cold water, place over high heat and bring to the boil.  Boil steadily for 5 minutes.  Remove from heat and drain.

Line a baking tray with non-stick baking paper.  As soon as potatoes are cool enough to handle, place them on the baking sheet and flatten with the heel of your hand.   Pull the leaves off one rosemary stalk, and strew them over the potatoes, along with the garlic clove.  Drizzle liberally with olive oil, and season generously with flaky sea salt and freshly ground black pepper.

Place the tray of potatoes in the preheated oven, and cook for 20 minutes.  After 20 minutes remove the garlic cloves from the tray and set aside, and turn the potatoes over.  Return to the oven for a further 20 minutes.

Meanwhile prepare the gremolata.  Deseed the olives and chop finely.  Place in a small bowl.  Add the leaves from the remaining stalk of rosemary, and the lemon zest.  Squeeze a couple of now soft garlic cloves into the mixture and stir/mash to combine everything well.

Make the dressing by putting all the ingredients into a small jar and shaking until well combined.

Remove cooked, golden potatoes from the oven, place in a serving bowl, and drizzle liberally with the dressing - do this while the potatoes are still hot and they will really soak up the dressing.  Sprinkle the gremolata over the top, and set aside to cool slightly - this is best served warm.

Note:  You probably noticed that we cooked a whole head of garlic, but only used a couple of cloves here - the rest were saved to go into the gravy for the roast chicken which was the perfect accompaniment to this hearty salad.

If you would like to get to know Nigel Slater a little better, and to see what everyone else has cooked up this week, then do go and visit my friends at I Heart Cooking Clubs and check out the links ...

... or check out Tender, Vol. 1 and Nigel's many other great titles available from Amazon USA, Amazon UK, or Fishpond NZ.

I'll also be sharing this post this week at See Ya In the Gumbo hosted by the delightful Michelle at Ms. enPlace, at Weekend Cooking hosted by Beth Fish Reads, and at Foodie Fridays hosted by Designs by Gollum.

         

Pumpkin Pangrattato with Merguez Sausage & Black Olives

At I Heart Cooking Clubs this week we begin a new culinary journey with British cook, Nigel Slater.  Nigel is determinedly not a chef, rather a self-confessed amateur cook, who prides himself on producing food which is understated, home-style cooking.  We will be spending the next six months cooking his food, according to a different theme each week - an opportunity to explore his food in depth, and get to know the vast repertoire of recipes he offers through his books, television programmes and online sources.

I have a few Nigel Slater books in my collection, which I've used a bit and always enjoyed, but I have to be honest and say that I haven't used them nearly as much as I would like to have, so I'm really welcoming this opportunity.

For this week's dish I turned to Nigel's book Tender (Vol. 1).  In this book he chronicles tales about his vegetable garden. He talks of his dreams of self sufficiency, and describes how he transformed a small city garden into something which now produces the vegetables that have become the mainstay of his daily cooking.  Each chapter is a different vegetable, and offers advice on planting and harvesting, companion flavours and seasonings, and a variety of recipes.

Not only are all the recipes very simple and "do-able" for the average home cook, they are beautifully photographed, and the book is beautifully written.  Nigel's style is very "conversational" - the kind of information he would give you if he was cooking alongside you in the kitchen, and this style extends to the titles of many of the recipes.  Who wouldn't want to try "A quick cabbage supper with duck legs", "A tart of asparagus and tarragon", "Smoky aubergines and a punchy, bright-tasting dressing", or "An extremely moist chocolate beetroot cake with creme fraiche and poppy seeds"?

Leafing through the pages, something from the pumpkin department seemed perfect for an autumn dish, and when I stumbled across Nigel's "Pumpkin pangrattato with rosemary and orange" I knew that I had found my dish.  Of course you know that I can't leave well enough alone, and when I saw pumpkin mash with sausages on the very next page, I was convinced that I somehow had to work sausages into this dish.  My initial thoughts were to use some chorizo, but having picked up some nice, spicy, merguez sausages from my favourite butcher, I thought these would be a great accompaniment to the pumpkin.  I omitted chilli from the recipe, since the merguez is already spicy enough, but of course if you want the added heat, knock yourself out, and of course if you happen to be vegetarian then leave out the sausage and throw in a small, chopped red chilli or sprinkling of chilli flakes for a bit of heat.  I threw a handful of black olives into the mix as well, because I love pumpkin and olives together, and I mixed some little chunks of taleggio cheese into the breadcrumb topping, because after all what's not to love about a crunchy, cheesy topping on anything?!

This turned out to be a great dish with which to welcome Nigel to the IHCC kitchen.  With the addition of the sausage and olives, it made a pretty substantial meal, with a truckload of flavour and texture going on - in my eyes, always the hallmark of a great recipe.  You'll find the spicy nuggets of sausage and briny olives a great foil to the tender, sweet butternut squash;  the crunchy breadcrumb topping is a perfect compliment to the softness of the pumpkin;  and every so often you get little added explosions of flavour from the rosemary and orange.

In all, this is one of the best things I think I've made recently, and I will definitely be making it again.  There's easily enough going on here for this to make a substantial meal on its own, but would also make a great side dish as part of a larger meal if you were feeding a crowd.  Admittedly, this is not quite a throw it together in 5 minutes kind of meal, but neither is it an arduous labour intensive meal either.

I often ponder the scenario of someone asking me, "if I was to only make one dish from your blog, what should I make?"  I have in my head a shortlist of dishes I would recommend, and this dish definitely makes it onto my list.  All I can say is, "if you keep this up, Nigel, you and I are going to get along famously".  I hope you give it a try.

Pumpkin Pangrattato with Merguez Sausage & Black Olives Recipe
Adapted from a recipe by Nigel Slater
from Tender, Vol. 1
Makes 3 substantial servings, or 4 smaller servings
Click here for a printable copy of this recipe

olive oil
4x merguez sausages
1x whole butternut squash, peeled, de-seeded, & cut into large bite-sized chunks
generous handful black olives (I used kalamata)
3x cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 tablespoon fresh rosemary, finely chopped
grated zest of half an orange
4 generous handfuls fresh white breadcrumbs
(for great texture & crunch, keep breadcrumbs quite coarse)
1 generous handful flat leaf parsley, roughly chopped
50g (1-3/4 oz) taleggio cheese
flaky sea salt & freshly ground black pepper
butter

Preheat oven to 180 degrees C (350 degrees F).

Put pieces of butternut into a steamer set over boiling water, and steam until just tender to the point of a knife.  This may take up to 20 minutes, but start testing after 10 minutes, as you really don't want to overcook it at this stage.  Remove steamer from heat and set aside.

Meanwhile, remove casing from sausages, and break into bite-sized pieces.

Heat a small amount of olive oil in a large, ovenproof frying pan (cast iron is ideal) over medium-high heat (see note below).  Add the chunks of sausage to the pan, and cook until golden brown all over.  Remove the sausage from the pan, and set aside.  Don't discard the fat which has been released from the sausages.   (Note:  if you don't have an ovenproof pan, don't worry, you can use a baking dish later on.)

Return the pan to heat, and reduce the heat to medium.  Depending on how much fat has come out of the sausages, you may need to add a little extra olive oil to the pan - you want about 4-5 tablespoons altogether.  Add the garlic, rosemary and orange zest to the pan.  As soon as the garlic becomes fragrant, add the breadcrumbs and parsley to the pan, and stir until the breadcrumbs are a pale golden colour.  Remove breadcrumbs to a medium sized bowl, but don't clean the pan.  Break cheese into small pieces, add to the breadcrumbs, and toss gently to distribute evenly amongst the crumbs.

Return sausages, butternut chunks and black olives to the pan (or use a shallow baking dish), distributing them evenly.  Season generously with salt and pepper, and dot little knobs of butter over the top.

Tip the breadcrumbs over the top of the pumpkin and sausage in an even layer, and drizzle with a little extra olive oil.

Bake in the preheated oven for 35-40 minutes, until the crumbs are golden and crunchy and the pumpkin is thoroughly tender.

If you would like to get to know Nigel Slater a little better, and to see what everyone else has cooked up this week, then do and visit my friends at I Heart Cooking Clubs and check out the links ...

... or check out Tender, Vol. 1 and Nigel's many other great titles available from Amazon USA, Amazon UK, or Fishpond NZ.

I'll also be sharing this post this week at See Ya In the Gumbo hosted by the delightful Michelle at Ms. enPlace, at Weekend Cooking hosted by Beth Fish Reads, at Foodie Fridays hosted by Designs by Gollum, and at Cook Your Books hosted by the lovely Joyce at Kitchen Flavours.

                                 

Going Crackers with Bittman

Funny how things just kind of fall into place sometimes.  I had been going ever so slightly "crackers" for about two weeks trying to decide what to make for my contribution to this month's Tackling Bittman event.  Don't get me wrong, this was not because there are any shortage of great Mark Bittman recipes to make, as a browse through his fabulous book "How to Cook Everything" or HTCE iPhone application will reveal.  It was more a case of there being so many great recipes to choose from that I was having trouble deciding.  The solution in the end, virtually found itself.

You see, lunchtime rolled around yesterday, at which time I headed for the fridge and pulled out the bowl of hummus I'd made the day before, which quite coincidentally had been made using this Mark Bittman recipe I've posted before.  That was when I realised that I was completely out of the pumpkin seed crackers I usually like to have.  Toast didn't seem right, no pita bread in the freezer, and I didn't feel like going out just to get crackers, and that was when I decided to turn to Bitty for help.

Out with my trusty iPhone, and sure enough a quick search turned up a recipe for homemade crackers.  The dough is very simple, takes just moments to make, and is infinitely variable.  I chose to use olive oil instead of butter as the shortening (as I wanted the olive oil flavour);  I also added in some freshly grated parmesan and fresh rosemary, and sprinkled a little flaky sea salt over the top before baking.  You could really add any herbs or freshly ground black pepper to dough;  nuts and seeds would also make good additions either gently kneaded into the dough or sprinkled over the top;  you can also make cream crackers by substituting cream as the binding liquid when you make the dough.  Are you starting to get the picture?  All told, about 20 minutes from start to finish and I had a batch of beautiful, crispy, Parmesan and Rosemary Crackers.  These tasted fantastic, and were a beautiful compliment to the hummus.  I'd like to be able to tell you that these keep well, but the truth is that they're gone already - next time I'll be doubling the recipe!!

Parmesan & Rosemary Crackers

Adapted from Mark Bittman's

"How to Cook Everything"

Makes about 24

Vegetarian

Click here for a printable copy of the recipe

1 cup all-purpose flour, plus more as needed

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 tablespoons olive oil or butter

1/2 cup freshly grated parmesan cheese

1-1/2 teaspoons finely chopped fresh rosemary

1/4 cup water, plus extra as needed

Preheat oven to 200 degrees C (400 degrees F).  Lightly dust two baking sheets with flour or line with parchment paper.

Put flour, salt, olive oil and parmesan together in the bowl of a food processor, and pulse until combined.  Add water and let the machine run for a bit, then add extra water a teaspoon at a time until the mixture comes together but is not sticky.  Lastly pulse in the rosemary.

On a lightly floured surface, roll the dough out thinly, adding more flour if needed.

Transfer the rolled out dough to your prepared baking sheet.  Score lightly with a sharp razor or pastry wheel to form squares or rectangles.  (I think that next time I would also prick each of the squares in a couple of places with a fork - you will see why in a moment.)  Sprinkle flaky sea salt over the top.

Bake in the preheated oven until lightly browned, about 10 minutes.  Cool on a wire rack, and store (yeah, right!) in an airtight container.

Notes:

My first sheet of crackers turned into something that looked rather like a giant puff ball, and whilst it was nice and crispy on top was still soft on the bottom - tasted fantastic, but was rather more like very thin pita bread than crispy cracker.

This was where it became obvious to me that I needed to, firstly score the dough a little more firmly than I had originally done, and secondly prick the dough.  I also reduced the temperature of my oven for the second sheet of crackers to 190 degrees C (375 degrees F) - you may need to play around with that according to your oven - and set the oven rack a little lower down in the oven than the first time around.

Final verdict - perfectly crispy little crackers, made in less time than it would take to dash out to the supermarket, and at a fraction of the price.  With numerous variations to explore you can bet that I will be making these again - often!!

Interested in cooking some more with Mark Bittman?  I highly recommend any of these Mark Bittman books:

     

Available from Amazon, Book Depository UK, and Fishpond NZ

This post is my submission to this month's Tackling Bittman blog hop.  If you're a Bittman fan, please come on over and join in the fun.

This post is also submitted to the Tackling Bittman Giveaway at girlichef - she's giving away a copy of Bittman's "The Food Matters Cookbook" - entries are open until 31 January.