Spicy Tomato Pork Tenderloin and the Slow Cooked Challenge is back!
It's been a pretty miserable summer here in Scotland and I've been making many more Slow Cooked dishes than I would usually.
The Slow Cooked Challenge has had a bit of a break over the summer, but as we head into September, it's time think about slowly cooked stews, soups, curries and cakes.
I'm delighted to announce that I have a new co-host for this challenge, the very talented Lucy of Baking Queen 74. Lucy is the queen of baking in her Slow Cooker and will be hosting the Slow Cooked Challenge every other month.
If you are not familiar with the Slow Cooked Challenge, it is a monthly blog challenge dedicated to making recipes using a Slow Cooker/Crockpot or by slow cooking in the oven, aga or other slow method of cooking. Each month there will be a theme e.g. soup, dessert, vegetarian or an open challenge.
This month it's an
OPEN challenge, so you can enter any Slow Cooked recipe.
If you would like to take part, then please:
- Make your recipe in your Slow Cooker or other slow cooking method and post a photograph and the recipe, or a link to a recipe, on your blog
- Link to Farmersgirl Kitchen and Baking Queen 74
- Use the Slow Cooked Challenge logo in your post
- If you use twitter, tweet your post with @FarmersgirlCook @BakingQueen74 and use #SlowCookedChallenge and we will re-tweet it to our followers AND post your picture on the dedicated Pinterest Board.
- A round up of all the entries will be posted on the host's blog.
Rules:
- Please do not publish recipes from cookbooks on your blog without permission, they are copyright.
- If you are using recipes from another website, please link to the recipe on the website rather than publishing the recipe.
- One entry per blog.
- Recipes must be added to the linky by the 28th of each month and a round up will be posted on the host blog.
Spicy Tomato Pork Tenderloin
Ingredients
450g pork tenderloin (fillet)
Salt and pepper
Freshly ground black pepper
400g can of chopped tomatoes
2 tbsp dark brown sugar
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
1 tbsp soy sauce
1/2 teaspoon chilli powder
1 clove garlic crushed
- Place pork tenderloin in bottom of slow cooker
- Season with salt and pepper.
- Stir together the canned tomatoes, brown sugar, Dijon mustard, soy sauce, chilli powder and garlic in a small bowl and pour over the sauce.
- Cover and cook on low for 6 hours.
- Check seasoning before serving.
Labels: challenge, chilli, Pork, slow cooked, Slow Cooked Challenge, slow cooker, spicy, tenderloin, tomato
Garlic Bread and Tomato Bake
You know how it is on a Saturday when you haven't really planned what to eat for lunch? Then suddenly you find that everyone is at home and looking expectantly for you to come up with something tasty for them to enjoy.
Well that's what happened to me last Saturday. What could I make? What did I have in the larder and fridge?
Garlic Bread and Tomato Bake
Serves 4
A single garlic baguette
6 tomatoes
4 eggs
100 ml milk
2 tbsp red pesto
75g grated cheddar
freshly ground pepper
A few basil leaves (optional)
- Pre - heat the oven to 180C
- Slice up the garlic bread and place in a buttered oven proof dish.
- Thickly slice the tomatoes and layer over the bread.
- Cover with 2 tablespoons of pesto.
- Beat the eggs and add the milk, pour it over the bread and tomatoes.
- Season with freshly ground pepper and cover with the grated cheese.
- Bake for 20-25 minutes or until risen and golden.
- Tear up a few basil leaves and scatter over the top.
- Serve with salad.
And of course
Credit Crunch Munch as this is a thrifty dish which will fill up the family at very little cost. Credit Crunch Munch is run by Helen at
Fuss Free Flavours and Camilla at
Fab Food 4 All
Labels: Bake, basil, bread and butter pudding, cheese, Credit Crunch Munch, garlic bread, No Waste Food Challenge, tomato
Kellie's Tomato Tart - a last taste of summer
As soon as I saw the photograph pop up in Facebook I knew that I had to make this tomato tart. If you haven't visited
Food to Glow then you have a treat in store because Kellie makes beautiful food which is also very healthy.
Get the recipe here
Tomato Tart with Seed and Nut Herb Crust
I'm adding this to
Bookmarked Recipes the challenge to help you used those recipes you've saved, whether in books, magazines or online.
Labels: Bookmarked Recipes, Food to Glow, tart, tomato
Kitchen Garden Experts - Lamb with Savoury Potatoes - a review
I should be presenting you with
Charcoal-Cooked Lamb Rack with Savoury Potatoes, however what you are actually getting is
Slow Roasted Lamb Leg with Herby Potatoes. This dish sums up my difficulty in reviewing Kitchen Garden Experts, let me tell you more...
Kitchen Garden Experts features the chefs and gardeners at twenty of the UK's most exciting restaurants, hotels, pubs and cafes, focusing on how they produce the best fruit and vegetables to appear on their menus.
The TWenty Chefs include:
Raymond Blanc and Anne-Marie Owens at Le Manoir aux Quat'Saisons, Gill Meller at River Cottage, Sir Terence Conran at Barton Court, Simon Rogan at L'Enclume, Tom Lewis at Monachyle Mhor, Jack Stein at Padstow Kitchen Garden, Skye Gyngell at Heckfield Place, Carina Continti at The Scottish Kitchen Garden and Ruthie Rogers at River Cafe.
The Author is Cinead McTernan, a horticulturally trained writer and gardening editor of The Simple Things magazine. She was previously editors of The Edible Garden magazine and worked on The English Garden and BBC Gardeners' World magazines.
Award-winning photographer Jason Ingram has worked on numerous garden and food magazines. His published books include the Ethicurean Cookbook.
The Kitchen Garden Expert is a really good read, with lots of great gardening tips and a fascinating insight into the interaction between gardeners and chefs. However, I found it incredibly difficult to find many of the recipes that I either had access to ingredients for, or for which I was prepared to do all the cheffy preparation. If you have a fabulous kitchen garden full of unusual vegetables and herbs, or you live close to a superb market or greengrocer, and you have a penchant to cook like a top class chef, then I think you would really enjoy cooking from The Kitchen Garden Expert.
Here are a few of the recipe titles: 'Paris Market' and 'Sugarsnax' Carrots with Ham Fat Cream and Nasturtium; Sorrel Frittatta, Whitby Lobster with Quail Eggs and Garden Beans; Winteringham Wood Pigeon with Home-Grown Cabbage and Spring Onion, Plum and Almond Tart.
If like me you are more of a home cook on the run from work to table then you can still enjoy reading the book and maybe make adaptations to the recipes to suit your ingredients and cooking style, just as I have done, so here is the original recipe for Charcoal-Cooked Lamb Rack with Savoury Potatoes and my adaptation.
Charcoal-Cooked Lamb Rack with Savoury Potatoes
Justin Hammett (Jekka McVicar and the Company of Cooks)
Serves 4
2 racks of lamb (6 bones in each)
salt and pepper
4 tsp extra-virgin olive oil
Edible flowers to garnish (optional)
Red Wine Jus
750ml chicken stock
375ml red wine
Sprig of mint
small sprig of rosemary
Savoury Potatoes
120ml extra-virgin olive oil, plus some for coating ovenproof dish
1.2kg potatoes, Desiree or King Edward, peeled and thinly sliced
250g onions, thinly sliced
4 sprigs of winter savoury
Salt and pepper
500g cherry tomatoes
Roasted Vine Tomatoes
6-7 cherry tomatoes, on the vine
2 tsp extra-virgin olive oil
Sprig of winter savoury
1. Preheat the oven to 200C/400F/Gas 6. Heat 3 pieces of wood charcoal, each 4cm long, over a gas flame until they glow red. Create a cup shape from a square of tinfoil and leave on one side. Season the lamb racks with salt and pepper. Heat the oil in a sturdy, cast-iron casserole and seal the lamb, fat-side down. Drain off any excess oil. Put the tinfoil cup into the casserole alongside the racks, and using tongs, carefully place the glowing charcoal pieces in it. Put the lid on the casserole and place in the oven for 20 minutes. The juices of the lamb should run pink when pierced with a skewer. Leave to rest for about 20 minutes before carving into cutlets. Discard the charcoal and skim any fat from the surface of any juices left in the pan.
2. For the Red Wine Jus, simmer the stock with the red wine and herbs until syrupy and thickened. Add any charcoal infused juices from the lamb to the jus. Strain and discard the herbs.
3. For the Savoury Potatoes, preheat the oven to 180C. Brush the bottom and sides of a shallow ovenproof glass dish or small toasting tin with olive oil. Arrange some potatoes in a singe overlapping layer in a concentric circle over the base of the dish or tin. Scatter with one third of the onions and a sprinkling of winter savoury leaves, season with salt and pepper, add one-third of the cherry tomatoes and generously drizzle with 40ml of olive oil Repeat this process three times, finishing with the onions savoury and tomatoes on top. Season and drizzle with the remaining olive oil. Bake for 45-50 minutes until the tomato skins have darkened and the potatoes are tender. Remove from the oven; leave to cool for a few minutes.
4. For the roasted vine tomatoes, turn the oven up to 200C/400F/Gas 6. Put eh tomato vine in a small roasting tin drizzle with oil and sprinkle with winter savoury leaves. Roast for about 10 minutes, until the skins have blistered and the tomatoes softened.
5. To serve, place the roasted vine tomatoes over the savoury potatoes before serving with the lamb and red wine jus. Garnish with edible flowers.
Farmersgirl Kitchen Version
Lamb: Cook your leg of lamb as you prefer. I seasoned the lamb and cooked in a roasting tin, covered with tin foil with rosemary and 1/2 pint of water at 160C for 3 1/2 hours until meltingly tender.
Red Wine Jus: I made the wine jus as per the recipe.
For the Savoury Potatoes: I used small new potatoes and left their skins on, substituted chives for the onions and mint for the winter savoury, the tomatoes I used were not cherry tomatoes so I sliced them, otherwise as per the recipe. I added chive flowers sprinkled over the bake before serving.
I didn't add the roasted vine tomatoes.
The lamb was delicious and I would certainly make the red wine jus again, it was a nice change from gravy. The potato bake brings a summer flavour to a traditional roast meat dish and would be good to serve at a barbeque. I would probably use less olive oil and add some stock, so that the potatoes soak up flavour rather than oil.
Kitchen Garden Experts
by Cinead McTernan
Photography by Jason Ingram
Foreward by Raymond Blanc
Hardback RRP £20
Published by Frances Lincoln
If you would like to win a copy of Kitchen Garden Experts complete the questions on the Rafflecopter Widget, there are only two, nothing too difficult. The competition is only open to residents of the UK.
a Rafflecopter giveaway
To order Kitchen Garden Experts at the discounted price of £16.00 including p&p* (RRP: £20.00), telephone 01903 828503 or email mailorders@lbsltd.co.uk and quote the offer code APG130.
*UK ONLY - Please add £2.50 if ordering from overseas.
Labels: Bake, Cinead McTernan, Jus, Kitchen Garden Experts, lamb, potato, Raymond Blanc, red wine gravy, tomato
Hot 'n' Smoky Cheese and Tomato Wraps
This recipe is easy peasy Applewood Cheesey! The
Hot n Smoky Cheese and Tomato Wraps are easy to put together and full of flavour. You could vary the recipe in all sorts of ways as long as it includes cheese.
This is my third recipe for the
Applewood Spreadable Blogger Competition, check out the
Kale, Pumpkin and Smoked Cheese Tart and
Smoky Celeriac and Apple Remoulade.
Hot 'n' Smoky Cheese and Tomato Wraps
6 large tortillas or wraps
350g/12oz Applewood Smoked or mild cheddar, grated
100g/6oz Applewood Spreadable
200g chorizo
15g fresh coriander, chopped
2 spring onions
3 large vine ripened tomatoes
1 red chilli
First make the salsa
1. Deseed and chop the tomatoes and place in a bowl. Finely chop the spring onions, deseed and finely chop the chilli, add to the tomatoes and set aside.
2. Skin and chop the chorizo, fry it gently in a non-stick pan without oil until the sausage pieces start to char at the edges and the oil starts to run.
3. Lay out the tortillas and spread with the Applewood Spreadable, divide the chorizo between the 6 tortillas, laying it in a line down the middle.
4. Top the chorizo with the salsa, grateed Applewood Smoked Cheese (keeping some aside to top the finished dish) and chopped coriander.
5. Roll up the Tortillas, cut in half and layer them up in an ovenproof dish. Top with the remaining grated cheese.
6. Bake at 200C/400F for 15 minutes until heated through and the cheese has melted. Serve hot with salad.
I was provided with samples of Applewood Spreadable, Applewood Smoked Cheese and a hamper of other ingredients. I was not paid for this review and all opinions are my own. Labels: Applewood Smoked Spreadable, cheese, chilli, salsa, tomato, tortilla, wraps
Carrot and Tomato Soup - Credit Crunch Munch
This is one of my favourite soups, it's really easy to make and very economical. You can use up all the dodgy carrots at the bottom of your fridge drawer and with a couple of cheap cans of tomatoes, an onion some stock and a little milk, you can have enough soup for 8 people.
Carrot and Tomato Soup (serves 8)
1 tbsp sunflower oil (2p)
1 large onion, peeled and roughly chopped (19p)
Approx 600g carrots, peeled and roughly chopped (40p)
2 cans plum tomatoes
chopped or unchopped doesn't matter (31p)
1 litre vegetable stock (2p)
salt and freshly ground pepper
200ml milk
optional (15p)
1. Heat the oil in a large pan (I make this in my pressure cooker but it's not essential) add the onion and the carrots and stir them around for a few minutes.
2. Add the two tins of tomatoes and the stock.
3. Season with a tsp salt and a few grinds of pepper, you can adjust later if required.
4. Cook until the carrots are soft, 10 minutes in the pressure cooker, about 20 minutes without.
5. Puree the soup either with a stick blender straight into the pot or using a blender or food processor.
6. Add the milk if using, but the soup is also very good without it.
Total Cost: £1.09
Printable Recipe
Labels: carrot and tomato, Credit Crunch Munch, economical, Soup, tomato
Romanian Sweet and Sour Eggplant - Street Food!
STREET FOOD
I had never heard of
Susan Feniger until I was asked if I would like to review her book,
Street Food. It turns out that she is one of the original Food Network cooking stars.
Susan opened her first solo restaurant, STREET, in Los Angeles in 2009 and in this book she shares 83 of her favourite recipes adapted for home cooks.
What does Street Food mean to you? I was fairly horrified realise, how few street food opportunities we have locally, perhaps it’s just the very rural area that I live in and a climate that doesn’t encourage outdoor eating! Thinking about my own memories of street food, they do seem to be from holidays in the sun, I remember eating crepes in France, at 12 years old , and roast chicken never tasted better than the pollo roti eaten on a Spanish beach, but when I think of street food, it is the food we ate in Malaysia, we ate from street stalls almost every day for three weeks.
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| With my sister-in-law, eating Satay in Taiping, Malaysia |
This is a book for the adventurous cook. Someone who is willing to seek out unusual ingredients and try new techniques, not the comfortable, recognisable classics with a twist that many chefs produce. You may recognise a few of the dishes, like Thai Drunken Shrimp with Rice Noodles, but there are many more that I had certainly never heard of; "Any one for Tatsutage Fried Chicken with Spicy Yuzu Mayonnaise?"
The book has a well written introduction, where Susan Feniger talks about her love of Street Food and how she wants to re-create the ‘magical’ street experience. There is also a useful chapter called ‘Organizing the World’s Kitchen’, which takes the reader through the myriad of ingredients and explains which ingredient goes into which category:
THE SALTS; THE SOURS; THE SWEETS; THE HOT AND SPICY and THE MELLOWERS AND COOLERS.
The Contents are divided into:
Starters and Small Bites including Coconut Curry Caramel Corn, Spiced Millet Puffs and Lamb Meatballs with Date and Carob Molasses
Salads including Heirloom tomatoes with black garlic and basil vinaigrette, Baby Beet Salad with Kumquat, Mint and Coriander and Indian Puffed Rice Salad
Vegetables and Grains includes Cactus Relleno with corn and Arbol Salso, Romanian Sweet and Sour Eggplant, Cheese Grits with Three Pepper Relish
Land and Sea including Picadillo Chilli Dog with Mustard and Relish, Uruguay Chivito Steak and Fried Egg Sandwich, Malaysian Black Pepper Clams
Curry & Tofu & Noodles including Coconut Curried Mussels with smoky Chorizo, Chilled Soba Noodles with Spicy Orange Sesame and Tofu, Anatolian Ravioli with Chickpeas, Feta and Brown Butter
Chutneys & Pickles & other condiments including Tamarind Date Chutney, Japanese Pickled Vegetable Ribbons, Jamaican Ginger Hot Sauce
Basic Spice Mixes and Pastes including African Spice Mix, Thai Curry paste, Tamarind Puree
Sweets including Danish Black Licorice and Cherry Biscotti with Buttermilk Koldskal, Croatian Sour Apple Fritters, Turkish Doughnuts with Rose Hip Jam
Elixirs & Tonics & Lhassis including Canton Ginger Kick, Honeydew Cucumber Cooler, Salted Lhassi with Cumin and Mint.
In addition to the recipes there are four Travelogues, taking you in words and pictures to Vietnam, India, Turkey and Mongolia. Susan Feniger summons up the sights, sounds, smells and particularly the tastes of the places she visits and the food she eats. I enjoyed reading these sections, they help to contextualise the culture and landscape of the original recipes.
Pros
I enjoyed the variety of the recipes and found the different techniques and ingredients really inspirational. I can see this book being a jumping off point for all kinds of cooking experimentation.
The photographs are clear and the recipes well laid out.
There are useful hints and tips, with photographs introducing particular ingredients and, sometimes, offering alternatives
Cons
There are no metric ingredients measures and no conversion chart, as with many US publications.
Some of the ingredients would be extremely difficult to source e.g. Cactus Paddles!!!
Romanian Sweet and Sour Eggplant
Makes 4 Cups
Serves 4-6
Here is what Susan says about this recipe: There’s a very traditional dish made in home kitchens all throughout Romania and south eastern Europe that’s typically called “eggplant salad”. I toyed with different ways to highlight the key flavours of the original recipes which seems underplayed. I like to make a green salad with watercress, olive oil and lemon, top it with a scoop of this sweet and sour eggplant, and serve it with a slice of toasted sourdough bread topped with goat’s cheese and roasted red peppers.
2 large eggplants (aubergines) about 2lb
3 tbsp plus ½ teaspoon kosher salt (rock salt)
½ cup extra virgin olive oil
10 cloves of garlic
2 bunches of scallions (spring onions), white and green parts, roughly chopped (1/4 cup)
½ teaspoon cayenne pepper
Canola oil
1 (14 oz) can whole peeled tomatoes, drained and roughly chopped
¾ cup cider vinegar
½ cup packed dark brown sugar
Cut off and
discard both ends of each eggplant, and cut them lengthwise into ¼ inch thick
slices. Lay the slices out on a baking
sheet, and sprinkle both sides with the 3 tablespoons of salt. Set aside for 20 minutes so that he salt will
draw out some of the water from the eggplant. Then pat the eggplant dry with a
dish towel.
Put the olive oil,
garlic, scallions, parsley, cayenne and remaining ½ teaspoon salt in a food
processor,and puree until a smooth paste forms (it will resemble pesto). Spread liberally all over both sides of the
eggplant slices.
In a large sauté
pan set over medium-high heat, heat 2 tbsp canola oil. Add enough eggplant slices to cover the
bottom of the pan, and cook until they are browned on both sides and cooked
through, 2 to 3 minutes per side.
Transfer the eggplant to a platter or plate. Repeat this process with the remaining
eggplant slices, adding 2 tablespoon oil for each batch. Cut the cooked eggplant into 1 inch wide
strips.
In a saucepan set
over medium heat, combine the tomatoes, vinegar and brown sugar. Stew for 12 minutes or until the tomatoes
begin breaking down. Add the eggplant
strips and stir together. Reduce the
heat to low and simmer for 8 to 10 minutes until most of the liquid has been
cooked off. Remove from the heat and
serve or chill. This dish may be served
warm or cold.
We enjoyed the Romanian Sweet and Sour Eggplant, it's bursting with flavour and can be made ahead. There is nothing particularly daunting about the recipe as long as you have a food processor to make the 'pesto'. I think it would be a great dish to include in a tapas/mezze style meal.
I doubt if I would have picked up this book in a book shop, but I would really have been missing out on an enjoyable reading experience and an excellent cookbook. It is some time since I have felt inspired to take a cookbook to bed to read, high praise indeed! I would recommend it to anyone who wants to try some new flavours and and regain their cooking mojo! Be inspired to try some STREET FOOD.
Street Food by Susan Feniger with Kajsa Alger and Liz Lachman
Published by Random House, USA
Distributed by Grantham Book Services for Publishers Group UK
RRP £18.99, available at popular online book store for £12.15
Thanks for to PGUK for the opportunity to review this book
Labels: Aubergine, Cook book review, garlic, Malaysia, parsley, Romanian Sweet and Sour Eggplant, satay, Street Food, Susan Feniger, tomato
La Tasca Paella de Carne Recipe
A few weeks ago, I was invited to
La Tasca in Renfield Street, Glasgow to watch Executive Chef Antonio Bennetto and Thomas, the La Tasca chef, demonstrate cooking paella, as well as tasting the delicious autumn menu for La Tasca. You can read about it in my blog post
'Paella People'
After the demonstration I wanted to make some Paella myself. As I wanted it to be as authentic to La Tasca as possible, I asked if they would be able to provide a recipe for me and was delighted when the answer was YES!
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| Paella de Carne ingredients |
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| Frying the onion and peppers in garlic infused oil |
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| Adding the chicken and chorizo |
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| Adding the prawns and peas |
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| Adding the rice in a cross |
LA TASCA PAELLA DE CARNE
Serves 2 – 4 people
Prep time: 20 minutes
Cook time: 30-35 minutes
INGREDIENTS
200g of Spanish paella rice such as bomba or calasparra
2 tbs garlic infused olive oil
1 tsp pimenton de la vera dulce (smoked sweet paprika)
Pinch of saffron (or turmeric if you don’t have saffron)
675ml good quality chicken stock (475ml if using calasparra)
4 large ripe tomatoes
1 small white onion
2 medium sized fresh chicken breasts, diced into 25mm chunks
100g fresh chorizo sausage, sliced into rounds about ½ a cm in thickness
40g of fine beans, top, tailed and chopped into 1cm
30g of garden peas
Pinch of salt & pepper
1 roasted red pepper cut into quarters to garnish
1 lemon cut into wedges
CROCKERY
1 Paella Pan or a 30cm Large Heavy bottom frying pan
1 small pan for tomatoes
METHOD
1. Cut the onion and pepper into roughly 2cm cubes.
2. Score a small cross on the base of each tomato, then carefully place into a pan with boiling water, leave for 20 to 30 seconds, then remove using a slotted spoon. Drop the tomatoes into a bowl of ice cold water and leave to cool. Remove the tomatoes then peel away the skin. Cut the tomatoes into quarters, remove the seeds with a spoon, and then roughly chop the flesh. Set the chopped tomato aside.
3. Place a Paella pan or sauté pan over medium heat and when hot pour in the garlic infused olive oil. Add the onions and peppers and cook for 3-4 minutes until softened then move to one side of the pan.
4. Add the chicken and chorizo, stirring through and cook for 2-3 minutes until the chicken starts to brown and the chorizo begins to lightly caramelise before mixing back through with the peppers and onion.
5. Add the diced tomatoes, almost all of the chicken stock (leave 50 to 75ml back) and the pimenton, saffron/or turmeric. Mix in the green beans and peas, turn the heat up and once the broth is at a rolling boil and the chicken is cooked through, taste to make sure you are happy with the flavour (at this point you are looking for a strong flavour of Smokey paprika, saffron (if using) and a rich chicken stock kick) – season with salt and pepper if required.
6. Add the Paella rice making a cross in the pan with the rice from one side to the other.
7. Share the rice around the pan carefully using a spoon to distribute the rice into the 4 sections making sure the rice is even and in every part of the pan. Cook for 10 minutes on medium to high heat. Do not stir.
8. Turn the heat down to low, place the roasted red pepper quarters on top of the paella and cook for 10 minutes until the broth has been absorbed by the rice.
(Have the remaining chicken stock on hand to gently ladle over the rice if required at any point within these 10 minutes).
Once the broth has totally disappeared, check that the rice is al dente – cooked but with a slight bite, then turn off the heat and let it rest!
A Rest is so important: 15 minutes is the La Tasca golden rule, however if you have the luxury of waiting up to 45 minutes you will see a notable difference in texture and condensed taste. If you choose the 45 minute wait, make sure you cover the pan loosely with kitchen foil.
Great Paella should have a layer of rice caramelised on the bottom of the pan together with looking compact and caramelised on top; add the lemons just before serving!
Only fluff up the Paella when you are about to serve!
Please note: I added some prawns to the original recipe, as I am a big fan of seafood.
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| Finished Paella |
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The paella was delicious with a rich smoky flavour from the smoked paprika and chorizo, I would certainly make it again. Many thanks to Antiono for supplying the recipe and to Jade, Ella and Amy for being so accommodating.
Note: I found that I had to cover the pan with foil towards the end of cooking to get the rice on the top to cook properly. This is probably because my pan wasn't big enough to get a thin layer.
Labels: Chicken, chorizo, La Tasca, Paella de Carne, peas, pimenton, prawns, recipe, rice, smoked paprika, tomato
Salad Lunch with Pie!
I made a trip out to our local Farm Shop,
Kilnford Barns to stock up on some of their Galloway Beef, Blackface Lamb and Outdoor Reared Pork all locally produced. While I was there I spied this pie in the Deli, it's ham, chicken and stuffing, as I'd been out all day I thought it would be ideal for our supper with some simple salads. This piece was around £6.00 however, it served three people. It's a heavy little pie, because it is stuffed with lots of meat and is quite filling so overall it was good value and really very delicious.
I got a new food processor recently and it is brilliant for making your own coleslaw. This one has sliced white cabbage, sliced fennel and grated carrots dressed with a well seasoned mix of mayonnaise and greek yogurt and topped with some roughly chopped pistaschio nuts.
The hot potato salad with spring onions and mint was featured on
Lavender and Lovage and was easy to make and delicious.
My basil plant has finally produced leaves big enough to pick. They are still pretty small but another week and I will be wondering what to do with them all! Simply sliced tomatoes, seasoned with salt, pepper and a pinch of sugar, dressed with olive oil and topped with basil leaves.
The salad leaves came from my little salad trough, which has done better than ever before due to the huge quantity of water coming from the sky and the muggy temperatures.
Here are the salad leaves in situ
And here are the salads laid out on the table to accompany the pie. It may not be much of a summer, but that doesn't mean we can't eat and enjoy summer food.
Labels: coleslaw, Kilnford Barns, leaves, Pie, potato salad, tomato
'Groovy' Focaccia and Salmon with Tomato Vinaigrette
I love olive oil, so I was intrigued when I was asked to review some oils from Groovy Food, I was sent two different oils:
Omega Cool Oil –a
clever organic blend of Omega 3, 6 and 9. Specially pressed from flax, hemp,
pumpkin and evening primrose seed oils, serving up a perfectly balanced amount
of essential fatty acids, which our bodies crave. Cool Oil is also the perfect
accompaniment to cold foods and as such is ideal when drizzled onto salads,
blended into smoothies or used simply for dipping breads and olives.
High Five Cooking Oil –
sees a unique yet complimentary fusion of five cold pressed virgin seed oils.
Blended to perfection High Five Cooking Oil is the ideal healthier alternative
to other cooking fats. Offering high nutritional properties whilst graced with
a subtle flavour, the oils unique characteristics ensure the great taste is
retained even when cooking at high temperatures.
I thought I'd put the oil to the test with a bit of baking and some cooking.
Groovy Focaccia
500g strong white flour
2tsp dried yeast
1 1/2tsp salt
1 tsp caster sugar
175ml water
75ml white wine
75ml High Five Omega Cooking Oil
2 tbsp rosemary, finely chopped
3 tbsp Omega Cool Oil for drizzling
Sea salt flakes for scattering
1. Put the flour, yeast, salt, sugar, water, wine and High Five Cooking Oil into your bread maker and set for dough.
2. When the dough programme finishes, roll or pull the dough out, oil a baking sheet or roasting tin and fill with the dough.
3. Cover with a tea towel and put in a warm place to rise for about an hour to an hour and a half.
4. Us your fingertips to gently press into the surface of the dough, brush with a little High Five Cooling Oil and scatter over the rosemary and sea salt.
5. Heat the oven to 200C and bake for 30 minutes until golden brown.
6. Sprinkle with the remaining Omega Cool Oil.
The Groovy Focaccia was very good, although I did miss the taste provided by the olive oil. I also tried dipping the focaccia in the Omega Cool Oil but I felt that the flavour of the oil didn't lend itself to dipping.
I was planning on having some salmon fillets for supper so used the oil in Recipe #2:
Salmon with Tomato Vinaigrette
4 salmon fillets
2 tbsp Omega Cool Oil
1 tbsp champagne or wine vinegar
1 tsp Dijon mustard
2 garlic cloves, crushed
1 tsp caster sugar
4 ripe tomatoes, deseeded and finely chopped
salt & freshly ground pepper
1. Mix the Omega Cool Oil, mustard, vinegar, garlic and sugar together. Add the diced tomatoes.
2. Brush the salmon with oil and place in a hot frying pan skin side down to crisp the skin, when skin is brown, turn the salmon and cook for 2 minutes, then switch off the heat and leave as the heat in the pan will cook the salmon through.
3. Place the salmon onto the plate and spoon over the vinaigrette.
Serve with roasted red peppers filled with chopped tomatoes and garlic and drizzled with High Five Cooking Oil.
The salmon was delicious as was the roasted red pepper and I would say that the lighter flavour of the seed oil was a really good match for the fish and the vinaigrette was quick easy and one of the best ways of adding a bit of zing to farmed salmon that I have found.
The Groovy Food Oils collection is available
throughout Tesco and Sainsbury’s stores nationwide, selected health food
retailers and online at freefromandfinefoods.co.uk.
Omega Cool Oil – 250ml – from £8.49
High Five Cooking Oil – 500ml - from £6.99
The company themselves are very passionate about their products as you can see
from their website: www.groovyfood.co.uk.
Disclosure Statement: I received two bottles of oil from Groovy Foods to review. I was not required to write a positive
review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. The prices are
correct at time of posting.
Labels: Bread, breadmaker, champagne vinegar, digon mustard, Focaccia, Groovy Foods, High Five omega cooking oil, Omega Cool Oil, roasted red peppers, Rosemary, Salmon Vinaigrette, tomato, vinaigrette
