More of a porky week, this week : Meal planning w/b 17 Oct 11

My favourite style of potatoes

From last week's lamby week, to this week's porky week - in one fell swoop.

As has become traditional, let's finish off last week by telling you how I got on with the idea of the Lamb with Boulangere style potatoes.


Well, it was all going so well until it went into the oven.  The lamb mince, onion and carrots tasted good - full of different flavours but in a somewhat thicker sauce than I had anticipated, but I hoped it would do well enough.  Hubby likes to have a "sauce" rather than a "broth" on his plate, you see.

I painted each layer of mandolin-cut potatoes with melted butter into which I'd added a sprinkling of chopped rosemary, so all should have been well there.

Brussels sprouts!  ~mouth waters~

The trouble was, after 2½ hrs of cooking, the carrots were tender, the potatoes were cooked through - but all the lovely flavours had left home.

I'm really not sure where they went.  For all I know, they could be hiding at the back of the cooker, just waiting until the next time I make a meringue, when they will leap out and savoury it up.

No, all joking aside, I was disappointed.  I have a sneaking suspicion that the sauce was to blame, as it had nigh-on disappeared and I suspect had taken all the flavour with it.  I jolly well knew that sauce was too thick!  Serves me right for not letting it down with some water.  But there we are, 'tis done now.

Because I'm not happy with the recipe, I'll not be passing it on.  I may well have another go one day (and make sure the sauce is right, this time) so I'll blog it if it succeeds that time.

Mind you, those little brussels sprouts were divine.  From the bottom of our garden, they were little baby sproutlings of ultimate deliciousness.  Look at their happy smiling faces!  How can you resist?

So, shaking off the unsuccessful Monday, let's have a look at what the remainder of the week has in store :

Tues : Pasta alla Amatriciana

Weds : Slow cooked pork & celeriac with crusty bread (or toasts)

Thurs : Cheese, onion & potato pie, baked beans & hash browns

Fri : Pasta bolognese with doughballs

Sat : Beef Rendang & Sag Aloo with rice

Sun : "Posh Porks", with carrots, tenderstem broccoli & rice

Mon : Full English breakfast.

So, who is thinking "some of that sounds familiar"?

Well, after last week went so severely to worms, there are two meals included in this week's list that didn't make it onto last week's dining table - and because a) I'd bought everything for one (Pasta alla Amatriciana) and b) I'd promised son & heir we'd have it (Full English breakfast), I was committed.

Being Tuesday, we've just had the Pasta alla Amatriciana for dinner and it was marvellous.  I have been using Tarantella tomatoes in preference to any other kind of tinned tomatoes just lately and have now found some Tarantella tomato puree.  The flavour is a cut above other tomatoes, they don't cook up to be so acidic, plus the colour is beautiful.  So the colour you see in the photograph is absolutely the colour that the dish turned out to be.  Utterly fab!

Mind you, I very nearly killed the entire dish through SUCH a schoolboy error - but I won't embarrass myself right now - I'll save that for later when I blog the recipe for you.

Celeriac - the ugly duckling of veg.

I found the Slow cook Pork & Celeriac recipe on the BBC Good Food website and was intrigued by the combination of flavours.  I thought it sounded completely lovely and so perfect for these colder days we're having.

I was going to serve it with crusty bread for mopping up all the lovely flavours in the sauce/gravy, however, I notice in this month's BBC Good Food Magazine there's a natty little idea for anchovy toasts to accompany a beef stew.  Now I'm not suggesting making anchovy versions, but I'm definitely pondering on some kind of toast!

Thursday's Cheese, Onion & Potato Pie is very definitely "one for the boys".

Hubby astounded me the other day by announcing that he "loves Cheese & Potato Pie".  Say what?  This, from the man who abhors every incarnation of potato except the chip and crisp?

Well okay then!  I found a likely-sounding recipe on BBC Good Food (always my first port of call for reliable recipes) and we'll be having it with "man food", i.e. baked beans and hash browns.

Having made the males in my life happy, (well, one can but hope!), I get a night off when hubby cooks us a pasta bolognese.  Once again he'll be using the Tarantella tomatoes - and he does make a pretty darned good bolognese.  It will make son & heir happy, as any dinner that involves meat + carbohydrate, minus discernible vegetables but + cheese, is dinner nirvana for him right now.

My ever-faithful slow cooker

Saturday's Beef Rendang I'm very much looking forward to cooking.  It's a recipe by Atul Kochhar which I found on the UK TV Good Food website.  I will be cooking it in the slow cooker, as the recipe demands a good 2 hrs cooking in the oven, otherwise.

Thanks to the success of the Keema Mutter and Vegetable Curry, I've got a bit of confidence in supplying two Indian dishes (and a rice) at any one time.  So, owing to the fact that I'm using the slow cooker and will have time to spare, I decided to take advantage of what seemed like a cracking recipe for Sag Aloo (from the My Dish website).  I'll be able to make the Sag Aloo while the rice is cooking.

I'm quietly excited about this one, as they both sound completely delicious.  Fingers crossed!

Before I started writing Rhubarb & Ginger, I used to keep a note of yummy recipes by blogging them on my personal blog, Timewasting.  So the other day, I decided to go through them and pick out the ones which were particularly nice, to do again and blog them onto Rhubarb & Ginger.

The first of these is a lovely recipe that now goes by the name of "Posh Porks".  Well, it's all because it uses pork and my internet nickname has long been PoshPaws.  See?

It's basically a "pork in mushroom cream sauce", served with seasonal vegetables and rice.  It was one of the first recipes that I devised completely, without any adaptation of another recipe - so I am quietly proud of it.  I think it will be interesting to cook it again, in the light of the experience I've gained since then.  I can feel (already) the urge to include some white wine in that sauce ...

Which brings us back to the Full English Breakfast, a meal of bacon, sausage, egg (but not for hubby), mushrooms (but not for son & heir), black pudding, baked beans (but not for me), tomato (but not for either chap) and fried bread (definitely not for me - I'll have toast!).

Looking at that list of likes, dislikes and dietary requirements, I'm jolly glad I'm not cooking it!

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What is on the menu for this week?

This week seems to be following in last week's chaotic footprints.  I seem to have failed miserably on the ordering front, because we're missing and running out of so many things!  Hubby had to go out yesterday on his new bike (which wasn't a tragedy for him - he's looking for reasons to take it out), for emergency dog biscuit - and I've already put cling film and washing-up liquid on the shopping list for tonight.  *sigh*


It is true that I did do the online shopping in a bit of a hurry, last Sunday.  Once my parents had left for home, it suddenly occurred to me that I needed to not only place the order, but before that make the shopping list and before that, decide what the heck we'd be eating.  So as time marched on, I suspect my thinking may have got a little fluffy.

Hey ho.  I'm sure we'll survive!  There's a lot worse going on across the globe, so mustn't grumble over a roll of cling film and a bottle of washing up liquid, eh?

Here's what's on the menu this week :

Honey Mustard Chicken, herb salad & jacket potato with sour cream & chives

Sultana chicken with Jasmine rice

Sausage in a roll, chips and coleslaw

Bacon & blue cheese filo tart, with red onion & tomato salad

Salmon & Orzo salad

Bacon & Pepper Lasagne, with a green salad

Pasta bolognese, with garlic dough balls.

A bit of a random selection - with salad featuring quite prominently!  Which, of course, means it's going to rain.  Betcha.

Yesterday started things off very well.  The Honey Mustard Chicken was really lovely.  For once, the honey mustard glaze actually glazed the chicken instead of rolling off and spending its time being wasted at the bottom of the pan.  I don't know why I have this problem with glazes - but they rarely work.  In fact, this is the first glaze to work in around a thousand years (or thereabouts).  Well, that's how it feels, anyway.

I wonder if cooking the chicken at a higher temperature (because the jacket potatoes were in the oven, I cooked it at 200deg C instead of around 180deg C) had anything to do with it.  I suspect it may have done, so I'll test that theory the next time I attempt to glaze some chicken.  The meat had retained its softness, yet with a suitably glazed exterior.  Even the small fillets weren't over-cooked, as I'd snuggled them up to the side of the larger pieces which had afforded them protection from the fiercest of the heat.

The potatoes I used for the jackets were Asda's extra special Marabel potatoes.  They purported to require no butter, as they'd be rich enough.  Of course, we treated that information with the contempt it seemingly deserved and hubby loaded up the jackets with butter.  I added sour cream and chives to mine and son & heir's, but I have to say, I really don't think the butter was entirely necessary.  It's so rare to find a product that does what it says on the packet!

Along with the lovely herb salad (by far and away my favourite type of salad), it made for a thoroughly delicious meal which I will blog the recipe for.

Photo c/o BBC Good Food

Wednesday should have been the Bacon & Blue Cheese Filo Tart, but owing to the reluctance of the chicken to defrost last week, everything has been moved on a day or so.  Hence, we'll be having the Sultana Chicken and Jasmine Rice that had been booked in for last Monday.  Son & heir has decreed he'll be attending a friend's house "to work on a science homework project" (possibly also known as "mucking about with guitars") where he's undoubtedly hoping to get some tea.  In turn, I'll be hoping that he lets me know whether he'll require feeding, before I start cooking the rice!

Thursday's dinner is a "dinner for boys".  We're having sausages - ordinary bangers that is, rather than hot dog sausages, in a hot dog roll with fried onions and tomato ketchup.  Hubby and son & heir will both be having chips, but I've taken the opportunity to whip up a home made coleslaw.  Neither of them eat coleslaw, but I love the stuff - so hopefully, everyone will be happy!  Yes, I know it's a Bonfire Night dinner really, but maybe we'll set fire to the pile of dead weeds in the garden and make do.

Friday brings about the return of the Bacon & Blue Cheese Filo Tart.  By hubby's special request.  It's the kind of tart that looks like you've spent ages fiddling about cooking this and that for it, but in reality it's simply a "cook some bacon, assemble the rest" job.  Simple as - provided I remember to include the pine nuts.  The last twice I've made this tart, they've been forgotten and it certainly does lose something in the flavour without them.  I'll have to make sure I get them out of the cupboard to begin with!  I'll be making a red onion and tomato-based salad to go with it, as the cheese and onion is a lovely combination - as is the tomato, of course.

Now Friday should have been Scampi and chips - but thanks to the freezer, the Scampi can quite happily wait until next week.

Saturday's Salmon and Orzo salad is a new combination for us - and the first time I'll have used Orzo in a salad context.  However, using it in the same way as one would do rice, in order to make a dressed salad, seems to me to have the capacity to work.  I just hope I can get some fresh Dill on Saturday, or I'll be scratching my head for an alternative.  ~thinks ~  I suppose Fennel would work .... hmmmn.  I hope the salmon isn't so expensive that it leaves me wondering, either!

All the ingredients, from the last time I cooked the tart.

Now comes the dish that requires all the cooking.  Sunday's Bacon & Pepper Lasagne is a real production that requires a Sunday in which to do the cooking of it proper justice.  I suspect that I'll be rather done for by the end of dinner, that day!  However, the Lasagne itself is worth every moment of energy expended in the production of it.  Never have I tasted a better Lasagne - not even true Lasagne's, involving beef instead of the bacon.  The combination of the bacon and the sweet peppers, mixed with the sauce which I make with red leicester cheese, is just a glorious orange coloured melange of tastebud tittilating flavours.  I'm using fresh egg pasta for the first time, too - ordinarily I use the dried pasta sheets.  I'm not sure what the difference will be, but I'm crossing my fingers that it'll be good!

We're staying in Italy for the final dish of the week - a good old Bolognese.  Not spaghetti this time, because I've got so many half-bags of spirali, penne and fusilli, I think we'll have a mixture and try to finish some of them up!  This dish will also use up the beef mince I bought from Spring Fields Butchers, when I wasn't sure whether I'd be able to find lamb mince for one of the dishes a couple of weeks ago.  It's a good dish for a Monday, as it doesn't take much preparation, so when I'm all tired and brain-dead after adding up and taking away for the last four hours at work, I can (almost) put it together with my eyes shut.

So, there you have it!  Oh, one other thing - I'm planning on making some vegetable soup for lunch today, from the leftover ends of the asparagus, fennel, green beans and leeks we used at the weekend.  Fingers crossed it will turn out to be yummy - as I have been looking forward to a lovely bowl of soup, since Sunday!

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