Well, it's a new week but the alternative carbohydrate experiments continue. It was the turn of couscous today, however, the first consideration was what type of protein to have.
We had the other half of our bag of individually frozen salmon fillets to use as I don't like to leave fish in the freezer for very long. It tends towards getting freezer burn so quickly, to make the best of its best, I wanted to use it fairly rapidly.
So, salmon. We've not been the greatest eaters of fish in the past - although we would have been, given the chance! Fresh fish is so flipping expensive that it often renders itself out of the equation for my dinner considerations. However, Asda have recently been selling a greatly improved range of frozen fish - and for an affordable price. This salmon has been our first foray into sampling some of it and we've been really pleasantly surprised. Naturally, it's nothing like the quality of fresh salmon - it really doesn't have a chance of being - but it isn't half bad, for frozen.
We have had two meals from the bag and there are two fillets left - which I imagine will go into a fish pie. It cost around £8 and at £4 for a meal didn't seem too expensive. That was, until we realised there were 11 (albeit small) fillets in the bag which meant two meals plus a bit! Even better.
So, what to do with this salmon? I'd grilled it in a marinade previously, so didn't want to repeat that. I hadn't really come to any conclusions, other than I knew that I wanted to keep the fish in its fillets and not break it up into pieces. Historically, we've had "broken into pieces" fish because that's all we could afford, so to have a fillet on your plate was quite a treat.
I was browsing through this month's BBC Good Food magazine and saw a recipe for Sicilian Cod, i.e. cod fillet with a thick tomato and herb sauce drizzled over. Now that had promise - as the acidity of the tomato sauce would work very well with the oily salmon.
What to serve the fish and sauce with, then? Potatoes immediately came to mind (I have to get out of that habit!) and got abandoned. I wanted something a bit more creative and something a bit more exciting.
In this rehash of our diet, I've tried - with every new recipe - to create a meal that has balance across all the food groups without creating huge portions. There's no doubt we've been eating too much (portion-wise) just lately and I was keen to bring the size back down again. Portion size is another of my problems, you see. I can't help it, I seem to channel some Jewish mother somewhere, who just wants to feed the family until their eyeballs pop. Hence, this portion control was in the back of my mind too.
I'm really not sure what made me think of the Ottolenghi Green Couscous, but I'm jolly glad I did. We really like this form of couscous - hubby says it's because you can't taste the couscous for all the herbs, onions, chilli and other loveliness that is in there. I love the interaction between the herbs, fried onion and sea salt that just teases the tongue.
I've made the Ottolenghi Green Couscous a couple of times in the past, but it has been a while since I made it last. The recipe is on Rhubarb & Ginger, just click on the link on the name above.
I reckoned the fish would go with the couscous with no real problem and the big flavour of the tomato sauce would complement the freshness and richness of the couscous. Decision made, Sicilian Salmon with Green Couscous was officially on the menu list.
None of the three components are difficult to make, the couscous is really just a matter of preparing the onions and herbs to mix into the couscous, the sauce is simplicity itself to make and the fish couldn't be easier, as I simply grilled the fillets.
It would have taken a bit longer if it wasn't for hubby who jumped into the role of sous chef and fried up the first batch of onions for me. Well, he had sidetracked me earlier when we were having fun translating various Polish phrases - most of which involved the word "doughnut" - from English to Polish and back again. I will have to tell you more of the Polish Delicatessen we visited today - but that's another story!
As I suspected, the three component parts - fish, sauce, couscous - went together really well and the flavours were really interesting. Even son & heir enjoyed his meal, saying that the tomato sauce went really really well with the couscous - and went back to the kitchen to get more! Now that really IS a vote of confidence. Hubby was very happy to have another meal that was not only a little bit different, but completely devoid of potatoes. *chuckle* It's not going to last - but if I can include a potato every now and then, just to soothe son & heir's and my own potato lust, that'll do.
A little "cooks note" that is worth mentioning, is that both the tomato sauce and the Green Couscous can be made well in advance. So if you're going to be tight for time one evening - it makes a very good choice!
February 2016 : This time, I paired the salmon up with some spinach fettucine and a side salad, which worked really well. I also made the following changes to the recipe :
- swapped a sweet white onion for the red one, which looked better;
- added 2 rashers of finely chopped bacon to the onions & garlic, all of which I cooked together instead of separately;
- added 3 sliced chestnut mushrooms and a chopped tomato to the pan once the onions etc were softened
- added 1 heaped teaspoonful of tomato puree;
- swapped out the oregano for 1 big teaspoonful of chopped dill;
- swapped the sugar for 1 teaspoonful of runny honey.
Recipe development in action! I think the changes and additions make for a more rounded, deeper flavour in the sauce and I'll be making it this way in future. I have reflected the changes in the recipe below.
31 March 2017 and this time I think I'm getting the hang of cooking salmon! Served on mushroom couscous, this was by far and away the best incarnation of this dish so far. :)
SICILIAN SALMON (serves 3)
Ingredients :
1 tbsp rapeseed or olive oil
2 rashers smoked back bacon, chopped small (optional)
a small red onion (or white sweet onion), chopped finely
a clove of garlic, chopped finely
3 sliced chestnut mushrooms (optional)
1 chopped tomato (optional)
400g tin of chopped tomatoes - the best you can get
1 tbsp tomato ketchup
1 heaped tsp tomato puree (optional)
1 tsp dried oregano (or dried dill)
a pinch of sea salt
half a tsp of freshly ground black pepper
1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
1 tsp sugar (or honey)
100ml water
3 salmon fillets, skinless and boneless.
Method :
1. Heat the oil in a frying pan and add the bacon, onion and garlic. Fry until the onion is softened but not coloured in any way and the bacon is cooked through.
2. Add the mushrooms and tomato and continue to fry until the mushrooms are beginning to soften.
3. Add the rest of the ingredients (except for the salmon) and stir to combine. Simmer over a low to medium heat, stirring regularly, until thickened.
4. Place the fish fillets - upside down - onto a flat roasting tray, season and drizzle with olive oil. Place under a pre-heated grill for 2-3 minutes. Turn the fish carefully and replace under the grill for as long as it takes for the fish to change from translucent to opaque.
5. Taste the sauce for seasoning and adjust if necessary.
6. Serve the fish over couscous or fettucine pasta, with the sauce drizzled over.
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For really quite a long time - ever since seeing them on the t.v. - I have wanted to reproduce those gorgeous Spanish style tapas meatballs that you see being served in small terracotta dishes. They look so yummy with their thick tomato sauce that just the sight of them is enough to set my saliva glands tingling.
Well - and purely by accident - I think I've just achieved it.
I didn't set out to make a tapas-style meatball at all. I'd found a recipe on goodfoodchannel.co.uk probably around a year or more ago, which I'd filed away in my folder of "good ideas" with a view to making some time in the future. It was a Peter Gordon recipe, so immediately I had confidence in it as Peter Gordon always appears to me to be something of a "serious" chef, as opposed to those who are more keen on the t.v. appearances than making good food.
What made me decide to make the recipe now, though, was entirely down to the fact that I had a tin of Sainsbury's butter beans burning a hole in my tin cupboard. I'd had a discussion with a friend on Facebook about how much we liked butter beans and she'd recommended Sainsbury's as being good ones of their type. (Thanks Marj!) I really dislike soggy butter beans that just fall apart when they're cooked - and these ones definitely don't do that. They're tender, but still firm enough to cope with being stirred regularly. Now I really - no, really - like butter beans, so the knowledge that I had a tin of good ones in the cupboard was more than enough enticement.
There was something else about the recipe that tickled my curiosity. In the meatball method, it said to include four tablespoonfuls of cold water into the meatball mixture. I so nearly didn't do this, as it seemed as though - with the grated carrot there too - it stood the chance of making the meatball terribly soggy. However, I decided to place my trust in Peter Gordon's capable hands and complied with the recipe. What a revelation!
Now anyone who has ever made meatballs from scratch, will know that the blasted meatball mix will stick to your fingers and steadfastly refuse to be moulded into a ball. I'd read a little tip which said to run your fingers under cold water whilst rolling the ball, which very definitely helped - in fact, it made the task do-able. However, if you add the water to the meatball mix, you don't need to keep running them under the tap (with accompanying water wasteage and cross-contamination hygiene issues). The meatball mix just rolls up without a squeak of complaint and - what's even better - is the meatball stays moist and delicious throughout the browning process, right the way to being served! As I say - a revelation!
The grated carrot was another departure from the norm - and one which worked brilliantly. The flavours of lamb and mint are traditional and the addition of the grated carrot really brought out the sweetness of the lamb, along with helping to ensure the meatballs stayed moist.
As ever, well you wouldn't expect anything else now, would you? I made a few changes to the original recipe - which I have reflected in the recipe below - both to suit what ingredients I had in the house and to suit our palates. Amongst a few other things, for instance, the original recipe called for 8 cloves of garlic. Now we do like garlic - but 8? Between three of us? I don't think so - especially as all eight go into the sauce! Hence, I trimmed it down to a much more acceptable 2.
The quantity of mince is 800g on the recipe, whereas a supermarket pack of mince is generally 600g. From the 600g, I made 21 meatballs which were a good size - with a bowl of sauce and butterbeans for lunch the following day. (Which coupled with a fresh baked baguette was just such a stellar lunch!). So feel free to increase the size to 800g if you've extra mouths to feed. I found the 600g fed the three of us perfectly.
The recipe also called for 200g of bacon lardons. Well, I have to admit that I've no time for lardons - not when my local butcher is still selling their wonderful smoked back bacon for a fraction of the price of 100g of lardons! It's all bacon, after all. So I swapped those lardons for three large (and I'm talking large) rashers of smoked back bacon, cut into small pieces. It worked. It worked very nicely thank you.
Owing to hubby's sensitivity to tomatoes - the acidity tends to give him rampant indigestion if not cooked out very well indeed - I habitually add a little tomato ketchup. Now you could add a little sugar to do the same job - but tomato ketchup has all those intriguing spices along with the sugar, that add that little je ne sais quoi to a tomato sauce and helps to kill the acidity.
Quite apart from anything else, this recipe is a complete doddle to make. Apart from forming the meatballs (which really doesn't take very long at all), it's a simple matter of chucking everything in order into a deep pan, stirring occasionally and cooking something to help mop up the sauce.
Speaking of which, I decided to cook some Orzo. Now I'd only ever used Orzo once before, in my Greek Lamb & Orzo Bake - which we all really liked. So I knew that I was onto a fairly safe bet there. Son and heir was momentarily befuddled by it, asking what sort of rice it was, but was satisfied when we revealed that it was a tiny pasta instead. He commented that it was "odd" and didn't finish his portion - but for the first go in a very long time, plus the first time of having it as a side dish, I think he did pretty well. He's a conservative ole thing, don'cha know. I added a few frozen peas to the Orzo more with a view to their colour than flavour, but they added a nice sweetness that the Orzo alone couldn't have delivered.
All in all, I was very pleased indeed with this meal. Everyone loved the meatballs and to have found a tapas style meatball in tomato sauce is a very definite bonus, as I have a yen to make a tapas style dinner one night. So, my first dish is tucked firmly behind my ear for later!
LAMB & CARROT MEATBALLS WITH BUTTERBEANS (serves 3)
Ingredients :
600g lean minced lamb
1 tbsp fresh mint, shredded
1 carrot, peeled and grated
100g plain flour
sea salt & freshly ground black pepper
1 tbsp rapeseed or olive oil
1 large onion, sliced thinly
2 cloves garlic, sliced
2 tsp dried rosemary
200g bacon lardons
750ml tomato passata
1 tbsp tomato ketchup
1 tsp lamb stock powder (or half a lamb stock cube)
400g tin butter beans
fresh parsley, finely chopped.
Method :
1. Make sure that all the vegetables are prepped and ready to go, before you make up the meatball mix, or the meatballs will stick to their plate as they wait to be browned.
2. In a large bowl, mix the lamb, mint and carrot together with some seasoning and 4 tbsp cold water. Form the mixture into balls the size of a walnut.
3. Take a large freezer bag and mix the flour together with some seasoning. Roll each meatball in the flour until coated.
4. Heat the oil in a deep frying pan or wok. Once hot enough to sizzle the meatballs, add them gently and without crowding. You may need to brown them in two batches. Brown them all over and remove with a slotted spoon onto a warm plate.
5. Once all the meatballs are browned, drain the majority of the fat from the pan and add the onion. Cook over a moderate heat until softened and turning golden.
6. Add the garlic and rosemary, cooking until the onion is beginning to caramelise and the garlic is softened.
7. Add the bacon and continue to cook, stirring frequently, until all the water has cooked out of the bacon and it is beginning to turn golden.
8. Add the passata, tomato ketchup and the lamb stock powder - (I used Essential Cuisine's superb lamb stock powder) - along with 200ml of water. Stir well, then add the butter beans and bring to a boil, stirring as it heats through.
9. Once up to temperature, return the meatballs to the pan and coat with the tomato sauce. Place a lid on the pan and simmer for 35-45 minutes, stirring occasionally.
10. Serve sprinkled with the chopped parsley.
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Rarely has one dish so split the audience!
So if you're looking at this blog post and thinking "ooh, my husband/son would love that!", I advise you to go carefully - as I have a suspicion it may very well be girl food. Reason being that I absolutely loved this dish (as it stands), but hubby hated it and son & heir wasn't all that keen. Hubby did say, though, that the flavour of the meatballs was good - it was just the wine that I'd put into the tomato sauce that he disliked intensely. Where son & heir is concerned, I think it was the indignity of having to have vegetables instead of pasta to accompany it.
Personally, I absolutely loved it and would happily have the same again tonight.
So, I decided to blog the recipe as without the wine in the sauce and served on pasta instead of with mashed potato and vegetables (although I'd be tempted to include the carrots & broccoli in the tomato sauce, on the pasta!) I think it would have been a lot better received.
Hence, it's up to you. Go with the wine in the recipe if that's what you like. Serve it with mashed potato and vegetables if that's what everyone likes. Or you can go down the pasta route, if you think the potato/veggie combo is too "out there" for your tastes.
Of all the turkey meatball recipes I've made just recently, this is by far and away the easiest. Simply mix the minced turkey with three quarters of a grated onion and two heaped teaspoonfuls of pesto (green or red - I used green). Mush it all together and roll some meatballs. So long as the turkey is straight from the fridge (i.e. extremely cold), the mixture will be very soft, but will hold together if you treat the meatballs gently.
The recipe did a very good job of using up the turkey mince that I had in the freezer, plus it made a large dent in the jar of pesto. A few pasta lunches should see off the remainder!
Oh, and incidentally, I was looking today for some inspiration where cooking turkey was concerned, and tripped over this website Lean on Turkey. As I'm quite keen on turkey as an ingredient (I think we could all do a lot worse than to eat more of it), I thought I'd pass it on!
TURKEY & PESTO MEATBALLS IN TOMATO SAUCE (feeds 3)
Ingredients :
500g minced turkey
1 onion, peeled and grated
2 heaped tsp green or red pesto
1 tbsp olive oil.
For the sauce :
1 onion, chopped fine
1 clove garlic, grated
2 vine ripened tomatoes, diced small
1 glass red wine (optional)
1 tbsp tomato puree
1 tbsp tomato ketchup
a large pinch of dried oregano
an even larger pinch of dried basil
half a tsp paprika
1 tsp mushroom ketchup or Worcestershire sauce
sea salt & freshly ground black pepper.
Method :
1. Take a large bowl and add the turkey, grated onion and pesto to it. With your hands, squidge the meat together with the onion & pesto until evenly distributed. Pinch off pieces to roll into meatballs, around the size of a walnut. Should make 16-17 meatballs.
2. In a frying pan, heat the olive oil until really quite hot - enough to make the meatballs sizzle as soon as they connect with the pan. Add the meatballs and gently turn them after 30 seconds cooking. This will "set" the outside shell of the meatball and prevent them from falling apart.
3. Reduce the heat to medium and continue to fry the meatballs until coloured on all sides and firm to the touch. Remove to an oven-proof dish and keep warm.
4. Switch the oven on to pre-heat, at 180degC/350degF/Gas4.
5. Without wiping the frying pan, add the onions to the remaining oil and cook on medium until softened. Add the garlic and cook for a minute or so.
6. If you are opting to use the red wine, add this now and bubble it until it has reduced by around half.
7. Add the tomatoes and cook until they are softened, then add the tomato puree,
tomato ketchup, dried oregano, dried basil, paprika and mushroom ketchup or Worcestershire sauce. Give everything a good stir and allow to simmer for 10 minutes or so.
8. Taste and adjust seasoning with the sea salt & black pepper.
9. Pour the sauce over the meatballs, then add to the oven and cook for 30 minutes or until bubbling.
10. Serve, either with mashed potato & vegetables, or with pasta & vegetables (which could be added to the sauce before serving).
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We were in the mood for some tart, last week. We hadn't had one for quite a while and, although pastry is on the no-no list for my diet, I hoped that I'd be able to offset it a little bit with the other ingredients.
Being Pizza Tuesday, I was able to craft the tart to please just hubby and I - which obviously meant mushrooms!
Aside from that, however, I had been having difficulty with chorizo just lately. I am not all that taken with the taste of a lot of smoked paprika, which of course, makes chorizo very difficult. I like a little smoked paprika in dishes, but find it becomes almost medicinal in quantity - which isn't very nice. However, our local Asda has begun to stock some cooking Chorizo, as well as the "ready to go" version. I thought it would be worth giving it a try, so used it in the filling for the tart and was pleasantly surprised. I certainly would be willing to use it again, so it can't have been all that strong! Hubby used the last Chorizo sausage in the Chilli Con Carne later in the week, and it was crackingly good in that.
Something else that's worth noting, is that I used the Jus-Rol Low Fat Puff Pastry for the first time. Now I know that "low fat" and "puff pastry" seem like a contradiction in terms, but it worked perfectly! You must bear in mind, though, that I wasn't looking for a well risen pastry for this tart, but something that would give a lighter effect than shortcrust - and in that context it worked just fine. I'll be using it again, as every little ounce of fat that can be gained, is all to the good.
So. What did I do? Well, I unrolled the pastry rectangle and placed it on a baking tray, then because it was a bit big (ordinarily I'd run a knife around the outside to create a crust), I rolled up the edges to form the crust of the tart. After copious amounts of pricking to prevent it from puffing up hugely, I then part baked it for 10 minutes at 200degC.
Next, I took a pizza sauce (yes, shop bought. I was interested in a tart that was easy to prepare! If you want to make a pizza sauce, then by all means be my guest. I know they aren't difficult to make, but it was one step further than I wanted to go, that night) and put a coating of that over the pastry.
Next job was to slice the chorizo very thinly and add that to the tart base, followed by the sliced mushrooms (which in the recipe, below, I have sauteed first - it will remove a lot of the water that they carry) and topped off by the slices of mozzarella and a small sprinkle of grated parmesan cheese over the lot.
That done, it went into the oven for 25-35 minutes, or until the mozzarella was melted and browned on top and the filling was obviously heated through.
I served it with the Zesty Beetroot Salad on top of some mixed salad leaves. Oh, incidentally, I used a pack of beetroot that had been marinated in honey & ginger for this - and it was gorgeous. That's something else we'll be having again!
The salad was just lovely with the tart and provided that nice freshness to counteract all the rich flavours of the tart.
Totting up the Inflammation Factors, the end result is -356 per serving, so as you can see, I failed miserably where offsetting the pastry is concerned. *sigh* I was SO sure that beetroot was anti-inflammatory, but it turns out it's anything but. Hey ho. Back to the drawing board!
PIZZA TART (Serves 2-3)
Ingredients :
350g puff pastry
3-4 tbsp tomato pizza sauce
a tsp of olive oil
3 cooking chorizo (4" links), sliced finely
3-4 mushrooms, sliced finely
2 balls of mozzarella, sliced finely
a small amount of parmesan cheese, grated.
Method :
1. Pre-heat your oven to 200deg C/350deg F/Gas 4.
2. Roll out (if home-made) your pastry to form a rectangle which will fit your baking tray, then using the tip of a knife, score approx 1" in from the edge a line around the inside of the pastry, to form the crust. Alternatively, (if shop bought) simply unroll the pastry onto your baking tray and score - or if slightly larger than your tray, roll up the edges to form the crust.
3. Using a fork, prick the inside of the pastry all over, then place into the oven for 10 minutes.
4. While the pastry cools slightly, in a frying pan, add the teaspoonful of olive oil together with the chorizo and cook on a medium heat for 5 minutes or so, until the oil has changed colour. Add the mushrooms and cook on a fairly high heat until they have given up their water.
5. Next, coat the inside of the pastry with the pizza sauce, then add the chorizo & mushroom mixture, levelling off as you go.
6. Lay the slices of mozzarella on top, then sprinkle the parmesan over and place back into the oven for 25-35 minutes or until the mozzarella is browned and bubbling.
7. Allow 5-10 minutes for the tart to cool once removed from the oven, then serve with a salad.
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I usually leave a day or so in between trying out a recipe and blogging about it, but the really good ones get blogged earlier than that because, basically, I can't wait to tell everyone about them!
Such is the situation with this Baked gnocchi dish from Jo Romero's Comfort Bites blog.
You know how some recipes strike you instantly as being so "do-able"? You can see immediately that everyone who will be eating would enjoy the ingredients and the way they have been prepared. The first time I read through the recipe on Jo's blog, I knew straight away that we'd really enjoy eating this dish.
I felt as though I was cheating a bit, buying a jar of pasta sauce. However, I'm glad I did as the jar - a sundried tomato sauce from Dress Italian - was very nice with a depth of flavour that I'd have been hard put to have achieved in a home-made sauce (for the same money - just a pound - that is!).
I also added a ball of mozzarella, diced, to the recipe as I know how much Son & heir enjoys the stringiness of cooked mozzarella and anything that helps him over the fact that there's also spinach in the dish, can't be anything but good.
I have given the recipe below, but please note that I'm very definitely not claiming it as mine - it's simply because I've added the mozzarella, which is where my recipe differs from Jo's.
Even if you've never cooked Gnocchi before, this is a perfect introduction to the little darlings. Flavoursome and rich with the mascarpone balancing the tomato and with the spinach for added texture and flavour, it is truly a lovely thing. The sheer fact that neither hubby nor Son & heir missed their meat (in case you haven't noticed, it doesn't contain any!) is testament to the satisfaction it delivers.
BAKED GNOCCHI WITH TOMATO, SPINACH & MASCARPONE (feeds 4)
Ingredients :
500g pack of potato gnocchi
500g jar of your favourite tomato based pasta sauce
2 handfuls fresh spinach leaves, washed
About 6 tablespoons mascarpone cheese
A mozzarella ball, diced
Handful of Parmesan.
Method :
1. Preheat oven to 180C. Heat a large saucepan of slightly salted water until it boils. When the water is boiling, drop in the gnocchi and cook for around 2 minutes, until they puff up slightly and float to the top.
2. Meanwhile, scatter the washed spinach leaves in the base of a fairly large roasting dish.
3. When the gnocchi are cooked, drain and tip directly onto the spinach in the dish. Mix slightly, so that the spinach begins to wilt in the steam of the cooked gnocchi. But go careful - you don't want to break them up.
4. Tip on the tomato sauce and mix again.
5. With a tablespoon, scoop out dollops of mascarpone and arrange them over the top of the tomato-gnocchi mixture. Sprinkle over the cubed mozzarella and cover with a handful of freshly grated Parmesan and bake for around 30 minutes, until the gnocchi is bubbling and the cheese has melted.
Allow to cool slightly before serving - with a side salad.
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