recipe

Spring time orecchiette

Springtime pasta

All the different produce coming out with the change of season gets me quite excited. I usually buy vegetables without meals in mind, and wait for inspiration to strike. When I realised that I had asparagus, broad beans and fresh peas, I knew that I wanted to throw it all together and have a little homage to spring. As a bonus, I also had ricotta, left over from the chocolate and cherry ricotta cake. This pasta made itself, really.

I am my harshest critic when it comes to my food, but even I thought this pasta was freakin’ awesome. 😀

This is my contribution this week to Presto Pasta Nights. Check out Presto Pasta Nights for more great recipes!

Spring time orecchiette

Serves 3-4

300g dried orecchiette or other pasta
400g fresh broad beans, podded
200g fresh peas, podded
Small bunch of asparagus (around 250g)
3 rashers of bacon
3 garlic cloves, crushed
200g ricotta
Salt & pepper

Bring a small pot of salted water to the boil, this will be for the vegetables. When boiling, add the podded broad beans and blanch for a minute. Remove with a slotted spoon into a bowl of cold water.

Return the water to the boil, and add the podded peas. Boil for 5-10 minutes .

While you’re waiting for the peas, peel the thick skin off the broad beans and set aside. It should take a few minutes to get through and by then the peas should be ready. When the peas no longer taste raw, remove them from water with a slotted spoon and add to the broad beans.

Put a pot of water on to the boil for the pasta and start cooking the pasta.

Snap the woody ends off the asparagus, and slice into 3cm lengths. Add the asparagus to the water and cook for a couple of minutes. Remove from the water and set aside with the broad beans and peas.

In a frying pan, fry the bacon to your liking. Remove and drain on paper towels, then cut into small pieces.

Wipe the frying pan with paper towels, then add and garlic on a medium-low heat. Cook gently for a few minutes, then add the vegetables and bacon and leave them on the medium-low heat to warm up, stirring occasionally.

When the pasta is cooked, drain, reserving some of the cooking water.

Tip the pasta into the pan, adding a couple of tablespoons of the cooking water. Add the ricotta, and stir it through the pasta, mashing it up a bit if necessary.

Taste, season with more salt if required, and finish off with lots of freshly ground pepper.

Chocolate and Cherry Ricotta Cake

Chocolate and ricotta cake

The second sweet item for the inaugural barbeque was a chocolate and cherry ricotta cake. I adapted it from a recipe on taste.com.au which was for a Chocolate and Raspberry Baked Ricotta Cake. Essentially, it’s the same, except I used cherries instead of raspberries (der).

I had long ago eaten my frozen berry stash from last summer, but I did have a jar of cherries that I bought in a moment’s madness in Aldi. We hardly ever go there, but whenever I do I’m always amused by the weird stuff you can buy. Last time we were there, you could buy a petrol generator, or a portable foozball table, in case you needed more than just groceries and alcohol! Totally random, and that randomness must’ve influenced me to buy a jar of cherries that I didn’t need.

The cake itself is a contender for the ugliest thing I’ve ever baked. It was so ugly it was beyond ugly. It was fugly. I found the “batter” very thick, and had trouble smoothing it down. When I pulled it out the oven, I had concerns that it would be dry – it certainly looked dry! After we dished it out though, I was happy that my fears were unfounded. It had quite a dense texture, and you could certainly taste the tang from the ricotta. I didn’t think it was quite sweet enough, or taste chocolaty enough but it was still tasty. I would love to play around with the recipe and try it with some melted dark chocolate.

Chocolate and Cherry Ricotta Cake

Adapted from Taste.com.au

Ingredients (serves 8)

3/4 cup (165g) ricotta cheese
2 cups self-raising flour
1/4 cup cocoa powder
1 cup caster sugar
100g butter, melted
1 cup hot water
1 cup pitted cherries (I used ones from a jar)

Cherry sauce
1/4 cup caster sugar
1 cup pitted cherries

Method

1. Preheat oven to 160°C. Grease and line base and sides of a 6.5cm-deep, 22cm (base) round cake pan with baking paper.

2. Sift flour and cocoa into a bowl. Add sugar, butter, water and ricotta. Mix well. Gently fold through cherries. Pour mixture into pan. Bake for 1 hour or until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. Stand in pan for 5 minutes. Turn onto wire rack to cool.

3. Make cherry sauce: Combine sugar and 2 tablespoons cold water in a saucepan over medium heat. Cook, stirring, for 5 minutes or until syrup thickens slightly. Add cherries. Remove from heat and set aside for 15 minutes.

4. Cut cake into wedges. Place on plates. Spoon over cherry sauce & serve.

Malteser biscuits for an inaugural barbeque

Malteaser biscuits

On what turned out to be a rather windy and chilly Saturday evening, we were invited to an inaugural barbeque at Ben and Lisa’s. The inital inaugural barbeque had been scheduled several months ago, but unfortunately the connector from the barbeque to the gas bottle didn’t, well, connect. This time, we were assured that the correct connector had been purchased, and some barbeque would be had!

So it was a rather special occasion, and in it’s honour I took along a couple of sweet things. One of those items was malteser biscuits and the other was a chocolate and cherry ricotta cake (to be blogged about later).

They’re quite straight forward, and contain condensed milk and chopped maltesers (I gave mine a good bash with a rolling pin). The recipe is from taste.com.au here. My only deviation from the recipe was to only add one teaspoon of vanilla essence rather than two.

The biscuits were soft and chewy, and particularly chewy in the parts that had malteser bits. If I’m going to be picky, I think they may have been a tad dry…. which was most likely my fault as I turned on the grill instead of the oven again. I didn’t even realise until the biscuits had been in the oven for 10 minutes. Still, I was probably the only one who noticed the slight dryness, judging by how quickly the biscuits got gobbled up!

Wontons

Wontons

I learnt how to make wontons by watching my mum make them. My parents used to own a small food business, and I worked there from when I was an awkward teen of 13 till I was 22 (gotta love family obligations). Nowadays I wonder what people thought when they came in. Even when I was young, I would be making burgers and frying up fish and chips. I wonder if that was ever considered weird.

I know that on the very few occasions when I got to a fast food “restaurant” like KFC or McDonalds I often have a little internal shudder when I see the youngies. It’s another reason to not like those places – I don’t quite trust teenagers cooking my food!

Right, I’ll put my grandma persona away and get back to wontons. I tend to mix up a big batch of dumpling meat, then divide it into smaller batches and freeze. 200 grams of mince seems to make around 30 wontons (depending on how much meat you put in each). The recipe I use for the mince is below, along with a lesson on how to fold wontons.

Wontons can be deep fried, steamed or boiled. My favourite way is boiled in soup. I love biting into the meat and then slurping up the soft skin. I also use the same mince to make pan fried dumplings by wrapping it in gyoza skin. I must warn you though – while they taste great, dumpling burps can be something awful. Don’t drink something fizzy during or immediately after eating!

Wonton soup

I served my wontons in home-made chicken soup with fresh shitake mushrooms, bok choy, sprouts and squid (left over from the lemon herb squid evening).

Wonton mince

1 kilo pork mince
1 thumb sized piece of fresh ginger root, peeled and minced
4 cloves garlic, peeled and minced
6 dried shitake mushrooms, soaked in water for at least 30 minutes then diced finely
1 tablespoon chinese rice wine
4 tablespoons soy sauce
3 tablespoons sesame oil
1 egg, beaten
1 teaspoon salt

In a large bowl, combine the pork, ginger, garlic, shitake mushrooms, rice wine, soy sauce, sesame oil, egg and salt. Stir until well mixed.

To shape wontons

Wonton 1

Step 1: Take a small teaspoon of mince and place it near the top half of the wonton wrapper. Don’t use too much mince, or the wontons will be hard to shape.

Wonton step 2

Step 2: Fold the wrapper over and flatten it around the mince.

Wonton 2

Step 3: Wet one corner of the wrapper and bring the two edges of the wrapper together. Press the corners together until they stick.

Wonton 3

Your wonton should look like this!

Cheesy Pasta with cauliflower and asparagus

Cheesey asparagus pasta

Apart from an occasional weekend coffee, and for cooking, we don’t use much milk. I don’t like the taste of plain milk, whether it’s skim, normal or full fat. (But I could drink litres of soy milk, particularly the plastic bottles with yellow lids that can be bought in Asian supermarkets – yum!)

Due to the lack of milk drinking, I often find that we have run out or, more commonly, it’s been sitting in the fridge for too long and has gone chunky (ick).

This was the situation I found myself in this week. There were two cartons of open milk in the fridge, both well past their use by dates. But no milk, no matter! Normally I would’ve made a cheese sauce, but this time I just melted the cheese through the hot pasta. It was cheesylicous!

I would like to submit this to Presto Pasta Nights (my first time!). Check out Presto Pasta Nights for more pasta recipes.

>Cheesy Pasta with cauliflower and asparagus

Serves 4

300 gram dried pasta spirals
2 small onions, finely sliced
3 garlic cloves, crushed
250g cauliflower
Bunch of asparagus
2 tablespoons butter
150g tasty cheese, grated
50g pecorino, grated
Salt & pepper

Bring a pot of well salted water to the boil for the pasta. Add the pasta when the water comes to the boil.

Cook the onions and garlic on a medium-low heat in a frying pan until soft, for about 10 minutes.

While this is happening, bring another pot of salted water to the boil. Cut the cauliflower into small florets and rinse. Add to the boiling water and cook until just tender. Remove with a slotted spoon and drain in a colander.

Snap the woody ends off the asparagus, then cut the spears into 3cm lengths. Add to the boiling water that the cauliflower had been in and cook until just tender (about 1 minutes). Remove from the water and drain.

The pasta should be about ready by now – when al dente, remove and drain. Reserve some of the cooking water.

Heat the butter in a pot over medium-low heat (use the pasta one to cut down on dishes!), when melted, add the cauliflower and asparagus, then the onions and garlic. Stir to warm the vegetables, then add the cooked pasta and a couple of tablespoons of the pasta cooking water. Tip in all the cheese and stir until melted through the pasta.

Taste, add salt if necessary, and season well with lots of freshly cracked pepper.

Vegie burgers and chips

Vegie burger

I enjoy eating meat, and I don’t think I could ever give it up. However, I do try and ensure that we have a few nights a week where we have a vegetarian meal. I felt like we had been eating a lot of meat last week, so one evening I made vegie burgers. My Bro did defeat the purpose a bit by adding bacon to his, but you know what they say about leading the horse to water… 😉

These vegie patties are really easy if you use a food processor and they’re also very tasty. I served ours up with some frozen oven fries, which were (surprisingly) great.

Vegie burgers

Makes 6 large patties

2 small onions, peeled and cut into quarters
2 large carrots, peeled and cut into quarters
2 cloves crushed garlic
3 medium potatoes, peeled and grated
1 x 400g can chickpeas
4 slices of stale sourdough or other white bread
1/2 teaspoon curry powder
2 eggs
Salt & pepper

In a food processor, pulse the onion and carrots until chopped finely (don’t over process). Tip into a large mixing bowl.

Squeeze as much liquid as you can out of the grated potatoes, and add that to the onion and carrots with the garlic.

Drain and rinse the chickpeas, and mash roughly before adding to the vegetable mixture.

Process the bread in the food processor until in fine breadcrumbs. Add to the mixture with the curry powder, eggs and season very well with salt & pepper.

Mix together and, with wet hands, shape into large patties. They may be quite wet – add more breadcrumbs if you need to.

Cook in George (Foreman Grill), or in a frying pan until cooked through. Serve in buns with fresh salad, cheese and tomato sauce.

Chicken and potato curry with roti

chicken curry

I don’t normally like using curry pastes that come from a jar. They’re very convenient, but I find the taste a bit odd. One problem is that it never tastes the way I think it should (ie good!) but the worst part is that there always seems to be either a sour or chemical taste to them. I’ve tried a few different brands and they all seemed odd.

I’m never buying Indian curry paste again. I’ve successfully tried a few recipes for Indian curries that were delicious. They were time consuming and contained a gazillion spices, but the depth of flavour was infinitely better than jar curry. I’d rather cook curry on a special occasion than put up with ick curry.

But I’ve never had any success with cooking Thai curries. Even from scratch, my curry pastes are insipid, one dimensional and uninspiring. Such a disappointment. I should keep trying.

As for Malaysian curry – I’ve never tried making it. The “outside kitchen” (ie when Alastair “cooks” and goes out to buys food) does such good laksa and nasi lemak, that I’ve never bothered trying. But the other week I had roti in my fridge, and no time to cook a proper curry. I decided to use a jar of laksa paste in the pantry that I bought a while ago (Por Kwan brand, bought from an Asian supermarket). I added in a few things and it actually tasted really good! Have I been wrong about jar curry paste?

Chicken and potato curry

2 onions, sliced
The white part of a stalk of lemongrass
Half a jar of laksa paste
3 medium potatoes, peeled and cut into large chunks
400gram can of coconut milk
200ml water
6 chicken drumsticks
1 teaspoon fish sauce

Cook the sliced onions on low heat until soft (about 15 mins). Crush the stalk of lemongrass with your knife and throw that into the pot.

Add half the jar of laksa paste and the potatoes. Stir to combine and cook until fragrant.

Add the coconut milk and water, then the drumsticks. Bring to the boil and then simmer until the chicken is cooked and tender (about 30 minutes).

Stir in a teaspoon of fish sauce and serve with flakey roti. (If serving with rice, you may want to thicken the sauce).

Bulghur, bulgur, bulgar, or burghul?

bulgur

However you spell it, bulghur is delicious!

Bulghur is wheat that is parboiled, dried, and then coarsely ground. At that time, the outer layers of the bran are removed, after which the grains are cracked. It has a distinctive nutty taste, and is high in fibre and proteins and low in fat – it’s a good substitute for rice or cous cous if you’re watching your weight as it’s more nutritious. Traditionally it’s used to make tabouli and pilafs.

I like to cook bulghur in chicken stock to add extra flavour, then mix through vegetables and a dash of olive oil to make a salad. It’s great to take to work for lunch (although I wouldn’t use lettuce if I was going to let it sit overnight).

Bulghur & Tuna Salad

Serves 3-4

1 cup uncooked coarse bulghur
1 & 1/2 cups chicken stock
1 large can of tuna
Several leaves of lettuce, shredded/sliced finely
2 medium carrots, grated
2 spring onions, sliced finely
Salt & Pepper
Good quality extra-virgin olive oil

Rinse the bulgur, then place into a pot with the chicken stock (the bulghur will expand, so use a good sized pot). Cover with a lid.

Bring to the boil, then lower to a simmer. Simmer until all the liquid has been soaked up. Turn off the heat, take the lid off and cover the top of the pot with a clean tea towel. Place the lid on top of the tea towel and let it sit for 10 minutes.

Fluff the bulghur up with a fork, and place into a large bowl. Drain the tuna and add this to the bowl with the lettuce, carrots and spring onions. Toss all the ingredients together, season well with salt and pepper and add a good dash of olive oil.

Jamie inspired roast lamb

Roast lamb

This (rather unattractive) roast lamb was inspired by a recipe in Jamie Oliver’s book, Cook With Jamie. In the book, he has a recipe for Mad Moroccan lamb (page 170 if you have it).

Jamie’s recipe looked wonderful, but rather involved, and it included cous cous. I adore cous cous, but the Boys are not fans. But I liked the idea of the spices, especially since we all have colds. Subtle flavours are a bit lost on us at the moment.

I served the lamb with balsamic chickpeas (adapted from Jamie’s recipe) and roast potatoes. For the potatoes, I parboiled them whole, then cut them in half and tossed in a glug of olive oil and 1/2 teaspoon of cumin seeds, coriander seeds, chilli flakes plus a good seasoning of salt and pepper. They went into the oven for half an hour.

The lamb was too well done for my liking, but it still tasted good. I’m an “bit of this, bit of that” kind of cook, so truthfully I have no idea if all the spices and stuff I put in are necessary for yumminess. Possibly not, so consider the recipe below a guide more than anything!

Roast lamb dinner


Jamie inspired roast lamb with balsamic chickpeas and roast potatoes

Serves 6-8

For the lamb

1 x 2kg shoulder of lamb
2 teaspoons cumin seeds
2 teaspoons coriander seeds
2 teaspoons black mustard seeds
2 teaspoons chilli flakes
6 large cloves of garlic
Zest from one lemon
1/4 cup lemon juice
2 teaspoons salt

For the chickpeas

1 large red onion, peeled and sliced
1 cinnamon stick
salt and pepper
1 x 400g tin of chickpeas
100ml good quality balsamic vinegar
200ml water

Preheat the oven to 220 degree C. Score the lamb in a criss cross pattern about 2.5cm apart.

In a mortar and pestle, crush the garlic cloves with the salt.

In a dry pan, toast the cumin seeds, coriander seeds and black mustard seeds over a medium heat until fragrant. Tip them into the mortar and pestle and add the chilli flakes. Crush it all together, then add the lemon zest and lemon juice. Mix it all up with a spoon, it should be like a paste. Rub this all over the meat, making sure you get it into the cuts. Put the lamb on a rack in a roasting pan and put into the oven for about 1 & 1/2 hours (mine went in for 2 hours which was too long unless you like well done meat). After the lamb is cooked to your liking, take it out of the oven and allow it to rest for 10 minutes.

For the chickpeas, heat some olive oil in a large saucepan and fry your onions and cinnamon with a pinch of salt and pepper for about 15 minutes or until softened. Don’t hurry this. Add the chickpeas with the water and the vinegar. Simmer on a medium heat until nice and thick, then remove from the hob and serve with slices of the roast lamb.

Belgian Waffles

Waffles

When we went to Auckland, there was only one thing that I wanted to take back. My mum’s waffle maker.

We bought the waffle maker over 10 years ago, and I have many fond waffle memories. I’ve had a look for a waffle maker here in Oz, but have only seen one that shapes them like a penguin. Wtf? So I was happy that our visit to mum and dad’s meant I could finally have waffles again!

First weekend back from Auckland, and waffles was on the menu! I found a recipe on from allrecipes.com here. It contains yeast, so a fair amount of time is required – over an hour before the waffles are ready to be cooked. I prepared the batter the night so that it was all ready to go in the morning.

The waffles weren’t very sweet, so they definitely needed some icing sugar or syrup. And they weren’t as thick as I wanted, but I think that’s the fault of my waffle maker. With all the extra effort that went into a yeast batter, I’m not entirely sure it was worthwhile. Next time I’ll have to try a baking powder batter to decide whether yeast is worth the time and energy.

Oh, and the recipe made a GAZILLION waffles. (If you want to be accurate, gazillion = 15.) Alastair never eats more than me, unless he’s ingesting pancakes, waffles, french toast and cake. He managed 3 and a half, but his appetite for sweet brunches is astounding and I would suggest that two is probably a more normal number to eat.