Pizza is a Friday night staple in our house. It’s fun food, the varieties are endless and it’s also quick and easy which is perfect for a relaxing night at home following a busy week. I was out on Friday night though and since we had decided to try the purple sprouting brocolli topping and didn’t want to wait another week, we went crazy and had pizza on a Saturday night instead. I know, mad aren’t we?

As it turned out, we had a busy Saturday too so we made the dough in advance and left it to rise while we finished off the last of the day’s chores (not that much of a chore actually, since we spent the afternoon at Vagabond, a local wine shop that has a tasting fridge).

The combination (brocolli, chilli, anchovies and lemon zest) is a good one, it’s a classic that works well with pasta, which generally always makes for good pizza topping. We added whole anchovies which were a little over-powering and would have been better simmered in the tomato sauce. The chilli flakes were hot but tasteless, fresh chilli would have been a better option. The brocolli was very good though, adding a depth and richness which reminded us both of the cavolo nero pizza we loved so much last year.

I started a new job last week and one of the many good things about it is that I get to work from home and therefore save myself an extra two hours a day that I used to spend at the mercy of London Underground. I can also work flexible hours so, in theory, I could start work early and then finish early, giving myself lots of time in the evening to spend in the kitchen. I haven’t quite got myself into a routine yet though so what generally happens is, I finish work and then realise there’s very little food in the house and I have no idea what to cook. I meant to resolve this at the weekend by planning lots of meals that I could start in the morning before work or be ready to prepare when my working day is finished. I didn’t get round to it though, I did however manage to buy vodka which meant we could eat this (original recipe here), never let it be said that I don’t have my priorities in order.

In a happy coincidence, a rather nice man knocked on my door yesterday and presented me with 40 rashers of bacon (more on that later) so I did the only thing I could in that situation, immediately fried some up and added it to the pasta sauce. Of course, everything is better with bacon but this took quite a lot of seasoning and lemon juice before it was properly balanced (Sainsbury’s have stopped selling my favourite San Marzano tomatoes so I tried some tinned cherry tomatoes which weren’t brilliant: too sweet and too much skin) but, once it was balanced, it was a good combination.

Of course, now I not only have to work out what we’re going to eat next week but I also have to work out how to incorporate those 40 rashers of bacon before they expire.

This started life as a potato and fennel soup but, somewhere along the way, pasta and beans became more appealing. Pasta and beans with chorizo. I’m sure the potato and fennel soup had potential but in a fight with chorizo there can only be one winner.

This was a pretty basic soup recipe to which I added some cooked pasta. I would have just thrown it into the soup towards the end of the cooking time but I wanted to use up the odd looking pasta that’s been hanging around for a while. I cooked it first and then sliced it up when it had cooled which was one of the most fun kitchen experiences I’ve had for a while. I love to chop and the way the knife sliced through that soft pasta was very rewarding. I’m tempted to buy another packet just so I can keep using it this way actually.

I also added some green beans which were left over from Friday night’s dinner and definitely past their best. They were fine in the soup though, as older vegetables mostly always are.

My top tip for this soup is to render the chorizo first and then add just half back to the soup. Reserve the other half for serving on top. Even with a short cooking time in liquid, the chorizo will leach most of it’s flavour leaving you with nicely textured but pretty tasteless chorizo. If you add half back when you serve (ensuring you’ve cooked plenty in the first place) then you’ll have fully flavoured liquid as well as tasty chorizo.

Pasta Fagioli
Serves Two (generously, i.e. with a small portion left over for lunch tomorrow)

150g dried cannelini beans
3 pints water
150g chorizo
Olive oil
1 onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, crushed
2 bay leaves
Handful rosemary, chopped
1 tbsp tomato puree
Glass white wine
250ml vegetable stock
Salt
Parmesan cheese

Start by cooking the cannelini beans in a large saucepan. Today, these took about 1.5 hours but I find this varies so keep an eye on them and top up with water if you need to. You want the beans to be almost cooked but not so much that they are breaking down. A little more al-dente than you would serve pasta. Once cooked, leave the beans to cool in the cooking water.

In a frying pan, cook the chorizo until the fat has rendered. Remove to a plate lined with kitchen paper and blot to remove the excess oil.

Clean the pan with some more kitchen paper, add some olive oil and soften the onion, about five minutes. Then add the garlic, the bay leaves and rosemary and cook for another three minutes.

Next, add the tomato puree and stir until it is well incorporated. Add the wine and cook until the alcohol has evaporated.

Return half the chorizo to the pan, season with pepper.

Now, tip the contents of the frying pan into the saucepan with the beans and the water. Add the vegetable stock, bring to the boil and then simmer for about 30 minutes. After about 15 minutes, squash some of the beans with the back of a wooden spoon so that they break down. This will help to thicken the soup.

Season with salt and pepper and serve. Add the remaining chorizo and grate over some parmesan cheese.

An old favourite this evening, pasta bolognese/bolognaise. I keep beef mince in the freezer for emergencies. What sort of emergency I’m imagining is anyone’s guess, we live 15 minutes from the centre of London and have at least three butchers and as many supermarkets and deli’s within walking distance of our front door. Still, I like to be prepared. Until I actually need to use the freezer for something and have to clear it out, hence the appearance of the bolognese this evening.

I was going to make a double portion and add some pork mince to the beef and then re-freeze the leftovers. That would have defeated the purpose of defrosting the beef mince in the first place though so I went with just the beef.

This was good, it’s always good but we just don’t cook it that often since there are so many other things to cook. It varies each time, depending on what’s in the fridge but our basic bolognese recipe is here. This time I used dried herbs since the plants outside are looking a bit sorry for themselves and I didn’t have any fresh ones to use up. I did however have quite a lot of half-empty pasta packets hanging around so I cooked both the farfalle and the lumaconi and we had half each.

Leftovers. I know I waffle on about this a lot but I’ve been thinking about it more recently and have made a distinction. I like leftovers that I have a definite plan for, cold roast chicken for sandwiches or to be used in a curry. Lamb shoulder that can be stuffed into pitta bread and dressed with tzatziki. Leftover pork shoulder to accompany some Mexican beans. You get the idea. The kind of leftovers I’m not so keen on are things like the noodles Stephen mentioned last week or the ends of the different kinds of pasta shapes that aren’t quite a whole serving but can’t easily be combined because they require different cooking times.

The olives for this puttanesca are the kind of leftovers I don’t like. We used some olives in Sunday’s lamb dish and had half a jar sitting in the fridge. These aren’t the good olives that are nice to eat alone but the cooking variety, that have a harsh, briney flavour until they’ve bubbled away with lots of other things for a while. We don’t cook with olives a lot and I knew that if I didn’t use them soon then they would find their way into the bin. The problem was, all I could think of to do with them was puttanesca which I discounted as dull. It doesn’t always have to be exciting though, sometimes we just need to eat something. Which is what we did last night. And it was nice. Not exciting but perfectly fine.

(We don’t follow a recipe for this anymore but our version is based on Delia’s, just with more of everything).

(Apologies for the terrible picture, I should have waited for the steam to dissipate. And set the whole thing up a bit better).

I knew when we bought the brisket that there would be lots leftover so I planned to turn the rest into tacos or wraps with the addition of some chilli sauce and some black beans. That chilli sauce is brilliant at turning leftovers into something exciting but it does pay to use a variety of dried chillies so that you can layer up the flavours. I get these at Borough Market but there are various online stockists that carry them too.

As it turned out, Stephen was out this evening though so I just had the beef and beans without the bread, cheese, guacamole, sour cream, etc. The beef was certainly much more enjoyable eaten this way but the beans were the real star.

I cooked them in the oven using a no-soak method I read about on eGullet. I don’t generally soak my beans anymore anyway but I haven’t tried cooking them in the oven before.

Oven-Cooked Black Beans

Cover the beans in water, add salt (since I knew I was going to be turning these into a variation of refried beans, I also added chilli, garlic and onion) and bring to the boil on the hob. Put a lid on the pot and then transfer to a pre-heated oven (at 150 degrees) and cook for 75 minutes.

Ours took a little longer than this and we did need to top up the water with boilng water from the kettle but otherwise, the method worked out really well. We had the oven on anyway and the resulting beans were tender and evenly cooked, something that can be difficult for us to achieve on the hob since our gas feed runs high and keeping an even temperature with a diffuser plate isn’t that easy. I’ll definitely be using this method again.

This was so good, we ate it two nights in a row. Admittedly, we did have pizza dough left over, as well as a surplus of artichokes but this really was worth cooking again.

Unlike the artichokes we cooked when making salad, we didn’t parboil these but just sliced them finely on a mandoline and then fried them quickly over a high heat. This method worked much better, resulting in crispier artichokes which soaked up less oil. It also produced a much more concentrated, nutty flavour which worked very well with the sweet salami. A scrape of lemon zest provided a good balance on the first night with capers instead tonight. The lemon just edged it.

We use Jamie Oliver’s pizza dough recipe which we’ve documented here, I experimented by adding a little more sugar (maybe another quarter tsp) and yeast (7g instead of 6g)this time which seemed to work well resulting in a crispy, light base.

I wrote this up at the time of eating but forgot to post it and have just found it in the draft folder. Lucky for me since I wouldn’t have remembered any of this.

Both Stephen and I are recovering from heavy colds and today’s weather meant we didn’t feel much like venturing from the house. At this time of year, there’s not a lot in the fridge as there’s so much going on in the evenings that we’re not finding much time to cook. There are always lentils in the cupboard though and always some kind of bacon in the freezer so this was easy to put together while we snuffled and sneezed our way through the day.

Not the most exciting dish for a Saturday night but it was easy to cook and since neither of us have much of an appetite anyway, it’s relative simplicity was soothing and comforting. I ate mine with pasta, Stephen had his with bread.

Lentil and Bacon Ragu
Serves Two

250g bacon
1 onion, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, crushed
Bay leaf
Large handful herbs, finely chopped (I used fresh thyme and rosemary)
Tablespoon tomato puree
200g puy lentils
Salt and pepper
Nutmeg
Glass red wine
300ml vegetable stock
Worcester sauce
1 tin tomatoes

Start by frying the bacon until the fat has rendered. Remove to a plate.

In the same pan, add some olive oil and then soften onion and garlic. Next add the bay leaf and the herbs and cook briefly before stirring in the tomato puree. Ensure everything is coated and then cook for a couple of minutes.

Now add the lentils and give everything a good stir. Season and grate in the nutmeg. Deglaze the pan with the red wine and allow the alcohol to cook out. Add the rest of the ingredients, bring to the boil and then simmer for around 40 minutes.

I know, it sounds a bit novelty doesn’t it? Like I was trying to come up with a festive pizza or something. I wasn’t (although it’s got me thinking) but was instead wondering whether it would be as good as our favourite pizza of the year: the cavolo nero pizza. It wasn’t as good but we both enjoyed it anyway.

The Brussels sprouts (which had been previously sauteed in olive oil and butter) weren’t as deep and earthy as the cavolo nero but they did have a bitter edge that added an interesting flavour to the pizza. The salami balanced that bitterness nicely, as did the sweet tomato sauce.

This is something we often cook on a Monday if we’re fortunate enough to have leftovers from the day before. We often do have leftovers because we generally buy a larger piece of meat than we need – it makes for a quick and easy meal on a Monday night and I think the larger the joint of meat, the less chance there is of it drying out on the day of roasting.

There’s a few posts on this particularly leftover dish so I won’t go into much detail (you can find the method for the chilli sauce that the pork is reheated in here) but we have altered our bean recipe so I wanted to record that.

We’ve been making these beans for a while and really like them, the original recipe is a real faff though so we’ve been playing with it to see if we can simplify it without losing any of the flavour. This is much simpler and is a really versatile recipe that works well in wraps or as an accompaniment to other Mexican dishes. It freezes well too.

Mexican Beans
Serves Two

175g dried beans, preferably black (turtle) or pinto beans
1 onion, finely chopped
3 garlic cloves, chopped
1 bay leaf
2 red chillies, cored, deseeded and chopped
1/2 tbsp vegetable oil
Small tin chopped tomatoes
Salt

Put the beans into a pot, add cold water to cover.

Add half the chopped onion, half the garlic, the bay leaf and the chillies. Bring to the boil, reduce the heat, cover and cook until the beans are tender. The cooking time will vary depending on the beans and whether you’ve soaked them or not. Allow two hours but check regularly and top up with water if necessary. You want the water to have almost completely evaporated by the time you’ve finished this stage but you can drain the beans if you need to. I usually do this the night before I need the beans and refrigerate them at this stage, completing the next step on the following day.

About 20-30 minutes before the beans are cooked, heat some oil in a frying pan and soften the remaining onion and garlic. Add the tinned tomatoes and cook for about five minutes. Add a quarter of the cooked (and drained) beans into the frying pan and mash. Stir in the remaining beans, mix, season with salt and then serve.