Roast Brown Trout with Roasted Vegetables
Tonight we roasted a couple of brown trout. We stuffed with with a herb and shallot mixture. We started by roasting red pepper, onion, tomatoes and onions for a while and then added the trout for the last half hour along with half a glass of white wine. The result was good, with the juice from the fish mixing with the wine into the vegetables. Served with some green vegetables too – spring greens and runner beans.
Asparagus and Pancetta Risotto
We had some left over asparagus that I’d bought on Thursday at the “farmer’s market”* in Hammersmith. It was getting a little past its prime, so we made it into risotto instead of just eating it on its own. We boiled up the stalk ends (and also the stalk ends that we’d kept from last night) to make an asparagussy stock, which worked well.
*I use quotes because there are really only a handful of stalls here that have anything to do with farms; the rest are selling take away food of various sorts. However, the market has apparently “breathed new life into Lyric Square” if you believe the Hammersmith and Fulham press office and this can only be a good thing in an area characterised by ghastly pubs and awful traffic congestion both on the roads and on the pavements.
Further down the above-linked article is a quotation from Hammersmith Town Centre Manager, who said. “You only have to pass through Lyric Square on a Thursday and see the heaving crowds and smell the delicious food products being cooked to know this idea is a hit.” Which gives me an opportunity to rant about a personal bugbear. It really, really irritates me when food is just referred to as a “product”. It gives me the impression that the person saying it doesn’t actually have any appreciation for, or understanding of food and is just issuing a general-purpose, impersonal statement. They might as well be referring to matchboxes or bicycles or hatstands. Grrr.
Friends for Dinner
Last night, we had some friends over for dinner. We started with asparagus and the same dressing we made last week:
Next, we had rosemary and garlic lamb, crushed new potatoes, fresh peas, runner beans and winter greens:
And finally, elderflower jelly with summer fruits and vanilla ice-cream:
The jellies, based on a Mark Hix recipe, turned out very well. Elderflower is very sweet but this was nicely balanced by the sharpness of the fruits. Th fruit is cleverly suspended due to a two-stage setting process.
G
Lemongrass Beef and Chicken with Cashew Nuts
Last night we had a quick-but-tasty dinner of lemongrass beef skewers and chicken with cashew nuts.
We’ve made the skewers a couple of times before and they’re definitely a favourite. They were marinated overnight this time, which gave them a stronger flavour. Next time we make them we’ll make some Thai dipping sauce too.
Followed by a chicken and cashew nut stir fry. Apologies for the messy presentation; we were in a hurry. It looks a lot like last night’s dinner because we ended up using the left-over vegetables from last night rather than following the recipe properly. Served with jasmine rice.
Scallop Stir-Fry
This is a recipe I found on an old Sainsbury’s Magazine calendar, it’s been in my recipe file for ages but we only got round to making it today. The scallops were fried off then removed from the pan, the shallots, garlic and ginger were then fried before the vegetables (tenderstem brocolli, baby corn and spring greens) were added and cooked off.
Then the sauce (rice wine, soy sauce, sesame oil and sesame seeds) was added and a lid placed on the wok to finish cooking. The scallops were then returned to the pan and heated through.
We served it with plain brown rice.
I thought it was really brilliant, nine out of ten in fact, and I can’t wait to eat it again. Both Stephen and I thought it would go well with chicken or beef so maybe next time we’ll try that.
G
Spaghetti, Prawns and Rocket
We both popped out after work for some social business today, so when we got home we needed something quick and easy for dinner. Kerri bought some prawns on the way home, so we made spaghetti with prawns and rocket. Much like this. Quick and easy and tasty.
Hemp Seeds
Welcome to the first in a new series entitled The Dinner Diary Top Tip….add some toasted hemp seeds to your salads for extra crunch and flavour.
Lamb Kofta
Yesterday afternoon, while we were cooking lamb, we also made up some lamb kofta to have this evening. I like to have something quick and easy for a Monday evening, sort of a homemade ready-meal.
I used the same recipe that I always do but the results weren’t so great. We used some new-season lamb mince that we bought at the butchers and the flavour of the meat was good, the spicing was just a bit off. Stephen seemed happy enough though as he finished mine too.
Rack of Lamb with Sauteed New Potatoes and Asparagus with Pine Nut and Herb Sauce
A long title today because it all deserved mention.
We started with asparagus with a pine nut and herb sauce. It turned out as more of a relish than a sauce really. It contained pine nuts (obviously), red onion, parsely, mint, olive oil and vinegar. This went very well indeed with the asparagus; next time we’ll use more nuts and a little less onion though.
For main course, we had rack of English spring lamb, roasted quite simply, which was all that it needed:
With it we had some sauteed new (Jersey Royal) potatoes:
And some home made mint sauce. In our little blue and white jug that we’d bought on holiday in South Africa. You can’t see much of the sauce in this picture, but the jug looks more interesting than the sauce really:
We also had shelled broad beans, runner beans (very fresh and very beany tasting) and green cabbage. Three green vegetables to go with our roast lamb and potatoes.
With it (actually, mostly before it) we drank a bottle of Springfield “Wild Yeast” Chardonnay which was good and went well with the asparagus. I fancied red with the lamb though, so opened a mini bottle of Casillero del Diablo Cabernet Sauvignon which we had in the cupboard for cooking: it was drinkable but not particularly interesting. I usually fancy pinot noir with lamb and have a few bottles of decent Burgundy and also some new world pinot on the wine rack but figured that opening a whole new bottle at that point would have been a waste. However, given that we opened another bottle of white Burgundy after dinner anyway, I think that I should just have gone ahead. Next time definitely.
Boiled Egg
Not just any old bolied egg but a goose egg. Stephen had it for breakfast this morning, with soldiers. He said it was tasty, like a very good chicken egg. It needs to be boiled for 11 minutes meaning the white went quite hard but the yolk was nice and soft.
