Roast Rib of Beef
We were out all day last Sunday and ended up in the pub in need of something to eat. When this happens I always avoid the Traditional Sunday Roast since I don’t think it’s ever as good as the real home-cooked version. For some reason, last Sunday I broke my golden rule and was rewarded with a plate of food that was edible but by no means remarkable. It gave me a craving for a proper Sunday lunch so this morning, Stephen went off in search of beef while I got on with the accompaniments.
When he returned, he was clutching a large bag which contained a rib of beef, well two ribs actually. We followed Hugh’s instructions again but were taken by surprise at the speed the beef cooked which meant we ended up with meat that was just over the medium-rare we prefer. This was a tasty cut of beef though so the flavour wasn’t affected too much. We really must remember to pay more attention to the meat while it’s cooking though since this is a situation we find ourselves in all too often.
Great Yorkshire pudding (that wasn’t frozen like last week), crunchy roast potatoes, average parsnips and a decent selection of vegetables made for a good lunch. There was plenty of excellent gravy too, another bonus of eating at home and not a pub/restaurant.
The “This Week Last Year” plugin on the sidebar tells me that we ate roast beef exactly a year ago. A further search through the archives reveals that we haven’t had it since. Far too long.
Chicken Kiev with Mustard
My obsession with mustard continues. As does it seems my obsession with breaded meat, especially for Friday night dinners. The two together obviously equal chicken kiev with a mustard-butter instead of the usual garlic. We were going to call this Chicken Dijon (since the chicken is stuffed with Dijon mustard) but that already exists and I couldn’t think of anything else. Not that it matters, what matters is that it was a good combination and the butter did a very good job of staying inside the chicken and not leaking all over the frying pan which is always good.
No lengthy recipe required, just stuff the chicken with the mustardy butter (I used about 2 tablespoons of mustard to about 3 tablespoons of butter along with some salt and pepper and some chopped parsley), roll the chicken in some seasoned flour, then beaten egg and finally some breadcrumbs. Add some olive oil to your frying pan, heat and then brown the chicken on both sides.
Transfer to the oven and cook for about 20 minutes or until the chicken is cooked. Serve with some kind of potato and vegetable – we ended up eating the salad I had prepared as a starter hence the rather lonely looking chicken up there.
Thai Prawn Stir Fry
This was supposed to be mussels but when we came to clean said mussels, most of them were open. It was 7pm by this point so we quickly returned the mussels and exchanged them for some prawns. One of the major benefits of stir-frying is the speed at which the meal comes together so the fact that it was getting late wasn’t too much of a problem.
Our recent stir-fries have been a bit haphazard, basically throwing a bunch of ingredients into a pan and hoping for the best. They turn out fine, good even, but there’s nothing authentic about them so this time we tried to stick to a more Thai-style dish. This was also good and probably no better than our throw-it-all-in-and-hope-for-the-best efforts but at least we felt a little more authentic.
Thai Prawn Stir-Fry
Serves Two
2 spring onions, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 red chilli, finely chopped
1 stalk lemongrass, finely chopped
200g prawns, shelled
Generous splash light soy sauce
Generous splash Thai fish sauce
Handful baby corn, sliced lengthwise
Handful pak choi, prepared and separated
Heat the oil in a wok over high heat. Add the spring onion, garlic, chilli and lemongrass. Stir fry for 1 minute. Add the prawns. Stir fry for 2 minutes. Add some soy sauce and fish sauce. Add the baby corn. Stir fry for 2 minutes. Add the pak choi. Stir fry for 1 minute. Add a dash of water and white wine and a little more soy sauce and fish sauce. Turn down the heat and cover, cooking for another 2 to 3 minutes. Stir in chopped coriander leaf and serve with rice or noodles.
Pasta Fagioli
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.
Indian Baked Whole Chicken aka Best Chicken Ever
I couldn’t get the title of the post to do justice to the meal, so had to add that bit on the end. The recipe is from Madhur Jaffrey’s “Indian Cookery” and the title in there doesn’t do it justice either; it is simply called “Whole Chicken Baked in Aluminium Foil”. On reading the recipe though, it becomes obvious that there is more to it than that – there is a marinating step and then some more spice paste is put onto the chicken before it is wrapped up and cooked.
We found the recipe in the morning while paging through our recipe books and when I saw that it required the whole chicken to be skinned, I was initially a bit worried that I would spend the whole afternoon in the kitchen trying to do it. But then serendipity – we were watching Saturday Kitchen and Atul Kochhar ended up doing exactly that! I didn’t skin it as quickly and effortlessly as he did, but at least I had an idea of the technique before starting, which helped a lot.
We had planned a few accompaniments too – dal, roasted cauliflower, braised cabbage and chapatis.
The chicken was brilliant. At one point I said something like “this is the best chicken I ever remember eating”. The depth of flavour was intense, but in a mellow and rounded way. The spice paste had cooked through and made an excellent sauce, along with having flavoured the chicken with its deep gingery, garlicky, spicy goodness. I can’t think of much more to write about it that will do it justice, but we will certainly be cooking this again when some friends are around to share the deliciousness.
Indian Baked Whole Chicken
Serves 4-6
Marinade
2.5cm ginger, chopped
2 cloves garlic, chopped
6 tbsps natural yoghurt
1 tsp turmeric
1 1/4 tsps salt
1 tsp cayenne pepper
Black pepper
1 chicken, skin removed
225g onions, chopped
4 cloves garlic, peeled
4cm ginger, chopped
25g slivered almonds
3 tsps cumin
3 tsps coriander
1 tsp turmeric
1 tbsp paprika
1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
1 1/2 tsps salt
Oil
2 tbsps lemon juice
Pepper
1/2 tsp garam masala
First make the marinade by blending all the ingredients together. Rub the marinade all over the chicken, including the inside, and set aside for two hours.
Meanwhile, blend the onions, garlic, ginger and almonds together into a paste. Add the cumin, coriander, turmeric, paprika, cayenne pepper and salt and blend again.
Put some oil into a frying pan and fry the paste over a medium-heat for 8-9 minutes. Add the lemon juice, pepper and garam masala and mix together. Leave the paste to cool and pre-heat the oven to 180 degrees.
Spread the cooled paste all over the chicken, including the insides and then wrap securely in foil. Bake, breast side up, for 90 minutes or until the chicken is tender.
Breaded Veal
This was going to be veal milanese (breaded veal, coated in egg, herbs and parmesan then rolled in breadcrumbs) but I didn’t have any eggs. Instead, I coated the veal with mustard (much like last Friday’s chicken), sprinkled on some dried herbs de provence (Stephen chopped some fresh parsley too but I forgot it ), some salt and pepper and then rolled it in breadcrumbs. We then fried the breaded veal in some oil and served it with some lemony green beans.
Not veal milanese but very good nonetheless, as everything coated in herbs and fried is.
Chicken Stir-Fry with Szechuan (aka Sichuan) Pepper
When we fancy a stir fry of some sort we usually end up following a Thai recipe or at least giving it a Thai twist, but this time we fancied something in a Chinese style instead. We had intended to use oyster sauce but when it came to cooking time we found that we didn’t have any. Problem. And we thought of using chilli flakes but we found that we had none of those either. Another problem. But we ended up using Szechuan peppercorns instead; Szechuan peppercorns are brilliant and if we’d remembered that we had them then we probably would have planned to use them anyway. So we forged ahead and just added loads of soy sauce in an attempt to make up for the lack of oyster sauce… it worked out pretty well.
The recipe was of our own devising and went something like this:
Ingredients:
2 chicken breasts, sliced thinly
soy sauce
Chinese cooking wine
4 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1/2 teaspoon szechuan peppercorns
vegetable oil
3 spring onions, green and white parts, sliced (remember to wash them as there can be sand in the green ends)
baby corn
mange tout or sugar snap peas
spring greens or pak choi
Chinese noodles – either soaked for the appropriate amount of time, or the “straight to wok” type
Place the thinly sliced chicken breasts into a bowl and add 2 tablespoons of soy sauce along with the szechuan peppercorns and one third of the garlic. Stir and let it marinate for 30 minutes. Then heat up your wok and add a little oil. When it is hot, add the garlic for 30 seconds and then add the chicken (leave excess marinade behind in the bowl for now), stirring constantly while it fries. After 2 to 3 minutes it should be almost cooked; remove it to a plate.
Add a little more oil and another third of the garlic. After 30 seconds add the baby corn, mange tout and spring onions. Add a splash of soy sauce and stir fry for two minutes, adding the spring greens or pak choi half way through. Then add the chicken back to the wok along with the reserved marinade and a splash of the Chinese cooking wine and turn down the heat. Stir well then cover the wok with a large saucepan lid and leave it for 2 to 3 minutes.
Then it should all be cooked, so remove it to a plate, preferably a warmed one so that it doesn’t get cold. Turn the heat back up and add a little more oil and then the last of the garlic. After 30 seconds add the noodles and a generous splash of soy sauce; stir fry for 2 minutes or until done.
Serve the noodles with the chicken and vegetables on top of it. Enjoy!
Pasta Bolognese
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.
Chicken with Mustard Lentils
I love puy lentils and we eat them a lot. Boiled simply and then flavoured with oil and fresh herbs while still warm, they are endlessly versatile and often form the basis of a quick, week-night dinner. What we don’t often do is cook them with other ingredients as part of a one-pot dish.
Cooked this way (braised I suppose), the lentils took on more flavour and the texture changed too, becoming almost creamy. It took a little longer this way but we were rewarded with a completely different dish and a whole new way to enjoy lentils.
The other thing I particularly liked about this was the mustard. It’s the second dish I’ve cooked recently that uses a lot of what I mostly use as just a condiment. I’m definitely converted to cooking with mustard instead of just spreading it on my ham sandwiches and am looking forward to experimenting further.
Chicken with Mustard Lentils
Serves Two
4 skinless chicken thighs (legs would obviously be fine, breasts would be more likely to dry out)
Salt and pepper
150g pancetta
1 onion, finely diced
1 rib celery, finely diced
1 carrot, finely diced
2 cloves garlic, crushed
Herbs (I used a handful of fresh rosemary and parsley and a couple of bay leaves)
Glass white wine (I wanted to use sherry but there wasn’t any left, funny how that happens)
200g puy lentils
250ml chicken stock
2 tbsps Dijon mustard
Squeeze lemon juice
Handful fresh parsley, chopped
Pre-heat the oven to 180 degrees.
Start by browning the seasoned chicken until it’s very dark all over and then remove to a plate.
In the same pan, remove the excess oil and then fry the bacon pieces until the fat has rendered. Remove to a plate.
Again, remove the excess oil and then soften the onions, celery and carrot. After about five minutes at a medium heat, add the garlic and cook for a couple of minutes. Next, add the herbs and the black pepper and cook for just a minute.
Return the bacon back to the pan and then add the wine, allowing it to bubble for a couple of minutes so that the alcohol burns off.
Now add the lentils and stir them around so they are well incorporated with everything else. Add the chicken stock and mustard and stir again. Sit the chicken on top of the lentils and put the pan into the oven for about 35 minutes (this will vary depending on the kind of chicken you’re using and whether it has bones).
Check to see if you need to add any salt, add a squeeze of lemon juice and the parsley and then serve.
Mustardy Breaded Chicken
Another recipe found in the recent Recipe Spring Clean, courtesy of The Wednesday Chef.
I’ve had this bookmarked for a while but, much like my clippings folder, rarely refer to my bookmarks when I’m searching for inspiration. I tend to cook something quite quickly after discovering it and the online “recipe” folder is typically where recipes go to die. I’m glad I found this one again though because it was brilliant. There’s a lot of mustard on that chicken but it melts away and provides really tasty crumbs. The original recipe calls for duck which I’m not sure about, pork chops would work very well though I think.
Mustardy Breaded Chicken
Serves Two
Skinned chicken pieces (I used two legs and two thighs but breasts would work well here)
Salt and pepper
2 tsps dried herbs (you could use a mixture of fresh herbs)
4 tbsps Dijon mustard
Breadcrumbs
Melted butter (or olive oil)
Season the chicken with salt and pepper and then sprinkle over the dried herbs. Next, spread the mustard all over the chicken before rolling the chicken in breadcrumbs. Transfer to an oiled baking dish and then drizzle over the melted butter.
Bake in the oven at 180 degrees for an hour or until the chicken has cooked through.
