Saturday 27th of April 2013

Another lovely sunny day here today, so a light lunch was called for, in order to allow for maximum time spent in the garden and minimum time spent actually having to do anything.  Baked eggs are, anyway, a bit of a weekend lunchtime favourite at Distracted Towers and this is a lovely version.

Baked Eggs on Mushrooms and Spinach

large lump of butter
200g chestnut mushrooms, finely chopped
150g spinach leaves, washed and shaken dry
1 tbsp whipping cream
2 tbsp chopped fresh tarragon (optional, and see below)
8 small-to-medium-sized eggs
25g grated parmesan cheese

Preheat the oven to 180ºc. Melt the butter and fry the mushrooms over a high heat.  I have some rather wonderful porcini mushroom powder called, endearingly, Shake O'Cini, and I added a few shakes here to boost the mushroom flavour, but you don't have to be as elaborately specialist if you don't want to be..!  When the mushrooms are brown and almost 'squeaking' as you stir them, pack the spinach into the pan and put on the lid.  Remove from the heat and leave for a few minutes.  Remove the lid, stir well and then replace the lid for a few minutes more until the spinach is well wilted.  Tip the vegetable mixture into a sieve over a bowl, and press down on it with a spoon, allowing the scant, but flavoursome, juices to drain through the sieve.  Stir the cream into the strained juice.  You can just as easily use double cream instead, but whipping cream is what I mostly have in the 'fridge.


Arrange the vegetable mixture in shallow ovenproof dishes and make a 'hole' for each egg, as shown in the picture, left, and scatter over the chopped tarragon, if using.  Tarragon is a great addition to the triumvirate of mushroom, spinach and egg, but leave it out if you don't have it, or don't fancy it.  There's no mileage in using dried tarragon here... Put the dishes onto a baking tray (I lined mine with one of my silicon mats to provide a non-slip surface, stopping the dishes from sliding around on their short journey to the oven. Crack each egg into one of the 'holes'.  Drizzle over the cream-swirled cooking juices, then scatter over some parmesan.

Bake for 10-12 minutes, then remove from the oven.  The eggs will continue to cook in the dishes, so err on the side of their being slightly underdone when you take them out of the oven, rather than risk overcooking them.  Serve with a nice loaf of bread and some crunchy salt to sprinkle over the eggs.

Cath xx  

Sunday 14th of April 2013

The final weekend of the school holidays has been, for me, split between relaxing before the chaos hits and cooking up a bit of a storm to prepare for busy days ahead.  We enjoyed my Lamb Stew with Summer Flavours on Friday night, helped along by a steaming mound of couscous, some salad and a scattering heaping pile of my Herby Cheese.

Saturday Lunch was a courgette and goat's cheese tart; made to my usual recipe, but using my lovely new rectangular tart tin from Lakeland.  The new tin made the tart much more presentable and neater to slice, though I found it rather more difficult to get the tart out of this tin than with my workaday round tins.  We ate the tart with some salad and steamed new potatoes (I normally eschew potatoes with party, but I ran across these spanking Charlotte potatoes and was irresistibly drawn to them...  In the evening, the boys and I enjoyed a casual supper of cheese and biscuits with salad and fruit in front of Doctor Who and The Voice.  I like a cheeky weekend fix of Sir Tom, I do (even if his tendency towards name-dropping is worse than ever!).

Now, with school bags packed and ready for the morning, I can truly relax, having cooked an enormous batch of Slow-Cooked Onions (and I used red onions today) to see us through the next couple of weeks, prepared a very nice-looking vegetable curry to go in the slow-cooker tomorrow and served up a bacon and mushroom risotto for lunch.  In advance of school starting tomorrow, the boys and I are looking forward to a 'last supper' of mussels in garlic butter sauce with some crusty bread before it's back to metro, boulot, dodo. Back to the grindstone...

Cath xx

Pudding Emergency!

Required at short notice to provide a pudding for today's lunch, I fell back on a favourite which can be conjured up pretty quickly from mainly storecupboard ingredients.  This is, I suspect hardly the 'proper' way to make frangipane, but hell, it works for me.  If it's easy and it tastes good, I'm one very happy Distracted Housewife!  The shop-bought sweet pastry cases are a storecupboard staple (actually, they live in the bread bin) and I cannot see that there is any point in being snobbish about them; while I never buy shortcrust pastry in the supermarket because I find it easy to make, I always buy puff and filo because, you know, eek!  Sweet pastry also gives me the heebie-jeebies, I have never managed to get the desirable shortbread texture without everything disintegrating into infinitesimal crumbs like, well, shortbread...

Tinned pears (in juice, never syrup for my tastes) happen to be a fruit that I keep in the cupboard habitually as I love their grainy texture.  They are wonderful with whipped cream or ice-cream and a quick, hot, chocolate sauce as a very basic Poires Belle Helene (which, after holidaying in the Loire Valley as a youngster, remains for me the most respectable way to fill a crêpe).  Pears and chocolate is a classic combination for me; hence the chocolate included here (although you can happily leave it out if the idea doesn't fill you with the greedy excitement that it does me!).  I would have rather like to have a scoop of ice-cream with this pudding today, rich yellow in colour and flecked with vanilla seeds, but sadly no amount of praying to the freezer could force some into existence so we 'forced it down' without...

Pear and Almond Tart with Chocolate

1 ready-made sweet pasty case from the baking aisle at the supermarket
50g dark chocolate, grated or very finely chopped (I used the processor)
1 tin of pear halves in juice, drained
2 eggs, beaten
80g each butter, ground almonds and caster sugar

Heat the oven to 180ºc.  Put your unwrapped pastry case onto a baking sheet.  Scatter the chocolate over the bottom of the pastry case.  Thickly slice each pear half widthways, but keep it 'together', as it were, and arrange them on top of the chocolate.  Melt the butter and stir in the ground almonds and sugar. Mix in the eggs, forming a nubbly paste with the consistency of double cream.  Gently (although this is a counsel of perfection for me, being both clumsy and impatient) spoon and spread this over the pear-and-chocolate filled pastry case and pop it in the oven for 20-25 minutes.  Take it out and leave it to rest for a few minutes as this is SO much better warm than hot.  Any leftover slices (ha!) are perfect with a cup of tea later, but don't put them in the 'fridge, something awful seems to happen to them if you do!

Cath xx

Sunday Soldiers

I love a man egg in uniform!  Admittedly, this isn't really much of a post, this, just a quickie...  How fabulous is this soldier egg cup and toast cutter set? My boys were lucky enough to be given one apiece by my parents and it continues to prove, almost every weekend, that it is just the thing for 'dippy' boiled egg and soldiers.  The soldier sets are widely available on the interweb and the sort of cool gifts-homewares-and-novelty shops I spend far too much money in.

Eggs are easy enough to boil, but hobs are fussily awkward about producing them until you get the timing and temperature just right for the stove you're using.  Luckily (?), with two small egg-o-holic boys, I get lots of practice!

Cath xx

Oh Snapz!

Children always seem to want to snack, don't they?  I suppose it's because they are such busy little bees, but my boys always seem to be re-fuelling.  So I am always interested to find out about new snacking options for them; ones that are good for them, or at least not bad for them, and which have a touch more kid-appeal than the usual 'healthy' options seem to.  I received a parcel from Healthy Supplies this morning, containing a selection of the interesting and nutritious goodies stocked on their website.  First on our taste-testing schedule were some Snapz fruit and vegetable crisps... 

Baked, rather than fried, they are still crisp and really rather delicious.  We first tried the beetroot crisps and the carrot & paprika crisps.  It's fairly obvious which is which, huh?  The children were torn as to which they preferred but ultimately Chris liked the beetroot crisps best (as did I); sweet and crunchy as they were, while James preferred the carrot & paprika version.  I found these tasted very strongly of carrot, which would be a big plus for most people (and especially my carrot-addicted children), but I've never been a huge fan of cooked carrots , vastly preferring them raw, so I couldn't eat more than a few.  However, the two types were hugely complimentary when mixed together which was an interesting option, and the paprika added a pleasant piquancy to the earthy-tasting carrots.  We often eat root vegetable crisps as a pre-dinner nibble, but these weren't salty or greasy like some we've tried and tasted so clearly of the vegetables rather than the seasonings alone, that it was a completely new experience

Next,  I suppose, we moved on to 'pudding', and tried some of the apple fruit crisps.  One the left in the picture are the regular Crunchy Apple variety, the Apple & Cinnamon crisps on the right are strongly flavoured with cinnamon.  Rather too much cinnamon for my taste, but the children adored them and were pretty close to licking the dusty scraps out of the bowl after they'd polished the actual apple-slice-crisps off.  The cinnamon-flavoured apple crisps were noticeably thicker, and chewier, than the au naturel version, which were delicious and, somehow tasted even more of apples than do actual untouched apples.  Go figure!  The children rated the selection as follows.

Chris

• #1 Beetroot
• #2 Apple & Cinnamon
• #3 Carrot & Paprika
• #4 Apple

James

• #1 Carrot & Paprika
• #2 Apple & Cinnamon
• #3 Apple
• #4 Beetroot

As for me?  I preferred the beetroot and the carrot & paprika crisps when they were mixed together as a savoury option.  I wouldn't choose to eat the apple & cinnamon crisps again, but I might nibble on the odd pack of the plain apple crisps in the future.  I can see these finding a home in lunchboxes for school trips and the like in the future.

Cath xx

         

On the Pull...

This is a fab Saturday night family supper.  Not much work, then all day in the slow-cooker, a little bit (but again, not much) of work again and you're ready to eat.  I found this recipe on one of my blog-watching sessions, following links and seeing what I can find.  This is taken from the website of an American public media radio show, The Splendid Table and I've bookmarked a couple of other ideas that interest me from this site too.  I've made a few tiny changes (mainly to do with quantities), but the original recipe is here if you'd rather follow that.  Bottled 'liquid smoke' is available in the UK from American Soda, who are based in Ashton-under-Lyne, though I suspect that this would be just as tasty, though in a different way, without the 'specialist equipment'.  I also adore the fact that, in the US, pork shoulder is (inexplicably, to my mind) referred to as 'pork BUTT'.  Oh my, how the evolution of language fascinates...

American BBQ-Style Pulled Pork

I think the dsp (dessertspoon) measure may be a little archaic these days, but I rather like it; it refers to 2 tsp.

2kg boneless pork shoulder
3 tbsp paprika
1 tbsp flaky sea salt 
1 tbsp black pepper
1 dsp garlic powder
1 dsp English mustard powder
4 tbsp bottled 'liquid smoke'

Stir the spices and salt together. Cut the pork into chunks, removing the rind   Put half the pieces into the slow cooker, then add half the spice mix and half the liquid smoke, then add the rest of the pork and the remaining flavourings.  Cook on medium all day (I would say use high if you don't have a medium setting). Put the cooked meat in a bowl and strain the cooking juices into a jug.  Shred (this is the 'pulling' part...) with two forks as for French rillettes or Peking duck.   Put the shredded meat back into the slow cooker pot and add as much of the reserved juice as you need for a pleasantly soft and juicy texture

Serve with rolls, salad and barbecue sauces and condiments of your choice.  Our pre-prandial snack tonight was celery sticks with a cheesy dip.

Cath xx

Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep

We are redecorating and reorganising the children's shared bedroom at the moment, with an eye to having "a place for everything, and everything in its place" sometime in the not too distant future, not to mention somewhere for homework as they get older (which they are, rather rudely, continuing to do all the time!).  That said, however, Hubs and I were distracted from the more practical side of the shopping when beautiful frivolity by KICO popped up on the radar .

How could we resist this BIRDEY light? It's somehow Pixar-esque.  In fact, we kept having to open the box regularly, to peep at it and get a giggle-fix, until it went up onto the ceiling.  The children love it, we love it and the light is amazingly bright, as are our smiles every time we see it.  Now we just have to resist getting the matching wall lights too!

Cath xx

Homemade (Burger) Heaven

 Oh man, how I love the taste of a homemade burger!  Burgers are one of those wonderful things to cook that (almost) everyone - and especially children - loves, plus they are quick and easy to prepare, in fact those same children can help you with the whole shebang.  You know exactly what has gone into them - no nasties - and can vary the recipe however you like, according to your mood/the weather/what's in the cupboard/the day of the week.  While beef burgers are the mainstay of any summer barbecue with us, a midweek special treat for us is these lovely lamb burgers.  They take next to no time to knock up when I get in from the school run with the children feeling somewhat fractious in the heat.

As for the shaping, you can either do it with your own, wetted, hands, or gadgets are available for the purpose.  I have an old, much loved burger press from Lakeland, which I would not like to be without at this time of year (or ever, frankly).  They don't seem to sell the one I have anymore, but still stock a similar product.

Lamb Burgers


500g lamb mince
1 small onion, very finely chopped
1 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp ground coriander
2 tsp mint sauce (from a jar)
1 tsp olive oil


Rolls, salad and chips or crisps, to serve

Put all the ingredients in a bowl and squidge them together, with your hands, to mix thoroughly.  Divide the mixture equally and shape into burgers (and see above).    Cook on the barbecue. or grill under a moderate heat, turning once, until cooked through and just browning nicely on the surface.  I love them in a toasted bun with spinach leaves and a blob of natural yoghurt.

Cath xx

Tikka Time

Saturday evenings for us, these days, are increasingly ruled by my sons' growing obsession with Doctor Who.  Not terrible, because Hubby and I enjoy watching it with them (even if we do have to tolerate a running commentary on what's happening in the program we. are. watching. too.).  Early evening television means an earlier supper than we might otherwise have and this spicy dish is perfect for a Saturday night, eaten from sticky fingers, noshed without ceremony but with huge enjoyment, before they rush to the sofa for their weekly 'fix'.  Tonight I prepared a bowl of my ever-popular Spiced Potatoes with Spinach, but these wings are just as good with a bowl of rice or a nice green salad.   Cross-culturally, I rather love them with Tzatziki, too, especially leftovers eaten cold for a sneaky snack or a light lunch.

Tikka-Style Wings

I have a Typhoon CrushGrind, (highly recommended) so I grind *these* spices in that before adding them to the whizzer.  Alternatively, crush in a pestle-and-mortar or even substitute 1/2 tsp each of the bought ready-ground spices

12 chicken wings
6 tbsp olive oil
3 tbsp cider vinegar
1 1/2 tbsp tomato purée 
1 onion, roughly chopped
1 inch piece ginger root, roughly chopped
5 cloves garlic, roughly chopped
2 tbsp ground cumin
1 tbsp ground coriander
1 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
6 cloves*, ground (and see above)
seeds from 8 cardamom pods*, ground (and see above)
tbsp black peppercorns*, ground (and see above)

Put the chicken wings in a large bowl and everything else into a blender or food processor.  Whizz to a fragrant, nubbly paste.  Pour and scrape this over the chicken wings, then turn them really well to coat them completely in the spicy paste-marinade.  You can either cling-film the bowl as it is or, to save space (always important in a family 'fridge), I transfer the whole shebang to a lidded plastic box.  Either way, chill for at least 6 hours or overnight. 

Cook the chicken wings, still coated in the flavour-paste, in a 200°c oven for 40 minutes.  I usually line a roasting pan with foil because any burnt-on paste is a nightmare to wash up!  Serve on a large platter and make sure to provide plenty of kitchen paper and a poubelle de table (aka 'table dustbin') for the discarded bones. Slurp!

Cath xx

A Funkin Good Time

This weekend was a bit of a big one; I went out with a couple of girlfriends to celebrate one of their birthdays and my Mum came to visit - ostensibly to babysit (aren't Mums great) - but I had a lovely time with her on Sunday and Monday too.

On Saturday night, before going out, my friend Sharna and I tried out these new Funkin Cocktail Pouches. I was sent samples from this brand new range of clever cocktail mixers to try out. It's a great idea, I have to say - perfect cocktails in just minutes. You just have to add you r spirit and ice to a glass and top up with the single serve cocktail pouch, though I must admit that for testing purposes we opted to make two small drinks (i.e. one for each of us) with each pouch!

Of the three we tried, we were a little disappointed with the Mojito mixer - bags of lime flavour, but little in the way of mint - if you had access to some fresh mint it'd still be a goer though. It also occurred to us that it would be gorgeous with a shot of tequila instead of the rum.

The other two pouches were better - the raspberry mojito still suffered from the lack of mint but the fresh, fruity flavour made up for thatt. The Cosmo - easily among my favourite cocktails anyway - was really good, and it really took no longer to make this than it would to throw together a vodka and orange. Way more stylish, though!

Favourites Old and New

This first course is a 1950s American favourite. Retro-Food.com informs me that the Lipton company first printed the recipe for its 'California Onion Dip' on the back of Lipton onion soup mix packets in 1954.

I first came across the idea in my copy of Kitschy Canapés by Babs Harrison and recently rediscovered it while book-trawling retro catering ideas for my 30th birthday party later this year. As the vrai Lipton Recipe Secrets Onion Soup Mix is un available to us limeys, I substitute a sachet of Knorr French Onion Soup mix. Mixed with a 300ml carton of sour cream and chilled for an hour or so, it makes for something that is way more than the sum of its parts. Things become classics for a reason, don'cha know..?

Speaking of which, may I present my new best thing. After a Facebook-based conversation with an old (the friendship, not the friend) mate, I was introduced to this, and could hardly wait to cook it for dinner tonight to accompany some plain-cooked Lincolnshire bangers.

Daniel's Favourite Potatoes

new potatoes
mustard
mature cheddar

Boil the potatoes until tender, then drain them and 'crush' lightly with a potato masher, to break them up but not too much. Mix in some mustard (I used wholegrain, but Daniel's original uses English mustard). Bung in a dish, top with cheese and melt it, in the oven or under the grill.

This is the sort of food you SCOFF!

Tarts - Always a Good Option

Well, that's what I think anyway, hee hee. Make the pastry , line the tin and you're laughing. All you need to do then is fill it - and you can do the pastry case in the morning or even the day before - just put it in a sealed plastic bag to keep it fresh in the fridge.

When you're ready to cook it, find some bits for a filling - tonight I fried some bacon bits and cut up half a camembert (which had been rather disappointing on the cheeseboard, but worked fine in this) - then beat 3 eggs and a 200g tub of crème fraîche together and pour into the pastry case, covering the filling. Bake at 200°c for 30 minutes, then leave to cool slightly before sliding it out of the tin and onto a serving plate.
I had intended to serve the tart with steamed potatoes and a green salad, but found that we'd actually run out of potatoes. Grr! This rice salad made a more than acceptable substitute, however, and reminded me how much I love rice salads (unlike pasta salads which, with limited exceptions, are pretty foul).

Colourful Rice Salad

I use Morrisons' Frozen Special Mixed Vegetables, defrosted, for this. There's not really anything that 'special' about them, but it's the sort of mix; peas, corn, carrots, broccoli and peppers - rather than those packs of diced mixed veg for stews - that you're looking for here.

300g brown rice
350g vegetables (and see above)
handful raisins
garlic & herb dressing (recipe follows)

Cook the rice. Chop the vegetables up, if necessary, for a nice finish to the completed salad and combine with the cooked rice. Stir in the raisins, then pour over as much dressing as you need to evenly coati, but not swamp, the salad. Chill until needed.

Garlic & Herb Dressing

5 fl.oz olive oil
2 tbsp garlic vinegar
2 tbsp lemon juice
1 tsp Dijon mustard
handful fresh herbs - your choice - chopped finely

Whisk it all together, or whizz in a blender. You'll need only 1/3 to 1/2 this quantity for the rice salad, but thisis one of my absolute favourite salad dressings, so keep it in the fridge and use it whenever you might otherwise use a vinaigrette.

No Basket Required

Chicken and Chips is, to us, a pretty perfect Friday night feast. I made my Crisp Chicken, supplemented today by Nigella Lawson's 'Fast Fries' from Nigella Express. I used maincrop potatoes instead of new and cooked them in the oven instead of frying them. I find that I am always less harried by food that is out of sight (and the reach of children) in the oven than on the hob. I am hugely grateful for the idea of breaking up the spuds by bashing them with a rolling pin. Totally therapeutic! Also, because the potatoes are bagged up, there's nothing more than the oven tray (not even a knife) to wash up after making these.


To start tonight's meal, I adapted one of my favourite party snacks. I know, I know, "life's too short to stuff a mushroom" and believe me I agree with you, but this way makes it quicker, honestly. I make no apologies for using 'Bacos' rather than actual bacon - I know they're as proceesed as you can get, but I do have rather a soft spot for them (and see here for more on this subject). No matter, though, here we go.

Cheese & Bacon Mushrooms

mushrooms
'Bacos' (or cooked bacon, if you'd rather)
chopped parsley
grated cheese

'Pull the stalks out of the mushrooms and put them, cup-side up in an ovenproof dish. Don't throw the stalks away, will you - there's always 'shrooms on toast or an omelette to be had with the leftovers! Sprinkle 'Bacos' into each hole and cover with chopped parsley. Blanket the whole lot with grated cheese, grind over some pepper and bake at 200°c for 20 minutes. Serve with salad leaves.

Glitter Bug

This is just fabulous - I have to share it. Showing my toenails in summery peep-toe shoes means that a bit of a (rushed) home 'pedi' is in order. I am a great one for colour anyway, but wearing bright nail polish in a vivid colour can really make my day. This is my latest favourite - Barry M Nail Paint in 150 Red Glitter. It's so quintessentially 'ruby slippers' that it just feels perfect for toenails.

I can hardly stop wiggling my toes around because it's so great. Doesn't it make you want to click those heels together? Or is that only me? I think this might just be the best nail polish ever!

Currying Favour

Tonight I tried something new. 'Vegetable curry' was not something I was really expecting to go down terribly well, but I loved the idea of the combination of flavours and textures in this meal, so I decided to be brave and go for it.

Softening the (potential) blow of a totally vegetarian meal was made easier by a first course of a large plate of Potato Bhajias (made according to Madhur Jaffrey's recipe). I then brought the steaming pan of curry to the table and awaited my judgement with bated breath. What a relief! The children positively inhaled it , despite having already gorged themselves on the bhajias. I think Hubby was probably less keen, but he is more of a meat-and-potatoes-man and, give him his dues, his plate was clean.

Vegetable Curry with Red Lentils

I used an organic Tikka Masala curry powder, blended by Steenbergs, which we received in a hamper at Christmas (ta, G+E).

1 small onion, chopped
2 tsp 'lazy' garlic
1 tbsp curry powder (your choice, natch)
100g red lentils
600ml vegetable stock
1 small cauliflower, in florets
1 big carrot, peeled and sliced
100g fine beans, trimmed and halved
2 good handfuls spinach leaves

Heat some oil in a wide pan and cook the onion and garlic together until softened. Add the curry powder and lentils, then pour in the hot stock. Drop in the pieces of cauliflower and carrot, then cover the pan and simmer for 20 minutes. Stir in the beans, then lay the spinach on top of the curry and recover the pan for a further 5-10 minutes. Mix well and serve, with brown rice and condiments. I liked yoghurt and lime pickle with mine, Hub just the former. James wanted lots of mango chutney with his, I think he thinks it's jam. Christopher is still going through his (apparently never-ending) 'suspicious' phase when it comes to added sauces and dressings, so he had his 'as was'.

Saying that, I notice that his wariness doesn't seem to apply to chocolate sauce on ice-cream, nor to custard with puddings...

Perky Turkey

It's been soooo hot today; not that I'm complaining, you understand. I've been shivering in "It's Spring, dammit!-denial" for weeks now, so it's rather nice that the weather has finally caught up with my wardrobe. James and I spent the afternoon (while Chris was at school) outside, playing and sitting, chatting to friends, respectively. I wasn't sure, on the way home, if the meal I'd planned for this evening would go down terribly well because of the heat. I'm happy to report that it did, after all - clean plates all round.

This is definitely a throw-it-together kind of meal. You can vary this in all sorts of ways to make it suit your mood and (in my case, anyway) what needs using up from the freezer.

Turkey Enchiladas

300g turkey, sliced
400g can mixed beans, drained and rinsed
2 x 400g cans chopped tomatoes
6 flour tortillas
100g cheddar cheese, coarsely grated

Heat a little oil in a large pan and fry the turkey strips until just cooked through. Add the beans, then stir in half of one can of tomatoes. Use this mixture to fill the tortillas, laying the 'wraps' side-by-side in an ovenproof dish. Tip the rest of the tomatoes into the pan, along with 100ml water, and bring to the boil. Pour this sauce over the tortillas, pushing the edges down to cover everything well. Top with grated cheese and bake at 180°c for 25 minutes until golden brown and bubbling.


For an easy first course, I set out a bowl of yoghurt and another of Salsa Mexicana Verde (from a can!), with some shop-bought tortilla chips. The salsa, which came from Mexgrocer, is quite tangy and piquant but nonetheless addictive for that. The boys aren't so keen, but there's time...

Pulse Rate

Lentils are so useful in the kitchen. I add the little red split ones to all sorts of things to bulk them out, stretch them further or just to add a different dimension of texture. A spoonful or two in a stew thickens the gravy nicely as it cooks, without the need for any artificial jiggery-pokery, and you can stretch a small quantity of minced beef further if you add half the quantity of lentils to whatever you're cooking and simmer with some stock. Pulses are cheap, especially if you buy the bags of dried ones which you soak and cook for yourself. More and more, too, I find that my children adore pulses of all kinds and will enthusiastically devour just about anything that is accompanied by lentils, chock-full of chickpeas or studded with red kidney beans.

For a meal or side dish, though, you'd be hard pressed to beat the beautiful, pebbly, French lentilles de Puy. Once a recherché resident of upmarket and continental grocers, they can now (thanks largely to Merchant Gourmet) be found in even the smaller supermarkets. This little one-pot meal shows them off to their best, cooked simply with sausages for an unfussy, but still somehow rather special, family supper.

Sausage & Lentil Braise

The pork chop was added really because I had one that needed to be used; you could easily leave it out, though I do think it adds to the flavour of the juices and to the 'feastliness' of the meal as a whole.

1 leek, shredded

fresh thyme

50ml vermouth (or white wine)

250ml Puy lentils

1 or 2 pork chops, bone-in please

6-10 coarse pork sausages

Heat a little fat in a flameproof casserole and soften the leeks with some finely chopped fresh thyme. Add the lentils to the pan, stirring to coat them in the fat, then pour in the vermouth or wine and allow the alcohol to bubble away. Pour in 500ml water, then lay the pork chop and sausages in the pan. Bring to the boil, then cover the pan and simmer for 20 minutes. Serve straight from the pan, possibly (if you can stand the extra carbs) with some nice bread for mopping up the juices.

Spaghetti & Chocolate

Tonight I asked a friend over for an impromptu spag bol dinner and a none-too-serious Wii tournament. I say impromptu because it really was a last-minute thing; I sent her a text at lunchtime to ask if she fancied it and away we went. Everyone has their own way of cooking a bolognese sauce (and mine is here), people bang on about how it's not 'authentic' Italian really, but who cares when it tastes so good. You do need a bit of time to leave it on the stove, which you can profitably use to make some Garlic Bread. If time is short I'd suggest doing another pasta dish instead, less rush and stress all round. There are a few ideas if you follow the pasta link below this post...

Win luxury Easter eggs from Hotel Chocolat!!

Easter is coming very quickly and everyone wants that extra special Easter Egg! Distracted Housewife has teamed up with Hotel Chocolat to offer you a chance to win some of Hotel Chocolat’s extra special, extra thick Easter Eggs.

To enter, click here and simply answer six questions which will take you on an Easter egg hunt to find the secret code. Once you have answered each question, use the first letter of each answer to reveal the secret code. If you have found the right answer you stand a chance to win one of Hotel Chocolat’s stunning Extra Thick Easter Eggs!

Tortilla Filla

After all the drama of my car accident the week before, last week I was nursing a very poorly Christopher who was off school with a terribly upset stomach. Not much time for anything except cuddles and lots of laundry, though I did manage to keep a lunch date with friends to celebrate of of their birthdays. Cooking was limited by the facts of Karl's shifts and Christopher's inability to eat anything, so I used what little evening time I had for rest and relaxation as far as possible. However, I'm now back, as it were, and this week I will try again to get things back to normal again (famous last words...) and for us that started with a family meal. Tonight I cobbled together lots of bits and pieces and made a really good dinner which was so popular I just know I'll repeat it again and again. It started as a way to use up a pack of wholemeal tortillas that Hubby brought home (as they were reduced to the bargain price of ninepence), which had been sitting in the freezer for a while.

Mustering the minute sum of my Mexican cooking knowledge, I came up with this little wonder, which is basically my riff on enchiladas. I made the filling and sauce together, scooping the 'bits' out to fill the tortilla rolls, then used the sauce to moisten the dish before topping it all off with cheese.

Tortilla Bake

If you prefer, use strips of beef or pork instead of chicken. The Mexican Pepper Recaudo is available online from Mexgrocer as Mexican Marinade & Grill Sauce, or you could subsitute the equivalent quantity of some other Mexican-style cooking sauce)

4 cloves garlic, peeled
1 onion, sliced
500g chicken, cut into strips
2 red peppers, deseeded and sliced
400g tin chopped tomatoes
1 x 311g bottle Mexican Pepper Recaudo (and see above)
6 flour tortillas (mine were wholemeal but - meh!)
grated cheese (strong cheddar for preference)


Heat some oil in a big pan and, when hot, fry the garlic cloves until they begin to colour. Scoop them out of the oil and discard them. Drop in the sliced onion and cook briefly to soften, then add the chicken strips and peppers and fry until the chicken is cooked through. Tip in the tomatoes and the Recaudo, then bring the sauce to the boil. Scoop out the chunky chicken and vegetables with a slotted spoon and use to fill each of the 6 tortillas, rolling them up and laying them side-by-side in an ovenproof dish. Pour the sauce over and around the tortilla rolls, then top with plenty of cheese. Bake at 200 for 25 minutes until browned on top, then serve.

We ate ours with a simple green salad; all it needed, really.

Cauli Gosh!

We had a lovely little cauliflower in our veg box this week, so tonight it made a cheering dinner of cauliflower cheese for the children and me. We'd been out all afternoon as I had a session with the BFN, who are training me to become a breastfeeding helper. The boys spent the afternoon playing in the créche, so we were all three ready for a hearty meal, when we finally arrived home and got in out of the rain.

This is another of those straightforward bung-it-together family meals, made comforting by lashings of cheesy sauce. I like to use a mixture of milk and cream to make the sauce for this particular dish, as it helps it to really cloak the cauliflower, rather than completely running down the sides. I also prefer not to break up the cauliflower into florets, but to steam it whole. This is purely an aesthetic thing, and I won't deny that breaking it up beforehand does make this quicker to cook, and easier to serve.


Cauliflower Cheese


1 smallish cauliflower, trimmed of outer leaves but left whole (and see above)
30g butter
30g plain flour
1 tsp mustard powder
150ml double cream
300ml milk
handful grated Cheddar cheese
grated parmesan, to finish (optional)




Cook the cauliflower until tender. I steam it, but you can boil it or even stick it in the microwave. Don't over-cook it to mush, but equally you do want it soft(ish). Crunchy cauliflower cheese? Not good.

While the cauli is cooking, get the sauce ready. Put the butter, flour, mustard, milk and cream into a pan and bring to the boil, whicking continuously. Simmer for a couple of minutes until the sauce is thick and glossy, then, off the heat, stir in the grated Cheddar.

Put the cooked cauliflower into an ovenproof dish and pour over the sauce. Dust with a little parmesan, if you like, and then flash it under a blazing hot grill until parts of the sauce begin to scorch a bit. Serve straightaway, while still sizzling hot.

We had some cheese and onion bread (made in the machine from a Wright's mix) and a few bits and bobs of salad veg alongside.