Beef Casserole with Herb Dumplings

This was very very nice..... no leftovers...

About 500g diced beef
Olive oil
3 carrots
Celery (3 sticks)
Garlic (2 cloves)
2 onions
c. 1.5 pints of beef stock (2 cubes)

1. Garlic. Chop.
2. Onions. Chop.
3. Into the pan with garlic and onions. 2 mins. High heat (5-6 on the hob)
4. Add the beef. Stir until browned.
5. Add chopped celery and chopped carrots.
6. Add half the stock (you can probably add all in one go, but I did half, and then added the rest once it had disappeared) and turn down to 3-4. Cover.
7. Cook for 1-2 hours (I didn't keep track - just pop in and check occasionally).

Make the dumplings:
100g SR flour
1/2 tsp of baking powder (I was a little too generous with this - closer to 1tsp = v.big dumplings!)
50g Atora Light Shredded Vegetable Suet
Herbs - Flat-leaf parsley was suggested in the recipe I started from, but didn't have any and so used dried rosemary. This was OK, but probably will experiment with something else next time (thyme, perhaps?).

1 Mix ingredients together with c. 5-6 tbsp of cold water (enough to make a sticky dough).
2. Put spoonfuls into the casserole - stir slightly (so some of the juice covers the dumplings). Cook for a further half an hour, then serve.

Butternut Squash, Bacon and Sage Risotto with Pine Nuts

This is very nice, perhaps a little rich (next time I'll actually measure the sage....). However, very good for taking lunch to work.

1 large butternut squash (or as much as you've got left)
3 rashers of unsmoked back bacon
2 garlic cloves, peeled
2 tbsp olive oil
15 sage leaves (says the original recipe from the BBC website, but I used dried sage, which I got from Spice Master)
Sea salt and ground pepper
400g of risotto rice
Vegetable stock (2-3 cubes, about 1.5 pints)
Parmesan cheese
Pine nuts

Step 1: Roast the squash with the chopped garlic, glug of olive oil, half the sage leaves, sea salt and pepper. (Will take around 40-50mins @ 200C)
Step 2: Mash the squash (lightly).
Step 3: Heat some oil in the saucepan, cook off the chopped bacon.
Step 4: Add the squash and sticky juices from the roasting pan.
Step 5: Stir, add in the risotto rice and stir until grains are covered by the oil.
Step 6: Add some of the stock, stir, wait until absorbed, add stock, stir, wait until absorbed, etc.
Step 7: Add in some dried parmesan (c. 1-2 tbsp).
Step 8: Toast the pinenuts in a hot frying pan, and scatter over the risotto once served.

Indian chicken ... (murgi musallam)

This weekend saw Sister-In-Law-The-Younger (SILTY?) leave London for the Promised Land in the North to complete her university studies after a year's internship. As such, she (and Mumsy) stayed over on Saturday evening. I wanted to cook something a bit nice for Sunday lunch, and a bit Indian, so that we could try out the mango chutney (recipe to be posted) which I had made earlier in the week.
I was wanting to cook 'murgi musallam' - as set out in the recipe here.
I think that it worked quite well - I susbtituted butter and a little olive oil for the ghee, and chopped the chicken breasts up instead of cooking them whole. I also stirred through (on the advice of The Husband) half a tsp of ground cumin and a tsp of ground coriander towards the end.
Served with leftover saffron rice (rescued from SILTY's freezer) and plenty of fiery mango chutney. Yum!

Serves 4-6

Ingredients

1 medium-size chicken

2 tbsp yoghurt

2 medium-size onions

1 tsp salt 8 raisins ½ tsp coriander, grated or powder ½ tsp ginger, grated or powder

4 cloves of garlic, grated or chopped

8 whole black peppercorns

2 cinnamon sticks, about 4in

4 cloves

2 tbsp ghee (clarified butter)

4 cardamoms, peeled and sliced

4 almonds, peeled and sliced

Pinch of powdered saffron

Method

1 Marinate the chicken with the yoghurt, one onion (grated), salt, raisins and all the spices, except the cardamom , almonds and saffron. Leave for up to an hour.

2 To cook the chicken, heat 1 tablespoon of ghee and about 2 tablespoons of water in a pan, add the meat, and cook covered until it is tender, removing the lid until most of the liquid has evaporated.

3 Remove all the marinade and mash to make a paste. Meanwhile, fry the chicken slowly with the other tablespoon of ghee until it is nicely browned.

4 Rub the marinade paste over the chicken and cook for a few minutes more on a low heat, adding the cardamom, almonds, saffron and one onion (fried).

5 Serve hot with pilau rice.

Fish pie

Prompted by a rather delicious Sunday lunch at Sister-in-law the Younger's today, this is the recipe for Fish Pie which I have used recently. Taken from 'Easy Living' -

Serves 4-6
Prep 30 mins
Cooking 35 mins

Mashed potato to cover (make more than you think you will need, as it is difficult to spread across the top of the pie dish)
500g (1lb) firm white fish fillets
250g (80z) smoked fish fillets
600ml (20 fl oz) milk
1 bay leaf
4 black peppercorns
50g (1 3/4 oz) butter
1 small onion, chopped
2 tbsp plain flour
250g (8oz) small uncooked prawns, peeled
Pinch of cayenne pepper
2 tbsp chaopped flat-leaf parsley
20g (3/4 oz) butter

1. Make mashed potatoe, head oven to 180C / Gas Mark 4
2. Skin fish, remove bones, flake into bite-sized pieces.
3. Into the saucepan: white fish, smoked fish, milk, bay leaf, peppercorns - over a medium heat and summer for 5 minutes.
4. Strain the mixture, reserving the fish and the milk.
5. Melt butter over a low heat, add the onion and cook for 7 mins, stirring lots, until soft and translucent.
6. Add flour, stir well, cook for 1 minute.
7. Slowly whisk in the reserved milk, and bring to the boil, whisking frequently, and cook until smooth and thickened. Allow to cool.
8. Add the prawns, cayenne pepper and parsley to the bowl containing the fish, and pour over the sauce.
9. Add milk if appears too thick, season with salt and pepper (I tend to leave out salt)
10. Spoon the mixture into pie dish.
11. Cover over with mashed potato. Fluff with a fork. Dot with additional butter.
12. Bake for 30-35 mins / until golden and bubbling.

Serve with something green (mmmm, petits pois, green beans!). When I made this for the Husband's parentals, I added tarragon to the mashed potato, which I think worked.

Mmmm ... Beef Stifado

First day back at work today, The Husband and I went via the Rose of Waiting to pick up some provisions in advance of a big on-line shop next week.

We picked up 'Beef Stifado'. Gorgeous!

A little hunt on t'internet produced a variety of recipes, including this one.

One to try, methinks...

Lamb biryani

I've just tracked down The Husband's favourite dish, which I shall have to attempt at some point...

Madhur Jaffrey's lamb biryani.... I found the recipe here.

Hunter's Chicken

What I cooked for Saturday dinner (shortly before the brand-new cooker died - grr!) for The Husband, Sister-In-Law The Younger and me.

Serves 4

Recipe is taken from Nigella Express and tweaked here and there.

Ingredients:
Olive oil
Garlic to taste
Pancetta (c. 75g - or a whole packet, if more)
Red onions
Bunch of rosemary
3 chicken breasts
1/2 tsp celery salt
125ml white wine
400g (tin) of chopped tomatoes
2 bay leaves
400g (tin) of cannellini beans.
2/3 peppers - red/yellow will work best

Method:
1. Fry off the chopped garlic, onions, rosemary and pancetta for a couple of minutes (adding one at a time - probably in the order stated above)
2. Add the chicken, stir well, sprinkle with celery salt
3. Pour in the wine, and let it come to a bubble.
4. Add the tomatoes and bay leaves.
5. Replace lid, simmer for 20 minutes.
6. c. 5-10 mins before serving, add the sliced peppers.
7. Drain the beans and add to the pan just at the end of the 20 minutes (in 5.) - when they have warmed through - Serve!

This was accompanied by some rather lovely focaccia (with a garlic and pesto centre) made by Sister-In-Law-The-Younger.

Yum!

Chilli Con Carne

My chilli recipe - adapted from Mary Berry's 'Complete Cook Book'.

Serves 4
Ingredients:
250g (or a tin) of red kidney beans in water
2 tbsp olive oil
450g (or a pack) of beef mince (steak mince is best)
2 onions, chopped
2 fresh red chillies
Garlic to taste (recipe says one clove crushed, I would probably use c. 1/4 - 1/2 bulb as The Husband's family are *very* keen on garlic)
1 tbsp plain flour (or, at a push, any flour)
500ml of beef stock (made from Oxo) + another beef Oxo cube to crumble in
2 tbsp of tomato puree

Method:
1. Put olive oil in pan, throw in chopped garlic, and chopped chillies. Cook off for a few minutes to let the garlic/chilli infuse into the oil.
2. Add the meat. Brown off. Add the onions.
3. Add the flour, stir in and cook for a minute.
4. Add the stock, and then the tomato puree. Stir.
5. Crumble in the additional stock cube. Stir.
6. Add the beans. Stir.
7. Bring to the boil.
8. Turn the hob down to c. 3 or 4 (assuming it goes up to 6) and leave, covered with a lid, for c. 2 hours, stirring occasionally.
9. Eat.

This works very well (The Husband thinks that it is better, even) if it is cooked, put in the fridge overnight, and then reheated through (e.g. in the slow cooker when at church, as we did this morning - even if parking restrictions meant that we didn't actually make it to the service).

Lamb shanks

We had very nice lamb shanks for Sunday lunch today - recipe as follows (taken from the BBC Good Food website, and tweaked):

Lamb shanks (1 per person - the quantities below were for 4 people)
2 tbsp olive oil
1 onion, chopped
2 carrots, chopped
rosemary
3 bay leaves
1 garlic bulb (this is due to the family being v.pro-garlic - the original recipe I looked at suggested 4 cloves)
2 tbsp plain flour
1 tbsp tomato puree
350ml white wine
500ml lamb stock
and an extra stock cube.

The original recipe also had the lamb cooked at 200C for c. 2 hours. As our oven is half broken (so we use just the grill/top oven, and the hob), we had to tweak that as well as we needed the oven to cook roast potato wedges for the meal...

So....

• Put the olive oil into a stew pan, add the lamb shanks, cook at 200C for 10 mins
• Add chopped carrot and onion, cook for a further 10 mins
• Add the garlic, rosemary and bay leaves, cook for a further 3-5 mins
• Remove lamb from the pan, set aside, transfer pan to hob
• Add white wine, lamb stock (could probably use both cubes at this point - i used one, and then put one in later on), flour (remember to mix in well) and tomato puree (n.b. this amount does make it quite tomato-ey - I may cut back slightly in future.
• Simmer for a while
• Add the lamb back, put lid on stew pot, continue to cook for c. 90-120 mins (the liquid should be simmering, rather than boiling - we cooked this at c. 3/4 (on a scale of 1-6) on the hob.
• Turn the shanks halfway through - this helps you to see when it is falling off the bone.

This was lovely - the lamb fell off the bone, and fell apart on our plates. We served with roast potato wedges, sweet potato mash, baby corn and mange tout. Followed by white chocolate and raspberry cheesecake ramekins.