Posts Tagged ‘Onion’
Wednesday, March 2nd, 2011
Here’s another meat free offering for your bad selves. Don’t worry, I’m not going veggie, but this baked aubergine classic is a winner, and might even make it into my top 5 Italian dishes. Failing that comfortably top 10.
The mozzarella and the aubergine give great texture to the dish, and I like to griddle my aubergine before layering to add a bit of a smokey flavour.
Lets do this.
Ingredients (serves 2)
2 tins of chopped tomatoes
1 onion, finely chopped
2 large cloves of garlic, finely chopped
1/2 glass of white wine
1 tablespoon tomato puree
Small bunch of fresh basil
1 large aubergine, or 2 small
180g mozzarella
Salt & pepper
Parmesan
Olive oil
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Tags: Aubergine, Baked, Basil, Italian, Meat Free Monday, mozzarella, Onion, parmesan, Parmigiana di Melanzane, Tomato
Posted in Dinner, Lunch | No Comments »
Monday, February 21st, 2011
I can’t remember if I’ve mentioned it before or not, but we start every week with Macca’s ‘meat free Monday‘. Don’t hold it against us.
As a confirmed carnivores, it can be quite tough to build up the enthusiasm to cook a bunch of vegetables, but this curry is healthy, tasty, and as it uses a ready made paste, its fast too. I use a spicy madras paste in this recipe, but you can use what ever floats your boat.
Ingredients
1 onion, finely chopped
3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 heaped teaspoon of chopped fresh ginger
2 tablespoons madras curry paste
1 teaspoon ground coriander
1 tin chopped tomatoes (400g)
1 tin chick peas (400g)
200 ml water
150g fresh spinach, roughly chopped
Handful of fresh coriander, chopped
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Tags: Basmati Rice, Chick Pea, Coriander, Curry, Garlic, Ginger, Madras, Meat Free Monday, Onion, paste, Paul McCartney, Spinach, Tomato
Posted in Dinner, Recipes | 1 Comment »
Thursday, January 6th, 2011
Back to Christmas for a couple of posts. As I mentioned earlier, my old dear does a Herculean quantity of cooking over Christmas, so it’s become a bit of a tradition that I’ll give her the night off and cook something up for the family.
This year I opted for a stuffed loin of pork, served with rosemary and thyme roasted new potatoes and buttered cabbage. The only really fiddly bit of this recipe is tying the joint up after you’ve stuffed it. I made a bit of a mess of my string work, but there are plenty of on-line vids to watch to help you hone your skills.
A 2kg joint should serve around 8 people. Get your butcher to bone and butterfly the meat, and score the skin for you, unless you know what you’re doing with a knife.
Ingredients
2kg loin of pork (the best you can afford)
400g pork mince
1 apple, peeled, cored and diced
1 onion, finely chopped
2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
Handful of sage leaves, finely chopped
Handful of bread crumbs
Zest of a lemon
1/4 nutmeg, grated
Salt and pepper to taste
Another onion, sliced for roasting the joint on on
Half a glass of white wine
Method
It should be no surprise to learn that the first step is to prepare the stuffing, but before you do this set your oven to 230c, then sweat off the onion, apple and garlic in some olive oil, making sure your apple is diced nice and finely. You don’t want to colour the ingredients, just get them softened. When the onion is translucent, set aside to cool a bit.
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Tags: Apple, Bread crumbs, Christmas, Crackling, Lemon Zest, Loin, Mince, Nutmeg, Onion, Pork, Roast, Sage, Stuffing, White Wine
Posted in Dinner, Lunch, Recipes | No Comments »
Tuesday, August 24th, 2010
They’ve been repeating the Jamie Does… series on More 4 recently, and aside from the shocking title sequence, I think it’s a pretty enjoyable show. I like the idea of zeroing in on a region’s cuisine as opposed to skimming the surface of a whole country, something that the late great Kieth Floyd did so well.
One of the dishes that got my mouth watering the most was the tomato risotto he cooked in Venice. There was just something beautifully simple about the risotto and the tomatoes cooked in olive oil that made me want to give it a go. I’m sure there’s an accompanying book for the series, but I haven’t bought it, so this recipe is a approximation of what I saw of the idiot box. It worked for me, so should do for you too.
Ingredients (serves 2)
For the risotto
1 small onion, finely chopped
1 large celery stalk, finely chopped
100g arborio rice
100 ml white wine
1 litre vegetable stock
Handful of grated Parmesan (about 25g)
Olive oil
Unsalted butter
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
For the tomatoes
15-20 mini plum / cherry tomatoes, halved
1 large clove of garlic, finely chopped
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Tags: Basil, Butter, Celery, Jamie Does..., Jamie Oliver, Kieth Floyd, Olive Oil, Onion, parmesan, Risotto, stock, Tomato
Posted in Dinner, Lunch, Recipes, Reviews | 3 Comments »
Thursday, June 24th, 2010
It’s been hot, hot, hot in London town this week, and the warm weather has got me thinking about summer food. Aside maybe from a decent burger on a barbie, for me it’s the Mediterraneans that totally nail ‘al fresco’ eating. Grilled meats, crunchy veg and fresh zingy flavours.
These lamb wraps have all that and more. The taste of the spicy, charred, marinated meat and the tzatziki work really well together, and the wraps mean that the dish is still pretty light. We don’t have a garden, so our griddle pan has to do.
Ingredients (makes 3 large wraps)
For the lamb
400g lamb leg steaks
Handful of fresh oregano leaves, chopped
2 cloves of garlic, chopped
1 teaspoon dried chilli flakes
Juice of one lemon
50ml extra virgin olive oil
1/2 teaspoon smoked paprika
Pinch of salt
Freshly ground black pepper to taste
For the tzatziki
200g 0% fat Greek yoghurt
1/4 cucumber, sliced and diced
Handful of mint leaves, chopped
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Tags: Chilli, Cucumber, Garlic, Lamb, Lemon, Mint, Olive Oil, Onion, Oregano, Paprika, Salad, Tzatziki, Wraps, Yoghurt
Posted in Dinner, Lunch, Recipes | 3 Comments »
Friday, May 21st, 2010
One of the other dishes I was thinking about for the previous post was this omelette for two. I thought it could work quite well in that it combines seaside ingredients with the romantic nature of Lou and Liam’s retreat. However, fish for brekkie isn’t to everyone’s tastes, so this is the kind of dish you can enjoy at any time of the day.
There’s only one mackerel fillet in the mix so the flavour isn’t too strong, and I use a bit of zero fat Greek yoghurt in the eggs to help keep the omelette moist in the middle. The little bit of sharpness the yoghurt gives also works well with the oily fish.
Ingredients
4 large free range eggs
2 tablespoons 0% fat Greek yoghurt
1 mackerel fillet (around 70g)
1/2 medium onion, chopped
2 tablespoons chopped chives
2 tablespoons chopped flat leaf parsley
Handful of grated Parmesan
Salt and pepper to taste
Olive oil and butter for frying.
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Tags: Chives, Eggs, Greek Yoghurt, Mackerel, Omelette, Onion, parmesan, Parsley, Raddish, Salad, Smoked
Posted in Breakfast, Lunch, Recipes, Travel | No Comments »
Monday, May 3rd, 2010
As I may or may not have mentioned before, my other half’s family are a real mixed bag in terms of nationalities. Chinese, Indian, and South African to name but three. A veritable melting pot compared to my comparatively mundane ancestry.
As a result, my future mother in law, Connie, seems to be able to cook anything. From insane curries and whole fried Chinese fish, to cream horns and South African doughnuts. And the speed she does it at is mind blowing. Turn your back for 10 seconds and when you look back there’s a plate of food in front of you. Brilliant.
This recipe is for her quick lamb curry that I tried whilst over in Oz and she kindly wrote the recipe down for me. It’s very tasty, and also very easy. If you can get your lamb on the bone, so much the better as it’ll give your curry more flavour.
Ingredients
750g stewing lamb, diced
1 large onion, chopped
4 cloves garlic, pounded
1 thumb sized piece of ginger, pounded
1/4 teaspoon tumeric
1 teaspoon ground coriander
1/2 teaspoon cumin
1/2 teaspoon chilli powder
1 teaspoon garam masala
1/2 teaspoon cumin seeds
1 cinnamon stick
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Tags: Chilli, Coriander, Cumin, Curry, Garam Massala, Garlic, Ginger, Green Lentils, Lamb, Onion, Rice, Tomato
Posted in Dinner, Recipes, Travel | 4 Comments »
Monday, January 25th, 2010
The 25th of January means that it’s Burns Night chez Hand To Mouth. Despite my name I’m not Scottish, and neither of us are huge poetry fans, but we both love a bit of haggis so we celebrate Scotland’s favourite son with a bit of haggis and a drop or two of whiskey.
People get a bit squeamish about haggis as it’s made with sheep offal (lungs, liver and heart) and (traditionally) cooked in a sheep’s stomach. These days most haggises are sold in artificial casings, and there’s really nothing to worry about as all the contents are mashed up and mixed with onion, oatmeal, beef fat, spices and salt.
When it’s liberated from the casing the haggis it warm, sticky, hearty and really tasty. We have ours with neeps (mashed swede – still no idea why it’s called neeps), greens, and and intense onion and whiskey gravy.
Tradition dictates that you welcome the haggis to your table with one of Burn’s most famous poems ‘Address To A Haggis’. It’s pretty tricky to read, but it’s a bit of fun.
Ingredients
Serves 2
1 small haggis
1 medium swede
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Tags: Burns, Gravy, Greens, Haggis, Neeps, Night, Onion, Swede, Whisky
Posted in Dinner, Opinion, Recipes | No Comments »
