Recipe corner: Duck breast with tomato harissa sauce

Whenever D goes away for the night, you can almost guarantee that my supper will consist of one of two things. Either pizza or filled pasta (tossed in butter, cheese and black pepper of course). Cooking for one person, even when that person is myself, has never been of particular interest to me which is daft really. But I am a bear of very simple brain and all I want, when I am on my own, is something delicious, easy and comforting. Maybe one day I will branch out but...maybe not.

Whenever I go away for the night, as I did recently, D comes into his own. A delicious meal, usually involving a large slab of protein, a bottle of fine wine - the man knows how to party solo. His latest creation was this very delicious looking duck dish that he has promised faithfully to cook for me soon.

He is rather obsessed, and with good reason, with his Meater probe as it guarantees perfectly cooked meat. If you don't have one then you will need to just go with testing and cook's instinct!

Ingredients

Handful of cherry tomatoes - halved

Generous splash of olive oil

Garlic cloves - finely sliced

Shallot - finely sliced

Tsp cumin seeds

2 tsp harissa paste

Duck breast

2 tsp harissa

To serve (optional) - frites, mayonnaise cut through with hot sauce

Serves 1

To cook the duck - first, preheat your oven to 180. Insert the probe and then place skin side down in a cold pan. Set to a medium heat (this will be a 5 or 6 on our induction hob). Cook for 10 minutes to allow the fat to start to render. As it sits in the pan, paint the flesh side with harissa paste. After 10 minutes, transfer to the oven and cook until it is blushingly pink (the timings will very much depend on your duck breast, and my notes from D just say - "Remove when the probe tells you to.") Brush the skin with harissa and set aside to rest.

For the sauce - heat the olive oil and then add the shallot and garlic, with a generous amount of seasoning, and allow to soften for a few minutes. Stir through the harissa paste, then add the tomatoes along with the cumin seeds. Use the back of a spoon to gently crush the tomatoes. Reduce, over a medium heat until the sauce has reached its desired consistency - at least ten minutes. Do a final seasoning check - you may need a touch more salt and pepper and even a pinch of sugar if the tomatoes aren't quite sweet enough.

Serve the duck atop the sauce - with optional fries and spicy mayonnaise on the side.

Recipe corner: slow cooked sausage sauce (ideal for penne)

I hope that I'm not the only person out there that has an absolutely ridiculous amount of recipe bookmarks. I mean, more dishes than I could ever make in a lifetime if you count them up across all the different platforms. And still, they continue to accumulate.

There are some, though, that just lodge themselves in your head. And the fact that I recently cooked a recipe from a blog post that was originally written in 2010 just goes to show that...er, it may take 14 odd years but you might get there eventually. And, when you do, it will be splendifiourous! For this was a truly fantastic dish that I'm glad I finally roused myself to make, and will appear on our food plan again.

I believe that this is originally a River Cafe recipe, via Essex Eating, to ensure that the full credit is here in the post. It is rich and meaty and creamy and the absolute perfect pasta sauce to carry you through the autumn months. 

Ingredients

4 decent pork sausages

tbsp olive oil

Red onion, finely chopped

3 garlic cloves, crushed or grated

1/2 tsp chilli flakes

1/2 tsp fennel seeds

Bay leaf

150ml red wine

400g tin tomatoes

Pinch of sugar

1/4 nutmeg

60g Parmesan, finely grated (plus the rind if you have it)

75ml double cream

Serves 2-3 with 75g pasta pp (depending on level of greed)

Over a medium heat, warm the oil and then crumble in the sausage meat, removed from its skins. Cook gently, until more fat starts to render from the sausages.

Now add the onion, garlic and dried spices and, keeping the heat relatively low, cook for 30 mins or so until the onion is golden and soft.

Add the wine, whack the heat up a notch or two, and cook briskly until all the liquid has evaporated. Then add the tomatoes, seasoning with a pinch of sugar to take off the acidity, and add the Parmesan rind as well if you happen to have it. Turn down the heat and simmer for 45 minutes.

Season with the nutmeg, plus salt and pepper as required (you won't need much of either), and then stir through the grated cheese and the cream.

Serve with pasta (although I actually also think this would be lovely with a cloud of mash).

Recipe corner: Gymkhana's tandoori lamb chops

Halfway through February already - the days are slipping by at a frankly alarming rate and I can't believe how long it has been since I last blogged. 

Excitingly, it is entirely possible that we have already had our top dish of the year thanks to a fabulously foodie short break in Paris (abroad!) However, up until this last weekend, I felt my cooking mojo had been somewhat lacking. Looking back over our archived meal plan for January, I'm a little surprised at how much we cooked actually because I definitely felt that it was all a bit meh. It could just be the January blues (pernicious blighters) and the fact that after the Christmas festivities, things are always a little bit flat. 

Anyway, early on in the month we had a sneaky short break down in London, primarily to see my family for the first time since before the pandemic. And it was wonderful. My brother and sister in law are fantastic hosts and I don't think I have ever eaten a better Spanish omelette than the one that V cooked us as part of a tapas spread. The children, my gorgeous nieces and nephew, had, unsurprisingly, changed enormously in the last two years, but were as fun as ever, and super tolerant of their aged auntie. We spent a brilliant day with them. And the icing on the cake was the fact that the night before we had a superlative dinner at Mayfair's Gymkhana, a restaurant I have been keen to visit for a long time.

We were not disappointed. If you like Indian food (we do) then this is a must-visit. We had the tasting menu which, I must admit, defeated us in terms of sheer quantity but the flavours and skilful balancing of spices had us in full on plate-licking mode initially (until we got so full we could barely move!) We'd love to go again and maybe order a la carte to manage capacity issues. 

The star of the evening were the tandoori lamb chops which, D declared, ruined tandoori lamb chops for him forever - and I quite agree. While the starting point was undoubtedly meat of the highest quality, luscious and tender and tumbling off the bone, the flavours of the marinade were fantastic - recognisable to the Western palate as "tandoori" but with a complexity that is lacking in your bog standard order-from-up-the-road. 

Unfortunately, Gymkhana's kitchen has yet to produce a recipe book BUT the recipe for the lamb chops is online - when I discovered this fact they went straight on the meal plan and we cooked them this weekend. They did not disappoint; the only real point of difference we could discern was the fact that we cooked them under our grill, so they lacked the note of char produced by a tandoor over; the next time we make them, we will be firing up the barbecue. I made a few little tweaks as I went along - exceedingly minor - but the original recipe, along with some other stunning looking dishes can be found here.

Some notes - this requires two marinades, the first overnight, so you do need to prepare in advance. Some ingredients are a little obscure - I bought the kasoori methi (dried fenugreek leaves) and mustard oil online. The original recipe called for red chilli powder; now I know that our chilli powder is EXCEEDINGLY hot and didn't want that here (it wasn't in keeping with the original). I also know that a smoked paprika / chilli powder combination is sometimes suggested as a sub for certain types of Indian chilli powder, so that is what I did. The resulting lamb had a tingle but was not overwhelming; if you like chilli heat then you may wish to adjust my quantities upwards. Oh, and, goes without saying - use the best possible meat you can for this because that really is the bedrock of the dish.

Ingredients

8 lamb cutlets (or 1 8 bone rack of lamb)

First marinade:

Tbsp salt

3 fat cloves of garlic

2 inch (approx) piece of root ginger

2 tsp chilli powder

2 tsp smoked paprika

Tbsp kasoori methi

Small red onion, crushed with a mallet or rolling pin

Second marinade:

Tbsp salt

3 tsp chilli powder

3 tsp smoked paprika

7 tbsp Greek yoghurt

2 fat cloves of garlic

Inch (approx) pieces of root ginger

2 tbsp garam masala

2 tbsp mustard oil

Serves 2 greedy people (with sides)

Assemble your first marinade. Make a garlic and ginger paste: crush or finely grate the garlic, weigh, and then grate on an equivalent weight of root ginger and squish together with the flat of a knife. Bruise whatever remains of the ginger with whatever implement you used to crush the onion.  Combine the paste and the whole ginger with the other ingredients and add the lamb, mixing well and ensuring the lamb is well coated in spice. You may wish to do this in a large plastic bag rather than a bowl. Refrigerate, covered, (or in the bag) overnight.

Assemble your second marinade, making the garlic and ginger paste as before and this time discarding any of the ginger that you don't use. Combine the paste with all the other ingredients and then, in goes the lamb. Marinate for a further six hours or so.

To cook - grill (or barbecue), turning every few minutes until the centre of the cutlets has reached around 58 degrees (this should give you a medium result which is perfect for this dish but, of course, cook for longer if preferred).

Ricepe corner: A lightly spiced, buttery onion pilau

Let's talk rice. If I had to put my carbs in order of preference (and this is the kind of game that D and I play regularly) rice would tend to come near the bottom of the list but I love rice, I just tend to think I love bread and pasta and potatoes more. And then I eat some really nice rice and feel terrible for maligning it so. 

We had this rice with a very delicious lamb bhuna on Saturday night. I would share a picture, but I am terrible at food photography when the food is attractive, and we all know that there is nothing attractive about a plate of curry (taste aside, of course). Here is a picture of my cat instead:

She is playing in a large cardboard box here because, as any fule kno, cardboard boxes exert some sort of weird, magnetic pull on our feline friends and they tend to want to climb into them. Or, in this case, turn them into their own private fort (it was a very large box).

Anyway.

A very basic recipe (or ricepe - ha, ha) to be sure, but I like having a record of the basics. Especially side dishes - because it is attention to detail that can really make a meal. And while there is certainly nothing wrong with plain steamed rice, it's hard to get excited about.

Often, when we serve rice with a curry or a chilli, we just fork through some of D's famous green stuff (chilli and coriander chutney) which is a really quick way of taking things up a notch. But it's also nice to have a simple pilau recipe to hand to mix things up a bit - the spices are mellow and subtle and, of course, plenty of butter makes it rich and luscious.

I'm going to be honest - I think I've said this before - I just don't bother to soaking and rinsing my rice. I had a phase of doing it but I didn't really get much of a difference and it involves a) additional faff (not great for such a lazy individual) and b) being ORGANISED (which I am very much not). Hey, I know my (many and varied) limitations. Maybe I'm not doing soaking and rinsing right? 

I think this recipe originates from a blog and I can't remember which one so...apologies. I really need to remember to quote sources when I note stuff down. And, of course, Googling pilau rice doesn't really help. 

Ingredients

Tbsp vegetable oil

30g butter

Small onion, finely chopped

Tsp cumin seeds

Tsp turmeric

4 cardamom pods - lightly crushed so that the seeds are released

1/2 cinnamon stick

2 bay leaves

150g rice

225ml vegetable stock (you may need slightly more, so maybe make up 300-350 mls).

Heat the oil and half of the butter in a large pan which had a well fitting lid. Keep the heat nice and low so that when you add the onion it starts to soften and go translucent rather than colouring. Cook for around 5 minutes until soft. 

Add the dry spices and cook for a further couple of minutes until they have lost that slightly "raw" smell, then stir through the dry rice so that it is thoroughly coated in everything.

Pour in the stock. You want it to come about half a centimetre over the surface of the rice. Bring everything to a simmer and then put on the lid, turn the heat down to its lowest setting and set a 7 minute timer.

When the timer goes, turn off the heat and leave for a further 5 minutes without removing the lid.

Fluff the rice with a fork and melt through the other half of the butter. Discard the pods, stick and leaves before serving.

Recipe corner: Creamed spinach

As mentioned on Monday, I have recently added this to my rotating repertoire of side dishes for a roast (roast potatoes are the only fixed point, everything else is up for grabs. Controversial?) This is SUCH a simple dish but a fabulous accompaniment. Because the flavours are mellow (the Parmesan is really a seasoning, so it’s not particularly cheesy - just fabulously savoury) it would go with most things. And it is so soft and comforting, I can quite imagine just eating a bowl of mashed potato with this spooned on top with an extra cheeky shower of Parmesan. 

Ingredients

15g butter

15g plain flour

150ml milk

Scant teaspoon of English mustard

10g Parmesan cheese, finely grated

Shallot, finely chopped

Bag of baby leaf spinach (c. 120g)

Knob of butter, splash of rapeseed oil

Nutmeg

Serves 2, as a side

Melt a knob of butter and a splash (just a teaspoon or so) of oil over a very low heat. When the butter is just melted, throw in the shallot. Add a pinch of salt to help it sweat and then cook it, slowly, until soft and translucent. This dish is about softness, so be sure to cook until all hint of crunch is removed.

Add the spinach leaves, still keeping the heat low, and then cover. Cook, covered, for five minutes or so, stirring occasionally and wonder as the spinach wilts to practically nothing. Remove the lid and continue to cook until any visible liquid has disappeared. At this point season - you won’t need too much salt, but add a good grind of black pepper and a generous grating of nutmeg. I went for about a quarter of a small nut as I wanted a real whack of nutmeg flavour, but go slowly if you’re not sure - it’s heady stuff. Remove the spinach mixture from the pan and set aside.

Turn the heat up slightly (so now medium low) and then we’re making a standard roux. You know the drill: melt the butter then stir in the flour to create a pale, golden paste. Pour the milk in, a third or so at a time, stirring briskly on each addition to ensure a smooth sauce. Once all the milk has been added, lightly season (remember you already have well seasoned spinach), stir through the mustard and bubble the sauce, gently, for a couple of minutes. Taste, to ensure all the flour taste has been cooked out. Remove from the heat and melt through the Parmesan. Finally, add the spinach back to the sauce and combine well.

Bake in a hot (180 fan) oven for 25-30 minutes, until golden and bubbling. I would suggest covering it for the first half and then removing the lid / foil for the remainder, but I have a beast of an oven. If you’re having it as part of a roast dinner (for example) it a good one to prepare in advance and just whack in to bake alongside potatoes et al.

Recent eats: the interminable winter edition

I find myself so intensely boring at the moment that I haven't wanted to inflict any blogging on the world. Lockdown has not been good for me. I have basically turned even more sloth like in my habits and my hair is, frankly, ridiculous. Funky, asymmetric styles are all very well until they start growing out and then they just look like someone can't cut straight.

So we've been cooking and eating, which is fine. What can I tell you about? We brined a roast chicken the other week - or, to be strictly accurate, we brined a chicken for 48 hours prior to roasting it which was delicious. It would have been better, however, if I hadn't managed to roast it upside-down. Which meant that the underside was golden and crispy and buttery and the breast was...a wee bit pale and flabby looking. D removed the breast skin and crisped it up under the grill, while I languished on the sofa wondering how on Earth I have reached the age of 40 without knowing which way up a chicken should go. 

I made pizza last week, and remain very impressed with Dan Lepard's dough recipe, so that was good. We cooked a smoked haddock and kale hash from one of the new Christmas cookbooks which was DELICIOUS. It is actually online, here, if you're interested. It is one of those dishes that somehow manages to be significantly more than the sum of its parts. Highly recommended.

Oh, and D splashed out and treated us both to a Dishoom bacon naan takeaway kit thingy. Good, but we think we can tweak it to make it even better (it will probably include a liberal drizzle of our beloved coriander and chilli chutney, aka "green stuff").

In the background, we've both been trying to shift a bit of weight which I am loathe to talk about really because - see first paragraph it is SO BORING. And I'm conscious that this blog is like bloody Groundhog Day for Diets - except that it's not, not Bill Murray actually learns and grows during Groundhog Day and me...not so much. But I will say that a few months ago - mid-October time - we introduced low calorie days back into our week, so we now follow a programme of intermittent fasting which involves only eating for 8 hours a day and, on two of those days, only eating 500 calories. A mash-up of 16/8 and 5/2. And it does work, albeit slowly, and it is a hell of a lot easier to manage low calorie days when we're at home not really doing everything. Whether it will be sustainable when the world goes back to normal...not so sure. But since that shows no sign of happening for a while, we'll keep going for now! 

Happy New Lockdown

We watched that all time classic film Groundhog Day on NYE; it seemed peculiarly appropriate as we prepared to say farewell to 2021. And, turns out, peculiarly prescient too, as last night England was plunged back into the lockdown that everyone (apart, perhaps, from the actual government) knew was coming. And even though it won't make an awful lot of difference to my life in the immediate future (we had more or less decided to hunker down for the next few months anyway - and are blessed enough that we can do so) still, I lay awake for hours last night feeling sad and anxious.

I am worried for the health of my friends and family. I am worried for the sanity of those of them who have to go back to trying to home school their children alongside everything else. I am worried for all those businesses, particularly those in the hospitality trade, who must be limping along in hope of a miracle: what will survive when we finally make it out? I also realised, extremely selfishly, that I am worried about the food shortages that happened last time (who could forget that dreadful few days where I COULDN'T BUY EGGS*) and then started worrying about the fact that it is somewhat morally dubious to have such concerns in the face of all the others. 

*(And we get eggs delivered every week now, by our friendly local milkman, so we are usually overrun with them).

Let's talk of happier things, shall we? Did everyone manage to have some sort of Christmas? We were lucky enough to see my parents briefly on Christmas Day - I don't know how lucky they felt given that I wept all over them - which was gorgeous. I baked Gougeres for the first time in ages which almost made me feel like a hostess again. Christmas Dinner was our standard fare - confit duck leg, duck and black pudding bonbon, mash, red cabbage, creamy mustard sprouts - which, as ever, was sublime. And, for the first time ever I made a Yule log! I'd share a picture but, dear Teapot, my food photography skills, lacking at the best of times, have not been kind to the poor beast and I wouldn't want to put anyone in mind of...well, you know. Suffice to say, the sponge was light, the filling flavoured with cherries and Kirsch was airy and boozy and the chocolate ganache was dark and slightly bitter to balance everything out. I declare it a positive triumph.

Amazingly, our waist lines escaped the whole festive period relatively unscathed. We'd already been making efforts in that direction before Christmas (of which maybe more in a future post) and I think we naturally managed to balance the more indulgent days with lighter ones. My last hurrah meal before work re-started yesterday? A poached egg on toast. And very nice it was too.

A couple of recipes to share with you (I'll add the links to the relevant page). I used several different recipes for the Yule log, but the basic chocolate Swiss roll was from the GBBO site and I was extremely pleased with the way in which it turned out. Some recipes call for beating the eggs and sugar up over a pan of warm water, but warming the eggs slightly first is so much easier! My sponge was perfect after 8 minutes of cooking, but my oven is a beast so the 10 minutes specified in the recipe is probably fine for most. 

And this carrot and sesame seed bread by Dan Lepard (I'm getting slightly obsessed with the man) was divine - although I found that my mixture needed a splash more liquid than specified to completely come together. Marvellous flavour and texture in the finished loaf though - and a crisp crust that particularly suits it for toasting.

2021 may not have got off to the greatest of starts, but I hope everyone out there is bearing up. (Sort of ) happy new year all!

Recipe corner: Mussel and bacon pizza (jingle all the way!)

The thing about authentic Italian pizza is that tends to be pretty simple. Tomato, cheese and then a few, carefully chosen, toppings. Not enough of anything to create sloppiness: a crisp base and the structural integrity of the whole is important. No weird combos. No doughiness, no ten tonnes of cheese (that is the province of Domino's and their ilk). I get all that and I appreciate it. But SOMETIMES it is fun to play a little bit and end up with something which is somewhere between what an Italian Nonna would appreciate and what drunk people order at eleven pm with a side of chicken wings.

When I wrote this up in my notebook I called it "Pizza Bianca del mare e dell'odore" which means "A white pizza of the sea and the sty". And I like that title very much. It sounds so much more elegant than mussel and bacon pizza. But I've stuck with the English for the blog title because it's probably a bit more useful. 

This is a pizza that combines seafood and cheese, that is a little bit on the sloppy side and, to be honest, is a bit of a bloody faff if you're making it because it involves numerous processes. None of them difficult but it's not easy home cooking. Jamie couldn't squish it into a 30 minute meal. So I probably haven't sold it to 99.99% of the people who will come across this blog post. But for the rest of you, who are intrigued, you are in for a tremendous treat. I think this is the most delicious pizza that I've ever made.

When I wrote pizza 101 back in July 2016 (!) I was using Paul Hollywood's dough recipe, but I've fallen out of love with that recently after a couple of issues with the dough being just too sticky to practically use. So I turned to Dan Lepard and, sure enough, his recipe and method worked perfectly. I won't repeat it here but if you DO pop over to have a look I would note:

I used a tablespoon of malt extract and all water, rather than open some of D's precious beer

I went up to 200ml of water - 50ml fresh boiled and 150ml cold from the tap to get it luke(ish) warm.

I initially made the dough the night before using and left it in the fridge overnight before moving on to the stretching and folding stage. This has the benefit of spreading the effort a bit as well.

I was making personal sized pizzas, so divided this recipe into 6 (actually, I made a half batch and divided it into 3). This was a generous portion. If you're not greedy, you could reduce the portion size further.

And for the topping...

Ingredients

1/2 kilo mussels

Splash of white wine or Vermouth

150ml milk

3-4 garlic cloves, peeled and bruised

Large sprig of thyme

15g Parmesan

10g butter

10g flour

75g pancetta (or diced bacon)

Small onion, thinly sliced

100g firm mozzarella, grated

75g smoked cheese, grated

Makes 2 generous individual pizzas

OK, so firstly we want to cook the mussels with no more flavourings added than a splash of white wine. Clean and de-beard the crustacea then heat the wine in a large, lidded pan until it simmers madly, and tip them in. Cover the pan and cook for around 5 mins, shaking gently every so often. They'll be ready when the majority of the shells are yawning open. Incidentally: we tend to buy up bags of mussels whenever we make it the fishmonger, cook and freeze them for future use. But if you do this be sure to freeze them alongside their delicious liquor.

Make the white sauce by first infusing the milk with the garlic and the thyme. Place all together in a small pan, scald the milk (which means heating it until the edges are beginning to bubble) then turn off the heat, cover and leave alone for at least a couple of hours.

Then we make a roux - melt the butter, add the flour and stir briskly to make a paste. Pour in the infused milk, bit by bit, stirring vigorously every time to eliminate lumps. When you've added all the milk, add the mussel liquor - again, bit by bit. Gently bubble the sauce for a few minutes to ensure that all the flour is cooked out (the easiest way to check this is by tasting it - if you can taste even a hint of flour, cook for a bit longer) then season with the grated Parmesan, a tiny pinch of salt and a little pepper. This is the base of your pizza.

Fry off the pancetta until crispy and then remove from the pan with a slotted spoon. Then, turn the heat right down and soften the onion in the bacon fat.

Finally, assemble your pizza. Take your rolled out bases and spread across the white sauce. Top with the cooked mussels, bacon and onion and finish off with the mozzarella and smoked cheese. If you have any spare, sprinkle a few fresh thyme leaves over to finish. Bake in a very hot oven for about 12 minutes until everything is bubbling and beginning to brown. 

If you have any sense at all, you'll allow it to cool slightly (and, in doing so, begin to solidify) before eating.

Recipe corner: garlic butter naan breads

As mentioned in my previous post, I've been turning to Dan Lepard a lot lately for baking recipes. This one is an adaptation of a recipe for coconut garlic naan that can be found here. Although the original works perfectly well, I did not find that you got much of a taste of coconut from the coconut milk, so tried it out with plain yoghurt (which we more usually tend to have knocking around the kitchen) and was pleased with the resulting soft texture. I also advocate garlic butter rather than garlic oil for the dabbing-while-cooking but you need to be careful not to allow it [the butter] to burn.

Dan Lepard has a slightly different approach to bread making which generally means much less hands on time, and although it feels counterintuitive, it does actually work really well. You just need to make sure you're keeping track of where you are in the instructions!

I think that these, as with most flatbreads, are best straight out of the pan but the good news is that can you make the dough up in advance, divide it up into balls and then leave them, covered in the fridge for a good few hours with no ill effect. I finished the dough at 6pm on Saturday and cooked up the last naan bread at 12pm for lunch on Sunday and it still worked like a charm, if, perhaps, it puffed up ever so slightly less. However, since I was using it as a wrap, this wasn't an issue.

Ingredients

25g boiling water

75g cold tap water

4g fast-action yeast

185g plain, full fat yoghurt

275g strong white bread flour

Tsp salt

Oil, for the worktop

Additional flour, for shaping

25g butter

2 cloves of garlic, crushed or finely grated

A sprinkle of nigella seeds

Makes 3 large or 4 medium naan

Measure out the water into a large bowl (I've given weight rather than volume as I think this makes life a bit easier). Test it when the two waters are combined - it should be warm but not hot. Whisk in the yeast until dissolved and then whisk in the yoghurt.

Shower in the flour, add the salt and, using your hand shaped like a claw, bring the dough together - it will be soft and not too sticky. Cover the bowl and leave for 10 minutes.

Oil the worktop, tip out the dough and knead gently for 10 seconds. Return to the bowl, cover again and leave for 1 hour. Wipe up any remaining oil while you remember.

When you return to the dough, lightly flour the worktop then tip it out and divide into 3-4 pieces. Shape these into rough balls, cover, and leave these again for 30 minutes (at this point, you can transfer the dough to the fridge until you need it. Just be sure to bring up to room temperature before using).

Roll the dough out - the teardrop shape is traditional for naan, but round will work just as well here. 

Put a frying pan over a medium heat. Crush or grate the garlic over the butter and then melt (I use a microwave but a small pan and a low heat will do just as well).

Fry the breads for about a minute and a half, dabbing the melted butter onto the surface with a silicon brush, and finish with a sprinkle of the nigella seeds.

Recipe corner: Carrot, apple and date muffins

Back when I used to work in an office (remember that time?) we had a Starbucks open just thirty seconds from the front door and, I must admit, initially the novelty factor was such that I was in there most mornings. And what better way to start the day with a milky coffee big enough to bath a kitten in, and a nice chunk of cake. For, let us be clear, we all know that the word muffin (in the non-English sense) is just a sneaky way to legitimise cake for breakfast.

I eventually managed to (more or less) ditch the Starbucks habit (although consumption used to creep up again around this time of year when the gingerbread lattes hit the store. I love a gingerbread latte, sickly as it is, and I love the announcement that the red cups are coming because - Christmas. But we won't go there yet). 

To return to the original thought - I eventually stopped the daily detour. And one of the things that helped break the habit is that they stopped doing two of the best muffins - apple and cinnamon and, for high days and holidays, "breakfast" muffins. I have only a limited idea what was in these latter but they were good - fruity and spicy with a sprinkle of seeds on top to indicate virtue.

I don't think these are quite the same, but they come pretty close. I don't generally eat breakfast much now - most of the time we do intermittent fasting to only eat between the hours of 12 and 8. (And yes, I realise that the first meal of the day is breakfast whatever time you choose to consume it, but I mean to say that I don't often eat breakfast type foods at noon.) However, a nice muffin is perfect with a cup of tea mid afternoon to get you through a sugar slump. This makes six decent sized muffins, but there is no reason why you could not miniaturise them if you felt so inclined. They contain some fruit and veg not to mention are partially made with wholemeal flour, so you can almost convince yourself that they're a health food - again, if you feel so inclined.

Ingredients

70g wholemeal flour

90g plain flour

1.5 tsp baking powder

Pinch of salt

1.5 tsp ground cinnamon

Tsp mixed spice

50g soft brown sugar

Eating apple, peeled, cored and chopped into small chunks

Carrot, peeled and coarsely grated

50g chopped dates

150ml milk (I always use skimmed which works fine)

1 egg

55g butter

3 tsp demerara sugar

3 tsp pumpkin seeds (or similar)

Makes 6 muffins

Preheat your oven to 200 (180) fan and prep a tray - I use a silicon muffin tray which I brush very lightly with vegetable oil, but you could use a metal tray with paper liners,

Combine all the dried ingredients (flours, baking powder, spices, sugar) in a large bowl. Add in the apple, carrot and dates and mix well so they are thoroughly coated.

In a small jug or similar, melt the butter (I do this in the microwave for ease). Whisk in the milk (which will immediately cool the butter) and then the egg.  Pour this into the dried ingredients and stir to combine.

Seasoned bakers will know - you want the ingredients to be only just mixed - don't overwork. I tend to use a spatula to fold the wet ingredients in, rather than stirring with a spoon, and I find this helps. Fold through four or five times until you can't see much by way of dried flour anymore.

Put the mixture in the cases (it will fit although they will be full) and sprinkle over the demerara sugar and the seeds. Bake in the oven for around 35 minutes until a skewer comes out clean (it may take slightly longer - my oven is a beast).

Serve for breakfast, lunch, dinner or snacks. Cake is good at all times of the day.

Recipe corner: my perfect Toad in the Hole

I'm finding it particularly difficult to edit Blogger posts at the moment which is most annoying and is what led to the original version of this post sitting in drafts for a couple of weeks before I ended up deleting it in disgust.  They have changed the layout which is supposed to make it easier to post from a phone or a tablet (it doesn't) and seemingly done away with the ability to poke around at the HTML version of the post which was what I used to do to de-wonk it when nothing else would work.  Or perhaps I'm missing something?  That seems quite likely. 

Anyway. Toad in the Hole. Isn't it a glorious concoction?  Plump sausages nestled in a cloud of golden batter - I can think of few things more comforting.  I mean, you could melt some cheese on top for that extra layer of indulgence (Diana Henry has a lovely, cheesy version in her book From the Oven to the Table which also features baby leeks) but here, we're going nice and simple and classic.

I've struggled with getting the Yorkshire Pudding element of my Toad right for years but recently saw Nigella making it on TV and she suggested using Jane Grigson's method which involves adding solids to liquids rather than the other way round and that seemed to work a treat. The result had a bit of crispiness at the edges but was wonderfully soft and gooey in the middle.  This may not be to everyone's taste - some people prefer their batter to be crisp throughout, in which case this may not be the recipe for you.

Notes:  there is no need to start the sausages off in the frying pan as I have suggested below - but it helps to give them a bit of colour.

In the (as usual somewhat crappy) picture, you will see that I have made the Toad in a rectangular Pyrex dish, but I have since tried it in a 20cm round silicon cake tin and this worked even better - no sticking of batter to silicon and, also, for some reason I feel it is more appropriate that this dish be round, although for the life of me I couldn't explain why.  

Side dishes - gravy is a must (and there is no shame in just making up some good old Bisto as far as I'm concerned) but then I think all you need is something along the lines of some roasted roots, perhaps some peas.  You could serve it with a scoop of mash, but I think it is unnecessary and I say that as a greedy person.

Ingredients

6 pork sausages - go simple and classic here

1/2 onion (red for preference) - thinly sliced

2-3 sprigs of thyme

2 eggs

160ml milk

125g plain flour

1/2 tsp mustard powder (optional)

2tbsp vegetable oil

Serves 2

First, make your batter - and you need to allow a bit of time for the liquids to stand, so factor that in.  Whisk together the eggs and milk and set aside for at least 15 minutes.  Then add the flour, mustard powder and seasoning and whisk again. Some people swear blind that batter needs to rest properly before using - I'll be honest, I've tried resting it for a good half hour and cooking with it straight away and didn't notice a great deal of difference.  Just be aware that you have some flexibility.

Incidentally, unless you're planning to have the batter sit around indefinitely, I would suggest pre-heating the oven at the point at which you add the solids - to 200 degrees - you want it to get nice and hot.

Put a tablespoon of oil in the dish you are using for the Toad and place in the oven for around 10-15 minutes.  Meanwhile, if you are cooking the sausages separately, heat the oil in a frying pan over a medium heat and cook them for 5-10 mins, turning regularly to get a decent colour on all sides (if not, just put all of of the oil and the sausages in at the beginning and start off in the oven).

Once the oil in the oven is hot, remove the dish, add the sausages and any oil remaining in the frying pan, and pour over the batter.  You need to work quickly here to make sure the batter hits the oil while it is still nice and hot.  Sprinkle the sliced onion and the thyme leaves over the top and return to the oven.

Bake for around 40 minutes by which time the pudding should be puffed and golden, just beginning to catch at the edges, and the sausages should be cooked through.  

Recipe corner: 61-hour duck breast

I first became aware of the concept of brining meat for a short period when I saw Nigella, wearing some sort of silky dressing gown if I remember correctly, immersing a turkey in a bucket of salt water.  The overnight bath was said to improve both the flavour and texture of this sometimes maligned bird.  I have never done this myself (we don't tend to have turkey at Christmas) but I think my brother has.  Anyway, the point is, it is the first time that the concept of a short, sharp brine flickered on the radar, as opposed to the longer process that is undertaken for cured meats such as corned beef.

Short and sharp it may be, but it still has a massive impact on texture and flavour.  We had brined duck breast when we went to Restarant Joro in Sheffield and couldn't believe the difference it made.  And duck breast is good anyway so imagine doing something to it, relatively low effort, that makes it even better.  I would definitely urge you to try this.

You need to start preparing your duck 61 hours before you want to eat - hence the recipe title.  But be assured the amount of work you need to do is minimal so it requires more organisation than it does effort.

The flavours in our brine, and the subsequent rub, tend a little towards the Orient - so chosen to suit the accompaniments - but you could definitely switch this up a bit.  The ratio of salt and sugar to water is what is important here - D spent quite a lot of time researching brine solutions to ensure that he got this bit right.  

Ingredients

500ml water

75g salt

25g sugar

2 star anise

5 allspice berries

5 juniper berries

2 garlic cloves (unpeeled but bruised)

Bayleaf

Tbsp coriander seeds

Tbsp black peppercorns

1/2 teaspoon Chinese five spice

2 duck breasts (skin on)

Make the brine: but all the ingredients in a large pot, bring to the boil (stirring, if necessary, to ensure that the salt and sugar are fully dissolved) then allow to cool.

Place the duck in a suitable container (ideally one with a lid, otherwise you will need to make sure it is well covered with clingfilm or similar) and pour over the cooled brine.  Place the duck in the fridge for 48 hours.

Now (and this is important if you want a properly crisped skin), 13 hours before you intend to eat it, remove from the brine, dry with kitchen paper and place uncovered in the fridge.  This will dry out the meat.

1 hour before dinner, remove the duck from the fridge and allow to come to room temperature before cooking.

Rub a small amount - approx 1/4 tsp - of Chinese five spice in the flesh of the duck and then season both sides well with salt and pepper.

We have found that the best way to cook duck is to preheat the oven to 180 and then place it, skin side down in a cold pan over a medium heat.  As the duck begins to cook it will start to render its own fat.  The timings will depend somewhat on the size of your breasts and the heat of your hob, but after 5-7 minutes you should be able to see that the skin is getting golden and crispy.  Follow your instincts here - you want to get the skin perfect before putting it in the oven.

Flip the breast so it is now skin side up and place in the oven.  Again, the timings will massively depend on the thickness and the oven but here, there is no need for instinct - for a perfectly blushing pink duck breast you are aiming to get the internal temperature to 52.  If you don't have a meat probe then a) buy one and b) try giving it a prod after, again 5-7 minutes.  The texture should be nice and springy.

Serve with whatsoever you desire (but check out our anniversary dinner post for our most recent iteration).

Recipe corner: a basic template for houmous

It's been an up and down few weeks since I last posted.  In reality, very little has changed.  Our household (me, D, the cat) remain much as before the lockdown in the UK started lifting.  Because we are in the very fortunate position that we can both work full time from home, and have pretty much been able to get all shopping delivered throughout, we have decided to keep more or less to ourselves for the foreseeable.  Although the world has become very small, some days - most days - that feels OK.  I miss my extended family and I miss my work colleagues and I miss sitting in a bar with a pint and a packet of Scampi Fries, but the longer this goes on, the more "life before" takes on a certain dream-like quality.

But there are down moments.  I was broken by cake a couple of weeks ago.  It was good cake too - Nigella's Clementine Cake which is usually pretty foolproof but, on this occasion, because I was trying to deal with it alongside cooking something else, I rushed and it didn't come out of the tin properly; I ended up with half cake, half crumbs.  Such a small thing but I had a proper, screaming tantrum.  And then, for the next few days, found myself bursting into tears at random intervals.  To be clear, I don't think this was really about cake (and, in retrospect, it may have had a lot to do with hormones) but it made it obvious that I'm not 100% OK.  I don't think anyone in the world is 100% OK at the moment.  The fact that I'm OK an awful lot of the time puts me among the very, very luckiest of people.

Anyway, I post the below recipe more for my future reference than anything else - but if you are a houmous fan and have never made it yourself then I think it is well worth it if you happen to have a decent little food processor handy.  The secret to the perfectly whipped texture is, of course, the liquid that the chickpeas were cooked (or canned) in.  I came quite late to this realisation and had all but given up making it before I found out because I only ever produced an oily, claggy disappointment of a mess.  It's taken me a few goes to get the proportions quite right but I think that I'm there now - so I record it for posterity.  

This recipe produces, to my mind, the perfect basic houmous.  All the flavours are in harmony, nothing is too strident.  Once you have that you can play around with your flavours. I didn't weigh out exactly how much this produced, but in terms of volume was probably about the equivalent of the size of standard pot you buy in a supermarket.  Precise, eh?

Note: A true aficionado will probably:

a) remove the skin from the chickpeas before blitzing but, I'm going to be honest, I am not that person.  The results without removing the skin are perfect for my unrefined palate and

b) shudder in horror at the prospect of "flavoured" houmous.  But again, I am not that person.  Caramelised onion houmous is my particular favourite - and it goes beautifully with cheese.  So there.

Ingredients

50g dried chickpeas, soaked in cold water overnight

1/4 tsp bicarbonate of soda

1/2 fat clove of garlic, finely grated or crushed

3 tsp lemon juice

2 tsp tahini

Tsp sea salt (or, a generous pinch if you don't tend to measure such things)

NB: if you are using tinned chickpeas, this amount dried equates to about half a drained tin.  Simmer them gently in the can liquid for 10 mins or so to soften slightly and then proceed per the recipe.  Then buy some dried chickpeas and try it that way next time - you'll never go back!

This is barely a recipe but...

Drain the soaked chickpeas and then put them in a large saucepan, add enough water to cover them by about a centimetre, add the bicarb and bring to a boil over a medium heat.

Boil until soft - by which I mean it will crush easily, with minimal pressure, between your thumb and index finger.  The timings will depend on your chickpeas - I gave my last lot just half an hour, but it can take longer.  Keep the water topped up to roughly a centimetre or so over the pulses throughout and skim off any of the grungy looking foam that rises to the top.

When cooked - drain RESERVING THE COOKING WATER.

Put the chickpeas in a little processor - nothing else initially - and blend to a coarse paste.  You then want to add enough of the cooking water to create a perfect texture - and should do this gradually, a tablespoon at a time.  I have found that my optimum texture comes from between 5 and 7 tablespoons of liquid.  What I would suggest is take it down to ever-so-slightly too thick (for me, I would check at 3 or

4 tablespoons).  Then add the other ingredients so you can gauge what effect these have.  And only then finish adding enough water to get it to where you need it to be. Remember, it may vary as it is partly dependent on how much liquid the chickpeas have absorbed during soaking and cooking.

Now you have your basic houmous you can go mad!  Drizzle with olive oil and strew with pomegranate seeds!  Whack up the garlic!  Throw something entirely incongruous (like, say, caramelised onion chutney that needs using up) in there.  Have fun.  And eat smeared on pitta, or toast, or just with a spoon.

With love to all of you out there who are not quite OK.  Rather like the weather today, things remain changeable and sometimes rather gloomy, but the sun, always, inevitably, indubitably, comes out in the end.

Recipe corner: cheese and pepper chickpeas

Lots and lots of food writers are doing sterling work at the moment across all of social media, making loads of recipes and cook-alongs and tricks of the trade available to us mere mortals.  I have always been an avid Ottolenghi fan anyway (his book "Plenty" remains one of our most utilised) but he has had some fabulous stuff over on Instagram which he saves to his Stories. When he mentioned doing a sort of take on cacio e pepe, but with chickpeas, then I had to give it a go.

You will note that lockdown has not improved my food photography skills any.  Sigh.  Although I suspect it would be hard in any case to make a pile of gloopy beige chickpeas look attractive (not really selling it there, am I?)  Anyway, forget about the crappy picture, these chickpeas were DELICIOUS.  Look, so good it made me shout.  D was less enamoured and, of course, he is entitled to his opinion (he is WRONG.)  I suspect that the problem here was partly that I didn't quite get the sides right.  I served them with a tomato and chorizo couscous salad and flatbread which, while nice in their own right, weren't quite...there.  

Anyway.  My chickpeas needed less cooking and slightly more water than Ottolenghi's so I've included my timings and quantities on the below write up - a lot is going to depend on the peas themselves, the soaking, your oven...you just need to cook them until they are nice and soft and most (but not all) of the liquid has been absorbed so that you're left with a very slightly soupy texture that will thicken up into a silken, clinging sauce once the butter and cheese has been added.

Cacio e pepe should really just be about cheese and pepper so don't be afraid to be bold with the latter.  Since Ottolenghi himself supported the initial addition of garlic, I'm going to go one step further and chuck a couple of aromatics in at the cooking stage, but you could quite happily omit these.  Oh, he also originally suggested a couple of pickled chillies as a garnish.  I didn't bother as I had a bit of heat coming through from the couscous, but I think that they would be a lovely addition.

Ingredients

150g dried chickpeas, soaked overnight

Tbsp olive oil

4 cloves of garlic, crushed

Couple of Parmesan rinds

2 bay leaves

Sprig of thyme

750ml water

Pinch of bicarbonate of soda

50g butter, fridge cold

25g Parmesan, finely grated

Heaped tsp black peppercorns, roughly crushed

Serves 2

Preheat the oven to 180 (160 fan).

Take a pan large enough to hold all the soaked chickpeas comfortably and that will go in the oven - some sort of casserole dish is ideal.  Over a low heat, warm the oil and then fry off the garlic for just a minute or so, until the raw edge has disappeared from the smell.

Drain the chickpeas and add to the pot, tossing well in the garlicky oil.  Then throw in the rinds, the bay and the thyme and cover with 750ml of water and a pinch of bicarbonate of soda.  Bring the lot to the boil and then cover and transfer to the oven.

My chickpeas were cooked perfectly after just an hour in the oven - the original recipe called for an hour and forty five minutes.  I would suggest checking after an hour.  Cook until the chickpeas are tender and the consistency is still slightly soupy.  

Remove from the oven and discard the Parmesan rinds and the herbs.

Add the butter and the Parmesan in 4 lots, stirring well each time to ensure that they have melted completely.  The residual heat in the dish should do this without the need to apply any further heat from the hob.  Then finish by stirring through the black pepper and a pinch of salt (if needed).

Serve.  With...something.

Recipe corner: coconut and ginger mussels

We got five new recipe books for Christmas which added to an already huge collection. All too often, much wanted books come into the house, get read, drooled over, maybe even tagged and then they get consigned to the shelf. And, come meal planning, it’s the internet that is called upon as the main resource. It’s ridiculous.

So, despite our plan to spend most of January eating down the freezer, we decided to make an exception for the new books. Last night, we pulled out “Made in India” by Meera Sodha. This was a gift from my Mum who has been raving about it for years. On the basis of this dish, I see her point. It wasn’t complicated food but it was utterly delicious and one we hope to revisit soon.

I love mussels in any shape or form and they are so cheap! D picked up a bag in the market for just over £3 which served two of us very generously and felt like a luxury. We just had some well buttered baguette on the side - Sodha suggested paratha which would have been lovely but was an effort too far after a long week at work. Next time!

Ingredients

1kg mussels, in the shell, debearded and cleaned

Tbsp vegetable oil
2 small onions, finely chopped
Small handful dried curry leaves
4 fat garlic cloves, crushed
Chunk (4-5cm) root ginger, grated
Red chilli, deseeded and chopped

Hefty tbsp tomato purée
1/4 tsp chilli powder
200ml coconut milk
Handful fresh coriander, roughly chopped

Serves 2

In a large pan (with a lid) gently heat the oil then tip in the onions and the curry leaves with a decent pinch of salt. Turn the heat down to low, cover, and cook for 8 mins until the onions are very soft and beginning to turn golden.

Now in goes the garlic, ginger (be generous with the ginger!) and chilli and cook off for another minute until the garlic has lost its raw smell. Stir through the tomato purée and chilli powder, again cook for a minute to get rid of any raw spice, and then pour in the coconut milk, up the heat and bring to a gentle bubble.

Time to tip in the mussels. Swirl the pan gently then put on the lid. Cook for 6-8 mins - it will be dependent on the size of your mussels, but you want all the shells to be wide open and the meat glistening and tender.

Use a slotted spoon to dish the mussels then stir the coriander through the sauce and check the seasoning before pouring over and serving with some sort of bread for dunking.

Recipe corner: cacio e pepe

You may recognise this dish as having been particularly trendy - oooh, a good year ago, maybe more. Now, obviously, the cool kids have moved on but I still think it is worth posting this methodology for posterity. This is the sort of simple, quick pasta dish that I can imagine will remain on our regular meal rotation for many years to come.

This recipe comes, with a few tiny tweaks for personal taste, from the wonderful Smitten Kitchen blog. I must admit, I follow very few American food blogs and cook from them seldom. The reasons for this are neither sinister nor snobbish; when I first started really getting in to blogs, and bookmarking recipes, I soon found myself with a “to make” list that would never get made if I lived to be 500 and cooked something different every day. In order to get things to more manageable levels, I decided to restrict myself to UK sites. I recognise that I’ve probably missed out on a lot. If it hadn’t been for the fact that Smitten Kitchen somehow survived the cull I would never have learned about this fabulous foolproof method for cacio e pepe.

I would recommend warming the plates or bowls before serving. The pasta will start to cool while you’re tossing it in the sauce and if you don’t want it to be cold within a minute or so of starting to eat, a warm plate is a necessity.

Ingredients

200g dried spaghetti

90g pecorino cheese, finely grated
Half a teaspoon black peppercorns

You will also need to have some water to hand, and a small processor / chopper

Serves 2

Put a large pan of salted water on and bring to the boil.

In a pestle and mortar, grind the peppercorns. How fine you take them is up to you - I want a good flavour without crunchy bits being caught in my teeth, so I take it quite fine.

Set aside a small amount of the cheese for garnish. Then, put half the remainder into the mini processor along with a tablespoon of water and blitz - it will start to come together and clump. Add the other half of the cheese in with another tablespoon of water and half of the pepper. Blitz again. Continue to add water, a tablespoon at a time, until you have a paste roughly the consistency of cream cheese. This was about four tablespoons for me last time I did it. Add the pepper to taste (note: I would probably always end up using the full quantity but I like it peppery).

Cook the spaghetti in the boiling salted water for around 8 minutes, or until al dente. Use a mug to scoop out some of the pasta water before draining and returning to the pan.

Add about half of the cheese and pepper paste along with a couple of teaspoons of pasta water and toss vigorously (I must admit, I tend to stir vigorously rather than tossing - I am messy by nature and don’t want to end up splattered in sauce). Continue to add the paste - a generous tablespoon at a time alongside a teaspoon of pasta water, stirring again each time, until the pasta is coated in a light, silky sauce. If you add it too quickly, you will end up with gummy lumps of cheese stuck to the bottom of the pan.

Plate up and garnish with the reserved cheese and another grind or two of pepper.

Recipe corner: carrot, tomato and feta soup

A beautiful soup is a wonderful thing and I haven’t posted a soup recipe for AGES.

It was partly, perhaps, a reaction to Weight Watchers (where zero point soup, aka joyless, fatless veg purée) is heavily endorsed that I had all but stopped making the stuff. But one day, after yet another disappointing pot of ready made supermarket offering, fishing around for the one, desultory chunk of chicken in what purported to be chicken soup, D pointed out that we should really go back to doing it ourselves. He’s right; given that one only has a finite number of meals, why waste your time on crap?

Here then is a delicious, sweet and summery concoction, courtesy of Nigel Slater. I did mine slightly differently to him in that I blitzed the carrot element to be quite silky smooth (I like a smooth soup) and then stirred the tomatoes through to add texture at the end. The carrots were the mellow backdrop to the peppery, sprightly basil flecked tomatoes with a final zing from the feta. Lovely. I must admit, I also used a bit less oil than he recommended. Weight Watchers habits die hard...

Ingredients

Tbsp olive oil
Large onion, roughly chopped
400g carrots, peeled and roughly chopped
Litre of very dilute veg stock (I used a tsp of Bouillon powder in total)

Tbsp olive oil
500g cherry tomatoes, quartered
Garlic clove, peeled and lightly bruised
Small handful basil leaves, shredded

To garnish:
120g feta cheese, crumbled
Basil leaves, torn
4tsp olive oil

Serves 4

Place a nice, large saucepan over a low heat. Warm the oil and then cook the onion until pale and soft. Then in go the carrots with a hefty whack of salt and pepper to cook slowly for a further 10 minutes. Pour in the stock, bring to a gentle simmer and allow to bubble away for half an hour until the carrots are soft. Remove from the heat and allow to cool slightly before blitzing to a smooth purée with a stick blender (or in a processor). This can all be done in advance.

Shortly before serving, put the quartered tomatoes in a second pan with the oil and garlic and cook down, over a low heat, for 10 minutes or so until you have a sweet mush. Season, stir through the basil and then add to the carrot mix and heat the whole gently.

To serve, garnish with the crumbled feta, some torn basil and a drizzle of olive oil.

MPM: 24th June 2019

It's a brand new week and a typically grey, muggy day here in Leeds.  I am not a fan of heat at the best of times, but this particular brand of damp stickiness is particularly unpleasant.  Either we need to get on and have a bit of a summer or admit defeat and lurch straight into the cool, crisp days of Autumn.  Sort it out, weather.

Today also marks the start of my fourth week in my new role which has been full on and busy from the get-go but which is all going well so far.  I feel a little bit like a hamster on a wheel, and I don't think that I will ever see the bottom of my inbox again, but at the moment that still feels OK.  A few months down the line, if I am tearing my hair out in fistfuls, please feel free to refer me back to this.

Meal planning this week - I'm going to a bottomless brunch on Saturday, so it is unlikely I will still be upright come tea time.  The planned curry is going to be made in the slow cooker in advance so will be there if I need it.  Otherwise, a quiet week (well, it is the end of the month).

Monday: soup, as per often.  Crusty bread on the side.

Tuesday: spaghetti in tomato butter sauce and with turkey meatballs.  These meatballs are not, to my shame, homemade, but have been lurking in the freezer for a while and need using. 

Wednesday: trout fillets, minted hollandaise (again, the hollandaise is not homemade!  My foodie credentials are taking a battering today), potato salad, asparagus.

Thursday: fishcakes, but I'm thinking of going down a slightly Scandi route.  This Rick Stein recipe for "frikadeller" with remoulade looks nice.  I've got half a fennel bulb in the fridge that needs using, so I'll probably thinly slice that and add it to the remoulade to boost the veg content.

Friday: I'll keep back some of the tomato butter sauce from Tuesday and use that, alongside a batch of frozen dough, to put together a Friday night pizza.

Saturday: cardamom butter chicken

Sunday: a D choice - steak and chips

Hmmm not a bad selection at all, although it would be nice to see a couple more veggie options on there - something to balance out next week.  Have a good one everyone, and happy cooking!

Recipe corner: A springtime trout tray-bake

A momentous thing happened today: D bought his first ever umbrella. Up until this point, he has claimed to be agin them. Unless they are made by Aquascutum and cost several hundred pounds and, short of a lottery win or an elderly, hitherto unknown eccentric millionaire relative leaving me their fortune, I am NEVER going to think that is a good idea.

Anyway, he now has an umbrella which is useful, as it looks as if Easter weekend was a temporary aberration and we are back to the chill, damp days of the English spring. And to celebrate, last night we ate a meal that was extremely springlike, a celebration of all of the wonderful produce around at this time of year. If you have a jar of Hollandaise lurking in the back of your fridge (as we did for some reason) this is the work of minutes. You could make your own if you like. Or you could sub in a nice, rich mayonnaise or creme fraiche or even plain yoghurt.

This is seriously easy, low effort (difficult sauces aside) and a delicious Friday night fish supper.

Ingredients

2 x trout fillets
Heaped tsp of Dijon mustard

250g new potatoes
Pack of asparagus, woody ends snapped off
Tbsp vegetable oil
Tsp dill

2 heaped tbsp Hollandaise sauce
Small handful of mint leaves, finely chopped
Squeeze of lemon juice

Serves 2

Preheat the oven to 180.

Cut the potatoes in half and place in a pan of cold, salted water. Bring to the boil and simmer for five minutes, before removing with a slotted spoon into a large bowl. Bring the water back up to the boil and then throw in the asparagus spears and simmer for one minute. Then drain and run cold water over the spears until they have cooled down.

Toss the potatoes in the oil, dill and season well. Transfer to a large ovenproof tray (I used my flat Le Creuset casserole but a baking tray would do as well). Place in the oven and cook for 15 minutes.

Meanwhile, pat the asparagus dry and put it in the potato bowl. Swish it around so it gets coated in any remaining oil. You might need to add a drop or so more at this point. Season the asparagus.

Brush the underside of the trout with the mustard. Season the skin well.

After 15 mins, remove the tray from the oven. Push the potatoes to the edges and then bung in the asparagus and lay the trout fillets, skin side up, on top. Return to the oven for another 12 minutes. While this is cooking, stir the chopped mint and lemon juice through the Hollandaise.

After 12 mins, the trout should be cooked through, and the asparagus tender. Serve, with dollops of minted Hollandaise sauce on the side.

Recipe corner: Saag paneer (spinach and paneer curry)

Of all the British Indian Restaurant curries, saag paneer is one of my all time favourites and I think that I’ve finally come up with a home version that is good as any I’ve eaten out. I’d be the first person to say that I am not versed in authentic Indian home cooking. My recipe, detailed below, is a mash up of several others that I have collected like a spice loving magpie. In fusing these dishes together, I’ve probably created something as inauthentic as you like but, my view with cooking is that the most important question is always: “Does it taste good?” as opposed to: “Is this how my grandmother’s grandmother made it?”

NB: Since both of my grandmothers’ grandmothers were probably Irish peasants, I can’t imagine that they were concerned with much more than boiling up enough potatoes to keep their families fuelled.

Right - let’s talk the recipe. It may seem like something of a faff to cook, and spice, spinach and paneer separately and, if so, make the spinach as written and then just bung the cubed paneer cheese in at the end and stir well. You don’t even need to fry the cheese really, I just like the little additional texture that it gives.

Also, as with all curries, this one will benefit from sitting around in the fridge for a couple of days while all the flavours get to know each other. What I would suggest is, making the spinach in advance then spicing and frying the paneer fairly last minute to really maximise that lovely textural contrast mentioned above.

Some more top notch food photography for you...

Ingredients

For the spinach:

2 tsp rapeseed oil
Tsp dried fenugreek seeds
Medium onion, finely chopped

Generous tbsp of tomato purée, mixed with 120ml boiling water

2 cloves of garlic, crushed
Fresh ginger (equivalent weight to the garlic cloves), grated
0.5 tsp chilli powder
Heaped tsp cumin
Heaped tsp ground coriander
0.5 tsp turmeric
Heaped tsp garam masala
Generous pinch of salt

225g frozen spinach (around 6 “pucks”)

For the paneer:

120g paneer cheese, cut into small cubes
Tsp rapeseed oil
0.5 tsp each of: ground coriander, cumin and paprika
0.25 tsp turmeric
Generous pinch of salt

Serves 2

Start with the spinach. Heat the oil, gently, in a large pan and add the fenugreek seeds. As they start to brown off and smell a little toasty, add the onions and fry until they are softened but not brown.

Next, in goes the diluted tomato purée and the rest of the spices. Mix well. Keep the heat nice and low and simmer everything together for about 5 minutes.

At this point you can add the spinach. Again, mix well and stir gently to allow it to melt and combine with the ingredients. Turn the heat down low, low, low, cover the pan and cook for 15-20 mins. You will need to check and stir frequently. If it is drying out, add a splash of water.

Place the paneer cubes into a large bowl, drizzle over the oil and sprinkle over the spices. Toss to combine.

To finish the curry: heat a dry frying pan over a gentle flame, add the cubes of paneer and cook, regularly shaking and turning, until start to go crisp and golden on all sides. Stir through the spinach before serving. The whole thing can be done in advance, paneer and all, but for maximum flavour and texture, make the spinach slightly in advance and stir the paneer through at the last minute.