Not-Mince Comfort Food

I overdosed on red meat last week, with the Irish beef stew – so delicious, but eating it for 3 days in a row (plus what’s in the freezer) just made me need to stop eating meat for a few days. I do find I feel a lot healthier when I stick to seafood and veggies, but I like my curries, stir fries and roasts too much to completely becoming a vegetarian.

I wanted something healthy tonight but without meat – so I raided the cupboards and threw together this TVP based “mince stew” – reminiscent of an easy quick simmered stew my mum used to make when I was little. I loved it then, but my first husband had a distaste for minced anything (he was in fact Mr Food Fusspot personified), so a lot of things quickly made their way OFF the menu in my house for 15 years.

The one Mum used to make had, I think, Gravox in it to thicken the juices, and was probably a lot higher in fat content than what we can buy these days (mince was mince – none of this 3***, 5***, premium stuff!), but gee it was delish, especially served on hot, buttered toast.

This is today’s “what I had in the fridge” vegetarian version – lighter, but still tasting of meat. TVP is amazing!

You can add whatever veg you like to this – celery and baby spinach would be great. The chilli was from the garden of the lovely Carol from my work, who has been bringing them in to share with those of us that love cooking (there are a few of us and we are quick to reserve all the new cookbooks as they arrive!).

Vegetarian Mince Stew

1 tbsp olive oil

1 cup dried TVP soy mince

1 small brown onion, finely chopped

3 baby potatoes, finely chopped

1 small carrot, finely chopped

425 gm can diced tomatoes

1 small birdseye chilli, chopped

splash of soy sauce

1 tbsp fresh thyme, chopped

1/2 tsp paprika

3/4 cup frozen peas

cracked pepper, to taste

Heat olive oil in large pan and sauté onion, potatoes and carrots for 2 mins, stirring frequently.

Add all remaining ingredients, bring to a gentle simmer and cook, on low heat, stirring occasionally, for 20 minutes.

Serves 2-3

(that was really hard, wasn’t it!)

Last week was actually “meat free week” – oops I failed there – but I don’t eat meat all the time anyway so I don’t feel particularly cut up about it – however, the supporting website has some really lovely vegetarian recipes on it, so check it out, even if you are a carnivore.

Happy Fooding!

Getting My Irish On…

I made this beef stew with Guinness, on St Patrick’s Day, and OMG it was so delicious.  Of course it made enough to feed an army lol, and there was just me, so I now have portions in the freezer, but with something as yummy as this I don’t mind at all.

There was about 20 minutes of chopping up/prep involved, but once that was done the cooking itself was pretty easy. I do so love things that simmer away on the stove creating gorgeous smells, while you get on with the important relaxation things of life…..in this case I was stitching away merrily on a Henry VIII cross-stitch project that I am obsessed with currently, and watching the Australian F1 Grand Prix.

I keep forgetting to tell you, I have a new Twitter handle for this blog, so feel free to follow me @salmonavocado and share with your friends by retweeting!

A little bit of Henry

Happy Pot of Gold Fooding!

Medieval Mushrooms!

Making the puffs

After years of wanting to, I recently finally joined the Society for Creative Anachronism. I’m still getting my garb together (I have made one houppelande dress – not my best effort, but at least I have found that my clothes sewing skills have not completely disappeared from years ago!) and am slowly working out how it all works, deciding on my period of interest, developing a persona etc.

There’s a lot to take in, but I have finally been to my first event – a tourney, with a “pot luck supper”. As my main areas of interest (apart from a love of history) are Arts & Sciences and Cookery, I have been doing a lot of reading up on medieval foods, customs and recipes, both online (there’s so much out there!) and via books through the library I work at.

I really wasn’t sure what to expect at the tourney, food-wise – I know it’s supposed to be an attempt at something authentic if possible – but on the competition list was “decorated cupcake” – hardly 14th century haha.

I decided to just keep it simple for my first time, and made food that didn’t necessarily need heating up or facilities that might not have been available in the hall. This turned out to be the right decision, as we just put things down on tables and didn’t heat up anything.

I made a loaf of wholemeal bread (bread machine, but still homemade, sort of…..), and these cute Mushroom Puffs from an SCA recipes resource.

I wasn’t sure how many the quantity of filling would make – it didn’t seem like a lot so I made double, and just thawed out 4 sheets of short-crust pastry (I know, I should have made my own but it was 42C here and even in the air conditioning I needed to make things as comfortable as possible). I ended up making 33 puffs, but still had about a third of the filling mixture left, which I’ve frozen for another time (or it would be good folded through scrambled eggs, a crepe or an omelette). I made them slightly bigger than the 2″ circles noted in the recipe, as I used my trusty cheap plastic empanada press, which makes moulding filled pastries and dumplings SO easy. I wish I could buy round empanada wrappers here like I used to in Chile – no cutting out or rolling out the scraps of pastry needed then – but I’ve never seen them here unfortunately. I used to make empanadas all the time with leftovers, to freeze for lunches, but it’s nowhere near as convenient with the sheets of pastry or homemade stuff.

Served in a basket, wrapped up in linen.

Instead of regular salt, I used truffle salt to increase the mushroom-y-ness – but just a pinch, as I didn’t want it to be too salty.

The puffs came out very cute, and tasted good. Definitely a recipe to make again. And I had fun!

Happy Fooding!

Ye Olde Soupe!

I’ve been borrowing a lot of medieval cookbooks lately, through the library I work at, and also ploughing through websites and generally having a good old medieval surf! I was looking at the latest information about the gorgeous kitchens at Kew and Hampton Court Palaces (when I was at HCP a few years ago I saw the most enormous mortar & pestle, amazing), and I saw that they now have videos and recipes for a couple of authentic recipes from the Georgian and Tudor eras.

I made the Soupe Barley from the Kew kitchens page, as it seemed so easy but nourishing – barley’s such great Winter comfort food – mind you, it’s stinking hot here at this time of year so doesn’t really go with that, but oh well never mind. I’ll be over there in May and Kew Palace/Gardens is on my list as a place to visit this time, can’t wait.

The soup was very easy and tasted good. The inclusion of a few raisins I found quite interesting and it did add a bit of a sweet flavour, without being overpowering. I did add a little fresh thyme at the end as well, which seemed to me to go with the barley and also be in keeping with the era.

It was intended to be a starter, and I can well imagine how the Georgian upper classes must have felt SO full after eating an array of courses, if just the starter was as filling as this broth!

 

You can find the recipe here.

This week I also tried out a barley soda bread recipe from a cookbook I got last year, but it was a failure, so I’m not sharing it with you!

Happy Summer (or not) Fooding!

Ranting Chef’s Salmon

As a variation on my often-made salmon with pesto topping recipe, this week I made The Ranting Chef’s salmon with a walnut, honey & dijon mustard topping. Delicious, easy and healthy – a double hit of super dooper brain food, with the salmon and the walnuts.

Served on top of tabbouleh, and topped with avocado and Greek yoghurt, this made for a light but filling and tasty Spring evening meal for one. Actually it was VERY filling!

Happy Fooding!

Please Go Away Winter

I tell you, I am so over the cold weather. Actually I was never into it in the first place, but this is the coldest Winter since I arrived here 3 years ago – and I hate it.  I need warmth, and my tiny place is like a freezer all the time, even with the heating on – on sunny days it is actually warmer outside – the place just never warms up.

SO……I am still in crockpot mode and have been raiding all of the local libraries, reading every slow cooker recipe book I can find (and there are LOTS as crockpots are very “in” at the moment) to get different ideas for mucking about with.

This is a combination of a pork and a chicken recipe, because I liked the flavours of both so I just mixed it all up! Definitely use chicken thigh fillets here, as breast fillets will be soooooooooooooo dry. This is adapted from two recipes in Stephanie O’Dea’s More Make It Fast, Cook It Slow cookbook (Stephanie has a slow cooking blog that she has turned into two successful cookbooks).

Teriyaki & Apricot Chicken

8 chicken thigh fillets, trimmed of skin/fat

1 large red capsicum, cut into large pieces

2/3 cup apricot jam

1/4 cup teriyaki marinade (try to find one without too many nasty artificial flavourings/preservatives – I used this Masterfoods one)

1 tsp ground ginger

2 tbsp Dijon mustard

1/2 cup chicken stock

2 tbsp fresh thyme

cracked pepper, to taste

Place chicken and capsicum in crockpot. Mix remaining ingredients together and pour over chicken; stir to mix well. Cook on LOW for 6-8 hours. Serve with rice or green vegies.

Serves 4.

Happy Fooding!

Polenta-Topped Turkey (or Chicken!) Bake

This is supposed to be made with turkey, but I could only find turkey mince or drumsticks last week, so made it with chicken breast fillets instead. I don’t think it makes any difference to the taste really, so use whichever you prefer.

The topping used here makes a wonderful crust and could be used to top any casserole type dish, instead of the regular kind of dumpling or scone topping.

Polenta-Topped Turkey Bake

1 tbsp olive oil

1 brown onion, sliced

600 gms turkey breast (or chicken), cut into 3 cm cubes

4 small carrots, peeled & diced

1/2 cup frozen peas

410 gm can cream of asparagus soup

Topping:

3/4 cup plain flour, sifted

3/4 cup polenta

pinch of salt

2 tsp baking powder

60 gms butter

1 egg, lightly beaten

3/4 cup milk

Heat the olive oil in a saucepan and saute the onion and turkey until the meat is browned and the onion softened.

Mix in the carrots, peas, thyme and soup. Bring to a gentle boil then reduce heat and simmer for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Spoon the turkey mixture into a deep pie/baking dish, and spoon the topping over it evenly. Bake in a 190C oven for 30 minutes or until the topping is cooked and golden.

To make the topping:

Mix flour, polenta, salt and baking powder together. Add butter and rub in with fingertips until mixture resembles coarse breadcrumbs. Whisk egg and milk together and stir into flour mixture until well combined.

Serves 6

Happy Fooding!

Vegie Pies

In a different twist to the yummy egg-in-pastry basket that I had the other day, last week my mum sent me the above photo of vegie pies that she made.

The recipe is from the Coles free recipe magazine. Looks pretty yummy, hey? And certainly easy.

Roast Vegie Free-Form Pies

2 zucchini,, halved lengthways and cut into 3cm pieces
about 700g small pumpkin, cut into 3cm pieces
1  red onion, cut into 3cm pieces
Olive oil spray
3 sheets frozen shortcurst pastry, thawed
100g fetta cheese
1 egg yolk, lightly beaten with 2tsp. water
Fresh thyme leaves to garnish (if desired)

Preheat oven to 190C or 170C for fan forced.  Line a baking tray with baking paper.  Spread vegetables on tray in  a single layer and spray with oil.  Roast for 25 mins. turning once, until tender.  Cool.

Line 2 baking trays with baking paper.  Using a bowl as a guide, cut 6 x 13cm circles from pastry.  Crumble fetta into middle of each pastry round, and top with vegetables, leaving a 3cm border around the edge. Fold pastry up over vegetables, pleating edges with fingers so it stays in place.  Transfer to prepared trays and brush pastry with egg wash.

Bake pies for 25-30 mins until pastry is golden brown. Place on serving platter and sprinkle with thyme.

Happy Fooding!

Chicken Meatballs

Here is a super easy meatball dish…..I make the meatballs in the morning, because not being browned they hold together much better when cooking, after being refrigerated for a while.  Then it is really simple to just throw the sauce ingredients in, add the balls and simmer away. Perfect with rice and a big dollop of Greek yoghurt on the top to serve.

Chicken Meatball Neopolitana

700 gms chicken or turkey mince

1 cup breadcrumbs

1 egg, beaten

1 tbsp dried thyme

1/3 cup chopped fresh parsley, basil or coriander (any fresh herbs will do)

3/4 cup chicken stock

2 x 400 gm cans diced tomatoes

1 cup fresh basil, roughly chopped

1 tsp sugar

1/4 tsp salt

4 cloves garlic, crushed

Combine mince, breadcrumbs, egg, thyme and herbs, and mix well in a bowl.

Shape meat mixture into balls and set aside in the fridge for a couple of hours (or more).

Place chicken stock, tomatoes, basil, sugar, salt and garlic in a wok or wide-based saucepan, and bring to the boil.

Add meatballs and simmer for 15 minutes (covered) or until cooked through.

Serves 4.

Happy Fooding!

Another Dinner For One….

Snacky Sunday night can’t-be-bothered meal here……I read recently an idea for adding feta cheese to egg dishes and thought hmmmmm I’ll try adding haloumi to some scrambled eggs. Great idea – I cut 90 gms of haloumi into small cubes and marinated them for an hour in a bit of lemon juice, with a generous sprinkling of dried thyme and merken (use chilli powder if you can’t get merken).  Then I simply dry-fried the cubes in a non-stick omelette pan, for about a minute (tossing about), added 3 eggs (beaten with a little milk, cracked pepper and some fresh garlic chives) and stirred until it was 3/4 cooked. Took off the heat, stirred through a few drops of truffle oil, served it on toast and YUMMO there was my easy supper.

Actually, it was very filling, so probably 3 eggs was too much for one person, but I don’t eat eggs very often so it was a nice treat. 2 eggs and a little less haloumi would be good next time. I couldn’t waste it though!

Enjoyed it with a glass of vino, of course…..

I know it looks a bit “grey” but thats because the herbs and spices kind of get into the egg mixture. It certainly wouldn’t win any prizes for looks, but then I only made it to please ME so who cares.

Happy Fooding!