Category: Vegetables

Pig’s Bum! (Need I say more?)

2 Comments

As I mentioned in a previous post, I have got myself a big bunch of rhubarb. Happily, tonight’s dessert not only uses this rhubarb to glorious effect, it also fulfils my desire to steam things. To top it off, it is called Pig’s Bum, thus indulging my love of silly names. Ultimate Pudding.

But first, dinner. Again, no meat, but we definitely didn’t go hungry. The weather was – you guessed it – rubbish today, and I felt like something bolstering for dinner, so I made a sort of loose minestrone. That is, I didn’t follow any particular recipe, instead, just used what I had kicking round. That happened to be: onion, celery, carrot, pumpkin, potato and later on, asparagus. It must be one of the most virtuous dinners you can eat – a trillion vegetables, bound together by stock and a bit of pasta. It is so healthy that it pretty much obliterates the calorific dessert that follows…right?

Above: Veges for the minestrone – so many that I needed two chopping boards! Healthy!
So, I sweated the veges in a little butter and olive oil for about ten minutes. I then crumbled in a stock cube – Knorr Porcini flavoured cubes brought back for me from Italy by my aunty Lynn. (it’s what Nigella uses!!) I then added water to the pot, brought it to the boil, and let it simmer away while I made the pud.
I wish I had thought to take a photo of the rhubarb (microwaved for a few minutes with a spoonful each of sugar and water) – it was just so pink, it looked as though I had added food colouring. The pudding, which is from Nigella’s How To Eat, is basically a Victoria Sponge batter mixed in with the rhubarb. I have to agree with Nigella when she says how great the batter tastes. I have always been a sucker for eating the mixture though…Anyway, you heap it all into the greased pudding bowl, cover it, and steam for two hours.
Once the pudding was a-steaming, I added some chopped asparagus and a handful of macaroni to the pot of soup. Once the pasta had swelled up and cooked, I ladled it out and grated over some parmesan. It was perfect – warming, comforting, tasty.

Above: Tim’s minestrone (rhymes with pinecone?)

As for the Pig’s Bum, it turned out beautifully, an incredibly light sponge with flecks of pink throughout.
Above: Pig’s Bum!

It tasted amazingly good, especially considering it took all of five minutes to make. Unlike the last couple of things I have steamed, it wasn’t stodgy in the slightest – really very light in fact. So, by the time Tim and I had ploughed through it, and Stefan and Kieran had had some too…there really isn’t much left! Will definitely be making this again at some stage.

Pizza for two, roast veges for twelve…

Leave a comment

Another vegetarian dinner for us, involving one of my very favourite things: melted cheese. I made a pizza base following a recipe from Nigella’s How to Be a Domestic Goddess:


Above: The dough, rising on the stove – it is actually covered in glad-wrap but you can hardly see it!

While it was doing its thing, I chopped up parsnips, carrots, onions, and potatoes and roasted them with a little olive oil. I got Tim to grate some cheese (he will, without fail, obligingly do the two kitchen jobs I hate the most – grating cheese and peeling/washing potatoes) and I shmeered some tinned tomatoes onto the pizza base.


Above – the oven-ready pizza.

Okay, I have a confession to make – there was a LOT of cheese and while it tasted wonderful the photo of the baked pizza looks reeally oily in the photo. A bit like the Bobotie that I wrote about below – not very photogenic but tastes delicious. So, I’m making the executive decision to not post the picture…however, here are the roast veges, which didn’t turn out so badly…


Above: Mmmm….okay so it’s a lot for two but…Tim need his carbs?

Tim, Kieran and I went to Kaiwharawhara today to do some various jobs – Kieran to get his stereo fixed, and Tim and I went to Spotlight for some trouser lining and goldfish chow. While we were there I stopped in to a fruit and vege shop and got a big bunch of the most gloriously scarlet rhubarb which I can’t wait to tinker with! Maybe tomorrow…

You Say Banana

1 Comment

Went out and bought some more asparagus today, for the express purpose of roasting it for tonight’s dinner. As I mentioned in the previous post, the weather here is rubbish – and it makes you want to EAT. We had a meatless dinner tonight, (A) because I hadn’t defrosted anything and (B) it’s good to make the meat go a little further by ignoring it sometimes. Our dinner comprised of roast asparagus, roast pumpkin, and a curiousity found in the Supersavers book called Cauliflower Bread. I have to admit the name drew me in. This oddity in no way resembles bread (it is in fact, gluten free) and is made of mashed potato, steamed, mashed cauli, eggs, cheese and butter all mixed together and baked in a makeshift bain-marie (ie, sit your dish in a roasting pan filled with boiling water while it bakes.) The result is actually really good, gratifyingly stodgy and almost a complete meal – protein, carbs, and veges in one. Didn’t take a photo because the batteries for the camera needed charging. But, luckily they were charged in time for dessert…

Kieran had bought a packet of puff pastry for some reason ages ago and admitted he was never going to use it. I acquired it, but decided to bake a pudding for everyone (well, everyone except Emma, luckily she was out.) Had a shmooze through some books before deciding upon the Banana Butterscotch Upside Down Tart from Nigella’s Forever Summer. Very simple – slice up bananas and place at the bottom of a pie dish (warning – you need a lot!) Melt butter, and a surprisingly small amount of sugar together, before stirring a scant tablespoon each of golden syrup and cream. Pour this caramelly mixture over the banana, then roll out the pastry, (I got Tim to do this – he actually did all the really hard work for this recipe) tuck over the top of the bananas, bake, et voila!
As you can see below, the pastry puffed up beautifully.
Above – the baked banana tart. Yes, our stove is grimy.
Tim also did the next bit – turning out the boiling hot tart onto a plate. I have to say, he did it without any stress and didn’t burn himself with the caramel as I undoubtedly would have…
Above – the finished product. Am not the most die-hard banana fan, and the idea of warm bananas doesn’t really light my fire but this stuff was super moreish. You probably don’t need me to tell you that it’s nearly gone already…

A Steaming Mishap, and late-night brownies.

Leave a comment

I got home from work a bit early yesterday, and convinced myself that it was cold enough to use my steamer (it was quite mild outside really.) In my Supersavers book, there is a recipe for what looks like steamed, deconstructed, spag bol. That is, you cook some short pasta (I did macaroni, as the book recommended) add mince, canned tomatoes, frozen beans, dried thyme, garlic and an egg. Put it in your pudding steamer and steam for two hours. I was smitten not only because I got to steam something again, but also because miraculously, we had the exact ingredients required. So, two episodes of Season 1 Outrageous Fortune later, (did I mention that we bought the DVD and are rapturously pleased with it?) it was ready. I served it with the remaining asparagus, which I roasted, as per a suggestion of Nigella’s in How To Eat. If you are a fan of asparagus, PLEASE try this! It is wonderful! Just a 220 C oven, a tablespoon of olive oil, 15 minutes, and then sprinkle it with a little salt. It is nutty and slightly crispy and absolutely fantastic. Second only to asparagus rolls (on white bread with canned asparagus) for my favourite way of eating it.

Anyway…maybe I didn’t grease the pudding bowl enough (didn’t grease it at all, come to think of it) but the steamed mince thingy really didn’t unmould well – only half of it, as you can see below, came out. No matter – it’s not what you would call a ‘photogenic’ dish and I’m sure that it would have looked ugly even if it had turned out properly!
Above – Half of our dinner. The other half is still in the steamer…

Well, it tasted good, which was the important thing, but I don’t see how a combination of its ingredients could really go wrong. And it did seem like the exact sort of recipe you could expect to find in a book called “Supersaver’s.” It benefited from salt, and it could have definitely been improved with some cheese. But, cheese is expensive and grating is a pain, so we don’t often eat it frivolously. As you know, the asparagus was amazing.
Emma was babysitting last night, and Kieran, Stefan, Tim and I were all watching Outrageous Fortune. (pausing only to switch off the DVD and turn to Prime for Flight of the Conchords) Somewhere in the middle of this, I got a real hankering for some kind of pudding. Problem was, time was ticking on. Suddenly I decided to make something I used to do a lot as a youngster – Alison Holst’s chocolate brownies. Now, I’m not teeerribly fond of La Holst (she does seem to take the fun out of cooking) but as I said, I am very familiar with these brownies and knew they’d do the trick. I used the Dollars And Sense cookbook that Mum gave me some years back (a book filled with many gems actually) and got Tim to help me round up ingredients so as to get it going faster.
It is very easy, one of those wonderful one-pot melt and mix recipes that leave you with a minimum of washing up! No fancy ingredients required, but I added some chopped dark chocolate (had a bit lying round in the cupboard.) We put it in the oven, and halfway through another episode of Outrageous Fortune, they were ready. Not as densely squidgy and delicious as Nigella’s, but good for a quick fix, and much cheaper. You can see below what was left of them!
Above: Brownies, made in a silicone tin (can it still be called a tin if it’s made of silicone?) that Tim’s parents gave me.