Category: Vegetables

Gentlemen Prefer Blondies

2 Comments

I bought some more pork. I wasn’t going to, but I thought – My public needs me. However, I made a different recipe to the last, semi-disastrous time, mostly because Marsala is relatively pricey and the Roast Pork Cinghiale uses rather a lot of it. I turned instead to the much simpler Slow Cooked Pork from Nigella Bites, actually a recipe for 12 people (with 9 1/2 kilos of pork!!) so I had to scale it down…a lot. You are supposed to cook it in a low oven overnight, after smearing it with a chilli-garlic-ginger paste, but I just left our comparitively meagre 1.6kg in for about 5, while Tim and I went off to do our exam. Still tender as a woman’s kiss. I presume.

Above: An actual photo of pork! Look, you guys didn’t miss out on much last time because…I still haven’t figured out how to make pork look good on camera. I believe studio lighting and some photoshop might help.
To go with, I made a dish I’ve been eyeing for some time, from The Accidental Vegetarian: Fennel, Asparagus and Roast Potato salad. I fiddled with it slightly, in that I didn’t add the Italian dressing or rocket leaves, but it was amaaaazingly good. The roasted potato gave crunch, the asparagus gave its own brand of magical deliciousness, and the crisp shards of fennel gave cool, fresh contrast, not only to the slight oiliness of the other veges but also to the rich pork.

Above: The reason I am thankful for the vege market.
We ate this while watching The Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to The Galaxy, which is a pretty amusing film, though I think I prefer the book. I particularly like how the doors on the spaceship open and close with a sigh – and how we caught a glimpse of New Zealand at the end when they are zooming all over the world. Then, as you know, we went and watched the spectacular fireworks, from the top of the Cable Car lookout, which is a 5-10 minute walk from our place. It was a very clear, still night – miraculously – so perfect for such an occasion.
When we got back I was going to make something for dessert but didn’t have the energy. The idea of having to measure flour made me want to weep like a bairn, so I left it till this morning to make…White Chocolate Brownies (or Blondies, if you will.) These come from Nigella’s How to Be A Domestic Goddess and are child’s play to make.
Speaking of which, I found the following amusing:
Above: Zoom in – gorgeous white chocolate.
Above: Zoom Out – Why yes, that is a pack of loo roll and half a roast chicken on our dining table.
Anyway, melted white chocolate and butter goes into beaten eggs and sugar (I used half brown to give it extra fudginess) and flour gets folded in (or flung, in my case – I can never keep the stuff in one place.)

Above: photo by Tim, who is as adept at capturing slow-moving batter as he is with fireworks. Even though you can only see about 1/18 of my hands (okay, 1/3, they’re pretty small) what is visible is very floury and smeary. Imagine That!

Above: The finished blondies. These are great, in that they are no effort to make and yet repay you with such gratifying squidginess. The only thing that I think would improve these is a handful of white chocolate chips or the like in the batter but…I just really like white chocolate (even though there is a vogue for claiming to love the intensely bitter 300% cocoa solids dark chocolate these days.)

No pudding again? Souper…

4 Comments

First post of November! Wait, it’s November already? Aaargh! Tim and I spent 4 hours at the library today, watching the BBC production of Richard III, which although erring on the side of endless, is really very enjoyable, with lots of fantastic lines. But still: Four Hours. I am drained…

I have restrained myself from making pudding lately, because, well, I thought it wouldn’t hurt to lay off the sugar a little. And boy, do I miss making pudding…sometimes a quartered orange just doesn’t cut it, but it is, as Nigella accurately notes in How To Eat, “something to stave off that moment of loneliness and despondency that always threatens to settle when you realise eating is over for the day.” Though it pains me a little to quote Meatloaf, she took the words right outta my mouth. The words were no doubt covered in butter.

Last night I made another recipe from Nigella.com, Tomato, Red Lentil and Chorizo Soup. I realise that chorizo probably isn’t the thing to eat if one is worrying about having too much pudding, but I figure the inclusion of red lentils and canned tomatoes instantly squashes any of that…At any rate, it was flavoursome and full of veges (and lentils!) and was very easy to make.


Above: Everything looks good in the bowls Ange left at our flat. Thanks, Ange.

Speaking of which, this soup would, I’m sure, be fine if you wanted to take it in a vegetarian direction and leave out the chorizo, or indeed you could replace the chorizo with bacon or somesuch to make it gluten-free. Now that I’ve talked it up, I feel I should provide the recipe, which is…here! Note – I halved it, used canned tomatoes, and didn’t have any capsicums. Still great!
To go with, I used a recipe from Annabel Cooks, a book by a very pleasant NZ cook, which I haven’t really used much because of the…expensive…nature of many of her recipes. I realise that someone so devoted to Nigella can’t throw stones but it’s different with her!! Anyway, Annabel Cooks is all “feta cheese” and “creme fraiche” this and “pine nuts” and “boneless skinless chicken breast” that. I did however find a recipe containing things I had in my cupboard, which was her variation on a dish that I consider to be a Kiwi ”classic” – potato bake.

The main difference in this one is that the potatoes are grated (kindly done by Tim.) It bakes slowly in the oven, ensconced in a mixture of eggs, milk and cheese, and comes out almost like a giant baked rosti, with lots of delicious crunchy bits on top and creamy yielding potato below.

Above: Looks good, right? Also vegetarian and gluten-free…oh what a world we live in.

Tonight’s dinner was a bit dull because I was pretty drained after all that Richard III and hadn’t planned anything exciting (and obv there was no pudding.) More soup though – something from Alyson Gofton’s Flavours cookbook, which is a million times superior to her schilling Watties products for Food in a Minute. Flavours has a good concept, too – each recipe is dedicated to a different flavouring, some familiar, like cocoa, vanilla pods, and ginger, some a little more interesting, like sherry, tumeric, and walnut oil, and some are those “I bought this on a whim and now what?” flavourings like saffron, verjuice and tamarind. I made the Garlic Soup, which although worryingly flatulent in title is nothing more taxing than onion soup with garlic in it. It is easy to make, with a lovely creamy texture – despite no cream – and is good for when you don’t think you have anything in the cupboards.
Above: Someone else: “Why is that photo cut off…let me adjust it a…” Me: “It’s supposed to be creative!” Just as some people can strew throw-pillows about their houses without looking messy, while others just look like they dumped cushions everywhere, well…you guess which category I fall into.
PS: Without wanting to sound like I’m asking for them…Don’t be shy with comments!

A Simple Tart…

1 Comment

When I bought the rhubarb that has graced many of my posts here, I also grabbed a big bag of apples for $2. As they sat on our kitchen table, threatening to fester at any moment, I realised I’d better do something with them. Apple Crumble was the first thing that popped into my head, but although I love it immensly I felt like something a little more challenging. Nigella’s butterscotch tart from How To Eat called my name, especially after reading about its success on this lovely blog.

With that in mind, I thought I ought to have something relatively healthy for dinner. And so I turned to someone who would never replace butter with a low-fat margarine – Nigella. Her Vietnamese Coleslaw from Nigella Bites is so good, it would be one of her recipes that I make the most. It is basically a shredded cabbage, carrot, and chicken salad with Vietnamese dressing, but I hardly ever put chicken in it as it is wondrous and cheaper without. I’ll give you my adapted recipe for the dressing as no one needs to be told how to chop carrots and cabbage (mind you, it is infinitely easier and quicker whizzed up in the food processor)
Mix together:
-1 1/2 t rice vinegar
-1 1/2 tablespoons each of lime juice, fish sauce, vegetable oil, and sugar.
With this goes a crushed garlic clove and as much chilli as you can handle. I suppose you could replace the sugar and chilli with a spoonful of sweet chilli sauce. I usually have lemons, not limes, to hand, which works fine, and I quite often leave out the oil and replace it with a few shakes of sesame oil. Anyway, mix all this into the vegetables, along with chopped mint, which gives it an incredible freshness. Seriously, I could eat this by the bucketload. It even looks quite beautiful, so one can revel smugly in their healthy dinner –

Above: World’s. Best. Coleslaw.
With that I made the Chicken with Soy and Sherry from the New Zealand cookbook. Except…we don’t have sherry, so I replaced it, a little recklessly, with Sake, ie Japanese rice wine, a substance that I looooove to cook with. This recipe (which I deviated from slightly) is a very simple combination of great flavours. Basically, in a roasting dish I put chicken pieces, ginger, soy sauce, garlic, onions, Sake, and sesame seeds for crunch. I realise that putting Japanese and Vietnamese flavours together may seem a little dismissive of the respective nations’ cuisines but…if food tastes good, eat it!

Above: A sliiightly blurry photo of the chicken. Despite having no added fat (oh alright, a few shakes of sesame oil) it was crispy and toothsome.
While the chicken was in the oven, I got started on the pastry. I have to say, pastry makes me nervous, but Nigella does have it pretty sorted. As with the cole slaw, life is much, much easier if you use a food processor. Okay, so cleaning it is a bit of a pain, but it knocks so much time off the making process. I am suspicious of anything labelled ‘fool proof’ (ie, my learners driving liscence…”any fool can pass it,” they said…not this one) but Nigella’s pastry pretty much is. The crucial thing is to freeze the flour, and half its weight in fat, for a bit in the actual processor bowl. Cold= good, warm=bad for pastry, and the less you handle it the better. Whizz the two together, add a little cold, lemony water, refrigerate for a bit, and then roll out. It actually is remarkably do-able, even for someone like me who gets flour everywhere.

Above: the pastry, which was a dream to roll out waiting to be pressed into my silicone pie-tin.

One of the BEST things about this pie, no, THE BEST thing about it, is that it doesn’t need baking blind. Oh, how I hate baking blind. I can never manage to escape from burning myself while removing the weights.

Above: I did manage to use quite a few apples in this and thus justified my desire to make pie!

This doesn’t really further the plot but I thought this looked pretty, which I am not always capable of in cooking. Looking capable isn’t always my forte either, come to think of it…
All that happens now is a dense mixture of brown sugar, cream, eggs and flour is poured over, and the pie is baked.
Above: The finished product. Isn’t this wholesome and comforting to look at, with its monochrome butterscotch colours and bits of apple peeking out from the toffee flavoured filling. That’s a statement, not a question.
This was so, so yum, the filling had a texture similar to frangipane and contrasted delightfully with the sour apples, while the pastry was feather-light and crisp.
In other news, Tim and I have been studying hard for our exam next Monday, so things may be a trifle slower round here…I had a dream about Shakespear’s Cymbeline last night in which I altered the ending, I don’t know if this a good thing or not!

From Pig’s Bum to Cowpats…

2 Comments

Haven’t posted in a wee while on account of studying for an upcoming Shakespeare exam, my only one – hoorah!

Last night’s dinner came via Nigella.com, which has a section where people can post their own recipes. It is indeed fertile ground for food creations, and I found two recipes that suited the ingredients I had to hand. The main was a Turkish dish, very easy, more of a suggestion than a recipe. Into a casserole dish go chicken pieces (I used thighs as that is what we always have) a chopped onion, chopped potatoes, a can of tomatoes, and a sprinkling of cinnamon. Bake till the chicken and potatoes are cooked, and well, that’s it. To go with I made something called Pumpkin Tian, which involves cubing some pumpkin, dusting with a little seasoned flour, sprinkling with grated parmesan and baking.

The end result:

Above: Turkish Chicken with Potatoes and Tomatoes.

There was a photo of the chicken with the pumpkin on the side but the stove looked a bit toooo grimy for my liking – it has since been given a wipe so don’t worry! The chicken tasted great, really warming and hearty, and cooking everything bathed in tomatoes meant that the chicken was super moist and the potatoes flavoursome. I can’t honestly say that I tasted the cinnamon, so I added an extra shake before serving. If I was to make this again I might biff a whole cinnamon quill in while it cooks and fish it out at the end, for extra flavour.

Because it was a day of the week ending in Y, I had a hankering for some pudding. To go with the homestyle dinner, I thought that a chocolate self-saucing pud might be good. I think chocolate self saucing pudding is one of those dishes in the canon of “classic” New Zealand food, I’m not sure how or why this came about though. I remember Mum making it occasionally for pudding when I was younger, in my household it was called, rather poetically, “Chocolate Floating Pudding.” The recipe I used came from Nigella’s Feast, and is not only easy to make but requires the simplest of ingredients – a great one for when you think you have nothing in the cupboard. Nigella’s recipe is a somewhat modern take on the original though, with cinnamon in the mixture and an optional slug of rum in with the water that goes on top. Not having rum, I used some Marsala all’uovo.


Above: Closeup on the Chocolate Floating Pudding. Nigella succinctly notes that the pudding “isn’t the most beauteous creation, there is a touch of the cowpat about it.” I feel that my photo is a direct visual realisation of her description.

No harm done, as it tasted fantastic. The marsala added resiny depth and fullness of flavour and it was as easy to eat (doused liberally with milk) as it was to make.

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.