try another 43 new recipes

Taken from here

There’s something special about home made chinese ‘takeaway’, and the fried rice is key. I’ve tried variations on this a couple of times now, and I’m pretty sold :)

Definitely works better with cold rice – it stops it soaking up as much liquid from the other ingredients. However, I get a bit twitchy about reheating rice even though I haven’t managed to poison myself yet!

This time, used finely diced peppers and sweetcorn (rather than the peas/carrots mentioned in the link) along with the onion, and it worked great. After softening those with a little garlic, push to one side of the pan and add the egg; roughly scramble – you want this in small bits. I added a bit of soy sauce to stop it sticking, which does turn the egg a funny colour!

Then add the rice, sweetcorn and several decent splashes of soy sauce. Heat well and serve with whatever you fancy!

Based on this to use up all sorts of leftovers, like Herb & Garlic Philadelphia, half a tin of kidney beans, and a jar of salsa. Added to this chicken, sweetcorn, and half a red onion. Usual method for me with the slow cooker: bung it in, leave it cooking on slow for about 6 hours! I did, however, leave the cheese til the last hour or so.

I was only making it for me, so sort of guesstimated the quantities. Word of warning: don’t put in too much cheese (about 2 dessert spoons is definitely too much!) as it makes it really cloying.

As per the suggestion, I made a bit extra and am currently munching cold leftovers. Just like the freshly prepared, it’s more edible than I was starting to fear, but probably not something I’d bother with again even with far less cheese! o_O

rough ingredients for 4
About 250-300g each of:
carrots
turnip (Scottish – the yellow one)
parsnips
leek
150ml veg stock
295g can condensed vegetable soup – I used cream of celery

for the cobbler
150g self raising flour
2 tablespoons chopped fresh herbs (eg chives, parsley, thyme)
40g margarine or butter
4 tablespoons natural yogurt
1 tablespoon milk
salt/pepper

1. Chops and mix the veg, and put in a non-stick roasting pan covered with the stock. Roast at 190C for 25 minutes.
2. To prepare the cobbler: with your fingertips, rub the flour and marg together to breadcrumb consistency. Add the yogurt and herbs and mix to a soft dough – add a little cold water if necessary.
3. (Ideally:) Roll out to about 1cm thickness, and use a cookie cutter to stamp out ~3-inch rounds. (Reality: it was so gloopy I just made rough sticky balls of it!)
4. Transfer the veg to an ovenproof casserole dish and mix in the soup. Layer the cobbler rounds around the edge, and brush over with a little milk
5. Bake for 20-25 minutes until the cobbler is golden brown and risen.

Have made this a couple of times now, with varying results – largely due to messing about with quantities to make this just for one. First time was gorgeous, but I had put in more than half the tin of condensed soup – and not sure I was ‘meant’ to be using a creamy one, although it was gooooood! – and it did get a bit sickly near the end! I struggled a bit with the roasting of the veg (tried to do it in the casserole dish, to less success) and wasn’t sure if I was meant to leave the remaining stock in with the veg – probably, to dilute that soup!

Second time I tried to cut corners and pre-boil rather than roast the veg: between that and the lower soup quantity, the flavour really did suffer.

The real surprise win from this though was that cobbler recipe! Mine was entirely gloopy-sticky so I really didn’t think it was going to work too well – but it did, and it was yum! Really light – I did try and stretch it relatively thinly over the top – and with the herbs it added a lot of flavour to the whole dish. Best bit of it!

Recommended as a healthy and actually not too time-consuming yummy meal.

From here via Abs – with whom I agree, it’s an okay-ish lentil soup. I jazzed mine up a bit and it was still only okay.

My version:
For a big pot (5-6 large portions):
2 cups green lentils (yes, I used cups!)
1 large onion, chopped
big tin chopped tomatoes
3 cups leafy greens (I used spring greens, for want of choice), finely chopped
2 cups water
(where I started deviating)
couple of potatoes, peeled and cubed
larger sprinkle garam masala
sprinkle cumin
sprinkle turmeric
sprinkle celery salt
2 chicken stock cubes

Urm, my usual method applies: bung everything in and get cooking! It does mean I skip any oil/frying stage, which I prefer to do. Actually, this time I did pre-boil the lentils, and left the green out until the last 10 minutes of cooking time.

End result wasn’t exactly liquid enough to be soup (the lentils I chose didn’t mush, either) but it feels uber-healthy and wasn’t as bad as my haphazard spicing method had me fearing! ;)

Been meaning to type this up for ages! Was a great way to use up some over-ripe plums. Whole thing was very sweet, and yet the ginger totally stopped it being cloying. Loved it surprisingly much, so tried it with pork, which also worked brilliantly.

Original recipe/idea from here

for one
1 chicken breast
a little seasoned (w/salt and pepper) flour, for dredging
2 slightly over-ripe plums, stoned, skinned (as pref.) and chopped
1 small onion, diced
3 teaspoons honey
1 teaspoon maple syrup
0.5 teaspoon ginger puree
about half a cup of fruit juice – I had ‘tropical’ in the house, worked fine cut with a little water

1. put the chicken in a plastic bag – without holes! – with the flour and seasoning, then shake it up to coat.
2. brown the chicken in a little oil, in a hot pan, until browned on both sides.
3. combine the remaining ingredients to form the sauce, and add to pan.
4. cook for ~20 mins, or until chicken is properly cooked through.

All very chuck it in, as I like it :) The sauce boils down to a bit of mush – not the best look, but tasted wow! How much juice you want to add is up to you: remember you can let it boil off or not depending on whether you put the lid on the saucepan during cooking.

I served mine with rice and green veggies.

Original recipe and picture from here

For 2 generous portions:
small-ish butternut squash, cut into chunks
tin of berlotti beans, drained
1 tin chopped tomatoes
1 onion, chopped
1/4 teaspoon chilli powder
200ml white wine
200ml vegetable stock
squeeze of garlic puree
sprinkles of dried thyme and oregano, plus bay leaf

for topping:
2 slices slightly stale bread, whizzed through processor into crumbs
mixed nuts (pistachio, brazil, almond), chopped
sprinkling of dried rosemary

1. Soften the onion in a little oil; add the garlic, herbs, chilli, tomato and wine, stock plus salt and pepper to taste.
2. Cover and simmer for about 15 minutes.
3. Add squash and beans and simmer for a further 25 minutes.
4. Transfer mix to oven-proof dish(es). Top with the breadcrumbs mixed with the nuts, and spray with a little oil (for colour/crispness).
5. Bake at 180C for about 30 minutes.

Nom! Quite a sweet dish between the squash, wine, tomatoes and rosemary, but not overly so. I had to make some changes to the original recipe for lack of ingredients (plus I’m not too keen on butter beans!), but it all worked fine.

I made two individual portions – it is freezable, but I ended up munching the second the next day. It is nice cold, but also fine if reheated in the microwave.

Recipe here

I’ve been drawn to the idea of making my own dhal for ages: I love lentils, I love curry; this is light and healthy. So finally!

Alas, it wasn’t great. Not bad, but… hmm. Of course, might have been better if I’d realised that the squash should have been pureed through the dish, not left in chunks – oops! Also, I combined the tarka ingredients into my main dish rather than cooking it separately. Also, I added a dollup of curry powder just… cos!

Made a nice big, freezable batch, but I think I still need to work on getting the flavour just so.

My sm’s been making this for years, and last night I finally tried my hand at it – and yup, every bit as easy as she said, and was delicious! :)

When I say ‘cup’ in the measurements, I’m not being American – we really did just measure everything in cupfuls!

Step 1:
1 cup castor sugar
1 cup sultanas
quarter of a regular tub of margarine (I’ll look up the measurement!)
1 cup water

Bung all of these into a saucepan and bring to a boil. Leave aside to cool completely.

Step 2:
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground mixed spice
1 egg, beaten
2 cups flour

Again bung everything in and mix well. Pour into a (tinfoil) lined loaf tin and bake at 160C (fan oven) for 50 minutes. Turn heat down as low as it will go and leave for the final 10 minutes to dry out a little.

You do have to let this cool before slicing, or it’ll just crumble everywhere. Absolutely nom, though! :)

(from Good Food Sept 2009 supplement, _Take Five Ingredients

Takes about an hour and a half.

Ingredients for 4:
1kg braising steak
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 tablespoons flour
3 onions, thinly sliced
300ml red wine
300ml stock
3 rounded tablespooons cranberry sauce
salt and pepper

1. Cut the meat into large slices. Tip the flour and some salt and pepper into a large food bag, and shake with the beef to coat.
2. Heat the oil in a heavy-based pan and brown the beef – this may need to be done in batches. Remove to a plate.
3. Add more oil if needed. Fry the onions quickly for 5 minutes until starting to brown.
4. Return the beef to the pan and add the stock and wine. Bring to the boil.
5. Reduce the heat and simmer gently, covered, for about 90 minutes until the beef is tender.
6. Stir in the cranberry sauce, seasoning, and simmer for a further 5 minutes.
7. Serve with mashed potatoes.

A surprise nom! I’d defrosted some individual portions of beef yesterday for a slow cooker meal, and halfway through cooking discovered I’d left one of the portions in the fridge – d’oh! So, quick look to find something to use a single portion for today – and this was the first recipe in the book!

It sounds like a faff ‘cos it takes so long, but other than checking the pot once in a while it’s really easy – you just let it cook away. Makes the beef wonderfully tender, and the sauce is yum! Perhaps a tad on the rich side, so do serve with lots of nice green veggies :)

It does freeze, had I made more than a single portion.

I based this on the Sainsbury’s feed your family for a fiver recipe card, adapted to throw in some more moroccan-y flavours to jazz it up to my tastes.

For one:
splash of olive oil
1 chicken breast
sprinkling of cinnamon (about 1/8th teaspoon)
half a small red onion, sliced
small tin of tomatoes (240g?)
half teaspoon oregano
half teaspoon harissa paste, or to taste (I could have gone for a bit more heat!)
black pepper
chickpeas – about a third/quarter of a big tin, or to taste

1. Using a high heat, seal the chicken (sprinkled with cinnamon) in the oil until browned.
2. Add the onions and fry quickly to soften.
3. Add the remaining ingredients – tomatoes, oregano, harissa and pepper, then the chickpeas.
4. Turn the heat down, cover and simmer for about 10 minutes. Finish with the lid off to thicken the sauce a bit.

Serve with couscous – I used a pre-flavoured version, stirred through with roasted peppers and onion leftover from last night.

Worked well – am pleased :)