The Overly Developed Imagination of the Only Child

So, to herald my recent departure from unemployment, pajamas, self loathing and day time television is a recipe 100% guaranteed to warm the cockles of your heart. If hearts have cockles, which I happen to highly doubt. For one thing, this recipe is a slight adaptation from one on the BBC good food website. For those who don’t know me very well BBC good food is to me what cute, captioned pictures of anthropomorphic cats are to most people. The internet equivalent of a sanctuary; a safe, unbreachable, harmonious haven.

RECIPE:

• 4 portobello mushrooms
• 4tbsp olive oil
• 1 large clove garlic, chopped
• 400g baby spinach
• frozen puff pastry (block or sheets) defrosted
• 140g stilton (or other blue cheese) sliced
• 1 egg, beaten

Preheat your oven to 200’C.

Put the oil in a frying pan and let it heat. Sizzle the mushrooms for a few minutes each side, just until they begin to darken and soften up a little. Put them to the side.

Turn the heat low and using the same frying pan and oil, add the chopped garlic and let it cook for a few seconds. Toasty, golden garlic may be delicious but burnt garlic tastes like the innermost circles of hell. Add the spinach and stir it until it’s wilted to about a millionth of it’s former size. Season the spinach and garlic with salt and pepper and pop it in a sieve to drain. You can use the back of a spoon as a squishing device to speed the process along a little. You want to squeeze out as much liquid as possible or the pastry will be soggy. Which is, as we know, completely unacceptable.

Roll out your pastry (about a £1 thickness) on a lightly floured surface. Using a bowl or plate that is much bigger than the mushrooms as a template cut out 8 circles from the pastry for the tops and bottoms.

On 4 pastry discs, spoon a quarter of the spinach mix, a couple of slices of cheese and add the mushroom (smooth side up) and top with a little more cheese until it kind of looks like a little pixie house (I was an only child, alright? Drop it.) Repeat this for the other 3 mushrooms.

Brush some beaten egg around the edge of the mushrooms and drape the 4 remaining pastry discs over the top. Use your fingers to press the edges of the pastry together. The bottom disc will be much wider than the top so I like to fold it over in a pretty sort of star pattern. This also seems to seal the pastry better, making the cheese much less likely to leak out of the sides.

You can also use the left over pastry to make some highly unnecessary but pretty decorations. Glaze the tops with a generous amount of egg and pop them in the oven for around 40mins or until they are very puffed up and golden-brown.

How sweet are they? Little golden parcels of deliciousness. The blue-cheese tanginess is so good with the meatiness of the mushrooms. They have the added benefit of looking kind of posh as well, so dinner party it up! Impress your in-laws. Or just foil your friends into bringing round copious bottles of wine. It’s a win-win either way!

Down and Out in Perth (and Pajamas)

I am back, my dears, after a somewhat prolonged absence. Was she mauled by a drop bear, I hear you ask? Aggressively hugged to death by a koala? Or did she just take one look at Tony Abbott, gave up all hope for herself and others and died lying in a corner, hugging her own knees, shivering in apathy and despair?

Well, the short answer is no, although the last is probably closest to the mark. I was, in fact, briefly unemployed.

Surely, you might think, not working would leave you with more time for extra curricular activities rather than less? You might think that. You’d be wrong. You’d probably be surprised to find how little time you have left over after you’re done picking your fingernails, staring listlessly into space and wondering whether you remembered to brush your teeth this morning. And don’t forget watching reruns of bad television shows in your pajamas and basically experiencing your brains turn to porridge and begin to leak slowly but persistently from your ears and nose.

I was rushed off my feet. I’m surprised I even had time to find a job.

It didn’t help that my unemployed cuisine du (every single) jour was beans on toast. Or sometimes, if bread was low, beans not on toast. And sometimes toast. It didn’t exactly make for a lively and varied blogging atmosphere, and dimlylitmealsforone pretty much has that stuff covered.

Anyway, I’m back and, Australian wildlife and politicians permitting, here to stay.

Bring on the food.

Mary Berry Goes Commando

I love cooking with pastry – it just makes meal times feel that bit more fancy. Even if your pastry was very cheap, very un home-made and, in fact, very much bought from the frozen section of the supermarket. I will admit there’s something almost fur coat and no knickers about shop-bought pastry but who honestly gives a damn? Going commando can be liberating.

The trick with filo pastry is not to let it dry out. If you buy frozen let it defrost beneath a slightly damp tea towel and leave the bulk of it under the tea towel while you work with individual sheets. If it dries out it will pretty much turn to ashes as soon as you touch it, like some kind of melodramatic emo song lyric (vaguely embarrassing and to be avoided).

RECIPE: (serves 4)

• 500g leeks, thinly sliced
• 150ml hot vegetable stock
• 175g button/chestnut mushrooms, chopped
• 4 large sheets filo pastry
• olive oil
• 85g goats cheese
• 1tsp toasted sesame seeds/poppy seeds

Heat the oven to 200’C/180’C fan and line a baking tray with baking paper. Put the leeks and the stock into a saucepan and cook for about 8 minutes until the leeks are starting to soften, add the mushrooms and cook together for 5-8 mins until most of the stock has evaporated. Squeeze out the rest of the liquid of the liquid with a fork. You don’t want to end up with a soggy strudel. Mary Berry will hunt you down like a stern, mildly threatening, overly lip-sticked grandmother.

Lightly brush a sheet of filo pastry with olive oil and then fold it in half so that the un-oiled side is facing upwards. Brush the edges with more oil and then spoon a quarter of the veg along one edge. Crumble a quarter of the goats cheese over the top, fold over the edges and then roll up. Lather, Rinse and Repeat for each strudel.

Pop the strudels on the baking tray, brush the tops with oil and scatter on the seeds. I think toasted sesame taste lovely with the goats cheese but the black of the poppy seeds also look pretty striking. The choice is yours.

Bake for 25 mins until crisp and goldeny-brown.

These are crunchy and filled with deliciously melt-y cheese. The best thing is that they aren’t too bad for you either. Filo pastry is the healthiest and probably about a billion times better for you than puff pastry, so all in all they aren’t too fatty either! Serve them with some green salad and you have a fabulous lunch… dahlings.

Gratuitous close-up of melting, gooey innards. Possibly NSFW.

Hot Dayum!

Douglas Adams once described the alcoholic drink the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster as being similar to “having your brains smashed in by a slice of lemon wrapped around a large gold brick.” Well, sometimes that is exactly what is required. Sometimes you stumble across a day that can only truly be described by the terminology “A Shiter.” I’ve decided that today is one of those days. There’s that horrible, bitty, insidious rain happening. The kind that promises it will do nothing more than drastically fluff up your hair in a bad, ugly-extra-from-an-80s-B-Movie kind of a way but actually turns out to have the added bonus of making you damp from head to toe. And I don’t mean wet, I mean damp. Just vaguely, uncomfortably damp. It’s reminiscent of those student days when you had to dry your clothes inside your tiny, freezing, airless flat and when you put them on you were never sure if they were just cold or actually still wet. And they smelt vaguely of mushrooms.

Just me? Never mind.

Anyhow there is only one known cure for B-Movie hair and slightly damp pants and that is harrissa. Actually I completely made that up. The only real cure is alcohol, but the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster is, unfortunately, as fictional as it is obviously incapacitating. And harrissa is to food what the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster would be to alcohol if it actually existed. Harrissa is pretty much like having your taste buds smashed in by a chilli wrapped around a large… gold… clove of garlic. The analogy is getting away from me here somewhat.

RECIPE:

• 8 large dried red chillies, soaked in a little water overnight
• 1tsp cumin seeds
• 1tsp coriander seeds
• 4 large cloves garlic
• 1tsp sea salt
• 80ml olive oil

Take the chillies out of the water and drain them, reserving the water. Cut the stalks off, they don’t taste good, and roughly chop.

In a small frying pan, toast the cumin and coriander until they smell awesome and then bash them about with a mortar and pestle until they are powdery.

Put them in your food processor with the chilli, garlic, sea salt and oil and 2tbsps of the reserved chilli water.

Pulse it up until it turns into a beautiful red-y orange paste.

That’s all well and good but what do I do with it now, I hear you cry! Genuinely anything. Cut up some carrot sticks for dunking, toast some pitta bread and serve it with olives, spread it on toast, stir it into pasta. Whatever. Just find the fastest, most efficient way to get it into your mouth and you’re good to go. It is a wonderful, heady, spice explosion. Liquid sunshine. Not quite a Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster but close.

Cheesus Christ

I’ve always, to the dismay and confusion of my sweet-toothed mother, been something of a savoury kid. I’m serious. I’ve eaten salt and vinegar crisps until I have lost all feeling in my lips and tongue. Once, when I was a child, I stole a huge jar of gherkins from the fridge and ate the entire lot while sitting on my swing set. Trust me, unorthodox amount of pickles + swings will result in a phenomenal, earth-shattering heartburn, don’t try it at home. Anyway, what I am trying to say is that surprisingly, from the age of around three, I have in fact had the cravings and habits of your average pregnant woman.

And if you like savoury things, well, cheese is pretty much the God of savoury isn’t it? The Just and Wise Ruler of the Salty Kingdom. And we should worship him in all his many incarnations, soft, crumbly, firm, vintage, blue and… scone-y. So say we all.

These scones are ridiculously easy. If you can stir and operate an oven then you should be pretty much okay. They also taste SO GOOD, super light and cheesy and delicious.

RECIPE:

• 420g self raising flour
• 1tsp salt
• 1/2tsp grated black pepper
• pinch cayenne pepper
• 50g butter, chilled
• big bunch of fresh herbs (I used thyme, but most things will work, basil, oregano, chives etc)
• 1 spring onion, chopped
• 50g strong cheddar, grated
• 250ml milk

Preheat your oven to 220’C/200’C fan and line a baking tray with a sheet of baking paper.

Sift the flour into a large bowl and add the salt, pepper and cayenne and mix it all together. Add the butter and, using your fingers, rub it into the flour mix. You use exactly the same motion as you would if you were a gangster ominously motioning someone to pay up, just the other way round. Carry on gangster-ing up your kitchen until there are no mega lumps of butter left.

Add your grated cheese and tear in your herbs. Thyme is my favourite, but you could use pretty much anything. Herbs with bigger leaves will need to be chopped finely or they look kind of swampy. Add the milk and stir it all together. The mixture will be a little bit on the dry side but if it seems excessively floury add a tiny drop more milk.

Put some flour on a work surface and gently knead the dough together. Don’t over do it, just make sure the mixture is holding together.

Pat the dough flat, it should be about 2cm high and then cut it into approx 5cm rounds. You don’t need a cutter for this, use anything, a small cup, a bowl, a wine glass… or even just roughly with a knife. You should get around 10-12 little discs.

Pop them on the baking tray and into the oven for about 12mins. Give them plenty of space above them in the oven because they should rise nicely.

And there you go (almost) instant cheese gratification. Amen.

These would be really nice with a hot bowl of soup. Or, as the boyfriend informed me, with some “chive creme fraiche”. Because yes, he is the campest straight man on the planet.

Burgers, Bad Puns and The Perils of Student Living

Like all great, epic sagas (and also unfortunately the not-great ones) the quest for the perfect veggie burger has a second installment. A Return of the (Burger) King, if you will, or a Clash of Hob Rings. Terrible puns aside:

Except not really, I LIED!

Ahem, terrible puns aside, the reason for the speedy ease of this recipe could be that it comes from famous Mockney, Jamie Oliver. A man who favours stop-watch timed cooking, turning meal times into a frantic race against the clock like some kind of feverish kitchen-based version of Countdown, except with an unusually high burn risk. He also favours serving his food on big wooden boards because, y’know, plates are too conventional.

RECIPE: (serves 4)

• big bunch fresh coriander
• 1 x 400g tin mixed beans, drained
• 200g frozen broad beans (defrosted for 5mins)
• 1/2tsp cayenne pepper
• 1/2tsp cumin
• 1/2tsp coriander
• zest 1 lemon
• 1 tbsp plain flour
• olive oil
• feta
• cherry tomatoes
• lettuce
• jalapenos
• gherkins
• 4 wholemeal burger baps

Put the coriander, mixed beans, broad beans, spices, lemon zest and flour in a food processor and pulse together until combined. I made the mistake of putting the broad beans into the processor whilst still frozen. This gave a fairly accurate sounding reconstruction of the horrifying sound of several machine guns going off at once. Interesting to note for any war-enthusiasts, or you could record it and use it as a sound effect during your next game of Risk. Just an idea.

Scrape the mix out and, on a floured surface, form it into four patties.

Pop the buns in the oven (disclaimer: not an anti birth control slur), lay out some sides and heat a tablespoon of olive oil in a frying pan over a high heat.

Add the patties and cook for a couple of minutes on each side, turning when they are nice and golden and that… is pretty much it.

These are very yummy! The beans make them really satisfying and for just a couple of minutes of work they are definitely not disappointing. They are also a ridiculously cheap dinner and therefore student friendly. If students actually cooked… which most often they don’t. I actually had a flatmate once who tried to cook a frozen meat burger in a toaster. Undergraduates really do inhabit a special world of unreality.

Anyway these are very tasty, very fast and very easy. Happy cud-chewing people 🙂

Golden Balls

The name of these eggs is not, in fact, my own desperate cry in favour of Scotland’s Independence but just what I have decided to call this recipe for vegetarian Scotch eggs. As meat is such an integral element of Scotch eggs I thought that calling them Scotch was a bit of a lie. Like a wolf in sheeps clothing. Or an American acting the part of a famous Scottish person. For example.

I absolutely love picnics. They are little more than an excuse to eat delicious food in the favourable guise of being active and healthy and outdoors-y. I always hated missing out on Scotch eggs. They aren’t particularly good for you (the traditional version) but they look so yummy. Savoury spicy-ness and eggs, all in a little portable, finger-friendly package.

So I give you freedom eggs! Free from horrendous, nasty, stereotypically Scottish, death-inducing ingredients. And also free from meat (but not free from David Cameron nor free from questionable acting – just a little disclaimer)

RECIPE: (makes 6 eggs)

• 7/8 large eggs
• 2tbsp olive oil
• 1 onion
• 250g grated carrots
• 2 heaped tbsp curry paste
• 200g breadcrumbs
• 85g roasted cashews, chopped

Put 6 of the eggs in a pan of cold water and bring it to the boil. Let them boil for 5mins exactly and then take them off the heat and cool them in cold water. Shell them carefully. No one wants bits of shell in their egg. Major picnic faux-pas.

While they are cooling heat the oil in a frying pan and fry the onions for 5mins, add the grated carrots and cook for a further 10mins, until soft. Add the curry paste and the breadcrumbs and leave the mixture to cool a little. Then beat the egg and mix it in. If the mixture seems a little dry beat another egg and add it in a little at a time until the mix becomes a paste.

Heat your oven to 170’C/150’C fan.

Now for the messy bit! Divide the mixture into 6. Flatten a part of the mixture in your hands and then put the egg on top and slowly wrap the mixture round. Use wet hands if the mixture seems to prefer sticking to your fingers instead of the egg. Scotch fingers are a slightly more controversial version of this recipe and not one I intend to go into at this point in time. The mixture should bind around the egg pretty well. Do this for each of the eggs and then roll them in the chopped cashews.

Pop them in the oven for about 15-20mins until the coating has crisped up and then serve them with some mango chutney and a crunchy salad. Or just put them in a tupperware and pretend you are going on a hike somewhere.

These are totally delicious, spicy and crunchy. Vegetarians (or just heart-attack avoiders) rejoice!

Buxom Barmaids

Shop-bought puff pastry is one of those miraculous inventions that turns the near impossible (or at the very least the thoroughly time consuming) into what can only be described as idiot-proof. As easy as pie. Or, as the case may be, as easy as a tart, which is pretty much just a pie lying on it’s back… which is kind of appropriate.

This is so easy that you don’t even need to actually like your guests in order to muster up the energy to make it for them. It is, however, so beautiful and dramatic when you turn it over that you’ll insure that your guests end up liking you. So don’t bother if you don’t want them coming back for seconds.

RECIPE:

• 3 firm pears
• 3 apples
• 100g butter
• 100g caster sugar
• 3 cardamom pods (or 1tsp ground)
• 1 large cinnamon stick (or 1tsp ground)
• 5 cloves
• 2tbsp brandy
• 500g block puff-pastry

Peel and halve the pears and carefully cut out the cores. Do the same for the apples but cut them into quarters. If the fruit seems to be very juicy, leave them in the fridge to dry out for a few hours (you can also leave them in overnight, slightly sprinkled in lemon juice to stop them going too brown).

Put the sugar, butter and spices in an oven-proof frying pan (about 20cm) and cook over a high heat constantly stirring and shaking the pan. The butter and sugar should melt together and then begin to separate and turn a dark toffee colour. Be careful with it, caramel is ridiculously hot. No Seriously.

Put the apples and pears in the pan and toss them into the sauce. Cook them for around 10-12mins. Don’t worry, they won’t burn. Splash in the brandy and let it flambe. Flambe is, in my opinion, a much camper way of saying please be careful, this could take off your eyebrows. Take the pan off the heat and leave it to cool for a few minutes.

Meanwhile, heat your oven to 200’C. Roll out the block of puff pastry to the thickness of a £1 coin. For people down under a pound is much the same thing as a dollar only thicker and it feels much more like real money (think 2 dollar coins stuck together). Using a plate for a template, cut a circle in the pastry, it should be slightly larger than the pan you are using. Press the edges with your fingers to thin it out a little.

When the pears have cooled you can pluck out the cinnamon sticks, cloves and cardamom pods. Some people like to leave them in to be artsy but really, have you ever accidentally bitten into a cardamom pod? Not good my friends, not good. Arrange the fruit in the pan, cut side up. I went for a sort of flower arrangement with the apple slices around the edge.

Put the puff pastry disk on top of the fruit and tuck the edges around the sides nice and snugly. Pierce the pastry with a fork and then put the pan in the oven for 15mins. If there is a lot of juice bubbling around the edges then drain a little of it off at this stage and then put it back in the over for another 15mins, reducing the heat to 180’C. The pastry should be golden brown.

Take it out of the oven and leave the tart to stand for 10mins (this allows the caramel to set slightly). Then put your serving plate on top of the pan and carefully, carefully flip it over.

Voil-fucking-a!

It’s beautiful! Like a firstborn, or a sunset, or a unicorn! Glossy like the flaxen hair of a medieval wench! As plumptious as the bosom of a barmaid! More sexually enticing than warm apple pie! And other stuff…

This tart tastes sinfully and unforgivably good. Sweet and spicy and sticky and juicy and all things that are even remotely good. The only thing that makes it better is ice-cream. Eat it straight away. Not that you could manage not to…

Mariachi Madness and the Majestic Cactus

As members of the human race we are constantly searching for new distractions. Art can take you places. Music can lift your soul. A good book can be liberating, capable of opening up a whole new world of possibilities – whether it be a world of magic and the epic struggle between good and evil or merely a world of gratuitous S&M as portrayed in the undisputed masterpiece Fifty Shades of Grey. In a similar manner some foods just transcend their own foody limitations. They have a story to tell, a new world to show us. This soup is one. Imagine, ladies and gentlemen, the edible equivalent to a one night stand with a Mexican millionaire; the setting sun pouring in through the windows (through which you can see the silhouette of a mighty cactus), the smoky taste of tequila on his mustachioed lips. This soup is hot, spicy, luxurious and undoubtedly over much sooner than one would like.

RECIPE: (serves 2)

Soup

• 250g cherry tomatoes
• 1/2 tin of chopped tomatoes
• 1tbsp tomato paste
• 1tbsp sugar
• 1tsp smoked paprika
• 1tsp cayenne pepper
• a sprinkling of dried chillies
• 250ml hot vegetable stock
• extra virgin olive oil
• salt and pepper

Salsa and Croutons

• 2tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• handful fresh coriander
• handful fresh mint
• a couple of pickled jalapenos
• squirt of lime juice
• 2 slices bread, diced
• 1/2 cup cheddar cheese, grated

Preheat your oven to 200’C. Put the cherry tomatoes on a baking tray, drizzle them with olive oil and season with salt and pepper. Put them in the oven for about 15/20 minutes or until they are splitting and blistering.

Cue a gratuitous and utterly unnecessary close-up of some tomatoes. Your welcome.

Put them in a food processor with the chopped tomatoes, tomato puree, sugar, spices and stock and blend them together until they are smooth and a colour Duluxe would probably term something ridiculous like Terracotta Daydreams. Trust me on the sugar, in really brings out the taste of the tomatoes and the smokiness of the paprika. Pour this into a saucepan and add the rice, letting it cook at a gentle (but tremulously passionate) simmer.

Meanwhile, make the salsa by putting the coriander, mint, jalapenos, lime juice and olive oil in the blender. Pulse until smooth-ish. I call this colour Intense Swamp.

When the rice has absorbed the soup and is cooked but still slightly al dente (this means not rice crispies but not porridge either, a happy medium) make the croutons. Heat some olive oil in a small frying pan and add the bread. Season with salt and pepper and turn until they are golden-brown and crunchy. Take them off the heat and then add the grated cheese, allowing it to melt all over them in a sensuous manner.

Pour the soup into bowls and swirl over the salsa and top with the croutons. This soup is genuinely the dogs bollocks. The spicy, acidic salsa cuts through the smoky, sweetness of the soup. Intense flavour bomb. It would also really, really work with tortillas instead of croutons. Put some tortillas topped with the grated cheese under the grill. When the cheese is melted and bubbling put them on the soup and your ready to go…

Arriba!

Falafels: An Incoherent Truth

 

There are, on this planet, only a couple of truths that are universally acknowledged. One of these is that drunk people make a mess. To progress this idea could be to argue that drunk people will make a spectacular mess, merrily, and often in record time. It’s inescapable, and therefore should be embraced whole-heartedly. The fact that drunk people enjoy making a mess is, in fact, the sole reason behind the existence of many of our most celebrated dishes. Do you really think the Mexicans would have invented nachos if they hadn’t invented tequila first? What other purpose does a kebab actually have? Do you think chips and cheese would even exist without drunk people?

And so I bring you falafel wraps. These are the perfect drunken food. DIY wrap-making can be messy at the best of times, even when your sobriety is not actually in question. So you have the added bonus of watching your friends trying to navigate a cheesy, leaking wrap into their silly drunk faces. It’s pretty much the equivalent of giving them a hair-trigger Super Soaker full of hot sauce. Amazing.

RECIPE: (serves 3-4)

Falafel

• 1 x 400g tin of mixed beans
• 1 x 400g tin of chickpeas
• 1 lemon
• 1tbsp harrissa
• 1tsp allspice
• 1tbsp plain flour
• 1 bunch fresh coriander
• olive oil

Sides

• 2 bell peppers, roughly chopped
• 4 spring onions, as above
• 8 small tortillas
• 2tbsp mango chutney
• 250g cottage cheese
• cherry tomatoes
• 1 red chilli
• 1/2 clove garlic
• 1 lime
• sweetcorn

Drain the chickpeas and the mixed beans in a colander. Make sure all the gunk from the tin has come off, or your falafels will end up smooshy. Nobody wants a smooshy falafel. Put them in the food processor, grate in the lemon zest and season with salt and pepper. Add the harrissa, allspice, flour and coriander and blitz everything together. It doesn’t matter if it it doesn’t have a perfectly smooth consistency, the falafel are actually nicer with a bit of texture, and besides, your drunk, so what do you care?

Scrape out the mixture and (with slightly wet hands) shape it into 8 to 10 balls. Squish them flat, heat a tbsp of oil in a frying pan and cook the falafel on both sides turning them when they are nice and crispy.

Fry up the bell peppers with the spring onions. It’s alright if the peppers go a little black, they’ll be sweeter that way, so you can let your drunken mind wander… just not too far. Put them in a bowl.

Put the tomatoes, chilli, garlic and some more coriander in the processor with the lime juice. Whiz it up till it’s smooth and salsa-y, season and put it in a serving dish. Mix the cottage cheese with the mango chutney or sweet chilli sauce – both is good trust me, I know it sounds bizarre – and put it into another bowl. Other nice bowls of stuff could be sweetcorn, some chopped cherry tomatoes and grated cheese. I know this already sounds washing up heavy, it’s worth it, I just hope you have polite friends.

Put the tortillas in a microwave for about 45 seconds, or warm them in the oven. Pop them on a plate and let battle commence.

I will warn you: Do not serve this to your in-laws unless they are either forgiving, like-minded or suitably plied with alcohol. You are going to end up looking like a toddler with problematic motor skills.