Crispy and burnt.

Today I celebrated an early Christmas with Becko and her family. It was a beautiful Summer’s day and Becko and Dave had prepared a generous feast as per their usual entertaining style. But as per my current habit of insisting that I bring something along – I have a deadline to meet after all – I asked that Becko let me contribute to lunch.

Crispy Fragrant Jumbo Prawns

Becko had put together a big mezze plate, which we munched on under the shade of a sail in the back garden, followed by some oysters. Then it was time for the prawns.

Butterflied green prawns, dipped in seasoned flour, egg wash and the crumb mixture (bread crumbs, finely chopped parsley, grated parmesan and lemon zest) then laid out in a lightly oiled baking tray and into the oven for 15-20 minutes till crispy.

We served them up with some lemon wedges and another glass of wine. They were absolutely sensational – crispy, warm and full of flavour.

It was a perfect day for a long and lazy lunch with friends and family and we made the most of the good food and the good weather – as well as the bucket of sangria! Shame about the sunburn – looks like it’s not just the prawns that were crispy, but now my back as well…

Xx

Simply Shocking.

Luckily I hadn’t made plans to cook anything fancy tonight, coz I was stuck at work til late and would not have felt like a big session in the kitchen.

Simple Green Salad

Creamy French Dressing

I had some spinach and cheese triangles in the freezer, so as soon as I got home, I threw them in the oven and whipped up the green salad, which was not as simple as just lettuce (I don’t think Jamie does things quite that simple!) but rather rocket, cress, finely sliced fennel and finely sliced asparagus. Tossed with the dressing (white wine vinegar, sesame oil, olive oil, S&P, Dijon mustard, crème fraiche and finely chopped parsley), so that it coats the whole salad and as Jamie says “fancy but easy”.

The dressing is the shocking part. Don’t get me wrong, I love a good spinach & cheese triangle, but the dressing made the dinner. The sesame oil/Dijon mustard combo was a winner. Who would have thought one could get so excited by a simple salad for dinner. Though, I might have been a little delirious by the time I actually got home…

Xx

PS – Just need to do a quick shout out to Sarah H, who was also working late and challenged me to go home and cook!

Fire and Spice.

I really felt like some lamb tonight, but the only lamb recipe I’ve still got to go is lamb shanks, which I’m saving for a winter weekend in 2010. So I thought I’d do my own thing with lamb, but add some Jamie vegetables into the mix.

Superb Sweet & Sour Squash

Simple Sautéed Courgettes with Chilli & Lemon

I marinated a mini rack of lamb with some Moroccan spice seasoning and fired up the barbie.

The sweet and sour squash began with dried chilli and crushed coriander seeds being thrown into hot oil, which threw up a pretty intense and eye watering fragrance. I then added the butternut pumpkin, red onion and some water, covered with a lid and popped it into the oven for 15 minutes. Meanwhile I put the lamb onto the BBQ with the hood down, leaving it to grill away.

I sliced the zucchini and tossed it into a frying pan with some garlic and dried chilli. Once brown, I added a squeeze of lemon juice and a small knob of butter. Simple.

It was at about this time, that I noticed how smoky the kitchen was getting and realising that the smoke was coming in from outside, I ran out to the BBQ and lifted the hood only to discover a rather large fire and a very charcoaled lamb rack. I’m lucky I’ve got any eyebrows left I tell you – it was one hell of a blaze. I huffed and puffed a bit, turned everything off and left the rack to sit and sizzle while I headed back inside.

I took the pumpkin out of the oven and placing it on a medium heat on the stove, I added pine nuts, raisins, garlic, thyme, balsamic & white wine vinegar, a spoonful of sugar and some S&P and left to simmer.

By this stage, I was suffering quite a bit of watery eye action, both a combo of all the chilli used and the smoky haze, but it didn’t cover up the fact that charcoal as it might have been on the outside, once I sliced into the lamb, the inside was not just pink, it was blue. So into a hot frying pan, for a quick fix and finally I served up my spicy lamb and veg dinner.

As far as a fiery dinner goes, all the chilli and spices were delicious, but I can live without the blaze on my balcony, that’s for sure.

Xx

Back to the future cake.

Today I had lunch at Marcus & Mel’s and as always I knew they’d serve up something spectacular for lunch, so I offered to bring something sweet.

My Nan’s Lemon Drizzle Cake

When I was growing up, my favourite cake – that I always requested Mum make for my birthday each year – was a lemon poppyseed cake, cooked in a bundt tin, with lemon syrup drizzled all over and down the centre hole. So. Good.

Well, Jamie’s lemon drizzle cake is not dissimilar to Mum’s, but baked in a plain round tin and not just drizzled with lemon syrup but with runny lemon icing as well, I was kind of worried that it was going to be a VERY moist cake once sliced. But Jamie got it right and his nan’s lemon drizzle cake was a crowd pleaser with the kids and the big kids at lunch today.

It brought back lots of fond memories from my childhood including the old poppy-seeds-in-teeth conundrum.

Xx

Short cut to a small explosion.

I had my friend Raz over for dinner on Friday night and as it had been a couple of months since we’d caught up, I wanted to go for something pretty quick, so we could focus on the talking rather than time spent in the kitchen.

Lovely Easy Caramelle with Ricotta, Basil & Black Olives

Caramelle is Italian for “sweetie” which is what this pasta is supposed to look like when done – like a bon bon, with the twisted ends. To make things easy, I decided to cheat and rather than spend the time making fresh pasta, I bought fresh egg lasagne sheet. I feel as though I’ve taken a few short cuts lately, but really, I have made pasta before and will make it several times more before my year in the kitchen is out, so I figure, where I can cheat, I will.

For the pasta stuffing, I combined ricotta, nutmeg, finely chopped basil and black olives, grated parmesan, S&P & olive oil. When I went to make the “sweeties”, things went a little pear-shaped and apparently karma was out to get me, for taking my short cut. Even though the pasta was fresh and soft, it was by no means as fresh and soft as if I’d made it from scratch that night and so when I tried to squeeze the ends together to seal in the filling, it cracked and split a bit, making leakage during cooking look like a sure thing. But with the help of my slotted spoon and some quick work with a saucepan of simmering water, I managed to avoid serving up too much of a watery mushy mess and ended up with some pretty creamy caramelle served with a tasty tomato sauce (cherry toms, basil and garlic, fried then slowly simmered).

Without getting too preachy, obviously I learnt a lesson here and will try to avoid the short cut again, but I make no promises. I’d hate to have to learn another lesson about making promises one can’t keep…

Xx

Honey, I turned it upside down.

I had a couple of the gals for dinner tonight and over a good catch up and gossip, we enjoyed a visual and taste sensation.

Honeycomb Cannelloni

I had a couple of newbies for dinner tonight – Meals and Evans have not yet had a meal from the cookbook, so I was keen to show off a bit. Jamie has a sequence of pictures for this recipe and it just looks sensational, so I thought tonight was the right night to whip this recipe out.

Essentially it’s just your average cannelloni with spinach and a tomato ragout, but the very obvious and very cool difference is that the cannelloni aren’t lying down and stuffed, they’re standing up – a big round pot of vertical tubes, that from the top, looks exactly like…HONEYCOMB!

Firstly I made a vegetable ragù with carrot, celery, red onion, leek, garlic, mushrooms and five tins of tomatoes. It simmered away while us girls had a vino and a chat. After a good 45 minutes, I started the layering. First layer on the bottom of the round pot was a simple “white sauce”, made with cream, sour cream and grated parmesan, on top of that was some wilted spinach, then half the ragù. Then I placed all the cannelloni tubes vertically into the ragù and gently pushed them down, so that the bottom layers squelched up into the tubes. I then gently poured over the remaining ragù, so it filled the tubes from the top, then the remaining white sauce mixture, plus a sprinkling of grated parmesan to top it all off.

Into the oven for 45 minutes and served with a salad, it was a sensation. It just looked so cool and was such a simple and clever way to make a change to a pretty common recipe. And the girls loved it – enough for us to stop talking momentarily and just focus on eating!

Xx

PS – I’m warning you now, so please don’t judge, but one of my recipes this week is simply going to be a salad dressing. I have so many salad ingredients hanging about in my fridge and there are at least five dressing to be made in the book, so I’m not cheating nor am I avoiding a recipe, it just won’t make for exciting reading…

Pink is the colour of my plate.

I love beetroot, both the tinned kind and the fresh kind and I don’t care what anyone says but a hamburger is better when it has beetroot on it. Well tonight’s dinner wasn’t a burger, but it was a beetroot spectacular.

Crunchy Raw Beetroot Salad with Feta & Pear

With a freshly sharpened knife, I attempted to julienne the fresh, peeled, raw beetroot. I know, weird right? Who would have thought you could eat it raw? Tinned, roasted, boiled etc, but raw? I love it when Jamie surprises me. So pink fingers and finely sliced beetroot was what I had, mixed with finely sliced pear (yet again I forgot to peel it – what is with that?), some lemon juice, olive oil, S&P, torn mint leaves and crumbled feta. Tossed together and served with a couple of lamb cutlets, it was absolutely delicious.

It was basically a salad of crunchy pink matchsticks. But what a fun dinner. Like a pile of pink confetti on my plate.

Xx