I saw this recipe from Nigella during the week and thought I might give it a go for some weekend lunch. When I read the recipe closely I wasn't keen on the idea of blitzed up sweetcorn so although it would make it far less like a chowder and more like a soup I decided to keep the corn more chunky and just rely on the semolina to thicken. That is, I decided to freestyle with a recipe I had never even eaten before, much less made. The result was actually a pretty tasty lunch and the colour reflected the sunshine outside on this nearly-spring Saturday and not bad for less than 30 minutes work. I accompanied it, as Nigella instructs, with toasted tortillas with cheese, it seemed churlish not to!
I used:
300g drained sweetcorn (either fresh or defrosted)
300ml vegetable stock
30g semolina
1 chilli, chopped
Tortilla chips
80g sharp cheddar cheese
Salt and pepper
Turn the oven on to preheat at 180 degrees.
Blitz 200g of the sweetcorn in the processor with the semolina and then add to a saucepan with the rest of the corn and the stock.
Bring to the boil and then turn down to a simmer.
Add half of the chilli and 20g of the cheese to the soup and season generously with salt and pepper.
Simmer on a low heat for about ten minutes.
Meanwhile, lay as many tortilla chips as you fancy (we liked having extras on the side to dunk!) on a baking sheet, cover in the rest of the cheese and put in the oven until the cheese has melted.
Serve the soup with tortilla chips, which will sink and go slightly soft, and the rest of the chilli on top.
Serves two.
This has been deemed worthy of further experimentation and although this is perfectly tasty as it is and also not too heavy for a lunch time meal next time I think I will throw in some cooked bacon to the soup and maybe a bit more cheese too!
I am an incredibly accident prone person. You name it and I can break it, spill it, trip over it or get tangled up in it. This has led to a perfectly rational fear of cooking anything in a lot of oil. Visions of the entire house ablaze have kept me from attempting anything involving more than the tiniest covering of oil in a pan. After discussing the strategy should the pan catch fire with the husband and only just stopping short of a full blown fire drill, I made arancini for dinner. Arancini are little balls of leftover risotto rolled in breadcrumbs and fried in oil. They usually have some kind of cheese in them but you can add almost anything you like really. I kept mine simple and just added mozzarella and parmesan. The husband and I are huge fans of these and usually have them whenever we hit an Italian restaurant which is sadly not as often as it used to be. Never being one to do things the easy way I decided not to wait until I had leftover risotto but instead make a small batch at lunchtime with some stock and a few tablespoons of passata to give it a faint tomato flavour. A friend had leant me a copy of Tessa Kiros' Apples for Jam this week and the inspiration to finally give it a go came from there. If you haven't read this book then I thoroughly recommend it and I'll be trying out many things inspired by it in the coming weeks. Stacked up with some gnocchi cooked in the oven and scatted with mozzarella and a tomato and chilli sauce for dipping, these little beauties were Saturday night heaven on a plate for me.
I used:
300g cold leftover risotto
1 egg, beaten
breadcrumbs (I forgot to weigh these but they covered one dinner plate)
parmesan (to taste)
50g mozzarella cut into small cubes
Vegetable oil for frying
Makes 8-10 arancini
Add the egg to the cold risotto and combine, it should be firm but also sticky.
Grate parmesan into the mixture, as much as you like. I love parmesan so added a lot but you can do this to taste.
Take a small amount of the rice mixture and roll into a ball.
Poke a hole in the middle of the ball, add a mozzarella cube and then wrap the rice around the cheese sealing it in the centre. Put to one side and repeat with the rest of the rice mixture.
The little balls should be sticky enough to take on the breadcrumbs without having to roll in egg again. Roll each of the balls in the breadcrumbs and then chill in the fridge until firm. This took me about 30 minutes but it may be more or less depending on your mixture.
Put 2-3 cm of oil in a heavy based frying pan and heat slowly, preferably one with high sides to keep the risk of spitting and making a mess to a minimum. A wok would also probably work here but I don't have one!
Having your fire evacuation plan sorted, gently lower the balls into the oil using a slotted spoon and fry in batches of 2-3 at a time. They should only need a couple of minutes on each side until golden brown then remove with your slotted spoon and drain on kitchen towel while the rest cook.
Next time I make these I think I'm going to go for a more punchy tomato taste, possibly with some chilli. There is definitely going to be a next time as these little wonders have vanquished my fear of hot oil for good.
I decided to make these because last weekend I picked up some food colouring paste and I wanted to see if it was really more potent than its liquid cousin. When rummaging through my baking drawer for some cupcake cases I came across some left over from the Royal Wedding last year so my red velvet cupcakes became Jubilee Cupcakes as it was sixty years since Elizabeth II's accession last week. With the blue cases, red cakes and almost white frosting it seemed to just about work so I went with it. I use Nigella's red velvet cake with cream cheese frosting recipe from Kitchen and this was definitely the best colour so far. It's not easy to see from the picture but they really are bright red, it's glorious! My piping has always been dire but the first outing of the piping set my husband bought me for Christmas definitely improved the process! Being bright red they would also be ideal for Valentine's day but I am rather fond of these as royalist propoganda in cake form.
I had heard about a product that is liquid egg white which sounded ideal for making macaroons and meringues and I was keeping an eye out for it everywhere I went for a while. When I finally saw it one day in a Waitrose near me I had to buy it purely because I had been looking for it for so long. It then sat in the fridge for a while and is due to go out of date fairly soon. Given the number of times I banged on about it to my husband, I feared for the state of our marriage if I didn't use it and simply threw it away. After the last time I made macaroons I was not in a hurry to try that again so it had to be meringue. The problem with meringue is they tend to go best with cream toppings and I need to avoid cream where possible so I had to get a bit more creative than your bog standard pavlova. Once again Nigella came to my rescue with a recipe for a chocolate meringue stack. The meringue came out pretty much as expected but I didn't much fancy making the creme patissiere in the recipe, not least because my snazzy find meant I didn't have any egg yolks left over. After what must be far too long for any one man to endure, I finally gave my husband a break when I stumbled across another Nigella recipe for chocolate peanut butter sauce that should usually adorn an ice cream sundae. It's now drizzled over my three layers of chocolate meringue and again my shoddy photography skills don't come near to showcasing all its glory. I really need a new camera. And also a cake stand rather than improvising with a plate and upturned bowl. A few more sweet treats like this and I reckon him indoors might cave and let me have one.
I also knocked up eighteen mini pavlovas to go in the freezer and use up the rest of the egg white. They came out a bit misshapen and really only good to be broken into pieces in desserts but that's good enough for me.
After a horrible week, a few days of following someone else's recipes to create something delicious was definitely what I needed. Hopefully I'll have more energy to be a bit more creative soon.
It's been pretty tough work wise lately so weeknight cooking has become less about experimenting and more about tasty home cooked food I can get on the table as quick as possible with minimum effort. One of my favourites is chicken and noodle soup which is less than half an hour from entering kitchen to eating and with the addition of some vegetables knocking around is truly wholesome too. Risotto is one of the best types of fast food. I love the comforting ooze and it is twenty minutes from the liquid going in to finish. After many months of experimenting, I have also cracked a perfect fajita spice mix and if I slice the meat (usually turkey as chicken is expensive these days) thin enough and quickly fry in a hot griddle before resting then I can have fajitas on the table in less then thirty minutes too. Then there is spaghetti bolognese, cottage pie (made with a sweet potato topping) and spicy meatballs. All of these can take over an hour but after the initial prep and stirring they can sit quite happily either on the stove or in the oven until we're ready to eat and are truly comfort food without opening a ready meal or takeaway menu. This leaves the weekend as my time to play in the kitchen and try something new. This week it was Chinese roast pork belly and egg fried rice courtesy of a recipe Ken Hom cooked on last week's Saturday Kitchen. It may sound like lots of effort and took over ten hours but most of that time was either sitting on a rack drying in the kitchen or in the oven. It was my first time using Chinese 5-spice and I have to say that while I do like the taste I find it a bit strong and might use a bit less next time. It was definitely a well deserved treat though and so good my husband apparently dreamt about it last night, high praise indeed!
