Beet THAT!

I'm intrigued by 'wrong' coloured foods! I love black spaghetti and I will always choose my ice cream by the colour, "I'll have the bright green one please!"...

The following is a great dinner party dish, the colour is very impressive and beetroot lovers will thank you for months!! Beetroot is the veg a la mode in this house, I've been using it ALOT, perhaps too much, Bill? It is delicious though so I'll throw a few more beetroot recipes your way before I abandon it!! 

Beetroot Risotto

You'll need

Olive oil

500gms risotto rice

1 large glass of red wine

1 pk of cooked beetroot in juice

1 clove of garlic, crushed

500mls chicken/vegetable stock

100gms grated parmesan

A knob of butter

100gms soft goats cheese

Handful of rocket

Chopped walnuts

Method

Fry the rice with the garlic in oil until becoming translucent around the edges.  Add the wine and the juice from the beetroot.  Cook off the liquids and then add the stock, in dribs and drabs until the rice is cooked.  If the stock runs out use hot water. 

When the rice is cooked, chop the beetroot and add, stirring through to get as much dye on the rice as you can and then add the butter and parmesan.  Stir through.  Serve sprinkled with the rocket, walnuts and goats cheese.

Delicious!

Lasagne Primavera

I've baked this style of lasagne for a good few years after eating something similar in Italy, but I'd forgotten about it until lo and behold I was watching a digital food channel that shows Rachel Ray and she was baking it on air!! I felt cheated but then delighted, a family favorite reinstated, and ours is a little different from Rachels so its all good!

Lasagne PrimaveraYou'll need
A pk of ready to bake (is there any other kind?) lasagne sheets
4 tins of tomatoes
3 courgettes, grated
500gms ricotta, mixed with 1 egg and 80gms grated parmesan
400gms lamb mince
1 mozarella ball

2 cloves of garlic
Handful each of basil, mint and parsley.

Method

Cook the lamb mince with the chopped onion until browned. Stir in 1 tin of tomatoes and leave to simmer until thickened. Add the fresh basil. Chop the mint and parsley and stir into the ricotta cheese.  In a separate pan, chop two cloves of garlic and stir fry in olive oil, adding the courgette, with salt and pepper after a few moments.  Stir in the hot oil until coated and remove from the heat.Pour some tomatoes from a tin to coat the bottom of the dish, then layer the lasagne, pasta, courgette, ricotta, pasta, meat, courgette, pasta and so on as you wish.
Top with a full tin of tomatoes and slices of mozarella.
Bake at 200c for a 40 minutes or until the cheese is golden and the dish is bubbling.
Wait ten to fifteen minutes before slicing.

Happy Easter!

This has been my second Easter in blog land, and again we roasted a lovely Leg of Lamb and had family over to enjoy the day! It was such a pleasure to entertain in my new lovely kitchen! 

I started the dinner off with a Pea and Mint Soup, which went down well, and was lovely and refreshing.  Then served the lamb with rosemary potatoes and wilted greens... I have to admit I was so busy eating it all I barely took a picture!!

The evening rounded off nicely with a raucous game of Cranium (in which there was a few serious accusations of unsportsmanlike behaviour!) and our family favorite 'Incognito'! 

Happy Easter!

Pea and Mint Soup

You'll need

1 tbsp olive oil

1 clove of garlic, smashed

1 small bag of frozen garden peas (around 500gms)

500mls of vegetable stock

A handful of fresh mint leaves

Some cream to garnish

Method

Lightly fry the garlic in the oil, add the peas and the stock and simmer over a medium heat for 20 minutes.  Add the mint.  Blend until smooth.  Serve hot with a swirl of cream.

Happy (Day After) St Patricks Day from DUBLIN!

Oh the frustration of internet glitches! Yesterday was St Patricks Day, I'm here in the horses mouth, and I couldn't get blogger to post for me! It kept saying error blah blah blah!


Anyway HAPPY ST PATRICKS DAY! Or as we say in Irish LA FHEILE PHADRAIG!!


We all donned green, pinned our shamrock to our lapels and enjoyed a day where the whole world joins us in the celebration of our lovely little island!!


I could have chosen a very traditional Irish dish for todays post, but considering most of the very Irish meals (Irish stew, coddle etc) were born from necessity due to half the country starving to death, I didn't feel it was exactly the spirit I was after! So after a him and a haw I decided to get into the spirit with a good old Beef and Guinness Pie! We've got cows, we've got stout, we've got appetites to sooth - as Irish a dish as you can get!


Must be eaten with a diddly eye diddly dee diddly dum!


Beef and Guinness Pie


You'll need
500gms Stewing beef
2 Carrots
1 Large onion
1 Sprig of rosemary
500mls beef stock
A Pint of Irish Stout (Guinness!)
Salt and Pepper
Enough Puff pastry to cover your pie dish!

Method
Saute the onions and the carrots with the rosemary (wonderful aromas here) and then add the seasoned meat. Stir about a bit and then add the stock and the stout! Add a couple of tablespoons of flour. Simmer for 2 hours with a lid on until the sauce has thickened! Pop into a pie dish, cover with pastry, glaze with beaten egg and bake until golden brown in a hot oven, about 180c.

Serve with mashed potatoes and a large glass of milk!

A trifle amusing!

I've never been a huge trifle fan... although I will admit those I have trifled with have been "old school" with tinned fruit, birds custard and buckets of sherry! However after a disastrous attempt at a trifle last christmas, which left mouths like smoking guns and sent most of us over the limit, I decided to think of something new for this years attempt.  With some inspiration from Emily over at Honeybee I decided on this!

It worked out well, subtle and not too rich, and certainly one for the recipe notebooks to make again and again!

Raspberry and Almond Trifle

You'll need

3/4 Raspberry Muffins

1 bar white chocolate, grated

1 carton of devon custard

1 carton of whipping cream

1 tin of raspberries

A few fresh raspberries

Chopped almonds

100mls of Amaretto

Method

Roughly break the muffins into chunks, place into a seperate bowl from the trifle bowl, and sprinkle with all of the ameretto.

Leave for a few minutes and then take half the chunks and line the trifle bowl. Top with some tinned raspberries, grated white chocolate and a sprinkle of chopped almonds.  Top that with a thin layer of custard.  Repeat until all the muffin is laid and finally top with softly whipped cream, almonds and the fresh raspberries... Grate some chocolate on top and serve within a day.

Happy Christmas!

Well I've been up to my eyes in the Christmas run-up, this is the first minute I've had to get online!

I will have plenty of recipes and posts after the festivities, but for now I will just post a bit about the wedding cake I put together for my brother and his now wife, for their wedding which was held in Markree Castle last weekend... 

Here it is!

Thankfully it all went smoothly, metaphorically and literally, with only a few bumps in the icing! The tiers were all different, with the brides mothers famous fruit cake on the bottom, and then I made a chocolate orange cake for the top tier and a chocolate biscuit cake using my own recipe for the middle! All went down a treat! 

I will post the chocolate biscuit recipe soon, I'll need to make it again to see how much of everything I put in, its my own recipe that I put together as I always find other biscuit cakes too buttery and sickly sweet... 

But for now you'll have to make do with a picture!  Happy Christmas Everyone!!!!

And of course BEST WISHES TO MY LOVELY BROTHER FERGAL AND HIS GORGEOUS NEW WIFE CAT!!

Curry... The Return...

Remember my No Worry Curry that I posted a good while ago, well it has come full circle and I would consider it now to be the perfect "cook for a crowd" meal that you can whip up at a moments notice, and be certain to please everyone! 

No Worry Curry

The New and Improved Version

You'll need

100gms of fresh coriander

2 red chillies

2 cloves of garlic

1 tbsp thai fish sauce

2 tbsp of olive oil

2 Pink Curry Onions

300gms Cooked Prawns

1 Tin of white crab meat (M&S is the best I found)

2 tins of chopped tomatoes

1 tin of coconut milk

Method

Pop the coriander, chilli and garlic into the processor and blitz to a rough paste.  Add the oil and fish sauce and blitz again.  Heat a heavy bottom pan and add a dash of oil. Chop and saute the onions until soft and then add the paste.  Stir for a couple of minutes to allow the aromas to fuse, then add the tomatoes and the coconut milk.  Reduce by half.

Remove from the heat and stir through the fish.

Serve with thai sticky rice.

Stuff that!

I've been following Rosemary Shragers School for Cooks over the last few weeks, and it is a treasure trove of inspiration, she really is a fantastic chef, with great ideas. After one particular show, where the teams were asked to stuff breast of chicken with chicken mousse, I was dying to try something similar. Then another show 'Saturday Kitchen' stuffed a whole chicken with chorizo sausage and lemon. That clinched it - I immediately set about stuffing some chicken, and put together a Spanish inspired meal that was so simple yet had everyone stuffed to the gills but hoping for even one spoon more.

It was slightly restauranty and so I will describe it to you in restaurant fashion...

Spanish Chicken Roulade

Organic breast of chicken, stuffed with feta cheese, lemon and chorizo. Served with warm chorizo and potato salad and wilted spinach.

You'll need

4 large chicken breasts

200gms feta cheese

zest of 1 lemon

1 tbs chopped parsley

75gms cooked chorizo sausage

Salt and pepper

For the salad

250gms new potatoes

1 cooked chorizo sausage

Juice of 1 lemon

1 red onion, chopped

Method

Mash the feta. Skin the chorizo and chop into tiny pieces. Add to the feta with the parsley and season.

For each chicken roulade, lie the chicken breast between two sheets of cling film and bash with a rolling pin until about 3mm thick. Spread one fourth of the cheese mix onto the breast and roll up. Wrap with cling film and chill.

After about ten minutes, remove from fridge. Heat olive oil in a pan and carefully place the roulades in to brown on top.

Then remove them to an oven dish and pour the oil over. Bake for about 12 minutes or until cooked through.

For the salad, boil the potatoes, skins on, until tender. Add to the pan that browned the chicken and fry lightly. Add the chorizo and allow the oils to profuse. Add the parsley, the lemon juice, season and serve.

Wilt some spinach in olive oil over the heat.

Eat!

Colcannon

Colcannon is a traditional Irish meal, served at Halloween. The local supermarkets and Greengrocers become stocked to the hilt with the beloved Curly Kale, which rarely makes an appearance at any other time of year!

You'll need

500gms Floury potatoes, peeled and boiled

200gms Curly Kale, washed and chopped

125mls Creme Fraiche

1 Clove of Garlic, crushed

100gms Butter

50mls Milk

Salt and Pepper

4 large coins wrapped in foil, I use 50 cent.

Method

Mash the potatoes well and add half the butter, stirring until mixed through. Stir in the creme fraiche and the milk. Season. In a frying pan heat some olive oil and add the garlic. Fry the Kale in the oil until bright green. Stir through the potato. Drop the wrapped money into the mix and stir.

Melt the rest of the butter in a pan. Place a large dollop of Colcannon in a bowl and make a small well in the centre. Pour some melted butter into the well and serve.

Dip your spoonfuls of Colcannon into the melted butter as you eat. Watch for that money!!

The Black Stuff...

Its hard to make a manly fairy cake, so when faced with the challenge for a recent birthday party, I knew beer had to come into it somehow.  I had recently bought Nigellas 'FEAST" which has a whole section on cakes, so I flicked through looking for inspiration, and there it was, a recipe for a Guinness cake! Beyond manly if you ask me, Guinness puts hairs on the chests of women! Nigellas recipe was for a cake, but its easy to adjust for fairy cakes, I usually just add a bit more flour if the batter is very damp, a cake can cope with a moist interior but a fairy cake? Not so much...

OH they were delicious!! So easy too! I love that!

Iced with philly cream cheese icing and they looked like little pints sitting there! I only wish i had taken the time to ice little harps on each - that would have been sweet!

Here is the recipe from Nigella Lawsons book, I might substitute the guinness for flavoured ale next time and see what happens!

Chocolate Guinness Cake

You'll need

250ml Guinness

250gm unsalted butter
75gm cocoa (I use Green and Blacks!)
400gm caster sugar

142ml sour cream
2 eggs 
1 tbsp real vanilla extract
325gm plain flour 
2 and a 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda

Method

Get your oven nice and hot, around 180^oc, and prepare a tray with your cake cases.

Pour the Guinness into a large pan, add the butter in cubes, and heat until melted. Stir in the cocoa and sugar. Don't worry about lumps unless they're massive! Remove from the heat and in a separate bowl beat the sour cream with the eggs and vanilla and pour into the beer mix in the pan and finally whisk in the bicarb and flour. I left mine stand for a while, then filled the cases in my usual way (wondering is it enough, will it overflow, dropping a blob in the middle of the tray, and on the floor, all accompanied by a varying degree of my favorite curse words, most inherited from my mother, including the wonderful "sugery shite"...)

Bake for a snip of ten minutes, until a skewer comes out clean and pop onto a wire tray to cool completely before icing with a mix of 200gms Philidelphia cream cheese, 120mls double cream and 400gms icing sugar.  

A parting gift...

So the time has come to say Goodbye, but not for long, six weeks from now I will be back here shouting into the cyberspace hoping someone will hear me!

I only hope some of you will pop back to say hello, I will hopefully get to blog sometime along the way on my travels!

So goodbye for now! 

But just before I go...

I am going to bestow on you now one of those recipes that I have thought about posting but there was never a time that felt special enough, as this recipe is probably the one you will simultaenously thank me for while also beating me over the head with your licked clean spoon wailing "I will ne'er eat nothin else"!

Of course its a nigella recipe, but one no one has ever mentioned to me, and I wonder is that because it feels like it should be only discussed in hushed tones, perhaps in alleyways by hooded ladies... 

P.s. if you don't like nuts... skiddaddle, go on - shoo - there is nothing for you here...

Okay first things first - your shopping list...

175mls double cream

100g milk chocolate

100g smooth peanut butter

3 large tablespoons of golden syrup

Ice cream (I go pure vanilla)

Double chocolate chip cookies

Salted peanuts

Go straight away and get that list, nothing can be done until you have it.

Got the stuff? Good, okay lets go!

Put the cream, chocolate, syrup and peanut butter in a pan and melt it all together.  Pour over scoops of the ice cream and broken biscuits and top with the nuts.... There you have it - Your own Peanut Butter Fudge Sundae! 

The secret is definatley in the sauce!

Taste it.  Isn't it unbelievable? Stop crying now, but isn't it fab?! The first time I made this, even my chatterbox mother could not speak! 

I know, I know you can never thank me enough... 

Well... I wanted to give you something special before I left....

xxx

I heart...

...cooking for a crowd!

I really like cooking with a crowd in mind, all queueing, plates in hand, eyes eating the goodies before they've even picked up a paper plate.  Ciara and Jays annual solstice is a great opportunity to cook for a crowd, and I have a stack of easy quick big bowl salads or cold dishes to set down beside the rows and rows of colourful global cuisine that inevitably ends up there!

But this year I decided to be a bit more thoughtful, and make a pie, a main to be surrounded by salads, a staple.

The party has been put off to next week, so unfortunately we had to eat the pie between just a few of us... it was a dirty job but somebody had to do it!

I made my mothers applause inducing cheese pie, but with Ciara and Jay being vegetarians replaced the usual ham with spinach.  This made the pie a little wetter than usual but it was still absolutely scrummy!

Italian Cheese Pie

You'll need

400g ricotta

400g grated cheddar cheese

400g parmesan

400g cottage cheese

4 sheets shortcrust pastry (buy it!)

1 egg, beaten

1 sachet/2 tsp dried italian herb mix

handful of ham or spinach

handful pine nuts.

Method

Grease and line a large springform tin (about 23cms).  Measure and cut out a pastry bottom and place in the tin, brush with milk and place cut out rectangles around the sides of the tin, overlapping onto the bottom. The pastry should be left coming over the sides of the tin and brushed with milk, then set to one side.  In a bowl mix the cheeses together with the egg and the herbs, season.  

Place half the mix into the pie and top with spinach leaves or ham and the pine nuts. 

 Place the rest of the mix on top.  

Place a double layer of pastry on the top of the pie and with a fork or fingers press down to stick to the sides which have been brushed with milk. Prick the top and decorate. Bake for about 45 minutes at 190c until golden brown. Allow cool before slicing.

Cocktail and Cake!

Friends of mine were celebrating a double birthday yesterday and so of course I volunteered to bring the cake, and of course I wanted to make it as personal and thoughtful as I could so no ordinary cake would do!

The last time I saw these girls socially they were making pina colada cocktails, and telling me the joys of this sunny fresh cocktail, so I decided to try to make some sort of "pina colada cake"!

Oh the trials! It wasn't easy, two prototypes later and I had a rough idea of what I needed to do!

Nigella Lawsons chocolate orange cake (see my earlier post here) would form the base for the recipe, I'd substitute the marmalade for pineapple jam and get coconut and rum in, someway or other!

After a dramatic baking session (which involved forgetting the baking powder and having to get online pronto to find out my options!) the cake was made, iced, (Have a look here for how it should be done!)and ready to go!

It turned out very nice, although there wasn't a strong enough pineapple presence as I was hoping for, but the icing was devine and saved the day!  I will need to tweak this recipe some more, but overall it works! I'm going to bake some cupcake versions today and see how they turn out before I write it into my favorite cakes notebook!!

Here is the recipe,

Pina Colada Chocolate Cake!

You'll need

for the cake

200gms Dark Chocolate

250 gms Unsalted butter

250gms Caster sugar

4 eggs

500 gms Self raising flour (or Cream flour with 3 tsp Baking powder 1 tsp salt added)

400 gms Pineapple Jam

150gms Glace Pineapple Chunks (Tesco do these!)

for the icing

Approx 75mls of coconut milk

1 tbsp of white rum

500gms Icing sugar, sifted.

Make the cake as per the original recipe, see here! Add the glace chunks at the end and stir through.  Bake in a medium oven until a skewer comes out clean-ish (ie no liquid but a bit of gunk is fine!) - Cool the cake completely then make the icing by adding the coconut milk mixed with the rum to the icing sugar until you have the stiff peaks.  Smooth over the cooled cake and decorate if you wish! Apply candles, offer to Birthday girls and BLOW!!!

If I were to do it again, I would brush the cake a few times with pineapple juice, or even pour some over and let it soak through, to give it a bit more of a proper pineapple tang.  The icing is really nice, and not sugary sweet so the cake could afford to be a little bit sweeter!

Feeling hot hot hot!

When I spotted baby squid in the fishmongers yesterday - I had to buy them! I'm intimidated by squid but I'm determined to conquer it, as it is one of my favorite things to eat!

So I came home and fried up the baby squid. After eating one of them, it was so scrumptious, I wanted to use them to create something... but what? I had a look at my housewifes choice shelf in the fridge - some parmesan, some old chillies, an onion and a few bits and bobs!

So I chopped the squid with the cheese and onion and stuffed it into the chillis, drizzled with olive oil and roasted for ten minutes...

They were really good - but boy were they hot! My mouth was sizzling! I felt guilty because I hadn't known to warn my nearly sister in law who got a bit of a surprise!

Luckily I had prepared Lemon slices, which is a brilliant home remedy for chili burn! I sucked a quarter and was glad of the relief!!

I'll definatley serve some sour cream with them next time!!

No Worry Curry

So many people get all worked up over making proper Thai curry, all the marinating, all the simmering.... all the effort... all the time... Recently after eating the most amazing curry at a party, I was determined to come up with a similar sensation but without the usual 'twenty day cooking in a hand built oven wrapped in leaves' that you usually find accompanying the best curry recipes!

After a few trial runs I discovered that you can make THE most tasty curry FROM SCRATCH in a half an hour, with just a few ingredients! I promise you - Try it!

It is easy and good enough to serve at a dinner party (really, try it!)

Curry for 4

You'll need

Meat (I use 4/5 pork chops, chopped into bite size pieces, Veggies could use Courgette.)

2 tins chopped tomatoes

1 can coconut milk

Paste made from a good handful of coriander, 2 cloves garlic, 1 good size red chili, 1 tsp fish sauce, 1 tsp American mustard, 2 tbsp Olive oil (whizzed to a fine paste in a blender)

Method

Oil a hot pan and add your meat and the paste.

Stir until just browned and pour on the tins of tomatoes . Add the coconut milk.

If your pan is too small wait add the tomatoes a tin at a time, waiting for them to reduce before adding the second. Allow to bubble on a medium heat for about 15 minutes, or until the sauce has reduced by half.

Serve with jasmin rice or cous cous and a leafy salad!

It really is that easy!

No place like home...

There is one piece of Ireland that I miss more than any when I'm away, I can handle missing Barrys tea, Tayto crisps, Brennans bread... the alternatives are different enough to hold my interest and there is always a foreign replacement that holds more appeal for that time. Except when it comes to black pudding. I cannot replace it, there is nothing like it (morcillo just does not taste the same!).

Black pudding is a staple for the Irish breakfast, which consists of eggs, sausages, rashers (bacon) and mushrooms all served up beside black and white pudding. White pudding is nice enough, sausage meat mixed with bread crumbs but it comes nowhere near black pudding for taste.

I love it spread on toast, I love it served with apple, with scallops, with peas... but most of all I love it when its in a pie...

Bills Black Pudding Pie

you'll need

1 black pudding

4/6 sausages

1 red pepper

1 onion

1 green chili

Fresh herbs (whatever you have)

tsp harissa paste

1 clove garlic, crushed

handful grated cheddar cheese

1 sheet puff pastry (buy it don't make it)

Method

Fry the onions, garlic, herbs, chili, pepper along with the sausages until they are cooked. Chop them in the pan and put aside. Fry the black pudding slices until they are crumbling under pressure.

Mix into the sausage mix and add the cheese and harissa paste. The pudding will crumble and the cheese will melt.

Place the pastry on a baking sheet and paint with milk along the edges. Place the pudding mix along the centre and pull the sides up around and across each other like swaddling. Paint with beaten egg or milk.

Tuck in the ends and place in the oven for 20 minutes until golden.

Happy Easter!

Easter Sunday! I love an excuse to prepare a feast! So for today I ordered a leg of lamb and stocked up on luxury ingredients - the channel island double cream, the madagascan vanilla, the french butter, the best wine... Christmas and Easter, thats when we go all out and it really makes the special days special!

So with my nearest and dearest sitting happily around a decorated table, I served up our first course...

Velvet Squash Soup

(this is beyond easy and a great starter when you've guests as you can make it in advance and reheat)

You'll need

1 Butternut Squash

4 cloves garlic

500mls chicken stock

Method

Split the squash in two, and scoop out the seeds. Drizzle with olive oil and place in a roasting dish. Split the garlic cloves and place them in the hollow of each piece of squash. Pop into a hot oven (200c) and roast the bejesus out of them, until they are so soft the flesh will come away from the skin without much pressure.

Scoop the roasted flesh out and into your food processor or into a jug if you're using a hand blender. Pour on the stock. Blend until smooth and velvety.

Add salt and pepper to taste, cream if you like and a pinch of parmesan if you have it.

So everyone tucked in, this soup really appeals to all!

Main course time, so we opened a bottle of our favorite special occasion wine...

Easy Peasy Leg of Lamb

Order from a butcher, he will give you the right size for the amount of bellies!

You'll need

Leg of Lamb

Olive oil

Sea salt

Rosemary sprigs

Clove of garlic

Method

Rub your lamb with the olive oil. Halve the clove of garlic and rub the oiled meat with it. Spear the leg all over with a sharp knife and stick the rosemary sprigs into the holes.

Roast at 190c/210c until the juices run clear-ish! (My oven took 2 and a half hours)

Serve with roasted potatoes (add them to the roasting tin about a half an hour after the lamb, but par boil them first and shake them around a bit to be sure of crispy edges!) and cabbage! I always add cream and a bit of onion puree to cabbage on special occasions, ! Don't forget the mint sauce and of course the gravy - I made todays with the juices from the lamb, a cup of boiling water, two tsps redcurrant jelly and a tbsp of bisto which may not appeal to the food snobs out there but I really think bisto makes the best gravy!

So the tums were almost full, the lamb had turned out perfectly, just pink in the middle and crispy on the outside.

All we needed now was dessert!

Lets call these,

Raspberry Mmmms....

You'll need

200gms white chocolate (use green and blacks organic if you can)

200mls double cream

200mls creme fraiche

handful fresh raspberries

chocolate flake.

Sit the white chocolate in a bain marie until melted. Take it off the heat then and stir in the creme fraiche, the chocolate may seize but keep stirring - it'll be fine. Add the cream.

Plop into serving glasses (looks gorgeous in any wine glass) and refridgerate.

Just before serving pop in a few raspberries and sprinkle with crumbled flake.

Mmmmmmm....