Wednesday 22 June 2011

Stuffed Marrow

Sorry about the lack of updates for the last week; I was busy with work and my parents drove down to help with the wedding planning. We had a trip to the florists, where I learned there are worse things than buying shoes, and on a more fun note we had the wine-tasting for the wedding! Nine bottles between nine people, and we picked out a champagne, a white and a red. Oddly enough, the cheapest of each, but we really were tasting for quality!

Also I had my hen party at the weekend, which was brilliant - thank you to all the lovely ladies who made it possible! This also involved some amazing food - lovely picnics, oysters on ice, a seared beef fillet with foie gras, the choclatiest-thing-on-the-menu, a brilliant Mexican-inspired veggie breakfast and afternoon tea with champagne! A lot to fit into one weekend and certainly more than I can properly describe in one blog post. Especially when I need to catch up with lots of food I cooked myself...

As I was away all weekend, the SO did all the shopping and food planning. So this week is a little... interesting. Ok, ok, I bought this marrow, so to be fair he did plan around using it up. But as my dad predicted, it's tough coming up with something when you're faced with a big green tasteless vegetable. They just look so lovely on the market stall! Fair play to the SO, he found a good flavourful recipe, and after a couple adjustments by yours truly, I think it turned out very well. This would be brilliant with a generous dollop of split pea dahl on the side, but at the time I didn't realise so just had some fruit afterwards. The ingredients bear a startling resemblance to one of my favourite pasta fallbacks, so I guess some flavour combinations are simply classic.

Ingredients:
  • 125g bulgur wheat
  • one red onion
  • three cloves of garlic
  • 100g spicy chorizo
  • a large marrow
  • two red peppers, roasted and skins removed
  • two ripe red tomatoes
  • a large handful of coriander
  • a large handful of mint
  • a large handful of parsley
  • juice of one lemon

Preheat the oven to 200 C. Set the bulgur wheat cooking according to its cooking instructions - mine takes 15 minutes in simmering water at a 3:1 water:wheat ratio. Finely slice the red onion and gently fry it for 4-5 minutes until softened. Finely dice the chorizo and add it to the pan, then crush in the garlic and  cook for a further minute.

Marrows: not completely useless.
Slice the marrow lengthwise and scoop out the seeds, erring on the side of scooping out more marrow rather than less. Discard these scoopings - or let me know if you have any ideas what do to with them! Roughly chop the peppers, tomatoes and herbs, then add to the onion mixture in the pan. Drain the bulgur wheat and add to the pan, along with the lemon juice. Stir everything around, then pack into the  marrow halves, which should be placed in a sturdy roasting tray in a way that they can't be tipped over. Roast for 25 minutes, until the marrow is just tender and the topping is golden. We dolloped over some natural yoghurt, and I definitely think a dahl would make a great side dish.

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