Roast Courgettes with Tomatoes

Really hesitating to include this, as it was rather... boring. But the recipe book was wrong, and I want to correct that. For posterity. Served this with some haggis, and tripled the flavouring ingredients all the way through the recipe, so actually it was all fine. I just wish I had some better vegetarian recipes. I couldn't imagine serving this as a main portion, even with all my additions. The original didn't even have any herbs or balsamic in it, and 1/6th the amount of garlic. /facepalm

Left: 1300s Scottish food. Right: 1970s vegetarian food.
What? It's fusion...

Ingredients:

• four courgettes
• three tomatoes
• a generous handful of fresh herbs - e.g. oregano, marjoram, basil
• balsamic vinegar
• two cloves of garlic
• a big slice of bread
• lots of salt and pepper, and olive oil
• cheddar or fontina cheese (optional)

Preheat the oven to 160 C. Slice the courgettes lengthwise and scoop out the seeds with a spoon, then lay them skin-side-down in a roasting tin. Crush the garlic cloves into a bowl and glug in some olive oil, and season well. Spread the garlicy goo all over the inside of the courgettes, then lay down the herbs. Slice the tomatoes and put them on top. Drizzle over a little balsamic vinegar. Roast at 160C for 30 minutes.

Blitz the breadcrumbs in a blender. Remove the tray from the oven, cover in breadcrumbs and drizzle with olive oil; cook for a further 25 minutes. Remove again, top with grated cheese, turn up the heat to 200 C and roast for a final five minutes.

Back from Bali: Haggis!

We were in Bali last weekend for a short holiday and on our return we had just a touch of the 'Bali belly'! So this week has been very much a back-to-basics week; we've had lamb abruzzio, quesadillas, pasta with roast tomatoes, fajitas, and pork chops. Nothing exciting but no time to experiment. Tonight we made something I've been meaning to since January 25th this year -- haggis :) There is a little 'expat' shop down Albany Highway that sources them from a local butcher; at $20 a pop they're not cheap, but they certainly are tasty :) And more authentic than the ones I got back in the UK! I think this one was actually made with a real stomach. Mmmmm....

Laksa Lemak

This is a slightly vegetable-fortified version of a very seafood-heavy Singaporean soup from my humungous Asian cooking compendium. The whole house now smells of prawns but it was worth it :)

Ingredients:

• 10 raw prawns (or more if you're hungry)
• a large handful of rice vermicelli
• 1 tsp dried shrimp paste (don't inhale, lol)
• 1 large onion, peeled and cut into big pieces
• 1 tsp galangal powder
• 6 candlenuts
• 1 stem lemongrass
• 1 tsp ground turmeric
• 1 tsp ground coriander
• a 200g chunk of pumpkin, cut into bite-sized pieces
• 200ml of coconut milk (or thereabouts)
• a large handful of frozen peas
• one lime
• fried tofu, cooked crab or fish cakes (add if you're very hungry)
• a quarter of a cucumber
• a small bag of beansprouts

Peel and devein the prawns; reserve the flesh in the fridge and put the heads and shells in a stockpot. Cover with at least 300ml of boiling water and boil for 30 minutes, to produce a rich prawn stock. Drain and discard the heads and shells. Soak the rice vermicelli in hot water for 10 minutes, then drain.

In a food processor, blend the shrimp paste, onion, galangal powder, candlenuts and lemongrass, then fry for 7-8 minutes, turning frequently, until the mixture has darkened and reduced a little. Add the prawn stock and simmer for twenty minutes, then add the pumpkin and cook for a further five -- or until the pumpkin is almost done. Stir in the coconut milk, frozen peas, cooked vermicelli and add the raw prawns. Bring up to a simmer and cook for a few minutes; turn off the heat as soon as the prawns are cooked. Juice in half of the lime, and cut the other half into wedges.

Slice the cucumber thinly and add to the bean sprouts in a separate bowl; add the lime wedges to decorate. Serve the soup in deep bowls, topped with the extra protein if you're very hungry. Take handfuls of salad and top the soup, add a splash of lime juice and soy sauce and eat the salad with the soup. Yum!

Salt n Pepper Tofu Stir Fry

To go with our vegetarian steaks, we made a quick stir fry. The tofu was salted and peppered and fried separately, then left to drain. We finely chopped the vegetables and about half a thumb of ginger, stir-fried them quickly for a few minutes, then added the tofu and a splash of soy sauce at the end. Nom.

Nasu Dengaku

This time, with an amazing photo:

The original recipe is here.

Okra and Sausage Gumbo

As is typical when I get back from a trip away, there were a couple of cold sausages slowly edging past edibility at the back of the fridge. Luckily I noticed them in time, and put together an incredibly fast gumbo, which also happened to be amazingly tasty. We served it with pumpkin and potato mash - I suspect that the pumpkins aren't fully in season yet as they're a tad bland still.

Ingredients:

• a large white onion
• a few handfuls of okra
• two cloves of garlic
• a corn-on-the-cob
• 1 tbsp paprika
• 1 tsp cumin seeds, toasted and crushed
• a pinch of dried chilli
• three ripe tomatoes
• a couple of cooked sausages, preferably spicy chorizo, but any will do

Peel and finely chop the onion; fry over a moderate heat until softened. Top and tail the okra, then cut into bite-size pieces. Add to the onion and crush in the garlic; fry for a further minute. Meanwhile, cut the kernels from the corn-on-the-cob and chop the tomatoes. Add to the pan, along with the spices, and a splash of boiling water. Cover and cook for 15 minutes, stirring every few minutes to make sure the mixture doesn't stick. Add more water if you need to. Slice the sausages and stir into to the pan; turn off the heat and allow the flavours to mingle, then serve with mash or brown rice.

Salmon and Runner Bean Pasta

This is the sort of crazy yet strangely delicious thing I create when I get home just twenty minutes before my evening telecon with Cambridge.

Ingredients:

• a generous handful of runner beans
• a couple of ripe tomatoes
• a handful of fresh oregano, finely chopped
• a cooked salmon fillet (I suppose tinned salmon might work!)
• a 75g--100g tub of really good pesto
• packet gnocchi

Slice the runner beans into cm-thick diagonal pieces and put on to steam. Chop the tomatoes and fry in a preferably non-non-stick frying pan. After  a minute or so, when they release some liquid, add the oregano. Set the gnocchi on to boil. When the runner beans are done and the tomatoes are well-softened and starting to dissolve, drain the beans and pop them in with the tomatoes. Turn off the heat and flake in the salmon. Season well with black pepper. Cover and allow the flavours to mingle. Meanwhile, drain the gnocchi, return to the pan and stir with the pesto. Serve the gnocchi topped with the sauce. I found it didn't even need parmesan!