Tabbouleh

I combined a couple of tabbouleh recipes to generate this delicious accompaniment to some freshly-grilled lamb chops from the butcher's. It's really important to have some good fresh herbs to hand; you can't substitute or reduce them without reducing this from tabbouleh to a mere cous-cous-with-bits-in. On the other hand - you can totally substitute cous-cous, if you don't have time to cook bulghur wheat or just don't fancy the flavour.

Ingredients:

• 75g cous-cous
• a slice of butter
• 1/2 tsp vegetable stock powder
• two ripe red tomatoes
• a couple of hot radishes
• a spring onion
• a good handful of flat-leaf parsley
• a good handful of fresh mint leaves
• juice of half a lemon
• olive oil

Pour boiling water over the cous-cous in a 2:1 water:cous-cous ratio and stir through the butter and stock powder; microwave for a minute or two then leave to stand to cook through. Cool if you have time. Dice the tomato and radishes; finely chop the spring onion and herbs. Combine the cooked cous-cous, herbs, tomatoes, radishes and lemon juice, then drizzle with olive oil just before serving.

Aubergine and Caramelised Onion Pasta

I tried another recipe from Nigel Slater's Kitchen Diaries II, and overall I'd say it wasn't bad. After  agonising over the right pasta shape for a few paragraphs, before settling on one I've not seen for sale down under, he suggests basking the aubergine whole, then scraping out the cooked flesh, whipping it with olive oil to make a pasta sauce.

I found that compared to my usual method, this takes a very long time, and the insides get steamed instead of grilled, so are missing all of the lovely charcoal-y edgy bits that make cooked aubergine so extra delicious, on top of the meltingly soft, subtle flesh. Plus you have to throw away the skin, which is another flavour & texture combo I relish. I think his recipe would be much faster and tastier if you simply sliced the aubergines, brushed them lightly with olive oil, bbq'd them over a hot grill; meanwhile caramelise some onions, then tear the aubergines into pieces and toss everything together with basil, freshly cooked pasta, and a good squeeze of lemon. Punchier, faster, less greasy, and preserving all the best flavours of the aubergine. I'll report when I've had a go with my modifications.

Okonomiyaki (Japanese Savoury Pancake)

Another inspiration from my amazing Flavour Thesaurus, with guidance from one of my favourite food blogs and a helpful Japanese cooking info page. This time I was reading the underwhelming-sounding 'cabbage and egg' section. Turns out the Japanese have a long tradition of making these gorgeous savoury pancakes with a range of different ingredients, but almost-always including shredded cabbage as the base. And since cabbage was on my list of 'cheap veg at the market this week', I have a whole head to use up. I made up the money saved buying the cabbage by buying beautiful katsuobushi, the dried bonito flakes that 'dance' in the convection currents generated by the hot pancake. I also made my own okonomiyaki sauce, which meant I had to buy ketchup for the first time in my life. Oh well - maybe when winter rolls around I'll deep-fry some potato chips. Or, more likely, I'll just make these again, because they were AMAZING! Even easier to flip than Korean pancakes, less fiddly than fried veggie fritters, and absolutely divine in flavour. I think it's worth putting in the extra effort to make the sauce, and track down the katsuobushi and wakame (dried seaweed).

Ingredients

What is so exciting about this seaweed??

For the pancake: 

• 1/4 white/green cabbage
• 1 carrot
• 2 spring onions
• 1 egg
• 3/4 cup room-temperature dashi stock (substitute seafood stock, or vegetable stock, or even water)
• 1 cup plain flour

For the toppings:

• 2tbsp ketchup (tomato sauce)
• 2tbsp Worcestershire sauce
• 1 tsp dark soy sauce
• 1 tsp sugar
• 2 tbsp mayonnaise
• 50g katsuobushi (fine bonito flakes)
• a small handful of wakame (dried seaweed)

Japanese pancake on the barbie.
Now that's what I call fusion food :)

Shred the cabbage, grate the carrot and finely slice the spring onions. Combine with the egg, stock and flour in a large mixing bowl. Get a bbq hot plate nice and hot and brush generously with oil. When you can see it start to shimmer, plop the mixture onto the hotplate and push down and smooth out to make a pancake or two (how many depends on your confidence in your ability to flip them!). Close the lid and bbq for 5-10 minutes, until crisp and golden on the bottom, and cooked through enough not to fall apart when you lift the edges with a spatula. Flip onto the other side and cook for a further 5-10 minutes.

Meanwhile, combine the ketchup, Worcestershire sauce, soy sauce and sugar in a small bowl, to make the okonomiyaki sauce. Put the mayonnaise in a small plastic bag with the corner cut off, or piping bag, if it's not in a squeezy bottle already. When the pancake is nearly done, turn off the heat and brush the top surface with the okonomiyaki sauce. Pipe on the mayonnaise in long lines, or whatever pattern you like. Tip on the katsuobushi and scatter with a handful of wakame. Serve hot off the grill, with the bonito flakes dancing to their tasty song :)

Roast Green Peppers with Giant Cous-Cous

Green peppers have a hard time competing with their red, orange and yellow brethren. Chefs are full of admonitions to 'never ever' substitute green peppers for red, and it's understandable: the flavour is noticeably different, being less sweet and grassier. However they're indispensable for the gorgeous lamb abruzzio and a staple of my Mexican cooking. Tonight I wanted to try stuffing and roasting them, but using flavours which would complement their green taste. I used a Nigel recipe for inspiration, but like the risotto I made earlier in the week, substituted most of the ingredients. To figure out the flavours, I started with the 'abruzzio' flavours, then subtracted the lamb (I try to eat veggie on days when I'm not exercising) and replaced its umameness with a little anchovy.

If you can't get giant cous-cous (and I have to say, I was amazed to find it in my local market), I'm sure normal cous-cous would work just fine. You would, however, miss out on the joy of the escapee giant cous-cous, which leap from the peppers onto the hot roasting tray, and bake through to produce joyous bonus crunchy popcorn-like additions. This recipe makes enough for two hungry people, or in our case, enough for dinner and then lunch the next day.

Ingredients:

• 200g giant cous-cous (also called pearl cous-cous, or mograbiah)
• six spring onions
• a large handful of mint
• six large salted anchovy fillets
• 10-12 olives
• four medium to large green peppers
• half a lemon
• 100ml sour cream
• 1 tsp paprika

Cook the cous-cous according to its packet instructions; mine didn't have any but took about 20 minutes to become tender. Finely chop the spring onions and fry in a little olive oil until softened. Zest the lemon, chop the mint, halve the olives, and crumble the anchovies; turn off the heat and add them all to the spring onions, then season with black pepper. (You probably won't need salt because of the olives and anchovies.) Drain and tip in the cooked cous-cous and squeeze over the lemon, then gently combine.

Cut the peppers in half and remove the seeds and pith, but leave the stalks on. Lay out in a large baking tray and fill with the cous-cous combination. Cover loosely with foil and roast in a 200C oven or on a hot bbq for 35-40 minutes, until the peppers are cooked through and beginning to caramelise at the edges. Stir the paprika through the sour cream and serve with the cooked peppers.

Pumpkin Pangrattato

Pumpkin was cheap at the market. Turns out that's because it has almost zero flavour at this time of year (midsummer). I have written down the basic recipe, which comes from Nigel's Tender, a book I have struggled to use well since it's aimed at someone growing vegetables in a much more temperate climate. I certainly remember the pumpkins in Cambridge being sweeter than the sad specimen I cooked tonight. Anyway, I include in italics the ingredients to include if you suspect your pumpkin is lacking a certain joie de vivre. And I'm toning down the amount of chilli: we had to have a yoghurt afterwards to cool down!

Ingredients:

• 750g pumpkin or butternut squash
• 3 cloves of garlic
• 1/4 tsp dried chilli flakes
• 1 1/2 tbsp rosemary leaves
• zest of an orange
• a handful of parsley leaves
• four handfuls of breadcrumbs
• 2 tsp sugar
• 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp nutmeg
• 40g butter
• segments of an orange

Peel and deseed the squash, then cut into ~2cm pieces. Steam for 15-20 minutes until just tender. Crush the garlic into a frying pan with some olive oil and fry gently until just beginning to colour. Meanwhile, finely chop the rosemary and parsley leaves, and zest the orange. Add the herbs, chilli and orange zest to the garlic, then tip in the breadcrumbs and mix well; fry for a further 3-4 minutes until fragrant and just beginning to crisp.

Tip the pumpkin into a large roasting tray and taste; if it's lacking in flavour then season with the sugar, cinnamon, salt and nutmeg. Tip over the breadcrumbs and dot with butter. Roast at 180C or on a moderate bbq for 35-40 minutes until the crumbs are deep gold and the pumpkin is tender. If you like, stir through the orange segments before serving.

Mung Bean Sprout Risotto

A strange-sounding combination, to be sure. It started out as an entirely different recipe - 'A risotto of spelt and pea shoots'. Then I attempted to obtain the ingredients from my local market:

Nigel: Now easily available from supermarkets and grocer's, this ancient grain has an extraordinary comforting quality.
Me: Do you have pearled spelt?
Shelf-stacker: *blank look*

Me: It's like spelt - but before it's been ground into spelt flour...
Shelf-stacker: We have pearl barley...
Me: Thanks...

I didn't even try for pea shoots. Pea shoots? Really? And Nigel grows them himself in a tray? How much time does this man have to wash things? I picked up a pack of mung bean sprouts and hoped for the best.

The remaining ingredients were an onion - substituted with a shallot - and vegetable stock - replaced with an amazing chicken stock we'd made with the chicken carcass at the weekend. OK - I didn't substitute the Parmesan or butter... cheddar and lard just didn't sound right!

Anyway, it turned out surprisingly well. Strangely nobbly complementary textures. It was very easy - just make the simplest onion and rice risotto base and then stir through mung bean sprouts at the end... I suspect the recipe might have been lost in substitution!

Bacon and Chilli Yoghurt Muffins

I'm in a muffin mood! Specifically I seem to be hooked on bacon muffins. SO GOOD. This recipe comes from an awesome Christmas present, The Flavour Thesaurus. It's an incredible book in which the author set out to describe every possible flavour combination, scaling back from an insane number that could only be represented in scientific notation to a 'more feasible' 4,591 combinations - of which, to be fair, only the edible ones are described. It's brilliant to flick through as the prose is amusing and filled with interesting historical and cultural tidbits- it was in the 'everything goes with bacon' chapter that I came across this lovely recipe. I didn't have any cornmeal, so in place of the plain flour and cornmeal, I used a 'corn bread' baking mix, which is half-and-half white flour and coarse corn meal flour. Don't be scared by the quantity of chilli flakes: their heat is well-tempered by the yoghurt and butter. I also took the advice in the recipe and served with cream cheese: a wonderful combination.

Ingredients

• four rashers of bacon
• two eggs
• 450g plain yoghurt
• 50g butter
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 65g plain flour 
• 275g fine cornmeal
• 1 tsp dried chilli flakes

Fry or grill the bacon until crispy and easy to snip or crumble. Whisk the eggs together with the yoghurt in a large mixing bowl. Melt the butter and drizzle it in, whisking all the while. Combine the salt, soda, flour, cornmeal and chilli flakes in a bowl and then fold into the yoghurt mixture, stopping as soon as you no longer see any dry flour. Pop into 12-18 muffin cases or trays and bake at 200 C for 20 minutes, until golden and risen.