A quick and easy dinner based on something seen in Olive magazine: red onion, diced courgette and carrots fried in oil flavoured with cumin and paprika. Once they’ve softened a little, a tin of tomatoes and a little veg stock is added then left to simmer until all the veg is tender.
I’ve topped it here with some sliced flour tortillas dry fried until crisp.
Typical absurd simplicity from Wagamama. Stir fried garlic, courgette, leek, onion and green bean mixed with noodles and chicken stock. I wish I could elaborate, but that’s it!
My presentation’s not quite there, but if you squint you might recognise this as the critic-pleasing dish from the Pixar film Ratatouille. That’s technically what this recipe is, but this is it as reinvented by the chef-genius Thomas Keller, who christened it confit byaldi. Spoilers ahoy, but in a scene that should make Heston applaud, as the grouchy critic chomps down he is transported to his mother’s cooking of his childhood. Evoking such memory and inspiration really makes me smile when it comes to cooking. This is a really classy way of improving a truly peasant dish.
…Or it might be jambalaya. I’m not sure what the criteria is. It’s rice ‘n’ stuff in one pan, anyway.
My old chum chorizo makes a special guest appearance, but it’s the vegetables that do the work in this one. I fried the chorizo a bit to char the edges and encourage their spicy-sweet juices to leak out, then put them to one side. Then in go the veg: red onion, celery, carrot. After they’ve tenderised a bit, in go a courgette, some garlic and a pepper. After a couple of minutes I added some basmati rice and tossed that around to get up to heat. I wanted an alcoholic flavour so I added some Cinzano of all things at this point – slightly bitter, slightly sweet.
Then the chorizo went back, along with a pint of veg stock, some saffron and some paprika. Lid on, and left it for 20 mins or so. I came back to find a pan full of sticky rice and tender veg. Garnished with a little fresh parsley and shovelled away heaped spoonfuls at a time. Dinners in one pan rock!
