Categories
cauliflower food lamb

griddled lamb with cauliflower puree

griddled lamb with cauliflower puree

I’ve managed to catch up with the dreadfully named Recipe For Success. A couple take over a restaurant for a day and try to run it. It’s fronted by the affable Simon Rimmer, whom I’ve admired for many years and I’m sure is worthy of a bigger household name status than he has. He gave this recipe to one of the couples, and it inspired me to do it that evening.

After the weekend’s gorgeous lamb, I wanted to use lamb steaks again. So I used a similar spice mix of cumin, coriander, salt, pepper and oil, then griddled them both sides and left them in the oven til done.

Meanwhile I braised some cauliflower in lamb stock with a pinch of garam masala until knife-tender, then removed the florets. I let the stock reduce down a little, then put the stock and cauliflower in a blender along with some fried onion and a touch of cream. Then I blitzed to a smooth puree.

It was quite indulgent, a great blend of flavours and textures, and very tasty.

Categories
asparagus food

asparagus

 

A quick post to celebrate the first day of the British asparagus season. A very kind local farmer gave me some heads of asparagus to plant last year, and here they are on the first day of the season, bendy but proud.

Asparagus is one of my absolute favourite vegetables, and I look forward to May every year with glee. I eat them in all sorts of ways – keep an eye out for asparagus recipes coming soon!

Categories
aubergine courgettes food peppers tomato

confit byaldi

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.

The recipe is lifted wholesale from NYTimes so I won’t reiterate the whole thing here. Suffice to say it’s a bunch o’ veg sweated off and topped with discs of other veg. It’s time consuming but really not difficult, and the results are well worth it. Simultaneously sunny, tasty and wholesome, I heartily recommend it.

Categories
broccoli food mozzarella pastry sausages tomato

sausage and broccoli tart

This wonderful little creation is a result of a supplement from olive magazine, courtesy of cathyella’s generous subscription present 🙂

There are a number of elements to it, all made separately and then brought together on the tart. Purple sprouting broccoli is blanched for 2 mins and refreshed in cold water to arrest the cooking. Good quality Italian sausages are deskinned and torn into pieces, then fried in crushed fennel seeds until browned. And then a puff pastry square, ready made. I chucked on some cherry tomatoes (Tesco do an amazingly flavourful tin of them), some of the broccoli, some sausage pieces, then a little parmesan and torn-up mozzarella. After 15 or so minutes in the oven for the pastry to brown and rise, I topped it with basil and dressed with balsamic vinegar. Really tasty, and looked the part too.

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