Spiced chilli pork

It's New Year's Eve, what can you make with cold roast pork, well I let my imagination go and produced this lovely dish. It was really easy and extremely yummy.

Ingredients:
3 tbsp olive oil
1 onion, sliced
1 clove garlic, sliced
Cold roast pork cut into .5 inch chunks
1 tbsp paprika
1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
6 mushrooms sliced
5 tomatoes cut into chunks
1 tbsp dried oregano
Salt and pepper
Water
1/2 Savoy cabbage finely sliced

Method:
Heat the oil in a frying pan, add the onions and garlic and fry gently until soft.
Add the pork and fry for 1 minute, add the paprika and chilli and fry coating all the pork and onions in the spices. This will release the flavours.
Add the mushrooms and fry for another minute. Add some water to help release the juices crusted on the bottom the pan.
Add the tomatoes and the oregano. Season well. Simmer for 10 mins, add more water if necessary.
Add the cabbage and continue to simmer for another 5 minutes.

Serve with boiled rice.

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Turkey goulash

Ingredients:
2 tbsps olive oil
1 onion, sliced
3 cloves garlic, sliced
1lb potato chunks

2 tbsp olive oil
1lb turkey leg pieces
1 tsp caraway seeds

1 tbsp paprika
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
Salt and pepper
1 tbsp flour
1 tbsp tomato puree
4 large tomatoes chopped
1/2 pint chicken stock
1 green pepper, chopped

Method
Heat oil in a large frying pan, add the onion and garlic, fry until soft. Add the potatoes and sauté for approximately 3 mins. Remove into a bowl.
Add remaining oil and fry the turkey for a minute, add the caraway and fry until the turkey is brown on all sides, add the paprika and cayenne and stir fry for a minute to release the flavours, season the turkey. Add the flour and make sure this is stirred in, covering all pieces of the turkey.
Put the potatoes and onions back in with the turkey, add the tomato purée, the chopped tomatoes and the chicken stock.
Cook for 10 minutes.
Add the chopped green peppers and cook for until the potato is tender, approximately 20 minutes.

Serve with sprinkle with chopped chives and a spoon of sour cream.

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Ah, cooking aromas are the key to happiness

There is nothing like the smell of home cooking to bring smiles to the faces of family.

It is half-term, so my daughter and I are at home for the week, both of us working on coursework in someway, either catching up on assignment work, or planning and preparing for the next half-term. Whoever thinks teachers get loads of holiday, certainly needs to shadow a computing teacher for a year, as we don't seem to stop, and are constantly learning new skills and software.

So after a morning working we needed a break and this afternoon we went on a lovely drive into the New Forest to our favourite farmshop to get some meat to last us until Friday when we can get the weekly shop. It is lovely shopping where you are known so well, the butcher remembering that hubby bought some neck of lamb last Friday for a stew on Saturday, to be put in the slow cooker so that after our trip to the open day at Coventry University we had a lovely hot meal with little effort apart from popping some frozen peas and a few fresh herby dumplings in for the last 30 minutes.

The film Julie and Julia is a Foodie's dream, an inspiration to get cooking. I was so fascinated I bought the boxed set of Julia Child's books and love reading them and browsing through her recipes when I get time. I love her recipe for Coq au Vin and as I haven't cooked anything from her recipe books for ages, I thought this was an ideal time to cook this as I'm not so rushed. You can't beat a free range chicken and I jointed it, keeping the carcass and giblets for stock, (yes you get giblets still at Danestream). If you want to try the recipe it is easy to find the recipe through a search on the web.

We are using lacto-free butter and gluten free flour at the moment as my daughter seems to be intolerant, but that doesn't change the flavour of the dish in anyway. The first aromas are the bacon frying in the butter, lush and certainly make you feel hungry. Then browning the chicken followed by flambee-ing the pan with brandy, this is so magical and the aroma always draws my daughter into the kitchen. Pouring the whole bottle of red wine in always causes a gasp, I mean, a WHOLE bottle of wine, not a sip escapes, even though a glass would be wonderful to help with the preparation, but a shot of brandy in a glass works even better.

Now that my daughter is expanding her cooking repertoire, it is lovely sharing the preparation and my tricks with her. Simply pouring boiling water over the baby onions for 30 minutes before peeling them, makes the job so much easier and stops the tears.

It is always difficult to stop checking the pan and checking the taste of dishes that are so scrummy, if there is any left then our favourite way to serve is with some plain rice to soak up the juices.

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Lasagne

Ingredients
1 batch of my Bolognese Sauce
1 batch of my White Sauce
1/2 box of lasagne sheets (normal or verdi(green) or mix of both)
75g/3oz grated cheese, you can use cheddar or mozzarella (either ready grated or fresh cut into slices)

Method
Preheat oven to Gas Mark 4/180C.
You need a wide dish suitable for lasagne, ideally about 10cm high. I use a square lasagne dish, you can use a casserole dish, but it need so be large enough to take at least one sheet of lasagne at a time. Don't worry, the lasagne sheets break easily.

1. Add a couple of large serving spoon size spoonfuls of the bolognese sauce to the dish, I use a ladle, spread it so it just covers the base.
2. Now drizzle over some of the sauce, about a large serving spoon size.
3. Now cover with a single layer of the lasagne sheets. (see next step below if you have just used the last of the sauce)

Repeat steps 1-3 a couple more times. You will need enough of each sauce left to cover the final layer of lasagne so it is all covered.

Sprinkle over the grated cheese or place on the fresh mozzarella.
Bake in the oven for about 45 minutes until golden brown.

Serve with a salad and garlic bread.

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White sauce

Ingredients
250ml/ 1/2pint milk
25g/1oz plain flour
25g/1oz butter/spread suitable for cooking
Salt and pepper

Method
Put all the ingredients in a small pan, grab a balloon whisk and put over a medium heat, keep stirring until the sauce has thickened. (don't leave it, just keep stirring, trust me it will look impossible to start with but it works)

When it has thickened and starts to bubble, allow to simmer for 3 minutes to "cook" the flour.

Season to taste.

Cheese sauce - simply stir in 1 tsp dijon mustard, add 75g/3oz grated cheese and heat gently until melted.

Parsley sauce - stir in 1 tbsp finely chopped parsley

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Bolognese sauce (ragu)

 Ingredients

1 onion, finely chopped
1 stick celery, finely chopped
2 tbsp olive oil
2 rashers streaky bacon, chopped into small pieces, or 1 pack of cubed pancetta/bacon lardons
1 clove garlic, finely chopped
500g/1lb minced beef
1 carrot, finely diced
1 tbsp tomato purée
100ml/ 1/4pt milk
1/4 nutmeg grated (use fresh, it's much nicer)
1 glass red wine (there won't be any alcohol left after cooking)
1 tin chopped tomatoes
1 oxo cube
Water
Salt and pepper

Method

Heat the oil on a medium heat in a large saucepan, add the onions and celery and gently fry until they are soft, add in the bacon and fry for about 3 minutes. Turn up the heat and add the garlic and minced beef, break up the mince as you fry it, it should start to crumble, fry until none of the mince is pink. Add in the carrot, tomato purée, nutmeg and milk, bubble until the milk has vanished. Now add the wine, again bubble until it has vanished. Sprinkle over the oxo cube add the tinned tomatoes and enough water to just cover the ingredients, season. Bring to the boil and then turn down to a very low simmer so that the odd bubble breaks the surface, cook for a good hour, stirring occasionally. At this stage you could pop this in a slow cooker and leave on low all day to cook.

Check seasoning and then serve.

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