Vanilla Frozen Yogurt, a David Lebovitz recipe.

I have always thought of frozen yogurt as ice cream's poor relation, or worse the 'healthy option'.  I am not one for brown rice, quinoa or goji berries, I find it all just a little bit worthy (not to mention largely unpalatable). So frozen yogurt was not a natural choice, but as I always like to know what I'm missing out on (if anything) I thought I'd give it a go. This was a good decision.

Ingredients:

720g Greek yogurt
200g caster sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp vanilla bean paste (my addition, optional)

                                  Put yogurt and sugar into a bowl, stir until sugar has dissolved.

   Add vanilla extract. I also added 1 teaspoon of vanilla bean paste for extra vanilla  flavour, and because I love seeing those little black vanilla dots in the mix.

                                                              
                                                            Refrigerate for 1 hour.

                 Churn in an ice cream machine (it will become quite thick rather quickly which is fine).

                                                     Decant into a container and freeze.

                                        Leave to to soften for 10 minutes or so before serving.



I am officially converted. It was a perfect combination of creamy, sweet and  tangy. I actually think I prefer this to ice cream. This recipe's a keeper.

Stuffed Aubergines, by an indecisive cook.

I am an indecisive cook, starting one way and darting off in another direction half way through. This is probably due to a lack of planning and skill on my part, but I prefer to think of it as an organic and flexible approach that promotes creativity. I had originally intended to make a vegetarian Middle Eastern inspired aubergine dish, but whilst making the sauce I realised that this was in urgent need of some meat. A quick addition of minced beef was hastily thrown in (lamb would have been better), and what would have been a rather sloppy and disappointing meal actually turned out rather well.

Ingredients

4 aubergines
Olive oil
2 red onions, chopped
2 fat cloves of garlic, sliced
2 hot red chillies, chopped
2 anchovy fillets, chopped
1/2 tablespoon cumin seeds
1/2 tablespoon coriander seeds
1 can plum tomatoes

water

minced beef (or lamb)

chicken stock

goats cheese (or feta)

Lightly brush a baking tray and 4 aubergines with some oil. Prick (to avoid messy explosions) and roast until yielding, about 1 hour at 180.

Fry 2 red onions sprinkled with salt, after 10 mins (ish) add 2 red chillies and sliced garlic

 then add the anchovies (you won't be able to taste them but the flavour of the sauce is vastly improved by their inclusion).

In a separate dry pan toast the cumin seeds and coriander, then grind.

Add the spices to the onion mix.

 

When the aubergines are ready, peel pack the top layer of skin and discard, then carefully scoop out the flesh (trying not to pierce the skin)

The flesh will look alarmingly like squid innards, ignore this and add to the pan with onions and spices (chopping a bit if necessary).

Cook for a few minutes, then add 1 can of chopped plum tomatoes, fill the can  with water and chicken stock and add to the mix (plus another 1/2 can of water and stock) with some black pepper. Bring to boil then simmer. Check seasoning.

It was at this point I realised that a meaty texture was required, and fried off some minced beef and added to the pan. Check seasoning.

 When suitably reduced, fill the aubergines and bake in the oven for 10 minutes or so, with some goats cheese (or preferably feta) crumbled on top.

Serve with rice and yogurt, and a watercress salad.

Afterthought: Sprinkle aubergines with parsley before serving.

Belated Christmas Cookies.

Sometimes I feel like eating things at unusual times of year. Soup in summer, salads in winter and so on. So it was no surprise that as the sun came out and the weather people declared record temperatures for this time of year, I fancied Nigella's cranberry and white chocolate cookies. I had intended to make these over Christmas (an annual tradition) but I never got around to it.

Ingredients (Makes 30 according to Nigella, I made 17, must have been fatties),

150g Plain Flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
75g rolled oats
125g soft butter
75g dark brown sugar
100g caster sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla extract
75g dried cranberries
50g peacans
150g white chocolate chips (I used around half of this due to insufficient chocs at home)

Preheat oven to 180 (gas mark 4). Measure flour, baking powder, salt and rolled oats into a bowl. Then mix butter and sugars until creamy, and add egg and vanilla.

Beat in the flour, baking powder, salt and oat mixture, then fold in the cranberries, chopped peacans and chocolate chips.

Roll into balls and put them on a lined baking sheet. Squish down with a fork...

..until they look a bit like this. Cook for 15 mins, leave to cool on the baking tray for a bit then transfer to a wire rack to cool.

They will be very soft when they come out, but resist the temptation to put them back in the oven. They will firm up. Mine came out a bit flatter than the photo in the book, but they still had that all-important soft gooeyness that is essential to a good cookie.

The mixture was enough for 2 batches, and my second lot weren't spaced out enough hence these conjoined cookies. Made no difference to the taste though and I still gobbled them up. Yum.

Veal and mash.

Hungry and in the mood to cook, I found some veal fillets in the fridge but couldn't decide what to do with them. As usual when in doubt, I turned to Google. I came accross a recipe by Michael Caines (http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/panfriedvealfilletwi_88996) and inspired by his recipe I made this dish.

Ingredients:

Mashed potato

Potato
Milk
Butter
Garlic

Sauce:

5 shallots
few sprigs of thyme
110g Button mushrooms, sliced.
100ml Pedro Ximenez
100ml chicken stock
100ml double cream
butter

Veal:

2 Veal fillets
Thyme, few sprigs
Garlic, 3 cloves.
Shiitake mushrooms
Lemon juice

To make the sauce soften 5 chopped shallots in butter. Add thyme and button mushrooms, cook until mushrooms are golden. Add Pedro Ximenez, reduce by half. Add chicken stock, reduce by half.

 Add double cream, reduce by half. Sieve. Season. Whisk in a few knobs of butter. Keep warm.

I absolutely loved the flavour of this sauce, but next time I will double the recipe because once I had sieved it there was a disappointingly small amount.

Next the mash. Made in the usual way, but using my favourite kitchen gadget.

Behold my Williams Sonoma potato ricer! I don't know how I lived without it, I now have smooth lump-free mash every time.

I roasted 3 cloves of garlic (on some salt wrapped in tin foil at 180) until golden and mashed into a puree with the back of a knife. Stir into the potato with the milk and butter. Season

Melt some butter in a pan, add a few sprigs of thyme, 3 cloves of garlic (squished with back of knife, skin on), and the veal (seasoned on both sides). Cook on a medium heat for 3 minutes each side. Remove veal, cover with foil and leave to rest.

Add shiitake mushrooms to the same pan, cook for 3-4 mins. Season and squeeze of lemon.

Stir the veal juices from the resting plate into the sauce, and serve with wilted greens.

Delicious. I will definitely be making this one again.


Afterthought: Could have done with more sauce.

Takeaway Heaven.

I am a fussy eater, and there's nothing I can do about it. I would love to be able to eat my way through all the various offerings in my environs, but on the whole I find myself dissatisfied and wishing I hadn't eaten at all. Too salty, greasy, soggy, bland, unidentifiable, overcooked, raw, of dubious origin...are among my most common complaints. I often feel that even someone prone to culinary ineptitude such as myself,  could have done a better job. Not so with Izgara, an unassuming Turkish Ocakbasi restaurant in North London.

This place does what it does amazingly well (photos do not do it justice), and when I find something I like, I stick with it. Religiously. This is why I always order the same thing- lamb shish (large). Generous cubes of lamb, perfectly cooked, marinated in who knows what, that makes it so delicious its ridiculous.

I get everything separately so I can put it together just so. First, I spread a generous layer of hoummus onto the flatbread. Next a layer of shredded carrot and red cabbage, and on top the meat. By this time there is at least a tablespoon of meat juices in the container, which I pour on top. Finally a generous squeeze of lemon, roll up, and eat (with green chillies on the side).

I had intended to take a photo of it all put together, but greed got the better of me and I ate it.  Can only be a good sign.



Izgara, 11 Hendon Lane, N3 1RT.

£-  Just over £20.00 for 3. Bargain.

Spiced Yellow Split Pea Soup

When my house feels like an igloo,  there's nothing better than a steaming bowl of thick, hearty soup to keep the cold at bay. Today is one of those days.  This is originally a Mark Hix recipe, but I have fiddled with it a bit, natch.

Ingredients:

500g yellow split peas (soaked overnight if poss.)
2 large onions
2 sticks of celery
1 large leek
large chunk of ginger, chopped (hate the watery slosh when you grate it)
2-3 red bird's eye chillies (careful!)
3/4 tsp dried chilli flakes
2 tablespoons cumin seeds
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cumin
2 cloves of garlic, grated
3 litres chicken stock
lemon juice
yogurt.

                                      Chop onion, leek, celery, ginger, chilli and grate garlic

Fry onion in olive oil and a little salt, 5-7 mins

                      Add leeks, celery, garlic, ginger, cumin, chillies, chilli flakes, cook for 5-7 mins

Add yellow split peas and chicken stock, bring to boil, simmer for 1 1/2 hours or until split peas are soft, skim any scum that forms on top

Blitz & Season. The soup at this stage is not super smooth, but I like finding a rogue piece of ginger to chew on and don't mind a few lumps. For a smoother result, pass through a sieve.

Serve with a dollop of yogurt in the middle (you WILL need it, this is seriously spicy), and a generous spritz of lemon.

NB If the consistency is too thick, thin with stock.

Afterthought: Needed a bit more ginger.

Feedback: The general consensus on this soup is that it does need to be passed through a sieve to make it smoother and less grainy.

Guacamole

I love Guacamole. Seriously. But I have yet to find one in a restaurant that I actually like. I find hunks of red onion and seedy tomato deeply off-putting, and so have devised my own (Mexicans please look away now)- here it is:

                            Add about this much garlic to the juice of around one and a half limes.            

         Add 2-3 chopped ripe avocados (my 'perfectly ripe' avocados were anything but).Mash up a bit.

Add 1-2 chillies...  

                                                  and chopped coriander stalk and root.

                                          Next, olive oil, salt, and more lime to taste.
                                          Stir in chopped coriander leaves.

Thats it, and although slightly chunkier than is ideal due to rock hard avocados, it was still pretty damn good.