Tag: vegetarian

Crème renversée à l’orange

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Or, as it’s more popularly known, crème caramel, or flan in Spain. I am unreasonably picky about this ubiquitous dessert. Absolutely no bubbles allowed: it should be a perfectly smooth, only just set custard that wobbles when you turn it out. I’ve lost count of the number of times I have been disappointed in restaurants. Always, always bubbly round the edges, or worse. Yet it takes no more time, only attention, to achieve a perfect one. This Simon Hopkinson recipe is the acme of baked egg custard. It simply can’t be improved on. I hadn’t made it for ages, but today we had a surfeit of eggs. I’m so pleased I did. It turned out perfectly. My only regret: I halved the recipe to serve two, so there’s none left.

Note: I know, the photo is aesthetically lacking, but I wanted to show the texture. Even then, the photo can’t convey the velvety smoothness. Never mind!

It’s most impressive when made as a single large custard in a soufflé dish, very carefully turned out onto a large plate. But you can of course make smaller individual ones in ramekins. This recipe makes four or six servings, depending on how greedy you are. Allow plenty of time for it to cool. You can chill it, but it’s best to take it out of the fridge half an hour before you want to serve it. If the recipe looks long, it’s not because it’s complicated — it’s because you need attention to detail.
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Roast summer vegetables

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Roast vegetables
A recipe shamelessly pinched from Nigel Slater’s Observer column, because I want to make sure I always have it to hand. I suppose it’s a variation on escalivade really, but the carrots and spice make it quite different. I have changed it a little — Nigel said to put two tablespoons of harissa in it. I think harissa in the UK must be quite feeble. If I’d used that much of the ubiquitous Tunisian harissa in tubes that we get here, it would have blown our heads off. Naturally you can adjust the level to your taste and the strength of your harissa.

Make lots of this, as it’s ideal for keeping in the fridge and eating at room temperature when it’s so hot you don’t want to cook. A good party buffet dish too I should think.
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Watermelon gazpacho

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Watermelon gazpacho
Gazpacho is thought of as a chilled raw soup, always containing tomatoes, plus peppers, cucumber, olive oil, and vinegar. And possibly stale bread: there seem to be two schools of thought on this (I’ve always put bread in mine). But as Spanish cuisine has become more internationally famous, chefs have been creative in coming up with variations; I clearly remember being served a tomato and cherry gazpacho a decade ago. It really lends itself to experimentation, so I wasn’t surprised to stumble across a watermelon variation online. Rooting through the fridge today to find ways of using up some leftover watermelon, I found I had practically all the ingredients. The site I found it on has many other variations.

The recipe I found made a vast quantity. I like to serve gazpacho in shot glasses or small glass bowls as a starter or part of an apero spread. So my reduced quantity will serve about 4-6. If you really do want substantial bowlfuls, double it. It’s traditional to garnish gazpacho with tropezones, tiny dice of tomato, pepper, cucumber. I used what was available: feta and some charentais melon. Finally, with gazpacho always be bold with the seasoning. Remember chilling it affects how strong the seasoning tastes. It will also mellow with time, so check again before serving.
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Curried lentil and coconut soup

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Curried lentil and coconut soup

Another lentil soup! Similar ingredients to my previous post, but a quite different result. This one does work really well with red split lentils. I stumbled across it on the Food & Wine site, but amended it to suit my taste, since I found their version too bland and lacking spinach. The recipe makes a vast quantity, enough for at least six generous servings, so you can halve it if you want. As I was on my own, once it was cooked I ladled out enough for me into a smaller pan, and added spinach to that part. The rest will go in the freezer. It will certainly improve by being kept in the fridge until the next day.
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Moroccan spiced lentil soup

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Moroccan spiced lentil soup

A rather eccentric, messy image complete with splatters, taken immediately before we dived in to eat it! Known as “still life on the run” in our household.

I believe this soup originated in Delicious magazine. Since I discovered it via sister-in-law R, I’ve cooked it multiple times, improving it every time. It has become one of my favourite soups. Delicious, healthy, low-carb diet friendly, vegetarian — what more could you ask?

The first thing to note is that the original recipe specified red split lentils. R didn’t happen to have any when she made it, so she used Puy lentils. Good move — having tried both ways, the Puy lentil version is vastly superior. Other than that, don’t miss out any of the ingredients — they are all essential. That said, you can get away with tinned tomatoes, but fresh are better. I particularly like it with cherry tomatoes, cut in half.

The serving suggestions top the soup off to perfection, with the lemon juice adding extra zing. This amount will make about four servings, unless you are greedy like us.
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No-knead focaccia

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No-knead focaccia
I wanted to make some focaccia for an apéritif dinatoire the same day, and my sourdough starter was dozing in the fridge. What to do? A spot of research, and I found a no-knead recipe on the blog Un déjeuner de soleil — in French, but written by an Italian. It looked just the ticket — quick and easy, with little hands-on time. I was very impressed by the result too — crisp on the outside, with a chewy, open crumb. It went down very well.

So here’s my English version. Note, it makes a very large focaccia. You could easily halve the recipe if there are only a couple of you. I have about a third of it left over, so I’ve frozen it and we’ll see how well it survives reheating.
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Sourdough blini

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Sourdough bliniI came across this recipe via Google, and it’s such a quick and easy method of making blini, with good results, that I decided to record it. It doesn’t rely on the starter for rising, so you can use surplus starter straight from the fridge, or refreshed starter —- it doesn’t matter. The recipe makes a large quantity, but they keep well covered in the fridge for a couple of days, or you can freeze them. Reheat for 20 seconds or so in the microwave. As well as the obvious topping of smoked salmon and soft cheese, I like them with butter and honey, or maple syrup and cream.

Officially, blini are made using buckwheat flour (which is gluten-free), but if you don’t have any then wholemeal wheat flour is a fine substitute. And while they are quick and easy, try to plan ahead so you can keep the batter in the fridge overnight, or at least a few hours.
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Cheeseboard tart

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After inviting friends for dinner we often find ourselves with a large amount of surplus cheese. On this occasion I was home alone with not much in stock for dinner other than a couple of eggs and the deteriorating remains of a week-old cheeseboard. So it was a pleasure to stumble across Rosie Birkett’s recipe in the Guardian a couple of days ago for precisely this situation — I had all the ingredients on hand except for pickled onions. It was so good I’m recording my slightly adapted version here in case the online version disappears. Gorgeous bubbling, gooey cheese, with a crunch and a bit of acidity added by celery and cornichons. A salad would be good with it.

You can use any cheese you have, hard or soft. I had no soft cheeses, but I had a couple of stubs of Pyrenean tomme, some Morbier, and an unidentified but fairly mild blue cheese.
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Bosworth jumbles done wrong

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Bosworth jumbles
I was browsing through my Evernote notebook of clipped recipes looking for suitable cakes for my Christmas charity cake stall, and came across a very brief recipe for Bosworth jumbles. No idea where I got it from. It sounded very easy, and I had all the ingredients, so I went for it.

I baked them in mini muffin moulds and I think they will be perfect. Just the right size to go with a cup of espresso, and a lovely texture midway between cake and shortbread. Before I started this blog post I decided to google them, hoping to find the source. I found several recipes, but unlike the one I had (“whack the mixture into a muffin tray”), they all said to shape them into an S-shape, with one outlier going for a figure 8. You can read about their history here.

Anyway, I will stick with my mini muffins. They are so easy — just be careful not to overbake or they will be hard rather than slightly crumbly. You could drizzle icing over them if you like — a simple icing of lemon juice and icing sugar would be good, and will use some of the juice of the lemons you zested. Other flavours will work too — orange zest, or simply vanilla for example.
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Hazelnut pesto

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I can’t even remember the last time I made pesto — it must be decades ago. I do usually have a jar of commercial pesto in the fridge for perking up pasta dishes though. I was impelled to try by the massive bush of basil in the tub outside the door — I’ve never had such a flourishing plant, while everything else wilts in the heat.

I had some leftover roasted hazelnuts from a salad, so I used those instead of pine nuts. Excellent idea — the toasty flavour really came through. And fresh pesto is an eye-opener — so zingy and green. If you have a food processor, that’s the obvious tool — I didn’t replace mine when it broke, so I used the mini chopper to start with and finished off with a stick blender. I’m not hardcore enough to use a mortar and pestle.

This recipe makes a small jar — it will keep for about a week in the fridge covered with a slick of olive oil, but it’s best to use as soon as possible.
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