Gazpacho revisited August 16, 2016

Six and a half years ago, I posted this recipe for gazpacho. I have since made gazpacho on many occasions, until revising it to become the following. You will need:

• Four 400 gram tins of peeled, whole plum tomatoes
• One cucumber
• Two pieces of roasted bell pepper in oil and vinegar
• Garlic
• Salt
• Olive oil

Cut the cucumber in chunks and add to a blender with garlic (as much as you’d like, but keep in mind that the soup is meant to be left overnight, and that a little, in this case, goes a very long way indeed), a couple of pinches of salt, and a generous glug or three of olive oil. Blend until chopped fairly finely. Add the bell pepper and tomatoes, and blend until you achieve a consistent chop.

Unless you have a very big blender indeed, you will probably need to blend in batches to get everything done; it took me two batches. Once everything is blended, mix well in a bowl. Cover, and leave in a fridge to cool (at least two hours, preferably overnight).

Serve it up with ice cubes to keep it cold, and with various garnishes (diced cucumber, croutons, red pepper, red onion, and corn kernels come to mind, and I enjoy bread and olive oil with it, too).

Coconut and red curry paste pasta August 1, 2016

Of late, I’ve been experimenting with curry paste and coconut milk. The following recipe is an example of what comes out of said experimentation. It feeds two adults, a four-year-old, and a one-year-old very well. You will need:

• Red curry paste (I use about a teaspoon; use more if you want more heat)
• Garlic (I use two large cloves)
• Ginger (I use two teaspoons worth of grated ginger)
• Soy sauce
• One tin (400 ml) of coconut milk
• Two handfuls of button mushroom
• One sweet pepper (I use the pointy one, but bell pepper works fine, too)
• 0.3 liters of rice
• 250 grams of salmon
• Cooking oil
• Salt

Wash the rice to get rid of the surface starch. Add to a pot, and add two parts boiling water to one part rice, as well as a pinch of salt. Simmer until tender.

Add oil, curry paste, ginger, ground garlic, and a pinch of salt to the pan, and cook it off for a little bit, to bring out the flavors. While this is heating, roughly cut the mushrooms into slices, and add to the pan. Stir to coat with the curry, before adding the coconut milk, and a couple of dashes of soy sauce. Bring to a simmer, and simmer for ten minutes. While simmering, cut the pepper in two, then slice into sticks. Five minutes in, add the pepper. Dice the salmon.

Add the rice to the pan, simmer for a minute or two, and serve.

This is the basic recipe, which can be varied nearly ad infinitum. Want more spice? Add more curry. Want it to be vegan? Drop the salmon. I’m sure some coriander would be nice, too, and I think it would work well with pasta, too.

Refreshing drinks for summer June 29, 2015

Summertime is a time for sitting outside in the sun, enjoying some cold drinks. Here are three of my favorites:

Cold brew coffee:

Take one part coffee to ten parts water (by weight), grind the coffee like you would for a french press. Mix the water and coffee well in a carafe, and set in the refrigerator for ten to eighteen hours. Remove the grounds with a fine mesh sieve, filtering through paper if you so desire. Taste, and dilute with water as needed. Reserve in a cold place until ready to serve.

Cold brew tea:

Take twenty five grams of tea to one liter of water. Mix, and leave in the refrigerator to steep (steeping time will depend on the tea you choose; start out with an hour, and work from there). Remove the grounds, then taste and dilute as needed. Reserve in a cold place until ready to serve; serve with slices of lemon or lime.

Chef John’s Watermelon Aqua fresca:

Remove the rind from a half watermelon, placing the flesh into a blender. Add half a liter of water, and blend until liquefied. Strain out the pulp, and reserve in a cold place until ready to serve. I also recommend adding a very small amount of simple syrup, which really brings the flavor together.

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For all of these, I like to serve with a bottle of simple syrup, to allow the guests to sweeten their drinks to taste. Enjoy, keep cool and hydrated, and have a great summer!

Simple syrup

Simple syrup is very, very easy to make; as indicated by the name. Here’s how you make it:

Take equal parts (by volume) of sugar and water; mix in a saucepan, and heat until the sugar is dissolved. Let cool, and transfer to a squeezy bottle, then reserve it in the fridge until needed.

Cauliflower, broccoli and mustard soup March 8, 2015

I love soup, in all its incarnation. From heating broths to chilling iced soups, from light consommes to heavy chowders, I love them all. Here’s a recipe I happened upon one day when I didn’t want to make something out of a bag. You’ll need:

• A cook top
• A pot
• A blender (I used carafe, but stick should do the trick, too)
• 500 grams of frozen cauliflower and broccoli
• 50 grams of salted butter
• 3 deciliters of milk (I used low-fat)
• Three generously heaped teaspoons of strong, sour wholegrain mustard
• Water
• Salt

Bring salted water to the boil, add the vegetables, bring back to the boil and turn off the heat. Drain after five to ten minutes, making sure to reserve at least three deciliters. In the carafe, combine the butter, vegetables and a little of the cooking liquid (about half a deciliter), and run the blender until everything is combined. Add the milk and mustard, and blend to combine. Thin it out with the remaining cooking liquid as desired. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Alone, this serves two hungry adults. I like to serve it with a little chili-infused olive oil – lovely!

Hot pasta salad October 1, 2014

This is another one of those dishes that you just stumble upon. It takes the concept of iffits, and takes it to a new level of delicious. It’s a quick pasta salad that cooks in about the time it will take you to boil the water and pasta. It works equally well with filled pastas (such as tortellini, cappeletti or ravioli) or non-filled pastas (such as penne, tagliatelle or farfalle). For two people, you will need:

• 1/2 red onion
• 100 grams of feta-like cheese
• 25 grams of butter
• 250 grams of pasta
• One bag of mixed baby leaf lettuce

Put well-salted butter to the boil. Cut the onion in small pieces, and sautee in butter. Dice the cheese, and add about half to the onion and butter. Once the pasta has boiled, add it to the pan with the onion, butter and cheese. Top with the lettuce, and leave until the lettuce has wilted. Add to a bowl, mix well with the remainder of the cheese. Divide onto plates, and top with olive oil.

Parmesan and pepper sauce September 16, 2014

This is a very simple and tasty pasta sauce, which delivers on taste and comfort. It assembles in the time it takes to get the water boiling and pasta cooked. This recipe coats five hundred grams of cooked pasta. You will need:

• 2 eggs
• Olive oil
• Pepper
• Salt
• Parmesan

Beat the eggs and olive oil together, adding pepper and salt to taste. Be quite liberal with the oil. Add in parmesan until the sauce base goes gloopy. Once the pasta is cooked, drain it, and pour onto the sauce, mixing well. Use the pastawater to loosen the sauce until you get to where you want.

Serve with a light salad.

Onion and mushroom sauce September 8, 2014

This sauce is a typical “ifits”-sauce, meaning “If it’s in the cupboard/fridge, it will be eaten”. You will need:

• One red onion
• 125 grams of champignon mushroom
• 100 grams of butter
• 150 ml dry white wine
• A handful of grated parmesan
• Vinegar
• Milk

Roughly chop the mushroom, and sweat with a bit of salt and olive oil. Remove from the pan. Slice the onion, and sweat in olive oil with a bit of salt. Remove from the pan. Deglaze the pan, and boil the wine down to 1/3rd of the original amount. Add in the butter, parmesan, mushroom and onions. Stir to combine. Season to taste with salt and pepper, adjust the acidity with white wine vinegar and milk.

Goes well with most types of pasta.

Broccoli and cauliflower mash

I love mashed vegetables. They simply taste great, and go well with many things. In this day and age of low-carb fads, I decided to experiment with broccoli and cauliflower, both of which have significantly less carbs than potatoes. Still, it needs to be delicious, and work with many different dishes. The base recipe goes as follows:

• One 500-gram bag of frozen broccoli and cauliflower
• 150 grams of frozen peas
• 1 tsp. powdered vegetable soup
• 50 grams of butter

Bring salted water to the boil, and dump in the broccoli and cauliflower. Keep on high heat for ten minutes. After nine minutes, add the peas. Drain. Using the same pot, melt the butter, and incorporate the powdered vegetable soup. Add in the vegetables, and blitz using a stick blender until you achieve the consistency you want, adding water and/or milk as needed.

Things that go well in this:

• Cashew nuts
• Pine nuts
• Feta cheese

The mash goes well with oven-baked salmon fillets, as a dip or a spread, and can be served cold or hot, as you like.

Summer vegetables with herb butter July 24, 2013

One of my favourite things to do in the summer, is to take advantage of the absolutely amazing produce we get, and serve lightly cooked summer vegetables with a nice yummy butter. It’s super quick to make, and tastes great. Plus, it’s vegetables, so if you overeat, you’ll not get to regret it for too long. This recipe feeds two:

Vegetables:

• 1 bunch of asparagus
• 1 large broccoli
• 1 large cauliflower
• 1 vegetable stock cube

Herb butter:

• 100 grams salted butter
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 1 bunch of parsley
• Salt
• Olive oil to taste

Crush the garlic in a garlic crusher, and finely chop the parsley. Mix the herbs and butter, and add salt to taste. Add olive oil to get a smoother, more spreadable, consistency. Chop the ends off the asparagus. Cut the broccoli and cauliflower into bouquets. Bring a large pot of water to the boil, then add salt and the stock cube. Turn off the heat, and put the vegetables in. Leave them to steep for five to ten minutes. Drain the vegetables and add to a mixing bowl with about a third of the herb butter mixture. Plate up, and place the butter in little dishes on the plate beside the vegetables. Finish off with a sprinkle of finely chopped parsley, grated parmesan and olive oil.