Review of 2011

So, it’s been a good year.   Although I began this blog at the beginning of 2010, I wrote very few posts and only began blogging regularly towards the end of that year.  Looking at the stats I can see that I’ve had almost 15 times as many visits this year, as last year, and this month has been the busiest yet.   There have been a few blogging ups and downs during the year though. During the first three months of my pregnancy I couldn’t face cooking, reading or writing about food and missed not being able to keep up with it.   Since I’ve been feeling better, I’ve still been feeling very tired and so haven’t managed to cook new things or post as often as I’d like.     Looking ahead to 2012, I’d love to get round to making all the recipes I bookmark, continue to create my own inventive ones and manage to blog more regularly throughout the whole year.   Unfortunately I already know that little baby B’s appearance will make that rather a challenge.

One thing I did at the end of last year, was make a list of all the dishes I wanted to make this year.   I’ve made some, and they were well worth it, especially the beef wellington, which was possibly my favourite dish of the year.   Others, such as lasagna, have yet to be made but I still fully intend to make it.

Back in Spring, while watching my favourite cooking programme, Masterchef, I began a series of posts called Inspired by Masterchef.   Perhaps not surprisingly, many of these posts turned out to be the most popular posts of the year.

Anyway, counting down from 10 to 1, the most popular posts of 2011 on Searching for Spice were:

10. Greek Lemon Chicken

9. Inspired by Masterchef: Vanilla Panna Cotta with Mixed Berry Sauce

8. Inspired by Masterchef: Nasi Goreng

7. Inspired by Masterchef: Pear Tarte Tatin and mackerel Wrapped in Bread

6. Stuffed Jacket Potato Skins

5. Slow Cooker Chicken Tagine

4. Sausage Rolls

3. Inspired by Masterchef: Chilli and Black Pepper Tofu

2. Creamy Chorizo Pasta

1. Inspired by Masterchef: Gnocchi with Chorizo and Garlic

Judging by the top 2, chorizo is clearly one of the most popular ingredients on my blog!   If only pregnant women weren’t banned from eating it!  Anyway,  I’m proud to see all these dishes in my top 10 and look forward to seeing what turns out to be popular next year.

It’s now time to look forward to 2012.   I don’t want to set myself too many targets this year – just to keep on blogging, however busy I might get, and to finally make a lasagna!

 

Spaghetti Carbonara and Review of Dreamfields Pasta

When I was a student in Durham we never used to eat out in restaurants except on someone’s birthday.  And then, it was always an Italian restaurant.   At the time, I hadn’t got into spicy food.   I was wary of chilli and so scared of Indian food, I thought I didn’t like Chinese food much as I didn’t like sweet and sour or lemon chicken, which everyone else seemed to love.   It may sound hard to believe, considering what I now like to eat, but I grew up in the middle of the countryside, 8 miles from the nearest town (of about 10,000 people), which had no Indian restaurants and only one Chinese one which I went to for the first time when I was 17.   My mother was (and is) a very good cook and made healthy but traditional dishes – pies, quiches, casseroles with potatoes and vegetables or salad.   A lasagna or moussaka was about as exotic as it got!  The nearest dish to curry was coronation chicken.  Really, when I look back at what I used to eat and what I used to avoid, I can hardly believe I was the same person.

Once I got to university, I think a lot of my university friends were the same with the result being that spaghetti carbonara is a dish that reminds me of my pre-spice days, as it was the dish I always used to order.   I loved the creaminess and the bacon and the fact that it was not something I would make for myself.  Not at that time anyway.  How things have changed!

So, why did I suddenly decide to step back in time and make a carbonara, perhaps ten years since I’d last had one?   Well, I recently received some spaghetti, penne and rotini pasta from Dreamfields to review.   And what better recipe to make with the spaghetti than carbonara.   Now, I’m not an expert on nutrition, but Dreamfields pasta claims to be different from other pastas in that it has only 5g of digestible carbohydrates, a 65% lower glycemic index and twice as much fibre as regular pasta and therefore could be good for people wanting a healthier pasta or those on a lower carb diet.  The Dreamfields website gives a lot more information about the nutritional content because here I have to be honest and say that as a runner, as well as a food blogger, carbs don’t bother me.   But, I do try to eat healthily and like to include foods with a low glycemic index and lots of fibre.  To me, what’s most important is the taste, the texture and does it fill me up.   And on these criteria I was very happy.    When cooked it didn’t go at all soggy like some pastas, it was nicely al dente and held the sauce well.

And it was definitely a good sauce.  It may look like a rich sauce full of cream, but, like a true Italian carbonara, it is cream-free.   The creaminess of the sauce comes entirely from the egg, parmesan and cooking water.    When you add the egg mixture, take the pan off the heat and stir quickly so you get  a silky smooth sauce, not a scrambled egg mixture. I ended up thinking, if carbonara is this easy, why does anyone ever buy a jar of sauce.   And why have I practically given up ever eating it?  Well, as it’s so simple, I still won’t be eating it in restaurants, but I might now be making it at home instead.

For more information about Dreamfields, take a look at their website.

I am also linking this to Presto Pasta Nights, this week hosted by Debbie Does Dinner Healthy.

Ingredients – Serves 2

120g spaghetti

2 eggs

4 rashers bacon

Black pepper

2 handfuls grated parmesan

1 clove garlic, chopped

Olive oil

How to Make Spaghetti Carbonara

1. Put the bacon in a frying pan to cook.   When ready remove.   Leave to cool and then chop.

2. Put the pasta on to cook according to the pack instructions.   It’ll probably take about 10 minutes.

3. Put the eggs in a bowl and beat them.   Season and add the grated parmesan.

4. Drain the pasta but reserve the water.

5. Heat a little olive oil in a frying pan or wok.   Add the garlic.   As it begins to colour add the pasta.    Toss.

6. Add a little of the reserved pasta cooking water.  Take off the heat.  Add the egg and parmesan mixture.   Keep stirring.   Add extra cooking water if it is too dry.   You should get a smooth creamy sauce.

 

Cheese and Mushroom Pasties and The Cookery School at Little Portland Street

I was very lucky last weekend.    I got to spend almost five hours cooking and eating.    Heaven.   Absolute heaven.   I realise that may not be everyone’s idea of the perfect Saturday, the cooking part at least, but for me it most definitely is.

For the last few years I have done at least one cookery class a year as I get my gorgeous husband to buy me a class for my birthday or Christmas.   It always makes me very happy and I come  home full of new ideas and things to make.    Although my husband’s workmates joke that he should get me an ironing course next, I remain a domestic goddess only as far as cooking goes, and I’m sure Nigella would agree that that’s the way it should be.

Anyway, this year’s class was at the Cookery School at Little Portland Street.     There were just 7 of us in the class and we were divided into three groups which meant it was nice and small and everyone had lots of opportunity to be fully involved in the cooking.    Altogether we made about 14 dishes, with each group making about 5 each.   We kept stopping to see what the other groups were doing so that we would be able to make all the dishes ourselves later.    The title of the class was outdoor eating and included dishes such as:

Spinach, rice and herb flan

Homemade mayonnaise and coleslaw

Asparagus and pea salad

Pasta pesto salad

Grilled prawns

Terrine

Spatchcocked grilled poussin

Potato, cheese and herb pasties

Granary Bread

Shortbread

Lemon cake

Chocolate Brownies

I took lots of photos and they can be seen at the bottom of this post.     I especially liked the pasties and the spatchcocked poussin but everything was good.   I was also impressed by how easy it was to make the terrine, something I’d never considered making before.   By the time I left at about 2:45 I was so full I could hardly move.    In fact, I had eaten so much that I couldn’t eat anything when I was out with friends in the evening and the only food I ate for the rest of the day was a slice of toast before going to bed at about midnight.

So would I do another course at Little Portland Street?  Definitely, but probably a more advanced one.    Although I love doing cookery classes and courses, I feel I’ve reached the stage where I need a more advanced class.   As I said above, the class was fantastic and I’d thoroughly recommend it, especially for relatively inexperienced cooks.  Also, because of the amount of dishes made in relation to the time spent in the class,  I feel that this course compares well to other similar courses.

There was one thing I didn’t do quite as well as I wanted on the course.   It’s a long time since I’ve made proper pastry and mine was a little too crumbly and dry when making the pasties.   As a result, ever since last Saturday I’ve been wanting to make pastry again, and to make pasties, which I just love.   However, I didn’t want to make exactly the same ones, so I’ve fiddled with the recipe and adapted it almost completely and ended up with the cheese and mushroom pasties you see below.

Ingredients – Makes 4

220g flour

100g butter or margarine

Iced water

Salt

150g mushrooms

1 onion

100g raw potato, cubed

60g cheese, grated

Egg yolk (optional)

How to make Cheese and Mushroom Pasties

1. Add a pinch of salt to the flour.    Mix the butter into the flour with your fingertips until it is like breadcrumbs.

2. Add a small dash of iced water.   Bring the mixture together with your fingers so that it forms a ball.

3. Put it in the fridge for at least half an hour.

4. Fry the onions in a saucepan until soft.    Add the mushrooms.    Cook until the mushrooms have reduced in size and any liquid released by the mushrooms has evaporated.    Leave to cool.

5. Mix together the potato, mushrooms and onions and cheese.   Season.

6. Roll the pastry until about 1/2 cm thick.    Put a small plate or saucer onto the pastry and cut around it with a knife.

7. Put a spoonful of the filling  into the middle of the pastry circle and bring the opposite sides together.   Pinch both sides of the pastry together so it forms a small parcel with no gaps.

8. I forgot this stage, but ideally brush a little egg yolk onto the pasty so it turns golden as it cooks.

9. Bake in the oven at about 190 for 40 minutes.

 

Carob and Chocolate Cake

I have decided that there is nothing I like better than recreating a favourite dish after a holiday. And when that dish is as interesting as this cake then so much the better.

I left Croatia a couple of weeks ago, having made a new discovery.    That discovery was carob.   It wasn’t a completely new discovery.   When I was in my early teens, my sister made something with carob in.  I say something as I have completely forgotten what it was.   It could have been a cake, biscuits, whatever, but it’s not important.   I asked what carob was and was told it was a substitute for chocolate.    Of course,   I was imagining some sort of delicious chocolatey dessert and when I tasted it, and it clearly wasn’t chocolate, I was very disappointed, as would any adolescent be.   I decided carob was not for me, and I would probably not have tried it again except for that fact that in a lovely Italian restaurant in a suburb of Dubrovnik, I fancied homemade cake for dessert.    There were only two types of homemade cakes.   As I peered into the glass cabinet trying to work out which to choose, I asked the waiter what the delicious looking chocolate coloured one was.   He didn’t know the word for carob in English, but it sounded a bit similar.    He showed me a dried pod and told me it grew in Croatia.   He had me hooked.   A local ingredient, something different.   Maybe it was time to try carob again.   After all, it looked so good.

When it came, I wasn’t expecting a chocolate cake, and so I wasn’t disappointed.   I tasted it to see if I liked it, trying to work out what it tasted of, but I couldn’t really say it tasted like anything else I knew, but it did taste really good.   I loved it, but apart from the carob, I couldn’t quite work out what it had in it.

That first night was near the beginning of our holiday, and I kept thinking back to that cake.  We ate in lots of places, in the old town of Dubrovnik and near our hotel, but I didn’t have another dessert I liked quite as much, and I was still mulling over what the ingredients were in that carob cake.   We decided to go back.   Once again we had a lovely meal, with a lovely relaxed atmosphere and at the end of the meal I finished with the carob cake.    Just as good as I remembered.   But I still couldn’t quite work out what it had in it.

A few days passed, we went home, I looked for carob cake on the internet, but all the cakes seemed to use carob as a substitute for chocolate.   I wanted a recipe for a cake that would celebrate carob as an ingredient in its own right.   Also, none of the recipes I found sounded quite right.   And so, having kept the card, I emailed the restaurant, not even knowing if I would get a response.   Then, about 24 hours later, I got a reply.   Srdan had very kindly taken the trouble not only to reply but also to translate the basics of the recipe into English.   I danced around the living room!

I was a little bit unsure of what was meant by some of the ingredients, but I experimented and followed the basic method.   The cake I ended up with didn’t taste exactly the same as in the restaurant, but it was similar.  It still had that carob flavour, distinct from chocolate.   The texture was also different.   Mine was crumblier, not as solid as the restaurant one and the bits of apple were jucier.   I also didn’t have any rum so I decided to substitute it with sloe gin.  I thought it would go well with the fruitiness of the apple and currants, although my cake guinea pigs said they would like to have it with rum next time.   One of my cake guinea pigs thought the apple needed to be cooked more before going in the cake but the other cake guinea pigs liked the little cubes of juicy apple.   Overall, there is room for some more experimenting with this cake before I declare it an absolutely final recipe – I would quite happily make it and eat it again as it is but I think I’ll experiment with preparing the apple in different ways.   There was also one ingredient that  stumped me – flavour.   Was it a misspelling of flour?  Or was it something else?   I could have asked, but I was enjoying the experimental nature of the whole challenge – so I decided to use ground almonds.    After all, why not?

If you ever get the chance to go to Dubrovnik, and if your hotel is in Lapad,  I would strongly recommend the Konoba Atlantic.   There are a lot of hotels in Lapad and a lot of restaurants, many of them on the main pedestrianised road leading to Lapad beach, but this restaurant was a clear step above these.   It was on a very quiet residential road, running parallel but behind the main road.   Unless you knew it was there, you wouldn’t just wander across it, and because of that the quality and service were of a much higher standard and meant we had a much more enjoyable meal out.   Delicious bruschetta, homemade pasta, and of course for me, the star of the meal, the carob cake.

Konoba Atlantic can be found on Kardinala Stepinca 42, Dubrovnik

www.konobatlantic.com

I am submitting this to Sweets for a Saurday at Sweet as Sugar Cookies and Cupcake Apothecary for a Themed Bakers Sunday

Ingredients

4 apples, peeled and diced into tiny cubes, about 2mm

4 eggs

30g  currants

100 ml rum, alternative alcohol or fruit juice

100g caster sugar

100g carob powder

100ml oil

60g ground almonds or 100g flour ( as in the real recipe)

50ml milk

120g dark chocolate

How to make Chocolate and Carob Cake

1. Put the currants in a bowl and pour the alcohol on top and leave to stand.

2. Put the egg whites in a bowl and whisk till they turn white and begin to form soft peaks.

3. Gradually whist in the sugar, egg yolk, ground almond, oil, milk and carob powder.

4. Mix the apple, currants and alcohol together.   Then mix the fruit mixture into the other bowl.

5. Grease the bottom and sides of a springform tin and then add the cake mixture.   Bake in the oven at about 180C for 40-45 minutes.   Check it is ready with a skewer or cocktail stick.

6. When the cake has cooled, melt the chocolate and spread on the top of the cake.

Update: Srdan has since got back to me and the mystery ingredient, flavor, was actually a typing error for flour.  Next time I’ll try it that way and let you know how it turns out.   I imagine it will be less crumbly and with a more similar texture to in the restaurant, but the taste should be almost the same.

 

Review of Bipin’s Curry Paste

I love receiving packages through the post, especially edible packages. And you know how much I love curry – homemade, takeaway, restaurant,  just any curry.  So earlier this week I was especially excited to receive a sample of Bipin’s Methi Masala Curry Paste.    I’d made my own curry from scratch just a few days earlier but I was more than happy to make another one when I got this.   Some curry pastes and sauces are so processed that you can’t tell what they’re made of, but in this paste you can see the individual herbs, spices and bitty bits, and that’s one thing that impressed me. You can probably see in the photo below as I marinated the chicken in it

The paste came with clear recipe instructions which were very easy to follow.  Basically the masala is mixed with the meat then cooked on the hob or in the oven.   Cream, yohurt or coconut milk can then be mixed in for a more saucy curry.   I added yohurt to mine.   I also added some extra vegetables – green peppers and mushrooms.

So, would I use them again?   Yes, happily.   I really liked the flavours, although I enjoy making my own pastes and so would normally prefer to make it myself.   My husband also said he prefers my curries.   Well, he may have been in trouble if he hadn’t said that!   I feel these pastes are  perfect for someone who wants an authentic but healthy curry but who doesn’t want to go to all the trouble of preparing the paste themselves.   This might not be typical me, but it is lots of people.

The masalas can be bought online at Bipin’s site.   There are 6 different varieties and each one can serve up to four people.   They use fresh ingredients with no additives, preservatives, colourings or flavourings and so are pretty healthy too.   Something a takeway often isn’t.

And finally,  I do like to make things myself so I couldn’t resist making some naan breads to mop up the curry.   I feel the recipe/my technique still needs perfecting though so I won’t post the recipe today.   The flavour was great though and I will be making them again soon.

 

Piri Piri Chicken

Today I set myself a challenge: To make a meal from Jamie Oliver’s 30 Minute Meals.  Some of the menus have no dessert, some an uncooked dessert and some a dessert that you need to actually cook.   Of course, if I’d chosen the easiest menu this would not have been such a challenge.   To really test Jamie’s book I felt I should choose a menu that looked like it would be challenging in the given time.   Now, I may not be the best or most efficient cook, but I do consider myself to be keen and with a certain amount of experience.   If I struggle then surely a less experienced cook would also struggle.   Now, I don’t have any data to back up this speculation at all but I would imagine that a lot of inexperienced cooks will tend to get or be given this book, partly because Jamie is so well-known but also because of the 30 minute claim people will think the recipes are quick, and quick is what people are looking for these days.

Jamie explains his concept at the beginning of the book.   If we just learn to be more organised and work on more than one dish at a time, we will be able to cook more efficiently.   He explains it as revolutionary, but isn’t this what many people already do?   I agree that it is useful to have detailed instructions and this will help many people but at the same time it does mean that there is a lot of reading to do while you are cooking.   The first time you make a menu I think you can forget about doing it in 30 minutes,  the next time, you can aim to be a bit closer to that.

Before beginning Jamie instructs us to get out all our ingredients.   In a tiny kitchen, this is difficult so I had to put some things on the floor.    In fact throughout the exercise I felt I needed much more work surface.   I worked as quickly as I could, switching between preparing different dishes.   I felt like a whirling kitchen dervish.    Normally I’m calm and relaxed in the kitchen but this challenge brought out a slightly stressed side.   My husband tried to have conversation with me (I have no idea what it was about) but decided it was best to wait until later, rather like how I feel when he’s watching football.

So, what was I making: piri piri chicken, dressed potatoes, rocket salad and quick (yeah right) Portuguese tarts.  Well, actually they would be quick if you weren’t trying to do a million other things at once.   As I result, I put all the sugar in the custard mixture rather than saving most for the caramel.   They were still good though.    A bit sweet, but nice.  That’ll teach me that  I need to read all the instructions rather than just look at the list of ingredients.

Anyway, despite the unrealistic timings, this menu was good and I would make it again.   Next time though, I wouldn’t aim to make everything in half an hour.   I wouldn’t follow the order given in the book.  Sorry Jamie.  I would make the piri piri sauce and the filling for the tarts first so I wouldn’t be rushing with too many things at the same time.    I would then have a bit more time to clear up during the cooking process so the kitchen wouldn’t look like such a bombsite afterwards.

Anyway, here’s the recipe for the piri piri chicken.

Ingredients

4 chicken breasts

1 yellow pepper, cut into chunky slices

1 red pepper, cut into chunky slices

Piri Piri Sauce Ingredients

1 red onion, diced

4 cloves garlic

2 small chillies

1 tbsp smoked sweet paprika

2 lemons

4 tbsp white wine vinegar

2 tbsp Worcestershire sauce

2 tsp dried  basil

1 tsp dried thyme

How to Make Piri Piri Chicken

1. Make a few slashes in the chicken breasts then cook on a griddle pan for about 5 minutes on each side.    After about 5 minutes, add the peppers.   Keep turning them.

2. Put all the  sauce ingredients in a food processor and blitz until smooth.    Add a little water if necessary.

3. Put a little of the sauce in the bottom of a roasting dish.   Put the peppers and chicken on top then pour the rest of the sauce over the top.  Cook in the oven at about 200c for about 15- 20 minutes