Quick, Easy, Cointreau Mincemeat

I bastardised several Googled recipes for this, looking to make some last minute mince pies and, possibly, a mincemeat & apple pie for Boxing Day. 

Ingredients

• 1 bag of Sainbury's Basics mixed fruit

• 1 tub chopped candied mixed peel
• 1tub glacé cherries, chopped 
• 2 small apples, cored and chopped small 
• Glug of rum 
• 150ml Cointreau 
• zest of 1 lemon, juice of same
• 200g shredded veggie suet
• 200g dark brown sugar
• ½ small nutmeg, grated, or to taste

Mix all the ingredients together in a large bowl apart from the Cointreau and the rum. Add about 100 ml of the Cointreau, give it a good stir and leave overnight. If you're in a hurry ignore the resting bit. 

In the morning heat in a pan on a low heat until the suet is melted, stirring hard and often. I used veggie suet as I have veggie guests coming for Xmas. 

Stir the mix often as it cools. When cooled add the rest of the Cointreau and the rum. Stir some more. Eat small spoonfuls to ensure no more alcohol is needed. 

Mmmmm...

Damn those Archers!

Yesterday I made a batch of mincemeat using Cointreau. This morning I find that Jennifer Aldridge, in the Archers, has done the same. So much for what I thought was a moment of mincemeat genius..,

Fresh Bread

Baking your own bread has a number of things going for it. Firstly, the taste is great - there's nothing like freshly baked bread. Secondly it's cheap. Artisan bread is rather expensive, although you can get decent bread from most supermarkets these days. Thirdly, though, it's great to have the oven on when it's so bloody cold!

This is  the result of a rather nice simple French bread recipe, which I'll post soon. 

Packed Lunch

I'm back working now, albeit part time, and getting back into the routine. This includes, of course, a working lunch. My new role is rather different to my last 'proper' job as a marketing director in the City, where lunching was a part of your working life. Indeed, I was known to certain colleagues as the 'luncheon director'. This is not to say that the quality of my lunches has declined. A great packed lunch should rival anything in respect of flavour if we put a little bit of love & effort into its creation. 

A lunch time staple is the sandwich, of course. We may have invented the sandwich, but we don't pay them sufficient respect in my view. The French and the Spanish do better in terms of quality of ingredients. The Catalan bocadillo chorizo, with its fresh bread rubbed with tomato springs to mind. The Americans, on the other hand, produce magnificent sandwiches, which often feature all the contents of a well stocked fridge. It is almost impossible to bite a New York deli sandwich with a dainty, European sized mouth. 

So back to today's lunch. Regular sliced white bread, I'm afraid, but with a magnificent filling. Tuna, anchovies, those little plum tomatoes, gherkin & beetroot. Flavour comes from white wine vinegar, smoked paprika and ground black pepper. No olive oil as the tuna came in sunflower oil and that does the trick. 

The problem is not eating them on the bus into work....

Not HP, Not Daddies, No Way, Never, No More

I have always been disposed to try the 'basic' ranges. I am generally skeptical that premium brands are any better, like for like, in most cases. I used to use the example of aspirin when giving presentations on the power of marketing (I've since discovered that John Hegarty uses the same case study) where the power of the brand means that people pay 5 or 6 times more for what is exactly the same active ingredient. Anadin's ad campaign, Nothing Acts Faster, was brilliant - nothings acts slower, either, of course.

Of course, this nonsense applies to food as well. The worst outcomes are with fresh veg, where we'll never have the pleasure of comically mis-shaped carrots in the supermarket because the buying public apparently won't buy anything that doesn't look like it's been preformed in a carrot factory. Muppets. We are wasting so much of the harvest due to this silliness. I can't fix that, but we can start moving away from ludicrously priced branded products to the cheaper versions.

On to brown sauce. Was it just me that felt that the recipes of HP and Daddies changed when they went to Holland or wherever it is that they're made now? More vinegary? I switched my allegiance away from them sometime ago - not due to financial constraints but to taste alone. I found that the Aldi brown sauce, Bramwell's, was just as good as the big brands. Recently, though, I've not been over to Aldi and have been experimenting with other, even cheaper sauces.

Top of the list is the Sainsbury's Basic - no longer in the glass bottle pictured as it's just been changed to a squeezy plastic bottle. It costs only 25p! That's 6p per 100g compared to about 40p for HP.

I like the taste, I have to say. It doesn't contain any E numbers and it's amber on the bizarre scale of badness for sugar and salt whereas most brown sauce is red. Perfect for the traditional Dunkley breakfast of sausages and tomatoes.

If this anoraky tale of bargain brown sauce leaves you wanting more, I found an almost perfect fan site out there, http://www.tablesauce.co.uk - who would have though that there'd be a site dedicated to the bottled elixir? Perplexing that they only have a brief mention of OK sauce (a past favourite - fruity brown sauce that is, apparently, still in production) and nothing at all on Ideal Sauce. Still work to do out there....

Piri Paprika Roast Pork

This is an easy way to get some real flavour out of a joint of pork. 

All you need is some piri piri mix and smoked paprika - both bought from the nut & spice stall in Coventry Market. 

I used a cast iron casserole pan, in which I heated some bacon fat. I cut the skin and fat off the pork, for crackling, and then put the pork into the hot fat. 

I sprinkled the spices generously over the pork, turned it and did the same to the underneath. All you need to do then is keep turning it in the fat so it's well coated in the flavours. Then pop it into a pre-heated oven. 

The crackling is also straightforward. Cut some deep grooves in the skin and coat with oil and salt. I also applied some piri piri and some smoked paprika. Put it on a grill and over the pork. Cook per the size of pork and until the crackling is ready to go. 

Nicest pork I've tasted for ages. 

Food at The Pod

I'm going to be cooking at The Pod this Wednesday, with other foodies. There's a food themed evening, starting at 4:30. My bit of the menu, subject to confirmation, is:


Tortilla

Champinones al ajillo

Ensalada Rusa

Pan con Tomate

Manchego y Dulce de Membrillo

Paella con pollo

Should be rather nice - especially the chicken paella, which will involve a whole roasted chicken and its juices, with roasted vegetables, included in the paella.

Food Waste...

The latest report on food waste suggests that UK families are throwing away the equivalent of six meals a week. The BBC report can be found here:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-24846612

My view is that throwing food out is immoral. I love eating meat, but I can't abide the lack of respect that wasting meat represents when that animal has been slaughtered for our pleasure.  

At the risk of teaching folks how to suck eggs (thus avoiding waste of surplus eggs) here are a few thoughts...

BUY LESS!!

We all know that we should do it, but never get round to it - make a shopping list. Only deviate for real bargains. I only buy canned tuna when the multipacks are on sale. Do not buy reduced meat, fish, veg or bread unless you're going to use it or freeze it. 

Better still, only buy the stuff from supermarkets that they're really good at - cupboard essentials. Move to buying fresh food when you need it from local stores or the market. You'll waste a lot less if you're not buying from supermarkets and, even if they're cheaper for some things they're certainly not cheaper if you've bought a load of crap you're going to throw in the bin. They are really good at selling you crap you don't need. If you still think supermarkets are cheaper, have a look at my previous post where my £5 spent at Coventry Market would have cost £13 at Tesco.

It is pointless buying food that you're not going to eat. I know people that maintain a fruit bowl for decoration only. Diet tip:  If you eat fruit rather than eating pasties you'll lose weight. If you buy fruit, eat the pasties and then throw the fruit away then you're only going to lose money. 

USE IT!

Leftovers are good. They're quicker - and cheaper - than take aways. Just one example: bubble & squeak is magnificent and doesn't need to be restricted to breakfast. 

Fruit on the way out can be used in cooking. My current obsession with adding apples to all manner of dishes (liver, bacon & apple - delicious) shows the way. Squishy tomatoes are fantastic fried. Stale bread works for toast and bread & butter pudding. 

Stocks and soups are fabulous for avoiding waste. I even keep peelings in the freezer for making stock. 

If you can't use it - freeze it!

BEST BEFORE

The three saddest things in food? 

1. Children that don't know what a carrot is. 

2. People that think that fruit on trees and in hedgerows is 'dirty'

3. People that pay any attention to best before dates

I'd say that you can easily tell when almost any food is off. Be careful with pork, chicken and seafood - but even these are pretty obvious. 

If you're throwing cheese out, I despair. Use it in a nice cheese sauce. 

I could rant on and on about this but I'll sign off with a great tip from Callie. No normal person can eat a portion of chips from the chippie. Well, keep them in the fridge and refry them the following day. When you think about it, good chips should be double-cooked, and some places triple-cook them - so Callie is taking frugality into gourmet territory. 

Liver, Bacon & Apple with Potato & Leek Cakes

I know - another strange apple recipe. Delicious, though, and we should really make full use of the harvest.

Ingredients

400g ox liver - use whatever you prefer
1 tbsp veg oil
6 shallots
125g bacon
2 apples, cored and chopped. Dessert or cookers!
1 ham stock cube - use beef if you don't have the ham
500ml boiled water - use the water from the veg (we had sprouts) if you can
1 teaspoon garlic powder (or fresh cloves)
1 teaspoon smoked paprika
½ teaspoon chilli powder
Salt and freshly ground black pepper

For the Potatoes:
500g potatoes, diced
50g butter
1/2 leeks, sliced
1 tbsp sunflower oil
Cheddar cheese
Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Peel and chop the potatoes. Boil them and, when nice and soft, mash them.

Meanwhile, chop the shallots and fry in the oil. Chop the liver and the bacon and add them to the pan. As they brown, add the apple, chilli, garlic and smoked paprika. Once browned add the stock cube and the water. That's really all there is to it.

Whilst all that's going on chop the leeks finely and fry in the butter. Once soft add the mashed potato to the pan and give it a good stir. Form into whatever shape you fancy and fry in the oil. Turn over and try to not lose the crispy bit on the bottom. As you fry the second side put some grated Cheddar cheese on the top. When you've crisped the bottoms, stick them in the grill to melt the cheese.

Panettone Bread & Butter Pudding with a Banana Toffee Topping

If you're watching your weight, don't look any further. This is so, so naughty...

Actually quite difficult to photograph...

Ingredients

For the pudding:

Left over panettone (or stale bread), about 8 slices

Butter

2 apples

A good handful of stoned dates

50gm caster sugar

200ml milk

70 ml double cream

3 eggs

Tspn vanilla essence

For the topping:

110gm Demerara sugar

1 ripe banana

60gm butter

2 tablespoons milk

There seems like there's a lot to do here, but it's all easy and quick.

De-core the apples and then chop them and the dates into pretty small chunks. Put them in a bowl and pour over about 70ml of boiling water. Allow to cool.

Whilst that's happening, butter the inside of an oven proof dish and the slices of panettone.

Make the custard by combining the caster sugar, milk and cream in a mixing bowl and...er....mixing. Beat the eggs and the vanilla essence. Add them to the mix and mix some more. When the apple & dates have cooled, add the water to the mix and stir.

Place a layer of panettone in the bottom of the dish and spread the apples and dates across it. Then add a top layer of panettone. Pour the custard over it.

To make the topping, melt the butter in a pan and add the sugar and about two tablespoons of milk. Finely chop the banana and add it too, stirring occasionally while the sugar and banana become toffeeified (don't use this word in Scrabble). Pour over the bread and butter pudding and then pop it into the oven for about 35 minutes on 180, perhaps a touch less if you're using a fan oven.

Serve with custard or cream. Considering the calories in this dessert you might as well have both...

Beetroot, Apple and Mushroom Rice

I may seem a little fixated with apples at the moment. There are three reasons for this. Firstly, they're in season. Secondly, they're free. Thirdly, they're delicious and should be used in savoury dishes far more than they are,

This was cooked up for lunch with a veggie friend and accompanied a vegetarian chilli cooked to this recipe. We served it with grated mature cheddar and sour cream.

Ingredients

200g/7oz long-grain rice

3 beetroots (Used pre-cooked here, but only because we were out of fresh)

3 apples 

A good handful of mushrooms

Half tspn cumin

Half tspn ginger

Cider / cider vinegar

Olive oil - tablespoon

Cook the rice. If you want to go wild, pop a vegetable stock cube in the water. Some folks prefer to let the rice cool before adding to the wok, to avoid clumping, but I rarely bother and find my rice clump free. If only life was clump free (sigh). 

Core the apples - they don't need peeling - and chop. Chop the beetroot and the mushrooms and then warm the olive oil in a wok / large frying pan.  Once the oil is hot, add the fruit and veg to the pan and give a good stir. Add the ginger and cumin and stir again. All you're looking to do here is soften the apples and beetroot (if you're using fresh). Add the cider or cider vinegar (or white wine vinegar if you have neither). Let the liquid boil down - only take a minute or two - and then add the drained rice. 

Stir like Noël Coward to get that great beetroot colour distributed evenly though the rice.

Serve! 

Fast Food v. Home Cooking 1 - Bacon, Veg & Noodles

I've had a very busy few days and not a lot of time for cooking. Thursday, in particular, I'd gone without food for hours and, when Sarah returned from work, we headed straight for the local Chinese. The wait was over ten minutes. Add a couple of minutes walk each way and you've fifteen minutes to cook fresh food to compete with the take out option. Even the branded fast food folks wouldn't be any quicker. The nearest MacDonalds, Kentucky, Pizza Hut would take as long door to door.

On Friday night I was going to The Albany to see The Baptists first gig in 25 years and ended up with about half an hour to cook and eat. I went for the 'Real' fast food option and cooked myself bacon, veg & noodles. I was on my own, so this is a meal for one.

Ingredients

1 'nest' of egg noodles

Half an onion

2 garlic cloves

Half a sweet green pepper

One apple

Half a courgette

2 rashers of bacon

one mushroom

Tspn smoked paprika

Half tspn ground ginger

Tspn of mustard

Ham stock cube

Worcestershire sauce

Oil for frying

Ready, steady, GO!  

Boil the kettle for the noodles. While that's going CHOP! Chop the onion - fry with the heat on high. Chop the garlic - add to pan. Chop and add the bacon. De-core the apple, chop. Chop the pepper, the courgette and the mushroom. Add all to the pan.

As soon as the water's boiled get the noodles on the go. The egg noodles I used, from the excellent little Chinese Supermarket on Market Way, take three minutes.

As soon as the bacon is nicely browned add the spices to the pan. A good splash of Worcestershire and then throw in the stock cube, chopped to make it dissolve quicker. Put in a small amount of the boiling water from the kettle - as soon as the noodles are ready add those and some of the noodle water. Let it bubble for a minute or two.

I reckon five or six minutes - ten minutes quicker than the take out option.

There's no picture for this one - I was in a hurry!

Roast Pork with an Onion and Roasted Vegetable Paella

This is not, strictly speaking, a paella, but artistic licence, etc...

I came across a recipe for a Spanish rice dish, using paella rice, into which all the juices and fat of a roast chicken are poured  towards the end of cooking. Its base is a lots of onion, almost an onion sauce. It really is a very tasty dish.

I thought it would work with pork and it certainly did. The flavours of the pork juices, the cider and the roast vegetables were fabulous - particularly the apple. A great dish to bear in mind with the massive apple crop that's on its way.

The use of booze in cooking is something of an extravagance in this country of ludicrous alcohol duty but, due to the idiocy of the bureaucracy, cider is cheaper than beer and wine on a slug for slug basis. Depriving poor people from using wine and beer in their cooking, through the mechanism of taxation, is inhuman. 

Ingredients

For the rice:

200gm paella rice 

3 onions

4 garlic cloves

1 sweet red pepper

pinch of cayenne pepper

If you have saffron, a few strands, otherwise use about 1 teaspoon of paprika 

500ml of stock - I used a pork stock cube, but vegetable or chicken will do

Fresh parsley or thyme to finish

2 tablespoons olive oil

Cider

For the roast veg:

3 sweet potatoes

3 turnips

4 apples (I used ageing dessert apples)

Cider

For the joint of pork:

Olive oil

Smoked paprika

Sea salt

Black pepper

The pork is straight forward. Cut slashes into the skin, which we want to turn into crackling. Rub the pork with the olive oil and the salt. Then rub in the smoked paprika. 

De-core the apples, you don't need to skin them.  Chop the sweet potatoes, turnips and apples into smallish bite size chunks. Put them into the bottom of an oven pan over which you can place a grill tray with the pork on it to enable the juices to drop into the pan. Cover the veg with a good glug of the cider and top up with water. Put the meat on top of a grill over the pan and put into the oven. Follow the cooking times for the meat you have, of course. Keep an eye on the dish and top up with water if it looks like drying up.

The juices will drip into the pan, the veg will roast rather deliciously and the pork will do its thing. Whilst all that's happening you should be making your paella.

I don't have a paella pan, shame on me, so I use a wok.  Fry the onions slowly in the oil. You want them to be really soft, not browned, so stir often and keep an eye on them. After five minutes or so add the garlic, keeping the heat low. Another five minutes pass before you turn up the heat and add the chopped sweet red pepper. Add the cayenne pepper and the saffron, if you have it. In Spain, if they don't have saffron, which is bloody expensive, they use colorante, but a teaspoon of paprika will do the job.

Once the heat has done its work, add the rice and stir vigorously. You don't want it to burn, but you do want it to absorb the juices in the pan. Add a decent splash of cider and let it be absorbed, then add the stock. I've said 500ml - but read the instructions on the rice. You can always add more liquid later.

A proper paella develops a crust on the bottom, which is delicious. This crust develops by not stirring. If you're not careful, though, you can end up with hard rice on the top, so stir the top of the rice if you want the crust. 

As the pork finishes, put the meat to one side and add the juices and the roasted fruit and veg to the paella. The rice need to be just cooked as you do this. Stir it in and  cook for a couple more minutes. Chop some fresh parsley to sprinkle over the paella when you transfer it to a serving bowl.

I recently made this again but with different veg - beetroot, aubergine and carrot. Equally delicious. 

Nachos with a Veggie Chilli Dip

Nachos are the perfect accompaniment to a cheesy DVD when you feel like slobbing out. Tonight we had a packet of Tangy Cheese Doritos, but wanted something a bit tastier than the sugary (and expensive) branded dips. This recipe  beats them hands down. 

Forget the cheese and the sour cream and this dip works for vegans. 

Ingredients

2 small onions

4 cloves garlic

Half a large green sweet pepper

3 tomatoes 

Tin of red kidney beans

Splash of veg oil

Tspn hot chilli powder

Tspn smoked paprika

Half tspn mustard powder

Half tspn chilli flakes

Tspn oregano

Tspn Marmite 

Chop the veg nice and small. Fry the onion and the garlic until soft, then add the red pepper and the tomatoes. 

Add the spices and the oregano. 

Put in the beans - and the water from the can. It's a poor man's stock. Stir in the Marmite (or Sainsbury's own brand - cheaper and tasty).

Let the sauce thicken, probably 25 - 30 minutes, then serve with sour cream and grated cheddar cheese. 

Smoked Haddock & Apple Pie with a Kick

There's no pic of this one for the simple reason that we were feeding Nav, who brought some lovely Ryton Organic veg to accompany the pie and I forgot to take photos in all the excitement. 

The smoked haddock was a half price bargain from the Co-op, but I think the flavour would have been better from Clive Miller on the market. I incorporated the apple because I think we should work season free fruit into our meals where we can - hardly a chore as it was a real winner. 

Ingredients

2 filets of smoked haddock 

2 apples, cored and roughly chopped - no need to peel

Spring onions

A few of Mel's delicious French beans

Potatoes

Butter

Milk &/or cream

Cheese (I used cheddar)

Salt & pepper

Smoked paprika

For the cheese sauce:

Tablespoon butter

Tablespoon flour

Milk

Half tspn cayenne pepper

Ground black pepper

Grated cheese to taste, I used cheddar

Boil the potatoes for the mash. Add salt to the water if that's your thing. 

Fry the apples and the spring onion in the butter. Take the skin off the fish, roughly chop and add to the pan. Fry for a few minutes and then add the beans. Leave on a low heat while you make the sauce. 

This is a simple cheese sauce. I'm not a big measurer of ingredients (apart from rice - I'll always cook too much rice unless I weigh it) but if you keep the butter and the flour roughly equivalent, all you have to do is melt the butter then add the flour & the cayenne pepper and stir to make a roux. Add milk whilst stirring vigorously until you have a nice, smooth sauce. Then turn the heat down and add the cheese, stirring until it's melted in. Taste it and add more cheese to taste. The sauce will have a kick, but that will subside as the pie cooks, so don't panic at this stage. 

Put the fish into an oven-proof dish and pour the sauce in, then mix well. 

Drain and mash the potatoes. Don't stint on the butter and milk - add cream if you have some in the fridge. You want them fluffy. 

Spoon the mash onto the fish and sauce. Grate cheese onto the top and sprinkle smoked paprika. 

Pop into the oven for 20 - 25 minutes until the topping is golden brown. 

We served with buttered cauliflower and courgette. 

Bacon, Chicken & Pea Soup

The crap weather is compensated, somewhat, by the arrival of seasonal comfort food.

The chicken wings were an absolute bargain - the reluctance of the great British public to suffer the inconvenience of fiddly bones means there are some great offers out there. The bacon was some fat cut from bacon bits - fabulous. And the split peas cost, I think 55p for 500gm, which makes them an incredible bargain. 

Ingredients

5 chicken wings

2 rashers of bacon

150gm green split peas (soaked overnight)

2 small onions

2 potatoes

5 cloves garlic

Tablespoon oil / butter for frying

Chicken or ham stock

Half tspn cumin

Half tspn paprika

Tspn mustard

Pepper

Optional fresh chopped parsley

Chop the onion fairly small and fry in the oil (or the butter). Add the chopped garlic, the bacon and the chicken wings. Let the chicken brown before stirring in  the cumin, mustard and paprika, then add the split peas. Keep the water the peas have soaked in overnight. 

After a couple of minutes pour in the stock. I used ham stock - that's the kind of guy I am - but a chicken stock cube would do the trick. 

Cover and simmer for about half an hour, stirring occasionally. Chop the potatoes into small chunks and add to the soup. Give it another half an hour before removing the chicken wings. 

Pull the meat from the bones. This only takes a couple of minutes - use two forks if, like me, you don't have asbestos fingers. Add the meat back to the soup and serve with a sprinkling of chopped parsley and a twist of the pepper grinder. 

Simple Pork and French Bean Stir Fry

This was a late supper, so had to be quick to cook. The pork was half price from the Co-op, and so the meal cost about a pound for the two of us. 

Ingredients

Small pork chop / steak

Medium onion

Four garlic cloves

Carrot

Small handful of French beans

Red pepper

A splash of white wine or cider 

Pork (or chicken) stock cube

Half tspn ground ginger

Half tspn cumin

Tspn sweet paprika 

125gm wholegrain rice

Cook the rice according to the instructions on the packet. We had whole grain, but any rice'll do. 

Fry the chopped onion and garlic, with the spices, on a low heat for a few minutes until soft, then increase the heat for the arrival in the pan of the pork, which has been chopped into small bite-size chunks. 

Once the meat has coloured, add the carrot and red pepper, stirring vigorously, before adding a good splash of vinegar. As is my wont, I used the spiced vinegar from a nice jar of gherkins. 

As the vinegar boils down, add the pork stock. The sauce will reduce nicely. Add the chopped French beans towards the end. We were lucky enough to have beans fresh from Mel's allotment - delicious. 

When all is cooked, add the (drained!) rice to the dish, stir well and you're ready to go. 

If you have an apple handy, then you could core, peel and chop and add to the pan when you put the carrots in. 

Chicken, Bacon, Carrot & Lentil Soup

We picked up a splendid half-price free range chicken at the weekend, which did for a roast and a really rather excellent chicken, smoked bacon and chorizo dish with the leftovers. 

Chicken being the bird that never stops givin', the carcass was used to make stock which forms the basis of this soup. Stock cubes can be used, of course. 

The total cost of this soup would be about a quid. Lentils are dirt cheap, the carrots were about 30p and the bacon probably about 10p. Sadly, this dish sees the end of a 800gm 'bacon bits' from the market (discussed in a previous post) that had the finest smoked bacon I've ever tasted. Unbelievable. 

Ingredients

Small splash of veg oil

1kg carrots

100gm lentils

Large onion

3 cloves garlic (or tspn garlic powder)

3 rashers bacon

About 1.5 litres of chicken stock 

2 tspns mild curry powder / paste 

1/2 tspn celery seeds / salt

1/2 tspn mustard powder

Squirt of tomato purée 

Splash of cider vinegar or equivalent 

Chop the onions and the bacon and fry on a low-medium heat in the oil. Olive oil is great, I used rapeseed - don't use palm oil as no soup is worth the death of an orangutan. When the onions are soft and the bacon slightly browned add the garlic and give everything a good stir. 

Add the chopped carrot and lentils. Stir and add the curry, celery seeds and mustard. Don't worry if you don't have celery seeds / salt and do feel free to use any mustard if you don't have the powder. A quick squirt of tomato purée and a bit of vigorous stirring. Doesn't really need to be that vigorous but I need the exercise. 

Don't let anything burn: add that splash of vinegar. I actually used the vinegar from a jar of gherkins from the Polish Deli on Shelton Square - spirit vinegar infused with charlock, celery, bay leaf as well as what appears to be chopped garlic and black pepper seeds. You wouldn't want to throw that deliciousness out when you've finished the gherkins, would you?

It'll only be a minute or so before you need to add the stock. Bring to the boil and then reduce the heat right down and cover. Should be ready in about half an hour. 

I actually whacked this through a food processor, but most adults can cope with bits of carrot and it works as a lumpy soup. 

I served with a little raw courgette, thinly sliced, as I had some in the fridge that needs eating. 

Smoked Paprika & Chilli Roasted Potatoes

We all love roast potatoes, but that doesn't mean they're beyond improvement. I like to give my potatoes a bit of zing once in a while and these potatoes are going to be perfect with a bargain free range chicken with a rather nice sage & apple stuffing. Life would've been better if the chicken had its giblets, but hey ho.

Ingredients

Potatoes

2 tablespoons oil - I used rapeseed as short of olive oil

Teaspoon smoked paprika

Pinch of hot chilli powder

Good pinch of onion powder

Sea salt

Black pepper

Cut the potatoes into small chunks. I went for skin on, but peel away if you prefer. Boil for a few minutes, turn off the heat and leave in the water to cook further. 

Pour oil into a large mixing bowl and add the paprika, onion powder and chilli. Mix well. 

Drain the potatoes and put them in the bowl with the seasoned oil. Stir vigorously. Decant into a roasting tin. Season with the sea salt and pepper. 

Pop into a hot oven - 220 or 200 if using a fan oven. They'll need to be stirred a couple of times during cooking. 

Blackberries and Apples

This year has been magnificent for fruit. We've had a bumper harvest of blackberries from brambles at the bottom of the garden. Walking through Hearsall Woods, though, I was amazed by the quantity of fruit available. 

It does seem that folks are uncomfortable with picking and eating wild fruit. There were two dessert apple trees. A couple walking their dog were surprised to see us collecting fruit - they'd always thought they must be crab apples. It's free fruit folks - and delicious - go harvest!!

Sweet Potato & Spinach Curry with Desiccated Coconut!

If you're cooking on a tight budget, substitution of ingredients is fairly standard. You tend to use what you have in the cupboard no matter how compelling Nigella may be when she's adding a pinch of dried mosquito posing pouch into the pan (I'd use smoked paprika as a near enough replacement).

I'd not cooked this dish for a long time and had always used coconut milk, but not having any and being unwilling to shimmy along to the Earlsdon Co-op to make a purchase, my thoughts went to the desiccated coconut on the shelf. 

A quick bit of googling and it appears that you can get coconut milk and flour from boiling desiccated coconut! I couldn't be bothered to go the while hog, but thought that a short cut of boiling the desiccated coconut would add both flavour and texture to the curry. I think it worked rather well, and was a lot cheaper. 

Ingredients

3 sweet potatoes

Spinach (I used frozen)

Large cooking onion

3 cloves garlic

Red pepper

Peas

Cherry tomatoes

Medium curry powder

Stock cube - vegetable 

Sweet paprika

Celery salt 

Black pepper

Cooking oil - I used olive

Fry the onion and garlic slowly, add the curry powder to taste, start with teaspoon. Add in a decent pinch of sweet paprika and of the celery salt. 

Stir well, then add the sweet potatoes, chopped into smallish pieces, and the red pepper. Another good stir and then in goes the stock. Cover everything.  

 After about fifteen minutes add the spinach, the cherry tomatoes and the peas. Cooked for another five or ten minutes until the sweet potatoes are nice and soft. 

I served this with homemade flatbread

Bread, bread, cake and pie!

Tonight I'm following on from the huge success, even if I say so myself, of my whole meal loaf with a loaf of white bread. 

I'm also going to make some flatbread to go with a sweet potato & spinach curry. 

With a couple of brown bananas there's going to be a banana cake. 

And I'm going to make tuna empanadas, albeit with a wine-less pastry in consideration of our ludicrous taxes. 

More later...,

Lentils with Cabbage and Bacon

The ingredients for this dish probably total about £1, if you shop sensibly. Oh - and it's delicious!

Ingredients

Four rashers of bacon (I used bacon bits from the market, hence coming in on budget)
Four cloves of garlic
Two large carrots
One turnip
One onion
The outside leaves of a cabbage
150gms lentils
Splash of olive / cooking oil
Pork stock cube
Teaspoon of smoked paprika
Pinch of cayenne pepper (to taste)

Fry the onion in the oil. I love olive oil, but I used rapeseed for this and I'd defy anyone to be able to tell - partly because I use very little. Add the garlic and the bacon. Chop the carrots and turnip fairly small and throw those in. You can use pretty well any veg with this recipe - I just happened to have them in the fridge.

Give everything a good stir and add the smoked paprika and the cayenne pepper. Watch the latter as it's hot! Far easier to add more later in the process than have a meal that's too hot for comfort. I just chop the stock cube, throw it in and add hot water to the mix. If you want to make it up in a measuring jug, do feel free. Add a decent amount of water stir vigorously and then add the lentils.

The lentils will absorb the water - add more to keep the sauce from burning and to achieve the finish you're looking for. I wanted to serve this with rice, so I was looking for a sauce the consistency of a nice madras curry.

Immediately add the cabbage. I've said use the outside leaves, which retain a really nice texture and flavour, but you can use any type of green that you have available.

The lentils will take between 20 minutes and half an hour to cook, by which time the sauce will be delicious. As well as the spices, you have the garlic and the cabbage producing a really good flavour. I have put both chorizo and black pudding in versions of this meal. The black pudding can either be cooked separately and added at the end or put in with the bacon, in which case it'll disintegrate and add to the overall deliciousness of the sauce.

In the picture I've served this with Cajun egg fried rice.

Eating economically with Bacon Bits

I am very fond of bacon and have discovered the perfect compromise between quality and economy - packs of bacon bits from Coventry Market. You can buy 800gms for £1.50 - that's a lot of bacon - and it's good quality, so no crappy white saline/fat oozing out whilst it's frying. You may get rashers you may get odd chunks - luck of the drawer - but if you're flexible it's the most economical way to eat bacon.

Available from the butchers nearest to the cafe.

Smoked Haddock Fishcakes

Or how to feed a family of four with a £1.60 fillet of naturally smoked haddock...

As the Coley recipe suggested, I'm a big fan of Clive Miller on Coventry Market. I was really buying veg, but had a bit of a hankering for comfort food and purchased a small smoked haddock fillet. Natural in this case means without colourants. 

Ingredients 

Small smoked fish fillet

Butter

Cream (optional)

Milk

1 egg

Breadcrumbs 

6 small potatoes

Three spring onions

Peel and boil the potatoes until they're ready for mashing. Broadly, this means they fall off a fork if you prong them and they're starting to crumble. Drain and mash the potatoes. Add finely chopped spring onions. 

Whilst the potatoes are boiling you've time to prepare the fish. I deboned and pulled the black skin off the fish before putting it into a small frying pan with a knob of butter and enough milk to cover the bottom of the pan. Season with black pepper to taste. The butter will stop the fish sticking as the milk reduces. It needs about four minutes on each side. The trick is for the milk to reduce as the fish cooks, leaving a delicious reduction to fold into the potatoes. 

When the fish is cooked flake it and add it to the mash with the reduced milk and butter sauce. I added a little double cream at the stage because I had some in the fridge. Don't add too much or you'll not be able to form the fish cakes. 

You don't need to breadcrumb the fish cakes, but I had a crust and an egg going spare. I zapped the crust in a food processor, although you can use a grater. Some like to bake the breadcrumbs to make them crunchy, but I think that comes with the frying anyway. Breadcrumbing is easy but messy - into the flour, then the egg, then the crumbs. 

Your fish cakes are now ready for frying until golden on both sides. 

I served with stir fried pak choi and peas in a cheddar cream sauce and finely cut chips. 

If you want a bit more zing, finely chop a chilli (or use powder) and add to the pan when cooking the fish. 

Sour Cherry, Coconut & Almond Rocket Fuel

All you need for the perfect cherry liqueur:

Sour cherries, pitted and halved

Almond essence

Desiccated coconut

Bay leaves

Bottle of basil flavoured vodka

2/3 bottle of odd sweet whiskey liqueur

1/2 bottle of strange rum liqueur

The amounts of ingredients added were based on a debate between Head Chef Sarah and I along the lines of "Whaddya think?" and "Go on, stick a bit more in"

Mix well, place in dark cupboard and agitate daily. 

After 24 hours the liqueur has gone from the industrial waste colour in the picture to a rather nice light cherry colour - and it smells good! 

More updates to follow. 

Coventry Market: making sense of shopping

As anyone who knows me will testify, I'm a bit of a fan of shopping locally in general and of Coventry Market in particular. I think market shopping is more fun than trawling around a supermarket, but it's also a lot cheaper. Partly that's because, unless you're more disciplined than I am, it's very difficult to buy only what you need at a supermarket   - but mostly because it's much, much cheaper. 

Today I spent around £12.50 and bought:

0.8 kg bacon

Pork hock

0.5 kg ox liver

Filet of natural smoked haddock 

Cabbage

1.5kg potatoes

3 punnets strawberries

13 apples

6 large tomatoes 

Bag of white onions

2 bunches of spring onions

I compared the prices of the apples, bananas, strawberries, tomatoes, spring onions and bacon to Tesco Online (before getting bored) and, for their cheapest items, I'd have paid £12.97 rather than the fiver that they cost me at the Market. 

This is hardly a scientific survey - and I got a great deal on the strawberries and spring onions, but I think it's pretty compelling. 

Shop at the market!!

Cajun Blackened Coley Steaks

A key theme of this blog is great food for those on small budgets and when it comes to fish there are some tasty options if we steer clear of the obvious. 

The finest fish in Coventry can be found in the Market - the natural home of the budget-conscious foodie. I asked Clive Miller, a fabulously knowledgeable fishmonger and supplier to Blue Bistro, what he'd recommend based on price and taste and he didn't hesitate: coley steaks. 

Coley is, despite the efforts of many great chefs, seen as a poor-mans cod. Well, great - if ignorance keeps this tasty fish in our price range. 

Clive, whose knowledge of how to cook fish is second to none, recommended a Thai curry. Delicious as this sounded I didn't have all the ingredients I needed.  So, keen to stick to my budget but with my taste buds tuned to spicy, I went over to the Nut Stall on a mission. 

If you don't know already, the Nut Stall has a great selection of spices and dried herbs, including exactly what I was looking for: a Cajun spice mix. Of course, I could produce a Cajun spice mix myself, but I'd be a muppet to design a dish on a budget that requires eight ingredients just for the flavouring. Their excellent Cajun mix cost just 60p and will be used for all sorts of delicious treats. 

Ingredients

Coley steaks

A good knob of butter

Three garlic cloves

Cajun spice mix

Melt the butter in a pan. Crush the garlic cloves and add them to the butter. Give it a minute or so to infuse the flavour of the garlic. 

Coat the steaks in the garlicky butter. This provides a deliciously sticky base for the Cajun spice - which you should apply liberally. I used a frying pan, but a griddle would do the trick. I reckon about 3 minutes on each side. The fish should be, as the title says, blackened. 

I dressed the fish with roasted sweet red peppers and served with a curry fried rice, a variety of which will be featured on the blog soon.  If I'd not run out of potatoes I'd probably have been tempted by smoked paprika roast potatoes as an alternative. 

The fish was delicious - we'll be seeing more Coley in the blog before too long. 

Easy Tuna Tapas

Tapas are my favourite things and these are really very nice. 

Ingredients

Beetroot - we used puréed from the Polish Deli

Cucumber

Roasted red pepper

Baguette

For the tuna:

Can of tuna

Spring onion

Gherkin

Cider vinegar

Smoked paprika 

Black pepper

Chop the spring onion and gherkin finely. Drain the tuna well - especially if you're using one in oil. Mix, adding the smoked paprika and the vinegar. Pepper to taste. 

Spread the bread with the puréed beetroot, add a slice of cucumber and then spread some of the tuna mixture on.  Top the tapa off with some roasted sweet red pepper. 

Enjoy!

Chilli Apple & Pear Sauce

Sometimes the traditional British roast needs a kick up the backside, and this alternative to apple sauce for pork dishes certainly does the trick. You could also serve this with a veggie roast dinner or as a condiment for sausage & chips.

Ingredients

(Serves 4)

3 apples

3 pears

Half a small red onion

Good pinch of chilli powder to taste or a finely chopped red chill

Pinch of cumin

Teaspoon demerara sugar (or any sugar) 

Water

Butter

First peel and core the apples and pears then chop them into small chunks. Peel and finely chop the onion. Put a good knob of butter into you pan and fry the onion. Don't let it get too hot - you want soft onions. After about 3 minutes stir in the chilli and cumin. Stir and then add the apples and pears. Give them a good stir and then add enough hot water to keep everything moist. 

Stir regularly and roughly crush the fruit with a wooden spoon. You don't want to lose all the texture, but you need a good, thick sauce. Keep adding water in small amounts - you don't want the sauce to dry out or burn. Taste the sauce - if it's not got enough kick add a little more chilli. Don't go crazy - you want balance not blisters.

After about ten minutes add the sugar and a little more water. Stir vigorously and then add a good knob of butter. Taste it again and add more butter if you fancy it. 

That's it - the sauce is ready. Can be served hot or cold - delicious with left overs, as in the pic where it's served with pork and bubble & squeak