Microwave dinner

Yes, you read that right. But trust me, this was not one of your average 'remove sleeve, pierce film' types (I'm not quite that bad), but rather a full on home-cooked delicious meal delivered to me in various plastic boxes by my mum when she came to visit yesterday. The meal in question was a recipe that she used from Jamie's Great Britain- Guinness Lamb Shank, complete with celeriac and potato mash and even a little minty oily drizzle stuff. Not your average student dinner, ey? Although I did notice that the mint and spring onion sprinkle thing that Mr Oliver defiantly stated on his programme that 'if you weren't going to add then you shouldn't bother making the dish' was missing- tut tut (but then again, I don't think it would have had quite the same freshening 'lift' effect after a few minutes in the microwave- so I'll forgive).

My mum warned me that she found it to be a little sweet (which is no wonder when the list of ingredients includes raisins, red onions, marmalade, ketchup and celeriac), but I really really enjoyed it. Tender, fall off the bone, succulent meat, rich sticky sweet gravy and warm, comforting mash, with just a hint of mint (complete with glass of wine and followed by some of my mum's ridiculously good tiramisu)- and all I had to do was bung it in the microwave and wait for the beep. I feel very spoiled (and very very full) right now.

Happy New Year!

Well hello there strangers! Or rather, should you be the one saying that to me? I know, I know, I disappeared for a bit, but with work to do before the end of term and then a Christmas holidays spent travelling the length of the country (and generally just vegging on the sofa and eating copious amounts of food before I had chance to photograph it) meant I haven't had the time to blog for all you beautiful people, but I promise that I'll try my best to start posting a bit more regularly now 2012 is upon us. 

I spent Christmas at my brother's flat in Bournemouth with our parents and Bruce the border terrier, and it was lovely (thankfully having my mum there meant that Christmas dinner wasn't left to my brother to prepare- although he did do a good job of carving the turkey with his brand new knife, I'll give him that). I shall now leave you with some obligatory photos of delicious Christmas food that makes me drool over my keyboard and long for next December and the days when it is acceptable to put cranberry sauce on everything and drink wine at any time of the day. It's fine, me and my flask of coffee and clingfilmed sandwich are getting by alright. I don't even like chestnut stuffing and Christmas pudding. Much.

Starter of smoked salmon and prawns- which is my main responsibility for Christmas dinner every year (one I take far too much pride in).

The main event (and my bother tucking in). Delicious turkey. All the trimmings. Standard.

 Italian meal we made a few days after Christmas, inspired by the new cookbook I got as a gift- Jamie's Italy, and the hamper of Italian food goodies that my parents received as a gift. Crostini with various toppings, including a cannellini bean and garlic affair that I made using a recipe in the book; antipasti with mixed meats, buffalo mozzarella, roasted peppers, olives, semi-dried tomatoes and bread, and pasta with homemade pesto. Not quite Christmas food but made using Christmas pressies so I thought I would include it. Plus it was too delicious not to.

So there you go, a snippet of my Christmas. I hope you all had a lovely one and ate far too much amazing food. Now onto 2012 and the culinary adventures that await!

Tomato, spinach and mozzarella gnocchi

There are few things more comforting to come home to after a long day in the (underheated) library and a walk home in the rain than a pasta bake. Oozy cheese, stodgy filling pasta, hot sauce and those delicious almost burnt bits that I love so much. However, I've been on a bit of pasta overkill session at the moment, working my way through a pack of eggs and some pancetta by making carbonara (one of my absolute favourite dinners) rather repetitively over the past week. So I decided to mix things up (a little), and bought some gnocchi. I was inspired by this recipe, but to be honest I didn't really use it, I just used the same kind of idea- sometimes you really don't need a recipe. 

I would love to tell you that I made my own tomato sauce (which I would usually do, I promise), but there are times when the soothing sound of a popping jar is called for. Last night was one of them, as I just really couldn't be bothered- I blame that end of term feeling. So I heated some of my (Tesco discount brand- I really am a classy lady. You won't find any food snobbery over here) jarred sauce, mixed it with some boiled gnocchi, threw some spinach in for a bit of greenery (and to generally make me feel better about the insane amount of comfort food I seem to have consumed lately), dotted ripped up mozzarella and a sprinkle of parmesan over the top and threw it under the grill. And within minutes I was in warm, carby (is that a word?), stodgy, cheesy, comforting heaven. So blissful that I shall be repeating the process in a couple of hours. 

Dim Sum

I made dim sum! Sorry, I don't mean to sound overly proud of myself but I was quite chuffed at how they turned out. They were delicious, if a touch greasy (I blame the pork. That and my over generous-ness with the sesame oil- but it just smelled so good!), and aren't they adorable? Perhaps that's just me, but I found them very cute- they're like baby Cornish pasties!. There's something about mini food that just gets me far too over excited. Put me in front of a buffet full of 'party food' and I'll hop around like a kid on Christmas Eve (I'm very easily pleased- I know). 

I've been planning on making these little Chinese dumplings for a while (when I see something I fancy making, I tend to not stop thinking about it until I've done it) and after a trip to Manchester's China town (which is incredible) for ingredients, I finally got round to it last night- and I was amazed by how quick and easy they were to do! I was completely expecting a bit of a fiddly production line of ripped dumpling wrappers, soggy uncooked filling and burnt bottoms, but everything went right and I was tucking into my potstickers before I knew it (which is even more surprising when you consider that I made them after having had 3 mugs of mulled wine at the Christmas market). I first saw this recipe on Cook Yourself Thin, but having since flipped through my copy of Chinese Food Made Easy, there is an almost identical version in there, so I'm going to assume that no one has claim to it and go ahead and share it with you all, as you have to try them! This recipe serves 1 quite generously, but can easily be doubled up. Also- feel free to play around with different fillings- I certainly intend to.

Pork Potstickers 

Ingredients

100g pork mince

A couple of spring onions, finely sliced

1 tsp grated ginger

1 1/2 tsp soy sauce

1 tsp shaosing wine

1/2 tsp sesame oil

1 tbsp cornflour

Gyozo wrappers, defrosted

Method

Mix all the ingredients, minus the wrappers, together in a bowl. 

Take a wrapper, place a generous tsp of filling in the middle, wet the edges of the wrapper and fold together (forming a shape like a mini pasty). 

Repeat until you have used all the filling.

Heat a pan on a medium-high heat with a tbsp of oil (any flavourless will be fine) and add the dumplings, flat side down, covering with a lid. 

After a few minutes, when the bottoms are browning, lower the heat, add 50ml of water and quickly replace the lid.

Steam until all the water has evaporated.

Serve with a dipping sauce of your choice, if you fancy, and tuck in!

I love cooking 'proper' Asian food, as, due to it commonly being eaten only as a take away treat, it is mainly seen as quite calorific and bad for you, whereas cooking authentic recipes from scratch shows you that this needn't be the case, and that you can get more flavour in similar things and be absolutely free of any guilt (and copious amounts of MSG). I fear that my success last night may have sparked a bit of a Chinese cooking phase- oh well, there are deinitely worse things that could happen. Any excuse to get my wok out.

Sweet potato and spinach daal

I am by no means a vegetarian- give me a plate full of ribs, a whole fish or a spatchcocked chicken any day (preferably peri-peri) and I will be a very happy bunny- but I quite often eat like one. I don't need meat on my plate for my meal to be satisfying, it's quite nice (with the risk of sounded a bit Hugh FW) to make the most of lovely fruit, vegetables, grains and the like for a change (and it's often a fair bit cheaper to do so). I do tend to gravitate a lot towards cooking and eating quite a lot of what my brother would call 'hippy food'- things like lentils, bran, brown rice and beans. Don't get me wrong, I am rather partial to the odd disgustingly processed McDonald's burger or two, complete with rubbery orange perfectly square 'cheese' and worryingly uniform salty fries (word of warning- never squeeze a Maccy D's chip between your fingers), it's just nice to feel like at least some of the time you are cooking 'real food', making delicious grub from scratch from natural ingredients from the earth. I'm getting a little too zen-like now. Don't worry, I will not be moving to a self sufficient commune anytime soon- I doubt they have skinny toffee nut lattes.

Anyway, back to the point, how could you see this bunch of ingredients and not want to cook something wholesome and delicious, guaranteed to put a halo on your head and no inches on your waist? You can't. Or I can't anyway (ahem, I definitely didn't buy these ingredients to cook with the night before and end up going back to the shop for a frozen pizza because I couldn't be bothered). So I threw together- literally, it's that easy- one of my favourite Indian style dishes to make, which always warms and fills me up properly- a sweet potato and spinach daal. I got the recipe here on the BBC Good Food website (God bless that website), and it is almost unbelievably simple- the only bit of relatively strenuous activity involved is a bit of peeling and chopping. 

Granted, it does sound like a bit of a side dish, and many the meat-eater reading this will be picturing it on the table alongside a large lamb balti, and I imagine it would be delicious as such- but it's absolutely delicious and filling as it is. Served with sliced toasted pittas (wholemeal of course) for dunking in, it leaves you warmed through and satisfied, with a hint of chili tingling your tongue, and, with the amount of vegetables in it (and not a lot else), feeling absolutely guilt free (or with room for pudding- whichever way you want to look at it). 

Right, I had best go, before I give you all a brackets overdose (I would apologise for my brackets addiction- but I refuse to acknowledge that it is a problem, and therefore won't be attending brackets anonymous anytime soon). Yes, I am aware that I am hilarious. Lots of lentilly love,

Corned beef hash

Last night I used a very humble, almost controversial ingredient (food snobs look away now), a tin of corned beef. And I'm not even sorry; it was delicious. I made yet another thing that I've never attempted before (I'm not even entirely sure if I've eaten it before), and rustled together a corned beef hash. I remember watching The Hairy Bikers' Twelve Days of Christmas last year, sprawled across the sofa hiding from the cold, most likely haven eaten far too much festive food (Christmas telly-watching is the best), and have vague recollections of seeing the pair cook hash with pretzels for a load of people on some massive building site. I have the feeling it was an important building, but that detail is far less important that the velvety ooziness of the yolks from the poached eggs they served on top- a detail that I ensured was a part of my finished meal. So on yesterday's miserable dark November evening, I recreated their (breakfast) recipe and indulged myself in some proper comfort food, complete with smouldering crispy bits (a million miles away from the 'hash' I've seen some people make- essentially mashed potato mixed with corned beef), a wonderful kick of Worchestershire sauce (definitely the ingredient that made the dish), and served with a buttered  fresh-from-the-oven soda bread roll, which I'll save for another post. Oh I'm a tease- I know.

Toad in the hole

I have been craving Yorkshire pudding for a good 3 weeks. And after a conversation with my mum and gran about roast dinners, and watching Jamie Oliver tuck into them on Tuesday night (the best mouthful of food he'd ever eaten- apparently), it had reached a new level of craving. So last night I made toad in the hole. A visit from the boyfriend was the perfect excuse to cook and tuck into a big homely dish (it seems a bit sad to make it just for one- although with two sausages left and a perfect one person-sized pot, I may have to be a bit sad), and it didn't disappoint. I used the only sausages that should ever be used- Cumberland, and Jamie Oliver's method of making Yorkshire puddings that he used on Tuesday's Jamie's Great Britain, in which you measure your eggs and use the same amount of milk and flour. Served with lashings of onion gravy, it went down very nicely. Granted my onion gravy did look a little like apple sauce as I realised too late that the only stock I had was chicken, but for my first gravy-making attempt it tasted pretty damn good (better than it looked anyway). And the toad in the hole was just perfect- nice meaty spicy sausages, crispy Yorkshire with a little bit of squidgy in the middle, and a hint of thyme (any excuse for me to use thyme). Very suitable for a cosy dark night in hiding from the Manchester weather (rain- lots and lots of rain).

 Look what I got yesterday! After my whinging about not being able to afford pretty new cookbooks (which he didn't even read, he was just surprising me), my boyfriend landed with a copy of Jamie's Great Britain, all for me! Massive boyfriend points were obviously awarded (in the form of most of the aforementioned toad in the hole), and now I have a shiny new book to cook from! Satisfied Yorkshire pudding cravings, and a beautiful new book- what more does a girl need ey?

Lamb and apricot tagine

Back in Manchester and the land where internet moves quicker than a glacier. I had a wonderful time at home but being cut off from the world of high-speed broadband did make me feel a little like a quarantined mouse (I am a student after all- I don't know how to function without it), and it also meant I haven't posted on here as much as I wanted to, so I'll have to do a bit of catch up over the next few days.

 I think one thing that everybody loves about visiting home is the familiarity- it's comforting when things aren't too different. However, one thing that I arrived home to find different this week was the appearance of a brand new purple tagine in the kitchen. I know I'm a loser to be excited by this but it was beautiful. And as I realised that smuggling it in my suitcase back to Manchester (like I do with a large quantity of the cupboard contents) would be rather difficult, I decided that the next best thing would be to use it whilst I was home. Some scouring through cookbooks in WHSmith later (yes I'm too broke to actually be buying new cookbooks, no matter how pretty they are and how much I want to), I found a recipe in Jamie Oliver's Jamie Does... (which I've just realised is only a fiver with free delivery on Amazon... hmmmm...). The original, which is online here, is for a beef and prune tagine, but I swapped in lamb and apricots (purely for personal preference) and it worked really well. The recipe in general worked really well. All the ingredients were easy to get hold of, although the lamb neck was labled shoulder (to quote my mum- it had never been shoulder in it's life), and there was an almost unsuccessful search for ras el hanout in the wonderful supermarkets of Whitehaven. I really didn't want to have to make my own- the last time I attempted it it just ended up tasting of cloves, which wasn''t really the vibe I was going for- but lucky for my parent's tastebuds I was saved by Morrisons (boo to you Tesco). 

The recipe was also really easy to follow, and it turned out really well. I don't mean to sound suprised, I have every faith in Jamie's recipes, it's just that slow-cook dishes aren't usually a strength of mine (mainly because I am far too impatient with anything that requires me to leave it alone for any amount of time), but with a combitation of Sky TV to distract me away from the kitchen and a mother to shout at me anytime I tried to go back in, my tagine was a delicious success. Served with some simple cous cous dressed with lemon and coriander, it was the perfect combination of spice, perfume, succulent meat and juicy fruit and vegetables- and for a dish that was supposed to serve 4-6 people, there wasn't an awful lot left after the 3 of us got stuck in, which is always a good sign.