Month: November 2009

Best sandwich in the world

.. or so says the Bear. He likes this whenever he is at home and would probably eat it every day if he could. Of course, it is not a sandwich in the real sense of the word – there’s no top – and I am perhaps more partial, say, to egg mayonnaise. Or maybe crayfish and rocket… Still, each to his own and that is his choice.

It’s very simple – just three ingredients and a sprinkle of Maldon Salt

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It’s best made with the delicious No Knead Bread, which makes spectacular toast, a Hass avaocado (they are the knobbly, dark green ones) and some small baby plum tomatoes, crisp, sweet and juicy.

Slice your bread

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and lightly toast it

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Slice those little tomatoes

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and then scoop out the avocado and mash it with a fork

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Then start to put it all together….

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Spread the mushed up avvy thickly over the toast

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Then put the tomatoes on top of that

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And sprinkle lightly with Maldon Salt…..

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And there you have it. How to keep a Bear happy in one easy lunch.

Bear Bars

The Bear travels a lot and often has to get up early (really early, like 3 am) to get a flight somewhere. He needs his breakfast, but with the best will in the world, it takes a bit of stamina to have porridge before dawn… or to transport porridge to eat later while he waits in an airport.

We tried buying those cereal bars, thinking they would do the trick – packed full of nuts and seeds and fruit…. and, as I realised when I looked at the labels, packed full of unwanted sugars and fats.  Surely it couldn’t be that difficult to make them? OK, so they wouldn’t be wrapped as nicely but that’s why we buy cling film!

I worked at trying to make something tasty and healthy and I did sort out a recipe, writing down the quantities and being oh-so-specific… and then I changed it. It’s going to be much easier to show you by taking photographs of each step.

If you want to do what I am doing…  get the ingredients below. If you don’t like a particular ingredient in the second section get another. The important thing is that the consistency must be right before you put it in the oven, though I have to say this is a pretty good mixture….

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2 large eggs,  wholemeal self raising flour, porridge oats, golden granulated sugar, and then, what amounts to a smash and grab on the dried fruits and nuts shelves……

 

 

 

sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, chopped mixed nuts, pistachio nuts,  sultanas (I’ll use two kinds – green and golden –  but that is because I have them and I like them), dried cranberries, goji berries, dessicated coconut, raw coconut, if I have any I will put in dried blueberries and cherries… and then, what might seem to be an odd choice, a jar of Bramley apple sauce. You can buy it in supermarkets.

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I know… I always make everything as much as possible from scratch. The thing is, these Bear Bars are incredibly quick to knock together and I always have the dried ingredients and I always have eggs.. the thing that might not be around is apple. I can square this with my conscience by knowing if I have a jar of it in the larder, the Bear is never more than an hour away from a healthy snack.

I will do this in a glass bowl so it is easier to see what I am doing. I tried to measure it out once but what a palaver it is…. I have always made this by eye and I think that is the way to do it, so watch, copy and make!

Get a your ingredients together. Get a large bowl and a spoon.

You’ll need what I would call flapjack tins… either line them with greaseproof paper or put a silicone sheet in.

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A couple of handfuls of porridge oats… and a shake over of wholemeal self raising flour( I suppose the amount would be a scoop… maybe half a cup?)  …add a pinch of salt to round out the flavour (even when making sweet things, a touch of salt just brings the flavours together. Look at the back of breakfast cereal packets – they have huge amounts of salt in them! At least here you are sticking to a minimal amount)

***If you want to make these gluten free, do as I have done for my coeliac friends and replace the flour with ground almonds and some gluten free white bread flour with some baking powder… it still tastes marvellous. In fact people don’t notice any major difference…. because this isn’t a specific quantity/ingredient recipe any minor differences would be attributed to that***

Right now you start adding the goodies! A handful or so of  sultanas… two handfuls if you are using different kinds.

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A good handful of unsalted pistachio nuts, what a beautiful colour they are and they taste so lovely…. and then a bigger handful of chopped mixed nuts (they are cheaper so that’s why I use more of them)

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Sunflower and pumpkin seeds next….

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Goji berries (because the health food store, Julian Graves were selling them and I thought I’d try them. They are incredible antioxidants, apparently… but they are also nice to eat and so pretty in the bar! (Part of the enjoyment of these bars is that when you slice them you see the incredibly beautiful mix of colours of the seeds and berries and fruits) 

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Dessicated coconut next – this keeps  moisture in the bars and adds a lovely sweetness. I’d give it a good two scoops or so…. or shake it so it makes a good layer, like this….

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Raw flaked coconut is gorgeous so if you can get some add that too

 

 

 

 

 

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 Now, if you look at the bowl you will see all the lovely layers of fruits and nuts………  that’s why I haven’t said quantities……  I just shake things in to make thin layers…..

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Add a scoop or so of sugar.. you don’t need much because you have added all that fruit. Sometimes I don’t bother. Now stir everything together. The flour and the porridge oats will coat the fruit and help it all mix together before you add the wet ingredients. You want all the fruits and nuts and seeds to be evenly spread throughout.

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Now, roughly whisk 2 large eggs together and pour into the mix….

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Add the jar of apple sauce and then start to stir

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You will end up with a rather solid mix but it will be wet and spreadable. If you want, give the mix a taste… is it sweet enough for you? You can add more sugar, especially if you have children who like things sweeter. I might add some agave nectar if I think it needs extra sweeteners as it is healthier alternative to sugar.

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Put the oven on to heat at 160 degrees C

Now, start to get that thick, yet spreadable mix, into the lined flapjack tins…..

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Spread it smooth so it cooks evenly

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And into the oven for maybe half an hour or so. This does depend on the amount of sugar you have in there as that will brown more quickly, so keep your eyes on it.

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When it is a good golden colour all over and feels springy to the touch, get it out and leave it to cool.

 

 

 

 

 

Then cut it into slices … you can freeze them (but make sure you wrap them separately so they are easy to separate)  and then you will have a ready supply of healthy bars to give to the ones you love.

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That’s better for you than one of those bought cereal bars, isn’t it?

And just perfect for when your sister in law visits and you can give her some with her coffee!

Monkfish

I was cooking for some friends recently and bought monkfish tails. I didn’t use all the monkfish so I froze a tail fillet knowing that it would come in handy one night as a quick supper for the two of us.

That night was Friday night.

I had a few tomatoes and the last bit of a pot of cream.  It was cold and grey outside so I wanted  something bright to look at and there’s nothing more cheery than saffron added to food, with its lovely golden colour and that gorgeous deep tang of its flavour.

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This wouldn’t take long so I thought rice would be good. Basmati cooks really quickly and all you need to do is measure the rice then add the same amount of water and maybe a tablespoon extra.

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Just put that on the heat with a pinch of salt and get cracking on the rest of the supper…

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Start by chopping up a small onion and gently sauteing it in some butter till it softens and sweetens . Add a good pinch of saffron

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And some finely chopped tomatoes

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Stir it round and then pour in a good old slug of vermouth… maybe a cup full, add some salt and pepper..

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Stir that round and let it bubble down a bit.  The alcohol will cook off so don’t expect to get lashed on the sauce 😉  and don’t worry, you can give it to youngsters!

Get the monkfish and cut it into rounds.  Check the rice… has the water all been absorbed in? Is it tender? If it needs a drop more then add that but keep your eye on it. If it is ready, take it off the heat and put a tea towel over the top and then put the lid on to absorb the extra steam. By now the tomatoey sauce will be coming together. Add a knob of butter and stir round then carefully put the monkfish slices in

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Let it gently, very gently, bubble away for about 5 or so minutes until the fish is cooked.

Take the fish out and put on one side because you are now going to make the most delicious sauce…

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Pour in some cream and stir it in then turn up the heat so the sauce can reduce and thicken

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See how it is still a sauce but it has thickened?

Now pile up the rice in a bowl and add the monkfish

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Doesn’t it look gorgeous?

Then pour the sauce over

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And settle down to eat….

Bone Idle Bread

Sometimes a simple breakfast is all we want… maybe tea and toast. And sometimes we want a sort of fruity nutty feel to the toast, and Nigella’s Lazy Loaf is just the thing.

Like most things I make, this is simplicity itself – we call it Bone Idle Bear Bread because it is so easy.

All you need is bread flour… I have been working my way through a range of seeded and grain bread  flours… some yeast, some muesli, a pinch or so of salt  and milk and water.

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To bake it in you’ll need a loaf tin and one of those silicone paper liners. Either that or line the tin with greaseproof paper but that is so fiddly, so go and buy some liners… you will thank me for it

In a big bowl, put 200g of muesli (we particularly like Dorset Cereals Really Nutty) and 325g of bread flour. This week I am using Allinsons Seed and Grain Flour and stir it round…. put a sachet of yeast.. or a teaspoon or so in

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 and stir round, adding a pinch of salt

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You’d better do this before you add the 250 ml of milk and 250 ml of water… you get a better mix

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That’s just under a pint, mix the milk and water together and pour straight in

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Stir it round.. it becomes a gloopy mix very quickly

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Then pour it (I tell you, this is pourable.. don’t panic!)

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Then… you won’t believe it but this is right.. put it into a cold oven

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THEN, and only then, turn the oven on to 110 degrees C and walk away for 45 minutes. This allows the bread mix to start to rise…..

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At the 45 minute stage, turn the oven up to 180 degrees C and leave for an hour.

Then.. take it out and leave it to cool on a rack

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This is a substantial bread…

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And it is wonderful toasted…..

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Put the kettle on for a nice cup of tea while you wait.. then spread your bread with butter…

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And then, because the Bear loves the taste of Marmite on fruited and nutty bread, a lovely mix of sweet and savoury….

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Try it with jam.. or honey….but whatever you do, try it. Easy as anything and that, my friends, is all we ask!

Bonfire Night

Yesterday was  Guy Fawkes, or Bonfire Night and, for us in the UK, we gather round bonfires, watching fireworks and eating sausages, commemorating the failed attempt to blow up the Houses of Parliament and the resulting punishment given to Guy himself. It’s also a special day for us as it is our wedding anniversary. And yes, we’ve heard all the jokes about there being fireworks on our wedding night 😉

From our dining table we can look down onto the city below us and see all the fireworks – a fantastic sight and, as a plus point,  it also saves us standing around outside. We don’t like to ignore tradition completely though, so we thought that we would at least have the sausages as part of our anniversary meal. Sausages and our favourite sparkling wine – the one we had at our wedding. Because it was cold we thought that red wine would be better than champagne – more warming, even though it was chilled. I’m sure you know what I mean. We’d wanted sparkling drinks to go with the fireworks going on outside and  chose Hardy’s Crest Sparkling Shiraz

I had to do more, though, than cook sausages and serve some wine and I decided that one of my favourite wintery standby recipes would be perfect – roasted, spiced winter vegetables. I have a recipe that I must have copied down from somewhere – it is written in a very old diary from 1977… not that I first did it then, just that I used the diary…it was already old when I found it….Old and empty, which is why I decided to use it for scribbling down recipes.

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Goodness knows when I wrote that, though, but it must have been at least 17 years ago.

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I have no idea where I got it from, so I can’t give due credit. Anyway, it has evolved, almost beyond recognition since then and I think the tweaks I made have improved it. Well, it has improved it to MY taste, anyway. Still, in order to make it  I needed vegetables, so set off to the greengrocer to see what I could get.

It’s great to be able to go to a traditional greengrocer

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All the fruit and vegetables are piled up so you can see what you are buying and choose just what you want

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I came back with lovely, knobbly Anya potatoes, sweet baby Chantenay carrots, sweet onions, broccoli, baby tomatoes, a sweet potato, a couple of parsnips, some baby corn, some garlic and some ginger. I also bought a packet of Merchant Gourmet roasted chestnuts, which must be one of the best things ever – the time that saves in roasting and peeling, well, I wouldn’t be so keen on chestnuts if I had to do it all myself… and as for the sausages? I chose Toulouse sausages – they are  small French sausages made of coarsely diced pork and bacon flavored with wine, garlic and unlike other sausages tend to have more meat and less of the normal breadcrumb filler.

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The aim is to have the perfect mix of roasted vegetables. I love the soft sweetness of the sweet potato, with a bursting little tomato, a tasty, slightly charred bite of broccoli with the gorgeous chestnut…. lovely little garlicy roasted potatoes and mushrooms…. it really is delicious. It can easily stand alone as a vegetarian meal but with the addition of sausages…..oh it is just perfect!

And best of all it is simple! Start by putting the oven on high – about 230 degrees (210 if it is a fan oven) so that when the vegetables are ready they go into a hot oven and get just a hint of charring. It really deepens the flavour.

Then, prepare your vegetables. Start with the root vegetables –  peel and roughly cube the sweet potato. Chop the Anya potatoes (or any other potato) into roughly the same size pieces. Same for the parsnip. The onion needs to be cut into manageable pieces.  Obviously they are going to take longer than the other vegetables.

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Scatter them into a large roasting tin and drizzle oil over them to give them a good, but light and even coating

Then prepare your spice mix. You need ground coriander, ground cinnamon and some cardomom pods.

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Crush the cardamom pods and take out the seeds inside (I hate it when you leave the pods in and then you chew on the inedible outer casing…it’s a sort of medicinal taste. Not good when you are aiming for a comforting supper) Give them a grinding in the  mortar with your pestle

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The cases split open and inside are the aromatic black seeds.

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You need to separate them from the husks.. either through your fingers

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Or in a large draining spoon so the seeds fall down.

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Then crush the seeds to a powder. You’ll need a teaspoon or so

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Scatter the spices and ground seeds lightly over the vegetables (maybe a large teaspoon of each) and add some grated ginger and chopped garlic. Sprinkle some salt over the top and drizzle with some more oil.

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Into the hot oven for ten minutes or so till you can see it starting to brown….

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Turn the oven down to about 175  degrees (less if it is a fan oven) and before you cover with foil, scatter in the softer vegetables, the baby tomatoes, broccoli florets, quartered mushrooms, the baby corn,  and the packet of chestnuts.

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That will take another hour or so. Just check how things go as it steams in its own juices under its tin foil cover.

Now, I suppose, you had better set the table

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Once I did that, we really entered into the spirit of Bonfire Night… Fireworks? Hah! We had a sparkler each. No expense spared for our anniversary dinner……..

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Back to the cooking. Is everything softening well?

Take the foil off and stir things round….. dot the top with small nuggets of butter and then let it cook, uncovered for the last half hour or so.

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That is, I can assure you, the most lovely aromatic mix of roast vegetables you’ll have had in a long time.

The only other thing to do is cook the sausages

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Make sure they are beautifully browned

Pour some wine… the bubbles are just so right for Bonfire Night. A glass or two of lovely rich sparkling shiraz is just the thing for sausages and veg…. and just the thing to celebrate with!

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And… serve!

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 The roasted vegetables are beautifully soft with just the right hint of charring. The spices are perfect and smell is just gorgeous. Look at how beautiful it all looks.

But Bonfire Night isn’t Bonfire Night without some fireworks… and we needed to celebrate…..

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And the result?

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Clean plates. Always a marker of how successful a meal has been.

And I did, in the end, manage to get a photograph of  the fireworks going off below us

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So… a simple meal of roasted vegetables and sausages – perfect for Bonfire Night and even more perfect to celebrate an anniversary…

Cheers everyone!

Kedgeree

I do so love a good breakfast and when breakfast almost turns into lunch that’s even better. That means you are up later so you missed breakfast and  you are hungry but it’s too early for lunch. That’s why they call it brunch.

Weekends and lazy days. like today (our anniversary)  are perfect times for relaxing, celebrating and enjoying cooking and eating  food and one of the perfect things to make on days like this? Kedgeree 

So get some basmati rice, an onion, some curry powder (yes, I know, but this is one recipe that just needs it…no need for grinding lots of spices), maybe some ground cumin (but no need to worry if you don’t have it) some eggs, some smoked haddock, coriander leaves and a red chilli and some cream. I have a mix of natural undyed smoked haddock and some smoked cod there. Not for any reason other than  there was only a small bit of smoked haddock available when I went shopping, so I had to get some extra fish…. You have to do that sometimes. Just be flexible and don’t worry.

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First of all, in a large frying pan, gently cook some chopped onion in some oil and butter. This softens the onion nicely . If you like coriander as much as I do then chop in some of the coriander stems as well.

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While that is gently cooking, put your smoked fish in another pan with some water and poach at a soft simmer. I was going to say a gentle simmer but I realised I had said “gently” far too many times already. There again, I suppose it is a theme of the day…. this is the sort of breakfast that goes with a relaxed mood.

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Put 4 eggs in a pan and start boiling them for 4 minutes. As soon as the time is up, put the pan under a cold tap and run the water to cool them quickly. This will stop them cooking, keeping them just slightly soft and making sure there’s no horrible black rings round them.

Measure your basmati rice – for four people, I use 1 mug of rice, and add a mug and a little bit of water. Bring this to the boil then turn the heat down. Basmati rice cooks quickly so keep your eye on it. If you have measured the water then it should all have absorbed

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Thing is, it won’t be perfectly fluffy rice just yet. What you need to do is to get a clean tea towel and put that over the pan (taking it off the heat, of course) and then put the lid on top…. this absorbs the last bit of steam

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While that is on one side, the onion will have softened so stir in a teaspoon of curry powder, a pinch or so of cumin (if you are going to add it)  and a knob of butter. This deepens the flavour and makes it taste rich and delicious.

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By now the fish will have poached so take it out carefully with a fish slice and let it cool enough so you can remove the skin and flake it into bits.

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And, when you peek under the tea towel,  the rice will be perfectly fluffy

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Your eggs will be cooled so peel and quarter them.

Now? Now you start to put everything together…… First, the rice gets stirred into the oniony mixture in the frying pan

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Then, if you have cream, stir in a couple of tablespoons of cream… or failing that, some mayonnaise. Not too much, just enough to smooth out the flavours of the curry powder and onion and rice

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Then, carefully (you don’t want to break the fish into shreds and you have, I know,  flaked it so carefully) fold the fish into the rice mix

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Then… add the eggs

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Chop the coriander leaves and scatter over the top

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Smell that……. maybe a quick squeeze of lemon juice to sharpen things up and then…. into a bowl

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Doesn’t that look delicious? I always chop a bit of chilli to scatter over the top – very finely chopped chilli, not too much, just enough to leave tiny red specks of heat in the occasional mouthful

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If you haven’t made it before… try it. Honest, it’s good.

A perfect brunch on a perfect day.

Chicken in cider casserole with apple and chive dumplings

I was wondering what to make for supper and looking round to see what we had when I spotted the last  Bramley apple in the fruit dish. My aunt has a huge tree in her garden so whenever I go to see her, I come away with the cooking apples.

Chicken, I thought. Chicken casserole and I’ll add the apple… and make the gravy with a bottle of cider! And maybe dumplings to go on top…. just the thing for a blustery day. So off I went to the butcher’s and came back with legs and thighs (my favourite bits of the chicken – so juicy and flavoursome) I got a leek, some sweet onions and a couple of carrots, too.

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First thing to do was brown the chicken in the casserole dish. If you are using a slow cooker, just brown them off in a frying pan. It won’t take long and it does make a difference. Besides it melts out some of the fat which is a good thing.

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While they are browning chop your vegetables. You of course can add whatever you fancy. Onion and leek are good as they sweeten over the cooking time and I am going for a sweetly savoury, rich and delicious casserole here, a soothing meal rather than a spicy one. Carrots look pretty, so they can go in!

Take the chicken out and add your vegetables, stirring them round gently so they pick up some of the brown and caremelised bits of the chicken that are stuck on the dish.

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Then lay your chicken bits on top the vegetables. I sprinkled some Knorr Granulated Bouillon over the chicken (much easier than cubes) as I needed some stock in there

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Then, pour in the Bulmer’s apple cider!  Look at it froth beautifully. That is going to go perfectly with the apple and make the stock taste delicious. The smell as it hits the hot dish is incredible

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I peeled the Bramley, cored and cut it into pieces and quartered some mushrooms. They went in on top of everything.

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And that was it….into a preheated oven at 160 degrees so it could bubble away this afternoon. A couple of hours at the most and it would be ready.

But I wanted this to be the perfect casserole. Dumplings are always a good move… light and tasty, floating on top of delicious gravy….

For them you need flour – I used 40 g of self raising  – and 20 g of beef suet. This will make 6 lovely little  dumplings, perfect for the two of us and with two of them left over so that a certain person can take some casserole for his lunch the following day. Double the quantity, I think, for more people.

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When I make dumplings, I often chop into the mix some herbs – maybe lemon zest and some thyme, or chives… and there I was staring at the chopping board where the peel from my Bramley lay…. why not, I wondered? I nibbled a bit of the peel – definitely sharp flavoured and appley. If they added just a hint of appleness to the savoury dumplings… well, that might just be considered a triumph!

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So I chopped the apple peel finely and chopped up some chives

 

I added some salt to the suet and flour and a tablespoon or so of  cold water… then stirred in the chopped chives and apple peel

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Look how the colour changes slightly as it comes together

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Then I rolled the dumpling mix into 6 little balls.Brisket, chcicken casserole and dumplings 032

Before you put the little morsels of dumpling loveliness into there, stir in, if you have any, a spoonful cream. Cream in a chicken gravy is perfect. The apple and cider sharpen it so it isn’t too rich and the mixture of it all together is just so delicious.

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Then, add the dumplings.   

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I pop them on top of the casserole (remembering to leave space for them to expand a bit) maybe half an hour before I am ready to serve it. If you are doing this in the slow cooker then just turn the heat up to high for the last half hour.

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Look at them… flecked with the green of the chives and the apple…

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And that, let me tell you, was delicious. The chicken was tender, the gravy was smooth, both sweet and savoury and the dumplings had a gorgeous taste of apple running through them. How inspired was I to think of adding the peel?

I think I am on to something with that!

Mayo… mmmmmmmayo

It’s always handy to have the makings of mayonnaise in the house. In just a few minutes you can have a lovely thick, tasty dressing that you can modify in all sorts of ways to match whatever you want to use it with.

 I made fish and couscous and wanted something to tie it all together. I know that Bear would have been happy with tomato sauce but I wanted something nice. Lemon mayo, I thought, would be just the thing. So….

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Two eggs were separated (the whites can go into something else tomorrow) and the yolks put into a jug.

Stir a sparse teaspoon of mustard (very, very sparse if you are using English mustard as that is hot, maybe just a touch… but I was using Dijon which is mild) into the yolk and blend it. Add a pinch of salt and then, if you are feeling energetic, whisk it fiercely. I stuck the balloon whisk on the end of my blender and whizzed away.

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You can see it start to thicken slightly and change colour a bit

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And then you trickle in some oil. Use a flavourless oil, like sunflower, rather than olive oil as that can make it taste just a bit too strong. I have saved the oil from jars of roasted peppers or sunblush tomatoes (you know how there’s always loads left and it seems such a waste to bin it) and used that before as an addition to the sunflower oil. That just gives it an extra taste dimension – useful if you are making it for a specific dish.

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Suddenly it thickens even more and the colour lightens…

I wanted a lemony mayonnaise to go with the fish so I added the juice of a lemon

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Whisk, whisk, whisk! Add more oil and maybe a couple of teaspoons of white wine vinegar. Taste it to see if you have the flaovouring right.

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You’d be surprised how much mayonnaise you can make if you keep adding the oil. In one of my favourite books, ‘ The Curious Cook’ Harold McGee experiments with just how much oil can be emulsified with just one yolk. Make as much as you need.. just keep whisking and adding the oil slowly.

You end up with a wonderfully thick, unctuous, deliciously flavoured mayonnaise. Less than ten minutes (I made it while the fish cooked) and you have something to be proud of. This was lemony and savoury and oh-so-right for that fish.

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In fact, it was so nice that the Bear went and got an extra spoonful and he’s not a mayonnaise lover. Mmmmmmmm…

Fish and crisps

Fish is brain food, or so people say.

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What could be better than a nice piece of fish, in a crispy crumb, baked to perfection?  We got some line caught cod as a treat and I set about making a crunchy covering for it.

I started to think about what to  do for the crispy crumb… breadcrumbs? Passe, my dear, so passe. Also, I have to admit, I didn’t have any bread to make crumbs from. So that ruled that out.

I did have cornmeal (polenta) and I did have a bag of crisps… well, Sunbites. They are wholemeal snacks that are crunchy and tasty. They would do. They would have to.

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I crushed them, inside the bag, so they were roughly crumbed and mixed the bits with a couple of tablespoons of cornmeal and a teaspoon of salt.

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On a plate, I roughly whisked, with a fork, a small egg and some milk.

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I put an oven tray, with a silicon sheet on, into the oven and set the temperature to 180 degrees. The tray needs to be hot when you put the fish on it so the bottom gets cooked as well, without being too soggy.

Drying the cod – or at least, patting it dry with kitchen roll – means that when you dip it in the eggy milk mixture, it gets a good coating…

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Which makes the crumb mixture stick to it. Put the fish onto the crumbs and pat them into the fish. It’s a bit sticky on the fingers but worth it, so don’t complain. I sprayed it with some oil spray so that the heat of the oven would crisp things up

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Doesn’t that look good? And it isn’t even cooked yet. Get it onto that hot oven tray and into the oven.

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15 to 20 minutes and it has crisped up to perfection. The fish flesh is brilliantly white and flakes perfectly.

I made some couscous flavoured with lemon zest and juice and some lemon and garlic mayonnaise to go with it

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What a lovely mouthful……

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There you go…. easy crispy coating made in seconds and twenty minutes in the oven and you have delicious fish… and crisps!

Like it? Then try it… and look, I have a like button!

Tomato and chilli little loaves

Making bread is quick and easy and doing it yourself means you can tailor it to make the perfect match to whatever you are cooking. Because I was making pumpkin soup for Halloween I thought that some tomato and chilli mini loaves would be just the ticket…. a hint of chilli to liven the bread up and some sun dried tomato to round out the flavour.

So… get your flour out – you will need 350g for 8 mini loaves.

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I had dried a chilli that was left over… oh, OK, I had forgotten about a chilli that was in the kitchen fruit bowl (no, I don’t know why it was there) anyway, it had dried beautifully. Waste not want not, I always say

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So. I cut a bit of it off and chopped it finely

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Put that with the flour in a bowl with a 7g sachet of yeast… or two scant teaspoons if you are using a packet.

Add a teaspoon of sugar, a teaspoon of salt, a couple of dessertspoons of oil and 200ml of warm water and mix well…. either by hand or by mixer

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Whizz that round and round until it comes together into a smooth dough (or knead together by hand until you get the same effect)

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While that is kneading, chop some sundried tomatoes

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and knead them into the dough on a well dusted board. Cover the dough with cling film and leave it to rise

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I bought some tiny loaf tins (I don’t know where but they are easily found) and after an hour the dough had risen nicely. As I had 8 little loaf tins, I cut the dough into 8 pieces – how about that for logic?

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Leave them to rise again and preheat the oven to 200 degrees.

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There they are going in and after about 15 minutes, out they came….

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Perfect little white loaves studded with bits of sundried tomato and the tiniest hint of chilli. Just right for that pumpkin soup…. mmmmmhmmmmmm…