Chicken with peppers and tomato

This is a popular dish all over Spain, but works equally well in the UK when the weather is a little colder or even on those rare days when it's warm and sunny!

Ingredients
4 tablespoons olive oil
3 skinless chicken legs
4 garlic cloves, crushed
2 onions, chopped finely
50g parma ham, sliced
2 yellow peppers, cored, deseeded and cut into thin strips
1 red pepper, cored, deseeded and cut into thin strips
3 400g cans chopped tomatoes
A sprig each of oregano and marjoram
2 bay leaves
Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Method
Heat the oil in a large casserole over a medium heat, add the chicken, garlic and onion and fry until the chicken is golden on each sid, this will take about 10 minutes.

Add the ham and peppers and cook for a further 5 minutes so the peppers are softened but not coloured.

Add the tomatoes, herbs and bay leaves and bring to a boil.  Reduce the heat to minimum, cover and simmer for 1-1.5 hours, by which time the chicken will be falling off the bone.

Skim off as much of the fat as you can from the top of the dish, season to taste with salt and pepper and server with boiled rice or a rice salad of peas, broad beans, chopped spring onion and cucumber.

Gazpacho

I've been making Delia's version of gazpacho for some time and it's pretty good, but I find it a little acidic for my taste, so I've used the recipe from my "Fresh Spanish" cookbook this time with a few variations.  So far, it's tasting very good, but I'll need to see what it's like when it's chilled.

In the meantime, here's the recipe...

Ingredients

For the soup

1.4 kg Vine ripened tomatoes, as ripe as you can get them

2 slices of white bread

1 red pepper, cored and de seeded

4 cloves garlic, crushed and peeled

3 tablespoons red wine vinegar

3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

½ teaspoon Tabasco sauce

1 level teaspoon paprika

1 teaspoon salt

½ teaspoon ground black pepper

To serve

⅓ cucumber

½ red onion

2 slices bread

1 tablespoon finely chopped red pepper

Method

Cut a cross in the bottom of the tomatoes, then put them in a bowl and pour over boiling water, soak for 1 minute and then drain and cover in cold water.  Peel the skin off the tomatoes, cut them in half and deseed them, putting the seeds into a sieve suspended over a bowl to catch the juice.

Put the tomatoes into the food processor or blender and add the rest of the ingredients except the bread.  Make sure you get as much juice from the tomato seeds as you can, then soak the bread slices in the juice and add this to the blender.  You may need to do this in to stages depending in the size of the blender or food processor.  Put the soup into a large bowl and chill for at least 4 hours.

Make the croutons by cutting the bread into 5mm cubes and fry in hot olive oil until golden.  Peel the red onion and chop finely.  Peel and chop the cucumber into fine dice.  Serve in bowls with the croutons, onion, cucumber and red pepper piled into the middle of each bowl.  It tastes even better with some freshly make ciabatta.

Armenian kebabs

If you want a quick and easy meal for after work and are prepared to plan ahead, this is the one for you!   Alternatively, prepare it in advance before you go out and leave it to marinade in the fridge to cook when you get back from the pub or club and save yourself the cost of a kebab :-) You can also cook these on the barbie and they'll taste even better, but make sure you leave the barbie to cool slightly before cooking them otherwise they'll burn on the outside.

You need to marinade the meat, ideally overnight, so be warned!  Rowena is especially keen on shish kebabs so she'll love this I'm sure.  It's not too expensive either, especially if you make it by buying lamb chops and cutting them up into pieces - this cost me a tenner for three people.

Ingredients
1 decent size lamb chop per person, fat and bone cut off and chopped into 2cm cubes
150ml red wine
50ml oil - olive oil by preference
1 small teaspoon ground allspice
1/2 teaspoon salt

To serve
Lettuce or Salad leaves - I prefer Little Gem lettuces
1 medium tomato
A few slices of cucumber
A few slices of raw onion
1 green chilli (optional)
Half a lemon or lemon juice
1 pitta bread, toasted
Salt and Pepper to taste

Method
First, mix all the marinade ingredients together in a non-metallic bowl and add the diced lamb.  Cover and put in the fridge ideally overnight but for at least a few hours.

Next day, turn the grill on full then thread the meat cubes onto skewers (I use metal skewers but you can use wood if you prefer) then place them under the grill, adding a little of the marinade over the top to keep the meat moist.  If you're using the chilli, top, tail and deseed it and cut in n half lengthways and add it to the grill pan with a little of the marinade.  Cook the meat, turning regularly, until it is slightly browned on all sides - it takes bout 10-15 mins with my grill.

While the meat is cooking, prep all the salad. Shred the lettuce, quarter the lemon, slice the tomtato, cucumber and onion and slit the pitta bread across the long side to make a pocket.

Once the meat is cooked, put it on the plate and while it's resting for a couple of minutes lightly toast one side of the pitta.  I prefer serving it all separately so you can mix and match what you put in your kebab but if you prefer you can assemble them in advance, it's up to you.

Finally, serve with some chilli sauce - there's my recipe here if you want to make your own!

Hot and spicy tofu

Many years ago we used to visit the Penang Satay House restaurant (if my memory serves correctly) on Turnpike Lane, Woodgreen, London.  We had many a lovely Thai meal there and the satay was fantastic, but one dish that was fantastic and I've never found a recipe for it was a Tofu dish that was marinaded in a hot and spicy sauce.  This is my attempt to recreate the dish - long years may have dimmed my memory, but I thin this is pretty good!

Ingredients

1 350g pack firm soy bean tofu

Sechuan pepper

Salt

plain flour

salt

oil for frying

1 dessertspoon light soy sauce

1 dessertspoon dark soy sauce

1 dessertspoon fish sauce

1 dessertspoon chinkiang vinegar

2 teaspoons chilli oil

½ teaspoon honey

Fresh coriander (optional)

Method

Chop the tofu into 1cm slices and carefully coat the slices with a little salt, a good few grindings of sechuan pepper and a coating of a little flour.  Heat the oil in a pan until it is hot, then fry the tofu on both sides until golden brown.

Combine the soy sauces, fish sauce, vinegar, chilli oil and honey together and once the tofu is golden, chop it into bite size pieces and add it to the mixture.  Adjust for taste with chilli and fish sauce and serve as is with a little chopped coriander for garnish or use it to make some Pad Thai.

Asian style turkey burgers with rice and guacamole

This was from a website originally, but I've made a few changes to the recipe as the ingredients left the burgers rather bland.  We had this as a midweek meal and it was really quick to prepare and cook and perfect for a Tuesday in our house where we are all doing different acivities.

Ingredients

500g turkey mince
75g breadcrumbs
30g packet of fresh coriander
1 fresh green chilli
1 large red onion
juice of 1½ limes
1½ teaspoons salt
2 teaspoons Worcester sauce

To serve

Plain boiled rice
Avocado and cucumber guacamole
Lime cut into thin slices
Pepperdew peppers sliced into strips
Chopped fresh coriander

Method

Make the avocado and cucumber guacamole first using the linked recipe, put it into a bowl, cover with cling film and push the film onto the surface before sealing to exclude all the air so the guacamole doesn't go brown.

Now make the burgers.  Peel and chop the onion and chilli as finely as you can, then wash and chop the coriander leaves making sure you leave a few for garnish.  Add the Worcester sauce, breadcrumbs, onion, coriander, chilli, lime juice, salt and pepper to a large bowl and mix together well.  If you're cooking these later, cover with cling film and keep in the 'fridge.

Set the rice to boil and while it's cooking fry the burgers.  I like to cook them in a non stick griddle pan with a little olive oil.  Cooke them on a medium heat until they are browned on each side, then leave them to rest while you plate up.

Drain the rice and serve in a mould to add a little interest to the dish, add a couple of spoonfuls of guacamole then pile the burgers next to them.  Decorate with the thinly sliced lime, coriander and pepperdew peppers and enjoy!

A favourite Sunday lunch, slow roasted pork belly

Of all the roasts, this is probably my favourite.  I know it's very fatty, but slow roasting reduces the fat by quite a bit and leaves to meat tasty and melting in the mouth.  Most of the cooking fat is simply thrown away, but it's essential to use some of the cooking juices for the flavour.  Best of all is the wonderful crackling :-)

Ingredients

2-3 ribs of pork belly per person depending on appetite, skin scored

1 tablespoon cumin seeds

1 teaspoon black peppercorns

½ teaspoon of salt

5 cloves of garlic

5 or 7 sprigs of fresh thyme

1 large carrot

1 large or 2 small onions

Salt and pepper to taste

1 large old potato per person

1 small brown onion per person

600ml chicken stock

125ml white wine

A handful of curly kale per person, tough central stalk removed
2 large teaspoons cornflour

Method

Preheat the oven to 200°C.  Dry fry the cumin seeds and black peppercorns in a non stick pan over  medium heat until they release the flavour.

Add the seeds to a mortar with the salt. Pick the leaves off the thyme and add them to the mortar, then crush the garlic cloves and add these too.  Grind the mix together until it's a paste.

Peel the carrot and the onion, chop into medium chunks and add them to a roasting tray so you can rest the meat on them.

Prepare the meat by washing and drying thoroughly, then coat the underside of the meat with the herb and spice mixture and add it to the roasting tray skin side up on top of the onion and carrot.  Now add a liberal amount of salt to the skin, cover the meat with aluminium foil and place in the oven.

Peel the potatoes and onions and slice them thickly (1 cm slices is perfect) and add them to a second roasting tray.  At this stage I add a couple of cloves of garlic sliced thinly but this is optional.  Add a sprinkle of salt and a good few grindings of black pepper and mix the potatoes, onion and garlic together.  Pour the chicken stock over the mixture and set to one side.

After 30 minutes, take the meat out of the oven and check to see if the carrots and onions are starting to brown, if not then put the meat back and leave for another 10 minutes. When the carrot and onion is browning, turn the heat down to 150°C, take the meat off and scrape the cumin and peppercorn mix off the bottom into the roasting tray.  Now place the meat on top of the potato and onion mix and put it back in the oven for 3 hours.

Meanwhile, make the sauce.  Drain the fat from the roasting pan keeping the juices. De glaze the roasting pan with the white wine to get off as much of the roasting juices as possible - you may need to add a little water to this. After 1½ hours of cooking, decant off about 200ml of the stock and roasting juice mixture from the oven  and add this to the sauce.  Turn the heat to medium under the sauce and start reducing the sauce to concentrate the flavour.  As you cook more vegetables, add 100-200ml of the cooking water to the sauce when you drain them to add more flavour.

When the 3 hours is up, take the meat out of the oven, put it on a warmed plate and cover with foil to rest it.  At this point, if the potatoes and onions still have a lot of liquid, add it to the sauce leaving about ½cm in the bottom of the tin.  The potato and onion mixture should be nicely browned on top, if it isn't turn the oven up to maximum and put the mix on the top shelf to crisp it off.

Cut the skin off the meat and brown it under a hot grill to make the crackling.  I find the best results are to put the grill pan on the bottom of the shelf leaving a 10cm gap between the element and the skin otherwise the crackling will burn in some parts but won't be cooked in others.

Meanwhile cook the kale for no more than 2 minutes in boiling water, drain and keep warm. Mix the cornflour with a little water and add this to the sauce to thicken, season to taste and keep the sauce warm.

Carve the pork and plate up, add a spoonful or two of the potato and onion mixture, a little cracking and some kale and serve with the sauce and a glass or wine.  I prefer white with pork, but read works equally well!