Food #3

Beef Bourguignon

I tried to make a Bourguignon. I failed again. I don't know why I can't get this right but mine always tastes rubbish. After a lot of tweaking with stock, gravy granules and cornflour I ended up with a pretty yummy beef stew instead. You can find the recipe here. Hopefully you can do a better job than I did. I also added pastry. Because well why wouldn't you?

Quinoa Salad

I think Quinoa is amazing if you don't have much food in and need something quick and tasty for lunch. I tend to just cook the Quinoa in some stock and then throw in whatever I have laying about in the fridge. I just added some toasted pine nuts, left over chicken and sun-dried tomatoes here. Quick, healthy and tasty! My spell checker keeps telling me that Quinoa must be spelled with a capital Q. This seems odd to me. But I'm just going to go with it.

Healthy Houmous

If I snack then I try to do it healthily. So there's always avocados, smoked salmon and houmous in my fridge. All quite high in fat but really good for you as long as you don't eat the whole bowl/packet/fruit in one sitting. Not that I've ever done that *cough*. Don't worry though - I am far from holier than thou. We have a cupboard designed specifically to hold all manner of unhealthy junk food like chocolate, biscuits and crisps. And it has taken quite a battering from me this week. 

Smoked Salmon Pate

One of Ava's favourite foods is smoked fish. Her favourite dinner is smoked haddock with mash and peas and she'll steal that oatcake with smoked mackerel pate right out of your hand if you're not careful. After buying said pate for ages we've realised that we are so much cheaper just making it ourselves. So every couple of weeks I make up a big batch of pate for the fridge. All you need is your choice of smoked fish, cream cheese, horseradish, garlic (I put garlic in everything) and some lemon juice. 

Gok Wan's Twice Cooked Pork Belly

I have heard nothing but praise for this recipe and had some pork belly in the fridge that was crying out for some slow cooking, but this just didn't work for me. The meat was lovely and tender and crunchy on the outside but the actual sauce lacked any depth. It was in dire need of sugar (not in the recipe) and there wasn't enough sauce to coat the noodles making the whole thing very dry. I found this disappointing. However, don't be put off as everyone else seems to love it and I may have cooked it wrong. Recipe here if you want to give it a try.

Eggs In Purgatory

This is a great breakfast or brunch dish if you want something different and aren't scared of a bit of chilli in the mornings. There's lots of recipes out there but I like Nigella's version. Awesome served with soldiers. The bread variety, not the armed forces.

Scrambled Eggs with Avocado

Speaking of breakfast, this is an amazing combo. Eggs and avocado just work so well together. But they are nothing without some good rock salt. Preferably Maldon Smoked Seasalt. And a few splashes of Worcestershire. Oh and maybe put some cream cheese through the eggs. I could go on.....

Jamie O's Southern Sausage Stew

This stew is amazing. In fact I can't believe it took me so long to get round to trying it. I love a good sausage stew and before this the Hairy Bikers version won hands down. But this is my new favourite. Serve with brown rice if you are being good. But if not then this needs to be eaten with some really creamy, buttery mash or a big wedge of sourdough bread. Yum!