cookbooks

Greenfeast spring, summer by Nigel Slater

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Cookbook Challenge Part 10

I’ve taken a break from blogging over the school summer holidays, although I’ve still been posting on Instagram. I have done a bit of cooking though, in between a few trips away so I have some cookbook challenges to write about. I can’t believe I’m on part ten – that’s ten cookbooks pulled off the shelf and used instead of sticking to the same meals.

It occurred to me that as this is supposed to be a Spring and Summer book I should hurry up and post this while we’re still (just) in August. Here’s the book – it’s a very pretty colour although quite difficult to take a photo that includes the title.

You can just about read the title down the side. There is a section in the back of the book which explains the brushstrokes used on the cover and throughout the book and also a couple of paragraphs about the type. It’s interesting to think about all the work that goes into designing a book like this. There are plenty of tempting pictures of all the recipes and it took me a while to decide what to make.

As I was cooking for all four of us I wanted something quite substantial, so I chose a warm dish plus a salad for the main course.

Freekeh, Peaches, Feta with Tomato, Beans, Bread. You really need to read the recipe and look at the pictures to understand what the dishes will actually be like, but the Freekeh is served warm with baked cheese and peaches and the other dish is a tomato and bread salad with olives and crunchy beans.

Freekeh is a young green wheat which has been roasted and polished. You cook it in a similar way to rice. We had never tried it before, but all of us liked it and preferred it to bulgur wheat or cous cous. It was delicious with the salty cheese and sweet peaches. I used herbs from the garden so I’m not sure if I had quite as much as the recipe says, but it seemed like a lot. I would definitely have this again. It doesn’t really look as good as it tasted. I think the feta fell apart more than it was supposed to, but that meant it mixed in with the grains easily.

The tomato salad used more oil than I would usually add to a salad as you had to drizzle the bread with oil before toasting, as well as making a dressing that the pices of bread were dipped in. It was worth it though, the oil balanced out the tangy tomatoes and vinegar and even though this made a large quantity it disappeared very quickly.

I wanted a light dessert after all the strong flavours, so I chose a really simple dish with only three ingredients

It’s a watermelon and Prosecco granita, sweetened with elderflower cordial. For once I remembered to start this early in the day so it had time to freeze, although it probably would have been even better if I’d left it overnight as it was still quite slushy in the middle of the tub.

The watermelon was a pretty colour in the processor

This was very refreshing on a warm evening. It’s contains alcohol of course, so my sons just had a little bit and ate the rest of the watermelon. The recipe suggests using pink grapefruit juice if you don’t want to use Prosecco.

I’m really enjoying seeing all the vegetarian cookbooks that have come out recently and I think we’re going to be using this one regularly. Although it’s a spring and summer book there are quite a few mushroom recipes that would work well into autumn, as well as some curries that would be good at any time of year. I’m looking forward to the autumn, winter edition that comes out in October – I’m sure I’ll want to add that to my collection.

Easy Meals by Rachel Allen

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Cookbook Challenge Part 8

Sometimes you do just need an easy meal. This book was in my Mum’s kitchen until a few years ago when she passed it on to us. We were still trying to get used to feeding children in the short window of time available between collecting them from nursery and them being so tired they throw a tantrum and then fall asleep in their dinner.

This book promises to help, although I would prefer to enjoy my busy life rather than just “get through” it, but never mind.

I decided to make quesadillas since no-one in my family has ever complained about those. There are three options for fillings in the book and I picked mango with Gruyere, which doesn’t sound particularly Mexican but I thought it would be an interesting combination to try.

I used a bag of ready grated cheese to make it even easier, so the most difficult thing I needed to do was chop and peel the mango. I could have bought that ready chopped too, but those packs are not always as sweet and juicy as I would like.

I know it’s not the best presentation, but hopefully you get the idea of the gooey melted cheese and slightly caramelised mango. It was a really tasty combination, like cheese and chutney, but if I made this again I would use two chilies as my family like a bit of heat.

Dessert was an Easy Lemon cake. This was an all in one recipe that you make in the food processor and then ice with a simple lemon juice and sugar icing.

I think I made the icing a bit too runny! I added the yellow sprinkles just because I had some and otherwise it would have just been a white cake on a white plate. It still doesn’t look that photogenic.

It looked a bit better when it was sliced up. The cake had a good lemon flavour, but was more dense that I would have liked. I think it was overmixed, as I followed the instructions to process for about a minute or until the batter came together. My new processor is so powerful that it was ready in a few seconds, so I should have stopped there. My sons thought it was good though, they are just happy to have cake.

This book was great when our sons were younger and is fine if you are looking for some quick and basic meals. I think stronger flavours are more popular in our house these days.

I haven’t decided which book to cook from next week. I may go back in time again, maybe much further back – we’ll see!

Easter Weekend Cooking

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Sirocco by Sabrina Ghayour

Cookbook challenge part 7

This weekend we were away visiting family for the Easter holiday, which meant I was cooking for the next cookbook challenge in my Mother-in -Law’s kitchen down in Wiltshire. As there were going to be a few of the family around over the weekend, I wanted to make a selection of dishes that we could share on the Saturday and still have some leftovers for Sunday lunch. It seemed like a good opportunity to use this book which I have been wanting to try for a while as it just looks so colourful.

Before we set off on Good Friday, there was time to bake some hot cross buns for breakfast. They came out rather rustic looking, but were still tasty.

Saturday was a beautiful hot sunny day, so we went into Devizes to watch a few people setting off for the Devizes to Westminster canoe race.

And now, on to the cookbook challenge.

I knew I wanted to make these stuffed baby aubergines as soon as I saw the recipe, but I also knew my sons were never going to eat this, or aubergines in any form in fact. Now that I also had another vegetable loving adult to cook for it seemed a lot more worthwhile.

This recipe is very simple, but the tahini really adds extra depth of flavour and makes it more special. One son tried a tiny piece and then his brother took one look at his face and declined! They were very popular with the rest of us though – no leftovers for Easter Sunday.

I needed something a bit more substantial that everyone would definitely eat, so puff pastry seemed like a reliable choice and these Za’atar and Goats’ Cheese puffs were easy but effective. If I had been able to get ready rolled pastry they would have been even easier, but I had to roll mine out – it didn’t take too long but was more difficult to make the puffs all the same size.

They look slightly burnt in the picture, but that’s where the cheese got a bit too well toasted on top and they didn’t taste burnt at all. We had these warm and everyone thought they were delicious. The aromatic za’atar went really well with the cheese too, so it’s worth getting a tin of this.

Next I needed a couple of salads. The first one was apple, sumac, red onion and pomegranate salad. I used sumac before when I cooked from the Ottolenghi Simple book and since then I’ve been sprinkling it on all sorts of things to give a tangy flavour.

This refreshing fruity salad was a great contrast for the rich pastry and aubergine dishes. It was a large portion so there were lefotovers for Sunday lunch (the citrus juice stopped the apple from turning brown). It even looks like the picture in the book doesn’t it?

The second salad was a supposed to be made from Maftoul (Palestinian couscous), but I couldn’t find that anywhere so I used giant wholemeal couscous which I think is very similar, but not identical.

The recipe also included black garlic which I’ve never tried before. This is what it looks like.


It’s been aged in special conditions until it turns black and sticky and it has a sweet mild flavour which is very different to fresh garlic. As it’s mild you usually need to use the whole bulb in a recipe which does make it quite expensive – this bulb cost me about £4. The recipe also included dried sour cherries which seem to be in short supply at the moment as I couldn’t get them in Manchester (or in Devizes, but that is quite a small place), I used ordinary dried cherries which were not too sweet, but not exactly sour either.

This made a huge portion with plenty of Sunday lunch leftovers. All the family liked it, except our youngest niece and nephew but they are not known for their adventurous tastes. I would have this again, although with all the dried fruit, black garlic and fresh herbs it is probably the most expensive salad I’ve ever made.

Here is the full selection of dishes.

Of course there had to be a dessert and we all love a drizzle cake so I made this one which included orange, lime and lemon.

It had a good zesty flavour and a crunchy citrus sugar topping as promised. The ground almonds give this a good moist tender texture.

This was all quite fun to cook and not too difficult even in an unfamiliar kitchen. There was a lot of citrus fruit involved, which made everything taste light and fresh but also meant a lot of zesting. I bought a new mini grater / zester especially for this meal and the cooking would have been a little arduous without it. We enjoyed having a selection of different flavours and textures and this was a good meal for a warm sunny evening.

Cookbook Challenge Part 4: Nigella Express

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This Saturday we were busy visiting the University of Bolton. It’s hard to believe my eldest son is looking at universities already! We didn’t get home until 5pm, so I had already planned a quick menu.

I decided to make “Curry in a Hurry” which certainly sounded appropriate. I actually wanted to make a prawn and mango curry – I’ve had it before and it’s delicious, however my sons have an irrational dislike of sweet potato and butternut squash which are key ingredients in that recipe, so I tried this one instead.

This is a Thai green curry and is supposed to use chicken. I don’t eat chicken, so I replaced some of it with Quorn chunks, which are OK and at least everyone in the family will eat them. I also used another meat replacement: jackfruit – often used as a vegan alternative to pulled pork. You can’t buy it fresh here, it comes in a tin like this:

I used forks to shred the pieces of fruit and it did vaguely resemble shredded chicken. It doesn’t taste meaty at all, just slightly acidic and salty from the brine it’s canned in, but it soaks up flavours from whatever sauce it’s cooked in.

Apart from the extra task of shredding jackfruit that I gave myself, this recipe is really easy as it uses bought curry paste and frozen vegetables. It’s more of a suggestion than a recipe in fact, but it is still useful to have reminders of shortcuts like using chopped spring onions instead of peeling and chopping a big onion and using wok oil to add extra flavour with no effort.

It was very tasty and the coconut milk made it rich and filling. It went down well and the jackfruit was quite successful with no complaints about the unusual bits in the curry.

Curry in a hurry served with basmati rice
And Riesling which is supposed to pair well with Thai food

Dessert was a cherry clafoutis. I’ve had clafoutis before in restaurants, but never made it myself. It usually takes quite a long time to cook, but this is a shortcut version with a short ingredients list and short cooking time.

All I had to do was mix up a quick batter in the Kenwood Chef and stir in some ready prepared cherries. I added Kirsch as suggested, mainly because I’ve never used it before. Let me know if you have any suggestions for using up the rest of the bottle! It was worth using though, it soaked into the cherries and made the whole dessert taste a bit more luxurious,

I overbaked this a bit. I keep forgetting that I should reduce the temperature for my fan oven and I forgot to check on it while I was cooking the curry. Still, you live and learn, which was one of the aims of this challenge and it tasted good anyway. We had it with single cream, although actually I think creme fraiche would have been better.

(Update: we had the cold leftovers with cream the next day and that tasted even better.)

Not a bad meal at all considering it only took about an hour to make.