Easy Everyday by Jessica Merchant

 

This new book Easy Everyday by Jessica Merchant - her fourth, came out a few weeks ago. It’s very good, does what it says on the cover! There are some nights that come suppertime I’m so exhausted I’ve no energy left. The kind of nights when I want a home made meal, not takeout, not the rock hard things I’ve frozen for such an occasion, and forgotten to take them out of the freezer, (lol) but something freshly made and hopefully including veggies! 

This book has been so useful, in these times of need, and I’ve not made anything I’d not like to make again.  There are breakfasts, lunches, dinners, sides, snacks, sweet treats and even some cocktails and mocktails. So really Jessica has you covered for all times of day. I like how it’s written, the headers, the great doable photography, and the little tips given in the recipes to let you know which parts you can make ahead, like a sauce or dressing from the first chapter in the book.  When I’ve not been thoroughly exhausted I’ve made a quick and easy dinner or lunch, and that has been a bonus too.

These are some of the dishes I’ve made, also did bbq meatballs and a tortellini Caprese salad which I forgot to take pictures of, which were also good.

Chicken tortellini soup with tomatoes. The recipe uses fire roasted tomatoes, which are not the easiest to come by or an economical choice here in the UK, so I used tinned cherry tomatoes as one of the tins of tomatoes (plus a tin of normal ones) and added in a pinch of chilli flakes and a handful of chopped olives. It was so comforting and delicious. 

The easiest fancy puff pastry quiche. Herby bacon and asparagus quiche, no pre baking! I served with Branson Pickle! 

Caprese cottage cheese toasts. We had this one as a Sunday supper after a lunch out. It was pretty, light, tasty and just right. I’m not the biggest fan of cottage cheese, but it was good here.

Cranberry jalapeño chicken salad. I used dried cranberries (in place of dried cherries) as don’t keep dried cherries on hand. This is a really lovely chicken salad, making it again this week.

Tomato lentil lunch soup. The recipe is the book is fire roasted lentil lunch soup, I used a tin of cherry tomatoes. Also I only used only one of the two tins of lentils in the recipe, and we thought it was a great little lunch. The picture in the book also has seasoned sourdough croutons - which look do look yummy, and I’ll add them on a colder day. 🙂

Mini Egg Cookie Bars

 

Then just like that it’s May again!  I’m using up my Mini Eggs chocolate bags, and knew I wanted to make this one. It’s from Jane’s Patisserie website / blog. Obviously, they’d be fab for Easter, but as I gave up making chocolate things for Lent, so my Easter makes and bakes are happening now. I can’t tell you how hard I found that, there was a point mid-way through I thought  I just couldn’t do it! Then I read something online and it said the mid point of any project is the hardest, and the point at which we are most likely to give up. Whether or not that is true it was a very timely article and gave me a mental boost to power on through,  and I made it to the end. 

The recipe is  Here Mini Egg Cookie Bars and definitely worth a go.  This tin of goodies is heading for the exam revisers, a little sweet treat for frazzled brains! We had one still warm, and it’s new to me, but a warm mini egg is a thing of deep joy! I reckon my daughter may micro each bar for a few second before eating them. 😊

Greek Yoghurt and Passion Fruit Puddings Recipe

This didn’t really start out meaning to be what it is, but I made them, then looked at the recipe afterwards, and realised the error of my ways!

I’ve been making things from Prue Leith’s new book - Life’s Too Short to Stuff a Mushroom. It’s a lovely book, as I’ll post more about it soon. She has a breakfast section, and there are a couple of pages on ‘Yoghurt Made Posh’ which starts with making your own yoghurt.  There is also a bit that says 50/50 yoghurt and double cream makes a good pudding. 

I didn’t really read either bit properly before doing this pudding. Which is very unlike me, however I’ve landed up with this pudding, which is luscious, so I’ll pass it onto you. 

Perhaps you’ve added sugar to yoghurt before, but I haven’t, we usually drizzle with maple syrup or honey along with berries and granola. It makes it Greek yoghurt so good!  It’s also very easy, an actual 10 minute pudding, 5 if you are faster than me! It’s barely a recipe, but sometimes barely recipes become regulars. 😊

Greek Yoghurt and Passion Fruit Puddings

Adapted from Life’s Too Short to Stuff a Mushroom by Prue Leith

Per person

200g Greek Yoghurt

1 tablespoon and 1 teaspoon caster sugar

2 Passion Fruits, ripe and crinkly

I used margarita cocktail glasses (which have never seen an actual margarita, only puddings!). 

Stir the sugar into the yoghurt. Spoon in a third of the yoghurt mix, then one halved and scooped out passion fruit. Follow with the remaining two thirds of the yoghurt mix and top with the remaining scooped out passion fruit.  

Lemon Brownies from Broma Bakery

 

Sarah Fennel of Broma Bakery posted this recipe on her Instagram page last week. I thought, I’ve got all the ingredients, I’m making them. Easy to make, bake and eat! 

They are called brownies, and I do get why they are called this, there is no chocolate, but texture wise they are a bit fudge and chewy. They are a delightful little bar. The icing is also so, so good!   Recipe link is here on Broma Bakery website. They’d be lovely for Easter time or Spring time too, in fact anytime! 

Jane’s Patisserie Easy Favourites by Jane Dunn

I love Jane Dunn’s recipes, her books are great, her website / blog is great and her recipes are so lovely. This book is her fourth one, Jane’s Patisserie Easy Favourites.  I’ve started cooking from this one in Lent, so I’ve made a couple of savoury recipes and one sweet.  If it wasn’t Lent, there would definitely be something chocolate-y like chocolate orange cookie dough desserts, mint chocolate brownies or banana bread Blondies. There is also a beautiful sticky ginger loaf cake, speculoos fudge and banoffee trifle that all look divine - to mention but a few. 

Like her previous book, this one is well laid out, beautifully pictured with easy to follow recipes. As well as the usual sweet chapters, there are a couple of savoury ones too. Which I like to see, as a) I’m nosey and like to see what bakers cook and b) supper always needs to be made and inspiration is welcome.

The things I’ve made are Baked Gnocchi, which was lovely, sort of like a Caprese salad except hot for winter and bolstered with gnocchi. Definitely doable on an exhausted night.

Cheesy Ham and Leek bake, this is a bit like a pie filling but instead of mash or pastry on top there is cubed Brie! Another quick and easy supper. My hubby was thrilled with there being lots of leeks, one of his favourite vegetables. 

Finally on the sweet side, I made Berry Crumble Pots. 

I doubled the recipe so used a small pink baking dish (a new fave I recently bought from Anthropologie!) instead of pots or ramekins.

I really like a berry crumble and this blueberry raspberry one was very good. I know blueberries are good for us, but I really struggle with them raw, cooked however they are delicious.  

Super Italian by Giada De Laurentiis

 

So pleased to see a new Giada De Laurentiis cookbook. I love Super Italian, the food is craveable. It’s definitely healthier book, but also definitely not a Diet  book - it’s La Dolce Vita! 

The previous healthy one from a few years ago, now looking backwards makes total sense, healing clean detox food, that Giada needed then to right her digestion and health. Whereas now, in a new chapter of her life, healed, she has more flow and is cooking more intuitively again. The recipes all look like something you’d want to eat. It’s just a real benefit that that they are indulgent with great ingredients. 

Age wise I’m similar to Giada, and honestly I’m having problems with my tummy and digestion too. All stemming from not looking after myself properly. I look after and care for my family, it’s never really been even a side thought to do the same for me! Giada isn’t preachy in any way, but she tells her story and I can certainly identify with the things she describes, and now that this book is out I’m more inclined to look back to the previous one too.

The first two recipes I’ve tried are her Sicilian pesto which is then used in Sicilian pesto with prawns (shrimp) both pesto and pasta were delicious. Good, satisfying, but not heavy. 

It’s been a while since Giada has written a new book, and she is back with a cracker! Really looking forward to cooking so many recipes from this new book and picking up some of Giada’s healthy tips and tricks along the way. 

Sweet Tooth by Sarah Fennel

 Hello hello, long time no see! I’m still here, still a cook book obsessive and still cooking. I buy fewer books now, which is a matter of space, pickiness and money too to some extent. Good books are more expensive than they used to be, unless you are as good and famous as Mary Berry, in which case the cost still seems reasonable due to economies of scale.  I digress though, I’ve missed writing about and sharing good cookery books. So just like that I thought I’d start once again.  

So where to start? Well, this one came out last year, from Broma Bakery website founder Sarah Fennel. I’ve followed her for years online, and always thought she should indeed have a book. So it came to be and Sweet Tooth was born. It’s a brilliant baking book. It has everything you’d want including a Holiday / Christmas chapter - joy of joys! 

I made the Cosmic Cookies, my daughter loves a soft cookie, and these were just perfect. Super chocolate-y with yummy ganache topping  and I sprinkled with hearts and dried raspberry pieces.  In the book Sarah used multi coloured candy coated chocolate, that I’ve not seen in the UK, but then Cosmic Brownies are not a thing here either! Have a look at Sarah’s picture if you buy or have the book, the picture is gorgeous. It’s definitely what drew me in to make this recipe. 

Picnic Sandwiches and Krispie Treats

 In the time when I wasn’t blogging, I discovered Teighan Gerard and her Half Baked Harvest website.  Her recipes are so good. She has a couple of excellent cookbooks, which I’ll get to in another post, but even if you don’t have her books, her website is wonderful. She is the blog I follow every post, and have done for coming up two years now. 

Anyhow, I’ve made a couple of her website recipes recently. The first Picnic Style Brie and Procuitto Sandwiches is a really treaty lunch. I swapped in ham and salami for procuitto, but really just use what you like. Perked up our Monday lunch time. 🙂

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The second is one I’ve been meaning to try for ages, Chocolate Covered Brown Butter Krispie Treats (also has peanut butter and pretzels in them!). A fab little no-bake recipe, that is so cute with the pretzels on top. Yum 😋 

Chocolate and Amaretti Custards

 This one was an unplanned pudding. It was one of those nights, earlier this week when I was just plain craving chocolate.  I’m trying to limit my chocolate consumption, so I only keep some in the house. These little cups though, are made with cocoa, which I always have. 

Chocolate and amaretti custards comes from A Table in Venice by Skye McAlpine. This is the first book by Skye, and I resisted it for a while. Did I really need another Italian cookbook?! Once I saw it in a bookshop though, it was a done deal! I did, and do need it. 

It’s not a Summer book, but I tend to cook from it in the Summertime. This is probably influenced by the one time I have been to Venice being in the hot Summer. My husband has been back with work in December and it was perishing cold, but my memories are different.  I can still remember coming from the airport in a boat and this wall of heat just hitting us in the face.  By the afternoon, I was simply melting. I can recall sitting on a seat of some sort outside, and looking at the stone pavement, thinking, that’ll be cool for the soles of my feet.  Except Venice is not Scotland, and the stones were extremely hot! Note to self: never do that again. 

It was a day trip from Aberdeen that our local paper ran, probably about 28 years ago. In a time before global warming and worrying about plane travel was really on the table. 

Anyhow, these were the perfect chocolate-y quick to make puddings.  I’ve also made the tortellini in broth this week too, and although I didn’t take a picture, it was lovely too. 

Sticky Toffee Cupcakes

 These sticky toffee cupcakes are my husband’s absolute favourite. They are my slight variation on the ones in The Hummingbird Bakery Cake Days. In the normal run of things, I decorate them with chopped dates, as I tend towards things being decorated in a way that lets you know what they are. However, I was going to make these for Father’s Day for him, so bought a box and edible rice paper pansies and leaves.  Just getting round to making them now, but I though I might as well use the bits and pieces I bought.  Thinking the rest of the flower decorations will be pretty on a cheesecake or something.   

Rose Eton Mess

 This one isn’t from a book, but from The Sunday Times Magazine. 

A couple of weeks ago, Skye McAlpine’s column was about edible flowers. When I saw her recipe for strawberry and rose Eton mess, it had to be done. I’d actually meant to make it for Father’s Day for my husband, but we were too full, so saved the berries for tonight.  I made half the quantity and only used 300ml of cream. Perfect for the 3 of us.  

Rigatoni with Mascarpone and Pancetta

 A Table For friends by Skye McAlpine was one of my most favourite books that was published last year.  It’s just such a joy to read - and cook and plan from. As is her previous book A Table in Venice. 

Tonight we had Skye’s rigatoni with mascarpone and pancetta. It’s like an easy take on carbonara, and as she says it’s very comforting. I’ve made one of her no-churn ice creams today as well, but it’s in the freezer setting, as I didn’t get my act together in enough time! More on that another day. 

Ina’s Baked Raclette

 Ina Garten’s new cookbook last year was called Modern Comfort Food.  It’s a brilliant book, I love what she has done with the favourites of a nation. Actually, wider than a nation, several nations. 

I’ve made a number of recipes, and this one is her baked raclette, well sort of, what I made is definitely inspired by Ina’s recipe. Where I live I can’t always get raclette or reblochon.  Earlier this year I had my first trip to Waitrose, which is 2-3 hours from me. We were there, in Edinburgh, to view a car and there was a Waitrose close by! What luck!! I bought a number of cheeses especially, that I would not normally (be able to) buy. Anyhow, there, in all it’s glory was some reblochon, which I have used before in tartifilette.  However, it’s definitely a winter dish, and it’s June, so I used it in Ina’s Baked raclette. Also changing out her chorizo for a sprinkling of cooked sliced ham, which I already had. It worked well, lightened it up for a Summer lunch.  I’ll definitely try her actual recipe with chorizo next time I can lay my hands on the cheese. 

Tomato and Cucumber Salad with Capers and Feta

 To me, this is Greek Salad by another name.  Love to eat it when the days are warm.  We had it for lunch with some Italian salami and pimento stuffed olives, garlic bread too. An actual summery feast! 

This recipe is from Milk Street Tuesday Nights Mediterranean by Christopher Kimball. Only change I made was to add a touch of honey to the dressing, primarily to make the vinegar soaked onions more digestible, as although I love vinegar, I’m not sure it loves me back! 

Lemon and Garlic Chicken

 In 2018 Donal Skehan came out with a new book called Meals in Minutes. It’s a great inspiring book too. 

I found myself in a ‘lost my cooking mojo’ round about that time, and for a good while before that too, after the passing of my Mother. Donal’s enthusiasm for cooking is infectious and it was this book that made me want to cook again. Not that I hadn’t been cooking, just hadn’t enjoyed it much at that particular time in my life. For that I’ll always be thankful to Donal and his lovely family, who are great fun to follow on Instagram. 

Anyhow, back to tonight’s supper, lemon and garlic chicken with couscous salad and hummus. The latter two are cheats ingredients, as they are bought, just leaving you to butterfly chicken breasts, then cooking them in garlic butter and finish off with lemon juice. It’s a lovely recipe, hubby and I both liked it a lot. Definitely keeping this in mind for the hot days of summer, you know the ones where it’s too hot to do anything, but the family still needs fed! 

Celebration Trifle

 This is my new favourite trifle. It’s from Simple Comforts by Mary Berry. Celebration trifle has a ring to it, doesn’t it? I made it first not long after the book came out, then again as a double sized one for Christmas Day last year.  

Now, in Summer, here it is again! The fruits are fresh raspberries and tinned pears, a really good combination. The only change I make to the recipe is I miss off toasted almonds from the topping and use shaved chocolate instead. The business! 

Milk Street Pasta alla Silana

 A new book for me a couple of days ago was Milk Street Tuesday Nights Mediterranean by Christopher Kimball and team Milk Street.  It’s a cracking book.  So many great ideas for any cook who likes interesting meals during the week. 

First make, last night was this, pasta alla Silana.  Pasta, tomato sauce, a little bacon and salami plus onions, chilli and basil. 

PW Mini Meatloaves and Roasted Broccolini

Mini meatloaves from The Pioneer Woman Cooks, Come and Get It by Ree Drummond. The recipe in the book is for turkey mince, I subbed in pork mince and it worked well. I need to try Ree’s meatloaf from her first book... one of these days. 

On the side is broccolini roasted with olive oil, seasoning and garlic, then spritzed with lemon before serving. This one is from the same book. I have really struggled with broccolini, and haven’t tried it for a few months. So this was really it’s last chance in my kitchen, and -hurray- it was delicious. Thank goodness I was willing to try it one last time! Which won’t be the last now I’ve found a way we like to eat it! 

PW Thai Chicken Wraps

We had these Thai chicken wraps for supper, and they were very good. The marinade / sauce for both the chicken and the satay sauce are both just stir together numbers, so super easy. From The Pioneer Woman Cooks, Come and Get It by Ree Drummond. 

Pioneer Woman Apple Dumplings

Apple dumplings from The Pioneer Woman Cooks,  Come and Get it. 🍏 Apples stuffed with raisins, pecans, sugar and cinnamon. Wrapped in puff pastry then glazed with a buttery sweet syrup when baked!