End of Summer Spring Clean!

Here are a few pics that I’ve cooked recently, with no particular link, except that I’ve cooked them! I’ve decided to blog them altogether, as they might get forgotten soon with all the new books due out, and the corresponding new pictures. These are all worth a mention though…

Firstly there are a couple from David Lebovitz’s The Perfect Scoop.

Matled Milk Ice Cream, very rich but so good!

Orange Popsicle Ice Cream with wine poached apricots from Crazy Water Pickled Lemons by Diana hendry

and again with Dorie Greenspan’s chocolate sauce from Baking From My Home To Yours. I liked the second pairing best, but this is no surprise with my chocolate and orange tendancy!

Prawn Fra Diavlo
A yummy light pasta dish from Giada De Laurentiis’s Everyday Pasta. It should have been lobster, but prawns are more readily available here.

Mushroom, Leek and Tarragon Risotto
This one is a vegetarian dish from The 30 Minute Cook by Nigel Slater. I thought it was an unexpected pairing (or I suppose that would be trilogy?) but it was really inspired and really good.

Rigatoni and Asparagus au Gratin
Delia Smith’s Summer Collection is the home of this recipe, which spins out a small amount of asparagus into a tasty and delicious supper. The recipe is here as well as in the book.

Pea and Coriander Soup, this soup in real life is a real vivid just-cooked-pea-green, I just could not get it to come through in the pictures I took...

Lastly one of my most favourite fast soups from Rachel Allen and Rachel’s Favourite Food. My little one loves this soup. I think she wanted initially because Primrose on Fifi and The Flowertots made pea soup, but now she asks for it because she likes it so much. If you haven’t a clue about that last bit don’t worry – kiddies TV programme! Anyhow here is the recipe for this gorgeous soup.

Pea and Coriander Soup
From Rachel’s Favourite Food by Rachel Allen. I have varied this only slightly by omitting a chilli from the recipe, and I’ve also made it with parsley in place of the coriander - which was also lovely.

50g butter
150g onion, chopped
2 garlic cloves, crushed or chopped
½ tsp salt and pepper, or to taste
850ml chicken stock or vegetable stock
450g fresh or frozen peas
2 tbsp chopped coriander
Melt the butter in a large saucepan, and add the onion, garlic and chilli. Cover with a greaseproof paper and a lid, and sweat over a low heat for 3 or 4 minutes, or until the onions are soft. Pour in the stock, and bring the soup to the boil. Tip in the peas and boil rapidly, without the lid, for about 2 or 3 minutes, or until the peas are tender. Add the coriander to the soup, and blend in a liquidiser until smooth.

Baked Cannelloni and Coconut Lime Cake

Here are couple more recipes from Delia, one with a minor tinker and one with a bigger one! I’ll do the savoury first.

Baked Cannelloni. I have always loved cannelloni, I’m not even sure exactly what its appeal is to me, but it’s got something! This recipe is Delia Smith’s from Delia's How To Cook Book 1, I didn’t buy either of the three How To Cook Books to learn how too cook, I bought them as many Delia fans here did to gain some new recipes from her. It’s a very comforting dish. It’s been quite chilly here for 6 out of the last 7 days, so when I did the shopping I thought it’d be ok to make something in the oven.

I’ve changed the meat filling mixture by using slices of chorizo instead of mortadella sausage slices, as the first time I made this dish this was what I used – I just couldn’t find mortadella. I have subsequently found it, but I really liked it with the chorizo, so left it as I’d made it. Also Delia uses 1 talespoon of chopped fresh sage in the meat mixture, and I dislike sage to the point that I just can’t eat something if there is sage in it, so I missed it out. Delia’s amazing trick that she passes on here is that instead of using dried cannelloni tubes, she uses fresh lasagne sheets that you cut in half and roll round little sausages of filling, genius!

It’s not the quickest recipe, but it’s a good kitchen potter, which is cooking at its most enjoyable for me. You make a processor meat filling mixture which is also a meatball mixture from another recipe in the book. Halve lasagne sheets, make little sausages of meat and wrap the lasagne sheet around it. Next you make a bechamel sauce and grate and cube some cheese - Parmesan and mozzarella respectively. Pour the sauce over the waiting cannelloni fingers and sprinkle with the cheese and bake. I made up the filled pasta, sauce and prepared the cheese at lunch time then it was just a quick assembly and into the oven. Delicious, savoury, comforting, mmmmm.

Baked Cannelloni
A variation of a recipe in Delia's How to Cook Book One by Delia Smith

8 fresh Lasagne sheets(weighing about 6oz/175g)
5oz (150g) Mozarella, diced
1 ½ oz (40g) Parmesan Cheese, finely grated
For the filling:
8 oz (225 g) minced pork
70g pack of sliced Chorizo
2 level tablespoons finely grated Parmesan
2 tablespoons chopped parsley 3 oz (75 g) white bread without crusts, soaked in 2 tablespoons milk
1 large egg
a little nutmeg
salt and pepper
For the béchamel sauce:
1 pint milk
2oz (50g butter)
1/1/4 oz (35g) plain flour
1 bay leaf
good grating nutmeg
2 ½ fl oz (65ml) double (heavy)cream
salt and pepper

You will also need a baking dish with a base measurement of 7 x 9 inches (18 x 23 cm), 2 inches (5 cm) deep, buttered. (mine is 9 x 12 and these is a bit of space left).
First make the filling: chop the chorizo slices in the processor then add in all the rest of the filling ingredients into the bowl of a food processor and blend everything on a low speed until thoroughly combined. If you don't have a processor, chop everything as finely as possible with a sharp knife and blend it with a fork. Wrap in clingfilm and chill for about 30 minutes to firm up.
Next make the sauce by placing the milk, butter, flour, bay leaf, nutmeg and seasonings into a medium-sized saucepan over a medium heat, then, whisking all the time, slowly bring it up to simmering point until the sauce has thickened. Then turn the heat down to its lowest setting and let the sauce simmer for about 5 minutes, then remove the bay leaf, stir in the cream, taste to check the seasoning, cover and leave aside.
Now pre-heat the oven to gas mark 4, 350°F (180°C), then cut the lasagne sheets in half so that you have 16 pieces. Next divide the meat mixture in half and then each half into 8, then lightly roll each of these into a sausage shape about 3 inches (7.5 cm) long. Place each one on to a piece of lasagne and roll it up, starting from one of the shorter edges. As you do this, arrange them in the baking dish with the join underneath – what you should have is two rows neatly fitting together lengthways in the dish. Now pour the sauce over and scatter the Mozzarella cubes here and there. Finally, scatter the Parmesan over the top and place the dish on the centre shelf of the oven to bake for 40 minutes, by which time it should be golden brown and bubbling. Then remove it from the oven and let it settle for about 10 minutes before serving. Finally, sprinkle a little extra Parmesan over.

Coconut Lime Cake

This is a lovely summery cake, and comes from Delia Smith’s Summer Collection. It’s really fresh and zingy and the lime and coconut adds a different flavour to a cake often made with lemon (I’m not knocking a lemon cake – like them too!). There is lime in the cake and the filling, and both dessicated coconut and coconut milk power in the cake. My only very small tinker here is that I leave of the lime zest as a decoration (not keen on the texture), favouring some pretty summery icing flowers instead! It could be a cake to go with a cup of something or a pudding cake, it’s good both ways.

If you would like the recipe for the cake here is a link to it on Delia’s website: Coconut Lime Cake.

Fried Halloumi Cheese with Lime and Caper Vinaigrette

Fried Halloumi Cheese with Lime and Caper Vinaigrette

Firstly I must apologies for my lack of posts recently, it’s just a combination of the end of term and a real lack of time. It’s the actual holidays now, so I’m going to try and post one a week, twice if the going is really good. I guess most of us are in the same boat time wise at this time of year, seasonal hazard!

Back to this post though, I recently saw a vegetable lasagne that Freya (Writing at the Kitchen Table) had made, and it reminded me that I like to make Delia (Smith’s) roasted vegetable lasagne in the summer time. Actually there are a good number of recipes from Delia Smith's Summer Collection by Delia Smith that I love to make, it was a real pioneering book for summer food. It’s testament to how great a book it is that the recipes haven’t dated, and are just as fresh now as they were in 1993 when it was first published.

The following recipe is one of our favourites and Keith requested it the other day. It’s lovely in the summer time, but I sometimes make it as a Sunday supper if we have eaten a traditional Sunday lunch at lunchtime in the winter. Yesterday we went for a drive during the day, it was a really enjoyable day, sunny, but not blazing with a nice breeze, with a stop along the way for some ice cream and the beach for little one. We went to a hotel for Sunday lunch, and it was lovely, I like Sunday lunch in the summer time – as long as it’s not my oven on making the house a furnace!

So when we came home this is what I made for supper, accompanied by some warm pita bread. I usually make the dressing as per the book, but sadly my limes had gone a bit brown and shrunken, so I used lemon juice instead. If you like the salty sharp taste of halloumi and gutsy salad dressings this one is for you. I have fried the cheese in the past without the flour coating, but it’s better with it – more crusty and delicious!

I won’t type out the recipe, as Deila’s Summer book is a multi million bestseller, so I’m guessing most bloggers and readers will have one! Expect to see more from The Summer Collection soon – it’s the season you know!

Edit: Here is a link for the recipe from Delia's Website.