Tag Archives: recipes

Venetian Spiced Roast Chicken & Apples

21 Tuesday Jan 2025

Posted by in Main Courses

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This recipe was inspired by a description of Venice as a historical trading port and how its cuisine has been influence by the goods and people passing through it throughout the ages. Arab traders brought a taste for fruit cooked with meat and Marco Polo introduced eastern spices not just to Venice, but from there into Western Europe. I thought to combine these two influences to spice up a Sunday roast.

For 4 portions

medium sized free range chicken cut into about 12 pieces

1 teaspoon black peppercorns

1/2 teaspoon sea salt

3 garlic cloves

2 cloves

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg

good pinch of saffron

zest and juice of half a lemon and half an orange

2 tart eating apples

Using a pestle and mortar grind the salt, peppercorns and cloves together to a powder

Add the ground cinnamon and nutmeg, mix well.

Chop the garlic roughly and add to the spices, crush to a paste, then add the saffron, orange and lemon zest and juice.

Mix well to a paste and add the the chicken portions mixing well to ensure that the chicken is well covered with the marinade.

Leave for an hour to let flavours to enter and tenderise the chicken.

Roast the chicken pieces in a hot oven 180 fan or 200C for twenty minutes.

Cut the apples into wedges and remove the cores.

Take the chicken out of the oven and turn each piece, add the apple pieces and return to the oven for another twenty minutes.

If you want to roast potatoes with the chicken, have them peeled, cut into the size you like and seasoned. Twenty minutes before the chicken needs to go in the oven start roasting the potatoes in olive oil. After the twenty minutes, take the tray out of the oven and turn the potatoes over. Add the chicken and proceed as above

Enjoy!

Salmon Trout Parcels

20 Monday Jan 2025

Posted by in Fish, Food for One, Main Courses, Techniques

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Salmón trout fillets steamed on a bed of black rice and flavoured with fennel, leeks, garlic and fresh red chillis. This is a great dinner party dish as everything is prepared in advance and each portion individually parcelled up in tin foil ready to be baked in the oven. I suppose this is more of an assemblage than a recipe. Of course it’s a method of cooking that allows for variations of flavourings, I’ve used ginger, lemongrass and chilli, with coconut milk as the sauce and rice noodles as the bed to lay the fish on. I’ll write that style out in more detail at the end of this basic recipe.

So you need

fillets of salmon trout

cooked rice, I used black rice which apart from being tastier than white, was a great colour contrast to the trout

tender vegetables that will cook in 15 minutes, for example broccoli florets, mange toute peas, spinach, asparagus. I used the first two for this recipe.

well flavoured fish stock, 3 tablespoons per serving

finely chopped fresh red chilli

fennel fronds

finely sliced leek

finely chopped spring onion

finely chopped parsley

olive oil

Cut a large oblong piece of aluminium foil for each serving and oil the inside.

Place on one half of the oblong a portion of rice, on this a fillet of trout and the vegetables to each side of the fillet, then the seasonings, a sprig of fennel, pinch of chopped parsley, the sliced leek and chilli, and finally the spring onion

Spoon over 3-4 tablespoons of the fish stock and season everything well with salt and freshly ground black pepper.

Fold the aluminium sheet over the fish and seal the sides by neatly folding over the foil twice.

Lay the parcels on a baking sheet and bake at 180C for 20 minutes.

Simply serve each parcel on a plate and let yourself and your guests open them at the table and enjoy firstly the wonderful aromas of the fish and it’s herbs before the delicate taste of the dish.

As I said earlier there are many variations of flavours and ingredients than can be used with this method of cooking.

Any lean fillet or steak of fish can be used, salmon, hake, cod, swordfish.
The base can be a purée of potatoes or other root vegetables, with these being quite moist adjust down the amount of stock or sauce that is spooned over the dish.
Flat rice noodles work very well. I soak them in cold water for 15 minutes, drain them, and then pour over boiling water and leave them 2 minutes before draining again and using them in this dish. I allow 40 grams dry noodles per person.

To follow the oriental them of the rice noodles I flavour the fish with slivers of garlic, ginger, chilli and lemongrass and use coconut milk as the liquid.

Have fun trying your own combinations

Parsnip & Tomato Bake

29 Sunday Dec 2024

Posted by in Main Courses, Starters, Vegetable Dishes, Vegetarian

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Creamy, warming and savoury and a little sweet, this bake is a meal on its own which I used to cook regularly in the British winter before moving to Spain. Here you didn’t see them as they clearly don’t do well in this hot dryness, the odd time you would find them they would be woody and small, great for adding flavour to a dish but not much more.

So I was surprised to spot some plump ones in the supermarket and decided to revisit this recipe from my dim and distant past. Thin sliced of parsnips layered with slices of fresh tomatoes and ricotta style cheese and seasoned with the usual salt and pepper and a touch touch of sweetness, a sprinkling of brown sugar, or for me today some quince jelly as a have jars of it in my store. I know it might sound too much putting sugar with parsnips and tomatoes that are both sweet, but trust me it really adds to the richness of the dish.

For 2 portions

2 large parsnips

3 large tomatoes

ricotta or similar cheese

salt and freshly ground black pepper

brown sugar

olive oil

Grated pecorino or Parmesan

Slice the parsnips and tomatoes into fairly thin rounds.

Using an ovenproof dish start with a layer of parsnips, then scatter over the ricotta cheese, then season with the salt, pepper and sugar, then add a layer of the sliced tomatoes.

Continue layering in this order until the dish is full ending with a layer of parsnips and seasonings.

Brush over with olive oil and cover with tin foil. Bake at 150C for 1 hour 30 minutes. Remove the foil, sprinkle generously with grated pecorino or Parmesan and put back in the oven for another 10 minutes or so until the cheese is a bubbling golden brown.

Enjoy!

Endives & Butter Beans

25 Wednesday Dec 2024

Posted by in Vegan, Vegetable Dishes, Vegetarian

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I see that it’s been far too long since I’ve posted anything, it’s not that I haven’t cooked and it’s not that I haven’t photographed some good recipes and scribbled down how I made them, I’ve just not got to the final typing and posting bit. I’m about to make amends.

The Italians have a way of taking a few, usually seasonal, ingredients and preparing them in a quite simple way to make dishes that are so tasty. This is one of those dishes.
The type of endive it uses is the large frilly one also known as frizze, in Spanish Escarole Rizada. The blanched inner parts are fabulous in salads, while the outer greener leaves can be cooked. They have a slight bitterness so need to be balanced with something soft in flavour like butter beans.

For 2 portions

1 small onion – cut in half and sliced thinly

3 garlic cloves – finely chopped

fresh red chilli – finely chopped

1 tablespoon olive oil

outer leaves of a large endive – washed well and drained

300 grams cooked butter beans – they can be tinned or from a jar.

salt and freshly ground black pepper

In a large frying pan heat the olive oil over a low heat.

Add the onions, garlic and chilli. I haven’t given an amount for the chilli as they vary so much in strength, for this you just want to know it’s there without it being strong, so add the chilli slowly if you are unsure.

Cover and cook slowly until the onions are soft.

Cut the endive into bite sized pieces and add to the pan. You might have to do this in two lots and let the first half of the endive cook down before adding the rest.

Cover and braise for five minutes. Stir and continue braising for another five minutes.

Season well and add the beans, mixing them in to the endive. Let cook a couple of minutes for the flavours to infuse.

Serve and enjoy