Stuffed Roasted Tomatoes

One cold autumn afternoon and I was craving something warm, hearty and not too heavy. This immediately caught my eye, the rich tomato flavour, mixed with the herbs and breadcrumbs made the perfect dish and definitely hit the spot!

So simple to do, but so tasty these little treats will work wonders for a starter if you are cooking for friends as they take 30 minutes in the oven so you can literally pop them in as your guests arrive.


Ingredients:

Large round tomatoes (2 per person - I made six)
12 Semi-dried black olives (the wrinkly kind)
2 Anchovy filets (preferably in olive oil)
2 large cloves of garlic, minced
1 small onion finely chopped
a small handful of parsley, basil and mint
Olive oil
Fresh breadcrumbs made by tearing a large chunk of crusty bread into shreds (you could use packet ones but its better to keep the rough texture)
a small handful of parsley, basil and mint (roughly chopped)

Method:

Pre heat oven to 160ºC. Start by chopping the tops off the tomatoes about 1cm down, then using a spoon scoop the inner flesh and seeds out, leaving a nice shell to stuff. Sprinkle in a little salt and then place tomatoes upside down in a colander to drain any excess water. Next (de-stone) and chop up the olives into small chunks and cut the anchovies (or use capers if you want a veggie/vegan version) and mix this along with the garlic, onion, herbs and breadcrumbs. Next using about 1tbsp of the breadcrumb mix stuff each of the tomatoes leaving a nice dome of crumbs. Then place on a greased or lined baking sheet, drizzle with the oil and bake for 30 minutes. Serve with a little rocket salad (I added a little goats cheese and balsamic) and enjoy!

Celeriac and Pear Soup

Whip up this warming, fragrant soup in next to no time. After my adventures with stuffed squash I thought I would try out another new vegetable. Celeriac. Looks like a turnip, tastes quite a lot like celery but more subtle and definitely more versatile: boil, mash, bake, fry or turn into a tasty, healthy soup. Pear is a surprisingly delicious fruity accompaniment. This is a slightly modified BBC food recipe, and is suitable for most allergy –afflicted peeps to eat.

Ingredients

• A little oil
• 1 celeriac
• 4 medium pear
• I large onion
• 2 garlic cloves
• 3cm piece of ginger
• 2 garlic cloves
• 1litre vegetable stock
• A few fresh chives

A few little cooking steps




1) Heat the oil in a large saucepan, chop the onion, garlic and ginger and lightly sauté

2) Peel and chop the celeriac and add to the pan and fry briefly












3) Peel and chop the pears ...
















...and add to the pan with the stock and simmer until the celeriac is nice and soft (around 15-20 minutes, depending on how shall you chop the pieces in the first place)










4) Leave to cool for a few minutes then liquidise the soup in a blender
















5) Return briefly to pan, heating gently through










6) Serve garnished with the chopped chives

Sweet Dumpling Squash with Lemon-Herb Rice

Following on from stuffed peppers and continuing in the stuffing mode... Stuffed Sweet Dumplings. I’d never eaten these little beauties before. A friend pointed them out and recommended that I give them a go. A definite thumbs up. They are visually pleasing and the taste is equally sweet. Likely to be swiftly devoured! This is a nice and easy vegan recipe that will serve two hungry bellies in a heart manner.
Ingredients

• 2 Sweet Dumpling Squash
• 1 medium onion
• 1-2 garlic cloves
• 300g rice (I used basmati but any rice will do)
• 1 lemon
• 1 Tbsp soy sauce
• A few generous sprigs of fresh herbs ( I used parsley, thyme and rosemary)
• 50g pine nuts (or a few more if you prefer)
• Salt and pepper (to taste)

A few simple cooking steps

• Preheat the oven to 200ºC






• Cook the rice















• Cut the two squash in half and remove the seeds and strings












• Sprinkle the squash with salt and pepper













• Place squash face-down on baking sheet and drizzle with oil














• Bake until tender (around half an hour)










• While the squash are baking: chop the onions and garlic and sauté

• Add the rice, 3Tbsp water, the juice and zest of the lemon, the soy sauce, pine nuts the herbs (chopped) and salt and pepper (to taste)











• Stir the stuffing until well mixed (add a little more water if necessary)







• When the squash are cooked through, place them upright and fill with the stuffing. Cover with foil and return to oven until heated through (around 15 minutes)


• Enjoy!

Stuffed peppers

So the blog ground to a halt, arrested, cut short, brought to a standstill. And while Andrew has the excellent excuse of having recently moved house, I have no excuse at all. It’s not like I stopped cooking, baking, making... and I even took plenty of foody photos along the way. Once the sneaky lag in writing steps in it’s hard to overcome. Soooo. Tonight I prepared myself, did all my procrastinating early in the evening, and now am tucked up in my dressing gown, with a bedtime drink and am bringing the blog back to life.

And I do have lots of new recipes I’ve been trying out that I’d love to share.

I’ve made this stuffed peppers recipe a few times now and it’s one of the best vegan meals I’ve ever eaten. I recently had to cater for a mix of people including: veggie, reluctant to eat a meal with no meat, dairy intolerant and gluten intolerant and this turned out to be quite a winner. No leftovers.

It’s not a very quick dinner to prepare, but it’s really not difficult to get right. I hope you enjoy it as much as we did.

Ingredients

• 8-10 sweet peppers
• olive oil for frying
• 1 onion, diced
  
• 2 garlic cloves, finely sliced or crushed
• 175g mushrooms, sliced
• 250g rice
• 90g red lentils
• 450ml vegetable stock
• 60g pine nuts
• several generous sprigs of fresh parsley, finely chopped

Basic cooking steps





Heat a little oil in a large pan and gently cook the onion, garlic and mushrooms until soft

(I've also used shallots in place of onions which turned out pretty good)









Add the rice and lentils and a little extra oil and stir


Pour in stock and season with salt and pepper

Bring to the boil and simmer gently until the rice is cooked. Add a little more water if required. This will take around 15 minutes but will depend on the type of rice you decide to use









While the stuffing cooks, prepare the peppers: carefully cut the tops off and keep to one side, rinse out the cores and seeds

Preheat the oven to 180°C









Stir in the pine nuts and parsley and check for taste - if you like it a little spicier, add a dash of cayenne pepper










Divide the stuffing between the peppers (depending on the size of the peppers you may have a little stuffing left over...but this is pretty yummy to eat just as it is!)

Stand the peppers upright in a casserole dish and place the tops back on

Pour a little cold water into the bottom of the dish and bake for 30-40 minutes until peppers are nicely tender




Serve with a green veg. Peas work well!

Broccoli and Tomato Pasta

Saturday afternoon, still slightly drunk from friday night (yes - apparently I can't drink that much) and craving something healther than the previous days melted cheese fest, I opened the fridge to find.... not a lot. So after pulling a head of broccoli, a few tomatoes and a mountain of garlic from the fridge there was only one option, pasta! This created a really tasty lunch for 2 hungry people and took less than 30 minutes.

Ingredients:

1 small head of broccoli
2 ripe tomatoes
2 small cloves of garlic
a small handful of parsley
butter/olive oil
pasta
juice of 1/2 a lemon
black pepper
salt

Method:

Put on a large pot of water to boil. Pick small florets from the head of broccoli and steam for 3-5 minutes over the water (use a sieve or colander over the pot of boiling water). Keep the water boiling after steaming the broccoli, salt and add your choice of pasta and cook as the packet instructs. Meanwhile finely slice the garlic cloves and add to a cold saucepan (big enough for all the ingredients) with a slug of olive oil and a large knob of butter. Put over a low heat to infuse the oil and cook the garlic. Chop the tomatoes into small chunks and tear the parsley leaves from the stems.

Once the garlic is starting to fry add the steamed broccoli and turn the heat to a medium-high, and sauté, tossing the garlic and broccoli together every few minutes. Next add the tomatoes and toss everything together. Just as the tomatoes begin to soften (around 3 mins) add half a cup of the pasta water and a good pinch of salt and lots of freshly ground black pepper, let cook for 2 minutes then add another knob of butter (or glug of oil), the fresh parsley and cook for one minute more. Drain and add the pasta and toss everything together.

Serve with a few sprigs of parsley and a drizzle of chilli oil.

Banana Soy Shake

This is another great way to use up ripe bananas. It’s quick and easy to make and goes well with a home-made cookie or cake.

Icy, yummy goodness!

• Chop one ripe banana into food processer
• Pour soya milk on top until just covered
• Add 2 Tbsp. plain soya yogurt, 1 tsp. cinnamon, 5 ice-cubes, 1 tsp. honey
• Whisk until the ice has broken up (the clanking noise of the ice begins to disappear)
• Drink straight away!

Spontaneous Crisp Lettuce

Charles Dudley Warner knew how to appreciate a good lettuce. He once commented: “Lettuce is like conversation; it must be fresh and crisp, so sparkling that you scarcely notice the bitter in it”

Perhaps the best way to lay your hands on a perfect lettuce head is to grow your own... and if that fails nab one from your brother’s vegetable patch (or if you’ve been a v. good girl he might just give you one to take home with you, covered in mud and a slug or two: earthy!)

So there I was last week with my vibrant fresh lettuce, which once gently washed and patted dry, required eating. So what to eat with, to make the most of my lettuce? Rooting around in my kitchen, I came up with this refreshing little quick and easy little salad recipe.

This will serve one for a light main course or two for a starter.

Ingredients

• A few handfuls of crisp lettuce
• 1 carrot (peeled)
• 1 apple (peeled)
• 1 handful of sultanas
• 1 handful of dried cranberries
• 1 handful of walnuts
• 2 Tbs of plain soya yogurt
• 1 garlic clove
• A few springs of fresh parsley
• ¼ tsp of Dijon mustard
• Freshly ground black pepper (to taste)




Five simple salad-making steps

1. Wash your lettuce, pat dry with kitchen roll, break into pieces and arrange on serving plate
2. Slice carrot, chop apple into chunks and combine in a mixing bowl with the sultanas, cranberries and walnuts
3. In a small bowl combine well the soya yogurt, chopped up garlic, parsley, mustard and pepper
4. Pour dressing over the carrot mix and toss well
5. Spoon the carrot mix over the lettuce and serve immediately

Melissa Salad

This tasty salad is a perfect accompaniment for those hot days when you want refreshing summer dishes. The name comes from the use of the Orange balm leaves (from the melissa plant family) which I discovered on one of many trips to a garden centre with the other half. I didn't realise it was orange balm until I did a little research at home, it was the scent from crushing a leaf between my fingers that persuaded me to add it to the overflowing basket! It's citrus scent is amazing and I decided to add the orange chunks to complement their favour. The best part about this salad is that herbs like basil and orange balm are very easy to grow at home in the U.K, and even in our Barcelona window boxes, so there is no excuse not to have a little herb garden of your own!
Ok, I have jumped down from my herb growing soapbox, but anyway try the salad, even if you cant get your hands on the orange balm maybe throw in a little mint or fresh oregano!

 

Ingredients:                                        Serves 2

• 2 large, ripe tomatoes
• 1/2 medium onion
• 1 juicy orange (taken straight from the fridge)
• a handful of basil leaves
• 8 orange balm leaves
• salt
• pepper
• olive oil

  

Cut the tomatoes in half and then half again and slice into 1cm slices. Thinly slice the onion (as fine as you can) and top and tail the orange then cut away the peel and pith, slice into 2 cm slices and chop into small chunks. Tear any large basil leaves in half, you still want to keep them fairly large for maximum taste.

Mix all of the above ingredients together and season with salt (rock salt if you have it) then drizzle a generous amount of olive oil. Now finely slice/shred the orange balm leaves (using a knife) and scatter over the top along with a good pinch of ground pepper. Leave the salad to marinate for a minimum of 10 minutes (to allow the juice from the orange, tomatoes and oil and salt mix together) and then serve at room temp.

Serve with rice and beef kofta kebabs.

Garlic Bread with a Twist

When I made the Creamy Fusilli last week I decided to be a little extravagant and put some garlic bread together to have with it.

This is a really flexible little recipe that has potential to be dairy-free, gluten free or even vegan

Firstly, you need to make sure you buy a lovely fresh baguette (or for gluten-busters/vegan the best quality gluten-free/vegan bread you can lay your hands on). Decent bread definitely makes a difference! I used a fresh organic and it was super-delicious.

Next, cut the baguette in half and position on a baking tray (or if you are using a sliced loaf, position single slices on the tray).
Pre-heat the oven to 180ºC

Now for the garlic-butter topping! Use a good quality soya or sunflower dairy-free spread. The Pure range works well for this, although I’m sure there must be decent equivalents outside of the U.K.

The quantity you need will depend on how big your baguette is, but don’t worry if you don’t make quite enough... it’s so quick and easy to mix a little extra.

I used 150g soya spread mixed vigorously with 2 crushed garlic cloves... and then mixed in the magic ingredient – a handful of freshly chopped parsley. Hmmmm.

Spread a thick layer on top of the bread and bake for around 10 minutes, or until the edges begin to brown.




And now for a luxury cheesy option (use either a mild lactose-free goat’s cheese or a vegan cheese alternative). Grate a generous layer of cheese on top of the bread and bake for a further 5 minutes.



Great with any pasta dish! Feel free to use more garlic... though be prepared to be ooozing it for a day or two. Hmmm... might be worth it!