Roast Portabellos with Taleggio, Puy lentils and Asparagus

Mmmm Taleggio. One of my favourite cheeses... so melty and great with so many things. I set out to make this a meat free meal but then I found some smokey bacon in the fridge and it was game over. Smokey bacon and Taleggio together, as I like to say a lot in the kitchen are so banging! You of course use a 1/2 tsp of smoked paprika if you weren't as much of a bacon fan as I am and then it would be vegetarian friendly.

Mushrooms and Taleggio are also a delicious match, so during my yoga class this evening I thought this up. I always seem to plan my dinner when I should be concentrating on something else!  

Roast Portabellos with Taleggio, Puy lentils and Asparagus

1 large onion, finely sliced

35g butter

2 rashers of smokey bacon, chopped (Optional)

1/2 a 400g tin of chopped tomatoes (You could probably use a whole tin if you didn't have some to use up)

250g puy lentils

1 bay leaf

1 cup water or stock

4 large portabellos

4 sprigs of thyme

olive oil

70g Taleggio, sliced into 4 

handful of parsley

70g-100g baby spinach

Zest of half a lemon

1 bunch a asparagus

Start by getting your lentils on to cook. In a small pot cover them with plenty of water and add the bay leaf. Bring to the boil and simmer for 20 or so minutes or until just tender. Strain and briefly rinse. Put a pot of water back on for cooking your asparagus.

Place your Portabellos on a lined baking tray and drizzle with olive oil, thyme leaves and flaky salt and black pepper and roast in a 200 degree oven for 5 or so minutes. Place the Taleggio on top and switch the oven to grill. Leave them aside until you are ready to serve.

Heat a pan and add the butter, onion and bacon and cook slowly with a pinch of salt until the onions are soft and sweet. Add the strained lentils, tomatoes and 1 cup of hot water and cook until the lentils are tender and most of the water as evaporated. Season and add the baby spinach, chopped parsley and the lemon zest.

Now to finish everything off... Place the mushrooms under the grill and melt the cheese and let it caramelise. Place your asparagus into salted boiling water and cook for 2 minutes or until they are done to your liking.

Plate up the lentils, place the asparagus on top and finish with the cheesy mushrooms and if you like things to look pretty then sprinkle on some basil leaves from your garden. Yum!

The left over lentils, if you have any would be pretty delicious with a poached egg on top the next day.

Stephanie Alexander App

For all of those who love Stephanie Alexander check out her new app available from the Apple App Store. I love Stephanie Alexander and was super excited to see that she had a cooking and recipe app!The app is based on her best selling cookbook The Cook's Companion. It has all the same recipes and tip bits as the book. It also has a tab with each recipe so that you can add your own notes.Now when I searched for the app I discovered that it was free! I thought wow this is way too good to be true! And it was. The app is free to download but when you go into the app everything is in sections. For example, pasta and noodles, basics and equipment, vegetables and herbs etc. The first section, pasta and noodles, is free to access and use. However, you have to individually pay to access each of the other sections. They range in price from 99c for the basics and equipment section, to $9.49 for the vegetables and herbs section. So to get all the sections it can add up pretty quickly.Having said that it is a really good app. I find the iphone has too small a screen to read recipes off but if you had an ipad it would work really well. However, if you are like me and think that you can remember your shopping list and then get to the supermarket and realise that the shopping list has slipped your mind, its very handy having the recipe on your phone to refer back to the ingredients list.

Flourless Orange Cake with Syrup

The thing that I hate the most is wasting quality produce. So every weekend I go through the fruit bowl and pick out all the fruit that is nearing its 'time to go in the compost' date. I then google for a cake recipe that has the fruit I have picked out in the recipe. This way we have a cake to eat with lunch for the week and we don't waste any fruit. This is how the above orange cake came to be in our cake tin, and, boy was it a good one.
Usually my partner juices any left over oranges so that we have fresh OJ in the fridge. However, when I saw this recipe I wrestled the oranges off him.
We usually always have Navel Oranges in the house. We find that, one, they usually have the best flavour and juiciness, and, two, the local oranges tend to be all navel and we try to buy all local produce. Its good for the environment, good for the local economy and produce tends to be tastier as it is fresher. However, you could use any type of orange, mandarin, tangelo, etc.
I have given you two syrup recipes to choose from. In the photo above I have used the orange syrup but I have previously made a killer orange cake using the spiced coriander syrup which is delicious!! So use what ever one you feel like. I know the coriander syrup seems weird but definitely give it a go sometime - you will be pleasantly surprised.

FLOURLESS ORANGE CAKE

2 Oranges

3 Eggs

1cup sugar

3cups almond meal

1t baking powder

Pre-heat oven to 170C. Grease and line a cake tin.

Place oranges in a saucepan and cover with cold water. Bring the water to the boil and boil for 15mins.

Drain the water and repeat the process again.

Once the oranges have been twice boiled drain them and chop the whole orange roughly. Remove any seeds. Then place the whole orange (pith and all) into a food processor. Blitz until a smooth puree is formed.

Meanwhile beat eggs and sugar together until pale yellow and thick.

Fold almond meal, baking powder and orange puree into the egg/sugar mixture.

Pour mixture into prepared tin and bake for 1hour.

Once cooked let sit for 15mins then carefully using a skewer poke holes in the top. Then pour either one of the following syrups over top and allow it to soak in.

Serve with organic natural yoghurt.

ORANGE SYRUP

1 orange

3/4 cup sugar

Zest the orange and place zest in a small saucepan. Cover with cold water. Bring to the boil and boil for 5mins. Drain.

Juice the orange. 

Place the juice, sugar and boiled zest into a saucepan.

Cook over low heat until the sugar is dissolved and the syrup has thickened slightly.

SPICED CORIANDER SYRUP

2t coriander seeds

100g sugar

100ml water

2t lemon juice

Toast and grind up the coriander seeds.

Add ground coriander to saucepan with the rest of the ingredients.

Simmer until the sugar has dissolved and the syrup has thickened slightly.

Spiced Lamb and smokey chilli Lahmacun, Eggplant Zaalouk, Mint and radish salad and Labne

I ate a variation of this dish while in Turkey, well the Lacmacun part anyway. Its basically their version of a pizza and you can get them all over Turkey. They are so delicious hot from the wood fired oven! I want!

To make it more of a meal, I served it with a warm eggplant salad, a refeshing mint and radish salad and some homemade labne

There are a few recipes in this post post but don't let it scare you away. They are either quick and easy or can be done in advance. For the Lahmacun I adapted one of my favourite chefs, Greg Malouf's recipe.I love his food! I used his dough recipe exactly but changed the topping.


Lahmacun dough

1 T dried yeast
3/4 t sugar
40 ml warm water
150g thick natural yoghurt
60ml extra virgin olive oil
310g strong bread flour ( I just used high grade)
1/2 tsp  sea salt

Dissolve the yeast and sugar in the warm water and set aside for about 10 mins.
Place the flour, salt, olive oil and yoghurt in a bowl of the stand mixer fitted with a dough hook and add the yeast mixture. On a low speed knead for about 10-15 minutes or until the dough is smooth and shiny.
Cover with a damp tea towel and leave for 2 hours until its doubled in size.
After 2 hours knock back the dough and divide into 10 x 55g balls. Roll out to about 14cm rounds and lightly brush with olive oil and spread with the lamb topping.

Chopping all the topping ingredients together.

Spiced lamb and smokey chilli topping

200g minced lamb - not too lean
1 red chilli
1 small red onion, finely diced
1 tomato, seeded and diced
1/2 tsp smoked paprika
1 tsp sumac
1/4 tsp dried mint
1/2 tsp allspice
1 clove garlic, microplaned
1 tsp olive oil
salt and pepper


Char the outside of the chilli and put in a bag to steam. Peel off the skin and chop the chilli up.
Place all the ingredients in a chopping board and with a large knife chop everything together to form a fine paste. Season well.

To make the Lahmacun heat your oven to 220 degrees. I used my pizza stone so I heated that up too but you could just use a baking tray.

Roll out your dough and flop the rolled dough onto the hot stone and brush lightly with olive oil and spread over the filling. Bake for about 4-8 minutes depending on how hot your oven is. You want the edges brown and the base cooked.

I cooked all of mine in batches of 3 and then when the time came to serve I flashed them in a hot oven to warm through.


Eggplant Zaalouk

2-3 T olive oil
1 eggplant, diced
2  cloves garlic, crushed
1 tsp each of coriander and cumin seeds, ground
1/2 tsp sweet paprika
1/4 tsp cayenne
1/2 tin of cherry tomatoes
1/4 cup water
pinch sugar
1/2 cup of coriander and parsley, chopped
juice of 1/2 a lemon
salt and black pepper

Heat oil in a pan on a high heat, add the eggplant and cook for 5 minutes. Add the spices and cook out. Add the tomatoes, water and sugar and cook until the tomatoes reduce and coat the eggplant. When the eggplant is tender its done. Season and add the herbs and lemon juice.


Mint and Radish salad

1 cup of mint leaves
4-6 radishes, thinly sliced on a mandolin
150g baby spinach
juice of half a lemon
1 T virgin olive oil
flaky salt and freshly ground black pepper

Mix all together before serving.


To serve

Labne
Extra red pepper flakes if you like it a bit spicy
Pomegranate molasses to drizzle over the Lahmacun

When eating this I like to pile everything on top of my Lahmacun so every mouthful is delicious and balanced and then fold it over and eat it with my hands. Yum!!

As you can see a wee friend popped into the photo...

How to make Labne

Labne with olive oil and sumac

Labne

Labne is strained thick yoghurt. It is one of my favourite things and you can use it in so many ways. I like to keep some in my fridge most of the time. It has a great shelf life, especially if you cover it with a nice olive oil. Or you can keep it in an airtight container and it pretty much keeps as long as your yoghurt would. You can also roll it into balls and roll them in herbs, nuts or seeds. Spread it on toast with fresh tomato on top or use it as a dip. Add it to salads like I did here. Serve it with barbequed meat or roast vegetables. The possibilities are endless!


1kg plain unsweetened yoghurt (don't use low fat!)
1 1/2 tsp table salt
zest of a lemon
a new chux cloth or piece of muslin
sieve
bowl to sit under the sieve

In a bowl mix together the yoghurt, salt, and lemon zest.
Line the sieve with the chux cloth and pour in the yoghurt mix.


Gather the edges of the cloth up and tie in a knot and place the sieve over the bowl. This catches all the liquid that strains out of the yoghurt

Yoghurt straining and ready for the fridge

You want to strain your yoghurt for 24-48 hours. The longer you strain the thicker it gets. I checked it after 6 hours once and there was quite a lot of liquid in the bowl and it had definitely thickened so it is personal preference really.

You can also flavour the labne as you wish before straining or after. Fresh herbs are nice, spices, Harissa, lime instead of lemon. You could fold in toasted nuts before serving too. See! So many possibilities!

Puy lentil, quinoa and haloumi salad with baby carrots and asparagus

On a hot Sunday night this was just what we felt like for dinner. We picked up fresh asparagus and baby carrots from the market so they were super fresh!

The lentils and Qunioa can be cooked in advance and the dressing can be made up to a day a head or earlier if you omit the tomato and add it on the day. The onions can also be done the night before too.

There are only two of us here but if you upped the carrots and asparagus to say 500g each then it would be plenty for four. We had enough for dinner and some for a lunch the next day.


Puy lentil, quinoa and haloumi salad with baby carrots and asparagus

200g Puy lentils
2 cloves garlic
100g quinoa - I used black Quinoa
200g baby carrots
250g asparagus
1 T olive oil
1 tsp each of cumin and coriander seeds
flaky salt and black pepper

1/2 red onion, finely sliced
1 T red wine vinegar
1/2 tsp Allspice
1/2 tsp Sumac

1/2 cup hazelnuts - roasted and roughly chopped
200g haloumi, thickly sliced
1/2 cup finely chopped parsley
1/2 cup labne or Greek yoghurt

Dressing
1 tomato, deseeded, small diced
2 T red wine vinegar
2 T pomegranate molasses
3 T virgin olive oil
Black pepper
1 tsp flaky salt
2 cloves garlic that you cooked with the lentils, mashed
1/2 tsp sumac


First bring the lentils to boil with the garlic cloves and a couple of bay leaves and simmer for about 20 minutes or until tender. Drain and briefly rinse. Set aside.

I cooked the Quinoa using the absorption method with the ratio of  one and a half times as much water. You don't want it crunchy so keep adding more water if you need.

Finely slice your onion and place it in a bowl with 1 T red wine vinegar and the sumac and allspice, mix it together and leave while you sort out your other bits.

Mix everything for the dressing together and set aside.

Place the carrots, 1 Tablespoon of oil and the cumin and coriander on a roasting tray and roast for about 6 minutes at 180°. Then add your asparagus and cook for a further 5 minutes.

While the carrots and asparagus are cooking you can start mixing your salad together.  In a bowl add the lentils, Quinoa, marinated onions, parsley and dressing. Season well.

Arrange the lentil salad on a serving platter and pile your roast carrots and asparagus on top.

Next you want to cook you Haloumi as you want it more melty and less squeaky. Heat a non stick pan on a medium heat and heat 1 T of oil. Add your Haloumi slices and turn when caramelised. When cooked place the Haloumi on top of the vegetables. Sprinkle with the roast hazelnuts and dollop on the Labne.

Finish with a squeeze of lemon and serve!

Lets Make Some Seeds!

Now you may be forgiven for thinking that we have terrible design skills at our house if you judge us by this photo! However, we are collecting seeds...kale seeds to be exact.
We had a bumper crop of kale this year. We had three different kinds on the go - Tuscan Kale, Curly Leaf Kale and Purple Kale. The purple kale is still going strong, however the other two types went to seed a while ago.

Purple Kale

Since we had such a great crop this year we thought we would attempt to catch seeds for next year. It is extremely simple to collect seeds and is very satisfying when your caught seeds turn into produce. You really feel like you have grown the produce from scratch. Furthermore, if you collect seeds from a strong crop you are more likely to get a strong crop the year after as well. So how to collect seeds...

1. - Let the kale go to flower in the garden.

2. - Continue to let the kale flower and then form seed pods.

3. - Allow the seed pods to dry a little on the plant.

4. - Pull the plants out of the ground and place them upside down in an old pillow case. Hang the pillow cases up somewhere dry and out of the direct sunlight. Once again our verandah was perfect. At this time of year our verandah doesn't have room for humans with all the drying of veges and seeds going on!

5. - Allow the seed pods to dry so that they crack open and let the seeds fall to the bottom of the pillow case. This can take a few weeks. To help this along you can gently hit or shake the pillow cases.

6. - Collect the seeds, store them in a paper bag (a small envelope works really well), and have them ready for planting next year.

You can also do this with herbs and instead of using them for replanting you can use them in cooking. For example, you can do this with coriander, fennel or dill, just to name a few. Instead of keeping them in a paper bag keep them in an airtight container. To get the best flavour use the seeds within 6 months. Imagine how much better your cooking will taste with home grown, fresh seeds!