Tomato and chili Oil

A hot spicy dip to accompany roast meat or to simply serve with crusty bread, as an informal starter.

Ingredients:

4 tbs good olive oil
300 ml crushed tomato or passata
3 cloves of garlic
Chili flakes, to taste
1 dessertspoon of sugar
salt
pepper
1 tsp balsamic vinegar

Peel and slice the garlic, gently heat the oil in a sauce pan and warm the garlic for 1 minute.
Add the rest of ingredients, cook over a gentle heat for 20-25 min. check the seasoning.

Remove the sauce from the heat.
Serve hot or warm, with bread.

Tartiflette savoyarde

Tartiflette Savoyarde

(French Gratin potatoes)

The name derives from the name tartiflette of potato Savoyard tartifles, a term also found in Provençal tartifles. The Savoyards first heard of the tartiflette when it arrived on the menus of restaurants in the ski stations, conveying an image of friendliness, authenticity, and soil of the mountain.

It is hard to find Reblochon outside France, so I often use Raclette cheese instead.

time 50 minutes plus potato cooking time.

yield  8 people, as a side dish 

category potatoes

cuisine France

ingredients 

• 1,2 kg de potatoes, 
• 200 gr de bacon lardons
• 1 onion (optional)
• 1 reblochon cheese
• 1 tub  crème fraiche
• 1 glass white wine (vin blanc de Savoie)

directions

1. Boil the potatoes whole, until cooked through. Drain and cut into thick slices. About 0.5cm.

2. Fry the onion, sliced, in a little butter, until pale and starting to brown

3. Add the lardons to the onion, fry for a minute or so, turn off heat

4. arrange the potatoes in a well buttered ovenproof dish, spoon over the onion and bacon mix. Stir the wine into the creme fraiche, pout over the potatoes. Season well with salt and pepper.

5. Slice the reblochon over the potatoes, (Alternatively, use raclette cheese) 

6. bake in a hot oven 180 degrees C for 25-30 minutes until golden and bubbly.

Steamed Ginger Pudding

Pudding ingredients

• 200gr all purpose flour
• 1 tablespoon ground ginger
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
• 150gr sugar
• 200gr unsalted butter, room temperature
• 2 large eggs
• 1/2 cup orange marmalade
• 1/4 cup mild-flavored (light) molasses
• 1 teaspoon grated orange peel

For pudding:
Coat inside and center tube of 6- to 8-cup pudding mold  generously with butter. Sift flour and next 6 ingredients into medium bowl. Using electric mixer, beat sugar and butter in large bowl until well blended. Beat in eggs, 1 at a time, then marmalade, molasses and orange peel. Add flour mixture and beat just until blended. Transfer batter to prepared mold. Cover mold tightly with foil.

Place steamer rack in large pot. Place pudding mold on rack. Fill pot with enough water to come halfway up sides of mold. Bring water to boil. Reduce heat to medium. Cover pot and steam pudding until tester inserted near center comes out clean, adding more boiling water as needed to maintain level, about 1 hour 15 minutes. Using oven mitts as aid, remove mold from pot. Uncover and let stand 10 minutes. Cut around top center and sides of pudding to loosen. Turn pudding out onto rack and cool 20 minutes. (Can be made 1 day ahead. Cool completely. Return to mold; cover and chill. Resteam 45 minutes to heat through, then turn out of mold.)

Transfer pudding to platter. Cut pudding into wedges; serve with Vanilla ice cream or cream.

Majorcan Vegetable pie

This recipe is very flexible and more than a recipe, it is a cooking method. Customize this dish to use up any vegetables in the refrigerator. (cauliflower, mushrooms, cabbage, potatoes, onion etc)

Ingredients for 4

• stale bread, 200 grams, sliced thinly.
• shredded cabbage, 300 grams
• garlic cloves, 2 
• tomato, 1 
• chopped parsley
• salt
• swiss chard or spinach, 200 grams
• green pepper, 2
• onion, 1 
• olive oil, 3 tablespoons
• paprika
• black pepper

1) Wash and chop all the vegetables. Shred the cabbage and spinach.

2) Heat the oil in a heavy pan, preferably an earthenware one. Stir fry the onion peppers for a few minutes until pale. Add the tomato and the rest of the vegetables. Season well with the salt, pepper, and paprika.

3) Add 200 ml vegetable stock, cover the pan and gently braise the vegetables for around 20 minutes until they are cooked through.

Turn the heat off, remove the vegetables and place in a bowl, leaving the juices at the bottom of the pan.

4) Place the slices of bread on the bottom of the pan, let them soak the stock, place the vegetable on top of the bread. Let the dish rest for 10 minutes or so. 

You can keep it warm in a moderate oven for 20-30 minutes.

Serving suggestion:

Serve in the same pan, as a starter

If intended as a main course, add fried eggs, pork or lamb chops, fried fish fillets.

Meatball and Egg Tagine

Meatballs:

• 450g/1lb minced beef or lamb
• 2 tbsp finely chopped parsley
• 1 tsp ground cumin
• 1 tsp salt
• freshly ground black pepper
• ½ tsp hot paprika

Tomato sauce:

• 1 medium onion, finely chopped
• 800g/14oz can chopped tomatoes
• 1 tsp ground cumin
• ½ teaspoon hot paprika
• 1 tsp freshly ground black pepper
• 2 garlic cloves, crushed
• salt to taste

Also:

• olive oil
• 4 large eggs
• salt and ground black pepper
• handful fresh coriander leaves, coarsely chopped, to garnish

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 200C/400F/Gas 6.
2. For the meatballs, put the minced beef, parsley, cumin, paprika, one teaspoon salt and some black pepper into a bowl and mix together well using your hands or a fork. Dampen your hands and form the mixture into about 28 2.5cm/1in balls. Set aside.
3. Heat two tablespoons of the oil in a shallow tagine or frying pan and brown the meatballs briefly on all sides. Remove with a slotted spoon to a plate and set to one side.
4. For the sauce, add the onion to the tagine or pan with the remaining tablespoon of oil and cook gently for ten minutes until very soft and just beginning to brown. Add the remaining sauce ingredients and leave to simmer gently for 15-20 minutes until well concentrated in flavour but not too thick. Season well with salt to taste.
5. Return the meatballs to the sauce and mix together. Transfer to a shallow ovenproof dish if you have prepared the sauce in a frying pan, otherwise leave the mixture in the tagine. Make four slight dips in the mixture and break an egg into each one. Bake in the oven for 15 minutes or until the eggs are just set.
6. Scatter with the chopped coriander and serve with warm flatbread or cooked rice

Lemon Pudding

Delicious after a heavy meal!

Ingredients

55 g butter
115 g vanilla sugar, or caster sugar
grated zest and juice of 1 lemons
2 large eggs, separated
55 g self-raising flour
285 ml milk

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 200°C

2. In a mixing bowl, cream together the butter, sugar and lemon zest.

3. Add the yolks and flour and beat together. Mix in the milk and 3 tablespoons of lemon juice.

4. Whisk the egg whites until stiff. Fold into the lemon mixture. Transfer to a buttered ovenproof dish.

5. Place the dish in roasting tin 'au bain Marie': pour in boiling water around the dish until it reaches halfway up the dish's sides.

6. Bake in the oven for 40 minutes until golden and firm on top. This is a self-saucing pudding so there should be a pool of lemony sauce at the bottom. Serve warm from the oven.

Foolproof Cake

200 gr butter, room temperature
200 gr sugar
3 eggs
200 gr flour
1 dsp baking powder
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tbs cocoa powder

Wisk the butter and sugar in a large bowl until pale and fluffy, carefully incorporate the rest of ingredients.

If you want a marble cake, hold the cocoa and divide the mixture in two bowls. Add the cocoa to one half of the batter. Spoon alternate mixes into a greased cake mold until you have used up all the cake mix.

Bake for 35-40 minutes at 180ºC.

Enjoy