56: Bean shoot salad with corianer and mint, p378

Jeepers!! I only used one chilli instead of two, and left it all for 5mins, not 15mins, and this was darned fiery!! Served with garlicky chilli prawn linguine, this made enough for at least four as a side dish. Can't think of an enormous amount to say... crunchy, tasty, but not the most substantial or filling of dishes so don't think I'd make this as a main course on it's own.

55: Thyme and feta lamb, p123

Another simple recipe, thank goodness as I was full of cold and fell into bed super early this evening... Simple lemony, herby marinade, and little chops allowed to crisp up on a hot ridged grill pan - but left nice and pink and soft in the middle. T doesn't like feta, but had a little - but left the rest. I couldn't decide on the feta - I liked the herb/cheese combination, but it seemed to overpower the soft, sweet lamb, and I ate most of it separately to the meat, so it didn't really work as an overall combination for me. Nonetheless, served with steamed rice and mangetout, and devoured in minutes, as lots of these recipes seem to be...

54: Mackerel with cumin and lemon, p120

Hubby very helpfully retrieved two mackerel for this recipe from the fishmonger, but less helpfully forgot that whole fishes come with guts inside and it's good form to ask said fishmonger to remove said guts before presenting fishes to wife. Grr. So I unexpectedly ended up gutting mackerel for the first time ever before this recipe was possible - thank goodness for google!

I probably made too long a cut along the belly of each fish as they kinda curled up a bit whilst grilling, so they didn't look like the picture in the book, and I'm afraid they did burn a little, but it didn't seem to be a problem.

As I've said before, I once got a fish bone stuck in my throat and it was a bit of a traumatic experience - which I remember everytime I eat whole fish and gets me a bit anxious, so this wasn't the most relaxing of meals... but it did taste jolly good. The flesh was cooked to perfection - I though it would dry out, especially since I did burn it a little, but it wasn't at all dry and was lovely. Most of the bones were either big and obvious, or tiny thin ones that even I was able to swallow without realising it, but I did get one inbetweener, of the throat-catching variety, which provoked a bit of a yak yak yak... but didn't actually stick. Phew. There's still two more mackerel recipes to go...

 

52: Five-spice quail, p169, and 53: A hot, sour bean shoot salad, p163

Quails. Possibly the most anthropomorphic little carcasses to cook with - especially when their little legs aren't tucked/trussed up as in a chicken you'd roast, but instead are sticking out in a slightly disturbingly human way - with little knees and calves - making them look like little decapitated bodies...

But oh so yummy when marinated in a garlicky chinesey spicy mix, and then roasted...

Very easy little recipe and surprisingly the meat didn't dry out at all and was deliciously moist, and the coating had quite a kick to it.

Went really well served with another lovely crunchy hot Asian-style salad (we're really liking these salads) with spinach and bean shoots, and a good dollop of chilli and nam pla.

51: Smoked haddock with flageolet beans and mustard, p45

Another T pleaser tonight, smoked fish is one of his favourites, but has never been one of mine - although if cooked/mixed up with other things, I think I rather like it (kedgeree, smoked mackerel salads, etc).

Another very creamy sauce though, and I'm not sure how two people are supposed to eat the full amount this produces - 2 tins of flageolet beans, and 300ml double cream??? I halved the quantities for the sauce and used about 300g fish instead of 400g and it was plenty.

Could have done with a bit more seasoning, but this was a really nice supper, and the steamed spinach went perfectly.

50: Onion soup without tears, p17

Oh yum, yum, yum, yum, this is a winner! Love french onion soup, and this is the super easy version!

Baking the onions, cut into halves, instead of chopping them up finely (hence, the tears of the title) makes it sooo easy, and gives the soup the loveliest caramelised tastiness, as well as a lovely dark, honey brown colour.

Didn't have fresh french bread, but did have a freshly baked regular loaf, which I cut into two big rounds using a cookie cutter, covered in grated Emmental and grilled, before floating on top of the soup.

Will definitely do this again. Tastes much more complicated than it is...

49: Rosewater and yoghurt panna cotta, p204, and A passion fruit puree for panna cotta, p204

Nearly a disaster - halfway through simmering the milk, cream and vanilla, I realised I was missing one of the ingredients - not only that, but one of the ingredients in the title, yoghurt. Doh. So a quick dash up to the corner shop and yoghurt retrieved, the pan is now boiling instead of simmering... Whoops.

I love rosewater, and have had an unopened bottle from a little Asian food shop in the cupboard for quite a while, so this was a good excuse for opening it. I must make rasmalai and baklava and other such yummy things with the rest...

The passionfruit puree reinforced my conviction that life is too short to try to obtain the juice/pulp (sans seeds) from a passionfruit... mashing the flesh through a tea strainer (for such a small quantity it seemed daft to use the big flour sieve...) with a spoon, and cursing as drop by drop I managed to accumulate about 5ml of the damned stuff, T came in several times to see what on earth I was doing, before beating a hasty retreat to the living room. Really - why wouldn't you just use all of the pulp - juice and seeds together? It was like trying to squeeze frogspawn.

And the sodding panna cottas wouldn't turn out, so were more like little custards than anything. I had the splodgy one, T had the one left in the coffee cup which I hadn't tried to turn out. I spooned the miniscule amount of passionfruit puree on top, as you'll see in the photos, on the splodgy half-turned out pudding it just looks like it's the yolk of a fried egg, and on the one left in the cup, it looks like just a cup of orange juice. Brilliant. I'm very glad I didn't save this one for a dinner party... More gelatine next time? Or less boiling of the mixture at the start perhaps?

Nonetheless, it did taste as panna cotta should, jolly scrummy, and vanished in record time :)

48: Braised lamb with leeks and haricot beans, p57

Another of Nigel's hearty stews, where the recipe is 'enough for four' and even with slightly reduced quantites and served on its own without potatoes, extra veggies etc, quite clearly feeds six!

A good one though, with very simple, unfussy flavours - and the sweetness of the lamb really comes through, with the herbs, soft leeks and cream making a gorgeous silky sauce. Lovely and thumbs up from T too. I didn't mention to him the preceding paragraph in the book where Nigel is talking about fancying some 'bland' food, and this being a 'beige casserole'!! Doesn't exactly sell the recipe!!

47: Sausage and black pudding with baked parsnips, p57

Wasn't sure about this one - black pudding is definitely not an ingredient I'd normally buy and I've never cooked with it before. It's one of those fashionable ingredients you find in posh restaurants in little nuggets alongside seared scallops, or with an assiette of pork, perhaps, so I've had it a few times and haven't disliked it, but can't say I'd particularly choooose it...

T was chuffed to bits when I got home on Friday evening and said this was what we were having - he'd found the black pudding and sausages and looked them up in the book to see what the recipe was going to be, and it appealed to his carnivorous tendencies for some reason :)

An easy peasy recipe, the only difficult bit was trying to brown everything in my big Denby casserole which was rather full and so difficult to stir, so some bits got a little browner than intended, but then only 40mins in the oven and it was done. Served with steamed sugar snap peas and homemade papika-y wedgie oven chips, the resulting casserole could have been a bit more flavoursome but that was properly down to slightly inferior ingredients - only one type of black pudding in the supermarket, and 'half fat' butchers sausages were probably a mistake. But still, quite yum, with a thick, glossy gravy from the sauce.