Sunday 24 June - The Great Tortilla Experiment

So, thanks to a random post by someone on the food board, I found myself browsing the Mex Grocer site to look at Mexican ingredients, and unfortunately a tortilla press fell into my shopping basket, (along with a few other goodies). The parcel arrived very swiftly (the next day in fact) and I decided to spend the day trying to make tortillas for supper tonight.

The instructions on the bag of flour were in Spanish, but I think I managed to follow them - 2 cups of flour were mixed with some salt, and 1 1/4 cups of hand hot water - I mixed it in the Kenwood with the dough hook, and thought it wasn't holding together, but then went in with my hands, and had a dough that felt exactly like playdough, and smelt like my sons breath after a dorito fest!

Now to the press itself, I didn't think this would work for one minute, it all seemed too simple to me....

A ball of dough was placed between two pieces of polythene, ( I cut a freezer bag up) and then we closed the press, and pushed down on the handle....

Much to our amazement, a perfect tortilla emerged, and it also came off the plastic with no problem at all.

I cooked these on my heavy iron crepe pan, and will reheat them later on.

A pile of tortillas completed  - we have sampled one, and they taste just like soft doritos.

Serving these later on with chicken which I have marinaded in beer and spices, which I will stir fry with some peppers and onions, and I've got a big pan of black beans simmering away to serve along side it.

Saturday 23 June - Back to Low Fat Again

It's pretty obvious from recent posts that I'd pretty well abandoned the low fat diet. However, a visit to the Doctor this week after suffering several bouts of severe chest pains has meant I'm back on it with a vengeance. It's possible that I have gallstones, and one way of managing the pain is to cut back on fat (thanks Google!)

So, can we do a three course low fat meal?

Starters, Bobs favourite food in the world - crab and sweetcorn soup - I cheated a bit with the stock as had no chicken bones, so it was onions, garlic, ginger, soy, carrot, celery and some coriander stalks, simmered for a couple of hours, with a knorr stockpot. Then a tin of sweetcorn added to the strained stock, thickened with some cornflour and rice wine and finally the crab meat, an egg beaten with sesame oil was drizzled in and a sprinkle of spring onions.

Main course was planned around the mornings excitement of digging up the first potatoes (in fact the first produce we have ever harvested) from our allotment

To go with this Delias Thai Salmon Filo parcels, but with a spray of olive oil rather than the butter she recommends, and less pastry. The salmon is topped with chopped coriander, spring onions, garlic, ginger and lime, then wrapped in filo and baked. Served with our lovely spuds and probably the last asparagus for this year.

And for dessert   - how to get two of your five a day into children - jelly! But not just jelly, lime jelly with strawberries in it, and strawberry jelly with blueberries in it in layers. I also made some vanilla ice cream which the boys had with this, but I just had the jelly.





Saturday 9 June - Enchilladas

Task one was to use up all the chocolate that is still lying round the house after Easter - so Georges egg was broken up, added to some Tiddly Chicks and some old bits and pieces lying around, and turned into brownies in our free lurpack tin - we needed butter anyway and it was cheaper to buy two packs and get the tin as well.

These were served after the main meal, with some shop ice cream as this worked out to be cheaper than making our own.

We had bought some very cheap braising steak, and half was used tonight, and half is to be used for chilli or stew later in the week.

Tonights was rubbed with some dried oregano and cumin and a bit of olive oil, then wrapped in foil and put in a very low oven for three hours.

Bob then did a marvelous job of shredding this up to fill the enchiladas.



The sauce was tinned tomatoes, chillies, lots of coriander stalks, garlic and onion which was simmered for ages, then whizzed up and seived.

Then the difficult bit - corn tortillas had to be very quickly fried to soften them, then dipped in the sauce. These were then filled with the meat mixed with a bit more sauce, rolled up and placed in the baking dish.



These were baked with some grated cheese until bubbly, and served with refried beans which I made using a tin of black beans, some soured cream, some homemade guacamole and some extra jalapenos.

Not low fat by any means, but rather  tasty, and not expensive to make - definitely one to do again.



Thursday 7 June - Pork Meatballs

The quest at the moment is food on a budget as we are saving frantically for our holiday in August.
A few days off work, so more time for messing around in the kitchen, and pork loin steaks very cheap in Lidl at the moment.

We minced the steaks, fat and all as that way there is more flavour in the final meatballs.

I prefer to keep it all fairly plain in the actual meatballs - I add some bread soaked in milk, and some chopped oregano plus salt and pepper, and roll them into smallish meatballs that I fry pretty thoroughly.



The flavour is all in the tomato sauce - lots of fried onion and garlic, tinned tomatoes at this time of year, and lots and lots of fresh basil cooked into it. I then simmer the cooked meatballs for a good hour or so.

Served over spagetti with more torn fresh basil, and lots of grated fresh parmesan. This is what I tend to cook if I have visiting children, as I've yet to find a child who doesn't enjoy meatballs!

Monday 4 June - Thai Green Curry

Long Bank Holiday Weekend for the Diamond Jubilee, so a nice trip to Ikea, and a relaxing cooking evening.

We like to make our own curry paste, as George is a bit of a chilli head, and the ready made ones don't contain enough for him.

I don't tend to follow a recipe just chuck in what I have to hand - the vital things though are the coriander and chillies -I use lemon grass from a jar as I find it doesn't process too well from fresh, and also use lime rind rather than lime leaves - this goes into the food processor as a pestle and mortar is a step too far for me.

This was fried with some chicken breast chunks, and then a tin of coconut milk was added, and simmered for half an hour or so. At the last minute the final ingredients were added - lime juice, fish sauce, mange tout, toasted cashews and loads of chopped coriander.

This was served with steamed jasmine rice, cucumber salad and some prawn crackers.



Saturday 2 June - A Take On Saltimboccca

Lidl had cheap pork loin steaks, so we made a sort of saltimbocca. We bashed out the pork and topped with parma ham and sage, then rolled it up.

A bit short on the Marsala front, so made a sauce with fried onions, the drip left in the bottle and some of my homemade chicken stock which was reduced and frozen in ice cube trays. The pork was then cooked in this for an hour or so, and then taken out and the sauce reduced down.

There were also some lovely English strawberries, so we made little victoria sponges and filled with cream and strawberries and served with a coulis. The left over coulis was made into jelly, poured over the leftover sponge pieces and some more strawberries, and is going to become the base of a trifle for Sunday.



Served with potatoes, asparagus and spinach.