Showing posts with label #SundaySupper. Show all posts
Showing posts with label #SundaySupper. Show all posts

Sunday, March 22, 2015

Irish Lamb Stew

Lamb shoulder is one of the tougher cuts so it is perfect for stewing, becoming melt-in-your-mouth tender as it simmers, creating its own rich gravy flavored by thyme, onion and garlic. Add in some Irish whiskey and lemon juice to brighten the whole pot. 

This week my Sunday Supper group is throwing a Spring Fling to celebrate spring recipes and my thoughts went immediately to lamb. It is the meat of choice in many cultures and countries for spring, as the weather starts to warm and the lambing begins.

We eat a lot of lamb at our house, whatever the season. It’s funny because in my growing up home, we never ate lamb. My grandmother thought it was too strong in flavor and she passed that prejudice on to my mother. It wasn’t until I started dating my British husband, that I discovered the delight of lamb and embraced the baaaah, as we used bleat when discussing lamb. Mom also didn’t like goat cheese for the longest time because she said she could taste the goat. My mother is a most adventurous eater, as I’ve written about here, so I am pleased to say that she got past her own childhood embargoes and will now eat both goat cheese and lamb chops. I am still working on her for leg of lamb or shoulder.

This stew starts with browning the lamb shoulder then adding onions, garlic and celery, along with Irish whiskey and lemon juice to the sticky pan. Then a long slow simmer makes sure that the meat is falling off the bones. When the nights are cold, as they still are in the frozen north of the US - never mind that we have passed the first official day of spring and it’s still SNOWING as I type this in Providence, Rhode Island - this dish will fill the kitchen with fragrant aromas and warm you, body and soul.

Ingredients
2.25 kg or almost 3 1/2 lb lamb shoulder, cut in thick slices
Flakey sea salt
Freshly ground black pepper
Olive oil
1 large onion
2-3 stalks celery
3 cloves garlic
Handful sprigs fresh thyme plus more for garnishing before serving, if desired
1/4 cup or 60ml Irish whiskey
2 tablespoons or 30ml fresh lemon juice
3 medium sized potatoes or more to stretch your lamb to feed more people
1-2 medium sized carrots or more to stretch your lamb to feed more people

Method
Season your lamb shoulder on both sides with a good sprinkling of salt and freshly ground black pepper.


Dice your onion, celery and garlic.



Pan-fry the lamb in a little olive oil, just a few pieces at a time, so you don’t crowd the pan and they can brown well.

Remove them to a plate and continuing pan-frying until all the lamb is well browned on both sides.



Add the onions, celery and garlic to the pan and give it a good stir.

Cook for a few minutes over a medium flame and then add in the whiskey and the lemon juice. Use a wooden spoon or spatula to make sure all the sticky bits on the pan are loosened.



Add the lamb back to the pan, along with any meat juices that have accumulated on the plate.

Toss in a few sprigs of thyme and cover the pot with a tight fitting lid.

Simmer, covered for at least an hour, but, really, you could leave it for two, checking the liquid level occasionally and adding in a little water if it looks like the stew is going dry.

Meanwhile, peel your potatoes and carrots and cut them into chunks. Keep them in a bowl of cool water until you are ready to add them to the pan.

When the lamb is tender, drain the potatoes and carrots and add them to the pan. Give the whole thing a good stir to coat the potatoes and carrot with the pan juices. Sprinkle with a little more salt and pepper and add some water to almost cover the meat, if more liquid is needed.



Cover your pot again and simmer another hour or so. Check the salt and pepper and add more if necessary. Garnish with a few more sprigs of thyme, if desired.



I always serve my lamb stew over white rice because I may not have been raised on lamb but rice and gravy was a childhood staple. In this, my grandmother would have been in complete agreement. Nothing better for a still chilly spring Sunday Supper than rice and a rich gravy.

I must confess that I also chose to share this recipe because lamb stew is one of my husband's favorite dishes. It's our 29th wedding anniversary today and although I am in Providence making new memories with our daughters, it is never far from my mind that I owe all of this to him. All of it.


Enjoy!

Are you ready for spring? I’ve got plenty of recipe inspiration for you today, along with our fabulous hosts, Valerie from Lifestyle Food Artistry and D.B. from Crazy Foodie Stunts and the Supper Sunday crew.

Beverages
Appetizers
Sides
Entreés
Desserts



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Posted by at 5:33:00 AM 1 comments
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Sunday, March 8, 2015

Crème de Menthe Parfait



A simple retro cocktail recipe that can double as dessert, this delicious parfait is made with vanilla bean ice cream, crème de menthe liqueur, whipped cream and is topped with a cherry or two! 

When I saw the theme for today’s Sunday Supper – Retro Recipes – I was delighted. I’ve got quite a few cookbooks and magazines that date back to the Good Old Days of Jello mold salads and meatloaves baked in tube pans, many older than I am. It’s always amusing to see what my foremothers must have thought was the cutting edge of what was new and fun to bake and cook back then.

I can never resist buying a cookbook put together for a fundraiser either! Among my collection, I have books published  - with proceeds going to charities - by Jakarta International School, the Association of British Women in Malaysia, the American Society of Rio, Maadi Women’s Guild (Egypt), the American Women’s Association of Indonesia and the British Women’s Association of Singapore, just to name a few that I can lay my hands on. These are full of what I would call retro recipes, even that one that was published in the Nineties, because back before the days of the World Wide Web in far-flung places, we cooked what we knew and those were the old recipes.

Just a few of a vast collection!


My mother has a beautiful frosted glass decanter, rather like this one, which she kept filled with bright green crème de menthe liqueur when I was a child. To my young mind, it was the height of sophistication to sip something out of the tiny glasses that matched the decanter and I loved when my parents entertained and the crème de menthe was served. How could I resist making a crème de menthe cocktail for Retro Recipes! Many thanks to our host, Heather from Hezzi-D’s Books and Cooks for organizing this great event.

One thing that I’ve noticed about vintage cookbooks, is that quantities are often lacking and methods are not as complete as what we are used to now. Fortunately that doesn’t really matter when it comes to ice cream and whipped cream. This parfait recipe comes from a book published by Arrow Cordials in 1960 and I found it on Mid Century Menu, a blog that is all about retro food and vintage recipes.

Ingredients
1 oz or 30ml crème de menthe
Vanilla ice cream (I used Haagen-Daz Vanilla Bean.)
Whipped cream
Maraschino cherry or two

Optional to serve: drinking straws

Method
Scoop your ice cream into a pretty glass. Two or three balls will probably do. I don’t own parfait glasses so I used a Champagne flute. A brandy snifter would also work.



Pour crème de menthe over the ice cream.

Even the color is retro, don't you think?

Top with generous scoop of whipped cream and then a cherry. If you want to drizzle just the tiniest little bit more crème de menthe on the whipped cream, I would second that impulse. Stick a couple of plastic straws in, if desired.



Enjoy!

Let’s take a walk back in time together and check out all the groovy vintage recipes from my Sunday Supper group today!

Bodacious Breakfasts and Appetizers:
Made in the Shade Main Dishes:
Swell Side Dishes:
Dreamy Desserts:
The Bee's Knees Beverages:





Posted by at 4:01:00 AM 0 comments
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Sunday, March 1, 2015

Classic Cassoulet

This classic cassoulet is a hearty, rich bowl of white beans with bacon, sausage and duck confit, the perfect dish on a cold winter's day.

Food Lust People Love: This classic cassoulet is a hearty, rich bowl of white beans with bacon, sausage and duck confit, the perfect dish on a cold winter's day.


When I started this blog, it quickly became both a place of experimentation and recording old favorites, a creative outlet where I could explore the food options as I moved from Kuala Lumpur to Cairo and then on to Dubai, even as I cooked and reminisced about family recipes. For all the things I missed when left behind, I discovered new options that had not been available to me. 

Two years ago, we were newly in Cairo and I wrote a post about butchering a whole duck, using the breasts for one meal, making confit out of the legs and thighs and then roasting and simmering the carcass for rich stock. Eventually, when my mother came to visit, that duck confit was turned into a classic cassoulet, one of the tastiest dishes ever concocted, but with some of the ugliest photos ever snapped so it never saw light of day in this space. I’ve since made it a couple of times but somehow never got around to posting those either.

When I saw that the theme for today’s Sunday Supper was Beantastic, I knew cassoulet would have to be revisited yet again. The photos still aren’t spectacular but I think the richness of the dish shines through. Cassoulet is meant to be peasant fare but, unless you have a duck you've hunted for yourself to make confit, that one ingredient is kind of expensive to buy. Let me say this, though, it’s totally worth it, not just for what it adds to the cassoulet but also for the extra duck fat you get that sits around the confit duck in the can or jar. Save that stuff! It’s fabulous!

Classic Cassoulet

Apparently the essential ingredients of a classic cassoulet are hotly debated and depend on the region of France. Although all will include beans, the meat that is added varies. Today’s tasty dish is in the Languedoc-style with confit duck and sausage and bacon. It's my favorite. 

Ingredients
1 lb or 450g dried white beans
1 medium onion
2 large onions
10 cloves garlic
7 oz or 200g slab bacon (I like smoked bacon. Some purists say it should be unsmoked. Pffft to them.)
2 bay leaves
Several fresh thyme sprigs
Olive oil
1 1/4 lbs or 540g fresh pork sausage
4 leg/thighs duck confit  - You can make your own. It’s not hard, just time consuming. Or buy the ones in a big can or jar. For this dish, I used these from Rougié.  <affiliate link
Salt
Black pepper

Method
Soak your dried beans overnight or cover amply with boiling water and leave to soak for one hour.

Meanwhile, cut your medium onion into quarters and cut your slab bacon into chunks.

Pour off the soaking water and put the beans into a large pot with the thyme sprigs, the quartered onion, the bacon chunks and one bay leaf. Cover with fresh water and cook until tender over a low fire. Stir the pot occasionally and add more water, if necessary. You do not want the beans drying out.



Drain the beans and bacon and reserve the cooking liquid. You can discard the thyme sprigs and bay leaf but the onion has probably melted away to almost nothing so I wouldn’t worry about it.



Scrape the fat off of the confit duck legs and thighs and save it in a clean jar in the refrigerator.



Slice your other two onions and your garlic and slowly caramelize them in a saucepan over a low heat, with a drizzle of olive oil or, better yet, some of the lovely duck fat you just saved.



If you are just sitting around, waiting on your beans to cook to tenderness, you can wait till the onions and garlic are caramelized and use the same pan to brown the sausage. Or use another pan and get on with it, if your beans are already ready.

When your onions/garlic are well caramelized, eyeball the pan (or the bowl into which you have transferred them to reuse the pan for the sausage) and mentally divide it into three major portions with a little leftover for the final topping.

Brown your sausage in a little olive oil or a little duck fat.



Preheat your oven to 350°F or 180°C.

In a cassole or casserole dish, start with a good drizzle olive oil or duck fat, then add almost one-third of the caramelized onions/garlic. Top with half of the cooked beans and tuck the browned sausage into the beans. Sprinkle with salt and few good grinds of fresh black pepper. Add on some more (perhaps almost one-third again) caramelized onions.



Now spoon on the rest of the beans, the boiled bacon chunks and season again with a sprinkle of salt and black pepper.




For the final layer, add almost all of the remaining caramelized onions and top with the confit duck and then the very last of the caramelized onions. Pour in some of the reserved bean cooking liquid to cover the beans and come half way up the duck. Not pictured here but you should: Tuck a bay leaf into the liquid.

Food Lust People Love: This classic cassoulet is a hearty, rich bowl of white beans with bacon, sausage and duck confit, the perfect dish on a cold winter's day.


Bake in your preheated oven for about an hour or until the duck is lovely, golden and crispy on the outside and the beans melt in your mouth.

Food Lust People Love: This classic cassoulet is a hearty, rich bowl of white beans with bacon, sausage and duck confit, the perfect dish on a cold winter's day.

Serve with a hearty red wine and some crusty bread to mop up the juices.

Enjoy!

Check out all the Beantastic recipes we have for you today!

Beantastic Beginners
Bean-a-rific Soups and Stews
Bean-a-licious Sides
Incredi-bean Main Meals
Amaze-beans Sweet Endings


Pin this Classic Cassoulet! 

Food Lust People Love: This classic cassoulet is a hearty, rich bowl of white beans with bacon, sausage and duck confit, the perfect dish on a cold winter's day.

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Posted by at 3:43:00 AM 0 comments
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Sunday, January 11, 2015

Baked Lemon Dessert

Fresh lemon zest and lemon juice are the stars of this tart, sweet baked lemon dessert spooned into a buttered casserole dish and baked until light and fluffy. The supporting role is played by the raspberries or whatever berry you can get your hands on this time of year.
 
Food Lust People Love: Fresh lemon zest and lemon juice are the stars of this tart, sweet baked lemon dessert spooned into a buttered casserole dish and baked until light and fluffy. The supporting role is played by the raspberries or whatever berry you can get your hands on this time of year.


Gin and bear it
Over the weekend, which regular readers might remember is Friday and Saturday here in the United Arab Emirates, we went out sailing offshore Abu Dhabi and then stayed over at a friend’s house on Friday night. 

Our friend is quite a collector of gin so it is not uncommon for the evening cocktail hour to start with a tasting of the new additions to his collection. One gin and tonic is mixed with each new gin and then we pass the glasses around, sipping the cocktails and discussing the attributes of the different gins. 

One in particular caught my fancy. It was made in Wales and contained an unusual ingredient: kelp or seaweed. After enjoying the gin and tonic and to extrapolate on the suggestion that we serve it in an oyster shell, we mixed a small shot of the Dà Mhìle seaweed gin with ice, a squeeze of fresh lemon and a sprinkle of sea salt, which really brought out the kelp. 

Which led to a discussion of whether Americans use the word kelp. Or do we just call it seaweed? I honestly could not remember so if anyone wants to weigh in, please leave me a comment. What do you call the green stuff on the seashore?

Pudding is dessert, pudding as dessert
As I straddle UK/US divide both in my home and with friends, I often lose track of whom uses which word for what but as a majority of my readers are US-based, I tend to name dishes in a way that they will understand. 

Way back in October, when I was trolling the internet and my cookbooks for a dessert to fit our budget friendly Sunday Supper theme, I came across a recipe on All Recipes UK. It was called lemon pudding in the British sense, meaning dessert. Because if they were actually making what we Americans call pudding, they’d call it custard and eat it for pudding. If you know what I mean. Anyway, I ended up making profiteroles for that occasion in October but this dish has been on my list of “things to make” every since, no matter what you want to call it.

Captivating Casseroles
Lemons are like eating a healthy dose of sunshine and while we get that almost every day here in Dubai, I know that there are a lot of folks in the northern hemisphere that could use some sunlight and warmth right about now. 

If you are trying to keep warm, may I suggest you turn the oven on to bake a casserole or two? Scroll on down to the Sunday Supper link list to see all the fabulous captivating casseroles we are sharing, along with our talented, over-achiever of a host, Alice from A Mama, Baby & Shar-pei in the Kitchen, who is in the middle of an international move but still stepped forward to host. You are a star, Alice!

Ingredients
4 eggs, at room temperature
6 tablespoons or 90ml fresh lemon juice
Zest 1 lemon
1/8 cup or 30g butter, softened, plus extra for buttering casserole
1 cup or 230g sugar
4 tablespoons plus 2 teaspoons plain flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups or 350ml milk

Optional for serving: fresh berries and a sprig or three of mint

Method
Butter your casserole dish (about 8x8in or 20x20cm square – or equivalent volume in another shape) and preheat your oven to 350°F or 180°C.

Separate your eggs and put the whites in the bowl of your stand mixer or in one that is deep enough to use electric beaters. You can certainly whisk egg whites to stiff peaks by hand but it’s hard work!

In another mixing bowl, whisk together egg yolks, lemon juice, lemon zest and butter until well combined. If your eggs are too cold, the butter is going to break up into little pieces again rather than whisking in. If you’ve made this mistake, just keep whisking. Eventually it will all soften again and create a homogeneous mixture.

How you know your eggs were still too cold. Ugh.


In yet another bowl, combine the sugar, flour and salt then mix well.



Add about a third of the dry ingredients at a time to the yolk mixture, along with one third of the milk, whisking well after each addition, until all of the flour/sugar is incorporated.



Beat your egg whites until stiff.


Gently fold the egg whites into the yolk/milk mixture.



Pour into your prepared baking dish.



Put your baking dish into another larger baking pan and fill it with hot water (should not be boiling) halfway up the baking dish.



Carefully transfer the pan to the oven and bake for 40-45 or until set and puffy, but still jiggly when you shake it gently to check.

Remove from the oven and take the baking dish out of the baking pan.



This can be served hot, warm, room temperature or even cold.

Garnish with berries and mint if desired.

Food Lust People Love: Fresh lemon zest and lemon juice are the stars of this tart, sweet baked lemon dessert spooned into a buttered casserole dish and baked until light and fluffy. The supporting role is played by the raspberries or whatever berry you can get your hands on this time of year.


Enjoy!

Food Lust People Love: Fresh lemon zest and lemon juice are the stars of this tart, sweet baked lemon dessert spooned into a buttered casserole dish and baked until light and fluffy. The supporting role is played by the raspberries or whatever berry you can get your hands on this time of year.
It's kind of soufflé-like except then it's saucy on the bottom, which tastes pretty amazing, actually.




Check out all the lovely casseroles we have for you today!

 Captivating Breakfast Casseroles
Appetizing Casserole Sides
Main Event Casseroles
Decadent Dessert and Sweet Casseroles

Pin this Baked Lemon Dessert! 

Food Lust People Love: Fresh lemon zest and lemon juice are the stars of this tart, sweet baked lemon dessert spooned into a buttered casserole dish and baked until light and fluffy. The supporting role is played by the raspberries or whatever berry you can get your hands on this time of year.



Posted by at 4:55:00 AM 0 comments
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Sunday, January 4, 2015

Fish Steamed with Spicy Couscous

For this fish steamed with spice couscous, the fish fillets are steamed on top of the couscous so all the lovely cooking juices are soaked up, making the already spicy, herby couscous even tastier.
 

This is one of my favorite dishes to make when entertaining guests. See easy instructions to adapt for a dinner party at the end of the recipe.*

Parlez-vous français? Yeah, I really didn't either.
To say that three years of high school French prepared me poorly for living in Paris would be an understatement. As much as Madame Reat taught me about La Belle France, including our occasional field trips to a nearby French café where we were supposed to order in French to justify the educational status of said excursion, I learned more useful things by reading signs and labels in grocery stores and recipes on my own. 

I now know weird but handy phrases like laissez gonfler - leave to swell -  and saupoudrer de chapelure – sprinkle with breadcrumbs - and napper en sauce – coat with sauce - that hardly ever come up in normal conversation. 

Not a culinary word, but one I am very proud of learning is autocollant. It means self-adhesive. Not useful you say? Try ordering stamps and imagine miming, "the ones I don't need to lick," at the post office. 

Probably more importantly, I learned that Ah, bon, despite containing the word for good, can be used to acknowledge good or bad things, a confirmation akin to “I hear you”  - or a question, depending on inflection: “Really?”

Répétez après moi: Le couscous est simple à préparer.
I am always on the lookout for new and different starches to add variety to our plates, outside the usual triumvirate rice/potatoes/pasta so I was delighted to come across couscous for the first time in France. It’s a staple there, I am guessing thanks to the North African influence from the former French colonies. 

It has since become essential in my cupboard as well and the instructions on that first box of couscous, graine moyenne or medium coarse, is the source for my pet phrase laissez gonfler, which I have managed to work into more conversations that you would imagine. 

This spicy dish is adapted from a Jamie Oliver recipe from a series called Oliver’s Twist. I’ve been making it regularly since 2003 when the episode Flash in the Pan first aired. It’s perfect for this week’s Sunday Supper theme of Lighten Up for the New Year, with lots of flavor from the spices and cilantro and very healthy steamed fish on top. Make sure to scroll down to see all the other lovely lightened up recipes the group has made for you today!

Ingredients
For the spice mix:
1 1/2 teaspoons flakey sea salt (I use Maldon.)
1 1/2 teaspoons fennel seeds
2 teaspoons cumin seeds
2 teaspoons coriander seeds
1 (2-inch or 2.5cm) piece cinnamon stick

For the dish:
2 cups or 370g wheat couscous – medium grain
1 small onion
2 cloves garlic
2 red chilies (Remove the seeds for less heat.)
1 large bunch cilantro or fresh coriander, leaves picked, stalks finely sliced
Four portion size filets of a relatively thin white fish like sole or flounder. Cod will do if it is not too thick.
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper for seasoning fish
Extra-virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
Couple of handfuls cherry tomatoes (more or less to your taste)
1 large lemon, cut in half at the equator
Optional: another lemon cut in wedges for serving.

Method
Put the couscous in a bowl with enough hot - but not quite boiling - water to cover it. Seal the top of the bowl with cling film and then drape a towel over the top and set aside for at least 10 minutes. Laissez gonfler!

 The couscous will soften and double in size. When it's done, fluff it with a fork and keep covered till needed.



Make your spice mix by pounding the salt, fennel and cumin seeds, coriander seeds and cinnamon together in your mortar.  (If you don’t have a mortar and pestle, you can use already ground spices.)


Mince your onion and one chili pepper. Slice the garlic and the other chili.



Cut the very tough bottom parts of your cilantro stems off and discard. Finely chop the rest of the stems up to the leafy part and then roughly chop the leaves. Some leaves are going to get in your stems and, of course, your leaf pile will have the most tender stems, and that’s okay.

Mostly leaves in front. Most stems in back.


Lay your fish out on a plate and season both sides with salt and pepper.



Heat a large saucepan on a low heat, and sauté the onion, garlic, cilantro stems and chopped chili in a good drizzle of olive oil.



Add the spice mix to the pan with another drizzle of olive oil.

Cook for a few minutes and then add the butter. Let it melt then add the couscous.



Mix thoroughly with the spices and sautéed seasonings. Stir in most of the cilantro leaves, reserving some for garnish when serving.


 Turn the stove down to a very low heat, and lay the fish fillets on top of the couscous. Drizzle with olive oil and tuck the lemon halves, cut side up, and the whole cherry tomatoes in the couscous.



Cover with some foil or a tight fitting lid, and cook for 15 minutes or until the fish is white through and flaky. You may need to add just a little bit of water so that the couscous doesn’t burn on the bottom, so do check it about halfway through. A very heavy pan or a diffuser will help with this problem.

Adding a few tablespoons of water about halfway through.


To serve, sprinkle with the remaining cilantro and sliced chili, squeeze the cooked lemon halves over everything and drizzle on some more olive oil. Divide the couscous between four plates and top each with a steamed fish fillet. Serve with additional wedges of lemon, if desired.



*Dinner party instructions
If you are having a dinner party for eight or 12, double or treble the ingredients and prepare as instructed up to the point where the couscous is ready. Allow it to cool then transfer to a greased baking pan (Make sure it is one that can go straight from refrigerator to oven) before adding the fish, the halved lemons cut side up, cherry tomatoes and drizzle with olive oil. If you want to get fancy, throw in some raw shrimp or prawns as well. Cover with foil and refrigerate if it’s going to be more that a half an hour till it’s cooked or if your kitchen is warm. Once the guests have arrived, bake your fish on couscous- still covered in the foil - in an oven preheated to 350°F or 180°C, allowing extra time for cooking the fish if the dish is chilled. Follow the same serving instructions above.

Enjoy!

If your New Year’s resolutions include eating more sensibly, I’ve got a great list of “lightened up” recipes for you this week. Many thanks to our great host T.R. from Gluten Free Crumbley!

Bright Beverages
Blissful Breakfast Items
Appetizing Starters
Savory Soups and Sides
Marvelous Mains
Delightful Desserts




Posted by at 4:56:00 AM 1 comments
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