Fattoosh

Posted on April 4, 2014 by tenuoustoaster

When it’s 9pm and you haven’t eaten yet you have a choice. Don’t eat, or knock up a fattoosh. I made this in less than 15 minutes!

I’ve made a number of fattooshes (fattooshi? not sure what the plural is). Ottolenghi’s fattoosh has a buttermilk dressing and is diced smaller. This one is very chunky – those cucumbers and tomatoes in the picture are 1.5cm dice.

Fattoosh belong to a family of dishes known as fattat – which tends to use stale flat bread as a base – which usually has sumac over it to give the dish a sour taste and it will usually have parsley in it.

Fatt means crush! oosh is just a suffix – so fattoosh I guess means crushed.

This dish – like a number of dishes in Veggiestan – has a lot of fresh herbs. This has a handful of parsley, coriander and mint (well it’s supposed to – I always put more – much better than throwing it away).

This is incredibly zingy, crunchy, fresh and tasty. The olive oil, garlic and lemon juice dressing really gives it a kick.

Also in the dish are peppers, black olives and spring onions.

And I really love the toasted bread in olive oil, dusted in sumac. Sumac is amazing – it always brings toasted bread to life.

The recipe calls for pitta – but I didn’t have any so I just diced a french stick and did it with that.

The other good thing about a fattoosh salad (we just decided the plural of fattoosh is ‘fattoosh salads’) is that – even at 9:30pm – you can stuff your face with this endlessly and never feel full up.

Veggiestan Waldorf Salad

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When I read this recipe in Veggiestan I thought ‘hmm, might be a bit boring’. How wrong could I be.

This is a very exciting take on a Waldorf Salad and would make the perfect side to anything from fish to chicken to Halloumi – I could go on.

We both thought that it could be made into a perfect main with the simple addition of some bread (maybe pitta or garlicky croutons) and some cheese (maybe shaved parmesan – or Freya’s preference Stilton).

I like this kind of dish on a work day because you can take all the ingredients to work in their raw state and just prepare it when you want to eat.

There’s nothing worse than preparing a salad in the morning, popping it in some Tuppaware and then seeing it degrade before you get to eat it. You can prevent this somewhat by keeping the dressing separate but as soon as you start cutting apples or such-like they will lose their colour – so it’s best you just do it when you want it.

A traditional Waldorf salad is made from fresh apples, celery and walnuts, dressed in mayonnaise, and usually served on a bed of lettuce. This dish differs slightly with the addition or raisins, chopped coriander and chopped mint, green pepper and onions. Also there is no mayonaisse. The dressing is made from yoghurt, oil, saffron, seasioning and cider vinegar.

I used some really colourful little gem lettuces (with nice purple tinges), and red onion in my version to make it look less green.

I love this. It packs a punch and has lots of different textures and flavours running through it. It’s a great salad – and it’s made with ingredients I usually have knocking about. I’ll never make a traditional Waldorf again.

Fried Eggs with Dates

Posted on April 2, 2014 by tenuoustoaster

This is weird. In fairness when we saw it in the book we said – that looks weird, we should try it.

If you think about it too long, you won’t try it. Because it’s dates and fried egg mixed together. That’s it nothing else.

I feel kind of sucked in by the narrative under the ‘Western International Breakfast’ where the author says ‘Because the best food in the world is often the simplest’.

This may be true – but only of other dishes – not this one!

Freya didn’t like this – as was apparent when we swapped plates once I’d eaten three quarters of mine and she’d merely moved her food around the plate. Obviously I have concerns for how regular I might become having consumed 250g of dates – but I’m sure I’ll be fine!

I only made this while I waited for the Ocado man to deliver our groceries. Freya was hungry and in need of a quick nibble. I should have waited 15 minutes – although I guess I’d have made it eventually.

Have I got across to you all that I won’t make this again? Good!

Veggiestan – Sally Butcher

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This is the first Vegetarian only cookery book I’ve cooked from. I borrowed it from my future mother-in-law quite some time ago and haven’t gotten round to cooking from it.

I like the down to earth writing of the author of this book – it’s a very modern writing style.

In searching for this week’s recipes I only got to page 80 before I’d shortlisted 20 recipes – and then stopped. This book compliments all the Ottolenghi books – and many of the recipes are strikingly similar but with slight twists. The middle eastern style of cooking really suits me. I hope I can go there on a holiday once we’ve sorted our boat out !

I particularly like the ‘suggestions’ of how to modify the dishes and customise them to your own tastes.

Anyway all this week’s recipes are going to come from this book. I’ve plumped for lots of simple to make, smaller dishes as I don’t have a lot of spare time this week. I hope you enjoy them !

This week I’ll be making:

Turkish Pizza Bread
Spinach Fatayer
Afghan Leek Pies
Beetroot and Orange Salad
Cucumber and Pomegranate Salsa
Waldorf Salad
Fatoush
Herby Omelette Thingies
Onion and Herb Salad
Fried Eggs With Dates
Figs and Halloumi
Cheese Baked Egg-Stuffed Tomatoes
Tomato, Fennel and Arak Soup

I’ll also make Mung Bean Casserole – but I have to wait for those to arrive from souschef.co.uk, they take a few days to deliver based on past experience.

Couscous and Moghrabieh with Oven Dried Tomatoes

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Moghrabieh is big couscous. I got some in my Ottolenghi food box for Christmas this year – and this is the first time I’ve used it. I have some dried limes too – I just haven’t found a recipe that uses them yet!

You can find this recipe in Yotam Ottolenghi’s – The Cookbook, BTW – the book is full of awesome recipes which I will hopefully come back to sometime soon.

I wasn’t intending on making this yesterday – but it was one of very few things where I knew I had all the ingredients. Both of us were off work with ‘the flu’ and spent most of the day sniffing and coughing and feeling sorry for ourselves. By 4pm we realised we really should eat something but the cupboards and fridge were somewhat bare. We’d made a mistake in not doing our shortlisted order with Ocado on the Sunday and were paying the price today. We’d have to wait until tomorrow for a grocery delivery. Modern day shopping really does make you lazy! We have a reasonable excuse. Our nearest grocery store is 12 miles away in Henley and you just can’t beat the quality of the groceries that Ocado delivers.

This is quite easy to make – but will take two hours to be ready (minimum). Even longer if you make the Labneh that is recommended as an addition. Labneh takes a day to make at least – I cheated and used some feta. Feta is a handy swap for some cheeses as it means you can reduced the amount of salt you put in food. And I always have feta.

You have to slow roast a lot of tomatoes in a balsamic glaze and wait for them to ‘dehydrate’ – I left them on the lowest setting of my oven.

While you wait for the tomatoes, caramelise some onions. Then prepare the Moghrabieh until it is al dente. Drain and leave to cool. Then prepare the couscous in some vegetable stock. You have a lot of time to do this. Those tomatoes take a long long time! We even went for a nap.

Once the tomatoes are ready, mix the couscous, moghrabieh, onions and tomatoes in a serving dish – including all the tomato juice and some Nigella seeds and mix a little. Add some Nigella seeds and more Olive oil as a topping and you are done. Dress with cheese if you want !

This makes a lot of food. So either reduced your quantities, invite your friends round – or be prepared to eat it for a few days!

I swapped couscous with bulgar wheat – because I forgot to check I had all the ingredients. I don’t think it makes any difference – they are quite substitutable apart from the preparation time.

This is one of those recipes that you should be able to make any time of year as there are no seasonal ingredients to worry about. It’s also great because you will always have leftovers for work the next day! Just make sure you get really tasty tomatoes!

In hindsight I should prepared more tomatoes. They are the centre of the dish and I don’t think I had enough of them in relation to the grain. Other than that this dish is spot on.

Slow Roasted Tomatoes

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I knocked this up as a snack during the day yesterday. I had gone to the fridge to see what I could possibly make for dinner and there really wasn’t much in there. This week’s selection of recipes had yet to be ordered from Ocado so we were somewhat short of food. I did however have a lot of tomatoes!

I couldn’t remember what I’d even bought them for and then remembered that Natoora had an offer so I’d bought them without a real use in mind. That said I love tomatoes so they weren’t going to be wasted.

These Slow Roasted Tomatoes are from the ‘One Good Dish’ cookbook by David Tanis – and they are very easy – they just take a long time to be ready.

Cut some tomatoes in half. Drizzle with Olive Oil, Sliced Garlic and Basil and bake until they are done. I did them at 150 degrees C for and hour in a Halogen oven and they took on a really sweet taste.

You’re supposed to have them with fish, but we just munched them while we waited for our ‘proper’ dinner to be ready.

Tasty things don’t need to be difficult. This was easy – you just need good tomatoes – like Natoora!

Plenty – Yotam Ottolenghi

Posted on April 2, 2014 by tenuoustoaster

Most people I know swear by Jamie Oliver for their quick easy recipes. I swear by Yotam Ottolenghi.

Why? Well Jamie does do a lot a good food but my personal opinion is you aren’t going to keep your weight down. He makes lots of things with pasta and potatoes – especially in his 30 minute meals book. Also – Jamie cooks mainly with meat. Not exclusively – just mainly.

We are by no means vegetarians – at least we weren’t! Freya (my fiance) probably won’t go back to the dark side. We just decided that the only way to get Freya’s vegetarian mum to eat better was to adorn her with lots of yummy vegetarian things that were easy to make – and hope that it rubbed off.

Plenty – one of the Holy Trinity of Yotam Ottolenghi’s cookbooks – is not exclusively vegetarian. That said – there are enough vegetarian recipes in this book that you won’t have to search for the Sides section and hope you can turn the dish into a main meal.

I’ve made almost every vegetarian recipe in this book and on the whole they are all incredibly easy, tasty and versatile. Only on a few occasions did I have to go to specialist shops for ingredients.

I can’t recommend this book enough. There is a lot of ‘foody talk’ in this book – and I generally don’t read the ‘blah blah blah’ – having been put off by Nigella’s half page introductions to almost every recipe. You will read this though. The man knows his stuff, he’s interesting, relevant, passionate and keeps things simple.

Polenta Pizza with Crumbled Sage

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This dish took ever so slightly longer than most. I actually had to cook something this time!

Cook up some polenta and when it’s done pop it into a round pizza type dish about 2cm deep. I think mine is less as I used a bigger dish. Let the polenta cool down so it solidifies – you want it to resemble a pizza dough somewhat. I left mine outside as a frost was on the way. Fortunately the local wildlife didn’t get at it!

Then simply top with Mozzarella and Parmesan, olive oil, dried chilli flakes and fresh sage (that you have dried – not dried sage) and bake in an oven until it’s bubbling.

I dehydrated my sage in an halogen oven – to book suggests leaving it on a window sill for a few days – but who has time for that during the working week!

I got sucked into the vortex that is talking to my in-laws whilst making this and by the time it was ready it was too late to eat it – so it’ll have to do for lunch tomorrow. Hence the uncut pizza picture.

There’s no reason for it not to be yummy with the amount of cheese in it. Just be careful not to over salt the polenta as the parmesan is pretty salty already.

UPDATE:

We had this for lunch and it’s just too heavy. I think if you could halve the Polenta and put a bit more flavour in it than just salt then it might work – but for now I’m going to give this a miss.

Quick Scallion Kimchee

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This won’t be ready for another 72 hours. Not sure what a not quick kimchee is – having never made one. But there you go.

You simply trim several bunches of spring onions (scallions) and marinade in a dressing of ginger, garlic, chilli flakes, fish sauce, rice vinegar, brown sugar and sesame oil and seeds.

I’ve never had this before but I’m guessing it’s going to have quite a kick given the amount of chilli flakes in it.

Another incredibly quick and easy recipe to prepare from One Good Dish by David Tanis.

UPDATE:

We ate this after it had marinated for 3 days.

Half a cup of chilli flakes is going to give you some idea of how hot is was!

It would be lovely in a burger – or with something meaty. I had it ‘as is’ and it was a bit much! The leftovers I cooked in an omelette, and that was amazing!

Radishes a la Creme

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This isn’t cooking in any sense of the word. It’s cutting up some radishes and putting a blob of creme fraiche next on top.

If you don’t have a watermelon radish, or daikon it’s not going to be particularly exciting. That said – if you do it really works !

The combination of the three radishes (salad, daikon and watermelon) offers different textures and crunches.

Dressed with some whipped up Creme Fraiche and salt and pepper – this dish couldn’t be simpler or quicker provided you have a very sharp knife.

You never know what you are going to get when you buy a watermelon radish. Sometimes they are really colourful inside and look amazing. Other times (like this time) they just don’t offer the amazing contrast on the plate.