Looking out of my office window today it’s obvious that spring is very much with us, there’s new growth all around and an air of optimism as the natural world throws off the cloak of winter and stretches. I love this time of year as we see all sorts of things making their annual appearance in our kitchens, for those of you that haven’t had any new season asparagus yet I urge you to grab some and marvel at the delicate flavour.
Seasons form the natural backdrop for eating. All of the World’s Healthiest Foods are seasonal. Imagine a vegetable garden in the dead of winter. Now imagine this same garden on a sunny, summer day. How different things are during these two seasons of the year! For ecologists, seasons are considered a source of natural diversity. Changes in growing conditions from spring to summer or autumn to winter are considered essential for balancing the earth’s resources and its life forms. But today it’s so easy for us to forget about seasons when we eat! Modern food processing and worldwide distribution of food make foods available year-round, and grocery stores shelves look much the same in December as they do in July.
Which brings me to this weeks recipe, the fields abound with young lamb and the shops will soon be pushing new season lamb for all they’re worth. This is a situation that I’ve always found a bit odd, after all new season lamb or milk lamb has almost no flavour. The poor little devils haven’t had the time to eat the multitude of grass varieties that will in the coming months give the distinctive flavour that makes lamb so wonderful. So does this mean that lamb is off the menu, well actually no but you need to think about where the flavour comes from, last years lambs have just become year olds or Hogget (why they couldn’t come up with a more appetitising name I don’t know) that wonderful transition between the soft and succulent lamb and the full flavoured but tough mutton.
So ask your butcher for some hogget and give this Moroccan classic a bash and remember sometimes it’s worth waiting for.
Tagine of Lamb with Apricots
Serves 6-8
The name “tagine” derives from the clay pot with conical lid in which stews are cooked slowly over a fire. In Morocco, a very sweet fruit tagine (Tagine barragog) is made, with lamb, prunes and honey. With this recipe, we prefer to use sharp, naturally dried or semi-dried apricots – if you can find them!
2 large onions, chopped
2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1½ tsp ground cinnamon
¼ tsp saffron
1 tsp ground cumin
A good pinch of chilli powder, to taste
1kg leg or shoulder of lamb, trimmed of some of the fat
2½cm fresh root ginger, cut into slices
3 garlic cloves, crushed
Salt & plenty of black pepper
500g dried apricots
Method
Using a tagine (or casserole dish if you don’t have a tagine), fry the onion gently in the oil until soft.
Stir in the spices – the cinnamon, saffron, cumin and chilli powder – and put in the meat Turn the pieces so that they are covered in the spice mixture. Add the ginger, garlic, salt and pepper and cover with about ½ litre water. Simmer, covered with lid, for 1½ hours, turning the meat over occasionally and adding water if necessary. (You can also put the tagine in your barbeque to simmer.)
Add the apricots and cook for 30 minutes more, adding water if necessary.
Couscous
Generally, the couscous you find in supermarkets is a quick-cook variety and you need to be careful not to over cook it and create a glutinous mess that will put the kids off it for life.
Here’s an easy, failsafe way to cook couscous.
- Place 2 cups of couscous in a heavy bowl.
- Boil 2 ½ cups of water and add to the couscous.
- Add ½ a teaspoon of salt.
- Stir with a fork.
- Cover and allow to sit for 5 minutes
- Uncover and fluff up with a fork – the grains of couscous will have absorbed the liquid without becoming mushy.
- Dot with butter and fluff again. Season and serve
Cooking Couscous – an Olive Oil Variation
To impart a richer, nuttier flavour to your couscous try the recipe below.
- In a saucepan, heat 4 tablespoons of olive oil.
- When the oil is hot add 2 cups of couscous and a good shake of salt.
- Cook for 2-3 mins until the couscous is golden, stirring constantly to prevent burning.
- Add 2 ½ cups of boiling water.
- Remove from the heat and cover.
- Let the couscous sit until all the water is absorbed and the grains are soft – about 5 mins.
- Loosen the couscous with a fork and serve.
- Dot with butter and fluff again. Season and serve
More Flavour
Alone, couscous can taste somewhat bland. While the main taste centre of your meal will be the meat or fish you serve with it, you can add more flavour to the couscous itself by substituting beef, chicken or vegetable stock for the boiling water in the recipes above.
The flavour of couscous can also be punched up by adding pine nuts, currents, oregano, thyme, basil or cinnamon before you add your boiling liquid.
Wine match
We are blessed in this glorious country to have some of the most wonderful Boutique wineries. For the wine connoisseur they are worth tracking down. This week I’ve just found Bijou Estate and their Pinot Noir is a cracker. So go on be adventurous and track them down.
I’ve been looking back over the last couple of years of columns and realise that I haven’t shared the best Brownie recipe in the world. This is one that we used to do at the deli all the time and is just perfect. The sweet richness of the chocolate brownies is counterbalanced by the sharpness of the raspberries.
You’ll notice that the recipe includes frozen raspberries instead of fresh, this is quite important as fresh raspberries would turn to liquid during cooking whereas frozen hold their shape and don’t sink.
There’s no real trick when making brownie, it is really just a chocolate cake that doesn’t have enough rising agent in it so collapses at the end of cooking to form that wonderful dense fudge-like consistency. You don’t need to worry about opening the oven as the collapse is the desired end result anyway, and you will know it is ready when it looks cooked but still has a little bit of movement in the middle when you shake the tray. Dust with a little bit of icing sugar and enjoy.
Chocolate & Raspberry Brownies
Makes 1 medium tray
200g plain flour
80g cocoa powder
300g unsalted butter, diced
300g dark chocolate, chopped
6 eggs
450g caster sugar
2 teaspoon vanilla essence
150g flaked almonds
150g frozen raspberries
Method
Melt the chocolate and butter over a pan of gently boiling water and allow to cool slightly. In a clean bowl, whisk the sugar and eggs until thick and creamy, mix in the vanilla and chocolate mix until smooth. Fold in the sifted flour and cocoa, and then pour into a greased 20 x 30cm tray. Sprinkle with the raspberries and nuts evenly on top. Bake in a pre-heated oven at 170˚C for 25 minutes. When cool, cut into squares and serve dusted with icing sugar.
Brownies are a hard one to wine match as the chocolate tends to dominate, that said a Mills Reef Port certainly hits the mark.
Some nights it’s just got to be left overs, in this case left over from a catering job. I served these as a starter to clients but made a few extra just for us, that said they are really easy to make and go down really well when all of us get home late and just want food on the table as quickly as possible.
Rösti Fish Cakes with Champagne & Chive Sauce
Serves 8
450g prepared crabmeat or mixed white fish
300g firm waxy potatoes
1 tablespoon capers, chopped (optional)
2 tablespoons lime juice
2 teaspoon grated lime zest
4 spring onions, finely chopped
3 pinches cayenne pepper or ‘La Chinata’ Smoked Paprika
2 heaped tablespoons chopped parsley or coriander
Salt & pepper to season
1 egg, beaten
Salad greens to serve
Champagne & Chive Sauce:
3 shallots (or 1 medium onion), finely chopped
¼ leek, finely chopped
1 clove garlic, crushed
1 tablespoon olive oil
300ml champagne or white wine
300ml fish stock (or chicken stock)
3 tbsps fresh chives, chopped
300ml double cream
Lemon juice to taste
Seasoning
The day before:
Put the unpeeled potatoes in salted boiling water for exactly 10 minutes. Mix remaining ingredients in a bowl. When potatoes are cooked, drain. When cool enough to handle, peel off the skins and grate. Carefully combine both mixtures and portion. Place portions on a tray and chill for at least 2 hours to become firm.
Meanwhile prepare sauce: sweat shallots, leek and garlic in the olive oil. Add stock and champagne to the pan and reduce to quarter of original volume. In a second pan, reduce cream to half the original volume. Add stock mix to cream and hand whisk. Add lemon juice, chopped chives and seasoning to taste. When cool, put into a box and refrigerate.
Heat a frying pan until almost smoking and place fish cakes carefully into hot pan, working in four portion batches. Cook for 3 minutes each side; they should be golden brown but barely cooked in the middle. Lift out onto paper towels and squeeze a few drops of lemon juice on top. When cool, place in an airtight box and refrigerate.
On the night:
Reheat fish cakes in oven at 200°C for 5 – 10 minutes. Meanwhile, reheat sauce on a low heat in a saucepan. Place a small handful of salad greens in the centre of each plate, place hot fishcakes on top, spoon over sauce and serve immediately.
I keep banging on about food should be fun, and this roast beef is one of those where the use of spices takes the whole meal to a new level. Nobody ever guesses that the lovely crunchy crust is really curry powder and salt. Use the mild curry powder and either rock or flaky salt.
Choose your meat carefully, cheaper meat tends to carry more fat not just on the surface but also in amongst the muscle fibre. Try Cambrian Meats in Judea or Harmony Meats at the good food trading company.
Roast Beef
2.5 – 3kg Beef roast
1 tablespoon Curry powder
2 tablespoon salt
Fresh ground black pepper
2 Onions , roughly chopped
1 Leek, roughly chopped
2 Carrots, peeled and roughly chopped
3 cloves of garlic, peeled
2 sticks of Celery, roughly chopped
1 tablespoon Plain flour
1 cup red wine ( optional but really good)
! litre of stock or water
Method
Mix all the powders together and spread on the fat layer of the sirloin. (This will make it very crispy.) allow to sit at room temperature for at least 1 hour.
Put all the chopped veg in a high-sided roasting dish and sprinkle with the plain flour.
Place meat on top of the veg and flour and on the middle shelf of a preheated oven at 240˚C for 15 minutes per 450g plus 15 minutes extra, turning oven down to 190˚C after first 20 minutes.
Carefully lift the meat off the now caramelised veg, wrap the meat in foil and leave to one side to rest. Rest for at least 30 minutes before serving. While resting make the sauce by placing the roasting tray with the caramelised veg in over a high heat on the stove top. Get good and hot again and then deglaze with the red wine if using. Let this reduce by half, then add the stock or water making sure that you get all the lovely tasty bits off the bottom. Once boiling, sieve into a saucepan and keep warm
Top tip.
If you have a meat thermometer then these temps will guarantee doneness
Core temperature for RARE 50˚C
Core temperature for MEDIUM RARE 56˚C
Core temperature for MEDIUM 65˚C
Core temperature for WELL DONE 75˚C
Roast Vegetables
I large potato, large dice
1 kumara, large dice
¼ pumkin, large dice
1 red capsicum, chopped roughly
1 yellow capsicum, chopped roughly
1 red onion, sliced
1 courgette, sliced
1 small carrot, peeled and chopped roughly
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 cloves garlic
1 cup spinach, chopped roughly
Vinaigrette dressing (see below)
Method
Roast chopped vegetables (except spinach), garlic and olive oil in a pre-heated oven at 180°C for 30 to 40 mins until golden brown. Remove vegetables from oven and add spinach and seasoning. Add dressing and mix well.
Vinaigrette
Makes 400ml
½ tablespoon smooth Dijon mustard
50ml red wine vinegar
50ml balsamic vinegar
100ml hazelnut oil
100ml avocado oil
100ml olive oil
½ teaspoon salt
6 turns white pepper
1 clove garlic, peeled and crushed
Method
Place all the ingredients into a blender and blitz for 60 seconds. Strain through a fine sieve.
My week seems to be getting filled with sport at the moment, not just with our two boys getting to finals time with their rugby and hockey, but also as a cook. Wednesdays are filming days for foreverfit.tv, an online gym and Internet TV channel, while my Mondays are taken up with cooking for the mighty Steamers.
For those of you that know me well, it’s obvious that I love food in all its forms and being a cook it is a little hard to stay at the peak of fitness. Who am I kidding with the peak of fitness thing; nothing makes you feel short, fat and old like walking into the Steamers training rooms to be surrounded by real athletes. Speaking of real athletes, we all should be very proud of these exceptional young men that represent the Bay of Plenty on the rugby fields around the country. I am constantly astonished at their dedication and discipline, and their constant search for improvement.
So why is the chef involved? Simple really, food is supposed to be tasty, easy and fun, especially during training. It’s too easy to make a list of all the things you’re not allowed to eat instead of exploring new flavours that can make mealtimes fun again. For our young athletes striving for their personal gold medals the sacrifices are already enough with out dismissing the joy of good food.
Hot and Sour Thai Chicken Broth
This recipe is based on a version of Tom Yum soup – a spicy, clear, refreshing broth found on the menu of most Thai restaurants. It can also be made with tiger prawns and is very low fat. This soup is also nice made with Japanese miso stock.
Serves 4
2 skinless chicken breasts (175g each)
1.2 litres chicken stock
10g bunch coriander leaves, stalks removed and set aside
2 small red bird’s eye chillies, halved and de-seeded
1 stalk lemon grass, roughly chopped
2.5cm piece of ginger, peeled and sliced
2 medium ripe tomatoes
3 salad onions, trimmed and finely sliced (including green parts)
50g fresh, shelled peas (or frozen)
50g sugar snap peas, cut in half
1 tablespoon Thai fish sauce
1 tablespoon tamarind puree
Juice of a large lime (about 2 tablespoons)
Method
Put chicken stock into large saucepan and add coriander stalks, one of the halved chillies, lemon grass and ginger. Bring to boil, stir, then cover and simmer gently for 15 minutes to allow Thai flavours to infuse stock.
Skin tomatoes with hot water and cut into quarters, removing seeds, then cut quarters into three lengthways so you have thin slices. Cut chicken breasts in half widthways and slice into thin slivers. Strain stock, discarding flavourings, and return to the pan. Bring to a simmer, then stir in chicken slivers and half of salad onions. Stir and cover, leaving chicken to poach gently for 5 minutes until cooked through. Meanwhile, finely slice remaining chilli (washing hands afterwards!)
Next, add peas, sugar snaps, sliced chilli, fish sauce, tamarind and lime juice to the soup, stir and gently simmer for 2-3 minutes or until peas are tender. Stir tomato in and divide coriander leaves among 4 deep bowls. Ladle hot soup on top, sprinkle with remaining salad onions and serve.
How can I recommend a wine when this is all about being fit? Well for those, like me, whose athletic ship has already sailed a little glass of Gewurztraminer hits the spot. Try Osawa Wines from the Hawke’s Bay.
This week it’s all about risotto, in this case seafood risotto. Risotto can be as rich and fatty as you want to make it, which obviously in this case we’re trying to avoid that. The trick to avoiding fat is to recognize that fat is what we as humans find interesting and flavoursome, so eliminating it runs the risk of making our food taste a bit boring. Once you accept this you can see the importance of seasoning, spicing and building strong base flavours. The homemade fish stock is the start point that builds the flavour, and is so easy to make. just wash the bones before you use them and follow the recipe. you can get the bones from Sandfords (cheap or free) or if you’re out fishing keep the bones. Make lots as it freezes well.
For the risotto, I’ve shown the pan method though on monday I did it in the oven adding the fish just for the last five minutes, both work really well. I also added saffron to both the stock and risotto which brings a wonderful richness and colour. As i said earlier we tend to associate flavour with the fat content, so just removing it will leave your meal missing something. replace with real natural flavours and its a joy to eat again. See you next week.
Fish Stock
2kg soaked and washed fish bones
50g fresh herbs
3 litres cold water
12 white peppercorns
2 medium onions
2 bay leaves
2 white leeks
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 sticks celery
600ml white wine
Method
Sweat the vegetables and herbs with the olive oil until soft but without colouring them. Add the fish bones and stir to coat. Add water and wine to cover and bring to the boil. Skim and simmer for 20 minutes. Allow to cool (about 3 to 4 hours), sieve and store in the fridge or freezer.
Easy Risotto
The main point to remember when making risotto is that any liquid that you use, whether it is stock, wine or cream, should be boiling hot before you add it to the rice. This will stop your risotto from “clumping”.
For 2 – 3 main servings:
1 cup Aborio or risotto rice
2½ cups stock, boiling
½ onion or 2 shallots, chopped
1 – 2 cloves garlic, chopped
Extra virgin olive oil
100 ml white wine
Salt and pepper
Parmesan, grated
Extra hot stock, olive oil or butter
Method
Heat the wine gently (and saffron, if using.) In another large pan, heat a little olive oil and sweat the “soffrito” slowly – garlic, onion and any other root vegetable being used (e.g. carrot, leek). Add the rice and heat through for 1 – 2 minutes (called toasting). Add hot wine and allow to reduce. Add the boiling stock all at once, bring back to the boil and add seasoning. Cover and simmer for 15 – 18 minutes.
Add flavourings, rest for a few minutes and then stir through parmesan, a little extra stock, gently heated cream, extra virgin olive oil or butter – the amount depends on how ‘allonde,’ or creamy, you like your risotto.
Suggested additions:
- Ø Porcini: Soak 15g dried porcini in 250ml warm water for at least 20 minutes. Strain and use some of the stock in risotto. Add sliced porcini at halfway point. Add heated cream at the end, along with parmigiano and chopped Italian parsley. Drizzle with Truffle oil.
- Ø Smoked Mushrooms: As above, but use Aromatics Smoked Mushrooms instead of porcini.
- Ø Smoked Salmon: Add chopped leek to the initial ‘soffrito’. Before adding Parmesan, add chopped, cooked Smoked Salmon.
- Ø Chorizo & Saffron: Add a pinch of crushed saffron to the wine/stock and, before you add the Parmesan at the end, fold through 2 cooked, chopped chorizo sausages.
- Ø Pumpkin: Cook cubed pumpkin slowly in EVO with garlic and some red wine and add with the Parmesan.
- Ø Lamb, Feta & Capers: Add 1 – 2 seared lamb fillets, marinated in Balsamic Vinegar and Infused Olive Oil (Lemon or Porcini) plus 2 tablespoon salted capers, soaked and rinsed and 100g cubed Creamy Feta.
This idea of writing about our food at home is proving to be a real hit with all the family. Our 11 year old food photographer, Fraser, is getting more and more demanding, i think it must be the artist in him trying to get out. What is really neat is how we are all learning something new.
So, on to tonights meal. I was preparing a private cheffing job that included puff pastry so figured I’d use up the off cuts for our meal. The trick with beef Wellington is to precook the beef to the point that it needs 12 minutes in the oven inside the pastry (thats how long the pastry needs to puff up and colour), also season the steak really well before you wrap it in the pastry.
This blog is following the feeding of The Bay of Plenty Steamers through the next ten weeks. I’m writing it for the players, so that they can keep track of the recipes that we are using and hopefully gat a bit of fun and taste back into their food. That said I hope it can be of interest to others. I will be talking directly to all the team and most of the advice will be rugby specific and in line with the teams dietary needs. If anyone has questions or need help please email through this site or facebook.
So on to this week, I really wanted to introduce Quinoa to the team as frankly it is an astonishing superfood, high in vegetable protein and gluten free. Almost more importantly it is really quick to cook and available in most supermarkets. You’ll see from the recipe that you need to panfry or dry toast the washed seeds for a while and then cover with boiling water, the easy trick is to heat the pan and fill the kettle, drop in the slightly damp quinoa and turn the kettle on. Use the time it takes the kettle to boil as the dry toasting time, then carefully add the boiling water (carefully, because it will hiss and spit for the first few seconds, then calm down). The toasting stage is important as it will release the natural nutty flavour of the quinoa.
Now to the chicken, try to buy whole chickens as it will be cheaper in the long run and learn how to butcher it (any problems, let me know and I’ll show you how next week). Leave the bone in as it will add more flavour. With the seasoning try to avoid the jar type and stick to the powder, as they tend to add all sorts of rubbish to the jar that you don’t need. The best powder I’ve found is the one at Cambrian Meats in Judea, although the supermarket ones would do.
Usually Butter chicken is made with cream, but in this case we’ve substituted with lite coconut milk to cut the fat content.
Mild Butter Chicken
1 whole chicken, preferably free range
2 tablespoons of butter chicken spice powder
1 tin crushed tomatoes
500 ml lite coconut milk
small bunch coriander
seasoning
Separate the breast, legs and thighs of the chicken from the bones and sprinkle with the spice powder. Place in a sealable box and refrigerate overnight, (including the bones)
Start by bringing the coconut milk to the boil and reduce for 5 minutes then add the tomatoes. Meanwhile panfry the chicken pieces for colour and flavour, and place in a casserole dish. Pour over the sauce and place in a medium hot oven for 25 minutes.
Season to taste and sprinkle with chopped coriander, Serve.
Quinoa Salad with Roast Vegetables & Halloumi
Serves 6
1 red capsicum, chopped roughly
1 yellow capsicum, chopped roughly
1 red onion, sliced
1 courgette, sliced
1 small carrot, peeled and chopped roughly
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 cloves garlic
1 cup quinoa (pronounced ‘keenwa’)
Salt & pepper
1 cup spinach, chopped roughly
150g haloumi cheese, grilled until golden brown, (optional)
Vinaigrette dressing
Method
Roast chopped vegetables (except spinach), garlic and olive oil in a pre-heated oven at 180°C for 30 to 40 mins until golden brown.
Meanwhile, wash quinoa with cold water in a sieve and squeeze dry in a clean tea towel. Place quinoa in a pan, place over a medium heat and fry until lightly toasted. Cover with boiling water and simmer gently until all the liquid has been absorbed.
Remove vegetables from oven and add to quinoa with spinach and seasoning. Add dressing and mix well. Place in a bowl with grilled haloumi on top as a garnish and serve.
Vinaigrette
Makes 400ml
½ tablespoon smooth Dijon mustard
50ml red wine vinegar
50ml balsamic vinegar
100ml hazelnut oil
100ml avocado oil
100ml olive oil
½ teaspoon salt
6 turns white pepper
1 clove garlic, peeled and crushed
Method
Place all the ingredients into a blender and blitz for 60 seconds. Strain through a fine sieve.
Every week the boys cook one night, my dearest wish is that once they fly the nest they will be able to look after themselves without resorting to fast food and who knows the life skill of being able to cook just might help them socially if you know what I mean.
The rules are simple, they must plan the meal and do it all themselves with me in an advisory role only. Tonight Alex has found a Bill Granger recipe for panfried marinated beef rice paper rolls with Vietnamese dipping sauce. I guess the get my recipes quite a lot so a change is as good as a rest.
I’m so proud of how much effort they go to, and how special the meal becomes. And of course with two boys the competition is on, with each trying to outdo the other.
Now to do the washing up, the one job that I can usually sidestep as the cook, but not tonight.
Lasagne is one of those dishes that all the family loves, even when I’m being a bit sneaky and adding lots of veg to the beef mince. So many parents seem to have problems getting veg into their kids, and at times our two have been interesting. Although to be fair Alex and Fraser are really cool about their food and seem to enjoy Daddies nightly experiments.
The trick is to clear the veg drawer and panfry some onions, garlic, carrots, mushrooms, peppers and whatever else that you want, then add it to the mince that your cooking off with tomatoes. To give it a real depth of flavour spend some time on the white sauce or bechamel and then don’t spare the parmesan.
Béchamel Sauce:
100g butter
100g plain flour
1 small onion studded with whole cloves
1 bayleaf
1 litre milk
A little freshly grated nutmeg
Salt and pepper
Firstly simmer the milk for a couple of minutes with the onion, cloves, bayleaf, nutmeg and seasoning, and leave to one side to infuse. Now melt butter for béchamel in a saucepan. Whisk in flour and cook for a few minutes, stirring constantly, then gradually whisk in the warm milk, having discarded the clove studded onion and bayleaf, and continue to cook for 10 minutes, stirring constantly until thick and smooth.
