Chipotle Bloody Mary

It’s a bank holiday in the UK. It’s cold and raining so we haven’t been out other than to get the newspapers. The boy loves a Bloody Mary and I found this recipe from Tabasco, and thought I would ring the changes. I prefer mine without the vodka. The boy doesn’t.

The recipe uses American cups – UK cups are marginally larger but as you should taste and adjust to you preference to go along, this won’t matter.

¾ cup vodka

3 cups tomato juice

1/3 cup freshly squeezed lime juice

3 ½ tsp Tabasco Chipotle Sauce

1 ½ tsp celery salt

¾ tsp black pepper

Garnish

Lime wedges

Celery stalks

Salt to rim the glasses

This recipe doesn’t need instructions but my thoughts on the ingredients….

Use a good vodka – the boy likes Russian Standard. As this is mostly tomato juice, choose a good brand. Our choice is Libby’s or Princes. Increasingly we like Lidl’s own brand. Del Monte is insipid and a waste of time. Whichever brand, it needs to be “from concentrate” and not freshly pressed for the same reason.

Chipotle is made from smoked jalapeno’s. I make my own chipotle in adobo from dried ones – there is a recipe on here. Tabasco’s version comes in a bigger bottle with a wider opening than their usual red sauce as it is thicker.

Start with getting the glass rims ready. Rub a lime wedge around the rim and dip into a saucer of salt. Our favourite is Fleur Du Sel, a damp salt from Brittany, but a flaky salt would be good too. Cut the celery stalks into a suitable size - they should be thin as well as fairly short.

Mix the Bloody Mary ingredients and pour into a jug. Refrigerate. I don’t hold with ice as it just dilutes it, though it does need to be cold. We have been known to pop a jug into the freezer when we are impatient.

Pour into the salt rimmed glasses and garnish with the celery and a lime wedge.

Consume the newspapers with the boy.

Discuss the world at large.

Greek Bean Soup

It is freezing for August. The boy and I are layering up  as we refuse to put the heating on in mid-August. A hearty soup is the answer.

500g dried haricot beans (or other white beans)

A good glug olive oil

1 large onion, finely chopped

400g can of chopped tomatoes

1tbsp tomato paste

2 carrots, chopped

1 celery stalk chopped (keep the leaves)

1 small dried chilli

1 small green bell pepper, chopped

1 litre water

Pepper

Bread, olives and pickles to serve

You need to soak the beans overnight. I find this supremely satisfying. I love watching them plump up ever so slowly. Next morning put on some Rembetika music and drain and rinse them. Put them in a pan with water to cover – bring to the boil and then let them simmer for 30 minutes. They shouldn’t be quite tender as they will finish cooking in the soup. Drain and put to one side.

The boy has done a fair bit of the chopping, so he may as well sauté the veg. They need to be soft. Meanwhile blend the tomatoes and tomato paste. I admit to buying a huge can of Greek tomato paste because I love the design on the tin. Once washed I will keep pencils in it.

Once the onions, carrots and celery are soft, add the green pepper and celery leaves. Crumble in the chilli. Pour in the water – ideally boiled in a kettle first, and tip in the drained beans.

Give it a stir and that is pretty much soup. Simmer for an hour to 90 minutes. This will allow some of the beans to break down and thicken the soup. You may need to add more water so it is still recognisably a soup. Nothing to do now, but wait. The boy is playing with his cat.

When it is ready, grind in plenty of pepper. Serve with bread- I think any kind with sesame seeds would be really good. I’ve put out a small side plate for each of us with a selection of olives and pickles. The sharpness cuts through the chalkiness of the beans. I notice that the boy avoids the pickled chillies, even though they are the big mild ones. Never mind. More for me.

Sauerkraut

It has turned decidedly cool for August – the boy thinks cool enough for making Sauerkraut, so we have sought out some tight white cabbages.

This recipe is very scalable and really depends on the size of your container. However as it takes a while to ferment, I think it’s worth making a fair amount.

2kg cabbage

50g salt

1tsp caraway seeds

The boy’s favourite way to remove the stalk of the cabbages is to whack it hard, stalk side down on the kitchen surface. That way you should just be able to pull it out. Remove the outer leaves and finely shred the rest. Our food processor is too small so it’s a knife job for us. The boy gets his consignment even finer than mine. Well done him.

Layer the cabbage into your container – we’re using the fermentation tub that we use for brewing beer. Sprinkle salt on each layer , but turn them and mix as you go along and sprinkle in a few caraway seeds as you go. There is some debate about what salt to use but I think the cheap table stuff will be fine.

Put a weighted plate on top – we’re using a couple of tins of tomatoes- to press it down.

After about a week, a brine will form so we will remove the cans but leave the plate on. Just check that the top of the cabbage remains submerged. If it isn’t, add some more brine – 25g salt in 1 litre of water.

It needs checking every couple of days. Once it starts fermenting a foam will form on the top which you need to skim off. After about 3 weeks this should stop which means it is ready to eat. Just give your serving a quick rinse and drain it first to get rid of some of the salt.

I like the sour hit of it as it comes though the boy likes his in the German style, gently fried in butter, and with plenty of good sausages. This will be ready in mid-September when my thoughts turn to mellow fruitfulness and the boy’s turn to sausages with sautéed sauerkraut.

Real Sage & Onion Stuffing

I’m posting this as I reckon 90% of all sage and onion stuffing is made with Paxo, which is crazy when it’s such a simple thing to make. The boy is a traditionalist and a Sunday roast is an unmovable feast in our house.

My Mum used to make a version of this but also used a small box of Paxo so it was half hers and half Paxo’s. No need.

500g white onions, chopped

125g fresh white breadcrumbs

60g butter or dripping

3tbsp sage, chopped

Salt and pepper

The boy has chopped the onions and predictably, they made him cry. Pat him on the shoulder and say “there, there”. I think they need to be the white onions rather than the red ones.  I actually don’t measure any of this out but give the above as a rough guide. It’s about 2 medium onions.

Grate the bread coarsely or give it a quick whiz in the food processor, but don’t get it too fine, This is easiest if you use yesterday’s bread.

Gently fry the onions in the butter or dripping so they are very soft but not browned. I don’t let the boy do this as I don’t want them crispy!

Sophie Grigson recommends pouring boiling water over the sage and letting it sit for one minute to tone down the medicinal taste. I probably wouldn’t do this if using shop-bought hothouse sage, but the stuff from the garden is quite potent.

Put the breadcrumbs in a mixing bowl and add the (drained) sage and salt and pepper – plenty. Tip in the onions with all of their cooking fat from the pan.

Mix well and stuff your meat. The boy prefers the stuffing separate, rather than inside a chicken or rolled in a meat joint. In this case, gently add a little boiling water, mixing the stuffing well until it is just moist and plumped up. Let it sit for 10 minutes then put in a greased tin and dot with butter. Put it in with the roast for the last 20 minutes until it crisps up on top.

Make the boy his Sunday Bloody Mary while you wait for it to cook

Campbell's Tomato Courgette Medley from the 80s

I really like old cookbooks and the boy likes ones associated with grocery brands. He found a book by Campbell’s soup from the late eighties. We both love soup and so always have some in the larder. 

There are a lot of things in the book that I would never want to try and are destined to remain in the 80s – i.e. a potato salad made with a can of cream of celery soup. But we did fancy this one.

1 can Campbell’s condensed cream of tomato soup

3tbsp grated Parmesan

1tbsp lemon juice

½ tsp grated garlic

½ tsp dried basil

875g courgettes, sliced

1 medium onion thinly sliced

1 green pepper, deseeded and cut into strips

The original recipe suggested garlic granules but I’m not going that far. The dried basil is a concession. Normally we have Heinz tomato soup in the house but you need Campbell’s for this as it’s condensed and it is from their book after all.

This is hardly a recipe – Put everything in a large saucepan and toss gently so it is all coated. Simmer over a low heat for about 10 minutes , without letting it boil, as this will spoil the soup. This should just cook the vegetables but leave them firm. Sprinkle with additional Parmesan.

The book also offers a Microwave version, which is “Cook on High for 15 minutes”. I suspect that is based on an 80s microwave and that it would need considerably less these days. (Do microwaves still have a High setting?)

It apparently serves 6-8. This must mean as a side dish – either that or we didn’t eat much back then.

Enjoy with Nik Kershaw or Howard Jones (depending on your allegiance), blasting out as loud as the neighbours will bear.

Lemony Broad Beans

It’s almost too late for broad beans but not quite – many of us are enjoying the second harvest. I love them, The boy is okay with them but hates double podding them. He says they look like big ticks.

1kg broad beans

1 lemon

A good glug of olive oil

Salt and pepper

1tsp paprika

1tsp cumin seeds

½ tsp cayenne pepper

This is very slightly adapted from a recipe that came with the organic box. So – assuming the broad beans come in their long green pods, push them out. The boy actually likes this part. Bring a pan of water to the boil and give them about 7 minutes. Check to make sure they are tender.

Now the double podding – tip them into cold water so you can handle them, and remove the grey, slightly wrinkly skins from them and you will have lovely spring-like fresh green beans again.

Halve the lemon and cut one half into slices as thin as you can get them, removing the seeds.

Heat a large frying pan, with the oil and add the lemons. You want them to just start to caramelise. Tip in the beans. Add the spices. I think sweet paprika will work best here. Squeeze in the juice from the other half of the lemon and mix well until the beans are heated through and covered with the oil and spices. Add the alt and pepper and check the beans are tender – if not, add a splash of water and keep it going another minute or two.

The boy pointed out that this would be a good bruschetta topping if given another drizzle of oil at the end.

Fresh Coriander & Green Chilli Chutney

I had this at a good friend’s lunch party, and it was so good I had to beg the recipe. Apparently it came from the wife of another good friend, so it has good provenance (or Terroir, as the other good friend would say).

115g chopped coriander leaves

3 cloves garlic, crushed

20 cashew nuts

2 green chillies, deseeded

1tbsp sugar

1tsp salt

1tbsp lemon juice

3tbsp canned coconut milk

I don’t know anyone who weighs their coriander leaves. A large pack from Waitrose is about 100g, so you’re looking for about what you’d get in a bunch from an Asian grocers. I’m assuming the cashews are unsalted, as salt is an ingredient, but am not going to beat myself up about this.

Put happy music on – anything from the eighties will do.  It’s really quick to make so you could probably finish the entire thing in about as long as “Walking on Sunshine” by Katrina & the Waves. It will make you happy, as will this recipe.

Put everything except the coconut in a blender and whizz. Add the coconut milk – though shake the can first as it will always separate. Slowly pour in until you get a thick paste.

We dipped home-made bread in this. I would happily have taken the bowl home on my lap in the taxi when we had it – it is that good. The boy had been playing cricket all day. He said something about 50 for 2, which isn't even English!

Pineapple Raita

The boy and I both like Raita, and I’m always looking for versions that go beyond diced cucumber in yoghurt. The boy always thinks he can take curries, hotter than he actually can, so a cooling raita is often essential.

This version has two selling points – it’s quite sweet and it uses canned pineapple so there is no tiresome prep. Pineapple usually comes in small cans which is what you want.

500ml plain yoghurt

3 slices tinned pineapple

½ tsp black peppercorns

1 tsp cumin seeds

1 tsp sugar

Salt to taste

Toast the cumin seeds is a hot frying pan and crush the pepper corns in a pestle and mortar. Chop the pineapple slices quite small. Drain it well on kitchen paper and add to a bowl with all the other ingredients. I think pineapple can take quite a bit of salt. 

This recipe is from Pushpesh Pant’s wonderful “India Cookbook” which has 1000 recipes from the subcontinent. Interestingly, none of his raita recipes include the cucumber variant so I wonder if it is traditional at all? 

The boy likes this with Garlic Chilli Chicken, though he has to change into a dark coloured T shirt first. For obvious reasons!

Salaad (to go with curry)

I have agreed to let us have curry ready meals from the supermarket, and even I have to admit that these are usually very good these days. However, they need improving. I’m adding a dollop of thick yoghurt and some spicy mixed pickle (I like Ahmed Mixed Pickle in Oil, which comes from the local Pakistani butcher).  On the side I am serving this salad, from Madhur Jaffrey. It's not a spelling mistake by the way - Salaad is what her family called it.

140g cucumber, peeled and diced

7 large cherry tomatoes, quartered

1 large shallot, sliced thinly

½ tsp salt

Freshly ground black pepper

½ tsp ground cumin

1/8 tsp cayenne pepper

1 tbsp lime juice

I adore Madhur Jaffrey. I recently found a first edition of “An Invitation to Indian Cookery” for next to nothing. I love that the author biography focuses on her life as an actress, rather than as a cook.

So – again no recipe really – just combine everything. Ideally the cumin seeds should be roasted whole in a hot dry frying pan and then ground. A mandolin will really speed the chopping up, though it’s raining and I quite like chopping vegetables.

My one addition to this is a few long thin slices of carrot. I also think the small crook cucumbers will work best as they are less watery, but not essential.

The boy is accustomed to salads with most meals and seems to like that this one is quite different, though that could be down to the Cobra beer.

Green Slaw

A typical British summer. It was hot and now it’s cold and damp. The boy wants a baked potato for lunch. He likes them topped with (in this order), plenty of salted butter, grated cheese, thinly sliced red onion and coleslaw.

This interesting coleslaw recipe is from Pitt & Cue, a British take on southern US barbecue cuisine.

1 savoy cabbage, shredded

2 onions, finely sliced

1 green pepper, deseeded and finely sliced

1 large green apple, skin on but cored, julienned

1 jalapeno chilli, deseeded and finely sliced

A handful each of coriander and mint, finely chopped

100ml plain yoghurt

Finely grated zest and juice of 2 limes

Salt and sugar to taste

Savoy cabbage is just coming into season and it’s good to have it now while it’s young and tender. I’d be tempted to add a bit more chilli but the boy has vetoed it. The apple is Granny Smith and the yoghurt is Turkish. The sugar does make a difference.

Recipe: Mix.