The classic Stephanie casserole
This is one of my youngest daughters favourite meals, wow can she shovel it away! Simplicity itself, as most things here are, but packed full of flavour and lots of vegetables. Improves if you make it a day ahead! I put far more veg in than meat so am giving method rather than measures.
Sweat down chopped onions, leeks, carrots, pumpkin and a couple of bashed cloves of garlic. Then add a handful of chopped cherry tomatoes.
Sear chopped beef until browned and season to taste. Add a two ...
Maple Syrup Glazed Chicken
This was delicious, apologies for the exceptionally retro style rice timbale...I watched a 70's programme earlier, you might get a gateau next, oops! So marinade:
2 heaped tblsp maple syrup, 2 of fresh lemon juice, 1 of light soy sauce, knob of grated garlic, 3 cloves of grated garlic and some black pepper
marinate 2 trimmed chicken breasts for up to 3 hours. Take chicken out, don't throw the marinade away please!
Sear the chicken off then wrap loosely in ...
Cottage Pie with Cauliflower Purée top
For me cottage pie is like a warm hug, just wholesome comfort food at its best. This is lighter and better for you plus upping vegetable intake, perfect! Don't like cauliflower? Try parsnip and butternut squash purée instead.
Gently sweat diced vegetables: onions, carrots, leeks, celery, squash until softened. Use whatever veg you like in the quantities you want.
Brown 500g of ground minced meat, I used beef. Add a tblsp of tomato paste, 200ml of stock and about half a wine glass ...
Espresso Black Treacle Chilli
Or perhaps a title of "I may be losing the plot"...The plan was for a smokey flavour paired with a touch of sweetness, usually a couple of squares of dark chocolate works but I wanted a change. Very happy with the result!
2 onions, 2 cloves of garlic, 1 de seeded red chilli all finely diced. A heaped tsp of ground cumin, hot paprika (more if you like it hot) and black pepper.
Gently sauté in a little oil for a few minutes. Add 250g of minced beef, sauté. ...
Salmon, hash & poached egg..it’s a miracle!
Seriously I'd never successfully poached an egg in my life so I quickly made another one to make sure it wasn't a fluke! Organic fresh egg at room temperature, crack into a pan of rolling simmering water with a tsp of vinegar and a pinch of salt. Gently shape the egg and simmer for 4 minutes.
For the hash I parboiled diced sweet potato then fried it up with onion, courgette and red pepper. Season to taste.
Season and pan fry the salmon fillet, just a couple of ...
Japanese Beef Bowl
So simple, chopsticks at the ready, feel free to swop the beef for chicken, pork or maybe prawns? Ooh salmon would be lovely but I think I've leave the mushrooms out?
300g thin slices of beef, cut into strips. A couple of cloves of garlic and a knob of ginger, grated. Finely diced de seeded chilli depending on your "hot" radar. A tin of mixed water chestnuts and bamboo shoots. Some Chinese mushrooms soaked in hot water for 2 hours. A couple of spring onions, ...
Gorgonzola Beef Burger
Easy Friday night supper and, bonus, I had too much meat so made double and froze the other 2 for another day.
To make 4 burgers:
500g good beef mince. 1 large onion, grate half and very finely chop the other half. Approximately 70g blue cheese, roughly chunked. I happened to have Gorgonzola left from the chicken recipe a few days ago. As much freshly ground black pepper as you like.
Mix together well, really squeeze the ingredients together and shape into ...
The Best Beef Stew, melt in the mouth good..
I'm pretty critical about food, food I cook anyway, often wondering what I could have done differently. Wow this was amazing, personally I wouldn't change a thing and the whole lot was devoured by just three of us last night.
Ingredients and method:
800g beef shin (I thought we'd have leftovers, boy did that meat shrink!) Dust the whole joint in seasoned flour and sear until browned evenly. Remove from pan.
2 large onions, 4 decent sized carrots, 4 sticks celery all ...
Let’s “tweak” that trusty Chicken Shnitzel, bring on the blue cheese and smoked ham!
Make ahead, takes minutes to cook and tastes really good. Definitely worthy of serving to guests!
Just the 2 of us so one plump chicken breast cut in half lengthways. Blitz some nuts (I only had walnuts) and mix with freshly ground black pepper. Press your chicken slices into the nut mixture then chill (so you can do this and veg n the morning then just cook chicken and reheat vegetables). If you don't like nuts use breadcrumbs!
Heat olive oil and butter hot, in ...
Slow cooked Belly Pork with Asian flavours
A much underrated and cheap joint of meat, yes it's fatty but that means you can cook for ages and skim the fat off yet it stays so moist and tender. Tons more belly pork recipes to come over the winter!
It takes just a few minutes to prepare then switch on the slow cooker and enjoy the really good aroma wafting away for best part of the day. (I'm a lazy cook so it seems..)
You'll need 500g or more of belly pork to serve 2 people, it shrinks when cooked!
Just chop an onion, bash a few ...
