Potato Salad

(This is from Food in a Minute)

700 g – 1 kg baby new Potatoes, scrubbed

a handful of chopped up Salami

a handful of chopped up Bacon

4-5 Gherkins, sliced

approx  ½ cup Mayonnaise

5 Spring Onions

1 tablespoon Sour Cream

a couple of pickled Cocktail Onions, if you like

 

Cook potatoes in boiling, salted water, cover and simmer gently until just tender, about 10-15 minutes (mine took more like 20 minutes, they were a bit soft, but my wife tells me that’s the way they’re meant to be).  Pan-fry the salami and bacon until crisp.  Remove, draining any fat off before adding to the salad.  In a small bowl combine mayonnaise, sour cream, mustard and gherkins.  Drain cooked potatoes and rinse in cold water, drain well.  (You might want to chop the potatoes before boiling, but i chopped them after draining.  Bit messy chopping cooked potatoes though.)  Turn into a salad bowl with salami, spring onions, cocktail onions, bacon and toss with the dressing.  Season with whatever you like to taste.

 

The original recipe has radishes in it too, which I didn’t have but would like to add next time.

Sweet and Sour Pork

500 g Pork pieces

Oil

2 small Onions, quartered

2 cloves Garlic, crushed

½ cup Chicken liquid Stock

225 g Pineapple pieces in Syrup

1 tablespoon Cornflour

¼ cup Tomato Sauce

½ teaspoon grated root Ginger

2 tablespoons Vinegar

2 tablespoons Brown Sugar

1 chopped Red Pepper

1 can Baby Sweetcorn

100 g Mushrooms, quartered

 

Trim fat from pork and cut into 2 cm pieces.  Heat oil in a saucepan or wok.  Add onion and garlic and cook until onion is clear (I found a low heat helps).  Remove from pan.  Add half the pork pieces and quickly brown on all sides.  Remove from pan.  Repeat with remaining meat.  Return meat and onions to pan.  Add stock and bring to the boil.  Cover and cook gently for 30 minutes or until meat is tender.

Drain pineapple, reserving juice.  Combine juice and cornflour, mixing until smooth.  Add pineapple pieces, tomato sauce, ginger, vinegar (the original recipe said white, I used red wine vinegar, still turned out lovely), sugar, pepper, sweetcorn and mushrooms to pan.  Cook for 5 minutes.  Return to the boil.  Stir in cornflour mixture and boil for 2 minutes or until mixture thickens slightly.  Serve with rice or noodles.

Serves 4-6

 

Only now did I realise that it did not in fact say to use a frying pan or wok, but a saucepan.  I don’t yet have a wok, and used my big cast iron frying pan, which once again was too small for this lot.  Next time I’ll use my big saucepan, which should make the whole thing easier to stir.  I think this is one of my favourite meals so far, and it went beautifully with Baz’s rice.

Baz’s Rice

My semester is finally over, I have just handed in my final assignment.

Thanks to our friend and former flatmate Baz for this recipe.  Makes a nice, soft, creamy rice to go with your favourite sauce.

For each cup of rice, use 2 cups of water.

Boil Water with 1 teaspoon Salt

Put Rice in a separate pot on a high heat with a tiny bit of Oil and stir it so it doesn’t burn.

Add a clove of Garlic, a few slices of Capsicum, or some Herbs for added taste.

Cook until the rice is toasted.

Pour the water onto the rice, put it on a low heat, do not let it boil, and put the lid on.  Do not stir.

Cook until all the water is gone and the rice is level.  Try to avoid lifting the lid too much to check on it.

To see if it’s done, make a small hole in the rice with a spoon to see if the water is all gone at the bottom.

Scalloped Potatoes

4 medium Potatoes, peeled and thinly sliced

1 small Onion, finely sliced

1 cup grated Cheese

Salt & Pepper

1 cup Milk

1 Parsnip, peeled and thinly sliced (optional)

1 Carrot, peeled and thinly sliced (optional)

 

Place a layer of potatoes in a medium sized casserole dish.  Sprinkle with some onion, cheese, salt and pepper.  Cover with a layer of parsnip and carrot.  Repeat until all ingredients are used up, ending with a cheese layer.  Pour over milk.  Bake covered at 180ºC for 40-50 minutes or until potatoes (and carrots & parsnip) are tender.  Remove cover after 30 minutes.

 

It took much longer than 50 minutes to bake…  about 1½ hours or more!  Then again, I just realised that “remove cover after 30 minutes” is probably referring to when it’s been in the oven for 30 minutes rather than 30 minutes after it comes out of the oven.  I shall try that next time.  Once it was finally done, it was really yummy, except the parsnip wasn’t quite done.  Might boil the parsnip for a few minutes before putting it in next time.

Shepherd’s Pie

1 tablespoon Oil

1 Onion, chopped

500 g lean Beef Mince

2 tablespoons standard plain Flour

1 tablespoon Tomato Sauce

1 tablespoon Sweet Chilli Sauce

¾ cup liquid Beef Stock

3 Potatoes, peeled and chopped

1 tablespoon Butter

1 tablespoon finely chopped Onion

1 cup grated Cheese

salt & pepper

 

Preheat oven to 190ºC.  Heat oil in a large frying pan.  Add onion and cook until clear.  Add mince and cook until well browned, stirring constantly.  Stir in flour and cook for 1 minute.  Add tomato sauce, chilli sauce and stock.  Bring to the boil, reduce heat and simmer for 5 minutes.  Set aside.  Cook potatoes in boiling, salted water until soft/tender.  Drain and heat for a few minutes to dry off excess moisture.  Shake the pan frequently during this time.  Mash potato (still on the low heat).  Add butter, onion and half the cheese, mixing until smooth and creamy.  Season with salt & pepper to taste.  Put mince into a pie dish.  Top with the potato mixture.  Sprinkle with remaining cheese.  Bake at 190ºC for 20ish minutes or until golden and heated through.

Serves 3-4

Lasagne

Noodles:

¾ cup Flour

1 Egg

¼ teaspoon Salt

 

Italian Meat Sauce:

250-300 g Mince

1 clove Garlic, crushed

1 tablespoon chopped Parsley

2 teaspoons dried Basil   (I had neither Parsley nor Basil, so I put in some dried Mixed Herbs)

1 teaspoon dried Oreganum

1½ teaspoons Salt

1 can Tomatoes

1 small pottle Tomato Purée

 

Cheese Mixture:

½ pottle Cottage Cheese

1 Egg, beaten

Salt & Pepper

2 tablespoons chopped Parsley  (again, I replaced this with Mixed Herbs)

½ cup grated Cheese (Parmesan recommended, I didn’t have any, so used Colby)

250 g (approx.) thinly sliced Colby

 

Preheat oven to 190ºC.  Combine flour, egg and salt and mix well.  If necessary, add a little water so the dough forms a soft ball.  Divide dough in half: roll each half in a rectangle 6 mm thick.  Cut into strips 5 cm wide and about 15 cm long.  (I don’t yet have a rolling pin, but managed to form and flatten some chunks of dough, and they really don’t have to look perfect, they just need to be usable as lasagne sheets).

Cook noodles in 2-3 litres boiling salted water for 3-5 minutes.  Do this in two or so batches.  As the noodles are cooked, try to hand them over the side of a colander until required.

To prepare the sauce, brown the meat in a saucepan until it separates; drain off any exceess fat.  (Don’t add the next ingredients until you can see the excess fat, and have drained it.  I didn’t notice it untill I’d started putting in the next ingredients and it really is quite and oily dish.)  Add the garlic, herbs, salt, tomatoes and tomato purée.  Simmer, uncovered, for approximately 45 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Make the cheese mixture by combining in a bowl all ingredients except the colby slices.

Cover the botton of a rectangular ovenproof dish with noodles.  Spread half the cottage cheese mixture over the noodles.  Add one third of the colby cheese slices and then cover with half the meat sauce.  Repeat layers and finish with sliced cheese on top.

Bake at 190ºC for 30 minutes.  Allow to stand for 10 minutes before cutting into squares to serve.

Mini Meatballs with Dipping Sauce

Meatballs:

450 g lean minced Beef

1 red Onion, finely diced

2 cloves Garlic, crushed

½ cup Coriander leaves, finely chopped (dried, mixed herbs work too)

100 g pitted green Olives, finely chopped

1 Egg, beaten

salt & pepper

Oil

Dipping Sauce:

4 tablespoons Sweet Chilli Sauce

4 tablespoons Tomato Sauce

juice of 1 Lime/Lemon

1 tablespoon Sesame Oil

2 tablespoons Soy Sauce

 

Meatballs:

Preheat oven to 190ºC.  Combine all ingredients except the oil and shape into 40 small balls.  Place in a roasting pan with the oil and bake at 190ºC for 15 minutes until well browned.  I left out the oil entirely and put them on a tray on top of a sheet of baking paper.  Worked fine.

Dipping Sauce:

Combine all ingredients in a glass jar.  Shake well and chill.  Serve meatballs hot with the dipping sauce.

Apricot Chicken

6 Chicken pieces

Oil for frying

425 g can of Apricot halves

½ teaspoon grated Lemon or Lime rind

2 tablespoons Lemon or Lime juice

½ teaspoon ground Ginger

2 tablespoons Cornflour

1 tablespoon spiced Vinegar

½ teaspoon Sugar

1 chopped up Carrot (optional)

½ – 1 chopped up Capsicum (optional)

salt & pepper

 

Purée apricots and juice in a food processor or blender (if you dont have one, try squeezing them through a sieve, into the pot, or mash them up while they’re cooking).  Put Purée in a saucepan.  Add lemon rind, juice, ginger and cornflour.  Mix well.  Add veges.  Gently heat, stirring constantly until mixture boils and thickens.  Stir in vinegar, sugar, salt and pepper to taste.

At the same time: remove skin and fat from chicken pieces.  Heat oil in a frying pan and cook chicken for 10 minutes each side (depending on how big the chicken pieces are) or until juices run clear when tested.  Drain on absorbent paper.  Pour apricot sauce over chicken.

The veges were my idea, and the carrot wasn’t quite done by the time the rest of the sauce and chicken was, so it was a cruncy sauce.

Fried Rice

1½ cups long grain Rice

2 Eggs

1 teaspoon Soy Sauce

3 tablespoons Oil

6 rashers rindless Bacon, chopped

1 clove Garlic, crushed

2 teaspoons grated root Ginger

6 Spring Onions, chopped

1 tablespoon Soy Sauce

 

Place rice in a sieve.  Wash under cold running water to remove starch.  Cook in boiling water for 12 minutes until tender.  Tip into a sieve and rinse under cold running water to cool.  Drain thoroughly.  Spread rice out on trays and leave to dry for at least 1 hour.

Lightly beat eggs and first measure of soy sauce.  Heat 1 tablespoon of the oil in a wok or heavy based frying pan.  Pour in half the egg mixture and cook until golden on both sides.  Repeat with remaining egg.  Cut egg into 1-cm-wide strips.  Set aside.

Heat another tablespoon of oil and cook bacon until crisp.  Remove from wok.  Add remaining oil to wok.  Cook garlic, ginger and spring onions over a low heat for 1 minute.  Add rice and stir-fry for 5 minutes.  Return strips of egg and bacon to wok.  Stir-fry to heat through.  Add second measure of soy sauce.  Stir to mix in.

 

I found there was too much rice in this, and in a normal size cast iron frying pan, it was nearly overflowing with rice.  Seemed a little bland to me…

Pasta Alla Cabonara

Oil

8 rashers rindless bacon, chopped

400 g Pasta shapes (eg. penne, spirals, elbows)

3 Eggs

½ cup Cream

½ cup grated Cheese (or more, if you’re a cheese fan)

salt, pepper

 

Heat oil in a heavy-based frying pan.  Cook bacon for about 6-8 minutes, stirring frequently, until almost crisp and until pan is dry.  Remove from heat.  Cook pasta according to instructions on the packet.  While pasta is cooking,  whisk together eggs, cream, cheese, salt and pepper.  Drain pasta thoroughly, then return to saucepan.  Toss through egg mixture and bacon.  Return to a low heat and toss until eggs are cooked to your liking.  Serve immediately.  With veges on the side.  Boiled broccoli works well.

(The original recipe says 30 seconds, and not too long or hot, otherwise the eggs scramble.  We like it best when the eggs have gone a bit scrambled, otherwise you get gooey egg.)