If there was an Olympic competition of making the best mushroom sauce, I’d now have a medal. I spent another productive day in my clean, warm kitchen, while outside it rained and blew. Although it’s Saturday, I opted out of the pizza for dinner, too much pizza lately. I’ve made Izzie’s favourite kluski slaskie instead and with them a mushroom sauce that I was very happy with. All those little jars of truffle goodness I brought back from Italy in summer!!

The sauce started with a chopped and fried shallot and quite a few chopped chestnut mushrooms, slowly fried up, a handful of porcinis and some chicken stock. Black pepper. After about half an hour I added some double cream/flour/water mix to thicken it, 2 tbsps of truffle paste and then blitzed it all into smooth sauce and seasoned to taste. Chopped parsley to finish.

As child was going to eat it, I threw some cooked chopped carrots and green peas in, to make it a bit more nutritious. The said child ended up having 11 dumplings, which made my heart sing!

Chocolate eclairs were had 2 hours later. 🙂

How did I manage never to have made it before, is beyond me. It’s phenomenal and so simple! I came across Donal Skehan making on it on youtube this lunchtime, while I was looking for a review of a kitchen aid mini food processor – it’s on my list to Santa this year. 🙂 I watched the review, then I watched Donal and I decided to make this pasta this evening, as I had little time to enjoy cooking due to school disco.

While the pan of water for pasta was being brought to the boiling point, I threw 2 large, thinly chopped garlic cloves into a generous amount of a good Tuscan olive oil, 6-7 tbsps maybe? The heat was low, as the oil was to get infused with that garlic, rather than get burned and stink the dish out. A pinch of chili flakes went in too. When pasta was ready I drained it and then added the oil with garlic and chili onto it, alongside a generous amount of freshly grated parmesan. Tossed it all well, finished off with chopped parsley and served with a glass of Californian cab sav and of course, extra parmesan. Absolutely loved it and will be making it again very soon!

I have a magnet on the fridge that says “Kitchen is my happy place”. It certainly was today and it showed on the plate in the evening. While making soup for lunch I started making the filling for ravioli- we decided yesterday that it’s a disgrace we’ve not used our pasta machine in a year or so. We did today. I built that filling nice and slowly, tasting, thinking, adding, tasting some more. Started with frying a shallot and a small piece of leek, a good amount of chopped brown and white cup mushrooms, a handful of porcini, a knob of butter. Some chicken stock. I nicked a cooked, soft potato from the soup I was making for lunch, to thicken it and add texture. A handful of grated parmesan. Seasoning. Then I blitzed it all into a thick, lovely paste and decided to add 2 tsps of truffle paste from San Giminiano. Initially the sauce was to be made with truffle paste, but having chatted to Miky, my Sicilian buddy from Ubon, who cooks and eats with pleasure as much as I do, I decided to do a simple, sauce, so make the pasta shine on the plate- though heavy and calorific with butter, a big fried cup mushroom, double cream and parmesan. Ewa Chodakowska would not approve!!! 🙂

Florek made the pasta, I made the ravioli and the sauce, finished it with some chopped parsley and we all enjoyed it immensely, even Izzie had 4 ravioli, which made me very happy. A glass of Rioja went down nicely with it all. We must make fresh pasta more often, that was superb.

Recipe from Waitrose magazine I picked up at a service station last weekend on the way to Suffolk. I knew I’d be making it even though I’m not crazy on relishes and chutneys, but I love cheese, a good cracker and a glass of red with that. So I made the relish, very much enjoyed making it and gave a jar to Wiola, fellow cheese lover. A text came late in the evening, that it’s been a long time she’s had something that delicious and flavoursome. Shared the recipe straight away. 🙂

4 jars got washed and rinsed clean, then stayed in the 180 degree oven for about 10 minutes upside down. A method new to me, but simple enough. Left to cool, while I finely chopped a big red onion, grated 10 g of fresh ginger, added about 250 g of dried cranberries and sultanas, a juice and zest of 1 whole orange, a tsp of cinnamon and a half of that of allspice, 150 g of caster sugar, a pinch of chili flakes( genius!), 150 ml of cider or white wine vinegar- I used cider. All this into the pan and gently heated up for about 15 minutes to dissolve the sugar. While that was happening, I peeled and finely chopped about 500 g of pears and added them in. After roughly and hour I had my relish, whacked it into the jars, turned them upside down and left to cool.

Enjoyed last night with some dolcelatte and extra mature cheddar. Yum.