We continue down the nostalgic route. This evening one of Ubon and Nobu’s classics, awesome, oily and flavoursome new style sashimi.  I watched a quick video on youtube to remind myself the ratios of yuzu soy and the oils, sliced my salmon and got cracking. The only thing was, I made  waffles in the afternoon for myself and Iz, so I wasn’t exactly starving, shall we say. But still, enjoyed my solo dinner- Florian’s away at work, 4 dinners all by myself. 🙁

I sliced the salmon as thinly as I could, smeared with crushed garlic, a touch of julienne ginger on each slice, some chives and sesame seeds.  A drizzle of yuzu soy, which I made with 3 tbsps of soy to 1 of yuzu. Tasted yummy, so I proceeded. Some sunflower oil got heated up with a bit of sesame oil, until it was smoking and then the fish was seared with it, sizzled nicely on the plate and smelled most inviting. In the restaurant it used to have a cherry tomato tempura in the middle of the plate.

I had it on a bed of rice to soak up the oil a bit and make it more into a dinner than a starter. Very pleased with myself.  Thumbs up.

Jedrus came for the weekend, did a massive job in the garden for us- trimmed the ugly apple tree. Jedrus is a great eating companion. He’s never complaining of lack of appetite, loves meat, loves good wine. So for starters, before chicken teriyaki I made a duo of tatakis, a duck and a beef fillet. Modestly I’ll say, they were both fantastic. Both cooked pink, well rested, with home made ponzu( equal measures of lemon juice, rice vinegar and soy). Served with a salsa made of tomato, coriander, shallot, garlic and shichimi. A drizzle of balsamic on top.  It was destroyed and thoroughly enjoyed.  And will be done again, soon.

I’ve been feeling like pierogi, but not the ones with potato and cheese stuffing, I thought I’d make them usual way in terms of the dough, but stuff them with Asian sort of stuff, like gyoza. So chopped, raw shrimps went in, blitzed chicken thigh meat, scallions, garlic, ginger, grated carrot- that didn’t really contribute any amazing flavours, soy sauce and sesame oil.  Twice cooked- first boiled for a couple of minutes, then pan fried- a must, for the lovely crispy texture. Served with ponzu- equal quantities of rice vinegar, soy sauce and lemon juice. Absolutely delightful. 🙂

I’ve popped in to Toby the Butcher’s to get some of his lovely Gloucester sausages and while he was packing them, he told me that lamb is now in season ( it’s always in freaking season as far as I’m concerned), plus the price is quite attractive. Of course I ended up buying a piece of leg on the bone, alongside the sausages and 2 burgers for Florian, who doesn’t like lamb- weirdo!

As Florian is eating out with work mates this evening, I’ve marinated my lamb before lunch time and had it the way my Mum makes it.  It was superb, but I’m now thinking some sauce would be nice; it’s served in its own juices, but still, might work something out next time, as I might get the Dinings team come over by the end of August.

Bozenka’s marinade is made of generous amount of garlic, crushed and chopped with salt, in fact, I mash the salt into the garlic with a blunt knife, which makes the garlic juicy and almost creamy.  Lots of black pepper, herb pepper, some hot paprika and all this joined together by olive oil. The lamb in small pieces is rubbed all over and left in the fridge for a few hours, Bozena would probably leave it overnight.

I actually made good use of the bone as well. I made lunch for Izzie based on lamb stock made from that bone, stripped all of the meat from it when cooked and mixed all the veggies cooked in the broth.  My lovely little carnivore had her first taste of Cotswold lamb, she’s eaten everything and clapped afterwards- her own sweet way of applauding herself for finishing her food. 🙂

My lamb got sauteed on olive oil, then stewed for about an hour with a few splashes of water. Half way through cooking I added roughly chopped onion and a couple carrots, to add texture and taste to the sauce.  Served with rice and raw onion salad, that divides the crowd- it’s just chopped onion seasoned with vegeta and hot paprika.

The whole thing is rather awesome with a large glass of good red, but I only had water today- we’re having alcohol free week with Florek, after Zatrybki’s visit and a weekend in Suffolk.

Good stuff. 🙂

The photo’s not great, because I was surprised at how good this dish was, so I took the photo while eating it. I was chatting with Jedrus on the phone and came up with this dish of goodness.  The cod was sat on a bed of – I’d like to say rattatuille, but I’m not sure if what I made was it. It was a selection of veggies- red pepper, half a courgette, a shallot, all fried on 2 small pieces of cooking chorizo and a rasher of bacon. A handful of cherry tomatoes went in, a splash of ketchup, some oregano. I also threw in  a few pre boiled potatoes in small pieces.

The cod simply seasoned, covered with crust made of various herbs from the garden, some breadcrumbs and parmesan. Might have added some garlic, actually.

All this baked in the oven for about 20 minutes. Excellent, unexpectedly! 🙂

From yesterday’s Saturday Kitchen.  Fat boy Antonio caught my attention when he made a brief introduction to the world’s most famous sauce, saying “you’ve probably been doing it wrong all your life”.  I took notes of what he was doing on the telly, Florian demanded this is what we’re having for dinner and we got all we needed in Sainsbury’s this morning.  Half way through making it I researched what I could find on Antonio’s bolognese online and I wished I’d done it before I started.  The recipe on telly called on just onions fried on butter and olive oil, a touch of garlic and then onto that lean minced beef and lean minced pork, half and half. The recipe online stuck to what I’ve always been doing- onion, carrot, celery and garlic.  That’s what I’ll be sticking to, the flavour of the veggies is irreplaceable.

The idea of pork and beef rocks though. The texture of the sauce is lovely. Another thing is the wine, Antonio uses white, he says there is no need for extra colour, as the tomato concentrate provides lots of that. I used about 2 tsps of that and 400 g of passata. As for the wine, nearly half a bottle of very decent chardonnay went in. Antonio insists on using no herbs whatsoever, no oregano, no basil. I didn’t this time, but I had to flavour my sauce, so salt, pepper, sugar and a beef stock thingy from Knorr went in.

It cooked for nearly 2 hours. I served it with tagliatele, again, Antonio insisted this is the pasta to soak in all the flavours of the sauce. Finished with parmigiano. Enjoyed a lot.

Jamie Oliver’s, naturally.  I’ve been waiting for the episode with the recipes for steamed buns, that he puts on the table and says- imagine putting this on the table- boom! They looked wonderful. And I’ve always been a pig for Chinese food. Finally, last Thursday I caught that episode, took notes of all the recipes, ordered a bamboo steamer from Ocado and this evening made the whole thing.  Olutafied, as ever, I had to. Jamie boy makes those meals a bit too healthy  sometimes, so I decided against steaming my chicken, I fried it. 🙂

The buns. Super easy recipe. A 400 ml can of coconut milk and 2 of those cans of self raising flour. Pinch of salt. Kitchen aid.  The dough was very runny, messy and difficult to work with, but I was doing as I was told, as always on the unfamiliar territory.  They steamed in the wok for about 15 minutes using the muffin paper cups and they  looked exactly like on telly.  They tasted ok and were very, very filling, however I couldn’t, for the live of me taste any ducking coconut!!!Maybe coconut cream next time? Some toasted desiccated coconut? We both really liked them though and I’ll be looking at more recipes with steamed buns.  If I could make those super light dim sum things with hot pork inside, I’d be super happy.

The chicken was awesome. And will be done again this way. A quick marinade of hoisin sauce, a juice of half a lime, some salt, sesame seeds. A few chestnut mushrooms.  Quickly pan fried, finished with fresh chili and coriander- from the garden. Loved it! Fresh, exciting, oriental.

Also present were some steamed broccoli and pak choi, a bit overcooked, but eaten nevertheless. And a little cucumber salad that I won’t bother with any more, so average it was.

I’ll definitely be doing more buns, more steaming and more of that yummy chicken.

Majestic delivered today 24 bottles of Asahi, which they had on a nice offer, 24 bottles for £24. There had to be burgers to go with it. I had some from Ocado’s counter, the Aberdeen Angus ones, with them brioche buns buttered and toasted. Green salad, fresh shallot, plus some of the processed cheese that melts so nicely. And fries.

Yum.

The masterplan was to make ravioli, fill them with a selection of lovely, fresh mushrooms from Whole Foods and drizzle with truffle oil.  But having spent most of the day DYI’ing, like good christians that we are, we couldn’t be bothered with making pasta, so I made pizza dough instead. Chopped and fried the mushrooms and pan fried them with lots of pepper and salt. Less is more, when it comes to pizza, so all I put on it was tomato sauce, grated cheese, some cherry tomatoes, the said mushrooms and baked it. When ready, some fresh thyme from the garden added lovely aroma, parmesan shavings and that truffle oil sealed the deal. Sooooooo good! 🙂

Sometimes on Saturday mornings I finish my coffee and turn on “Saturday Kitchen live”.  In it I saw Tom Kerridge’s recipe for proper beans on toast. Tom said that once one tries it, there’s no way back to the canned alternative.  Well, there is a way back, I’d say, as canned alternative doesn’t take 12 hours of soaking the beans and then over 2 hours cooking. But it’s worth it. Super rich flavour and I still went easy on vinegar.

So, about 150 g of haricot beans were cosily soaking over night and most of the day. Then drained and boiled for nearly an hour.

Some bacon, chopped and fried on rapeseed oil, chopped onion and a crushed clove of garlic, then 200 g of passata, a splosh of ketchup, 4 tbsps of brown sugar, about 70 ml of white wine vinegar ( recipe called for red, I had none) and about 250 ml of water- all this went in and was brought to the boil. Then the beans went in and it all cooked down slowly for over an hour.

Tom also baked the soda bread to go with his beans, I served mine with rustic French baguette.  One thing can make it better- the marriage with some grilled chipolatas. Next week. 🙂