Roasted red pepper and walnut dip

I’m a bit late in writing this one up I’m afraid, as I made it last Saturday for our little Eurovision get-together. It’s a tasty little dip from the book Mezze by Ghillie Basan, that Neil got me for my birthday earlier in the year. It’s delicious, and makes a nice change from garlic and onion, or houmous. One word of warning though – I only used one chilli, not the suggested two, and it was still quite spicy, so just be aware and use the chillies according to your preference

3 red peppers
2 fresh red chillies
4-6 garlic cloves
150ml of olive oil
150g of shelled walnuts
3 heaped tablespoons of fresh breadcrumbs
2 tablespoons of pomegranate molasses
Freshly squeezed juice of a lemon
2 teaspoons of runny honey
1-2 teaspoons of ground cumin
A small bunch of fresh, flat-leaf parsley, finely chopped
Sea salt

Preheat the oven to 200.

Put the peppers into an oven dish with the chillies and garlic cloves. Drizzle with half of the olive oil and pop then in the oven to roast for an hour. Turn the peppers and chillies from time to time. You can remove the chillies and garlic when they are ready, but cook the peppers for the full hour, until the skins are slightly burnt and buckled.

Put the walnuts on a baking tray and pop them in the oven for the last 10 minutes of the cooking time, so that they are lightly toasted and smelling nutty.

Carefully peel the skins off the pepper, chillies an garlic, and remove any seeds from the peppers and chillies. Roughly chop the flesh and put it in a food processor with the walnuts, breadcrumbs, pomegranate molasses, lemon juice, honey and cumin.

Pour in the oil from the roasting dish and blend to a purée. Drizzle in the rest of the olive oil whilst blending. Add most of the parsley and season well with salt.

Tip the mixture into a serving bowl, swirl a little pomegranate molasses over the top, and sprinkle with the rest of the parsley. Serve with toasted flatbread, or some other dipping food of your choice.

Little lamb meatballs with chickpeas

Another delicious recipe from the Greekish that I made last night. I love lamb, and I love a meatball, so this was already off to a great start, the lemon zest, herbs, and spices served to deliciously enhance the flavours, and the chickpeas were a welcome addition. Reasonably quick and easy to do it was a tasty and comforting evening meal. The recipe suggested serving with crusty bread, but I opted for garlic flatbread instead, along with a generous dollop of Greek yoghurt on the side, as suggested.

Serves 4

½ a bunch of fresh mint
3 red onions
3 garlic cloves
½ a bunch of flat leaf parsley
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
50g of breadcrumbs
1 teaspoon of sweet smoked paprika ½ a teaspoon of dried mint
1 lemon
500g of lamb mince
Olive oil
1 tablespoon of plain flour
2 tablespoons of tomato purée
2 x 400g tins of chickpeas
300ml of beef stock

Peel and chop one red onion and two garlic cloves. Place in a food processor with the picked mint leaves, and the flat-leaved parsley – stalks and all.

Pulse until finely chopped (I used a hand blender, as I was only cooking for me – if you’re doing it for four as the recipe says, you might find that takes a bit too long.)

Season well, then add the breadcrumbs, paprika and dried mint. Finely grate in the lemon zest. Pulse again, then add the lamb mince.

Pulse a few more times, until it all just comes together. Transfer to a large mixing bowl, then scrunch together with your hands and then roll into small meatballs, about 2.5cm across.

Finely chop the remaining onions and garlic.

Place a large, deep saucepan over a medium heat, drizzle in a little olive oil and then fry the meatballs for about 5 minutes, until browned all over.

Add the chopped onions and garlic to the pan, reduce the heat a little, and sauté for about 10 minutes, stirring frequently.

Sprinkle in the plan flour and stir until everything is well coated. After a minute stir in the tomato purée.

Fry for another minute or so, then add the chickpeas, including the water from the tins, and the stock.

Season generously and bring to the boil. Then reduce the heat and simmer, stirring occasionally. Let it gently bubble away, for 15-20 minutes, until the chickpeas are tender, the meatballs cooked through and the sauce has thickened.

Serve, sprinkled with a few torn mint leaves, and a generous dollop of Greek yoghurt on the side.

Spiced chilli and coriander chicken kebabs

Another delicious recipe from my new Greekish cookbook. I love a kebab and these were really tasty. The buttery marinade melts during cooking, which means that the meat is delicious and moist.

Makes 4 skewers

500g chicken breast (I actually used thighs)
4 garlic cloves
50g of unsalted butter
1 teaspoon of ground coriander
½ a teaspoons of ground cumin
1 teaspoon of Aleppo pepper (or ½ a teaspoon of dried chilli flakes)
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 tablespoons of olive oil

Trim the chicken and cut into bite-sized pieces (roughly 2.5cm)

Peel and finely chop the garlic. Melt the butter and place in a mixing bowl or a non-reactive container with a lid.

Stir in the chopped garlic, ground coriander, gound cumin and Aleppo pepper. Season generously with salt and pepper and stir in the olive oil. When the mixture is room temperature, stir in the chicken pieces until well coated.

Cover, or seal, and pop in the fridge for at least an hour – longer if possible.

If using bamboo skewers, soak them in cold water for 30 minutes or so, to stop them burning during cooking.

Evenly divide the meat between the skewers, making sure that the pieces aren’t pushed too close together. Cook on a hot griddle, or grill them, for about 10-12 minutes, until lightly charred and cooked through.

Village pasta with chicken and lemon

I had the lovely Fig over last night for our regular dinner and Doctor Who, and, as we were watching the Tom Baker story Underworld, which is based on Greek myths, it seemed appropriate to do another recipe from my new Greekish cookbook from Vanessa.

This recipe caught my eye, and is lovely and tasty, with delicious flavours. I’m not sure what constitutes ‘village pasta’ but the recipe does say you can use macaroni if you can’t find it. Sadly Sainsbury’s didn’t have any Swiss chard, but, again, the recipe says that any greens will do, so I used kale instead.

The recipe serves 4, but I scaled it down for just the two of us. (Good job too – my only flame-proof casserole dish isn’t big enough to have made this recipe for 4.

Olive oil
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
6 skin-on,bone-in chicken thighs
1 teaspoon of dried oregano
1 tablespoon of dried mint
3 garlic cloves
400g of Swiss chard (or kale if you can’t get chard)
100g of halloumi
1.4 litres of chicken stock
250g of Greek or Cypriot village pasta (or macaroni)
1 lemon

Preheat the oven to 200

Place a wide, deep flame-proof casserole dish on a medium heat and drizzle in just enough olive oil to cover the base.

Season the chicken thighs well, especially the skin, sprinkle over the dried oregano, and place in the casserole dish, skin-side down. Fry for 8-10 minutes, until the skin is golden, then flip over and fry for a further 8-10 minutes.

Whilst the chicken is cooking, peel and finely slice the garlic. Trim the chard and shred it, including the stalks. Coarsely grate the halloumi and set it aside.

Once the chicken is golden on both sides, remove it from the casserole dish and set aside. Add the garlic to the dish and cook in the remaining oil for 2 minutes. (turn the heat down a little to avoid burning the garlic.)

Add the chard and stock to the pan and bring to the boil. Stir in the pasta, bring back to the boil and cook for 5 minutes. Squeeze in the juice of the lemon and stir in most of the dried mint.

Place the chicken thighs back in the pan, skin-side up, so they sit in the pasta, and place the pan in the oven.

Bake for 25-30 minutes, until most of the liquid has been absorbed, the pasta is tender and the chicken is cooked though.

Before serving the chicken and pasta, stir through most of the grated halloumi and then scatter the rest on top, with the remaining dried mint.

Classic bifketia with chips

On Saturday, the lovely Vanessa came down to visit for the day, bringing with her a belated birthday present, which included a fabulous looking cookbook called Greekish by Georgina Hayden, which includes recipes with a Greek flavour or origin. I flicked through it and there were some lovely looking recipes – lots of tasty, tasty stuff – and I spotted this one and thought I’d cook it for myself last night.

It’s effectively burger and chips, but the burgers are cooked in a roasting tray along with the chips, and aren’t put in a bun to serve. Also the burger mix contains grated tomato, milk and an egg, which makes for quite a sloppy mixture – I certainly wouldn’t have wanted to try frying them – but cooking them in the roasting tray works well.

The recipe serves 4, but, obviously, I scaled it down for just me. I didn’t quite scale it down enough though and was absolutely stuffed afterwards. I would’ve taken a photo of it in the roasting tray, but there was too much stuff for a small roasting tray, but in the larger tray it just looked a bit lost, so I photographed it on the plate instead! I served it with a bit of light salad, heavy on the feta to maintain the Greek flavour!

Serves 4

400g of beef mince
2 garlic cloves
1 red onion
1 ripe tomato
2½ teaspoons of dried oregano
1 teaspoon of dried mint
25g of dried breadcrumbs
75ml of whole milk
1 bunch of flat leaf parsley
1 large egg
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
Olive oil
3 large baking potatoes (about 600g)
1 lemon

Preheat the oven to 200

Place the beef mince in a large mixing bowl. Finely grate in one garlic clove, then coarsely grate in the onion and tomato (discarding the tomato skin). Add two teaspoons of dried oregano, the dried mint, breadcrumbs and the milk. Finely chop the parsley and add half of it to the bowl. Stir well to combine. (I also added a small sprinkling of dried chilli flakes, as the author suggested) Crack in an egg and season generously. Drizzle with a tablespoon of olive oil and then scrunch everything together until well mixed.

Cut the potatoes into 2.5cm thick wedges. Place in a large roasting tray and finely grate the zest of a lemon, and the remaining garlic clove over the top. Sprinkle over the remaining oregano, season generously and squeeze over the juice of the lemon.

Toss everything together until well mixed. Pour a couple of tablespoons of water into the bottom of the tray.

Take the mince and shape into four equal sized patties. (like I say, the mixture’s a bit sloppy, so this can be a little messy) You’ll want to flatten them down a fair bit as they’ll shrink a bit during cooking.

Drizzle over a final bit of olive oil, then cover the dish tightly with foil and pop in the oven for 10 minutes.

After 10 minutes remove the foil and then return the tray to the oven and cook for a further 30-35 minutes, until the potatoes are golden and the biftekia are crusted and cooked through.

Serve scattered with the remaining chopped parsley.

Little spinach and feta pastries with pine nuts

I was off to John and Tom’s for some dinner and Doctor Who last night, and I needed a little something to take along. This is another recipe from the Mezze book that Neil got me for my birthday, and I already had my eye on it as spinach and feta is such a lovely combination.

They are very easy to make, and very tasty – they certainly went down well with the boys. The amounts listed here made about 16 pastries, which is plenty for a group to snack on. The recipe says to serve them hot, but I have to say they are still just as nice cold the next day.

Makes about 16

500g of fresh spinach, trimmed, washed and drained
2 tablespoons of olive oil, plus a little extra for brushing
1 tablespoon of butter
2 onions, chopped
3 heaped tablespoons of pine nuts
Juice of 1 lemon
1 teaspoon of ground allspice
150g of feta, crumbled with your fingers
A small bunch of dill, finely chopped
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
Plain flour for dusting
450g of ready rolled puff pastry

Steam the spinach until soft and floppy. Drain and then refresh under cold running water. Squeeze out all the excess liquid with your hands. Roughly chop.

Heat the oil and butter in a large, heavy bottomed pan and gently fry the onion until softened. Add 2 tablespoons of the pine nuts and cook for 2-3 minutes more until both the onion and the pine nuts starts to turn golden.

Stir in the chopped spinach and the lemon juice, then add the allspice and chopped dill, and lightly toss in the crumbled feta. Stir well to combine, season with salt and pepper and then leave to cool.

Peheat the oven to 180

Roll out the pastry, on a lightly floured surface, into thin sheets. Using a 10cm cutter, cut out as many rounds as you can.

Once you’ve finished, take each round and spoon a little of the spinach mixture into the centre. (I found that about 1½ heaped teaspoons was about right.) Pull the sides up to make a pyramid, by pinching the edges together with your fingertips. (It doesn’t matter if the edges part during cooking, so there’s no need to dampen them in order to create a seal.)

Lightly grease two baking trays and pop the pastries on them. Lightly brush the pastries with a little oil and then bake them in the preheated oven for 25-30 minutes, until golden.

About 5 minutes before the pastries are ready, toast the remaining tablespoon of pine nuts. (I usually do this in a hot frying pan, but you could also make a little tin foil tray and pop them in the oven for 5 minutes)

Remove the pastries from the oven, arrange them on a serving plate and sprinkle over the toasted pine nuts.

Spicy bean balls

For my birthday Neil got me a book called Mezze by Ghillie Başan, which is full of lovely recipes for small plate, sharing dishes from Turkey and the Middle East. There are loads of tasty looking recipes in there, but I chose this one to start with today, rustling some of these up for Neil and me for lunch. They are, effectively, falafel and are easy to do, although it’s not a quick recipe – the beans need to soak for 24 hours before use, so it’s not something you can decide to do on the spur of the moment.

This recipe serves 4-6, so, obviously, I scaled it down for just the two of us. Even going for slightly under half the suggested amount of beans I was still able to make a batch of 12 balls.

350g of large, skinless, dried broad beans, soaked in cold water for 24 hours
6 garlic cloves, crushed
1-2 teaspoons of salt
2 teaspoons of ground cumin
2 teaspoons of ground coriander
1 teaspoon of chill powder
1 teaspoon of baking powder
A bunch of fresh, flat-lead parsley, finely chopped (reserve a little for garnishing)
A bunch of fresh, coriander, finely chopped (reserve a little for garnishing)
4 spring onions, trimmed and finely chopped
Sunflower oil for frying
Lemon wedges to serve

Drain the beans and place them in a food processor and blend to a smooth, sofa paste. (this can take quite a while. With my food processor the mixture kept climbing up the bowl, so I had to keep on pushing it down and folding it over into itself so that it all got evenly blended.)

Add four of the crushed garlic cloves, along with the salt, cumin, ground coriander, chilli powder and baking powder, and continue to blend the paste.

Add the herbs and spring onions and give the whole mixture a final, brief whizz. Leave the mixture to stand for 1-2 hours, to allow the flavours to mingle.

Mould the mixture into small, tight balls and pop them on a plate.

Heat up enough oil for deep frying in a heavy-based saucepan and fry the balls, in batches, until golden brown. Drain them on kitchen paper.

Tip the falafel onto a serving dish and sprinkle the reserve parsley and coriander over them. Serve with wedge of lemon and maybe a dollop of yoghurt.

Chicken stew (chicken ishtup)

I made this for Neil and I last night – it’s another new recipe from my new cookbook Chai, Chaat and Chutney that Abigail gave me. It’s a delicious, and easy recipe from Kolkata and only takes just over an hour to do. The only slight nuisance was having to buy a whole coconut for just a couple of tablespoons of grated coconut. The only alternative Sainsbury’s had was dessicated coconut, which, as the recipe called for ‘fresh’ didn’t quite fit the bill. The recipe called for 6 tablespoons, but I cut it down to just 2, partly ’cause I was only cooking for 2, not 4, and partly because neither Neil nor I are actually that keen on coconut. (The rest of the coconut is now hanging outside, in theory for the birds, but in reality, being eaten by a hungry squirrel!)

Serves 4

2 tablespoons of sunflower oil
4 skinless chicken legs
4 garlic cloves, finely chopped
2.5cm piece of fresh ginger, peeled and finely chopped
2 onions, finely chopped
6 tablespoons of freshly grated coconut
1 litre of boiling water
1½ teaspoons of salt
½ a teaspoon of ground turmeric
2 carrots, diced
2 floury potatoes, peeled and diced
1 tablespoon of plain flour
½ a teaspoon of ground black pepper

Heat the oil in a wide saucepan, over a high heat.

Cook the chicken pieces, (1 at a time to avoid overcrowding the pan) frying for 5 minutes on each side, until golden all over.

Remove from the pan and set aside.

Put the garlic, onion and ginger into the same pan and cook in the same oil as the chicken, and cook over a medium heat for 2 minutes until the onions begin to soften.

Then add the coconut and return the chicken to the pan. Pour in the boiling water, and add the salt and turmeric. Mix well and cover the pan with a lid and simmer over a low heat for 40 minutes, until the chicken is cooked through.

Add the diced carrot and potato to the pan. Pop the lid back on and cook gently for 15 minutes, until softened.

In a small bowl mix together the flour and 4-5 tablespoons of cooking liquid from the stew into a smooth paste. Stir this into the stew, then bring to the boil and cook over a high heat for 2 minutes.

Serve immediately with pepper sprinkled over.

Egg chops

The lovely Abigail bought me a great new cookbook for my birthday – Chai, Chaat and Chutney, a book about Indian street food. It’s full of lovely recipes, some full meals and some snacks. Flicking through it, I spotted this recipe for egg chops, which are, essentially, Indian Scotch Eggs, only with spiced potato instead of sausage meat.

I decided to make a few of these yesterday and they’re very tasty.

The recipe does say to make sure that the cooking oil is heated to 190 degrees, as if the oil is cooler the chops will break up. I thought I managed to get the oil to hot enough, the coating on the chops still cracked a bit, although they didn’t fall apart, so maybe I didn’t have it hot enough.

Makes 8

4 large eggs
1 tablespoon of sunflower oil
1 teaspoon of cumin seeds
1 small green chilli, finely chopped
1 onion, finely chopped
2.5cm piece of fresh root ginger, peeled and finely chopped
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
½ a teaspoon of salt
½ a teaspoon of chilli powder
1 teaspoon of garam masala
4 floury potatoes, peeled, boiled and mashed
Sunflower oil for deep frying
Sea salt flakes
1 egg lightly beaten
100g of golden breadcrumbs

Your choice of chutney, to serve

Boil the eggs for 12 minutes, then drain and set aside to cool.

Heat a tablespoon of sunflower oil in a large frying pan over a medium heat. Add the cumin seeds and once they start to sizzle, add the green chilli and chopped onion. Cook for about 5 minutes until the onion starts to soften.

Add the ginger and garlic and cook for a further minute, until fragrant, then add the salt, chilli powder and garam masala.

Mix well, then mix in the mashed potato. Transfer the mixture to a bowl and set aside to cool.

Divide the cooled potato mixture into 8 equal portions. Peel the eggs and then cut them in half lengthways.

Cover each half egg with a portion of the potato mixture, smooth it over the surface of the egg to enclose it completely.

Dip each coated egg half in the beaten egg and then roll it in the breadcrumbs until thoroughly coated.

Heat enough oil for deep-frying the egg halves in a deep fat fryer or large saucepan to 190 degrees (if the oil is cooler than this the eggs will break up.)

When the oil is hot, fry the egg chops, 1 or 2 at a time, turning gently, for about 3-4 minutes, until the coating is golden brown.

Transfer to a plate lined with kitchen paper to drain off the excess oil.

Season with sea salt flakes and serve hot with chutney. Delicious snacks.

Ginger beer pork

I’ve recently bought a new cookbook for work – 30 Minute Mowgli, from the Mowgli chain of restaurants and whilst flicking through it the other day I came upon this recipe and decided to cook it for myself on Sunday evening.

I love a bit of pork, and it does go particularly well with both ginger and mustard, so I was interested to see how it came out. Normally I tend to use Dijon mustard in recipes, but this one called for English Mustard, which is much yellower in colour and so gave the sauce a distinctive orangey colour. The recipe itself is tasty and easy to do, and works well paired with a buttery mash and some sautéed kale.

Serves 4 (the recipe presumes 1 pork loin medallion per person, but the ones I got were quite small, so I had two and that was just about right)

3 tablespoons of vegetable oil
1 clove of garlic, crushed
4 pork loin medallions
½ a teaspoon of salt
½ a teaspoon of fresh ground black pepper
150ml of ginger beer
1 heaped teaspoon of English mustard (I love a bit of mustard to I put two in!)
150ml of crème fraÎche
2 tablespoons of freshly chopped parsley to garnish

Heat the oil in large frying pan over a medium heat. Add the garlic and cook for 1 minute, stirring so it doesn’t burn.

Add the pork to the pan and cook for 3 minutes on each side (approximately 6 minutes in total) until golden.

Season the pork with the salt and pepper and then pour over the ginger beer and stir in the mustard.

Give everything a stir, and then stir in the crème fraÎche and stir well to combine.

Cook for a further 2-3 minutes, until the sauce thickens and reduces slightly.

Divide the pork medallions between the serving plates and spoon over the ginger beer sauce.

Garnish with the chopped parsley and serve immediately.