Chorizo and Manchego empanadas

I’ve been meaning to make some empanadas for a while now. My friend Vanessa always brings along tuna empanadas to our Eurovision parties, and I’ve always meant to try making some myself.

Rather than tuna ones, I thought I’d got for chorizo and Manchego ones, having seen a couple of recipes online, and I’m very partial to both chorizo and cheese! This is a mash up of two different recipes, and, for speed I used ready made shortcrust pastry, rather than making my own from scratch. The results were very tasty – I only made a small, test batch, but I’d definitely make a larger batch in future. The recipes I was following said to cut the pastry into 16cm circles – this made very bit empanadas and I think that next time I’ll go for smaller circles and thus smaller end products – more along the bite-sized snack line, rather than the full-sized pasties that I ended up with.

Other than that it was a very satisfactory first go.

Makes 6 (approximately)

200g of potatoes, peeled and diced
1 egg, beaten, for sealing and brushing
1 brown onion, peeled and finely chopped
200g of chorizo, peeled and roughly diced into 5mm dice
100g of Manchego cheese, roughly diced into 5mm dice
500g pack shortcrust pastry
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon of olive oil
1 tablespoon of freshly chopped flat-leaf parsley

Preheat the oven to 180.

Boil the potatoes in a pan of lightly salted water for 10-15 minutes until tender. Drain, transfer to a bowl and roughly mash, then allow to cool.

In a large frying pan, heat the oil over a medium heat and fry the onion and chorizo for 3-4 minutes, stirring continually, until the onion starts to soften and the chorizo releases its orangey oil and starts to crisp up.

Add the cooked onion and chorizo to the mash, stir in the chopped parsley and diced cheese, season with salt and pepper and then stir well to combine.

Lightly flour a work surface and roll out the pastry to a thickness of about 5mm. Using a 16cm* cutter or bowl as a guide, cut 6 circles from the pastry (rerolling the trimmings).

(*like I said, I found this a little large – a 12/14cm cutter might work better)

Brush the edges of the pastry with a little beaten egg and then divide the chorizo filling between the circles, placing it in the middle of each pastry disc. Fold the pastry over the filling, and crimp to seal.

Place the empadanas on a baking tray lined with baking paper, and brush them with a little beaten egg.

Cook in the centre of the oven for 25 minutes, until golden and cooked through.

Transfer to a wire rack to cool. Delicious hot or cold.

Turkish meatballs with eggplant (aubergine) and feta

I made this for myself on Friday night. Another recipe from Let’s Do Dinner by Antoni Porowski, which I found whilst looking for the smoky sausage ragout that I cooked on Thursday. This one is also delicious – the meatballs are full of flavour and lovely and juicy, and the yoghurt and feta dressing works really well with both the meatballs and the aubergine.

I oven baked the meatballs, rather than grilling them, as the recipe suggests. And I mixed the feta into the yoghurt dressing, rather then crumbling it over. For the salad I used a red cos lettuce, as Sainsbury’s didn’t have any romaine lettuce, but I doubt that makes much difference.

Serves 4

675g of lamb mince (or beef, if you prefer)
1 large egg
170g of dried dates (preferably Medjool), roughly chopped
1 brown onion, finely chopped
3 tablespoons of pine nuts (I roughly chopped them, although the recipe didn’t say to)
12g of fresh mint, finely chopped
1 teaspoon of lemon zest
½ a teaspoon of ground cumin
¼ of a teaspoon of ground coriander
¼ of a cayenne pepper
Sea salt
450g of aubergine, cut into 2cm cubes
1½ teaspoons of extra virgin olive oil, plus a bit extra for drizzling

For the topping
120g of plain Greek yoghurt
Sea salt
1 teaspoon of grated lemon zest
2 teaspoons of finely chopped fresh mint
½ a teaspoon of dried chilli flakes
225g of feta cheese, crumbled

1 head of romaine lettuce, leave separated

Heat the grill to a medium high heat.

Mix together the minced lamb, egg, chopped dates, onion, pine nuts, mint, lemon zest, cumin, coriander, cayenne pepper and ¼ of a teaspoon of salt in a bowl and mix well.

Form the mixture into balls about 3-4cms across and arrange them on a baking sheet.

Grill the meatballs, turning them halfway through, until golden and cooked through. (I bakes mine in the oven for 15 minutes, and that worked just as well).

Transfer them to a plate and cover them with foil to keep them warm.

Place the aubergine chunks on the same baking sheet, brush them with olive oil and toss them with ½ a teaspoon of salt. Grill for about 7 minutes or so, until golden and tender.

Whilst the aubergine is grilling, make the topping by mixing together the yoghurt, a pinch of salt, and a tablespoon of water in a bowl. Gently mix in the lemon zest, mint and red chilli flakes. (I also stirred in the crumbled feta at this stage.)

Arrange the lettuce leaves on serving plates, top with the meatballs and aubergine chunks and season with salt and pepper. Drizzle over the yoghurt topping and scatter the feta. You can add some more chilli flakes at this stage if you like. (I added a few rocket leaves and chopped cherry tomatoes to the salad leaves)

Smoky bean and sausage ragout

New year, new recipe! Starting off as I mean to go on I’ve cooked a new recipe for my first ‘Thursday Doctor Who with Fig’ evening of 2024. This is a tasty and comforting recipe from the book Let’s Do Dinner, by Antoni from Queer Eye. It’s quick and easy, but very tasty. I amended it slightly by adding a sprinkling of dried chilli flakes, just for a bit of extra spice, but other than that the flavours of the Polish sausage give the dish a delicious, smoky flavour.

I was able to find some smoked kielbasa in my local Sainsbury’s so that was great. They weren’t very long though, so whereas the recipe says to cut them into 3-4 inch lengths, I cut them into 1 inch lengths instead. Other than that they were perfect for the dish. (looking online it seems that ‘kielbasa’ is a bit of a catch-all term for all types of Polish sausage in America, whereas in Poland it just means ‘sausage’, it’s clear from the recipe though that you’re looking for a smoked, ready to eat, Polish sausage.)

It serves 4, but I scaled it down for just the two of us, and served it with mash and broccoli, although a nice crusty bread would work well too.

Serves 4

400-450g of kielbasa
2 tablespoons of olive oil, plus a bit extra for drizzling
1 small onion, chopped
1 red pepper, deseeded and chopped
2 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
½ a teaspoon of marjoram
½ a teaspoon of dried chilli flakes (my addition, not in the original recipe)
Sea salt
Freshly ground black pepper
2 x 400g tins of chopped tomatoes
2 x 400g tins of cannellini beans or butter beans (I opted for butter beans)
Chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley for garnish

Cut the kielbasa into 3-4 inch lengths (if your kielbasa is long enough – mine ended up as 1-2 inch lengths) and then cut each piece in half lengthways.

Heat a tablespoon of olive oil in a large frying pan over a medium heat. Add the sausage cut side down and cook for 5 minutes of so, until golden and heated through. Remove from the pan and transfer to a chopping board.

Add the onion, red pepper, garlic and the remaining tablespoon of olive oil to the pan and cook, stirring frequently, for 6 or 7 minutes, until the vegetables are softened.

Whilst the veg is cooking, thinly slice half of the sausages. (leaving the other half intact.)

Add the dried herbs, chilli flakes if using, 1 teaspoon of salt and a generous grinding o black pepper to the pan and cook, stirring, for one minute.

Stir in the tomatoes, beans and the thinly sliced sausage and mix well. Then add 120ml of wat, reduce the heat and simmer for 10 minutes or so, stirring occasionally, until the flavours have blended and the sauce has thickened.

Spoon the ragout into bowl, drizzle with a little oil, top with the reserved sausage pieces, a grinding of black pepper, and the chopped parsley.

Beef in black bean sauce

A final new recipe to end 2023 with! I must admit that I’ve been a bit remiss in updating this blog this year – I simply haven’t cooked enough new recipes. I shall try and rectify this in 2024 and cook at least a couple of new things each month!

This one was a tasty one to end with though. It comes from the book Chinatown Kitchen, which is well worth a look and contains loads of tasty Southeast Asian recipes. It requires fermented black soya beans – they took a bit of tracking down, but I managed to find them in an Oriental supermarket in town. They need to be rinsed, drained, chopped and then mashed with a fork before use in this recipe. The recipe calls for a mix of red and green peppers, but I used red and orange because the green peppers in Sainsbury’s yesterday were … uninspiring.

Serves 4

300g of rump steak, sliced into thin strips
2 tablespoons of oyster sauce
1 tablespoon of cornflour
½ a teaspoon of bicarbonate of soda
4 tablespoons of cooking oil
3 garlic cloves, very finely chopped
2.5cm piece of fresh ginger, peeled and finely chopped
3 tablespoons of fermented black soya beans, rinsed, drained, chopped and then mashed with a fork
1 large red chilli, deseeded and sliced into rounds
½ a red pepper, deseeded and sliced into thin slices
½ a green pepper, deseeded and sliced into thin slices
2 tablespoons of Shaoxing rice wine
1 teaspoon of dark soy sauce (I misread this and added a tablespoon, but it still tasted fine!)
1 teaspoon of sugar
2 spring onions, white parts sliced in half lengthways, green parts sliced into rings
50ml of stock (I used vegetable stock and that worked fine. You can even use water if you don’t have stock to hand)

Mix together the oyster sauce, cornflour and bicarb in a bowl and toss in the beef strips, stirring until they are well coated. Cover the bowl with clingfilm and leave to marinate for at leats 20 minutes while you prepare the rest of the ingredients.

Add the cooking oil to a wok and heat over a high heat until just below smoking. Add the beef and stir fry briskly for a minute, separating the strips of beef out as they cook, until the beef is browned (it will sizzle a lot). Remove from the wok and set aside. (I don’t know if I didn’t have the heat quite high enough, or the oil hot enough, but a lot of the marinade stuck to the pan and I had to deglaze it with a bit of Shaoxing wine before continuing with the rest of the cooking.)

Drain all but 1 tablespoon of oil from the wok then return to the heat and stir-fry the garlic and ginger for a minute or so, until fragrant. Add the chilli and mashed black beans and carry on stir-frying.

Add the peppers, rice wine, soy sauce, sugar and the whites of the spring onions. Pour in the stock and stir well to combine. Cook, stirring occasionally, for about 5 minutes, until the peppers are almost tender

Return the beef to the wok, stir well and cook for a further minute or two until the sauce is thick and glossy. Serve with boiled rice, and garnished with the green parts of the spring onion. (as you can see from the picture I forgot to do this bit and simply put the green parts of the spring onions into the dish. Ah well. (it’s also not a great photo))

Seik thar hin (mutton curry)

This is a lovely recipe from the The Rangoon Sisters cookbook, which I actually made over a month ago. Sorry it has taken me so long to write it up – I just completely forgot. No real excuse!

It’s a delicious recipe and very easy to do, although I used lamb leg steaks rather than mutton, as it was easier to get hold of. It’s a slow cooked recipe so it does take a while – it’s not a quick dinner! Spicy and full of delicious flavours, but not too hot.

Serves 4

8 tablespoons of vegetable oil
4 medium onions, chopped
6 garlic cloves, peeled
1 thumb-sized piece of ginger, peeled
½ a bunch of coriander stalks, finely chopped, plus some leaves to garnish
2 teaspoons of paprika
2 teaspoons of turmeric powder
2 teaspoons of chilli powder
1kg of mutton shoulder, cut into 3cm chunks
4 tablespoons of fish sauce
750ml of hot water

Pre-heat the oven to 160

Heat the oil in an ovenproof, lidded casserole dish over a medium heat. Add the chopped onion and cook slowly, for 10-15 minutes or so, over a medium-low heat, stirring every few minutes, until softened and slightly coloured.

Crush the garlic and ginger to a paste using a pestle and mortar.

Once the onions are soft and browned, add the ginger and garlic paste and chopped coriander stalks and fry for a minute until fragrant. Add the spices and mutton to the pan and stir well to mix. Turn up the heat and cook, stirring, until the meat is browned all over.

Pour in the fish sauce and water and stir. The liquid should just cover the meat, if not, add a bit more water. Bring to the boil, then cover the pan and pop it in the oven for 2½ hours. (check after an hour or so, just to check that there is still enough water in the pan.)

Serve hot with boiled white rice and garnished with coriander leaves.

Youvetsi (Greek lamb stew with orzo)

I made this for myself on Friday evening – I fancied something with lamb, and with a Greek flavour so I hunted around and found this recipe on the Waitrose website and thought I’d give it a go. Very tasty – the lamb, rosemary and spices all work really well together and the orzo is a tasty addition. Definitely one to do again.

I did make a couple of small additions to the recipe – I popped in some petit pois and a bit of sliced red pepper which worked well.

Serves 4

2 tablespoons of olive oil
450g of lamb leg steak, cut into large chunks
1 onion, finely diced
1 rosemary sprig, leaves finely chopped
½ a teaspoon of ground allspice
2 bay leaves
400g of chopped tomatoes with garlic and olive oil
200ml of fresh chicken stock
2 teaspoons of clear honey
¼ of a teaspoon of salt
200g of orzo
120g of spinach leaves
75g of feta, crumbled

Heat 1 tablespoon of oil in a large casserole and brown the lamb in batches (adding more oil if needed), until golden. Remove from the pan and set aside.

Add the onion and sauté for 5-10 minutes, until soft.

Return the lamb to the pan, then stir in the rosemary, allspice and bay leaves. Cook for 1 minute, then add the tomatoes, stock, honey and salt.

Bring to the boil, then simmer for 20 minutes.

The original recipe says to cook the orzo and then add it to the pan, however, I simply rinsed the orzo under cold water and then stirred it into the casserole along with the tomatoes and stock. I found it cooked perfectly well in the 20 minutes simmering time.

At the end of the 20 minutes simmering time, stir in the rinsed spinach, until it wilts.

Cover and set aside to rest for 2-3 minutes, then remove the bay leaves and serve, sprinkled with the crumbled feta.

Courgette fritters

It’s taken me a little while to get around to blogging this, as I made them a couple of weeks ago. We had Neil’s parents, Greg and Avis, and his brother Nick, over for dinner. Usually, when it’s just his parents I just cook a normal meal, however we only have four matching plates, and four chairs that fit around the dining table, so the addition of Nick meant we needed a different plan. So, I did a hot buffet of various different dishes. Most of them were Spanish, but I saw this Nigella recipe on Twitter and thought I’d give it a go.

They’re really easy to do and are delicious – light and tasty, with the feta, paprika and mint giving them a lovely flavour. A good addition to any buffet or picnic.

Makes about 25

4 courgettes
6 spring onions, finely chopped
250g of feta cheese
1 small bunch of fresh parsley, chopped
1 small bunch of fresh mint, chopped (plus extra to sprinkle over at the end)
1 tablespoon of dried mint
1 teaspoon of paprika
140g of plain flour
Sea salt flakes
Freshly ground black pepper
3 large eggs, beaten
olive oil, for frying
4 limes (to serve)

Coarsely grate the courgettes. Spread the grated courgette out on a tea towel and leave for about 20 minutes to get rid of any excess wetness.

Put the chopped spring onions in a bowl and crumble in the feta. Stir in the chopped parsley and mint, along with the dried mint and paprika.

Add the flour and season well with salt and pepper.

Gradually add the beaten egg and mix thoroughly before stirring in the drained, grated courgettes. (Don’t be alarmed by the straggly lumpiness of this batter – it’s meant to be this way.)

Heat a few tablespoons of oil in a large frying pan and drop heaped dessertspoons of the mixture into the hot oil, flattening the little cakes down with the back of the spoon as you go.

Cook these little patties for about 2 minutes on each side, until golden, and then transfer to a waiting plate.

Once you have cooked all of the batter, sprinkle the fritters with a little extra chopped, fresh mint, and serve, garnished with lime slices. (squeeze the juice from the limes over the fritters before eating)

French apple tart

As I was off work yesterday, I decided to make this to take around to my friend Abigail’s in the evening to accompany our ongoing Avengers marathon. It’s a Mary Berry recipe from the book Mary Berry’s Baking Bible and it’s tasty and easy to do, although it does take a while – there are quite a few stages.

My mother, not unreasonably, asked ‘what makes it French?’, and the only answer I could give is ‘Mary Berry says so.’. Regardless of whether it’s authentically French or not, it’s very tasty.

For the pastry

175g of plain flour
75g of diced butter
1 large egg yolk
A little water, if necessary (I did find it necessary to add a little water to make the dough.)

For the filling

900g of cooking apples
50g of butter
2 tablespoons of water
4 tablespoons of apricot jam
50g of caster sugar
Grated rind of ½ a lemon
225g of eating apples
1-2 tablespoons of lemon juice
1 teaspoon of caster sugar for sprinking

For the glaze
4 tablespoons of apricot jam

To make the pastry place the flour and butter in a large bowl and rub together with your fingertips until the mixtures resembles fine breadcrumbs. Add the egg yolk and stir in to the mixture with a rounded-bladed knife until a dough forms. (you might need to add a little cold water too.)

Knead the pastry very lightly, then wrap in cling film and chill in the fridge for 30 minutes.

To make the filling, quarter and core the cooking apples and then cut them into small chunks (there’s no need to peel them). Melt the butter in a large pan and add the chopped apples and the water. Cover and cook gently for 10-15 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the apples have become soft and mushy.

Rub the apple through a sieve into a clean pan and add the apricot jam, sugar and grated lemon rind. Cook over a medium/high heat for 10-15 minutes, stirring continuously, until any excess liquid has evaporated and the apple mixture has thickened. Set aside to cool.

Pre-heat the oven to 200.

Roll out the pastry on a lightly floured surface until thin. Line a deep 20cm flan tin. (The recipe recommends one with a removable bottom, but I only had a sandwich tin to hand, and that worked fine) Cover with baking parchment and fill with baking beads and blind bake in the oven for 10 minutes. Then remove the beads and the paper and bake for a further 5 minutes or so, until the base of the tart has dried out. Remove from the oven, but leave the oven switched on.

Spoon the cooled apple purée into the tart case and level off the surface.

Peel, quarter and core the eating apples and slice them very thinly.

Arrange the apple slices on top of the apple purée, in neat, overlapping circles. Brush with lemon juice and sprinkle with a teaspoon of caster sugar.

Return the tart to the oven and bake for 20-25 minutes, until the pastry and the edges of the apples are golden brown.

To make the glaze, sieve the apricot jam into a small saucepan and gently heat until it goes runny. Brush over the top of the apples and the pastry.

Can be served warm or cold.

Chicken Marsala

I made this for myself last week – it’s taken me ages to get around to blogging it. I think, partly, because I wasn’t very happy with the photo I took, so I was debating whether to blog it, or whether to try cooking it again to see if I could get a better photo. In the end I decided to just go with what I had. It’s a delicious recipe that I found because Nigella Lawson tweeted a link to it a while back. It’s creamy, rich and tasty. I served it with some mash, to help absorb the creamy sauce, and some veg on the side. Very nice.

The amounts here serve 4, but I scaled it down for just me. As ever I substituted diced red pepper for the hated mushrooms!

Serves 4

2 large chicken breasts, cut in half horizontally
½ a teaspoons of of salt
½ a teaspoons of of black pepper
35g of plain flour
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons of unsalted butter
2 banana shallots, peeled and cut into 1cm squares
1 clove of garlic, crushed
200g of white mushrooms (you know how I feel about mushrooms, so I used diced red pepper instead)
250ml of dry marsala wine
125ml of chicken stock
125ml of double cream
¼ of a teaspoons of of salt
Freshly ground black pepper, to taste
1 tablespoons of of finely chopped parsley, for garnish

Cut each breast in half lengthways to form 2 thin steaks. Cover with a sheet of cling-film and pound to 1 cm using a or rolling pin. (This tenderises the meat and ensures even cooking of the chicken.)

Sprinkle each chicken steak with half the salt, pepper then flour. Lightly rub flour across the surface, turn and repeat with remaining salt, pepper and flour. Shake excess flour off each piece just before cooking.

Put half the butter and oil in a large non-stick pan over medium high heat. Once the butter is melted and foamy, place the chicken steaks in, then cook for 3 to 4 minutes until golden and crispy, then turn over and cook on the other side for 2 minutes. Remove from the pan and place on a plate.

Once you have removed the chicken from the pan, add the remaining butter and oil. Once the butter is melted, add shallots and garlic and cook for 1-2 minutes, stirring regularly.

Add the mushrooms (or the peppers, if, like me, you hate ‘shrooms.) and cook for 3 minutes, stirring regularly.

Add the marsala, turn up the heat to high and allow the liquid to boil for 3 minutes or until reduced by half.

Add the chicken stock, cream, and season well with salt and pepper. Stir, and then lower the heat so that it’s simmering, and simmer for 3 to 5 minutes until the sauce thickens to a creamy consistency.

Nestle the cooked chicken pieces back into sauce and leave for a minutes or so to reheat.

Take off the heat, sprinkle with chopped parsley and serve.

Spinach and feta fatayer

I saw fatayer for sale in Waitrose a few weeks ago. I didn’t buy any, but I made a note of the name so I could do a bit of research and find out what they are, and maybe try my hand at a recipe. They are middle-Eastern (most sources say Lebanese) savoury pies, that can be made with a variety of fillings, spiced meats (usually lamb mince), or spinach seem the most popular. I tracked down a recipe online and decided to give them a try. Although they are referred to as ‘pies’ they use a bread dough for the casing, rather than pastry, so when you’re making them allow enough time for the dough to rise properly – usually an hour initially, followed by a further 30 minutes. So they’re not as quick to make as pastry pies. Delicious though.

On Monday we had a librarians away day at work, and so I decided to make these for my team. As my colleague Dan is vegetarian I opted for the spinach and feta filling, rather than the meaty one. I scaled the recipe down a bit from the one I found and was able to make 6, reasonably large fatayer, although you can scale it up or down as required. I think that next time I make them I’ll add some chopped, toasted pine nuts to the filling mix.

Makes 6

For the dough

200g of strong white bread flour
I teaspoon of salt
7g of fast-action dried yeast
1 tablespoon of olive oil
Warm water to mix – approximately 200ml, but play it by ear

For the filling

200g of fresh baby leaf spinach (the recipe talks about using frozen spinach, but I prefer fresh)
1 small brown onion, diced
2 teaspoons of sumac
½ a teaspoon of salt
Freshly ground black pepper
A squeeze of lemon juice
50g of shredded mozzarella
200g of feta, crumbled
1 teaspoon of nigella seeds
1 egg, beaten, for glazing.

In a large bowl mix together the flour, salt and yeast. Make a well in the centre and pour in the olive oil. Then add the warm water, a bit at a time, mixing it in with a wooden spoon until the mixture forms a soft dough. (Like when making ordinary bread, or a pizza base, you don’t want too much water – the dough should be soft and slightly sticky to the touch.

Turn the dough out on to a lightly floured surface and, use your hands to knead the dough for 5-7 minutes.

Place the dough in an oiled bowl and cover with cling film. Leave it to rise, in a warm place, away from draughts, for 45 minutes to 1 hour.

Turn the risen dough out on to a lightly floured surface, punch down the dough and shape into equal sized balls.

Place the balls on a baking tray, cover, and allow them to rise for a further 30 minutes before shaping

Whilst they are rising, make the filling

Roughly chop the fresh spinach, sprinkle over the salt, and leave to stand for 10 minutes, to draw out excess liquid.

Meanwhile, cook the diced onions in a large frying pan, until they’re soft and translucent

Place the spinach in a sieve over a bowl and squeeze out as much water as possible using a spoon or your hands.

Place the squeezed spinach in the skillet with the onions and add the sumac, salt and pepper.

Continue to cook the mixture for another 5 minutes to further dry it up. Adjust the seasoning to taste and add a squeeze of lemon.

Once the spinach and onion mixture has cooked for 5 minutes and is dry, transfer it to a bowl and mix in the nigella seeds mozzarella and crumbled feta. Stir well to combine.

Pre-heat the oven to 200.

Roll out the dough balls into very thin circles.

Place a tablespoon of the filling in the middle of each rolled out circle, and fold together two sides. Then bring up the third to form a triangle.

Pinch the sides together really tightly to ensure a secure seal.

Brush each fatayer with the beaten egg, Then arrange them on a lightly oiled baking tray and bake in the middle of the pre-heated oven for 15 minutes, until golden.

Serve warm or cold. Delicious.