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Saturday 27 May 2017

Open tuna salad sandwich with poached egg

Open tuna salad sandwich with poached egg

  • Tin of tuna, drained
  • 2 tomatoes
  • Handful of black olives
  • Small handful of feta cheese, cubed
  • Spring onion, sliced
  • Wedge of cucumber cut into quarters
  • Handful of mixed salad leaves 
  • 2 eggs, break each egg into a small ramekin dish
  • Bread of choice
  • Salad dressing
  • White wine vinegar

Serves 2
Method:
Cut off a couple of decent slices of bread, butter them and place onto your plate.  Top the bread with some salad and then put the tuna on top followed by the feta, cucumber, spring onions, olives and tomato, season with a few grinds of black pepper.

Bring a medium pan of water to the boil, add a few splashes of white wine vinegar and then tip in the eggs and cook for 3 minutes.  Remove the eggs with a slotted spoon and place each egg in top of your sandwich, drizzle over some salad dressing and serve.

This is quick and easy to make and is a super tasty lunch.  My local Co-op sells a mature cheddar and jalapeƱo bread which is what I used here, it is seriously good, go get some, trust me you won't regret it!  This is perfect when sat out in the garden with a nice cold glass of Pinot on the go, a great way to welcome in the summer to come!

Thursday 18 May 2017

Breakfast frittata

Breakfast frittata
  • 12 chipolata sausages
  • 2 large handfuls of grated cheese
  • 8 cherry tomatoes
  • 2 handfuls of baby spinach
  • 10 eggs, lightly beaten
  • Couple glugs of whole milk
  • 1 small pepper, finely diced
  • Salt and freshly ground pepper
  • Couple pinches of Turkish pepper flakes (if you have them!)

Firstly lightly grease your tin, I have a small non stick roasting tin, 9"x12" and 2" deep which is perfect for this recipe.  Preheat your oven to 180 degrees, whilst this is warming up cut up your sausages, you want about 6 pieces from each sausage.

Crack the eggs into a jug, add a few glugs of milk and season with salt and pepper and then lightly beat.  Place the cut sausages into the tin and cook in the oven until browned through (around 10 minutes).  Once cooked, place the spinach over the top of the sausages and then pour over the egg mix.  Sprinkle the diced pepper over the top of the mixture followed by the cheese, gently push down onto the top as you want the egg mix to cover the ingredients.  Place the halved cherry tomatoes evenly around. Grind some more pepper over the top and sprinkle on some of the Turkish pepper flakes (optional if you have them!), return the tin to the oven and cook for around 30 minutes until the top is browned slightly and the frittata is firm to the touch.

I only call this breakfast frittata as I make this for my partners breakfast however it is perfect for any time of the day, brunch, lunch or dinner served with a nice crisp salad or some cheeky feta fries!  It is so versatile, you can pretty much put what you like in with the egg mix, mushrooms are another firm favourite for this dish, enjoy!

Breakfast frittata


Wednesday 10 May 2017

Turkish Style Tuna & Halloumi Salad with Herby Salsa

Turkish Style Tuna & Halloumi Salad with Herby Salsa
  • 2 tins tuna, drained
  • 1/2 pepper thinly sliced
  • 1 carrot, thinly peeled in to ribbons
  • 1/2 cucumber thinly sliced
  • 1/2 red onion finely diced
  • 3 tomatoes, deseeded and finely chopped
  • 500g sliced Halloumi
  • Handful of chopped coriander
  • Handful of chopped mint (reserve a pinch to garnish the dish)
  • 6 tbsp olive oil
  • 2 tbsp pomegranate molasses (available from supermarkets)
  • A pinch of Turkish pepper flakes (ordered mine from Amazon)
  • Sea salt and ground black pepper
  • 1 punnet of Sweet Chili baby beetroot
  • Bag of salad

Method:
To make the salsa, combine the tomatoes, onion, herbs, pepper flakes, molasses and 4 tbsp of olive oil, mix together and season to taste with salt and pepper.

Heat the remaining 2 tbsp of olive oil in a frying pan over a medium heat, fry the halloumi for a few minutes each side until golden and then set aside.

On a large serving dish empty the bag of salad and scatter over the carrot, peppers and cucumber.  Top the salad with the halloumi and the tuna and then drizzle on the salsa. Add the Sweet Chili baby beetroot around the edge.



This recipe serves 4 and whoever the lucky people are to share it with you, they will thank you, trust me!  We had this last night for dinner and the two of us polished it off, it was that good.  This recipe is perfect for this time of year and is great on its own or to go alongside a BBQ, this is what al fresco dining was invented for. 


 I shall be making this again in the next few days, thinking I may top with some poached eggs, what do you think?




Saturday 6 May 2017

Red Dawg Apache pulled pork flatbread with crackling

Red Dawg Apache pulled pork flatbread with crackling

  • Pork belly (size will depend on how many people you are feeding so adjust accordingly)
  • Flatbreads (1 per person)
  • Handful of pea shoots
  • Crumbled Feta cheese
  • 1/2 sliced red onion
  • Sliced peppers
  • Red Dawg Apache sauce from www.angusandoink.com 
  • Voodoo Mango sauce from Angus & Oink
  • Phat Taco sauce from Angus & Oink

Method:
Place the pork belly in a lidded tin (the tin needs to be just big enough for the pork), pat the skin dry and rub over a few pinches of sea salt.  Heat the oven to highest setting and place in the pork (uncovered) for around 20 minutes or so until the skin is blistered looking.  Turn the oven down to 160 degrees, pour a small amount of water around the pork (just enough to cover a depth of around a centimetre), place the lid onto the tin and return to the oven.  You will need to cook the pork for around 3-4 hours depending on the size of the meat.  Periodically check the pork and top up the water as this will cook off, for the last hour add white wine to the tin instead of the water and then for the last 30 minutes turn the heat up to 200 degrees and cook the pork uncovered to really crisp up the crackling, once done remove from the oven and set aside.

When the meat has cooled slightly, using a sharp knife remove the crackling sheet from the top of the pork, once removed you can scrape off any fat that may remain (it should pretty much have cooked off though!).  Break the crackling into small pieces and leave to one side.  Using two forks, shred the pork in the tin (there should be no liquid remaining at this stage).  Once shredded, add a good few glugs of the Red Dawg Apache sauce and mix through, the idea is not to swamp the pork in the sauce, you just want to use enough to moisten the meat and for the sauce to impart its flavour.  

Heat your flatbreads in the oven according to the pack instructions, once heated, drizzle some Phat Taco sauce over the top of each and spread evenly using the back of a spoon.  Top each flatbread with the shredded pork, peas shoots, peppers, feta cheese and crackling.  Finish off with a drizzle of the Voodoo Mango sauce.

This is a great Saturday night dish, you can vary the toppings and the cheese, (I normally use grated mozzarella but had feta in at the time).  You can make this as spicy or as mild as you like for each flatbread made, it is always a crowd pleaser and the sauces really give a great kick and flavour.

If you don't have the time (or inclination) to cook the pork as above, you can cheat and buy one of those BBQ joints from the supermarket that have already been cooked so you just need to heat it through in around 30 minutes.  This is handy is you are in a rush, but I prefer the slow method, you can't beat a good bit of crispy crackling which you can only get through a long slow roasting!