Halloumi Fries

Halloumi Fries!

• Pack of Halloumi, sliced and cut up into chip shaped sizes
• 2 tbsp plain flour
• 1 tsp paprika
• Vegetable oil

Pour enough oil into a frying pain, deep enough to come up about half way against the depth of the fries, heat the oil until smoking hot.  Mix the paprika into the flour and dip the halloumi into the mix, ensuring all areas are coated, then place into the frying pan.  Cook until golden and crispy, turning over once the bottoms of the halloumi fries have crisped up.  Remove the fries from the pan and place onto some kitchen roll in order to absorb any excess oil.

This recipe is so quick and simple yet produces something which is so tasty.  I served the halloumi fries with a tuna rainbow salad and some mustard mayo and boy was it good, will definitely be making these again.

Indian style pizza

Indian styles pizza

• Portion of  Hairy Bikers Style Beef Rendang curry
• 2 naan breads
• 1 pack of paneer cheese, cut into bite sized cubes
• 1/2 red onion, cut into thin slices
• 1/2 pepper cut into thin slices
• 2 tomatoes cut into chunks
• Pinch of cumin
• Handful of chopped coriander
• Handful of rocket leaves
• Mint and cucumber raita
• Mango chutney
• Rapeseed oil

Method:

Last week I made a beef rendang curry, it was a big portion so I decided to do something a little different with the leftovers.  Everyone loves Indian and Italian food so why not an Indian pizza!

Obviously this dish will work with any curry that you have made, I am just using the beef rendang as an example as that is the last curry that I made and is what I used in this recipe.

Warm your curry up in a small saucepan and pre heat your oven to 180 degrees.

In a small frying pan warm a dash of rapeseed oil and then  add the tomato chunks, paneer and a pinch of cumin and fry for around ten minutes, by which time the tomato will have softened and make a sauce.

 On an oven tray place your naan breads and sprinkle with a small amount of water (this will keep them moist when heated in the oven).  Once the curry has been warmed through spread half over each of the naan breads, top with the paneer and tomato sauce and cook in the oven for around 10 minutes. 

 Once done, top each pizza with the red onion, pepper slices, rocket and the raita and mango chutney.

A quick and easy dinner which is tasty and filling.  I prefer to add my vegetables after the cooking process to keep them fresh and crunchy but you can add them to the pizza when you place them in the oven.  This is a great alternative to the traditional Italian pizza and one that I hope you will love as much as we did

Beef Rendang – Hairy Bikers Style

Beef Rendang – Hairy Bikers Style

• 2 lemongrass stalks
• 2 red onions, quartered
• 4 garlic cloves
• Thumb sized piece of fresh root ginger, peeled and roughly chopped
• 1 tbsp galangal paste
• 2 plump red chillies roughly chopped
• 1 tsp ground cumin
• 1 tbsp ground coriander
• 1 tsp tumeric
• 1 tbsp soft brown sugar
• 1 tbsp dark soy sauce
• 5 curry leaves
• 1 cinnamon stick
• 1 tin coconut milk
• 200ml water
• 1 tsp tamarind paste
• 2 tbsp vegetable oil
• 1 kilo beef steak cut into bite sized chunks (stewing or braising)
• Big pinch of sea salt

Method:

Peel off the dry outer layers of each lemongrass stalk and slice the inner white part into 1cm pieces.  Place them into a food processor, add the onions, garlic, ginger, galangal and chillies and blend to make as fine a paste as possible.  You will need to push the mixture down a good few times to ensure everything gets a good blitz, word of caution, don’t breath in deeply when doing this as the fragrance will knock you for six!

Heat the vegetable oil in a large flameproof casserole dish and fry the onion paste gently for around 5 minutes, stirring constantly.  Add the cumin, coriander and turmeric, mix well and cook for a further 2 minutes.

Add the beef to the casserole dish and toss it with the onion paste and spices.  Cook for 5 minutes, stirring constantly until the meat is lightly coloured all over.  Pour in the coconut milk, add the water, curry leaves, cinnamon stick, sugar, tamarind paste, soy sauce and salt.  Place a lid on the casserole dish and cook in a preheated over at 160 degrees for around 3 hours or until the meat is very tender, you will need to give a good stir on the hour and also just to check it isn’t drying out.  

By the end of the cooking process you should be left with a thick, rich sauce.

It is best to make the curry the day before you eat it as the flavours will enhance the dish even more.  If you are a spice fiend then add as much fresh chilli as you can take, I did find the two chillies (including the seeds) gave this quite a good kick of heat. 

  I served this with basmati rice, cucumber and mint raita, and a tomato, onion and coriander chutney with some poppadoms.

Whilst it may seem like a lot of ingredients most of the dry ingredients people will have in their store cupboard and any additional ingredients required shouldn’t work out too costly and will keep in the fridge for a while once opened.

We both loved this dish, perfect for the weekend and with enough leftover for another dish I will be making later in the week,, watch this space for an Italian dish with an Indian twist!

Recipe adapted from The Hairy Bikers – Great Curries

Homemade chicken kievs

Homemade chicken kievs

Well Christmas and New Year have been and gone, all roasted out, how about a nice chicken Kiev?  Ordinarily I would have had this with a big plate of fries but given everything that I've eaten over the festive period I went semi healthy and had a big plate of rainbow salad with mine!

• 2 chicken breasts
• Salted butter
• Handful of finely chopped parsley
• 2 minced garlic cloves
• Squeeze of lemon juice
• Panko breadcrumbs
• Beaten egg
• Flour

Method:

In a bowl place enough butter to make two small pats that will go inside the chicken, add the garlic, parsley and the lemon juice, mix together using the back of a spoon, once combined form into a small sausage shape and put into the fridge to firm up.

Place the chicken breasts inside a plastic sandwich bag (or something similar) and give them a good whacking with a rolling pin or the base of a pan, we need to flatten them slightly. Using a sharp knife make a slit in the side of each piece of chicken, not too large but use the knife to work some space inside the chicken to accommodate the garlic butter, placing half into each chicken breast.

Place the Panko breadcrumbs into a deep dish, put some flour onto a plate and beat the egg in a bowl large enough to dunk the chicken into.  Roll the chicken in the flour, dunk in the egg and then roll in the breadcrumbs, once done repeat the egg and breadcrumb process that way you ensure you get a good coating which will get pretty crispy once cooked.  Place the chicken in the fridge and leave to firm up before cooking.

Put some vegetable oil into a large frying pan and heat up ready for the frying stage.  You can drop a breadcrumb into the oil and if it sizzles you know the oil is hot enough. Place the chicken breasts into the pan and cook for around 20 minutes, turning half way through (this can take longer depending how thick your chicken breasts are, you can always cut into the end part of the chicken to ensure that it is cooked).  Remove the breasts from the pan and place onto some kitchen roll on a plate in order to absorb any excess oil then serve.

The good thing with this recipe is you can pretty much put what you want into the butter mix, next time I'm going to try coriander, lime and chilli flakes, give it a bit of a Mexican twist!  Obviously you can add as much or as little garlic to the original recipe as you like and adjust the amount of butter depending on how many kievs you are making.

New Years Day Canapés

New Years Day Canapés

Here are a couple of quick and easy canapé ideas, I won't bore you with the smoked salmon blinis recipe as I'm pretty sure most people know how to put these together: shop-bought blinis, smoked salmon, creme fraiche mixed with horseradish and some lumpfish caviar, job done.

For the tuna and cucumber canapés you will need a tin of tuna, drained and mashed in a bowl, add a squeeze of lemon, few grinds of black pepper, small handful of diced red onion, mix well and then add a teaspoon of the mix onto a thick slice of cucumber (it needs to be thick as you don't want a floppy cucumber!).

Given my love of a bit of spice I think next time I may add a few dashes of hot sauce to the tuna mix, liven it up a notch!

I really hope you and yours had a wonderful Christmas and New Year and I would like to thank you all for checking in on A Mouthful Of Mark, here's to another great year ahead of foodie adventures!