Orange Roughy on a bed of pea and asparagus risotto ... in the Thermomix

I need to start off by saying that I am damned proud of this dish and how it turned out. It was absolutely delicious.

We've recently started having more fish as we've discovered a good fish supplier (almost) locally. It's an hour drive and back to get to them but we get excellent fresh fish and at great prices.

The Boy is always after me to make more fish to add to our diet, but I'm not a big fan of fish in general. I need my fish to be really, really fresh and not smell like fish. Can't stand that fishy smell!

Long story short, we went for a little trip and picked up some fish and Orange Roughy (a fish from New Zealand) was in the mix. The Boy loves Orange Roughy. I asked for two portions but didn't realise that for the Orange Roughy, one portion could feed two people. They came frozen (though I could have asked for them fresh, had I known!) and I just put them straight into the freezer.

The last few times that we have been out, The Boy has ordered fish and it has arrived on a bed of risotto of some sort. I thought that was a great way to serve fish, since we always find that fish on its own just isn't quite satisfying enough as a meal.

We had some friends over to dinner recently and I was at a loss as to what to cook for dinner and The Boy reminded me that we still had the Orange Roughy in the freezer, so I thought I'd serve the fish on a bed of risotto for the mains.

Here's what I did for the fish: (of course, it doesn't have to be Orange Roughy, you can use any fish you like).

Ingredients:

• Orange roughy (or any other type of) fish in single serve portions, as many as needed for number of people serving
• Salt
• Pepper
• Paprika 
• Olive oil

Instructions:

• Heat oven to 200°C
• Prepare baking trays with a sheet of aluminum foil on it. Lightly spray with oil (I use an olive oil spray)
• Place Orange Roughy onto the tray, depending on size of the tray, 2 or 4 to a tray
• Drizzle a small amount of olive oil on top of fish
• Sprinkle salt and pepper onto fish for taste
• Dust a light coating of paprika onto fish as well
• Bake in oven, uncovered for 8 - 10 minutes until fish is done
• Serve on a bed of pea and asparagus risotto

For the risotto, originally I thought of making a porcini and truffle risotto but then thought that the porcini and truffle might overpower the flavor of the fish, so went with pea and asparagus instead.

Here's how I made the risotto: (of course, if you don't have a Thermomix, you can make your risotto the traditional way).

Ingredients:

• 1 cup of Parmesan, block or shredded
• 1 onion, quartered
• 3 cloves of garlic
• 40g Olive oil
• 300g Arborio rice
• 80g white wine
• 4 tsp chicken stock
• 1 litre of hot water
• 1 cup peas
• 1 bunch asparagus, diced

Instructions:

• If Parmesan is in blocks, put in TM bowl, grind for 10 seconds, speed 7, remove and set aside
• Chop onion and garlic together Speed 6, 3 – 5 seconds, scrape sides
• Add olive oil and sauté at 100 degrees for 2 minutes
• Add Arborio rice and wine wine, sauté for 2 minutes at Reverse speed 1, 100 degrees
• Add stock and hot water, set time to 12 minutes, Reverse speed 1, 100 degrees
• After 12 minutes, peas and asparagus, cook at 100 degrees for 4 minutes, Reverse speed 1
• Remove risotto from TM bowl into a large serving bowl, fold in 2/3 of ground Parmesan, add pepper to taste.
• Serve risotto and sprinkle remaining Parmesan on dish. Enjoy.

A word of advice, timing is everything for this dish. You don't want your fish to be done too early and go cold or get overcooked, so time your risotto and when it is about 8 to 10 minutes from being ready, then pop your fish into the oven.

To serve, I put a generous scoop of the risotto onto the middle of a dinner plate and then placed the fish on top of the risotto. For garnish, I kept it simple and just drizzled a little olive oil over the outer rim of the plate.

If you do make this, be sure to post pictures for me to see either on Instagram - be sure to tag me with @langshipley or on my Daz In The Kitchen Facebook page.


© This work is copyrighted to Invest-Ex and Destiny's Fortunes Pty Ltd

Find me around SOCIAL MEDIA:
Cooking blog: http://dazinthekitchen.blogspot.com.au/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/dazinthekitchen
Twitter: @langshipley https://twitter.com/langshipley
Instagram: @langshipley http://instagram.com/langshipley
Pinterest: https://pinterest.com/langshipley/
Youtube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/langshipley
Makeup and beauty blog: http://langshipley-deannasworld.blogspot.com.au/

Steak and fries

For a very long time (2 - 3 years, I think), I was not eating any red meat and certainly not able to handle an entire steak. As a result, my poor darling didn't get any red meat at home (unless it was minced in a spaghetti sauce) and the only time he got a steak was when he went out to a steak house.

Recently, I've been back into the red meats again, slowly but surely. The whole process has taken a good year, but I'm back to eating it again and even craving it slightly.

Last night, The Boy decided that he wanted something simple, steak and fries and that is what he got. It's such a simple meal and so tasty.

Here's what I did:

Ingredients:

• 2 x scotch fillet steaks
• Garlic salt
• Freshly ground pepper
• Green leafy lettuce
• Sweet potato fries (frozen from the store - any type you like)

Instructions:

• Defrost your steaks if they are frozen
• Place onto a plate and drizzle lightly with olive oil, sprinkle with garlic salt and ground pepper
• Heat up a pan to medium heat and place the seasoned side onto the pan
• Cook for about 3 - 4 minutes. While the steak is cooking drizzle a little olive oil onto the top side of the steak and then season again with garlic salt and pepper
• After the 3 - 4 minute mark, turn the steak over and cook again for another 3 - 4 minutes
• Note: this will give you a medium-rare steak. If you want a more cooked steak, leave it in the pan for a longer period of time. If you want a more accurate check of your meat, you can also use a meat thermometer, and you can find the correct temperatures here.
  

For the sweet potato fries:

• Heat up a small saucepan of canola, sunflower or whatever vegetable oil you like that can be used for frying and has a high heat point
• Take the fries out of the freezer, and while the fries are still frozen, drop them in batches (how much will depend on the size of the saucepan you are using) into the saucepan and fry until a golden brown, about 2 - 4 minutes for each batch, depending on your oil temperature
• Remove the fries and drain them in a plate lined with paper towels
• Repeat until all the fries are cooked
• Once all the fries are cooked, remove the paper towel, sprinkle some garlic salt over the fries and toss them to evenly distribute the garlic salt. This will make your sweet potato fries very tasty
• Note: if the oil is hot enough, it will bubble when you drop the fries in. You can do one test fry to check the oil temperature. Also I used sweet potato because I like sweet potato fries, but really, you can use any type of fries you like
  

For the green leafy lettuce salad:

• I just used some salad mix from the store and then dressed with with a little olive oil and balsamic vinegar. Very simple

This dinner turned out to be super tasty and The Boy really enjoyed it a great deal. This is also probably the first time in several years that I have cooked a steak for us for dinner. I think I will be doing it again soon. I really enjoyed it.

If you do make this, be sure to post pictures for me to see either on Instagram or on my Daz In The Kitchen Facebook page.


© This work is copyrighted to Invest-Ex and Destiny's Fortunes Pty Ltd

Find me around SOCIAL MEDIA:
Cooking blog: http://dazinthekitchen.blogspot.com.au/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/dazinthekitchen
Twitter: @langshipley https://twitter.com/langshipley
Instagram: @langshipley http://instagram.com/langshipley
Pinterest: https://pinterest.com/langshipley/
Youtube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/langshipley
Makeup and beauty blog: http://langshipley-deannasworld.blogspot.com.au/

Easy taco casserole

This is another recipe that The Boy found, and again, from Facebook, I think.

We have been wanting to try this out and invited a few friends over to dinner to be our guinea pigs. It started out as a dinner party for 4 but turned out to be a dinner party for 6.

Even then, with generous portions for everyone, this served 6 people very comfortably, with at least one of my guests having seconds. We still had about 2 reasonable serves as leftovers after all the eating was done.

Here's the recipe.

Ingredients:

• 1 pound lean ground beef
• 1 can pinto beans or Mexican style beans (original recipe: Ranch style beans)
• 1 large bag tortilla chips, crushed
• 1 can diced tomatoes (original recipe: Ro-tel tomatoes)
• 1 cup diced jalapenos (not needed if you have Ro-tel tomatoes)
• 1 small onion, chopped
• 2 cups shredded cheddar cheese, divided
• 1 package taco seasoning
• 1 can cream of chicken soup
• 1/2 cup water
• sour cream and salsa for serving

Instructions:

• Preheat oven to 180 degrees. In a large skillet, brown meat and drain off fat. Stir in beans, tomatoes, onion, taco seasoning, soup and water. Simmer over medium-low  heat until everything is well combined and heated through.
• Grease a 9×13 casserole dish. Put down a layer of crushed tortilla chips, followed by a layer of the meat/bean mixture, then half of the cheddar cheese. Repeat layers. Cover with foil and bake for 20-30 minutes, or until bubbly.
• Let sit for 5-10 minutes before serving. Top with sour cream and salsa.

First thing to note, is that this is an American recipe, and I've modified the ingredients above a little bit for non-American people as well. I have included the "original recipe ingredient" in parenthesis so that you know what it was asking for, if you were from the US.

I mostly followed the recipe but I did make a few adjustments so that it was more to our taste.

I added a second packet of taco seasoning, just to give the flavor more depth.

I used Mexe-beans from Old El Paso as a replacement for Ranch style beans. If I had not found those, I would have just used pinto or kidney beans. I did not drain the beans as a lot of the seasoning was in the liquid that the beans were in.

With the tomatoes, I used a full can of diced tomatoes and also a cup of chopped up jalapenos to approximate the Ro-tel tomatoes after looking up what was in a can of Ro-tel tomatoes. I did not drain the tomatoes either.

After that, I pretty much followed the recipe to cook the taco filling.

One thing to note: you do need to cook it and let it simmer for a bit to thicken up and reduce as with not draining the beans and the tomatoes, you end up with a lot of liquid. I did not even need to use the 1/2 cup of water that the recipe called for.

Once that was cooked, I did the all important taste test, but found it a bit flat for my liking (I like my food spicy) and added a heaped teaspoon of hot chili flakes and one teaspoon of mild paprika, which really rounded out the flavor for me. Of course, you can skip this step if you do not like hot and spicy, although to me, this just added depth to the flavor rather than heat. None of our friends found it to be too spicy for them.

With regards to the tortilla chips, I did not use plain tortilla chips, because I'm a rebel that way. :-p Instead, I used the Doritos Tortilla chips in the Cheese Supreme flavor. My flavor of choice when it comes to using tortilla chips for anything like nachos and such.

Because I was having people over, I cooked the filling in advance and just before we were ready to eat, assembled and popped it into the oven. Since the filling had cooled down in the meantime, so it had to be in the oven a little longer than the recommended time. I had the casserole in the oven for about 40 minutes with the last 10 or 15 minutes set to 200°C and the foil taken off the top. Of course, this only applies if you had let the filling cool, like I had.

This is a super delicious dish. I served it with sides of homemade guacamole, salsa and sour cream.

I hope you enjoy this as much as we did.


© This work is copyrighted to Invest-Ex and Destiny's Fortunes Pty Ltd

Find me around SOCIAL MEDIA:
Cooking blog: http://dazinthekitchen.blogspot.com.au/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/dazinthekitchen
Twitter: @langshipley https://twitter.com/langshipley
Instagram: @langshipley http://instagram.com/langshipley
Pinterest: https://pinterest.com/langshipley/
Keek: http://www.keek.com/langshipley
Youtube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/langshipley
Makeup and beauty blog: http://langshipley-deannasworld.blogspot.com.au/

Chicken, tarragon and mushroom pie

The Boy has decided that he would do all the cooking for tonight's dinner again and has picked a pie recipe. He's going to have me on stand by to help with any questions but has decided that he will try as much as possible to do it all himself. He's very, very excited about it.

He has found a recipe for a chicken, tarragon and mushroom pie from the cook book The Chef behind the bar by Scott Thomas.

Here's the RECIPE for the pie(s):

Ingredients:

Chicken, tarragon and mushroom filling:

• 500g boned and skinless chicken thigh meat, diced
• Salt and pepper to taste
• Plain flour
• 1 onion, diced
• 1 carrot, diced
• 1 stick of celery, diced
• 1 bay leaf
• 3 sprigs of thyme
• 100g button mushrooms, cut in quarters
• 100ml dry white wine
• Chicken stock
• Double cream
• Small bunch of tarragon, picked and chopped

Pie crust:

• 1 egg
• Splash of milk
• Puff pastry*

* Making puff pastry is satisfying but time-consuming. For home cooking, buy from a local baker or the best quality from a supermarket.

Instructions:

Chicken, tarragon and mushroom filling:

• Season the chicken with salt and pepper. Toss in the flour, shaking off any excess.
• Fry chicken in small batches until well colored (turned brown).
• Saute the onion, carrot and celery until soft. Add the mushrooms and cook for another 5 minutes. Add the bay leaf, thyme and white wine and cook until reduced.
• Add the chicken and enough chicken stock to just cover. (about 500ml of chicken stock).
• Cook at a gentle simmer for around an hour, stirring occasionally, until the chicken is cooked and tender. Finish with a splash of cream.
• Adjust the seasoning, add tarragon and set aside.

Pie crust:

• Lightly grease individual pie moulds and line with pastry, leaving a little overhang.
• Fill with the pie mix and brush some of the eff wash around the edge.
• Place a lid on top and squeeze down the edges to create a seal.
• Refridgerate before trimming the excess overhand. Brush the top with the remaining egg wash before baking.
• Preheat an oven to 180 degrees C and bake the pies for about 16 - 18 minutes.
• If the tops start becoming too dark, cover with aluminum foil and continue baking.
• Before turning out the pies, check the bases are cooked and golden.

To serve:

• Serve with a side of mash or handcut chips.

The cooking process went very well. The Boy didn't have too many questions and managed most things on his own. I think I only butted in about 4 or 5 times. :-)

The recipe didn't say how much flour to use, but we ended up using about 4 tablespoons.

It also didn't say how much chicken stock to use, but we ended up using about 500ml of stock to just cover the filling.

We put the mixture into the oven to simmer at 110 degrees C for 1 hour rather than do it on the stove top. I just like doing it that way better because the heat is more consistent and it is a lot safer. Plus, you don't end up burning the filling, which can happen if you do not watch it closely.

Simmering in the oven

After we took the filling out of the oven, it looked to still be quite watery, so I put it back on the stove and did a high simmer for about 7 minutes to reduce the liquid so that it was thicker. That worked out very well as it needed constant watching and stirring to make sure it didn't burn.

We did not have pie dishes, so we used soup bowls instead. We lined the bottom of the soup bowls and then filled in the filling and covered it following the instructions and then crossed our fingers and hoped for the best. :-) We'll need to invest in some pie dishes if we plan on making more pies, which we will, because I love pie.

By the way, the filling is so gosh darned tasty!!!

Well, the pies turned out to be amazing. The soup bowls worked out very well.

© This work is copyrighted to Invest-Ex and Destiny's Fortunes Pty Ltd

Find me around SOCIAL MEDIA:
Cooking blog: http://dazinthekitchen.blogspot.com.au/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/dazinthekitchen
Twitter: @langshipley https://twitter.com/langshipley
Instagram: @langshipley http://instagram.com/langshipley
Pinterest: https://pinterest.com/langshipley/
Youtube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/langshipley
Makeup and beauty blog: http://langshipley-deannasworld.blogspot.com.au/

Slow cooker braised beef with horseradish

This blog post was written a while ago. I'm just posting it now.

Tonight we are celebrating our 12th wedding anniversary with a dinner and while usually we head out to some favorite restaurant this year we have decided to cook at home and pop open a really nice bottle of wine with a few episodes of our favorite TV show. Tomorrow night, as the second part of our celebration ... well, actually third part, as we have already started last night with a fabulous bottle of wine which The Boy blogged about here, we are going to watch the new Star Trek movie at the cinemas as a special treat to me.

We were talking this morning about what to cook for dinner and I had The Boy hand over a cook book that was lying on top of the dining table.

We recently went to our favorite discount book store, that has a ton of cook books on sale and I picked up a slow cooker and casserole cook book. This one is called Best Ever Slow Cooker One Pot and Casserole Cookbook by Catherine Atkinson and Jenni Fleetwood.

I went to the "slow cooker meat" section and flipped through a few pages. I eat with my eyes and love my cook books with lots of pretty pictures. One caught my eye and also sounded good, so I asked if The Boy would like it for dinner. I knew that I wanted a slow cooker dish.

This is Braised Beef with Horseradish, slow cooked.

Here's the RECIPE for it:

Ingredients:

• 2 tablespoon plain flour
• 4 x 175g braising steaks (I used what we call chuck casserole steaks from the grocery store)
• 2 tablespoon sunflower oil
• 12 small shallots, peeled and halved
• 1 garlic clove, crushed
• 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1 teaspoon curry powder
• 2 teaspoon dark muscovado (molasses) sugar (I used Golden Syrup)
• 2 cups near boiling beef stock
• 1 tablespoon Worchestershire sauce
• 2 tablespoon creamed horseradish
• 225g trimmed baby carrots, trimmed
• 1 bay leaf
• salt and ground black pepper to taste
• 2 tablespoon chopped fresh chives to garnish
• roast vegetables to serve

Instructions:

• Place the flour in a large flat dish and season with salt and pepper. Toss the steaks in the flour and coat.
• Heat the oil in a pan and quickly brown the steaks on both sides. Transfer them to the ceramic cooking pot.
• Add the halved shallots to the pan and cook gently for 10 minutes or until golden and beginning to soften. Stir in garlic, ginger and curry powder and cook for 1 minute more, then remove the pan from the heat.
• Tip the shallot mixture into the ceramic cooking pot, spreading it over the meat, and sprinkle with the sugar.
• Pour the beef stock over the shallots and meat, then add the Worchestershire sauce, horseradish, baby carrots and bay leaf. Stir to combine then season with salt and pepper. Cover the lid and cook on high or auto for 1 hour.
• Reduce the slow cooker to low or leave on author and continue to cook the stew for a fruther 5 - 6 hours or until the beef and vegetables are very tender.
• Remove the bay leaf from the stew and sprinkle with the chopped chives before serving with roast vegetables.

So, I don't have a slow cooker / crock pot and ended up using a cast iron enamel pot instead. I put the whole pot with the ingredients in it into the oven at 120°C for high and at 90°C for low. The temperatures suggested ranges between 120° to 90° C for high and between 90° to 70° C for low.

I thought it would be hard to stir and combine everything, so I mixed the stock, horseradish, sugar, Worchestershire sauce, salt and pepper together and just poured it into the pot.

I'm relatively new to slow cooking since it's not something The Boy is very fond of - he claims slow cooked food is mushy and tasteless. I'm trying to stay patient and not go poking and prodding at the food while it cooks, especially when it is to cook on low for 5 to 6 hours. We'll see how well I fare on that.

Oh yes, The Boy helped me to prep, and I had him peeling the onion shallots. I forgot to ask him to halve them, so they went in whole. I'm hoping that might be okay. The only thing I can think of that it would do to the onions is that it will not fall apart into the different layers in the cooking and will stay whole.

So this turned out to be very, very tasty. It has a slightly sweet flavor to it, but still very savory. I think the sweet comes from the sugar. I might try it without the sugar next time.

We loved this dish. It is a perfect winter dish, for a cold winter's night. We will probably serve it with mash potatoes next time. There was plenty of gravy to soak up which was just delish.

© This work is copyrighted to Invest-Ex and Destiny's Fortunes Pty Ltd

Find me around SOCIAL MEDIA:
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/dazinthekitchen
Twitter: https://twitter.com/langshipley
Instagram: langshipley
Pinterest: https://pinterest.com/langshipley/

Fettuccine Boscaiola ... or in this case, spiral pasta

My beloved Boy is cooking dinner tonight. He has decided that he wants to cook more and become more proficient in the kitchen, so I'm happy for him to take over cooking and meal duties now and then.

The Boy has been talking about being in the mood for a tomato based pasta dish for days, most of this week, actually, but at the last minute decided on a creamy sauce pasta instead.  He said he wanted something with ham so I thought Boscaiola, which yes, I know is made with bacon, but still .... who can complain about bacon, right?

I went onto the interwebs in search of a recipe and came up with this which sounded tasty and easy to make.

I gave it to The Boy to read over and he seems comfortable that he can tackle it without any help from me. Anyway, I'm kicking back while he is cooking, which, let me tell you, is very nice.

Here's the recipe for this particular Boscaiola, which we are making with spiral pasta instead of fettuccine, just because The Boy did not feel like fettuccine.

Ingredients:

• 400g dried curly fettuccine pasta
• 250g rindless bacon rashers, thinly sliced
• 40g butter
• 400g cup mushrooms, thinly sliced
• 5 shallots, ends trimmed, thinly sliced
• 425ml pouring cream
• 30g (1/3 cup) shredded parmesan
• 30g (1/3 cup) shredded romano
• Parmesan (optional), extra, to serve

Instructions:

• Cook the pasta in a large saucepan of salted boiling water until al dente. Drain.
• Meanwhile, cook the bacon in a large non-stick frying pan over medium heat, stirring often, for 4 minutes or until golden. Use a slotted spoon to transfer to a plate.
• Heat the butter in the frying pan. Add the mushroom and cook, stirring often, for 5 minutes or until tender and the liquid has reduced.
• Add the pale section of the shallot and stir to combine. Stir in the bacon and cream. Simmer for 6-7 minutes or until the mixture thickens slightly. Add the parmesan and romano, and stir until well combined.
• Add the pasta and green section of the shallot to the sauce. Season with salt and pepper and toss until well combined. Divide the pasta among serving dishes. Top with extra parmesan.

Since it was The Boy cooking, he tends to like to follow the recipe exactly when cooking for the first time ... well, most of the time really. I'm the one who improvises.

Anyway, he did follow the recipe almost exactly, but with the shallots, since we didn't have any fresh ones, just frozen ones, he just put them in towards the end to the mushrooms, bacon and cream and cooked it all together. There was no green section of the shallot to put in at the end. It all just went in with the sauce.

He also used spiral pasta rather than fettuccine. For some reason, he did not feel like fettuccine and decided on spiral pasta instead. The spiral pasta turned out great for the sauce to coat every little spiral on it.

The recipe doesn't say so, but salt and pepper to taste is important. With adding so much pasta to the sauce, it can taste a bit bland if there's not enough salt and pepper. You don't need a lot, but a pinch or two of both really helps.

The dish turned out to be very, very tasty. It made enough for 6 serves so we have plenty of leftovers for The Boy to take some to work over the coming days for lunch too.



© This work is copyrighted to Invest-Ex and Destiny's Fortunes Pty Ltd

Find me around SOCIAL MEDIA: Cooking blog: http://dazinthekitchen.blogspot.com.au/ Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/dazinthekitchen Twitter: @langshipley https://twitter.com/langshipley Instagram: @langshipley http://instagram.com/langshipley Pinterest: https://pinterest.com/langshipley/ Youtube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/langshipley Makeup and beauty blog: http://langshipley-deannasworld.blogspot.com.au/

Chicken bacon and wild rice soup ... with a little Thermomix help

Last night I got home from a work week dead tired and I still had dinner to cook, fortunately for me, The Boy wanted nachos for dinner and that was easy to do. On top of that I had to decide what to cook for the weekend since we were going to be home during the weekend and needing meals both nights.

I went through my Pinterest board where I had pinned a whole bunch of stuff and came across a soup recipe that sounded good. Now, it's not exactly the season for soup here since it's supposed to be Summer though the weather has not been terribly warm. (Right now though the apartment is very warm from all the cooking I've been doing!)

Anyway, I asked The Boy what he thought of chicken bacon and wild rice soup and he thought is sounded very good and immediately suggested a lovely chardonnay that would go well with it.

Therefore, tonight, we are having soup for dinner and here's the RECIPE for it:

Ingredients:

• 8 cups chicken stock
• ½ cup uncooked wild rice, rinsed
• ½ cup finely chopped green onions
• ½ cup margarine or butter
• ¾ cup all-purpose flour
• ½ teaspoon salt
• ¼ teaspoon poultry seasoning
• ⅛ teaspoon pepper
• 2 cups milk
• 1½ cup cubed or shredded cooked chicken or turkey (2 chicken thigh fillets)
• 8 slices bacon, crisply cooked and crumbled
• 1 tablespoon chopped red capsicum
• 2-3 tablespoons dry sherry or white wine, if desired

Instructions:

• In a large saucepan, put in chicken stock. Add wild rice and onions. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat, cover and simmer 30-45 minutes (or until rice is tender). Once the rice is cooked, there will be some additional broth – do not drain.
• In a medium saucepan, melt margarine, stir in flour, salt, seasoning, and pepper. Cook 1 minute, stirring constantly, until smooth and bubbly. Gradually stir in milk with the butter/flour mixture and cook until slightly thickened, stirring constantly.
• Add this creamy mixture back into the saucepan with the rice/broth. Add remaining ingredients (chicken, bacon, capsicum, and sherry). Heat on low, stirring every once in a while, for at least a half an hour. Do not boil. The mixture will look thin, but the longer you heat the soup, the more the flavors merry and the more it will thicken. This soup is best served after gently heating for an extended period of time (even a few hours) or the next day! For extra flavor, add more poultry seasoning and/or bacon.

I was immediately daunted by the bit in the recipe that needed to make a roux and I was quite daunted by it - I'm a complete wuss when it comes to making a roux and I get very intimidated by it so thank goodness for the Thermomix. I went through my Thermomix recipes and decided to look for one that would do the roux and found one which was went something like this:

Thermomix version of creamy mixture:

• Add margarine, flour, salt, seasoning, pepper, milk into Thermomix. Cook at 90 degrees for 12 minutes on speed 4.

Unfortunately for me, this turned out to be rather a thick roux by following the cooking instructions exactly and I was left with lumpy dough that I somehow had to smooth out into a creamy texture. To the rescue came my trusty hand blender and the whisk attachment. My mistake was putting the hand blender in without covering the pot because EVERYTHING went EVERYWHERE. What a splash it made! I'm sure that I will be cleaning up soup mixture for a long time! but the whisk did the trick and turned my soup back into a lovely, thick, creamy texture.

Now, I just need to adjust the Thermomix recipe for the creamy mixture for the next time I make this soup. I think the trick is to not let it go the whole 12 minutes but to check it for texture about 3 minutes in. (Just a little tip for those of you who have a Thermomix)

I followed the recipe pretty much exactly for the quantities and that made a lot of soup. I went with 8 cups of chicken stock when in fact, I should have gone with 6 cups of chicken stock because there's only the 2 of us eating and there's now enough soup for about 3 or 4 meals for the 2 of us. I am going to have to freeze some of the soup for future consumption, I'm thinking.

Where it said bring to boil and simmer for 30 - 45 minutes for cooking the rice, instead of simmering the soup on the stove, I cooked the soup in a cast iron pot and put the whole thing into the oven for the time recommended at 120dC to cook the rice, which worked out well as a no mess, no fuss way of simmering something. The only thing with doing it this way was there was a lot less evaporation and that also contributed to me having a lot more liquid left in the pot and hence, a lot of soup.

The soup was still a very thick, very creamy texture.

I wanted a slightly smokier flavor and something to enhance the bacon further, so I also added some smoked paprika to the soup to give it more depth and a little additional flavor on top of the chicken and bacon flavor which was the dominant flavors.

I also listened to the recipe and cooked the soup early, so it sat in the oven with the lid on, cooking at a low 90dC for several hours to get the most out of the flavor.

Other than that, the soup turned out to be very, very tasty, though with the bacon and all that chicken stock, I don't think the extra chicken seasoning and the salt was really necessary and next time I will leave it out - this means that next time I will go with 6 cups of chicken stock and no extra chicken seasoning and no salt.

© This work is copyrighted to Invest-Ex and Destiny's Fortunes Pty Ltd

Find me around SOCIAL MEDIA:
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/dazinthekitchen
Twitter: https://twitter.com/langshipley
Instagram: langshipley
Pinterest: https://pinterest.com/langshipley/

Buffalo wings ... with blue cheese dressing in the Thermomix and celery sticks

I have a cousin in the US who is always bragging about his wife's buffalo wings and I love buffalo wings, so I've asked for the recipe a number of times but never got it.

Since I had a hankering for buffalo wings one night, I decided to search the interwebz and consult with some American friends to see what I could come up with for a recipe for buffalo wings.

I found a recipe that I thought would work and looked simple enough to make and decided to have at it.

Here's the RECIPE that I used:

Ingredients:

• 36 chicken wing pieces (one wing makes 2 pieces - the "flat" and the "drum")
• 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 tablespoons white vinegar
• 1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
• 1/8 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1/4 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
• 1 teaspoon Tabasco sauce
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 6 tablespoons Louisiana hot sauce (Frank's is the brand used in Buffalo)
• 6 tablespoons unsalted butter or margarine
• celery sticks
• blue cheese dressing

Instructions:

• Preheat oven to 425 degrees F.
• If necessary, cut whole wings into two pieces. In a bowl toss the wings with the oil, and salt. Place into a large plastic shopping bag, and add the flour. Shake to coat evenly. Remove wings from the bag, shaking off excess flour, and spread out evenly on oiled foil-lined baking pan(s). Do not crowd. Bake for about 20 minutes, turn the wings over, and cook another 20 minutes, or until the wings are cooked through and browned.
• While the wings are baking, mix all the ingredients for the sauce in a pan, and over low heat bring to a simmer, stirring occasionally, and then turn off.
• After the wings are cooked, transfer to a large mixing bowl. Pour the sauce over the hot wings and toss with a spoon or spatula to completely coat.
• These are always served with celery sticks and blue cheese dressing on the side.

Since I don't live in the US, getting the Frank's brand of hot sauce was a bit of a challenge even though I have now found out that it's possible to get the Frank's hot sauce from an online store that specializes in American foods. For my next batch of buffalo wings, I will make sure that I have the right hot sauce because I do think it makes a difference.

I ended up using a bottle of hot sauce that I found in the pantry that worked pretty well.

The buffalo wings turned out tasting pretty good, and my blue cheese dressing was incredible, but to me, it just seemed like I had used a whole lot of butter. When I chatted to a friend about it later, she said that she only uses 1 or 2 tablespoons of butter and me following the recipe with 6 tablespoons of butter was a heart attack just waiting to happen. Next time I will use a lot less butter!!

There were only the two of us, so I only used 10 chicken wings (but full wings, including tips) and I cut them up with the little drummettes in one piece and the wing and tip in another piece. The Boy likes the little drummettes and I like the wings and the tips. Works out well for the both of us - just like Jack Sprat and his wife! :-)

As for my blue cheese dressing, the stuff was so dang good that I wanted to eat it all up on it's own with the celery sticks. I ended up with a lot more blue cheese dressing than I needed for the meal that night, so I saved what was left for another night.

Here's the RECIPE for the blue cheese dressing, and I'm telling you - even without buffalo wings, just make the dressing to eat with salad or as a dip. It's delicious!!

Ingredients:

• 1 cup regular mayonnaise
• 1 cup sour cream
• 180g blue cheese
• 1 Tablespoon apple cide or wine vinegar
• 1/2 teaspoon pepper
• (optional) 2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce
• (optional) 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder

Instructions:

• Crumble the blue cheese, and mix together with all other ingredients. Thin with water if desired.

Thermomix instructions:

• Put all the ingredients in the Thermomix and blend on speed 7 until smooth. This may take between 7 and 15 seconds.

I made my blue cheese dressing in the Thermomix, but really, it's not necessary if you don't have one. A regular old blender or food processor would do the trick too. Or if you didn't have any of those, just crumble the blue cheese like it says in the recipe and just mash it all around with the fork or whisk with the other ingredients. That works just as well too.

Happy munching!!


© This work is copyrighted to Invest-Ex and Destiny's Fortunes Pty Ltd

Find me around SOCIAL MEDIA:
Cooking blog: http://dazinthekitchen.blogspot.com.au/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/dazinthekitchen
Twitter: @langshipley https://twitter.com/langshipley
Instagram: @langshipley http://instagram.com/langshipley
Pinterest: https://pinterest.com/langshipley/
Keek: http://www.keek.com/langshipley
Youtube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/langshipley
Makeup and beauty blog: http://langshipley-deannasworld.blogspot.com.au/

A simple but delicious chicken Caesar salad

Small aside: I wrote this post in the Summer, but I'm just posting it now. Somehow, I failed to post it when it was written. It's Winter here right now!!

I'm a huge fan of the chicken Caesar salad. When I am not sure what I want to eat when I'm out for lunch and it's a warm day, this salad is always a tasty option. Of course, the quality and taste varies from place to place, but for the most part, I enjoy it a great deal.

Last night was hot, hot, hot, a nasty 37 degrees C and The House was sizzling. We had the AC on but couldn't bring ourselves to do much cooking that involved heat, either from the stove or the oven.

We decided on a chicken Caesar salad since it was quick and easy.

Here's my RECIPE for this delicious and simple salad:

Ingredients:

• 2 chicken thigh fillets of cooked chicken cut into bite size pieces, seasoned with Masterfoods Season All
• 4 tablespoons Caesar salad dressing (we use Cardini's)
• 120g Lettuce salad mix or cos lettuce
• Garlic salt (my not-so-secret ingredient)
• 1 handful shredded cheese (I just use the Coles Pizza cheese mix)
• 1 hard boiled egg quartered
• Croutons (optional)

Instructions:

• Place a layer of salad mix in the bottom of a large salad or mixing bowl, then sprinkle a small amount of garlic salt over the top of the lettuce.
• Repeat until all the salad mix is in the bowl.
• Drizzle some of the Caesar dressing on top of the salad mix - I use about 4 tablespoons for the two of us, but you can use whatever amount you like, depending on how much dressing you want in your salad.
• Sprinkle the shredded cheese on top of the dressing and mixed everything together.
• Top the mixed salad with the chicken pieces and serve up salad onto plates
• Once the Caesar salad is in the plates you are serving with, place the quartered hard boiled eggs on top of the salad.
• Enjoy!

This recipe serves two people for dinner with nothing else to accompany, so it's quite large and filling.

When I am more inclined, I cook my own chicken thigh fillets but last night, The Boy decided that we just buy a roast BBQ chicken from Coles so that we could have the chicken for the salad and then also for sandwiches and eating as cold meats to accompany an antipasto dish. I actually really do enjoy the Coles BBQ chicken since they are quite tasty and still fresh and hot when you buy them. Usually, when we buy them, I bring them home and take the meat off the bones - breast, drumstick and thigh. I also take all the other meat around the chicken carcass off and put them together for the salad and anything else I want to use them for. Then I enjoy nibbling on the bones, the chicken wings and the stuffing as a small snack.

I have in the past made my own salad dressing but last night we decided to just run to the store and get a pre-made salad dressing. Cardini's is The Boy's favorite even though it also has the most calories, but really, it's the tastiest. The other one that we like is the Paul Newman Caesar dressing, either the Newman's Own Caesar Dressing or the creamy version.

The garlic salt makes a huge difference to the taste of the salad. Don't use a lot, but just a little sprinkle between the layers of lettuce as you place it into the bowl for mixing adds a lot of depth to the flavor of the salad.

An alternative to the shredded cheese is also just straight shredded Parmesan cheese - something like this, though it doesn't need to be this exact brand. Just make sure it is shredded so you get texture and not the powdered or finely grated stuff for pasta.

Since there are the two of us, we each got two quarters each for the hard boiled egg but you can decide how much egg you like.

Notice I don't have croutons in my recipe, but that's entirely up to you. I don't like croutons, so for me, I leave them out. If you like them, of course, include them.

I hope you enjoy this very simple salad recipe. It's one of my favorites.


© This work is copyrighted to Invest-Ex and Destiny's Fortunes Pty Ltd


Find me around SOCIAL MEDIA:
Cooking blog: http://dazinthekitchen.blogspot.com.au/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/dazinthekitchen
Twitter: @langshipley https://twitter.com/langshipley
Instagram: @langshipley http://instagram.com/langshipley
Pinterest: https://pinterest.com/langshipley/
Keek: http://www.keek.com/langshipley
Youtube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/langshipley
Makeup and beauty blog: http://langshipley-deannasworld.blogspot.com.au/

Slow cooker beef with mushrooms and barley

On Sundays, I like to cook a nice meal for dinner and have leftovers for the week, so the dish needs to be something which leftovers will work. Some dishes just don't lend itself well to leftovers.

Anyway, this Sunday, I really, really wanted to do a slow cook meal and I thought beef would be nice, since The Boy likes beef and because I don't eat much red meat, he doesn't get much beef at home.

I pulled out my slow cooker cookbook, Essentials of Slow Cooking. I actually was looking for a different cookbook but couldn't find it. I think we may have taken it up to The House and left it there accidentally, but now we won't know till we get up there again and check.

I flipped through the beef section of the cookbook and found the Beef with Mushrooms and Barley recipe and decided that that was what I wanted to make for tonight's dinner. I like mushrooms and I like barley.

Here's the recipe:

Ingredients:

• 30g dried mushrooms such as porcini
• 2 tablespoons of unsalted butter
• 1kg beed chuck, cut into 2 inch / 5cm pieces
• 2 yellow onions, finely chopped
• 2 cloves of garlic, minced
• 500g fresh mushrooms, preferably cremini, brushed clean, stems removed and caps thinly sliced
• 2 cups beef broth / stock
• 1/2 cup pearl barley
• 3 carrots, finely chopped
• 2 parsnips, peeled and finely chopped
• salt and pepper to taste
• 2 tablespoons chopped fresh dill

Instructions:

• Put the dried mushrooms in a bowl and add 2 cups boiling water. Let soak for 20 minutes. Strain through a fine mesh sieve lined with a double layer of cheesecloth (muslin) placed over a bowl. Rinse the mushrooms under cold running water and finely chop. Set the mushrooms and soaking liquid aside.
• In a large frying pan over medium-high heat, melt the butter. Working in batches if necessary, add the beef and cook, turning frequently, until browned on all sides, about 10 minutes. Remove from the pan and set aside.
• Add the onion to the pan and saute over medium-high heat until softened, 3 - 5 minutes. Add the garlic and cook for 1 minute. Stir in the rehydrated mushrooms. Add the fresh mushrooms and saute over medium heat until they start to brown and release their liquid, about 5 minutes. Stir in the mushrom soaking liquid and broth.
• OVEN: preheat oven to 300°F (150°C). Transfer the beef to a Dutch oven. Add the mushroom mixture and stir to combine. Cover and cook until the beef is tender, about 2 hours. Uncover and stir in the barley and 1 cup of water. Cover and cook for 1 hour. Uncover and stir in carrots and parsnips. Cover and cook until the beef and barley are tender, about 30 minutes longer. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
• SLOW COOKER: Transfer the beef to a slow cooker. Add the mushroom mixture and stir to combine with the rest of the ingredients. Cover and cook for 3 hours on low heat setting. Uncover and stir in barley and 1/2 cup water. Cover and cook for 2 hours. Uncover and stir in carrots and parsnips. Cover and book until the beef and barley are tender, about 1 hour longer. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
• Spoon the stew into warmed bowls, garnish with the dill and serve at once.

Well, for starters, as usual, I did a few of things differently here, just because I didn't have some things and didn't want to get them.

I did not have any dried mushrooms, so I skipped that. And because of that, I didn't have the 2 cups of mushroom water, so I used 4 cups of beef stock instead.

I bought two parsnips like the recipe said, but the parsnips I got were HUGE, so I'm going to have a lot of parsnips in the stew. :-)

Additionally, the recipe said finely chop the carrots and parsnips, but I didn't want it too fine and look like mush after it cooked down, so I went with little chunks that were just a touch larger than a pea in size. That worked out really well.

I also used a ton of garlic, just because I love garlic. I think I must have used 6 or 8 cloves of garlic instead of the recommended 2. Don't feel you need to do that at all.

With the beef, I coated them in some salt, pepper and flour, before I browned them, because I wanted the flour in the stock to thicken up the stock a bit into a nice sauce.

When I put everything into the pot, before going into the oven, I had the pot on the stove and brought it to a boil before putting it into the oven. I used the oven to slow cook as I do not have a slow cooker (nor do I have the room in my tiny kitchen for one!!)

Once I put the parsnips and carrots in, that took up a lot of space in the pot, but it also meant that there was not enough sauce / juice left and the sauce got quite thick while slow cooking, so I added another 2 more cups of beef stock (or just enough to cover the vegetables) and brought it back to a boil on the stove before putting it back into the oven to cook again.

On the last round of cooking while the vegetables where still in the pot, I cooked it in the oven for another hour, so in total, I cooked it for 2 hours, then 1 hour and then another hour. I always brought the pot back to the boil on the stove before putting it back in the oven each time.

The apartment smelled amazing the whole time that the stew was cooking!!

This stew turned out to be very delicious. The Boy loved it. In fact, he had been sneaking tastes in between each time I took the pot out of the oven. :-)

This is a fabulous winter dish. I served it with a side of quinoa and a side salad. The quinoa soaked up the sauce from the stew and was just delicious!!

© This work is copyrighted to Invest-Ex and Destiny's Fortunes Pty Ltd

Find me around SOCIAL MEDIA:
Cooking blog: http://dazinthekitchen.blogspot.com.au/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/dazinthekitchen
Twitter: @langshipley https://twitter.com/langshipley
Instagram: @langshipley http://instagram.com/langshipley
Pinterest: https://pinterest.com/langshipley/
Keek: http://www.keek.com/langshipley
Youtube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/langshipley
Makeup and beauty blog: http://langshipley-deannasworld.blogspot.com.au/

Zucchini soup ... in the Thermomix

Continuing my adventures of the ginormous zucchini, I used the remained of the zucchini after the zucchini bread to make zucchini soup for dinner. Basically, it's just a large pot of creamy vegetable soup - very healthy, if you leave out the butter in the recipe, which I did not. :-)

This was a super easy recipe and I found it here.

Here's what the RECIPE looks like:

Ingredients:

• 1kg zucchini sliced
• 2 medium onions, chopped
• 2 medium potatoes, cubed
• 2 large carrots, diced
• 50g butter
• 4 cups chicken stock
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon pepper

Instructions:

• Melt butter in large stock pot
• Add all vegetables. Coat vegetables with butter stirring constantly
• Add salt and pepper, stir to combine
• Add chicken stock. Simmer until vegetables are soft
• Cool slightly. Blend until smooth

Note:

• Blend with a stick blender until smooth and then add a dollop of cream or sour cream to serve. The cream is optional.

I did change up the vegetables a little bit, just based on what I had in the fridge. I had part of a green capsicum left that I used up and instead of 2 medium potatoes, I used 4 small potatoes instead, also because that was what I had.

I decided to simplify my job even more by doing all my chopping in the Thermomix. I just put each vegetable into the Thermomix and cut it at speed 5 for about 3 seconds. I wanted them chunky, so I didn't cut for too long, I didn't want it to turn into mush.

After chopping everything in the Thermomix, I just followed the recipe and cooked it the way the recipe said, but added a step or two.

I coated the vegetables (and there were a LOT of vegetables) with the butter in the pot, and then added an additional step - I covered the vegetables and sweated them in the spot, stirring ocassionally for about 15 minutes. This browned the base a little and really got the flavor out of the vegetables. It smelled so good.

After I sweated the vegetables, I added the stock and brought it to a boil. Once boiling, I put the whole pot into the oven at 120 degrees C to simmer for 15 minutes.

Once that was done, I took the soup out and blended it with the stick blender until it was creamy and smooth.

The soup turned out to be very tasty and very very good.

© This work is copyrighted to Invest-Ex and Destiny's Fortunes Pty Ltd

Find me around SOCIAL MEDIA:
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/dazinthekitchen
Twitter: https://twitter.com/langshipley
Instagram: langshipley
Pinterest: https://pinterest.com/langshipley/

Spanish chorizo and chickpea soup

It's getting into the cooler weather for us now and so I'm thinking that we will do a lot more soups for meals.

The Boy likes thick, hearty soups with lots of stuff in it or thick, creamy soups. I made one recently which was a huge hit, the wild rice and mushroom soup, which is just delicious beyond words.

Tonight, The Boy decided that he would cook and he picked a soup recipe out of the A Gluten Free Soup Opera by Sibel Hodge. He picked out the Spanish chorizo and chickpea soup. I didn't really help much at all besides helping him prep the stock and turning on the oven (he still hasn't figured that one out yet! :-) ). I'm so proud of The Boy for doing all of this himself.

So here's the RECIPE for the soup:

Ingredients:

• 100 gr of gluten free chorizo – chopped
• 1 x 400 gr can of chickpeas – drained and rinsed
• 3 large spring onions – sliced
• 2 cloves of garlic – crushed and chopped
• 1 ½ pints (approx. 3 ¾ cups) of gluten free chicken stock/vegetable stock/water
• 1 large carrot – grated
• 3 – 4 mushrooms – diced
• 1 green cubranelle pepper (or regular bell pepper) – diced
• 2 cups of rocket (arugula) – chopped
• 3 tablespoons of red lentils
• 2 large tomatoes – peeled and diced
• ¼ – ½ teaspoon of chilli flakes (optional)
• 2 tablespoons of paprika
• 1 teaspoon of smoked paprika (optional)
• 2 tablespoons of black olives – deseeded and chopped (optional)
• Salt and pepper to taste
• Olive oil for frying

Garnish:

• Hard boiled egg – chopped

Instructions:

• Fry the onions, peppers, and mushrooms until soft
• Add the other ingredients and bring to the boil, then simmer for 35 – 45 minutes
• Top with the chopped egg and serve

Serves 4 – 6

The recipe asks for gluten free ingredients, but we did not use any. We just used regular old ingredients since neither of us need to be gluten free.

The Boy used all the ingredients, even the optional ones, except with the red lentils, he just used regular (I think, yellow) lentils, since the store did not have any red lentils in a can.

The only thing that we didn't do was the hard boiled egg for garnish. The Boy didn't get round to boiling the egg and since it was for garnish, we decided that we could live without it.

For the simmering for 35 - 45 minutes part, rather than have it simmer on the stove, which can be a bit dicey if not watched carefully, I turned the oven to 120dC and brought the soup to a full boil. Once it was boiling, I had The Boy put the whole pot of soup (make sure your pot is oven-proof!!) into the oven and let it simmer that way for the time. This is an excellent way of simmering or slow cooking anything. Very controlled, no mess, no fuss.

The soup turned out to be very, very tasty. It is a brothy soup with lots and lots of bits and pieces in it, so it makes for quite a filling and hearty soup. Because of the chili and the smoked paprika, the flavor it very full and slightly spicy. If you don't like your soup to be very spicy, ease off on the chili.

For us, this made exactly 4 serves. 2 for dinner and 2 to be saved for later in the week.

Definitely something that we will make again.

© This work is copyrighted to Invest-Ex and Destiny's Fortunes Pty Ltd

Find me around SOCIAL MEDIA:
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/dazinthekitchen
Twitter: https://twitter.com/langshipley
Instagram: langshipley
Pinterest: https://pinterest.com/langshipley/

Turkish bean salad

The Boy has decided that he wants to cook more meals entirely on his own, which I'm very happy about.

He recently got this cookbook from one of his online author friends called "A Gluten Free Taste of Turkey" by Sibel Hodge on his Kindle and has been excited to try some of the recipes. It's a beautifully written and edited book with lovely pictures for each of the recipes. There's also a great review on the book here.

So far The Boy is doing pretty well. He's managing to cook most of the things he's decided to cook on his own without consulting me too much. I'm enjoying the time off. :-)

The Boy loves beans so when he came across the recipe for a bean salad he bookmarked it to try. This one in English is simply known as "Bean Salad" though in Turkish it is known as "Baharatli Kuru Fasulye" which I also assume translates to "Bean Salad". :-)

Here's the RECIPE for the bean salad:

Ingredients:

• 1 can of white beans (haricot / butter beans / cannellini)
• 1 red onion - diced
• 1/4 teaspoon chili flakes
• 1 green chili - diced and fried
• 1 small red pepper (capsicum) - diced and friend
• 1/2 to 1 teaspoon cumin
• 1 teaspoon tomato puree
• Salt to taste
• 2 teaspoons lemon juice
• 2 cloves garlic - crushed and chopped
• 1 tablespoon olive oil for frying
• Chopped coriander (for garnish)

Instructions:

• Drain can of beans, then rinse and place in a bowl.
• Fry onion, chili, garlic and pepper in olive oil until soft and add to beans.
• Add the rest of the ingredients into the bowl with the beans as well.
• Mix all the ingredients together, garnish with chopped coriander and serve.

This recipe serves 4 people as a starter or two people as a main for dinner, though a bit on the light side.

I don't think The Boy did much different to this recipe aside from the lemon juice. He used the juice of half a lemon, which is more than 2 teaspoons worth of lemon juice, but that's okay cos we like our lemon juice. :-)

Oh, I just checked ... instead of a whole red onion, he only used half a red onion because it seemed like a lot of onion, and he used 2 green chilis instead of one because we like our chili.

There was a lot of slicing and dicing with this recipe, all into small pieces and I'm glad that it was The Boy doing it rather than me. Can't say that I'm a fan of the fine dicing work.

This recipe was delicious and certainly quite different from what we normally eat. The Boy loves beans, so this worked out well for him. It was zingy and tasty. I think next time though, we might have something else to accompany the dish since just this dish alone was not quite enough just for dinner. I think this makes a much better side dish than a main dish.

© This work is copyrighted to Invest-Ex and Destiny's Fortunes Pty Ltd

Find me around SOCIAL MEDIA:
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/dazinthekitchen
Twitter: https://twitter.com/langshipley
Instagram: langshipley
Pinterest: https://pinterest.com/langshipley/