wow, is that the time!

Ok,

so it's been over a month since my last post - but I've been busy! I went on holiday for a week - self catering admittedly so I could have took pictures - but I only made breakfast and ate out everynight. Then it was Christmas as well....not the best excuses are they.

To be honest I haven't been cooking that much, and anything I have been cooking, I've cooked so many times before It wasn't worth taking pictures of. There's been plenty of soup, pasta and salads. On one occasion when Becky was away, I couldn't help but treat myself to 'Minced Beef Findus Crispy Pancakes, Smiley Faces and Mushy Peas' - with a big triangle of brie (but that's just because I can't help but eat cheese if there is some in my fridge). You know what...it was fantastic! Nothing wrong with a bit of childhood regression every now and again.

Having a quick look on my phone, there's a few pics for you to look at but I'm not writing about them as it's all stuff you could make with your eyes closed, in fact some of it looks like I have.

Check out the garish house lights across the road from my house as well. Blurgh!



I'll try to post better stuff soon - but I'll just get New Year out of the way first!

It's game over for game!

So I had this reduced pheasant in the freezer, which I'd defrosted the night before so had to cook. Unfortunately I really wasn't in the mood and to be honest would have preferred a pizza! But I got on with it anyway.

What did I make?

Pheasant breast, parsnip and apple mash, rosemary carrots with a whitewine stock sauce

Firstly, the pheasant smelt a bit funny, I'm not sure if it was getting a bit old or that's just the gamey smell of pheasant but I wasn't convinced.

So anyway, Carrots were foil bagged with rosemary, salt and pepper and half a glass of white wine and stuck in the oven for about 40 minutes - they were nice but then again there's not much you can screw up!

Parsnip and potatoes were peeled and chopped to a similar size and boiled for 20mins. About 5 mins before the end they were added to the parsnip and potatoes. Once soft they were drained and mashed with creme fraiche - again this was lovely!

The pheasant was fried in olive oil on the skin side for about a minute to get some colour, then turned. To this I added just under a glass of white wine and turned up the heat to burn off the alcohol. Word of warning, hot olive oil, pheasant and wine tends to explode. My head got burnt and the floor was covered in fat but cest la vie! After turning down the gas, I added about 100 ml of chicken stock and cooked for about 5 mins.

After 5 mins I took out the pheasant and kept warm - ok so I just left it in a bowl but I did have a hot head at this point - literally!

Now for the sauce, I reduced by half and added butter mashed with flour in small amounts and whisked till thickened - there's a term for this but I can't remember the word and I'm typing this on my blackberry so just look at the picture to see what I mean!

So onto the plate it all went but at this point I'd lost all interest so plate presentation went out the window along with portion size.

The taste? All lovely, but pheasant isn't for me - at least not if I'm cooking it. Still.....the wine was nice!

Enjoy some pictures, goodnight (hmmm my phone doesn't like the pictures I'll add them later):

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Mushroom Pasta

I had this yesterday as couldn't be bothered to cook anything (that takes up a lot of time), too much television to watch! I cook this ALL the time it's mine and Becky's favourite meal - and the easiest thing to make as well, top bananas!

Fortunately I have the recipe on the My Dish site already, so I can give you the full breakdown and just show some pictures from the meal I actually made. I only had a few button mushrooms and porcini available but you makes what you can with whats you got!

Ingredients
• 15g Porcini
•  Handful Button/Closed Cap Mushroom
•  Handful Chestnut/Shitake Mushroom
•  1 Small Onion/ a few shallots
•  Garlic
•  Veg Bouillon Powder for the veggies/or home made Chicken stock
•  Double Cream
•  Parsley
•  Parmesan
•  Linguine preferably but spaghetti will do

Recipe

Boil Kettle and add half a pint of water to the stock of your choice with the 15g Porcini, stir then leave to soak for 15minutes

Finely chop the onion or shallots and add to a pan on a medium heat with a glug of olive oil

Chop the raw mushrooms (not the soaking porcini) into diffferent sizes, some sliced, some cubed, etc

Turn the pan down a bit

Add 1 clove chopped garlic to the onion and stir.

Add the chopped mushrooms, stir and then add salt and pepper to help the mushrooms give up their juice and take on the pepper.

After 10 minutes of occasional stirring, your porcini should be nicely soaked. Firstly, fill up the kettle and switch it on. Then, using a sieve, strain the porcini soaking water (the half a pint) into the pan with everything else, and stir.

Empty the sieve onto a chopping board and chop the reserved porcini mushrooms up a bit then add them to the pan. Be careful that you leave any grit from the porcini in the sieve and don't let it fall onto the chopping board else you risk adding it to the pan.

Turn the gas/heat back up to medium or higher as you want to start evaporating the liquid.

Pour the water from the kettle into a large saucepan, put it on the hob and add salt, wait till it comes back up to the boil, then add as much pasta as you want to the pan.

As the liquid stock reduces, your pasta should be cooking nicely. When the liquid has almost gone, add 3/4's of a small pot of double cream to the pan (I can't remember off hand the size but the smallest one you can get) and stir continuously. If you have one use a silicone spatula as it's easier to get all the bits off the side of the pan and keeps the sides clean.

When the pasta is ready and the sauce is nice, thick and creamy, strain the pasta, then add it to the mushroom sauce pan along with a small amount of cooking water to loosen the sauce a bit.

Add parsley to the pan and stir, then serve with parmesan and garlic bread.

The End

PS: It's essentially the ingredient list for a mushroom risotto but I swopped it for pasta. It works just as well both ways. If you really want to be snazzy, buy some summer black truffles (basically the cheapest ones you can get), slice with truffle slicer and marinate in truffle oil (you can get it from any supermarket) then sprinkle a few shavings over the dinner. Yum!

The pics below follow in the order they were made so use this maybe if your reading the recipe. Enjoy!

Panini Farina

Wasn't he a famous Ferrari designer or something? Anyway - I was going to make mushroom pasta for tea but Becky came back with some panini bread from the supermarket. What with my new top of the range (ok maybe not) Panini toaster, it was Panini's for tea:

Rocket

Buffalo Mozzarella

Chopped Sun Dried Tomato

Sliced Tomato

Thinly Sliced Ham

Pepper

Panini Bread (or small ciabattas)

They were quite nice, but I keep making the mistake of using Buffalo Mozarella - which whilst being tastier and more expensive, is not the best thing to use on pizzas or paninis in this case. The cheese is too milky and turns
the bread/base soggy…so now you know!

I'm on my own tonight so it's waffles, beans and cheese for tea. Yeah whatever - I like it so it's my treat - comfort food!

Eating Out

What a hectic weekend!

Our Friends Claire and John came down to stay from Halifax where they own two pubs so obviously we had show them the pubs of Stamford for comparison *ahem*.

We went out for an Italian on the Saturday night at Fratellis which would have been great had I not drunk far too much and lost my appetite. Still the bruschetta and meat sharing platters were awesome, which I managed to get a photo of.

As they wanted to stay for another day, they checked into the Crown Hotel - so there would be no rushing the next morning when we would be off too work. We met them about 4pm in the town centre for more drinks and then a brilliant meal at the Hotel.

I had breaded grilled goats cheese to start, a gorgeous fillet of beef for Mains, and then a cheeseboard to finish. Totally ate it all!

So I think I should give my liver a rest and take it easy this week. I really need to go food shopping but I spied enough ingredients for the awesomely easy mushroom pasta tonight - perfect for when you really can’t be bothered to do anything. I'll try and get my act together this week or next and start cooking something a little more adventurous! Especially now I know I have at least two readers - even if one is a family member. Whoooooo!

Leftovers

So it's Friday night and Children in need so wine is required!

Somebody has finally put in an offer on our house so shortly we can stop paying mortgage on the house and a whole lotta rent for the house in Stamford! Whoop whoop, celebrations! Nothing exciting tonight foodwise, just finishing off the chicken pie from the other day with mashed turnip and carrot and new potatoes. Seriously I think you could bottle and sell the smell coming off the reheated chicken filling, Homer would be drooling.

Enjoy Friday night, off out for an Italian meal tomorrow at Fratellis in Stamford with some friends, yum!

Bye
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Impulse Buys

And people say Waitrose is expensive! Checkout the price reduction on these badboys - in the freezer for now but expect a recipe made out of this lot at some point in the future.

Left over meatballs for tea - made far too many the other day! Possible offer on our house up north came up today so a glass of red wine is in order!

Till the next time...
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You say potato, I say potato

Not so much a meal, but just a small update

I had a left over baked potato in the fridge, and i was just about to throw it away, but thought - hey what the hell i'll make some gnocchi - not much as it's only one potato!

Ingredients:

1 Baked Potato

some pasta flour (you want tipo 00 flour -used for making pasta)

salt and white pepper

you need to scoop out the innards of the potato and put it thorugh a potato ricer. I don't have one, so just used a sieve and a silicon spatula and put the sieved potato into a plastic bowl, I added about the same amount of flour as potato - maybe a bit less. season with salt and pepper, knead it in the bowl, then on a floured surface, roll it into a long sausage. Chop with a knife (you can chop it any way you like, I generally just chop at an angle to make each gnocchi quite long.

Thats it, roll them all in a bit of flour so all sides have been floured then put them in a fridge for a while to firm up. - oh! almost forgot, to cook, just put them in a boiling pan of salted water for a few minutes, they'll rise to the top once they're done. I often fry them in a little olive oil with sage. nom!





I've made gnocchi shed loads of times, sometimes it works well, othertimes it's a failure. Not sure what I'll be making with this, it's currently 5.52pm on a Sunday night, I'm sat with a glass of wine, having just tucked into some olives watching 'Come Dine With Me'. I'll work out what I'm going to make later, I think there's some bacon, cabbage and cream in the fridge - I'm sure I can rustle something up.

so anyway, thats how easy it is

Saker - out!

Chick, Leek and Mushroom Pie

It's Pie Day!

Carrying on with the one pot (almost) theme, I baked a pie - Chicken, Leek and Mushroom pie to be exact and it was well tasty.

I screwed up the pastry a little though as I’d forgotten to turn on the oven until I'd already laid the pastry on top of the dish, so the remnants of the heat had dropped the pastry somewhat, meaning it didn’t rise anywhere near as much as it should have but hey ho.

So whats in the pie then you ask….

1 red onion

1 or 2 carrots - diced

1 large leek

2 large chickenbreasts - free range of course

1 Pack of white mushrooms - sliced (I sliced them, I'm not that lazy I bought them pre-sliced)

1 chicken stock cube - Kallo Organic - it's the shizzle - added to half a pint of boiling water

Fresh Thyme

1 glass of white wine (I only had rose Pinot Grigio to hand)

1 or 2 cloves of garlic

1 beaten egg for basting

1 small pot of cream
1 pack of pre-rolled puff pastry

Recipe (just about)

Cut up the chicken into bite size pieces, and fry in a pan big enough to eventually hold all the pie mix. Once it's sealed, add the chopped carrot and cook for a few more minutes.

Now add the onion, garlic, leek and mushrooms. Season with salt and pepper, cook for five or ten minutes. Put a lid on if you have one to soften the vegetables quicker.

Add the glass of wine, and cook that for a while until it's mostly gone, then add the hot stock to the pan (you should have made this using the stock cube and half a pint of boiling water in a jug)

Let the stock reduce a little, then add the pot of cream, and keep that cooking. If it's boiling too hard, it will start to curdle, so either simmer it gently, or stay nearby stirring which will stop it curdling.

Once it's reduced enough (it should be reduced more than in my photo, but that's only because I added too much stock and I was too hungry to let it reduce any further!) fill your pie dish with the mixture and then put it in a sink of water (not enough water that it goes over the edge and fills the pie dish with water). This will cool down the pie mix so it doesn't make the pastry go gloopy when you cover the pie.

Once cooled enough (just give it 5/10mins) then open up the pastry, unroll it and cover the pie. You then want to crimp the pastry all around the dish to create a seal. Then go around the edges with a knife, and chop off the excess pastry. If you have enough left over make some cheese straws as they rock! Glaze the pastry with beaten egg, then cover with cheese and stick in the over for 20minutes. Simples!

Back to the pie - make some elaborate scoring on the pie (just criss cross if your unsure), which will help the pastry rise.

Put in the oven around 180-200 degrees for 35-40minutes et voila PPPPPIIIIIEEEEEE

I served mine with mash and savoy cabbage. tasty as!

Meat Balls

I seem to cook Meatballs everytime my girlfriends mother stays over - I can't be bothered to write out the recipe again - but if you head over to mydish.co.uk and run a search for Misohungry you can find my recipe there. Tadaa!

Best Served with loads of parmesan cheese and yoghurt/ or soured cream if you don't care about the calories.

Well here's some picture proof

"note - I gotta stop using my Crackberry for pictures, it looks like I can't afford the leccy bill!"

Chilli Con Carne

I'm being a bit lazy this week - I keep seeming to cook one pot affairs - Todays is "Chilli Con Carne". I went a little overboard with the spice though!

Ingredients:
Beef
Onion
Pepper
Red Chilli
Red Kidney Beans
Oxo Stock cube - it's not cheating honest!
Can of Chopped Tomatoes
Empty Can full of Water
Basmati rice

Spices:
Cumin
Cayenne Pepper
Cinnamon
Bay Leaf

I think that's it - I tend to just throw stuff in chilli.

Chef of the Week

Woop Woop,

Guess who is chef of the week on Mydish - and with only 5 recipes on there as well, who'd have thought. Well for a variety of my recipes (read 5), head over to www.mydish.co.uk and search for user misohungry - a hilarious take on "me so horny".........Taxi!

Sunday Roast Dinner

Not the most exciting meal of all time - but nice all the same, plus you get to eat it two days in a row as I always make far too much.

Sunday Dinner consisting of:

Beef Topside
Roast Potatoes
Roast Parnsnips
Stuffing
Mashed Potatoes
Cauliflower Cheese with Spring Onions
Brussel Sprouts
Caarrots
Graaaaaaaaaaavy - lots

The Premise

On and off for the last few years I have been taking pictures of every meal I cook, and was beginning to wonder what to do with them. To give them some use - other than reinforcing my OCD, I figured I might as well upload them to a blog. I'm not going to upload all my old food photos as that would be kerrrrazy, but I may put them on an album at some point and put the link in here, we'll see how far this thing goes - I'm easily distracted!

And so it begins...