Leeloo Dallas Multi-Pie

Why make one pie when you can make four or five for the same amount of trouble and keep them frozen for when you need them.

If you go to the supermarket you can buy packs of foil trays for about a pound - the sort that you would get takeaway delivered in.

Here's a recipe for four chicken pies:

Two free range chicken breasts
Small pack of button mushrooms chopped
A few carrots chopped
Two medium onions chopped
A leek
Chicken/Veg Stock Cube
Frozen Peas
Frozen Sweetcorn
Few garlic cloves
Chopped parsley
Small pot of double cream (it's the smallest size you can normally buy)
Flour

Take the chicken breast and chop into small bite sized pieces remembering that you want to split this mixture between four pies so you don't want the pieces too big. Put the pieces in a bowl

Add a few teaspoons of flour to the bowl of chicken and mix it around. Basically your using the flour to thicken the gravy that'll go into the pie.

Using a large saucepan, or casserole dish, cook the chicken in a little olive oil till it's cooked through. Then add the onion, garlic, carrot, mushrooms and leek and stir to let them sweat down.

Add some salt and black pepper

After about five minutes, add about a pint of water (boiled) with a chicken/veg stock cube mixed in to the pot.

Add the peas and sweet corn, along with the small pot of double cream

Cook for five further minutes until the sauce has reduced and thickened to the consistency you would expect in a pie.

Let the mixture cool. You might want to transfer to something else as the saucepan or casserole dish might take a long time to cool

Spoon the mixture into four foil trays.

Unroll your puff pastry and it should fit nicely over four pies with some spare for a few cheese straws - oh yes!

Don't forget to criss-cross your pies with a knife to encourage the puff pastry to rise. You will also need an air hole in the centre, and finally egg wash the pastry.

Then......

Cook one for your tea, stick the rest in freezer bags and put them in the freezer. There you go, 3 more pies for a future tea.

Big badda boom!

Piri Piri Chicken with Oversized Cous Cous and Spinach

I made this a few nights ago, it's about the fourth time I've cooked it, being a quick easy meal. The idea is from "Jamie's 30 minute meals", I just change the accompaniments he has with it. I tried it with his sweet potato and feta slop, and didn't find it that appealing.

The side dish is my take on South American Rice and Peas, except it doesn't contain rice or peas! Instead I used oversized cous cous, spring onion, red pepper and spinach. The idea is it's something cleansing to eat when the chicken is too fiery. The cous cous is cooked in water with added vegetable stock - you need some salt in there to give it some flavour.

Turn on oven.........................................now

Piri Piri Chicken marinade is very easy. Get a mixer/blender and add to it a few chillis, with the seeds out (how many is up to you I guess). This time I used a habanero, and a few medium red chillis and that was enough! Also a clove of garlic, half a red pepper, a bunch of fresh herbs such as basil and parsley, and the juice of at least a lemon, and some paprika. Whizz that all up and adda bit more water just to thin it out as it will thicken in the oven.

Chicken wise you can use what you want. To follow Jamie you use the cheaper cuts, like Chicken Thighs. You want to slash the underside (not the skin side) of the chicken thighs to open it out, this will help the marinade get into the chicken.

Heat up a frying pan and add the chicken thighs skin side down and let them cook for about 5-10 minutes getting nice and crispy on the skin, then add them to a baking dish which is full of the piri piri marinade, leaving them skin side up.

Now add them to the oven and cook for a further 15-20minutes. When they come out the skin should be really crispy and all the piri piri sauce has gone into the chicken flesh.

Serve on a plate and add a bit more sauce out of the dish over the chicken.

Remember a glass of milk - or beer!

Spicy Lamb meatballs in Pitta

Blogging from my phone. Let's see how well this works!

I had this last week and it was, well... om-nom

Admittedly the meatballs look somewhat like something we won't mention.

I made the meatballs in a blender with lamb mince, chilli, garlic, bread crumbs, lemon juice, spices were ummmmm cumin, fennel, chilli powder, fenugreek and maybe some more I can't remember. Google a lamb meatball recipe!

I made up a ton of salad, poured some natural yoghurt in a bowl, toasted the pitta breads. Oh I also thinly sliced some onions and added red wine vinegar to them to soften them and make them a little less harsh.

And that's it. This was a pain to type on a phone!

Beef Stock

Occasionally when you walk round the supermarket you'll sometimes see random animal bones in the chiller cabinets. They might be lamb or beef bones, ham shanks, the left-overs from whatever the butcher has been hacking apart.

Anyway, I buy these and stick them in the freezer. It just so happened I had quite a few packets of beef bones so I figured I'd make some beef stock whilst I had the free time.

Ingredients:

Beef Bones - I had four packets at about 50p a pack, there was about three actual bones in a pack
2 Onions
1 Leek
1 Celery Stalk
2-3 Carrots chopped into thirds
A few garlic Cloves
2-3 Bay Leaves

Howto:

You want to rub the bones in a little oil, and roast for about 40 mins, turning once so you get some nice colour on the bones.

Add all the veg into a stock pot (or massive pan if you don't have one) and fry for 3-4 minutes until you get a bit of colour on the veg, then add in the roasted bones, and 3-5 litres of water, depending how big your pot is.

Add a bit of water into the roasting tray and scrape off all the juices, and add that water as well - it will add flavour to the stock.

Now simmer for as long as possible, at least 6 hours.

Here's a picture before it was strained, doesn't look so appetising yet it will be, honest...

Random Food Pictures I have found

Just to keep the blog updated and because I haven't taken many pictures lately, here's some photos from over the past few years I've found

HO HO HO!

Picture Picture!

Polenta and Bolognese

I get very excited about buying polenta now, there's loads to choose from. My latest batch came in a nice clear bag from Waitrose and looked all traditional with the odd black bit here and there, probably bits of beetle no doubt...

Anyway, a while back I made a big batch of polenta, spread it out on a baking sheet and let it cool. When polenta cools it goes hard so you can slice it up and fry in oil or grill it. So I sliced up what I didn't need and nestled it in my freezer next to my leftover bolognese sauce (probably).

So here is leftover bolognese sauce, fried leftover polenta, some grated parmesan and some somewhat haphazardly sprinkled greek basil. It would probably look nicer with olive oil drizzled around it, but when your fiancee is a Dietitian...let's just say it would be frowned upon.



I really need to use a decent camera instead of using the camera on my phone, the pictures always look so washed out. pah!

Smell my Cheese - AHA!

Back in 2007, I thought I'd have a go at making cheese so I did! The photos have been tucked away in an old Facebook album so I thought I'd put it on here to share.

I've just lifted the pics and comments straight from my Facebook album so without further ado..do:

Ingredient List:

Yorkshires Finest Full Cream Milk. The only milk I've been able to find which isn't homogenised. What is homogenised you may ask? It means it's shit to make cheese with!

What else is there? Citric Acid which increases the acidity in the milk. you could use yoghurt, or starter culture and other such stuff but citric acid is easier :o) If you haven't got citric acid you could use the juice of a few lemons instead although it depends how lemony you like your cheese!

There's also DVI culture which you could use to culture the milk by itself without the citric acid but you'd need to leave it for ages so I just use a little for flaaaaavor.

And finally animal rennet. Made from the stomach linings of calves. Yum!



In goes the milk and 1.5 teaspoons of citric acid and a dab of DVI culture. Normally you would make a gallon at a time which is what most websites tell you to do, but the milk was expensive and I wanted to make sure it did the job first so I did about half a gallon.



Heat the milk to exactly 31.1 degrees centigrade at which point the flux capacitor will engage and.............

TBH keep it between 30-34 degrees and it's fine.

At this point add about a third of a teaspoon of the rennet and stir for about a minute



Stick the (makeshift) lid on and leave for about 15 minutes.



About 10 minutes in, you can see it starting to coagulate (separating the curds and whey)



About 15 minutes



You need to be able to get what they call a clean break, I sort of did but I should have left it about another 10-15 minutes as it made the next parts a lot harder than they should have been and I ended up with about a third of the cheese I should have but hey ho.



Chop up the curd with a knife and leave for a few mins stirring slowly.



Transfer the curd into a colander with cheesecloth in it. I did a gash job of this as I had a shit spoon and the stock pot made it difficult to get it out. In the end I just drained it all into the colander which broke up all the curds into a pike of cack as you'll see in the next picture.



mmm, nice

Let it drain for about 15 minutes.



I couldn't be arsed to wait so I tied it up and squeezed out the excess. Unfortunately because I'd broken up the curds so much and then squeezed so hard I madeabout two thirds of the curd stick to the cheesecloth and it was impossible to get off. Shit!



At this point, if you want to be old fashioned (and if you have solid curds, preferably left overnight and not broken up ones like I have) then you could use boiling water to cook the curd and turn it into chees, but I used the microwave as it's easier.

1 minute on high and using a fork and spoon I started to bring the cheese together. Sort of like a fondue :o)



Back into the microwave for another 30 seconds, then I picked up the cheese and kneaded it like you would bread, except in my hand not on a counter top. When it got a little cold I nuked it in the microwave for another 30 seconds.

I also added quite a lot of crushed salt to the cheese otherwise it would be very bland.

Then I formed it into the stadard mozzarella ball shape and stuck it in a tub of iced water (with a little salt in)




Ze finished Product

Done! (as Ramsey would say)



Attractive photo finish.

I had a cheese and ham sandwich shortly after this and it tasted good, needed more salt though.

So if I'd have done it right there would be probably about 2-3 mozzarella balls, but as I cut corners and I'm too impatient I only got one but who cares, it's f'kin cheese!



so there you go...all the way back from 2007

I'll see what else i can dig out from the last six months since I last posted!