Fennel Chicken

I've almost finished the lovely organic veg from our friends at Rowanbank now but there were still a few things left today: wee fennel bulbs including the lovely herby fronds, tomatoes and potatoes. Add to that a free-range chicken and you have a Sunday roast dinner on a Monday night. Not bad, not bad at all!

(serves 4 - 6)

1 free range or organic chicken (approx. 1500-1750 grams)
1 lemon
sea salt
black pepper
1 whole bulb garlic, julienned
olive oil

vegetables for 4-6 servings:
fennel bulbs with fronds
cherry tomatoes
potatoes
fennel seeds, optional

Season the chicken inside and out with pepper and salt. Place the fennel fronds, garlic and lemon inside. Cook in a preheated oven at gas mark 5/200 °C for a total of 90 minutes.

Peel the potatoes and cut into large chunks. Parboil for 10-12 minutes in salted water. Drain and leave to dry. Drizzle with olive oil. Slice the fennel, season with pepper and salt and drizzle with olive oil. After 45 minutes add the potatoes, fennel and fennel seeds (if using) to the roasting tray and cook for approx. 25 minutes before adding the tomatoes. Mix all the vegetables and cook for a further 20 minutes.

Pierce the chicken thigh. If the liquid runs clear the meat is cooked.

Porcini Risotto

Included in our organic haul was at least 500 grams of chard, Swiss, red, yellow and orange, which I turned into a warm salad. You can find the recipe here, look for 'variation'. To accompany this I opted for risotto. Not having any fresh mushrooms I made my first risotto using only porcinis. Very satisfying!

(serves 2)

150 g arborio rice
1/4 red onion
1/2 celery stick
1 garlic clove
500 ml vegetable stock
200 ml porcini stock
150-175 ml dry white wine
sea salt
freshly ground black pepper
50 g freshly grated parmesan
10 g butter

Boil 200 ml of water and soak the porcinis for 30 minutes. Remove the porcinis and reserve the stock. You'll use it when making the risotto. Coarsely chop the porcinis and set aside.

Now make your risotto as described here. After the wine has been absorbed add the first ladle of porcini stock and, since I used home-made, unsalted stock, season the rice with salt. Once you've used up the porcini stock, start adding the vegetable stock. Once the rice is cooked to your liking add the chopped poricinis and season with black pepper. Stir in the parmesan and butter. Cover and leave for a couple of minutes. Serve in warmed plates.

Cooked Salad of Green Beans and Hard Boiled Eggs

Last weekend, we were given a heap of organic veggies by our friends from Rowanbank and have been eating really well all week. Normally I sauté green beens with onion and garlic before adding stock and/or tomatoes and serving them as a vegetable side dish or salad. Today I fancied doing something a wee bit different and steamed them instead. While the salad was marinating I hard boiled some eggs for no specific purpose. Not having had any lunch I decided to add a couple of the egss to the beans. The result was icredibly morish. I could have eaten the whole lot by myself!

500 g green beans
2 hard boiled eggs
fabby vinaigrette
dried oregano
freshly ground black pepper
sea salt

Top and tail, then wash the beans. Cut them into 2-inch pieces, place into a steamer, season with pepper, salt and oregano. Bring some water to the boil, place the steamer on top and cover. Steam the beans for 5-8 minutes until just tender turning them occasionally. Place into a large bowl and dress to taste with the vinaigrette. Leave to cool but mix them every so often so prevent the beans from cooking further. Chop up two hard boiled eggs and gently mix with the beans. Eat slightly warm or at room temperature.

Vanilla Ice Cream with Blackberry Sauce and Pistachios

Today, we bought some blackberries but when we got home we realised that they were very soft and on the cusp of going off. We had to eat them quickly. So I came up with this easy dessert.

(serves 4)

200-250 g blackberries
maple syrup
unsalted pistachios, chopped
vanilla ice cream

Puree the blackberries adding maple syrup to taste. Spoon over four portions of vanilla ice cream and sprinkle with pistachios.

Yoghurt and Oil Dough

Fresh Pea Quiche

In Germany, many cakes and savoury dishes are made with a quark and oil dough, which is a lot lighter than a shortcrust pastry. However, finding quark in the UK is really difficult. 20 years ago I would have bought French fromage frais but nowadays I can only find 0% fat fromage frais, which means this product has thickeners added to it. And I refuse to buy processed foods like that. Ricotta might be a good alternative but it's expensive (in comparison) so I've experimented with yoghurt and I've finally come up with a recipe that work. Only, it was a wee bit too much dough for my 26 cm flan dish and as you can see there's rather a lot of pastry for my fresh pea quiche. But that's okay, I'll reduce the amount of dough next time or buy a larger tin. It's delicious at any rate.

200 g strong white bread flour
100 g wholemeal flour
15 g baking powder
1/2 tsp sea salt
4 tbsp olive oil
200 g yoghurt/Greek-style yoghurt/soured cream

Combine all the ingredients either by hand or using the kneading hooks of an electric mixer/the kneading knife of a food processor. Roll out and line a lightly greased 30 cm cake tin.

Top with a quiche mix of your choice.

Aubergine and Sundried Tomato Dip

Today, I really needed to use up two aubergines I bought last week and decided on a baba ganoush. Only, I had no tahini in the house. After raking through the food cupboard to find something to thicken the dip with – I like using this kind of thing as a spread – I spotted a pouch of sundried tomatoes. These are soft but don't have any oil on them, other than what's needed to separate them, a bit like raisins. The result is really tasty. Will have to do this again. If you don't have this type of sundried tomatoes to hand just use the ones in oil and don't add any oil to the dip until it's been blended and you know if it needs more oil

2 aubergines
juice of 1/2 lemon
5-6 sundried tomatoes
1-2 tbsp olive oil
2 garlic cloves, crushed
1 tsp toasted, ground cumin
sea salt
freshly ground black pepper

Pierce the aubergines all over with a fork and roast in the oven at 220° C/ gas mark 7 for 90 minutes. Scoop out the flesh and leave to cool.

Combine all the ingredients and blend. Check the seasoning. Serve sprinkled with some chopped herbs, e. g. basil, coriander.

Paprika pork strips with red peppers, cherry tomatoes and red onion

Another idea for marinating meat for a barbecue turned into something else when the wheather didn't play ball. Based on a recipe for spare ribs from "More fired up" by Ross Dobson.

(serves 4)

4 pork loin steaks, cut into strips

Marinade:
60 ml sherry vinegar
1 tbsp smoked paprika
1.5 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp dried oregano
2 garlic cloves, crushed
1 tbsp olive oil
sea salt
freshly ground black pepper

Mix all the ingredients, pour over the meat, toss the meat and marinate in the fridge over night.

3 sweet red peppers
1 large red onion
400 g cherry tomatoes
olive oil

roughly torn fresh basil, optional

Slice the peppers, half and slice the red onion. Drain the marinate off the meat and toss the veggies in it. Pour a little olive oil into a frying pan and sauté the peppers and onions until they start to brown. Add the tomatoes. Cook over a medium heat until the vegetables are tender. Transfer into a warmed bolw and set aside. Add a bit more oil to the same frying pan and fry the strips of pork for about 5 minutes until done. Mix in the vegetables and serve with pasta. Scatter with the basil, if used.

Vegetarian variation: Marinate the veggies for 1-2 hours and cook as above.