I love flavour, me!

Friday, 10 May 2013

Cottage Pie and Blogging on a budget

Hi everyone!

Oh my, it really has been a long while!

I really do appreciate your continuous loyalty and visits and I feel I need to explain the reason for my absence.

In the current financial climate, it's hard enough to sustain a living but, in our case, a mixture of health problems and changes in circumstances have seriously affected our income.

How does that relate to the blog, you may ask. You see a Food Blog is meant to be an adventure where the blogger talks about their experiences in cooking and trying new ingredients so that other people may share in that same experience and be able to experiment themselves.

So what happens when the blogger's life changes and they can longer live that adventure but instead are left to try and survive and provide their families with the best nourishing meals on a budget?
It doesn't sound so interesting anymore, does it?

So I struggled on a daily basis to cook dishes for my family that would be both nutritional and nourishing, I found myself thinking that there was no point in blogging those recipes.

In this day and age where Masterchef rules and even Jamie Oliver encourages people to buy expensive ingredients to cook a 15 minute meal, I didn't feel there was a place for me in the Food Blogging world anymore.
I fact, I even messaged Mr. Oliver on Facebook to ask him why he couldn't make a programme about under £15 budget meals. Needless to say I never got a reply.

Anyway, I returned to the blog today and was surprised to see how many of you out there still keep an interest in my posts. So I decided to take a chance and post the recipe for this very humble but very nourishing and healthy Traditional British Pie that actually costs just a mere£1.50 a head (feeds 4-6)

I hope you try it. It is really delicious and comforting and I do hope to see you back here again!

Chicken and Prawns Paella and a great Competition

I have to admit this wasn't one of my most successful recipes.
Don't get me wrong, taste-wise it was spot on and brought many good memories of sunny Spain back, but the texture of the rice wasn't as good as it should have been.

2 key factors made it an 8 out of 10: the wrong type of rice and too much stock.

You see, I had to make it before hand and reheat with extra stock as I wouldn't have time to make it fresh and serve it there and then-mistake number one.
I went to the supermarket to get some paellla rice. They were fresh out and because I was short of time, I decided to use Arborio rice-mistake number two.

I've tweaked the recipe I'm sharing with you here and I can assure you that it will be a 10 out of 10 if you follow the steps to the letter.
However, this made me think about how overconfident we can get in the kitchen at times.

I've made paella hundreds of times before, and each time it came out tasting amazingly. I tried to be resourceful on this occasion only to realise that I could actually do with some cookery lessons.
Just to learn how to be able to adapt flavours and ingredients, be creative and successful under pressure.
Yep, I could do with some cookery lessons.

So that brings me to the competition.
I heard through the grapevine about this competition which sounds like an amazing opportunity to get lessons from an excellent pro. I know the chances of winning are slim but someone needs to be the winner, right?

I've entered the competition and I suggest you do too. It's really simple. All you have to do is watch the recipes, which we all enjoy doing anyway, and answer the questions.

Here's the link http://goo.gl/TEqea.
The deadline is the 17th of October and all the terms and conditions are on the site.

To participate in the competition, you have to answer a simple questions. The answer will be in one of these 3 videos:

So on with the recipe:

Chicken and Seafood Paella

Serves 3-4

Ingredients:

300gs of paella rice

600mls of chicken stock

150mls of white wine

1/2tsp of saffron

2tsp of smoked paprika

2tsps of tomato puree

100gs of chopped smoked chorizo

2 medium sized chicken breasts chopped into chunks

200gs of cooked king prawns/shrimp-if uncooked ou need to add them 10 mins earlier in the coooking process

100gs of shelled, cooked mussels-if live you need to add them when you add the raw shelled prawns

6-8 king sized raw shelled prawns

3 chopped banana shallots or 1 large onion

2 sliced red peppers

3 chopped cloves of garlic

2tbsps of olive oil

Chopped parsley

Salt and pepper to taste

Method:

Season the chicken chunks with salt and pepper and add 1tsp of smoked paprika. Mix it all well, making sure every chunk is covered in the paprika.

Fry the chorizo in a non stick frying pan until all the oils start runnning out. Add the shallots and cook until translucent. Add the garlic and cook for a further 2 minutes.

Add the sliced peppers and fry gently for 2 minutes.

Add the chicken chunks and fry until opaque.

Add the tomato puree and stir well. Push the meat and veg to the side in order to make a well and add the rice.

Combine the rice well with the vegetables and meat for 2 minutes and add the wine.

Once the wine has reduced, add the stock, 1tsp of smoked paprika and the saffron.

Stir well, cover and allow it to simmer for 10-12 minutes. If you're using raw seafood, you should add it to the dish, 5 minutes into cooking.

Once the rice has softened, add our cooked seafood.

Mix it all well,place the raw king prawns on top of the rice, cover and simmer for a further 10 minutes.

At the end of the cooking time I removed the heads of the prawns as m guests were a bit squeamish.

Sprinkle with lots of freshly chopped parsle and garnish with lemon wedges.

Serve with a nice fresh side salad,

Tuesday, 25 September 2012

Spanish Bean and Chorizo Stew-Fabada Asturiana

As the cold weather approaches, I start thinking of comfort food.

Food that warms the body and the soul. Food that you can eat with your slippers on. Food that you can dip your bread into.

This is one of those dishes. Spanish, Meditteranean flavours combined to bring a mixture of smokiness, spice, sweet velvety textures and it is, most of all a dish you want to have plenty of bread to dip into the juices..

Although this is a traditionally Spanish dish from the Asturian region, it is also made in Italy, France and Portugal with slight variations. This is my favourite version.

Baked Trout with Creamy Potatoes (Dauphinoise)

Hi there.
We're approaching the end of August and I still don't feel 100 per cent but I wanted to share this simple, easy recipe with you.

It's fairly quick to make and packed with flavour.

Tapas-Mediterranean Octopus Salad

Hi everyone,

It's the last day of July and I almost didn't make it this month. It has been a rough month and I haven't been feeling well at all, but I wanted to keep my promise of writing one post a month, so here we are.

I wanted to bring more Portuguese and Spanish flavours to the blog and a few weeks back I decided to have a Tapas night.

Traditional Luxury Fish Pie

I've been thinking a lot about the blog lately, now I have finished writing about my foodie experiences in Italy.
I've been mostly thinking about what inspires me to cook.
The answer, I'm afraid, is Seafood.

Seafood has always been my passion in so many ways.
The smell of freshly barbecued fish evokes memories of Summer holidays spent by the seaside in Portugal.

The aromas of seafood and shellfish take me back to my childhood memories of Christmas and New Year Celebrations

Earthquake in Italy and Thinking of all of you

As I wrote my last post on my Foodie Experiences in Italy on the 5th of May, I never thougth that only a couple of weeks later, the lives of the people that made my experience so truly memorable and who I hold so dear in my heart, would be in danger.

Some of you may be aware of the fact that there was an earthquake in the North of Italy on Sunday.
It covered the area between Modena-where I lived-and Ferrara.

You can find the full story here.

Not only did it have a terrible impact on people's lives-7 dead and many injured or homeless-but it also destroyed many historical buildings.

Buildings that had stood the test of time and that I will always hold dear in my memory of visiting the places. Places like Mantova.
The building that looked like this:

Now looks like this:

Such an incredible loss!

Still, my main concern lies with the people. The friends that shaped my life and experiences in Italy.
I've been in touch with most of them and so far the news has been good, everyone seems to be safe and well.

Still it's been a shock and scary for all of them, to say the least.

But, to quote a friend's true words ' The Emiliani people are very strong and the country will rise from the ashes!'

I don't doubt it for a second!
My thoughts are with you all!x

Saturday, 5 May 2012

Italian Foodie Experience-Sicillian strawberry and Cream Tart

One of my most memorable Foodie Experiences in Italy was receiving a phone call from a British TV channel representative that had read my blog.

He was looking for someone who could develop a recipe for an unusual, yet delicious dessert, in a TV programme named 'Britain's Best Dishes'.
The programme focus is on representatives from different regions in the UK showcasing their best recipes.

Italian Foodie Experience#5 King Prawn/Shrimp Ravioli with a Portuguese Twist

My welcoming gift when I moved to Italy was a Pasta machine.
It couldn't have been more apt.

I was surprised at how easy it was to make homemade pasta. No wonder so many Italian people make their own fresh pasta at home.
It's a truly satisfying experience, to get the right texture and thickness. I would truly recommend it.

I spent ages trying to think of a dish worthy of christening my new shiny pasta machine.
Being the seafood addict that I am, I knew it had to be something truly seafoody and special.

So I thought of one of my favourite Portuguese treats: King Prawn Rissol-Rissol de Camarao.
A light pastry covered in breadcrumbs and filled with a rich, creamy sauce and chunks of juicy king prawns.

Italian Foodie experience # 4-Pasta al Forno (Baked Creamy Pasta with Ragu) and of Nonna

So I said I would post once a month. Somehow February crept up on me, came and went and I ran out of days :).
Still this post is a celebration in many ways-of my Italian foodie experiences and also of the fact that this is my 100th post!

Today I recreated one of my favourite pasta foodie experiences in Italy, so to speak-Pasta al Forno.
The reason why I call it a pasta experience as such, is because it was a way of experiencing the role of the nonna or grandmother in the Italian family culture.