Friday 27 July 2012

Chepstow Smoked Garlic

Sam and I will be selling lovely smoked garlic this weekend at both Undy and Chepstow farmers markets. It tastes fab and I'll be making some garlic bread as tasters so come along and try some.

http://chepstowsmokedgarlic.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/garlic-ciabatta.html

Debs

Tuesday 24 July 2012

Because I Can!


So many to chose from    I love them all........
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQ_k_VG6Syc




Debs

The Tubes aaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhh

I've waited such a long time to see them....got to be 5 years ? and this weekend we went up the M4 to London to see them at last. Not a short journey from South Wales but just so great. I've been a fan since the very early ( 1981?)  1980's and  just couldn't wait to see them again. I was so lucky to get seats so close to the front and they didn't disappoint  AGAIN....so good. Great band, great fans, I feel blessed to love them so much.

Debs

Precious little cooking.

What with a last minute holiday to the Norfolk broads I'm afraid that there has not been a been a lot going on here for a while. Having said that, there's not a lot going to go on either as I've decided to take up the piano. I played for a few years as a child but have had a yearning to go back to it for a while now and now is indeed the time. In my mind I want to achieve this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qD8n7LNK6GI

I love playing classical piano but I really want to play jazz......I think that it's a long way off but if you don't try stuff - at any age - then whats the point?  It's not running a marathon but it's taking practice.... and patience . I think that I've got the first 4 bars but as I can't find any music for this arrangement, I'm learning it by ear. It could be some time!

Debs

Sam's blogging elsewhere!!!

Not that he blogged extensively on here he's now blogging alone here:

http://chepstowsmokedgarlic.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/roast-garlic.html

Kids eh? Looks like I'm blogging alone......I think I always was tho'

Debs

Monday 2 July 2012

Garlicky Prawns

I took this recipe from the Good Food website as it promised to be tasty. It was ok but not great, prawns looked a little pale and uninteresting and the whole dish was slightly disappointing with not enough depth of flavour.

3 tablespoons olive oil
3 garlic cloves thinly sliced
400g large prawns - uncooked and de-veined
2 tablespoons dry sherry
handful of finely chopped parsley

Heat the oil in a frying pan and fry garlic for a few seconds. Stir in the prawns and cook until just pink.
Pour over the sherry and cook for a couple of minutes.
Sprinkle with parsley and serve.

Garlicky prawns with sherry


Not my piccy ( taken from Good Food Page ) but.....well it's just prawns isn't it??

I'm sure that this recipe could be a LOT better, just needs an injection of flavour.

Debs

Tiramisu again

As posts get a little lost, here is a link to the easiest Tiramisu recipe. Not necessarily the most authentic but scarily easy and everyone seems to like it.

http://debandsamsblog.blogspot.co.uk/2011/11/tiramisu-easy-way.html
Debs

Patatas Bravas with chorizo

As part of our Tapas and Tiramisu evening, we couldn't imagine not making patatas bravas. I find the smell of chorizo, paprika, garlic and onions quite seductive and this was no exception. Mr Debs knocked this one up while I did the ironing.

A little olive oil for frying
1 medium onion chopped
3 fat garlic cloves chopped or crushed how you like
1 can ( 400g ) chopped tomatoes
1 large red chilli - chopped
1/2 a teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/2 a teaspoon paprika
1 kg waxy new potatoes chunked ( not too small )
250g nice cooking chorizo

Heat the oil and fry the onion, garlic and chilli until the onion is softened. Add the cayenne and paprika and stir.
Add the tomatoes and bring to a simmer, then cook for about 20 minutes until it resembles a thick paste.
Season well and if you want a smooth sauce - blitz in a blender. Season to the heat you like.
Meanwhile steam the potatoes for 10 minutes until just cooked and fry the chorizo in a frying pan so that some of the oil is released.
Tip off the excess oil and add 1 tablespoon olive oil, add the potatoes and fry together until all coated, tip into a bowl and cover with sauce.



This is SO yummy, as I said, the combinations of flavours is an absolute hit in my opinion ( see GFS post!)
lovely.

Debs


Kedgeree

I've wanted to make this for the longest time but have never got round to it. I don't know why as every single time I see it cooked on the T.V. I get a yearning for it. Anyway, Saturday morning ( as usual ) I was noodling about watching James Martin and there they were - Two Fat Ladies - making kedgeree and huevos rancheros. Although I love the idea of huevos rancheros, I didn't actually like the recipe that was featured but the kedgeree looked really good. We were having smoked haddock for breakfast on Saturday anyway so one more fillet to be poached was dead easy. Anyway, this is how it went:



1 lb smoked haddock
1 medium onion finely chopped
4oz butter
1 teaspoon garam masala
1/2 teaspoon turmeric
12oz basmati rice
4 hard boiled eggs ( I used 2 ) roughly chopped
Salt and pepper to taste
Handful of fresh parsley finely chopped

Simmer the haddock in salty water to cover for about 10-15 minutes, leave to cool, de-skin and flake.
Fry the onion in the butter and spices until soft and golden.
Cook the rice until just cooked and drain - allow to cool a little a dry out.
Combine all ingredients. Done.




The photo is a little on the pale side as the finished dish was more yellow. It's delicious and, as we didn't eat it for dinner, it nuked up beautifully today for lunch at work. I reckon that this will serve 3  maybe 4 servings depending how hungry you are. I have changed the recipe from the original as I didn't really want all the cream and I probably put in a little more spice, but that's the beauty of finding these recipes, you can just kind of mess with them to suit your taste.

Debs

Sunday 1 July 2012

Bit late now

We decided to make a supper suitable for a Euro cup final this evening and decided on Tapas and Tiramisu  ( recipes to follow ) and very nice it was too. As we sat down to eat it occurred to us that we had missed a trick here - we could have had some fun all along matching our meals to our footy. I'm  quite sad as I do like a bit of a challenge and it may have made us look outside our comfortable eating habits. Hey ho, there's always the world cup in a couple of years.

Debs