A late-morning Bank Holiday weekend breakfast

I'm taking next week off - hooray! Let the holiday begin. And after staying at work until 9:30pm last night to prepare for my week away, I sure as well deserve it.

My late-night workplace heroics also meant I missed the opportunity to cook the lovely raw frozen king prawns I removed from the freezer Friday morning in hopes of making lovely grilled prawns with pitta, minted yogurt and salad. My husband sensed my weakness and bought in Thai takeaway for us, which I hoovered up along with a gorgeous bottle of Pinot Gris that we brought back from Oregon earlier this summer.

So what to do with those beautiful prawns? They need using. And suddenly I'm reminded of an entry in Nigel Slater's Kitchen Diaries of a light summer dinner of an omelette with potted shrimps and a glass of white wine.

So I'm thinking a prawn frittata with garlic, bread crumbs and creme fraiche would really hit the spot. I've got loads of freshly-cut cantaloupe in the fridge too - so think I shall make a cantaloupe salsa (yum). Shall report back with the recipe - and my opinions - following my feast.

Update: here's the cantaloupe salsa recipe

Amazing meatballs

So I mentioned at the end of last week that I was going to try out this recipe for Chicken Meatballs with Peperonata, but tweak it a little. The main tweak being, of course, that I wasn't going to use chicken, but rather turkey, since it's more readily available in ground/minced form.

Long story short: I loved it. I'm not normally a big fan of meatballs - never gone for that ol' classic spaghetti and meatballs - but these were great. Ground turkey, a little bit of bread soaked in milk, egg, onion, garlic, and thyme, basted with tomato paste/puree and baked. So simple, right?

But the accompanying peperonata nearly stole the show too - roasted peppers, dressed with capers and vinegar and hot chilli flakes. So summery, so deep, so sweet.

I decided our green veg for this dish should be wilted spinach to tackle the other sweeter flavours in the dish. I think it worked really well, but other green vegetables such as runner beans (though we're nearly the end of the season) or broccoli would be fab too.

As always, I recommend cuts to the amount of oil used. Here's my version of the ingredients...

Turkey Meatballs with Peperonata - my version

(serves 2)

For peperonata:

2 red peppers

1 tsp oil

30 g capers

1 tsp vinegar

chilli flakes

For meatballs:

2 pieces of white bread, torn into pieces

200 ml skimmed milk

100 g onion, finely chopped

1 garlic clove, chopped

2 tsp oil, divided in half

1 medium egg

300 g turkey mince (tip here: it comes in 500 g, so freeze the other 200 g for another time - it adds up)

chopped fresh thyme (though use whatever herb you fancy - recipe called for parsley)

50 g tomato puree

To make the peperonata: roast the peppers in a 200 C preheated oven in 1 tsp oil in the lower 1/3 of the oven. While that's cooking, combine the capers, vinegar and red pepper flakes and sit to the side.

For the meatballs, you can follow the recipe pretty closely:

Soak the bread pieces in milk for a few minutes.

Saute the onion and garlic in 1 tsp oil with salt and pepper until the onion is softened. Allow it to cool.

Beat an egg with a fork, then add to the turkey, onion/garlic, thyme and bread (squeeze the milk from the bread first and discard milk). This will make 9 meatballs - form them into balls and place onto a small, lightly greased casserole dish.

Take the last tsp of oil and combine with the tomato puree. Use a brush to baste the tops of the meatballs. Cook for 20-25 minutes in the top third of the oven. If the peppers finish early, remove them, add them to the vinegar mixture and cover with cling film until the meatballs finish.

Calories: 2 equal sized servings - 540 calories each. (I had a smaller portion though - 1/3 of the overall amount, so three meatballs, which was plenty. A small serving is 360 calories (plus green veg) and a large serving is 720, which was plenty filling for my husband, who really enjoyed them.

As a side note, turkey meatballs are sweeping the nation! (Okay, not really, my close family and friends. Two people have mentioned they're making it this week, so I impatiently await their opinions...)

Recipes I'm going to play with this week...

...courtesy of the August issue of Gourmet magazine, my monthly treat from the States. You can find all their recipes online, though, but perusing the pages of the print version brings me much joy.

For iPhone lovers - Epicurious (the online home to Gourmet and Bon Appetit recipes, amongst others) has a great free app now. Wonderful for browsing on a train or bus ride home.

Baked tomatoes with hazelnut bread crumbs
Roasted tomatoes in general are one of my favourite summertime side dishes, but the addition of hazelnuts was just too exciting to pass up. I won't, however, use a half of a stick of butter - 1 tbsp of olive oil - max - will do just fine. In my opinion, butter would really mask the flavour of the tomatoes. Is that just me?

Baked chicken meatballs with peperonata
Okay, I don't even know if you can get minced chicken here in the UK. But you can get minced/ground turkey, which should work just fine. And I'll probably skip the pancetta - not because I think I wouldn't like it - but I'm on a budget here and I think it will taste lovely even without.

What do you think? I'm really excited about trying them - they should be fun, cheap ways to inject some excitement into summer suppers.

Smackerel fishcakes, a great recipe for summer

Is smoked mackerel an acquired taste? I suppose it is – it’s such a strong flavour, a wonderful flavour in my opinion, but it must put some people off.

But it’s worth extolling the virtues of smoked mackerel (which I’ll lovingly shorten to ‘Smackerel’ in the grand tradition of celebrity couple nicknames a la Brangelina or TomKat). It’s cheap – you can get a good 250 g of it for less than £2.

And a little goes a long way both flavour and calorie wise. It’s not to be denied that it’s quite high in calories/fat – but it’s the “good” fat, a phrase so many nutritionists love to spout. It’s full of those lovely fish oils that assist in brain function (and at the moment, I need all the help I can get.

But the fact that 50g of mackerel brings in about 150 calories (compare to 38 cals per 50 g in plaice) means that it’s a blessing that a little goes a long way. And to be honest, that’s all you need for a fairly hearty fishcake in this recipe. One fishcake for me was plenty, though my husband was happier with two.

Smoked mackerel fishcakes with runner beans and sweetcorn

(serves 2)

150 g smoked mackerel

200 g potatoes, peeled and ready to boil or 300 g potatoes already boiled

2 spring onions, sliced

salt and pepper

a drop of milk or cream – anything to hand really

spray olive oil to lightly coat the foil

400 g runner beans, sliced

2 cobs of sweetcorn

Preheat the oven to 200 C. Boil the potatoes for about 15 minutes (or until you can pierce easily with a fork) and allow to cool slightly. Mash, adding a drop of cream or milk. Season with salt and pepper.

Next, break up the strips of mackerel with your fingers and drop into the mash, along with the sliced spring onions.

Here’s where you get your hands dirty: using your fingers, mix all the ingredients together, ensuring you get a good consistency. Roll the mixture into three balls and place on a foil-lined baking sheet.

Bake for 20 minutes, turning halfway through.

While they’re cooking, prepare your veg – because it’s summer I’ve gone with sweetcorn and runner beans, which I steamed.

Serve immediately – because mackerel is such a strong flavour, I didn’t need an extra sauce, though my husband did enjoy the extra dollop of mayo I gave him.

Calories: 300 for a fishcake, a generous helping of runner beans and a cob of sweetcorn.

I recommended this to a friend as well and it's gone down a treat.

summer roast

I don't generally like cooking proper Sunday lunches in summer. Perhaps it just feels wrong to cook such warm, boot-filling fare when it's supposed to be warm outside.

Nonetheless, my husband continues to request roasts, particularly roast chicken. Cooking chicken feels virtuous - it often makes for several meals and I've managed to perfect the art of not needing any added fat to get a good, crispy bird.

Therefore I relented yesterday and purchased a lovely free-range chicken to roast with lemon, basil and rosemary. But choosing the side dishes wasn't as easy - carrots, mash and gravy just felt wrong.

Given that it's August, garden tomatoes went on the table, dressed simply with white wine vinegar, fresh basil, and salt. Add a little yellow to those lovely rich reds in the form of sweetcorn (from the can, though cobs would have been lovely.) Finally, freshly boiled runner beans completed the traffic light trio of veggies on the table.

Oh, and because no roast is complete without potatoes (to my husband, anyway) a few steamed baby new potatoes finished off the plate.

courgette cakes

I'm back. As for my extended absence, I can only throw up my hands and say "I'm sorry, I've been really busy!" And, of course, offer you a lovely recipe for courgette cakes that I made last night. I made a similar recipe awhile back inspired by Nigel Slater. I can only recall that these were equally yummy.

As my lovely husband is away, I'm cooking for one at the moment - so this only serves me, though it is easily multiplied.

Courgette cakes with dill
(serves 1)

2 courgettes, grated (sprinkle with salt and allow the water to drain out...alternatively squeeze the water out)
handful of dill (or more to taste), chopped
1 large spring onion, chopped finely
2 tbsp flour
1 beaten egg
salt and pepper to taste
1 tbsp olive oil

Mix the courgettes, dill, spring onion, salt, pepper, 1 tbsp of the flour and the egg together in a bowl. Then form into four balls/patties, allowing any excess juice to squeeze out from your hands. Roll the patties in the other 1tbsp of flour (just a very light dusting).

Heat the in a small frying pan. (If you have too many cakes for one batch, then use half of the oil now and half for the second batch). When the oil is hot, put the cakes in the pan - allow to fry for about 5 minutes, and then flip over (carefully) and allow to fry for another five minutes. Use the spatula to press the cakes down as necessary.

Serve with a dollop of yogurt (or creme fraiche or sour cream). Yum.

Calories: about 400, including yogurt. Perfect for a warm summery evening when a heavy dinner just wouldn't seem right.

ideas for the week

Throughout the week, I jot down ideas for dinners the following week. I'll either hear about a recipe, or think about what's in season at the moment and then brainstorm up some recipes. We really only get a chance to do a proper shop once a week (on Saturdays) so it's important that I know what we're going to have. (I've also found it saves money too.)

So what's cooking this week? Well, it's late September, so we've got vine tomatoes, we've got aubergines, peppers, courgettes. And soft fruits abound - give me nectarines, give me raspberries. (I'm thinking a dessert crumble may be in order later this week.)

So what does all this add up to?

Well, a few recipe database trawls later and I think I've got a few winners...

Courgette cakes - mmmm, lovely. Nigel Slater raved about these a few years back, and recommended serving them with some tomato chutney. But I like the idea of greek yogurt... and some smoked salmon. It just sounds fresh...

Aubergines? No problem. Roasted aubergine curry is always a hit. Looking back in my archives, I made this in late July, but the aubergines are much better this time of year. I don't think I'll do quinoa again, though...

Cucumbers? Actually, I found this recipe on a BBC website and it just struck me. It's a Rachel Allen recipe from Saturday Kitchen. Cumin and yoghurt chicken with cucumber and dill salad - doesn't it just sound lovely and tangy? I think with the last spurts of summer covering our shoulders in sunshine, we need to enjoy these types of recipes while we can. Dill is fun to use, too - I think it's simultaneously overused and underused, if that makes sense. Either people don't use it at all - or use it WAY too much. And instead of a whole spatchcocked chicken, I'm going to use poussins...

Peppers? Easy. This one is a great recipe I picked up from my friend Sarah. Roasted vegetables with couscous, goats cheese and harissa. It's fabulous - and it's easy to make seasonal - just use the best vegetables at the moment. This month, I'm going to use (more aubergines), red peppers, courgettes and mushrooms...

Finally, tomatoes. We've got to enjoy them while we can - before long we'll be going back to the can (which isn't a bad thing, but still, it's so much fun to use fresh ripe tomatoes). I'm normally not a fan of chicken casseroles, but chicken cacciatore has a lovely late-summer ring to it. I've got to confess, I've never made it before, so it will be interesting to taste how it turns out.

here comes the sun...

I've just woken up on this Monday morning to a weather forecast predicting - what's this - no rain for the entire week! What's more, we're to expect - what's this - sun!

That's all it takes - my mind is racing for lovely summer lunches. For lunch today, a green bean salad - I'm still using frozen but I've defrosted some and they've kept their crispness. I'm quite a big fan of frozen foods, but I've done a bit more research on the tinned/frozen/fresh question - I'll post a bit more later this week on my other blog http://theculinarydigest.blogspot.com/, so check back later this week.

green bean salad
(serves 1)

200 g fine green beans
10 small cherry tomatoes, halved
1 yellow pepper, sliced thinly
1 tsp basil infused olive oil (or if you don't have any, use some olive oil and shred some fresh basil leaves)
1/4 tin chickpeas
salt and pepper to taste

Combine all in a dish (or your tupperware for lunch) and shake. By lunchtime, the dish will literally taste like summer. Eat it in the park for maximum effect (I think I will...)

Calories: 183 calories - very reasonable, so if you want to add more to it, you could. To bulk it up more, perhaps add some pine nuts if you have some in the pantry... carrots would also be lovely if julienned.

rainy day barbecues 6/23

British summertimes are perhaps not the best for barbecues. At least not in June. But we couldn't resist.

Gathering friends in London Fields for a barbecue, we were afraid that the rain would wash us out. A stroke of luck kept us (relatively) dry until the evening, when the sky opened, drenching everyone.

A new barbie served us well - burgers, sausages, falafel, chicken thighs, steaks and homemade veggie burgers kept the masses protein-stuffed.

The side dishes came fast and plenty - a smorgasbord of mezze. On offer:

-bulgur wheat with goats cheese and summer vegetables roasted in lemon basil and rosemary olive oil. (Here, the rich and nutty bulgur was filling, not cloying, and the aubergines, tomatoes, peppers and onion, infused with the oil, left a clean palette)

-inspired by a Waitrose recipe - broad beans, peas, butter beans and courgettes in white wine vinegar with mint. (The Waitrose recipe called for feta, but the broad beans, peas and butter beans were creamy enough to satisfy)

-oversized pasta shells with mayo, sweetcorn, spring onions, carrot and cucumber. (Jazzed up to differentiate it from its mundane supermarket relatives, no cheese was needed and lots of freshly ground pepper was used throughout)

-gherkin-less potato salad: jersey royal new potatoes, celery, onion, white wine vinegar, mayo and wholegrain mustard. (Only because there were no gherkins to hand - though the tangy mustard and mayo combination coated its crunchy counterparts to perfection)

Friends brought cole slaw (perfectly under-mayonnaised), ripe tomato salad (with a divine shallot vinaigrette), and strawberry mango and mint fruit salad (delightfully fresh and ultimately addictive).

All in all a success - and we were grateful for any leftovers - which we served with cold roast chicken the next day. Gorgeous.