Warming food

It has been embarrassingly long since I have posted anything here. I did eat in the meantime (surprise there!) and have tried a lot of new recipes. It's just that darkness is not too inspiring and I can't really carry the food to work to catch some sunshine for photos. Setting up lights is hard work (however much Charlie claims differently).

Winter is a lazy time and the coldness in the last few days requires food that warms you all over. Well, here is a curry that most certainly warms me all over. I generally choose curry when looking for simple, warming comfort food. China Town in London is a weird and wonderful place. I bet you it has more products you have never heard of than you have had warm meals in your life. I buy the curry pastes they sell there at random. The standard "green", "red" and "yellow" I am bored of, but why not try panang curry for a change? It is still a Thai curry but sweeter and creamier than the red and green varieties. Perfect when it's freezing outside.

Panang vegetable curry

You will need:
1 onion (chopped)
1 potato
3 carrots (sliced)
1 red pepper (chopped into long pieces)
some bok choy

2 tablespoons of Panang curry paste
1 tin of coconut milk
splash of fish sauce
1/4 lime

some vegetable oil, salt and pepper
(and rice to serve).

Parboil the potato and once it is ready cut it into small cubes. In the meantime fry the onion in a large wok. Add the red pepper and bok-choy (chopped into strings) and stir occasionally, so that it does not burn. Then add the carrots and fry for a couple of minutes. Add the curry paste and stir it in well. Then add the coconut milk and the potatoes and allow the mixture to simmer until the carrots are semi-soft (it should take about 10 minutes, depending on how thick the slices are). I don't like my carrots to be too soft, but it is up to you. When the vegetables are ready add a splash of fish sauce and the lime juice. Stir in well and serve immediately with some rice.

If you find that the dish is not flavoursome enough add some more curry paste - they vary a lot, so sometimes the suggested amount may be too little. Or, too much in which case make sure you serve the curry with some yoghurt on the side.

Voila!

I will make this for my mum

Sometimes it is good to have a flick through supermarket magazines. I refuse to pay for them but I will happily steal recipes. Luckily Charlie is the same and with his uber-phone stealing of recipes is almost too easy. I stick to the old fashioned methods (i.e. try to remember and write it down the moment there is some paper around you!) but sometimes being modern can be useful.

This is a not so modern pie - it has things that you all know and if you don't like any of the ingredients alreay this recipe won't covert you. It is as much about leek as it is about stilton. And when you get cooking make sure you do bake it for 40 minutes. Trust the pastry and don't get paranoid after 20 minutes when it looks vaguely ready. If you want a crispy bottom let it wait. 
 

Leek and Stilton pie

about 500g potatoes
1 onion, chopped
3 leeks, chopped
200g stilton
~350g puff pastry
butter
salt, papper and thyme

1 egg yolk or some milk for glazing

 

Preheat the over to 200C.

Start with making mash potatoes. Chop the potatoes into cubes and boil until soft. When they are ready drain them add a bit of salt and, if you wish, milk. Mash them until smooth and set aside.

Put a knob of butter with a touch of oil in a frying pan and add the onion. Fry it on medium heat for a couple of minutes and add leeks. Fry for further 10 minutes until leeks become soft. Add thyme to taste and season with salt and pepper.

Roll out the pastry into a greased pie dish. Make sure you have some pastry hanging around the edges, so you can make the pie look cool by covering it with the excess pastry. Spoon the mash on the bottom of your pie dish (onto the pastry!). Crumble the stilton on the mash and then add the cooked leek on top of the cheese. Fold the remaining pastry on top and glaze with an egg yolk or some milk.
Bake for about 40 minutes until the pie is all crispy and golden brown. The cheese will melt beautifully and it will all go really well with a glass of red wine and some simple salad. Enjoy!

(plus it makes great lunch next day as it can also be eaten cold)

When it's cold outside

Today's been a horrible day - wet, windy and miserable. One of those days when all you want to do is curl up with your duvet and sleep until April. I find that one of the easiest ways of making yourself feel better on a day like today is to with a big bowl of hot soup. As I was feeling lazy I resorted to the simplest of soups you can imagine ... my Mum's magical cheese soup. It's brilliantly easy, it's warming and it reminds me of early winter in Poland. I serve it with garlic bread, so that while the soup is making itself you can entertain yourself with the most advanced part of that dish - the garlic butter. 

Here, we go then...

My Mum's Really Easy Cheese Soup

You will need:

for the soup:

1 packet of Knorr 4 Cheese Sauce Mix (yep, you heard it right)

250 ml cold water

150 ml vegetable stock

1 Tbs Philadelphia (or any other cream cheese)

1 Tbs double cream

and some pepper to taste

and for garlic bread:

1 baguette

~100 g of butter (3 big spoonfuls), preferably at room temperature

2-3 cloves of garlic

a touch of olive oil

salt, pepper and some fresh parsley if you like it

Soup:

Mix the sauce mix with the water and stir until there's no lumps on the mix any more. Put on the cooker and cook until the mix boils. Then add stock, cream cheese and double cream. Cook until the soup starts to simmer, stirring ocassionally. Add some pepper to taste. And ... that's it.

Garlic bread:

Preheat the oven to 220°C.

Crush the garlic and add it to the butter with salt, pepper and a touch of olive oil (the latter makes the butter more creamy). Mix all of that with a fork and at the end stir in some parsley. Cut the baguette into about 2,5 cm slices but do not go all the way through the bread. Put a teaspoon or two between each of the slice. 

Bake for about 8 minutes or until it looks ready.

just a small edit: I am not entirely sure you can buy the Knorr Cheese Mix in the UK. I tend to stock up on it when I go home. I'm sure however that there will be similar products in the land of stabilised democracy as anything and everything seems to come in a ready-made option here.