Broccoli and sweet potato soup

Do you ever a craving for some fresh, rather plain vegetables?  Sometimes I get so caught up in trying interesting sauces or blending flavours that the individual ingredients can't stand out.

This soup is the remedy - a soup that really tastes of fresh vegetables and not much more.

Served with some of the world's best garlic bread, breadstick, homemade garlic butter and some parmesan.

Baked potato soup

Yes, I did just receive 3 or 4 new issues of Jamie magazine from my mum - no idea where she finds them because they are "old" but because I am in the southern hemisphere they are perfectly in season!

This week I made the baked potato soup - which is basically liquefied baked potatoes topped with "standard" baked potato toppings.  In my case, we used sour cream, cheddar and spicy pancetta.  Maybe a bit of green would have made this dish look better, but it tasted absolutely amazing.  I wonder if the trick is the parmesan rind that is in the pot while the soup cooks?

Recipe to serve 4
4 cold baked potatoes - I cooked these on Sunday, made the soup on Tuesday
1 onion
2 cloves garlic
1.25 litres stock
optional - parmesan rind

Sweat an onion until soft, then add the garlic and cook for a couple of minutes.

Throw in the chopped up baked potatoes (skin and all) and the parmesan rind and let that saute for a few minutes.

Pour in stock and bring to boil, then reduce heat and simmer (covered) for 25-30 minutes.

Remove parmesan rind and "blitz" (food processor, stick mixer - your choice) the soup.

Return to the pan and season with salt and pepper as needed, and add extra stock to thin the soup if required.

Toppings
A dollop of sour cream
Some crumbled cheddar
Some spicy pancetta that I fried to make it crispy

Lamb Shanks

Before I let G launch into his guest post, just wanted to give a shout out (and thanks) to my friend The Shy Lion who was kind enough to award me (and 14 other bloggers) the Versatile Blogger award!

G here, guesting on this venerable blog after a long absence  I am doing such because I am rather chuffed with myself after cooking some lamb shanks that were delicious.

Used a Jamie recipe, he's a big fave on this blog is old James. We had some lamb shanks in the freezer which we had bought a while ago, when spring lamb was at it's best and cheapest.  It's pretty simple too, as most of Jamie's stuff is.

Make some herby butter with rosemary, sage and thyme, salt and pepper.  Make a little pocket next to the bone to stuff the butter down into the heart of the meat.  Messy and yum.all at once.

 

 

Chop up some leek, carrot, onion and whole garlic cloves.  On a fairly large sheet of foil, place the vegies and a bit of the butter in a mound in the middle.  Place some oiled up shank on top, the handle straight up, and tightly gather up the foil around the shank.  As you seal it up, pour some white wine in to the packet of awesomeness for braising liquid and extra flavour

Cook on 180 for about 2 to 2.5 hours and serve in the parcels.  I served it up with some oven chips which had cooked with dried rosemary and salt on top.  Use the chips to soak up some of the liquid and to smoosh into the garlic cloves

 

Delish!

Mushroom and pancetta muffins

Another pork recipe for the girl who doesn't really eat pork - whoops!  These ones are made with yoghurt, so they are a nice and moist muffin.

200g flour + 2tsp baking powder + 1/2 tsp bicarb soda
50 g parmesan
25g toasted pine nuts
2 eggs
250g greek yoghurt
200g mushroom
4 slices of pancetta (we used spicy)

Cook the mushrooms and pancetta in olive oil.  Mix all the dry ingredients together then stir in the wet ingredients, followed by the cooked ingredients.

Bake at 200 degrees for 15 mins.

Carrot and mint risotto

A Jamie, of course.  Basically a normal risotto with carrot and mint, topped with extra mint leaves or some mint pesto (my favourite way to use up extra herbs is to make pesto)

Side note, we made it again, this time with purple carrots, and the risotto ended up SERIOUSLY purple.

Jamie's filo tarts

I know, I know, there are a hundred million* recipes for filo tarts.

Many people will have their own egg to cream ratio for a quiche, but I tend to go for 1 egg = 200ml thin cream.  But filo pastry is flimsy, and reacts differently.  So when I saw a Jamie recipe, I thought it was worth a try!

In Jamie's version, for 16 quiches, there is a very different ratio - 6 eggs = 150ml double cream (which in Australia is pouring cream).  Mixed with onion, garlic, 400g spinach and 200g fetta = a great recipe for a min filo quiche.

* a hundred million may or may not be an exaggeration!

Creamy smoked trout pate

What a simple, easy to prepare dinner, courtesy of Jamie's Great Britain - creamy smoked trout pate.  

 

It's one of those recipes where you are simply putting things together, mixing the cream cheese and horseradish, some herbs and gently mixing through a flaked smoked trout fillet and spreading it on delicious croutons or melba toasts.  Not really a recipe so much.

I made it (Empire Roast Chicken, that is)

After raving about this dish and then being lucky enough to receive the necessary recipe book as a Christmas gift, I had to make Empire Roast Chicken.  I assembled a number of ingredients - although I did spiced roast potatoes and made gravy from the chicken pan juices, so needed less ingredients than the recipe called for.

a gaggle of ingredients - mostly spices

the marinade that G was kind enough to make

the roasted bird

and some spiced, roasted taters

 

 the whole kit and caboodle

You don't need to own Jamie's Great Britain to make this recipe - Jamie has made it available online.  The gravy I made from the pan juices was heavenly, but next time I may give Jamie's version a try!  I didn't need to flake off as many burnt bits as Jamie did, perhaps my oven is not as hot as his. 

I would highly recommend this recipe - roasting a chicken is something that is super easy (but impressive) and quite comforting.  While it does take some time, most of it is "idle supervision", that is, sitting around and reading a magazine while the bird is in the oven.  Did anyone else's Mum ever tell them NEVER to leave the house with the oven on???