Baked Pasta Cheese with Chorizo Sausage

A variation on macaroni cheese, made with wheat-free pasta, chorizo sausage, spring onion and tomato, with Cheddar cheese.

I diced about 50g of chorizo, and fried it slowly in an omelette pan for about twenty minutes. The diced tomato was added, along with the spring onion. Cook in the fat from the chorizo for another fifteen minutes.

The stir-fry was decanted into a pyrex bowl. Once the pasta was prepared, it too was added, and stirred through.

Next I made the pasta sauce with cornmeal (use cornflour if you prefer a finer texture), milk and about 50g of grated cheddar. Heated in a saucepan (stirring almost constantly) until the cheese had melted, and the sauce had begun to thicken.

After that the saucepan was removed from the heat, and the sauce was decanted into the pyrex bowl, and stirred in thoroughly. Add white pepper.

Grate another 50g of cheddar and sprinkle on top. Preheat the oven to 190 deg C (about twenty minutes or so), and place on the middle shelf. It should be ready in 40 to 45 minutes, by which time the cheese topping should have begun to brown. Delicious!

Cheese, Pasta and Prosciutto Salad

Diced prosciutto crudo, served with wheat-free fusili, slices of cheddar cheese and spring onion.

The fusili was Sainsbury's own brand, which cooks pretty much like a wheat based fusili (ie, somewhere between nine and fourteen minutes). Cooked in salted water, with a little olive oil to prevent the pasta sticking together.

The dish has a really delicate flavour. No herbs, no chilli, no garlic. Served with a light dusting of black pepper.

Breaded Pollock Fillets

Gorgeous Alaskan pollock fillets from Sainsbury's, baked in the oven.

I placed them in a roasting dish on some aluminium foil, then I spread small squares of slightly salted butter along the top of the fillets. Then I folded the foil over the top.

Placed in an oven preheated to 190 deg. C, for twenty minutes. The fillets did not stick at all to the foil, and I used a traditional wooden fish slice to get them out of the roasting dish without breaking.

Served with Gem potatoes in their skins, and some thinly sliced sweet-sour gherkins (soused in vinegar and dill). Dressed in freshly ground black pepper.

Chorizo and Spring Onion Omelette

Finely dice about 50 grams of Chorizo sausage, and fry slowly in an omelette pan for about twenty minutes, stirring occasionally. No additional oil is required, since the sausage cooks in its own fat.

Add a medium sized diced red onion and cook for a further fifteen minutes at a medium heat, stirring frequently. Add diced spring onion during the last five minutes.

Add two large eggs beaten together with two dessert spoonfuls of salted water,  and with a quarter teaspoonful of Herbs de Provence. Turn the heat right down to the lowest level, and cook under glass for twenty minutes, without turning.

Loosen the omelette if it is at all adhering to the pan. Invert the pan and tap it with a wooden spoon, so that the omelette drops onto the serving plate. Dress with black pepper, and serve with two squirts of tomato ketchup.

Peppered Beef Stew

Wonderful peppered beef from Aldi is the main ingredient for this dish.

Prepare batonned carrot and julienned white onion, and fry slowly in an omelette pan for about half an hour. Add some chopped baby plum tomato, and cook at a medium heat for another ten to fifteen minutes.

Decant the vegetables into a saucepan of near boiling hot water. Stir thoroughly, and cook for another half an hour under glass at a low heat.

Add the pieces of peppered beef, and the beef stock. Simmer under glass at a low heat for another forty minutes. Stir occasionally.

Add the herbes de Provence ten minutes before the dish is ready.

Serve with semiskinned boiled potatoes, cooked with sea salt.

Prosciutto Crudo and Chorizo Salad

Italian prosciutto crudo (dry cured pork), with Spanish chorizo sausage, finely cut, baby plum tomatoes (each cut into three pieces with a sharp knife), spring onion, sliced boiled potato, and carrots.

An excellent and easy to prepare salad (the potato and carrot were left-over from a meal on the preceding day).

Dressed with some freshly ground black pepper.

The prosciutto crudo was sourced from Sainsbury's.

Chilli Chicken and Red Onion Salad

Roast chicken pieces soused in a sweet red chilli sauce, along with julienned red onion.

Served on a bed of green and purple lettuce. Simple and delicious!

Cheese and Apple Salad

A simple cheese and apple salad, served with green and purple lettuce leaves, and a creamy coleslaw.

I used Cheddar cheese, but German or Austrian smoked cheese would do just as well. I cut one Braeburn apple into slices after coring.

Dressed with some black pepper.

Casseroled Chicken with Red and Green Peppers

Two chicken thighs, casseroled on a drizzle of sunflower oil, a bed of thinly sliced potato, a layer of mange tout, and another of sliced red and green peppers. Plus one finely diced garlic clove, and a de-seeded and diced red chilli.

Add 100mls of cold chicken stock and a light dressing of sweet red chilli sauce. Shake some sea salt onto the skin of the the chicken thighs.

Place the casserole dish on the middle shelf of an oven preheated to 190 deg C, and cook for 55 minutes (check progress halfway). 45 minutes under glass, and without the lid for the final ten minutes. This allows the skin to brown and become deliciously crispy.

Flaked Salmon in a Sweet Chilli Sauce

A fillet of red salmon steamed for twenty minutes, then de-skinned, and then flaked with a fork.

Mixed together with a third of a cup of long grain rice, cooked for fifteen minutes in boiling salted water, and then drained.

Served with sweet red chilli sauce, and some black pepper.