Cajun Curry with Black-Eyed Beans

A Cajun style curry, made with black-eyed beans, carrot, garlic, green and red chilli, green and red bell peppers, onion, and tomato puree.

I used a commercially available Cajun spice powder, which contained garlic, chill powder, paprika and cumin. But you could easily make this up from your spice cupboard.

The black-eyed beans were rehydrated overnight in unsalted water, then boiled for half an hour until soft. The pot was drained, refilled with salted water, then brought to the boil again.

Then I added the diced vegetables - the deseeded chillies, the red and green peppers, the carrot and onion, and two garlic cloves, the tomato puree, the Cajun spices, and some vegetable stock. Simmered for forty minutes. Add a generous pinch of oregano.

The black rice was cooked for twenty minutes first of all, and then drained. The pot was refilled with boiling water, salted, and a third of a cup of American long grain rice was added. Turn down the hob to a medium to low heat and cook for another fifteen minutes, stirring frequently/Drain the rice thoroughly. Add the rice to the serving plate and spoon in the curry. Delicious!

This is a vegetarian version, but the dish can be served with chicken.

Vegetable and Smoked Bacon Soup

A soup packed with goodness to the point of almost being a broth. Made with onion, carrot, courgette, Brussels sprouts, celery, potato, spelt, oats, and fried smoked bacon.

I started the soup with three small diced carrots, half a courgette, also diced, and a julienned white onion. Cooked for half an hour until soft. I then added celery and 250g of peeled and tailed Brussels sprouts, some preboiled potato, and a handful each of spelt grain and ground oats, and half a teaspoonful of turmeric.

Simmered under glass for another half an hour, and then the contents of the pan were mashed.

I added a little sunflower oil to the soup, some mixed herbs (tarragon, parsley and sage), two small pinches of cumin, and vegetable stock. Add a dash of Worcester sauce if you like. Once it had cooled, the soup was stored in the fridge overnight (soups are always better the next day).

I diced two rashers of smoked bacon, and fried the pieces at a medium heat until crispy. The soup was reheated, and the bacon pieces added and stirred through. Ready to serve!

Apricot and Coconut Cornbread

I used peanut oil in this recipe - if you have an allergy to peanuts, use coconut or sunflower oil instead. I also used milk.

Made with 100g of semi-dried apricots, 150g of coarse cornmeal, 50g of peanut oil (I weighed this in a bowl), 2 heaped teaspoonfuls of baking power, a pinch of salt, one egg, plus 150mls of milk (actually a low fat blend of milk and buttermilk, bought from the co-op).

The Apricots were chopped up with a sharp knife. The cornmeal was added and stirred together. I added the milk, the peanut oil, the salt, and the egg. Then I added the baking powder and the dessicated coconut (two teaspoonfuls). The mix was gently blended with an electric foodmixer for five minutes, at a medium speed.

I decanted the bread mix into a silicon bread tin. Cooked at 180 deg C for forty minutes on the middle shelf, until the bread had risen, and the surface had browned. Check the bread at 25 minutes, even if you are using an accurate oven thermometer.

The loaf can be knocked out of the bread tray without breaking or sticking (just turning it upside down is enough!).

 If you would prefer a sweeter loaf, you can add some granulated sugar before blending. Dissolve the sugar in the milk to make sure there are no crystals in the bread mix.

Excellent eaten with rhubarb and ginger jam!

Beef and Kidney Stew

I bought diced kidney and cubed beef separately with the intention of making a steak and kidney pie. What was left over became a  beef and kidney stew.

The beef was cooked according to the usual procedure, being first browned in some sunflower oil, along with the diced kidney. Then sliced onion was added, plus boiling water. Simmer under glass for an hour, adding the sliced mushroom half way through, and the beef and vegetable stock. Add a desert spoonful of dark soy sauce. Stir occasionally.

Serve with boiled potato, and boiled or steamed sugar snap peas.

Brisket Beef with Vegetables

I cooked a joint of brisket beef in a slow cooker for six hours, along with two bay leaves (creates a great smell in your kitchen in the morning, if you do this overnight). The joint was allowed to cool, and was cut into slices with an electric knife.

The courgette slices and the carrots were cooked separately, as were the Brussels sprouts. The juices from the cooked joint were decanted from the slow cooker into a saucepan, and the courgette and carrots were added, along with some beef stock. I mixed some cornflour with water to thicken the gravy, and added that. Simmered at a low heat for thirty minutes, until the vegetables were tender, stirring regularly.

The sprouts were cooked in boiling water for seven minutes, and the slices of brisket were reheated in a steamer for ten minutes before serving. Dust with black pepper!

Cold Roast Beef, with Potatoes and Brussels Sprouts

A straightforward dish, ready in twenty minutes, made with thinly sliced roast beef from Morrisons, plus boiled and halved Brussels sprouts, and boiled potato wedges, semi-skinned.

The beef was sold as chillied roast beef, but, while I'm sure that chilli was involved somewhere in the process of making the beef slices, I couldn't detect any chilli flavour in the finished product. So I rolled the beef slices, and dressed them in American mustard. The combination worked very well.

The sprouts were boiled for seven minutes, and the potatoes for twenty. Served hot. The dish was dusted with a generous amount of black pepper.

Black-eyed Bean Salad

Another simple dish. The dried black-eyed beans were rehydrated overnight, and then cooked for fifteen minutes in salted water. They were drained, and allowed to cool. Then dressed with some olive oil.

All the other ingredients were raw. A four leaf salad from the Co-op, half a red bell pepper, cut into strips, five cherry plum tomatoes, cut into three, and two spring onions, diced into chunks.

Served with three teaspoonfuls of mayonnaise, a drizzling of olive oil for the baby leaf salad, and a dusting of freshly ground black pepper.

Chickpea Chilli with Mushrooms

Rehydrated chickpeas (allowed to stand in a dish of water overnight) cooked in a knob of butter.

The diced onion was cooked first, until gently browned, after which I added the chickpeas and the deseeded and diced medium-sized red chilli (one will do). Cook at a medium heat and stir frequently, for about ten minutes.

After that the quartered white mushrooms (five) were added to the dish, and cooked for about seven minutes.

The chopped basil leaves were added after that, and stirred through thoroughly. Cooked for a further three minutes, before being decanted onto the serving plate. Twenty minutes all told.

The serving plate was dressed with a spiral of soy sauce, and some black pepper. You can drizzle soy sauce on top if you prefer (or both).

Egg and Bacon with Hash Browns and a Seeded Flatbread

Another variation on a British breakfast. What they serve you in hotels often seems to be an attempt to kill you on the spot (sausages, black pudding, deep fried potato bread, etc.). Less is more.

I started with the raw potato slices (semi skinned), which were fried in a large flat non-stick pan, altogether for about twenty minutes at a medium heat, and turned a couple of times.

After the first ten minutes I added two strips of smoked bacon, which were cooked to the point where the fat sizzled, and were also turned a couple of times.

Next the quartered mushrooms were added, along with half a dozen halved cherry plum tomatoes. All cooked at a medium heat, and not under glass.

I toasted a seeded and folded flatbread in a toaster (pre-damped), and placed it on the serving plate. The egg was added to the flat pan three minutes before all the other elements of the meal were decanted to the serving plate.

Served with a drizzle of American mustard, and some freshly ground black pepper! 

Chorizo and Mushroom Tapa

A simple dish of sliced chorizo sausage, with quartered mushrooms, halved cherry plum tomatoes, diced onion, and some chopped basil leaves.

The chorizo slices were put into into a non-stick omelette pan first, at a medium heat, and all the other ingredients were cooked in the fat which emerges from the sausage. Add the vegetables when there is sufficient fat in the pan. The diced onion was added first, followed a little later by the mushroom quarters, and then the cherry plum tomato halves.

The ingredients were regularly kept on the move. The basil leaves were added shortly before the dish was ready to serve. The dish should be ready within ten minutes at a medium heat, when the mushrooms begin to brown.

Served with a dusting of freshly ground black pepper. Great flavour from the paprika in the sausage!

Pork Curry with Jasmine Rice

A curry based on ground pork, browned for twenty minutes or so, and stirred frequently. After adding water to the pot, I added one diced onion, three desert spoonfuls of oats, a diced Bramley apple, a deseeded green chilli, and one red, and five Brussels sprouts, finely diced, Italian style. Simmer for half an hour to forty-five minutes.

I also added some pre-boiled pieces of potato, left over from another meal.

Add three squirts of tomato puree, or otherwise six dessert spoonfuls of a passata, a pinch of paprika, and half a teaspoonful of turmeric. Add a desert spoonful of a hot curry powder (Asda brand), and three diced cloves of garlic. Add the pork and vegetable stocks. Simmer for another twenty minutes, and add a pinch of coriander leaf ten minutes before serving.

Serve with  Basmati rice infused with jasmine essence. Add some lime pickle if desired.