Posts Tagged ‘mushrooms’
Tuesday, September 20th, 2011
What do you do when handed a pile of cheap pork chops and you dont want to simply grill them yet again? The answer is to get them off the bone and do something imaginative.
Generally speaking, Stroganoff is a dish made with fillet streak – it is fast, luxurious and easy. If any recipe tells you it takes ages, then it isn’t a proper Stroganoff – after all, it was one of the staples of many a top hotel in London in the 60s, and they do not want recipes that take forever!#
I have never seen why I have to limit the technique to beef only, and really, this could be applied to just about anything, maybe even fish, as long as it was something like Tuna. Anyway, here is a pork version. For this I have reduced the amount of paprika and added black pepper – it seems to suit the meat better. (more…)
Thursday, August 4th, 2011
Sometimes it is the absolute basics, the very simplest of ingredients that can fool us the most; to the point where we can neglect them altogether. In this case I am referring to the standard closed cup mushroom as produced by the ton load every day and sold in just about every supermarket and greengrocer throughout the country.
This mass produced specimen is regularly critisised by the celebrity chefs and tossed aside in favour of the wild varieties that are quite frankly beyond the budget of most of us – assuming we can find anywhere that sells them at all.
And yet, this boring little fungus can be quite delicious and a pile served on toast a most handsome treat. However, they sometimes need a little bit of work to bring out the best. So here we go.
(more…)
Friday, March 4th, 2011
Garlic bread adds something to the chicken
It is very easy, sometimes, to be overly complicated and forget that even very simple dishes, cooked right can be delicious and satisfying. Cooking dinner every day I occasionally remember this philosophy and do something that I have not cooked for ages. Today was a prime example.
A free range chicken was lurking behind a pot of yoghurt in the fridge and the plan was to something peri-peri-ish with it, or tandoori-ish, perhaps, bung it in the oven and serve it with a tomato salad. However, with sudden, unexpected sneakiness, the idea of cooking it up with mushroom rushed into my head with such devastating results that I had picked up the chicken and de boned it before I even had time to think – and why not?
(more…)
Wednesday, September 22nd, 2010
At this rate I am going to have run out of Autumn dishes before we have even got there! I have to say that I haven’t cooked a chicken and mushroom pie in yonks. Partly because my lot have had a mixed relationship with mushrooms until recently and secondly through pure laziness. You see, when it comes to this sort of pie I just don’t lie the shop bought pastry. We have become used to soft, crumbly, ultra short pastry in recent years and it is just ill suited to a pie which may have a fair amount of liquid in it. The pasty I have used here is a hot water paste – the sort of thing you would use for pork pies. However, when cooked hot on top of this sort of pie the result is a hard, brittle pastry than does not go soggy and has a real biscuit feel to it.
So, on to the recipe ….
(more…)
Wednesday, March 31st, 2010
I love mushrooms, even the ordinary ones you get from supermarkets, though I admit I can be bribed with a nice fresh Cep. Mushrooms on toast might seem like a bit of a boring dish, but it is truly wonderful as long as you keep it simple. Part of the trick is plenty of mushrooms; there is nothing worse than a bit of bland bread with a couple of grey-brown lumps on top. No, mushrooms on toast should be overflowing!
Grab a pile of mushrooms and slice to a medium thickness – around a centimetre perhaps. Get the best loaf of bread you can find, preferably something good and coarse and rustic. Cut your self some nice thick slice. Now, take a very large frying pan. Mushrooms, like meat, cook best when they have some elbow room; pack them too tightly and the liquid that comes out of the mushrooms will just boil the mushrooms rather than evaporate straight away. Get your pan very hot and add a couple of table spoons of olive oil. Throw in the mushrooms and fry till soft and there is very little liquid. At some point, get your bread toasted! Salt and pepper the mushrooms and add a teaspoon of good unsalted butter and some fresh chopped herb – a bit of sage might be nice, or a simpler taste like parsley. Be careful not to over do the herbs, we want to taste those mushrooms. Stir the mushrooms for a couple of minutes till the butter is stirred in and then plonk them on the toast.
Go and hide from the rest of the world and eat!
What do you do when handed a pile of cheap pork chops and you dont want to simply grill them yet again? The answer is to get them off the bone and do something imaginative.
