Sausage & Cider Casserole.

Fairly straightforward casserole.

6-8 Pork & Apple Sausages (good ones).
250g Bacon - chopped.
500ml dry cider
2 apples (try to get cooking apples, but they are so hard to find these days I had to settle for eating apples) - peeled, cored & chopped.
4 carrots - chopped.
1 lrg onion
Flour
Sage (6 leaves)
Lemon Thyme (handful of sprigs)

Cook up the sausages and bacon on a low heat for 10-15 mins, then set aside.
Fry up the onion in the same pan, until starting to turn transparent. Add more oil if necessary - don't burn it. Add in the carrots after a few minutes, and the apple just before done.
Return the sausages and bacon to the pot and dust with flour. Stir in.
Add the Cider and herbs. Bring to the boil.
Cover, and simmer for 1 hour.

I imagine this could serve 4 if accompanied by mash.

Tasty / Healthy Snack

3 Tomatoes
1tsp green pesto
Olive Oil
Balsamic Vinegar

1 Slice of Fresh bread


Slice Tomatoes
Cover with the tsp of pesto, olive oil and balsamic vinegar. Mix up well.

Use the bread to mop up the remaining dressing.

Thai style Chicken with Basil.

1 large onion
2 chillies (type to taste)
2 chicken breasts
sm tin of coconut milk
Basil Leaves (about 1 large pot worth)
Fish Stock (2x knorr stock cubes in 1 mug of boiling water will do)
2 cloves garlic
Rice Wine
Thai 7 spice
Worcestershire sauce
Rice (Thai)

Serves 2


Fry up onion in a little groundnut oil in a wok.
Once starting to go translucent, add chillies (finley chopped) and garlic (crushed).
Add the chicken (diced) and cook until browned.
Splash in 3 tablespoons (or so) of rice wine, a couple of dashes of worcestershire sauce and the fish stock.
Sprinkle 7 spice across the wok.
Add the coconut milk.

Put the water on to boil and once done, cook the rice as accoring to the packet.

Cook down until much reduced and starting to thicken.
Add the basil. Stir and cook for another minute or two.

Serve.

Creamy Mushroom Pasta.

Serves 2.

250g Pasta (3-4 Handfuls). Posh as you like.
Tin Tomatoes.
4 or 5 of manky mushrooms
1 handful porcini
2 heaped desert spoons of sun dried tomato pesto
1 sm pot sour cream (1/4 pint?)
Chicken stock cube
Italian herbs
2-3 cloves garlic

No Worcestershire!
No Ketchup!
No Cheese!
No Wine!

That said, a good bottle of Italian (Chianti?) or Spanish (Temparillo) goes well.

Soak the porcini in a little boiling water. Add the chicken stock cube to this. Leave for about 10-20 mins, unless in a real hurry.
Chop the 'shrooms, but not too thin. Only 3-4 slices from the average 'shroom.

Fry up the mushrooms in a little olive oil. In a non-stick pan, you don't need any oil to cook up mushrooms, but this recipe is hardly stingy on the grease.
Add the garlic (crushed) when almost done. The mushrooms don't want to be crispy, but do need to be sealed.
Add in the tomatoes (tinned & pesto), the cream, a good dusting of the herbs. Stir & mix well. Let cook for a few mins before adding the porcini & stock mixture.

Let it reduce down for a while. Enjoy the wine?

Put a pan of water onto the boil. Splash a bit of oil on the top.
When boiled, cook the pasta for the recommended time.

[I used some giant pasta shells bought in Windermere. It said cook them in 6 litres of water per 500g. They weren't joking - Obey the cooking instructions, otherwise it might go awry.]

Reduce the sauce down until nice and saucy. Drain pasta, cover with sauce and serve.

You may wish to finish the pasta off in the sauce if it's too runny, and you have a large enough saucepan.

Not bad for a veg dish

Vegetable cannelloni. Finding Cannelloni is hard work these days - why is that?

Serves 6, but you'll probably want something to go with it.

Cannelloni pasta
2 tins tomatoes,
1/3 bottle red wine,
4 peppers,
3 carrots (chopped),
1 sm broccoli
1 lrg onion
block cheddar
1 mozzarella,
1/2 tub mascepone
basil leaves
green pesto

Chop the peppers into quarters, deseed and drizzle with Olive Oil. Roast in the oven for 30 mins or so, until the edges are just starting to turn black.
Fry up the onions, add carrots after about 10 mins, and then the broccoli after another 5 mins. Fry together for another 3-5 mins, and then take off the heat.
Meanwhile, in another pan, cook up the tomatoes and wine with some lea & perrins and ketchup. Add herbs & seasoning to taste. Reduce down until a nice saucy consistency. Might need to thicken with cornflour - you will need a fair bit of sauce.

When the vegetables are ready, put in the food processor. Add mascepone, basil and about 5 teaspoons of pesto. Whizz together until a slightly lumpy paste.

Cover the bottom of your biggest Pyrex dish with olive oil, and add in a layer of the tomato sauce (use half of it). Fill as many cannelloni as will fit with the veg paste, and place in the dish. Cover the cannelloni with the remaining paste, and then the remaining tomato sauce.
Cover with a good layer of grated cheese, and slice the mozzarella on top.

Bake in a hot oven for 1/2 an hour - 40 mins.

Not So Traditional English Breakfast

Handful of White Beans
2 Rashers of Bacon
3 Slices of Black Pudding (thanks, Lou).
1 Sausage
3 Bay Leaves
1/2 pint (or so) of milk
1 Egg
1 Tomato (I didn't actually have this, but I think I should have).

(Per person)

Soak the beans overnight in the fridge.
Boil the beans hard for 10 mins, and then simmer for 1 hour.

Drain the beans, then cover them in milk. Add Bay and Bacon (chopped into thin strips)
Heat to boiling, then simmer. Don't let them dry out, but in 1/2 an hour or so the liquid wants to have reduced down. Add more milk as required.

Fry the sausage and Black Pudding slowly over a low heat.
Half the tomato and fry that too. (Shouldn't take as long as the sausages)

About 10 mins from the end, put a pan of water on to boil, and then poach the egg.

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I had this for dinner to add to the un-traditionallity of it. The subtle flavour of the beans contrasted with the strong flavour of the black pudding nicely.

Cottage Pie

Minced Beef
3 carrots
1 1/2 onions
frozen peas
6 mushrooms (large cup)
2 beef oxo cubes
1 bottle dodgy welsh beer
4 bottles IPA
mixed herbs
worcestershire sauce
ketchup
sauce flour
6 spuds (Maris Piper)
Cheese
Parmesan

Chop onions, carrots, shrooms

Fry up onions for a bit. Add mince, fry till brown. Add carrots & shrooms. Fry a bit more.
Add a sprinking of flour (until it looks like Christmas), stir in.
Add oxo cubes dissolved in 1/2 pint boiling water. Add Welsh Beer. And Herbs.
Bring to boil.
Add peas. Keep boiling

Open IPA. Pour into pint glass. Enjoy.

Meanwhile, peel and cook up spuds. Once done (10 mins boiling) mash 'em, and add in cheeses. You might need some butter as well, or maybe some milk, or even some olive oil.

Once sauce nice and thick, spoon into pyrex dish, cover with mash and bake. Half an hour maybe? Until the potato browns nicley.