Griddled courgette quiche with cheese and rocket salad

This was our first go at Quiche from scratch, and it was pretty good.   We disagreed a little on whether it was awesome or just nice, due to the intensity of herbs used.  The main flavour here is rosemary, and you have to like a really intense hit – for me it was just a little too much.  We had a salad with it, which was about the best salad I’ve ever had.  It was only a rocket, grape and walnut mixture with a dressing, but somehow it worked really well.

Rocket powered salad makes a nice launch.

The Quiche first.  We bothered to make our own pastry, for two reasons: firstly, short crust pastry is the easiest thing in the world, and secondly this was “enriched”, so used half egg and half butter instead of only butter.  It gives it a slightly more solid texture and richer flavour.  The filling is a courgette, 3 shallots and 2 tbsp mixed nuts (though pine nuts are recommended) all griddled until brown, mixed with 2 small eggs and 75ml double cream and 1 1/2 tsp pesto and 1 tsp chopped rosemary.  (Admittedly, we used way more than this…)  You just mix the lot together, drop on the pastry, and bake  for 30 minutes at 200 degrees celsius.

Whoops, we forgot a sprinkling of parmesan… now I’m not going to lie to you, everything does taste better with cheese.  But in this case, we didn’t miss it.

On to the salad. This was supposed to be a main meal, with roast chicken in, but we just left out the chicken and it worked really well.  Rocket, celery, cucumber , spring onion, walnut, Stilton and grapes make up the bulk with the dressing being olive oil, sherry vinegar , mustard and mixed herbs.  I think the key is to go lightly with the strongly flavoured ingredients, since everything in here is actually quite interesting to eat in its own way.

Who made it: The both of us.

Recipe: The salad is “The daily cook book” by love food, september 8th.  The Quiche is from “the complete vegetarian cookbook” by Sarah Brown, page 255, with the pastry on page 254.

The sa

Baked cheese Frittata

This baked cheese omelette is based on a dish we made a while ago.  It is really easy but a very tasty way of making omelette.

 

Omelette should come with chips. Sorry, frittata should come with chips. That's what I said...

 

Its dead easy:

1. Fry some onion, garlic, and whatever other veg you like: pepper, mushroom, beans, brocolli, chilli…
2. When they are cooked, add spinach, and your favourite herbs: coriander, parsley, dill, etc.  Also add fennel seeds.
3. Mix these in with 2 beaten eggs per person, mixed in with cheese – here we had about 50g of feta cheese.  Season…
4. Bake for 20-25 minutes at 200 degrees.

That is it. Obviously any variation is fine.  Meaties can add bacon; whatever veg is in the fridge will work well.  I think some herbs or spices are important but anything goes – a curry style mix would also do well, with cumin, paprika and coriander.

Who made it: Dan and Anna

Recipe: Made up, but based on “the complete vegetarian cookbook” by Sarah Brown, page 180.

Kuku with spinach

Kuku is omelette gone coo-coo.  It looks like nothing else in the world, but works amazingly well and this may become a staple approach to eggs for us.

Kuku?

The recipe book says that kuku comes in many variations over the middle east, and as far as I can tell it is ordinary omelette but a) it is baked, b) it has a little spice in.  The one here, is most definitely not ordinary omelette since it contains the most pure green – which is, in fact, spinach.  Again, I strayed a little from the instructions (overspicing as I like to do) so I’ll give brief details.

 

Ingredients

300g spinach, 3 eggs, 1 1/2 tablespoons chopped mint, 1 tsp ground cumin, 100g feta cheese.

Method

First, cook the spinach by placing it all into a large saucepan, alone, add a lid and put on a gentle heat.  The leaves quickly shrivel up, and with a little stirring the whole thing reduces about 10 fold.  Drain the spinach in a sieve or colander and squeeze out the extra water, then chop it up roughly.

Break the eggs and mix them up, trying not to beat them.  Add the spinach, chopped mint, crumbled feta cheese, cumin, salt and pepper to taste, then pour everything into a greased oven dish.  Bake at 180 degrees celcius for 25-30 minutes until just set.

The recipe book, no doubt following tradition, recommends serving this cold.  We did try that the following day and it wasn’t at all bad, but personally I prefer it hot.  The spinach forms an interesting base for the eggs, gently flavouring due to the long cooking time.  The feta cheese gives it a tang missing from simple omelette, and the mint and cumin make for a very flavoursome and different dish – no doubt you can make up the herbs and spices as takes your fancy.

Who made it: Anna and Dan jointly.

Recipe: “The complete Vegetarian cookbook” by Sarah Brown, page 181.

Quick Chocolate Mousse

This rich mousse is really easy to make, and for the lover of rich, dark chocolate is a great pudding.

 

Chocolate, in Mousse form

 

Actually, for me this was a little rich.  We used a rich, dark chocolate which is mixed in with (single!) cream, some raw egg and some Marsala.  That is all that is in there – but somehow, it tastes richer than the chocolate that went in!  Very strange. The egg doesn’t contribute to the flavour – it just makes it set in the fridge – and somehow the cream doesn’t take the edge off.

I think dark chocolate lovers would like this a lot more than I did, and perhaps I’d prefer it with milk chocolate.  But I do appreciate that there is no gelatine in it!

Who made it: Anna

Recipe: “The daily cook book” by Love Food, February 24th.

Leek and Fennel Frittata

This is basically baked omelette, which tastes very similar to the real thing and is much easier, at the price of slightly longer cooking time.

Omelette, but baked.

So for this we fry some onion, leeks and garlic, then add some fennel.  Add some dill when the vegetables have browned off then remove from the heat.  Then eggs and goats cheese are mixed in and the whole lot is baked in the oven for 30 minutes.

The taste is very pleasant, not complex but good and hearty, and the goat’s cheese gives it a pleasant tang.  Dill works quite well by giving an earthy gentle taste, although the smell will not please everyone! I’d recommend it and will be trying it again.

However, the key thing about the recipe is that you can basically do anything that works as an omelette hear, with the advantage that it cooks reliably in the oven instead of falling apart in a frying pan.  So when cooking for a lot of people this approach would be much better than the traditional one.

Who made it: Dan and Anna together.

Recipe: “the complete vegetarian cookbook” by Sarah Brown, page 180.

Herb Souffle

For a three course meal, we made 3 “light dishes” and had two as a main course.  This soufflé was part of the main course.

They do rise, but we obviously didn't fill the dish quite high enough...

After we tried a soufflé-like Broccoli and Stilton Roulade we thought we’d try the real thing.  I’m pleased to say that it didn’t disappoint.  Soufflé is a subtle dish, with most of the flavour and texture coming from the egg (beside the herb flavouring it only contains egg with a small amount of butter, flour and milk).  Of course a fair dash of fresh herbs provide a great taste, but the texture isn’t a million miles from scrambled eggs.  Baking, and folding in stiff egg whites leads to a slightly more interesting experience, and its not really that hard.  Ours rose nicely but flattened a little when we took them out of the oven.

Worth a try sometime – I’d have these again!

Who made it: Joint effort by Dan and Anna.

Recipe: “the  complete vegetarian cookbook”  by Sarah Brown, page 171.

Broccoli and Stilton roulade

This weekend we treated ourselves to a three course meal.  Starting with:

Broccoli and Stilton Roulade

What do you get when you combine broccoli and stilton soup, scrambled eggs and meringue?

So, this is our first ever roulade.  Described by the recipe book as “an impressive light lunch, supper dish or starter for a special meal, a roulade is not that difficult to make”.  This is true – relative to rocket science, brain surgery, or fudge making (the three pinnacles of human endeavour).  Compared to a soup, its still quite tricky.  Still, it really was worth it – until you’ve tasted roulade, you’ve never tasted anything quite like it.

There are two parts to this: a broccoli base with a Stilton sauce which are rolled to produce the rolls shown.  The sauce is really quite simple: its just a thick cheese sauce.  The roulade itself is just egg and broccoli – easy, right?  However, to get the unique fluffy melting taste, you have to separate the eggs and whisk the egg whites until they go stiff.  The yolks go in with the steamed broccoli, then the whites folded in.  Then you bake it until it goes yummy and brown, paste it with sauce and roll it up.

Taste wise, it is extremely similar to a broccoli and stilton soup – not too surprisingly!  But the texture is what makes it interesting.  Soft and melting, fluffy and bubbly, roulade is great fun to eat!  Of course, there are a million and one recipes for it, including sweet roulade, and I’m now quite inclined to work my way through them.

Who made it: A joint effort between Anna and Dan.

Recipe: “The Complete Vegetarian Cookbook” by Sarah Brown, page 183. Note: the instructions are not very good.  Start with steaming the broccoli, though boiling is also OK – don’t leave it till step 3.  Don’t faff around chopping the broccoli – a light blending does the same job with much less work!