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This recipe comes from … the newspaper (TaDa)! My mum saw this posted in her local paper and sent me a clipping. Its super simple to make, fresh, fast, and D loves it. Can’t beat that. I usually serve it with couscous, but its also great on rice or pasta. On the side here is lemon pepper snap peas and roasted red pepper hummus.
Moroccan spiced shrimp
- 1 lb shrimp
- 1 lemon
- 1 tbsp cumin
- 1 tbsp cinnamon
- 2 tsp black pepper
- 1 tsp kosher salt
- 1 clove finely minced or crushed garlic
- 1 onion, sliced
- 1 bell pepper, sliced
- 1/2 cup raisins
- Large can diced tomatoes, drained, reserving 1/2 the liquid
In a bowl toss shrimp with cumin, cinnamon, 1 tsp black pepper, and juice from 1/2 a lemon. In a large pan sweat onion with lid on with 1 tbsp olive oil, kosher salt, and remaining black pepper for about 5 minutes. Add bell pepper and raisins, cover and saute for 3-5 more minutes. Add tomatoes and 1/2 liquid and simmer for another 5 minutes. Now add shrimp (reserving liquid) and the juice from remaining 1/2 lemon. Once shrimp are opaque, its ready to serve.
Now this is just the basic recipe, but I usually add another helping of the spices directly in the tomato mixture for a little extra pizazz.
Oh no! My bananas are over-ripe, time to make… banana bread? again? nah… Everytime I get bananas, i get too many. Now, that’s not a bad thing, because they make perfect fodder for banana bread, muffins, pancakes, etc. But last night I found myself staring at my bananas, feeling bored with the usual old banana options. I do love banana bread, but sometimes you just need to shake up the routine a little bit. Enter banana cake!
Now, I ‘m not a big cake fan. For birthdays, I usually get pie or an icecream sundae. This particuar cake however has a texture somewhere between carrot cake and banana bread, so its nice and moist, and with the creamcheese frosting its a fantastic comforting desert. My directions below are using a food processor (because I don’t have a mixer), but you can easily adapt it for whatever equiptment you may or may not have.
Banana Cake
- 3 over ripes bananas
- 1/2 cup milk
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 3/4 tsp baking soda
- 1 stick butter
- 2 large eggs
- 1 1/2 cups sugar
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 2 cups all purpose flour
- 1/4 tsp baking powder
Preheat oven to 350F. In food processor cream bananas, milk, vanilla, and baking soda, and pour in large mixing bowl. Cream butter, eggs, and sugar, then add to banana mixture, stirring well. Add flour, salt and baking powder. Grease and flour oblong baking pan, and bake for 30 minutes. Frost when cool.
Cream Cheese frosting
- 1 8oz block cream cheese
- 1/2 stick butter
- 2 cups cream cheese
- 1 tsp vanilla
Cream all ingredients in food processor. (Isn’t frosting easy to make?)
Originally uploaded by mosli
Kuchen is German for cake. Simple translation, no? My grandmother used to make rhubarb kuchen every summer. She had a large rhubarb plant in her back yard, and its regular place at picnics was always welcome. Unfortunately for me, rhubarb is the one thing i’m allergic to, no matter how much i like it. So here I adapted grandma’s basic kuchen recipe to match a new fruit, pineapple!
Pineapple is something I love with a passion. I can eat fresh pineapple until the citric acid burns my tastebuds. I also love it cut in slices and grilled for a sweet and smokey desert. So when I found out that Waiter there’s something in my… challenge 18 was pineapple, I jumped at the chance to use it. It was a bit of an experiment making kuchen with pineapple, but the tastes matched extreemely well, and i’m definately going to be makeing it again.
Pineapple Kuchen
- 1/2 fresh pineapple, cut in thin chunks
- 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 2 tsp sugar
- 1/2 cup butter
- 1 egg
- 2 tbsp milk
- 3/4 cup sugar
- 2 tbsp flour
- 1 tbsp cinnamon
- 2tbsp butter
Preheat oven to 350F. Mix 1 1/4 cups flour, baking powder, 2 tsp sugar. Cut in 1/2 cup cold butter into mix until pea size (I used a food processor). mix in egg and milk, then pat batter into a 9×13″ greased glass baking dish. Cover with a tight layer of pineapple. Mix 3/4 cup sugar, 2 tbsp flour, and cinnamon. Dot the pineapple with butter, then cover with a layer of sugar mixture. Bake for 30 minutes or unitl golden.
Update: the final round-up for this “Waiter” challenge can be found here.
I find that pasta is the go-to meal when you’re short on time. It only takes a few minutes to boil the water for noodles, a couple of seconds for pre-prepared sauce, and you’re good to go. But it makes a nice special dinner too, with a little extra effort. One of the easier, faster homemade sauces I make for pasta is garlic cream sauce. No, really – its fast and easy – and I can be impatient, so that’s a good thing. This was D’s plate of shells and garlic cream sauce with sauted shrimp and halved grape tomatoes. Trust me, its worth it.
Easy Garlic Cream Sauce
- 1 pint heavy cream
- 1 bulb garlic, chopped very fine or to a paste
- 1 tbsp butter
- 1 tbsp sea salt
- 2 tbsp all purpose flour
Melt you butter in a pot and add the garlic. Saute at low heat until garlic just begins to turn golden. Add flour and stir very well – cooking at low heat for a minute or two. Stir in sea salt, then slowly mix in heave cream. Use a stick blender to make sure the garlic is well incorporated, then heat on low for 5 minutes or so. Now you’re ready to go!
Originally uploaded by mosli
I really do love wonton wrappers. They are so incredibly useful for holding different kinds of fillings, and can be cooked in so many ways. I used them for ravioli. again. with a-typical filling. why not?
For these little pillows of goodness I made a roasted garlic and aubergine (aka eggplant) filling. They were topped with balsamic and olive oil so that the creamy garlicy filling was the star. Very good – I’ll definately be using this again.
Roasted Garlic and Aubergine Ravioli Filling
- 1 medium augergine
- 10 or so cloves of garlic
- tsp sea salt
- 2 tbsp basil
- drizzle olive oil
Slice aubergine in rounds 1/2 inch thick and peel cloves of garlic. Drizzle oil on baking sheet and lay down aubergine and garlic cloves. Drizzle with olive oil and bake at 350F until garlic is golden coloured and eggplant is soft. Puree in food processor or blender until smooth. Filling is ready for its pasta wrappings!
As a veggie I end up eating an aweful lot of salad. Unfortunately, I don’t care much for lettuce (well, at least the regular iceburg kind – I find it bland). So I try to be as creative as possible, or find a decent dressing. I brought this little spinach salad to friend’s house as my contribution to dinner. The salad is raw baby spinach, roasted almonds, strawberry and orange pieces, and on the side were parmasan bits to add. The dressing was equal parts balsamic and olive oil, with 2 tbsp orange juice. Simple, yes. Tasty, also yes. Leftovers, a resounding no.
When life takes over, its hard to keep up. I’ve missed my fresh tasting bento lunches and after making batches of ready-for-bento staples I was very exited to have this one for lunch. In the top tier are banana and kiwi flowers, blackberries, and apple rabbits. In the bottom tier is a sesame-soy whole wheat pasta salad.
Sesame-Soy Pasta Salad
- 2 cups cooked whole wheat pasta
- 1 carrot, diced
- 1 stalk celery, diced
- 2 scallions, sliced thin
- 2 tbsp soy sauce
- 2 tbsp sesame oil
- 2 tsp ground ginger
Mix all ingredients. Simple, no? What can I say, I like my lunch prep to be fast and easy.
Lately i’ve been in the mood for simple dinners: salads, sandwiches, and soups. Canned veggie soups are fairly limited in my local grocery store, and lets face it, fresh and homemade taste better anyways (even if some of them can be a pain in the butt to make). This one was, surprisingly, not a pain in the butt. Potato leek soup was something that was often on the menu at the cafeteria for my school in the UK, and it was just the thing to keep you warm and full in the winter. This recipe isn’t exactly what I remember, but it brings back great memories.
Potato Leek Soup
- 1 Leek, sliced thin
- 3 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 tbsp butter
- 4 potatoes, cut in small cubes
- 3 cups water (or milk)
- 1/4 cup sour cream
- 1 tsp thyme
- salt and pepper to taste
In the pot, saute leek and garlic in butter. Add potatoes and liquid and bring to a boil. Cook until potato is tender. Blend until smooth. Stir in sour cream and seasonings. You can serve topped with cheese, green onion, and bacon (if you’re a carnivore like D.)
Two delicious bentos for two different people, all tied up in one photo! Its like a two for one, only better. And, my lunch was the best because of the tofu. After experimenting, i made grilled honey terriyaki tofu to great success at dinner, and it was even better with my soba. I used the same marinade/sauce chicken for D, but even he agreed the tofu was superior (score!).
In the yellow bento (my lunch) are soba noodles with sauce container, honey terriyaki grilled tofu, edamame, grapes, pomagranate arils, and kiwi slices. In the blue bento (D’s snack pack) are soba noodles with sauce container, veggie gyoza, grapes, pomagranate arils, and kiwi stars.
Honey Terriyaki Marinade/Sauce
- 1/2 cup terriyaki sauce
- 2 tbsp honey
- 1/4 cup rice vinegar
- 1 tbsp soy sauce
- 1 tbsp grated ginger
mix together. marinate for at least ten minutes. cook. yummy
I have a problem with ravioli. I’ve never liked your typical varieties, i.e. meat or cheese. They just always seemed heavy and fairly bland apart from the sauce they were drenched in. Maybe i just never had good ravioli.
I much prefer a savoury squash or vegetable filling, which I why I thought, why not use courgette? I scoured my recipe books and the internet and after coming up short, I deceided to do what I usually end up doing anyways, make stuff up and pretend that I know what i’m doing! These garlicy roasted courgette filled wonton ravioli were excellent, and the shallot-balsamic-olive oil sauce was a simple compliment. The only request from D was to make more next time!
Roasted courgette wonton ravioli
- package wonton wrappers
- 2 cups courgette (zucchini) in chunks
- 1 head garlic
- 1 cup sliced shallots
- 1/2 cup olive oil, plus
- 1/2 cup balsamic vinnegar
- 2 tbsp basil
- 1 tbsp sugar
- salt and pepper to taste
- 2 tomatoes, chopped
Put chunks of courgette and cloves of garlic from a whole head in aluminum foil wrap with a drizzle of olive oils and roast at 345F for about 1/2 an hour until all is tender. Purree courgette and garlic with 1 tbsp basil and a little salt until smooth.
To assemble ravioli, brush two wonton wrappers with water. Put about a tbsp of filling in the center of one, placing the second wrapper on top. press down edges, trying to get as much air out as possible. seal edges by applying pressure with a fork. Drop in boiling water for about 5 minutes until done.
In a sauce pan carmelize shallots in a little olive oil. Add tomatoes, basil, and sugar. Mix in balsamic vinnegar, olive oil, and salt and pepper. Drizzle over finished ravioli
