Todmorden tapas

What kind of an idiot sets out to do a whole tapas tea mid-week?  Well, it appears I'm that kind of an idiot.  To be fair, I did pull it together in 30 minutes, but it was quite a busy 30 minutes.

Figs - stuffed with blue cheese - Montagnola, from The Crumbly Cheese is perfect - wrapped in parma ham, with almonds and honey.

Smoked haddock - from Paul the Fish, of course, with chickpeas, red pepper and spinach.

Patatas bravas
Kalamata olives

Olive oil
Onions
Garlic
Paprika
Chili flakes
Bouillon powder (or other stock)
Potatoes
Red pepper
Chickpeas
Figs
Blue cheese - montagnola
Parma ham
Almonds
Honey
Chopped tomatoes
Smoked haddock
Spinach

To do it in 30 minutes:-  turn on your oven, and get 3 biggish frying pans at the ready.

1.  Start with gently frying onion and garlic in olive oil in 2 frying pans.
2.  Chop potatoes into bite sized pieces, and fry in olive oil in another pan.  Let them brown a little, then put a lid on to help them cook through a bit more quickly.  Shake every now and again.
3.  Into one of the pans of onion add red pepper, about 1/2 a cup of stock and a little paprika.  When the red pepper has had a couple of minutes, tin in a drained tin of chickpeas, keep on a low heat.
4.  In the other pan add a pinch of chili flakes and a tin of chopped tomatoes, stir and let simmer very gently while everything else cooks.
5.  Cut a cross in the figs to about a cm from the bottom, and stuff with blue cheese, wrap with parma ham and place in an oven dish.  (In our case it was 2 x stuffed with cheese and wrapped, 2 x stuffed with cheese, no ham, for the veggie, and 2 x wrapped in ham but no cheese for the lactose intolerant!).  Add a few almonds and a teaspoon or so of honey.  Bake in a medium oven for 20 minutes.
6.  Place the haddock onto the chickpea mixture, put a lid on top and let it steam for 8-10 minutes.
7.  Add spinach leaves to the chickpeas and fish, put the lid back on for 2 minutes as it wilts.  Stir the mixture together, breaking the fish up slightly.
8.  Serve the potatoes with the spicy tomato sauce, add a dish of olives and some crusty bread... and tah dah!  Tod tapas.

All sourced from Todmorden market.

Turnip and blue cheese gratin, dolmades and bean medley

 I will not claim that this was a gourmet dinner which would rival international chefs ... it was OK - all of the separate bit were really quite nice, but it is no masterchef entry.  The combination was prompted by i) left overs ... from the stall - the dolmades and bean salad are lovely (you can eat them all hot or cold) ii) the remnants ... of the veg box and some cheese from earlier cheeseboards and iii) it was COLD today so we wanted something warm.

Recipe - very sketchy, because it really is a "whatever you have" kind of a dinner ....

Sautee onions and garlic in olive oil.
Add a pinch of rosemary, and some peeled and diced root veg (turnips, carrot and potato).
Turn over for a minute or so, then add a glass of dry white wine and some stock.  Stir in a spoonfull of mustard.
Simmer for 15 minutes or so, then ad  shredded cabbage.  Simmer again until veg is al dente.
Transfer to oven dish and crumble on a bit of blue cheese, and a bit of cheddar type cheese.
Roast for a bit.
At the same time - put dolmades and bean mix into the bottom of the oven to heat through.

Blue cheese and hazelnut vegetable crumble, baby roastie and carrot

Ooops... tucked in before I remembered to snap a pic - but it was worth recording, so I snapped this of the leftovers.  The baby roasties were so nice we had scoffed the lot.

Start with roasties, then the crumble - takes about an hour and 15 minutes.

 

Potatoes

Olive oil

 

Chop potatoes into bite sized pieces, parboil for about 5 minutes.  Drain, chuck into hot olive oil, move about until all covered - stick 'em in the oven at 180 for just over an hour.  Move them about a bit a couple of times so that they are crisp on all sides.

 

Crumble

 

olive oil

Leeks

Garlic

Fennel

Green beans

mushrooms

celery

mixed herbs

stock cube

white wine

gram flour

spinach

rolled oats
blue cheese
olive oil
chopped hazlenuts

1.  Sweat off leeks in olive oil - add chopped veg and soften a bit.
2.  Add herbs, garlic, white wine, stock cube and some water.  Simmer until nearly done.
3.  Add sprinkling of gram flour to thicken sauce, and spinach.
4.  Put into oven proof dish.
5.  Mix oats, crumbled cheese, hazlenuts and olive oil and plenty of seasoning - until moist, but still a crumble.  Put on top of the vegetables.
6.  Bake for about 45 minutes.

Carrots
Butter
Black pepper

Steam until just overcooked, chop them with a sharp knife, so that they are not mash, but they are in tiny pieces - add butter and black pepper.  Keep warm in the oven.

Scoff .. go ooops forgot to take pic!

mushroom, fennel, kholrabi and blue cheese risotto

Well, I was so hungry that I forgot to take a pic until I was half way through my bowl of risotto.  However, it was a success, so I think I'll bung it on the blog - as it were...

We had big scoffy bowls full, and there is loads left, so I think there is enough for 6 servings...

1 onion
1/2 bulb fennel
1/2 kholrabi
garlic
risotto rice
white wine
veg stock
cavolo nero
frozen peas
blue cheese
black pepper

1.  Sautee chopped onion and fennel in olive oil.
2.  Add peeled and chopped kholrabi and crushed garlic, turn over in the oil.
3.  Add a handful of risotto rice, turn over so that every grain is lightly coated in oil.
4.  Chuck in a glass of white wine - listen to it sizzle and boil off, then add a ladle of veggie stock (OK, I cheat - crumble in a stock cube, and then add water as the risotto cooks)
5.  Keep stirring and add more liquid as you need it.  it should take about another 20ish minutes.  Season carefully.  Stir in shredded cavolo nero.
6.  When rice is just off done add a handful of frozen peas and blobs of blue cheese.  Simmer a little longer.
7.  Turn the heat off, and let sit for 5 minutes - then serve.

Enjoy the lovely silky texture.  If, like me, you have LOADS left, let it cool completely before freezing.

Leek, cavolo nero, pea and blue cheese risotto

Fresh, tasty and very easy.

olive oil
1 leek, chopped and rinsed
2 stalks celery, chopped
garlic
risotto/paella rice
white wine
vegetable stock
cavolo nero
frozen peas
blue cheese (rocquefort in this case)
lemon juice & black pepper

All the measurements are vague - because it's done by eye - but enough for 4 I would say - 2 small handfuls of rice and about 3/4 litre of stock.

1. Saute leeks and celery in olive oil, gently - let them go a bit soft.
2. Add rice and stir until every grain is coated in oil.
3.  Add a glass of white wine and let it simmer in.
4.  Add vegetable stock - a bit at a time, until rice is al dente - each time simmer and stir until it gets soaked in - then add some more (.
5.  When nearly ready, add shredded cavolo nero and frozen peas, turn into risotto and leave to cook for 3-4 minutes.
6.  Turn off heat, add in blobs of cheese and let them melt in.  Lid on, rest.... and for another 2 minutes after that, so that it's oozy and comforting, and not watery.
7.  Squeeze on lemon juice (optional), grind on black pepper (NOT optional, in my opinion).

Scoff :)

Root vegetable cake, kale with blue cheese dressing, roast tomatoes

Saw something similar on Nigel Slater - he grated a load of root vegetables and used it as a crumble on a steak pie... and had loads of root veg from the box, so I thought I'd adapt it and give it a go.

knob of butter
splosh of olive oil
2 onions
garlic
2 potatoes
2 parsnips
2 carrots
1 celeriac
1 tbsp grainy mustard
juice of 1 lemon
grating of nutmeg
lots of black pepper

olive oil
1 onion, finely chopped
chopped kale
blue cheese

tomatoes
salt
olive oil

1.  Grate ingredients for the root vegetable cake.
2.  Fry them in olive oil and butter until they're a bit soft.
3.  Add garlic, mustard, nutmeg and seasoning.
4.  Transfer to oven proof dish and bake for about an hour at 180.
5.  Chop tomatoes and chuck into oven, sprinkled with salt and drizzled with olive oil.
6.  10 minutes before serving, sautee onion until a bit soft- toss in choppde kale, add splash of water - cover and steam for about 5 minutes.
7.  Add cheese, recover, let steam and melt.  Stir in.

Broccoli and leek blue cheese gluten free pasta

Olive oil
2 leeks
1 head of broccoli
some chard leaves
garlic
white wine
about 100g blue cheese (gorgonzola in this case)

gluten free pasta
salt and pepper

Sautee leeks in olive oil.  Add chopped broccoli stalks, and then after a couple of minutes the florets.
Cook pasta according until al dente.
Splosh white wine into veggies.  Simmer.
When veg is nearly done chuck in chunks of blue cheese.
Drain pasta, chuck into veg and season.

It was extremely quick, and extremely tasty.

what's in the fridge? pasta

Literally... home latish, hungry, and not wanting rubbish - what was in the fridge?  Well, leek, mushrooms, broccoli, blue cheese and natural yogurt... and a bit of ham.  So, cooked some pasta, started sauce predictable with leek in olive oil, then added mushrooms until leek a bit soft... then garlic, then broccoli florets... a cup of water to help it steam down.  After about 10 minutes, stirring occasionally added chopped ham and crumbled blue cheese.  Stirred in until "saucy".  Turned down.  When penne was cooked, drained and mixed in with sauce and 2 big spoons of natural yogurt.  Black pepper - scoff.  I had seconds - and there's lunch in a box in the fridge.  :)

Chicken, broccoli and blue cheese hotpot

Chicken again, but fancied something we don't have every week - remembered the dolcelatte in the fridge - and leeks, mushrooms and broccoli in the veg box.  Chopped leeks and mushrooms, sauteed off in olive oil with some garlic, added bite sized chicken pieces to fry off a bit, then a tablespoon of flour to thicken sauce.  Stir in until it has mixed with the oil, add broccoli florets, and chicken stock.  Meanwhile parboil potatoes.  When the chicken and veg have cooked down a bit take off the heat, and stir in a good sized piece of dolcelatte.  Transfer to baking dish, slice potatoes and layer on top - drizzle on olive oil.  Bake for 30 minutes in hot oven.  Slice courgette and dredge in herbed, seasonned flour, shallow fry in olive oil for a couple of minutes on each side - drain on kitchen paper.  Boil frozen peas - as victim will complain about courgettes.  Was well tasty.  Victim was forced to have 3 slices of courgette, and made the hotpot into a sandwich - but declared it "so horrid I have to have seconds so that there are no leftovers".... hmmmm

Broccoli and blue cheese soup

Yes... I know, it's too orange for the title!  We had some left over tomatoes, so I chucked them in too - but, fundamentally - it IS broccoli soup with blue cheese and stuff.  Chopped an onion, squashed and chopped a garlic clove and about 3 inches of celery - fry off for a bit - chopped in 2 heads of brocolli, including most of the stalk.  Simmer, simmer, in stock (and left over tin of tomatoes).  Taste, season - add small cubes of cheese (some cornish blue today - but could be stilton... or other blue cheese) TURN HEAT DOWN... melt cheese and keep warm - zizz (as much as you want).. scoff.  Some people don't like blue cheese much (go figure), but even they will eat a bowl full, and then say - "nice, but would have been awesome without the cheese".  Strangely, none left to bung into freezer! :)