Alice's French Onion Soup, served with a Wensleydale Crouton

This is my re-creation of a classic. I used Wensleydale as I recently visited the Creamery and bought lots of lovely cheese! I love onion soup, the dark brown colour, the smell and oniony flavour! This recipe is also a very simple one, it makes a nice quick, yet hearty, supper.

Ingredients (serves 2, with a little extra!):
About 6 medium onions (sliced), I used brown organic onions because they were on offer in the supermarket and honestly I don't think it makes a difference in this soup which you use!
Chicken Stock (see basics recipe) I measured by the eye, but I probably used about 1 and 1/2 litres (this reduces whilst cooking remember)
3 Cloves, finely chopped garlic
Handful chopped fresh Parsley (or Thyme)
2 Slices crusty bread, toasted
1 Bay Leaf
Good amount of grated Wensleydale (or other complimentary cheese)
Pinch of Salt and plenty of black pepper
Knob of butter
Good dash dry white wine

Method:

1. In a large soup pan melt the butter on a medium heat and add the onions and garlic. Slowly brown and soften, lowering the heat if necessary, for about 15-20 minutes.
2. Turn up the heat and add the wine. Once it has mostly evaporated add the stock and bay leaf and bring to the boil. Once boiling immediately lower the heat and simmer gently for 5-10 minutes. Add salt and pepper.
3. Meanwhile, preheat the grill and grate the cheese if not already done.
4. Once simmered stir in fresh herbs. Now, either add the slices of toast to the top of the pan, or transfer the soup to individual (oven proof) serving bowls and add the toast, one slice each, to the top of the soup in those. 
5. Liberally sprinkle cheese over the top and grill for a minute or two until slightly melted. Remove from oven, grind over more black pepper and serve!

Spaghetti Picnic Frittata

Last weekend we went camping and  only had a short amount of time to prepare any food. I had a load of fresh farm eggs to use too so I prepared this simple but delicious dish in ten minutes with whatever I had left to use up in my fridge. This would work well with any vegetables or cheese, or even on it's  own with a little seasoning - although I would say the tomatoes make it! You can literally make this with anything so I've just written down what I personally used.

Ingredients:

Generous handful Spaghetti, cooked and drained (stir in butter to prevent sticking if cooking before preparing the rest of the recipe)

Handful cherry Tomatoes, halved

1 small Red Onion, thinly sliced

Small handful tinned Sweetcorn

Small handful diced Aubergine

Finely chopped Basil and Parsley

Generous handful of finely grated hard cheese (such as Gran Padano)

Olive Oil

Salt and Pepper

5-6 Eggs, lightly beaten and seasoned with salt and pepper (add a splash of  milk if you like)

Method:

1. Preheat the grill to a high heat and heat the oil in a frying pan suitable to go under the grill on a medium to high heat.
2. Chuck in all of the vegetables except the sweetcorn and fry for a couple of minutes until softened. Add the herbs and sweetcorn.
3. Stir the cheese into the egg mixture and pour into the pan.
4. Immediately add the cooked spaghetti and make sure it is evenly and completely covered by the egg mixture. Cook for about 5 minutes, check with a spatula to see if the bottom half is cooked.
5. Put under the grill for 5 minutes until the frittata is cooked through.
6. Leave to cool in the pan for a few minutes before turning out onto a plate and allowing to cool before wrapping for your picnic. When you serve chop it like you would a pizza and you can eat it with your hands! 

Alice's Vegetarian Tex-Mex Tortilla Tower

This turned out to be an absolute monster! I made it vegetarian because I had loads of spare veg to use, but it would be tasty with meat too. I didn't intend to make this to humongous American proportions, but it turned out that way and Paddy and I could only manage to eat half of each portion! This is very tasty though and fun to make. I came up with the recipe myself and I made my own tortillas and salsa, so I'll write this in a sort of series of mini-recipes in the order that I did everything. When it comes to assembling these big boys you need to have several pans on at once, but if you struggle with timings you could always mix the hot salsa with the veg and serve like that. This recipe serves two very hungry people with 2 left over tortillas to make lunch wraps with!

1. Tortillas

You can buy these if you like, but they're fun and easy to make! All you need is 10oz self-raising flour, about 300ml warm water, 3tbsp Extra Virgin Olive Oil and a pinch of salt and pepper. I also added an optional pinch of Turmeric to mine to give colour and a little flavour. You simply gradually add the water and oil to the flour and salt until you have a sticky dough, knead for 3-5 minutes until smooth and separate into about eight balls. On a floured surface roll out each ball into a rough circle shape. Heat a small amount of Olive Oil in a frying pan or chapati pan and lightly fry each tortilla individually on each side for 1 minute (Until raised parts of the tortilla are browned). Stack and wrap these in tin foil and set aside to re-heat in the oven later.

2. Salsa

Again, you can buy this but it's nice if you make it.

Ingredients: -

1 Red Onion, finely sliced

Small punnet of baby plum tomatoes, quartered

Generous handful of chopped Coriander

Small carton of passata

3 Jalapenos (mix of red and green) finely chopped, if you like it spicy use more green ones

Method: -

Fry the onion in oil in a sauce pan on a medium heat for 3 minutes (you still want them a little crunchy). Add the tomatoes, chilli and coriander and cook for a further minute before adding the passata. Reduce this for 5 minutes then set aside to re-heat later on. The flavours will enhance in the mean time.

3. Vegetable Mix

You could use whatever you want here, but I used what I had left in  the fridge, this is actually a good 'store cupboard supper'.

Ingredients: - 

Half an Aubergine, chopped into smallish chunks

1 and a half Courgettes, also chopped

Punnet of Mushrooms, sliced or quartered

Plenty Garlic, thinly sliced

1 Green Pepper, sliced

Tbsp Paprika

Pinch Turmeric

Tbsp Cayenne Pepper

Tsp Pimento Powder

Extra green chilli (optional)

Method: - 

Basically fry everything together in a large pan/wok until softened and ready to eat. You could also roast these if you like.

4. Assembly

To assemble you also need soured cream, grated cheddar cheese and two eggs. You can also add guacamole, homemade or shop bought. I don't like it but I bought some to put onto Paddy's tower.

1. Preheat the oven to 190 degrees. Put the tortillas (still wrapped in foil) in the oven to heat through.
2. Heat the salsa and vegetable mix in their respective pans. You can also serve the salsa cold if you like, but I heated mine back up.
3. Fry two eggs in some oil to a point when you have a lovely, golden dippy egg.
4. Heat two plates and bring the tortillas out of the oven. To stack place a tortilla on each plate and top with salsa, soured cream (and guacamole if using), sprinkle over some of the vegetable mix and cheese. You can do this in any order you like and I varied a little with each layer myself. Top with another tortilla and repeat another layer and top with a tortilla. Top off each stack with a fried egg, and another sprinkle of cheese if you think you can handle it! If you are using guacamole I would spread some over the top of the tortilla before placing the egg on top. Serve immediately - before this monster topples over!

 Paddy's tower with guacamole. Look at that lovely yolk!

Think you could manage this in one sitting?

Paella, Spicy Style!

Paella is one of Paddy's favourite foods so, since I have recently been converted to rice, I made my own from what I had left in my cupboard! I made far too much for two people, but it was lemony and delicious. With left over rice you can always make Rissoles or something. Paella isn't usually spicy, but I added a green chilli to mine and it gave a little kick and complemented the other flavours to my personal taste! If you're not too keen on lemons I would use less than I did in this recipe, but if you do, you'll enjoy this.

Ingredients:

1 Large Chicken Breast, chopped into pieces

Left over Crayfish Tails

Left over cooked and peeled Prawns

About 1 and 1/2 Lemons, chopped into wedges

Paella Rice (enough for two, I used Plaza Del Sol)

1 Onion, finely chopped

1 small Courgette, finely chopped

1/2 Red Pepper, 1/2 Yellow Pepper, finely chopped

Good handful of freshly chopped Parsley

Good handful Cherry Tomatoes, halved

Lots of Garlic, finely sliced (I used about a whole bulb, but that's personal taste)

1 Green Chilli, finely chopped

About 1 litre Chicken or Vegetable Stock, see Alice's Basics (I used homemade chicken stock from the freezer)

I also used 4 small left over Mushrooms, quartered

White Wine

Olive Oil

Method:

1. In a large heavy based pan sear and lightly colour the chicken pieces with the lemon wedges then set aside.
2. On a medium heat add the onion, courgette, garlic, chilli, tomatoes, mushrooms and peppers. Fry for a few minutes alone before adding the wine. Turn up the heat for a moment to burn off the alcohol.
3. Return the chicken pieces and lemon to the pan and pour in just enough stock to cover all the contents of the pan. Partially cover the pan and bring to a simmer.
4. Stir the pan every now and again. Once the first lot of stock has been completely absorbed into the rice add the rest of the stock a ladle at a time, making sure each is absorbed before adding the next. This should take about 10-15 minutes until the rice is cooked. Don't forget to keep covering and stirring the pan.
5. Once the rice is cooked stir through the seafood and chopped parsley, remove from the heat and allow to stand for one minute then serve! I served this on its own but you can serve it with bread and another wedge of lemon if you like. 

Monkfish, Hake & Prawn Ravioloni in a Saffron and Crayfish Tail Butter

This recipe is based on one in Carluccio's 100 Pasta Dishes book (see bibliography). This was good fun to make, although all together rather expensive! If I had even more money I might have gone so far as to use Lobster. To make this I used my pasta rolling contraption, however rolling it by hand is also fine but it may not go as thin. Do not let sheets dry too much as they won't stick together. Oh, and Ravioloni is just big Ravioli! I served 2-3 to a plate but one would do as an impressive starter! This was meant to serve two, however it makes enough to serve about four-five. Yet, since this was my first experiment a lot of the pasta broke in the pan and only 6 ravioloni survived! This was plenty for two, but that means if you do attempt this yourself beware of the quantities. Therefore, I'm going to write this recipe quite roughly (without exact amounts) and let you judge for yourself!

Ingredients:
Pasta dough for 2 (see Alice's Basics section) rolled into about 6 sheets
Piece of Hake
Monkfish Tail
Cooked and peeled prawns (chopped into small pieces)
Crayfish Tails
About 1 and 1/2 tsps Saffron (half pounded in a pestle and mortar)
2 egg yolks
Salt and Pepper
Butter

Method:

1. Whilst the pasta dough is resting before rolling (see Alice's Basics at the top right of this page), make the filling. Firstly, poach the Hake and Monkfish in slightly salted water for 10 to 15 minutes. Remove and leave to cool for a short while.
2. Chop the Hake and Monkfish into small pieces and remove all bones/skin. Mix together with the prawns, egg yolks, salt and pepper. Voila, you have the filling!
3. Once the pasta is rolled into sheets, onto a floured surface, put 2 heaped tablespoons of pasta about 10cm apart onto 3 of your 6 sheets. Top with another sheet and firmly press down around the edges of each dollop of filling. I made a mistake here and mine fell apart a little so do press firmly! Cut with a knife or pasta cutter into squares of about 7cm x 5cm.
4. This only takes about 4 minutes to cook in boiling - simmering water. Whilst it cooks heat a generous knob of butter in a pan and add the Saffron and Crayfish Tails until the butter has melted and the tails are warmed through.
5. Serve the ravioloni as 2-3 per plate and drizzle over the butter, Saffron and Crayfish sauce, serve immediately! This dish is rather rich, so I would say you definitely don't need any hard cheese on top. Enjoy your luxurious fishy dish!