Lemon linguine… yum yum! A family favourite!

A busy morning today.. swimming and gardening! Abbie is still very confident in the water since our holiday and spent her time jumping in and swimming between us, on our backs and practising swimming on her back! Jon and also managed to get a few lengths in ourselves and consequently we all worked up a healthy appetite! So I didn’t feel guilty about our calorie laden lunch….

This recipe is taken and adapted from ‘How to Eat’ by Nigella Lawson and is a great one to make with children as you can make the sauce up whilst the pasta is cooking and there is no cooking involved in this stage…

Lemon linguine – fed 2 adults and 1 child – our quantities

200g linguine
1 egg yolk,   1/2 lemon
Good splash cream
Good handful grated pecorino/parmesan
Big knob butter (25g)
Chopped fresh corriander

• Basically – cook the linguine for how long it says on the packet…
• Meanwhile mix up egg yolk, cream, 1/2 a lemon zest and juice and the pecorino
• When the pasta is drained, add the butter to the pasta pan until melted and chuck the linguine back in to coat it
• Add in the creamy sauce and stir until all the pasta is coated and you can’t see any bits of cheese
• Serve with a sprinkle of the corriander on top
• If you would like the Nigella recipe and method for a larger quantity, you can find it here: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/nigella-lawson/lemon-linguine-recipe/index.html

mixing the creamy sauce...

chopping the corriander with a mezaluna

'such fun' to eat.... clearly I have been watching Miranda too much lately!

Alongside our creamy, moreish pasta dish, we had broccoli and some baby salad leaves foraged whilst thinning out my lettuces…. delicious!

A glorious day calls for Sea bass baked in a parcel and a Nigella Greek Salad

 Well… today was gorgeous! A gaggle of mothers and their broods went off to Melsop Park Farm, all organised by Vic (a fantastic job!). It really was a brilliant place, my friend Kathryn describes it as ‘Big Barn Farm’ for those of you in the CBeebies passive watchers club! All the children had a wonderful time bottle-feeding lambs, cuddling baby bunnies and escapee piglets and in the case of Abbie and Mia (seen both cuddling baby rabbits to the left)…. terrorising chickens!  Luckily I was able to get Abbie to drop her plank of wood – I hate to think what may have happened!

 

We picniced for lunch, the children very hungry luckily so the draw of the playground was not too great….. for at least 10 minutes!

 

The weather really was glorious and Abbie and I were excited to see what fish Jon had managed to get for supper – hooray, one of our favourites – Sea Bass!  I quickly set to marinading the thinly sliced red onion and used them in both the Greek Salad and in the parcels of fish.

 

The Recipe for the ‘Ultimate Greek Salad’ by Nigella Lawson (from ‘Forever Summer’) can be found here: http://www.nigella.com/recipes/view/the-ultimate-greek-salad-220

I ommitted the fennel and used some of the marinated red onion slices in my parcels – as mentioned below.

 

 Baked Sea Bass in a parcel

 

I make up these parcels after the onions have been marinading in their oil, vinegar, oregano and pepper for about 1 1/2 hours – it really decreases the bitterness of the onions and makes them lovely and sweet.

 

I’ve given per parcel quantities so you can multiply this up depending on how many portions you need

 

Foil – about a 30cm length

Marinaded slices of red onion – about 8 per parcel

Sliced garlic – 1/2 clove per parcel

Rosemary – 1/2 sprig

Sea bass fillet

Splash dry white wine

Salt & Pepper

•  Preheat oven to 190C
• Onto you length of foli lay your marinaded red onion slices, sliced garlic and rosemary
• Flesh down, place your sea bass after a sprinkle of S&P
• Folding in the sides of your parcels, add a splash of white wine and then quickly fold and crunch up the sides to make a foil parcel
• Bake in the oven for 10-12 mins and serve straight away with the juices poured over the top and if you want.. a nice glass of Chablis!

 

 

 

Chicken noodle for my soul… and ‘magic soup’!

I have felt quite poorly today… frankly I have been ‘sponsored by unbranded cold and flu tablets’! So this soup was a must! There are only two soups which cut the mustard with me when I am feeling coldy…. Nigella Lawson’s ‘Sunday Night Chicken Noodle’ from ‘How to Eat’ and also what we call ‘Magic Soup’ in my home – this recipe (also Nigella’s from ‘Nigella Express’ – actually called ‘Noodle soup for Needy People – here is the link: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/nigella-lawson/noodle-soup-for-needy-people-recipe/index.html )

‘Magic soup’ is reserved for when you don’t have enough energy to cook (you literally open packets), but you need something nutritious and comforting – it should be on prescription as always cures my family quicker than any medicine – I add a bit of garlic puree to mine as in old ‘remedies’ garlic was supposed to help colds.

I made the ‘Sunday Night Chicken Noodle’ slightly differently as I used cooked chicken left over from our roast, added some sugar snaps and left out the dried chilli pepper for a child-friendly version – Jon and I then added chilli flakes to ours at the end – see later pic. So here is my version:

Feeds 2 plus at least one child (prob 2)

Marinade: 8 tblspns sake, 6 tablspns mirin, 2 tblspns Tamari soy sauce, 2 cloves sized squirts of garlic puree

3 handfuls of shredded cooked chicken

2 heads of bok/pak choi, sliced into mouth sized pieces

Small handful of sugar snap peas

Splash sesame oil

1 packet ‘ready-to’wok’ udon noodles – there are 2 bags of noodles in one packet

800ml chicken stock – I make mine from cubes and boiling water

small hanful of corriander (cilantro) chopped, chilli flakes (opt)

• Mix up the marinade ingredients and stir in the cooked chicken – leave for 10 mins
• Boil water and add the bok choi for 3 mins and then the noodles for an extra minute – drain
• Add sesame oil to a deep pan, heat and then stir fry the sugar snap peas for a minute
• Take out the chicken from the marinade with a slotted spoon and add to the peas – stir fry for a min and then add the marinade, let it bubble down until everything looks golden and sticky
• Add noodles and bok choi, stir and then add chicken stock – bring to the boil and then turn off heat
• Serve topped with a little chopped corriander and chilli flakes (if you want it to clear the nasal passages!)

The child's version...

..... and the adult's version

Slurping is a must!

Aylsham Farmer’s Market… another ‘picnic’ supper and Nigella’s Korean Calamari!

Saturday morning saw us making our monthly visit to our local (and excellent) Farmer’s Market. Although Aylsham also has a FM half-way through the month, the first weekend brings the best local producer’s and the fish stall is hard to beat!  We picked up some smoked salmon, smoked prawns (amazing), fresh anchovies and some fresh squid – passed up on clams until next month.  The veggie stall had some killer purple sprouting brocolli, so I bought loads in addition to a delicious looking free-range chicken (with giblets).  I was gutted that I had bought some cold-pressed rapeseed oil earlier in the week as a new, fabulous producer appeared for the first time at Saturday’s market. Nevermind, at the rate we use it, we could be getting some next month!

Abbie and the fantastic veggie stall

Anyway, to dinner – our picnic was a real mish-mash. Literally soemthing for everyone; Abbie wanted smoked salmon and olives, Jon wanted anchovies and quesadillas (just a tortilla, filled with grated cheese and sliced tomatoes, dry-fried on our skillet) and I was dying to have my first tasted of the year of smoked prawns and local early asparagus.

BUT I also was dying to try Nigella Lawson’s ‘Korean Calamari’…. I bought the chilli paste a few weeks ago, but have found squid really difficult to get hold of…. not anymore!! It was a delicious part of our supper picnic, but definitely would be better next time on top of some sushi rice, as recommended by the lovely Nigella!  It is incredibly easy to make and the squid stayed really soft, not at all rubbery…

Link for the recipe for this, from Nigella’s book ‘Kitchen’ is here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/korean_calamari_77533

The laden picnic table

Abbie's selection - all eaten!