Organic Irish Lamb Chops

This is my second time making lamb chops for my husband. The first time I cook them rare. He just asked more more potatoes. So this time I cook them really well done.

2 organic Irish Lamb chops
Rub with salt, pepper, ground cumin, ground coriander, garlic, lemon zest, lemon juice, drop of oil.
Cover and let marinate for10 min/ few hours.
Cook on a really hot grill pan 5 min on each side.
Pull the meat off and let rest for 5 min before.
De glaze the pan with red wine/ grape juice and pore on top of the lamb.
I also made roasted Indian potatoes.
Par-boil 4 potatoes.
Heat the oven to the highest heat.
Into a pan 2 Tbs oil, 1 tsp mustard seeds, 1 tsp cumin seeds, 3 whole cloves of garlic and 5 small green chillies. Heat the pan in the oven and then put in the par-boiled potatoes.
Bake for 20 min.

Fast and yummy, but I miss my rice!

Bread Machine

The same Lady who made us that nice dinner also game us a bread machine.

It works really well, makes 2 small loafs or 1 big if I send a way for the pan. I made a spicy corn bread and a sweet ginger bread. The corn bread was a dry dough and the ginger was wet, but they both baked up well. Also makes jam. How do you make jam in a bread machine???

Iranian Dinner

Last weekend we had a dinner at a lovely Iranian lady's home. There was think yogurt with cucumber, raisins and walnuts.

Spicy roast chicken with pomegranates seeds and hot green chili's.

She also made Khoresh Ghimeh: a very taste stew made from meat, split peas, dried limes topped with fried potatoes.

Look at these cute candy rocks!

Gormeh Sabzi

Green stew??? It is so so good! Its the herbs which give Gormeh Sabzi its color.
Soak 1 cup of kidney bean over night (can use a can, but add at the end of cooking)
Brown 1/2 cup of stewing meat.
Fry 1 onion in 1 tsp oil and 1/4 tsp of turmeric (so pretty).
Soak 1 cup of dried Gormeh Sabzi, drain and fry in 1 tsp of oil. (My mother-in-law always uses fresh herbs, but its hard to find them here. If you want to use fresh than use cups of chopped fenugreek, dill, parsley, cilantro, chives, and spinach.)
Put everything in to a pot. Cover with water bring to a boil, cover and lower the heat. Cook for a few hours until the bean are soft, adding more water if needed. 30 min before severing add 2 dried limes (and beans if using canned).

Enjoy with rice. Really do it! I love Gormeh Sabzi and you will too!

Dinner at a Friends

We went to a friends house last weekend. There wasn't much to cook with in his kitchen. But I love creating a meal out of nothing. What would you make with zucchini, mushrooms, and cauliflower? Any guess as to what I made? Here is a hint there was also Iranian pasta, flour, milk, mozzarella, lamb fat and pasta sauce.

Pomegranate Salad

I love fall! Figs, dates and pomegranates. It used to take me forever to peel pomegranates, but then I learned the Iranian way.
Cut a thin strip off the top and bottom. Should be able to see a tinny bit of fruit. Score around the fruit making four parts. Pull apart over a bowl. Then pop out the rest the seeds.

Done in record time. For pomegranate salad add salt and eat with a spoon.

Tomato Dal Soup

Its soup weather here. Dal or yellow spelt lentils take a while to soften, but are so creamy. One of my favorite soups.

Fry 1 chopped onion in 1 tsp oil and 1/4 tsp turmeric.
Add:
1/3 cup Dal
1 can of Tomatoes
1 cup water
Bring to a boil, cover and lower the heat. If you soaked the dal before cooking then the soup should be done in 30min, I did not soak my Dal, so it toke 2 hours and some mashing for mine to soften. Check for salt, pepper and sugar. Its great just like that, but it can be spiced up!
For Spice fry in 1 tsp oil for 2 min:
1 tsp mustered seeds
1 tsp cumin seeds
2 Tbs dry coconut
chili powder to taste.
Mix in with the soup.

Enjoy a small bowl with rice or naan.

Polow meets Pulao

Fresh Dates! Hard to find and seasonal. These are very unripe, like a green bannan. We had rice with fresh dates at our wedding, and I wanted to recreated it, but with a twist. This is Irinian meets Indian (in Ireland) or Polow meets Pulao.In addition to fresh dates I used traditional Iranian ingredients for Jeweled rice: orange peel, barberries and onion but seasoned them with Indian spices, cumin and green cardamom.
Fry in 1 tsp oil for 2-3 min.

Make Polow:
Soak 2 cups of rice in salted water for a few hours.
Drain soaked rice and bring a big pot of water to boil. Add rice and boil until aledenta about 5 min. Drain the rice and rinse.
Put 1/2 tsp oil in the bottom of a pot or rice maker. Layer 1/3 of the rice on top of the oil then1/2 of the spice mix, and repeat ending with rice. With the end of a wooden spoon make five steam wholes in the rice. Just stick the spoon in the rice! Put 1 tsp oil over the top. Wrap a clean kitchen towel around the lid of the rice maker or pot and pop on top. Steam the rice for 30 min. Can put a few tsp of butter in the last few min of steaming.

Very Tasty!

Soy Paper Sushi

Seaweed isn't for everyone. My husband hates it. So I roll his sushi in soy paper.
These beautiful sheets were expensive. 4e for 10. Very thin and hard to work with. But nice for a party.

KimBop and Sushi

I grow up eating KimBop. My family would sit around the kitchen table making thick rolls, my little brothers stealing whole rolls before my mom could cut them. Kimbop is Korean for rice and seaweed. It is like a sushi roll, but made with cooked meat(like Spam)and fish cake not raw fish.
Rice:
Use a short grain rice. Wash 2 cups of rice. Bring to boil with 3 cups of water, lower the heat and cover or put the whole lot into a rice maker. Cook for 25-30 min. Add sesame seeds and oil once cool.
Fillings:
Cut cucumber into long thin strips.
Cut green onions into long thin strips.
Cut Dakuan (pickled radish) into long thin strips.
Cut carrots into long strips, boil for 1 min and then fry in some sesame seed oil.
Cook some spinach in sesame oil.
Beat an egg with 1tsp water, fry in oil, making a thin omelet. Cut into Strips.
Fry fish cake in sesame seed oil, cut into long thing strips.
Roll:
Spread 1/2 cup of rice on half of a sheet of seaweed. Lay filling across the rice. Roll.
I don't have any Dakuan or fish cake but it was still yummy.
My housemate made Makizushi (rolled sushi). I made the rice, adding sweet vinegar not sesame oil. She filled them with smoked Salmon, cream cheese, green onion, cucumber and avocado, each roll was different. I rolled a few inside out, and covered them in sesame seeds.The very best thing was this rainbow trout I cured. I used Derry Clarke's recipe for Irish Whiskey Cured Organic Salmon. I changed it a bit, the fish, no dill or white pepper. Lemon not orange. It was so so good. I could eat it everyday.

Belish

Our house mates made this yummy pie. Its called Belish and from Tataria (Tatarstan).

This one was made with par-boiled rice, raisins and dried apricots. The pie steamed the rice perfectly. Can also make a meat pie with potato and onion.

Homemade Yogurt

My husband made yogurt last weekend. Simply, fast and tasty. All you need is milk and a starter. We used a yogurt maker because its cold in Ireland, but if you live somewhere warmer you may not need one.
Bring1 litter of organic whole milk to a slow boil big pot. Let cool to 30c, or until you can keep your finger in for 15 sec. Then add 2 Tbs of organic plan yogurt (starter) and mix. Fill your jars and leave in a warm place or in yogurt maker overnight.

Note: Don't use low-fat yogurt as a starter. Most small pots of yogurt in the shops are low-fat, but i makes slimmy yogurt.

Shevid Polow Ba Goosh

This stew is the easiest of all the Iranian stews I know of and even my brothers like it. I learned how to make it from the oddest source. Once I was in my local supermarket cafe, which happened to be in a parking lot. An Irish woman setting next to my husband and I started talking to us. She told us that her 'partner' is Iranian. Small world. She told me about this stew he makes. I have been making it even sense.
Meat and Onion Stew
Brown some meat in a thick pot. Its good to use a cut that has a bone in it. Take out the meat.
Chop 2-4 onions in thick rings and cook them in the pot until they get a nice color.
Add 1/2 tsp turmeric and the meat back to the pot. Cover with water, bring to a boil, lower the heat and let cook for 2 hours +.
My mother in-law gave me some dried fava beans so I soaked them earlier in the day and added them to the stew with the turmeric. I have also used white beans in the past. I like beans, but if you don't then leave them out.

Shevid Polow
To make dill rice just follow the recipe for normal rice but add 1/2 cup dried or fresh dill to it. I made Polow, which is proper Iranian rice.
Soak 2 cups of rice in salted water for a few hours.
Drain soaked rice and bring a big pot of water to boil. Add rice and boil until aledenta about 5 min. Drain the rice and rinse.
Put 1/2 tsp oil in the bottom of a pot or rice maker. Layer 1/3 of the rice on top of the oil then1/4 cup dill, and repeat ending with rice. With the end of a wooden spoon make five steam wholes in the rice. Just stick the spoon in the rice! Put 1 tsp oil over the top. Wrap a clean kitchen towel around the lid of the rice maker or pot and pop on top. Steam the rice for 30 min. Can put a few tsp of butter in the last few min of steaming.

2 Pies

For dinner last night I made 2 different pies. Both are versions of my mothers.

A few times a year my mom makes shepherds pie. Last year my brother walked in on her before she started and asked to have just meat loaf and mash. When she went to take the meat loaf out of the oven it had turned its back into shepherds pie! She forgot that she was making meat loaf! Afraid of what may happen I made a Shepherdess pie.
1 chopped onion
2 chopped carrots
12 chopped mushrooms
Cook on med high heat with 1tsp oil, thyme, two bay leaves salt and pepper for about 10 min, until the mushrooms have stopped giving off liquid and the carrots are soft.
Fill a baking pan. Then top with 1 cup corn (fresh, frozen, or canned) and 1 cup peas (I used soy beans). Cover the with the mash. (I cooked four potatoes, left on their skin and mashed with 1/4 cup milk, 1/4 cup yogurt, 2 tsp butter, 1 tsp chives, 1/4 cup cheese, salt and pepper.) Finish with paprika.
Bake for 30 min at 150c, until the top is crusty.

My mom does not like to make pie dough, she does make a really good crisp. She never uses a recipe (from what I can tell) so when I started to recreate her crisp I may have gone too far from her original.

The first major difference between our crisp is that I always leave the skin on the apples. I'm not just that I'm lazy, but it healthier therefore you can eat a second piece of pie.

Mix
4 cored and sliced apples
zest of one lemon and half its juice
1 tsp vanilla
a few shakes each of:
cinnamon
nutmeg
garam masala (A great addition, I sneak it into all of my moms pies)
dash of salt

Fill the pie pan and in the dirty bowl mix the crisp:
1/2 cup chopped almonds
1/2 cup ground linseed
1/2 cup brown sugar
a shake of each of the pie spices
2 TBS butter
Mix and top pie.
Bake at 150c for 30 min.

The apples were so good, the crisp needed oatmeal (which I was out of) and it was too sweet. Maybe my mom with give me her recipe.

Fennel and Mushroom Orecchiette

A friend asked me "Where is Italian NG?". I remember as a child asking my mom the same thing. "Why do we always eat rice?" Now I almost never make pasta. Its funny because my husband loves pasta, and I would almost always want to eat rice! So I made this meal to answer my friend. Here is Italian NG's Dinner:


I found some really nice imported orecchiette, which are little pasta ears. I wanted to make a simple sauce,with tons of veg but the orecchiette are small and I didn't want to overpower them.
In a non-stick pan over med heat:
1 tsp oil
1 finely chopped onion
1/2 a finely chopped fennel bulb
9 cloves of roasted garlic
9 mushrooms, sliced so they look like the orecchiette
1 tsp fennel seed
Salt and pepper

After the mushrooms stop giving off liquid and the onions have a nice colour add:
1 can Roma tomatoes
1/2 cup sliced olives rings

Cook for 10-15 min or until pasta is ready. Can add some of the pasta liquid if the sauce is too dry.

Mix with the orecchiette and top with fennel greens.

Secret Beef Stew

I have been fighting a cold and after a weekend of chicken soup I wanted something sweet. My husband wanted to make something for me, but we don't have any junk food in the house. So he made me Secret Beef Stew. What was in it? I don't know it is a secret, but it was sweet and tasty!

Indian Takeaway

Last night we treated our self to an Indian takeaway. Were did we order from? Me.
I made Ginger Beef which I saw on This Morning and Baingan Bhurta from Show me the Curry.

I made small changes to both recipes. The beef was should have been lamb and I added some tomatoes for a richer colour. The Baingan Bhurta calls for pea, but I used soy beans. Both dishes where tasty and we didn't have to pay for delivery!

Yogurt Drink (Dour)

I had this yogurt drink (Dour) a few weeks ago at the Iranian restaurant I wrote about. Once back home we started making this a few time a week. If you like salty yogurt than this is the drink for you!
1/2 cup plan think Greek yogurt (or use 1 cup plan yogurt)
1/2 tsp salt
stir in 2 cups of water little by little. The drink should look like milk. Add some ice and drink up!

Desert Island Zucchini Muffins

What would you cook on a Deserted Island? These Zucchini Muffins!

Pre-heat the oven to 175c.

2 big bowls.

Mix the dry bowl:
3cups self rising flour (can use 1 cup whole wheat)
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
dash clove
1 cup chopped walnuts
1/2 cup unsweetened flaked coconut (lower sugar if using sweetened)
salt

Mix the wet bowl:
1 zucchini shredded (about 2-3 cups)
2 eggs
1/2 cup brown sugar
3/4 cup sugar
3/4 cups oil
zest of one orange and lemon

Mix the wet into the dry. Fill muffins and bake for 30 min.

These where so so so good! I guess because I put oil and sugar in them! Next time I'll try with banana.

Khoresht-e Loobia-Sabz (Green Bean Stew)

Green Beans for a wedding gift??? Thank you Me-hall-ah! ( I also got some chicken) I made a one pot Green Bean Stew: Khoresht-e Loobia-Sabz.

Brown in a pot:
2 Onions
2 Chicken Legs/ parts

Add:
1 cup tomato puree
1 dried lime cut in half
water to cover
Salt

Bring to a boil and then lower the heat. Let simmer until most of the liquid is gone about 40 min.
Add 1 cup chopped green beans 5 mins before your ready to eat.

Rich and sour. I think this is a great dish for someone who wants to try Iranian food. Enjoy with rice.