Lazy Moussaka

Moussaka is one of those things I've never bothered to make before because it seems too complicated and time consuming, like lasagne. But, also like lasagne, I really enjoy eating it, so after having some delicious moussaka on holiday with friends recently, I asked for the recipe. It's easy, said the friend who'd made it, it's a Delia recipe....

Which she duly sent over to me. Alas, Delia,  the first part of the recipe involved an inordinate amount of faffing about with aubergines and salt, so at that point I lost interest and decided to find an easier recipe to follow. And here's what you do:

Get your aubergine and prick with a fork. Which always reminds me of this ;-)

But anyway, once you've had a little chuckle, stick the aubergine in the microwave for 2 or 3 minutes til it goes soft. Meanwhile, fry off some mince, lamb is nice but beef will do) bit of tomato purée (or ketchup works just as well) and a tin of chopped tomatoes (you can get them with herbs and garlic already added for extra laziness) and season (adding cinnamon is traditional). Slosh in some red wine (no idea if that's traditional but it's required in this house)...... then shove that into your ovenproof dish, slice the soggy aubergine up (use a serrated knife!) and layer on top and finally top with a mix of yoghurt or crème fraiche, an egg and some grated cheese (strong Cheddar or Parmesan), I added a pinch of nutmeg just to be exotic. And some Tabasco to the mince......

Cook in oven til brownish on top. Eat with garlic bread (Lidl do a nice pack of sliced garlic toast) and Greek salad so you can watch one of your kids refuse to touch it and the other one pick out all the olives and tomatoes.

Apologies to anyone of Greek extraction who knows how to make a proper Moussaka. This one tastes just fine to us :-)

Hearty beef stew for monster slayers.....

Last weekend I went to collect the other half after he'd been away all week LARPing (if you were wondering, the full Wikipedia explanation of this is here but it's basically grown men and women dressing up in fantasy costumes running about in the woods waving rubber weapons) and the nice lady who'd been doing the catering had 3kgs of diced beef left over from feeding the ravening hordes that needed a home. Being confirmed carnivores, we generously offered to take it off her hands. Then I wondered what the hell to do with it......

Answer? Cook it for ages. And ages. And ages.....

I did actually fry it off in batches first, bit faffy and you can probably skip that if you like, then it went into a couple of casseroles (3 kilos is a LOT, you probably won't need that much, unless you happen to be feeding a tribe of half orcs I guess) with some roughly chopped carrots and onions, a bit of dried thyme and seasoning, and a couple of tins of chopped tomatoes.

Then I just cooked it, on a fairly low heat, for hours. Checked it every now and then and added a bit of water if necessary (a slow cooker would be the best way to do it, if I actually had one) until the meat was lovely and falling-to-bits tender. Then I chopped some butternut squash to go on top, you could use sweet potato or good old spuds instead, and cooked it some more.

It was excellent :-)

Oh and if anyone is wondering what the OH looks like in his LARPing gear, he's the one on the left of this photo wearing the very fetching headband ;-)

Kiki's Quickie Quiche

This is a brilliantly simple recipe from my mate Sheila. Well, originally from her French neighbour I believe (hence the name). I once made a "proper" quiche years ago with all that blind baking malarkey and it was way too much faff, so this is the first time I have been inspired to make one since!

You need a ready-made round supermarket pastry: pate feuilleté pur beurre (puff pastry); put in 30 cm tin with the paper still on; prick the base with a fork.

Mix 6 eggs with enough creme fraiche to come to about 500 ml on measuring jug; add a packet of grated Comté or Gruyere (or cheese of your choice, I use old Gouda usually, would also be good with a mature cheddar) saving some for on top; spread a packet of lardons fumés (chopped up smoked bacon for mu UK readers) on the base and pour over the egg mix; add pepper but the bacon usually is salty enough; bake in oven at about 200°C for about 40 mins until puffy and golden.

Easy, eh? Being me I chucked in some chopped chilies to the mix :-)

I have since made it with tuna instead of lardons ( when a fluffy bunny vegetarian came to lunch) which is possibly even nicer.....

Chilli feta

Saw this recipe on the telly the other day, from one of the few chefs I can bear to watch, Nigel Slater. He doesn't ponce about doing complicated stuff, he does simple and quick.

And this is both. Chop up some spring onions and as many fresh chillies as you dare, fry them in a bit of oil for a couple of minutes with some garlic and a bit of fresh thyme, then add a piece of feta cheese and fry on both sides til it starts to melt. Put it on a plate, sprinkle on chopped fresh coriander and eat with some nice crusty bread.

Brilliant :-)

Chocolate Black Bean Cake

Our friends Guy and Sarah came round with some of this cake the other day. Chocolate cake with a hint of orange flavour. How complicated is that, I wondered, and it turns out it isn't complicated at all.......not even finding the black beans (in Leclerc, next to the white beans and red beans of course)

So the ingredients are:

100g sugar
normal sized tin of black beans (drained)
3 eggs
3 heaped tablespoons of cocoa powder
1 teaspoon of instant coffee
half a vanilla pod, scraped
1 teaspoon of baking powder
juice & zest from half an orange
pinch of salt

You just stick them all in a blender, whizz it up til it's smooth, pour it into a cake tin then break up 50g of 70% dark chocolate and spread it across the top of the cake mixture. Bake at 175 degrees C for about 35 minutes. Easy peasy. And very delicious, and in this house it has disappeared rather rapidly, I wasn't even quick enough to get a photo of it in one piece!!

(Chilli) Chowder

So after having to make carrot soup three times as Éowyn has been eating it non stop for two days, I decided to try and come up with something different. That doesn't contain carrots......

So I fried up some leeks and bits of bacon (I managed to find some proper British bacon in the freezer, but I guess those lardon thingies they have over here would do just as well), added a load of chicken stock, put in a couple of chopped spuds and peppers (Éowyn likes chopping peppers for some reason so that bit was very easy for me), salt & pepper and a few sneaky chilli flakes when no one was looking. Left it to boil along merrily for 20 minutes or so, then added a tin of sweetcorn to heat through and there you go.

Bluddy loverly, even if I do say so myself......

Carrot soup

At school, Éowyn often eats carrot soup. Apparently it's her favourite. She keeps on at me to make her some like she's mistaken me for some kind of domestic goddess or something....

Anyway, today, as she's at home due to the teachers being on strike (again) and as she actually helped me with the poo picking (!) I told her we could have carrot soup for lunch. Turns out it's pretty easy really.

Chop an onion or two, fry for 5 mins in oil, peel a decent sized spud (or even better, get a small child to do it for you), chop and add to pan, stick in a spoonful of ground coriander and stir a bit. Then add 5 or 6 peeled (preferably by said small child) and sliced carrots, bit of salt and pepper and a litre or so of chicken or veg stock.

Then leave it to cook til the veg is soft, chuck in a handful of fresh coriander and whizz it all up (small child enjoys this bit but tends to make a mess)

Easy. And very tasty, especially with a few chili flakes added ;-)

Hammy Eggy Peas......

A friend of mine recently put this recipe on Pinterest. Think it came from The Guardian. Obviously it had a slightly better title but it was in Spanish so I have translated freely.......anyway, decided to try it out tonight as it claimed to be quick and easy, and it was, pretty much.

You chop up a couple of shallots and some garlic (you all know I didn't use real garlic as it's far too much faff, the nice ready minced garlic they sell in Eurasie is so much easier) and fry them for a bit in some olive oil. Then you add a cup of chicken stock, (recipe said homemade, I said pass the Oxo) and a load of peas and leave it to simmer for a while til the stock has reduced.

Then in goes a bit of salt and pepper and some shredded Serrano ham (I used Jambon de Bayonne as someone gave us an entire leg of the stuff a while back and it's been a bit of a challenge to come up with ways to use it all up, frankly. There's a helluva lot of ham on a pig's leg). The best bit is you crack an egg or two on the top then just cover the pan until the eggs are cooked.

Easy and yummy, just eat with some nice crusty bread or something.  Reckon it'd be good with chorizo instead of ham too.

Macaroni Merguez

Just made this up, had some leftover Merguez sausages in the fridge, fried up an onion, chopped the sausages up and chucked them in the pan, added some smoked lardons (that's little bits of chopped up bacon to the non French speakers), fried it for a while, then added a tin of chick peas, a couple of tins of chopped tomatoes and a splash of Worcestershire sauce. Served with macaroni as that's what we had in the cupboard, the kids (and the big kid I married) gave it the thumbs up.

Obviously I sprinkled some crushed chillies on my portion :-)

Winter warmer....

It must be cold.....I felt compelled to make soup. Well it is cold, -15 C last night.......so I dug out the pumpkin from the freezer my neighbour gave me back in the autumn before south west France became an arctic wasteland.......and made this:

Obviously it wasn't complicated. Chop an onion, fry it in lovely sinful butter for a bit, then add a pint or so of veg or chicken stock (oxo, naturally), a couple of chopped carrots (had to defrost them from the horses' supply in the barn) and some chopped pumpkin. Then leave it to simmer til the veggies are soft, add seasoning of your choice, I used ginger and chilli but nutmeg or cinammon go just as well, bit of salt and pepper and whizz it up til it's smoothish. Naturally I have one of those hand held things you stick straight in the pan to blend it, less washing up afterwards!

Really nice with a bit of fresh baguette.......

Potatocornia.....

Gosh, haven't posted for nearly a year, how remiss of me. Not that I haven't been cooking, of course, just that being lazy I make the same stuff. A lot......

Anyway, this is a bit of an experiment that turned out rather well. Chop an onion and fry it, add some lardons. These are basically bits of bacon that come ready chopped up into small strips here and it makes life very easy.

Another thing that makes life easy are the pre cooked, pre diced potatoes you can get vacuum packed. So open a packet of those and chuck it in the pan. Along with some sweetcorn, tinned or frozen will do nicely. Then all you have to do is stir in some thick cream or crème fraîche and add lots of black pepper, the lardons are usually salty enough so you don't have to add more. And if you're me, you add some dried chilli flakes too.....

Et voilà:

Aliénor came up with the title. It's one of her favourites.......

Thai inspired stir fry

Just got back from a fabulous holiday in Thailand. The food was incredible, cheap and everywhere, day and night.....

....the ultimate destination for the lazy cook!!
But sadly, I live in France, where they don't really do takeaway except for Macdo....so I have to try and make it myself. Have a fabulous book full of Thai recipes, trouble is they're very faffy so not suitable for inclusion here.

But here's something Thai-ish that I made up for my dinner earlier:

Chop some shallots and lemongrass, fry. Add some chopped chicken. Then add chillies (of course!), fish sauce, ginger, lime juice, bit of sugar, chopped mushrooms. Stir fry til cooked, serve with rice or noodles, add coriander to taste.

I didn't go mad with the chillies and even the kids ate some!

Duck au curry......

Just invented a delicious curry, using what I had in the cupboard, namely a tin of duck confit. We may not be able to get decent supplies of chilies and coriander out here, but there's more tinned duck products than you know what to do with in south west France.

So I put my tinned duck legs in the pan and fried them for a bit. They are really fatty, so I drained the fat off a few times as they fried, never throw this stuff away, keep it in the fridge and use it to roast spuds in, it's delicious!

In a seperate pan I fried up sliced onions and peppers in a bit of oil so you get that nice charred flavour, the duck is too fatty to fry all the stuff together really (I know, TWO pans, extra washing up, sorry!!)

Then I removed the bones and skin from the confit which had kind of dismantled itself anyway during cooking so not as faffy as it sounds. Drained off the fat yet again and added a large dollop of my trusty favourite curry paste, I used the hot stuff but I'm sure it'll be just as good for those of you who are chilli wusses and have to use mild curry paste ;-)

Then in go the onions and peppers and a tin of chopped tomatoes, and voila, curried confit. Leave it to simmer for ages, stir occasionally, add water if necessary,

Really Easy Cheesecake

A recipe from my friend Marie, she said it was easy and she was right......

Get a packet of ginger biscuits, crush them up. Remove small child from kitchen having a tantrum because she wanted to eat the biscuits. Melt some butter, mix with biscuits, press into cheesecake tin, chill.

Whisk up tub of Marscapone and tin of condensed milk (which I have managed to find in France, hurray!!) with juice & zest of some lemons or limes for a good 4 minutes. Apparently if you don't do this for long enough, it won't work. Not being prepared to take that chance, I whisked it for ages........

Pour into tin, chill

And that's it. Chuck on some chocolate curls if you're feeling really extravagent - we didn't have any chocolate :-(

My dinner guests loved it, the kids ate 2 lots each, I finished what was left for breakfast the next day, fantastic.

Trifling Trifle

I've never even attempted to make trifle before as it's one of those desserts that seem to have far too many things in it. However, last month I got roped into helping a friend make 170 of them for an English meal we were doing for the locals, and I realised quite a bit of cheating can be done.

So you need:

Sponge fingers (they call them boudoirs over here for some reason)
Jelly
Carton of Ambrosia ready made custard (to be found in the "Exotic Foreign Food" section of the supermarket over here along with such delights as Marmite and lemon curd)
Tin of mixed fruit cocktail
Tub of thick cream (best substitute over here is Marscapone mixed with single cream, the French just can't do proper cream)
Hundreds & thousands

Break up the sponge fingers, put them in the bottom of the bowl, chuck in the mixed fruit cocktail, make the jelly up (this usually involves pouring over boiling water and stirring, not too arduous), pour it over and leave to set in the fridge. Then pour over the custard, leave in the fridge a bit longer, then add a layer of cream and top off with hundreds and thousands to keep the kids happy. Or if it isn't for the kids, don't forget to chuck sherry over the sponge fingers before you add the rest.

Easy! And the French seem to love the stuff and think it's incredibly difficult to make so you can pretend to them that it was......

Easy fajitas

This is something I make all the time. Just made it this evening as I found out the French student staying with us loves them. It's really easy.......

Get some chicken breasts, cut them into strips. Also cut a couple of onions and peppers into strips, (even better, get someone who really likes fajitas to do all the chopping for you) chuck them into a wok or frying pan with some olive oil, lemon juice, dried oregano and chilli flakes or some of that very lazy chilli stuff they sell in jars for people like me.

Mix together. Fry. Stir occasionally.

Serve with tortillas, grated cheese, creme fraiche or sour cream and salsa (from a jar, obviously)

Job done!

Sphagetti a la Carbonara

Just made a recipe for spaghetti a la carbonara sent to me recently. Never actually made this before, I mean, you can get it in jars, right? Still it looked easy enough, although separating an egg comes close to triggering the faffometer. Still, here's the recipe:

"Ingredients:

spaghetti
cream (I use a 20cl carton of semi épaisse)
shredded ham (instead of using bacon bits or having to chop the ham yourself!)
parmesan (ready grated)
salt & pepper to taste
1 egg yolk

Whilst cooking the spaghetti, heat the cream gently in a pan, then add the shredded ham and the parmesan and salt & pepper if needed. Drain the spaghetti and serve on to plates. At the last minute add the egg yolk to the cream mixture, blend in and serve over pasta.

This is for two people.

It's really quick and doesn't involve frying bacon and what not."

Well, it was really quick, didn't have parmesan but used emmental instead, and allumettes de jambon (that's diced ham to you and me). Fed it to the kids for tea and the verdict was "better than the stuff you get in the jar".
 

Reckon it'd be really good with a nice mature cheddar too.... if only it were readily available over here for anything less than an extortionate price *sigh*

Ersatz Italian Sausage Primavera

Was given this recipe:

"Ersatz Italian Sausage Primavera"


I love Italian sausage simmered in a yummy tomato sauce, loaded with veggies & served over pasta or polenta or mashed potatoes or any other starchy side dish. I've never actually found real Italian sausage in France, so any French sausage will do nicely (Toulouse, garlic, chipolata, even merguez). This is SUPER EASY - I like the polenta with it (1 minute polenta is readily available). It's a great way to throw in those healthy veggies, esp. for kids!
Ingredients :

Any sausage
olive oil
bottled pasta sauce
garlic powder
dried basil and/or oregano
bit of sugar
BALSAMIC VINEGAR (a must!)
frozen or fresh, cut-up veggies of your choice (leftovers are fine)
mushrooms (fresh or frozen), optional
red chili pepper flakes, optional (for those who like it fired up)

Drizzle olive oil into a somewhat deep frying pan w/lid (I like using the non-stick type). Heat & put in ALL ingredients together. Add a bit of water, as well - this should be nice & saucy. Seasoning is to taste - the addition of the sugar & balsamic vinegar will give it a rich, slightly sweet & tangy taste. I like to add the extra garlic & herbs, too, to jazz up the bottled sauce. You could use red wine, instead of the vinegar, but save that for drinking!!

Simmer for @ 45 min. minimum, even longer on a very low flame. Stir occasionally. That's it! Serve with pasta, naturally, or polenta, or any other starch. You could also add chunks of potato to the cooking sauce  then you'll have a true one-pot meal!

Made it with those yummy little herby sausages they do in Lidl but I bet it'd be brilliant with proper British sausages like you can't get here *sigh*. Chucked in some lardons (that's small bits of bacon to us Brits) I found in the freezer too. Having no idea what Polenta is (check it out on Wiki here if you're as ignorant as me) I did it with what my youngest calls "spiral pastas" and the kids hoovered it up, broccoli, carrots and all! Very easy, very tasty. Nuff said.

Oh, never heard of "Primavera" either but I have an excuse for that, apparently it's an American thing. More info here.

Cuban Roast Chicken

I'm on a roll now, people keep sending me recipes so I guess I'd better get my finger out and actually blog some of them......

So next up, this one:

That Med Lemon Chicken recipe sounds delicious - I do chicken with citrus lots of times. Another variation for you to try, esp if you like ethnic-easy - and exotic for France - is this CUBAN roast chicken :


Prepare EXACTLY as your friend's recipe, except leave out potatoes & herbes de provence. Instead of straight lemon juice, use a combination of lemon, orange, & lime juice (or buy the 100% citrus juice melange from Lidl, dirt cheap), salt & pepper, sliced onions or dried onion, & LOADS of garlic (however you prefer, fresh cloves or powdered). Roast as you normally would, allowing to brown & crisp at end.

Serve with plain steamed rice (easiest way you can make it) & a bowl of hot, canned black beans (if you can't find canned black beans, then pink or red or white would do). Also, you can quickly saute big chunks of bananas till slightly crisp & serve all together. A typical Cuban spread!!!!!

And it was bloody delicious!! Had to go and cook it chez les guinea pigs due to my oven cooking slower than just leaving the food out in the sun would have done. Used actaul oranges, lemons and limes instead of juice as we happened to have a load lying around after a recent cocktail party, like you do......as for the sauted bananas, they went really sweet, it's a great combination. Nothing was left except bones and citrus rinds, which went into the composter, got eaten by the dog and sicked up the next day (you probably didn't need to know that though......)

Roast duck with cherries

Next up, this rather good duck recipe:

Ok, here's a fab & EASY recipe for roasting duck legs (or, you could certainly use cut up chicken, if duck isn't available). I think pork could also be done this way - why not?


You'll need : a roasting pan w/cover or just use aluminum foil


duck legs (or chicken pieces) - leave skin on


salt & pepper to taste


garlic powder, onion powder or flakes


herbes de provence


1 bottle (or can) of dark cherries in their own juice (I buy these at Lidl - very cheap & perfect for this recipe). Attention : You will absolutely need the cherry liquid!



Preheat oven to 230 C. Place duck legs in roasting pan. Sprinkle with all the seasonings (I don't use precise measurements either - use your own judgement). Pour over the cherry liquid from bottle or tin - keep cherries. Roast covered for @ 1 1/2 hrs, basting a few times (here again, you can test for doneness yourself). Add cherries for the last 1/2 hr. of roasting, & uncover, as well, so skin gets nice & crisp.


That's it!!! So easy & really delicious. Goes beautifully with rice or plain buttered noodles, or whatever!

I made it using a tin of confit de canard and chucked in some spuds to cook in the duck fat to avoid having to cook rice or noodles separately, and it was delicious! Once again, my guinea pigs descended like a plague of locusts and all that was left were a few bare bones.......