Posts Tagged ‘main course’

Cream of celeriac soup and salad of grilled radicchio, pear and blue cheese

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December 31st, 2009

Soup and salad is my go-to simple meal for nights when I don’t feel like cooking anything but still want to eat something relatively healthy. But I love it so much that I sometimes fancy it up a bit. While today’s version totally defeats the purpose of the original concept (since it’s neither “easy” nor particularly “cheap”), it’s totally worth the effort.

This soup is a hearty, seasonal soup. It’s pretty simple to make, and freezes well. It’s a bit sweet, a little creamy, with a slightly nutty flavor from the celeriac. The salad, on the other hand, is a bit on the fancy side. The bitter radicchio is grilled on a griddle pan, and is topped with slices of pear, crumbled blue cheese, and caramelized pecans. While they don’t need to be served together per se, they compliment each other very nicely. (more…)

Canneloni redux: grilled pepper, eggplant and mascarpone filling

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December 31st, 2009

Hello Chompers!

Remember those hand-rolled canneloni I made a while ago? I liked them a lot, so I experimented with a different filling. This time, I used eggplant for the center filling and grilled red peppers and mascarpone for the outer filling. The canneloni were baked in a batch of D.I.Y. tomato sauce made with cherry tomatoes and a few dried chili peppers for spice. (more…)

Poll winner: Boeuf Bourguignon – my style!

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December 31st, 2009

While I promised you all this recipe a long time ago, I am only just now am getting around to posting the recipe. I actually have a massive backlog of recipes to post, but this poll winner gets top priority!

I’ve spent quite some time working on this recipe, and I really hope you like it! I’ve gotta say: while it involves a little work and a lot of time, boeuf bourguignon is the perfect comfort food for cold wintery nights. And it’s nearly impossible to have too many leftovers. Below the recipe I’ll explain how to turn boeuf bourguignon into little pies!

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Spiced carrot-lentil soup

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November 26th, 2009

It’s soup season, so of course I’ve been making SOUP! This recipe resulted from a previous cooking endeavor that only used one carrot out of a whole bunch, and a half packet of red lentils that had been glaring at me sadly from the cupboard. As the carrots wilted and the lentils moped, I said “ENOUGH ALREADY!” And then I blitzed them all into a quick, hearty soup.

I am really proud of my soup, as I’ve always hated the bland, overly sweet flavor of many carrot soups. This one, instead, is zingy, zippy, zesty and all kinds of good things that start with z. It is also nutrient dense, without becoming something you eat only because it’s supposed to be healthy. It’s a filling soup without being to heavy, with light flavors that can be spiced up or mellowed down to your own taste.

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Belgian endives with ham & cheese

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November 26th, 2009

I know I’m suppose to get cracking on that Boeuf Bourguignon I promised you, but the budget’s been tight and time is not on my side, so lately my cooking has been characterized by either “cheap” or “quick” or both.

Which brings me to Belgian endives. Damn, I love those things, and they are cheap as what-have-you ate the moment. I know lots of people are terrified of them, and many think they are very bitter. But with the bitter cores removed and combined with a luscious, cheesy sauce, they are delicious.

This recipe for Belgian endives with ham & cheese is my version of a Dutch staple. It was one of my favorites when I was a kid. I updated it by reducing the béchamel and cheese and using fancier ham. Despite this being an oven baked dish, it’s really quick and super easy. And, not unimportantly, it’s CHEAP!

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Spinach and ricotta risotto

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October 16th, 2009

I just realized that it must seem like I only cook Italian-style food, which isn’t the case. I guess I’ve just been on a bit of an Italian food kick lately. Also, I’ve gotta say that Italian-style cooking is really adaptable, which is great for using up leftover vegetables and such.

This risotto was the result of a huge bag of spinach left in the fridge, some leftover ricotta, something I read somewhere in some magazine, and the fact that I’m not totally crazy about pasta. It’s a simple risotto, much lighter than the usual kinds, and full of zing from the chili peppers and lemon zest. (more…)

Gambas with aïoli

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October 12th, 2009

One of the (many) reasons I will never regret moving to Amsterdam is the markets. My favorite Saturday activity is to wander around the Noorder-, Nieuw- or Albert Cuijp market, and decide my culinary weekend around what I find there. Last Saturday the prawns were looking exceptionally tempting, and the price was right.

I don’t eat prawns that often, because I can never be satisfied with 4 or 5 measly prawns. If I’m going to eat prawns, I want to be able to eat the HELL out of them. That’s why the portions on this recipe are rather generous. I’m also a prawn purist, so I don’t add too many ingredients. I do love some nice aïoli with prawns, so I added a recipe for that as well.

And of course I suck the head. It’s the best part!

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Canneloni with spinach and mushrooms

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October 10th, 2009

Convenience foods are not for me, obviously. Why make things easy if you can make them unnecessarily complicated? If I had my way, I would actually roll my own pasta, make my own ricotta, and grow my own vegetables. Sadly, the circumstances of my life  (such as, you know, people at work insisting that I actually produce something that isn’t edible) are kind of prohibitive.

In order to fulfill my need for D.I.Y cooking endeavors, I made these canneloni. And while I kept dreaming about owning a pasta machine, a goat farm, and a flourishing allotment full of home-grown spinach leaves, I had lots of fun AND produced a meal that elicited clearly audible CHOMPS! (more…)

Grilled eggplant with basil and mozzarella

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October 10th, 2009

This is one of my favorite quick meals. It takes no more than half an hour (depending on how you tackle the tomato sauce issue), but is still fresh and, not unimportantly, beautiful! It also works well as an hors d’oeuvre, if you cut the eggplant slices in half and offer toothpicks on the side, or as a pretty starter for a small crowd. But I usually want to just scoop it all into my maul as soon as it comes out of the oven…

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Roast chicken

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October 6th, 2009

As you may have noticed, I’m a big fan of simple, rustic foods. I really believe that the best food doesn’t result from mixing lots of complicated flavors or using complicated techniques. That is not to say that it isn’t warranted sometimes to go all out. I enjoy being surprised by the culinary artistry of great chefs. I have been thoroughly tickled by little dainty towers of beetroot crisps and home-smoked trout, by the molecular magic of fried ice cream with melon caviar, and I love a complex sauce as much as the next person.

But let’s face it: I’m a home cook. A competent one, no doubt, but I’m no chef and I won’t pretend that I am. So what do I do when I want to impress with a dinner? I turn to a chef for a really good, unpretentious recipe. And this is one of those recipes. (more…)