Braised sweet potato or squash

It’s the season for them, so here’s a simple way of jazzing up cucurbits or other starchy veg.  The slower cooking and the addition of oil, garlic and herbs really enhances the flavour of these autumn staples.

Serves two to three as a side dish. 

1 medium butternut squash or a quarter of a large pumpkin, or 2 large sweet potatoes, peeled and thinly sliced

2-3 cloves garlic, crushed or thinly sliced

Veg oil

A little stock

1 tsp mixed dried herbs or 1 tbsp chopped fresh mixed herbs

1 tbsp mixed seeds or 1 tbsp tahini as a topping

Very simple; pour a little oil into a large saucepan with a lid, heat gently and add the sliced sweet potato or squash, laying the pieces flat in layers.  Strew garlic and herbs between the layers and over the top, then pour on just enough stock to come round the edges, and simmer for 10-15 minutes or until the veg pieces are cooked and tender.  Keep an eye to make sure the pan doesn’t cook dry.  Serve hot with mixed seeds sprinkled over or a spoonful of tahini on top.

Braised veg with apple

We have an apple glut at the moment.  My landlady's garden is home to a tall apple tree and this year the crop is tremendous.  Every morning there are windfalls on the lawn, and we're both hunting for ways to use them up. 
A lot of chutney has been made, and blackberry and apple jam - I'll post some recipes for those shortly - and apple cake.  And tonight I invented this.
It's a kind of spin on the classic way of cooking red cabbage, but with different cruciferae (because this was what I had in the fridge) and more apple than usual.  This would serve two as a main veg dish alongside something like vege-bangers, pan-fried halloumi or grilled fish.

2-3 windfall eating apples, cored but not peeled, and chopped
1/2 a head of broccoli, chopped
1/4 of a white cabbage, thinly sliced
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/4 pt vegetable stock
Paprika and black pepper

Cook the broccoli in the stock for 5 minutes, then add the chopped apples, cook for a couple more minutes and then add the cabbage, garlic and seasonings.  Stir frequently and cook until the apple has gone to a mush and the cabbage is cooked through.  Serve hot.

Apricot, ginger and walnut buns

These were thrown together in a hurry, using my good friend the Muffin Method, which is why the ingredients are only in cups.  I'm really pleased with how well they turned out.  However I should mention that they're not as healthy as my usual cake recipes, because there's a small amount of real actual added sugar in them.  Shock horror.  I was using up a small amount of crystalised ginger, and even though I rinsed off the outer coating of sugar crystals, the crystalisation process itself has infused a lot of sugar into the ginger, and a quick rinse isn't going to get rid of that.  But by damn, crystalised ginger is sooo good! 

Not the best photo of food I've ever taken; the camera is more interested in my tea mug than the bun...

1 1/2 cups No 1 Baking Mix
1/4 cup broken walnut pieces
1/4 cup chopped soft dried apricots
1/4 cup chopped crystalised ginger (with the sugar rinsed off if you are trying to minimise the carb hit)
1 tsp xylitol
2 tsp baking powder
2 tsp cinnamon
2 tsp ground ginger
2 eggs
1 tblsp vegetable oil
1/4 cup water
Mixed seeds (e.g. pumpkin, sunflower and sesame) for a topping, if you like

Seive the baking powder and spices into the baking mix, add the xylitol and the nuts and dried fruit and stir all together.  Add the eggs and oil and enough water to make a soft but firm consistency.  Spoon into greased bun tins or muffin cups - it made seven medium-sized ones for me - and sprinkle with mixed seeds if you like a crunchy topping.  Bake at 150 degrees C (fan) for 25 - 30 minutes.

No-added-sugar rich fruit cake

I've been meaning to post this for ages, in fact since Christmas...

This is adapted from my mother’s family Christmas cake recipe, switching the fruits for less-sugary ones (so, for example, no candied peel) and removing all added sugar.  It made a lighter cake than usual but one with a really good fruity flavour and fantastic golden colour.  It kept well and still tasted good after a week.  Unlike a conventional Christmas cake, though, I don’t think it would respond well to being made a month in advance.

4oz/100g blanched whole almonds, chopped

4oz/100g raisins

8oz/200g dried apricots, chopped

2oz/50g dried mango, thinly sliced

2oz/50g dried cherries

Juice of 1 large lemon

1 tea bag, made into tea (can be herbal or normal tea, but NB no milk! I used a spicy rooibos blend)

4oz butter

4 tsp xylitol

3 large eggs

2 tsp vanilla essence

4 tsp ground mixed spice

4 heaped tsp baking powder, sieved

2 cups No 1 baking mix

Whole blanched almonds, whole walnuts or pecans and whole dried apricots to decorate

Soak raisins and apricots in tea, and dried mango in lemon juice, for at least a couple of hours.  Cream butter and xylitol together and beat in the eggs one by one along with the vanilla.  Drain the soaked fruit, reserving some of the remaining liquid, and stir the soaked fruit, the cherries and the chopped almonds into the mixture, then gradually stir in the baking mix, spice and baking powder, adding some of the fruit soaking liquid if necessary to get a soft, dropping consistency.  Line a medium-sized, fairly deep cake tin with greaseproof paper or baking parchment and spoon the mixture in, level it off and decorate the top with a pattern of nuts and dried fruit.  Bake at 150 degrees C (fan oven) for 45 minutes to 1 hour.  Test with a skewer or narrow knife blade; when the blade comes out clean it’s done.  Remove and cool for 20-30 minutes in the tin before turning out onto a cake rack.

Sesame-chilli cornbread

One of the problems with having coeliac friends is getting hooked on cornbread; it's wonderful stuff but recipes tend to have a fairly high GI.  This is one of the better reduced GI versions I've come up with so far.

1 cup/5oz/125g fine cornmeal

½ cup/2oz/50g No 1 baking mix

1/3 cup/ 2oz/50g sesame seeds, plus 1 tsp

3 tsp baking powder

1 tsp chilli powder

Pinch of salt

1 medium egg

2 dsstsp vegetable oil

½ cup water

A tsp or two of milk

Grind about half the sesame seeds roughly in a mortar or in very quick bursts in a blender.  Mix the ground and whole sesame seeds, sieved cornmeal, baking mix, baking powder, salt and chilli powder in a bowl and stir in the egg and oil and enough water to make a stiff mixture that will hold its shape.  Turn out onto a sheet of baking parchment on a baking tray and shape into a neat rounded mound.  Brush the top with a small amount of milk and sprinkle with the reserved 1 tsp of sesame seeds.  

Bake at 150C fan oven or the equivalent for 20-25 minutes or until it sounds hollow when tapped on the bottom.  Serve fresh with butter, hummus or guacamole; also makes good toast when it's a day or two old.  But be careful when cutting as it's pretty crumbly - delicious, but short!

Broccoli with cashews

A really simple quick steam-fried dish using green veg, with a good amount of protein from the nuts.  This would also work with cauliflower florets, spring greens or savoy cabbage - personally I'm not a big kale fan but I'm sure that would be okay too!  Vegan and gluten-free, but (obviously) not nut-free.  Good as a veggie side dish with dhal and rice, or on its own; any leftovers are equally good cold served as a mildly spicey salad or rolled in a flatbread with some cooked tofu or quorn or pan-fried halloumi cheese.

For two as a light main dish or four as a side

One medium head of broccoli, broken into fairly small florets
1 cup whole or broken cashew nuts
1 small onion, finely sliced
6-8 cloves garlic, finely chopped or crushed
Veg oil
2-3 tsp garam masala
1 tsp paprika
Juice of a lemon
Tamari soy sauce
Water

In a large wide frying pan, heat the oil and fry the onions on a medium heat until softened and just starting to catch a little; add the garlic, cook for another minute or so and then add all the broccoli.  Stir thoroughly to mix and raise the heat slightly, cook four to five minutes, stirring frequently.  Add the cashews and the spices and stir through; cook a few minutes more, stirring constantly; don't allow the cashews to burn (a bit of colour is okay but no more).  Add the lemon juice - it should hiss and give off a fair amount of steam - and continue to stir; when that has evaporated, add the tamari and a little water and continue to stir.  Continue stirring and adding small amounts of water (approx 1 tbsp at a time) until the veggies are cooked but not gone mushy.  There should be just a little liquid left at the end.

Banana tahini slices

You can buy tahini, the powerful-tasting sesame seed paste used in eastern Mediterranean cookery, in Holland and Barrett and other health food shops and in larger supermarkets.  This started out as a muffin recipe (you’ll notice the method is the same).  But although I liked the taste I felt they were far too doughy.  So today I tried it again as a tray bake and the result is excellent; I got eight fairly thin bars which are crispy on the outside and moist inside, chewy but not stodgy.  The combination of flavours is delicious, faintly reminiscent of sesame halva.

1 large ripe banana

1 egg

1 full tbsp tahini

½ tsp vanilla essence

½ tsp almond essence

1 cup No 1 baking mix

¼ cup sesame seeds

¼ cup raisins

1 heaped tsp baking powder

1 level tsp xylitol

1 level tsp cinnamon

Mix the dry ingredients together and toss through the raisins.  Beat the egg and mash the banana, mix the two together and stir in the tahini and the two flavouring essences.  

 The wet mixture looks pretty horrible - gooey and faintly glaucous - but fear not!   

Beat the wet into the dry mixture, adding a little water if need be to get a soft dropping consistency.  Spoon into a greased and lined baking tray measuring approx 20x20cm, smooth off – it will be quite a thin layer – and bake at 140 degrees C (fan oven) for 30-40 minutes.  Turn out and cool, then cut into bars.

Giant baked beans

If you've ever seen the above - or just "baked beans", or the even more blunt "big beans" - on a translated menu while on holiday in Greece, and you've avoided what sounds like a rather boring item, you've been missing a trick.  Fasolia gigantes, literally giant beans, are one of the joys of Greek cuisine, and they are nothing like our familiar Heinz Baked Beans, nor indeed the Boston Baked Beans those originally derived from.  They're a classic piece of "peasant" cooking; simple, wholesome, gluten and nut-free, and not just vegetarian but vegan; they're also easy to make, very tasty and highly diabetes-friendly.  Beans give a decent amount of vegetable protein and a reasonable amount of low-GI carbohydrate, set-off with plenty of fibre for your digestion. 

 

Giant Baked Beans, or Gigantes Plaki, fresh out of the oven

Unfortunately, I've never found them on sale in this country except as canned or (slightly posher) bottled versions, ready cooked.  These are okay, with a taste evocative of holidays.   But the real thing, cooked at home from the basics, are much better.  These days I bring a bag of dried fasolia gigantes back religiously from holiday each spring, so I can make my own Gigantes Plaki, giant baked beans.

Edited, 28/5/16, to add: I have now discovered at least two companies importing gigantes, hurrah!  here is one of them: https://greekmarket.co.uk/index.php/greek-groceries/greek-beans-grains.html

Gigantes look a bit like butter beans, but butter beans that have been working out; they are thick and beefy-looking, and they have a meaty texture and slightly sweet taste.  They're not the cheapest bean but they're worth the extra money.  If you do buy a bag on holiday and bring them home, try to use them up within 9 or 10 months maximum.  Don't hoard them; I've made this mistake, and found that like any dried pulse they go stale after they've been open for a while, and then won't cook properly.  I wound up throwing the last 1/4 of the bag away and feeling thoroughly cross with myself.

This is one of those dishes where every family which likes them is probably going to have their own variation on the recipe.  I've evolved mine from adopting things that seem to me to work well; it's quite variable so don't be afraid to tweak it to suit, for example, what herbs you've got.  The recipe can also be made with any other good dried beans, of course; borlotti beans are flavoursome enough and so are kidney beans (amend the cooking time if so, as gigantes are surprisingly quick to cook).  But though that will give you a very good simple bean stew, it won't be authentic gigantes.

1/2 lb/ 200-250g dried fasolia gigantes, rinsed, checked for grit and soaked overnight
1 large onion, chopped
Vegetable oil and olive oil
1 can chopped tomatoes
3-4 cloves garlic, sliced finely
1 dessertspoonful dried oregano
1 large carrot, sliced
1 heaped teaspoonful dried dill
1 small bunch fresh parsley, chopped
1 small bunch fennel leaves, chopped
Optional - a couple of handfuls of spinach or a couple of stems of celery, chopped, plus leaves
Black pepper, tomato puree, stock powder, (optional) a little cinnamon

Put the beans in a saucepan, cover with fresh water and bring to the boil.  Boil hard for ten minutes, then simmer for 30-40.  They should still have a bit of solidity at this stage, so don't cook until they are completely soft - they've still got almost an hour of cooking to go.  Slice the onion and fry until golden in a tablespoon or so of ordinary vegetable oil; after 5 minutes or so, add the carrot, garlic and all the dried herbs, some pepper, plus the celery and cinnamon (if using).  Continue cooking for another 5 minutes, then add the tomatoes, a dessertspoon or so of tomato puree and a teaspoon of stock powder, and the fresh herbs.  Simmer for another 5 minutes until thick and rich, add the spinach (if using), stir in and allow to wilt.  Add the beans and a little of their water and stir all together quickly.  Pour into an ovenproof dish or a deep baking tin.  If the beans aren't covered by the sauce, add a bit more of the water.  Pour a slug of olive oil on top and sprinkle with a little more oregano.  Cook in a medium oven (Fan 150 degrees, gas 4 or so) for 45 minutes to an hour.  Serve hot or cold.  This should be enough for two people as a main dish or three to four as a starter or side dish.

More muffins for springtime

A couple of slightly unusual variations on the muffin theme.

Savoury muffins

Because some people don't like sweet stuff!

1 cup/ 100g/ 4 oz No 1 baking mix

1/3 cup/ 25g/ 1 oz oatmeal or gf porridge oats

1/3 cup/ 25g/ 1 oz grated parmesan cheese

1 heaped tsp poppy seed

2 heaped tsp sunflower seed

1 tsp baking powder

Black pepper

10 stoned green olives, chopped

1 egg

Water – at least ½ cup/ 125ml

Stir dry ingredients together thoroughly.  Blend wet ingredients together and stir into dry ingredients, adding more water if needed to make a dropping consistency, then stir the chopped olives through the mixture.  Spoon into a greased muffin pan or similar and bake at 200 degrees C for about 35 minutes.  Makes around 6 muffins.

These keep for about three to four days and are good split and buttered.

Sesame apple muffins

A twist on the usual muffin model with this recipe, as the maize meal goes into the wet ingredients, not the dry ones.  This gives it a kind of pre-soak, and seems to counteract that slightly gritty texture you can get otherwise with cornmeal/polenta products.

The main background picture for this blog is a photo of a tray of these, incidentally.

1 cup/ 4 oz/ 100g No 1 baking mix

1 heaped tsp baking powder

1 heaped tsp xylitol

2 tsp cinnamon

3 tsp sesame seeds for the mixture, plus about the same again to top the muffins

1/3 cup/ 1 ½ oz 45g fine maize meal or fine polenta

1/3 cup cold water

2 heaped tsp tahini

1 small tart apple

½ tsp vanilla essence

1 large or 2 small eggs

1 tbsp vegetable oil

More water – probably about another 1/3 cup

Mix the maize meal with 1/3 cup of water and leave to soak for 10-15 minutes.  Mix together the baking mix, baking powder, xylitol, cinnamon and sesame seeds.  Grate the apple, cored but with the peel still on, and stir into the maize meal and water.  Add the tahini, oil and vanilla and stir thoroughly, then beat the egg and add.  Mix the wet ingredients into the dry and add more water as needed to get a rather wet mixture.  Spoon into muffin cups or a bun tin and top each muffin with ½ a tsp of sesame seeds.  Bake at 150 degrees C for 35 – 40 minutes.  

These are really good cut in half and toasted when they’re a couple of days old.