Mushrooms with pearl barley and basil

Make a vegetable stock by pouring 500ml of boiling water from the kettle over 1 tbsp of dried mushrooms. 

Bring a deep pan of water to the boil then rain in 250g of pearl barley and bring it back to the boil. Lower the heat to a simmer and let it cook for 25-30 minutes till the grains are tender. They should still have a pleasingly chewy quality. Drain and set aside.

Peel and roughly chop a medium-sized onion. 

Warm 4 tbsp of olive oil in a casserole or high-sided frying pan. Stir in the onion and leave to soften over moderate heat with the odd stir. 

After 20-25 minutes it should be pale gold. Peel and crush 2 cloves of garlic and continue cooking for another few minutes.

Finely slice 600g of assorted mushrooms (split them into firm and tender depending on what varieties you are using). 

Add the mushrooms and cover the pan with a lid. 

Cook until the mushrooms are golden, adding a little more oil as necessary. Stir in 1 tbsp of tomato purée, cook for 2 minutes, then stir in 1 heaped tbsp of plain flour.

Add the dried mushrooms and their soaking water and bring to the boil then lower the heat, season with salt, black pepper and ½ tsp of dried chilli flakes.

Stir in the cooked barley and continue cooking for 7-8 minutes. Tear up a handful of basil leaves. Add the basil and any fragile mushrooms you kept to one side. Squeeze the juice from half a lemon and stir in, a little at a time, tasting as you go. 

Serve in shallow bowls. 

Enough for 4

 Dried porcini are expensive but you can buy bags of mixed dried mushrooms – often broken pieces – at a reasonable price. Their deep umami goes a long way; you only need 1 tbsp of dried mushrooms to give you 500ml of rich, bosky stock.

 Wheat berries would be an interesting substitute for the barley, but take longer to cook – about 40 minutes.

Nigel Slater’s recipe for mushrooms with pearl barley and basil | Food | The Guardian

Хачапури

🔸175 гр мука
🔹115 гр вода🔸1 ч.ложка дрожжи
🔹0.5 ч.ложки сахар
🔸4 ч.ложки подсолнечное масло
🔹185 гр сулугуни
🔸185 гр имеретинский сыр
🔹1 яйцо
Имеретинский или Адыгейский сыр. 

Или несоленный сыр: рикотта или моцарелла

Тесто: в 115 гр воды смешать 1 чайную ложку дрожжей ,пол чайной ложки сахара и 2 чайных ложки растительного масла.
Влить в 175 го муки, перемешать и добавить ещё 2 чайных ложки растительного масла.
Замесить тесто(плотно не вымешиваем).
Убрать в теплое место на 30-40 мин.( Увеличится в два раза).
Сыр имеретинский и сулугуни ( один к одному с тестом,если делаете мегрельски 70 гр чтоб выложить сверху) натереть на крупной тёрке.
Выпекать при температуре 220-230 градусов 10-15 мин.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CpFNwChIHEd/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&igsh=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==

Sweden - Meatballs with a Creamy Spinach Sauce

This is day 5 of 30 days of recipes around the world. 

Not going to lie, this one took me a few tries to get right. 

Now, we are there Of course fish and pickles would be more classic but meatballs are pretty popular too. 

This is a fresher take on the classic and beyond easy for dinner.

Serves 2
Makes about 20 meatballs
Ingredients:
300g sausages (about 5), skins peeled off, meat at room temperature
45g egg lightly beaten (basically a little under a while)
50g peas
50g grated cheddar or other hard cheese, plus extra for grating on top
2 tbsp olive oil
100g panko breadcrumbs
Small bunch chives, thinly sliced

For the green sauce:
260g fresh spinach
200ml hot veg stock
1 chunky grated garlic
Squeeze lemon juice
130g creme fraiche (about heaped 4tbsp)
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
Salt + pepper

Preheat oven to grill setting 220C degrees and grab your 26cm by 26cm baking tray.
Add sausage meat to a bowl + mash with a fork. Throw in egg, cheddar + mix. Stir throw the peas + roll into small golf-sized balls.
Add half the spinach into a blender with half the hot stock, squeeze lemon, half garlic, cayenne pepper, salt + pepper. Blend until smooth, about 15secs. Pour into baking tray + do the same with the rest! Add creme fraiche + stir through. Taste to check the seasoning! Dip each meatball into the panko breadcrumbs so the tops are just covered. Place each ball into the sauce evenly spaced out. Grate over a light layer of cheese + drizzle over with olive oil. Place at the top of the oven for 15mins or until the tops are golden + it is bubbling. Sprinkle over chives + add a spoon of Saucy Chilli Oil to make this fancy for a dinner party.

Squash Parmigiana with Beans

The comfort with this cheesy one is real! 

I'm taking this down a more wintery route and using lots of store cupboard ingredients to make it work. You can use cannellini instead of butterbeans. We have just polished this off with a simple baby gem salad. It's a good one-tray dinner, you might say. 

The dinner party was approved, too!

Serves a greedy 6

Ingredients:

For the roast veg:

3 medium aubergines, sliced lengthways (1cm thick)
1.5 tsp garlic powder
1 tbsp dried oregano
Salt + pepper
7 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
800g butternut squash, cut into equal pieces

For the tomato filling:
3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1 medium onion, thinly sliced
Handful of rosemary + sage leaves
8 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
2 tbsp tomato purée
500g cherry tomatoes, halved (this can be a tinned variety when out of season)
1 tbsp dried oregano
1.5 tins plum tomatoes, plus half a tin of water
500g cooked cannellini/butter beans

Toppings:
100g breadcrumbs
2 large balls mozzarella
100g Grana Padano a hard, aged Italian cheese, grated

For the aubergines, lay them on 2 baking trays and sprinkle over oregano, garlic powder, pepper, and 5 tbsp olive oil. 

Add squash to a third tray and cover with 3 tbsp olive oil, salt, and pepper. 

Place everything in a preheated 200C degree oven for 30 minutes, turning the aubergine over halfway.

While they roast, start with the filling! 

Set a large saucepan to medium to high heat + add olive oil followed by onion. 

Fry for 4mins + then add rosemary + sage leaves. Next stir in garlic, purée, oregano + cherry tomatoes. 

Simmer for 2 minutes before adding tinned tomatoes, water,
salt + pepper. 

Mix + cover for 10mins. Check seasoning. Take off the heat!

Spread 1/3 tomato base in a large 30cm by 25cm baking dish. 

Top with a few spoons of tomato sauce, grated cheese, 1/3 torn mozzarella, 1/3 beans, 1/3 roast squash, and pepper. 

Top with a layer of aubergine slices. 

Continue like this until you have 3 layers. 

They don’t need to be perfect! 

Top with cheese, breadcrumbs, salt, and pepper. 

Bake for 40 minutes in the middle of the oven at 190C until cooked through and bubbling.
Rest for 5mins before serving!

from antoninaparker

London chef + cookbook author, owner of Saucy Chilli oils

https://www.threads.net/@antoninaparker

Best cafetières to buy 2024 | olivemagazine

Best cafetières to buy 2024 | olivemagazine

• Make sure your recipe or ratio of coffee to water is right. I usually use 30g of coffee with about 500ml of water, or 20g of coffee and 300-350ml of hot water for a large strong cup. 
• As a general rule, a good coffee ratio to use for this method is 1:15 (one part coffee to 15 parts water). 
• So to calculate, simply divide the volume of the cafetière (or of your desired end volume) by 15 to give you the coffee dose. For example, if you are using a large eight-cup French press that holds about 1 litre, use 67g coffee.

Recipe olia_hercules

 Remembering my grandmother Lyusya today and keeping her traditions alive and happily sharing them with you, hoping that you will also give it a go and spread the knowledge and the love. Because the weather turned so harsh today in London, I knew it was time to cut back my sorrel (which gows very happily in my garden almost all year round). I also bought some organic parsley from @shrub.london || Lyusya, for winter, used to cut down the herbs she grew just before the onset of winter. Dill, parsley, sorrel normally - and she would cut it into big chunks and put it into a jar and sprinkle salt inbetween. Almost like a herb kraut but without massaging it. The herbs are soft enough and will release their own juices without bashing them. She would then put them away into the cellar. The herbs will become dull in colour, and will ferment, but they still provide a very good flavour for a winter-time green borsch, or would have been used in regular borsch too. I have other plans for these, which I will reveal if it all works out! I started in this big jar, but once they release their water and shrink, I will transfer them and their liquid into a smaller jar and will keep them kn the fridge once the fermentation process begins. I hope this was interesting for you, I wonder if other Ukrainians’ grandmothers used to do this? And what did they call it? #keepUkrainianCultureAlive #standwithukraine #cookforukraine PS this recipe is in my 3rd cookbook #SummerKitchens and it has more regional Ukrainian dishes (and a whole chapter on fermentation).

Nigel Slater’s recipe for mushrooms with pearl barley and basil

 https://www.theguardian.com/food/2022/sep/27/nigel-slater-midweek-dinner-mushrooms-with-pearl-barley-and-basil

Spicy Chickpea and Bulgur Soup

Adapted slighty from Plenty More by Yotam Ottolenghi.

A few notes - scale back the harissa a bit if you are sensitive to heat (or if your harissa is on the spicy side). Yotam wrote this recipe using bulgur (as you see it below), but because I had cooked farro on hand, I took the liberty of swapping that in, in place of the bulgur. I imagine brown rice could be a welcome substitute too.

2 tablespoons olive oil
2 small onions, cut into 3/8-inch / 1-cm dice
4 cloves garlic, crushed
2 large carrots, peeled and cut into 3/8-inch / 1-cm dice
4 celery stalks, cut into 3/8-inch / 1-cm dice
2 tablespoons harissa paste
1 teaspoon freshly ground cumin
1 teaspoon freshly ground coriander
1 1/2 teaspoon whole caraway seeds
2 1/2 cups / 500 g drained cooked chickpeas (canned are fine)
4-5 cups / 1 liter+ water
3/4 cup / 100 g coarse bulgur wheat
3 teaspoons fine grain salt, or to taste
black pepper, to taste

Creamed feta paste

3 1/2 oz / 100 g feta, broken into large chunks
1/4 cup / 60 g crème fraîche
1 cup / 15 g coriander leaves, coarsely chopped
1/2 cup / 15 g mint leaves
1/8 teaspoon fine grain salt

to serve: mint, coriander, and/or celery leaves

Put the oil in a saucepan over medium heat. 

Add the onions and sauté for 5 minutes, stirring from time to time, until translucent. 

Add the garlic, carrots, and celery and continue cooking for another 8 minutes. 

Add the harissa, cumin, coriander, and caraway seeds and cook for a further 2 minutes, stirring well. 

Gently mix the chickpeas into the vegetable mixture--you don't want them to break down--along with most of the salt and plenty of black pepper. 

Add most of the water and bring to a boil. 

Turn down the heat and simmer gently for 10 minutes.

Meanwhile, rinse the bulgur, put in a small saucepan, and cover generously with cold water. Bring to a boil and immediately remove from the heat. Drain, refresh under cold water, drain again and set aside.

To make the feta paste, 

put the feta, crème fraîche, coriander, mint, and 1/8 teaspoon salt in the bowl of a small food processor and blitz for a couple of minutes, until a smooth, creamy paste forms. Keep in the fr

idge until needed.

Before serving, add the cooked bulgur to the soup and bring to a gentle simmer. 

Divide the soup among bowls, add a spoonful of feta paste to each bowl, top with some herbs, and serve at once.

How to turn leftover lasagne into a deep-fried treat.

How to turn leftover lasagne into a deep-fried treat – recipe | Pasta | The Guardian

Perfect lentil soup

Prep 15 min
Cook 1 hr
Serves 4


2 tbsp oil, or dripping
2 litres ham stock, or 1 ham bone or 150g chopped streaky bacon and 2 litres chicken stock (or water)
2 onions, peeled and finely chopped
2 large carrots, trimmed and cut into small dice
½ medium neep/swede, peeled and cut into small dice
250g lentils (I like red), washed
½ tsp ground mace
Salt and black pepper
1 bay leaf

Put the oil in a large saucepan on a medium heat, then fry the bacon, if using, until it browns lightly and the fat begins to render.

Add the onions, carrots and neep, and fry, stirring regularly, until the onion is golden and the other vegetables are starting to soften.

Stir in the lentils until they’re well coated in fat, then add the mace, a pinch of salt, a good grind of pepper and the bay leaf.

Now add the ham stock, or the ham bone and two litres of chicken stock or water, depending on what you’re using.

Bring to a simmer, then turn down the heat, partially cover the pan and leave to cook for about 45 minutes, until the vegetables are soft and the lentils have mostly broken down.

Remove and discard the bay leaf and ham bone, if necessary. Scoop out about a third of the soup, whizz it to a puree, then stir back into the pot. Adjust the seasoning to taste, and enjoy. Lentil soup: which is your favourite variety from around the world, and how is it served? Or are you of the Tudor opinion that lentils are best left to horses?

Perfect lentil soup

How to make the perfect lentil soup – recipe | Soup | The Guardian

Prep 15 min
Cook 1 hr
Serves 4

2 tbsp oil, or dripping
2 litres ham stock, or 1 ham bone or 150g chopped streaky bacon and 2 litres chicken stock (or water)
2 onions, peeled and finely chopped
2 large carrots, trimmed and cut into small dice
½ medium neep/swede, peeled and cut into small dice
250g lentils (I like red), washed
½ tsp ground mace
Salt and black pepper
1 bay leaf

Put the oil in a large saucepan on a medium heat, then fry the bacon, if using, until it browns lightly and the fat begins to render.

Add the onions, carrots and neep, and fry, stirring regularly, until the onion is golden and the other vegetables are starting to soften.

Stir in the lentils until they’re well coated in fat, then add the mace, a pinch of salt, a good grind of pepper and the bay leaf.

Now add the ham stock, or the ham bone and two litres of chicken stock or water, depending on what you’re using.

Bring to a simmer, then turn down the heat, partially cover the pan and leave to cook for about 45 minutes, until the vegetables are soft and the lentils have mostly broken down.

Remove and discard the bay leaf and ham bone, if necessary. Scoop out about a third of the soup, whizz it to a puree, then stir back into the pot. Adjust the seasoning to taste, and enjoy.

• Lentil soup: which is your favourite variety from around the world, and how is it served? Or are you of the Tudor opinion that lentils are best left to horses?