Cooking recipe books

Ensalada de judias verdes was the second starter of the Sunday lunch with friends was this salad, from Janet Mendel's Cooking in Spain . Serves: 6 persons. Ingredients: 500g green beans 1 large potato ½ onion, minced 6 tbsp olive oil ½ tsp cumin 2 tbsp vinegar 1 clove garlic, minced ½ tsp fennel seeds (the recipe called for 1 sprig fresh fennel leaves or parsley but I decided to improvise) salt & pepper to taste 2 hard-cooked eggs, quartered. Method: Remove strings from beans if necessary, but leave them whole. I thought this wasn't right and cut them in half. Maybe with smaller green beans it makes sense to leave them whole. Cook the beans and the unpeeled potato in boiling salted water until just tender. Drain and rinse in cold water. Peel the potato and slice it. Arrange the beans on a serving platter with layers of sliced potatoes between. Again, this makes no sense as there are a lot more green beans than potatoes so I just toss them on the serving plate. Sprinkle the...

I decided to make a couple of Spanish tapas for starters in a lunch I made for friends who were visiting on Sunday. Huevos rellenos was one of them.  The recipe is from Janet Mendel's Cooking in Spain . Half way through the recipe, I learnt to make mayonnaise, Darina Allen's recipe. Serves: 4 persons. Ingredients: 4 eggs 100g tinned tuna 4 green olives, chopped 1 small red pepper, roasted (the recipe called for a small tin pimiento but I had beautiful peppers growing on my tree and did not see why I couldn't use them instead) 1 tsp lemon juice 50ml mayonnaise salt & pepper to taste For the mayonnaise (makes 100ml) : 1 egg yolk pinch of English mustard or ⅛ tsp French mustard (I had French mustard at home) ⅛ tsp salt 1 tsp white vinegar 85ml oil: 25ml olive oil + 60ml vegetable oil Method: Hard cook the eggs, plunge them in cold water and peel them. Cut the eggs lengthwise, remove the yolks and set aside. In a bowl, mix the tuna with the chopped olives, part of the red...

I broke my phone a month ago. I had been warned by a friend that I was too forceful at plugging the charger and I really ought to treat my phone with more care. It was as if he was predicting that, a year or so later,  I was going to break the charging port of the phone.  I hate to admit this but, sometimes, men are right... I didn't really want to buy another phone and luckily I didn't have to. A friend 'volunteered' her husband to fix my phone. A month later, he changed the charging port and added a new battery to my phone in exchange for his favourite dessert: cheesecake. I can't remember where I got this recipe from but it always makes everyone happy. My father-in-law loves it! Serves: 10 slices. Ingredients: 500g mascarpone cheese 5 eggs 6 tsp sugar 200g tea biscuits (I used Maria biscuits) 150g butter 345g fruit jam Method: Butter and flour a 25cm spring form cake tin. Blitz the tea biscuits. Mix the crushed biscuits with the butter. I melted the butter in the...

I bought 500g of game pie mix at the Winchester's Farmers Market. I have not done pie the British way before so this was a good excuse to try something new. Darina Allen, as usual, did not disappoint. Her book had a venison pie recipe which I used. It is delicious but it took a long time to make. I made it in stages, 3 stages overall, spanning 3 evenings. I just did not have the time to do it all in one go. Serves: 3 persons. Ingredients: 500g game (venison, pheasant, partridge, rabbit) For the marinade : 140ml red wine 100g onions, sliced 1 tbsp brandy 1 tbsp olive oil ½ tsp salt ½ tsp lightly crushed black peppercorns (I used a pestle & mortar) bouquet garni made with parsley, 1 bay leaf and thyme seasoned flour For the sauce : 100g bacon, diced 1 tbsp olive oil 1 large onion, chopped 1 large carrot, diced 1 large garlic clove, crushed 150ml beef or game stock bouquet garni 9 small mushrooms, sliced 1 tbsp olive oil salt & pepper to taste Method: Soak the meat in th...