Category: Meat

Apricot Stuffed Pork Loin

Chica Andaluza71 Comments

Apricot Stuffed Pork (1)

Rest assured that despite the hard work, rubble and paint that is our life right now, we never go hungry!  In fact, we even manage to do a little small scale entertaining and this dish was one I made when Best Pal Ria and her brother-in-law came to visit and see what we had been up to.

I was inspired to cook this dish after having seen a beautiful recipe from ChgoJohn, take a look at this beautiful Roast Loin of Pork with Fig Preserves.

It was a great dish as it can be prepared ahead and served hot or cold, leaving you time to catch up with your guests.

Ingredients

  • A loin of pork (or a boned shoulder) mine weighed about 1.75kg 8 (which serves 6-8 people)
  • 10 finely chopped dried apricots soaked overnight in orange juice
  • 1 tablespoon of harissa paste
  • 2-3 tablespoons of pine nuts dried fried until toasted (or you can do this in the oven)
  • Salt and pepper
  • A glass of white wine (or chicken stock)
  • Olive oil

Use a long sharp knife to cut a slit through the middle of the pork loin (think of a hollow tube) so that you can then fill this with “stuffing”. Mix together the apricots and the juices, the pine nuts, the harissa and about 2 teaspoons of olive oil. Season the mixture and use it to fill the pork loin.

Season the outside of the loin and rub a couple of teaspoons of oil into it. Place the meat into a deep dish, cover with a lid or tightly with foil and cook at a medium low heat for about 3-4 hours. Remove the meat from the juices (which you will save) and chill the meat. Don´t skip this step, it makes serving so much easier!

The next day, thinly slice the meat into rounds. Warm the sauce and reduce a little. If you want to serve the meat cold, serve the sauce separately. If you want to serve it warm, pour about a third of the sauce over the meat, cover with foil and put into a medium oven for about 20 minutes and serve the rest of the sauce on the side.

I served mine with cous cous with mint, lemon zest, pomegranate and pine nuts but we ate if before we remembered to take a photo!

Speedy Suppers – Smokey Pork with Pimentón and Peppers

Chica Andaluza54 Comments

I do love alliteration don´t you?! Even more I enjoy a speedy supper dish which tastes amazing and looks pretty too.

Smoky pork & peppers (1)

If you don´t eat pork, this would be delicious too with chicken. It just wouldn´t be so alliterative.

Ingredients (to serve 2)

  • 1 pork fillet cut into small strips (or use a small piece of pork loin)
  • 1 pepper, sliced (I used an orange one)
  • 1 medium onion, halved and sliced quite thickly
  • About 6 chestnut mushrooms, sliced
  • 2 crushed cloves of garlic
  • 1 heaped teaspoon of smoked pimentón
  • A small glass of white wine
  • 2 tablespoons of crème fraiche (or use full fat yogurt)
  • Salt & Pepper
  • Olive oil

Start by browning the little strips of meat in a tablespoon or so of olive oil. When they are browned, remove from the pan and set aside. Now add the onions, garlic,  peppers and mushrooms into the same pan and cook gently until softened then turn up the heat slightly to give some colour to the onions.

Add the meat back into the pan and sprinkle over the pimentón and season.  Fry gently for a minute then add the wine. Turn the heat down and continue to cook for a further 2-3 minutes then turn the heat up for a minute or so just to reduce a little of the liquid.

Check to taste the seasoning, turn off the heat and stir in the crème fraiche. Delicious served with plain boiled rice and some green vegetables.

Lamb with Quince, Pomegranate and Coriander

Chica Andaluza81 Comments

The 6th January is the Feast of Epiphany, celebrating the arrival of the Three Kings to Bethlehem. In Spain el Día De Los Reyes is a feast Day, and widely anticipated and celebrated by young and old. Traditionally a Roscón de Reyes (a Cake of Kings) is made. Check out my recipe from last year here, or Giovanna´s beautiful creation here.

Although we´re currently in England, we weren´t going to let a celebration pass us by, and the opportunity to celebrate it with best friends and parents was too good to miss.

Lamb with Quince (1)

We may have had to eat off a folding table in a half decorated room with mismatched plates from charity shops, but we were going to eat well.

We started with Jamon y Queso (Ham & Cheese) and Habas con Jamon (Broad Beans with Ham) and a delicious Brandada. Check out Mad Dog´s fantastic post all about this Catalan delicacy.

Our main course was inspired by my Christmas present from Big Man, the beautiful book Jerusalem by Yotam Ottolenghi. We had bought a couple of quince back from Spain with us, although I didn´t have quite enough so added in chunks of butternut squash (Ottolenghi recommends pear) which worked really well.  Below is how I cooked the recipe with the original recipe also shown.

Ingredients (serves 4 as a main course)

  • 400g minced lamb
  • 1 garlic clove crushed
  • 1 red chili, chopped (I used 1 tsp hot pimentón)
  • 20g chopped coriander plus 2tbsp to garnish
  • 50g breadcrumbs
  • 1tsp allspice
  • 2 tbsp finely grated ginger
  • 2 medium onions peeled and finely chopped
  • 1 medium free range egg
  • 4 quince (1.3kg in total) I used 2 quince and a small butternut squash
  • ½ lemon squeezed plus 1 tbsp lemon juice
  • 3 tbsp olive oil
  • 8 cardamom pods
  • 2 tsp pomegranate molasses (I couldn´t find this so used honey plus the juice of an extra half a lemon)
  • 2 tsp sugar (I left this out)
  • 500ml chicken stock
  • Seeds of ½ pomegranate
  • Salt and black pepper

Place the lamb in a bowl with the garlic, chili, coriander, breadcrumbs, allspice, half the ginger, half the onion, egg and seasoning. Mix with your hands and then form small meatballs. The original recipe suggests stuffing halves of quince, Believe me, this is very hard work as quince are very hard to peel and chop, so I went with his other suggestion to chop the quince and cook with the lamb meatballs.

Lamb with Quince (2)

Peel and chop the quince/squash into large chunks and finely chop about a quarter of the chunks. Leave the larger pieces in a pot of water with the juice of half a lemon to stop the quince turning too brown. Or don´t bother – it will still look and taste good when cooked!

Heat the oil and add the finely chopped quince/squash, onions, ginger and cardamom pods. Cook (covered) until softened then add the molasses and lemon juice (or honey and lemon juice), sugar (if using), stock and seasoning. Now add the quince/squash and meatballs and cook gently for about an hour (covered) or until the fruit is soft. Remove the lid and turn up the heat and cook for a further few minutes until the sauce is thick and pulpy, check for seasoning and sprinkle with the pomegranate and fresh coriander before serving. I also added an extra squeeze of lemon juice.

Tastes even better if made the day before (just don´t add the coriander and pomegranate). I served it with basmati rice into which I stirred browned onions and cumin seeds (toasted and crushed with a pestle and mortar).

Fruit Platter (1)

Phew – a lovely meal with friends which was rounded off with singing and dancing (of the silly variety), Roscón and a fruit platter which went some way to convincing us that we hadn´t consumed any calories at all over Christmas and New Year.

Lamb Shanks with Borlotti Beans

Chica Andaluza48 Comments

Any regular readers of this blog will know that in the colder months, when I can light the oven in Spain (or pretty much any time in England) I am a huge fan of slow cooked comfort food.

Lamb Shanks with Borlotti & Harissa (1)

In Spain we often eat pork shanks, in England we got to enjoy lamb instead.  Here´s a simple recipe that is great for those cold winter days or nights and also a useful dish for entertaining as it can be prepared ahead and then forgotten about for several hours before serving.

Ingredients (to serve 2 people, easily doubled)

  • Two lamb shanks
  • 1 can (400g approx) of borlotti beans
  • About 1 cup of chopped tomatoes (tinned are fine at this time of year)
  • A sprig of rosemary
  • 4 cloves of crushed garlic
  • A glass of red wine
  • A teaspoon of olive oil
  • A teaspoon of tomato purée
  • Salt & Pepper

Mix all the ingredients (except the meat) together and season, pour them over the lamb using a deep oven proof dish. Cover with a lid or wrap tightly in foil and cook in a low oven for about 4 hours.

Serve with creamy mashed potato and make sure to finish that wine you opened to make the dish.

Venison Chops with Creamed Spinach and Mushrooms

Chica Andaluza52 Comments

Venison Chops with Creamed Mushrooms & Spinach (2)

I have spoken a few times about our lovely local butcher, London Road Butcher of Bexhill (just in case any locals are interested – but he does need a website!). Funnily enough, he was bought up in the same road as House Number One. Small world.

We recently saw a programme about cooking with traditional ingredients that are falling out of fashion, and venison was mentioned. I hadn’t eaten if for years and Big Man didn´t know if he had ever tasted it. In a timely fashion, the butcher had venison chops (which looked more like smaller versions of T-Bone steaks) for sale, so how could I say no?

The chops were cooked very simply – salted, rubbed with a little olive oil and cooked on a very hot griddle pan.  To go with them I made creamed spinach and mushrooms which I have since made again and served simply with rice. A great vegetarian dish (but obviously not when you have a slab of Bambi´s mother on the plate next to it). Quantities are flexible, the process is simple.

Venison Chops with Creamed Mushrooms & Spinach (1)

Ingredients (to serve 2 people)

  •  About 10 chestnut mushrooms, cut into medium slices
  • 4 or 5 cloves of garlic, peeled and thinly sliced
  • About 4-6 cups of washed spinach leaves
  • A splash of white wine
  • 2 heaped tablespoons of full fat crème fraîche (don´t use the low fat version for this, it will split and be very runny)
  • Olive oil
  • Sea salt
  • Black pepper

Gently fry the mushrooms and garlic in a little oil with the lid on the pan until the mushrooms start to release some of their juices. Add a splash of white wine and the spinach and cover again. When the spinach has wilted, removed the lid, season and turn the heat up so that most of the liquid evaporates.  Turn the heat down low, stir in the crème fraîche, add a final grind of pepper and serve.

Slow Cooked Lamb Shanks with Root Vegetables

Chica Andaluza54 Comments

The weather in the UK is very much autumnal. Rain, wind and then suddenly a day of beautiful chilly sunshine takes you by surprise and makes you smile. We´re here to enjoy the experience, and that most certainly includes eating and drinking the best of what the region has to offer.

Before we had spent considerable time in England Big Man was a bit perplexed as to why a leg of English (or Welsh) lamb could feed a family, when in Spain a leg of lamb would feed two people. Now he understands that our English lambs don´t have to scramble up rugged mountains in search of food in a dry dusty landscape. Big doesn´t mean tough when you have grazed on flat salt marshes. And yes, English Lamb is delicious he agrees.

What does come in perfect one sized portions though, is the lamb shank. That lower portion of the leg with plenty of sweet tasting meat which responds particularly well to slow cooking. Perfect for chilly autumn nights after a long day of work.

Ingredients for two people

  • Two lamb shanks
  • Four carrots, peeled and cut into quarters
  • Two parsnips, peeled and cut lengthways into thick slices
  • About a dozen small onions or a large onion cut into large chunks
  • Four large cloves of garlic, peeled
  • A sprig of rosemary
  • A large glass of red wine
  • About 500ml of chicken or lamb stock
  • A heaped tablespoon of tomato purée
  • Flour
  • Olive oil
  • Seasoning

Coat the lamb in flour and fry in a little olive oil until lightly browned. Put into a casserole dish with all the other ingredients and cook in the oven on low for about 4-6 hours while you put up a bathroom wall, realise you´ve put it in the wrong place, take it down and put it back up again. Ok, the DIY bit is optional. Serve with mashed or boiled potatoes, or (as I did) with slices of grilled polenta and a glass of that lovely wine you opened to put into the dish. Any leftover juices and vegetables can be turned into soup the next day by adding a little more stock or water and a handful of angel hair pasta.

Popping Home Pimentón Pork Pot

Chica Andaluza60 Comments

Yes, I mentioned the “H” word. Home! Big Man and I arrived back Up our beloved Mountain in the early hours of Wednesday morning. Only for a week mind you. This weekend is our village fiesta, and it was time to touch base with family and friends and to pick up some warmer clothes for the English autumn weather.

Our last night in very rainy Bexhill was spent pulling staples out of floorboards, hammering in nails and preparing the floor downstairs in House Number One to be sanded and varnished in our absence. Well, it was easier than trying to varnish around two excited pups (who are staying with my parents this week and creating havoc in their home). We had also spent time at House Number Two knocking down an outside loo, dealing with most of the kitchen ceiling falling in and leaving things ready for the plasterer to do his stuff while we are in Spain. Hectic times.

Before the ceiling fell in…

To get us in the mood for being home again I cooked a delicious one pot (what else) pork dish, reminiscent of Spain with the flavours of smoky pimentón, olives and peppers. I made sure to make double so that when we get back, tired and hungry (as we inevitably are after a day of travelling) we´ll have dinner sorted.

Ingredients (to serve 4)

  • 500g of cubed pork shoulder
  • 1 heaped teaspoon of smoked pimentón/paprika
  • 1 red pepper, thinly sliced
  • 1 large onion, thinly sliced
  • 2 fat cloves of garlic, crushed
  • Approx 150g olives (I used anchovy stuffed olives) sliced or halved
  • 1 ½ cups of your favourite or home made tomato sauce (yes, I made it!)
  • 1 tablespoon of tomato purée
  • A glass of red wine (optional, but of course I added!)
  • Water
  • Olive oil for shallow frying
  • Salt and pepper

Start by frying the pork until browned and remove from the pan. Then add the onions, garlic and pepper and cook gently until softened. Add the pork back into the pan and sprinkle over the pimentón. Now stir in the olives, the tomato sauce, the purée and the wine and season lightly. Bring to a simmer, cover (or half cover) with a lid and cook gently for about 45 minutes while you continue to pull staples out of floorboards (the stapling bit is optional).

If it starts to dry out too much, add a little water, depending on how saucy you like your dish.

When the sauce is rich and thick, and the pork tender and delicious, taste for seasoning and adjust if necessary. Serve with rice or boiled potatoes or simply crusty bread. Pour yourself a glass of wine from that bottle you opened, pull the staple out that has embedded itself in your knee and relax.

And what did we do with our first day back? Take it easy? Heck no!

We dealt with the last tomatoes in our Huerto.

We met up with a cousin of Big Man´s to pick plums.

Then we went to a wine tasting last night.

Today we planned to attack our very overgrown garden and enjoy some sunshine, but it´s not to be. The weather here is as cold and rainy as Bexhill on Sea.

Time to dig out the winter woolies I think.

One Pot Beef Burger with Caramelised Red Onions and Coriander …and “Fries”

Chica Andaluza54 Comments

Cooking “Under Fire”, or in difficult conditions brings a special set of challenges. You don´t have your usual array of pots and pan available to you. You also don´t have your usual stock cupboard with its range of flavours and spices at your fingertips. But you do have a good appetite at the end of a busy day, and you have tasty ingredients available to you which are not so easy to get hold of back home in Spain. So…you adapt. You work around the “problems” and enjoy the opportunity of a challenge.

I bought a large, deep frying pan with me which can be used for deep or shallow frying, braising and boiling and searing meat at a high heat. Here in the UK there are beautiful little waxy potatoes and superb beef from my new best friend the local butcher. I have learnt to cook more than I need when I get the chance, then to use leftovers the next day in another dish to save time.

Having made a delicious Ensalada Cateta (Orange and Potato Salad) for a taste of home, I made sure to cook double the amount of potatoes. Of course, I didn´t weigh them so I can´t give you exact amounts, but you´ll know how many you can eat!

Ingredients

For the burgers

  • 300g ground beef approx
  • One large red onion finely chopped
  • 1 teaspoon of brown sugar or honey
  • 2 cloves of crushed garlic
  • A little olive oil for frying
  • One tablespoon of very finely chopped fresh coriander
  • Salt and Pepper

For the “Fries”

  • Potatoes cooked in their skins (new, or small if possible) and peeled (or not) and quartered lengthways
  • About a dozen mushrooms (I used brown) thickly sliced
  • Half a white onion thinly sliced
  • 2 cloves of sliced garlic
  • Salt & Pepper
  • Oil for shallow frying
  • One tablespoon of very finely chopped fresh flat leaf parsley

To make the burgers, fry the red onion very slowly until tender then add the sugar and garlic and continue cooking very slowly until the onions start to caramelise. Season lightly with salt and pepper and allow to cool. Add the onion mixture to the minced/ground beef, then the coriander, and salt and pepper to taste. Form into two large of four small burgers/patties and chill until required (but do bring them up to room temperature before cooking).

Add a little oil to a large non stick pan and add the potato pieces. At a high temperature cook the potatoes until browned (you could also use raw potatoes, but it will take a little longer). Turn the heat down and add the onions, garlic and mushrooms and cook gently until the onions start to soften and release their liquid. Now add the burgers, continuing to cook slowly to ensure they are cooked through. Turn over to cook on both sides. Just before you are ready to serve, turn the heat up and brown the burgers on both sides and to cook off any liquid in the pan. Add the chopped parsley and serve.

Not quite burger and fries as most of us know, but very delicious and a great one pot dish.

PS. Think of me tomorrow and keep everything crossed – fingers, toes and eyes. We´re hopefully having our internet connection installed and I´ll be able to start reading and commenting again – yay!

Making progress…Making Food

Chica Andaluza62 Comments

It´s been a while, I´ve missed you all. Lots of news to update you with though.

Work has been going well, the kitchen has now moved on from this…

To this…

Just the final touches to the units (handles, skirting boards), then the wall units to follow. There´s still wall tiling to go but … pah…easy peasy compared to some of the things we´ve been doing.

Of course, when you have a hob and an oven (as of yesterday) you can COOK!! Oh what joy to have a relatively dust free area to prepare meals that are not sandwiches filled with cement or fried eggs lightly dusted with sawdust.

Supper was a simple meal of grilled lamb chops sprinkled with Malvern sea salt and a squeeze of lemon juice, with rice mixed with garlic mushrooms. It was nothing complicated but with a good glass of wine it tasted like the food of the gods.

Lunch today was a sharing platter (we have a lot of those as it means less washing up, very important when you´ve had to wash up with cold water in a bucket!). Good old tortilla, a leftover corn cob and some salami from home with a little salad made with sweet juicy local tomatoes.

Hopefully soon I´ll be able to get a little more adventurous in the kitchen, and we´re not talking about power tools here.  So…a little more news which may leave some of you wondering if we both need to get our heads examined. Things have gone so well, and we have learned so much…we´re going to do it all over again when we´ve finished this house. Yes, you heard right. Just around the corner from this house was another one crying out for some love and attention. It has a very similar scary carpet but we´ve learnt not to fear the shag pile.

It´s been more recently modernized…we´re talking some time during the late 1970s as opposed to the early 1960s in the current house, so a little less work. But not much.

No…your eyes do not deceive you…that´s a downstairs bathroom coming off the “oh so modern” kitchen.

We´re getting the internet installed though, so cross your fingers, toes and eyes for us and hopefully in about a week I´ll be chatting away to you all in my usual fashion and hopefully doing a bit more talking about cooking and a little less about house renovating. But I´m not making any rash promises!

Cooking Under Fire – Minced Beef Pasty/Empanada Thingies

Chica Andaluza77 Comments

When your bathroom looks like this…

And your dogs are moved from pillar to post in a bed that gets dustier by the day…

You buy minced beef. Well, of course you do.  For a start it´s hard to buy in Andalucía, and then the beef tastes soooo good in England it would be a crime not to. I have discovered a lovely “proper” butcher in Bexhill, and have already made friends with him. He has free range eggs too which are nearly as good as ours. But not quite.

I bought half a kilo (or a pound as my new butcher friend said…he can´t forget those imperial measurements) and turned it into two “cook ahead” meals for us. First up, a simple pasty (but it´s not a Cornish Pasty as it contains carrot and no potato) or empanada (but not really) which I made ahead then warmed up for lunch. I also made another dish for supper later in the week, but more of that later.

Apologies for the photos, my “good” camera is sitting safely in its little rucksack as it doesn´t much like the huge quantities of dust we are currently dealing with on a daily basis.

Ingredients for 2 large thingies

  • 250g short crust pastry (I confess, I bought it)
  • 1 large carrot peeled and finely chopped
  • 1 medium onion finely chopped
  • 3 fat cloves of garlic, crushed
  • 1 medium leek, halved and finely sliced
  • ½ red pepper finely chopped
  • ½ teaspoon of smoked paprika
  • ½ teaspoon of ground cumin
  • ½ wine glass of beef stock (I used a cube…I´m Cooking Under Fire you know!)
  • ½ wine glass of red wine (please make sure to drink the other half if you are using wine)
  • Salt and Pepper
  • 500g of minced beef (you will only use about 200g of it, so use less if you don´t want to make another dish, or you could make 4 thingies instead)
  • Olive oil
  • One beaten egg

Start by slowly frying the onions, garlic and leek until softened then add the carrots and peppers. Cover the pan with a lid and continue cooking gently until the vegetables are all softened. Add the minced (ground) beef, the paprika and cumin and cook on a medium heat until the mince is cooked. Add the beef stock and wine, reduce the heat and cook until most of the liquid has evaporated, taste and season.

Leave to cool slightly while you roll out the pastry. Cut it into two halves and if you´re feeling fancy you can cut out circles. Lay some minced meat filling down the centre of each piece (you´ll probably use less than half of what you have cooked if you used 500g of meat), fold the pastry over to make a parcel and brush with the beaten egg (I had to miss this step out as I had no eggs and I´m Cooking Under Fire you know!) Or have I mentioned that already?

Bake in a medium oven for about 25 minutes until golden brown or as near to golden brown as you can get your pastry without burning it because you didn´t have an egg in the house to brush on top even though you new butcher friend sells them. Phew, lunch (that isn´t a sandwich)…sorted!