A week of the new

 

Last week was a bit of a mixed week. On the plus side, my parents have had their first jabs, and my husband (in the same priority group) has had a letter about his. As neither of us can drive, Kent’s mass vaccination centre isn’t accessible, so he has to wait for a jab at our GP’s, who are currently still working their way through the group before him.

On the negative side, someone in my husband’s extended family died of Covid last week, and all of the news about the new South African variant appears to be bad. So on balance, I’m probably more on the down side of things than the up, right now.

So I was actually quite glad of my challenge to myself to eat only new meals for a week, as it gave me something to think about, and stopped me from simply rolling out the same old meals in autopilot, and depressing myself further through sheer boredom. So, here’s what we ate, in no particular order:

Crispy tofu with green beans, peanut sauce and coconut rice: I forgot to take a picture of this one (#BadBlogger), so you’ll have to make do with the one in the book (The Roasting Tin Around the World) and trust me that it did look a bit like this. I’ve somehow never cooked with tofu before, although I’ve thought about it plenty of times. This was really nice, and the technique for cooking the rice (put rice in a pot with coconut milk and spices, put lid on pot and bake for half an hour) might be useful with other recipes.

Picture from book: mine looked like this, honest. 

Chilli Tofu: I made this to use up the second half of the tofu. It’s a Meera Sodha recipe. Despite being entirely sober and not more than usually distracted, I managed to make not one but four mistakes while making this recipe – mostly putting things in in the wrong order, but also almost forgetting to add the chilli, despite the recipe title, and it was still tasty. My kind of recipe. Tofu will definitely be featuring again soon.

Chilli tofu, featuring pepper (delicious for me, a nightmare for Melinda)

Italian Sausage and chestnut risotto: This is in a Gino d’Acampo book, and I’ve been meaning to make it for ages. You all know all about risotto. This was a good one. I served this with a fennel and orange side salad, which is a slight cheat as I’ve made it before, although this is the first time I’ve actually had all the ingredients, plus the optional pomegranate seeds, so I reckon it passes.

Socca: Another one I’ve been meaning to try for ages. The recipe is in my beloved Art of the Larder, and while I’ve made the farinata which uses the same batter, I’ve never tried this until now. It’s good – I was worried it might be dry but it wasn’t.

Socca, about to be served

Sauasage and saffron pasta: In the same category is this Nigella pasta, made to use up the rest of the sausage I defrosted for the risotto. Also good, you can taste the saffron, although perhaps not as much as Nigella claims in her lead in. Served with chicory (making an unexpected appearance in the veg box) with spicy breadcrumbs, another Gino recipe, and a good thing to do with chicory (blanche chicory and drain well, fry breadcrumbs with chilli flakes, fry off chicory, mix).

Pasta, with chicory lurking in the background

Fish finger Bhorta: As well as recipes I really should have got around to making before, this week was useful in pushing me to make stuff from some of the new recipe books I got for Christmas. This recipe seems to have been doing the rounds on social media for weeks, and I’m pleased to report it is good. Weird, but good. It consists of bashed up fish fingers, mixed with spiced spinach and mustard, with red onions pickled in red wine vinegar scattered on top. I didn’t have enough fish fingers left for the full amount so I served some of Meera Sodha’s quick coconut dal alongside. Both this and the chilli paneer are from East, which I haven’t used a huge amount, but it came in useful this week, which I guess is another reason for doing this kind of challenge.

If in doubt, make dal.

A very extravagant sandwich: I don’t normally bother doing much for lunch during the week, but this felt in the spirit of the week. It probably isn’t the kind of sandwich I’d make normally. It’s from Max’s Sandwich Book by Max Halley, where it’s known as the Bhaji Smuggler (…). It consists of: carrot bhajis (homemade) coriander and peanut chutney (which I also made – it’s very good, and the recipe gives you a whole jar full), lime juice-pickled onions and Bombay mix. All on a sandwich. It is very good, and definitely the maddest thing I ate last week. There was also enough bhaji mix left to make some more for lunch the next day, although I didn’t put them in a sandwich this time…

About to be sandwiched (extra fritter that didn't fit on the side)

Desserts: I also made two desserts: Mango kulfi, and another new Nigella, banana bread with tahini and chocolate. The kulfi was very easy – just a question of blending a mango with yoghurt and condensed milk, then freezing. It doesn’t even have added sugar, which makes it very refreshing. The banana bread is delicious, although the taste of banana does get a bit lost amid the chocolate and tahini. It’s good on its own, but for one night I also made a miso butterscotch sauce to go with it, which I’d recommend. It’s a normal butterscotch (cream, butter, sugar) with miso paste whisked in at the end, which makes it richer and less overwhelmingly sweet.

Kulfi, ready for the freezer...

...and banana bread, fresh from the oven.

The only problem with this week was that because none of the recipes were familiar, and I ended up making more things than I usually would, it did feel like a lot of cooking, which was tiring. But I’m glad I did it, as it helped me think about food, and food planning, in a better way again, as a pleasure rather than purely a chore. And, let’s face it, good food is one of the few fun things available to us right now.