The best recipes are the ones you don't expect to discover, like this one for Sambal Tofu Quinoa Bowl in James Beard award-winning food writer Carolynn Carreno. The idea behind her book are recipes for healthy whole grain meals that you can serve in a bowl. There is this huge popularity for meals in a bowl, such as the ones you can find in chains, Chipotle or CoreLife Eatery.
I have a recipe that I regularly use for tofu, but it is always worth trying something new. Let's see if it is any good!
Yay or Nay: Yay
Like I gave away in the beginning of this post, this was a surprisingly delicious recipe for marinated tofu. The extra sauce leftover, used as a dressing, was definitely a winner as quinoa can taste quite bland, even when you pep up all the other elements of the dish. I would make this again in a heartbeat - a perfect summery dish.
I've been holding on to this recipe for Raw Cookie Dough Bars from A Modern Way To Cook for a while, mainly because of the end of the school year/birthdays/Father's Day meant that there were plenty of sweet treats to go around.
I love energy balls, so this seemed like a different version of the same healthy-ish indulgences. The ingredients seem simple enough, I haven't worked with Brazil nuts so I'm intrigued to how it might taste.
Yay or Nay: Nay
Thoroughly disappointed in this, I really had high expectations for this recipe. I figured this would be a new version of energy ball/bar that I could put into rotation but it failed massively. Sure, it was simple to make, but the measurements seemed off and I'm sure it affected the taste. It was waaaaay too coconut oily for me, greasy to the touch and taste, and I love anything coconut. I'm just upset I wasted chocolate for this!
I LOVE bimbimbap. There, I said it. It's been one of the 'it' meals for a while and believe me it's worth the hype. BUT, I was eating this waaay before it because the hot thing. After living in Korea, I know what makes a good bimbimbap and so I'm reluctant to try a recipe from somewhere that isn't from Maangchi or learned from someone Korean.
I've been trying to entice The Hubby to try more veggies so I knew he would go for this, such is our love for the ricey, spicy goodness that is bibimbap! I found a recipe for bimbimbap from Alice Hart's book Good Veg. What attracted me to this recipe were the lack of ingredients, nothing more I hate than an endless list of ingredients - all of which I don't have at home!
Yay or Nay: Yay
I must say, I'm impressed. Mostly with the sauce - it is pretty identical to ones used in Korean Kimbap shops. The mushrooms were nice and savoury, the peppers added sweetness and the wilted spinach was subtly gingery! I
did sub some of the veggies for ones I had available or for preference,
but the beauty of this dish is that you can combine a whole bunch of
things and as long as you have the sauce - it's dynamite!
When you have a glut of leeks after making chicken stock for ramen, you know you have to use them up! I don't have a backup recipe so when I saw this recipe for Twice Cooked Leeks from New York Times' and UK Guardian's (from very quick research) foodie Alice Hart. I knew nothing about her, but grabbed a copy of her book Good Veg from the library.
I always need a side side to go with my mains, and naturally I want to increase my veg intake. If this works then I'll be putting it into the rotation.
Yay or Nay: Not sure
I can't make a decision either way as the recipe called for hazelnuts, also, mustard for the dressing. One, I was too lazy to go to the supermarket just to get hazelnuts. Two, I hate mustard, so that was out. It wouldn't be fair to judge it on that, so based on what I made, it was OK - just OK.
TIP: I don't usually cook with leeks so I'm not sure if you're supposed to cook the middle. I would get rid of it as it was a hard, chewy mess!
I spotted cookbook Bowl at my local library and the premise is, pretty much meals in one bowl. Written by Lukas Volger, a veggie expert (as it states in the blurb) it was worth a flip through.
As the Hubby was out fishing for most of the day I wanted something fresh, healthy and most importantly made up of ingredients that he refuses to eat. I was planning to make something else from the book but I figured this would be easy and quick enough to whip up for lunch!
Yay or Nay: Yay
This was light, refreshing and smugly healthy! I didn't have some of the ingredients on the list so I omitted them or replaced them with similar items. Instead of buying 5 ears of fresh corn I subbed with canned corn, of which I used the liquid in the can as part of the broth as I couldn't get the corn milk that you would get from fresh corn. I'm assuming you'd get more corn-like flavour. I didn't add onion (none at home), togarashi, scallions or egg as I didn't think it would take away too much from the flavour profile - though I'd rethink the onion (for sweetness). I didn't have kombu (which I can't get my hands on here) so I subbed with some Korean seaweed/kelp.
Another day without the Hubby so another opportunity to make a dish I know he won't eat but I will! I figured I had to give another recipe a try from Amelia Freer's cookbook Cook. Nourish. Glow. even though the last recipe didn't fare so well.
Anything tastes good with an egg on top, so when the book naturally fell open to this recipe I knew it was one to try! Let's hope this recipe for Roasted Peppers with Baked Eggs will do better.
Yay or Nay: Undecided
I did make a few changes to this recipe; I added quinoa and replaced some veggies with what I had on hand so it is different from the original. On the plus side, it is a quick meal to throw togther and the egg adds a rich creaminess that you would otherwise expect by using cheese. Also, the harissa adds some welcome heat to an otherwise kind of bland meal. HOWEVER! Maybe it is down to technique and not overstuffing the peppers - but adding the egg on top was like mission impossible! The peppers kept toppling over so couldn't keep the egg on top, the filling didn't allow the egg to sit on top and the egg kept sliding all over the place so I ended up with pretty much half an egg.
Tip: Scoop out a hole/groove/pit to place the egg in or you'll end up with eggy mess!
After eating so decadently I needed a bit of a break from rich and moreish dishes. As soon as I was back home I spent most of the morning trying to save plants from the dead and unpacking. I realised that I had no food in the fridge so had to quickly think of some things to eat for the week. In the muddle of jetlag I flicked through Amelia Freer's book Cook. Nourish. Glow. and picked out a few recipes that I could rustle up without searching far and wide for ingredients.
The one plus of going away was that I came home to a jungle of herbs, berries, peppers and tomatoes which I knew I would utilise this week for sure. For the Mediterranean 'Pasta' I had 90% of the ingredients bar the courgette/zucchini and olives so I knew this would be easy, but would it be tasty?
Yay or Nay: Nay
I love the idea of zucchini/courgette noodles and all that but it never really lives up to expectations - I did have an amazing bowl of noodles in, of all places, Prague but I've never really had anything close to that since. There's always that weird taste when it is raw so knowing that this was cooked appealed a little more. Once the noodles cook down it does have a better aftertaste and the zest of lemon adds freshness but it was overall kind of bland and boring. Plus there was no mention of seasoning it! I'm not a big salt person but even I knew to add salt and pepper for at least some flavour!
When the temperature drops, straight away I crave something warming and hearty. But when you know it'll get back up to the 90s you kind of want something in the middle. As I was flicking through the Pure Delicious cookbook, this recipe for Mulligatawny Soup caught my eye with it's bright yellow liquid and contrasting pop of colour from the pomegranate seeds.
Now, I have heard of mulligatawny soup before and was pretty sure I had had it before, but there's no harm in testing it out.
Yay or Nay: Yay
This soup has a similar flavour profile to a Vietnamese Curry my mum makes, or even Katsu curry so it was definitely a hit. The only issue was making this in advance meant that when we were ready to eat this (the day after) it was waaaay to thick, almost like a stew but it was still tasty. Then again, it could have been the fact that I didn't have enough chicken stock for 8 cups, so I tipped what was left of the box in and figured it would be enough!
TIP: Don't add the stock and rice until you're ready to eat otherwise you won't get the consistency of soup.
We're always looking for a new place to eat and somehow I saw an article about a place that sold mussels and frites, a classic Belgian meal and suddenly I was craving mussels. I remember in London there was a restaurant, Belgo, that just sold mussels and frites in different sauces - but the best thing was, whatever time you turned up that's how much your meal was, so if you arrive at 5, then it would be five pounds!! I don't know if they still do this but I loved that place, with it's ahead-of-the-times industrial lighting and dim lights.
With some research I found Food Network's recipe for Spicy Mussels with Chorizo and Wine. I was looking for something that I could eat without the lashings of butter or cream. I figured with this recipe I could make a couple of changes quite easily; swap butter for olive oil and cream for cashew cream and it would still be tasty.
Yay or Nay: Yay
I don't know why I hadn't made this sooner, I mean it was so easy to make - a doddle! Super quick to prep and cook, I had to break cooking into two parts as I had to work late and figured the mussels would taste better freshly cooked instead of steamed and then reheated later. So I made the sauce and then once we were ready to eat, heated up the sauce, put the mussels in and added the cream.
TIP: I would up the harissa and red pepper flakes for a but more heat but this was delicious to mop up with some crusty bread!
