Empanadillas

Some people hate leftovers, and I don´t know why. Cook once, eat two or three times is my motto.
Some meals beg to be used that way. It´s just plain good sense to make a beautiful salad out of lentils and the last cuts from a joint of roast beef, or build high roast chicken sandwiches.
Which is fine the second time. But if you should have to dish things up a third time, which does happen in a household of two like mine, then we´re up against the deja vù factor. It´s not that you hate the food, not at all. It´s just that you´ve been seeing it every time you open the fridge, and it´s beginning to seem like it´s been there for a whole ice age.
There are classics like ropa vieja or hash or revueltos or fried rice that are a great way of recycling things. But you can still see whatever it was that was bugging you. And the question will be aired. "Isn´t this the cabbage from Saturday?" they´ll say. And even though it tastes good, you´ll start to like it less,
Layering is the answer. Lasagna, or pie, will hide the offending morsels and turn them into the savory heart of something new and exciting. If it´s nestling between dough and cheese, and you can´t see it, who cares what it is?
However, it will also make them go further, which might mean more leftovers.
The way to stop this from turning into a Tantallus circle is to go with empanadillas (the oven kind, as of course I don´t fry).
This recipe makes enough dough for 12 pasties, and they´ll go fast, between dinner and breakfast. And if not, they freeze well, and are perfect candidates for a lunchbox.
It´s a cocarrois dough, and apart from leftovers it can hold the raw filling cocarrois, or the quick and sneaky spinach filling here (don´t forget the garlic and pimentón).
When I did it on Monday, it took me thirty minutes to heat up the oven, rummage around for the ingredients, make the dough, spill pints of olive oil on a new cashmere jumper, curse a lot, try to wash it off, make the filling with the leftover meat and vegetables and a can of fried onions, some raisins and a dash of Old Bay spice (thanks, Heather!), roll out the balls, fill them and pop them in the oven.
Provided you are less clumsy than I, you can count on at least eight minutes less than that, which isn´t bad going. I don´t count the half hour in the oven, because that isn´t actual work.

Masa de empanadillas para horno

Preheat the oven to 180ºC
In the Th, mix 50 gr. butter (or lard), 50 gr. oil, 100 ml. water, one egg and half a teaspoonful of salt. Add 340 gr. or so of flour, and mix 20 seconds on speed 6.
The dough should be soft and supple and easy to work with. Make 12 balls, roll them out, and don´t overfill.
Bake approx. half an hour, until golden.
They´re better lukewarm, good luck waiting.

The art of breakfast: Thermomix porridge

The cold has finally kicked in, so I´ve had my first bowl of porridge this morning. I went for it without looking up the recipe, because I thought that, having made it dozens of times over last year would have ingrained the thing deep in my brain.

Not so. I realized, five minutes into the process, that I´d skipped a couple of the steps in this recipe . But when it came out perfecty, I realized I´d actually simplified the whole thing so much that it´s now a no brainer, easier than ever, omigod unbeliable return on investment.

No bringing the water to the boil, no scattering of the cereal. Because the Thermomix stirs as it heats, you can bung in a cup of rolled oats, pulse number 6 a couple of times so they´re steel cut, add two cups of water and then either leave the thing 8 minutes at 100º, or start with Varoma for 3 minutes and then turn down to 90ºC.

Instant oats, but the real thing. The perfect breakfast, with brown sugar and milk. I´m so happy to have discovered this, and also this blog, which I´m loving already. My drawing is a kind of sketchy homage.

Frozen spinach

Eek!, you say.
Do I want curses beating about my head? Haven´t I seen the River Cottage DVDs a million times? What am I thinking?
Well, I´m thinking that in real life it´s not always possible to have the fresh stuff to hand. It´s not practical to have whole bunches of spinach in danger of wilting lying around your fridge. Sometimes you just want a few leaves to provide a green note in a bowl of soup. Or you´re in a hurry and can´t really stop to trim and clean a whole lot of leaves. Or you can´t be bothered, and what´s wrong with that? It just makes sense to have some spinach (and peas, and green beans) stashed in the freezer, however many times a week you go to the market.
I grew up in a house where frozen spinach is boiled and then sautéed. But here´s how I do it which is quicker, and only uses one pan. If anyone thinks this is a dodgy method and I´ll die in convulsions pretty soon, please don´t tell me. I think it´s just great.

All you need is a heavy skillet with a lid. Heat a little olive oil in it and add your frozen spinach. It helps if it´s in pieces the size of undernourished golf balls, which is of course the lowly kind of frozen spinach, and if you think this is going from bad to worse, that´s too bad.
Add salt, cover the pan, turn down the heat. Wait maybe five minutes, dduring which time you can shake it a little. That´s it. Your perfectly serviceable spinach, without having to wait, drain, or do anything boring.
You can add cream and let it bubble down, of course. And before adding the spinach you can brown a little garlic, and add raisins. Pimentón will go well at the end, if you´re so minded, or nutmeg. Anything, really.
It´s not spectacular, but when there´s a lunchbox to be filled, or a lasagna/spanakópita to be assembled at a moment´s notice, it´s pretty good.

East wind in the kitchen

I´m rushed off my feet, so all the posts about interesting Spanish stuff will have to wait. When not working, I´m reading Fuchsia Dunlop´s "Land of Plenty" and "The Revolutionary Chinese cookbook". And the work is about a little Singaporean girl who loved food (not the one in the picture, which is from a guidebook of China). So it´s all East is east around here for the time being.
We´ll be having this for dinner. It sounds like the sort of comforting one bowl dish that´s just perfect for a Tuesday evening when you´re in the throes of a nasty cold.

Nigella´s chocolate-chocoalte chip cookies

The chocolate choclate-chip cookie has always seemed to me a rampant case of gilding refined gold and painting the lily.
Provided you use enough real chocolate chips, you don´t really need the extra boost from cocoa in the dough.
But then again...there´s something very seductive in an all chocolate cookie. It´s unapologetic, which I appreciate.
Take these, from Nigella Express. She doesn´t just bump up the chocolate content with cocoa, but with chocolate as well, so that even the raw dough is irresistible. And the end result? To quote the Domestic Goddess herself, they are chocolatey to the point of madness. Yes, they are insane. But you don´t have to have all twelve at a sitting, you know. Have one (ok, two) and freeze the rest.
That way, if you suddenly decide to have a couple of friends over for coffee, you can defrost them quickly. The chips will melt every so slightly, as will your friends. And most likely, they´ll ask for the recipe, so here it is:

125 gr. dark chocolate
150 gr. flour
30 gr. cocoa
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
125 gr. soft butter
50 gr. brown sugar
50 gr. white sugar
1 egg, cold from the fridge
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
250 gr. dark chocolate chips ( I use Valor 70%)

Preheat oven to 170ºC.
Melt the chocolate in the microwave in a couple of minute bursts at medium strength so that it doesn´t melt too fast.
Cream the butter and sugars ( I use the Thermomix.Follow sect book rules)
Add the melted chocolate, the vanilla and the egg. At this point it´s the most delicious mousse ever.
Add the flour and the chips.
This amount makes 12 mammoth cookies of the icce-cream scoop and spoon size. They´ll take about 15-18 minutes to cook.
Watch them like a hawk, and take them out the minute the bottom´s dark.
After five minutes on the baking sheet they´ll be hard enough to transfer to a rack to cool.

Washing up

I don´t really like washing up. Some people do, or at least they say they do.
I don´t, and I think the only downside to loving cooking is the surplus amount of washing up it entails.
You see, we don´t have a dishwasher (gasp!). My kitchen looks so sweet as it is, and I´d have to redo it entirely to fit one, losing all its Amélie charm. So I´ve convinced myself that we don´t really need a big clunky machine.
Today I was actually glad not to have it. I´d been having a rough morning, grappling with the impossible request to produce "edgy" drawings based on Stravisnky, and with a language textbook. By noon I was feeling murderous, and would gladly have shouted at Igor, had he been alive and available, or at the editors of the textbook, had I forgotten that I have a mortage to pay.
Who took the brunt of my rage? The pots and pans. Bless ´em.

First batch of soup

I made my first batch of proper wintry soup yesterday.
Monday isn´t a good market day, but I went in for some butter, and was inmediately sidetracked into buying carrots. And once there, why not go for the celery, cabbage and pumpkin? They´re not the sort of thing to suffer from being bought on a Monday.
And I happened to walk by the chicken stall, and there was a special on free range thighs. Now, I cannot resist a bargain, but I´m also a price snob, so I decided these legs were probably best used in a pot of stock.
So there I was, happy as anything, not minding at all that it was dark by six thirty. The windows on my kithen were steamed from all the chickeny vapours, and I was assured of a light and sustaining dinner.
And many more.
This soup started with onions, celery and carrot, simmered in olive oil. To which a potato was added, diced small, and some squashed, diced bigger. A handful of pre-soaked barley was tossed in, a bay leaf, Marigold bouillon powder, and a litre of water.
After half an hour, more water and some finely shredded cabbage, which simmered for fifteen minutes.
To serve, I nicked a bit of chicken from the stockpot, added a tiny shot of PX sherry, and it was a perfectly wonderful dinner, soft and unexciting but just what I wanted.
There´s a lot left, and it will have to be born again if I´m not to be bored. One option is a ladleful of the proper chicken stock. But the consomé is so good on its own that I tend to save it for just that.
So it´ll probably be some cheat´s stock and a bit of frozen spinach, with some lemon juice at the end.
Or a chunkier version, roast tomatoes from my freezer, with some chickpeas and pasta.
The list of variations is endless, but by then this batch will be finished, and another, different one, started, and so on, like this, until May, when soup season will be over, and gazpacho season starting over.

New books andnoodle soups

It´s arrived! Finally, at last, it´s a bit chilly and I can feel entirely excused for spending whole evenings without leaving the sofa, tucked inside a rug and even, sohelpme, watching "Friends".
After a few weeks of reading Andrea Nguyen´s "Into the Vietnamese Kitchen" , I´ve ventured into making some bastardized versions of her soups, light and savoury and full of herbs. Perfect for this weather.
And a completely shameless peg on which to hang the Weekend Herb blogging tag. This week Pille´s host, and I didn´t want to miss out.
Your best bet for Vietnamese recipes and tips are in Andrea´s own blog, Viet World Kitchen .
Chock-a-block with herbs, I promise.

Showcasing pimentón

Recently San San from Singapore and I have started something of an impromtu spice-route. She sent me sachets of bak kut teh and instructions for making a lovely soup of long-simmered por ribs. I sent a tin of pimentón, semi-sweet, from La Vera, but, no instructions. This is remiss of me, but the thing is, I don´t use pimentón all that much. A bit of it goes into my espinacas con garbanzos, sometimes. Cocarois have a dose, too, and a dusting on hummus is lovely. But you won´t see me scattering it happy go luckily around, on migas, poached eggs, soups or salmorejos. And never, ever, in marinades. The classic Spanish adobo of oil, garlic and pimentón, delicious as it is, tends to make all meats into a sort of ersatz chorizo, I think. For fish, with some lemon thrown in, maybe. In fact, yes please, but only south of Despeñaperros.

That said, I do like its smoky depth, and the Altamira rust colour it makes on boiled potatoes that have been drizzled with oil. This mixture is usually seen on plates of pulpo a la gallega.
But pulpo is bar food, really, to be eaten with toothpicks you throw on the floor, with lots of beers and preferrably some salty sea breeze disarranging perfect coiffures (although there are plenty of Galician bars in Madrid, too).

So what I do at home is arrange the potatoes, cut in chunks (cachelos) and then boiled. Then some short, cut hand slices of boiled ham or lacón. Then the drizzle of good oil, and at last a sprinkling of pimentón. It lifts the whole from the bland to the mildly exciting. And it´s quick, easy, homely and, for all its robustness, actually quite light.

What they ate at the wedding of the year

Here´s a very very Spanish vignette.
Last Saturday one of the most famous bullfighters got married in a big splash wedding that was the social event of the year. Everyone was there, my dear, including my parents. In the excitement of table hopping and celebrity spotting, my mother forgot to bring me the menu, so it´s paraphrased. But still and all, a foodie scoop of sorts, and here it is, in case you ever have to entertain a to a crowd of toreros, flamenco dancers and it girls.

Cream of escalibada soup.

Creamy shrimp rice (arroz caldoso, a Jerez specialty).

Quails with truffles, chestnuts and sauteed plums.

Three chocolate millefeuille, ice cream (mother not sure what kind) and meringues, mango coulis.