Goats Cheese Tart with Rocket and Grape Tomatos

Hannah and I were craving a pizza , so looking in the fridge we discovered the ingredients for this unexpected winner.


We took a sheet of puff pastry from the freezer, let it go wobbly, then lightly score a square frame around the edges. Topped this with crumbled goats cheese (or any bitey creamy cheese you want really) , grated parmesan , grape tomatoes halved and scattered, pepper and and drizzle with olive oil. Throw in the oven for about 15 minutes until crispy and the cheese looking goey and golden. Top it with fresh rocket and it will disappear in minutes!

Home made Ravioli!

We have been getting into the habit of cooking pasta for lunch on Sundays and this one we had bit of time on our hands so Hannah was inspired to make some ravioli from scratch. I worked on the filling while Hannah cranked up the pasta maker.

The filling was a Jamie inspired recipe. Caramelised spanish onions with balsamic, roasted pumpkin, goats cheese and thyme.

This got a bit fiddly, but was well worth it, plus we had heaps leftover for another meal the following sunday!

We kept is simple for the sauces. The first time, we melted butter with olive oil and sprigs of time and roasted pine nuts. Drizzled this over the ravioli and crumbled some extra goats cheese on top. Very rich and absolutely amazing.


Round 2, was just as delicious, with the simplest of toppings, lightly fried grape tomatos (halved) with heaps of olive oil (that the skins of the tomatos turned a golden red!), topped again with goats cheese and rocket! Some of the simplest meals are the most delicious!

The Bolognese Mission

I have given myself a mission, to perfect the bolognese sauce!

This may seem ridiculous, as most people probably think the humble bolognese is the easiest sauce of them all. But I am not content with mine, it just doesn't seem to have the flavour and perfect balance of spices I would like. Well it just doesn't taste as good as my Nonna's!

So,this was one I whipped up recently, that was pretty good and probably the best I had made in sometime...but please post your Bolognese tips and techniques!

My process is simple...the most important ingredient to making a delicious bolognese is time. Not the herb, but the ticking variety. The longer you can let the sauce simmer and rest the better its going to taste! This one I cooked on a Sunday arvo...let it simmer into the night, then let it cool and rest over night. It's getting chilly now so you can get away with it.

Ok, back to the sauce, my cooking process is; sweating the onion, garlic, finely diced carrot, celery and the stalks of the basil (this time I added thin slices of red capsicum too) for as long as possible...about 20 minutes. Don't rush to get the meat in there or skimp on the good olive oil. I then added the meat; an equal mix of pork and veal mince (about a kilo and a bit). I find beef mince, is way too heavy and overpowers the sauce. I cooked this through, turning til lightly browned, then added about half a bottle of red wine. I stirred this for a bit, then put the lid on, my logic being this lets the meat absorb the wine and not let the wine evaporate, I could be wrong. Once the wine reduced a bit, I added a big jar of passata and a tin of diced tomatoes. Given it a big stir to mix all together and bring to the boil.

Now, the spices which I am experimenting with to get a unique full flavour. I chucked in about 5 to 6 cloves, 2 dried chillies, a good punch of salt, cracked some pepper and a sprig of cinnamon. Once it came to the boil, I turned it down low, put it on the backburner and went back to the paper. After about an hour, went for a taste, Hannah spotted the cinnamon flavour was well and truly present so we fished out the sprig and left it for few more hours to do its thing.

The next day I heated up a small saucepan of it, and had it with some great new pasta we came across. An organic wholemeal spelt trofie style pasta. I'm not a huge fan of packet wholemeal, but this was really tender and tasty.

My thoughts on the sauce. It was very tasty, I liked the subtle cinnamon and clove flavour. It had a vibe of my Nonna's sauce but not as red and with more vegies. For this first phase of the mission, it was a good step forward, but I have a long way to go. Next time, I'm gonna try experimenting with some nutmeg and oregano and majoram. Perhaps adding more tomotoes or some paste and a wee bit more chilli. Eventually I will like to go old school and not use mince, but get some veal shoulder and stew that til it falls apart into bite size pieces.

The saga continues...

Perfect Pumpkin Soup

Marco: You just gotta love winter comfort food!

Hannah whipped up a delicious pumpkin soup the other night.

I can never have pumpkin soup again if it's not topped with crumbled fetta, toasted pine nuts and sesame seeds and fresh rocket! Delicious!

Hannah: I love pumpkin soup, but find that too many recipes are either just boiled pumpkin with loads of cream or so many things added, you hardly taste the pumpkin. So as I wanted to make something healthy and delicious my plan was: heaps of pumpkin, a good stock and some onion and garlic for flavour. The added fetta, pine nuts and rocket at the end were just inspired at the last minute from looking in the fridge!

Roast pumpkin is my absolute favourite – it makes the pumpkin super sweet and gives it a nice rich flavour! So, after drizzling some good olive oil in a roasting tray, I cut a whole butternut pumpkin into 1-2 inch chunks, chucked in 2 whole cloves of garlic (peeled – these also go super sweet) and roughly chopped up a whole onion. Everything can be rough, because it’ll all be blended up in the end.

So, while that was roasting away (I think I did it for about 1 ½ hours on 180deg), I made a simple chicken veggie stock. I love making stocks, because if you have a good one, it will make your meal amazing! So, considering that I put garlic and onion in with the pumpkin, I only used one clove of garlic and half an onion in the stock, I slowly caramelised these together. Then I just chucked in what I had in the fridge (too lazy to walk to the shops on such a cold day) which was: one carrot, one celery stick (with leaves) and one tomato. I kept the quantities small because it’s all about the pumpkin after all! I fried these off for just a minute or two with the onion and garlic then poured in about 1 ½ litres of boiling water and a teaspoon of powdered chicken stock. Then I just let this sizzle away until the pumpkin was finished roasting.

I let both the pumpkin and the stock cool down for about 20 mins then chucked it all in the blender. But, because I like it thick, I ended up not over doing the blending or the stock quantity, so it was smooth but nice and thick. Then, when we were ready to eat, I heated up the blended mixture in a big pot – do this slowly though, because otherwise it boils and plops everywhere (I made quite a mess). I quickly dry-fried some pine nuts, crumbled a little bit of fetta and a small handful of rocket on top – and it was yum! Perfect for winter!

Cheers,
Hannah

Rainbow Trout Sicilian Style

Roasting is just the easiest way to cook, you spend about 15 minutes preparing, then chuck it in the oven and walk away while the house fills with delicious aromas!

Here's something I quickly whipped up last night. I had stocked up on fish recently at the local fish marked in Marrickville. Grabbed some amazing looking local ocean rainbow trout.

I had never cooked it before, so I decided to keep it simple, knowing its a rich fleshy fish. So I just seared it in a pan with salt and pepper on both sides and then added a glass of white wine. Put a lid on it for a bit, then chucked it in the oven to slowly roast away. Served it with some roasted egglant with diced tomato, garlic, basil and pine-nuts. (Should've added anchovy) Had crunch cos and rocket salad on the side. Felt pretty posh on these big plates, but the fish just wouldn't fit on out other ones. This was way too easy and the kind of thing you would get charged a mozza for in restaurants.

Hand made Spaghetti with Pesto and Grape Tomatoes

Fresh from getting soaked at the Addison Rd Growers Market, (every sunday at the Addison Rd, Community Centre in Marrickville - near Reverse Garbage) we whipped up some fresh spaghetti, cranking up the pasta maker for the first time in our new kitchen. At the markets, we grabbed some delicious grape tomatoes, and the biggest bunch of basil and without even planning it we had the makings of delicious pesto on our hands!

Hannah worked her magic on the spaghetti. We hadn't tried this before, only making tagliatelle so far, so it was a bit fiddly and got a bit mushy, but still it was delicious. Nothing better than freshly made pasta! The pesto was so easy and being a classic Genovese sauce, it's not something I have grown up eating or seeing made. But with a good whizz and loads of good parmesan, olive oil and toasted pine-nuts you can't go wrong really!

Stay tuned for a recipe shortly.

It went down beautifully with a glass of of our favourite white wine, from Willow Bridge which is usually around the $11 mark!

Marco.

Mmmm burgers.

How good to these look? Wholemeal bread rolls (only 30cents each), with fresh tomatos, mixed lettuce, a slice of cheese, caremalised onions and of course home made patties! Oh, and don't forget the tomato saunce and mustard! Served with a pint of lemon, lime and bitters and it made a perfect lunch for a big hunger!