Caribbean Brown Chicken Stew

  It seems very rare that I cook at home these days. My boys have grown, and fend for themselves, and, after a long day of cooking for the general public each day at work, I really can never be bothered when I get home.

The past 10 days I have been on sick leave from work. For a workaholic this is not good news, especially as the first few days found me bed bound and unable to walk. I'm now at the stage where I feel well in mind but my body is still slightly lagging behind and I'm bored!

Hopefully my return to work is imminent so my days now turn towards thoughts of new meals for the menu when I return.  

 

 

This week on the internet I came across this rather lovely dish called Caribbean Brown Chicken Stew made from lovely fresh chicken, vegetables and herbs, exactly the type of meal that would fit the café menu.
Not quite sure what makes it 'Caribbean' to be honest but I made it for my family and what a lovely, tasty meal. My son thought the chicken would also work well in a tortilla wrap.   

Lots of photos today. Cooking at home allows me more time.

Ingredient list - to serve 2-3 people

5 or 6 chicken thighs, skinned
Zest & juice of 1 Lime
4 Spring Onions, finely chopped plus 1 extra to garnish
2 Cloves Garlic, finely chopped
1 Red Chilli (or Scotch Bonnet if you like the heat) de-seeded & finely sliced
1 Tbsp Soy Sauce
1 Onion, finely chopped
1 Red Pepper, finely chopped
4 Sprigs Thyme
2 Inch Piece Ginger, peeled & grated
3 Tbsp Light Brown Sugar
25g Butter
Tin chopped Tomatoes

 

 

This isn't a speedy dish. Allow time to marinate the chicken, at least an hour, overnight if possible to taste the full flavour.

To marinate, place the chicken pieces in a bowl and add all the ingredients except for the sugar and tomatoes. Cover with cling film and keep chilled in the fridge.

 

 

 

 

 

When the chicken is ready to cook, remove from the marinade and pat dry with kitchen towel. Keep the marinade to one side as this adds to the stew later.

Heat the butter in a deep frying pan ( I used my wok) and add the sugar. As it begins to caramelise add the chicken pieces and fry until you have nice caramelised bits on both sides.

Remove from the pan and set to one side.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Using the same pan, add the marinade and fry for a few minutes to soften. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Add the chicken pieces and the tinned tomatoes and just enough water to cover the chicken. Season and simmer for about 20 minutes until the chicken is cooked and the sauce has thickened.

 

 

 When ready serve with rice and garnish with chopped spring onion.

 

  

 

Definitely on the menu next week!!  

 

 

 

Linking up this week with:
Tasty Tuesdays
Foodie Friday and Everything Else
Sweet and Simple Fridays

Baked Camembert With Figs, Peaches, Passion Fruit, Pomegranate & Pistachio Nuts

 The kids have finished school for the summer, and August has arrived bringing the hot weather for the holidays. Well supposedly!!
As always, in England, we have a few hot, sunny days and get all excited, and then the clouds, wind and rain burst through again.
Remaining optimistic for hot weather this week I have put a light bite meal of baked camembert on the menu. 
Baked Camembert has become quite a popular dish the past few years in pubs and restaurants.
Easy and quick to prepare, the camembert is placed in the oven for about 10-15 minutes at 180° and served with crusty bread, usually on a slate or wooden board.
This is usually it, however, I spotted a gorgeous photo on pinterest this week with figs, pistachio nuts and pomegranate on top of the camembert and knew that was perfect for the café menu!
I was right, already it's been a great success, with 2 alternative toppings being served.

One version was topped with fresh, juicy peach, pistachio nuts, pomegranate seeds and my raspberry & strawberry ketchup served with crusty white baguette.

Is your mouth watering??

 

 

 

 

 

 

The second version was with fresh figs, passion fruit, pomegranate seeds, pistachio nuts topped with my tasty raspberry & strawberry ketchup.

Served on a rustic, wooden board with warm crusty baguette. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Which version is your favourite?  

 

Linking up this week with:
Tasty Tuesdays
Foodie Friday and Everything Else

White Bean & Chicken Chilli

I can understand the concept of writers block must be truly frustrating and depressing for a person in that trade. Having to constantly be inventive, imaginative, inspiring and all in a time limit is a concept I know all too well.
We only have about 7 items on the café menu but they change each week and, every so often, I get 'chefs block' and struggle to produce the goods.

This week my struggle was with my menus hot dish. We only serve 1 a week so I try to keep customers interest with new ideas, classical twists and flavours.
I rarely look to google for my ideas, now I just stick to Pinterest. A truly amazing site where you can put together scrapbooks of all your favourite items on the internet and look at what everyone is scrapbooking.
Traditional chilli con carne is a dish that goes well at the café whenever I put it on so I got rather excited when I saw this White Bean & Chicken Chilli on Pinterest taken from a lovely blog
  The Cafe Sucre Farine .




White Beans & Chicken Chilli

A lovely little blog which I'm sure I will head back to for more ideas in the future.
Having bought all the ingredients I set about on Monday morning to put this little dish together and what a success! As always I got all the girls at work to have a taste test before going on the menu and a big thumbs up I received from them all. My only criticism was that I think I slipped with the chilli powder and cumin as it was slightly too hot for my palate. But then I am girl who only eats korma!!  

If you fancy trying this the recipe can be found here , I can honestly recommend!

White Bean & Chicken Chilli

Linking up this week with
Tasty Tuesdays
foodie fridays and everything else

And if you fancy following me on pinterest where you can find lots of new ideas you can find me Here

Kedgeree For Sunday Brunch

This week I experienced my first ever work appraisal. Having been in catering for 30 years it's not something any establishment I've worked in has done, but I found the experience to be a good one and, from it, I took new enthusiasm.
One of the questions was what I liked or disliked about my job. My main like was menu planning, and the fact that I have freedom to change our lunchtime menu weekly. It keeps me motivated, stops the boredom and increases my knowledge of new foods.
One of my dislikes was cooking breakfasts! Bit of a hard one that considering the amount of breakfasts I cook weekly. But the challenge of cooking, watching for burnt toast, overdone eggs, then putting several different elements on a plate at one time can be an extremely hard, tedious and boring daily job.
After discussing my dislike with Kate she suggested looking into breakfast specials to keep my motivation going, especially on a Sunday when we serve brunch all day long.
With this in mind I took to Pinterest, my trusted idea search website to look for inspiration.
So I typed in 'Breakfast' and amongst many ideas that appeared was the dish Kedgeree.
I loved the sound of it so looked further for some good recipes.  


Smoked Haddock Kedgeree
Brunch at The Nook On The Square

I don't have many memories of school, especially not good ones, but I have a distant memory of making Kedgeree once and remembered it contained rice, fish and eggs. Oh yes and the rice was yellow!!!
Looking now into the origin of Kedgeree I was interested to learn that it is of Indian origin, so contains spices, and, it seems, the addition of smoked haddock and boiled eggs appeared when the dish came to England. It is a dish enjoyed hot or cold.
I took a little of each recipe I looked at and here is my version of the mixed rice dish.
All components were cooked first then put together in a pan as and when a customer ordered it.
Below I have fragrant basmati rice, cooked with a couple of teaspoons of turmeric in the water to change the colour from white to yellow, cooked and flaked smoked haddock, boiled eggs, finely chopped red onion and fresh tomato and a pot of blended spices and herbs.

Ingredients for Kedgeree

 

With all ingredients prepared I melted a knob of butter in my pan with a handful of red onion, tomato and a teaspoon of my blended herbs and spices.

After cooking for a few minutes I added a portion of rice. The rice seemed to stick to the pan so  I added more butter and a little water although, after more research into the dish, next time I would add a little cream at this point.

 

 

Fry the onion and tomato on butter.

 

 

With the rice sizzling nicely I added the haddock and boiled eggs. 

 

 

Kedgeree cooking in the pan

 

As soon as all the ingredients were hot to touch, over 75° if you have a thermometer I served into a warm bowl with a small dish of natural yoghurt.   

 

 

 

 

Smoked Haddock Kedgeree
Brunch at The Nook On The Square

Decorated with chopped coriander, wedge of lemon and a sprinkling of cumin on the yoghurt this was a welcome addition to the Sunday Brunch menu last week at The Nook.
Looking now for more breakfast ideas, what's your favourite?

Brunch at The Nook On The Square
Smoked Haddock Kedgeree

Ingredients for this lovely dish for 2 people are:

1lb Cooked and flaked Smoked Haddock
8oz Fragrant Basmati Rice, cooked in couple teaspoons of turmeric to turn yellow
3 Hard Boiled Eggs
Knob butter
1/4 Pint Cream
Salt & Pepper to Taste.

Herbs and Spices Blended In Processor:
Small Red Chilli
Clove Garlic
1ins  Ginger
Handful Coriander
1 Tbsp Curry Powder
1/2 Squeezed Lemon Juice


LINKING UP THIS WEEK WITH:
Tasty Tuesdays
Foodie Friday and Everything Else

Broad Bean And Basil Pate

It's a short harvesting season for Broad Beans, also known as Fava Beans, I learnt this evening, spanning from late May to early September.
Known as King of all beans they have a flavour smoother, sweeter and richer than all beans. According to Hannibal Lecter they are eaten well with liver and a nice bottle of Chianti!




Broad Beans, also known as Fava Beans.

 

 

 

Here at The Nook we like to work with seasonal food on the weekly menu.
This week I sought inspiration to use these fine beans for a dish and attempted a new pate, and boy the result was lovely.  

Broad Bean and Basil Pate accompanied by Mushroom Pate, Humus and Various selection of breads.

As with my mushroom pate I sweated some onion and garlic with butter in a pan then added some boiled broad beans. Unlike Hannibal Lecter I didn't reach for the chianti, instead I poured some pinot grigio in the pan with some basil leaves and allowed it to reduce down.
After allowing it to cool a little I placed the mixture into the processor with some cream cheese and seasoning and whizzed together.
I left to set overnight and it turned into a lovely smooth paste and soooo tasty.

Broad bean and basil pate on todays menu

The pate served up nicely in a bowl and accompanied on a rustic board with my chestnut mushroom pate, hummus and salad. On the side I served pitta bread, toasted focaccia and baked shortcrust pastry biscuits.
A big winner on the menu this week, I definitely recommend giving it a try .    

Broad Bean and Basil Pate

Linking up this week with:

Tasty Tuesday

Veggie Wednesday 

Foodie Friday and Everything Else

The Good Food Show NEC Birmingham June 2015

Last weekend saw the annual 'Good Food Summer Show' arrive at the NEC Birmingham.
For the past 3 years my interest in food has grown immensely and when I received tickets for the show as a birthday present I was really excited at the prospect of an interesting, educational and inspiring day out. 8



The Good Food Show at NEC Birmingham June 2015

 

 

Lots of people made the journey to Birmingham. There were many stalls ranging from oils, pastries, artisan breads, sweets, wines and spirits.

Crowds gather to the NEC Birmingham for The Good Food Show

This section was cakes and bakes.  

Cakes and Bakes section of The Good Food Show NEC Birmingham

 

 

 Meringues to die for!

 

Meringues

Flapjacks of all varieties.
My favourite had rocky road topping.

Flapjacks

                                     Enormous éclairs.

Pastries!

Sponge cakes. Sticky toffee sponge was delicious.

Individual sponge cakes

                            Various flavours of focaccia

Artisan focaccia at The Good Food Show

This man was demonstrating and selling whisks. He was quite the salesman and always had a crowd around him to entertain.

 

 

Spiralised vegetables and fruit, wow!! A very entertaining German was demonstrating how to transform vegetables.. I must confess to buying a spiraliser.

Spiralised fruit and veg at The Good Food Show

 

 

As we walked round I spotted tv chef  Phil Vickery doing a demonstration so we stopped to watch.

It was so interesting to listen to stories of his travels and listen to the food knowledge he shared.

Phil Vickery demonstrating at The Good Food Show

 

At 4pm we headed to the main theatre to be entertained and inspired by another tv chef, James Martin. In the space of half hour he treated us to a show producing 4 dishes, food knowledge and rather witty banter!

 

James Martin at the NEC Birmingham June 2015

I was rather intrigued at how much butter James used in all his dishes. Definitely not healthy eating but a great show.

James Martin at The NEC Birmingham

 

 

Our tickets also included entry into Gardeners World so we spent our last hour walking around the flower displays. Below are a selection of my favourites.

 

 

 

                              Al fresco dining display.

 

 

                             An English Garden display.

 

 

I don't know what these were but so so beautiful.

 

Brilliant day out and our tickets are valid for Novembers show as well. Looking forward to another lovely day out .

Linking up with:
Tasty Tuesdays
Foodie Friday and Everything Else  

The Humble Hash

In the years during, and post, World War 1 and 2, and for several years to follow, the humble Hash dish was a popular meal in most households due to the basic, low cost ingredients.
The traditional dish comprises of chopped and diced meat, potatoes, spices and onions.   Due to rationing limiting the availability of fresh meat in the war years corned beef became a popular meat in the dish.
It isn't a dish I ever fancied much as I'm not a great lover of corned beef, but it seems that new variations are developing and becoming more popular on restaurant menus.

One variation I have come across recently is Smoked Salmon Hash.
We had an excess of salmon in the fridge at work so I took a look through Pinterest for ideas on how I could use it and come across the hash dish.
So quick and easy to make and tastes absolutely delicious. This dish now appears regularly on our lunch menu and is always popular.

Smoked Salmon Hash Topped With A Poached Egg and Served With Salad.

For each person allow:
1 1/2 potatoes (par boiled and diced 1/2in squares)
2 slices smoked salmon (cut into small thin slices)
Handful finely chopped red onion and red pepper
Capers (amount according to taste)
Chopped dill
S&P to taste.
25g butter
1 or 2 poached eggs

In a frying pan melt butter and throw in the potatoes, onion and pepper. Fry until the potatoes start to brown and crisp, then add salmon, capers, dill, salt and pepper.
Cook for a further couple of minutes and serve topped with 1 or 2 poached eggs. I added a side salad when serving and a wedge of lemon.

As the salmon hash is so popular on the menu I decided to have a go at a breakfast hash as a Sunday morning breakfast special at The Nook this week.
Promoted by our waitress Sarah once again it proved to be a big hit with diners and I sold several portions.

Breakfast Hash with Potatoes, Sausage, Bacon and Smoked Applewood Cheese, Topped With 2 Poached Eggs

For each person allow:
1 1/2 potatoes (par boiled and diced into 1/2in squares)
Handful diced red onion and red pepper
1 cooked sausage (cut into small pieces)
1 rasher cooked bacon (cut into small pieces)
25g - 50g smoked applewood cheese (grated or chopped)
S & P
25g butter
1 or 2 poached eggs.

In a frying pan melt butter and throw in the potatoes, onion and pepper. Fry until the potatoes start to brown and crisp, then add the sausage, bacon,salt and pepper.
Cook for a further couple of minutes then scatter the Applewood over the top and grill for a minute until melted. Serve topped with 1 or 2 poached eggs and parsley.

For my next trial recipe I am going to swap white potatoes for sweet potatoes and use Spanish and Italian meats, herbs and spices.

For perfect poached eggs use this method -
Fill a non stick frying pan with water and boil to just before boiling point. Crack each egg into a cup first then slide it into the water. Turn off your heat and add a lid to the saucepan, then set your timer for 4 minutes.
Remove the lid and serve - nothing could be easier!
And there you have it,

Linking up this week with:
Tasty Tuesdays
Foodie Fridays and Everything Else  

Mushroom, Feta and Roasted Pepper Pate

I had a bit of a busman's holiday this week on my days off and went for tea and cake at a local café.
Looking at their specials board I noticed they had Mushroom and Stilton Pate on their lunch menu. Sounded lovely.
I often make mushroom pate at The Nook but never thought of adding cheese.
I had feta left over in the fridge this week so thought I would adapt my usual pate recipe and include it.

I chopped some mushrooms and pan fried them in lots of butter.

Sauté Mushrooms in Lots Of Butter 

 

 

 

Then I crumbled the feta in and cooked until melted. 

Mushrooms and Feta

I had some roasted peppers in the fridge and had a brainwave to throw them into the mixture. It seemed to be drying out in the pan so I added some cream and seasoned.
The mixture looked gorgeous and, if you didn't want to blitz into a pate, it would have been equally as gorgeous to stir through some pasta.
But for this recipe I put all the mixture into the food processor and blitzed until smooth, then refrigerated.

Mushrooms, Feta, Roasted Red Pepper and Cream

And here is the finished product!
 Feedback from our customers was very positive. Great to have another vegetarian option on the menu.

Mushroom, Feta and Roasted Pepper Pate served with Rhubarb, Fig and Ginger Chutney, toasted breads and salad.

I served it with my Rhubarb, Fig and Ginger chutney, toasted red onion focaccia from The Revel Bakery, and my own Lemon and Poppy Seed bread.

Mushroom, Feta and Roasted Red Pepper Pate.

Linking up this week with:
Tasty Tuesday
Veggie Wednesday
Foodie Friday and Everything Else.