Rice Archives - Page 2 of 2 - Retro Food For Modern Times

Category: Rice

03
Jul
2020

John Hillerman’s Paella

categories: Celebrity Recipes, Rice, Spain

Does anyone know / remember The Libertines song “Music When The Lights Go Out”? The hook line in this piece of indie-pop boy love runs “All the highs and the lows and the to’s and fro’s, they left me dizzy”. That is exactly how I felt when making John Hillerman’s Paella. No doubt about it, this was a tough cook. But oh boy did it pay off!

The Lows

Converted rice? Not available for love or money.
Clams in clam juice ? Nada.
Bottled clam juice? No, nay, never.
Polish Sausage…probably could have bought some but I had chorizo in the freezer which seemed more paella-ish anyway

I made this during the height of the ‘rona lockdown. But I honestly feel that my inability to get hold of these ingredients were not limited to that insane time of food shortages.

So, had this been one of my recipes? I would have ripped it up and we would have never more heard of it. But this was was not my recipe, this was John Hillerman’s Paella recipe that I was testing for Jenny for her Murder She Wrote Cookbook so onward and upward it was.

The To’s and And The Fro’s

I didn’t have converted rice. I didn’t have clam juice. Which meant I could not follow the first step of the recipe.

I had:

Bomba paella rice.
Fresh clams.
Frozen fish stock.

This meant that if I found another recipe that got me through that first step of cooking the rice, then the rest should fall into place like one of those Rube Goldberg machines I have become obsessed with during lockdown.

The recipe I used was the one below. I followed all the directions for cooking the rice per that recipe. But then switched back to John Hillerman’s Paella recipe from the step where he says to “saute the chicken in olive oil”.

Sorry, they won’t let me link it directly so here is the URL: https://www.deliciousmagazine.co.uk/recipes/chicken-paella-with-squid-and-beans/

Here is John’s recipe:

I was literally toing and froing between the two recipes and the pan and the ingredients, making sure everything cooked properly!

The Highs

Have you seen the photos? This dish was lush!!! It was so pretty, so colourful, so full of joy!

It looked gorgeous, smelled like heaven and tasted even better.

John Hillerman’s Paella brought the smell and taste of Spain into a very grey wintery Melbourne day. It was seriously like a ray of sunshine!

I LOVED this!!!! So, so, so good!!!!! The end result made it all worthwhile!!!

Thank you Jenny for the recipe! This is the best paella I have ever made and I will be sure to make it again! When travel opens up and we can spend time together again, this definitely needs to be on our menu! In my imagination, we are sitting in your garden with Mr R and Battenberg Belle and having a lovely long lunch of paella, great conversation, lots of vino, and some great tunes courtesy of Mr Rathbone. Some ’60’s bossa nova maybe?

Oh, also for those of you like me who do not know who John Hillerman was? His best-known role was as the incredibly suave Higgins In Magnum PI but he also appeared in Blazing Saddles, Chinatown (high on my must-see list), Murder She Wrote (obvs), and A Very Brady Sequal among many, many other films and tv shows!

Have a fabulous week friends!

Stay safe, eat paella, watch John Hillerman on the tv and listen to The Libertines!

Sounds like a pretty good way to spend the weekend to me!

14
Jun
2020

Tackling Food Waste

categories: Curry, Pastry, Rice

One of my goals this year was to reduce food waste. One of the downfalls of blogging, and being in cookbook club, is that I often buy ingredients of which I only need a small amount. Add to this my penchants for stocking up when things are on sale and buying things well…just because. As a result, my freezer and pantry are jam-packed and I sometimes forget about fresh produce in the fridge until it is too far gone to use.

Last year, I stole an idea off Jenny from Silver Screen Suppers and implemented a dairy shelf in my fridge. All dairy items go onto it which means I can keep track of those items a bit better. To twist the old phrase around “In sight, in mind”.

Recently I have also (maybe also inspired by Jenny???) implemented a “Use By Shelf” that contains the items that need to be used in the near future. Again, I have found that keeping these items front of mind has helped me to ensure that they are used in a timely manner.

Fridge Freezer Pantry Week

My latest endeavour is Fridge, Freezer, Pantry week where one week a month I minimise my shopping and cook as much as possible from items in….wait for it…my fridge, freezer and pantry.

Bet you never saw that one coming given the ambiguous name of the challenge!

My aim for this week is to only buy fresh fruit and vegetables. Everything else has to come from you know where!

Here is how the first attempt at this went

Sunday Night – Baked Lobster!

Cos, you know, if you’re going to start something, start it with a bang!

I bought lobster tails at Christmas when they were on sale. They came from the freezer. Everything else came from the pantry.
The recipe called for fennel. I didn’t have any. Normally I would have bought some but this week? I had some dill leftover from the potato bake so I used that instead.
I also subbed in Worchestershire sauce for the anchovy essence the recipe demanded.

This was an okay dish. I think the white sauce dulled the flavour of the lobster a bit which prevented it from being a great dish. I would not make it again which is why I have not included the recipe. If you want it, let me know. I don’t know why you would but hey, you do you!

Monday Night – South American Chicken and Rice

This was amazing! Diana Henry’s from Oven to Table is our current Tasty Reads selection and so far every dish has been a winner.

This recipe used chicken from the freezer and rice and black beans from the pantry. The only things I bought specially to make this was a punnet of cherry tomatoes and some chicken stock.

I did not use fresh peppers, I had some in a jar which I used instead. There were also chillies and garlic in that jar so I added them in too.

There was a lot of this leftover and given I had the potato bake and some soup to eat for lunches I made little one-serving packages of this and popped in the freezer for future use.

Recipe: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/recipes/everyday/chicken/south-american-spiced-chicken-beans-rice-avocado-pickled-chillies/

Tuesday night – Pizza

Earlier in the week Mum dropped off a heat and eat pizza. Someone had given her two and we benefitted from her surplus. I had film club that night so this was a perfect night for the Fussiest eater in the World to pop something in the oven whilst I chatted about the pros and cons of Revolutionary Road with my friends.

It was ok. Not as good as pizza shop pizza but better than frozen / supermarket pizza.

Wednesday – Bacon, Halloumi and Vegetable Pasties

A little while back I made the veggie pasties from Jamie Oliver’s Veg. I had a LOT of the leftover vegetable mix so I popped it in the freezer. The halloumi and pastry also came from the freezer.

The bacon came from the use-by shelf. 😇

I bought nothing for this meal and it was delicious!!!! Believe me, the picture does this no justice!

Thursday and Friday – Lamb and Cashew Curry

Oh. Wow. This was AMAZING!!!!

I used Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall’s Lamb and Cashew Curry for this.

I had to buy cashew nuts and coriander for this but it was worth every cent! This was divine! The lamb was melt in the mouth tender and the cashew gravy was lick your plate clean good!

Oh! I intended to make some flatbreads for the curry but ended up just serving it with rice. I bought some oat bran for the flatbreads which I did not end up using. Grrrr. 😡

Saturday – Squid, Chorizo and Chickpea Salad

Yay! I got to use those chickpeas on the Use By shelf!

I bought some oregano for this. It was marked way down. TBH though, I would have been happy with the leftover coriander from the curry.

Oh lord, I dropped my recipe for this into the frying pan that had all the chorizo oil in it! Luckily I was able to find it here!

My favorite dishes…I tried so hard to come up with just one but it really was a tie between the curry, the pasties and the South American Chicken Rice!

The Positives

Eating out of the fridge, freezer, and pantry created some amazing meals. Having said that, I had a lot of things in those places that made it easy!
Pretty much everything on the use by shelf got eaten.
I spent WAY less money than in a ” normal” week of shopping
I also feel I threw out fewer items than usual.
It was really fun to build my menus around the items that needed using!
Being conscious of not wasting anything also made me more proactive about ensuring that the leftover South American Chicken and the soup I was having for lunch were also frozen up for future use.

The Negatives

On Saturday morning I had to throw out an untouched bunch of broccolini which I could have used in the pasties.
We also threw out a whole cucumber, some ratty-looking chives and some bean sprouts
I now have pretty much a whole punnet of oregano to use, which even though it was bought highly reduced I have no further use for and which I don’t think really worked in the salad for which it was bought.
I bought that oat bran I never ended up using. One more thing in the pantry….

The Learnings

Keep a much closer eye on the produce drawers
Don’t buy things for which you have only one use (even if they are on sale)
Keep using what I have
Try to shop more than once a week for fresh produce so that things do not languish in that produce drawer
Take tips from the experts.

Whilst a few things went into the freezer and a few things went into the bin, on the whole I was really happy with my first attempt at fridge, freezer pantry week. It made me conscious of things that I need to be doing all the time and of how I can make the best use of what I already have. More than that though, it inspired me to keep going and to really get my act together when it comes reducing the food I waste.

This is what the useby shelf looked like by the end of the week. The four containers at the back are three serves of a cottage pie the Fussiest Eater in the World made for his work dinners and the last of the pasties.

I didn’t quite get through all that hummus but resisted the urge to buy another tub when I went shopping this week.

The three new containers hold some of the leftover chorizo and chickpea salad, and half an onion and half a lemon that I used to make it. That oregano is also there…😣

My favorite dishes…I tried so hard to come up with just one but it really was a tie between the curry, the pasties and the South American Chcken Rice!

If anyone has any tips on what to do with it, please let me know!

Indeed if you have any tips on reducing food waste, food management, etc please send them through, I would love to hear how you meal plan and your ideas on how to reduce waste. I have only just started this journey and know I have a LONG way to go before I get this mastered, so any advice I can benefit from will be greatly appreciated!

Have a great week! Stay safe and reduce waste!

26
Apr
2019

Sri Lankan Lamprais

categories: Curry, Rice, Sri Lanka

I had a different post planned for today but after the events of Easter Sunday in Sri Lanka, I thought I would change things up and share some Sri Lankan food. Lamprais is a dish from the Dutch Burgher community of Sri Lanka, which is my heritage. The name is derived from the Dutch word “lomprijst” which translates into “parcel of food”.

For English speakers, the closest pronunciation is “lump rice”.

So this is our “parcel of food”. It is Sri Lankan comfort food at it’s best – hearty, spicy, flavoursome. Lamprais is something that I have eaten for as long as I can remember – from being a small child who would only eat the fish cutlets (the meatball type things you can see in the picture above) and the rice because everything else was too spicy to nowadays loving the fact that I can have a delicious, satisfying, complex meal on the table within about 45 minutes and using either one baking tray or a steamer.

For the last, we think four years, (maybe five) Mum and I have been making our lamprais at Easter and it has become a little tradition for us(just like chocolate eggs)! We were planning our timetable over a very non Sri Lankan roast lamb dinner when we heard the horrible news of the Easter Sunday Isis bombings in Sri Lanka. Thankfully no one in our family or friends was injured in the horrendous act of violence but over 300 innocent people have lost their lives.

I have always wanted to share this dish but have baulked at it because it’s just so involved…but given we were down to make them, now seemed like a perfect time.

Let’s break down what goes into our version of lamprais. This will vary slightly, each family will have their own variation. For instance, many people add an egg into their lamprais which is not something we do. Also, traditionally in Sri Lanka many people add fried ash plantains.

Here’s what goes into ours:

Here is Charmaine Solomon’s recipe for Lamprais – there are some slightly different spellings / terminology but this is the closest version to ours that I could find.

We do not however, pour that final bit of coconut milk over the dish before cooking.

Lamprais Base – Ghee Rice

Ghee Rice is the foundation of every lamprais. (Except for last year when we ran out and had to sub in some microwave brown rice for our last two lamprais).

Ghee rice is long grain or basmati ricecooked in ghee (duh) with spices such as cardamom, cloves, curry leaves and cinnamon. This gives a lovely flavourful base for your lamprais.

The Main – Lamprais Curry

So, in our breakdown of labour, mum always cooks the ghee rice because she does it really well and I can’t cook rice for shit. Making the lamprais curry? That’s my job.

Lamprais curry is like no other curry, I know for two reasons. Firstly it’s a mixed meat curry containing beef, lamb, chicken and pork. I mean have you ever? It’s also delicious. Like seriously who knew mixing ALL the meats would taste so good?

Second, in most other curries, you cook the meat from the start in the gravy. Not so with this one. You boil the beef, lamb and chicken first, then tip the cooked meat into the curry gravy to simmer away for a couple of hours.

If you make this, be prepared to chop things for HOURS. Four onions, eight garlic cloves. And around two kilos of meat into a pea-sized dice.

Did I say labour of love?

Did I say this is why we split this between two people and only cook it once a year? On a long weekend?

Also, you can use the water used to boil the mix of meats as stock to flavour the rice.

Lamprais – My Favourite Bit – Fish Cutlets

Usually, in a lamprais, you get two fish cutlets. So, they are always the first thing I eat. And the last thing I eat. These are little crumbed meatballs you can see in the photo. Or should that be fishballs? Either way? They are delicious. If you are averse to fish, you could sub these out with frikkadels.

Mum makes these – she made around 60 of them this year. Which was handy because I ate my weight in them as we were going!

This recipe is from S for Sri Lanka. All other recipes are from Charmaine Solomon via the The Great Australian Cookbook.

In the above photo, you can also see our first condiment or sambol – Prawn Blachan

Lamprais Accoutrements 1 – Prawn Blachan

Blachan is made from dried prawns and spices. It is spicy, salty, pungent and a little goes a long way.

Lamprais Accoutrements 2 – Seeni Sambol

Seeni Sambol is a caramelised onion relish that adds a touch of sweetness to your lamprais. You could make this yourself. If you feel like chopping up another four onions after you’ve chopped up four for the curry….or you could find your local Indian / Asian / Sri Lankan grocery store and just buy a jar of it.

You have to make the rice, you have to make the curry, the meatballs and the blachan. Trust me, unless you want to end up sobbing on the floor, buy the seeni sambol.

Or make it just because it’s delicious a couple of days before you want to make the lamprais.

Here is our process in motion!

Lamprais Accoutrements 2 – Brinjal (Eggplant) Moju

Now, normally I make our brinjal moju but this year, I decided to use some ready made. Not so much because of my recently diagnosed allergies, but more so because I just didn’t have the time. The purpose of the eggplant moju is to add a little sour into the dish, to cut through the richness of the curry. And possibly also to add a vegetable that is not onion into this dish!

I also have no concerns about eating the moju despite the allergy. It is, after all, only a spoonful per meal

Which brings us to the end. We made 16 lamprais. We make ours big so one is enough for a meal.

Now you might have been wondering about the preponderance of aluminium foil in this post. Lamprais are traditionally wrapped in and steamed in a banana leaf. This also adds another layer of flavour/aroma to this dish. Here is a traditional lamprais that I had at the DBU (Dutch Burgher Union) in Colombo when I was there in 2015.

As much as I would like to go traditional, we use aluminium foil so we can pop our “parcels of food” straight into the freezer. You can either bake your frozen lamprais in the oven for around 40 minutes or steam them for around the same amount of time. I personally like to cook them in the oven because the bottom of the rice goes a little crispy like in claypot rice.

So that’s it…our lamprais….I don’t expect any of you to be crazy enough to make it, but if you have somewhere that sells Sri Lankan food near you, why not try some!

Stay safe, be kind to each other, take care and have a wonderful week!

13
Jun
2013

Retro Food For Modern Times – Never Mind Eating For Beauty, This Week is All About the Love!

categories: Curry, Desserts, Dried Fruit, Eggplant, Eggs, Jelly, Plums, Rice, Salad

So last time we left off, I had been eating for love and beauty for 4 days and loving it.

However, through the week, I began to see a certain theme running through my dishes…

Day 5

I made two recipes from Eating for Love and Beauty.

The first was a delicious Egg Curry.

This was very tasty, spicy and quick to make. I will definitely make this again. Also, I didn’t have fenugreek because…well who has? However, I noticed my Garam Masala contained fenugreek, cumin and coriander so I used that in lieu of all individual spices.

I think we all know eggs are a symbol of fertility…I had my egg curry with a Rice Exotica – Saffron & Lime Casserole.
Rice Exotica huh? I think the Swami might be getting a bit saucy!

Sadly, the Rice Exotica, was the least sexy dish of the week. Probably because in my first mouthful of it, I bit directly into a clove which spoiled entire dish for me Yes, it was my fault and I should have been more careful when I was counting them as I fished them out but still, not good. I was also not happy with the texture and I only par boiled my rice initially! I like my rice light and fluffy and this was a bit too mushy and stuck together for me. I dread to think what it might have been like had I cooked it all the way through the first time as per the recipe.

If I was going to make the rice again, which is unlikely, I would probably not cook it at all before bunging it in the oven with the nuts and spices. Hmmm…maybe I will try it that way. Sans the cloves!

Next up was an Eggplant Dish….and lo and behold, the internet tells me that eggplants are a symbol of abundance or fertility, passion and devotion. See what I mean about a theme beginning to develop?

Day 6 – Eggplant Gourmet

This was AWESOME!…

Earthy eggplant, sweet, sour..all sorts of deliciousness rolled into the one dish. The flavours reminded me very much of a Sri Lankan Eggplant dish that sometimes contains cashew nuts…and maybe dates?

(Dear mother given you have started to chime in on here, maybe you could offer some insight into the constituents of an eggplant moju???)

Either way, I had some cashews left over from the Rice Exotica so I dropped them in for extra flavour and crunch. I’m definitely making this again….

I also ate it more as a side dish than as a main. It’s also pretty good cold on crackers or some tzatziki on pita bread.

Eggplant Gourmet Recipe

Day 6 – Lovers Dandelion Salad

If you’ve read my earlier post…(here)…you know I have a bit of a penchant for a bit of foraging. So the Swami’s Lover’s Dandelion Salad was as good a reason as any to go comb the local environment for some dandelion leaves which, luckily, were plentiful.

I loved this salad. There is something about bitter greens that makes me feel incredibly virtuous and just oozy with health! Again, I had no fenugreek sprouts so I just used a sprout combo. I was becoming curious about why the Swami used fenugreek in so many dishes so I did a bit o’ research and hello…fenugreek is sometimes used to cure erectile dysfunction.

When the Swami wants you to eat for love, she doesn’t muck about!

She also says this salad is good for those suffering from mental or sexual debility. I ate mine for lunch a the office and it kind of worked. It certainly gave me a mental boost for the afternoon!

Lovers Dandelion Salad 0

Day 7 – 21 Essences of Kama Sutra

I followed the Lovers Dandelion Salad with the 21 Essences of Kama Sutra Salad although I guess I only had 19 Essences as I subbed a yellow pepper for the red and green peppers and could not find soy sprouts for love or money. Then again, I used my handy sprout combo per the last recipe so maybe I had more than 21 Essences of Kama Sutra! The Swami offers no comment on what the 21 Essences of Kama Sutra is good for. I think she’s letting the name speak for itself.

21 Essences of Karma Sutra — 21 Essences of Kama Sutra

This was also a very nice salad, although if I made this again, I wouldn’t bother with the Lotus Nuts. In the first pack I bought there were two dead moths. That made me gag and I had to throw them out. The second lot of lotus nuts was, thankfully, mothless but also largely tasteless.

I read on the internet Lotus Nuts are good for irritability. Well guess what? After the moths, and having to make two trips to the Asian food store to buy them, then finding they taste of sweet F.A. I guess they are. I was certainly a lot more irritable after all that palaver than I was before I started!

And quelle surprise, also apparently good for impotence!

1 21 Essences Of Kama Sutra

Day 8

It’s Plum Wonderful

I ended my week with the Swami’s recipe for an uncooked Plum Pudding which is basically dried fruit held together with jello. It’s really tasty, and has all the flavours of a plum pudding but is fruitier and not so heavy. It would be a perfect alternative to a heavy pudding, particularly here when it is warm at Christmas.

Plum Wonderful Recipe

I recently read that a good maxim to use when trying to moderate your alcohol intake is to abstain one day a week, one week a month, one month a year.

It doesn’t work for me alcoholwise as I am aiming for far more than one AFD a week but it’s certainly a philosophy I can embrace when it comes to adopting the principles behind Eating For Love and Beauty.

That book, which also had a whole host of other good advice was:

Dangerous Women

Apart from the moths and the failure of the Rice Exotica, Eating For Love and Beauty has been fun and I feel really healthy. It is winter here now and whilst people around me have been dropping like flies with all sorts of horrible lurgies, I have never felt haler or heartier!

I really want to go to the Swami’s retreat now….

I’m going spend my week trying to find a yoga class I can do at lunchtime so I can exercise for health and beauty as well as eat for it. Enjoy your week whatever you do!

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