Udon noodles with broad beans and fresh greens in a ginger and coriander sauce

Good one this. Very low fat too as there's very little frying involved. Here's the plan...

Ingredients:

Dried udon noodles
2 large carrots, sliced
200g spring greens
100g broad beans
Sesame seeds to garnish

And for the sauce:

1 tbsp vegetable oil
2 cloves garlic, crushed and chopped
2 tsp root ginger, grated
2 tbsp soy sauce
2 tsp rice wine vinegar
1 tbsp lemon juice
2 tsp mirin or sugar
2 tbsp fresh coriander, chopped
2 tsp cornflour, mixed in around half a cup of water

Method:

Get the sauce ready as everything else goes really quickly! In a smallish saucepan fry the garlic and ginger to release its flavour and to take out some of the garlic's after burn effect, after a minute or so add the soy sauce, vinegar, lemon juice and mirin, cook for a couple of minutes and then add the coriander and cook for just a minute or so. Now add the cornflour and water mix and stir constantly until you've got a nice smooth sauce. Set to one side.

Now I cooked the noodles (for five minutes) in the base of a steamer over which I steamed the vegetables. After five minutes check that the carrots are just about done, then remove from the heat, rinse the noodles really well and then stir the vegetables and noodles together, introducing the sauce and mixing through. Plate up, and then sprinkle with sesame seeds and a little fresh coriander to look dead posh.

Slightly oriental lentil and rice bake

Genuine experiment this one... Basically it's an attempt at a Asian inspired lentil and rice bake. Worked pretty well. Lovely texture. The coconut didn't come through as strong as I expected but the lemon zest lifts the whole thing. Next time might get some lemongrass in there too. Worth doing again.

Ingredients:

One onion, finely chopped
Tbsp vegetable oil
One carrot, finely chopped
4 cloves garlic, crushed and chopped
One cup finely chopped pointy cabbage
Tbsp chopped fresh coriander
Tbsp chopped fresh chives
Tsp chopped fresh parsley
Zest and juice of one lemon
3 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp agave syrup or sugar
1 tbsp rice wine vinegar
Tsp sesame oil
1 cup dried red lentils
200 ml vegetable stock
400 ml coconut milk
2 tbsp vegan margarine
2 tbsp corn meal
2 cups cooked basmati rice
Salt and some extra fresh coriander, to hurl in at the last moment!

Method:

Fry the onion in a large frying pan or wok until it starts to go translucent and is about to brown, around 5-10 minutes. Then add the carrot, garlic and cabbage and cook for a further ten minutes. Keep stirring by the way! Then add the dry lentils, and then the herbs, lemon juice, soy sauce, sugar, vinegar and oil. Stir through, let the vinegar cook off a little, and then add the vegetable stock and coconut milk. Leave to simmer, stirring occasionally, until the lentils are tender after 20 minutes or so. Stir through the margarine, then sprinkle over the corn meal and stir in, then cook for a further 5 minutes.

Now mix in the cooked rice. Stir through. At this point I added a little salt and some fistfuls of extra fresh herbs to add extra flavour. Press the mixture into a well greased loaf tin and cook, covered with foil, for 25 minutes.

Aubergine & Mushrooms in Coconut Sauce

This piece of 'jazz cooking' worked out pretty well. The absolute key to aubergine my experience is to cook it for absolutely bloody ages... as long as you can, until it's falling to pieces; then it's delicious. Try to rush aubergine and it will taste like you've cut the uppers out of your oldest pair of shoes and attempted to serve them up as an appetiser. So, open a bottle of wine, turn on the radio, and take some time with this one...

Ingredients:

1 small onion, chopped
1 small aubergine, chopped
6 or 7 mushrooms, sliced
Tbsp vegetable oil
2 cloves garlic, crushed and chopped
2 tbsp chopped fresh coriander
200 ml coconut milk
100 ml of veg bouillon or stock
2 tsp tamari or dark soy sauce
Tsp corn flour

Method:

Prepare the chopped aubergine by sprinkling it with salt and leaving to stand for a few minutes and then immerse in boiled water for a few minutes. The salting is dead important as it reduces any bitterness, and also makes the aubergine less absorbent of any fats you're using.

Heat the oil in a wok, and over a over a moderate heat, start cooking the onions and aubergine together. Cook for a good while - 20 minutes or so - until they're well browned. Now add the mushroom and garlic and cook for a further 5-10 minutes, and then add the coriander, coconut milk, vegetable stock and soy sauce.

Bring to a very gentle simmer for another 5 minutes or so. At the same time mix the cornflour with a little cold water to produce a creamy mix. Pour into the wok, gradually, until the mixture thickens up to your preferred consistency.

Serve up over some super-fluffy rice. Sprinkle with some more fresh coriander and sesame seeds if you're feeling posh.

Watch out, it's the tahini mousse!

It's the accidental discoveries that make pottering in the kitchen a sight more rewarding than feeling your synapses slowly dissolve as you watch another episode of Strictly Come Boredom. Here's my latest incidental dish - tahini mousse. What began as an asian salad dressing morphed, through a slight misjudging of measures, into the fluffy, delicate and playful cousin of that vegan staple, houmous. It was served up last night with a similarly asian-inspired chick pea salad, a green salad and some crusty bread.

Tahini mousse ingredients:

2 cloves garlic
4 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp tahini
Juice of a lemon
2 tsp rice wine vinegar
3 tbsp water
Dash of soya sauce
Dash of mirin or tsp of sugar

Method:

First of all crush and then finely chopped the garlic. Top tip on garlic that I learned from a tutor at the Vegetarian Society cookery school called Ursula Ferrigno, is that it likes to get crushed first, chopped later. Then lightly fry the garlic in half the olive oil, which I find takes the edge off and sweetens it a little. Then add this, plus all the other ingredients barring the water, into a small food blender. Blend it for a minute or so, and then start adding the water, bit by bit, until the mixture in the blender is light and comes up to a fluffy little point if you stick your finger into it. Not hugely hygienic that last bit, but if you're cooking for family and haven't just changed a nappy, I reckon it's ok.

Slightly asian chick pea salad ingredients:

2 peeled carrots
Tin chick peas
Juice two limes
Tbsp fresh coriander
Tbsp sesame oil
Cup of soy-toasted sunflower seeds

First of all toast the sunflower seeds. To do this put a good couple of handfuls of them into a frying pan, without oil, and then start to toast them on a low to medium heat. As they start to brown, hurl in a few dashes of soya sauce, preferably tamari if you have it, and continue to toast, stirring steadily to mix the soya sauce through. Continue for a couple of minutes and then leave to one side. As they cool down, they'll crisp up, and make a really good snack with beer, if you're not about to mix them into another dish.

Peel and finely chop the carrots, rinse the chick peas, and then turn through in a bowl with the lime juice,  coriander and sesame oil. Then at the last minute introduce the seeds, this stops the salad dressing taking a bit of their crunchy edge off.

To serve:

Last night we had the mousse above and the chick pea salad with a mixture of watercress, lettuce, cherry tomatoes and cucumber all from those lovely people at Riverford, who leave a box of veggie goodies on our doorstep every week. Yum.

Carrot, lentil and coriander soup

"Soup's not for dinner!" Is a refrain often heard in our house, when the awesome and fabulous Anne, my partner, suggests that it is in some way acceptable to serve soup as an evening meal. It is not. And attempting to 'pad things out' with the odd baked potato or maybe some garlic bread just serves to compound the situation. Terrible idea.

BUT... soup is obviously a top option for lunch, and you can freeze it and take it for work, etc. etc. So I make a fair few soups. Here's a good standby, the ever wonderful mix of carrots and coriander with red lentils thrown in to make it packed with iron and give it a little more umami. This dish can be swerved into a slightly more thai direction with a little lemongrass and substituting the soya milk for coconut milk.

Ingredients:

One medium sized onion
230g carrots, chopped
Four cloves garlic
Tbsp vegetable oil
2 litres vegetable stock
Tsp sea salt
2 Tbsp chopped fresh coriander
200g red lentils
150ml soya milk
Black pepper to taste

Method:

In a large saucepan turn the carrots, onion and garlic through in the vegetable oil over a medium heat. This is apparently known as sweating them, rather unpleasantly.

After a couple of minutes add the vegetable stock and simmer for around ten minutes, add the salt and coriander and crack on with the simmer until the carrots are becoming tender. Then add the red lentils, bring back to a simmer, and leave to cook until the lentils are cooked, through - around 15-20 minutes or so - you'll known when it's happened as they start to break down wonderfully and take on a slight fluffiness.

Remove from the heat and in a dedicated blender or with a hand blender in the pan (my preference) blend the soup until totally smooth. Then add the soya milk and blend in.

Serve in posh bowls with some lovely bread, black pepper to taste and a little more fresh coriander.

Tofu & Pak Choi Noodle Soup

The level of domestic craziness was pretty high tonight as I cooked this, so it's all from memory and the weights are guessed. At least I remembered to take photo. So - noodle soup - spectacularly easy dinner to do, dead popular with the kiddies, practically makes itself. You'll note there are no chillies in the recipe, this is because my loved ones, unlike me, aren't up for a bit of firey fun so if you decide to make this ADD CHILLIES! Yum.

Ingredients:


One small onion
100g carrots, sliced into thin, 5cm batons
200g shitake mushrooms, thinly sliced
150g cubed, deep fried tofu
200g pak choi
300g wheat noodles
750cl vegetable stock
One can coconut milk
1 tbsp vegetable oil
2 tbsp coriander
3 cloves garlic
3 tsp fresh root ginger
3 tsp soya sauce
1 tsp sesame oil
Juice of one lime
2 tsp sugar or mirin
1 tsp rice wine vinegar

Method:

Right, once you've started cooking this it goes like the clappers, so try and prep all the ingredients beforehand if you can. First of all, I'd soften up the noodles in boiling water for three minutes and then rinse and let to stand in COLD water while the rest gets done.

If you've got a blender, it works well if you blend the coriander, garlic, root ginger, soya sauce, sesame oil, lime juice, mirin (or sugar) and rice wine vinegar beforehand too. If you've no blender don't worry - just finely chop or mince them all, mix in a bowl and retain to add at the right moment.

So with noodles softened and the sauce mix prepared, start off by frying the onions, in a large wok, in the vegetable oil. Once they've gone translucent and are on the edge of browning, add the carrot batons. When the carrots are softening, add the tofu and then, after a minute or so, the mushrooms. Let the mix cook for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Then add the sauce mix, and cook for a further five minutes.

Now add the vegetable stock and coconut milk, and bring to a gentle simmer. At this point add the softened noodles and stir through well. All done.

To serve: 

Some more fresh coriander is dead nice now, and if you're feeling dead posh, some sesame seeds sprinkled over the top looks rather swanky. Have some soya sauce to hand in case you want some more and, don't forget - add some chillies!

Lebanese Lentils

Photo by me.

When I was at college I lived for a couple of years with a brilliant bloke called Tarek who was mad as a box of frogs. Inbetween the rather intense performance poetry sessions I'd occasionally come home to, he introduced me to an early version of this dish, which I've tweaked and played with over the years. It's a bit of winner in our house.

Ingredients:

One cup of puy lentils
One cup of basmati rice
3 or 4 tablespoons of olive oil
A medium sized onion, finely chopped
4 cloves garlic, crushed and chopped
100g chopped chestnut mushrooms
Zest of a lemon
Two tablespoons of finely chopped coriander (fresh if poss)
One tablespoon of sugar
Two teaspoons salt
Pepper to taste

Method:

Cook the puy lentils (25 min or so) and the basmati rice (10 min or so) separately, rinse in cold water, and set to one side. I used to try and cook them together in a classic student 'one pot' approach, but it discolours the rice, so definitely keep them apart until you're ready.

Next take the onion and start frying it, preferably in a wok, in the olive oil. Give it a minute or so, until it's softened and is translucent, then add the garlic. After a couple of minutes, as the mixture starts to brown, add the sugar, to let the onions caramelise a little. When the onions and garlic are golden brown, add the mushrooms, lemon zest, salt and coriander. Continue cooking until the mushrooms brown lightly and start to release their juice.

Next tip in the rice and lentils, and mix through thoroughly. Add the lemon juice, stir through, and then season with some pepper. And if you've got any fresh coriander left hanging around, use it as a garnish.

Last night I served it with a green salad and the rescued baked spuds I've included below. Also works brilliantly with pitta bread.