Tomato, Onion and Potato Tart

Firstly, yes, I am still alive and I can only offer my sincere apologies for the extended delay since my last post.    I’ve not been in very good health and have had a spell in hospital.

The other day a couple of things happened that made me decide to do this post.    My neighbour and farmer arrived with  a couple of sacks of tomatoes, potatoes and onions, all of which he had grown on the field I own.    When I first moved here, the land I bought included a couple of agricultural fields.   I’m no farmer, and the two fields together were not enough to do much with so I spoke to my neighbour and we agreed he would manage them on my behalf.   He grows a few kitchen vegetables, wheat and straw or hay and I pay him for managing them with the produce.  In fact these days, we just split the produce between us, lovely warm produce straight from the field or bails of straw to add to my own kitchen garden

After he had gone another friend invited me for supper  and I decided I could use the fresh produce to make a tart.  I’m afraid I didn’t measure anything but I’ll tell you what I did.   

 

First I blind baked a pastry tart shell, about 30cms by 20cms (12” x 8”)   I used a rectangular pie dish and lined it with greaseproof paper.

I took about 4 good sized potatoes and  cut them just enough to get them into my food processor, where I used the very finest slicer to produce wafer thin potato slices.  I blanched the potato for just a couple of minutes in a little salted water, taking care not to let them burn.   I didn’t use too much water as I wanted them to say rather firm.  Once blanched I immediately dipped them into cold water to arrest the cooking, then drained them.

Next I took about three of the medium onions and sliced them  and to the sliced onion I added about 5 cloves of garlic also sliced.  I fried the mixture, adding a touch of salt and black pepper until the onions started to caramelise.  Then I put that dish aside.

To assemble the tart, I started by layering about half of the blanched potato in the bottom.  The potato was a bit wet still so I added just a dessert spoonful of rice under the potato to soak up any juices.

On top of the potato I layered tomato, sliced fairly thickly.   Again seasoned with a bit of salt and pepper.

Next, another layer of potato.

Then a layer of the fried onions and garlic before putting the final layer of tomatoes on the top.

I scattered some fresh basil leaves over the dish and returned it to the oven to bake at about 180C (350F) for 20 mins

Clam Chowder

 

It’s been very cold here recently with temperatures getting down to –18C (about 0F) overnight.  We even had snow.  About a week ago just over 6” of it fell and unusually, it is still lying on the ground almost unchanged.

I was trying to think of a nice warming fish dish for this evening’s supper to combat this particularly cold snap.  I started off thinking about a basic fish stew.  The French do a great fish stew called Bouillabaisse and are famous for it in it’s home town of Marseille.   Bouillabaisse comes from the old Occitan language which was spoken across this part of France. and really simply means to boil then to simmer.  I guess that is how you make Bouillabaisse after all.   Interestingly enough, a local farmer neighbour  of mine, in his late 80’s still speaks Occitan and myself, along with many of my neighbours, both French as well as British, have a certain amount of difficulty understanding him.

But Bouillabaisse is really a warm climate dish and the one thing I don’t feel we have here at the moment is a warm climate, so I started to think about other fish stews from colder parts of the world:  Ukha from Russia, Lohikeitto from Finland, or even the Bergensk Fiskesuppe from Bergen in Norway.  Moving away from Europe I thought of Canada, but couldn’t really find a traditional local fish stew so moved on to the USA where I found, of course the wonderful chowders and in particular my own favourite New England Clam Chowder.

In fact, I have made this stew for many years and have slowly developed my own recipe along the way.   It uses tinned clams rather than fresh, but I usually chuck a few fresh ones into the pot for decoration and with it’s rich creamy thick stew is just the thing for a cold winter’s evening.

It’s really easy to make and tastes superb

Clam Chowder

Preparation time 20 minutes
Cooking time 20 minutes
Makes enough for 6 people

 

INGREDIENTS

4 Rashers finely chopped streaky bacon
1 cup diced onion ,
4 cups potato cubed
1 grated carrot
2 cans condensed cream of mushroom soup
2 teaspoons coarse sea salt 
good pinch ground black pepper
fresh chopped thyme
2 cups water
4 cans clams (8oz) 
2 cups single cream
A few Fresh clams
¼ cup butter

·

METHOD

• Sauté the bacon and onion in a little olive oil then transfer to a large saucepan;
• add potatoes, water, carrots, salt and pepper
• bring to the boil then simmer until the potatoes are cooked
• Slowly stir in the soup, clams and clam juice, cream, butter and thyme
• Simmer for 20 minutes
• Sprinkle with a little chopped fresh Thyme and serve whilst still piping hot.

And there it is, a delicious Chowder.

 

I usually make this dish a day in advance as I think it improves as all the flavours round together.

Reheat slowly until the dish is almost, (BUT NOT!) boiling.  If you allow it to boil the cream will curdle.  Then add the chopped thyme and serve

I can’t always get clams here, (either fresh or canned) so I have made this dish very successfully with other seafood, such as prawns

Serve with a lovely crusty bread.   I especially like this with my home made olive bread.

I hope you enjoy it, I know I shall.

Oh Dear!

I should have thrown it away and had cheese.

The weather here suddenly changed overnight.

After weeks of temperatures around 30°C (upper 80's F), last night the rain came in and temperatures dropped by about 10°C.   I have to say, going out to the market in the rain this morning it felt more like they had dropped by about 110°C....  but maybe that was just me.   I'm not a great fan of rainy, cold weather!

Walking around a very quiet Villereal, passing large expanses of naked street where normally there would have been all the supporting traders that summer brings, I began to think about lunch.  The cold weather, well, it was about 18°C, led me to thinking about a bowl of soup.

About a week or so ago I defrosted my big freezer....  I have a big old chest freezer and a much smaller combination fridge freezer.   Defrosting is something I should do every year....but I don't and when I finally get down to it I am always amazed at the assembled detritus collecting in the frozen depths.

This session had been no different, turning up a couple of bags of forgotten fruit, some completely lost minced steak and a couple of odd tubs of my home made soup, a true French potage made with whatever vegetables were available at the time I made it.   I had no idea what these soups were as the tubs had lost their labels which, interestingly, were not even still in the freezer!!!   I studied the frozen contents.... both tubs were a small portion of soup, one a simple potage and the other, what appeared to be a potage that had been blended to make it smooth.

I decide that on return home, I would mix the two soups and eat it with some crusty French bread.  Anticipating my delicious lunch I plodded round the half empty, very wet market in somewhat better spirits.

I didn't linger long, collecting the various bits of shopping I needed and popping into my favourite bar for a quick coffee, before heading off to the car park and back home.

It didn't take me long to find the two tubs of soup and, in order to speed things up, I gently warmed them before emptying the still frozen contents into a pan with a little water and started to heat them gently.

By the time I had put the greengrocery away my soup had defrosted and was beginning to warm up.  It smelt delicious as I cleared the kitchen table and got out a bowl and bread basket and, yes, why not, the butter dish!

I turned to stir the soup regularly as the big lumps of frozen goo gradually broke up and eventually, I became able to stir a warm liquid.  Habits are hard things to break and one of mine is to taste everything...taste, taste and taste again.  So I stuck my spoon into the now lukewarm soup to taste.... and was very surprised.

Delicious is not exactly the word....   no....   It was sweet, very sweet.  I could see the vegetables from the potage clearly now but, my guess was the blended "soup" was actually stewed apple.

Now, I should have binned the lot, cut myself some tasty French cheese and eaten it with the bread...  I really should have done that.  But I don't like to be defeated.  I'm nothing if not persistent.... some call me stubborn!   So, I decided to rescue the soup.

There were some nice vegetables in the vegetable rack....  There were one or two rather tired vegetables in the same rack... so I started adding bits...  I had the heart of a celery that had gone a bit limp, I had a couple of potatoes that had started sprouting, I had an onion that had split... and quickly I had a collection of vegetables prepared and boiling into the mixture.  Taste, taste and taste again...  It really was very sweet.   A couple more small potatoes, a tiny bit of salt, some fresh herbs, the end of a Belgian endive all were added to the pan, and finally it started to taste acceptable....

Oh, by now I had also realised that the stewed apple which had caused the problem in the first place, was actually the much sweeter stewed plums!!!

And so, my quick lunch was ready.  It had taken about an hour and a half against my anticipated 10 minutes.  It tasted very nice but not great, it was still quite sweet.  But, it had cleared out two old unidentified tubs of frozen food, a collection of tired vegetables, the remainder of last weeks vegetables and I had not used anything from today's shop.... well, except for the bread!

Like I said, I should have thrown it away and had cheese!

Leftovers pie

I had a friend from Luxembourg drop in on Sunday and I decided to cook a roast chicken dinner.  It was a pretty traditional thing with a lovely free range chicken and a mixture of roast vegetables.  I decided not to stuff the bird with my seasoning so I just put an onion in the cavity and let the juices blend with those of the onion, cooking the stuffing in a separate dish

In the same dish I put a couple of chipolata sausages and potatoes, pumpkin, courgette(zucchini), onion and carrots to roast, then popped the whole lot into a medium hot oven (180C) for about an hour

I also served a selection of nibbles as aperitifs and then a delicious pork pate de campagne with homemade multicereal bread made with a few nuts added. We followed the main course with a lovely selection of French cheeses, except, purely selfishly, I added a good English farmhouse cheddar. My guest brought dessert!  A glorious apple pie with an extravagant flaky pastry top and delicious shortcrust base.  The pie stands about 150mm (6") tall!! and we ate it without adding anything. 

Of course, there was quite a bit left over, particularly from the chicken and vegetables, so tonight I made a recipe I learned about from a relation just the other day.  Leftovers Pie.  I really wasn't sure about it but thought it was worth a try.  It turned out to be delicious

In a pie dish I spread out all the left over meat and vegetables, cutting everything into bite sized pieces.  I included all the leftovers, potatoes, roast vegetables, a few peas I had added to the dinner, the chicken and even one of the chipolatas and the left over stuffing until the dish was almost full.

Then I poured over the left over gravy and covered the dish with a puff pastry top.  As I always do, I used a ready made puff pastry.  I love making shortcrust pastry but have never managed to successfully make puff pastry and with such great ready mades available, I gave up trying many years ago.  The other thing about recipes for leftovers is, I believe, they should be extremely simple.  You've already cooked the meal so the ready made pastry makes it very simple and quick.

I popped the pie into a preheated oven at 190C and left it to cook for about an hour. 

The picture has been cropped so that you can't see just how much of the pie got eaten!!!

Fish Cakes

Friday in our house is fish night.   Actually, it rarely works like that but that is the idea.   I try and make sure that I eat at least one fish meal every week and, in order to keep tabs on it, I set aside Friday....  If I've not eaten fish in the week then I will have it on Friday....

This week was no exception and, as I hadn't eaten a fish meal I got some white fish out of the freezer...not quite deciding what to do with it...

After some debate... i.e. talking to myself!!!  I decided to make fish cakes and soon found a suitable recipe that I could adapt.

Here's what I did....

	INGREDIENTS 300 gms white Fish 400 gms  Potato A little butter 2 Tablespoons chopped fresh parsley 1 1/2 tablespoons capers, drained 2 small gherkins (chopped) 2 hard boiled egg, peeled and chopped small paprika pepper
For the crumb coating	Wholemeal Breadcrumbs a teaspoon grated nutmeg 1 egg, beaten
For the sauce	Mayonaise 2 gherkins finely chopped a little English mustard

 

first I poached the fish in a little salted milk

Then I boiled  the potatoes in the same milk until they were ready to mash and drained them, reserving the milk

Next I mashed them to a creamy consistency using the knob of butter and some of the reserved milk.

After I had prepared the above things, I mixed all the above ingredients in a large mixing bowl  and added a little more of the milk as needed to help bind it all together.  I mixed well and adjusted the seasoning by adding ground black pepper and salt to taste

Once it was all thoroughly mixed together I formed some balls, I made 8, tightly squeezing the mixture together.

Next I coated the balls by rolling them in the beaten egg and then in the breadcrumbs, placing each finished ball on a board lightly covered in more breadcrumbs.

Finally, I flattened the balls into cakes turning over so that they remained well coated.

To make the tartar sauce I simply mixed together the chopped gherkins and the mayonaise, adding the mustard to taste before leaving to stand until I was ready to serve.

I  fried the fish cakes in a dash of olive oil, over a high heat turning every couple of minutes until they were golden brown.

I served with a garnish of fresh salad leaves and tartar sauce

Baked Cheesy Fish

I made a small fish dish which I served on Christmas Day.   For me, Christmas dinner is a traditional affair with Roast Turkey and lots of vegetables and accompaniments, followed by Christmas Pudding with either cream or white brandy sauce.

This is, of course, quite a heavy couple of courses, so I'm always looking for something a bit lighter to serve as a starter.   This year, I plumped for tiny ramekins of my Baked Cheesy Fish

This is such a simple recipe using basic ingredients and only a few minutes to prepare.  I filled the ramekins in advance and kept them refrigerated before baking and serving.

INGREDIENTS

A piece of smoked Cod
A piece of Brie Cheese
A small portion of mashed potato
A little dry white wine (I used a Chablis)

 

METHOD

I fill a ramekin for each person

cover the bottom 1/3rd of the dish with mashed potato.

Next, add a piece pf fish to fill the dish, leaving a small gap to the top

Add a small slug of wine to each ramekin.  I use about a glassful for 5 or 6 ramekins.

Finally put pieces of the brie on top of the fish

The dish can now be kept refridgerated for upto 24 hours.

Bake in the middle of the oven at 180C for 30 minutes.

Finish off by grilling under a high grill just to brown the cheese, (a couple of minutes)

 

Serve immediately