Zombie Brains Revamped!

I made Jamie Oliver's Zombie Brains a while ago, and although it wasn't very popular I was keen to try and give it another go.  In our house we have agreed that we should try everything ten times before we decide whether we like it or not.  There is a scientific study out there somewhere which suggests that we can't actually know until we've done that.

Anyway, although I wanted to try celeriac again, and I thought the kids and my Husband should, I thought I'd need a revamp to make them interested.  

We all like curry, so it seemed sensible to mix the two.  I make my own curry pastes as a base for the curries we eat and this is another Jamie Oliver recipe, well loosely at least, I think I added some cashew nuts to the Jalfrezi paste for this one.  I love these curry pastes so much and this has encourage me to cook so much more curry than I would have done using jars from the shops.

I started by roasting the celeriac - the smell of this roasting is lovely, and it is so easy to cut once it is roasted.

Then I fried the paste and onions and added a tin of tomatoes and a good splodge of mango chutney.  I think the sweetness this provides is one of the reasons that my kids love curry.  We tried a lentil curry at a farmers market once, and they really enjoyed it despite never eating any of my previous efforts, and that one tasted sweet.  Since then I've always added a little chutney (or if I'm out of that cranberry sauce, or jam) and they have always eaten it.  I love the slight sweetness it provides too.  

Once the curry  had been simmering for a while I added half a roasted celeriac and a tin of chickpeas along with a little cream and then it was ready to serve.

The kids did eat it, though they pointed out they prefer it with other vegetables (I normally use whatever veg is unused at the bottom of the fridge, or a couple of tins of chickpeas or a cup of lentils).  I didn't tell them it had celeriac in it, but they both twigged very quickly.  I preferred  Zombie Brains this way,  and so did my Husband.  Still a few more times to taste celeriac before the kids can decide for sure whether or not they like it!  

Brownies

Woo Hoo, I've made it to a year of blogging.  I told the Husband that I would get bored way before a year came round.  So my anniversary post is going to be a brownie recipe.

Mmmm, lovely brownies. I do love them, and this is an easy recipe to remember and to make.  I love that you can mix it all in one pan ready for baking. The less washing up the better in my books. Again I think I originally found this recipe on the Money Saving Expert forums, but I haven't written down where I found it, so honestly it could be from anywhere.  I have a big folder filled with scraps of paper/envelopes/important letters from the kids school with my scribbles on them.  Mainly I just write down the ingredients and hope that I remember the method when I next come to them...

Probably why my cooking can be hit or miss.  I don't even bother getting the folder out to make these brownies anymore, I have memorised the recipe and even when I forget things (like baking powder) they tend to turn out ok!

Chocolate Brownie Recipe:

100g Chocolate

70g Butter

170g sugar

2 eggs

tsp vanilla

70g flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

Melt the chocolate and the butter together in a pan.

Once melted add the sugar (pretend you can't see the amount of that going in).

Let it cool a little and add the vanilla and the eggs.  You just don't want the eggs to cook on the top of it, it only need a couple of mins.

Then add the flour and the baking powder (they rise better when it is included!)

You can then choose whether to put them in a small tin and have big chunky thick brownies or spread out more thinly in a larger tin.  I normally go with the larger tin because then you can get more brownies from your mix.

I bake them in an A4-is sized tin at 160 degrees for about 15-20 mins.  You have to wait for it to crack on top.  Too little time and you'll end up with a fudge-y mess. Too much time and you'll end up with something that is more biscuit like, which I find disappointing.  I like fudgier brownies.

I've played with these to add different flavours too.
Chocolate Orange - add some zest and some orange flavouring in place of the vanilla.  

Chocolate Chilli - I added some chilli puree in place of the vanilla, though I'm sure it would work with finely chopped chilli too (only a little)
Chocolate Marmite - I added a teaspoon of marmite to the mix.  Not my favourite, although I do love marmite, so personally wouldn't recommend.
Chocolate Almond - replace the vanilla extract with almond extract.  Yummy marzipan flavour, disliked by the Husband and my son - such a shame...

I think coffee would work really well with them as well - if anyone else in the family would eat them I would try adding 2 teaspoons of instant coffee with the melted mixture.  Mmm, mocha brownies.  Likewise I think mint brownies would work really well if you replaced the vanilla with peppermint essence.

Enjoy!

Yorkshire Puddings and Pancakes - My Kind of Recipe

I'm not very good at following recipes, in fact I rarely follow one exactly, even if I'm planning on it.  Everyone's the same, right?

I have a terrayaki Chicken recipe which I've only every used on pork and salmon for example.

But I do love Jamie Oliver's recipe for Yorkshire Puddings - I think it is because it is pretty vague anyway:

• 1 mug of flour (Plain/All Purpose)
• 1 mug of milk (I've used powdered, semi-skimmed and full fat)
• 1 egg (I buy mixed sized eggs, so this will work with any size)

Put the oven on high (200 degrees) and put some oil in muffin trays (just a dribble in each).  Let it heat up while you make the batter.  I make the batter by adding the milk to the flour and whisking them together before adding the egg.  Pour into the muffin trays with hot oil and cook in the oven for about 20 minutes, or until golden and puffed up.  Delicious and no measuring.  Yay.

For pancakes I use the same recipe, but add about an extra 1/2 cup of water to the batter, until it is a slightly sloppier consistency - heading more towards double cream consistency.  I add a little oil/butter to a medium hot pan  and then enough batter to cover it.  You'll be able to see it change colour as it cooks.  One the colour has changed all over turn the pancake over - flip if you're brave,  I'm not and just use a spatula.  From one egg's worth of batter I get about 10 pancakes. This is 2 egg's worth of batter made into pancakes.

The rules in our house are that you have to have two savoury pancakes before you're allowed a sweet.  My favourite savoury is garlicky mushrooms with a little creme fraiche.  Delicious.  Sweet has to be lemon juice and sugar - yum yum!

We'll be having pancakes for tea next Tuesday (not these - they've already gone!) on Pancake Day!  They won't last long...

Zombie Brains

So, we had Zombie Brains last Sunday for tea.  The recipe was from Save with Jamie and involved roasting a celeriac with thyme, garlic, seasoning and bay leaves and serving with pearl barley and a creamy mushroom sauce.

As I mentioned here, the Husband and myself are not keen on celeriac and consequently have never given it to the kids before.  The Husband would also prefer not to eat pearl barley, ever.  You can imagine how much he had been looking forward to this meal!

My son was quite looking forward to the idea of eating Zombie Brains (all in the name I think). Every time I mentioned it to my daughter she just made a face, although said she was willing to try it even if it sounded gross!  Normally when trying new things with the kids I include something in the meal that I know they will like, so in this instance I would normally have served the roasted celeriac with rice, potatoes, pasta, basically anything else. As I was pretty sure that I would never get the opportunity to try this again I just went for it.  I did however have some leftover pancakes from lunchtime and some leftover fresh pasta (not home made) in the fridge on stand by.  I was hoping their love of all things Minecraft (ie the Zombies) might see them through the tastes they were unfamiliar with or didn't actually like.

My son's reaction to the dish was  "Mummy this is definitely.  Disgusting".  So after that praise for the meal I asked my daughter.  "The best part is the celeriac, which I didn't think I would like, so I said it was horrible when I first tried it".  Mmm, so not a total hit there either then, especially when coupled with "and the mushrooms are terrible".  I did know she didn't like mushrooms, so no surprise there.  In the end both standbys were used.  I'm pleased the kids tried it and both made sure they didn't like it by having a second bite of everything.

The Husband's response was actually pretty positive "It isn't as bad as I thought it was going to be", but "we're never having this again!"

I actually quite liked it, though I think I would have preferred the Zombie Brain element as more the main part of a vegetarian roast meal.  It looked like you were carving a joint (only a lot easier).  We've been trying to work out what the roasted celeriac tasted like, and suddenly I realised it tasted a bit like Jerusalem Artichokes.

I feel bad giving a bad review for this, because we have tried a lot of Jamie Oliver's recipes and normally they are a hit with us all, which I think is why I went for it.  Our favourite being his Yorkshire Pudding recipe, which is a total hit with the kids and pretty much every friend they've had over for tea!

Mayi Hshang Shu/ Ants Climbing a Tree.

Doesn't that sound tasty?  It may not sound very tasty, but it really is.  It is minced pork and noodles basically.  I'm posting this because the library book with the recipe has to go back.  It is called A World Of Recipes: China.  We've also used the Mexico and Italy ones from the same series.  They have been a great way to introduce the kids to some other cuisines, and they are appealing to them because they are designed for kids to cook.

Mayi Hshang Shu Recipe (Serves 2)
Ingredients:
125g Fine Noodles
Small piece of Ginger (approx 2cm long) - grated
1 clove of garlic - finely chopped
1 Vegetable Stock Cube
1tbsp Vegetable Oil
225g minced pork
2tbsp soy sauce
2tsp sugar
2 spring onions - chopped

I double up on ingredients, so it feeds us all.
I cook the noodles in the vegetable stock, and while I'm doing that fry the pork.  Once the meat is browned add the ginger, garlic, soy sauce and sugar(which I forgot to include in the picture).  I also add a few handfuls of chopped curly kale (we can call it the leaves of the tree ok?).

Once the noodles are cooked, I add them and the spring onions to the meat mixture and stir and serve.

I've done this meal with Turkey mince as well and that worked brilliantly too.  We all like it, you can tell:

Yum!