Courgettes stuffed with lemon rice

Adapted from Honey and Co: Food from the Middle East

This is a recipe of favourites. This cookbook is possibly one of my favourite cookbooks, from one of my favourite restaurants, and Instagram feeds. And as you know, risotto is one of my favourite things to eat, lemon is my favourite flavour, and courgettes are fast becoming one of my favourite vegetables. So it is an all-round win.

The preamble to this recipe is also probably one of the best in all of my cookbooks. It makes it hard to write this blog to be honest, because I don’t have a really charming story about vegetarian BDSM, or at least, not one that I want to share as publicly.

It’s a simple recipe – usually I am so guilty of over-complicating, and taking things too far. But with this recipe I have held back - I haven’t added anything to it, other than tinkering with the quantities. I considered adding garlic, or preserved lemon, or toasted almonds, but it is so good just like this. And also otherwise all of my food would probably taste the same.

This recipe seems complicated but it is actually really easy. I always appreciate recipes that you can just leave in the oven to do their thing, and that can be left hot for a while without getting ruined. I’ve made this quite a few times now. It is vegan and gluten-free without being obviously or annoyingly so, and uncomplicated enough that it will supplement any other dishes being served.

Serves 5 - 6 as a main meal, or a generous 8 if serving with other dishes too

Ingredients

5 – 6 even-sized courgettes, as straight as possible (depending on how big they are, and how big your tray is – see below)

2tbsp olive oil

1 large onion, or two large echalion shallots, finely diced

1 tsp (level) each of cinnamon, allspice and turmeric

½ tsp cayenne pepper

225g risotto rice

70g currants

zest and juice of 1 large lemon

750ml water

6-10 cherry tomatoes, halved (you could also use a few roughly chopped big tomatoes, but it won’t look as fancy)

1 small bunch of parsley, pick out the large stalks and chop medium-fine

Salt

Method

You will need a roasting tray with high sides for this one. Slice the courgettes in half lengthways and use a teaspoon to scoop the seeds out, creating a hollow. This is a very satisfying activity. Line them all up in the roasting tray (how many courgette boats will fit in the tray may also affect how many you make).

Pre-heat your oven to 200c, or 180c if you have a fan oven.

Heat the oil in a very large frying pan, turn the heat down low and add the shallots. Fry for a few minutes and then add the spices. Fry gently for a few minutes and then add the rice and stir to coat and toast slightly. Add the currants, lemon and water, season with a teaspoon of salt, and turn the heat up. Let the rice boil for about a minute, and then empty the frying pan into a colander sitting over a large bowl – keeping the rice and all the liquid. Mix the cherry tomatoes and parsley into the rice.

Use a spoon to distribute the rice evenly between all of the courgette boats, and then carefully pour the liquid into the tray around the courgettes. The liquid should come roughly halfway up the sides, so add a little more if you think it needs it, but be aware that the courgettes will also release a lot of liquid. Place a sheet of greaseproof paper on top of the courgettes, and then seal completely with foil (the greaseproof paper helps them to steam). Bake in the oven for about an hour – you can check them halfway through the cooking to see if they need a baste, but its also fine to just leave them to do their thing. And that's it!

Cavolo nero risotto with sweet roasted carrots

Adapted from For the Love of Food by Dennis Cotter

For the Love of Food is a really fun and very bonkers vegetarian cookbook. I really recommend it for creative and adventurous cooks who want to push the boat out. I have simplified this recipe from the original, but its still one of the most involved things I have made in a long time. I don’t usually make things that involve so many pots and pans, but it really was no trouble at all.

I normally find following recipes very tricky, because I’m not very good at concentrating, or doing what I’m told. I saw this hanger trick on a Buzzfeed a while ago but this is the first time I tried it. It worked really well and having something to prop the book open, right in front of my face made it a lot easier to follow the recipe.

As you all know by now, I really love risotto. This is the best risotto I have ever made, in terms of texture (they are all really good in terms of flavour). I have never been sure of the correct ratio of rice to liquid, and this one nails it.

I’ve always wanted to make something with cavolo nero because it just seemed so fancy. Really its just black kale, in Italian. I have used less cavolo nero than specified in the original recipe, because that was how much cavolo nero I had. I think it worked well, it might have been overly cabbagey and murky/pond-like otherwise.

The carrots might seem like overkill but its nice to have the contrasting texture and complimentary flavours. Lightens the whole thing up and the orange looks really pretty.

Serves four. This tastes a lot better if served straight away, rather than re-heated.

Ingredients

1.3 litres vegetable stock (I used a stock cube)

200g cavolo nero, stalks removed

2 tbsp olive oil

2 eshalion shallots, or one medium onion, finely diced

3 cloves of garlic, bashed a bit and finely sliced (cabbage and garlic are best friends)

300g risotto rice (I used Arborio)

125 ml dry white wine

50g butter (this is a lot less than the recipe suggests)

70g parmesan style cheese, grated. It is really hard to find vegetarian parmesan style cheese, but I recently discovered that the Sainsburys basics version is vegetarian, and it works very well here.

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

For the carrots

200g chantenay carrots (or just small carrots), topped and tailed and cut in half lengthways

Zest and juice of half an orange

1 tbsp olive oil

1 tsp agave syrup

1 generous sprig of thyme (not vital - if you happen to have some knocking about)

Generous pinch of salt, preferably sea salt flakes

Method

For the carrots:

Preheat the oven to 200c (or 180 with fan).

Arrange the carrots in a shallow-ish pyrex or small roasting tin, so that they are more or less in one layer, but snug. Add all the other ingredients and mix well. Roast for 30-40 minutes, until caramelised at the edges, and cooked through but not too mushy.

For the risotto:

Bring the stock to a boil, add the cavolo nero and cook for two minutes. You may have to do this in batches. Remove the leaves from the water (keep the stock at a simmer for the risotto), shaking off as much stock as possible. Squeeze the leaves dry and shred them finely. It will smell a bit cabbage-water and horrible at this stage, but will get better.

Heat 1 tbsp of olive oil in a large-ish saucepan over a medium-low heat. Fry the shallots and garlic for about 5 minutes, and then add the rice and toast for a few minutes more.

Add the wine and simmer, stirring constantly until it is mostly absorbed.

Add one ladleful of the hot stock at a time, stirring until it is completely absorbed before adding the next one. This whole process should take about twenty minutes, until the rice is cooked but a little al-dente, and most of the liquid is absorbed.

Towards the end of the rice cooking process, heat 1 tbsp olive oil in a frying pan, and sauté the shredded cavolo nero for about five minutes, until it stops smelling like cabbage-water and starts smelling delicious.

Add the cavolo nero to the rice when it is done, along with the butter and about two thirds of the cheese. Taste the risotto and season with salt and pepper.

Serve the risotto in shallow bowls, sprinkled with the extra cheese, garnished with a few carrots.

Salmon and pistachio risotto

I spoke about this risotto in the third post I ever wrote on this blog, way back in January 2011. It really has been playing on my mind for a while.

When I was eight years old I went on a family holiday to Sicily. When moments are happening it is hard to know what is going to become a significant part of your history, and what will be forgotten as a distant memory. This holiday has definitely become part of my history.

We stayed in a little place called Taormina, in the shadow of Mount Etna. We saw ancient ruins, splashed in volcanic mountain streams, climbed acropolises, and ate incredibly well.

This salmon and pistachio risotto was apparently a regional speciality in Taormina, and I remember it blowing my tiny mind. I haven’t been able to find any recipes for it, and so this is my version, based on a twenty-year old memory.

Serves 4

Ingredients

2 salmon fillets (no skin)

Olive oil

Sea salt

Freshly ground black pepper

1 large shallot, small onion or half a large onion, finely diced

300g Arborio rice (or other suitable risotto rice)

125 ml  (small glass) relatively dry white wine – something that you would want to drink

1 litre hot chicken, fake chicken or vegetable stock

Approx 70g pistachio nuts, roughly chopped

25 - 40g butter (risotto loves butter, but your arteries might not)

1 tbsp grated parmesan or similar hard cheese

Optional additions – green zingy herbs like lemon thyme or marjoram, lemon zest.

Method

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees (with fan).

Put the salmon fillets on an oven tray, and drizzle with olive oil and season with a pinch of sea salt and a grind or two of black pepper. Roast for 12-15 minutes, until just cooked through (you can do this while the risotto is cooking).

In a large saucepan, fry the onion in a glug of olive oil slowly on a low heat until soft and translucent (about 10 minutes).  Add the rice, and turn over in the onions until coated and glossy in the oil.

Add the wine to the pan and let it bubble for a few minutes, stirring all the time. Once the wine has bubbled to almost nothing, add the stock (I use fake chicken stock) a ladleful at a time, stirring and waiting for all the liquid to be incorporated before adding the next ladle.

This can take around 25-30 minutes.  When all the liquid is incorporated, check that the rice is cooked through, but still with a bit of bite. 

Flake the salmon (gently, so it doesn’t turn to mush) and add it to the rice, along with the chopped pistachios. Stir through the butter and parmesan, herbs if using, and season with salt and pepper.

Multicoloured spicy rice

This dish was not something that made with the intention of blogging.  It was more of a serendipitous creation, born from disorganisation and a certain degree of laziness (welcome to my world) that turned out really really good.  Essentially, after staring into the fridge for about 5 minutes wondering what to have for dinner, I made a dish using pretty much everything I could find. Discussions over what to name this dish led to the following brilliant quote: “oh rainbow rice isn’t a stupid name, but then again, my High School mascot was a unicorn.” And so, ‘rainbow unicorn rice’ was born.

I love cooking with red cabbage because of the way it turns everything purple without taking over the whole dish – like beetroot can do.  What is also brilliant – and I strongly recommend, is cooking rice with bits in, similar to this, but putting half a can of coconut milk in to boil with it – the addition of the red cabbage turns the whole thing a wonderful lilac colour, and the gloopiness of the coconut milk really does make it a bit like eating rice cooked in some sort of emulsion paint – tastes much better though – add some nam pla (thai fish sauce) for extra, coconut balancing, oomph.

Red rice is brilliant, with a complex, nutty flavour and chewy texture.  Its a bit like brown rice, but doesn’t take as long to cook.  The brand I have is Merchant Gourmet – but don’t let that put you off, it was not expensive and just in the regular rice/couscous section in Sainsburys.  I first had red rice in a delicious salad I bought from M & S, where it was mixed with cooked salmon and edamame beans.  It is also much more filling than white rice.  Edamame beans would have been a fantastic addition to this dish to, but for the past year I have had real trouble finding them (those birdseye packets that used to be next to the peas in supermarkets)– does anyone know what happened to them/ where I can find them?  I added some raw vegetable crunch in the form of celery and spring onion.  These kept it tasting very fresh and juicy.  Some carrots would have been a nice addition too.

This was enough to make about 5 portions – and would stretch further if having it as an accompaniment to something else.  I ate left over rice for lunch for a few days, and it reheated really well, with the rice not going dry and the celery keeping its crunch.  Some of its purple brilliance did diminish a little bit, but that would be my only criticism.

Ingredients

·     1 cup red rice

·     1 cup white rice

Veggies and things

·     Some red cabbage, chopped quite small between ¼ and 1/8 of a whole one.

·     2 peppers of different colours.  I used red and green, cut up into chunks – not too small so that they disintegrate.

·     Medium onion, chopped

·     Big handful of beansprouts

·     Small handful of salted peanuts, roughly chopped

·     Block of tofu, cut into cubes  (alternatively, quorn chicken pieces, white fish or chicken)

·     2 sticks celery, sliced quite thinly

·     2 spring onions, chopped

Sauces and flavourings

·     Teriyaki sauce (or equivalent – a recent discovery of mine is kecap manis, a sweet thick Indonesian soy sauce which comes in a handy squeezy bottle)

·     Soy sauce

·     Sake

·     Lemon/lime juice

·     West Indian style chilli sauce (made with habanero/ scotch bonnect chillis, which have a very fruity flavour, as well as being really, really hot).  If you do not have this, use 1 thinly sliced red chilli (remove most of the seeds) or some chilli powder, and a glug of orange juice.  For sweetness, you could add some sweet chilli sauce too (instead).

·     Ginger – a slice of a big root, about 0.5cm thick, finely chopped

·     Big handful of fresh coriander, chopped

For the tofu: Preheat the grill.  Arrange the tofu in 1 layer on a tray.  Pour some teriyaki sauce over the tofu and grill until its browned and a little bit crispy.  It will take between 5 and 10 minutes but keep an eye on it, turning the cubes over halfway.

For the rest: Put the red rice in a large saucepan, with about 3 cups of water  bring to the boil and then reduce to a simmer (lid on).  After about 15-20 minutes, add the cabbage, onion, peppers , white rice and a glug of sake.  You may need to add another cup of water at this point.  Simmer for another 10 or so minutes, add the beansprouts to the top and leave to steam for a minute or two.  Meanwhile, put the celery and spring onions in a large bowl with the chopped up ginger, 2 spoonfuls of soy sauce, another spoonful of sake and the juice of a lime/ ½ a lemon.  When the rice/veg mix is ready (hopefully there will be hardly any liquid left) add it to the big bowl and mix it all together with a dessertspoonful of chilli sauce and the chopped coriander and peanuts.  Serve with the tofu scattered artfully over the top.

Butternut Squash Risotto with Sage, Hazelnuts and Blue Cheese

Its quite rare, but sometimes I have the kind of week that reminds me that possibly the world doesn’t suck as much as I generally think.  The reasons for this strange turn in my perspective, were the Willesden Green Wassail, and the reaction of the Daily Mail readership to Melanie Philip’s ‘penguins and single dads are gay’ article.  Im not going to go into the ins and outs, but basically, people are lovely, and the world is lovely.  Don’t worry im sure that I will be back to my normal state of cynical misery soon enough.

Like the excitement of finding £10 in a pocket, or forgotten bag, or a whole pound coin under the sofa, a few days ago I found a butternut squash in my bedroom!!  I think I bought it about 3 weeks ago, and shoved it in a bag under my desk because I didn’t have anywhere to keep it.  I decided to celebrate the finding of the squash and the happiness of the week with one of my favourite things, risotto.  I love the kind of food you can eat out of a bowl, with just one piece of cutlery.  There is something so comforting and simple about it, but then of course, as with most things, it depends what you put in it.  My earliest memory of really loving risotto is from when I was 8 years old, on holiday in Sicily.  The local specialty of the town we were staying, Taormina, was a risotto made with salmon and pistachios.  It was heavenly, and appealed to my 8-year-old sensibilities by being flecked with pink and baby green, just like the tutti frutti gelato that was another Sicilian revelation.

I first had butternut squash and hazelnut risotto in a restaurant on Goodge Street called Ooze, a ‘rissotoria’ that I highly recommend.  Hazelnuts are amazing, its so rare that they are munched on I think, in comparison to peanuts, cashews etc.  I ate one while I was cooking and I thought wow, this is so yummy, I could sell this as a kind of ‘low fat’ ferrero rocher.  Although they are seemingly desserty, they work fantastically in this dish, and actually add a very rich and savory element, beautifully complimenting the sweetness of the squash.

Time: about 40 mins.  Difficulty: 3/5  Taste: 5/5

Ingredients

Butternut squash, diced into around 2cm square pieces.  You only need about half, but cook the whole thing and put the rest into a couscous/ bulgur/ quinoa salad, or simply with dark green salad

Around 2 teaspoons of dried sage, or a couple of springs fresh

salt

1.2 litres stock (half pretend chicken, half onion soup mix) use just chicken for a lighter risotto, and just onion for a richer one.

400g Risotto rice.

1 large onion, diced

125 ml white wine (vermouth, pear cider works well too)

Olive oil

Knob of Butter/ vegan margarine (this risotto can be vegan if the cheese is omitted, still very delicous)

Black pepper

handful of Hazelnuts roughly chopped

crumbled blue cheese, or goats cheese

Serves 4-5, depending on how hungry you are, and whether you want leftovers for breakfast the next day.

Preheat the oven to quite hot, around 200, or 180 with the fan (see previous notes on oven temperature issues)

Put a tablespoon of olive oil in a large bowl, add the dried sage (if using), and a generous shake of salt - preferably coarse sea salt or pink himalayan salt.  Add the squash and mix until all the pieces are coated in the spiced, herby oil.  Spread the pieces on a baking tray, all in one layer, and roast for about 40-50 minutes. This gives you enough time to then make the risotto, and have everything ready at the same time. I noticed that the long bit on the squash takes on a different texture to the round bit (where the seeds were) when cooked. I think the round bit contains more moisture, and so it goes much more caramelized. Add the chopped hazelnuts to the oven tray (and fresh sage if using) when there is about 10 minutes cooking time left.

In a large saucepan, fry the onion in a glug of olive oil on a low heat until soft and translucent (about 10 minutes).  Add the rice, and turn over in the onions until its all mixed together.  Add in the alcohol and let it bubble for a few minutes.  It is traditional to use white wine or vermouth, but I experimented with pear cider (cheaper, yummy and comes in cans) and it worked really well.  Add the stock a ladleful at a time, stirring and waiting for all the liquid to be incorporated before adding the next ladle. This can take around 25-30 minutes.  When all the liquid is incorporated, check that the rice is cooked through.  Season with black pepper (the cheese and butternut squash is quite salty so only put a little more salt in it) and stir through as much butter or vegan margarine as your arteries can take.

Just before serving, mix the butternut squash, hazelnuts and sage into the risotto. Serve with the blue cheese (or goats cheese) crumbled on the top.  Serve with a salad of dark green leaves, such as rocket, so the bitterness can cut through the richness of the risotto.  Enjoy, preferably sitting on a couch with a glass of wine and an archetypal ‘feel good’ movie, and a good friend, the kind that bakes you peanut butter cookies.