Tag: dinner
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Pantry Pasta with Pickled Anchovies
Some nights aren’t about cooking. They’re about getting something good on the table without overthinking it. It was one of those evenings. I had work still to finish, Louise wasn’t sure when she’d be home, and I wasn’t interested in shopping. A quick look through the pantry and fridge turned up a can of tomatoes,…
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An Afternoon with a Trout
Some meals begin with a shopping list. Others begin with a recipe. This one began with a trout. It was lying on the fish counter this morning, its skin glowing with soft pinks and golds, looking almost too beautiful to cook. I hadn’t gone looking for fish, but sometimes the best meals aren’t planned. They’re…
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Not Every Steak is a Good Steak
Not my actual kitchen! Last night’s dinner was a reminder that even after years of cooking, and years of raising good beef cattle, it’s still possible to get it wrong. The meal itself was simple enough: steak with creamy mashed potato and asparagus, blanched and finished with butter and a squeeze of lemon juice. The…
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Leftovers Don’t Have to Look Like Leftovers
One of the pleasures of cooking at home is discovering that yesterday’s dinner can become something entirely different today. After a roast chicken dinner, I found myself with half a chicken still sitting in the fridge. There was plenty of meat left on it, but not really enough for another roast meal. The obvious answer…
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Eat Fresh. Eat Simply.
One of the things that struck me most during our time in France was not the sophistication of the food, but its simplicity. Before travelling, it is easy to imagine that French dining is all white tablecloths, elaborate sauces and chefs performing culinary magic behind kitchen doors. Certainly, those places exist, but what we found…
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From Passata to Pantry
One of the challenges of making things from scratch is that you occasionally make more than you know what to do with. A little while ago I found myself with a substantial quantity of roasted tomato passata sitting in the refrigerator. The passata itself had come from an excess of tomatoes that had been roasted…
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Tortilla for Two
1. The Situation The potatoes are ready and sitting there. If you leave them, they go soft or start sprouting. The hens are laying steadily, so eggs aren’t scarce. This is one of those moments where doing nothing wastes both. 2. The Approach This is a holding dish as much as a meal. You’re turning…
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Getting the Sauce Right
Most of the time, what separates something average from something worth eating is the sauce. It doesn’t need to be complicated, but it does need a bit of attention. Rushing it, or treating it as an afterthought, is where things usually fall apart. The flavour doesn’t develop, and the whole dish ends up feeling flat.…
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Beef Satay-Style Curry
There was rump steak in the fridge that needed using, along with green beans that wouldn’t hold much longer. Onions, garlic and ginger were already there. A jar of peanut butter in the cupboard. Coconut milk on hand. The Malaysian curry powder from earlier. Enough to build something solid without going anywhere else. This wasn’t…
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Pork Medallions with Gravy and Garden Vegetables
There were pork medallions to use, but more importantly there was a container of roast chicken gravy sitting in the fridge from earlier in the week. That’s not something to throw away. It’s already done work. It just needs a way back in. There were also beans still coming through, potatoes on hand, and the…