Fabulous spaghetti and meatballs

Posted on November 19, 2008 by Marion

My apologies for the huge gap between posts. My evenings have recently been somewhat consumed by creating, printing and writing all the thank you cards for our wedding (almost done!) … and then designing, compiling and ordering the photo book of our wedding. It’s been fun to revisit what was such an amazing day, but time intensive!

We did the sums for the cards, and (since we now have a decent colour printer) it turned out to be significantly cheaper to buy the printer ink cartridges, the photocards and envelopes, and create all the cards ourselves. This was against using one of the online photo sites (like Kodak.com) or a local photo shop. This way, you end up with a lot more control over the process. And then of course we wanted to print out some of the professional photos to include with some of the cards … which made the task somewhat longer … But not to complain, because almost all of the cards made it into the post this afternoon.

And as regards the photo book, originally we were going to have the photographer compile the photo book for us, and then have four copies printed (one for us, three for parents). However once we realised just how expensive that was going to be I decided to investigate alternative solutions. Anyway, I came across Blurb.com(via a Facebook ad, of all things) and it’s just the most user-friendly of all the photo book websites that I’ve yet to come across. So it seemed far more sensible for me to invest two weeks of my spare time in creating the photo book and have it ’self-published’ than be restricted to only 150 photos and pay a cost of $700 AUD per printed book. Approximately £70 is far more reasonable! (Especially as there are about 500 photos in my photo book!) 

And so, having completed (well, almost completed) both of these tasks, I find myself able to attend to my little blog again … and wouldn’t you know it, but I have a recipe to share :)

I’ve really only ‘discovered’ / created my spaghetti and meatballs recipe recently, but it’s been a huge hit with my husband and I thought you might like it too. Now, I must admit that I’ve been using pre-made meatballs that M&S very conveniently make available, so that’s what this recipe calls for. Once I have a big enough kitchen (and enough time!) I’ll get around to making my own meatballs from scratch. Promise :)

Ingredients are:

  • 18 medium-sized beef or lamb meatballs
  • 1 medium brown onion, diced
  • 3 – 4 medium cloves of garlic, finely chopped
  • 1 carrot, diced
  • 1 large (or 2 small) sticks of celery, diced
  • 500ml tomato passata
  • 1 cup of good red wine (that you’d happily drink with the meal)
  • freshly cracked black pepper
  • ground nutmeg
  • dried ‘Italian’ herbs mix (generally rosemary, thyme, oregano, parsley)
  • grated Parmesan cheese, and either grated cheddar, or sliced Buffalo mozzarella cheese
  • enough long pasta for 2 (spaghetti / linguine / tagliatelle)
  • olive oil

The method:

  1. Pre-heat the oven to 180 deg C
  2. Heat the olive oil in a deep and wide-based pan (that is ok to use both on the stove-top and in the oven – I use my Portuguese terracotta casserole) over a medium heat
  3. Once the dish is hot, add the garlic and cook until fragrant; add the onions and some of the black pepper and sweat until the onions are softened
  4. Add the meatballs to the pan – turn them frequently to ensure they are browned on all sides and at least half cooked; once cooked, remove from the pan and set aside 
  5. Add the celery and carrots to the pan, stir to combine; add approximately half of the red wine, together with half of the herbs and nutmeg, stir once more and allow the alcohol to boil off while the flavours combine
  6. Add the passata and the rest of the wine, herbs and nutmeg to the mix; allow to simmer for approximately 10mins for the flavours to develop and for some of the excess liquid to boil off
  7. Return the meatballs to the pan, cover with the sauce and make sure they are evenly spaced around the pan 
  8. Sprinkle the cheddar / mozzarella and a generous amount of the Parmesan over the top of the meatballs and sauce, and place the pan in the middle of the oven for approximately 15mins
  9. Cook the pasta in a large pot of lightly salted, boiling water until al dente; drain and distribute between the serving bowls; spoon the meatballs and sauce over the pasta, top with a little more Parmesan and serve

Cooking time – 30 to 40mins

Serves – 2 to 4 people, depending on the size of the servings and how hungry people are!

Filed under: Dinner, London, Random, cooking, musings | Tagged: , , , , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

Top posts and general thoughts

Posted on October 21, 2008 by Marion

Well, I must say that I’m intrigued to look into the blog stats for this blog, and to see which of my posts are getting the most traffic. Especially since I’m not really doing all that much to ‘push’ the profile of the blog, aside from naming and tagging my posts in an SEO-friendly fashion. And considering this blog is less than 3mths old, >400 unique hits isn’t bad considering.

By far and away the most popular post is my World’s Best Pancakes recipe- although no-one’s yet written to tell me if they agree with my opinion!

Then come my posts about the terrible situation in Zimbabwe and my musings on social stereotypes. Oh, and then you seem to want to know about me … many thanks for that. I’m glad that you’re interested!

So, all I can think is that the general mix of what I’m writing about – home cooking and general rants / musings is of overall interest to those of you ‘picking up’ my blog.

But it seems that I should write far more about pancakes!

Sidenote – I’ve been refreshing and re-organising my photoblog, lamppost-pictures.com; if you’d like to check it out and let me know your thoughts, I’d be grateful

Filed under: Breakfast, Personal, Random, cooking, musings, photography | Tagged: , , , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

A surprising realisation

Posted on October 13, 2008 by Marion

I’ve been a somewhat breathless observer of all the recent tumult in the financial markets, to the point that hubby and I did have a ‘what’s the worst case scenario’ conversation over the weekend. Admittedly, being young, in the upper end of the socio-economic spectrum, having some assets and no dependents definitely means that our worst case scenario is far better than a lot of other peoples’. But that doesn’t mean that flogging the investment properties in a forced sale and living in S-E Asia for several years (or somewhere else with a comparatively tiny cost of living) wouldn’t be a huge mind shift!

So this has led me to a surprising realisation over the last couple of days. It turns out I have a level of admiration of Gordon Brown. And given he’s indirectly hubby’s new ‘boss’, I guess that’s a good thing.

Filed under: Finance, London, Politics, musings | Tagged: , , , , , | 1 Comment »

Perfect porridge

Posted on October 5, 2008 by Marion

To follow on from the fabulous pancakes that are a weekend breakfast staple in our house, now that the weather’s getting colder another option finds its way into my kitchen – steaming bowls of lovely, creamy porridge.

The method for perfect porridge is super easy, and the results are so much better than the packets of instant porridge you can buy in the supermarkets. For a wonderful, autumn / winter breakfast, you’ll need:

Combine the oats, milk and boiling water in a medium-sized saucepan over a medium heat; bring to a simmer, stirring occasionally to ensure that it doesn’t boil over. It will take approximately 10mins for the oats to cook and for the porridge to form.

The best ways to enjoy this perfect porridge (in our house, anyway) is either with a couple of spoonfuls of brown sugar & a dash of milk, or with a spoonful of honey. So good!

Serves – 2

Cooking time – approx. 10mins

For some other recipes using oats, the BBC Food website has some good ideas. And I’ll have to post my recipe for Anzac biscuits here too. They’re fabulous!

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Mushroom and bacon risotto – fabulous seasonal food

Posted on October 4, 2008 by Marion

Autumn is now in full swing here in England, with the leaves starting to turn (they’ll look fabulous sometime in the next week) and the shops full of seasonal goodies. Especially mushrooms. I remember an ad campaign that was on TV when I was little that sung praises for mushrooms, with the tag-line of ‘they’re meat for vegetarians‘. I guess that’s true – there’s certainly enough varieties to keep you just as interested in them as there are different types of red meat :)

So to take advantage of the abundance of mushrooms that’s around at the moment, I threw together a mushroom and bacon risotto last night that worked an absolute treat. As with all my recipes, this one is variable in terms of the ingredients (I always stay true to the fundamentals of a recipe, but will adjust according to what’s in the fridge / cupboard / seasonal). The one constant in this recipe is the amount of liquid to the amount of arborio rice used.

My ingredients last night were:

  • 3 large cloves of garlic, very finely chopped
  • 1 medium brown onion, finely chopped
  • 3 rashers of smoked bacon, sliced finely
  • 4 large Portabello mushrooms, sliced into bite-sized pieces
  • 1 handful of chestnut (brown) mushrooms, sliced
  • 1 handful of white button mushrooms, sliced
  • 10gm dried Porchini mushrooms, re-hydrated in hot water
  • freshly cracked black pepper
  • 1 cup white wine
  • 2 mushroom stock cubes
  • c. 3 cups hot water
  • 1 cup arborio rice
  • finely grated Parmesan cheese
  • butter & olive oil

I always find it amazing to see a list of ingredients written down – it always looks like far more on paper than it seems to be when I’m preparing everything in the kitchen!

So, to start combine the stock cubes, the hot water and the wine in a medium-sized saucepan and bring to a simmer over a low heat. This will serve to gently boil off the alcohol in the wine, as well as give you a piping hot liquid to add to the risotto while you’re cooking it.

In a large, heavy based pan heat the olive oil and a knob of butter over a medium heat. Once the butter is melted and the pan hot, add the garlic and stir. Once the garlic in fragrant, add the onion and some freshly cracked pepper and stir once again. Allow the onion and garlic to sweat until the onion starts to soften, than add in the bacon and the rice and stir to combine.

As the rice grains start to cook and release their starches they will start to become clear – when you see this, start to ladle the hot stock and wine liquid over the rice. The trick here is to be patient, and to only add two (or at the most, three) ladles of liquid to the rice at any one time. This will allow the risotto to cook at an even pace, and will allow you to control the amount of liquid you have in your final dish (remember that you can always add more liquid, but you can’t take any out!).

Once the rice grains are starting to soften slightly (test one or two grains to check), add the mushrooms to the risotto, and continue to cook as before – adding liquid to the risotto a ladle at a time, and stirring to combine. Allow the risotto to simmer throughout  – the heat allows the rice & the mushrooms to absorb the liquid, with the excess vapourising.

When the rice and the mushrooms are cooked and softened, your risotto’s done! Add a couple of handfuls of Parmesan cheese and stir through (this will help to ‘thicken’ the risotto), some more cracked pepper to season to your taste and another knob of butter to add a gorgeous glossy sheen to the finished dish.

Serves – 4 as a main meal, 6 as an entrée

Cooking time – approx. 20mins

Filed under: Dinner, Personal, cooking, musings, vegetables | Tagged: , , , , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

A heavenly way to serve cabbage

Posted on September 30, 2008 by Marion

After my post of last night, this post may seem to be an odd follow-up, but bear with me here.

Hubby and I were watching the Bloomberg coverage of the fallout of the vote failure and the after-close analysis last night and after such a huge amount of uncertainty and bad news, what seemed to be just the ticket for dinner was a simple and delicious dinner. Anything to help ease the worries over night and allow a decent night’s sleep – to ensure enough energy in reserve to allow for more nervousness today!

So simple and delicious … going by the contents of the fridge & freezer the best combination was lamb chops (gorgeous, thick & organic) and veg … and the veg in question was half a Savoy cabbage, button mushrooms, green beans, celery and the ever-present garlic, all topped off with bacon and cream. It’s an absolutely heavenly way to cook cabbage!

This is the sort of recipe that can have an infinite number of variations depending on the contents of your fridge or pantry, but this is how it came together in my kitchen last night (& BTW, this was for the two of us):

  • one half a Savoy cabbage, with the leaves halved and then sliced into thin strips
  • 3 medium-large cloves of garlic, very finely chopped
  • 4 stalks of celery, diced
  • a handful of green beans, topped & tailed and halved
  • 8 to 10 medium button mushrooms, finely sliced
  • 3 rashers of smoked bacon, finely sliced
  • a dash of double cream
  • virgin olive oil & a nob of butter
  • freshly cracked black pepper (as much or as little as you like)

Heat the oil and butter together in a heavy-based and deep-slided pan over a medium/high heat on the stovetop. Add the garlic and stir; once you can smell it starting to cook, add the celery and some of the fresh cracked pepper and stir, allowing it to sweat until the celery becomes slightly soft and clear.

Next, add the bacon; combine everything and allow to cook for another minute or so, until you can smell the bacon starting to cook. Now, add the beans, mushrooms and the cabbage; stir to combine and then cover the pan to allow the mushrooms and cabbage to steam a little. Finally, add the cream and season again with pepper. Cover again, and allow the cabbage to continue to steam for 4 or 5 mins.

The veg are ready once the cabbage is cooked – it’ll be a bright green, and soft (but not grey-green and wilted).

I’ve created this combination a couple of times now, and I think it’ll become a fairly frequent dish coming out of my kitchen this winter. It’s fabulous comfort food, and very easy to cook.

Now, I mentioned above that this recipe can be easily varied … some off the top of my head … instead of cabbage you could use a couple of leeks; you could substitute an onion for the celery, or a carrot for the green beans; if you want a stronger flavour from the mushrooms you could use brown or chestnut mushrooms, or some a little more ‘unusual’ :o )

I hope that this gives you a bit of inspiration … and that if today’s another crap day in the markets & for the economy it serves as good comfort food for you too!

Serves – 2

Cooking time – approx. 10mins

Filed under: Dinner, Finance, cooking, musings, vegetables | Tagged: , , , , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

Financial insanity

Posted on September 29, 2008 by Marion

To follow on from one of my previous posts (The current financial madness), I’ve been watching today’s news in a sense of complete disbelief. To think that so many enormous, financially earth-shattering events could happen in the space of 24hrs, and then to top it all off 13 foolish, idiotic Republicans scuppered the Paulson rescue plan at the first test! How do they feel that it’s reasonable to give their word that they will follow a certain course of action, only to do the absolute opposite when it comes time to act? Do these morons not realise that while the mess we’re all in may have started in the US, the ramifications of their actions will be … are being … felt far further than just the ‘fat cats of Wall St‘? Banks are failing and being nationalised in Iceland (Glitnir) and the UK (Bradford & Bingley), and being propped up in Germany (Hypo) & Belgium / Holland (Fortis) as well for heavens sakes!

{side note – interesting viewpoint on Newsweek}

I’m in a state of near speechlessness on the whole situation – it all seems so surreal. Here’s hoping that a resolution comes quickly, and that it is reasonable, and that it doesn’t pander overly to the ill-informed and overly parochial opinions coming out of the US. When will these people learn that they don’t exist in a vaccuum?

They do my head in!

And the mainstream US media should shoulder a fair and reasonable proportion of the blame for the current state of the crisis. They should appreciate the very real role they should be playing to educate the US public on the true state of the current crisis and what it is that the US government is actually trying to do.

Filed under: Finance, Politics, musings | Tagged: , , , , , , | 1 Comment »

A great way to spice up vegetables

Posted on September 25, 2008 by Marion

After the previous post of much seriousness and general concern, I wanted to share a new way of doing vegetables for dinner that’s better than simply steaming them, or stir-frying them, or serving them raw in a salad.

Generally speaking I’m just cooking for two (although I always seem to over-cater!), and I use the veges I have to hand in the fridge. This changes according to the seasons for two reasons – the veges that are in season will always be cheaper (lower transport costs) and will almost always taste better (they’ve not had to sit in cold storage for an extended period).

So at the moment my fridge has onions, celery, capscium, carrots, green beans, mange-tout, mushrooms, ginger, and leeks in it. It’s always fun to invent  a slightly different way of cooking / presenting them, and even when I have my favourites they tend to vary slightly!

Ok, so the other night we had some (huge!) pork chops for dinner that I literally covered in herbs (chopped rosemary, thyme and sage) and cooked on the stovetop. To jazz things up a bit (because, I have to admit, as meat goes pork can be very subtle – to the point of bland) I decided to cook the veges slightly rather than serve a salad.

So to c. 3 cups of mixed chopped vege I added:

  • 2 large cloves of garlic
  • a generous amount of freshly cracked black pepper
  • two pinches of ground cumin
  • a pinch of ground cloves

The result was amazing – a little bit of Moroccan-inspired magic. I strongly recommend you branch out & try something a little bit different!

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UK government – Orwell would be proud

Posted on September 25, 2008 by Marion

Flicking through the online news coverage just now (yes, I’m at work, but it’s also lunch time – so I’m not completely skiving!) and I spotted a new line of stories and analysis on the BBC website based around the announcement today of the go-live date for the first stage of the UK government’s controversial ID card scheme. This scheme has a long and contentious history, and while its a good idea on one level, the non-Labour UK political parties, a large number of public organisations and a significant proportion of the public are all very reserved, to very nervous about it.

As a (relatively recent) observer, it seems that an ID card in the UK is just one tiny additional bureaucratic hurdle to overcome. And given that a vast number of government bodies and departments seem to be (in essence) studies in job-creation schemes, its a fairly minor deal. However those opposing the ID card scheme (and there are a lot of them) have some very valid concerns:

  • The biometric data stored on the card will be stored on a microchip – how can its security and encryption be guaranteed? TfL has recently admitted that its Oyster card has very low security and millions of Londoners use it as an electronic form of cash and ticketing to travel on public transport … how can we know that the Home Office won’t take the cheap option with the ID cards as well?
  • Where will the central database be stored, where and how will it be backed up, who will be responsible for maintaining it and who will have the authority to access it?
  • When we have an increasing incidence of biometric passports in use, why do we need to have biometric ID cards as well? Isn’t this just wasteful duplication?
  • What about the accuracy of the biometric scans? Who will certify this and what about false-positives?

Well, the announcement made today makes it clear that the people initially issued with the ID cards will be foreign students and those with UK residence through a marriage / civil partnership visa. This is a small proportion of all migrants in the UK, but they are two groups (apparently) at high risk of breaching their visa conditions. (The views of some foreign students interviewed by the BBC are on their website.)

The idea is that the cards will be issued to these migrants instead of a sticker / stamp being inserted into their passport. So this means that these particular migrants will have to carry their visa / ID card and produce it whenever required – at a UK border crossing, applying for a job … when stopped and searched on the street by the police?

The next stage of the roll-out is listed as all non-EU foreign nationals over the age of six. Eventually, the ID card (rather than the passport) will become legal proof of the holder’s right to live, study and work in the UK, and presumably proof if ID to open bank accounts, apply for benefits (if applicable), etc.

I have to say that as a non-EU citizen residing in the UK, I find all this quite concerning. Especially when you take into account the UK government’s appalling record of losing personal data (in 2007/08 there were a number of incidents of data-filled CD-Roms going missing in the post, top-secret and highly sensitive files being left on public trains, data-filled laptops being stolen and / or lost … not really confidence-inspiring!). It seems that many others hold similar concerns, as the online converage states that some feel that today’s announcement will be the first in a number of incremental steps that will ’soften-up’ the UK public to the scheme, and will gradually erode opposition through making the ID card ubiquitous and un-sensational.

It’s not that I’ve got something to hide, or that I have an issue with people knowing where I am. I could be tracked through my mobile phone signal, my online behaviour, the geographic pattern of my credit / debit card usage or through a handfull of the 300-odd images of me captured by London’s CCTV cameras daily. I do, however wish to maintain some semblance of control over my identity, and the security of my personal data, and potential loss of privacy.

And for me, that’s what this mooted ID card represents – a loss of control over my personal information and the security of my ID. I’ve never been in trouble with the police, meaning that they don’t have my fingerprints, or a swab with my DNA. And given the choice, I’d rather keep it that way!

Filed under: London, Personal, musings | Tagged: , , , , , , , | 3 Comments »

The current financial madness

Posted on September 18, 2008 by Marion

Having a husband employed in the London City corporate banking world, I suppose I’m on the ‘curious and relatively infomed’ end the spectrum when it comes to normal people watching the financial markets tear themselves apart.

(Very) Fortunately for us, it seems that hubby’s job is very unlikely to be one of the predicted 110,000 to disappear in the near future. Thank god he’s not a trader! All the same, however, it seems that now is a spectacularly good time for me to be converting from long-term freelancer to permanent staff member. Especially as I work for a publishing house. And the UK print media is not experiencing much joy at the moment, what with advertising revenues tanking. This way, at least I’ll be eligible for a redundancy payment if there are market-conditions related job cuts in the offing. Way to think positively, huh?!

But this has all led me to consider the general sanity of what’s going one at the moment, and to wonder just how much of the current financial madness is related to actual, concrete information, and how much is being driven by panic-fuelled mob psychology. It strikes me as a bit like lemmings all running off a cliff, just because that’s where all the other lemmings are going.

I know that a lot of people are writing / propounding that the current situation is generally just the free markets doing what they’re supposed to (sort of like an economic version of Darwinism I guess?). However, this doesn’t change that fact that, what with Lehman Brothers collapsing (following in the not-so-illustrious footsteps of Bear Stearns), AIG being rescued by the US government (one week after Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were effectively nationalised), HBOS being swallowed up by Lloyds TSB and Merrill Lynch throwing itself into the welcoming arms of Bank of America … there will be a huge number of people in significant personal financial trouble, and the same huge numbers of people desperately seeking new employment.

It all seems very ‘Gordon Gekko‘ to a bystander like me. Here’s hoping the drama doesn’t last too long, and that the fallout doesn’t hurt too many people, too badly.

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