Cherry tomatoes

I was walking minding my own business then I ended up at the fruit and veg’s market…

Saw a beautiful bowl of mixed coloured cherry tomatoes… I couldn’t resist though I had yet no idea about what I was going to do with them.

Since I had already planned my week’s food, the tomatoes could be spoilt by the time I got round to doing something with them so, I just seasoned and roasted them to make a conserve.

The roasted tomatoes will later be used as accompaniment for some stir fry dishes, salads or sandwiches.

Ingredients:

·         1kg tomatoes

·         100g white onion quartered

·         50g garlic cut

·         1 teaspoon black pepper

·         1 tea spoon oregano

·         1 scallion

·         3 Maggi cubes crushed

·         100ml olive oil

 Mix all in the oven tray and place in the oven at 200C for 1hour 30 minutes…

Don’t forget to check from time to time to avoid it burning. No need to add water as the tomatoes will produce the necessary liquid during the roasting.

Bon appetit!

Once it is done, leave to cool down, then, spoon into a jar and use as needed. This will keep in the fridge for 3 weeks. Enjoy!

Roasted and ready for the jar

Old carrots second life. Sauce, dip, spread.



Sauce, Dips, Spread in ramekins

This is something I often do when I have not had the time to use the vegetables purchased in my monthly shopping.

Can you tell I have raided the fridge?

Using vegetables this way is great because it give them almost a second life and the bins are starved!

 

Ingredients:
·         500g carrots
·         100 onion
·         10g spring onion
·         1 pepper (optional)
·         6 spoons vegetable oil
·         1 fresh tomato
·         Salt & Herbes de Provences

Method:

Just peel rinse and chop everything. Place the onion, pepper, carrots, spring onion and tomato in a blender with just about 10 ml of water. Blend until very fine. But not liquid. Like on the photo.

In a sauce pan, heat about 6 tablespoons of oil, carefully empty the content of the blender in the pan, add salt and Herbes de Provences. Stir and cover the pan so the ingredients would cook though for 5-7 minutes. That is the first stage.

blended ingredients

At this stage, this carrots mix can be used as a spread for sandwiches as they need a bit of moisture. This spread will keep for 3 days.

The mix can also be used as a dip on a platter. If this is the way it is intended to be used, add Alpro single cream, leave to cook for another 2-3 minutes. Leave to cool before serving. Mine here is served with homemade crisps (recipe of crisps in the next post).

The one with the cream

If it is going to be used for pan fired red meats or warm dishes, instead of using cream, use mustard oil or any other spiced oil then spread on the meat either before serving or before frying.

If using it as a sauce, first fry some chopped onions before adding the content of the blender. Leave to simmer and dry completely before adding 100 ml of vegan stock and cook down to the constitution wanted. Here the carrot are used on a salad served with a warm steak Hache (mince beef steak).

 



The one with mustard oil



The spread

End of January sandwich all leftovers #skint

Skint? make your own (burnt) crisps

 

Used in a main meal - see last week's post

Voila!  Now go create and send me pics of what your have done with your old carrots!

 

Here is the collection: Carrots dip, spread, sauce…

Tip: if your carrots are shrivelled up and wrinkled, soak into fresh water to rehydrate. After an hour, the will look plumb and revived!

C Ya next time!

Chestnut and Broccoli Salad

Serving suggestion

This dish could be a starter, but it is great for lunch with a little glass of wine.

Ingredients:

Ingredients for the salad

·         1 medium onion
 ·         A hand full of crinkled beetroots
·         5 whole chestnuts in brine
·         1 green pepper
·         1 medium tomato
·         About 200 grs of broccoli
·         A hand full of roasted almond flakes.
·         A pinch of thyme and salt

Method:

Start finely cut the whole onion and fry with a pinch of salt and the thyme. Once the onion is brown, set aside and leave to cool down.

Floret the broccoli, cut the crinkled beetroots, roughly cut the chestnuts, the green pepper and the tomato.

Place all the above in a bowl and toss. Then, add the fried onion and crush the roasted almonds on the lot, mix well and serve.

No need for a vinaigrette here. The fired onion and the flavouring from the crinkled beetroot in some ways removed the need for a vinaigrette for this dish.

Enjoy.