Lotta's Nigella Express project

A Dinner with Three Nigella Express Recipes

2008-01-19T23:45:00.000+02:00

As I knew I would be home alone the whole weekend, I asked my mom and sister to join me for dinner on Saturday night. And as my boyfriend was not around, I decided to make a meal that would have a red meat main.

So... I took a look at Nigella Express and came across 3 recipes:

Potato Cakes with Smoked Salmon
Lamb, Olive and Caramelized Onion Tagine
Mango Split

I quickly realized I would not be able to get decent lamb meat in my hometown so on Friday afternoon we made a shopping excursion to a bigger city about 60 kilometres away. And I got some very nice lamb for only 10 euros per kilo! I am no lamb expert so I let the butcher decide on the cut and just asked for 1 kilo of lamb suitable for this kind of dish.

The potato cakes were easy to make. I had to add a bit of milk to the batter and my cakes were not as pretty in colour as the ones in the book. But they tasted good! As you can see from the picture, I made them a bit bigger too.

I could not get "caramelized onions from a jar" - I'm pretty sure they're not available in Finland. So I got some shallots, peeled them and used them whole. They were really nice as were the garlic cloves too. Yum! After an hour in the oven, my lamb didn't seem to be cooking at all so I put the pan back on the stove and cooked it for another hour. By then the meat was tender, falling off the bone (I had bone-in lamb pieces). I'm not a big fan of couscous (which Nigella suggest to serve with this dish) so we had dark rice and vegetables to go with the lamb. Delicious! I wouldn't hesitate serving this dish to "fancier" guests either.

By now we were stuffed but luckily there's always room for dessert... I couldn't get mango sorbet so I bought lemon sorbet instead. It was really sharp - I think the mango variety would've worked better. The sauce was interesting and, as you can see from the picture, mine turned out a lot darker than in the book's picture. The toasted shredded coconut was very nice. This dessert was a good, not-too-sweet end to our meal.

The recipe for Potato cakes with smoked salmon can be found on p. 198 in the "Razzle Dazzle" chapter of "Nigella Express.

The recipe for Lamb, olive and caramelized onion tagine can be found on p. 114 in the "Quick Quick Slow" chapter of "Nigella Express".

The recipe for Mango Split can be found on p. 78 in the "Retro Rapido" chapter of "Nigella Express".

It's been a long time...

2008-01-16T22:54:00.001+02:00

Oh my, it's been almost 2 months since my last post! Things have been hectic and I just haven't had the time or the energy to do any blogging.

But here's what we had on New Year's Eve!

The only Nigella Express recipe was Roquamole. In addition to that we had chicken wings, Greek salad, skordalia (a Greek garlicky almond and potato paste), tsatsiki, Greek olive bread and corn tortilla chips to go with the roquamole. Everything was delicious! The roquamole tasted very strong first but when I just kept eating it with the tortilla chips, I couldn't stop until I had eaten the whole bag! It's highly addictive, let me tell you. :) Next time, though, I'll use a little less cheese and a whole lot more avocado. :)

Here's a close-up of the roquamole.

The recipe for Roquamole can be found on p. 243 in the "Speedy Gonzales" chapter of Nigella Lawson's new book "Nigella Express".

Green Eggs and Ham

2007-11-13T21:50:00.000+02:00

I made these last week, can't remember what day it was. We liked them but thought the turkey I used was a bit too strong and didn't allow for the eggs to taste. (I used turkey because my boyfriend doesn't eat red meat.) I would definetely try these again as they were really easy & quick to make.

I really need to start writing my blog entries sooner - I've already forgotten what I was supposed to say about this recipe! And I need to get cooking more...

This recipe can be found on p. 103 in the "Get up and Go" chapter of Nigella Lawson's new book "Nigella Express".

Pineapple Upside-Down Cake

2007-11-06T21:17:00.000+02:00

I've wanted to make this cake ever since I got the book. Or actually even before that, many years ago. Now I had the perfect opportunity: I wanted to make something to take to a friend's house and this cake is something that can be made without much effort even when one is tired and busy. :)

The cake was really easy to make. You just butter a cake tin (I used a regular cake tin, I don't have a Tarte Tatin tin...), sprinkle it with some sugar, put in the pineapple slices and the cherries. Then you make a batter - just mix everything together - and spread the batter on top of the fruit. 30 minutes in the oven and you're ready.

I had an idea in my mind of how this cake would taste and it was very much like I suspected. Delicious! :) The pineapple slices were soft, the cake sweet and moist... yum!

A funny thing happened when I got to my friend's house. I had the cake on a plate, in my arms, still warm. My friend has lots of cats and one of them started acting in a bizarre way when he say (smelled) the cake! He was licking his lips (do cats have lips?), swallowing and finally jumped on my shoulder in his attempt to get a piece! I gracefully gave him the tiniest piece and he was happy. :) Bless him. Needless to say, my friend and her husband liked the cake too. ;)

I'll definetely make this one again!

This recipe can be found on p. 82 in the Retro Rapido chapter of Nigella Lawson's new book "Nigella Express".

Mustard Pork Chops

2007-11-05T22:59:00.001+02:00

Okay, here's finally my first entry! :) Today my mom and little sister came over for lunch and I thought it was the perfect opportunity to try this recipe as my boyfriend doesn't eat red meat so I very rarely have an opportunity to cook it.

The dish was very easy to make and took very little time, too. I think the chops would've benefited from a longer cooking time though - I put them in the sauce for a couple of minutes but as I'm used to pork chops that literally fall off the bone, I was a bit disappointed with these. But they tasted good despite the somewhat chewy texture. ;)

The sauce was delicious and I'm planning on trying it with turkey or chicken, too. We had the pork chops with shop-bought potato casserole (Christmas food but we just couldn't help ourselves when we saw the boxes at the store...), mushroom salad and a green salad topped with a dressing of natural yoghurt mixed with mango relish. Nigella suggest using gnocchi but they are not easy to come by in these parts - I didn't actually even bother to search for them at the store...

This recipe can be found on p. 11 in the Everyday Easy chapter of Nigella Lawson's new book Nigella Express.

Looking forward to starting the project

2007-10-17T15:03:00.000+03:00

I have already tried two recipes from Nigella Express - the Banana Butterscotch Muffins and the Flourless Brownies - and I'm really looking forward to having some more time to just sit down and choose the next recipe I want to try. There are loads to choose from - the new book is fantastic.

At first I didn't care too much for the layout of the book but now that I'm more used to it, it doesn't bother me anymore. The pictures are very good and make me want to try the recipes even more.

I promise to try some recipes later this month! :)

- Lotta