Cookery book club - June - Mexican Food Made Easy (Thomasina Miers) and Thirty Minute Meals (Jamie Oliver)

[Curioustiger]

Come join the Mumsnet cookery bookclub! Each month we choose two cookery books - one popular, like Nigella / Jamie / Delia, so you probably already have it / can borrow it and one a bit more unusual. We cook a minimum of two recipes each - you choose the recipe, they just have to be ones you have never cooked before- which works out at four new recipes each month.Then we chat about them!

For May, our books were:

• Jerusalem by Ottolenghi
  
• Kitchen Diaries
  

And we posted here

For June our books are:

• Mexican Food Made Easy by Thomasina Miers
  
• Thirty Minute Meals by Jamie Oliver
  

For July our books will be:

• Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall Veg Every Day
  
• Madhur Jaffrey Ultimate Curry Bible
  

We will always try to pick at least one book with recipes available on the Internet, and local libraries are great for cookbooks if you can order in advance. We pick books three months ahead so will be choosing August's books this month.

[kefybaby]

Signing in for June too. Hello, everyone.
JO has been sitting on my shelves largely unused (apart from the sausage rolls which I have made a few times and are good), so it is great to have an incentive to make use of it.
Given the raving reviews, I made the pregnant Jools pasta tonight. DH asked if this was a student recipe, my blender has suffered a blow and the jury is still out as to whether we will revisit the recipe. It was enjoyable enough but not amazing. Perhaps Jerusalem has spoilt us!

[Cantdothisagain]

I agree the pregnant pasta recipe is student-fare in a way but it's tasty cheap and quick... Rather than revolutionary...

[greensnail]

Haven't managed to do the trout yet as dh went out on Saturday and I didn't think it was worth cooking it just for me and the dds. Hopefully will make it tomorrow so will report back then!

[maniacbug]

If he'd called it anything other than 'pregnant Jools' pasta, I think I'd be more tempted to try it!

DH made the fish tray-bake menu on Saturday, getting monumentally stressed in the process as he can't resist a challenge and was actually trying to do it in 30 mins. Result: not bad, but closer to 1hr. Fish was absolutely delicious, and the salsa verde really made it (we had leftovers today on fish + chips), but the banoffee pie was horrible. Mind you, I still managed to eat a portion... (If you like banoffee pie, the Hairy Bikers one from their pie book is amazing.) Oh, and we thought the salad really didn't need balsamic vinegar, as there are so many other strong flavours going on.

Got a bit carried away on mexgrocer.co.uk (thanks for tip tigerlily) and ordered 1kg of chipotle chillis. So, guess I'll be making chipotles in adobo at some point this week! And probably giving jars of it away. What on earth was I thinking?!

[snoworneahva]

Just done my weekly plan - this week we're going to try Sopa de Lima from Tommy's book and the mustard chicken from Jamie's book. We'll be adapting the recipes to suit our diet -so instead of using potatoes in the dauphinoise we'll be using turnips and avoiding the tortillas in Tommy's soup.

What's everyone else got planned?

[pregnantpause]

I am making the roast tomato sauce, to go in the corn and chicken humble pie, which I'm hoping isn't too spicy for DC.
I've also planned the fish tray bake with spinach salad, but will go without the banoffeee pie (it's not my kind of desert and earlier reviews put me off) but will substitute the mango mini ice creams.

Unrelated to the cookbooks, but I have to cook a pork shoulder this week as my new freezer is smaller than my old so will have to defrost some meat. Any ideas what I can do with it?

[BeCool]

Very interested in this thread but I need to find a way to do this without buying new cookbooks (I am also part of the minimalist quiche), of going to the library.

I have JO's 15 minute meals - will it work to cook something from that instead?

[Cherrypi]

Hi all. Just picked up both books from the library and going to have a look through when/if the toddler naps.

[Nolda]

Just about to start the pork chops, crushed potatoes and minty cabbage. Back later!

[ScienceRocks]

BeCool, we might be doing 15 minute meals another month. A lot of the 30 minute meals are online, as are the Mexican recipes.

The pork shoulder could be slow roasted and served with mole

[ScienceRocks]

Chicken enchiladas here tonight. I have done the spinach and ricotta ones before, but I have leftover chicken from yesterday's roast so am adapting the recipe to suit.

[Feathered]

Still waiting for my TM book to be delivered.
The thing that confuses me about the JO book is that there are no timings. What do you do if you are cooking only elements of a certain menu? Or if a small voice shouts "MUMMY . . . COME AND WIPE MY BOTTOM!" when you're half way into the half hour????

[Nolda]

The pork chops were very tasty. I liked the fennel seeds and honey. I have to confess to making the basic error of not reading the recipe through before shopping and cooking. The chops I bought didn't have the skin because I thought that crackling isn't good for you so just skip that bit. Also microwaving of the potatoes took me by surprise but seemed to work although I would suggest stirring them halfway through.

The DCs were not overly impressed. DD said the meat was tasty but the potatoes and cabbage were a bit yucky. DS liked the meat and the cabbage but not the potatoes. DD loved the pud but DS managed a one spoon taste (which he spat out).

I liked it all and found the flavours worked very well together even the mint sauce on the cabbage (and I'm not usually a mint fan). Still waiting for DH to come home from spinning for his verdict. So far, I'd say I would probably cook the meat again but with different accompaniments given the DC's comments. Pudding was nice but we usually have fruit or a yoghurt.

[maniacbug]

Exactly, feathered, that's what's bothering me too. (Plus the fact that I don't like being told what to eat with what - it makes me deliberately want to break the rules!) I'm really struggling with the format. If we really like any particular dishes I think I'm going to write the recipes out for those dishes and then take the book back to the library.

pregnantpause re. fish tray-bake: 10 mins under the grill was not enough for our salmon to cook, though the pancetta burned. We did have the thick salmon steaks though; might have been different with tail-end fillets. Think if we try this again I would roast rather than grill and allow for 15 (even 20) mins rather than 10. Or if grilling, I might add the pancetta once the salmon's already half-cooked.

[Nolda]

at "Mummy ... come and wipe my bottom", Feathered.

[frenchfancy]

I made tortillas today, didn't use the recipe from the book as I don't have it yet. Just wanted to let you know you don't need a press. I used a rolling pin and they came out great. The first couple were a fail as I rolled them too thin but the rest were good.

I have a couple left over so I'm going to do the chorizo and potato Quesdillas. ( recipe here for anyone else who doesn't have the book ) .

It might be pregnant Jools pasta for dinner tomorrow, but it doesn't count as we have that quite regularly. I agree it isn't the best thing every, but it is quick, cheap, and the plates are always empty at the end which is a BIG plus.

[Nolda]

Oh dear, DH has now eaten his meal and said, "Which book does this come from? Please don't make anything else"!

[snoworneahva]

Made the Sopa de Lima this evening. Quite sour flavour as you add zest and juice of a grapefruit. Mixed reactions from the family, dh scored it a 9, - thought it was tasty and interesting, ds and I scored it a 7, we both liked the unusual interesting taste but it wouldn't be something we'd want again in a hurry and dd thought it was much too sour and drained all the soup off and just ate the chicken and avocado.

So worth a try but it has not made it into the family hall of fame recipes.

[Cherrypi]

Just cooked the Mexican scrambled eggs with chorizo. I liked the flavours but the texture was a bit odd. I did blitz my onions to a pulp though. Went well with the salad and tequila, chilli and lime dressing I bought from Asda.

[ELR]

Hi everyone just marking my place, just got back from a week away so will be having another lookthrough the books when ive got through the mountain of washing and cooking something on Thursday.
aka the steak sandwich in JO is lovely, do all the side dishes and its a real great weekend lunch.
Think I will try the killer jerk chicken.

[akarucker]

ELR oh good, I'll make the steak sarnie soon then.

Made the tomato soup and croutons tonight. It was very good and nice and easy. Will make again. I used focaccia for the croutons which worked beautifully.

[greensnail]

Finally made the trout with chilli cream from TM this evening. It was really yummy, dh and I both enjoyed it. The dds didn't like the chilli cream (it wasn't due to the chilli, they just didn't like it) but that wasn't a problem as it gets poured over the fish after cooking so easy enough for them to have their fish plain without it. They ate lots of fish that way so kept me happy! Will definitely definitely be making it again.

Will be doing pregnant jools pasta tomorrow. Hope it will be easy enough to work out the timings as I won't be doing the pudding to go with it and an also prone to having little bottoms to wipe mid cooking

[ScienceRocks]

Made the tasty crusted cod from 30 minute meals tonight. The tin of anchovies in my cupboard turned out to be out of date sardines so I substituted olives instead. I also didn't have lemons, so used lemon juice. Still, the fish was tasty, as were the mashy peas. And the tartare sauce was chunkier than in the recipe (I had already put the food processor in the dishwasher and switched it on, so had to chop it by hand) but added a good tang.

All in all a success (even if the fish under the grill smoked out the kitchen).

[kefybaby]

I made the meatballs from the JO meatball sandwich (with steamed veg instead of the bacon, cheese, bread and cabbage as I came across criticism that the sandwich contains more fat than a Big Mac!). DH and I were not very impressed with the result - perhaps they need to be eaten "in context". I am beginning to think that the focus of this book is on making as much as possible in 30 minutes...

[Pufflemum]

Well I have received my copy of TO but am struggling to decide what to make. I try and follow a Paleo diet so don't eat grains,means or bread, which limits the recipes significantly! The green smoothie sounds good and the different salsas so I'll definitely do those and then need to go through the book again and see what I can adapt. The chilli con carne is on the list for next week when DH is home.