Recipe review club

[GlumyGloomer]

I love trying out new recipes, and thought it would be fun to have a thread where we try stuff out and report back. Source must be cited and link provided if online. Photos encouraged.

Tonight I'll be making asian aubergine wedges, from Nadiya Hussain's Time to Eat book.
I like the taste of aubergine but have grave doubts about the texture. Still, I'm being brave and giving this a go.
Worth noting that I leave the chilli out of everything so that the dd's can eat it (I add at the table).

Anyone fancy joining me? (Waits for tumbleweed...)

Mr GG would completely agree with you on that one. I adore pretty much anything flour based, and love dumplings, but can't be bothered to make them just for me at the moment.
Tonight I bravely reheated the fish curry, and a chicken curry as it was a smallish portion of each. The fish curry was better than the first time round, but still won't be making again. It's out of my freezer now at least.

I used to make cakes & pastry, but stopped years ago.
I only use flour now to make sauces, & frying/egg & breadcrumbing.

It seems almost inevitable that we're in for another lockdown, so I hope you're well-stocked with flour before the panic-buying sets in again.

Mmm, dumpling, I love stodgy dumplings of any variety! Bought flour recently so hopefully we'll be ok this time. Last lockdown I ended up getting huge bags from a catering supplier!
This week we've had pizza so far, using the bread machine. Liked all round. Tomorrow I will attempt toad in the hole.

Oh, I also made rocky road with 3 chocolate oranges, most of a box of celebrations, some oatcakes and a tube of smarties. Very sickly...

Love rocky road but never made it, sounds yum
We stocked up on basics back in November, when no deal was looking likely so we're good. I even have yeast!
Not made much exciting recently but I discovered a load of past date eggs so going to be cake making soon.

I'm making this tonight ;-
www.eatyourbooks.com/library/recipes/1726693/chicken-livers---escabeche

Had it before, so know it will be good (for those of us that like offal)!

Sounds interesting @GlumyGloomer I bought chicken livers recently for terrine, and when I saw how cheap they are I thought I should get them more often. Im happy with a pate or terrine, but not sure I could deal with the texture of whole pieces, I'm not an offal fan!
Tonight I used this recipe for toad in the hole with cabbage. Came out well, but perhaps could have done with some herbs in it. Pretty plain fare I suppose! www.google.com/amp/s/www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/toad_in_the_hole_with_86283/amp

Veggie chilli tonight for us from the Hairy Bikers/ Dieters. They describe it as the 'best ever' chilli but despite some different ingredients to the ones I'd usually include, it didn't taste much different still, it was quite tasty and good for using up veg/ freezing etc.

The DC have asked to make cookies with the leftover Christmas tree chocolates. I'll have to work it into some sort of home schooling task!

@ClaraTheImpossibleGirl in all seriousness recipes are good for teaching ratios. Depending on the level you can explain how to double or halve the quantities, or give the amounts in grams and ask them to work out how many parts flour to butter etc. Ages ago I did an OU stem acces module and recipes were used that way as an example.

@Imicola it was Georgy's chicken liver recipe, I've never cooked them in my life, although I did used to like shop bough liver pate.

Tonight I finally made the cajun chicken pasta @FrenchBoule posted back on page 6(?). I made my own chilli free cajun spice mix using the recipe:
www.allrecipes.com/recipe/149221/cajun-spice-mix/
And it was delicious. Execution was a bit sloppy but definitely worth perfecting. I used garlic and onion granules instead of powder, and on the pasta recipe I skipped the lemon salt.

Pasta recipe again: www.allrecipes.com/recipe/8778/cajun-chicken-pasta/

Another thought for using cooking for home-schooling.
Get the DC to calculate weights, measures & temperatures from American recipes to U.K. metric !

I stopped looking at U.S. recipes as I CBA to calculate - I find "cups" really irritating as the weight differs according to the ingredient.

I've been to N'awleans, & loved Cajun food. I brought back a cookery book & various spices. Made a few things, then found the spices at the back of a cupboard when they were nearly 20 years old.

Georgyporky, you’ve just reminded me of a super simple salad- chickenivers fried with garlic and tarragon, add balsamic, olive Oi and pour over leaves. Had it years ago, delish!

Made this for lunch as had milk to use up:
www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/cheeseboard-macaroni-cheese
I used 50/50 cheddar and red Leicester, with parmesan on top. Also added tinned tuna and sweetcorn.
Huge success, even with dd1 who normally doesn't like cheese sauces.

That macaroni cheese recipe looks yummy @GlumyGloomer, I'll have to try it on DS2 who loves cheese! He enjoys cauliflower cheese but literally just cheese grated over cauliflower, no sauce or similar, maybe this will change his mind...

I've just bought a Two Chubby Cubs cookbook and the Batch Lady one, expect some recipe reviews soon!

Looking forward to it, Clara, especially Batch Lady, I love having meals in the freezer. Today lunch and dinner are premade and I'm glad to have an easy day.
Yesterday I tried making the NH frying pan cookie (Time to Eat). Possibly my fault but I wasn't impressed with this one. The base burned and the top just wasn't as tasty as I hoped. Cookies are definitely best in the oven.

Has DD1 decorated it as a Rorschach test?
I can see the DNA double helix, but maybe I should go to Specsavers.

Nope, this one is all my own work! I see a double s🤔

We're back to toddler at home while we both try to juggle work, so cooking will be basic and batch for a while I think!

Managed to mess up our veg box timing also and we are now totally out of veg! Had a huge batch of bolognese to see us through, and DH made cream of onion and potato soup with the last of those which was surprisingly good! Supermarket delivery tomorrow thankfully.

@ClaraTheImpossibleGirl

That macaroni cheese recipe looks yummy *@GlumyGloomer*, I'll have to try it on DS2 who loves cheese! He enjoys cauliflower cheese but literally just cheese grated over cauliflower, no sauce or similar, maybe this will change his mind...

I've just bought a Two Chubby Cubs cookbook and the Batch Lady one, expect some recipe reviews soon!

I also just bought the teo two chubby cubs book and the new pinch of nom one (need to lose some weight after last year). I've been trying to up my cooking game since last March when we went into lockdown. My holy grail is meals that both the teens like (DD16 is a bit fussy). Last week week I made Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstalls beef stew with cheddar cobbler which went down very well. The cheddar cobbler was gorgeous. I used my new pressure cooker to do the stew part and it ended up much more tender than when I do it in the casserole dish in the oven. Tonight I tried a Korean dish galbi-jim which is beef short ribs in a sweet sauce. Very tasty and the teens liked it with stixky rice.

My new cookbooks arrive on Tuesday so will start with them soon but I also have several recipes from one the roasting tin books that I still want to try.

You'll have to report back on the Pinch of Nom cookbook @Titsywoo, I haven't used any of their recipes yet!

Tomorrow will be... some form of cookies so the DC can cut them into shapes as part of their home schooling. Bribery is required to get them to learn these things

Will do @ClaraTheImpossibleGirl - I've had a brief look through and there are a lot of recipes I would want to try which is unusual for a cookery book in my experience!

I made spiced neep fritters for lunch today after my brother in law gave us a massive turnip from their farm. It was really nice, but as usual the toddler did not agree! Served with feta, plus date and tamarind chutney.
www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/spiced-swede-fritters