Fettucine with Warmed Tomatoes, Garlic and Rocket

Four out of five members of my family think rocket rocks, so we eat it every day, if it's in the shops (in summer it grows like a weed in the garden). I don't know what made my teens start liking a leaf as strong and peppery as rocket (taking them to Italy last year where pizzas arrived piled with fresh rocket helped), but I'm determined to convert my seven-year-old too, as Google tells me it's full of vitamins C, A and K, and that it's a superfood for bones

This is a winter version of that lekker summer pasta dish which involves tipping cold chopped tomatoes and crushed garlic into hot pasta.

Fettucine with Warmed Tomatoes and Rocket
1 box fettucine (fresh is better, from Woolies)
5 T olive oil
3-4 cloves garlic, peeled and crushed
5 ripe tomatoes, chopped
3 large handfuls rocket leaves
1 cup finely grated Parmesan or Grana Padano
1 tsp chilli flakes (optional)
salt and milled black pepper

Boil the fettucine in plenty of salted water. Heat the olive oil in a large deep saucepan and stir in the crushed garlic. Saute the garlic very gently (it shouldn't brown) for five minutes. Add the chopped tomatoes, stir to coat, and simmer very gently for another few minutes so that they are warmed through but nowhere near collapsing. When the pasta's cooked, drain well and tip it into the warm garlic and tomatoes. Add the whole rocket leaves and chilli flakes and toss well to coat. Turn off the heat, toss in the grated cheese and season well with salt and pepper.

Top with fine shavings of Parmesan and another lashing of olive oil.

Serves 5.

Recipe rating:

My rating: 8/10
Teenagers' rating: 8/10
Small-daughter rating: She didn't try it.

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Buttery Parsnip Mash

The Parsnip (Pastinaca sativa).
 Image: Wikimedia Commons

Parsnips are very well named, don't you agree? The word sounds like a parsnip looks: a big bulbous beginning tapering to a skinny little snippy-snappy bit. To me they look a little like goblins' legs, which is maybe why my kids have never worked up any enthusiasm for them.

This dish, however, received guarded approval from my taste team. The parsnips  I used were getting on for elderly, which is perhaps why this mash was so voluptuous.

You could add some orange juice and finely grated orange rind, or perhaps a pinch of ground cumin and coriander, or nutmeg, but I think it's just right tasting only of parsnip and butter.

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Buttery Parsnip Mash

8 large parsnips, peeled
3 Tbsp (45 ml) butter
water, to cover
a pinch of salt
3-4 Tbsp (45-60 ml) cream
salt and milled black pepper

Cut the parsnips lengthways into quarters. If they have tough-looking fibrous cores, ease these out using a sharp knife, and discard.  Cut into small chunks.

Heat the butter in a saucepan, add the parsnip pieces and fry gently for five minutes. Now add just enough water to cover the parsnips.

Boil briskly until all the water has evaporated and the parsnips are very tender (top with with more water if necessary). Add the cream and mash to until smooth and fine. The amount of cream you use depends on the size and age of the 'snips - I suggest you start with two tablespoons, and keep adding more until you're satisfied with the consistency.

At this point, you can push the mash through a sieve to make a silken purée, but usually can't be bothered.

Serves 6 as a side dish.


My rating: 10/10
Teenagers' rating: 7/10
Small-daughter rating: 5/10 ('Nice, but a bit sticky and hairy')


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Creamy Lemon Tarragon Chicken, a la Nigel Slater

What do you do if you're feeling cold, forlorn and demotivated? You head off in the direction of the kitchen with a copy of your favourite recipe book of the moment (Nigel Slater's The Kitchen Diaries), rummage around in the fridge, and see what's mouldering there.

I happened to have a bag of fresh tarragon (a herb I have never succeeded in growing) , which I'd bought at the Dunkeld veggie shop, Johannesburg, because it looked so fresh and crisp. I also had a cut-up chicken, so I decided to make Nigel's chicken dish with Vermouth (which I didn't have: who does?) and cream (which I did have.

I took my time making this dish, and followed his instructions to a tee. (Except that he forgot to say whether the chicken pieces should be turned over during the browning proces; I turned them over).

It was just delicious: the chicken was tender, and the sauce was gorgeous, even though I added a scant tablespoon of flour to thicken and stabilise it (sorry Nigel), and substituted fresh lemon juice and white wine for the Vermouth and vinegar.

Creamy Lemon Tarragon Chicken
3 tablespoons butter
1 tsp olive oil
salt and freshly milled pepper
8 pieces free-range chicken (4 thighs, 4 breasts)
1 tablespoon flour
juice of 2 lemons
1 cup (250 ml) white wine
a handful of fresh tarragon (use parsley if you can't find tarrgon)
1 carton (250 ml) fresh cream

Put the butter and olive oil in a deep frying pan and heat it until it stops bubbling. Don' t allow the butter to brown. Season the chicken top and bottom with salt and pepper. Place the chicken, skin side down, in the hot pan, and fry gently until the chicken skin is a golden brown and crispy. Turn the chicken pieces over and fry for another 3-4 minutes. With a slotted spoon, remove the chicken and set aside.

Tip the frying pan over the sink and drain off all but about one tablespoon of the fat. Now put the pan back on the heat, and sprinkle 1 tablespoon of flour over the bottom. Stir and scrape, then tip in the lemon juice and wine, stirring briskly to loosen the brown bits on the bottom. Allow to bubble for 1 minute, then add the carton of cream. Roughly chop the tarragon and add it to the pan. Now put the chicken pieces back in the pan, together with their juices, skin side up. Cover the pan with a lid or tin foil.

Turn the heat down to its lowest setting and allow to bubble gently for 25-35 minutes. Shake the dish now and then to prevent the cream from sticking.

When you think it's ready, take a sharp knife and cut to the bone on one of the thighs. If the juices are running clear, and have no trace of pinkness, the chicken's ready.

Serve with mashed potato.

Serves 6 -8

Recipe rating:
My rating: 8/10
Teenagers' rating: 6/10
Small-daughter rating: 4/10 (she didn't like the chicken skin, which she said was 'slimy'.) Print Friendly

Seven-hour lamb: fall-apart, sticky, garlicky, lemony heaven

This, like all the recipes below, is an archived copy of a recipe originally posted on my other blog, Salmagundi.

Feck, but it's cold outside. My jeans harden instantly into frozen blue cardboard when I open the front door to let the pup out for a poo. A black frost has withered every plant in the garden. Dogs and cats are piled outside the front door, looking suspiciously rigid, like a pile of hairy frozen logs. (Only joking: they're snoozing by the hearth, in front of the feeble glow that passes for a fire).

Anyway, all I can think about is soft, tender, fall-apart, garlicky roast lamb, even though it's half-past ten at night and I've already sconed, while having a drink with my friend Nina, half a ton of olives and 200 discs of garlicky, olivey, capery marinated mozzarella discs (from the Cheese Factory Shop in Strydom Park - one of the Seventeen Shopping Wonders of Johannesburg; watch this space!).

So this is what I'm going to make my family tomorrow night:

Seven-Hour Lemon & Garlic Lamb

1 big shoulder of lamb (ask your butcher for this), or a large leg of lamb
10 cloves of garlic, peeled
3 tablespoons good dried oreganum
Finely grated rind of 2 lemons
1 tsp coarse sea salt
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 onion, thickly sliced
Juice of 5-6 lemons
2 cups (500 ml) white wine

Pre-heat your oven to 220 C.

With a sharp knife, stab inch-deep cuts into lamb joint, at an angle. Ten stabs top and bottom will do. Now crush together the garlic cloves, the lemon rind, the oreganum and the sea salt, using a mortar and pestle, or a blender. Add the olive oil and mix to a paste. Using your fingers, stuff this mixture deep into the cuts you've made in the lamb. Rub any remaining mixture over the joint.

Arrange the onion slices in a deep roasting roasting tin, or oven-proof casserole dish, and place the lamb joint on top of them. Now put the dish in the oven, which should be blazing hot. Leave it for 20-30 minutes, or until the meat is nicely browned and the fat is starting to blister and bubble. Now turn the joint over, pour over half the lemon juice, and half the wine, and turn the heat down to 140 celsius. Leave to roast for another half hour, then turn the lamb skin-side up, cover tightly* with tin foil or a lid, and turn the oven down to 120 celsius. Cook for another four or five hours (depending on the size of the joint), topping up and basting frequently with lemon juice and wine. Don't allow the juices in the pan to boil dry - you want about 1 cm of juice at all times. After a total of seven hours cooking time, check the meat: you should be able to pull it off the bone with a fork.

Remove the lamb from the baking dish, put on a plate, cover, and allow to rest for five minutes. Skim the fat off the juices left in the pan. Now pull the lamb from the bone, using two forks, and toss it in the skimmed pan juices. Season with salt and pepper, and squeeze over the juice of half a lemon. Serve with roast potatoes** and veg.


* Note: There is a school of thought that says that lamb should not be covered during this slow-roast period (thanks, Michael-the-Greek). If you don't cover it with foil, it will have a lovely, sticky, lemony glaze, and a fantastic flavour, but it will be a bit dry on the inside.

** Note: Don't put the roast potatoes in the same dish as the lamb. An hour and a half before you're going to serve the lamb, parboil the pots in salted water for 10-15 minutes, or until they are soft and fluffy on the outside but still slightly 'cucumbery' on the inside. Drain off the water and toss the spuds well so they get fluffy and ragged on the edges. Now heat some fat (preferably the fat you've skimmed off the lamb, but olive oil if you're health-conscious) in a roasting tin or baking sheet, on top of the stove, until it's spitting. Add the parboiled potatoes, toss well to coat them in the fat, and put into a very hot oven (at least 190) for an hour or more.

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