nut bake

We celebrated Canadian Thanksgiving more than a month ago. But all the talk about American Thanksgiving is making me want to invite round another group of friends and cook up a feast in celebration. We have so much to be thankful for, so why only one day?


My Thanksgiving party always involves a few vegetarian guests. And I count myself when thinking about the veggie food. Although I eat meat, I just love vegetables more. Vegetarian food seems more inventive quite a lot of the time. (I think I might be a vegetarian if I wasn't married to a sausage-loving bloke.) This Thanksgiving I made the nut bake for my vegetarian and vegetarian-at-heart guests.


There are a fair few ingredients, but with a food processor or blender to whizz breadcrumbs and nuts, the preparation was easy. The vegetarian eaters loved it, and even most of the meat eaters enjoyed a portion. I was lucky enough to eat the leftovers for lunch later that week!

Nut Bake
serves 8
adapted from The Kitchen Revolution: A Year of Time-and-money-saving Recipes

Nut Layers:
4 T (1/4 c) butter
1 T oil
2 onions, finely chopped
4 garlic cloves
450 g (2 1/2 c) mixed nuts (for example, cashews, pine nuts, Brazil nuts, hazelnuts, almonds), crushed
4 large eggs
200 g (3 1/3 c) white breadcrumbs (from 6-8 slices of bread)
8 T (1/2 c) milk

Breadcrumb Filling:
1 lemon, zested
250 g (4 c) brown breadcrumbs (from 8-10 slices of bread)
2 sprigs fresh sage, leaves chopped
4 sprigs fresh thyme, leaves chopped
handful of fresh parsley, chopped
85 g (2 c) watercress, chopped
6 T butter

Preheat the oven to 200 C/400 F.
Soften the onions and garlic in a pan. Combine in a bowl with the other nut layer ingredients.
Mix the breadcrumb layer ingredients in a separate bowl and season well.
Grease two loaf pans and put a quarter of the nut mixture in each. Press down, then cover each with half the breadcrumb mixture. Finish with the remaining nut mixture. Cover with foil.
Bake for 30 minutes or freeze to bake later. (If freezing, defrost fully before baking as directed.)

grown-up baked beans

Here's a side dish from The Kitchen Revolution that I made to go with Bacon and Spinach Pancakes. The baked beans were easy--I just let them simmer away while I was preparing the more complicated parts of the meal.

Grown-Up Baked Beans
side dish for four people

3 T olive oil
1 large onion, finely sliced
2 garlic cloves
pinch of dried herbes de Provence
pinch of paprika
1 c white wine
1.5 x 400 g cans borlotti beans
1 x 400 g chopped tomatoes
1 t light brown sugar

Heat the oil and sweat the onion. Add the garlic, herbes de Provence, and paprika. Cook over a medium high heat for 5 minutes, then turn the heat up and add the wine. Bring to the boil and add the borlotti beans, tomatoes, and sugar.
Allow to boil then reduce the heat and simmer for half an hour or more.

I have been doing quite a few recipes from The Kitchen Revolution, but it is only a library book. So I am trying to keep it clean, especially while cooking spattering things like tomatoey beans.

bacon and spinach pancakes

I have been working my way through vast quantities of chard recently, which arrives semi-regularly in our veg box. This recipe called for spinach, but it was easy to substitute chard by very quickly boiling it before adding it to the recipe. This recipe is another "Two for One", where half the food is frozen for another day. I made a half recipe so that we had four pancakes to eat and four to freeze, rather than double this. (The original, larger, recipe is below.)

The filling is a mixture of cooked greens, bacon, cream cheese and cottage cheese, seasoned well.


Making the pancakes was quite fun. I added some whole wheat flour to them. The first one was rubbish, but the cookbook had this reassuring statement: "The first one is always the most tricky and you may find you have to give that one up to trial and error." That was certainly the case, but then I was short on batter. The last two pancakes were a lot smaller.

Bacon and Spinach Pancakes
two meals for four people

Pancakes:
2 c flour
3 large eggss
1 2/3 c milk
3/4 c water

Filling:
mild oil
400 g bacon, about 12 rashers, snipped into small pieces
2 bunches of spring onions
500 g spinach (or greens)
40 g Parmesan
300 g garlic and her cream cheese
300 g cottage cheese
4 t butter

Make the pancake batter by mixing the flour and some salt, then add the eggs, milk, and water. Stir well to make a smooth batter.
Heat a little oil in a large pan with a lid. Add the bacon, cook for a few minutes, then add the spring onions. Cover and leave for a couple of minutes.
Add the spinach, and when it starts to wilt, raise the heat to reduce the liquid in the pan and remove from heat.

Meanwhile, mix all but 1 T Parmesan with the cream cheese and cottage cheese. Season with salt and pepper.

Preheat the oven to 200 C/400 F.
Make the pancakes by heating a heavy pan with some oil. Pour in just enough batter to cover the base. when the pancake can be lifted, loosen it around the edges and flip it over. Cook both sides to that the pancake is golden. Make eight pancakes, using half the batter.

Once the spinach mixture has cooled slightly, mix with the cheeses. Use half the spinach mixture, divided between the eight pancakes, to make filled pancakes, rolled up.
Put the pancakes into the oven in a buttered pan, with the remaining Parmesan scattered on top, for 15-20 minutes.
While these are baking, make the other eight pancakes and fill them using the remaining filling. Wrap these in foil and freeze for another day.

On the day of reheating, defrost the pancakes thoroughly and bake as above.

Caribbean macaroni cheese

Here's a nice weeknight comfort food--a lovely twist on Mac'n'Cheese. I used another "Two for One" recipe from The Kitchen Revolution--it's designed for eating half now and freezing half for later. The Two for One recipe is for two meals for four people, so I halved it and made two meals for two people--except there were three of us. So we ended up eating almost all of it and saved one lunch box for Ant the next day.


I like the addition of sweet potato--low GI and very tasty. I boiled the pasta and sweet potato together, which was my only adaption of this easy recipe.


The sauce has some tomatoes and spring onions to give a nice combination of orange, red and green in the finished dish. It feels like autumn to me, with the colours of leaves and the warm hearty texture.


This was the amount of two meals for two--so I don't think I even have oven space to bake two meals for four at the same time.

Caribbean Macaroni Cheese
serves 2x 4 people

500 g macaroni
250 g sweet potatoes, cut into 1-2 cm chunks
3 free range eggs
2 c milk
3 T HP Sauce
2 to 3 t sweet chilli sauce
5-10 drops chillis sauce (for example, Tasbasco)
2 x 400 g cans of chopped tomatoes
2 bunches spring onions, sliced
300 g mature cheddar, grated
40 g (approx.) butter
2 slices of bread for breadcrumbs (optional)
handful of fresh parsley, chopped
salt and pepper

Peheat the oven to 200 C/400 F.
Cook the pasta according to packet directions, drain and set aside.
Bring the sweet potatoes to the boil, then simmer for 5 minutes. Be careful not to overcookt hem of they will turn to mush. Drain and set aside.
Meanwhile, make the sauce. Break the eggs into a bowl, add the milk, HP Sauce, sweet chilli sauce, chilli sauce, tomatoes, spring onion, and half of the cheddar cheese. Season with salt and pepper.
Add the pasta and sweet potatoes and mix well. Pour into two ovenproof dishes.
If using, add the breadcrumbs on top and sprinkle with the rest of the cheddar cheese. Dot with butter and the parsley.
Bake for 20 minutes, or until the tops are brown and the pasta mixture has set.
Put one dish aside to cool and freeze.

On the day of reheating, defrost the macaroni cheese thoroughly. Cover with foil and bake at 180 C/350 F for 30 t0 45 minutes. Uncover for the last 10 minutes of cooking.

for freezing: fish with cheesy topping

I am trying a few recipes from the book I borrowed from the library: The Kitchen Revolution. I expect to review this cookbook for you in a while, after I have tried out a few more of the 400+ recipes. The title of the first recipe I tried is Fish Rarebit. It's based on Welsh Rarebit, a fancy cheese-on-toast. Here, the toast is replaced with white fish. The idea of this "Two for One" meal is to make double proportions and then freeze half for a later meal.


Sweated leeks are added to lots of cheddar cheese, breadcrumbs, some ale (or water), mustard, and Worcestershire sauce. Then this is layered on the fish and grilled for a few minutes, then baked to finish. The recipe in the book makes two meals for four people, so I made half this, serving Ant and I one fresh meal and one frozen for a later date when things get hectic and we are both thinking of take-away. The original recipe is below.

Fish Rarebit
two meals for four people


3 leeks, approximately 500 g, finely sliced
2 T butter
2 eggs
1 1/2 T mustard powder
1/2 t ground cayenne pepper
350 g cheddar cheese, grated
2 t Worcestershire sauce
75 ml bitter or ale (or water)
100 g breadcrumbs (made from 4 slices of bread)
8 portion sized white fish pieces (haddock, pollock, cod, or coley, for example)

Melt the butter in a pan and add the leeks. Cover and sweat gently for 5-7 minutes.
In a bowl, combine eggs, mustard powder, cayenne pepper, cheese, Worcestershire sauce, beer or water, and breadcrumbs. Season with salt and pepper.
Remove the lid from the leeks and cook until the liquid evaporates. Season the leeks, remove from heat and allow them to cool.
Preheat the oven to 180 C/350 F and heat the grill to its highest temperature.
Oil an ovenproof dish large enough to hold four fish pieces. Place four fish pieces in the pan and use half the topping to cover the fish. Place under the grill for 3-5 minutes, or until topping is brown and set. Then bake in the oven for a further 7-10 minutes.
Meanwhile, top the remaining four fish pieces with the remaining topping. Place them in a suitable container (plastic, foil, or ovenproof dish). Cover and freeze well.
To cook the frozen meal at a later time, defrost the fish completely. Cook as above.
Serve with new potatoes, watercress salad, or veggies of your choosing.