No Waste Cooking
I began to focus on food waste when I read that 25% of the food we buy is thrown away. Usually any leftover vegetables become soup or go into a fritatta. We are having soup regularly because I use chicken carcasses to make stock and we seem to have a chicken every week. The stock becomes the basis for immunity boosting soup. The vegetables are whatever is available and sometimes I add pasta or lentils. I always add ginger and turmeric, sometimes garlic, all good for supporting immunity.
Cauliflower Puree
An assessment of the fridge and pantry revealed some things I needed to use to continue my “no wasted food” plan. I decided to steam the cauliflower to make some vegetable stock for a change. Usually our immunity boosting soup has a chicken stock base but I hadn’t thawed any today. It’s wet and windy, so definitely a soup day.
I’d normally make cauliflower cheese, a favourite of mine, but it seemed a bit heavy, so I made pureed cauliflower instead. It is quick and so easy and tastes great.
INGREDIENTS
- 2 cps steamed cauliflower
- 1/2 cp grated hard cheese. I used Parmigiano Reggiano as it was in my collection of things to use now.
- 1/3 cp of pepitas/pumpkin seeds. Optional but I like a little crunch. Pinenuts are good, too, but I wanted to use the pumpkin seeds as the packet was already open.
- 3 cloves of garlic. I used some from a jar
- 40ml of olive oil to make your puree creamy
- salt and grated black pepper to taste
METHOD
Puree the cauliflower using a stick blender or whatever you have available. Slightly break up the pumpkin seeds with the blender, add the garlic and grated cheese then the cauliflower, blend until mixed. Then drizzle the oil into the mixture and amalgamate. It should look smooth but not runny. Serve with grated black pepper. Serves 4 as a side dish.
Making Baguettes
This recipe takes more than 24 hours from beginning to end but the resulting loaves taste almost like traditional baguettes. Most of the time is actually taken letting the dough rise for 12 hours in a warm place and then 12 hours in the fridge.
Rolling out the dough after fermentation.
Divided the risen dough into three loaves and left to rise again.
This is a great recipe and although it takes longer than usual I am used to bread taking two days from start to finish as I have been making sourdough regularly for a few years. My loaves are more dense and smaller than a classic baguette but the flavour was certainly worth the time and effort. Find the recipe and instructions at
https://www.bakingsteel.com/blog/24-hr-baguettehttp:
Also baked a loaf of rye sourdough, a dense well flavoured bread.
Microwave Marmalade
Regular readers know how much I enjoy the citrus season. Lemons and limes add zing and zest to so many things we like to eat and my husband really likes marmalade. So, as soon as I had oranges, limes and lemons I made a few jars of marmalade for him. I am also eyeing off the kumquats, so they will be next!
The fruit I’d chosen weighted just over a kilo. There’s oranges, lemons and limes. I added just under 2 cups of sugar. Usually marmalade has an equal weight of fruit and sugar but I like tart marmalade so use less sugar.
I put some of the skins and the pips in this little muslin bag and then put it in the bowl while the marmalade was cooking. This usually infuses enough natural pectin for the marmalade to set but this time I had to add 10gm of powdered pectin. Later I realised I was just impatient. It has set to a very firm consistency and wouldn’t have needed the added pectin..
Thinly chopped some peel from the oranges, lemons and limes and added the peel to the cut up fruit. Also mixed some cut up peel which had been sitting in a jar of brandy since Christmas time.
Thick, slightly tart marmalade.
www.makecookgrow.com/2018/08/how-to-make-grapefruit-marmalade-in-the-microwave/
Painting
The art supply shop is open again so I set off for some new green paints. Some of my existing collection are so old I had to replace them. So lovely to wander around the art shop. Bought three new shades of green then did two paintings. The first is the lily when the flowers are still buds, the second is when they opened. These are fragrance free Asiatic lilies. Really enjoyed using my three new shades of green.
Reading
Hamnet by Maggie Farrell is set in the 16th and century. Laden with the emotions experienced by all people throughout time, love, loss, desire, greed and grief, it is a gripping story. Supposedly based on the tragic tale of William Shakespeare’s son, Hamlet, it is also the story of a woman and her life with her three children.
The story is based on these facts. A couple lived in Stratford in the 1580s with their three children, Susanna, Hamnet and Judith. Hamnet, a twin, died when he was eleven. About four years later his father, a playwright, wrote a play called “Hamlet”.
Detailed descriptions and terrible grief contribute to a sense of gloom throughout and yet, it is strangely uplifting. Described by Marion Keyes as “O’Farrell’s best book yet” it was long listed for the Women’s Prize. A very good read.
Tuesday 12th May was INTERNATIONAL NURSES DAY.
International Nurses’ Day is celebrated around the world on the 12th of May, the birth date of Florence Nightingale, to acknowledge and thank nurses worldwide for the contributions they make to society. This is the 200th anniversary of Florence Nightingales birth date and significant for all nurses.
This year, along with all frontline service providers, we are in awe of their hard work, compassion and bravery in the face of C-V 19. We appreciate their ongoing care. People in many countries are expressing their gratitude by clapping outside their houses one night a week. Thankyou to all nurses!