Category: Food and drink

Posts about food, drink, recipes and resaurants

Food and drink

Roast cod with parma ham

minceandskirlie

What a couple of weeks its been. Redundancy, leaving nights out (or day as it turned out) and then starting a new job have meant the last wee while’s been pretty chaotic. Still things are calming down now and a week of sunny weather put me in the mood for some sunny food on Friday.

When I first started cooking one of the first things I made for other people was roast cod wrapped in parma ham. It was from a fantastic cheap book full of about 400 recipes using only 3 or 4 ingredients (store cupboard essentials not included). As a learning resource this book was fantastic for a lazy fat man getting started with proper cooking. It taught me basic techniques, what foods work together etc. Now I’m further along my culinary journey I dusted down the book to try an old favourite again. Continue reading “Roast cod with parma ham” →

Food and drink

Homemade Sushi

minceandskirlie

My favourite bit of a supermarket just now is the world foods aisle. I’ve managed to work my way through the whole range of instant noodles and bought some great ingredients from it. However the one thing that’s been catching my eye recently was the range of sushi related products in our local Tesco. Sushi mats, rice wine vinegar, sushi rice, wasabi… everything you need to give making sushi a go.

On Friday night I decided to invite my brother and his wife over to have a go. Continue reading “Homemade Sushi” →

Food and drink

Pea and bacon risotto

minceandskirlie

This is the second post I’ve written about risotto. The mushroom risotto I posted before was fantastic and I wanted to do another one to show how easy it is to take the standard risotto technique and adapt it for different flavours.

I’ve always got half packets of bacon in the freezer and almost always have a packet of frozen peas as well so this was a simple, quick and cheap meal that will easily feed four people or two over a few days (I’ve just finished the leftovers for lunch as I type this). Continue reading “Pea and bacon risotto” →

Food and drink

Garlic and rosemary lamb chops

minceandskirlie

I know this is very similar to another post I made recently, but I don’t care. This version is massive improvement.

Last time I just threw some rosemary at thyme at the gravy after pan-frying the chops and hoped I’d get a superb meal at the end of it. That tactic almost worked but there was definitely room for improvement. This time I decided I needed more firepower. The small arms fire of rosemary and thyme are all very good but they need some heavy weapons backing them up. I reached for garlic, anchovies and a roasting tin. Continue reading “Garlic and rosemary lamb chops” →

Food and drink

Roast loin of venison

minceandskirlie

Another quick post while I finish typing up last week’s trip to Edinburgh. Today was farmers market day and I had a good reason to head down to Scott Skinner Square anyway (needed a haircut) so took the opportunity to fill our freezer with meat.

One of my favourite stalls at the market is Mortlach Game, a local company that provides cuts of venison, pheasant, pigeon and rabbit. Today I was shopping for venison and picked up a fantastic little joint of venison loin that was going to make a perfect Saturday night tea. Continue reading “Roast loin of venison” →