Category: food

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Fab 50 Weekly Menu

This week was all about preparation. Himself was celebrating a milestone birthday and had invited about 70 of his closest family members and friends to mark this momentous occasion with him.

Meal Plan for Week of 04/11/2024 – 10/11/2024

Monday – 04/11/2024

PREPARATION

The party is planned to start at 8pm so I am not planning to feed 70 people (or even the half that are likely to turn up) but as Himself has ordered a keg from Brew Crew definitely soakage will be required.

We don’t have enough plates or cutlery anyway for a party even a quarter that size.

I had decided therefore to begin the preparation on Monday with 2 delicious traditional Irish brown soda loaves from an ICA recipe that I picked up in a free booklet with The Irish Times many years ago. Always be checking those recipe booklets: I know that those recipes are often very well tested!

However after a week off the previous week and a boozy weekend away, I had a lot of catching up to do, got home later from work than planned and just wasn’t in the baking mood. So I postpone until Tuesday.

We still have to eat but will be dragging a lot of prepared meals from the freezer, the first being these tempting sounding treats. Anyone who listens to her podcast would know that my cousin Bea would be horrified.

  • Curry from freezer – actually a delicious recipe for Slow Cooker Chicken Tikka Masala from Taming Twins. Though I would normally avoid recipes that use prepped curry paste due to all the added salt, she acknowledges that this recipe “sits firmly between the two camps of ‘a jar will do’ and ‘this dish takes many careful hours and rare ingredients to perfect’.” Deliciousness on a school night? Yes please!
  • Naan from freezer: again on a weekday Himself would usually make from scratch but Dunnes have just added these to their range and they are delicious.

Tuesday – 05/11/2024

DINNER

  • Five-bean chilli – a quick and easy veggie option and then I get back on track with my party prep. Normally I have dinner with my parents on a Tuesday on my way home from work but Mum completely understands when I explain I am getting a headstart on the preparation. <sarcasm>She is also a very organised person. </sarcasm>

Preparation

Walnut and treacle brown bread

Serving Size:
12
Time:
1hr 50 mins
Difficulty:
Easy

Ingredients

  • 350g wholemeal flour
  • 50g plain flour
  • 1 level teaspoon bread soda aka baking SODA aka bicarbonate of soda
    1 pinch salt
  • 50g porridge oats
  • 2 large eggs
  • 1 dessertspoon sunflower oil
  • 500ml buttermilk
  • 2 large dessertspoons treacle
  • 75g chopped walnuts (optional)

Directions

  1. Preheat the oven to 170oC/gas mark 3.
  2. Grease and line a 900g loaf tin (this is a fairly standard size.)
  3. Put the flours, sieved bread soda, salt and porridge oats into a large mixing bowl and mix them well.
  4. In a separate bowl, beat the eggs together with the oil and add to the dry mixture.
    Next, mix in the buttermilk and mix until it reaches a ‘sloppy’ consistency.
  5. Finally, add the treacle and chopped walnuts.
  6. Pour into a 900g loaf tin and smooth the top of the bread with a wet spoon. Sprinkle some seeds or porridge oats on top of the bread and bake in the oven for one hour.
  7. After the hour has lapsed, remove the bread from the tin and return to the oven to bake for a further 20 minutes.
  8. Remove from the oven and allow the bread to cool down.
  9. The baked bread freezes well so consider making more than one!
    Recipe Credit: Edward Hayden

Wednesday – 06/11/2024

PREPARATION

So I have decided to make these mini-quiches (more later on these.) Now obviously I know I can buy any kind of pastry but at €4.25 for 640g it also makes delicious sense to make 1kg for about the same price. Well about the same price because I had to stop in Spar to buy the butter and it cost nearly a fiver. Doh.

I’ve been making this rough puff pastry for a few years and if you follow the instructions you can too! With Christmas on the horizon, it makes DELICIOUS mince pies. Enjoy!

DINNER

Thursday – 07/11/2024

Chicken & chorizo stew from freezer again from Taming Twins. I’m not crazy about this because the chorizo doesn’t have the nice texture it gets when you fry it off (as seen in this delicious bean and chorizo stew from 2006). It’s what the writer calls a “dump” recipe, where you dump all the frozen ingredients from a freezer bag into your slow cooker meaning you can prep at the weekend and pull out in the morning, slow cook and go. The whole idea is one and done so I get it. What you gain in speed, you deffo lose in flavour.

As we were tucking in, there was a ring at the doorbell.

Friday – 08/11/2024

Dinner

Preparation

Okay now things were serious. We were in day-before-territory. We had to pick up the keg and glasses from BrewCrew and I wanted to do a trawl of a few charity shops to get some extra glassware. We also needed to get a few more snacky bits from the shops and also some non-Guinness drinks (beer and non-alcoholic beverages.) I had also decided we would offer everybody a Dark and Stormy cocktail when they arrived so I needed as much ginger beer as I could find (just enough) and dark rum. If you would like to try this yourself at home, I recommend Bundaberg Ginger beer, although Fever Tree is okay too, and Kraken Dark rum. Delicious.

We also are very fancy in these parts and have a Sheridan’s CHeesemonger in our local Dunnes so I picked up some nice cheese, crackers and other charcuterie.

But things didn’t go as planned. Even though we had both taken the day off, Himself got dragged back into work. I kinda hung around to see if he could get out of it so everything was knocked off schedule.

I did make it to Oxfam Home on Francis St. where I picked up a gaggle of glasses, some really cute dessert plates and a couple of serving platters. Not necessarily cheaper but at least reused! Everything into the dishwasher when I got home.

  • Ligurian Focaccia Himself made this, a tried and tested favourite here at home, to which he added roasted red peppers (jarred!) and blue cheese and another with serrano ham and black olives. Cut up into squares and served on a wooden board, this was a big hit.
    • While he had the oven on he also made a batch of Rachel Allen’s Nutty Granola again from Home Cooking. Not for the party but essential for breakfast!
  • Easy 5-Ingredient Mini Quiche Cups – another big hit but I was horrified to discover, as I yoinked it out to start baking, that my mini muffin tray was only 12 holes not 24. So I had to make six batches instead of the planned three.
    I used my Rough Puff from the fridge (very well rested!), cutting numerous circles with this mad device that I “borrowed” from my parents’ kitchen many years ago. Basically it has two metal half moons back to back on a spindle which has a handle attached. You roll it across your pastry and it creates numerous circles. Perfect for mass production like this. I rolled out all the discs and rested them while each batch was baking.
  • Grilled Chicken Caesar Lettuce Wraps these were also delicious. Not an obvious finger food but I liked the idea of including something a little healthier and green. Mostly I was getting them into their marinade.

Saturday – 09/11/2024

PREPARATION

All the Nippers pitched in prepping the house. The weather was forecast to be unseasonably balmy until 1am so we set up the bar in a gazebo on the patio which worked out perfectly.

We put the returned Nipper 1.0 to work chopping crudités and slicing limes (for the dark and stormys) and lemons.

We bought ice in the local Tesco which we used to fill our super camping coolbox and filled it up with soft drink, bottled beer, some white wine and prosecco. Big thanks to everyone who brought drinks too!

Of course, I had to bake and decorate a cake. Mum had agreed to bring her delicious coffee and walnut tray bake and I had planned to make cinchy but delicious toffee squares with a lemon drizzle icing. Himself loves these delicious banana nut brownies from Darina Allen’s cook book but as I was attempting to go cutlery and crockery free I knew they would be too squidgy. So instead I made two round cakes of this Banana Chocolate Cake and added chopped hazelnuts. I filled it with a praline ganache and decorated with a plain ganache (for fear it would look like an actual pile of shit.) It turned out very well and delicious.

I took zero photographs. I am definitely taking some of my learnings from this experience and will be applying them to my own future significant birthday celebrations…

Sunday – 10/11/2024

Dinner was supposed to be Lasagne with Bolognese from the freeezer but ended up being a mixemgatherem of whatever was leftover mainly chicken caesar salad on brown bread, crackers and cheese and Nipper 3.0’s Halloween haul. I was VERY tired. Forgive me.

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All of tomorrow’s party postponed

Do you see what I’m doing there with my pop cultural reference being juxtaposed with my son’s 4th birthday party? It shows I’m still with it even though I’m a mom.

G is sick again so we’ve had to postpone his birthday for a fortnight. This is the third time in as many months that he has had a tummy bug so I’m getting a little worried.

And before you say it I do wonder if it’s something to do with the lurid pink icing. Or the fact that this cake was birthday cake no. 2 although he didn’t eat much of either.

My cousin R was over earlier and we were talking about all sorts of things before she had to go off to work. Among these many things the issue of weight came up and she commented as have a number of people lately that I have lost weight which is true and I am very glad that I am (just!!) under the 9 stone mark again at last. I do not write this to boast or to undermine anybody else. Those of you who know me in the flesh know I am only a small woman as G said yesterday at 5 foot exactly so I should be between 8 1/2 and 9 so I’m happy. The reason I write about this is because although I don’t think discussing weight is an appropriate topic of conversation because I think women are tyrannised by unrealistic “role” models (pity they aren’t rolly models!) and the last thing we should do to each other is add to it. However it is apparent from the frequency that comedians do the “and don’t ever get involved in the does-my-bum-look-big-in-this conversation” comedy routine that men find this obsession baffling. Tommy Tiernan did one recently at the Just for Laughs Festival in Montreal (not the clip I was looking for but funnier than the one of which I was thinking). So men may be baffled by our obsession but there is little in the world more baffling than going from a size 16 to a size 8 twice in 4 years and I am not including the time while pregnant. There is nothing more baffling than trying to be supermum when you feel like you are dressed with as much style as a Siberian on a Saturday night in the 80s.

And speaking of women, the Irish Times didn’t print my letter about Bias against Working Mothers. It was a bit all over the place to be fair and I’m not 100% whether I’ll publish it myself. But obviously I have been thinking about the issue lately and while listening to an interview on Seán Moncrieff’s show on Newstalk yesterday about Industrial Relations and various news reports about the Dublin Bus and Aer Lingus strikes etc. it suddenly occurred to me how mothers can prove for once and for all that they are an essential part of the workforce, be they working outside the home or not: a nationwide strike. Now while I currently have no gripe with my working conditions (I don’t have any) I would certainly down tools for a day to support my sisters. National No Working Women’s Day. The Pink Flu. Strike while the Iron’s Hot. Wans Strike and they’re out. I wonder what would happen…? I wonder could I organise it…? I must contact all the mothers that I know… I wonder would any of the trade unions go for it?

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Cherry (Well actually apricot) and sultana loaf

I’ve just finished baking 2 of these: one for Garman’s birthday in the creche tomorrow and one for his birthday tea at home. Hope he likes it. If it tastes half as good cooked as it did raw, we’ll be doing well.
This recipe comes from The Austalian Woman’s Weekly Cakes and Slices Cookbook which I love because it has loads of different and some really unusual recipes (Chocolate Zucchini cake anyone? And don’t laugh the chocolate potato cake in this book is one of my favourites. Potato and Chocolate hmmmm)
However I substituted chopped dried apricots for the glacé cherries because can you believe I had no glacé cherries. Believe it – they are a culinary abomination. Think of a fresh cherry, think of a glacé cherry. How can they both be called cherries?

Enough! Here’s the recipe. I chose it because half an hour before our party started last Saturday I exclaimed to Himself “Ohmigod! I’ve no dips.” and sent him off to buy ingredients which I had no time to whip into hummous etc. so I was left with a ton of sour cream.

125g butter
2 teaspoons greated lemon rinf
1 cup castor suger
3 eggs
1/2 cup sliced glacé cherries (see above)
1/2 cup sultanas
1 and 1/2 cups self-raising flour
3/4 cup of plain flour
3/4 cup sour cream
1/4 lemon juice (the juice of a lemon)

Preheat oven to 180 deg C.
Grease a 14cm * 21 cm loaf pan. (they say line base with paper, grease paper. I say life is too short.)
Cream butter, ring and suger in small bowl with electric mixer ntil light and fluffy; bet in eggs one at a time, beat until combined. They say transfer mixture to large bowl. I say start off in a large bowl, save on washing up. Stir in fruit, then half the (sifted – you decide) flours with half the combined sour cream and lemon juice, the stir in remaining flours and lemon mixture. Pour into prepared pan. Bake for about 1 1/4 hours (Mine took 1hr 10 min at 175 in a fan assisted oven.) Stand for 5 mins before turning on to a wire rack to cool.
G and I will be decorating ours anon – photos to follow.

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And the recipes come rolling in…

In the email I mentioned last night it specified that the recipes should be quick and easy. Herein follows the first recipe I got which although it might be easy it sure isn’t quick!

Roast Sticky Chicken-Rotisserie Style

“Ever wish you could get that restaurant style rotisserie chicken at home? Well, with minimal preparation and about 5 hours cooking time (great for the weekends!) you can! I don’t bother to baste the bird, though some like to for the first hour. The pan juices always caramelize at the bottom, and the chicken will turn golden brown…fall-off-the-bone good!”

PREP TIME 10 Min

COOK TIME 5 Hrs

READY IN 5 Hrs 10 Min

INGREDIENTS

  • 4 teaspoons salt
  • 2 teaspoons paprika
  • 1 teaspoon onion powder
  • 1 teaspoon dried thyme
  • 1 teaspoon white pepper
  • 1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
  • 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
  • 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
  • 2 onions, quartered
  • 2 (4 pound) whole chickens

DIRECTIONS

  1. In a small bowl, mix together salt, paprika, onion powder, thyme, white pepper, black pepper, cayenne pepper, and garlic powder. Remove and discard giblets from chicken. Rinse chicken cavity, and pat dry with paper towel. Rub each chicken inside and out with spice mixture. Place 1 onion into the cavity of each chicken. Place chickens in a resealable bag or double wrap with plastic wrap. Refrigerate overnight, or at least 4 to 6 hours.
  2. Preheat oven to 250 degrees F (120 degrees C).
  3. Place chickens in a roasting pan. Bake uncovered for 5 hours, to a minimum internal temperature of 180 degrees F (85 degrees C). Let the chickens stand for 10 minutes before carving.
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Marcella Hazan’s Tomato Sauce

I was just asked by my lovely Kiwi friend to take part in a recipe exchange. Basically it was a chain email which normally I don’t agree with but as you all know I love to cook and bake so I thought this was a really practical to get tried and tested recipes. I sent the inevitable Chocolate Fudge Cake and another staple from our kitchen.

Marcella Hazan’s Tomato Sauce
This is so simple and so yummy and it’s a lifesaver. Real comfort food.

  • 1 14oz tin of tomatoes (she specifies whole tomatoes but we use whatever is in the cupboard)
  • Half an onion
  • About 60g butter – a finger sized chunk

Put all the ingredients into a pot, leaving the onion unchopped.
Bring to the boil, allowing butter to melt.
Cook for about 20 minutes

Cook pasta according to taste/ packet instructions. Drain. Put in a bowl.
Remove onion half (can be retained for stew/ ratatouille/ whatever).
Pour tomato sauce over pasta. Mix well and serve with a good dose of good parmesan.