Shortcut Sausage Meatballs

It's Potluck time at I Heart Cooking Clubs (IHCC). This week we get to select any recipes from either our present or past featured chefs, and once again, I've cooked with Nigella. I've made her Shortcut Sausage Meatballs, though it is not shortcut for me. Nigella's recipe using store bought Italian Sausages, but I have made my own, without the casing.

For the Italian sausages, I used minced pork mixed with some salt, coarse black pepper powder, fennel seeds, paprika and hot red pepper flakes. Combine well and leave covered overnight in the refrigerator. Taste the seasoning by frying about a teaspoon of the mixture in a little oil. Add more salt or any of the spice ingredients if needed. 

The sausages are then rolled into small balls, about the size of cherry tomatoes, and fry in some oil until golden, then the rest of the ingredients are added in. Simmer for about 20 minutes until the sauce has thickened slightly.

A very easy and simple meatballs in tomato sauce, and do not take long to cook. We had this meatballs served over spaghetti for a weeknight dinner.


Shortcut Sausage Meatballs
(Nigellissima by Nigella Lawson)
serves 4, approximately 40 meatballs
450-500gm Italian sausages
2 tablespoons garlic oil
4 fat or 6 spindly spring onions, finely sliced
1 teaspoon dried oregano
60ml white wine or vermouth
2 x 400gm cans chopped tomatoes, plus water to rinse 1/2 can
2 bay leaves
salt and pepper, to taste
chopped fresh parsley, to serve (optional)

Squeeze the sausage meat from the sausages, and roll small cherry-tomato-sized meatballs out of it, putting them onto a clingfilm-lined baking tray as you go. Your final tally should be around 40.

Heat the oil in a large, heavy-based pan or flameproof casserole and add the meatballs, frying them until golden; as they become firmer, nudge them up in the pan to make room for the rest, if you can't fit them all in at first.

When all the meatballs are in the pan and browned, add the spring onion and oregano and stir about gently.

Add the wine or vermouth and chopped tomatoes, then fill half of one of empty cans with cold water and tip it into the other empty can, then into the pan. The can-to-can technique is just my way of making sure you swill out as much of the tomato residue as possible.

Pop in the bay leaves and let the pan come to a fast simmer. Leave to cook like this, uncovered, for 20 minutes until the sauce has thickened slightly and the meatballs are cooked through. Check the sauce for seasoning, adding some salt and pepper, if you like.

During this time you can cook whatever you fancy to go with the meatballs, whether it be pasta, rice, whatever.

Once the meatballs are ready, you can eat them immediately or let them stand, off the heat but still on the stove, for 15 minutes. The sauce will thicken up a bit on standing. Sprinkle with parsely on serving.

I'm linking this post with I Heart Cooking Clubs (IHCC), theme for this week

"November Potluck"

Italian Breakfast Banana Bread

It's Potluck week at I Heart Cooking Clubs (IHCC). For this week, I've made Nigella Lawson's fabulous Italian Breakfast Banana Bread. I have made many banana breads through the years, and my favourite is one of Nigella's recipes, which uses golden raisins soaked in rum, which I have posted here, and have made it many times. She has another banana bread recipe in her cookbook, Nigellissima that I just got to try, especially when it has espresso in it! I love coffee!

This is a very easy and quick bread to make. In the recipe, instant espresso powder is used. What I have are instant granules, and the first time I've made this bread, some of the granules did not dissolve completely, specks of it can be seen in the bread. But the bread tasted awesome and so "coffee-ey" delicious, that I made it again. This time I dissolved the instant espresso granules in the vanilla extract with half a teaspoon of warm water, before I mashed the bananas with the vanilla-coffee extract. The bananas are very ripe and sweet, so I have reduced the sugar slightly. 

This is one delicious banana bread! Nigella nails it again with this recipe. Moist, soft, full of banana flavour and that coffee taste in each bite is just delicious. Perfect with a cup of hot steaming coffee. Even though the recipes uses 4 teaspoons of the instant espresso powder, just as Nigella says "And even though I add quite a bit, the flavour doesn't overwhelm at all. It's there, but as a hint, and the subtle bitterness of the coffee undercuts, most elegantly, the creamy sweetness of the bananas". 

I have made this bread three times already. Believe me, one loaf will be gone pretty quick!  This is one recipe that I urge you to try, especially if you are a coffee lover!

Italian Breakfast Banana Bread
(adapted from "Nigellissima" by Nigella Lawson)
cuts into 8-10 slices
150ml flavourless vegetable oil, plus some for greasing
3 medium bananas, very ripe indeed (approx.400gm total with skin on, 300gm without)
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
pinch salt
2 eggs
150gm caster sugar (I use 100gm)
175gm plain flour
1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
4 teaspoons instant espresso powder
1 x 450gm/1lb deep loaf tin or 1 x 12-bun muffin tin

Slip a baking sheet into the ovenb, and preheat to 170C/gas mark 3. Get out a loaf tin, and line it with baking paper or a loaf tin liner, or lightly oil it. 

Mash the bananas with the vanilla extract and salt and then beat in the oil. 

Now, beat in the eggs, one by one, followed by the sugar.

Mix the flour with the bicarbonate of soda and esperesso powder, and beat these dry ingredients into the runny batter.

Pour the batter into your prepared loaf tin, and pop it into the oven, on the baking sheet, and bake for 50-60 minutes, or until slightly coming away at the sides and bulgingly risen. A cake tester should come out clean, barring the odd crumb. Wait for a day or at least half a day before slicing into it.

(I've used instant espresso granules, of which I've dissolved with the vanilla extract, and half a teaspoon of warm water)

I'm linking this post with I Heart Cooking Clubs (IHCC), theme for this week

October Potluck!

and

Cookbook Countdown Specials : Bake
 hosted by Kitchen Flavours and Emily's Cooking (Makan2) Foray

Pasta with Courgettes

It's Potluck week at I Heart Cooking Clubs (IHCC). For this week, we get to select any of IHCC's past and present featured chefs' recipes. I have chosen to cook with Nigella this week. 

Taken from her book Nigellissima, Pasta with Courgette is a very tasty, meatless, pasta dish. Main star character is the courgettes or zucchini. Nigella has used casarecce pasta, but I've used farfalle instead, as I already have a pack in my pantry.

The courgettes are cooked till soft and almost mushy. Instead of using garlic oil, I have added two cloves of chopped garlic, sauteed in olive oil till light brown and fragrant, then add in the spring onions and diced courgettes. White wine is then added in, cover and simmer until the courgettes are very tender.  I have omitted the parsley since I have forgotten to buy them. 

A simple and tasty pasta dish. But I would add more zucchini the next time, as they are quite delicious, when cooked to a "squashy khaki", as Nigella says!

Pasta with Courgettes
(adapted from "Nigellissima", by Nigella Lawson)
Serves 2
200gm casarecce pasta
salt for pasta water, to taste
2 cloves garlic, chopped (my addition)
2x15ml tablespoons garlic oil
4 spring onions, finely sliced
500gm courgettes, finely diced
60ml dry white wine or vermouth
small bunch fresh parsley, chopped
3x15ml tablespoons grated Parmesan, plus more (optional) for sprinkling
salt and pepper, to taste
2 teaspoons (10gm) unsalted butter

Put a pan of water on for the pasta, salting generously (or to taste) when it comes to the boil, then add the casarecce - cooking as per packet instructions, though tasting a couple of minutes before they're meant to be ready - and get on with the sauce.

Put the garlic oil and chopped spring onions in a heavy-based pan (that comes with a lid) on medium heat and cook, stirring, for 1 minute.

Add the diced courgettes and cook for 5 minutes, stirring every now and again,

Add the wine or vermouth, letting it bubble up, followed by 2 tablespoons of the chopped parsley, salt to taste, then lower the heat, cover with the lid and cook for a further 5 minutes, by which time the courgettes should be gorgeously tender.

Before draining the pasta, remove a cupful of starchy cooking water.

Tip the drained pasta back into its pan, add the braised courgettes, or add the pasta to the pan of courgettes, along with 3 tablespoons grated Parmesan and 4 tablespoons of pasta-cooking liquid. Combine thoroughly and taste to see if you wish to add more cheese or salt or pepper or; indeed, cooking liquid, then stir in the butter and most of the remaining parsley and divide between 2 warmed bowls, sprinkling with the rest of the parsley, and more Parmesan if wished, on serving.

I'm linking this post with I Heart Cooking Clubs (IHCC), theme for this week, July Potluck!

Italian Traybake : Bake-Along #93

It's Bake-Along #93, and the selected theme by Lena is Baked/Roast Chicken. I've made one of Nigella Lawson's chicken traybake recipe today for dinner (talking about last minute!). I was planning on making this traybake more than a week ago, but I was down with fever for a few days. And it took me almost a whole week to recover, what with our current heat wave which we are experiencing right now, is not helping much at all. I wish I have a swimming pool at home where I can cool off the whole day! The family has been eating takeaways for almost a week, because the cook in the house is out of action! LOL! But it rained today! Yay! What a welcome relief!

According to Nigella, this traybake, "It is "Italian" - in it's flavourings - the rosemary and lemon that waft gorgeously through the house as you cook - and in deference to the Italian sausages I use in it." 

And she is right - about the delicious aroma! I popped the tray into the oven, (my daughter helped me watch over it while I went to fetch my son from school), and just as I reached home about an hour later, I can already smell the delicious lemony-rosemary aroma right at my front door! Made our tummies growl!

I've used 6 chicken thighs and two drumsticks, 4 Italian sausages and Russet potatoes which I've peeled and cut into quarters. Fresh rosemary from my garden pot, and zest of one lemon. Put everything in a shallow baking tray, season with salt and pepper, with a drizzling of olive oil. Bake at 220C for 50-60 minutes. I baked them at 200C (I was going out), and when I came back about an hour later, I increased the temperature to 220C, move the tray up a rack in the oven, and baked them for another 15 minutes to brown the chicken and the potatoes.

These are so delicious! The chicken thigh has crispy skin with moist tender meat. And the Italian sausages, well, what can I say about the sausages! Next time, I will add a couple more Italian sausages to the tray! As for the potatoes, Nigella has this to say "What I need to tell you most urgently though is that the potatoes chunks soak up the meaty, lemony juices as they cook. So set your mind not to expect crunchy roast potatoes, but rather soft-soused chunks, scorched crisp at the corners." There was quite an amount of the tasty juices in the tray, perfect to drizzle over the chicken thighs during serving. With this traybake, I am reminded once again, how much I love all of Nigella's roast/bake chicken recipes, at least the ones that I've tried!

Italian Traybake
(from "Nigellissima", by Nigella Lawson)
Serves 4-6
3 baking potatoes (approx 750gm total), unpeeled and cut into 2cm chunks
8 chicken thighs, bone in and skin on
8 Italian sausages (approx 750gm total)
small bunch (6 or 7 sprigs) fresh rosemary
zest of 1 unwaxed lemon
1 teaspoon sea salt flakes or 1/2 teaspoon pouring salt
ground pepper
4x15ml tablespoons olive oil

Preheat the oven to 220C/Gas Mark 7.

Put the potatoes into a large, shallow baking tray and add the chicken thighs and sausages. If using 2 trays, divide everything between them (and also swap the trays over and turn them round halfway through cooking time).

Arrange about 4 sprigs of the rosemary among the chicken and sausages, then finely chop the needles of another 2 sprigs, to give you about 2 teaspoons of finely chopped needles, and sprinkle these onto the chicken pieces.

Zest the lemon over everything, and season with the salt and a good grinding of pepper. Drizzle with the oil and bake for 50-60 minutes, or until the chicken skin and sausages are golden and the potato pieces are cooked through. It's fine to let all of this stand for up to 30 minutes once cooked, prior to serving.

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Do stop by Lena of Frozen Wings and Zoe of Bake For Happy Kids, and all our friends who has baked along with us in the linky below :

For our next Bake-Along, we will be baking Dried-Cherry Chocolate Muffins (Williams-Sonoma : Essential of Baking, pg 78, or here). Link your post to our linky which will open from 21st to 30th April. Everyone is welcome to join us! Only current posts please.

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And since I'm cooking with Nigella Lawson's recipe, I'm also linking this post with I Heart Cooking Clubs (IHCC), theme for this week

March 2016 IHCC Potluck

An InLinkz Link-up