Posie’s Place

What to do with a huge tray of turkey escalopes??? That was the question facing me today. I’ve been trying to use up all of the meat we had in the freezer and so over the past week or so we’ve been eating quite a lot of red meat and it’s much more than I’m used to so I really want to steer clear for a few days. There was a special offer on at the supermarket and since I can’t resist a bargain I bought a tray of turkey, my only problem was that there was 1.5kg of the stuff..

As I walked/waddled/hobbled around the supermarket last night I tried to figure out at least one dish I could use the turkey for… and then thanks to seeing some smoked bacon lardons I had one of those eureka moments.. I would make a lasagne. This would not be a traditional lasagne as Stewart doesn’t care for bechamel sauce. I have decided to try one of those, I’ll make it up as I go along recipes and hope it turns out ok.

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One of my favourite dishes to make with minced beef is of course burgers!! I was really happy yesterday when Stewart reached for my copy of The Great Big Burger Book when I asked him to pick something for me to make with the minced beef I had in the fridge.

The Great Big Burger Book by Jane Murphy & Liz Yeh Singh is an essential for any burger lover or BBQ fanatic and I’ve featured recipes from it here in the past (See Guacamole burgers with Spicy Chili Con Queso & Braised Fajita Turkey Burgers with Fiesta Corn Salsa).

Stewart decided he wanted to give the Guinness Pub Burgers a try, I read through the ingredients and everything seemed pretty straight forward so without further ado..

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This morning I told Stewart that if he picked a recipe from any of my cookbooks which could utilize the pack of beef stewing steak and another which used the minced beef which I had in the fridge then I would happily make one for tonight and the other for tomorrow night’s dinners. After flicking through a couple of books I was presented once again with my copy of Cook With Jamie as Stewart really liked the look and sound of the recipe for The Best Stew With Potato and Rocket Pasta Cushions. I read through the recipe to find that we had almost all the ingredients in the fridge but I since the potato and rocket past cushions are a little too high in carbs to be diabetes friendly, I have decided to just concentrate on making the stew and serve something else as my side dish.

Check back tomorrow to see what I made using the minced beef.

In the meantime here is The Best Stew….

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I was watching Great Food Live the other day and Jenni Barnet was interviewing Helen Tse. Helen is third generation British Chinese and has just written a book called Sweet Mandarin which details the story of her family and their journey from China to the UK, it sounded really interesting. Helen has also just opened a Pan Asian restaurant with her sisters in Manchester also under the name Sweet Mandarin.

This curry recipe came from Helen’s grandmother Lily and has apparently become very famous at the restaurant. I’m a real curry devotee so when I saw Helen make this on Great Food Live it was definitely a recipe I wanted to try out.

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This recipe is another from a cookbook which has sat dormant on my bookcase for a couple of years and has been completely overlooked. Healthy Cooking For Two (or just for you) by Frances Price does have some rather unusual recipes but as I flicked through it this afternoon I came across a recipe which I though had some potential even though it had a bit of a strange title.

The name Bachelor’s-Prize apparently stems from the fact that “apparently” most singletons have peanut butter and natural yogurt in their fridge and that this recipe is so simple that “noncooking bachlors” are assured of success. Those are not my words or sentiments I hasten to add but those of the author.

Since I love just about anything featuring peanut butter I decided to proceed, adding a slight twist of my own.

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The doctor had referred me for a massage on Monday to help my back but it feels worse today than it did before. I was hoping to feel the benefit by now but instead I’m just having pangs of pain in one of my nerves. Good news is that I went to the Diabetes clinic on Tuesday and my blood sugar is well under control so the food plan is working!! I can’t tell you what a relief that is!

Anyway, back to food related matters….

After digging out my copy of “Cook with Jamie” the other night I’m on a roll and have decided to test drive another recipe. We both liked the chicken wrapped in pancetta the other night and as I’ve already said it’s about time I started to ensure that our freezer was was well stocked with homemade dishes. The bottom drawer of the deep freeze was still quite full of meat prime for making some casseroles etc and today when I looked I found a couple of packs of minced beef. Perfect!!

Whenever I buy minced beef I always make sure it contains no more than 5% fat otherwise I buy rump steak and ask the butcher to mince it for me. There is nothing worse than coming across a UFO (unidentified foreign object) in your mince after you have slaved away all day making a culinary masterpiece, it’s been my experience that the very lean minced beef has a much lower chance of containing anything nasty since you a pay a premium price.

I’m a bit predictable when it comes to recipes using minced beef, generally I make one of three things:

a) Chilli con carne

b) Meatballs (a recipe based upon one from Natalie which I think in turn was based on an Antonio Carluccio recipe)

c) Traditional Scottish mince and tatties

Instead of following my usual meatball recipe I thought it would be nice to give Jamie’s recipe a try.

Jamie’s original recipe was called Pappardelle With A Ragu Of Tiny Meatballs and he gave the recipe for making the pasta but I’m not bothering making fresh pasta.

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As anyone who has been a regular to this site will know I’m a big Jamie Oliver fan.  Natalie bought me a copy of Jamie’s latest book Cook With Jamie for my birthday back in October but I’m afraid this coincided with the time in my pregnancy when cooking was the last thing on my mind. With a beautiful sunny day outside I’m in the mood for something equally as sunny and I have decided to dust off my Cook With Jamie and finally sample one of the recipes within.

There were so many good looking recipes which I really would have loved to try, like the tomato, basil and ricotta risotto but because of my diabetes I had to select carefully and unfortunately for the moment risotto is out.

We had some chicken in the fridge so a recipe from the section on Roasted Chicken Breasts was the most logical choice. I hope you like this one!

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The last time we visited one of the local food markets I picked up some hot Hungarian paprika and I’ve been really looking forward to sampling it.

My back has been acting up this week and the doctor has advised me to get lots of rest so I wanted a recipe which would require me to be on my feet for as little as possible. Mindful of this I turned to Google, read through a ton of recipes and after getting a good idea about which ingredients go into a goulasch and thought I’d give my own version a try and throw it into the slow cooker/crock pot.

If there is anything left over after we’ve dished up this evening then I’m planning on popping it into the freezer as I really need to start stocking up for when the baby comes.

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Since the other night when I made Cod Wrapped in Parma Ham and discovered the most wonderful marinade sun dried tomatoes from Betty Bossi stocked in the Coop I have been trying to think of other ways of using them. For lunch today I decided upon another, when I looked into the fridge I saw that there was an incredible sandwich pleading to be made out of some delicious Italian ingredients.

How could I possibly resist?

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Stewart and I haven’t been out since we got back from Glasgow at Christmas. Every weekend we’ve been working in the house preparing the nursery and clearing the loft etc so by the time the evening arrived we were both knackered and in no mood to go out. This weekend however we took things much easier and I really wanted to take advantage of this by having a night out.

A few months ago my friend Kate and I came across this relatively new restaurant/bar in Basel called Noohn when we popped in for drinks after work one Friday night. I really liked the ambience and when I saw the Euro/Asian menu I knew that I wanted to try it.

Noohn is really pretty huge inside with 200 seats in 600m2. The dining area is comprised of a seated area, self service area, a roof terrace (only open in the summer) and a sushi bar. The restaurant is non-smoking although smoking is permitted in the bar.

The whole place seemed to be quite child friendly and there were a number of families with kids eating there last night.

I should have taken pictures last night but it wasn’t until this morning that I decided to write a review.

The menu was pretty varied and the kitchen is open plan so you can watch as your meal is prepared. As a starter Stewart had a salad of lambs lettuce with crispy bacon and pine nuts and I had chicken satay. For our main courses I chose the Angus beef with Szechuan sauce and coconut polenta and Stewart opted for the Terriyaki corn fed chicken breast on a bed of leeks with jasmin rice. I ordered my steak as well done (one of the downsides to pregnancy is not being permitted to ordering a medium rare steak) and was a little nervous as to whether this would actually happen or not. I need not have worried, as it arrived perfectly cooked and still wonderfully tender and juicy. Stewart’s terriyaki was also absolutely delicious.

I thought the portion sizes were well judged, had it not been for my diabetes the I would definitely have ordered a dessert as they looked and sounded incredible!

Our bill came to 108CHF and included 2 x 0.5 Litre bottles of mineral water and 3 bottles of Sapporo (Japanese beer).

We both really enjoyed our meal. Wefound the service to be courteous, fast, friendly and the food was excellent.

I would definitely book in advance as all of the tables around us were reserved and although we booked for 7pm the restaurant was already very busy.

Noohn

Henric Petri-Strasse 12,

4051 Basel

+41 61 281 14 14