Cooking dinner for the GF tonight, looking for inspiration. Something with chicken, pork or fish, whaddya got?
How much money do you want to spend on ingredients, how competent in the kitchen are you and how much time do you have? Also, anything she/you don't like?
This is easy quick and tasty http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2011/jan/16/foil-baked-fish-ginger-chilli-recipe-hugh-fearnley-whittingstall
lunge - up to twenty quid, pretty, a couple of hours, she doesn't like sweet/savoury mix (e.g main courses with fruit in)
Narrow it down a bit and I'll give you a suggestion. But I've no idea how good you are, what other ingredients you have, what sort of meal you want.
Last night I made a brilliant bacon, egg, courgette, mushroom, pepper, onion, chorizo & cream linguine. Took about 15 mins.
Night before I did a prawn & chorizo jambalaya, with side dish of new season asparagus, sugar snap peas & baby leeks blanched then griddled.
Yummy.
she doesn't like sweet/savoury mix (e.g main courses with fruit in)
Damn straight!
Tom soup to start with nice crusty bread, spicy chicken pasta dish then a tiramissoo for pud. Make sure you're steady on the garlic and all ingredients are fresh and in the case of the chicken cooked properly. Food poisoning isn't the best start to a romantic evening!
why not just go here? http://www.jamieoliver.com/ and look up some recipes?
IHN, excellent.
[b]How about sea bass with sweet potato mash.[/b]
Boil sweet potatoes then mash up with lots of salt and pepper and add some fresh chilli. You can also add mango chutney but they may make it to sweet for your GF.
Fry some pancetta or good smoked bacon and add this to the mash
Bash up some fennell seeds and press them onto the skin side of 2 sea bass fillets, fry them in some olive oil and server it all on a big wooden chopping board for a rustic feel.
or
[b]proper carbonarra[/b]
If you have 2 hours spend the first hour and 45 mins playing on your bike.
Fry some thick pancetta until crispy and keep warm
In a bowl mix 3 egg yolks to a good handful of finely grated parmesan and lots of salt and pepper
Cook some pasta until "al dente", pour the water away but leave the pasta in the hot pan
add the egg mix and pancetta to the pan mix, mix all together quickly and server with more parmesan on top and a good bit of black pepper
I'll have a think of anything else as i get bored at work...
got to 2nd the jamie oliver.
tray baked salmon with beans tomatos and olives always good. and if you can make your own mayonaise even better. served with chips. or avec les pommes frites.
Fresh mackerel whole grilled up with a mango, ginger and chili lime salsa with some salad and some jacket wedges.
cheap!
The mango is on offer at Sainsburys - you get some free plums or strawberries so you can make a pavlova for desert too. Boner.
2 whole mackerel will skin you about £2 so proper nice for improper pennies.
Okay, this has been one of my favourites in the last few months:
Quick Dauphinoise, Chicken with hot green marinade and Green veg of choice.
Spuds:
Thinly slice up a load of spuds and onions, put them in a baking dish (say 20cm * 30cm). Spread them pretty evenly. Then stick a good sized chunk of grated cheese over the top (say 1cm-ish all over) and then whack in about 400ml of whipping cream. Liberally douse with Nutmeg, add half a cup of water, cover with foil and whack it in the oven at about 225deg-C. Set a timer for 20 minutes.
Chicken:
Get a good handful of corriander/parsley, 4 anchovy fillets, a whole chilli, some olive oil, some white wine vinegar, lime, and basically anything else you fancy, stick it all in the food processor and mix it till it makes a good rough oily paste. Put two chicken breasts in a baking dish about the same size as the breasts, pour the goo over the top. When the timer goes, whack in the chicken and set the timer for another 20 minutes. Boil a kettle.
Greens:
When the timer goes off, pout your boiling water into a steamer, stick in some greens (I quite like purple sprouting or spinach) leave it for 5 minutes to steam and when it looks done, check the spuds and chicken
Serve:
If it all looks done (which it should do), get the cheesy spud mix and create a neat pile in the middle of the plate about 15cm across and 4cm deep (should be a good enough consistency to pile it up), stick a chicken breast on top of the spuds, arrange the greens as artistically as possible and then spoon the marinade over the chicken and serve.
The creaminess of the spuds works well with the heat from the chicken, greens make you feel at least slightly healthy and it is very easy to whack it all together and gives you some time to lay the table, pour wine etc.
My missus loves it, hope that helps.
How about some duck instead?
Two duck breasts - score the fat diagonally to make a sort of chequerboard effect
Marinate in a mixture of soy sauce, lime and lemon juice, finley chopped garlic/ginger/chilli
Meanwhile, prepare a salad of noodles, tomato and spring onions
Place the duck fat side down in a medium to hot frying pan and cook away! You're looking for nice crispy fat and cooked through to a light pink.
Place duck on top of the salad, then cook up the marinade a little in the pan (As it's had raw duck in, best to cook off any germs) and then pour the marinade over the top.
Top nommage, minimal cheffage.
Is it just me who thinks that chicken breast always comes out as dry as dust?
If I cook with chopped chicken meat I always use thigh. If I cook a piece whole, I always use leg. When I roast a chicken I leave the breast to the others and tuck in on the wings, parson's nose, skin and those little "oysters" on the back.
Okay, well, it all looks good, but the winner is Lunge with the carbonara. And I'll make a meringue (my first) with the egg yolks for some Eton Mess/Pavlova type action for dessert (inspired by thebikechain) 🙂
Is it just me who thinks that chicken breast always comes out as dry as dust?
Depends how you cook it, if you liberally marinade it, fry it before cooking or cover it when cooking you can mitigate the dehydration. sometimes a good chicken breast cooked whole can be wonderful but other times I have managed to reduce it to dust.
the winner is Lunge with the carbonara
Boooo.
CF - I love the sound of that, but she's a recovering vegetarian and duck is a step too far at the moment...
Goan Fish Curry. Made this at a mate's house and it was lush.
2 salmon fillets, skinned, boned and cut into bite-size chunks
1 teaspoon of tamarind
1/2 cup hot water
1 medium onion
1 or 2 tomatoes
Bird eye chilli - as many as you can handle
2 cloves of garlic, crushed
a chunk of ginger about the size of your thumb, finely grated (the ginger, not your thumb)
about 1/2 a mug of coconut, dessicated, fresh, whatever. You could also use that coconut concentrate cream stuff, in which case maybe use a bit less
Chopped coriander, about [this] much
a slightly heaped tsp of ground cumin
Pinch of turmeric
Pinch of chilli powder
Couple or three green (finger) chillies, slit lengthways
Soak the tamarind in 1/2 a cup of hot water before mashing it with your fingers to mix it well into the water. Strain through a sieve to get rid of any tamarind bits.
Roughly chop the onion and tomato, then add them along with the coconut, garlic, ginger, red chillies, all the spices/herbs and the tamarind gravy you just made into a blender and whizz it up til you have a nice gooey paste.
Heat some oil in a deep pan and cook the green chillis briefly before adding the gooey paste and fry for a couple of minutes. Then add about a mug of water, depending how much sauce you want, and bring it all to the boil. Reduce the heat and simmer for 10-15 minutes. Add the fish pieces and continue to cook/simmer until it's done, maybe another 10 minutes. Serve immediately with chips and a slice of white bread. Or rice. Whichever takes your fancy.
you trying to dump her gently with the carbonara? 😆
IHN - Member
CF - I love the sound of that, but she's a recovering vegetarian and duck is a step too far at the moment...
Same recipe works well with fresh tuna as well if she's open to that idea!
Good to hear that she's come back from the dark side, though! 😉
I am definitely saving this thread, some yummy food ideas. Good work gents.
you trying to dump her gently with the carbonara?
I never said it was the most glamorous of dishes!
It does however taste good, is cheap and takes no time to cook, all of which makes it a winner in my eyes!
*STOP PRESS*
Balls to pavlova, I'm going to do a baked Alaska 🙂
OMG you might as well call her her Mum's name when she arrives. heh.
If you're gonna dump her then nothing with any sort of curry sauce in.
She'll chuck it in your face and it's like bloody napalm 😳
she doesn't like sweet/savoury mix (e.g main courses with fruit in)Damn straight!
plus 1
Carbonara is brilliant for quick but scrummy dinners. The secret is picking the right type of pasta; the type that's been "roughed" up so it sticks to the sauce.
Red wine and chorizo risotto?
Key lime pie to finish
I just remembered the perfect dish for a "recovering" veggie. Although the sweet/savoury bit might have to be smoothed over.
Cauliflower & Sweet Potato Curry
Peel & chunk some sweet potatoes. Blanch them in boiling water.
Chop some florets off a cauli. Add them to the blanching sweet potato.
Fry a bit of chopped onion, mushroom & peppers in a big pan or wok.
When the blanched vegs are just softening, drain them off & leave in colander (or equivalent).
Add a dollop of Tesco green thai curry paste (it's the only pre-made curry sauce I buy - it's brill) to the pan and a load of coconut milk. (I use the powdered stuff but it doesn't really matter).
Add the sweet potato & cauli and simmer.
Then grill whatever meat or fish you want and serve it on the plate with the curry with some crusty bread.
If you don't get a shag there's something wrong with you.
Chicken breast stuffed with cheese then wrapped in palma ham always goes down well easy to do as well..make slice in breast stuff with cheese the wrap with palma ham cook in oven for 30 - 40 mins at 200 degree c. Done!