Eat your greens

Broccoli? Yes, it is tasty, but sometimes a bit yawanarama.

Stir-fry? Useful, yes, but can be a bit yawnarama.

Add to the mix veg box end of Winter lean-ness which means this is the 4578350574th week in a row that you have gotten broccoli, and its a veritable snoozefest, really.

When confronted with a slightly yellowing head of broccoli this week, I managed to create this, which was really very, very tasty, and a glimmer of hope as I wait for slightly more Summer-y veg to come.

I started with beef, onions and broccoli.

The beef got thinly sliced into strips…

The onions got thickly sliced…

And the broccoli got floretified. Must. Stop. Making. Up. Words.

Finely slice some ginger. I did matchsticks because I like superlumps of the stuff, but grating it would be fine, too.

The, prepare the sauce ingredients: honey, soy sauce, sesame oil and oyster sauce. The pretty little espresso cups are a bit much, admittedly, but you need to have it all measured out before you start cooking, so everything is to hand. Pretty bone china is optional.

You will also need some cornflour mixed with cold water. This is the anti-pretty bone china, if I’m honest.

Then, heat the wok until SMOKIN’, before putting in the oil. Yes, I know my wok is filthy, one of this days I’ll attack it with a brillo pad and re-season, but its just not happening any day soon, mmkay?

When the oil is hot, add the broccoli and ginger, and cook for a minute or two, stirring all the while.

Add the beef and onion.

Cook for another few minutes and stir ALL THE TIME.

Add a bit of the soy sauce if it needs a little liquid, but not too much, otherwise you will be boiling the dish, rather than stir frying. Boiled beef and broccoli? No, me neither.

Afer those couple of minutes, add the sauce ingredients.

Followed by the cornflour mix.

Hubble and bubble away for another few minutes. I like my sauce quite thin, because then the rice soaks it up nicely, but if you want yours thicker, just add a little more cornflour.

And it is done. Serve with rice or noodles.

Beef and broccoli stir fry
Serves 4. Cooking time 15 minutes.

1 head broccoli
2 onions
1 large piece frying steak
Piece of ginger the length of your thumb
30 ml soy sauce
30 ml honey
30 ml sesame oil
30 ml oyster sauce
1 heaped tbsp cornflour
250 ml water

1. Slice the beef thinly, slice the onion thickly, break the broccoli into florets and finely shred the ginger.
2. Measure out the oil, soy sauce, honey and oyster sauce. Mix the cornflour with the water.
3. Heat a wok until smoking, and add the oil.
4. Once the oil has heated, add the broccoli and ginger, and cook for 2 minutes, stirring all the while.
5. Add the onion and beef and cook for a further 3 minutes, stirring all the while.
6. Add the honey, soy and oyster sauce and allow to simmer for 1 minute.
7. Stir in the cornflour mix and simmer for 2 minutes until thick.
8. Serve.

The one with the dodgy pastry

I had this totally awesome blog post lined up, where I showed you my failsafe method of making pastry that never ever fails ever and tastes amazing. Then, as if the gods of not being a smug cow shone on East Belfast, my PASTRY SHRUNK while being baked.

There you go readers, a lesson learnt in not being smug. Although I’ll bet Sophie Dahl (queen of smug in this week’s Radio Times) or Rachel Allen (too smug to even think about) never have shrinking pastry. Le sigh.

MAVERICK that I am, I’m going to post the recipe anyways, because the blogging world is about real cooking I think, and real people do silly thing like forgetting to use baking beans. It usually doesn’t shrink (especially if you don’t forget aforementioned beans), promise, and even the slightly shrunken version provided an excellent vessel for a cheesy filling. Sorted.

*cookery crown wobbles ever so slightly*

I start the pastry by measuring out plain flour, some seasoning and a mixture of butter and Stork into a bowl. For some reason, the mixture of fats creates a lovely texture and flavour, I find. Although this posh butter, from the dairy section, didn’t really tickle my fancy. I’ll stick with the regular kind in future, stop getting ideas above my station.

Feel free to use only one or the other. But be sure to cut it up into tinnnnnnnnnny little pieces. Well, not that tiny, but I’m doing my Bill Bailey impression in my head, so roll with it.

The bowl then gets fired into the freezer for a wee while.

After a little go in the freezer, I put it all in the Magimix Of Joy. Any food processor will do, or you can even take it back to the old school and rub with yer fingers, but you want it to resemble crumbs.

Kinda like this. Crumb-y, isn’t it?

Then you tip the crumbs back into the bowl, and mix in enough cold water to bring it all into a big ball of dough, like so.

Then that ball of fun goes for a little sit in the freezer for a little while, before getting rolled out, like so. Thats the second time in one post I have used that phrase, I clearly must expand my vocabulary.

Use the dough to line the tin, and then put the whole lot in the freezer for one last blast of cold.

Meanwhile, prepare the filling: lovely manchego cheese, a nice onion and a somewhat forlorn looking red pepper (forlorn-ness optional).

Heat up a griddle. Getting an interesting picture of a griddle is quite tricky by the way, so I fully recommend a slightly jaunty angle at this stage.

While that heats up, cut the pepper into thick slices.

And the onion, too.

And then, in a shock maneuver, put the slice of veg on the griddle. You might need two batches.

At this point, take the case out of the freezer, and brush the base with some lovely mustard.

I find a thick layer of mild mustard yummiest (I think I just made that word up, what was that about expanding vocabulary?), but you GO WILD and use however much you want of any kind of mustard. Life is for living, innit?

Now, do what I FAILED to do and place a square of baking paper and baking beans over the case before putting into a hot oven. I don’t have a photo, because I didn’t do it. I am a fool.

While that is baking, use a potato peeler to create strips of cheese. I like a nice oozy middle of cheesy goodness in this tart, which grating doesn’t allow for. Peeling is the way forward.

When the case has cooked, it should hopefully look like a slightly less shrunken version of this…

It is now time to dry your tears over shrunken pastry fill the case.

I put the onions at the bottom…

And then the cheese and the peppers. It creates a sort of oozy cheese middle if you do it this way. Mmmmmm… Cheeese…

Then mix together some eggs, a spoonful of creme fraiche and some seasoning…

Pour it over the vegetables….

And bake.

I served mine with a nice green salad and some garlicky potatoes. It was a meal full of yum, if not perfection. And that, to me, is what food is all about.

Red pepper, onion and cheese tart
Serves 4. Cooking time 1hr 15 minutes.

200g flour
50g Stork
50g butter
2 tbsps dijon mustard
1 red pepper
100g manchego cheese
1 onion
3 eggs
1 tbsp creme fraiche
Salt and pepper

1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees.
2. Place the flour in a bowl with some salt and pepper. Add the butter and Stork, cut into small pieces. Place into the freezer for about 10 minutes.
3. Take out of the freezer, process into crumbs and add enough cold water to bring into a ball (it took about 4 tbsps for me). Place this in the freezer for about 10 minutes.
4. Roll the dough out and use to line an 8″ tart tin. Place in the freezer for another 10 minutes.
5. Spread the pastry with the mustard, cover with parchment and baking beans and blind bake for 15 minutes.
6. Slice the peppers and onion and cook on a griddle till nice and charred.
7. Using a peeler, create shavings of the cheese.
8. Once the case has cooked, layer the onions, cheese and peppers in it.
9. Prepare the rest of the filling by whisking together the eggs and creme fraiche with some salt and pepper. Pur over the vegetables.
10. Bake in the oven for 20 minutes, or until golden brown.
11. Serve.