Courgette carbonara

I love experimenting with food and cooking new and elaborate recipes but to be honest that sort of cooking is strictly for weekends when I have the time. If I am eating at home on a weeknight and prefer something speedy and straight forward. This is where this courgette carbonara comes in. It is quick and simple to rustle up after work. The pasta has the creamy silky taste of carbonara with the twist of strands of courgette mixed in with the pasta to add texture and colour.

Ingredients

70g cubed pancetta

100g button mushrooms, sliced

2 courgettes (zucchinis), grated

1 clove garlic, crushed

1 egg yolk

5 tbsp single cream

30g parmesan grated

150g fettucini

Salt and pepper to season

1. Cook the pancetta and mushrooms in a dry, non stick pan for 4 minutes or until the pancetta is crisp and the mushrooms are browned. There is no need to add oil or butter as there is enough fat on the pancetta itself.

2. Add the grated courgette and garlic and cook for 8 minutes or until the courgette is softened and cooked through.

3. Meanwhile, mix the egg, cream and parmesan and season with pepper.

4. Cook the pasta and lift it out of the water with tongs straight into the courgette pan. If a little of the pasta water also drips in the pan this will loosen your sauce.

5. Mix well and then take the pan off the heat and toss with the egg and cream mix. Season to serve.

Serves 2. Recipe adapted from a similar recipe in Olive magazine.

Links

If you liked reading this you might like these recipes for quick week night suppers: salmon fillets with a Japanese twist or farfalle with peas and prosciutto.

Thai Rice

I have a secret to share with you. There is a great little Thai restaurant at the grungy, cheap end of Portobello road called Thai Rice. I first discovered the joys of Thai Rice when I was at a Book Slam. Book Slam, if you haven't heard it it, is a monthly event in London which bills itself as a literary nightclub but is more like a book club at a bar. On the night of my first visit, the only food available at Book Slam was delivery from Thai Rice. As I tucked into my plastic takeaway container perched on a bar stool I remember thinking to myself, wow this is actually pretty good Thai food, even taking into account the fact I was a few drinks into the night.

Spring rolls

Like many people I do suffer from a technical impairment where food is perceived to be of higher quality and tastier than it actually is in direct correlation to how many drinks I have had and the time of night, which I like to call the kebab effect. Still, even factoring in the kebab effect, the stir fried beef and broccoli laced with oyster sauce and a hint of chilli (£6.50) was subtly spiced and the beef had been cooked to just the right degree of tenderness.

Since that first encounter I have become quite a fan of Thai Rice, usually for its home delivery but I do also sometimes venture to the restaurant which is fairly unassuming. The small shop front opens up into a larger dining area out the back in a glass atrium. The walls are painted a bright aqua colour and everything is rather modern and sparse with none of the carved wooden screens or other bits of Thai paraphanelia that you usually find in Thai restaurants.

Instead the focus is firmly on the food. The menu is extensive and contains special menus on top of special menus but I like to stick with some old favourites usually. For starters, the spring rolls (£3.95) are four plump little cigars of fried pastry filled with vermicilli noodles and matchsticks of vegetables. These deep fried beauties are served with a bowl of sweet and sticky chilli sauce to dip them in. Besides spring rolls, I like nothing better than to order a steaming hot bowl of Thai rice's green curry (£5.50) and inhale that fantastic rich coconut milk scent. The curry is filled with slices of chicken, pepper and onion and is always spicy.

Green curry

From the specials menu I have tried the pad thai with soft shell crab (£8.50) given that pad thai and soft shell crab are two of my favourite things I considered that perhaps this would be my ultimate Thai dish. The pad thai itself walked the fine line between sugary sweetness and the sourness of fish sauce and lime however the combination of noodles and soft shell crab was a bit dry and in my view Thai Rice's standard pad thai with chicken or prawns is a better option.

I can't tell you about the wine list as I always just have a Singha beer when I eat in, but I can say that Thai Rice is a hidden gem of a place. There are no dumbed down spices for Western palates, the prices are reasonable and the service is always charming if you choose to eat in.

Essentials

Details: 303 Portobello Road, Ladbroke Grove W10 5TD (Ph 020 8968 2001)

Damage: Reasonable

7/10

Links

I think Thai Rice is a better option than nearby Thai restaurant, Market Thai which is just a bit further down Portobello road. My favourite Thai restaurant in London is probably Patara Thai, however it is quite a bit more expensive than Thai Rice, so for cheap and cheerful Thai, Thai Rice it is.

How to make scotch eggs

"I don't want my signature dish to be a scotch egg", pleads Henry Herbert, the head chef at The Coach and Horses. It might be a little late for that after a whole group of bloggers and Qype members spent the night at a Scotch Egg master class with Henry. We each got to make our own scotch egg which was brilliant, although ours did not look quite as perfectly shaped as Henry's. The secret to a great scotch egg according to Henry is lots of seasoning (he claims one of the main differences between home cooks and chefs is the liberal use of seasoning), double dipping in Panko the super dry and crunchy Japanese bread crumbs and serving the egg warm.

Henry and his beloved Colemans mustard

Fortum and Mason claim to have invented the scotch egg as a snack for weary travellers to eat on their way home. Although they did serve their scotch eggs with gravy which must have made it a little more difficult to transport. The Fortum and Mason style scotch egg is a hot snack and Henry advocates this as the best way to serve them. The mass manufactured cold scotch eggs you get at service stations on the motor ways are a blight on the good name of the Scotch egg in his view. You could make the scotch eggs up to the breadcrumb stage and keep them in the fridge before frying and serving them at the final second. This is Henry's recipe for the perfect scotch eggs.

Rolling the egg in the pork mixture

Ingredients

6 eggs

300g minced pork

6 shallots thinly sliced

1 tsp butter

3 tbs English mustard

1 tb cayenne pepper

1 tb mace

1 tb fresh sage finely chopped

Salt and pepper to season

Coating

2 eggs

1/2 cup milk

100g flour

100g Panko

The eggs ready to be fried

1. Soft boil the six eggs for around seven minutes and then shell.

2. Fry the shallots over a low heat with the butter until they are soft.

3. Mix together the pork mince, shallots, sage, cayenne pepper and sage and season liberally with salt and pepper. Divide the mixture into six portions.

4. Mix the two remaining eggs with the milk and season with salt and pepper to create an egg mixture. Place this in a bowl and place the flour and Panko in two separate bowls.

5. Place one portion of the pork mixture on a piece of cling film and flatten and then place the egg on top of the pork mixture. Use the cling film to roll the pork into a sausage around the egg and then remove the cling film and use your hands to shape the pork so that it covers the whole egg and forms an egg shape.

6. Dip the pork covered egg in the flour, then in the egg mixture and finally in the Panko. Dip again in the flour and Panko to ensure a double coating.

7. Repeat steps 5 and 6 for each egg.

8. Deep fry the eggs for 2 minutes until the exterior is crispy and golden. If you don't have a deep fryer (join the club) Henry suggests shallow frying the eggs in 1cm of rapeseed oil or sunflower oil.

9. Preheat the oven to 180C and bake the fried eggs for 8 minutes. Serve warm.

Ready to eat - scotch egg

Essentials

Details: The Coach and Horses, 26-28 Ray Street, Clerkenwell EC1R 3DJ (Ph 020 7278 8990)

Links

If you liked reading this you might be interested in this recipe for crab croquettes (another excellent bar snack) or if you are looking for great scotch eggs in London, another option besides the Coach and Horses is The Bull and Last in Kentish town.

Gourmet Chick attended this event as a guest of Qype.

Balans

If you live in London, January is not a great time of year to have a birthday. The weather is dismal and everyone is hibernating after too many Christmas and New Year festivities. This was the dilemma that my friend Kirsten faced when trying to organise a celebration for her January birthday. She decided the solution was to go out for breakfast rather than dinner or drinks and so on a Saturday morning MTV boyfriend and I headed to Balans in Earls Court for a birthday brunch.

Three egg omelette

In both menu and appearance Balans is a London version of an American diner. There is high backed brown leather bench seating, bright pops of red in the wallpaper and lighting and a sunny breakfast menu featuring stars and stripes classics such as pancakes with bacon. When our order arrived the portions were also American in style, by which I mean generous. The "full English" could have fed a small family with two eggs, sausage, bacon, tomato, beans, mushrooms, potatoes and toast (£7.50). Disappointingly though the eggs were over poached and were leaning towards being rubbery rather than runny.

A better option was the three egg omelette which was offered with a choice of fillings such as ham, mushroom or smoked salmon (£7.50). It was served on top of a mound of "Balans potatos" which were moreish cubes of fried potato. The pancakes, served in a stack and topped with fresh fruit salad (£5.75), were also very good indeed. They were fluffy and thick pillows served piping hot. We drank bellinis (£7) to toast the birthday girl and they were just the thing to perk us up although the burnt coffee (£2.20) that followed dragged us right back down.

Balans may be American in style but every American diner worth its salt knows that the key to breakfast is good eggs and coffee. Admittedly, the fried potatoes are fabulous but I don't think they are enough alone to tempt me back to Balans.

Essentials

Details: 239 Old Brompton Road, Earls Court Sw5 9HP (Ph 020 7244 8838) Tube: Earls Court

Damage: Reasonable

5/10

Links

If you liked reading this you might like reading about other Gourmet Chick reviews of breakfasts in London, at the Antipodean cafe Lantana in Soho or my local breakfast spot, Raoul's in Notting Hill.

Pizza East

It's all about the dough at Pizza East. Elastic and soft with a smoky char to it from the woodfired oven it is an almost perfect pizza base. The restaurant itself is in terminally cool Shoreditch. Henry Holland was at the table next to us, need I say more. I visited with my friends Amanda and Claire and we decided that we needed new haircuts if we were to eat there again, preferably featuring a fringe, afro, quiff, or even a combination of the three.

Potato, garlic and rosemary pizza

Pizza East is located in the old TEA building on Shoreditch high street. It feels like you are eating in someones uber cool warehouse apartment. The focal point is a big central bar with a few salami strung up overhead and the huge woodfired oven in one corner. The walls are exposed brick and there is lots of metal, polished concrete and mysterious looking piping and ducts. Tables are a mix of long communal tables and smaller tables for twos and threes. The chairs look and feel like school chairs, by which I mean they are not the most comfortable chairs you will ever sit on but that is only a small niggle.

When we booked we were given a two hour "slot" to dine in, however in the end Pizza East was not full and so we were able to linger at our table for a good three hours. No one tried to hurry us along at all and service was attentive and friendly. Wine is served in glass tumblers rather than glasses which I am not that great a fan of although I suppose it adds to the casual feel of the place and saves on dishwasher space. On the plus side, wine is available by the glass, carafe or bottle, perfect for those nights when you don't want a full bottle (as irregular as they may be). The wine selection itself was pretty good and the Sangiovese del Rubicone (£18) was a perfect fruity winter tipple.

The menu is divided into "cold", "baked" and "fried" antipasti, pizzas, salads and a handful of other main dishes. Given the arctic temperatures we decided to order from the baked and fried antipasti. To start, the roasted bone marrow (£7) which was served St John style, in the bone with some toasted bread and parsley and salt as accompaniments. There is something very satisfying about sucking the marrow out of a bone and the marrow was unctuous and warming. The lamb meatballs (£5) came doused in a napoli sauce. They were tender but not hugely memorable. From the fried section, the "Sicilian aubergine" (£4) was deep fried like tempura with a kick of balsamic and chilli. It was quite an unusual flavour combination but I have to say that I quite liked it. Deep fried food, what's not to love.

Now for the main game, the pizzas. As I said, the base was pretty perfect, smoky and billowy. We tried the veal meatball pizza which was topped with crispy thin curls of prosciutto (£12) and a squeeze of lemon giving a hint of tartness. This was pizza with bags of flavour, right down to the seasoning through the base. With pizza though, I find that often simplest is best, so it was that the potato, garlic and rosemary pizza (£10) was the winner with its moreish double whammy of carbs. The baby gem salad (£9) with pancetta and pear was huge and lathered in a creamy gorgonzola dressing which was slightly overpowering.

Salted chocolate and caramel tart

There was not really any need for dessert after that so called salad but we decided to sample the hot cinnamon sugar donuts (£6) which were almost like fat, round versions of churros complete with a pot of hot chocolate to dip them in. They were fantastically airy and fluffy. Salted chocolate is everywhere at the moment so of course it was featured on the Pizza East menu in the form of a rich salted chocolate and caramel tart (£5). Obama himself (a salted chocolate fan) would have been in raptures over this cake which was rich and decadent.

With two bottles of wine our bill came to just over £30 each which seemed fair. Pizza East ticks all the right dining boxes. It is fun, casual and well priced with the polish that comes from being part of the Soho House group.

Essentials

Details: 56 Shoreditch High Street, Shoreditch E1 6JJ (Ph 020 7729 1888) Tube: Liverpool street

Damage: Reasonable

8/10

Links

If you liked reading this you might like this review of the excellent Lavender Hill pizzeria, Donna Margherita, or if you are in Shoreditch another good nearby (non pizza) restaurant is The Albion.

Olive and rosemary focaccia

This recipe was almost a disaster. I had volunteered to make a starter for dinner at my friend Nicky's house and had got all the ingredients together for an olive and rosemary focaccia. I was organised enough and started making the focaccia a few hours before dinner until I read with horror instructions in the recipe such as "leave to rise in a warm place for two hours". My mental math calculations are not what you would call lightening quick but it did not take me long to realise that the only way we would be eating focaccia at Nicky's house was as a dessert at the end of the meal. I had to abandon the focaccia and turn to a back up plan for a starter but when I returned from dinner several hours later the focaccia had risen beautifully and was all ready to be popped into the oven for a toasty treat the next day.

The moral of the story boys and girls is that if you are going to make this focaccia you will need at least five hours to spare. It is not like you are working away those whole five hours, most of the time you are doing something else while the yeast works its magic. Sadly though this process can not be rushed. No amount of blasting with hairdryers will make the dough rise more quickly (I have learnt this from personal trial and error). In a way that is quite a nice thing. The focaccia takes its time but sometimes the good things in life can't be rushed.

Ingredients

330g strong white bread flour

1 tsp light brown sugar

2 tbsp olive oil

1 tbsp coarse sea salt

50g pitted kalamata olives

2 sprigs of rosemary

Starter

1 1/2 tsp active dried yeast

420ml bottled still spring water luke warm

330g strong white bread flour

1. For the starter put the yeast and water in a large mixing bowl and stir until the yeast dissolves. Add the flour and stir until there is a porridge like consistency. Cover the bowl with a damp cloth and leave somewhere warm (next to the heater works well for me!) for about two hours or until it has doubled in size.

2. Mix the starter with the flour, sugar and olive oil. Knead for about six minutes, then add the salt and knead further until the salt is mixed through.

3. Brush a large bowl with oil, place the dough in it and brush the surface of the dough with more oil. Cover the bowl with a damp cloth and leave in a warm place for one hour or until the dough has again doubled in size.

4. Turn the dough on to a floured bench and stretch and flatten it into a rectangle. Take one of the short ends of the rectangle and fold it into the centre, take the other end and fold it over the first one to form three layers of dough.

5. Brush a heavy baking tray (around 30cm x 40cm) with oil. Lift the dough on to the tray and flatten it by pressing hard with your hands. Cover with cling film and leave to rise for another hour. During this time check on the dough a couple of times and press it down, spreading it to the edges of the tray.

6. Preheat the oven to 220C. Press the olives and rosemary into the top of the focaccia and sprinkle with sea salt. Bake in the oven for 10 mins and then reduce the heat to 190C and continue for 15-20 mins or until golden. When it is out of the oven and still hot brush with plenty of olive oil.

Adapted from the Ottolenghi Cookbook.

Links

Other recipes you may be interested in which are great for lunch or starters are this recipe for a French capital salad or this one for crab croquettes.

Gallery Mess

People either love or hate contemporary art and I am in the love category. I even love the fact that it is often incomprehensible. So I seized the opportunity to visit the Saatchi gallery this weekend with my friends Soph and Fraze who were in London for a couple of days. After being confronted and confounded by the art we needed a cup of tea and a sit down. The obvious option was the Gallery Mess which is attached to the gallery and is housed in the old Duke of York's officers mess. The main space is a long and thin room with a bar lining one wall with floor to ceiling windows on the other side. Exposed brick work has been retained from the original officers mess but otherwise the look is modern with white painted arched ceilings and neon art installations.

We were just in time for afternoon tea (£10.50) which is served from 2.30pm so we decided that would be the perfect accompaniment for our cups of tea. The tea on offer was Jing tea (£2.20), in a limited range of flavours and served in tiny white pots. I would have liked a wider selection of flavours to accompany the afternoon tea, and I also would have liked if the cost of the tea was included in the afternoon tea.

The afternoon tea itself consisted of sandwiches, scones and small cakes and was served on a single footed cake stand. The sandwiches were tiny squares filled with smoked salmon, cucumber and egg. The bread was fairly tasteless and dull. The scones were also disappointing as they were small little, flat nuggets rather than fluffy, towering beauties. Things improved with the cake selection which included two small macarons sandwiched together with a chocolate paste and an exquisite small, dense tea cake.

I have read good reviews of the Gallery Mess so I was fairly disappointed by our rather dispiriting experience at afternoon tea. I can only assume that lunch or dinner is a better bet. I think there are much better afternoon teas to be had in London (try the one on offer at Sketch) and better gallery caff's (like the one at Tate Modern with its fabulous views of London).

Essentials

Details: Saatchi Gallery, Duke of York's HQ, King's Road, London SW3 4SQ (Ph 020 730 8135) Tube: Sloane Square

Damage: Reasonable

5/10

Links

If you liked reading this you might be interested in reading about afternoon tea at Sketch or if you want to make your own afternoon tea, try this chocolate brownie recipe and serve in tiny bite size squares.

Stuffed butternut squash

I am a sucker for cookery programs on television. They are nearly always shown at dinner time and I develop instantaneous food envy as I compare my dinner to whatever feast is being concocted for our viewing pleasure. After watching Nigel Slater's Simple Suppers on Wednesday night I decided enough was enough and went out yesterday to the market and bought the ingredients to recreate his recipe for stuffed butternut squash (or butternut pumpkin as anyone reading this from Australia would call it).

This recipe takes minimal preparation time, the only time taken is in roasting the squash until it is sweet and soft. The squash is stuffed with a caramelised onion mixture and I also added a few chopped walnuts into the mix to add a little crunch. The perfect meal for a wintery winter supper in front of the television.

Caramelising the onions

Ingredients

2 butternut squash (butternut pumpkins)

20 gm butter

Salt and pepper to season

2 onions sliced

1 tbsp ginger cut into matchsticks

2 pinches cinnamon

2 pinches cumin

1 pinch paprika

1/3 cup sultanas

1/3 cup walnuts chopped

1. Preheat your oven to 180C.

2. Cut the squash in half lengthways and scoop out the seeds in the middle. Score the squash with crosses to allow the squash to cook all the way through.

3. Use half the butter to rub on the squash and season with salt and pepper before placing in oven to roast for one hour.

4. Meanwhile add the remaining butter to a hot frying pan, once it is bubbling add the onions and cook over a low heat for 15 minutes. Add the ginger, cinnamon, paprika and sultanas and continue cooking until the onions are caramalised to a deep brown colour with a soft texture.

5. Add the onion mixture into the hole in each squash and top with the chopped walnuts. Roast for a further 15 minutes.

Serves two as a meal or four as a starter. Adapted from Nigel Slater's Simple Suppers.

Links

If you liked reading this you might be interested in some other messages for pumpkin/squash like this one for pumpkin gnocchi or this one for pumpkin and chicken risotto.

Noura

How often have you dared to refuse to pay the London "optional" 12.5% service charge? Unfortunately it is a fact of life in London and one that I have got quite used to. I have only refused to pay the charge twice, once in a pub where I ordered my meal at the counter and then went back to the counter to collect it (where is the service in that?) and secondly, at Noura in Covent Garden.

Mezze selection

My friend Alice had organised a big group of people to see The Misanthrope starring Keira Knightley and Damian Lewis. We wanted a pre theatre restaurant and Noura seemed to fit the bill as it was within 500m walk of the theatre, came recommended by Time Out and featured a pre theatre menu keenly priced at £14 for two courses.

The restaurant is palatial in style, with columns, white stucco walls, high ceilings and seating for 150. At the early time that we ate the restaurant was fairly empty and lacking in atmosphere. There were lots of waiting staff who seemed to be hovering around with nothing to do, however it was almost impossible to get their attention. Eventually we flagged one down and explained that we were going to the theatre at 7.30 and so needed to leave the restaurant within an hour. Apparently this was no problem so we ordered some wine and mezze selection.

Rather than a shared platter of mezze we each got our own individual plate. There was some creamy hommus with a strong garlic flavour, a dip of smoky eggplants known (mouttabal), tabbouleh salad, a small puff pastry triangle filled with spinach called fattayer, and crispy felafel. It was quite a feast for an individual starter. The mezze was served with bread served puffed up fresh from the oven at the side of the restaurant where one of the chefs was on duty constantly baking new loaves.

Shish taouk

We finished quickly but our plates sat on our tables uncleared for 20 minutes. We started to get anxious about timing and eventually flagged down another waiting explaining that we had to go. More time passed and we eventually said we would have to cancel our mains orders. Magically they appeared, juicy plump skewers of chicken (shish taouk) on a bed of lettuce. They were delicious but we only had time to eat half our meal before rushing to the theatre and making it to our seats just before the bell.

We had paid the bill as our meal arrived and decided to deduct the service charge. A waiter came back over and told us that we owed more money so we had to explain to him that the service charge was "optional" and that after such a bad service experience we were not paying it. I feel sorry for the chefs who may have been deprived some of their tip (assuming the waiters split the tip with the kitchen) as the food was really quite good but in this situation the service really ruined our meal and left us feeling flustered and sweaty at the play after our sprint to the theatre door.

Essentials

Details: 122 Jermyn Street, Piccadilly Sw1Y 4UJ (Ph 020 7839 2020) Tube: Piccadilly Circus

Damage: such a bargain even my mother would approve

3/10

Links

If you liked reading this you might be interested in some of my other reviews of restaurants for pre-theatre dining: J Sheekey which is perfectly located for Wyndhams theatre (along with several others) and Kazan for the theatres near Victoria including the Apollo theatre currently showing Wicked.

The Ginger Pig (Gourmet Chick in Brighton)

Far too many pubs call themselves gastro pubs which are undeserving of the title so it was almost a revelation to eat at The Ginger Pig in Brighton, a pub which is a gastro pub in the true sense. The pub itself is technically in Hove and is an old art deco beauty which has been restored to highlight its 1920's architecture. It has garnered a cult following among locals (I received recommendations from Essex Eating and Graphic Foodie) so on a Saturday night the place was packed to the rafters, no chance of a walk up table here. Luckily we had a booking which we were about half an hour late for but our lovely waitress gave us the impression she was unperturbed.

Cod fillet

A jug of tap water arrived at our table without us even asking along with a basket of brown bread and butter, a small but sensible act that made me love The Ginger Pig from the minute we sat down. The menu trod the seasonal, local produce line but was also quite adventurous featuring dishes such as roast garlic and chestnut beignet with truffled cauliflower puree (£5.50). It could be a little poncy, but it wasn't and the food was hearty and generous. The standard menu was also supplemented by a blackboard where several specials were chalked up. I knew I was not in London anymore when I worked out that most of the entrees were around £5 and the majority of the mains from £10 to £15. This was bargain gourmet eating.

From the actual menu, the ox tounge and cheek with cannelloni delivered a huge serving of offal along with an accompaniment of buttered spinach (£14). The dish was perfectly executed but my only complaint was that it was a little too meat/offal heavy as the cannelloni itself was also filled with oxtail. I do love my meat, but even for me this was perhaps a step too far on top of the stack of ox tounge and cheek. A better option was the cod from the specials board. This dish featured a cod fillet balanced on top of bite sized roasted potatoes and gussied up with some salsa. The emphasis was good sense over high style but the fish was fresh and firm and the potatoes fluffy on the inside with crispy exteriors.

Ox tounge and cheek

After a big day of eating we skipped the dessert menu proper and ordered pieces of homemade fudge (£2) along with (excellent) cocktails for a sugar hit and pick me up before heading out to brave Brighton's night life. It was an absolutely freezing night in Brighton but we were warmed against the arctic sea breezes by our fully bellies and the contented feeling that you get when you have just had a very enjoyable meal. The ox tounge and cheek may not have been entirely successful, but I was more than happy to eat food where the chef had taken a bit of a risk and not pulled it off in its entirety rather than just churning out standard, safe and unremarkable pub meals.

Essentials

Details: 3 Hove Street, Hove (Brighton) BN3 2TR (Ph 01273 736 123)

Damage: Reasonable

7/10

Links

If you liked reading this you might be interested in my review of Hotel du Vin also in Brighton. If you are looking for a gastro pub in London that is not an insult to the moniker then try The Bull and Last in Kentish town.

Roasted winter vegetable salad

Happy New Year. We celebrated at our friend's George and Luke's house where we had a fabulous dinner and then braved the freezing cold and walked over to Primrose Hill where we watched the fireworks over London. As we were watching the fireworks it started snow - a very London New Year's Eve.

My contribution to the dinner party was this roasted winter vegetable salad. It's the perfect for when you need a salad with a little wow factor (like New Years Eve) as slow roasting the vegetables intensifies the flavours. This salad could easily be a meal in itself, but of course it was New Years Eve so there was much more to eat than salad. I hope your celebrations went well. Here's to 2010.

Ingredients

1 aubergine (eggplant) cut into 1cm thick slices

1 sweet potato cut into 1cm thick slices

2 zucchini sliced thickly

2 red capsicums sliced thickly

2 yellow capsicums sliced thickly

1 red onion sliced thickly

2 cups couscous

2 tsp ground cumin

25g butter

2 cups of boiling water

1/4 cup roughly chopped parsley

100g wild rocket

1 lemon

1 tsp seeded mustard

Olive oil

Slow roasting the vegetables

1. Preheat the oven to 200C.

2. Place the aubergine, zucchini, capsicum and onion in a roasting dish, drizzle with olive oil and season with salt and pepper. Cook for 1 hour or until the vegetables are soft and starting to blacken around the edges.

3. Combine the couscous, 1tsp of finely grated rind from the lemon, the cumin, the butter and water in a heatproof bowl and mix well. Stand for about 5 minutes or until the liquid is absorbed then fluff with a fork.

4. In a small bowl mix the juice of the lemon with the seeded mustard and a glug of olive oil to make a dressing.

5. To serve, place the couscous in the base of a serving bowl, top with the roasted vegetables and parsley then rocket. Drizzle with dressing.

Serves six as a side dish or four as a light meal.

Links

If you liked reading this you might be interested in this fantastic recipe for roasted sweet potato and chorizo salad or you might want to read about last new years eve which I spent at the Prince Alfred and Formosa Dining Room.