Leon...

I've really fallen for the Leon brand with their healthy cookbooks and quirky restaurants. Their 'healthy fast food' is a great concept and their restaurants are popping up all over the place. I first went to one on the Strand about a year ago and have only just got round to going again. The problem with all of these delicious restaurant chains (I'm also a huge fan of Yo Sushi, Wahaca, Wagamama, Pizza Express etc) is finding the time to visit them! We have to choose carefully when we go out (most are in London) as to which one to eat in. So anyway, last night my boyfriend, my parents and I went to Leon in Brent Cross. It's only been open for a couple of months and looks really lovely with twinkly lights and a chandelier. Unfortunately, we'd looked at the menu online and wanted the dinner 'grazing dishes' available after 6pm but Brent Cross doesn't serve these. So instead we ordered some flatbread and houmous to start (very good) then 5 lunch hot dishes between the 4 of us, they all come in a box with rice and dressed 'slaw which wasn't ideal as we then had to split the dishes and share out all the rice. I think the concept of the grazing dishes would be better, just ordering a good selection of the meat/veg dishes so you can try the all and getting the rice and salads separately. But anyway, the food was really delicious even if it was all mixed onto one plate. We had a Pork Jambalaya (probably my favourite) -  mexican slow cooked tomatoey cajun spiced pork, Grilled chicken with garlic and aioli, chilli chicken - grilled chicken with chilli sauce on the side, sweet potato falafel and the Leon Gobi a coconut based cauliflower curry - all with so many yummy flavours. And it was a definite winner for me serving brown rice and giving free water (in retro jugs with slices of lemon). 
You're probably wondering why, in a blog filled with sweet baking and puddings, that I haven't mentioned any pudding. And that's because like the grazing dishes, they didn't serve puddings with ice cream or anything. On the counter they have brownies or pecan pies but we wanted something proper after our mostly virtuous meal so came home for it instead.
So Leon is a great healthy place to go for breakfast (yes even their breakfasts are healthy and look delicious), lunch or dinner, just try to pick a branch that serves the grazing dishes and puddings in the evenings. Also, an added bonus is that if you sign up to their 'Leon love club', you get 40% off! So all of our food came to £26. 


The boxed chicken aioli, rice and slaw. 

 Our plate with a bit of each lunchtime dish.


















P.S I've only tried one thing out of the Leon cookbook so far (pancakes) but as I go through and try the rest out, I'll be blogging them :)

Mexican Lasagne with Guacamole (From Nigella Kitchen)

Note that this photo doesn't at all match up to the one in Nigella's cookbook.

Continuing with recipes from my new cookbooks, I cooked a Mexican Lasagne from Nigella's 'Kitchen' last night. It's such a great idea, layers of tortillas filled with tomatoes, peppers, onion, chilli, sweetcorn, beans and cheese. It would be great for a crowd as her version serves 8. We halved the recipe and just used 3 tortillas instead of her 8. We also added some spitroast chicken which was a good addition. But I'd say the recipe needs a little tweaking and here's what I'd do when I make it again:
Put some extra chilli in the sauce, it needed zinging up a little to be more 'mexican'.
Maybe add some cajun seasoning for more mexican flavour.
Not put the extra water in that she recommends, it made the sauce way too liquidy and it didn't bake up enough.
We served it with salad and my boyfriend had his with some guacamole which he said made it much better.


Ingredients - serves 8
For the sauce: 1 tablespoon garlic oil
1 onion, peeled and chopped
1 red pepper, de seeded and chopped
Pinch of salt
2 tablespoons coriander stalks, finely chopped
2 x 400g can chopped tomatoes, plus 400ml water swilled from empty cans (it definitely didn't need this, I'd advise you to leave it out and only add a little water if it's too thick)
1 squirt of tomato ketchup
For the filling:
2 x 400g can black beans, drained and rinsed
2 x 250g cans sweetcorn
250g mature Cheddar
Some spit roasted chicken (optional)
1 packet (8) soft tortillas


Salad and guacamole to serve.

1. Preheat the oven to 200c. Then make the sauce by heating the oil in a pan, frying the onion, pepper and chilli. Add the salt and cook gently for 15minutes, once soft add the coriander. Then add the chopped tomatoes (and water, see note above). Spoon in the ketchup and let it simmer for about 10 minutes.

2. Meanwhile, make the filling by mixing the drained beans and sweetcorn in a bowl and most of the grated cheese. (we put the chicken here too)
3. Assemble the lasagne by spooning a third of the sauce in the bottom of an ovenproof dish (approx 26cm x 6cm deep) then layer 2 tortillas so they cover the sauce overlapping slightly.
4. Then add a third of the beans and cheese mixture, covering the tortillas and then add a quarter of the remaining sauce and 2 tortillas to cover.
5. Repeat with another 1/3 of the beans and cheese and some more sauce before layering another 2 tortillas.
6. Finally. add the last layer of beans and cheese and nearly all the sauce before covering with the last 2 tortillas. Then spread the last of the sauce with the remaining cheese before baking in the oven for 30minutes. Then let it rest for about 10 minutes before slicing and eating with the salad and guacamole. 


- Nigella also notes that this can be made 1 day ahead and refrigerated until needed but with an extra 5 minutes cooking time. You can also freeze it for up to 3 months by wrapping the dish in a double layer of clingfilm and a layer of foil. Then defrost in the fridge overnight and cook as above. 

Double dessert part 2 - Swiss Meringues

This is part 2 of the double desserts using the left over egg whites from the Crème Brûlées. These meringues are made from a recipe in Eric Lanlard's 'Home Bake' cookbook and look like the ones often seen piled up in the windows of patisseries. I don't think mine quite match up to that standard but they taste good, nonetheless! And people are always so impressed if you make meringues rather than buy them. I swirled the mixture with melted chocolate before to give a marbled look and also drizzled melted chocolate over the top. These would be delicious with some ice cream and fresh fruit like raspberries or strawberries. Or you could crush up to make an Eton-mess by mixing them with whipped cream and fresh fruit. 


Also, if you haven't made meringues before then here are some tips: 
 - Make sure your bowl and whisk are scrupulously clean and free from any grease/traces of fat. I do this by scalding them in boiling water. 
- Don't over or under whisk your egg whites. If they are under whisked and not 'peaky' enough, they haven't incorporated enough air so will sink. But if you over whisk, they will go flat too. So that's why folding in the last 1/2 of the sugar is good to avoid the over beating.
- Finish making the meringues quickly and put them in the oven almost straight away. 
- When cooked and ready to lift off the baking sheets, use a flat palette knife to get right underneath and carefully prise up. 


Ingredients - 
4 egg whites
225g caster sugar

1. Preheat the oven to 100c and line 2 baking sheets. 
2. In a large bowl, using an electric hand whisk, whisk the egg whites to soft peaks. Whisk half the sugar, 1 tbsp at a time into the mixture until stiff. Carefully fold in the rest of the sugar using a large metal spoon. 
3. Carefully drop spoonfuls of the mixture spaced well apart, onto the paper. Bake in the oven for about 1 1/2 hours until dry and the meringues can be lifted easily from the paper. Leave to cool in the oven with the door ajar. 


Extras:
Raspberry swirl meringues - Mix 2 teaspoons framboise, 2 -3 drops raspberry extract and a small knife point of food colouring paste. Mix well and then swirl through the finished meringue mixture just before baking. 
Chocolate swirl - Melt 100g dark chocolate and swirl with a wooden spoon through the mixture just before baking and drizzle some on top.
Caramel - Use Golden caster sugar instead for a caramel taste.

Velvet Salted Caramel Chocolate Torte

This is such a heavenly pudding, it's a gooey chocolate fallen souffle with 'THE' flavour de l'annee, salted caramel. The recipe is from Green & Black's Ultimate Chocolate cookbook that I was given as a Christmas present. It was hard to choose a pudding to make at the weekend as everything in the book looked so good! But my Grandpa loves caramel and I'd never attempted it before so I chose this one. The contributor of the recipe said that 'there must be something in the alchemy of salt, deep caramel and darkest chocolate. Something highly addictive I'd warrant, a truly divine pudding' and I couldn't agree more. Before I tried salted caramel, I didn't really see what all the fuss was about yet it was appearing everywhere. I'm not really a fan of salt, always feeling really thirsty after I have it and knowing that it raises your blood pressure. But when I tasted salted caramel, I suddenly understood why everyone goes crazy for it. And of course, it's a miniscule amount of salt so you don't have to worry, yet it cuts through the sweet caramel and enhances its flavour.

You should make this pudding a few hours before you want to serve it as it needs time to cook and then cool and you serve it at room temperature, although I think it would be even better warm (but be careful that the caramel isn't scalding hot). As I said, it was my first attempt at making caramel and I was a bit worried when reading that you should keep a bowl of ice cold water nearby. But it was fine, just keep it in a deep pan at arm's length and stand back when adding the cream. Also keep watching it like a hawk so that it doesn't burn, it changes very quickly and if a tiny bit gets burnt, it will taint and bitter the whole batch so you'd have to start over again.

The pudding is perfect for a dinner party but I had some trouble when serving it, it looked great but it collapsed when serving into bowls. I served it with some Carte D'or vanilla ice cream.

Ingredients -
For the caramel:
175g golden caster sugar
3 tablespoons water
120ml double cram
1/2 tsp sea salt flakes
120g unsalted butter, cubed

For the torte:
250g dark chocolate, broken into pieces
160g unsalted butter, cubed
175g golden caster sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
120g ground almonds
5 medium egg yolks
6 large egg whites

Cream or good vanilla ice cream to serve (I don't think you can beat Carte D'or)

1. Make the salted caramel by pouring the sugar into a heavy based pan and add the water. Heat gently, stirring only until the sugar dissolves. Then turn the heat up to medium high and allow the syrup to come to the boil undisturbed. Simmer briskly and watch like a hawk until the caramel turns a rich amber colour (mine took a little longer than I expected but don't let it burn or you'll have to start all over again) Swirl the pan to prevent hot spots but don't stir or the caramel will clump and crystallise. Remove the pan from the heat and carefully stir in the cream and salt (be careful and stand back) then stir in the butter cubes until a smooth caramel forms. Set aside to cool.

 2. Then preheat the oven to 180c and line a 23cm springform cake tin with baking parchment.

 3. Melt the chocolate, butter and sugar together - either with a heatproof bow over boiling water or do what I did and put it in the microwave on low, stirring and heating until all dissolved. Remove from the heat and stir until smooth then mix the vanilla and almonds, followed by the egg yolks, one by one.
4. Whisk the egg whites in a clean bowl until they form stiff peaks. Fold 1 large tablespoon into the chocolate mixture with a metal spoon or spatula and then fold in the rest, trying to retain as much air as possible. Scrape about 2/3 batter into the tin, then make a dip in the centre and spoon the caramel into the dip. Then top with the rest of the chocolate, smoothing to the edges.


5. Bake for about 30-40minutes until puffed and barely firm. Leave to cool completely in the tin, it will crumple in the centre. Slice and serve at room temperature with ice cream.
NB - When I cut into the cake, caramel came running out so make sure you have it over a big surface so you can scoop it all up!



The Caramel started leaking out!

Jamie's Sea Bass & Crispy Pancetta, Sweet Potato Mash and Asian Greens...

This is another recipe from Jamie's 30minute meals cookbook that I cooked with my boyfriend last night. I think it's a really great way to do the sweet potatoes with coriander and mango chutney. It's kind of an Asian mix with some Italian Pancetta. Unfortunately Sainsbury's had run out of Seabass so we had to do the recipe with Haddock, which was nice but Seabass would have definitely been better. I also didn't have any asparagus for the greens so used spinach with the broccoli instead. And because we didn't make the lemon and ginger drink or berry ice cream like Jamie does in the 30minute recipe, ours was ready a lot sooner. I cut down the amount of lemon, salt and olive oil that Jamie ALWAYS insists on. I think these top chefs seem to have lost their taste buds and can only eat anything coated in lemon, salt and oil -raising your blood pressure and adding unnecessary calories. 
Ingredients - (based on the recipe for 4 people)
For the Mash: 
700g sweet potatoes, 
2 limes, 
A small bunch of fresh coriander,
2 tablespoons mango chutney,
Soy Sauce.
For the Greens:
1 fresh red chilli
1 clove of garlic
Soy Sauce
1 lime
Sesame Oil
100g Asparagus or some spinach
1 head of broccoli
For the Seabass:
8 thin slices of pancetta
4 x 150g fillets of sea bass, skin on, scaled and pin-boned
1 lemon (if you feel it's necessary)
1 tsp fennel seeds (optional)


1. Wash the sweet potatoes, trim off any gnarly bits then stab them a few times with a knife. Put in a large microwave safe bowl, halve one of the limes and add to the bowl then cover with a double layer of clingfilm and microwave on full power for 12 minutes, or until cooked through.
2. Deseed and finely chop the chilli adding half to a large serving bowl and set the rest aside. Crush the unpeeled clove of garlic into the bowl and add 2 tbsp of soy sauce. Squeeze in the juice of 1 lime and add a splash of sesame oil. Mix. Trim the asparagus stalks, if using, quarter the broccoli. 
3. Put the pancetta into a frying pan with a drizzle of olive oil. Turn when crispy. When golden, remove to a plate and leave the fat in the pan. Add the fish to the pan, skin side down. Shake the pan and press the fish flat for a couple of seconds. Then put the fennel seeds in if using with some pepper.
4. Finely chop coriander on a large wooden chopping board, setting a few leaves aside for the garnish. Add the mango chutney, a good splash of soy and the reserved chopped chilli. Chop the mix everything together on the board.
5. Fill a large saucepan with boiling water and add the broccoli and asparagus, completely submerging them. Put the lid on and turn the heat up high.
6. Check the fish, once the skin is golden and crispy, turn the heat down to low but have confidence to let the skin become good and crispy before reducing the heat.
7. Get the sweet potatoes out of the micrwoave and check they are cooked through, then use tongs to squeeze the juice from the lime. Then carefully tip the sweet potatoes on top of the mango chutney mixture and use a knife or masher to chop and mash everything together (inc skins). Season to taste.
8. Take the pan of fish off the heat and flip the fillets over so they gently finish cooking on the flesh side. Return the pancetta to warm through and serve the fish and pancetta on top of the board of mash and take to the table.
9. Drain the broccoli and asparagus in a colander then tip into the serving bowl with the dressing, quickly toss and take to the table. 

Cupcakes, Cookbooks and Coca Cola Ham!

I hope everybody had a lovely Christmas and are now planning for the New Year! 


First of all, I must blog Nigella's Coca Cola Ham. Not sure if anybody follows India Knight on twitter but she had a ham and there was a lot of debate about whether to do it in coca cola or not, everybody who has cooked it says do it but if you haven't then it probably sounds very strange. And I remember watching Nigella do it on one of her show's a while ago and thinking how weird it seemed. But true to her word, it does really work and I will definitely be cooking all my ham's like this in the future. We cooked this on Boxing Day ready for some family coming the following day and it went down really well (unfortunately not much was left!) The coke doesn't make it too sweet like I thought it would, it just adds a great depth of flavour and colour. Then you add the glaze which tastes really great.  The photo below doesn't really do it justice. 

Ingredients -
2kg mild cure gammon
1 onion, peeled and cut in half
2 litre bottle of coca cola (plus extra to make sure it's covered if your pan is too big like mine was)
For the glaze -
Handful of cloves (optional, I was a bit cloved out from Christmas so left them out)
1 heaped tablespoon of black treacle
2 tsp english mustard powder
2 tablespoons demerara sugar
One spoonful of the cooking water to loosen it up a little.


1. Nigella doesn't bother to soak the ham but I did just in case it was too salty. So if you feel it will be salty, put it in a pan covered with cold water and bring to the boil then tip into a colander in the sink.
2. Then put the gammon in a pan, skin side down if it fits like that, add the onion and then pour over the Coke.
3.Bring to the boil then reduce to a good simmer. Put the lid on but not too tightly and cook for just under 2 1/2 hours. If your joint is bigger or smaller then work out the timing by about an hour per kilo remembering that it will go into an oven later (but add an extra 15mins if it's been in the fridge right up until the moment you cook it)
4. Preheat the oven to 240c.
5. When the ham's had it's time, take it out of the pan but don't throw away the cooking liquid yet. Let it cool for a little bit to make it easier to handle or let it cool completely and finish cooking later if you need to. Then remove the skin, leaving a thin layer of fat. Score the fat with a sharp knife to make large diamond shapes then if using cloves, stud each diamond with a clove.
6. Mix the sugar and mustard powder into the treacle with a little cooking water and spread onto the ham.
7. Then cook in a foil-lined roasting tin for approx 10 mins or until the glaze is burnished and bubbling. 
Then slice when ready and serve! 
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I got lots of cookbooks for Christmas so I shall be sharing many recipes over the next few months. Here are a photo of some of my favourites. I can't wait to get stuck in to some new recipes, especially from Leon and Green&Blacks. But some others I'd really recommend and not pictured are: Jamie's 30minute meals, Mary Berry's Ultimate Cake Book, Delia, any by Ottolenghi and Nigella Express. 

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And finally, some photos of some food over Christmas including the cupcakes (I just used the Hummingbird vanilla recipe as everyone was a bit too flavoured out) and Turkey!

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Over January, I'll be posting lots of fresh and healthy recipes and lots from the new cookbooks. Happy New Year!