all year – Page 5 – Cook and Drink

The Art of Sauces: Green Sauce with Quails and Snails

1 November 2024

Many years ago we were looking for a nice restaurant in Fréjus. It was our last evening in France before returning home and obviously we were looking for something special, something typical Provençal. The area of our hotel wasn’t very promising, so we were ready to settle for pizza until we saw a small restaurant with a very interesting menu. It offered Tisane de Romarin, Cailles et Escargots and many other exciting dishes we unfortunately forgot. We entered the restaurant and had a perfect evening.
Combining quails and snails isn’t the most obvious idea, but rest assured, it works beautifully, also thanks to the very intriguing green sauce. It took us some time to recreate it, but after a few attempts we think this is the right version.
The question remains why the two go together well. Is it about fat (quails leg) and no-fat (snail)? Because both are meaty and tender? Because both love the tarragon in the sauce?
Of course, we made a note of the name of the restaurant and of course, we lost it. A pity, although preparing this dish brings us back to a lovely evening in Fréjus.

Wine Pairing

Enjoy your Green Sauce with Quails and Snails with a glass of Chardonnay with a touch of oak. The wine must be dry, mineral and medium bodied. We enjoyed a glass of Bourgogne Couvent des Jacobins as produced by Louis Jadot. The wine partly matured in stainless steel tanks and partly in oak barrels. The result is a wine that has citrus and apple aromas in combination with oak and vanilla. Great with the freshness of the herbs and the richness of the sauce. It balances very well with both the quails and the snails.

What You Need

6 Quail Legs
Butter
12 Snails (click here when you want to know which snail to buy)
For the Green Sauce
- 1 Bunch of Parsley
- 1/4 Bunch of Tarragon
- Chicken Stock
- Cream
- (optional) Beurre Manié or Potato Starch)
Black Pepper

What You Do

Wash the snails with plenty of water. Set aside. Warm a heavy iron skillet, warm some chicken or quail stock in a pan and bring a pan with water to the boil. Set your oven to 60 °C or 140 °F.
Now it’s time to make the Green Sauce:
Blanch parsley and tarragon in boiling water for 30 seconds and cool immediately in ice water. Dry. Blender the herbs with some cold stock until you have a very smooth green liquid. Set your blender to turbo! Pass through a fine sieve and store the chlorophyll. It will remain stable for at least a day.
Quickly fry the legs in butter. Warm the snails in some chicken stock. When both are ready, transfer the legs and the snails to the warm oven. Add chicken stock to the pan. Stir. Add cream to the pan. Let reduce for 5-10 minutes or until you’re happy with the consistency. Add chlorophyll until you have the right colour and taste. Be very careful, if you overheat the sauce it will lose its vibrant green colour. Perhaps you need to thicken the sauce with Beurre Manié or Potato Starch. Add black pepper and taste. Serve the legs and the snails in the sauce. Enjoy with crusted bread.

PS

You could also use two quails. Remove the breasts and the legs. Use the remainder to make the stock you need for the sauce. To make the dish more refined, remove the main bone of the legs.

Cordyceps

3 October 2024

Bright orange mushrooms that look like spaetzle? Interesting. We pick one up and look carefully: a long stem but without a cap with spores. Odd. We ask if they are edible, and the obvious answer is “yes”. We buy 100 grams and decide to look for details and recipes in our mushroom cookery books when at home.
Hm. No mention of Cordyceps. We visit the Forager Chef (Alan Bergo) and read about the background of the Cordyceps (or better: Ophiocordyceps). Parasite mushroom, infects insects, controls them, takes over, kills and then sprouts a fruiting body from their head. The fruit we just bought…
Fortunately, the Cordyceps we bought are grown on substrates that are not made of insects, which make them less scary. Normally when we find a new mushroom on the market, we taste it raw, but not today.
We quickly wash our hands and watch this BBC video as suggested by Chef Bergo. Interesting, but we prefer the culinary aspects of mushrooms.

Use

In traditional Chinese medicine dried and powdered cordyceps are used. Today it is considered to be superfood, supposedly boosting your vitality and endurance. Fresh cordyceps are used in Chinese soups and hot pots. Chef Bergo uses them in a dish with linguini. He writes: “The cordyceps weren’t mind blowing, but they definitely weren’t bad”.
We decide to make an Asia-inspired salad, with stir fried cordyceps, obviously. The salad tasted great. It was nutty, mild, fresh and the texture of the mushrooms worked beautifully with the crunchy radishes.

Wine Pairing

Best to drink a white wine with a touch of oak, perhaps a chardonnay. We tried something different, a wine made with a grape called Bouquet 1359. The wine is produced by French winery Abbotts & Delaunay. The grape was developed by Alain Bouquet. It is somewhat similar to the chardonnay grape but more resistant and easier to use in an ecologic environment. It comes with aromas of brioche and yellow fruit; the taste is fresh, long and slightly nutty.

What You Need

100 grams Cordyceps
1 Scallion
Bok Choy
White Radishes or Daikon
Walnut Oil
Jerez Vinegar
Light Soy Sauce (we used Tsuyu)
French Mustard
Olive Oil

What You Do

Clean the mushrooms if necessary
Cook radishes or daikon for 4 minutes in boiling water
Let cool quickly and slice or quarter
Finely slice one or two bok choy stems, depending on the size
Heat a skillet, add some olive oil and fry the mushrooms
After 1 minute add the sliced bok choy and the pre-cooked radishes
Toss, leave for 1 or 2 minutes and allow to cool
Transfer to the refrigerator
When ready to serve, make a dressing by combining walnut oil, soy sauce, Jerez vinegar and a touch of mustard. The mustard will emulsify the dressing
Taste and adjust
Happy?
Then add the dressing to the salad, mix and serve as a side dish or small appetizer.

Inspiration

If you’re into video games you will have recognised cordyceps as inspiration of the action-adventure game The Last of Us, which was the inspiration for the American post-apocalyptic drama television series with the same tittle and produced by HBO.
The 2016 movie The Girl with All the Gifts was also inspired by cordyceps. Two Pokémon species are also based on Ophiocordyceps.

Nasty Details

A few days later we opened Merlin Sheldrake’s impressive book Entangled Life. He explains that the fungus doesn’t turn the insects into zombies but controls it like a puppeteer master. He describes how a specific species of Ophiocordyceps is focused on giant ants. The fungus infects the ant and from that moment on it controls the insect. In the end 40% of the body weight of the ant is mycelium (the network created by the fungus). Through the mycelium the fungus controls the ant. When the Ophiocordyceps is ready to propagate, it steers the ant to a height of approximately 25 cm, ideal for the fungus and its spores. The ant then bites into the main vein of a leaf and locks its jaws. The ant is now in an ideal position for the fungus. This is the moment the fungus kills the ant and the fruit begins to grow.
Very pleased our cordyceps were grown on a substrate of grains!

PS

More mushroom recipes on our mushroom page.

Food For Thought

12 September 2024

Don’t we all love our cookies! With chocolate or with hazelnuts, perhaps a classic French Madeleine or a Dutch Stroopwafel: two crispy wafers held together by sweet syrup, baked perfectly golden brown and of course round. Unfortunately, not alle cookies are perfect, sometimes the Madeleines are too brown, or the chocolate chunks are on one side of the cookie only, or one of the wafers is broken or not perfectly round. Manufactures know these products will not be bought by consumers, so what to do? Destroy them? Feed them to pigs?
Which is actually done in the Netherlands: discarded Stroopwafels, Wine Gums, Donuts, Pies and Cakes are fed to pigs. Anything goes. We feel it’s very wrong, poor pigs having to eat all these unhealthy left overs, sometimes passed their best-before-date, containing tons of sugar, food additives and modified, refined ingredients. Not to mention feeding pork pies to pigs.

250X150 Containerschip MSC Leanne in de haven van Jebel Ali in Dubai, 2023, © Kadir van Lohuizen, Het Scheepvaartmuseum, available via https://www.hetscheepvaartmuseum.nl

Photographer and documentary maker Kadir van Lohuizen explored the world behind our global food production. He visited cow farms in the USA, he made videos in mega slaughterhouses where tens of thousands of chickens are slaughtered daily and in a factory with an overwhelming number of chicken incubators (also showing how sick or weak female chicks and all male chicks are separated from the healthy female chicks and destroyed).

One of the videos shows a dairy farm in Al Kawaneej, United Arab Emirates, where they cool 12.500 cows with mist and fogging nozzles (in the middle of the desert), producing some 260.000 liters of milk per day. He travelled to China and visited enormous distribution centers, delivering food, drinks and meals 24/7. In the Netherlands he visited the world’s leading centre of plant breeding and seed technology.
The result of this impressive project is an exhibition called Food For Thought in the Dutch National Maritime Museum in Amsterdam. Food For Thought explores the origin of our food, and the role the Netherlands and the global shipping industry play in our food system. Food For Thought raises questions and dilemma’s; you will go from admiration to bewilderment and back again.

In an interview Kadir van Lohuizen mentioned he liked the idea of feeding left over stroopwafels to pigs. Normally the bakery would destroy the cookies. Isn’t it better to feed them to pigs and import less soy products (apparently that’s what pigs normally eat)?

250x150 Transport van avocado's door groenten- en fruitverwerker Plan Fresh in Kabati (Kena), © 2023, Kadir van Lohuizen, Het Scheepvaartmuseum_0, available via https://www.hetscheepvaartmuseum.nl

Another dilemma: we are not keen on buying asparagus when they are not in season. Or strawberries, green beans, mangos et cetera. Even though the supermarket will offer them every day of the year. Most of these products are grown in Kenia. The country has a great climate for growing vegetables and fruit. Food For Thought shows how people in Kenia benefit from the export, socially and economically.

Why wouldn’t we buy products from Kenia? Because the carbon footprint of the transport? But how about all these lovely Dutch tomatoes and onions? The Netherlands is the second largest exporter in the world, after the United States, producing everything from potatoes to cheese, from seeds to flowers, from eggs to meat. We expect people to buy Dutch food, but we don’t buy avocados from Kenia?

Transport is clearly one of the key aspects of global food production. When pigs are slaughtered in the Netherlands, the spareribs are shipped to the US and the head, kidney, nose, heart and tail to China, because the Dutch consumer loves pork loin and chops but not the other parts.
The Nile perch, introduced in Lake Victoria in the 1950s, completely changed the eco-system, disrupted the circumstances of local fishing communities, is fished commercially, forbidden to be eaten by locals and shipped globally.

250x150 Foodnetherlands_2021_08392 © Kadir van Lohuizen, Het Scheepvaartmuseum , available via https://www.hetscheepvaartmuseum.nl

Food For Thought shows the global food production, distribution and the enormous scale of every aspect. A farm in Hereford (Texas) with 250 thousand animals, a Dutch grower producing 80 million kilos of tomatoes per year (see picture), 100 million chickens living in the Netherlands.

Today 783 million people, meaning 10% of the world’s population, face chronic hunger.

Did we mention that 35% of all food is wasted?

Food For Thought made us think again about our food and how we can contribute to a healthier, better world, with less hunger. We think Ralph Dahlhaus, Chef of the National Maritime Museum, is very wise and helpful in his video statement, shown at Food For Thought:
Your choice of food does not need to be perfect, but it must be responsible.

More information on the website of the National Maritime Museum. Food For Thoughts runs until January 5^th, 2025.

PS

Male chicks are destroyed on day one by asphyxiation and/or maceration. For every chicken you eat, one is destroyed. Knowing this we only buy eggs that are organic and if we are sure the male chicks are given a decent life, A demeter egg will cost 65 eurocent compared to 20 cent for a free range egg.
Big difference?
Not really when you think of a soft, cuddly chicken ending up in a shredder.

Hazelnut & Raisin Bread

22 August 2024

Two or three times per week we enjoy the taste of fresh home-made no-knead bread. The crust, the flavours, the aromas! And how about the singing of the bread when it’s just out of the oven? Baking your own bread is such a pleasure.

Our recipe for no-knead bread is based on a recipe published by Jim Lahey, owner of Sullivan Street Bakery, New York. It was published in the New York Times in 2006 and can also be found in his excellent book My Bread. The process is time consuming (it’s 24 hours from start to finish) but not labour intensive. The recipe is based on slow-rise fermentation. With only 1 gram of instant yeast in combination with 18+3 hours of rest the yeast will do a wonderful job. The dough will be perfect. And kneading, as you would expect, is not required.

Normally we bake our bread with blue poppy seed and brown linseed. Today we bake a luxurious bread with hazelnuts, raisins and cinnamon.

What You Need

200 grams of Whole Grain Flour
230 grams of Plain White Flour
1 gram Instant Yeast
70 grams Hazelnuts (peeled and roasted)
130 grams Raisins
2,5 grams Cinnamon
4 grams Salt (this is less than usual, most recipes for bread would suggest 8 grams)
345 grams Water
Additional Flour
Bran

What You Do

Mix flour, yeast, cinnamon and salt. Add water and create one mixture. Let rest in a covered bowl for 18 hours.
Soak the raisins for 10 minutes in warm water. Remove excess water. Cover your worktop with a generous amount of flour. Remove the dough from bowl and flatten somewhat. Cover the middle third with one quarter of the raisins and hazelnuts. Fold the lower third on top of the middle third. Cover with the second quarter. Fold the top third on top the the middle third. Cover the centre with a quarter of the raisins and hazelnuts. Fold the right part on top of the centre. Ad the last quarter of raisins and hazelnuts on top of the centre and fold the fold the left part on top of it. Dust with additional flour and let rest on a towel dusted with flour and bran for 3 hours. Check that the pot (and the handles!) can be used in a really hot oven. Transfer the pot to the oven and heat your oven to 235˚ Celsius or 450˚ Fahrenheit. Put the dough, seam side up, in the pot, close it and bake for 30 minutes. Remove the lid and bake for 15 minutes or until it is nicely browned. Let cool on a wire rack for at least an hour before slicing it. Enjoy with a generous amount of butter.

Watercress Soup

15 August 2024

Watercress tastes fresh and somewhat peppery. In this soup we combine it with chervil and dill (hints of anise) making it an even more uplifting, delicious soup. Adding cream or olive oil is optional. Easy to make, quick and vegan!

What You Need

50 grams Watercress
10 grams Chervil
Some Dill
Small Shallot
1 Clove of Garlic
1 Small Potato
Butter
Black Pepper
Vegetable Stock
(Double) Cream (optional)
Excellent Olive Oil (optional)

What You Do

Chop the shallot and the garlic. Peel and chop the potato. In a heavy iron pan heat the butter, glaze the shallot and later add the potato and garlic. Allow to simmer for a few minutes. In the meantime, remove the coarse stems of the watercress and the chervil. When the potato is done, remove some of the stock and blender this with the watercress, the dill and the chervil until very smooth. Transfer back to the pan and leave on low heat for a few minutes. Press the mixture through a sieve and continue on low heat for a few minutes. You could add some excellent olive oil or some double cream. If you add cream, make sure you give the soup a few more minutes, otherwise your soup will have the typical milky taste of cream.

PS

Many recipes for watercress soup suggest smoothing the mixture (including the potatoes) with a blender. Please don’t be tempted to do so! It will give the soup a gluey texture, not nice at all. Our method is perhaps a bit more work, but the result is much, much tastier.

Shiitake Salad

8 August 2024

We love mushrooms and are always keen to explore new recipes and ideas. This recipe for a salad is very much about the nutty flavour and the moist texture of the shiitake. An easy to make and delicious, aromatic salad with lots of umami and citrus.
We used Grains of Paradise (also known as Maniguette or Awisa). This West African spice was introduced in Europe in the 14^th or 15^th century as a substitute for black pepper. We like its peppery, citrusy flavour.

Wine Pairing

The fish sauce brings briny, caramel-like flavours with obviously some fishiness. The cilantro is very present with notes of citrus and pepper. The result is an aromatic, umami rich salad, best enjoyed with a glass of Pinot Blanc. We decided to open a bottle produced by Dr. Loosen. The winery was founded over 200 years ago and is well known for its Riesling and other excellent wines from the German Mosel region. In general, you’re looking for a white wine that is fruity and easy to drink, with gently acidity and some minerality.

What You Need

150 grams of Shiitake
2 cloves of Garlic
Olive Oil
Rice Vinegar
Thai Fish Sauce
Grains Of Paradise (Maniguette) or Black Pepper and Lemon Juice
Cilantro (Coriander)
Smoked Breast of Duck

What You Do

Remove the stems of the shiitake (they are chewy and fibrous). If necessary, clean the caps with kitchen paper. Slice. Finely chop the garlic. Warm a heave iron skillet, add olive oil and gently fry the shiitake. After a few minutes add the garlic. Keep on medium/low heat for a few minutes. Combine olive oil, rice vinegar and fish sauce. Ground grains of paradise and add to the dressing. The grains of paradise can be replaced with freshly grounded black pepper and a few drops of lemon juice. Taste the dressing and adjust. Add the shiitake to the dressing and mix. Allow to cool somewhat. Add a generous amount of chopped cilantro. Mix again. Garnish with slices of smoked duck breast.

PS

More mushroom recipes on our mushroom page.

Cod in Green

1 August 2024

“Perhaps you would like to try ling? It’s similar to cod, perhaps more delicate.” We’re always happy to try something new, so we said “yes” to our fishmonger and bought a nice slice of ling. It’s an impressive fish with a length of 200 cm and its weight can be 30 kg. There is no data available on the size of the population per region because it’s a solitary, deep water species, which makes it a ‘fish to avoid’.
We prepared the ling and unfortunately it wasn’t our most successful kitchen experiment. Taste and texture were very good, the combination with blue cheese didn’t work and frying ling turned out to be a mistake. Next time we will stew ling in a green sauce, like Paling in ‘t Groen (Eel in Green or Anguilles au vert) we decided.
A few days later.
“We would like to have some ling please.”
“Sorry, no ling today.”
“Ah, pity! What would you suggest as an alternative?”
“Cod!”, our fishmonger said, smiling.
Since eel is critically endangered, we decided to make Cod in Green.

Wine Pairing

Lots of fresh, aromatic flavours in this dish, making it light and uplifting. We would suggest a glass of Chardonnay, perhaps one with a touch of oak. We decided to open a bottle of Coteaux Varois en Provence rosé, produced by Estandon and made with grenache, cinsault en syrah grapes. Fruity, a touch spice and with a great finish.

What You Need

For the Sauce
- Watercress
- Parsley
- Chervil
- Dill
- 50 ml Double Cream
- 100 ml Fish Fond
- 65 ml Noilly Prat
For the Fish
- 200 grams of Cod
- Butter

What You Do

Combine cream, fond and Noilly Prat
Stir well and reduce until it thickens. This may take 15 minutes or more
In parallel remove the stems of a generous amount of watercress and chervil. Be less generous with the parsley. Add some dill
Poach this for 20 seconds in boiling water
Remove and transfer to an ice bath
Drain and blender until you have a smooth, green mixture
When the sauce starts to thicken, fry the cod in butter until it’s nicely browned and opaque
Four minutes before the cod is ready, add the green mixture to the reduced sauce and warm through and through
Do not boil
Add the sauce to a deep plate and serve the fish on top of the sauce. Garnish with chervil

Oyster Mushrooms with Parmesan Cheese

25 July 2024

An easy to make and delicious vegetarian starter with only five ingredients! We combine oyster mushrooms with Parmesan cheese, nutmeg, black pepper and olive oil. The oyster mushroom is a common, edible and often cultivated mushroom. Its texture is firm, meaty and moist, its taste mild, nutty and slightly creamy. Some website mention flavours like anise and seafood, flavours we don’t recognize.

The other main ingredient is nutmeg. Its sweetness and spiciness combine very well with Parmesan cheese and the oyster mushroom. The dish looks simple and we were tempted to add some greens, but the result is intense, tasty and uplifting.

Wine Pairing

We enjoyed our mushrooms with a glass of white wine made with Verdejo and Sauvignon grapes byPiqueras Almansa. This is a dry white wine with lots of aroma and a slightly spicy, fruity aroma. A balanced wine that goes very well with the various flavours in this dish. In general, we would suggest a white wine with clear aromas, not too much acidity and present flavours.

What You Need

200 grams of Oyster Mushrooms
Olive Oil
Freshly grated Parmesan Cheese
Freshly grated Nutmeg
Black Pepper

What You Do

Grate a generous amount of Parmesan cheese, add some black pepper and nutmeg. Combine and taste. The nutmeg should be clearly present. Add the olive oil to a heavy iron skillet, quickly fry the mushrooms, sprinkle with cheese and transfer the skillet to the oven. Allow to grill for 8 – 10 minutes. Divide in two and serve on a hot plate. You could serve it with some crusted bread.

Other Recipes

Our favorite with oyster mushrooms is Alla Milanese. Another tasty recipe is this salad.

Oyster Mushrooms with Parmesan Cheese ©cadwu

Beef and Black Garlic

11 July 2024

This is the first of two recipes with black garlic, which is made by fermenting fresh garlic in a controlled environment (humidity, temperature) for 6 to 12 weeks. The flavour and aroma of black garlic differ from fresh garlic. Black garlic has notes of liquorice and caramel. Its taste is long, intense and rich in umami. The consistency is paste-like which makes it easy to use in sauces and dressings. Black garlic is also supposed to be very healthy thanks to the amount of antioxidants it contains.
Black garlic is becoming more popular, so your greengrocer or health food store should have it. If not, you can also order it online via the usual channels.
We combine excellent beef with a mixture of black olives, shallot, thyme, rosemary, tomato purée and black garlic. A very powerful and intense combination, with sweetness, bitterness, umami and lots of aroma thanks to the herbs.

Wine Pairing

To balance the intense sauce, we suggest drinking a glass of dry red wine, one with some earthy notes, aromas of black fruit, limited tannins and clear acidity. We enjoyed a glass of Pinot Noir from La Cour Des Dames. A very nice pinot noir with sufficient earthiness and dark fruit.

What You Need

Excellent Beef
Olive Oil
Black Pepper
For the Sauce
- Shallot
- Scallion
- Thyme
- Rosemary
- One Clove of Crushed Black Garlic
- Teaspoon of Tomato Purée
- Ten Black Olives
- Vegetable Stock
- Teaspoon of Mustard

What You Do

The beef must be at room temperature. Halve the olives. Slice the scallion in 1-cm or 1-inch chunks. Finely chop the thyme and the rosemary. Coarsely chop the shallot. Heat a heavy iron skillet and quickly fry the meat. Transfer and keep warm. Reduce heat and gently fry the shallot. Add scallion, thyme, rosemary and black garlic. Add some vegetable stock. Combine with tomato purée and mustard until it’s a velvety sauce. The black garlic should be dissolved. Add more stock if necessary. Add liquid from the meat. Thinly slice the beef, add some black pepper and serve with the sauce.

RecipeTin Eats – Dinner

13 June 2024

Recently we reviewed RecipeTin Eats Cookbook: Dinner by Nagi Maehashi as part of the cookbook review project by Bernadette. It is a beautifully designed book with lots of great pictures. It is also a very positive and inviting book. In 2023 it was awarded Australian Book of the Year and it made the New York Times Best Sellers list. Nagi’s very popular website offers over three hundred recipes and videos. She has over one million followers on Instagram. Her philosophy on food and cooking is based on four principles: fast, creative, clever and fresh. And cost conscious as well!

Nagi also runs a food bank, RecipeTin Meals, where she and her team (including three full time chefs) make homemade meals which are donated to the vulnerable.

RecipeTin Eats Cookbook: Dinner contains not only over 150 recipes, but also recipes for basic sauces, stock, bread, a glossary and a table with internal cooked temperatures. All very helpful. Not so helpful are the indexes (don’t expect the obvious table of content) and the way the recipes are grouped in the book. The recipe index for instance comes with categories such as everyday food and what I do with a piece of…. Perhaps a bit too creative?

Every recipe in the book has a QR-code. Scan it and you have a helpful video guiding you through the recipe.

RecipeTin Eats Cookbook is a cookbook with lots of international dishes such as Beef Wellington, Mussels in White Wine, Sauce Bolognese and Chilli Con Carne; no recipes with kangaroo or ostrich.
We decided to make three dishes from the book, a salad with an Asian touch, a Moroccan dish with chicken and a blueberry tart with an almond filling. Our esteemed panel (André, Carolien, Hans, Joke, Martine and Rutger) was happy to join us on a sunny evening in May and talk about the three dishes. And the wine, of course!

Prawn Salad with Coconut Lime Dressing ©cadwu

We decided to make a Prawn Salad with Coconut Lime dressing because of the dressing. We expected the combination of Chinese Cabbage (or wombok in Australia), coconut, mint, cilantro and prawns to be tasty and refreshing.We served the dish with a glass of Pinot Grigio produced by Corte Vittorio.

A fresh and easy to drink wine with aromas of citrus and green apple. In general, you’re looking for a light white wine with pleasant acidity and fresh aromas. The panel was unanimous: refreshing, lots of flavours that go together very well, great colours, new flavours, love the way the apple combines with the cabbage, great on a summer evening, would like to make this myself, could I have the recipe?

One Tray Moroccan Baked Chicken with Chickpeas ©cadwu

The One Tray Moroccan Baked Chicken with Chickpeas comes with lots of flavours, baharat being one of them. A spice blend unknown to us. Fortunately, we could find it at our Turkish supermarket. Think cinnamon, cumin, nutmeg, ginger. The chicken is marinated for 24 hours in a mixture of lemon juice, oil and baharat.

It is then fried in the oven with chickpeas (coated with ginger and turmeric), fennel and tomatoes. We served the Moroccan chicken with excellent crusted bread and a glass of full-bodied Italian red wine, produced by Stefano Accordini. The wine is made from 90% Corvina Veronese and 10% Merlot grapes. It aged for four months in oak barrels, which adds to the warmth and flavours of the wine. A very affordable wine with aromas of blackberry, plum and chocolate. In general, you’re looking for a full bodied, rich red wine that goes very well with flavours like nutmeg, cumin and cinnamon.

The panel liked the presentation, the colours, the aromas and the preparation of the chickpeas in the oven. The flavours were nice, but a bit bland. It could have done with more spices. Although the chicken marinated in the refrigerator for 24 hours, the flavours of the baharat were not really present in the meat.

Blueberry Tart with Almond Filling ©cadwu

Dessert was Blueberry Tart with Almond Filling. The heading of the recipe says prep time 45 minutes, 4 hours of cooling and chilling, 1 hour cook time. Sounds doable? In reality it’s a bit more work.
The dough needs to be made, cooled, fitted in the tin, transferred to the freezer, in to the
oven, baked blind,

cooled and then filled with an almond cream that must be mixed, cooled, added to the tin, topped with blueberries, baked, topped with more blueberries and baked for another 20 to 25 minutes. Still there?
The idea of freezing the dough in the tin was great because it allowed us to do this step a few days earlier.

The panel liked the tart, the moist filling, well balanced, not too sweet, great crust and the combination of almond and blueberry was very tasty.

All three recipes required some adjustment: when we tasted the salad before serving it, we found the dressing needed extra mint and fish sauce. We also added more berries to the tart.

Should this book be on your shelf? The panel feels it’s a great, colourful, well-designed cookbook but that the number of recipes that are new or bring something specific (like the salad and the chicken we prepared) is rather limited. We would have liked to see more of Nagi, and perhaps of Australia, in the choice of recipes. One member of the panel decided to buy RecipeTin Eats Cookbook: Dinner, given the idea that if you would prepare one of Nagi’s recipes per week you would be sure to have at least one fast, tasty, colourful and creative meal per week. Very true!

RecipeTin Eats Cookbook: Dinner by Nagi Maehashi is available via your local bookstore or the well-known channels for approximately 30 euros or 30 US$. Prices may differ.