Tag Archives: one pot wonder

April 3, 2020

Time for Chickpeas

This is a recipe from the ‘live to be one hundred’ collection. Revithnos is a chickpea soup from Sifnos in Greece. It’s cooked slowly using just a few key ingredients – chickpeas, onion, olive oil, lemon and bay leaves. The slow cooking makes the chickpeas velvety soft in an emulsion of olive oil and onion which is brightened up with a squeeze of lemon juice. I seldom cook this dish as it takes a long time to cook but time is something we have plenty of at the moment. Although don’t confuse taking time with having to do a lot as after the initial cooking of the onions and bringing everything to the boil this more or less looks after itself.

Today’s revithnos did take a long time, especially as our Irish bought chickpeas must have been sitting in a warehouse for months if not years. I soaked them for 48 hours then cooked then for five hours by which time we were hungry and the dish was not ready so we resorted to blasting them in the pressure cooker for 10 minutes. They were good, softer would have been better but our appetites got in the way of culinary excellence. Next time I will seek out fatter and younger chickpeas but I still love the simplicity of this dish and even old chickpeas make a richly satisfying one pot wonder

Here’s the recipe although the cooking times are variable and it’s also possible to cook this entirely stovetop – or blast it in the pressure cooker if your hunger gets the better of you.

Revithnos – Chickpea Soup

350g chickpeas

150mls olive oil

2 large onions

2-4 cloves garlic

1 -2 bay leaves

big strip of orange peel – skin only

lemon juice

salt and pepper

water

a handful of parsley

Soak the chickpeas over night then drain well.

Peel the onions and garlic and chop finely.

Put the olive oil into a heavy pot and heat gently. Add the chopped onion and cook until the onions melt down but don’t let them brown. Stir in the chopped garlic and cook for a further two minutes then add the chickpeas , orange peeland bay leaf. Stir everything together for a few minutes then add enough water to cover everything by 2-3cm. Bring to the boil, reduce to a low simmer and cover with a tight fitting lid. Cook for one to one and a half hours or until the chickpeas are soft.

Stir in the juice of a lemon , add a little more water if it looks like it’s getting dry and season with a little salt. Pop the pot into a low oven , 150c, oven for an hour.

Serve with a little chopped parsley.

Leave a comment | tags: chickpeas, gluten free, one pot wonder, vegan, vegetarian | posted in beans, chickpea, dairy free, General foodie news, Greek, One pot wonders, Sifnos, Greece, soup

May 2, 2019

Tagliatelle with Asparagus and Shiitake Mushrooms

By lettercollumkitchenproject

I’m just about all ‘kaled’ out. We have eaten some amount of kale and spinach in the last six weeks and I am almost happy to see the plants bolt. We will miss them but the new baby salad leaves and rocket are much more exciting.

There’s not much else ready to pick in the garden at this time of the year unless you are lucky enough to have an asparagus patch. We don’t. I tried to grow asparagus some years back but eventually lost patience and pulled it all up. There never seemed to be enough for dinner, just the odd alien popping up here and there but not enough for a bunch.

Luckily there are successful asparagus growers in West Cork and now is the time to grab a bunch before it’s moment of glory passes and there’s another years wait.

This recipe is a kind of vegetable carbonara, a bit of an oxymoran as any self-respecting Italian will tell you that carbonara only has four ingredients – eggs, pancetta, pecorino or parmesan and spaghetti but as with all recipes tweaking can produce great results.

I have used asparagus and locally grown shiitake mushrooms. Shiitake mushrooms are feather light when fresh but become meaty and super tasty when cooked. Any long wiggly pasta will work for this recipe. If you get your timing right this dish can be cooked in the time that it takes to cook your pasta

Tagliatelle with Asparagus and Shiitake Mushrooms

Serves 2

1 small onion

7-8 stems asparagus

100g shiitake mushrooms

50g butter

50mls olive oil

2egg yolks

4tbs cream

50g grated parmesan or pecorino

250g tagliatelle/spaghetti/linguine

salt and cracked black pepper

Put a large saucepan of water on to boil, ready to cook the pasta

Peel and finely chop the onion

Snap the tough end from the asparagus and discard or put aside to make soup. Chop the rest of the asparagus in 3-4cm pieces

Slice the shiitake mushrooms.

In a small bowl mix the egg yolks, cream and grated cheese.

The vegetables are going to take roughly eight minutes to cook so now is the moment to decide when to add your pasta to the boiling water. Read the packet, add a large spoonful of salt to the water and cook the pasta according to the instructions – the vegetables can spend a minute or two resting whilst the pasta finishes cooking if needed

Heat a large frying pan or skillet and add the olive oil. When the pan is hot add the asparagus and cook for three to four minutes stirring every now and again. Season with salt and cracked black pepper and put aside. Next melt the butter in the pan and add chopped onion and the shiitake , mushrooms, cook on a high heat for three or four minutes, season with salt and cracked black pepper then put the asparagus back in.

Take the pan off the heat.

Before draining the pasta reserve a few spoonfuls of the cooking water.

Drain the pasta, add to the vegetables and the egg mix then toss together adding some of the reserved water to get a creamy dressing.

Eat immediately

Leave a comment | tags: asparagus, mushroom, one pot wonder, pasta, shiitake, vegetarian | posted in asparagus, General foodie news, italian, mushroom, One pot wonders, pasta, vegetarian, Vegetarian Recipes

December 30, 2018

Fatty Chickpeas

By lettercollumkitchenproject

I have had a packet of dried chickpeas in my pantry for months. A packet that i carried all the way home from Spain but never got around to cooking. Mostly because I forgot to soak them. They are big chickpeas – bigger than the ones we can buy in Ireland by far – I’d say double in size and delicious when cooked. It may sound mad to get excited about chickpeas but soaked overnight and cooked for 30 minutes they are ready to go, unctuous and creamy, which is quite something. The one’s we buy locally take three or four times as long to cook and are like little bullets.

It’s still the holiday season here and we have been valiantly making our way through our veg box which together with the pre-cooked chickpeas offered numerous possibilities for dinner. The winning dish was also a lazy dish. It didn’t take very much effort, more the availability to give the odd stir.

Take time sautéing the veg, they will become sweet and more flavoursome.

Chickpea Supper Pot with Almond and Basil Picada

1 onion – peeled and chopped

100mls olive oil

1 carrot – peeled and diced

1 small bulb fennel- sliced into skinny wedges

2 stems celery – diced

3 cloves garlic- peeled and chopped

2 ripe fat tomatoes or 1 can tomatoes – chopped

1 glass white wine (optional)

200mls chickpea liquor or water

2 bay leaves

a handful of parsley

salt and pepper

Heat a frying pan or skillet. Add the olive oil and the chopped onions, give them a stir and when they are sizzling season with a little salt. Stir in the fennel, celery, bay leaf and carrots, give a stir and when the veg are all sizzling season with a little salt then turn the heat to medium/low. Cook, stirring now and then, gently sizzling for ten minutes. Add the chopped garlic then continue cooking for five minutes.

Add the chopped tomatoes and white wine, bring to the boil then turn to a simmer for ten minutes

Stir in the chickpeas and cook for a further ten minutes. Add a little chickpea cooking liquor or water if needed. Season with salt and pepper. Stir in the chopped parsley

We ate this with a little picada/pesto to drizzle over and crusty bread

Picada

1 small slice bread, crusts removed and cubed

olive oil

15-20 blanched almonds

1 clove garlic

small handful soft green herbs – I used basil but parsley or coriander would work too

salt

Heat a small pan, add enough olive oil to cover the bottom and the bread cubes, fry until they begin to go golden then add the almonds. Cook for another couple of minutes.

Putvthe bread/almond mix in a processor together with a clove of garlic then buzz to a crumb.

Add the herbs then drizzle in enough olive oil to make the cicada move. Season with a pinch of salt

2 Comments | tags: chickpeas, one pot wonder, tomato, vegan | posted in beans, chickpea, dairy free, General foodie news, gluten-free, One pot wonders, tomato, vegan, vegetarian

January 7, 2015

Lunch at the Jade Hotel

By lettercollumkitchenproject

We’re about two thirds of the way up Vietnam now, in Hue. The clouds are are deeper than Saigon. I really should do better research before we travel! It’s a much smaller city than Saigon, still lots of traffic but we are getting the hang of crossing the road.Basically no one really wants to run you over and they are masters of avoidance so you just take a deep breath and launch yourself into the traffic and hope no ones driving the wrong way as you can’t look in two directions at once. The traffic is 90% scooters and bikes.

We are staying in a little guest-house run by the sweetest people who offered to show us how to make a ‘family dinner’ so we headed off this morning on scooters to the market.

Off we zoomed and it began to rain. The market was busy. Lots of wet people and mountains of food. All sorts of fruit and vegetables, live fish hopping in the baskets, fresh prawns and squid and dodgy looking meat.

We gathered up lots of vegetables, fresh noodles and prawns and headed back to cook. We unpacked and cleaned up all the veg and set cooking in the mini kitchen. The kitchen was very small in every dimension and Con and I were like giants, nearly decapitating ourselves on the cooker hood on several occasions.