A simple pasta supper

Here is something that you start cooking and then leave for a bit while you get on with other far more interesting things. It's the sort of dinner that you could present in generous bowlfuls to a household, but it offers succour to a famished singelton, too.


It's just pasta and roasted peppers. Make that spaghetti or linguine, actually. If I tell you what I had on my own last night, just scale up accordingly.


Heat your oven to 200 or so and, while it's coming to temperature, get three big fat peppers -- yellow, red and green. I used half of each one, deseeded and cut into large chunks. They went into a wide oven dish with six cloves of garlic, peeled but not chopped, and two medium onions, again cut into good-sized chunks. Add a sprinkle of chilli flakes --or a whole red or green chilli, chopped; deseeded if you must. Now chuck in a couple of tablespoons of olive oil, add some sea salt and plenty of freshly ground pepper, mix it around well  and put this in the oven to roast. It should take about half an hour, with perhaps just one toss from you -- but this isn't essential. The point is that the vegetables are to be sweet and caramelising at the edges. You may want to give them a little more time in the oven.


Now, allow time for some spaghetti to cook in lots of salted water. You know how much spaghetti (or linguine) you'll want to eat. I gather that, per person, it's supposed to be a bunch of strands enough to  fill the 'o' made by your forefinger and thumb. BUT I tend to expand on that a bit!


Hopefully, you'll have timed it so that your roasted vegetables are perfection just as your spaghetti is, but you CAN always put the vegetables to one side and let them re-heat a little later by giving them a good toss with the piping hot spaghetti. Then here's what you do: just drain your spaghetti and then add the vegetables, plus any juices from the roasting dish and don't forget to scrape in any crutsy little pieces from the dish, too. Mix it up well, taste for seasoning, add some roughly-chopped fresh parsley if you like and plus a generous grating of fresh parmesan. Or shavings of the same: use a mandoline.

That's it. Serve with a good glass of wine. I had some Merlot and it was, all in, a pretty satisfying supper. And, do you know, I ate this in my sitting room with the door open in the early evening with the cool autumn air coming in. Here's my sitting room, a little dark. No hall? No: it's a cottage and you learn to set upon muddy feet with eagle eyes.

An unsuccessful attempt to introduce a new ingredient: Karela.

Right: I love bitter foods. Love them all. Since I first had karela, the knobbled bitter gourd, in Sindh Province, Pakistan, eleven years ago, I have been hooked.It's a funny-looking thing, the karela. The size of a medium courgette, it is dark green and with a lot of warts! And man, it IS bitter. But, in hot countries, this bitterness, with heat and salt, is comforting and cooling and I like it in damp Blighty, too.

Oh, while I'm at it, here's a link to my catering company. It does Indian food. This is really my hobby, you know www.calcuttascarlet.com

You can get Karela fresh (well, ish) in Asian markets, in cans (though I'm not keen) and, I have discovered,in the frozen foods section in Tesco. (Whence I buy fozen okra and fenugreek greens, by the way.) So try what follows. I've said it was unsuccessful in that I have always failed to get the Georgian husband to eat it. But hey, what do you expect from a man raised on grits. (No -- don't get cross: I love grits, too.)

To make an exceptional lamb keema with karela, try this.

Take about 450g minced lamb.
Also, two small onions. Now do this: chop the onions finely and sweat them in oil unitl they are golden brown. Then add a tablespoon of ground coriander and the same of ground cumin, a teaspoon of red chilli flakes and, perhaps. a dessertspoon of turmeric. Mix carefully and fry together for a couple of minutes. Now, add the lamb, turning it around carefully in the spices. You could also fry off the lamb in a separate pan to make sure it is properly browned. I would then add two large handfuls of karela, add a little water, some salt and pepper and bring to a high heat, then down to a simmer for twenty minutes before adding a good handful of fresh, chopped coriander.Check for seasoning and serve with rice. You may want to add a much more complex list of spices and flavourings: say, three cloves of chopped garlic in with the onion; a large piece of finely-chopped ginger; a dessertspoon of brown mustard seeds; a tablespoon of garam masala in at the end....Experiment, but do not overdo. एक्सपेरिमेंट बुत दो नोट ओवर दो!

Now, look at this lovely thali dish of mine, below. Here we have, from top left, clockwise:
ginger root
green cardamom
dried curry leaves
fennel seeds
masoor dal (red lentils)
black peppercorns
turmeric
kalonji (aka onion seed, or nigella)
whole cloves
cinnamon quills
red chillies
fenugreek seeds
cumin seeds


If you want to get yourself some stainless steel dishes like these --with or without the katori, the little dishes that can sit in your thali, if you like, nip ovet to this site, of which I have long been a great fan: www.spicesofindia.com

• Really, this curry, above, is a variation on keema mattar (minced meat with peas). I adore the hit of the bitter gourd with the savoury lamb mince. I might also like to increase the amount of chilli I use. I do sometimes stuff  karela, too, but as what I write here is often the shape of family meals down our way, it tends not to be often. I noticed that the Georgian husband had removed the slices of karela from his keema. Does he not know it's supposed to be a tonic and good for thinning your blood?
  

Tonight Lucullus is dining with Lucullus...

I am coming down with flu! Hoorah! One big glass of Merlot and here is a little dinner for any poorly folk out there. Actually, this makes frequent appearances at various meals for me.

SARDINES ON TOAST

Now, I have recently stockpiled on sardines. They were 35p a can (in sunflower oil) in Lidl*. When I am unwell, when things feel a little out of control or when I am heavily pregnant, I tend to do a bit of stockpiling. You know: tinned tomatoes and the like. But these sardines, I must say, are excellent and here is what I did with them.

Take some sturdy bread -- white or brown, as you like. This will also, I have found, work quite well with white pitta bread. Get your grill good and hot and then toast your bread under it, briefly, on both sides. Now, take it out and pile on the sardines. I don't usually even bother to remove the oil because I like it to drip luxuriantly from the toast a little later on. Spread the sardines out evenly across the toast, pressing them down a little and add LOTS of freshly ground black pepper and, if you like, just a little sea salt. Now, blitz your sardines on toast under a hot grill until the edges of your toast have just started to char. Eat straight away, possibly with a tea towel to hand and definitely alone if this is a new relationship. Actually, I tend to eat this alone and I've been married for about 300 years. I tend to eat it like a cormorant devouring the best fish he's ever seen. And by the way: you toast the bread lightly first so that's it's a bit more robust for the topping and won't collapse as you eat it. With your hands.

Ooh, the joys of Lidl. I am particulary fond of the "wellness" range (e,g, the breakfast wellness flakes) and the "recycling toilet paper." I realise that this makes me sound as if I am making fun of Europeans just because I am not one and they speak a bit funny.**

**I'm joking.

A speedy dinner with a nip in the air.

By late summer, I am always glad for the cold breath of air in the morning followed by a warm day. Autumn food is some of my favourite and I love the smell in the air at this time of year. I get excited about this season in a way I just don't about summer. But enough: I expect you are hungry, so here is what we had for dinner last night.

EGG AND CHIPS TO THE POWER OF TEN

First, take some potatoes -- however they come. Don't bother to peel them, but cut them into fork-sized chunks. Put them into an oven dish with plenty of cloves of unpeeled garlic, a teaspoon or so of crushed red chilli flakes, some freshly ground black pepper and a good pinch of sea salt. Add a splash of sunflower oil and put them into a hot oven to cook until they are crisp and possibly even stuck to the dish. You could, I suppose, give them a good shake after about twenty five minutes.

Now, when you your potatoes are done, just fry as many eggs as you think you will eat. Try not to break the yolk. Now, eat your hot, crisp potatoes with the fried eggs, the yolk running through the crisp bits, the floury exploded bits and the little crunchy pieces of chilli mixed together with the salt and pepper. Squeeze out the cloves of garlic as you go -- or just much them whole, as I do.

Really, it's almost egg and chips. Well, egg and chips to the power of ten. I think you'll like it.

Feeling tired: a day of two breakfasts plus a banana.

Tomorrow, your recipes start in earnest, but for today, here's a tale of two breakfasts.

When I am exhausted, these things happen.

Breakfast one: 8 a.m. two slices of wholemeal toast, liberally buttered and with the insides of two large soft boiled free range eggs piled onto them. Salt and pepper. Banana on the school run. I have never ever been in love with bananas but -- I kid you not-- I swear they keep me calm.

Breakfast two at a local eating establishment, bought as treat by particularly wonderful girl, 9. 10 a.m. Four slices of granary bread, butter and a pot of marmalade plus an Americano. Lots of discussion: what to do about men, too many commitments.

And another banana, because I am doing a food talk tonight, I have dark circles under my eyes and I am a bit nervous.

x

Up and coming: autumn and winter!

Well, a lot of new writing will find its way to you this autumn and winter. And if you bought a copy of my book at Bradfood this weekend, thank you!
So, coming up:

Venison

Pheasants

Our Thanksgiving dinner

Apple dumplings

Blackberries

Halloween shenanigans

Pumpkins

What to eat on your own...

Bolstering food for cold weather

Think you don't like cabbage? Think again!

Advent, Christmas and maybe even an Epiphany feast.....

I love autumn.

Anna xxx
p.s. do you like our jack lanterns?