Cauliflower Soup

Cream of anything soup sounds pretty daggy- like something that should come out of a packet.

This is a very simple and quick recipe and a great way to use up one of our favourite vegetables.  When we tried to get our daughter to taste the "cauliflower" recently she tried to sniff it, as if it were a flower. I thought this was very abstract of her! Unfortunately, she still refuses to eat any.

Cream of Cauliflower Soup:

25g Butter
1 1/2 tbs olive oil
2 brown onions, finely chopped
1/2 head of cauliflower, chopped
1 1/2 cups chicken stock
1 cup full cream milk
1/4 cup cream

Melt butter and olive oil together. Add the onions and cook gently for 2 minutes (don't let them brown up). Add the cauliflowe and fry for a further couple of minutes.

Add the stock and milk and bring to the boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 15 minutes. Puree the mixture in a blender or with a stick blender. Return to the pot and add the cream. Season with salt and pepper.

We added some crusty garlic bread to satisfy our carb cravings.

Poached Quinces

It is a tragedy that we have gotten to the 2nd last day of Autumn before posting this! Quinces have such a unique taste but are only in the shops for a short time of the year. Last year our neighbours dropped off 2 large bags of quinces from their trees, which we used to make quince paste. It seems this year they have acquired a taste for them, because they dropped off no bags.


To make poached quinces (use about 4-6 medium sized quinces):

Peel and core the quinces. Keep the peel and offcuts with the seeds- place these in a kitchen chux and tie it up with string.

Quarter the qinces and place in a large pot. Cover with water and add about 1 cup of sugar.

Add a stick of cinnamon and 6 whole cloves. Add the chux with the seeds and peel to the water too.

Simmer at very low heat for a very long time. Cooking the quinces very slowly and the inclusion of the peel and seeds helps the quince change colour from yellow to a deep golden red colour. We cooked ours over about 3 hours at a very gentle heat, stirring occasionally.

Serve with some syrup and custard!

Dried Apples

Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall had this to say about Autumn apples: "There are culinary compensations for cooler days and darker evenings, not least the abundance of apples and pears. Raw but ripe, they beg to be munched, sucked, crunched and slurped. And when we've had our fill of the naked fruit, baked, poached, puréed and sautéed. And there's always time to toss some into a pie or crumble."

The pink lady apples we have picked from our own tree are not only sweeter than those bland  apples that can be bought all year round, but they have the most amazing crunch!

We have made quite a few apples dishes this Autumn. These dried apples are always a good way to use up excess. We now dry them in the oven, because when we tried baking them in the sun our daughter found the trays and took a bite out of every single one.

To dry the apples, wash and clean them well. You can peel them if you like (we didn't).

Core them and slice into thin rings (best thickness is about 3-5mm).

Cover a baking tray with al-foil and lay out the apple. Place in a pre-heated oven at 100 degrees Celsius.

Cook for an hour, then leave to cool in the oven overnight. If they are not dried enough repeat this process the following day (and again the following day).

They are supposed to last quite a few weeks in an airtight container, but they are always gone within a few days in our house, so we can't verify this!

Sri Lankan Pumpkin and Cashew Curry

Pumpkins are insanely cheap and great at the moment. We used one of our home grown butternut pumpkins, which was probably picked a bit early, as it wasn't as sweet as we would've liked. We have a similar recipe for a broad bean curry, and you could probably subsitute just about any vegetable you like.

Sri Lankan Pumpkin and Cashew Curry:

450g pumpkin

1 small onion, finely chopped

2 garlic cloves, finely chopped

3 green chillies (deseeded and finely chopped)

½ cup raw cashews

8 curry leaves

½ tsp fenugreek seeks

½ tsp turmeric

350mL can coconut milk

1 tsp salt1 tsp black mustard seeds

Squeeze of lemon juice

Cut the pumpkin flesh into 2.5cm cubes and place in a large saucepan with all the remaining ingredients except the lemon and mustard seeds.

Bring to the boil then simmer gently for about 15 minutes, until the pumpkin is just tender.

Grind the mustard seeds in a mortar then mix into the curry. Simmer for a further 5 minutes. Add a squeeze of lemon juice just prior to serving.

Jerusalem Artichoke Soup

The flowers and stems on the Jeresalem artichokes have now died off, which means the crazy potato-like/ artichoke like vegetable is ready to pick and eat.

They look like this after you pull them out of the ground and you just have to scrub the skin to clean them.

We cooked up this lovely Jerusalem Artichoke Soup with Horseradish Quenelles. It's from a cookbook of ours called Saturday and Sundays which is full of beautiful recipes and pretentious ways to enjoy them (e.g. light supper after the opera, slow brunch whilst sailing). It was suggested you might enjoy this soup as a supper with a game of backgammon! But beware the impact of a huge amount of jerusalem artichokes on your belly!

The quenelles are a bit involved, but are a nice addition to the soup.

Jerusalem Artichoke Soup with Horseradish Quenelles:

For the quenelles:
2 egg yolks
1 tbs of melted butter 
1/4 cup creamed cottage cheese
1 tbs horseradish sauce
1/4 cup fresh white breadcrumbs
finely grated rind of 1/2 lemon
1/4 cup chopped chives

For the soup:
500g Jerusalem artichokes scrubbed
1/4 cup lemon juice
1 tsp salt
300mL cream
1 tbs butter
4 tomatoes, peeled and chopped
1 clove of garlic
Parsley to garnish

Slice the artichokes thickly and add to a saucepan with the lemon juice, salt and enough cold water just to cover. Bring to the boil and simmer until tender (15-20 minutes). Drain and cool.
Meanwhile, melt the butter in a saucepan- add the tomato and garlic and cook gently until the tomato has broken up. Puree with the artichokes and cream. Add extra boiling water if the texture is too thick.


To make the quenelles, whisk the egg yolks with melted butter until frothy; stir in remaining ingredients. 
Heat 5cm water until simmering in a deep frypan. Shape quenelle mixture using 2 tablespoons and gently lower into the water. Cook for about 10 minutes.

Serve soup with cooked quenelles and garnish with parsley.

Spicy Pork Noodles with Cucumber

This is like an Asian spaghetti bolognaise. We discovered a dish similar to this at China Bar, and used to eat there just for this. Then we found 2 recipes that I have copied into my recipe book. Every time we make it we can't remember exactly which recipe we used last time, so the end result is always slightly different.

Here's one recipe (hopefully the best one!)
 

Sauce:

2 TBS brown bean sauce

1 TBS Hoisin Sauce

1 TBS Shaoxing wine

1 ½ cups chicken stock

Pork:

80mL vegetable oil

5 spring onions chopped (green and white parts separated)

2 cloves of garlic

300g minced pork

500g fresh noodles

1 Lebanese cucumber, julienned

Mix all sauce ingredients together.

Fry the onion (whites) and garlic in oil for 30 seconds, then add the minced pork. Fry until brown.

Add the sauce mixture. Simmer for 5-10 minutes until the sauce thickens. 

Season to taste with 1-2 tsp white sugar.

Cook the noodles in boiling water according to the packet instructions. 

Just before serving stir through the green parts of the spring onions and serve over noodles with cucumber.