Time on your hands … cheap & cheerful

I'm keeping an eye on the contents of my freezer, making sure I use everything in there. Yesterday I took out minced steak, ready to morph into something good today.

Keep the same eye on the perishable veggies in your fridge too!

This morning I made a Spie base – well a Cottage pie base actually – I'm stating the obvious I know that a Shepherds Pie is made from minced lamb and a Cottage from minced beef. It's just me being lazy, the truth of the matter is when I'm boxing meals and labelling ready to freeze I get writer's cramp from a full title x four so “Spie” is a catch-all term identifying the ready-meal!

My “Spie” base is ready to top with leftover mashed potato from last night's supper. In my fridge I found a bag of grated cheese and the remains of a box of bacon bits so it's ready to assemble!

Here are the photos :

individual foil trays are ideal for

portion control

stacked and ready for the oven

from the oven – meaty, mash, then cheesey and

topped with crispy bacon bits

ready to eat!

Next up … variations on the Spie theme

Time on your hands … what to do …

… with that jar of preserved lemons and black olives! This recipe is a Middle Eastern “hat tipping” to the wonderful tagine, cooked in stages for convenience. You could slow cook the dish altogether if that's better for you so – Plan A or Plan B!

Chicken and Preserved Lemon Tagine

Serves 4

2 tbsp of olive oil – or rapeseed

125g diced chorizo - 225g

1 medium onion, peeled and finely chopped

sweet baby peppers, de-seeded and finely sliced

30ml – 2tbsp preserved lemons – rinsed and

chopped

400g passata

60ml medium white wine

500ml chicken stock

black olives

2 cloves of roasted garlic or 2 cloves

peeled and finely chopped

15ml sweet paprika

salt and black pepper

4 medium chicken breasts

Plan A

Heat the olive oil in a large frying pan and gently fry the garlic paste, onion and paprika until soft – 10 minutes. Add the chorizo and fry until crispy. Add the wine and simmer until reduced – 5 minutes. Add the passata, stock and slow cooked chicken breasts and simmer gently, lid off, for about 20 minutes.

Add the olives and preserved lemons and season well – taste and adjust!

I'd slow cook the chicken breasts the day before required, using the 500ml of chicken stock in the recipe and then set them aside to cool, box and fridge. You can make the “sauce” when it suits you too. Complete your “tagine” adding the chicken breasts to the sauce and finish off as above, heating through gently on the stove.

Plan B

You could slow cook this recipe all together, completing the dish with the olives and preserved lemons either as you're re-heating or for the last 10 minutes of cooking time if serving straight from the slow cooker. If you're using this method then I'd slow cook for three hours. If you prefer your chorizo crispy I'd leave the chorizo until the last 20 minutes of slow cooking time then fry until crispy and add, with the oil, to your tagine, together with the preserved lemons and olives.

If you'd like a veggie version, use Quorn fillets.

What to serve with?

Keep it simple - new potatoes – boiled or steamed and or even roasted in their skins. Mange tout – sliced lengthways and stir fried.

Yum – now back to the cheap & cheerful!

Time on your hands … the extra bits for the Gateau a l'Orange

This cake is moist – moist is good but, to use the northern vernacular, it can be “claggy”. I would, and do, make extra “drizzle” to serve with a lemon drizzle cake – here's an orange version that is perfect to serve with the Gateau a l'Orange.

Orange Drizzle

200g icing sugar

250ml orange juice – no bits

Put the sugar and orange juice in a small saucepan and heat gently so that the sugar dissolves. Bring to the boil and then reduce the heat and simmer on a low heat for 10 minutes.

P.s. I love what we always referred to as “useless bits of information”. I've only ever heard the word “claggy” in the North West of the UK. To set the record straight it means “sticky” and apparently is Scandinavian in origin – you live and learn!

This cake is also large – I love large cakes – this version freezes perfectly, as does the drizzle. Cut into quarters, wrap in foil and freeze what you don't use for another day!

My final suggestion is to serve your cake with the drizzle and vanilla ice cream. Last week I used up a large pot of double cream, added vanilla bean paste and a tin of condensed milk from my store cupboard and made a batch of vanilla ice cream.

Vanilla ice cream

Prep – 5 minutes

Total time – 5 minutes

plus freezing at least 6-8 hours

or until firm

Gives you 1.6 litres of ice cream is equal

to 18 scoops

1 x 397g tin sweetened condensed milk

1 x 600ml double cream

2tsp vanilla bean paste

Put the condensed milk, cream and vanilla into a large mixing bowl and beat with an electric hand whisk until the mixture is quite thick and stiff, like pipeable whipped cream. Spoon the mixture into a lidded freezer-proof container

(or use smaller containers if more convenient)

and freeze for at least 6-8 hours or until firm.

Three elements – the cake, the drizzle and the ice cream. If you can't be bothered to make the ice cream then serve with a spoonful of clotted cream. Alternatively serve the cake warm with custard – it's whatever floats your boat!

If you'd like to see a photo guide for the cake, check out the Oranges label 6th May 2018.

Back to store cupboard stuff and something special.

Time on your hands … have you ever noticed

… when you get the urge and have the time to bake a cake … you can't get an essential ingredient like flour!

Here's my answer – bake a cake without.

The following recipe is already on the blog – I make no apologies for repeating it – it's delicious and there are extra bits too.

Gateau a l'Orange

(Orange Cake)

Serves 12

2 medium oranges, preferably naval

6 large eggs

250g sugar

2 tbsp orange blossom water

1 tsp baking powder

250g ground almonds

Wash the oranges and boil them whole for 1 – 1½ hours or until they are very soft, or see below for a quicker method.

Beat the eggs with the sugar. Add the orange blossom water, baking powder and almonds and mix well. *Cut open the oranges, remove the pips and purée in a food processor. Mix thoroughly with the egg and almond mixture and pour into a 23cm cake tin – lined with baking parchment, preferably non-stick and with a removable base. Bake in a pre-heated oven 170fan/190c/Gas 5 for an hour. Let it cool before turning out.

Believe me when I say that I stared at this recipe for years. What put me off baking this cake was the boiling of the oranges for the time allotted, an hour and a half is too long for me watching oranges and it's so easy to become distracted - before you know it you have a burnt saucepan and the rest, as they say, is history.

Where there's a will there's a way - instead of boiling the oranges, microwave them for 8 minutes on high.

Pierce the oranges with a paring knife – carefully and microwave for 4 minutes then turn and repeat. Make sure your fruits are in a covered vented microwave container. Continue with the recipe marked * as above.

A useful tip. Microwave the oranges ahead of making the cake so that they can cool, it will be much easier and safer to prep them, ready to pulverise.

Extra bits up next …

Time on your hands – time to think outside the box – or actually inside your store cupboard

Up to now we've rummaged in the freezer and in the fridge too, now for the store cupboard or pantry if you prefer.

Do you have a store cupboard or is it a cupboard for stuffing random purchases that seemed like a bargain at the time? Do you know what's buried at the back? You know what's coming next – time to sort it out! It's no good relying on a store cupboard if you don't know what's in it.

If you have a reasonably well stocked store cupboard then you'll be able to plan your meals more easily, it will save you time and money. My pantry is one extreme to another, from the usual staples - tuna, small chunk Branston, tomato paste, stock pots, cornflour, passata, suet Worcestershire Sauce, noodles and orzo – to name but a few - to what some may call the more “out of the ordinary” ingredients, a small tin or jar of black olives, a small jar of capers, Grapeseed oil for stick blender mayo and lets not forget the preserved lemons!

I've had a lot of practice planning meals. Three hours a day commuting to London every day before the advent of home delivery shopping taught me that life was too short to wing it. I planned weekly meals on the train and then made my shopping list. The earlier I made my weekly plan the better – it gave me an opportunity to check my store cupboard for the bits and pieces I'd forget about – you know seasoning, stock pots, condiments blah, blah. I gained valuable weekend time, was definitely less stressed and saved dosh too!

I can hear you saying so what?! If you're taking this current situation seriously then you won't be going shopping every day, you'll be staying at home as much as possible. It matters not whether you have to go out to shop or whether you have a home delivery – you still need to be organised.

Bear in mind too that now we're pretty much confined to barracks we won't need the volume of food (or calories if you like) that we've been used to when more active. Good luck telling your brain! If you want help balancing your diet and would like more information you can download the Eatwell Guide – GOV.UK which gives you chapter and verse on recommended portions.

Coming soon, a recipe using ingredients from my pantry that doesn't include a tin of tuna, but just before we continue with the something special and the cheap & cheerful ideas, I'm interrupting myself with a cake you can bake!

Time on your hands - a variation on a theme …

Most of us have tuna in our store cupboard – are you bored by the same old tuna pasta bake?

I've used the following recipe for years and it never fails. I have used it as a canapé to serve with drinks and known friends who “don't like fish” inhale them. They are also great as a snack or with other stuff for a weekend “picky bits” grazing style supper.

Here it is :

Tuna and Parsley rolls

200g/7oz tin tuna in oil

1 onion, chopped

100g/4oz cheddar cheese, grated

2 tbsp chopped flat leaf parsley

salt and black pepper

1 tsp wholegrain mustard

1 puff pastry sheet

1 egg, beaten

1 tbsp poppy seeds

or Nigella seeds, see below

Pre-heat oven 180fan/200c/Gas 6

Drain the tuna, reserving 1 tbsp of the oil. Pour the oil into a pan and cook the onion for 5 minutes until softened. Remove from the heat and stir in the tuna, cheese, parsley, seasoning and mustard until well combined. Allow to cool.

Roll out your pastry sheet and cut in half lengthways.

Divide the filling between the two rectangles, laying it in strips down the centre of the pastry.

Brush one edge with beaten egg and carefully roll up to create two long tubes. Cut each into 12 rolls. Brush with egg and put on a baking tray. Sprinkle over poppy seeds and bake for 15-20 minutes. Serve hot or cold.

You can make these rolls as large or small as you like, they don't have to be bite sized.

If you wanted an alternative to poppy seeds use Nigella seeds instead, also known as Black Cumin they have a delicious onion flavour and work well with this recipe.

This is an economical, easy but most of all tasty recipe and makes use of your store cupboard. If you're able to buy a puff pastry sheet, that's great – it's difficult to predict what will be wiped off the shelves at any given time. The fact that the sheet is a perfect emergency freezer item makes me think they may be as rare as hens' teeth – good luck and if you can't buy a sheet make your own.

Since none of us can guarantee what ingredients we're able to buy I'm going for both ends of the scale – something special and more cheap and cheerful ideas too – the common denominator - they use store cupboard items or ingredients you may have in your freezer … watch this space!

Time on your hands - the photo guide for the Tiddy ...

… made from leftovers taken from my freezer

the filling – finely diced

the baking sheet, lined and “glued” with parchment

and one strip of pastry

the filling in the middle of both strips of pastry

the pastry brought up to glue to the filling

freshly baked from the oven

bite sized pieces

a tasty morsel!

If you like the idea of the Tiddy, there's another variation using your store cupboard up next.