Red Pepper Chipotle Adobo

Still managing to hang on to a little of the home-made chipotle salsa from our mad half day Mexican course. Tommy Miers wonderful book and TV programme has only increased the growing interest in this simple peasant cuisine and I wanted to make sure that our recipes were as authentic as possible (without being too much of a pain to shop for). This sauce or relish is I think even better than our favourite Chipotle en Adobe from The Cool Chile Company and goes with anything from plain old avocado on toast to vegetables roasted in one of the exotic recardos from the Yucatan. You can buy fabulous dried chillies from a wide variety of online sources now - I got ours from MexGrocer. Don't worry, they look incredibly shrivelled when they arrive, but the flavour is wonderful!

Ingredients

2 dried chipotle chillies

3 dried ancho chillies

1 tbsp olive oil

½ onion, chopped

1 small red pepper, chopped

4 cloves garlic, sliced

3 tbsp tomato puree

½ tsp cinnamon

1 tsp ground cumin

2 tsp light muscovado sugar

2 tbsp white wine vinegar

200-250ml light vegetable stock

 Makes a good bowlful

First of all toast the dried chillies briefly in a small frying pan. Transfer to a large bowl and cover with boiling water. Leave for at least an hour (better and more reassuringly soft if you leave for 2 hours). Drain, de-seed and puree the flesh in a small blender, adding extra water in needed. (If you want the sauce really hot keep in some of the seeds too).

Then, sauté the onion and pepper in a medium sized pan until soft. Add the garlic and cook for another minute before adding the spices. Cook again for a minute and add the sugar and puree. After another minute or two add the vinegar, stock and pureed chillies. Simmer for 5 or 10 minutes to thicken and then blend. I left our salsa quite chunky but feel free to make it more like a smooth ketchup.

So easy, so addictive.

New Potato and Red Lentil Curry

I'm often asked for quick and easy supper dishes and I find one of the most simple... but tasty ..can be a curry. However I would say that the matching of the ingredients needs to have some thought and not just be a random compilation of what is hidding in your vegetable cupboard. I've been through a phase of butternut squash and chickpeas recently (with a touch of coconut) but this is my current favourite. It's not necessary to make your own paste from scratch - I generally favour Pataks. If you're going to use something processed it might as well be good quality and full of flavour.

Ingredients

1 medium onion, finely sliced

4 or 5 new potatoes cut into large chunks

2 carrots cut into chunks at least half that size

2 cloves garlic, sliced

1 tsp grated ginger

1 cup (about a small teacup) red lentils

1-2 tsp dried fenugreek leaves

2 tsp korma paste

500ml light vegetable stock

1/3 to ½ can of chopped tomatoes

Couple of handfuls of spinach

Serves 2-3 depending on appetite

Sauté the onion until soft and then add the potatoes and carrots, stir well and add the garlic and ginger and cook for another couple of minutes. Finally stir in the lentils and fenugreek leaves (these add a nice subtle edge - you could use curry leaves instead).

Add the curry paste and make sure it coats the vegetable mixture relatively evenly. Cook for a few minutes and then pour in the stock so it just covers the veg. Then pour in the tomatoes, bring to the boil and simmer on a low heat, covered for 30 minutes until potatoes and carrots are tender. Pop the spinach in to wilt a few minutes before serving.

I said it was simple.

Portabella Mushroom en Croûte

Coming up with dishes that appeal to meat lovers is always fun and this is one of Mo's favourites that we often use for such occasions (and for Christmas too...) because it's pretty easy and actually makes a substantial statement in the middle of the plate which is the space that can be bothersome.

So when it came to holding a team building lunch on the Farm for one of our favourite local businesses in Liverpool, The Chocolate Cellar, we wanted to impress their veggie-wary staff - and in fact these worked even better as mini pies (always useful to have something that people recognise at a buffet I recall from catering days).

Ingredients

2 tsp oil

2 cloves garlic, crushed

200g baby spinach, rinsed

2 large portabella mushrooms

2 tsp white balsamic condiment

50g vegetarian tapenade

200g puff pastry

1 medium egg, beaten 

Serves 2                         

                                   

First pre heat your oven to 200ºC/Gas 6. Then in a large frying pan sauté the garlic for a few minutes, then add the spinach and sauté until wilted, when cool, squeeze out any excess juices and chop finely.

Next, remove the stalk from the mushrooms and score the surface with a sharp knife. Pour over the balsamic vinegar, season with salt and pepper. Top each mushroom with 25g of tapenade.

Then roll the pastry out as thin as possible (best if you use the block version - ready rolled these days doesn't have much 'puff'') and cut in half. Cut each piece into a circle large enough to cover and enclose the mushroom. Either by hand or with a nifty little lattice cutter, cut several lines just in the middle of the pastry (not the edges). Brush the edges of the pastry with the beaten egg.

Now you're ready for the fun part - divide the spinach in half and place on top of the mushrooms, then carefully place a circle of pastry over the mushroom  to enclose, making the pastry stick to the bottom of the mushroom (it does, honestly!)

Finally place the mushrooms on a lined and greased baking tray, brush the pastry with beaten egg and bake in the preheated oven for about 25 minutes until the pastry is golden brown. If you fancy you can always add some feta or goats cheese on top of the spinach.

ps. I think you should also get to share, at least visually, the glorious array of brownies that we had to (yes had to!) sample in order to find the winner. I think perhaps 6 were indeed my max in one sitting.