Bean filled peppers served alongside squashed stuffed with leeks

The nights are drawing in, and winter is coming.  And with it come winter bugs.

We got a handout from my daughter's nursery about hand washing today - I think quite a few children were afflicted with a vomiting illness last week.  When I take over the world, I certainly will make sure that all sinks are fitted with a blender tap that can emit neither hot nor cold but warm water for hand washing.  I feel like this would help a lot in combating the fear of faucets that children have.

We had a couple meat heavy meals at the weekend, so now we are trying to get some vegetables back into our bodies to fight off these maladies.  Do leeks count as leafy greens? Hmm...

I turned to my Veg Every Day book from the River Cottage and saw two things that looked alluring: Stuffed peppers, which always proves popular as a veggie main meal, and squash stuffed with leeks.  Having seen lots of interesting squash adorning the supermarket shelves along with bargains on leeks, this seemed like a nice, seasonal choice.  Since there is cheese in it, I knew my kids would be less enthusiastic than me, but I hope that by continuing to put foods they dislike in front of them at dinnertime eventually they'll change their minds.

For once I had plenty of time on my hands as I only had one child pick-up to complete.  After a trip to Lidl, I gathered the pepper ingredients together:

First I had to grill/broil the peppers.  I hate this job, as it requires lots of turning, cooling time, and finicky peeling.  Unfortunately, I only remembered how much I hate it several minutes into it.  At least roast peppers do reward you with tastiness.

While they did their thing in the oven, I chopped up a few of these babies with some garlic:

The recipe had suggested grating tomatoes into the shallots but keeping the peel, but that sounded like it would be painful for my hands (I hate the acidity of tomatoes) so I opted for just peeling some cherry tomatoes instead and throwing them in.  I used a knife to make a cross in the end of them and poured over boiling water.

Finally, the peppers looked charred so I took them out and put them into a bag to cool.

Well, if I'm going to pay for a Lidl bag, I want to use it more than once...

After draining the hot water and cooling them with cold water I peeled the tomatoes

And ground some cumin

I peeled all the friggin' peppers and set them aside.

I cooked the shallots and garlic in a bit of olive oil then put in the tomatoes

And pressed on them with the wooden cooking implement.  Once they had reduced slightly, I turned off the heat.

I drained some butter beans and put them in, mushing them a bit.

And I added a bunch of coriander along with cumin, paprika, and seasoning.

I sliced "lids" off the tops of the peppers and took out the seeds, then filled them with the bean mixture. Remarkably, the amount of filling was just right for stuffing 6 peppers.  Most recipes produce too much, but props to River Cottage for getting it right.  Once I'd stuffed them, I set them aside to cook later (at this point they just need 20 minutes in the oven to heat everything up together).

Onto the squash.  I had in my mind a couple larger squash, but these were the last two small squash available at Lidl along with most of a butternut squash (I used part of it in soup yesterday).  Although the recipe suggested slicing a bit off the bottom to help them sit in the dish, I chose to sit them on their tops  and use the conical bottoms as lids since I didn't want to waste any of the already small squash.

Meanwhile I softened some leeks (they're under the lid hissing at you)

And hollowed out the squash.  See, they're cute AND you can eat them.

Ok, the leeks looked done...

So I took them off the heat and added mustard, thyme, creme fraiche, emmental cheese, and seasoning. Once I'd vaguely stirred them together, I stuffed the squash with it.

I had some leftover filling so I ended up using a bigger dish and
threw the filling into a ramekin.  That was a very good idea, I discovered.

I did all that ahead of time, so an hour before dinnertime I put the oven on and stuck the squash in, then later put the peppers on the rack underneath.

The squash were glorious.  My kids didn't like the filling, but they did eat a good portion of the surrounding squash at least, and I got that browned baby in the corner to myself.  Browned cheesy leeks...heavenly.

The peppers don't looks so pretty here, but they were surprisingly popular with the kids.  My only mistake was adding too many crushed peppercorns, otherwise they would have eaten more.  All in all, quite a successful vegetarian meal.

Both recipes adapted from Veg Every Day

Peppers stuffed with beans

INGREDIENTS

• 6 large, fresh peppers

• 1 tbsp rapeseed or olive oil

• 2–3 shallots, or 1 medium onion, finely chopped

• 2 garlic cloves, finely chopped 
• 150–200g cherry tomatoes, peeled

• 400g tin beans, such as borlotti, pinto or butter beans, drained and rinsed

• Bunch of coriander, chopped

• 1 tsp ground cumin

• 1 tsp hot smoked paprika

METHOD

Preheat grill to high.  Lay the peppers on a baking tray and grill, turning from time to time, until the skins begin to char.  Place in bag until cool enough to handle, then peel away skins, taking care to leave peppers whole.  Cut around and remove a flap of flesh to form a lid.  Carefully scrape out seeds and tip out any juice.  

Preheat oven to 180C.  Heat the oil in a frying pan over a medium low heat, then saute the shallots and garlic until soft, about 10 minutes.  Add your tomatoes and simmer for a couple minutes to reduce slightly, mashing the tomatoes a bit with the back of a wooden spoon.  Remove from heat.

Add the drained beans to the pan and roughly mash some of them with a fork so they break up a little, but don't overdo it.  Add the coriander, cumin, and paprika, season and mix well, then stuff the peppers.  Lay them in an ovenproof dish and bake for 20 minutes.

Squash stuffed with Leeks

• 3-4 mixed baby squash
• 40g butter
• 2 large leeks, thinly sliced
• 150g emmental, grated
• 4 Tbsp crème fraiche
• 1 tsp English mustard

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 190°C/gas mark 5. Cut the tops off the squash and if necessary take a slice off the bottom to give a flat base. Using a spoon scoop out all the seeds and fibrous matter.
2. Heat the butter and oil in a frying pan when hot add the leeks. Cook gently until the leeks are softened but not coloured then season with salt and pepper.
3. When cooked transfer to a bowl to cool slightly, add the grated cheese, crème fraiche and mustard; taste and adjust seasoning if necessary.
4. Scoop the leeks into the squashes and place the lids back on. Put the squashes into a hot oven for 1 – 1 ½ hours.

Ginger Snaps with Crystallised Ginger

Have I mentioned that my mother sent me a whole KILO of crystallized ginger?

Well she did.

In case you didn't know, that is a lot of ginger.  The only other time I've considered having this much ginger in my house was when I was pregnant and could only stomach plain white bread and ginger products.  Oh, first trimester, I miss you not.

But back to my mother.  She sent me a link to a recipe for ginger snaps studded with crystallized ginger so I thought I'd give it a go. I took the idea, that is, but used as the base recipe my Joy of Cooking recipe for ginger snaps that I knew could produce some pretty tasty cookies, having made these autumn beauties in years past.

The weather is perfect for these just now - crisp, cold fall days with whispers of winter in the wind that gush through the gaps of our Victorian tenement's exterior.  My tea consumption has been steadily climbing, much to the delight of the fellow who runs Anteaques who chirped "see you soon!" as I departed today with my two large bags of tea.  And these cookies are perfect with tea...or coffee...or, if you want to be North American, spiced apple cider. Anyone in Shaker remember that house on Scottsdale that would serve up hot cider and ginger snaps on Halloween every year?  Even fear of concealed razor blades couldn't keep us from enjoying their offerings.

So in one bowl went flour, lots of ginger, cinnamon, ground cloves, salt, baking soda, and baking powder.

And in another bowl went butter and sugar.  As you'll know, the other day I made pumpkin snickerdoodles. You didn't know that? What do you mean you don't check my cooking blog every day?!!!?!

Hmph

Well, anyway, I did, and I rolled them in a spicy sugar mix.  I had a lot of it left over and I hate wasting anything in the kitchen, so I just put the leftover sugar mix in these with plain caster sugar too.  I made sure to give myself a smug pat on the head, too.

I mixed it together...

Then put in eggs and uh...well, the recipe said molasses OR dark OR golden syrup, so I used the remains of some treacle I had and some golden syrup.  Some lemon juice and zest went in too.

I put my sous-chef to work mixing it together

Then I took some of the flour mix and put it in with the ginger chunks to stop it all from sticking when I pulverized it.

It seemed to work.

Catherine did a good job mixing everything in the big bowl.  She's always liked stirring things...

So I put in the flour mix too and asked her to keep mixing it up.

Getting there...

Looking good.  you can see the occasional stud of ginger if you look closely.

Then we rolled up balls and put them on baking trays.  Don't worry, I made sure Catherine washed her hands and did not pick her nose until after she left the kitchen.  I didn't realize until the first batch came out that I was supposed to press them down a bit before they went in.  Oops.  They still tasted good, even if they were a bit lumpy in appearance.

I like them chewy, so I pull mine out promptly after 10 minutes.  Michael thought they weren't done yet when he glanced at them, but he was wrong.

Hooray for quality control.

And for sunny baking days.

All happy together to go to St Columba's...minus a few samples.

Ginger Snaps - adapted from Joy of Cooking

3 3/4 cups flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
.5 tsp baking soda
4 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp ground cinnamon
.25 tsp ground cloves
.25 tsp salt
12 tbsp butter
1 2/3 c sugar
2 large eggs 
1/2 c dark molasses (or a general mix of treacle and golden sryup)
2 tsp lemon juice
1/4 tsp grated lemon zest

good sized handful of crystallised ginger

Directions

Combine flour, baking powder, salt, and spices.  

Place about a half cup of flour mix in processor with the crystallised ginger and pulse until you have small pieces.  Alternatively, chop by hand and add back to flour mix.

Cream butter and sugar.  Add eggs, molasses (or golden syrup & treacle mix), lemon juice, and lemon zest and mix until well combined.  Add flour mix and stir until well combined.

Pinch off generous tablespoons of the mix and roll into even balls.  Place 2 inches apart on baking sheets and press down lightly to flatten.

bake 10 to 13 minutes at 350 (underbake slightly for chewy cookies or longer for crispy snaps)

makes 6 to 6.5 dozen cookies

Clementine Cake

With citrus season on its way in, you really have no excuse not to try this cake.  It is beyond easy to make, lasts for ages without going stale, uses up any tired citrus you have around, has an extremely simple list of ingredients AND is both gluten free and fatless (apart from the eggs).  It is a Nigella Lawson masterpiece, and apparently is the most popular recipe out of her first cookbook How to Eat. There is a chocolate variation, but I prefer the original in its pulpy purity.

When we are running the teas and coffees after church we bring several varieties of cakes.  This one is just so easy to throw together that I regularly make it knowing I'll then have enough energy to be adventurous with the other treats I make rather than exhausting myself with the first offering.

All you do is boil a few clementines or oranges (you can even use lemons) for a couple of hours, drain them, and wait until they are cool enough to handle.  I decided to boil up an orange I had already zested, which is less than ideal but saved me from throwing it out.

Then I cut them in half to remove any seeds and threw them into the food processor.  A magimix is not essential here; I have done this by hand before.  You just want them roughly chopped.

This is how mine looked after I pulped it:

Then in went ground almonds, sugar, 6 eggs, and some baking powder.  That's it.  No creaming, nothing complicated, just a bit of light stirring.

Until you have this:

Then you pour it into a springform tin:

And it comes out looking like this:

It doesn't look impressive at first, but it is just so light, moist and full of citrus.  Seriously, just go make it now.

The like to the recipe on her site (with a printable option) is here: http://www.nigella.com/recipes/view/clementine-cake-2559

Or just read it below:

Ingredients

• 375 grams clementines (approx. 3 medium-sized ones)
• 6 large eggs
• 225 grams white sugar
• 250 grams ground almonds
• 1 heaped teaspoon baking powder

Method

1. Put the clementines in a pan with some cold water, bring to the boil and cook for 2 hours. Drain and, when cool, cut each clementine in half and remove the pips. Dump the clementines - skins, pith, fruit and all - and give a quick blitz in a food processor (or by hand, of course). Preheat the oven to gas mark 5/190ºC/375ºF. Butter and line a 21cm / 8 inch Springform tin.
2. You can then add all the other ingredients to the food processor and mix. Or, you can beat the eggs by hand adding the sugar, almonds and baking powder, mixing well, then finally adding the pulped oranges.
3. Pour the cake mixture into the prepared tin and bake for an hour, when a skewer will come out clean; you'll probably have to cover with foil or greaseproof after about 40 minutes to stop the top burning. Remove from the oven and leave to cool, on a rack, but in the tin. When the cake's cold, you can take it out of the tin. I think this is better a day after it's made, but I don't complain about eating it at any time.
4. I've also made this with an equal weight of oranges, and with lemons, in which case I increase the sugar to 250g / 2¼ cups and slightly anglicise it, too, by adding a glaze made of icing sugar mixed to a paste with lemon juice and a little water.
5. Additional information - for gluten free make sure that the baking powder is gluten free.