Lebanese Tortillas (by Biggs)

Boy, I really haven't cooked in a while. The second I stepped into the grocery store to collect the fixings I had an instant brain aneurism from frustration alone. I should really look into getting groceries delivered. However, once I'd bought the supplies and extracted myself from the horror of shopping, I scuttled home to make this treat.

I was watching Lebanese Food Safari recently and quickly realised that a kebab could be served on a tortilla and pass as a Tuesday night dinner. I made a tabouli, mainly from parsley and tomatoes. I couldn't find bulgur in the supermarket and was disappointed to discover we didn't even have the half-arsed substitute of couscous at home. It also had garlic, spring onions, pepper and lemon.

The lamb was coated in garlic, lemon and oregano and roasted to perfection. The hummus was from a jar.

It's probably worth mentioning that Fi supplied us with the fresh dried oregano - it's from her garden and serving our household well.

Steak and Potato Bake (by G)

This is basically the meal I had planned to cook a couple of nights earlier when I had an untimely lack of consciousness.

Apart from some griddled steak and blanched asparagus there was a potato bake inspired by the delightful James Martin.

Baked potatoes were topped with a mix of sautéed leeks, garlic, bacon, shallot, wine, cream and cheese... then baked again.  Pre-baking the potatoes in a potato bake is an excellent idea - they come out much less raw that way.

Average Chinese and/or Vietnamese (by Biggs)

Ultimate June is now officially COMPLETELY OUT OF CONTROL! I only had one day off this week and squandered it sleeping and drinking beer. Suddenly it was dinner time and I was without groceries or motivation.

So, I put the delivery man in charge. The delivery man brought us a range of very average Chinese and/or Vietnamese food. Some rice, garlic beef, pork chops, chicken skewers and rice paper wraps.

I think G said it best when he stated "This rice is a bit knackered isn't it?". From that point on I had awful flashes of the sort of kitchens that are featured on Kitchen Nightmares. Dinner was then quite unpalatable.

Burgers and Fries (by G)

As Biggs may have mentioned in her blog of the same date I may have been napping when I should have been cooking. As a result I had to make 'the order of shame' with a popular burger restaurant (though their popularity has been on the wane recently).

Anyway, I got burgers with 2 beef patties to which I added bacon and burgers with one patty. There were also fries.

I did feel like a sack of crap afterwards - that my have been guilt, but I suspect it was the food.

Leftover Pizza (by Biggs)

I was working down the coast today and considered staying down there for the night but felt guilty that I had RSVPd to dinner so headed back to Brisbane so G could feed me. Turns out he did not feed me. He never woke up from his post-beer nap. Lucky there was leftover pizza in the fridge.

Pizza (by Biggs)

This week was HARD and I have to work over the weekend so, even though it's strictly against the rules of Ultimate June, I ordered us pizzas. I at least went a little upmarket. Pizzas fine, blue cheese bread tasty, great chicken wings.

Must cook on Sunday night. Must eat vegetables.

Mexican Cowboy Breakfast (by G)

I wanted to make cowboy's breakfast for dinner but I'm pretty sure I've made that sometime in the past couple of years - so I thought I would put a spin on it to for a little variety... instead of using baked beans I cooked up some frijoles negros, then combined them with sausages and tinned potatoes.

I forgot to buy oil to fry the sausages and eggs in so I was forced to render some bacon for its oily properties and fry everything in that instead. No problem though, the bacon went into the beans along with some onion, garlic, coriander, tomato, red and green chillies and a touch of vegetable stock.

Normally cowboy's breakfast would not have a fried egg, but I was in the mood for one... and it gave me the opportunity to present dinner in a sun shape. Biggs did not seem to appreciate my creativity on that front.

If I was a Mexican cowboy and wanted breakfast for dinner this is what I would have.

3x Vegetable Curries $6.50 (by Biggs)

Work today was A LITTLE BIT STRESSFUL and I ended up having to stay back late so, for dinner, I just grabbed some takeaway on the way home.

Indian Kitchen is always a promising bet and a very tasty way to eat vegetarian so I ordered us both the 3 Vegetable Curries for $6.50. There was an eggplant one, a potato and cauliflower curry and a garlic dahl. The dahl was sensational. That would have been plenty for dinner but I'm never sure of G's stomach capacity so also got us a vegetable samosa. I'm super glad I did - it was awesome, spicy and delicious.

The naan from Indian Kitchen is always a highlight. I've never had better naan anywhere. The best bit is that it's about the size of two dinner plates. This one was also incredibly cheesy which was a delight.

All round, dinner was excellent.

Beef Mince Tortillas (by G)

I had a lot of surplus beef mince after dinner last night so I decided to use it for tortillas - it being Tuesday after-all.

Nothing to complicated about these tortillas just beef mince seasoned with paprika, cumin, oregano, dried chilli flakes, garlic and some stock - served with lettuce, tomato and red onion on shop bought flour tortillas.

I was very surprised and alarmed with how spicy hot the mince turned out - in the end I had to dilute the heat a little with some very mild salsa from a jar that happened to be lurking in our fridge.

Chips and a Coke (by Biggs)

Back at the airport for dinner tonight but truly uninspired by the options.

Tonight was a night I could definitely have done with some Qantas Club action. Where are you Qantas Club frolleague?! Where are you?!

Ned Kelly Pie (by G)

Biggs and I were discussing our favourite pie varieties the other day and I remembered the Ned Kelly pie. It is a wonderful combination of pie mince, bacon, cheese and an egg. The egg is what makes it special - I have no idea what relationship the pie has to Ned Kelly though.

We do have a pie maker but I suspect it may be buried somewhere deep in the bowels of 'the cupboard of mystery', so I made these pies in some little spring form tins using shop bought short crust pastry.

On the side I had had some packet potato chunks. They tasted mostly of dirt but the pie was pretty authentic. Pies are much more fun when you don't make them yourself.

Chicken Roll (by Biggs)

A late flight to Cairns for work tonight so an airport dinner for me. This chicken and bacon roll was incredibly satisfying. I paired it with a juice because I'm still not 100%.

Chicken Satay Noodles (by G)

Biggs was not due to be dining at home today so I decided to do something pretty simple utilising the left-over satay sauce from last night.

Dinner was just a mix of chicken pieces, chilli, garlic, satay sauce, flat rice noodles, sugar snap peas and what I had thought was coriander but turned out to Chinese spinach.

Unfortunately the ratio of satay sauce to the other ingredients was not as generous as I was hoping it would be - the combination of ingredients was good though.

Tapas (by Biggs)

It turns out that tapas really are best suited to be shared with friends and paired with drinks over several hours at a bar. Served on a giant plate with a knife and fork as a meal is a bold way to go.

I stuffed some mushrooms with blue cheese, spiced up some prawns with chilli and garlic, fried up the essentials of chorizo, halloumi and cheese bread, and served it all with olives, salami and roast potato chunks with parsley.

Salty and satisfying.....yet, a little sickening.

Momos and Paella (by Biggs)

Fi invited me for Momo'clock (she's hilarious) at the West End night markets this evening and I was SUPER keen.

 

She ordered some beers and saved our spot and had a perfectly considered menu for dinner by the time I arrived from work.

 

She suggested Tibetan momos (because we've had them before and loved them), paella (because it's delicious) and gluten free donuts (because we've had them before and loved them).

 

I haven't included a photo of the donuts because it came out super blurred....which may be explained by the fact we had had quite a bit of beer and wine by that stage.

 

A perfect evening.

Chicken PBBJLT Rolls (by G)

I wanted to create something a bit unique for dinner and, as Biggs was dining elsewhere, I seized my opportunity.

Below is a photo of my creation - Chicken Peanut Butter, Bacon Jam Lettuce and Tomato rolls. The peanut butter took the form of a spicy satay sauce on top, on the bottom is the bacon jam. My original plan was to grill some nice fresh chicken but all the stuff at the independent supermarket was reduced to clear which makes my skin crawl a little... so I went with a barbequed chicken instead (I guess that's what happens to chicken that is just too old to sell raw).

Despite supressing the sweeteners while making the bacon jam it was still a bit sweet for me in the end and the satay sauce was not quite spicy enough to offset it.  This idea is definitely a work in progress.

Chicken and Leek Casserole (by Biggs)

I'm back in business, but still wasn't too enthusiastic to put much effort into dinner. I asked G what he wanted and he replied 'MEAT'.

I was a bit worried that chicken wouldn't cut it as 'MEAT' but then I recalled what lyrical masters Butterfingers have to say about that: "Chicken's not a vegetable"...which I think was what G was mainly after - no vegetables. We have laid them on pretty thick this week (for us).

The casserole was chicken thighs with leeks, bacon, thyme, garlic, mushrooms and stock. An hour and a half in the oven and it was sorted.

Oh, and there was wine in there.....it had been a couple of days since a drink so I bought a not inexpensive bottle to both share and pair with dinner.

Vegetable Noodles (by G)

Damned Vegetarian Wednesday. All I could think to do this time around is a kind of vegetarian ramen. A bowl with a little bit of minced garlic, coriander and chilli in the bottom topped with instant vegetarian noodles.

On top of the noodles were mixed mushrooms fried in a lot of garlic and butter, along with a piece of spring onion that I deliberately charred. The kids are all about charring things these days so I thought I would give it a try - I have to say, the kids may be on to something.

There was a whole lot of garlic butter left in the pan after frying the mushrooms, I wasn't sure what to do with it so I just poured it on top. That was an inspired decision - less inspired was the decision to add fried tofu. The tofu was the low point in what was otherwise a surprisingly delicious meal.

Microwaved Mac & Cheese (by Biggs)

I'm horrendously unwell. Horrendously. I appreciate there's a lot of people in terrible situations in the world right now so I shouldn't feel too sorry for myself but I really do. Disproportionately sorry for myself.

G, demonstrating some very rare compassion for his little sister, asked if he could pick me up anything on the way home. After a day in bed thinking about it I decided a banana and microwavable mac and cheese could be just the thing to fix me. Flavourless, easily palatable nothingness. Nutrients in the banana, warm comfort in the mac and cheese.

It didn't fix me immediately but it definitely didn't make things worse.

Also, I can't actually take the credit for this - G lovingly microwaved it for me. No mean feat given he's never used a microwave before.

Fish Finger Tortillas (by G)

Biggs was too unwell to make or eat dinner tonight so I improvised. This abomination is simply lettuce, fish fingers and squeeze bottle tartare sauce. Instead of tortillas I used roti paratha because I had bought a gross of them the other day and I have to use them at every opportunity to get through them.

Despite being a crime against tortilladom these fish finger wraps were just what I was in the mood for.

Tsega Zigni (by G)

Meat, meat, meat, meat; meat, meat, meat, meat; meat, meat, meat, meat... I could go on.  While Biggs' vegetarian dish yesterday was excellent I was in the mood for some meat - and as I had just recently picked up some berbere spice I decided to use that also.

This was an easy dish to make. Brown off some cube of beef, add onion (I also added shallot) and garlic and berbere then fry for a little bit - add a tin of tomatoes and some stock then simmer for a couple of hours.  In the last 15 minutes I added some chopped coriander then served it up with a little (let's be honest) rustically chopped coriander.

Typically this would be made with injera bread, but it takes a couple of days to make and I could not find any ready made stuff - so I served it with some roti paratha from a packet.

I tasted the dish at the beginning and part was through and it did not seem promising. When I tasted it near the end I knew it was going to be a winner - easy to make with great flavour. The paratha was a pretty good match as well.

Cambodian Wedding Day Dip (by Biggs)

Shortly after G and I decided on Vegetarian Wednesdays we watched Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall make a Cambodian Wedding Day Dip and I very quickly called dips.

I know it's not Wednesday but I thought this might do us some good and also, I was feeling pretty lazy - this dinner was awfully easy to put together.

I fried off a shed-load of mushrooms with some garlic, chilli, curry powder, peanut butter, coconut milk, lime juice, soy sauce and coriander. I served it with rice and naan bread. Hugh also suggested serving it with garlicky greens but I just ended up mixing the bok choy, and some extra garlic, in with the mushroom dip.

Bacon Hock and Cous Cous (by G)

Biggs was due to be dining elsewhere so I decided to do something not particularly difficult, but vegetable heavy, for dinner.

Not much to it. Simmer bacon hock for 3 hours until it was fall off the bone tender. Blitz up onion, tomato, carrot, Brussels sprouts and zucchini then fry it off and simmer it with cous cous in some of the bacon liquid... then serve the latter topped with the former.

As it turns out Biggs' dinner plans fell through, so I  (reluctantly) split my delicious pork hock with her - I was more than willing to split the vegetable/cous cous shit with her.

Roti Canai Chicken Pie (by G)

Sometime I can make a very nice roti canai sauce, sometimes I can't. This time I was hoping to make a nice roti canai sauce, mix it with chicken and vegetables and put that in a pie.

As far as it goes, the project went okay. I made a bit of a sauce from fried onion, curry powder and secret sauce ingredients. It did occur to me that this mix would be going into a pie so I also mixed through some corn flour to thicken it up some.

I par cooked some potato and carrot, fried up a bit of chicken mixed that with the sauce, added some peas then popped that into a tin lined with short crust pastry.

Mostly things went well, unfortunately the pie filling fell out of the pie when it came to serving it up, but what can one do? On the scale of nice roti canai sauces this was about a C-.

Tequila! (by Biggs)

Tomorrow is going to hurt....

Curried Fish (by Biggs)

I popped over to Fi's for dinner tonight and was delightfully surprised by a dinner of fish and steamed vegetables.

Her friend Nick, a keen fisherman, had gifted her some fish which she needed to use. So, she marinated it in a curry paste and popped it in the oven. Delicious! When I asked what fish it was she looked at me blankly but then decided it would be a reef fish from Moreton Bay. Snapper? Who know.

It's probably worth noting that the rice was cooked in one of Fi and Dan's recent kitchen acquisitions - a Korean Tatung rice cooker. I highly recommend watching the promotional material on YouTube. Actually, I recommend G watches the promotional material on YouTube....we then may own our very own Korean Tatung rice cooker in the near future. Fingers crossed.

Although, given I went home after dinner and drank the Sols G had hidden in the vegetable crisper he may not currently be in a generous mood.

Kransky; Sauerkraut and Couscous (by G)

Something Biggs cooked a little while ago really stuck with me - spaetzle - from a packet- cooked with butter. For some reason I was craving that. Unfortunately I could not find pre-made spaetzle in packet form in the supermarket... and fucked if I could be bothered making that from scratch.

I did stick with the German theme by having some Kransky (simmered in water then griddled), sauerkraut (mixed with bacon and onion) because that's how I do it now, and couscous (because it's the closest thing I could find to staetzle) cooked with stock and butter and home grown parsley.

The combination was very pleasing despite the lack of German pasta goods.

Vegetarian Stirfry (by Biggs)

I've been in quite a mood since the conclusion of the long weekend and feel like my poor attitude has extended to my cooking ability. Another packet opening competition this evening.

The packets I opened were mixed vegetables, hokkien noodles, pre-marinated tofu and cashew nuts. The addition of heat, as well as soy sauce, oyster sauce, sriracha, ketjap manis and sesame oil, seemed to make things marginally edible.

I don't usually mind tofu but this stuff was odd and shit. I wish it had been pork.

Lahmacun Tortillas (by G)

We are not permitted to have pizza in the month of June due to an over-reliance on that food substance in the recent past. That aside, I decided some Turkish lamb pizza tortillas were probably permissible.

The tortillas were made by mixing lamb mince with dried crushed chilli, garlic, tomatoes, tomato paste and sumac then spreading the mix on some store-bought tortillas then cooking them in the oven.

Once that was done the tortillas were topped with yoghurt and a salsa of tomato, red onion, parsley and lemon juice.

These tortillas were pretty good - not all of them were cooked as dark as those shown blow.

Meat and Five Veg (by Biggs)

I do like the idea of a Sunday Roast and had that in mind when I bought this beef. Unfortunately it already came marinated, I couldn't find one that wasn't. But, the garlic, herby, red wine was not too bad. And, even thought you may thing this looks overcooked it's pretty much how we enjoy our roasts cooked. No gravy but a variety of mustards were instead provided.

For sides I decided we should try for a five vegetable day....which is meant to be every day I guess. I went with five of the most palatable vegetables - broccoli, corn, carrot, peas and little potatoes. The potatoes were generously coated in butter and chives.

Pork Hock (by G)

Biggs and I used to put away a lot of pork knuckle back in the day so when I saw pork hocks at the butcher I knew it would be a winner.

It didn't turn out to be the winner I was hoping for - mainly due to time. I was on a complicated sleeping schedule to watch the Canadian formula one GP and over-napped giving me little time to oven roast the pork hocks.

Never-the-less I coated the hocks in salt (numerous types of salt - black, smoked, Himalayan mountain, regular and the weird smoked style) and oil then oven roasted them for about an hour and a half. They were not at my preferred degree of crispiness on the outside so I bunged them under the grill to crackle up some.

For sides I roasted some potatoes in the fat left over from roasting beef ribs a while ago and cooked some sauerkraut (from a jar) with bacon and onion.  The sauerkraut was the standout of this dish... oh, also the gravy - which was made from simmering pork bones for hours and hours, that was also good.

Bacon and Chorizo Pasta (by Biggs)

I know G made a chorizo dinner last night but I'd already planned on a chorizo based dish tonight and given it's a long weekend I thought we'd earned two in a row.

This one was just a simple pasta with tomatoes, chorizo, bacon, parsley, onion, garlic and two types of cheese. I think individually portioned them and we ate them straight from the oven trays.

I sensibly made twice the amount required so we've got some left over for long weekend snacking. Oh, there was also garlic bread.

Francesinha (by G)

I don't know where I came across this monstrosity but it was lodged in my brain somehow. Basically, the francesinha is a Portuguese sandwich with all the fillings, topped with cheese and a unique tasting beer sauce.

I don't know that my version is too authentic, it contained chorizo, pork chipolatas, ham and slices of roast beef (the recipe called for steak but I was not in the mood for steak). The sandwich was topped with cheese then popped under the grill to melt it, then over to top of that went the francesinha sauce - beer, tomato paste, whiskey and cayenne pepper simmered with bay leaves then thickened with a milk and cornflour slurry.

It was one of the more unusual things I've eaten lately. Unfortunately I almost filled up quality testing the various ingredients while I was making it and could barely finish my sandwich once it had been completed.

Cannellini Bean Salad (by Biggs)

As mentioned in my comment on last night's dinner, I've retired from cooking so, tonight was a bit of a can opening competition.

It's about zero degrees in Brisbane tonight so I thought a cool refreshing salad might suit the season!

The salad was simply cannellini beans, tuna, red onion, capers, eggs, parsley and chili. Served with olive bread.

I can't quite remember where I found this recipe but think it was from a cannellini bean feature in The Guardian. G's going to mock me for that. I think he think's that I think reading The Guardian means I'm superior and highly intelligent. It doesn't help that I start almost every sentence with "I was reading in The Guardian...." in a highly affected voice. Wanker.

Char Siu Pork, Salad and Rolls (by G)

I, like any right-thinking human being, enjoy Chinese BBQ pork (char siu) - the butcher shop just down the road does an excellent version. This time, however, I decided to DIY it.

The process is pretty simple - make up a marinade of salt, five spice powder, paprika, white pepper, Chinese cooking wine, soy sauce, sesame oil, hoisin sauce, tomato paste, molasses (well, I didn't have that so I substituted with some ketjap manis), garlic and a dash of water. I also added some red food colouring to get the authentic look.

The recipe I pillaged called for a 6 hour marinating time but I went with about 48 hours before cooking in a super hot oven for about 25 minutes a side then finishing off under the grill - not forgetting to baste with marinade the whole time.

To cut through the richness of the pork I quick pickled a packet coleslaw mix in a combination of salt, sugar and apple cider vinegar. There were also breadrolls so one could make a pork and salad roll if one chose to.

My thoughts are that I could have lacquered the pork more frequently with the marinade to get a super thick coating on the outside, otherwise this was a pretty successful replication of char siu.

"Spicy" Beef Enchiladas (by Biggs)

G has been suffering from a serious case of the dreaded lurgy for the past few days and today I too caught the Black Death. As a result I was not keen to put too much effort into dinner. Even though it was Tortilla Tuesday, I also didn't want to serve anything family style that involved us touching shared food and spreading our germs even further. We really are quite sick.

I could only think of enchiladas as an easy, non-shared meal so, even though we've had them recently, I went with that. I was completely freaked out by cancer-causing anal polyps on Michael Mosley's Should We Eat Meat last night and was convinced it was going to be 100% tofu and vegetables from here on out. Clearly that plan didn't last. G was in fact hoping death would come faster today to put him out of his misery, so I tried to assist with a dinner of red meat, cheese and sour cream.

I did add an onion, a whole head of garlic and four chilies to try and fix us. If we don't update the blog tomorrow you'll know it didn't work.

The enchiladas were fine enough but did get a touch soggy on the top.

Stir-fried Vegetables with Pork (by G)

Biggs has expressed the desire to eat more vegetables and it occurred to me that the easiest way to do that is to throw a whole bunch of them into a stir-fry.

I fried some garlic then added balanced broccolini and carrot, mushrooms, red capsicum, spring onions and zucchini then fried them to tender. Though I'm sure vegetables have amazing flavour I thought I should kick it up a bit with some oyster sauce and ketjap manis along with some cornflour slurry to thicken the sauces. I also added a healthy dose of sesame oil.

Nothing goes better with vegetables than a decent amount of animal protein. I bought a huge chunk of pork butt for a recipe later in the week but figured I should utilise the surplus as soon as possible. I sliced off a few pieces, simply seasoned them with salt and white pepper then grilled the shit out of them. I may have taken the pork a bit past the point of crispy delicious to leathery delicious. That, and the fact I may have over used the oyster sauce, were the only two major drawbacks to this meal.