recipes and a promise of more

so, two days into the new menu and things are going well. the star starter, at least in terms of orders, is the lavash nachos. the star dish, full stop, is the szechuan tofu. this was a nightmare because i'd never really cooked chinese before, buddha's delight as a possible exception. so it was with a sense of, 'i'm sorry but this is of the menu tonight', that we trawled the web for recipes. with a non-exhaustive list of ingredients written down and an unsteady hand, i put a recipe together. i'll let you have that soon because i haven't measured anything yet but it is very nice.

the two recipes for today are the risotto, requested on thursday, and the tuile biscuits, which do not even appear on the menu but accompany the spiced plums.

risotto

1 Onion, 1 stick celery both finely chopped.
500g Arborio rice
mint, lemon zest and juice, shelled broad beans, peas
glass of white wine
veg stock

Saute the onion and celery in oil until soft. Turn up the heat a little, add the rice and coat with the oil. Add the wine and wait until it is absorbed. Now add the stock. I’m not one for adding a little by a little, so I would add about 500ml of vegetable stock now. What is important is that you don’t stop stirring. Once this amount is absorbed, then add more a little at a time until the rice is cooked. once the rice is just about there add the peas, zest, mint and broad beans. to finish, add some butter and cheese at this point if desired.


Tuile

this recipe is vegan and is basically stolen from the veganyumyum blog. it is a different recipe because i tried hers, which is based on US ingredients, and it didn't work. so this is the recipe i used

http://veganyumyum.com

1 tablespoon of flax eggs, ground in a coffee grinder.
65 ml water
1/2 cup of sugar
3/4 cup of plain flour
pinch of slat
teaspoon of vanilla extract

put the groand flax seed and water into a food processor with blade attachment and run on full speed. once the mixture thickens, add the veg marg, the sugar, salt and the vanilla and continue to blend until everything is nice and smooth. don't worry if it looks separated. now add the flour and continue on full power until everything is nicely incorporated. heat the oven to 180C, fan-assisted, and spread out a teaspoon of the mix onto good baking paper or a re-usable baking sheet. spread it very thin with a palette knife. you can use a template at this time and circles work best although i find it's easier if you don't have a template to spread them into rectangles.

place into the oven and bake util the edges beging to brown. using a palette knike remove them from the baking sheet and shape as required, eg cones, baskets, long thin ones that you didn't get to quickly enough but that will go with the plums anyway, that sort of thing. follow the link above for the general idea.

cheers

wayne