Thai gazpacho

It was a very hot summer here, so we ate a lot of cold soups. This one turned out very nicely, although if you want it to have a reasonably attractive colour, make sure you use yellow tomatoes, not red ones. Otherwise, though, it's all very tasty. Based on this recipe.

Ingredients:
3-4 large yellow tomatoes, cut into chunks
1 full Noa cucumber, or 1/2 English cucumber, peeled and cut into chunks
1/2 yellow pepper, deseeded and cut into chunks
1 onion
1-2 cloves garlic
1 tbsp lemongrass (paste, fresh, or frozen)
1 thumb-size piece of ginger, peeled and roughly chopped
juice and zest of 1 lime
2 tbsp fish sauce
1 tsp chilli paste OR 1 chilli (or to taste)
mint, (Thai) basil and coriander to taste (should be about 1/2 cup or so)
1/2 a 400ml tin of coconut milk (you can use more too, but keep some for serving)
seasoning

Throw the tomatoes, cucumber, pepper, and onion into a blender and blend. Add the garlic, lemongrass, ginger, lime juice and zest, fish sauce, chilli, herbs and seasoning, and then as much coconut milk as you want (less is more, add little by little until you have as much as you want). Blend the mixture until smooth.

Put in the fridge to cool for a few hours. Serve with some bread on the side. 

Kale and marscapone-stuffed chicken on a bed of roast vegetables

So this was nice...

The vegetable quantities are for about 4 people, but the chicken is only for about 2. Increase the stuffing and wrapping proportionally based on the number of people, and add a breast for each person eating. It's more or less the same as this recipe, but some small tweaks have been made.

Chicken and stuffing (quantities for 2 breasts):
2 skinless chicken breasts (these should be relatively thick, so that you can cut them open and stuff them)
50-60 g kale, roughly chopped and well washed (about 25 g per breast)
2 tbsp mascarpone (about 1 tbsp per breast)
1-2 garlic cloves
zest of about 1/4 to 1/2 a lemon, plus juice if desired
Provencal herbs
a dash of olive oil
seasoning
6-8 rashers of smoked bacon, depending on breast size and how much bacon you might want

Vegetables:
250 g parsnips, peeled and sliced
250 g sweet potatoes, peeled and chopped into thinnish discs
2 onions, peeled chopped into quarters
100 g mushrooms, washed and halved or quartered if needed
1 red pepper, sliced up into strips

Preheat the oven to 200-220 degrees, depending on your oven. Boil the kale for about 4 minutes to soften it up, then drain it, squeeze out the remaining water, and blitz it in a food processor with the mascarpone, garlic, lemon olive oil and seasoning. Cut along the chicken lengthways and stuff the kale and mascarpone into the cavity. Wrap the bacon tightly around the chicken and season. Topelt ei kärise.

Add some oil to a baking tray or dish, then put the vegetables in and toss to cover with the oil, and season, then put in the oven and cook for about 10 minutes. Once the 10 minutes are up, mix the vegetables, put the chicken on top of the vegetables and cook for another 20 to 25 minutes, turning the chicken and mixing the vegetables halfway through. Once the chicken is cooked, cover with foil and leave for a bit, then serve with extras in waiting.

This is really good. Enjoy.

South African monkey gland sauce

Don't mind the name—this stuff rocks. It's one of South Africa's unknown masterpieces, and it's quite sad, as we've got plenty of monkeys that could donate their glands for this... It's dead easy too, and a good way to use up errant bits of veg and monkey parts in your fridge. Smother meat in it, either as a sauce or as a marinade. Remember to pick out the pituitary gland before you eat—the texture goes to pot when you boil it.

1 onion
3-4 garlic cloves
Thumb-sized piece of ginger
1 pepper (optional)
3-4 tomatoes, diced
1 small tin double concentrated tomato purée
1 tbsp Worcester sauce
1/2 cup chutney
big dollop of red wine (optional)
AND/OR
dash of balsamic vinegar
1 tbsp mustard
150 ml vegetable (or chicken) stock
tabasco, to taste
1 tsp sugar
salt and pepper to season

Fry the onion, garlic, and ginger (and pepper, if you're using it) until the onion is translucent. Add the other ingredients, bring to the boil and cook on a high flame for about 8 minutes, then simmer for another 30–40 minutes. Taste and season if necessary.

Use for marinade and sauce. It should keep for about 2 weeks.

Bacon, cheese, and monkey gland burger

Baked eggs with tomato sauce and spinach

I've been using a lovely tomato sauce recipe I discovered recently for a bunch of different stuff. It is very nice. This time, I've used it for baked eggs. Although I made it in one casserole dish this morning, it works better if you have small single-portion pots that you can cook the eggs in.

Serves about 4

2 onions, thinly diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 red peppers, diced
1 chilli (or to taste), finely diced
2 tbsp red wine vinegar
1/2 tsp sugar
1 tsp Provencal spice
2 x 400 g tins diced tomatoes
200 g spinach, stalks removed and roughly chopped
Salt and pepper
6 eggs (in small pots) or 4 eggs (in a casserole dish)
crusty bread to serve

Heat the oven to 180 degrees. Fry the onions, garlic, peppers, and chilli until the onion is translucent. Add the wine vinegar, mix in, and then add the sugar, Provencal spice, and tomatoes. Simmer for about 20 minutes, stirring occasionally. While you wait, put the spinach in a colander and pour boiling water over it to wilt it. When it has cooled down, squeeze out excess water and, when the tomato sauce is done, add to the tomato sauce and then spoon into the pots or casserole dish. Make a small hole, or put a spoon in the tomato mix in a pot so that the is a bit of a depression in the sauce. Crack an egg on top of the spoon, then push down so that the egg sinks in to the mixture a bit, and then remove. Do this for all the eggs. Shove the pots in the oven, and cook for about 15-20 minutes. Be careful if you're cooking in a casserole dish, as you'll need to cook for longer. It might be a good idea to heat the oven to 140 or so and cook for about 20-25 minutes. In any event, it'll be nice.

Serve with bread, and enjoy. The tomato sauce rocks.

Butternut and beef chilli con carne

There was a bit of butternut left at home (when isn't there?) and I decided to try this. As a wise man once told me, "Use 2 different kinds of meat when making chilli." I decided I'd add some seasonal veg instead of extra meat. It was lovely. This is an adaptation of a couple of recipes which I have sadly misplaced. My apologies. Trust me, though: this is good.

1-2 onions
1-2 chillies (to taste)
Garlic to taste (around 4 or so)
2 red peppers
400-500 g beef mince

400-500 g butternut, in 1cm cubes

1 tbsp. chilli powder
2 tsp. cumin
¼ tsp. cinnamon
1 bay leaf
2 x 400ml tins diced tomatoes
2 x 400 ml tins beans (black or kidney), drained and rinsed
2 or 3 ripe avocados, diced (to serve)
white rice, cooked
grated cheese (cheddar or comté if possible)
sour cream
coriander

Fry the onions, chillies, garlic and red peppers for a couple of minutes until the onions start going translucent. Add the meat and brown it, add in the butternut and cook for about 30 seconds (to brown it too, I guess), then add in the spices, mix up well, and then add the tomatoes and season well before mixing it all up. Bring to the boil, then simmer for about 20-30 minutes or so. Add the beans after about 10 minutes and check to see if you need to add more spice (another chilli or chilli powder, or cumin or cinnamon). When ready, serve with white rice, top with avo, coriander, cheese and sour cream, to taste. 

Enjoy.

One-pot Thai chicken noodle soup

Mostly courtesy of Carlsbad Cravings. Do be careful with the spice. It is very nice, though - very recommend.

Ingredients:
500g chicken fillet, sliced to make very thin fillets
2-3 onions, diced
2 carrots, diced
2-4 tbsp Thai red curry paste (to taste)
2cm piece fresh ginger, minced
4-5 cloves garlic, minced
2 chillies, minced (optional)
1l chicken stock
2 400ml tins coconut milk
2 tbsp fish sauce
1 tbsp sugar
5-6 lime leaves
1 tsp basil or Provencal mix
Pepper to taste
250 g mushrooms, sliced
2 red peppers, sliced
150 g rice noodles, broken up into manageable pieces
handful roughly chopped coriander, plus extra to serve
juice of 2-3 limes, plus extra to serve

Brown the chicken in a big soup pot and then remove and put on a plate. Add in the onions and carrots and cook for 2-3 minutes. Add the curry paste, ginger, garlic and chilli and cook for 2-3 minutes. Return the chicken to the pot, then add the stock, coconut milk, fish sauce, sugar, lime leaves, basil and pepper. Bring to the boil then simmer for around 15 minutes or until the chicken is tender enough to shred. Remove the chicken from the pot and leave to cool until it can be shredded. In the meantime, add the mushrooms and peppers, bring to the boil again, add the (uncooked) noodles to the pot and simmer for around 4 minutes. Add the chicken, coriander and lime juice. Mix and serve with bread and wine on the side.

Homemade Bibimbap

We've got a Korean place around the corner from us, Gotsu, which is fantastic, but it's only open from 12.00 to 20.00, Monday to Friday, and only during the academic year. They make an awesome bibimbap though. I finally hunted down gochujang (Korean chilli paste) and I intend to use it all. Lots of bibimbap coming up. This is adapted from a recipe I found here, but do be careful about saltiness. The first batch I made was a touch on the saline side.

Ingredients (supposedly feeds 3):

Meat:
100g mince
0.5 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp sesame oil
1 tsp sugar
1-2 cloves minced garlic (or to taste)

Vegetables and rice: Use your best judgement
250g spinach (or other leafy vegetable)
Handful or 2 of bean sprouts
100g mushrooms thinly sliced
1-2 carrots, thinly sliced
Steamed rice (or, as I used, basmati)
4 eggs
Seaweed salad (Korean if you can, or goma wakame if you can't)

Chilli sauce:
2 tbsp (or more) gochujang
1 tbsp sesame oil
1 tbsp sugar
1/2 tbsp water
1/2 tsp vinegar
1-2 cloves minced garlic

Cook the rice early on. Mix the meat and marinade ingredients together and leave for about 30 min. Mix the sauce ingredients. Stir-fry the carrots and mushrooms for about 3-5 minutes, or until browned and cooked. Cook the meat for 3-5 minutes until cooked through. Fry an egg per person, soft yolks (recommended). Add rice to a bowl, then sauce, then meat, mushrooms, carrots, beansprouts, spinach, seaweed salad, and finally egg on top. Mix together and enjoy.

The best thing about this dish is that you can add whatever you want. It's a good way to use up leftover veg in the fridge. I've had it with cucumber, little radishes, and courgette. Basically, use your imagination.

Cream of celery soup

What to do with extra celery. This was an emergency recipe that's turned out quite nicely:

Ingredients:

Around 500-600 g celery (the better part of a head of celery), sliced
A large potato, diced
A large onion, diced
A red pepper, diced
A chilli or 2, diced
50-100 g butter
750 ml chicken stock
salt and pepper to taste
100ml cream or creme fraiche

Melt the butter in a large-ish pot. Add the celery, potato, onion, pepper, and chilli, season with salt, and cook for around 10-15 min over a low heat. When soft, add chicken stock and pepper, bring to a simmer, and cook for another 10-15 min on a low heat. When ready, take off the heat, add cream/creme fraiche, and blend. Serve with extra cream if so desired.

Chicken cacciatore

A simple Italian chicken stew. Can also be made with game meat. Lovely. Cobbled together from the BBC recipe and food.com's own version, with a couple of edits.

Ingredients:

Butter for frying
4 chicken drumsticks
4 chicken thighs
Plain flour mixed with salt, pepper, and cayenne pepper (to taste) to coat chicken
Olive oil
2-3 cloves garlic, minced
2-3 stalks celery, diced
1 onion, diced
2 carrots, diced
1 or 2 chillies, diced
1 or 2 large red peppers
Rosemary or Provencal herb mix
3/4 cup white wine
2 400g tins of diced tomato
250-300ml chicken stock
Salt and pepper to taste

Melt the butter in a large pot. Dust the chicken in the flour mixture, and then brown in the pot over a medium-high temperature. Remove from the pot using a slotted spoon. Add the oil and heat, then add the garlic, celery, onion, carrot, red peppers and chilli, as well as the rosemary/Provencal mix. Fry for a few minutes and then add the wine, scrape the bottom to remove chunky bits, and then add the tomatoes and stock. Return the chicken to the pot. Bring to a simmer, put the lid on, turn the temperature down low, then cook for around 45 minutes. At this stage, the chicken should be quite tender, as should the carrots.

Serve with rice and/or salad.

Chicken Noodle Stir Fry a la Jamie Oliver

An adaptation of Jamie Oliver's chicken noodle stir fry recipe. Unfortunately, we were lacking space in terms of a wok big enough to fit everything in. Needs had to, so I changed it a bit. The result was quite good:

Ingredients:

250 g egg noodles, cooked according to instructions and kept to one side
2-3 chicken breasts, thinly sliced into 1 cm strips
5 cm ginger, chopped into thin strips
3 garlic cloves, minced
Chilli to taste, sliced thinly
2 red onions, diced
1-2 carrots, sliced thinly
1 yellow pepper, sliced
1 head broccoli, cut into small florets and with the stalk shredded as far as possible (second part optional)
Soy sauce to taste
Sriracha to taste
Coriander
Lime juice

1) Cook the noodles as instructed in a rather large pot (3-5 litres or so).
2) Season the chicken with pepper and fry in a large pan until browned, or for 3 minutes or so.
3) Add the ginger, garlic and chilli and fry for another minute or so.
4) Add the onion, carrot, pepper and broccoli and stir fry for a bit longer (3-4 minutes). Add soy sauce and sriracha to taste, then stir fry for a bit longer.
5) Add the stir fry, coriander and lime juice to the noodles and mix in. Serve warm.

Enjoy.

Vegan(ish) lentil curry

A slight adaptation of something I found at the Hungry Hutch. Definitely worth a look:

Ingredients:

2 cups lentils, washed
2 red peppers, cut up into chunks
1 medium-sized sweet potato, peeled and diced
Onion, peeled and diced
Garlic to taste, minced
Chilli to taste, chopped finely
About a tablespoon of chilli powder/garam masala
About a tablespoon of turmeric
900 ml chicken or vegetable stock
2 tomatoes
400 ml coconut milk
Salt and pepper to season
Basmati rice, coriander, and plain yoghurt to serve

Fry the sweet potato for about 3-5 min in a fair-sized pot (3-5 litres minimum), then add spices, onions, peppers, garlic, and chillies and cook for another 5 min or so. Add the tomatoes, mix well and cook for another 2 min, then add stock and coconut milk. Add lentils, bring to the boil, season with salt and pepper, and then let simmer for 40-45 minutes. Serve over rice, with coriander and yoghurt if desired.

Homemade tomato pasta sauce

An adaptation of a couple of recipes I found online. A work in progress, but the initial result is promising:

Ingredients:

about 1.5 kg ripe tomatoes (the riper the better)
1 onion, diced
3-4 cloves garlic, minced
1 pepper, diced
2 carrots, peeled and diced
About 200-300ml tomato juice (optional)
Fresh basil to taste, shredded/torn up
1 tbsp or so Provencal herb mix
Pepper
Some salt to taste
1/3 cup red wine
2-3 bay leaves
1-2 full stalks celery - don't cut them up!
2 small cans tomato paste (or maybe only 1, depending on taste. Should be around 2 tbsp or so of tomato paste)

For the tomatoes, score them at the stalk end and then drop them into boiling water for 2 to 3 minutes to loosen the skin. Peel and core them, then dice them roughly. If you want, leave one or two intact.

Add onion, garlic, peppers and carrots to a biggish pot and cook for around 5 minutes until the onion is soft. Then add your tomatoes, as well as the tomato juice, basil, herbs and spices and red wine, mix in, then add the celery and bay leaves.

Cook for 1-2 hours on a very low heat, add the small tins of tomato paste and cook for another 1-2 hours (I cooked mine for 1 and 1, but varying recipes say 30 mins all the way up to 2 hours. Take your choice).

When it's all ready, remove the bay leaves and celery and leave to cool, then freeze or serve with pasta. Your choice.

Gazpacho

This is a cold tomato soup perfect for summer. Very nice too. It's a slight adaptation of a recipe I found on food.com.

Ingredients:

800 g flavoursome tomatoes
Tomato juice
1/2-1 cup cucumber, peeled, deseeded and chopped up
1/2-1 cup red pepper, deseeded and chopped up
1/2-1 cup red onion, chopped up
1 chilli (or to taste), finely chopped
Garlic to taste (usually 1-2 cloves), minced
Olive oil
Lime juice to taste
2 tsp balsamic vinegar
2 tsp worcestershire sauce
1/2 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp salt
1 tsp pepper
Coriander, to serve

To peel and deseed the tomatoes, cut a cross into the top or bottom of the tomato and then drop it into boiling water for 15 sec. When deseeding, put the remains into a sieve over a pot or bowl and try and get as much juice as you can from it, and then top up whatever juice you get with the tomato juice until it is about 1 cup. Put everything into a blender or food processor and blend until quite smooth. Leave overnight in the fridge, or serve with ice cubes and coriander.

Grilled salmon, courgette salad, rice salad, guacamole, and a full stomach: AKA Jazz Salmon

Source

Tasty special treat courtesy of Jamie Oliver. He's a bit of a git, what with his fabulous this and awesome that, but his recipes are, if you'll excuse the language, fantastic. I have made this a few times - my favourite part is the crunchy skin. It's a bit pricey to make in Estonia, but it's good for an occasional treat.

Definitely not my recipe, and I post this purely because I love it so very much. Enjoy.

Ingredients:

2 peppers
A bunch of spring onions
4 fresh chillies
1 x 1kg salmon fillet with skin, descaled and deboned as far as possible
2 lemons
fennel
1 mug basmati rice
225g pickled red peppers
some fresh mint leaves
balsamic vinegar
400g baby courgettes (although I've done this with larger courgettes too)
fresh coriander
1 clove garlic
2 limes
2-3 ripe avocados
olive oil (lots)
salt and pepper to taste

I agree with Jamie's advice to "get all your ingredients and equipment ready. Fill and boil the kettle. Turn the grill on to full whack. Put a saucepan on a medium heat. Put the standard blade attachment into the food processor (if you've got one)" (which we don't). There's a lot happening in a short period of time. This is from his 30-minute recipes, and even if it takes you slightly longer, you'll still be busy.

Anyway, here we go.

Salmon:

1. Pour a couple of lugs of olive oil into a large roasting tray. Slice the peppers, the spring onions, and 2 chillies.
2. Drizzle olive oil over both sides of the salmon, season, and grate lemon zest over the fillet - it'll need a full lemon for a big fillet.
3. Rub the flavours into the salmon. If needed, halve the salmon so it fits into the tray, then put the salmon in the tray skin up and put the vegetables around it.
4. Put under the grill and set the timer for 14 minutes. Put the rice into a medium saucepan with a pinch of salt and cover by 1.5 cm with boiling water.
5. Put the lid on, turn the heat right up and leave to cook for 7 minutes. Once cooked, take off the heat and leave to steam for 7 minutes, still covered with the lid.

Salad:

1.Squeeze the juice of ½ a lemon into a large serving bowl and add a couple of lugs of extra virgin olive oil and a good pinch of salt and pepper.
2. Finely chop the a couple of sprigs of mint leaves and ½ a chilli and add to the bowl.
3. Speed-peel as much of the baby courgettes as you can (using a mandoline if possible but a vegetable peeler works fine, too) over the dressing and put whatever is left behind on a large wooden chopping board.
4. Take the bowl of salad to the table but don’t toss until right before you are ready to serve.

Rice

1. Roughly chop and mix the jarred peppers and remaining mint leaves on the chopping board with the remaining courgette.
2. Add a pinch of salt & pepper, a good lug of extra virgin olive oil and a splash of balsamic.

Salmon

1. When the 14 minutes are up, take the tray out of the oven.
2. Using a knife and your fingers, carefully peel the skin away from the flesh and flip it over.
3. Sprinkle a pinch of salt and the fennel seeds over the exposed side of te skin.
4. Turn the peppers over, then put the tray back under the grill and cook for a further 5 minutes, or until the skin is really crispy.

Guacamole (n.b this can be done by hand for a chunkier texture)

1. Trim the rest of the spring onions and put them into the processor with most of the coriander, a chilli (stalk removed), a peeled clove of garlic, the juice of 1 of your limes and a good drizzle of extra virgin olive oil.
2.Whiz up while you stone the avocados and quarter the tomatoes.
3. Stop whizzing, and squeeze the avocado flesh out of its skin into the processor.
4. Add the tomatoes and pulse until chunky.
5. Put into a bowl and add more seasoning or lime juice to taste if needed.
6. Take to the table with a few wedges of lime for squeezing over.

Rice

1. Quickly fluff up the rice with a fork, then tip over the board of chopped veg and gently mix together. Take to the table.
2. Use tongs to carefully turn the crispy salmon skin back over.
3. Season with salt & pepper and cook for a further 5 minutes.

Serve with flour tortillas - these can be warmed in the microwave for 30s if bought, or wrapped in foil and placed in the grill after it has been turned off for a few minutes whilst you take everything else to the table.

Chicken and Chorizo Jambalaya

I don't know when I first heard about this magnificent combination of stuff, but it's become one of my favourite dishes ever. Quick, simple, and filling. And it can feed you for a week or so. Enjoy.

Jambalaya (portions here will feed about 4)

You will need:

2 chicken breasts, cut up into wee little pieces
about 200g of chorizo, also in wee little pieces
an onion, diced
garlic to taste, crushed or finely sliced
One or two chillies, depending on tastes
2 sticks of celery, sliced
A pepper or two, diced
4 tomatoes, boiled for a minute then diced, or (if you're lazy) a 400-ml tin of tomatoes
2 or 3 bay leaves
1 tsp paprika
about 400ml of chicken stock
1 tbsp of Tabasco (again, to taste)
1 cup of long-grain rice
Salt and pepper to taste

Chop stuff up. Dry-fry the chorizo until somewhat cooked in a big heavy pot with a lid. Don't worry, there's more than enough oil to coat the bottom of the pot. Remove, then fry the chicken until browned. Take that out too and put it to one side with the chorizo, then add the onion, garlic, celery and chilli, fry until soft, then add the peppers and do like-wise. When that's done, add the chicken, chorizo, and tomatoes, mix it all up, add the rice, making sure that it's all coated in oil and stuff, then add the stock, bay leaves, paprika, tabasco, and salt and pepper as needed. I also sometimes add oregano. Ensure the stock is covering the rice, then leave to cook for about 30 to 45 minutes. Don't let it get too dry - there should be some juice.

Serve it in a bowl, maybe with some salad, definitely with some wine or beer.

Enjoy.

Ceviche

Ceviche is a lovely South American dish of raw fish, coriander, and citrus fruit. And... that's about it, really. At least, the basics are really basic. But there are lots of possibilities to expand on the base. So go wild. This is the most recent, very basic, but quite fantastic version I used.

500g salmon, cut into 1cm-long strips
500g white fish (can't remember which type, since it was in Estonian), ditto
1/2 cup lemon juice, freshly squeezed
1/2 cup lime juice, ditto
1 chilli, seeded and finely diced
1 1/2 tomatoes, finely diced
1/2 onion, finely diced
1 small red pepper, ditto
Coriander to taste and serve
Dash of Tabasco, salt and pepper to taste, oregano
Avocado to serve

Combine everything in a non-metallic bowl or dish (glass or plastic) and leave to sit for at least 4 hours or overnight. Serve with the avo and extra coriander.

I feel I should point out that this doesn't keep, so it should be eaten within 24 hours. These proportions should serve 6-8.

If you're feeling adventurous, substitute your fish for other fish, or even prawns or other seafood; or add grapefruit, pomegranate, garlic, basil, etc. Go wild.

Have fun.

Ratatouille

On a bit of a French kick at the moment. Ah well.

Yes, this is the ratatouille from the film. Again, easy, fun to make, and you get to say the word ratatouille. I mean, how cool is that?

This should serve 3-4 people, depending on quantities.

Ratatouille

2 large aubergines, cubed
3-4 large courgettes, cubed
2 peppers, bite-sized chunks
3 or 4 tomatoes (you can put more in, but it's quite good with less of a tomato-ey taste). Pierce the skin, submerge in boiling water for about 20 seconds, then take them out and skin and de-seed them. Or don't. Either way, cut them into quarters.
Thyme (or Provencal spice)
1 or 2 onions, sliced (but not diced)
Garlic to taste (3 or 4 should generally do the trick)
About 2 tablespoons of red wine (or wine vinegar)
1 teaspoon sugar

For those of you with a bit of adventure in your souls, add some olives, a chilli or two, and some anchovies (but don't overdo the anchovies). A big cast-iron pot is also quite useful.

Cook the aubergines for about 5 minutes until soft, then remove from the heat. Don't overcook just yet. Repeat with the courgettes (until brown) and peppers (browning and then taking them out). Then cook the onions until soft and stuff. Add the garlic, fry for a bit, then add the wine/vinegar and sugar. Stir in, add the tomatoes and the thyme or Provencal spice, stir in again, and add the courgettes, aubergines, and peppers (and olives and anchovies if you're using them). Add salt and pepper to taste, then cook for about 5-10 more minutes.

I'd recommend serving this with couscous. And wine. It'll make you think of your childhood. And then overlook gross violations of public health and sanitation.

Sex Chicken Pesto Pasta

This one was something a friend made for us one very cold winter's evening. Lovely stuff, very easy. It is magical stuff, and if you are using it for a date, it will work wonders (hence the name). I can't remember the exact details, but I've adapted it and changed it (probably) and it still tastes pretty good. And it's dead easy.

Ingredients: (this should feed 4)

500g chicken breast, in smallish chunks
3 cloves garlic
2 onions
150g sun-dried tomatoes diced
2 1/2 tbsp green pesto
(Optional) mushrooms, peppers, Worcester sauce, 400g tin of tomatoes
Pasta of choice (macaroni or fettuccine should be best)
White cheese (feta or otherwise)
Salt and pepper to season

Mix the chicken, one onion, garlic, tomatoes, and 1 1/2 tbsp pesto and put to one side, the longer the better, but for at least an hour. Chop up the other onion, mushrooms, peppers, etc, fry them up. Prepare the pasta as directed. When everything is ready, shove it in a bowl with cheese on top. Enjoy.