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by bitsofcarey

Fresh tuna pate

November 5, 2010 in Fish, Snacks

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I have had no joy cooking with tuna this week, firstly, it was a mission to find and secondly, I overcooked it during a shoot(this is what happens when you are doing too many things at once)and I had to hunt for some again…not fun!

Well this is what I did with my overcooked tuna(not tough as an old boot overcooked but meaning I wanted mine still pink in the middle not cooked through). Since it was like R50 for +- 350 g, it couldn’t go to waste! Instead, I decided to make a refreshing tuna pate and refreshing it was! So in hindsight, not such a bad experience because I got to make this delight. I firmly believe that some of the best recipes are made by mistake!Spread thickly onto slices of toasted cranberry and nut sour dough bread…heaven!

P.s. This pate is super healthy, low in fat with loads of herbs and lemon for flavour.

You will need:

Makes +- 2 cups

+- 350 g cooked tuna or 1 large tuna steak

125 g smooth cottage cheese

Juice and zest of 1 lemon

1 large tomato, seeds removed and roughly chopped

Handful of chives (or 2 spring onions, chopped)

Handful of Italian parsley

Handful of coriander

Salt and pepper to taste

Bung everything into a food processor and blend until desired consistency.

Check seasoning.

Toast some lovely artisan bread and serve!

Lasts 3 days in the fridge(if you can manage that!)

mmm….

 

Have a great weekend all!

 

C xx

 

Motto for the weekend: “Do what you can”

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by bitsofcarey

Tuna and sweetcorn pasta bake

October 24, 2010 in Fish, Pasta

17 Comments »

Give this meatless Monday dish a go. Imagine tuna and sweetcorn combined with pasta and cheese sauce then baked…mmm. Hub isn’t a huge fan of tuna, but I still made a whole dish and froze the rest! I love this bake because it’s a classic pantry dish(you’ll have all the ingredients at home!). Replace tuna with bits of smoked haddock and use the poaching milk to make the sauce, yum! If this is not quite what you are looking for, try cauliflower mac ‘n cheese or MOG mac ‘n cheese . Planned on photographing this dish earlier, but was so hungry I forgot! HA HA!  So below this is my half eaten pasta bake…

You will need:

1 heaped cup macaroni, cooked in salted water until al dente

SAUCE:

50 g butter

50 ml cake flour

500 ml milk

125 ml grated cheddar

handful of chopped parsely

salt and pepper

1 small onion, chopped

250 ml/ 1 cup sweetcorn

1 tin of tuna in brine, drained

125 ml grated cheese

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees

To make the sauce, prepare a roux with the butter and flour, then add the milk and whisk continously over high heat until thickened. Remove from the heat and stir in the cheese, seasoning and parsley.

Heat a small frying pan with a little oil, saute the onions until soft then stir in the sweetcorn and heat through. Remove from the heat and add the tuna.

Combine the cooked and rinsed pasta, cheese sauce and tuna mixture and spoon into a greased medium baking dish. Top with more grated cheese and bake for +- 20 minutes or until golden on the surface.

Serve with a simple green salad.

 

Here’s to a new week of eating healthy and trying to go to gym 3 times. It is much needed after taking my brother out for dinner for the first time after being in bed 5 months! He can finally walk with 1 crutch and has use of his right hand again, so he was in high spirits and the first meal he wanted was chilli poppers. First option was Panchos, but was fully booked(good on them), so we went to Fat cactus in Mowbray. Lets just say, we ate our selves into a stupor! Go Mr D, it’s great to have you back! I am so proud to have him as my big bro!

 

Time to make some java and watch what is left of the 8 ‘o clock movie!

 

C xx

 

 

 

 

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by bitsofcarey

Smoked snoek and spinach “cheesecake”

October 6, 2010 in Baking, Fish

10 Comments »

I developed this recipe about a year ago when I was going through a savoury cheesecake phase and I have to say that this is a legendary one! You’ll have to bake this and taste what I am going on about! Now, if you do not eat smoked snoek, you can replace it with same amounts of smoked salmon offcuts, smoked angelfish or roasted butternut…something nice and bulky. I throw in baby spinach, for some colour and it does add to the flavour somewhat. It’s called a cheesecake because it has 2 tubs of smooth cottage cheese, some gruyere for richness and of course some eggs to help it set when baked. This is very easy to make, you just pop all the prepped ingredients into a food processor, pulse until smooth, pour over a tuc biscuit crust, yes you read correctly, a tuc biscuit crust and bake! So so more -ish…

What you will need:

1 packet of tuc biscuits or 200 g savoury biscuit of your choice

50 ml butter or olive oil

1 onion, chopped

100 g baby spinach

pinch of cayenne pepper

15 ml cake flour

250 g smoked snoek, stripped off the bone(make sure you get all the bones out!)

2 tubs smooth cottage cheese

250 ml grated gruyere cheese

3 eggs

black pepper to taste

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees.

Crust: Place the biscuits and butter(you don’t need to melt it) in a food processor and blend until it resembles damp sand, then press into a greased 23 cm springform tin and bake for 8 minutes.

In a frying pan, saute the onions in a little oil until soft and slighlty golden, then add the spinach and allow the leaves to wilt. Remove from the heat and stir the flour through to absorb the excess liquid.

Reduce the oven temperature to 180 degrees.

Put spinach mixture and all the remaining ingredients into the food processor and blend until smooth.

Pour over the crust and and bake for +- 45 minutes, will have a slight jiggle in the middle but mostly set.

Allow to cool slightly before slicing. Even better refridgerated overnight and brought back to room temperature.

Serve with a light watercress salad.

 

P.S you may notice that I did not add salt, I find the snoek salty enough. However, it’s up to your own palate!

 

We are off to Tulbagh for the weekend and I cannot wait, I might even try my hand in fishing! ha ha! Let’s see how that goes…

 

Have a SUPER weekend all!

 

C x

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by bitsofcarey

A fish “braai” and Sunday loving!

September 15, 2010 in Fish, Sauces, vegetables

16 Comments »

A few Sundays ago, we were going through a serious fish craving. I bought a beautiful fat angel fish and got the fishmonger to butterfly it for me. Angelfish has such a clean delicate flavour, so I wanted to keep the flavours simple. I chose to wrap the fish in foil and steam it rather than cooking it directly onto the heat of the braai. I even wrapped asparagus in foil with some butter etc, and steamed that over the fire. The end result was a flavour and texture sensation. I quite liked the foil idea, I saved myself from plenty of dishes, serving the fish and veg as is and everybody just helped themselves. I suppose you could’ve done this all in the oven, but it was superb just sitting in the garden next to the crackling fire, a glass of bubbly brut in hand and munching copious amounts of olives and bread while we wait for the “piece de restistance”. This is what Sundays are made for!

Wash and dry the fish

  • Fish: Top the one side with blocks of butter, a handful of parsley, crushed garlic and the zest and juice of 1 lemon.Season. Then fold the other side over the filling and wrap tightly in foil. The fish takes 20 minutes on each side to cook over a medium heat from the coals.
  • For the asparagus, just add butter and seasoning and wrap in foil. Place the asparagus on the heat for the last 10 minutes of cooking.
  • For sweet potato wedges: boil 2 large sweet potatoes until tender, then cut them into wedges. Place onto a baking tray, drizzle with olive oil, season and Just before the fish goes on the braai, roast at 220 degrees for +- 30 minutes or until super crispy. I like them almost cajun!!
  • For smoor(tomato and onion sauce): Fry 1 chopped onion and some garlic in a bit of oil until soft and caramelised. Add 4 chopped tomatoes(or 1 tin), 2 Tbs balsamic vinegar, 2 tsp brown sugar, salt and pepper, 1/2 tsp mixed herbs, cover and simmer for +- 30 minutes until reduced, sweet and delicious! Serve with the fish and wedges!

While prepping the food, J made freshly squeezed OJ….yum yum yum… we just love this mellerware juicer thingy mabob.

Our lovely array of nibbles and delicious, crispy Rhebeek Cellar Brut.

And there you have it! the smoor, the buttery asparagus and the fall off the bone lemony angelfish.

Crunchy asparagus, tender fish, crispy sweet wedges and sweet and sour tomato smoor finished off with some lemon of course!

 

All together, a lovely Sunday late lunch!

 

We all loved the angelfish and we will definately be eating it more often!

 

Isn’t this the healthiest looking “braai” ever?

 

Excuse the pics, wasn’t in the food styling zone at the time! :-)

 

Well, it’s cold and rainy in CT and I feel like a big bowl of soup!

 

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by bitsofcarey

Smoked snoek ‘n mayo stack

September 5, 2010 in Fish, Snacks

11 Comments »

My body is so happy that the cold weather is starting to thaw out into warmer days. Lighter meals and less snacking is in store for myself and many other people in SA. It gets easier to get out of bed in the morning and the days feel a bit longer (so you don’t end up in your PJ’s first thing when getting home!). And of course you feel more motivated to get on the cross trainer at gym and work off some of that winter bulge! I love winter and all the comforts it has to offer, but I am ecstatic that summer is on it’s way – it’s time for light, fresh and flavourful food!

On those cold days, we would be more inclined to make a soup or a buttery pate out of smoked snoek…a good example of lighter alternative is smoked snoek and mayo stacked with melba toast. I had this for lunch the other day and it was a pleasure to eat!

It’s also a nice change from using tinned tuna.

You will need:

250 g smoked snoek, removed from the bone and shredded

125 ml light mayo

3 spring onions, sliced

a squeeze of lemon

salt and pepper

Mix all the above together.

Stack with Melba toast from Pick n Pay or Woolies

Garnish with wild rocket and mini Italian tomatoes

I say this to myself every year, but I am really going to try and eat my 5 a day, eat more legumes, eat fish twice a week, snack a little less and exercise! I said I’m going to TRY!

Weekend was great! It was my bro’s 30th and I made him a rich chocolate mousse cake with a choc mint ganache(and would you believe I didn’t even take a photo!!), Saturday - cooked for friends at our place and Sunday we had a fish braai, all of which will be posted in my blog in due time!

HAve a good week all!

Cxx