Quick pear cake

A one-bowi wonder, adaptable to many fresh or bottled such as plums, apricots or apples. You may think it's a lot of powder (as I did) but it seems to need the oomph -to hold up the fruit.

INGREDIENTS

150g icing sugar

150g softened butter

150g plain flour

3 eggs

1 tbsp baking powder

dash vanilla essence

2 pears

white, raw, brown or coffee sugar, for sprinkling

METHOD

• Preheat oven to 200C.

• Combine all ingredients except fruit and additional sugar in a bowl or food processor until creamy and pale.

• Spoon into a greased 20cm tin (springform if you have one).

• Peel and quarter pears. Layer gently on top of the batter and bake for about 45 minutes or until cooked. Sprinkle sugar over after about 20 minutes. If the cake is browning too quickly cover with tin foil.

Pork Provençale

This is a tasty and delicious way of cooking pork, I leave the pork in large pieces which are then cooked for an hour and a half so that they are very tender. This dish is best served with rice or couscous.

1kg pork shoulder
1 eggplant
1 zucchini
1 red pepper, chopped
1 medium brown onion, chopped
2 garlic cloves, chopped
1 400g can tomatoes
2 tsp thyme
1 tsp smoked paprika (piménton)
⅓ tsp chilli powder
100ml chicken stock
salt and freshly ground black pepper
100ml white wine
pitted black olives

Chop the pork into 4cm cubes and lightly brown the pork in batches. Remove the pork from the pan and set aside,

Sweat the red pepper in the pan over a low heat. After about 5 minutes, add the onion and cook gently until the onions softens. Add the garlic and some sea salt and cook, stirring for a minute. Add the paprika, chilli powder and thyme.

Now add the can of tomatoes with the tomatoes chopped or crushed, white wine and the chicken stock. Add the pork to the pan, bring to a gentle simmer, cover and cook for 1½  hours or until the pork is very tender.

Meanwhile cut the eggplant into 2cm slices, and then these into quarters.  Heat 60ml olive oil in a heavy based frying pan and fry the eggplant in batches until golden brown on all sides, Drain on a paper towel and set aside.

About 10 minutes before serving, slice the zucchini and add the the pan. Then just before serving, add the eggplant and heat for 2 minutes so the eggplant is heated through. Garnish with pitted black olives.

Cook for approximately 1 1/2 hours on a low heat.

Serves 4 

Pear Cake

This recipe is very quick to make since it can be made almost entirely in a food-processor. It is great to have in your repertoire for when unexpected guests call.

INGREDIENTS
100g icing sugar
150g softened butter
100g plain flour
50g almond meal
3 eggs
1 tbsp baking powder
1/2 tsp vanilla essence
1/2 tsp rosewater or orange water
2 pears
brown sugar for sprinkling after cooking (although any sugar you have to hand will do).

METHOD

Preheat the oven to 200°C. Now add all of the ingredients with the exception of the pears and additional sugar into a food processor and blitz until the mixture is pale and creamy.
Spoon the mixture into a greased 20cm tin (preferably spring form if you have one).
Peel and quarter pears. Layer gently on top of the mixture and bake for about 45 minutes or until cooked. Sprinkle sugar over after about 20 minutes. If the cake is browning too quickly cover with tin foil.

Marinated Mussel Salad

One of my favorite dishes is marinated mussels. The method is very simple and quick. At certain times of the year mussels are fat and juicy and then they make an excellent meal.

First of all, clean the mussels and then open them in a hot pan. I just cook them in the pan without placing any liquid in it. This seems to keep the mussels plumper than if they were cooked in wine, for example. Simply heat the pan until it is hot and then add the cleaned mussels. Put on a lid and shake the pan from time to time. The mussels will cook in 2 or 3 minutes. Meanwhile prepare a suitable marinade. After the mussels are opened, remove the mussels from the shells and cool them slightly. Allow the cooking liquid drain off them. Then add the mussels to the marinade. The mussels may be eaten warm or cooled in the refrigerator. I prefer the mussels served still warm  served with a green salad. However, if you like, they make a great stand-alone 'tapas' dish.

You need:
1kg of opened and shelled mussels

For the marinade
3 tsp red wine vinegar
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tsp smoked paprika
1 clove of garlic, minced
6 sprigs of parsley, chopped finely
2 tsp chopped oregano or other chopped hebs
1/4 tsp chilli flakes

Stuffed Zucchini Flowers with Ricotta Cheese

We grow zucchini flowers in our garden over summer just for this dish. The special zucchini flower seeds which we use seem to grow mainly male flowers so there are usually quite a lot of flowers each day to pick. In this dish the flowers are filled with ricotta cheese which has been mixed with fresh oregano from the garden and then steamed. The flowers are served in a butter sauce with pine-nut sauce. They flowers are one of my favourite entrees which are why we grow the zucchini flowers.

around 12 zucchini flowers
a small bunch of fresh oregano, chopped
200g ricotta preferably from a tub of fresh ricotta
50g butter
olive oil
1 tbsp pine nuts, toasted
the juice of 1 lemon

Remove the stamens from inside the flowers and trim the ends. Mix the oregano with the ricotta cheese and season with salt and pepper. Put the mixture into a small plastic sandwich bag and trim of the corner of the bag with a pair of scissors to make a piping bag. Pipe the ricotta mixture into each of the zucchini flowers and seal each flower by twisting the end. Place in a vessel to steam the flowers, drizzling a little olive oil over the flowers. I use a metal colander placed over boiling water in a saucepan and covered with a lid for steaming the flowers.
Steam the flowers for 4 minutes and then place the flowers on a serving plate.
Meanwhile heat the butter in a small pan until it is golden and foaming. Add the pine nuts and the juice of the squeezed lemon. Pour gently over the zucchini flowers and serve immediately.

Garlic Prawns

This is one of my favourite dishes. A Spanish-style dish, it combines the seafood taste of prawns with the a sauce based on garlic and paprika.

a good "glug" of olive oil
3/4 - 1 kg prawns
3-6 garlic cloves, finely chopped - add more if you like garlic
2 tbsp fresh lemon juice
1/2 cup of white wine
1 tsp smoked paprika
1⁄2 tsp chilli pepper (to taste)
4 tbsp Italian parsley, chopped
salt and fresh ground pepper

• Peel and devein the prawns.
• In a wide, shallow pan over high heat, heat the olive oil; add the prawns, then add the garlic and sauté quickly for about 2-3 minutes.Add the garlic at a point when the prawns are half cooked so they garlic doesn't blacken.
• Add the lemon juice, paprika, chilli pepper, wine and salt and pepper to taste. Adjust all of these to your liking.
• Finally, transfer the garlic prawns to a warmed serving dish, sprinkle with the chopped parsley and serve at once.

Italian Style Boned and Stuffed Chicken Legs

While this recipe is fairly inexpensive, boning the chicken legs is time consuming and not without difficulty. Start at the top of the leg and work the flesh off the bone.  If you wish, you can use pancetta instead of jamón, in which case you will need about 8 - 10 slices of thin pancetta.

6 chicken legs (about 2kg)
4 thin slices of jamón or prosciutto
3 tbsp grated parmesan cheese
1 tbsp butter
2 cloves garlic
about 10 leaves of sage
rosemary
50 ml olive oil
100ml white wine
Salt & Pepper


Skin and bone the chicken legs without cutting into them too much. Start at the top of the leg and work the flesh off the bone using a sharp knife.  Don't worry about any holes which appear in the chicken flesh, they can be hidden when the chicken leg is rolled. The most difficult part is getting the flesh away from the joint, just be patient!!

Place the garlic, rosemary and sage  in a food processor and chop  finely. Chop the jamón with a knife and mix with the finely chopped herbs and grated parmesan. Place some of this mixture in each of the boned chicken legs and roll up, tieing each roll with string.

Heat the butter and the oil in a pan and brown the chicken rolls on all sides. Add the white wine, cover and cook for around 40 minutes.

Remove the string from the chicken rolls, lay the rolls out on a platter, spooning some of the sauce over the assembled rolls, and serve.

Alternatively, cool the chicken rolls, then chill them. Then slice each roll into 3 mm slices and spread on a platter for a great cold dish which is just as good.