Come Dine with Merlotti - Amuse Bouche recipes

From Bon Appétit

So, here's the first in a set of posts detailing the recipes from my recent Come Dine with Me session with the girls from school!

Part 1 includes the amuse-bouche, although I think the only recipe I haven't previously documented is the Tomato and chilli gazpacho.

tomatoes - deseeded and chopped
garlic - crushed
chilli flakes
vegetable stock
seasoning
herbs - I used chopped fresh basil

Heat a little olive oil in a frying pan and add the chopped tomatoes.
Fry until they start to go mushy, then add the garlic and chilli flakes.
Stir in the stock, a little at a time until the sauce has loosened.
Simmer gently for about 25 minutes, adding stock so it remains runny.
Taste and season as desired.
Stir in the chopped basil and leave to cool.
Pour into shot glasses and chill.
Garnish with a basil leaf and serve at room temperature.

As for the Tadpoles in Holes and Smoked Haddock Pot au Feux, simply click their names to find the recipes! For the Tadpoles, cut sausages into small pieces first and use little tiny tart cases, cooking for no more than 15 minutes. For the Smoked Haddock, simply poach the fish in milk first, then break into bite-sized pieces and place into individual moulds. Use the milk to make the sauce, pour over the fish, cover in grated cheese and pop into the oven until the cheese bubbles.

Walkers' Taste Test

The Walkers' Taste Test

As you may have noticed, Walkers Crisps are trying out 6 new flavours and asking us to vote on our favourite. Now, being a non-discriminatory foodie, I thought that, in the name of research, I should test them all and let Walkers know of my favourite. As I considered eating 6 huge bags of crisps, my mind drifted to the effect on my hips and bum, so thought it better to create an 'event' and share the tastes, and calories, with my friends! Helen was specially over from the USA (not specially for the taste test! That would be real commitment!) so it was a novelty for her to be eating crisps again instead of chips!

First things first - I had to introduce the idea to my friends as part of a 'girly' day we were having. I'd thought about how best to do this: Get them drunk first? Suggest it was in the name of research? Beg them that I needed a new blog post? In the end, I simply suggested it might be fun to have a taste test of the new flavours and they all agreed with relish! In fact, everyone we told thought it was a great idea!

Secondly we had to find the crisps. An easy task you might think? Well, think again. Despite Walkers advertising this promotion everywhere (television, front of all normal packs of crisps, front of multi-packs,) we struggled to 'find' the 6 new flavours. We tried many high street shops, including major supermarkets, and eventually, after visiting 10 shops - no lie - found that WHSmiths was the ONLY place to stock any at all. After rummaging through their boxes,we left with 5 out of the 6 flavours. I even asked if they had any extra deliveries of 'Fish and Chip' flavour in the back, but no, they had all sold out. This, apparently, was the general theme of all we talked to - Fish and Chips were certainly the first ones people were trying.

We now had the crisps and over the course of the afternoon, had devised a 'strategy' and system for the evening! Excitedly, we made our way home, labelled each identical bowl on the bottom with the given flavour, poured in the crisps, swapped them all around and numbered each bowl visibly. Now to the experiment. My friend did ask where the score cards were but we made do with pieces of paper and a pen each.

We scored each new flavour in 4 different categories. The first was Appearance marked out of 5. The second was Smell, again out of 5. The third was Packaging - this could only be added after we had identified each flavour, out of 5 again. The fourth category, and obviously most important, was the taste. This was marked out of 10. Everyone made their own notes as we went along, and finally had a 'guess' at what each flavour might be!

The Flavours:

Onion Bhaji, Cajun Squirrel, Crispy Duck and Hoisin, Builders' Breakfast, Chocolate and Chilli, (Fish and Chips - results to follow!)

The Strategy:

Take each bowl in turn
Assess the appearance, smell and taste of each one, in that order
Drink in between each crisp test - purely to eliminate each old flavour so the new one is more apparent (?!)
Make final comments and adjustments to flavour matching
See if we were right and add scores to find a winner!

Even the shadow joined in - he initally went for the Onion Bhaji, but settled on Cajun Squirrel!

The Comments:

On the whole, given a bowl of cheese and onion or salt and vinegar, we'd have picked those every time. That wasn't, however, in our remit, so...

Bowl 1 - The appearance was much darker than the others and this put us off a bit. They also looked much greasier. The smell was quite sweet and when tasted, gave a certain spicy 'kick' at the back of the throat. One comment on the taste was simply 'Yuk!'

Bowl 2 - These were rounder than the others (!) and had speckles and flecks of colour. They smelt herby and spicy with a definite 'sausagy' hint, that led some of us to an obvious conclusion on the flavour. Read on to see if we were correct!

Bowl 3 - The appearance of these was noted as 'golden' and they looked delicious. Again, they were flecked with little specks of red but this time, had a strong smell of 'curry'. We agreed that the smell, however, was actually much nicer than the overall taste. 'Old Socks' was one noted flavour, though how they know what old socks taste of, we will never learn.

Bowl 4 - These were quite pale in appearance and many more of them had a 'skin' edge to them. They smelt sweet and saucy with a hint of cucumber and tasted similar.

Bowl 5 - These looked very appealing in terms of colour and shape as they were all quite 'uniform'. The smell was not particularly pleasant with eggy undertones. The taste was noted as 'smoky'.


The Verdict

Bowl 1 = Chocolate and Chilli (4/5 guessed correctly)
Bowl 2 = Cajun Squirrel (the sausage flavours threw us on that one! 2/5 guessed correctly)
Bowl 3 = Onion Bhaji (4/5 guessed correctly)
Bowl 4 = Crispy Duck and Hoisin (4/5 guessed correctly)
Bowl 5 = Builders' Breakfast (2/5 guessed correctly)


The Scores

Now, would it be fair to give the results without having tasted all 6 flavours? Of course not. I am currently trying to get my hands on a bag of the Fish and Chip flavour, and will complete the remaining test at the first possible opportunity. Post to follow. Our friend from America will not be present, but don't worry, a substitute has already been found and is raring to go!

All we need now are the crisps themselves!

Buttersquash Risotto

Did you know that M&S cheeses have a little flap that folds over and sticks down to keep the cheese fresh? Saves me having to re-wrap the stuff in clingfilm! Brilliant idea!

Anyway, onto more important things...as you may have read, I spend a good portion of yesterday wandering around 'finding' recipe cards, one of which inspired last night's tea. I used a combination of my own and the recipe card's recipe for Butternut Squash Risotto - I've decided to call it Buttersquash Risotto - I like that!

Having never really used or cooked with BS (can't be bothered typing Butternut Squash every time) i wasn't sure what to expect. I asked someone if they would peel it before roasting and they suggested the skin can be tough, so I took that advice, and good it was! Here's my version...

BS

onion - chopped finely

risotto rice

small glass white wine

chicken stock

sage

parsley

chilli flakes - you could use fresh red chilli finely chopped without seeds

butter

cheese - grated. I used strong cheddar but you could use any you liked. A spiced or chilli cheese would be delicious.

First, cube the BS and roast until soft and just turning brown. Oven 180 ish as usual.

Next, add the onion to a hot pan - I used a wok - and fry til soft.

Tip in the rice and wait as long as you can bear before tipping in the white wine! It should sizzle nicely in relief!

When the wine is absorbed, add a ladle of stock and stir. Stir til absorbed.

Continue this process until the rice is cooked to biting point or as desired.

Mash half of the BS cubes and leave half to garnish at the end.

Turn off the heat under the risotto.

Add most of the cheese, (retaining some for on top,) chilli flakes, herbs, mashed BS and a dollop of butter. Stir in. It should become rich and creamy immediately.

Serve with a little of the grated cheese, chopped parsley and BS cubes on top - delicious.

It really was tasty - much more so than I expected and a completely different dish from, say, mushroom risotto, which I usually do.

You can't make an omelette without breaking eggs!

Evening. Had lots of thoughts between last night and tonight's blog but can't seem to remember any of them! Firstly, can I say thank you to all for the lovely messages I've had about the blog so far! It's really spurred me on. Secondly, I'm having a few teething troubles embedding the comments box under the blog, so to comment, you actually need to click on the word 'comment'!

Now the housekeeping is out of the way, I can get onto more important things - like this evening's meal! I arrived home with a little knot of unhappiness in my tummy as I knew there was virtually nothing in the fridge, and I really didn't want to have to call in to buy supplies on the way home. So, I was all set for one of my 'Bottom of the Fridge' specialities. If you're not sure what I mean by this, let me enlighten you! 'Bottom of the Fridge' specials do exactly what they say on the tin - it's really a way of using up all those bits and pieces in the veg. compartment that you don't have enough of to contribute as a portion in a meal. Usually, bottom of the fridge rice (salad) is the order of the day. Simply slice and fry off anything left over (peppers, onions, leek, carrots, mushrooms, etc.), add seasoning, garden herbs and whatever other flavours are to hand, and mix with the cooked rice! Despite its name, its scrummy!

Sorry, little digression there! Back to the point: I was just about the begin this process, adding in chorizo and turning it into a risotto of some sort, when I received a phone call from mum. She suggested - and its a dinner I'd sort of forgotten about - making a Spanish-type omelette.


Spanish Omelette

bottom of the fridge vegetables
potato
onion
bacon/sausage/chorizo
eggs + milk

Cube and cook the potatoes. Meanwhile, fry off your meat, then veg. Combine all in the non-stick frying pan. Beat the eggs with a little milk and add to the pan. fry over a medium heat until the bottom has set and the top is still runny. Add grated cheese (if you can find an odd chunk in the fridge!) and pop under the grill to finish. Serve with salad - except we didn't have any tonight. Instead I added a dollop of homemade hot chilli jam - delicious! (Click here for recipe or see recipe links on right - if you don't like it hot, remove the seeds first.)

You may have noticed I don't include quantities in my recipes - the reasons being we all have different tastes and you know what you like and don't like!

I've got nothing planned for the weekend and am really looking forward to making a delicious meal tomorrow night. I'm hoping to start with 'Pot au Feu' haddock; my mouth's watering already!

A demain,

Merlotti x