Green Panzanella with Blood Pudding

Wikipedia tells me that "panzanella" is: "a Florentine salad of bread and tomatoes popular in the summer. It includes chunks of soaked stale bread and tomatoes, sometimes also onions and basil, dressed with olive oil and vinegar."

I had never heard of it before coming across this recipe, but it was amazing. VERY high maintenance, but delicious, despite my dislike of blood pudding.

High maintenance though. It took almost an hour to assemble.

You start by making croutons. Frying or grilling up small cubes of bread. Recipe asked for sourdough bread, but I just used what we had in the bread bin, which in this case was the husband's wholewheat homemade bread. Fried it with some salt and pepper and olive oil, till good and crispy. Put aside to cool.

Fry the blood pudding in slices. I am not a big fan of the stuff, and actually would probably have exchanged it for bacon if I hadn't been engaged in this project. Part of my agreement with myself when I started this was that I would try EVERYTHING, even the things I don't usually like. So far that has worked well, but I really wasn't keen on this. I think it would have been all right if I'd used significantly less, but I didn't, and I felt like it took over the salad a bit. In any case, if you like the stuff, it would probably work just fine. Husband liked it. :)

In any case, fry it up till crispy, break into chunks and set aside to cool.

Cook up some fresh broad beans in boiling water for about a minute. Sounds quick huh? Yeah, except we bought the still podded variety and I had to pod them all. Once they've been cooked in boiling water for a minute or two, pull them out, rinse them in cold water and then peel off the hard shells. You know, I am a big fan of skipping bits in high maintenance recipes, and this seems like a good opportunity, but it really is worth doing. The soft insides are not only much tastier and more succulent without their nasty casings, but they're also a brilliant emerald green colour which is really gorgeous. Set aside.

Mix in some salad greens in a large bowl. I used lettuce and rocket, but use whatever you like. Add some fresh herbs. The recipe said mint and basil, but I used various leafy things from our window box collection. Throw in the croutons, blood pudding and beans.

Finally, the vinaigrette: Throw two large tomatoes, a few anchovies, half a cup of good olive oil and a generous dash of red wine vinegar and a bit of salt and pepper into a food processor. Whirr till liquidy. Throw the lot over the salad. Toss it about.

Enjoy.

It really is very good, and that vinaigrette is beautiful. But it did take a long time to assemble, and I am not sure it's THAT good. I'd have switched out the blood pudding for bacon, but to be honest, I probably won't make this again, just because of the effort involved. Unless I am really trying to impress someone.

Ratings:
Me: Meh. Not worth the time it took.
Husband: Meh. OK, but no great shakes.
(We both liked the vinaigrette though.)

Salsa Vinagreta

Sounds fancy, huh? Yeaaaah, not so much.

This one came out of a Catalan book we have, and really just is a bog standard vinaigrette. Olive oil, white wine vinegar, salt and white pepper. Mix. Pour. There.

But I did say I was doing every recipe, so I couldn't skip it.

I did make a pretty awesome salad to go with it. Home grown basil, coriander and rocket (very baby cos it's still growing), cherry tomatoes, boiled eggs, olives, green peppers. Full of yummy nutritious deliciousness.

Still, don't have a lot to say about this one. It was as you'd expect. Good, subtle, enhanced the salad without overblowing it. Standard vinaigrette stuff.

I honestly don't know why people buy these things pre-made from shops.

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Next week's is exciting though - I am looking forward to making this: Spinach and Goat's Cheese Stuffed Lamb Rack. NOM.

Pea soup and Mercian Salad

*dusts off blog*

So, I finally got our cookbooks on a shelf in the kitchen where they belong. I also seem to have found my round tuits, with the help of a little Android App called Astrid which is the electronic to do list I have been searching for for years. /plug.

So, I am going to try and finally do this little cooking project I have been planning on for ages. What it entails is working my way through the books, and cooking everything in them. Starting with the first recipe in the first book, then the first recipe in the second book, and so on, till I get to the end of the shelf and cycle back around.

Yes, I realise this will take me a LONG time. We're aiming for one a week, but some weeks (like this one!) we might just achieve more than that.

The first book on the shelf is a "Best of Floyd", so you can imagine my surprise and disappointment when it didn't have even a smidge of alcohol in it! (I really hope you all know about Floyd, or that will make no sense.)

It's a mint and pea soup. Pretty basic, cream, stock, mint and peas. Some butter, some seasoning. I even made proper real stock from a chicken carcass from the night before, cos I was feeling all culinary. Very easy, very basic recipe.

I'm not sure I've ever actually had pea soup before. I was less than impressed at first. It wasn't as minty as I expected it to be (even though I used FRESH MINT! From the GARDEN! As instructed.), but it grew on me. Kind of delicate. I love peas, so that helps.

We ate the leftovers the following day and it had thickened up a bit and was much nicer. The recipe certainly didn't say "Let it rest for a day", but it seemed to have improved it.

Ratings:
Me: Tentative thumbs up
Husband who loves food: Thumbs up
Incredibly fussy teen: Meh
Occasional hungry student: Thumbs up

The Mercian Salad comes out of a Spanish cookbook, and was actually made by the husband and said occasional student, who was here for dinner. I was otherwise occupied with the baby.

It's basically a salad made of roasted veggies - eggplant, onion, red pepper, garlic. There is about a ton of olive oil involved and some lemon juice, I think.

It was very similar to a Catalan dish that the boys make when we barbeque, except instead of cooking the veg over a fire, they're roasted in the oven. So it wasn't as exotic to us as it might have been. Nevertheless, it is one of my favourite things. Roast veggie salad, eaten cold. NOMNOMNOM. Also, you know, Mediterranean food for the win.

Me: Thumbs up
Husband who loves food: Thumbs up
Incredible fussy teen: Thumbs down
Occasional hungry student: Thumbs up


Next up: Almond and Roquefort Soup with Cheese Profiteroles. Mmmmm.