Favourite Food Steroids

Hi

Warm some olive oil in a large frying pan

Chop half an onion finely and fry gently in the oil. Add a clove of chopped garlic when the onion is transparent. 

Chop the stems of a large handful of broccoli into 1cm lengths and add to the frying pan

Add two large handfuls of risotto rice to the frying pan and after a minute or so add a half glass of dry white wine. Add a bay leaf and the finely chopped leaves of a sprig of rosemary. 

Add a teaspoon of marigold veg stock powder and a bit of salt and ground black pepper and stir. Keep adding boiling water, half a cup at a time, and stir until the water is absorbed. After ten minutes add the chopped tops of the broccoli stems. Keep adding water and stirring. 

After about 20 minutes you will have a creamy risotto with the rice just cooked but still with a touch of bite to it. The stirring is essential to release the starch from the rice and achieve the desired creaminess  only make this if you have time to stand at the stove gently stirring  for 20 minutes. 

Turn off the heat. Stir in a knob of butter, a small handful of toasted pine nuts and a handful of grated Parmesan. Leave for five minutes then serve with more Parmesan and ground black pepper on top.

Optional extras: Chuck in the rind of a piece of Parmesan if you have it after the while wine. I keep my rinds for this purpose. Fish it out at the end. 
Use veg stock in place of water made by boiling 500ml of water with your veg peelings such as carrot, onion skins etc with herbs and a teaspoon of veg stock powder. 

You can replace the broccoli with cauliflower. If so, top with a crunchy mix made by frying three or four chopped anchovies in olive oil with a half teaspoon of chilli flakes. When the anchovies have dissolved, turn up the heat and chuck in a large handful of breadcrumbs and fry until golden and crunchy. It’s banging. 

Hope this gets your taste buds tingling 

xxx

Hi All,

I was very tired and could not be bothered to do much last night.  I had intended to cook a nice piece of rump steak with chips, grilled mushrooms, tomatoes and peas.

Instead I inadvertently went paleo diet with a muesli starter followed by the steak, peppered but with absolutely nothing else except mustard and mayonnaise.  I did enjoy it but feel the need for vegetables today.

"Bon Appetit" everyone.

Gragon

This sounds delicious 

i don t eat cheese ,or any dairy ,but can get round that,my husband decided to make risotto ,started ,then had to go to work so i had to stir for the last while , so daloni ,you are so right ,make sure you have time 

I look forward to trying this,thanks 

janet

xxxxxx

Oooh Daloni that sounds like something i will have to try, than you for sharing the recipe.xxLynn 2x

Hello hello, 

So, tasting happened last night. Bride and I seemed to be on the same page flavour wise, but the mango cake I'd been asked to put as much mango into as possible as it was a favourite of the bride's, the groom felt was too mangoey..... I pointed out there are 3 differently flavoured cakes, and he isn't going to be eating the tropical one, so shouldn't we go with what was interesting and flavoursome? But seems not. Lol. So they've taken their two favourites away to taste again and will let me know, but at the moment they're leaning towards the: coconut and lime cake, with a mango and orange drizzle, a mango and passionfruit jam, with a cream cheese icing, all covered in toasted coconut and freeze dried mango powder, with a pile of fresh mango on the top.

So the left ovrr mango and orange drizzle I'm thinking I could put into a curry. The left over cakes are going to a self harm support group tonight that a friend is going to. The left over coconut caramel is going to my Mum. And I'm keeping the left over jam as it should last until the wedding in May, which means I don't need to make it again! Lol

As for the recipe..... 

• 2kg of ripe mangoes, about 6 medium. 
• 500g of jam sugar. 
• 225ml of passionfruit pulp, about 10 passionfruits
• 4tbsp of lime juice

1. Remove the skin from the mangoes and cube into 1cm blocks. Put into a plastic bowl and sprinkle with the sugar. Cover and leave for 2 hours, or overnight, at room temp to extract the juices.
2. Put 2 small plates into the fridge or freezer, ready for jam testing. 
3. Wash your jars in soapy water, rinse, then put into oven with lids beside them at 150C/130C fan for 30 mins.
4. Put the mango mix into a pan over a low heat and stir for 5 mins to dissolve the sugar. 
5. Add the passionfruit and turn the heat to high and cooking for 20 mins with an occasional stir. Skim off any froth that's produced and discard. 
6. Test it's ready by putting a tsp of the mix onto one of the chilled plates. It's ready if it wrinkles when poked. If it's too liquid, keep boiling. 
7. When it's ready, stir in the lime juice, turn off the heat, and pour into the warm jars. Screw on the lid and leave to cool. 
8. Store for up to a year. 
9. To zing it up, you could stir in some finely chopped stem ginger or a splash of rum. 

Now, my mango didn't break down, at all. So between stage 5 and 6 I got my handheld blender out and went to town on it. Lol. So I ended up with a nice smooth jam with passionfruit seeds in it. If your mango is better than mine, then yours may break down.

Today, I'm not doing too much as I'm sore and knackered. But I do need to eat, so I think the plan is a low carb lasagne, is what they are calling it. But it's more like a moussaka as they are using aubergine instead of pasta. Then a tomato sauce, a cheese mix, and I think some quorn mince.

See what happens. 

Lass

Xx

Thanks Lass . That looks banging  

As for the lasagne, leave out the mince and you’ve got a classic parmigiana a la melanzone. 

xxx

Lass, you're killing me.

I have a sweet tooth, always have. And I've been on a whopping dose of steroids since September,  so I'm more than a little greedy right now. Possibly.

I dropped over the descriptions of the cakes more than is decent. I've been trying to work out which fillings go with which cakes. Pencil and paper were required, so I could draw diagrams, which was a mistake. I thought taking a structured approach would limit the options, but whereas I had about 5 before, there are nine or ten now.

So... I need you to explain how it works before my evening is completely ruined. Please help. 

Drooled. 

Lol, sorry . Just to warn you, if I haven't already, I'm doing this another two times with them to work out the other two cakes too. So watch out in March as it's marbled strawberry, raspberry, and Mascarpone cakes and icings! Then April ish will be chocolate and nut!

So, with the tropical cake there's going to be the cake itself with is either going to be coconut and lime or mango. There will be roughly 4 layers of cake, and each will be soaked in an orange and mango syrup to keep it nice and moist. Each layer, except the top one, will then have a generous spread of the mango and passionfruit jam, as well as a good spread of icing. If it's the coconut and lime cake, then the icing will be a mango and cream cheese icing. If it's the mango cake then the icing will be a cream cheese and lime icing. Then the sides and top will be iced as well, then toasted coconut and freeze dried mango powder will be pressed into the icing to cover it. Then I'll chop up some fresh mango, pipe a ring of icing in the center top of the cake, then fill it and pile it with mango.

That's how they're all going to tie together. The chocolate cake will be covered in chocolate vermicelli and with a nut pile on the top. The Berry cake will have freeze dried raspberry and strawberry powder up the sides and on top, with a pile of berries in the middle. So gives it some cohesion, even though they are all very different flavours and colours. Lol.

And if any of you are in the Leeds area, you're more than welcome to ask for anything to be baked for you! I love baking, I've just noone to feed it to! 

Lass

Xx

Nooooo!