Tuna, red pepper and sweet potato pie

Recently I spent a few days in Torquay and was pressed into service to cook a fish pie. So when I returned to Melbourne fish and pies were on my mind. What was at the shops? Fresh tuna, sweet potato and red pepper! Yum yum!! And there it was.

Ingredients 

350 gr tuna

Half red pepper

Half sweet potato 

1 clove garlic

1 tsp crushed ginger

1 tsp Sambal oelek 

2 sheets frozen puff pastry

Poppy seed

Mode

Preheat oven to 180c

Remove pastry to thaw

Chop sweet potato and microwave for 5 minutes

Roughly chop red pepper

Place one sheet of pastry on base of square baking dish

Add tuna

Place red pepper and sweet potato around the tuna

Crush ginger and garlic and add to the pie contents

Add Sambal oelek

Place second sheet of puff pastry on pie

Press to seal

Sprinkle poppyseeds 

Place in 180c oven for 45 minutes

Σεσκουλόπιττα

This afternoon I was coming home from the cinema with my friend, Dina. She asked me what I was thinking of having for dinner. I quickly replied « spanakopitta ». You are going to start it this late she asked? No, I had already steamed the vegetables I said and it isn’t actually spanakopitta, I am making it with silverbeet. And not using phyllo. And I’m using garlic and chilli and ginger. And thanks for reminding me about the spring onions: I’ll have to cook the vegetables a bit more.

So this is my little experiment for you, Dina! 

Ingredients

Half bunch silverbeet (including stalks)

2 spring onions

2 garlic cloves

1 tsp Sambal oelek

1 tsp crushed ginger

50 gr fetta

2 tbs grated Parmesan

2 sheets frozen puff pastry

Poppyseeds 

Mode

Place a steamer on the stove and bring water to the boil

Remove pastry from freezer to thaw

Turn on oven to preheat to 180c

Meanwhile roughly chop half a bunch of silverbeet including white stalks

Add to steamer

Chop spring onions and add to steamer

Crush garlic and ginger add to steamer

Steam until vegetables tender

Place one sheet of pastry in the bottom of a square oven dish

Spoon the vegetables onto the pastry

Crumble the fetta on top

Grate the Parmesan on top to taste

Place the second sheet of pastry over the vegetables and cheese

Fold the two sheets of pastry together and press to seal

Sprinkle poppyseed on top

Cook in 180c oven for 45 minutes

Pork and coriander meatballs

On 2 January I attended the funeral of Peter Smyth, the brother of my friend Trish. The speeches made so many mentions of meatballs and red wine that I returned home wanting to make meatballs and drink red wine. I did neither that evening.

But today I want to dedicate this post to Peter Smyth. I have no idea what his famous meatballs were like but am sure that with my love of meatballs of all types that I would have enjoyed them. 

My meatballs are made from pork and coriander as the key ingredients with fusion ingredients of ginger and chilli matched with olive oil and tomato-based sauce and pasta. You can cook them separately and serve with stirfry vegetables with rice or noodles or as I did yesterday in a tomato-based sauce with pasta.  Enjoy!! 

Ingredients 

500 gr minced pork

1 spring onion

2 handfuls chopped coriander

2 tablespoons crushed ginger

2 cloves garlic crushed

1 teaspoon sweet chilli sauce

Olive oil

500 gr ready made tomato based pasta sauce

Water

Mode 

Place minced pork in bowl

Chop spring onion and coriander and add

Add sweet chilli sauce

Crush ginger and garlic and add

Meanwhile place tomato sauce in pan or saucepan to heat with cup of water

With hands form the meatball mixture 

Heat olive oil in a frying pan

Add meatballs and fry to seal

Add to pan with tomato sauce

Simmer for about 30 minutes until cooked

Serve with rice or pasta

Tuna and red pepper pie

I can’t believe that I really feel like blogging again! Maybe catching up with Greek foodblogger Ivy Liacopoulou triggered something for me as well as Fiona Doyle! 

So tonight on New Year’s Eve I am cooking a simple pie with fresh tuna, red pepper, coriander and ginger all put together in puff pastry. I know, unbelievably for me, that there are people who abhor coriander but I love the taste so that’s what we have today.

Ingredients 

280 gr fresh tuna

1/2 red pepper

Handful coriander

1 handful coriander

1 teaspoon crushed ginger

2 sheets puff pastry

Poppy seeds

Mode

Take frozen pastry sheets out of freezer

Turn on oven to preheat to 180c

Chop red pepper into large pieces 

Roughly chop coriander

Crush ginger

Place bottom sheet of thawed pastry on base of baking dish

Add tuna fillet

Arrange around tuna the red capsicum 

Sprinkle over chopped coriander

Add crushed ginger

Place second sheet of pastry over  and seal to form pie

Place in oven

Bake for 45 minutes

Serves two! 

Rhubarb, orange and ginger

On Christmas Day I found myself the grateful recipient of a large bunch of rhubarb from my sister’s garden. I am not sure what the variety is, but someone suggested from the photo that it was “ruby red” and it may well be so. I decided I would cook it in orange juice and add some ginger for an extra bit of flavour. Yum!

And the blogpost? I have been slack about blogging in recent times in part due to Google not keeping its Blogger app up to date as I had found this an easy way to work with my photos and text in one place on my phone. But for years I had participated in #blog12dayschristmas and when I saw posts this week from someone with whom I had participated in the past,  I thought of blogging again. As a result, I have found a third party app for Blogger and this is my first  experiment with it.

Ingredients 

4 cups rhubarb 

2 oranges

2 teaspoons crushed ginger root

Mode

Remove all the leaves from the tops of the rhubarb and dispose of carefully

Slice the bottom to clean off

Slice the rhubarb stalks into pieces about two inches long

Place in a saucepan

Squeeze the oranges and add the juice to saucepan

Crush the ginger and add

Bring mixture to a boil

Then simmer for about 5 minutes

Cover and allow to cool

Beef & spinach meatballs in tomato sauce

At a picnic recently we were discussing various ingredients we add to rissoles or meatballs to add to the flavour or moisten the mixture. With that discussion in mind, I thought I would add some spinach to minced beef and see how the resultant mix turned out. As I love meatballs in any shape or form and I also love spinach, it is not surprising that I enjoyed the end result. You can eat them alone, or serve with rice or pasta, or gnocchi as I did. Enjoy!





Ingredients

500 gr minced beef
1/2 cup thawed frozen spinach
2 spring onions
2 clove garlic
2 heaped tsp crushed ginger
Dried basil
Olive oil
1 cup pasta tomato sauce

 



Mode

Crush the garlic and ginger
Chop the spring onions roughly
Place the beef, spinach, garlic, ginger, basil and sping onions in a bowl
Using hands combine well
Using a spoon and your hands form into meatballs of desired size
Place the tomato sauce in a pan and bring to a boil
Turn down heat and simmer
Add olive oil to a pan and quickly seal the meatballs in batches, adding them to the sauce when sealed
Simmer for about 30 minutes until meatballs are cooked
Serve with rice or pasta with grated Parmesan.

Spanakorizo/Σπανακορίζο

It had been many years since I last cooked spanakorizo.  I don't know exactly why this had happened as I love it.  But maybe it was just one of those dishes you love and cook all the time and then stop. The trigger for me came one weekend when my teacher Roza in Athens was talking to me about cooking spanakorizo with some fresh spinach she had purchased at the laiki.  

Hmm, I haven't cooked that for a while, I thought enviously. I am sure Roza's dish with its fresh ingredients was tastier than mine which was made with the frozen spinach, canned tomatoes and some fresh basil that I had on hand.  However, I enjoyed mine and will be making it again!

Ingredients

2 tbs butter
5 spring onions
1/2 cup white rice
1 can chopped tomatoes
1/2 cup water
350 gr frozen spinach
1 clove garlic
2 tsp crushed ginger root
Handful basil leaves
Parmesan


Mode

Chop the spring onions finely
Heat the butter in a pan
Add the spring onions and cook until soft
Add the rice to the pan and stir for a few minutes
Add the tomatoes and stir to combine
Put the water in the tomato can, rinse and then add tomato water
Stir to combine
Bring to the boil, cover and simmer, stirring occasionally until almost tender
Meanwhile, crush the garlic and ginger root
Place the frozen spinach in a bowl with the garlic, ginger and basil
Microwave for 5 minutes until the spinach is ready (or steam if you prefer)
Stir together to combine
Uncover the rice and stir through the spinach mixture
Continue to cook until the water is absorbed  and the mixture is tender.
Serve hot with grated Parmesan.