Tuna Ice Lollies for Cats

Animals have been suffering in the heatwave we've had recently - I've seen several reminders on Facebook not to walk dogs during the hottest part of the day. My cat spent several days moving from one spot in the living room to another, seeking out the coolest bit of floor, so when I saw this idea on the internet (on Facebook again actually) I decided to give it a go.

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Tuna ice lollies for cats - whatever will they think of next?! To make these, you simply mix the liquid from a tin of tuna in spring water (rather than brine which is too salty), with a little tap water, and freeze them in ice lolly makers.

To get the lollies out, stand the mould in a bowl of boiling water for a few seconds.

Unfortunately my cat didn't seem particularly interested but I have seen videos on the internet of cats licking these so apparently they do work at least with some animals!

Fish in Lemon Cream Sauce with Hasselback Potatoes

My mother-in-law came to dinner recently and as she’s vegetarian and I don’t eat a lot of purely vegetarian food, that always involves a bit of thought around menu planning. Then I remembered that she is actually pescetarian, meaning she eats some – but not all – types of fish. She likes white fish and I had some in the freezer.

I don't eat fish as often as I should, as my husband doesn't like it and I find plain fish quite dull, so it needs a proper recipe - and during the week I don't tend to have time to cook complicated recipes from scratch. Of course, the recipes don't have to be complicated, but sometimes even getting out all the ingredients is more bother than I want when I get home from work!

It was a week night when we had my mother-in-law over but I was working from home. I always think that will give me plenty of time to make something a bit more elaborate for dinner but I usually end up logged on to work for far later than my official finish time (who doesn't?) so in the end it's still a bit of a rush. However on this occasion my husband was late home from work so we had quite a late dinner!

That gave me the opportunity to do some potatoes I've wanted to try for ages - have you come across hasselback potatoes before? They look a bit like mini hedgehogs - I think they would be a nice treat to serve on Bonfire Night (instead of jacket potatoes which a lot of people make then) as they are a bit different. They would also go down well at children's parties (so I imagine) - especially if you added little edible eyes to make them look like hedgehogs!

Back to dinner and sensible things.... to make these potatoes all you do is take a fairly large potato (not quite a baking potato size but a large standard potato) and make several slices into it, going two thirds of the way down, spacing the slices evenly apart by about a centimetre or a bit less depending on the size of your potato.

You can see the baked potato in this picture here:

Melt a little bit of butter in a pan or the microwave and brush the potato with the butter, getting into all the cuts you've made. Then put the potatoes on a baking sheet and bake at 180C for around an hour - it will depend on the size of the potatoes. The potatoes will be nice and soft in the middle when they are done and the slices you've cut will have fanned open a little and gone crispy. We really enjoyed these!

For the fish, I used this recipe by Nagi at Recipe Tin Eats - I didn't add the shallots/ spring onions at the end because I wasn't sure if my mother-in-law liked them (though in retrospect I'm sure she does - never mind!). It was a very easy dish to make and tasted delicious.

 

Smoked Haddock with Creme Fraiche Butter Sauce and Ozeri Electric Grinder Review

Another fish recipe from me now... I was going through the freezer seeing what needed using up and found some smoked haddock I'd bought to make a fish pie. I've gone off home-made fish pie a bit though -for some reason when I make it, it's always more bland than the shop-bought versions. I think I need to play around with the recipe a bit!

I had a look online to find something else I could do with the smoked haddock and found a recipe from Delia Smith online for smoked haddock with crème fraiche and a chive and butter sauce.

It's easy and quick to make - put the fish in a frying pan and add some freshly milled black pepper. Pour in some milk and simmer until the fish is cooked.

Remove the fish from a pan, increase the heat and add the crème fraiche to the pan. Simmer until reduced, then whisk in the butter and return the fish to the pan to heat through.

 

You are supposed to then scatter with chives but I used dill instead as I didn't have chives!

 

I used my brand new Ozeri Artesio electric pepper grinder for this recipe; it was part of a set (with the salt grinder as well) that I received from the company to review.

It took me a while to get started as I hadn't realised each grinder needed four batteries, and I didn't have eight of the right type in the house. I'm hoping because it needs so many batteries that they will go a long time without needing changing but I haven't had the grinders for long enough yet to know!

I had to read the instructions to figure out how to unscrew the grinders as I hadn't used ones like this before, then put some whole peppercorns into the chamber at the bottom. For such tall grinders there isn't actually much space for the salt and pepper as the chamber is mainly for the batteries! But you only use a little bit of salt or pepper at a time so shouldn't have to refill too often.

The simplest touch of the button sets the device grinding and you get a fine dusting of freshly milled pepper which is really nice - I almost got carried away and used too much as I liked pressing the button and seeing the pepper come out!

The grinders are sleek and stylish, and with black for pepper and white for salt, you won't confuse which is which. You can buy the grinders from Amazon.

I don't actually use pepper that much and have never had electric grinders before but I think I'm converted!

Grilled Cod with Jerk Spice

I love to eat fish but usually buy salmon, tuna or even something like mackerel – I get very bored with white fish as it can taste very plain. I found this recipe on Cooking Channel TV for grilled mahi mahi (a fish also known as dorado, which I’ve only ever had on holiday before) with jerk spice that I thought would work well with cod.

 

I thought I'd share what I made following this recipe with you - it may not photograph particularly well but it tastes good!

 

 

Scallions are spring onions in UK English- and the spices are all widely available in supermarkets, and mixing them is a bit more satisfying than just buying a jar of jerk seasoning. It’s very easy to make the marinade – just put everything together in a food processor!
 

The best way to cook the fish is to then grill it – serve with a green veg.

 

WeightWatchers Curried Fish Pie

Fish pie is a comforting family staple and is usually topped with mashed potato or puff pastry. The former is carb-heavy and the latter high in fat, so using filo pastry is a much lighter option.

I adapted a recipe in an old WeightWatchers magazine to make this, which tasted really good and made a nice change from the usual kind of fish pie. The WeightWatchers recipe had 6.5 syns per serving and I don't think my changes will have affected that.

To serve 2 you need:

175g white fish like cod or haddock, cut into cubes
1/2 tsp ground turmeric
75ml double cream (the WeightWatchers recipe calls for less than 55% fat double cream)
100g cooked and peeled prawns
1/2 tbsp. mild curry powder
zest of 1/2 a lime
4 x 15g sheets filo pastry
low fat cooking spray (I use Fry Light)

Preheat oven to 180C. Place the cubed fish and prawns in the bottom of an ovenproof dish and mix with the cream, curry powder and lime zest.

Cut each sheet of filo pastry in half to make 8 squares. Spray one side of the pastry with cooking spray and crumble up each piece of pastry and sit it on top of the pie dish until it is covered. Once you have used all the pastry, spray over them all with cooking spray.

Bake in the oven for 25 minutes until golden brown.

 

Spanish Roasted Fish with Patatas Bravas

I love fish, but usually find white fish - even cod - too plain and uninteresting. This recipe from Tesco, in one of their recent free magazines, is a great way to enjoy cod with some new flavours, and with the potatoes it makes a really substantial meal - and one that is really easy to cook.

You can find the recipe on the Tesco website. Don't be afraid of using fennel even if like me you don't really like it - it works really well in this dish and once it's roasted with the other ingredients the aniseed flavour is much less pronounced.

I didn't use the cherry tomatoes as I don't like them though I did use the tinned tomatoes in the patatas bravas sauce. I made this on a weekend as it does take quite a while to cook but is pretty easy - you just bung most things into a roasting tin - and it really was delicious.

 

Here's the fish (salmon, cod and prawns) plus potato, chorizo and onion in a foil-lined roasting tin.

It doesn't look much different after it's cooked, does it?!

Here's the patatas bravas - I cheated slightly and used Aunt Bessie's mini roast potatoes but then followed the recipe for the sauce, which worked really nicely.

The finished dish - really tasty!

MidWeek Coconut Fish Curry

I love prawns, and think they work really well with pasta or curry, so when I came across this recipe for a coconut fish curry on the BBC Good Food website, where the prawns took centre stage, I knew I had to make it. The flavours are inspired by both India and Thailand and doesn't take that long to cook -the part that took longest was probably finding all the ingredients in the cupboard! So it makes a great mid-week meal.

The shrimp paste in the recipe is not the kind that you may have had n your sandwiches as a child; it is an essential ingredient in Thai cooking. These days it is easy to find in supermarkets like Tesco though, in the speciality ingredients aisle.

To serve 4, you need:
1 tbsp. vegetable oil
1 onion, finely chopped
1 thumb-sized piece of ginger, finely grated
3 cloves garlic, crushed
1 tsp shrimp paste
1 small red chilli, de-seeded and finely chopped
2 lemongrass stalks, split and bruised with a rolling pin
1 heaped tbsp. medium curry powder
1 heaped tbsp. light muscovado sugar
small bunch of coriander, stems finely chopped
400g can coconut milk
450g skinless hake or other white fish fillets, cut into large chunks
220g prawns
1 lime, halved
cooked rice to serve
I also served mine with some broccoli

Heat the oil in a large frying pan and cook the onion for 5 minutes until softened. Stir in the ginger, garlic, shrimp paste, chilli and lemongrass and cook for 2 minutes.

Add the curry powder and sugar and stir until the sugar starts to melt, then add the coriander stems, coconut milk and 2 tbsp. water. Bring to a simmer.

 

Add the fish and prawns and squeeze in half the lime. Simmer for 5 minutes until the fish is cooked, scatter over the coriander leaves and serve.

Salmon with Mustard and Gruyere Herb Crust

I love salmon and often when I'm planning my week's meals, I put down salmon for one night - it tastes so good I don't really need to do anything, and can quickly cook a piece of salmon and some vegetables for a delicious dinner.

Sometimes though it's nice to do something a bit different. I found this recipe in my BBC Saturday Kitchen Cookbook; it's also available on the BBC website.

You make a crust from breadcrumbs, cheese and herb, and press it on top of the salmon. I didn't bother with the part where you chill it in the fridge and instead mixed it and pressed it straight onto the fish.

The fish is baked in a mixture of fish stock and wine which keeps it light and gives it a lovely flavour. I didn't bother roasting the tomatoes as I don't like them, but didn't think the dish lacked anything for it.

Spiralized Courgette and Carrot with Tuna and Lemon

This is a simple dinner I threw together after work one evening. Using a spiralizer really transforms vegetables - I don't even like courgette normally and certainly wouldn't eat a plateful of it but this meal tasted delicious and was really healthy.

I began by spiralizing a courgette and a carrot, and frying them in a pan with a little water until the vegetables had softened. I opened a tin of tuna - which I ended up sharing with the cat - and stirred it in along with some lemon juice, oil and dill. Toss the whole thing together in the pan to warm through and serve.

Barbecue Spicy Fish Tacos with Mango Salsa

This is something a little bit different to do on the barbecue - it's still fairly easy to do, and tastes absolutely delicious. Not everyone wants a lot of heavy meat at a barbecue and this is a brilliant way to serve fish.

The recipe is from a book called Jamie Oliver's Food Tube presents The BBQ Book - I thought initially it was written by Jamie Oliver but it's actually someone called DJ BBQ, an American DJ and barbecue chef who gives his recipes names like 'kick ass fish tacos'.

I left the guacamole and the red cabbage out of this recipe as I don't like it. You need to make the mango salsa separately and make the Mexican rub for the fish first, though it's very quick - what took longest was finding all the spices in the cupboard!

Here's what to do:
For the Mexican rub:

Mix 1tbsp brown sugar, 1 tbsp. sea salt, 1 tbsp. ground cumin, 1 tbsp. chilli powder, 1 tsp onion granules, 1 tsp garlic granules, 1 tsp cayenne pepper, 1 tsp smoked paprika.

It's a good idea to make the mango salsa before you start barbecuing as well. Mix a diced ripe mango with half a red onion, chopped, half a cucumber (which I left out as I don't like cucumber), a handful of fresh coriander leaves, the juice of 1 lime and a sprinkling of sea salt.

 

I had a long piece of cod in the freezer from when it was reduced in the supermarket; you can use any kind of (ideally chunky) white fish for this recipe. I rubbed the Mexican rub over the fish (any extra will keep) and put the fish on some tin foil. It didn't take long on the barbecue (we have a Weber gas barbecue) and when it was ready, I flaked the fish and used it to fill some soft flour tortillas and added the mango salsa on top. Delicious!

Low Carb Fish Pie with Cauliflower Mash

My low sugar diet also means low carb, as the starch and glucose in potatoes raises your blood sugar, so I've been looking for some good alternatives. I like cauliflower and wondered if I could make a fish pie and put mashed cauli on top, and found a few recipes online doing just that.

I followed this recipe for the cauliflower puree but I couldn't get mine smooth enough; I think if I had cooked the cauli for longer so it was softer that might have been better. I wouldn't have thought to add cheese and cream into it as well; it was quite nice, though to be honest I would have preferred mashed potato!

For the fish pie, I cooked a mixture of fish - I think I had white fish, salmon and smoked mackerel, and added some chopped leaks and made a white sauce.

I put it in a pie dish, spread the cauliflower mash over the top and popped it in the oven to brown.

Here you can see the fish and the topping. This felt like a very virtuous recipe and is good if you're cutting down on potatoes and miss having fish pie - but I have to say I would only eat it as "diet food", whereas a lot of the low cal/fat/sugar recipes I make are nice enough to eat whether you are on a diet or not.

Arbroath Toasties

In honour of Burns Night on January 25 I decided to make a Scottish recipe and came across this one for Arbroath toasties. Arbroath is a place in Scotland that is known for its smoked haddock and this recipe is basically haddock and cheese on toast. It's easy to make, a good source of omega 3 and tastes really good.

I used a recipe from a website called Rampant Scotland. I simply heated the fish in a pan of milk, added flour to thicken it and then added cheese and egg yolk. I'm not entirely sure why the recipe calls for the egg white to be whisked separately but I did that as well, and spread the mixture on toast and put it under the grill.

Eat and enjoy!

I'm sending this to the Food Year Linkup, hosted by Charlottes Lively Kitchen.

Two-Pastry Fish Pie

I was given a pack of Jus-Rol shortcrust pastry and another of puff pastry to take home after attending an event recently and decided to use them - both of them - to make a pie. I've never used more than one type of pastry before but thought that the shortcrust would work well on the bottom, and the puff pastry on the top to make a lattice. So this is more of an idea than a recipe post, but it worked pretty well so I want to share.

Take an ovenproof dish - I used a small pyrex dish that was enough for two servings - and line the bottom with rolled out shortcrust pastry. Line with greaseproof paper (I forgot this part but it makes it much easier) then fill with ceramic baking beans, or uncooked rice, and bake blind in the oven for 15 mins.

Meanwhile I poached some smoked haddock in milk

I also had a packet of salmon flakes (cooked) which I bought as they were reduced in the supermarket, and I decided to throw these in as well.

When the base of the pastry is cooked, spoon in the fish. I used the poaching milk as a basis for a small quantity of a white sauce which I poured over the top. 

I've written before about my lattice pastry cutter; it's definitely easier to use with shop bought than homemade pastry! Roll out your pastry and roll the cutter over the top, then use your fingers to gently prise apart the lattice - you can see here I've done the top section but not the bottom section yet.

Place over the top of the pie and cut off any excess, then brush with milk or beaten egg.

Bake in the oven for 15-20 mins until the pastry on top is risen and golden brown. I think the lattice effect makes the pie look nice and it reduces the amount of pastry you need on top so it's even a little healthier!