Roasted Eggplant Salad

When you want to serve up a dish that looks sensational as well as being nutritious it is hard to beat roasted eggplant, red onion and tomato salad with chickpeas, feta and spinach. You need a bit of preparation for this dish but believe me it is worth it!

Ingredients (for 4 people)

Cup of cooked chickpeas
Onion (with 6 cloves inserted)
1 carrot chopped
1 celery
2 sprigs of fresh thyme
2 fresh bay leaves
1 eggplant
2 red onions
4 large tomatoes
5 cloves garlic
Olive oil
balsamic vinegar
sea salt & black pepper
8 ozs fresh baby spinach
4 ozs feta


Method

Soak the chickpeas overnight in water , rinse well and place in a large casserole dish covered with water. Add the cloved onion, carrot, celery, a sprig of thyme and the bay leaf. Bring to the boil, skim residue and let bubble gently for around two hours under cover. Cube the eggplant, peel and section the red onion into eights and cut the tomatoes into halves. Place them on a roasting pan with the garlic and drizzle well with good quality olive oil. Add the remaining thyme and roast for 30 minutes at 200 degrees until everything is cooked through. Remove from the oven, add extra olive oil and balsamic vinegar to taste.
Serve the roasted vegetables on a large serving dish. Toss in the chickpeas with the spinach (which will wilt in the heat). Break up the feta and sprinkle over the roast vegetables and serve immediately.

Baked Turbot with Sauce Bretonne

It always amazes me that turbot is not more popular in the Uk and Ireland. It is such a delicious fish and so abundant around our coast. In Brittany it certainly is on every menu and they have a sauce aptly named Sauce Bretonne to go with it!
I love baked turbot and the sauce speaks for itself!

Ingredients (serves 6)

6 lb turbot
bunch of chervil(chopped)
bunch of flat leaf parsley (chopped)
4 tbsp butter (unsalted)
cup of white wine
black pepper
sea salt

Method

Stuff the fish with the chervil and parsley. Place the fish in a large (butter greased) roasting pan and pour over the white wine. Season the fish and add an extra knob of butter. Cover the pan and bake in the oven for 25 minutes at 400 degrees F. Depending on the size of the fish it may cook quickly so keep checking it by using a skewer to measure resistance against softness (softness means cooked!.

The Sauce

4 organic egg yolks
2 tsp Dijon mustard
Dash of tarragon vinegar
3 tbsp of chopped watercress
3 tpsp of chopped chervil
Half cup of melted butter (unsalted)
Sea salt& pepper

Method

Mix the egg yokes, salt,pepper and Dijon mustard together and add the tarragon vinegar. Add the watercress and chervil to the mix and slowly stir in the butter.
Keep mixing, transfer to a warm sauce bowl and serve fresh.

Tortilla Espanola

Many of you will know that we spent three months this winter traveling around the beautiful countryside of Andalusia. The province has a unique cuisine which takes some beating and easily made up for the terrible weather we had! We were expecting sunshine in January,February and March but were deluged with rain instead - more rain in fact fell in the first five weeks than in the previous five years! Anyway that did not stop us enjoying ourselves and doing what we do best - searching out great recipes for our cooking school!! Here is a delicious little dish which has always got a place in my heart probably owing to the main ingredient potatoes!!

Ingredients for 4 persons:

1 lb. potatoes peeled and cut into small dice
6 large organic eggs
Half cup olive oil
sea salt
black pepper

Method

In a large pan fry the diced potatoes until tender, then drain and transfer to a bowl. Keep warm. Heat more olive oil in the pan. Beat the eggs with the pepper and pour them over the potatoes. Pour the complete mixture into the hot pan and cook for a few minutes. Add the sea salt and continue until the liquid egg has solidified at the top. Cover the pan with a plate, flip it over and return the "wet" side to the pan and continue the cooking process adding a little extra oil as required. All done when no liquid to be seen.

Serve the tortilla warm hot or cold and with your preferred sauces and salads. This dish is simply amazing in its versatility and in Spain there are regional differences adding cheeses, herbs and bacon to the process. I love it with mushrooms but do try it simply with potatoes and eggs to get you started. It will also keep in the fridge for up to three days, great for picnics and those hungry kids on holiday!

Pear Salad

Yes the sun is out and the birds are singing again and we are tempted to eat out in the garden for the first time this year! Spring is definitely here at last and we have been busy in the garden rotating the soil and adding lots of yummie home made compost.

Today we are planning a nice crunchy pear salad a personal variation of a Waldorf salad which is particularly good with our very own home grown walnuts!
Preparation time only 25 minutes so very quick too! Serves 4. Calories 171 per portion.

Ingredients

1 Lettuce shredded (I prefer little gems)
2 sticks celery chopped
1 red pepper cored and sliced
25g of walnut halves
75g of green grapes halved, seeded and peeled
1 dessert pear, peeled, cored and sliced
225g smoked chicken, skinned and boned

For the dressing

2 table spoons plain yogurt
2 tablespoons mayonnaise
2 tablespoons of grated cucumber
1 teaspoon of grated onion
1 teaspoon of chopped fresh tarragon

For the garnish

1 dessert pear, cored and sliced
2 sprigs of fresh tarragon

Method

Mix the lettuce with the celery, red pepper, walnuts, grapes, pear and smoked chicken. To make the dressing, mix the yogurt with the mayonnaise, add the remaining ingredients and blend well. Just before serving, spoon the dressing over the salad and toss well to mix. Garnish with slices of pear and a few twigs of fresh tarragon.

Brittany from the eyes of James Martin

http://www.rte.ie/player/#v=1070033

Hope you can download this wonderful piece of film from the RTE series:
James Martin's Brittany. He has those hairy bikers from Northern Britain with him and they suffer the delights of Briton seafood and pork with cider!

The vegetable garden gets ploughed

It took Marcel only 30 minutes to completely transform our overgrown vegetable garden. What a difference a tractor in the hands of a skilled farmer can make! Marcel had to deal with numerous obstacles including uneven slopes, overhanging tree branches and recalcitrant tree roots! Thank you Marcel again for being so very supportive to the cooking school. We hope to plant potatoes and French beans again as they were such a great success last time. Also salads galore so that we can supply our diners with home grown produce throughout the summer.

Poul, our chef, demands vast quantities of fresh herbs every day. This alone can keep a gardener fully occupied. One of the surprising things I learned recently is that the moon has an incredible impact on garden produce. Timing is everything. One must wait till after the full moon before planting potatoes otherwise they will grow sideways!! Now that is something you won't get from the textbooks - it is knowledge direct from the memory and consciousness of farming folk with thousands of years experience behind them and their feet firmly on the ground when not doing acrobatics with a tractor.

Warm goats cheese with walnut and pear salad

We love warm goat's cheese and have our own walnut trees in the garden so this is a dish we love to make when something simple, quick and delicious is required!

Ingredients

150g goat cheese log cut into 4 slices
60g walnuts (cut in half)
6 slices of home made walnut bread
1tbsp lemon juice
1 tbsp of local honey
3tbsp of walnut oil/olive oil
1 red and 1 white chicory
30g lambs lettuce
1 ripe pear (cored and cut into wedges)
sprinkle of chili

Method:

Preheat grill to medium. Sprinkle the walnut bread with a little olive oil and toast under the grill until golden brown. Dress each cheese slice with walnuts and place on top of each slice of toasted walnut bread. Place on a baking tray, sprinkle with olive oil and toast again under the grill until the cheese is warm and the walnuts are toasted. Sprinkle a little bit of chili on top before serving.
For the dressing mix the honey, lemon juice and walnut oil together and season to taste. Toss the lettuce and the chicory leaves together with the dressing.


Serve all on one large platter with remaining pear wedges and walnuts scattered around the toasted goat cheese slices.

Serve with a nice glass of red