Leftovers and What They Mean

Recipe books are often filled with recipes for leftovers. Ideally a good cook has none, as their food should be so good nothing remains at the end of a meal, and they have judged precisely what is required. But inevitably we all have odds and sods that make their way into the fridge for later use, and it is literally a waste not to use them.

Friday we had some neighbours over for a meal, the main course of which was a daube of beef slow cooked for four hours. Lots of meat, and some health conscious eaters, so a few morsels left at the end. On Sunday these were dried of sauce, cut into much thinner pieces, and mixed with a drained tin of lentils, chopped onion and vinaigrette to make a salad. It was good, and I felt virtuous.

Getting the same feeling now as I smell the stock made with a chicken carcass and a few veg and herbs, the basis of a vegetable soup tonight. But it has to be about more than thrift to be really valid, and good chicken stock is always more than thrifty, the beginning of many flavorsome sauces, stews and soups. Cubes (we all use them at times) get nowhere near.

So leftovers well used are a sign for me of imagination, of economic thinking, and maybe experience. But only if they are not the norm.

Paella in Place of a Roast

We eat our evening meal (and breakfast) at the table nearly every day - an on-the-knee supper is a treat - but Sunday lunch is still special in food terms. It offers the chance to round off the week that's gone, and get ready for the coming one. Often the heart of our meal is a roast, ideally rib of beef but economically frequently a good chicken. Yesterday, however, we had a paella that cost about £7.00.

The sofrito was a carrot, red pepper, onion, and two sticks of celery all chopped into tiny dice and fried in oil until the onion was turning translucent. A half pack of paella rice was added and stirred about for a minute, then the usual routine of add stock, cook, add stock, cook until the rice is done. It was homemade stock from a chicken carcass cooked up with veg, to which when heated for the paella I added a few strands of saffron. Meanwhile four boneless chicken thighs were cooked in the oven, and at the end a handful of frozen peas, a pack of defrosted king prawns and (heresy but it works) fish sticks cut in two. The secret is plenty of salt and pepper, a teaspoon of smoked paprika, plus half-a-tin of chopped tomatoes which give it colour and depth. Cut the chicken into bite-sized chunks, and tip them and their fat into the paella, and serve. 

I guess the other secret is having a proper pan: it is not needed to make the thing, a wide frying pan is fine, but the look of a wide two-handled paella pan makes it seem special. 

In my old career I travelled frequently to Barcelona, and several times was served paella in a customer's  directors' dining room. Always with Rioja (red). Conversation inevitably turned to how to cook the dish - the cook rather demotically used to eat with us - and it was clear that for the Spanish the paella is the equivalent of the British BBQ, i.e. a man thing. Walk round El Corte Ingles and you'll see gas-fired paella cookers for doing the dish outdoors. It was evident too that everybody has their own recipe: variations in the sofrito; use chorizo or ham; rabbit preferred over chicken; include clams (terrific if they are fresh, the shells look wonderful). As one of my contacts there said, even if it is eaten on a Sunday, paella is a Thursday meal - meaning you can pretty much add whatever you have at the end of the week, so long as the flavours don't clash. 

Good Bread for Pennies?

There really shouldn't be a question mark in the title as three recent attempts, all successful, at making flatbreads has proved. No pun intended. Honest. HFW should get the plaudits, though I did make chapattis ages ago with a similar recipe. I was inspired by his recipe in River Cottage Everyday to give it another go as an accompaniment to his equally excellent spiced-up lamb burgers. Credit where credit is due.

You need (again no pun etc) 250g of flour, plain is ok but bread flour works best, 1 tsp of salt, a good tbsp of decent oil (best results so far with a delicious rapeseed oil), and 150ml of water on the warm side. Mix together, kneed for about 6 - 7 minutes, then cover and leave to prove for at least 15 minutes, ideally 30. Divide the dough into 8 - 10 pieces and roll them into very thin round(-ish) crepe-thin breads, using a bit more flour to prevent them sticking to the surface on which you roll them. Cook on a dry (no oil), non-stick frying pan that you have got very hot beforehand, each side only needs about a minute, you can tell how they are doing by the bubbles that puff up and the savoury bread smell, but lifting an edge to peek is fine too. Keep them warm in the oven while you do the rest. Great stuffed with crunchy salad, better with a homemade burger. These will replace buns for me in the coming BBQ season.

As regards ease, my 15-year-old son did last night's, nothing burned, nothing wasted, and only a bit of flour on his school trousers to show he had been involved. The one tricky bit is removing surplus flour from the pan after each is cooked - necessary to avoid creating an insulating barrier and as it burns and doesn't look great on the finished articles.

The lot cost less than 20p, though under the system of bribes we operate for help in the kitchen said son gets £1 bonus added to his pocket money. Worth it either way, they are at once crisp and light, free from supermarket-bread additives, and dead easy to fill and eat.

Do use them quickly, they don't improve with age (according to Hugh FW - we have never had leftovers).