One Flame Cooking - Vegged-up Style

Vegged-up. Gosh, how demotic as a good friend would probably say.

My one flame cookery has tended to be a meat-centred thing, but inspired it has to be said by HF-W's veg book, and for reasons explored in another recent post, we've cut down on meat (not cut it out) and pushed the veg quota here. I'm a big fan of what our American cousins would call the dinner salad too, so put those factors together with the one flame idea and you end up with some substantial meatless feasts.

Best of those has to be the lentil-centric salad (lentil-centric being like London centric, but different in that one is concerned with a lot of rather greyish vegetables all looking alike with no space between them, the other has lentils. Boom-tish, I'm here all week).

In the trusty Le Creuset cast iron pan a chopped onion is fried gently, with a chopped red pepper for colour, some garlic sliced, then a posh sachet of lentils. Had some been available I'd have added a few cubes of bacon or slices of chorizo (people who pronounce that cho-ritz-o now quite high up my list of those due to die horribly when I rise to supreme power). So long as the onion and garlic are cooked it's just a case of warming the rest through, not even getting them hot (how very continental), as you eat this warm.

Lettuce or rocket or lamb's lettuce on the plate the lentil mix is added, some Parmesan shavings and walnuts put on top (with enough time then for the oil in the nuts to warm through a bit - I am not a fan of toasting them), and the lot dressed with a vinaigrette. It's the basis for further experimentation (adulteration?) - goats cheese or blue cheese are good, tomatoes go nicely, black olives and hard-boiled eggs fit in too. So long as there are not too many ingredients (in which case it evolves into another nice Americanism, the garbage salad) it remains a good solid filler-upper, and one that can be on the table in 15 minutes.

Does this count as austerity cooking? As Merchant Gourmet lentils (for 'tis he) only cost about £1.50, and the rest if no bacon or chorizo used would add another £1.50 tops, that's dinner for two or three for £3.