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Spicy lentil soup

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This is more a daddy-soup than a Bertie-soup. Bert would eat it though, with the smaller amount of chili.

Serves two cold, greedy people

1 onion, diced

1 carrot, diced

1 stick of celery, diced

1 red pepper, diced

Splash olive oil

1/4-1/2 teaspoon chili flakes

1 teaspoon ground cumin

1 teaspoon smoked paprika

100g red lentils

1 tin chopped tomatoes and the tin full of tap water

Salt to taste

Fry the veg and spices in the olive oil, then stir through the lentils, tomatoes, water and seasoning. Simmer for 20 minutes then roughly puree. Eat with buttered bread and slabs of cheese.

 

Orange cake

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So winter has started in earnest, and so have the terrible twos. It’s howling inside and out. In an attempt to warm stomachs and sedate a toddler’s fury that he can’t scribble on my books while being spoon fed dinner from the comfort of a tiny red car, it’s beef stew and warm orange cake for dinner tonight.

In the picture he’s actually eating a hot cross bun as I daren’t take a phone to the table at the moment for fear I’ll end the meal by shouting ‘no bloody Peppa Pig!’ and throwing it across the room.

Makes a 21cm cake

Two large oranges, about 375g in total when pureed

6 eggs

225g golden caster sugar

250g ground almonds

A heaped teaspoon of baking powder

Cover the oranges with cold water, bring to the boil, put a lid on and simmer for 2-2.5 hours. Then remove from the water and blitz to a pulp. Weigh out 375g of it and beat with the other ingredients, cooking in a greased 21cm springform tin at 190 for an hour (or on a gridrack on the bottom of the Aga roasting oven).

We had ours warm with yoghurt or double cream.

White bean mash

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beanmash

This is a version of a recipe that I’ve seen Nigel Slater and Nigella both do. We were having lamb steaks for dinner and I looked at the salad and realised that, not only would Bert not eat it, the very sight of it would offend him deeply.

Served 2

1 400g can white beans (we used cannellini, butter beans would do nicely)

50ml water

1 garlic clove, peeled and roughly chopped into 3 or 4 pieces

Dessert spoon of sour or double cream

Teaspoon of butter

Tip the butterbeans into a pan, add the water and garlic and simmer for 10 minutes or so, till the beans are warm and the garlic soft. Add the butter and cream and a bit of salt and pepper, and puree the lot.

We had ours with yoghurt marinated lamb steaks (the same recipe as the kebabs, but whole steaks, cooked in olive oil on top of the hob for about 12 minutes) and salad; leaves for me, cucumber for Bert.

I’ll be honest – Bert didn’t eat a single mouthful of this, but I liked it.

Sticky spare ribs

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Current cooking requirements: must be cooked in a lunchtime nap or during a 5 minute Peppa Pig episode. This is a bit of both.

Gratuitous cuddle shot. My phone’s run out of storage space for new photos.

Serves 2-3

4 pork spare ribs

3 tablespoons soy sauce

2 tablespoons tomato ketchup

2 tablespoons runny honey

2 garlic cloves, crushed

A little water

Steamed rice and edamame beans to serve

Marinate the ribs in the soy sauce, ketchup, honey and garlic for a couple of hours. Tip into an oven proof dish and add a table spoon or two of tap water to stop it burning and cook at 180 degrees (grid shelf on the lowest rungs of the Aga roasting oven) for an hour. Check the burning situation as you go along and add a bit more water if necessary.

We had ours with steamed rice and boiled edamame beans as I’ve discovered you can buy them frozen in bags like peas. Egg fried rice would be nice too. Get your own beans nice and salty at the table.

 

Me and Bert’s steak and chips

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It occurred to me that steak and chips is the one pre-Bert meal I really miss. There’s not much he won’t have a go at so, other than eating at 6pm, we don’t sacrifice much by eating as a family. Except a rare steak, fries and a green salad. So this is Me and Bert steak and chips. Just as nice and eaten in excellent company.

I didn’t take a photo of him eating it so here’s one of him really enjoying one of our new Monday morning adventure slots, where the two of us go off and do something fun together.

Serves 2

1 minute steak

1 steak for you – as large and expensive as you dare

A teaspoon of butter

A couple of potatoes

A selection of root veg – carrots, parsnips (beetroot? turnip? I may be pushing it now)

A tablespoon of rapeseed oil (or vegetable oil). Rapeseed oil gets very, very hot before it burns so makes excellent chips and roasties.

Bash the minute steak with a rolling pin, as if it’s responsible for every sleepless night you’ve ever had. This tenderises it to toddler specifications.

Cut the pototoes into small batons – about 1/2 a centimetre thick. A bit like McDonald’s fries. Par boil in boiling water for 2 minutes. As they’re cooking, cut the other root veg into the same size pieces. Drain the potatoes and give them a minute or two to completely dry as you heat the oil up in a baking tray on the hob. Toss all the veg in the oil and cook in a very hot oven (as hot as it will go) for about 25 minutes.

Melt the butter in a very hot frying pan. For me, an inch-thick steak at room temperature needs 6 minutes to be rare but not lively. Only turn once, in the middle of the cooking time. While it’s resting, cook the minute steak for one minute.

Serve with your condiment of choice. Bernaise sauce for me. Dribble for my Bertie. A green salad on the side for those of you who aren’t leaf avoiders.

 

Plum and crystalised ginger cake

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plum cake

I have no idea why I have a supply of crytalised ginger.

Makes enough for 12 slices

180g self raising flour

180g soft butter

180g golden caster sugar

100g ground almonds

50g crystalised ginger, chopped

3 eggs

1 teaspoon baking powder

4 plums, sliced

More butter to line the tin (I used a 25 cm round springform, but a large loaf tin would do)

Beat all of the ingredients except the plums together till light and whippy. Butter your tin then core and slice the plums and lay them in the buttered tin (in concentric circles if you feel fancy), pile the batter on top and cook for about 40 minutes (grid rack on the bottom of the Aga roasting oven with the cool shelf 2 rows above, or 180 degrees in a normal oven). No need to bother skinning the plums. Who has time to blanch when they’re hunting down phones that a toddler has stored in the fridge?

We had ours warm with plain yoghurt. Something about the sugary, gingery plums makes me think of Christmas, but that’s the second time I’ve dropped the C bomb today (I booked Bert a storytelling session with Father Christmas) and I must now stop till November at the earliest.

Yoghurt marinated lamb kebabs

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lambkebab

Served 3

500g lamb steaks, cut into chunks

1 red pepper, cut into chunks

2 red onions or large shallots, cut into chunks

2 tablespoons plain yoghurt

1/2 teaspoon fennel seeds crushed with 1 clove of garlic and salt to taste

1 teaspoon ground coriander

1 teaspoon turmeric

Mix the yoghurt with the spices and marinate the lamb in it for about an hour. With a yoghurt marinade, you don’t want to marinate too long or the lamb gets tough. (I think the marinade is originally a Nigel Slater recipe.) Thread onto skewers with the veg and cook on a high heat – in a hot pan or under a hot grill – for 10-15 minutes. In a very tradition division of labour, Bert’s dad barbequed them while I made some flat breads and Bert moved water from one container to another.

We had it ours with salad. Bert looked at a salad leaf with the kind of horrified morbid curiosity most of us reserve for a road accident. Have I read somewhere that babies are programmed to avoid greens in case they’re poisonous? Bert is in no danger of being poisoned by greens.

Little apple frangipane tarts

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applefrang

Makes two little tarts

1/2 sheet of puff pastry

1 eating apple, finely sliced

1 egg

40g golden caster sugar

40g ground almonds

40g softened butter

1 teaspoon vanilla essence

Beat together the egg, almonds, butter, sugar and vanilla essence. Cut two circles out of the puff pastry (mine were about 12 centimetres in diameter). Press a smaller circle into each with the top of a glass and spread a dessert spoon or so of the frangipane mixture over each, keeping within the smaller circle – I’m not entirely sure if you need to bother with this, but I was in a neat-freak mood. Maybe because Bert’s started shaming me by tidying up after me.

Meanwhile, watch your todder finally master the art of forward motion on a wheelybug. (Finally, he won’t back himself into corners and squeal! Oh, he just backed himself into a corner and squealed.) Using the frangipane as a glue, press the apple in each in a spiralling circle (if you can be bothered to be neat) then top with another blob of frangipane to make a kind of frangipane sandwich.

Bake on a lined sheet at 190 or near the middle ish of the Aga roasting oven for about 15 minutes.

Cheese balls

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cheeseballs

This is a Leon recipe – I took out the tablespoon (!) of salt and was a bit more free and easy with the cheese medley.

Not sure how many it made as the number seemed to go down when I left the first batch alone with Bert’s dad and sister. I think about 50.

350g cornflour

150g plain flour

175ml water

175ml vegetable oil

175ml whole milk

275g hard cheese – I used pecorino, cheddar and parmesan

2 eggs

Bring the liquids to the boil and then stir into the flours gradually, beating well with a spoon. Add the eggs and then stir through the cheese. You could put some salt in at this point (maybe a couple of teaspoons) – I didn’t but I think my palate’s adjusted to lower salt levels.

You’ll have a very odd, wet dough that looks unmanagable but is strangely obedient. It handles like play dough – I suppose because of the cornflour. Anyway, form into balls (yep, walnut sized) and put on a baking tray in a hot oven (about 200 degrees or near the top of the Aga roasting oven) for 20 minutes.

Good with a glass of milk at 3pm or a G&T at 7pm.

Mr Tumnus toast

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tumnus

Serves 1.5

3 pieces of toast, buttered

Splash of olive oil

1 clove garlic, finely sliced or crushed

2 tomatoes, diced

1 can sardines in oil, drained

1 dessert spoon tomato puree

Black pepper to taste

Fry the tomatoes and garlic in the oil, crushing them together to make a paste. Add the sardines, pepper and tomato puree and heat through. Pile onto buttered toast and feed to one year old boys who eat like monkeys or to little girls called Lucy who’ve walked through the back of a wardrobe.