Chicken Myers

Chicken Myers is a very tasty meal that's reasonably quick to make and includes lots of vegetables. All you have to do is cook some rice or potatoes to go with it.

I'm not quite sure what the 'Myers' means - we've been making this in our family for a long time, and originally the recipe came from 'The Dairy Book of Home Cookery' although I think we've all made changes along the way so all our versions are a little different.

Lightly steam some carrots and broccoli, and spread them in the bottom of a large baking dish.

Put the tin of soup in a bowl or large jug and stir in enough milk to make a thickish sauce. Add some seasoning (not salt as the soup is usually salty enough) - I use pepper and a generous amount of wholegrain mustard.

Cut chicken breast fillets into thin slices horizontally and lay them in a single layer over the vegetables.

Cover the chicken with the soup/sauce and then top with grated cheese.

Cook at 190 C for 30 - 40 mins until top is golden and the chicken is tender. (Be careful not to cook for too long or the chicken will be dry.)

Serve with rice or potatoes - it serves 4 people quite generously - not bad for two chicken breast fillets!

Ingredients:

2 chicken breast fillets

4 carrots, peeled and sliced

1 head of broccoli , divided into florets

1 tin of condensed 'cream of...' soup - I use celery, chicken or asparagus

milk, pepper, wholegrain mustard

grated cheddar

Spaghetti Bolognese

This has been voted the favourite dinner in our house, everyone enjoys it!

It's one of those meals that most people can make, and there are many different versions. This one is easy to make, and using the passata rather than whole/crushed tomatoes makes a smoother than usual sauce. You can use two large tins of crushed tomatoes if you prefer.

The most important ingredient to get right is the meat. I use minced beef, and I make sure it's good quality. Don't get the churned-out stringy supermarket mince or the sauce won't work properly. My local butcher is part of a small supermarket so it packages up some of its meat supermarket-style, but it's good quality and also low-fat.

Some people I know, including my mother-in-law, who has an Italian background, use a veal/pork mince which tastes good and has a lighter flavour than the beef.

Fry onions in a little olive oil in a big, heavy-based pan until soft, then add some chopped garlic. Stir around to heat through, then push to one side.

Increase the heat, add some more oil, then put in the mince. Chop into it with a wooden spoon to separate it out and turn it to brown the whole lot.

When the mince is all browned, mix it in with the onion/garlic, and add the tomato paste, dried oregano, basil, a teaspoon of sugar, some salt and pepper.

I always use a generous amount of dried oregano and a smaller amount of basil. In summer I use fresh basil, but dried works well too if fresh isn't available.

Give it all a stir and warm it through.

Pour in the tomato passata and stir through. Half-fill each passata jar with water, give a shake to get all the passata and pour into the pot. Bring to the boil, then reduce to simmering point. The sauce will be quite watery, but it's going to simmer for a couple of hours so it will thicken as it cooks.

If you don't have a spare couple of hours, it can also be simmered for a much shorter amount of time, but don't add as much water.

If you have some red wine, add a glug of it to the sauce as it will make it a little richer, but I very rarely do this as I normally don't have any wine.

I have a splatter-proof lid to avoid mess, but otherwise just leave the whole thing uncovered and simmer gently for as long as you can.

When the sauce has reduced in volume and is looking richer and thicker, give it a taste and add some more sugar, salt or pepper if you think it needs it.

Serve with pasta - spaghetti, penne, rigatoni, whatever you like.

Stir some sauce through the drained pasta in its pot before dishing up, then add a blob to the top of each serve.

Add some grated cheese - our favourite is pecorino.

Serve with salad and crusty bread.

This makes enough sauce for 10 or more serves, so will normally be enough for two meals for most families. It tastes even better the next day, and also freezes very well.

Ingredients:
- 1 onion, finely chopped
- 2 cloves of garlic, chopped
- 1 kg minced beef, good quality
- 300 g tomato paste (approx) - (called tomato puree in the UK) I either use a 250 g jar or a couple of 140 g tubs.
- Herbs: 2 or 3 heaped tablespoons dried oregano; 1 or 2 heaped of dried basil, or a generous amount of chopped fresh basil; fresh chopped parsley if you have some.
- salt, pepper, 1-2 tsp sugar
- 2 jars (around 700 g each) tomato passata

Kuchen

This is from Nigella Bites, and in the book it's topped with blackberry, apple and an oaty crumble. I decided to make the sponge base and top it with demerara sugar instead.

Kuchen is German for cake, so is a very general term. This cake is made with yeast and is half bread and half cake - not overly sweet, and slightly lemon and cinnamon-tasting.

In one bowl combine 350 g of the flour, the salt, sugar and yeast. In a jug combine milk, eggs, vanilla, zest and cinnamon.

Stir the liquid into the flour mixture, to make a medium-soft dough. Add more flour if it's too sticky.

Work in the soft butter and knead for several minutes until dough becomes smooth and springy. Cover and leave to rise for 1 hour or so until doubled in size.

After it has risen (mine didn't rise much), punch the dough down and gradually stretch it over the base of a Swiss roll tin (20 x 30 cm).

I spread it out over the base of the pan, lifted up the dough and added a piece of baking paper to avoid any sticking. Leave to prove for 15 - 20 mins while oven is heating to 200 C.

Just before putting the dough in the oven, brush it with a mixture of egg, cream and cinnamon. Sprinkle demerara sugar over generously and put in oven. Cook for 15 mins, then turn oven down to 180 C and cook for a further 20 mins until slightly risen and golden.

Cooked and ready to cut with a bread knife. (I had to stop myself 'trying' pieces as I was slicing it up!)

Really good eaten with ice cream, and on its own - with a hot drink - and would be lovely topped with fruit and crumble, like in the original recipe.
At its best when fresh out of the oven, but still good when cool. I'll definitely be making this again.

Ingredients:
350 - 400 g strong white flour
1/2 tsp salt
50 g caster sugar
3 g (heaped half-tablespoonful) instant yeast
2 eggs
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
grated zest of 1/2 a lemon
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
125 ml milk, lukewarm
50 g butter, soft
Topping:
1 egg, beaten
1 tbsp cream
pinch of ground cinnamon
demarara sugar for topping

Cannelloni

This is a meal I've been making for a long time, it's a bit of a family favourite.

You need to make a really tasty sauce to start with - a tomato sauce, or bolognese, or a tomato and meat sauce. Whichever type it is, it needs to be reasonably liquidy as the pasta will absorb quite a lot of the water as it cooks.

The meat sauce I make starts with fried chopped onion and garlic (peeled, squashed and added to almost-cooked onion) and then add a couple of chops. Brown either side of the chops.

Add jar of passata and can of tomatoes, add 2/3 of the empty passata jar's worth of water. Season with salt, pepper, sugar and herbs. Simmer for as long as you can - 2 hours plus is ideal.

After an hour or so, remove chops from pan and take all meat off bones. Cut meat up into small pieces and return to the sauce. Continue to simmer the sauce. The longer you do this, the more tender the meat will be.

Towards the end of the sauce's cooking time, mix together ricotta, a beaten egg, salt, pepper and some chopped parsley - or rocket or baby spinach.

Fill the canelloni tubes with the ricotta mixture - I use a rounded dinner knife for this - it fills around 17 or 18 tubes. There's no need to cram the tubes tightly with ricotta, just as long as the filling goes right through the tubes, it doesn't matter if there are spaces.

Lay the filled pasta tubes in a large baking dish. Leave a bit of space between the tubes as they will swell as they cook.

Add the sauce to the baking dish, lift up each cannelloni tube to allow some of the sauce to go underneath. Cover the pasta and pour over a little extra water if the sauce seems a little thick.

Cover with foil and seal the edges. Cook at 180 C for 25 - 30 mins. Test the cannelloni with a knife to see if it's cooked through.

The cooked cannelloni ready to serve. Top with some cheese and eat with green salad and crusty bread.

Ingredients:
Sauce:
1 onion, chopped
2-3 cloves garlic
500 g chops - beef or veal
1 jar passata
1 small tin crushed tomatoes
dried oregano and basil - fresh if possible but dried is fine
1 tsp sugar
Filling:
500 g ricotta
1 egg
salt, pepper, chopped fresh greens such as parsley, rocket, spinach
1 packet cannelloni tubes

Falling Cloudberries

I've borrowed 'Falling Cloudberries' by Tessa Kiros from the library. It's a beautiful book, in the same style as 'Apples For Jam', with interesting recipes and colourful photos.

Some pages from the book...

Schnitzel/Escalope

A really simple and tasty meal which I cook often, as I know lots of people do.

I first ate this in France as a teenager, and it was the most delicious thing I'd ever eaten! As I was in France it was called escalope and was probably made with veal.

At my local butcher they sell beef cut into very thin slices which is what I normally use.

As it really needs to be eaten straight from the pan, I usually serve it on its own before or after some salad or green vegetables and bread. I think ideally it needs to be the only thing on the plate and in your mouth, so you can really appreciate the delicate flavours.

Dip very thin slices of meat in seasoned flour (dust off excess), then in beaten egg and then fresh breadcrumbs. Lay crumbed meat on a tray and cover. Keep in the fridge for at least half an hour. (This isn't essential, but the crumbs are more likely to stay on the meat during cooking if it's all well chilled.)


Fry in a medium/hot pan in a little oil until crumbs are golden and then turn over to cook the other side. The first cooked side will always be the prettiest for some reason! If you have a good non-stick pan (like my lovely new Scanpan) the job will be very easy.

Serve with a squirt of lemon juice and eat straight away.

Buns au Chocolat

I really call these chocolate buns, which sounds a bit more sensible, but they are a lunchbox-friendly version of pain au chocolate - made as a sandwich alternative for school lunches.

They are based on a fruit bun recipe, but with a square of chocolate instead of the fruit.

Put flour in a large bowl and rub in the butter. Stir in salt, cinnamon and sugar, then mix in the water and milk. Make a soft dough and knead for a few minutes, then leave, in the covered bowl, to double in size for an hour or two in a warm place.

When risen, punch down dough and divide into eight or so pieces. Give each piece a quick knead in your hands then seal a square of chocolate in the middle of each piece. Put on baking sheet, join side down.

Leave buns covered, to rise, while you heat oven to 200 C, then cook for around 20 minutes until tops are browned and bottoms sound hollow when tapped.

Good when still warm from the oven, as chocolate is soft and melted, but still nice when cool.

Ingredients:
450 g bread flour
25 g butter
1 tsp salt
30 g caster sugar
2 tsp ground cinnamon
2 tsp instant yeast
150 ml lukewarm water
150 ml milk, lukewarm
chocolate squares, 1 for each bun (I used cooking chocolate, but normal would probably be good too)

Pecan Pie

This was the first time I had made pecan pie, and I used a recipe my sister Claire gave to me a long, long time ago. I knew I'd make it eventually! In my house you get to choose the type of birthday cake you get, and this was my husband's choice.

Start by crushing up the biscuits finely in a biggish bowl (I used the end of my rolling pin for this), and in a small pan gently melt the butter and sugar together. Pour the butter/sugar mixture into the biscuit crumbs and mix well.

Press the crumbs into a dish. (The recipe suggests a 20 cm loose-based tin, I used a 22 cm Pyrex pie dish.) Bake at 180 C for 20 mins or until firm.

Meanwhile, make the filling by gently heating the butter and syrup, stirring to combine. Remove from heat. Reserve the best 9 (or so) pecan halves for decoration and roughly chop the remaining nuts.

Pour the butter and syrup into the now vacant large bowl, add the eggs and pecan nuts and mix well. (Be aware that the eggs could scramble if butter/syrup is too hot and eggs are not mixed in briskly.)

Pour mixture into biscuit case and return pie to oven for 20 - 30 mins until slightly risen and set.

Arrange reserved pecans on the top and if you like, bake pie for a further 5 mins.

The cooked pie - delicious! And just as good the next night, too.

Ingredients:
Base:
225 g digestive or granita biscuits
75 g unsalted butter
50 g muscovado or soft brown sugar

Filling:
100 g unsalted butter
5 - 6 tbsp golden syrup
2 eggs, lightly beaten
100 g pecan nut halves

Naan

This has to be the easiest yeast recipe ever. I made these naans tonight to go with our chicken and corn korma (Patak's sauce) and they turned out perfectly.

A few nights ago I made the naans for the first time and didn't add enough flour (I mis-weighed, if that's a real word!), so that I was dealing with a sloppy, very sticky dough that was impossible to roll, so I squashed blobs of dough into the pan with my hand. And they still turned out very well.

Tonight though the dough was just right and very easy to work with.

Mix flour, instant yeast and salt in a large bowl, and in a small bowl or jug blend together warm water, yogurt and oil. Stir the wet into the dry ingredients, then use your hands to form into a soft and slightly sticky dough. Add a few extra drops of water if necessary.

Knead the dough for a few minutes (I do this in the bowl but you can knead on a flat surface if you prefer). Cover the bowl and leave for an hour or so in a warmish place until the dough has doubled in size. Knock out the air and give the dough a very quick knead.

The dough risen and ready to be divided up.

Divide the dough into four pieces (or eight if you'd prefer smaller breads like the ones in my photos) and roll them out to about 5 mm thickness. Putting a little oil on your hands, work surface and the rolling pin will stop any sticking.

Leave to rest for 5 minutes while you heat a heavy-based pan over a medium-high heat. Do not add any oil to the pan.

Cook each piece of dough for 4 - 5 minutes until a crust has formed and it is golden and patched with brown.

Turn it over and continue cooking until the other side is golden.

Ingredients:
500 g plain white flour
2 level tsp instant yeast
1 tsp fine salt
300 ml warm water
1 generous tbsp plain yogurt
2 tsp vegetable oil (I used olive oil)

Adapted from a Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall recipe