Olympic Food Challenge: Kebapche with Shopska Salad - Bulgaria

Bulgaria is forever tied to one of my childhood food memories.  My godfather used to travel there a lot for work in the eighties and for some economical reason or another, the Bulgarians couldn't get enough of Sterling.  He used to return home with bags full of Toblerone because apparently, whatever you bought, they gave you the change in chocolate.  One tale I remember quite clearly involved buying a bottle of pink champagne for just £1 and getting one of those mahoosive Toblerones you can only buy in Duty Free as change.  If only you could do that today - I'd be there like a shot.

Kebapche with Shopska Salad

The other food thing I remember was him complaining that all you ever got for pudding was yogurt and cherries.  Everywhere.  He's a chef with his own fancy pants fine dining company and so he's not the kind of person to seek out the most English of foreign restaurants when he's away.  He'll do his best to eat 'native' - short of accosting someone in the street and insisting that they take him home and feed him.  He said it put him off of yogurt and cherries for life.  At the time, I thought this was an amazing thing to have every night for pudding.  Muller Fruit Corners were in their infancy back then and I remember pleading with anyone who would listen to let me have one because I so wanted to taste that glorious shiny black cherry sauce with the snowy white yogurt.  Now, as an adult, I can see that it's not actually the be all and end all of desserts.  But if the restaurant gave you Toblerone as change when you paid, I wouldn't be complaining.


Anyhow, whilst doing my research, I did toy with the idea of an easy-win by doing something with yogurt and cherries.  But I couldn't find a recipe for it!  I then decided to make a Bulgarian Wine Kebab which is basically pork sauteed in wine and served with mash.  But of course, the weather decided to buck its ideas up and I wasn't in the market for a heavy dish like that tonight.  The meat has now been placed in the freezer to languish there for a few months as I'm really not a pork fan.

Luckily, my back up recipe was for lamb kebapche with shopska salad.  Basically minced lamb kebabs with a chopped salad covered in feta.  Simple, fresh and summery.  If I'm honest, similar to a meal that I'd cook myself.  I was a little disappointed by the lack of taste in the meat - the recipe uses minimal spices and I find that lamb mince tends to need a lot thrown into the mix to stop it tasting like cardboard.  My go-to recipe for lamb burgers/meatballs/kebabs is definitely the Lorraine Pascale recipe that's the number two most read post on this blog.

As for the salad, I liked the addition of herbs which is something I wouldn't normally do and the red wine vinegar dressing worked for me.  I normally make the same dressing time and again (olive oil, balsamic, lime juice, garlic, salt and pepper) so it was good to have this lighter combination of flavours. I think I've got some learning to do about appropriate dressings for different salads.

The Bulgarian flag isn't stunted - it's white at the top!

For simplicity, taste and crowd pleasing abilities, this gets another silver for Bulgaria to go with the one they won in the woman's wrestling.  The only medal from the 63 athletes competing in 16 disciplines.

And finally, whilst on the subject of women wrestlers, a week or so ago I happened across a link on the BBC website that allowed you to compare your physique to that of an Olympic athlete.  I am closest to a shot putter or weightlifter (*horrified face*).  The only way I could get round this was by elevating my height to that of when I wear my stilettos - the extra four inches turning me into a footballer instead.  Amusingly, someone commented that pretty much every female they knew came out as a weight lifter, shot putter or wrestler and it must be a fix because nobody came out as a female volleyballer.  Nobody that is, except for one of my male friends.  That did make me chuckle!

Olympic Food Challenge: Keftah with Harissa Hummus - Algeria

Having competed in 11 Summer Olympic Games, Algeria have won just 14 medals and this year have sent 42 athletes to London to compete in 12 disciplines with a hope of extending that tally.  Historically, their best events have been Boxing and Athletics (specifically middle distance running) but Beijing 2008 saw them collect two medals for Judo so who knows what they'll achieve this year.

Located on the northern coast of Africa between Morocco and Tunisia, Algeria is home to 37m people.  Populated since 10,000BC, Islam was introduced into the country in the 7th century with around 90% of inhabitants now being Muslim.

No, it's not burgers and beans with Sainsbury's pita...

The country gained its independence from France in 1962 and this mix of influences is very apparant in the wide range of dishes attributed to Algerian cuisine.  Dishes vary from region to region and make use of seasonal vegetables.  According to Wikipedia, all meals use grains.  Wikipedia is quite obviously wrong because the recipe I cooked tonight didn't come with grains.  It could've done.  But it didn't.

Geography lesson over, tonight I increased the 'meatball tally' of the Olympic Food Challenge by one meal by choosing to make Keftah.  Like so many countries in the Mediterranean, Algerians have a fondness for highly spiced lamb made into either meatballs or kebab shapes.  I much prefer the term Keftah or Kofte (Turkish) to the very American meat ball.  It's like meat loaf.  Stating the obvious but doesn't sound that appetising.  My favourite term for meatballs is the German Frikadeller, although I've never tried real German ones.

The recipe was once again sourced from t'interweb and I was entertained by its lack of precision.  Put roughly this and a bit of that and a pinch of something else together with enough meat to make three smallish meatballs.  Great for a bit of experimenting.  Meatballs are a popular meal in this house, but if you've read some of my other posts on the subject, you'll know that the husband will only eat Waitrose Aberdeen Angus ones cooked in Rachel Allen's pasta sauce with spaghetti.  This is an advance because before this blog, we didn't eat meatballs in this house so it's one extra meal on the menu.  But he's poo-pooed all the homemade versions that I've tried.

When he found out that Miss A and I were having meatballs, he plastered a pout on his face that would rival Posh Spice.  But once he realised they were lamb rather than beef, he was quite happy to sit down to his boring dinner of plain chicken and plain pasta with cheese.  Until I put my plate on the table.

Algerian flag

'But it's meatballs on baked beans.  I'd really really like that' came the plaintive wail.  Revealing that the beans were actually chickpeas shut him up pretty quickly and let me eat my very yummy meal in relative peace.  As the 'hummus' was so spicy, I didn't give Miss A any, serving her meatballs with pasta and fresh tomato sauce.

I did tinker with the recipe a little because I wasn't a fan of the sauce which was basically water with some Harissa stirred in and then reduced.  So I added some chopped tomatoes, sea salt and sugar to the mix and garnished it with fresh coriander.  Much tastier.  The husband eventually stole one of Miss A's meatballs and you could tell from the look on his face that he actually liked it but wasn't willing to admit to it.  He can stick to his manky shop-bought ones until he retracts his scathing opinion which was based purely on sight.

Served with Khubz also known as Dan Lepard's Perfectly Plain Pita (I adore these and won't ever by shop bought again), it has to be my favourite meal so far and I'll definitely make it again.  First gold medal.

Just as an aside, the Keftah recipe has many similarities to the recipe for Lorraine Pascale's Minted Lamb Burgers (third most popular post on this blog) which I then turned into Moroccan Meatballs the following night.  It's a small world...

Recipe -  Serves 4 (Adapted from Shawna's Food and Recipe Blog)

For the Harissa Hummus

• 1 tbsp Harissa Paste
• 400g tin chickpeas, drained
• 400g tin chopped tomatoes
• 200ml water
• pinch of brown sugar
• pinch of sea salt

For the Keftah

• 400g lean lamb mince
• 1 medium onion, finely diced
• 2 cloves garlic, finely diced
• 1 tbsp fresh mint, finely chopped
• 2 tsp cinnamon
• 1 tsp allspice
• 1 tsp cumin
• 1 tsp coriander
• 1 tsp paprika
• 1/2 tsp ground black pepper
• 1/4 tsp table salt

• Fresh coriander to garnish

1. Mix the ingredients for the Keftah together in a mixing bowl until well combined.  Divide into twelve even sized pieces, shape into balls and place on a plate.  Rest in the fridge for 30 minutes.
2. Heat a small amount of oil in a frying pan over a medium/low heat.  Place the meatballs in the pan and fry until browned and fully cooked through (I popped mine into the oven on 180c fan for ten minutes, wrapped in foil just to make sure they were fully cooked after frying as they're quite large).
3. While the meatballs are cooking, place the chickpeas in a small saucepan.  Pour in the water, tomatoes, Harissa and simmer over a medium heat for 5 minutes.  Add the salt and sugar and simmer for a further ten minutes until the sauce begins to reduce and thicken.
4. To serve, spoon the hummus onto serving plates and top with three meatballs for each dish.  Garnish with coriander and serve with Khubz (pita) or rice or couscous.

Olive Magazine Roast Lemon and Thyme Lamb

As I mentioned yesterday, I've been staying with my mum and asked if she might be so kind this weekend as to let me cook roast lamb for the family sunday lunch.  I've mentioned before that I have an aversion to eating lamb products.  It's not really anything to do with any veggie tendencies, more that I was probably scarred for life in the eighties by Bernard Matthews' Lamb Roasts.  I blogged about this trauma a while back so won't repeat it again, but if you're interested, you can read about it here.

Lunch. Mum's roasties are ace :)

The need to do this was akin to the cravings I had when I was expecting Miss A.  I never craved anything really random but I'd be struck by moments when I absolutely had to eat something - the one I remember is my grandmother's homemade scotch eggs - but by the time I got said food, it made my stomach roil.  It was the same with the lamb.  When I made Dan Lepard's Perfect Plain Pita the other day, the idea of stuffing it full of cold roast lamb, tzatziki and salad got me all excited.  Yet this morning, when I was faced with having to remove a couple of kilos of lamb leg from its bloody resting place and stab it full of holes to stuff with lemon and thyme, my stomach persuaded my brain it wasn't such a bright idea.

I'm one of those meat eaters who will eat meat so long as it doesn't look like the thing it came from.  The easiest way to turn me veggie would be to demand that I look at a picture of the cute fluffy thing it once was before tucking in to my dinner.  My mother traumatised me further as a child (as if the Matthews roasts weren't enough) by once chasing me round our lounge with a fish that still had its head on, beady eyes staring balefully at me, before taking it into the kitchen and cleaving its head off in one clean move with the massive butchers knife she kept for such occasions.  After that I'd only eat fish fingers because with the logic that only a six-year-old can have, they quite clearly won't made from fish.

Oven ready

Anyhow, once I got over myself and cooked the lamb, and rejoiced in being allowed to make the matching gravy rather than using good old Bisto I got to sit down to a really lovely roast lamb lunch that I would happily eat again.  Well I would cook it again if I'd not had to drive back over Salisbury Plain watching all the sad, bedraggled lambs trying to gaily skip through quagmires.  I'm not sure if I'd feel more guilty eating a lamb who lived through this miserable spring or one who had the fortune to gambol amongst daffodils during one of our rare, sun-shiny Springs.

When I was small and we used to go out in the car, my grandfather taught me to shout 'mint sauce' when we passed a field of sheep and 'Yorkshire puddings' on passing cows.  When I realised what he meant, I went through a phase of only eating peanut butter sandwiches and eschewing any meat that wasn't mechanically recovered (six-year-old fish finger logic at work here).  Miss A was happily bleating from the rear of the car today every time we passed a field of sheep.  I am in no doubt that the child who happily ripped the head from the dog on her birthday cake (and swallowed it in one bite) will have any problems with whether or not to eat meat when she's older.

Back to the lamb, it got rave reviews from all the family so it wasn't sacrificed in vain.  I only hope it's other legs were treated so kindly in the afterlife.

As far as I know, my mum just normally shoves her lamb in the oven completely 'naked'.  It then gets slathered with mint sauce (something else I can't stand after overeating it as a child).  So the idea of giving my fussy grandfather lamb with lemon in it, no mint sauce and gravy that wasn't Bisto was quite daunting.  But he ate it, had seconds and even commented that he'd liked the lemony bits.  Result!

Resting before dinner

My mum enjoyed it so much that she asked if she could comment on the blog when I'd written it.  So hopefully she won't be too mad at me for revealing my childhood traumas to all and sundry.  And she'd told me I'm even allowed to go back again if I cook a Sunday roast like that again.  She'll have to wait another few months for that yet because I've still got around 150 posts to write for this blog.  She's going to be subjected to Beef Wellington next time.

Oh and we ate the rest of yesterday's Cinnamon and Blackberry cake for pudding.  Kept really well in the fridge overnight - wasn't covered up and still just as soft as yesterday.  Top eating weekend had by all.

Recipe - serves 6 From Olive Magazine

• 3 onions cut into large rings
• olive oil
• 1 lemon , zest peeled off and cut into 15-20 pieces
• 3 large sprigs thyme , broken into 15-20 small sprigs
• leg of lamb about 1.75kg

1. Heat the oven to 200C/fan 180C/gas 6. Put the onion rings and garlic halves in a roasting tray with 4 tbsp water. Sit the lamb on top and rub the surface of the meat with oil.
2. Stab the skin side of the lamb 15-20 times with a small, sharp knife, twisting to make small holes. Stuff the lemon zest and thyme sprigs into the holes. Season well.
3. Roast for 1 hour 15 minutes for medium rare, 1 hour 30 minutes for medium, 1 hour 45 minutes for medium-well done and 2 hours for well done. Baste the lamb 3-4 times with the juices in the base of the tin as it cooks.
4. Once cooked, rest on a plate or board for 20-30 minutes under foil. 

For the Gravy

Pour excess fat from the tin, then sit it on the hob over a high heat. Stir 1 tbsp flour and 2 tbsp redcurrant jelly into the onions until the jelly melts. Add 175ml red wine. Boil for 30 seconds, add 350ml stock. Bring to a simmer and cook for 2-3 minutes until thickened slightly. Season then strain through a sieve.

Moroccan Meatballs with Herbed Couscous

Yesterday, I made Lorraine Pascale's Minted Lamb Burgers which were absolutely beautiful.  Having only used up half of the raw mixture, I faced a dilemma because I'd defrosted the mince so couldn't freeze and store any more burgers.  For a while, my analyst brain ran wild - Option a) eat burgers again for tea. Option b) feed them to the dogs Option c) do nothing (I have to put this into every business case I write so it was just habit).  Option d) was to turn them into meatballs.

Still haven't improved my meatball photography skills!

I checked my BBC Good Food Binder and found just such a recipe that I'd bookmarked ages ago.  All I needed was the sauce and the herbed couscous.  In all actuality, I probably could've made the sauce up myself ever since I discovered that the difference between a good tomato sauce and a great tomato sauce is actually a pinch of sugar.  I wish I'd known that years ago.  In fact, the BBC Good Food recipe didn't include this, but I found my sauce to have a bit of a weird tang from the cinnamon.  One small pinch of brown sugar later et voila.  The perfect sauce.

Seeing as how it's Wednesday, the husband was having his usual meal of baked chicken, Uncle Ben's tomato rice and gravy.  When I turned up with meatballs for my dinner, he got all sulky.  But whenever I've mentioned Moroccan food before, I have to listen endlessly about how he spent a month living in Morocco, eating food cooked by a real Moroccan and he didn't like that so anything I might care to cook would be far worse.  I remain astounded that he managed to survive for a whole month.  Do they have Pizza Hut in Morocco??

Anyway, I honestly think he'll like this meal.  Everything was really tasty.  I've written several times before about how I've struggled with finding the perfect homecooked meatballs recipe but I think I've now finally found one he will like (he wouldn't like the Chipotle Meatballs I made back in December as they were spicy).

Recipe - serves four (with generous helpings)

For the meatballs

• 450g lamb mince
• 1 egg
• 50g breadcrumbs
• 2 tsp coriander
• 2 tsp cumin
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1 garlic clove, finely diced
• 1 large onion, peeled, grated and squeezed to remove as much liquid as possible
• small bunch of fresh mint, finely chopped
• small bunch of fresh coriander, finely chopped
• salt and pepper to taste

1. Mix all the ingredients together in a bowl until well combined.  
2. Divide the mixture into 24 pieces and shape into firm balls (they will feel a little soft but don't disintegrate on cooking).  Refrigerate for thirty minutes to allow them to set a little.
3. Heat a frying pan with a little olive oil and gently fry the meatballs until browned.  Remove with a slotted spoon and set to one side.

For the tomato sauce

• 2x400g tins of chopped tomatoes
• 2 garlic cloves
• 2 tsp cumin
• 2cm root ginger or a generous teaspoon of minced ginger from a jar
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1 tsp olive oil
• 200 ml chicken stock
• pinch of soft brown sugar
• salt and pepper to taste

1. In a large saucepan, gently heat the oil then add the garlic, ginger and dried spices and cook for two minutes.
2. Add the chopped tomatoes, stock sugar and season to taste.  Simmer for ten minutes.  Add the meatballs and simmer for a further 20 minutes.
3. Serve over herbed couscous.

Lorraine Pascale's Minted Lamb Burgers

Every winter, my life becomes a little like Groundhog day.  Or Groundhog week.  In that every Monday the husband asks why he can't have minted lamb kebabs for tea and I patiently explain that xyz supermarket only sells minted lamb kebabs during barbecue season.  He looks perplexed, his brow furrows, I offer something else to appease him (wine; a takeaway; ham, egg and chips...) and he's happy for another seven days.  The following Monday, the exact same conversation is had again.  And again.  In fact, I must say I have never been so relieved to see processed meat products in a shop as when xyz supermarket resumes selling minted lamb kebabs.

Not the most photogenic meal ever, but mighty tasty

Last year, I did try finding a suitable recipe online to make my own.  After a few disasterous attempts, we settled on one that used copious amounts of mint sauce.  They tasted pretty much like the shop-bought ones but instead of having a texture of  foam rubber, they actually felt just a little bit meaty.  But, like a fool, I forgot to save the link to my mac, I switched phones and the recipe was lost forever, no matter what combination of words I typed into Google.

So when I got given Lorraine Pascale's Home Cooking Made Easy for Christmas, I was really pleased to see her recipe for minted lamb burgers.  After all, a minted lamb kebab is just a burger on a stick.  I've been meaning to try them for ages so when I decided to make Dan Lepard's Perfect Plain Pita yesterday, these seemed like the ideal filling.  Having looked for the recipe online, I was a little dubious when I found the only reference to them on this blog, but each to their own - I felt duty-bound to try them.

I've never had much luck with burgers and meatballs.  I often find that the taste is lacking and all you get is that 'slab of meat' flavour.  Having watched James Martin making burgers some time ago, I recently realised that it's not just about the herbs and spices you throw in that makes the difference - it's the level of seasoning (ie salt and pepper) that brings out the flavour.  That's always the awkward thing with recipes.  They say 'season to taste' but how can you taste a raw meat product?

Hardly McDonald's fare

Some chefs suggest frying off small bits of the mixture and adjusting the seasoning if it's not right.  I just threw caution to the wind today and lobbed in a healthy pinch of Maldon sea salt, alongside the very generous teaspoonsful of coriander, cumin and cinnamon.  The recipe also calls for a smalll bunch each of fresh coriander and mint too.  I forgot the garlic in my haste.

And for once, my burgers had flavour.  So that's obviously it.  More salt.  Exactly what we're not supposed to do.  Or maybe they would've been just as tasty with a tiny pinch of salt.  Now, I don't know. But I'll definitely make these again and use less salt and do the 'fry a little bit, taste, adjust seasoning' method to see just how little salt I need to get a decent flavour.

The mixture seemed a little too soft to mould onto kebab sticks.  I tried to convince the husband that a minted lamb kebab is just a burger on a stick, but he's having none of it.  So my next attempt will also include trying to chill them before cooking to see if they'll solidify.  Also, maybe browning in a pan and then baking rather than grilling - in the same manner as the burgers are cooked - will stop the kebabs falling off the sticks.

These will be fantastic come barbecue season!  I'm also using the remainder of the mixture for tomorrow's recipe of Morrocan lamb meatballs with herbed couscous.  Watch this space!

Recipe - makes four generous burgers (adapted from Home Cooking Made Easy)

• 450g lamb mince
• 1 egg
• 50g breadcrumbs
• 2 tsp coriander
• 2 tsp cumin
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1 garlic clove, finely diced
• 1 large onion, peeled, grated and squeezed to remove as much liquid as possible
• small bunch of fresh mint, finely chopped
• small bunch of fresh coriander, finely chopped
• salt and pepper to taste

1. Mix all of the ingredients together in a bowl.
2. Divide the mixture into four and shape into patties about 2.5 cm thick (I shaped mine to fit the pita and they were really quite big)
3. Fry the patties over a medium heat for 2-3 minutes each side until browned.
4. Place the browned patties onto a baking tray and bake at 220c/200c fan for 8-10 minutes until thoroughly cooked.
5. Serve in buns or fresh pita breads with raita

Lamb Tagine

If my mother had the time and inclination to read my blog (which apparently she doesn't) she'd probably have to sit down after reading this post.  Because I cooked and ate lamb for my tea.  Yes, that's right mother. I. Ate. Lamb.

Every time I express my frustration about Abigail's fussiness, my mother kindly reminds me that at around two I went through a phase where I would only eat roast lamb.  And then as quickly as the fad started, it stopped and I became obsessed with celery and peanut butter (it's amazing, plastered thickly into the canal bit!).  Since those days, I've never really eaten lamb again.  I think it has something to do with Bernard Matthews' lamb roasts.

The Matthews' 'roasts' were the Turkey Twizzlers of the Eighties.  And I hope if you've ever had one, you will agree with me that they were disgusting.  The scrapings from the meat carcasses bound together with bits of fat and other unmentionables and sold to cash-strapped housewives as the convenient way to put a roast on the dinner table mid-week.  I wish I'd had the conviction as a six-year-old to declare myself as a vegetarian as those meals scarred me for life.  It's only as an adult knowing that I can choose to eat less meat and have better quality cuts that I'm starting to learn to love other meats besides chicken and turkey (although Matthews bastardised those into his 'roasts' too).

Over Christmas, I bit the bullet and made my first ever dish containing stewing steak.  Ordinarily, I wouldn't even consider what I would deem to be 'fatty' meat, but I now know that cooked correctly, the cheapest cuts can be more tender and tasty than the expensive stuff.

Lamb Tagine on herby couscous

So today, it was a toss-up between a mixed bean curry courtesy of La Berry's Complete Cookbook or a Lamb Tagine from BBC Good Food, December edition.  I asked the good people of Twitter-land and the tagine won the day.  Out came the diced stewing lamb, replete with little bits of fat that would ordinarily have me reaching for a carrot to munch instead.  But once the meat was sealed, it looked beautiful.  And after 25 minutes simmering away in the most fragrant smelling sauce, it was so soft and tender that it melted under my knife.

It was also so simple to cook for a midweek, after work meal.  Just seal the meat, fry the onion and then leave to simmer in stock with tomato puree and spices until the sauce has reduced and thickened.  And despite it being lamb, it is surprisingly healthy too at 450 cals for a really hearty meal.

You can find the recipe here.

And yes, mother, if you're reading, I did take that photo and then eat the food.  You can pick yourself up off the floor now.