Turkey Wraps

Feeling a little tired I decided to use the Waldorf salad I prepared yesterday (see previous posting) so I had to decide what to do to go with the salad.

I could do many things, but being tired I decided to go for something simple, therefore no real food recipe to be had here just an report. I had in the fridge some Turkey steaks and I had bought some streaky bacon for breakfast, so I cut the steaks into strips and seasoned them with salt, pepper, lemon juice and a little olive oil, wrapped the streaky bacon as you can see in the picture. The reason for this is that turkey has very little flavour and bacon has quite a lot of flavour and they compliment each other really well. I let them marinade for about 30 minutes.

On a frying pan I put some oil and slithers of garlic and when hot placed the turkey wraps and turning often until golden brown , prior to cooking I did sprinkle a little smokey paprika on top for extra flavour. While they were cooking i placed some crinkle oven chips in the oven and a couple of fish cakes for the people in my house that don't eat meat. On the plate I laid some salad leafs placed the Waldorf salad on top added a few cucumber slices, then when cooked....

I added the turkey wraps and the chips, I them after added some barbecue sauce and a little wine vinegar to the salad, while my wife taking the turkey wraps had the fish cake and the same salad and chips arrangement, simple yet was very tasty indeed...if you make this simple dish you are guaranteed to enjoy it.

Waldorf Salad & Port

I haven't yet planned what to do for dinner tomorrow, but I felt I needed something light and crispy to accompanied whatever I may decide to make, so I needed versatility and flavour.

At the same time I wanted to give something to my sister to try something new that she had not tried yet, as she just came from Portugal a few weeks ago. At this moment celery popped up to my mind and instantly salad, what better than Waldorf salad.

Recipe Ingredients:

• 1 celery heart
• 2 apples (green is better, as sourness is needed )
• 1 hand full of raisins
• 100grs walnuts
• 1 soup spoon of sugar
• salt and pepper to taste
• 1 glug of port wine
• 4 soup spoons of mayonnaise
  
• juice of one half of lemon

After washing well, thinly slice the celery sticks into a bowl, then peal quarter and thinly slice the apples, after that break the walnuts into small pieces and put the raisins in too.
At this point add the rest the sugar, lemon juice, port wine & salt and pepper, mix all very well, place it in a glass or ceramic container and refrigerate for 12 hours, I feel this is important as it allows some juices to blend into the sauce, give it a stir prior to serving to blend in the flavour and serve it with your main dish or eat it on it's own. As an accompaniment should be enough for 8 people.

Woking Good - Stir fried Veg and King Prawns

Recipe Ingredients:

• 1 Punnet of mushrooms
• 1 Punnet of baby corn
• 1 small tin of bamboo shoots
• 1 large carrot
• 1 red pepper
• 1 red onion
• 300grs king prawns (pealed but uncooked)
  
• 1 ginger bit the size of (two garlic cloves)
• 2 garlic cloves
• 1 large spoon of black bean sauce
• 1 tea spoon of Chinese five spice
• 2 soup spoons of soy sauce (optional)
  
• 2 soup spoon of brown sugar one soup spoon of rice wine (optional)
• 1 large medium chilli
• 1 soup spoon of arrow root (or corn starch)
• 2 glugs olive oil
  

I needed to make a quick dinner and this allowed me to literally take 7-10 minutes to cook it.
I chopped the onions and pepper into (1 inch) squares, chopped the garlic; ginger and chilli very fine mince, cut the carrot in half length ways and then half side ways and finally thinly sliced the from the side to for very thin rectangles, baby corns in half's length ways, mushrooms in quarters. Once all the veg are prepared place some oil in a wok (I used olive oil 2 glugs) but some people prefer nut oil, place over the flame once the oil starts to smoke, throw in the garlic, ginger, chilli, carrot, onion and pepper, let it cook for about 3 minutes then add the soy sauce, Chinese five spice, mushrooms, baby corns and bamboo shoots let it cook another 3 minutes then finally add the prawns, black bean sauce arrow root mixed with about 1/4 of a glass of water, the sugar and the rice wine, cook until the prawns turn completely orange as the uncooked colour is Gray, then you are done.
you can serve this with plain rice, Noodles or on it's own it's up to you...i had mine with Egg Noddles, actually was the best one I ever made as I tweak with the recipe every time I make. Like use some different vegetables like pak choi, or spring onions even cabbage or broccoli shoots, the only limitation is your imagination. Hope you like this one...

Turkey Curry and / or Quorn Curry

Receite em Português AQUI (com pequenas diferenças)

Pictures above illustrate the Turkey dish (and the rice was boiled with turmeric)

Endeavouring to do something quick but at the same time good enough for vegetarians (as my wife is one) and also for meat eaters as I wanted to use some turkey I decided to do a Curry to feed 6 people.

Recipe Ingredients:

• 2 large carrots (thinly sliced)
  
• 1 & 1/2 onions (diced)
  
• 1 large courgette (diced)
  
• 1 large red pepper (diced)
  
• 10 medium mushrooms (quartered)
  
• 1 chilli (de-seeded and thinly sliced)
  
• 3 large garlic cloves (thinly sliced)
  
• 1 big bunch of coriander (chopped)
  
• 1 & 1/2 tin of tomatoes
• 2 soup spoons of tomato paste (diluted in a little water)
  
• 1 large soup spoon of cumin powder
• 1 large soup spoon of garam masala
• 2 large soup spoons of turmeric
  
• 1 large soup spoon of coriander seeds powder
• 1 large soup spoon of sweet paprika
• 6 glugs of olive oil (half per pan)
• 300grs Turkey
  
• 300grs Quorn
  

I mixed all the powders together than divided it in half, on two seperate pans I poured 3 "glugs" of olive oil, once hot added the powders and let it cook for a little time once it formed a paste and cooked a little I added theonion, garlic the chilli and the meat/quorn (please notice I divided ingredients all the way through in half, for each pan appart from the meat and quorn which is one 300grs for each pan) cooked this until the meat/quorn was cooked through adding a little water when a little dried, then i added the pepper, the courgette the mushrooms the and carrots cooked this for about 5 minutes and added the tomato (again half to each pan) and let this cook for 10 minutes then added the tomato paste (half each) and let this cook for a further 10 minutes.
While this was doing I boiled some rice with 4 crushed cardoms, 2 crushed garlic, a tea spoon of cumin powder and a tea spoon of turmeric (if you want the rice to be white don't use turmeric), once the rice is cooked drained it rinsed with boiling water removed the cardoms and put it in a pan drizzled with a little olive oil (optionally you can stir in some chopped coriander and some green raisins) put a lit and let it rest for 2 minutes.
Once the curry is one minute away from being cooked add a generous bunch of coriander (half each) and garnish each plate with a fe coriander leaves on top see picture...this one was really tasty.

These Pictures bellow illustrate the Quorn Curry (and rice was boiled without turmeric)