Spicy Vegetable Puffs

I had a load of potatoes that needed used, but nothing much else.  What to make?

I found a couple of carrots in the bottom of the fridge and a bag of peas in the freezer  (there are always peas in my freezer) and decided to make some veggie samosas.

Here they are:

This is the recipe I use, it is a mix-up of recipes I have used in the past and adapted to suit my taste:  Nothing is properly measured as it is usually a "use up" recipe.

What you need....

• Potatoes (4 or 5)
• Carrots (3 or 4)
• Frozen Peas (a good shakeful)
• Sunflower Oil (blob or two)
• Garlic (frozen, fresh, whatever)
• Cumin Seeds (shake)
• Garam Masalla (1/2 tsp ish)
• Coriander powder (1/2 tsp ish)
• Curry powder (to taste - mine is medium and I use around 4 tsps)
• Chilli powder or a shake of dried chilli flakes
• 1 litre of veggie stock

What you do....

• Peel and chop the potatoes and carrots into small chunks.
• Heat the oil in a non stick decent sized saucepan, drop in the cumin seeds and garlic and cook until they brown.
• Add the Coriander powder, curry powder, chilli and the Garam Massalla, stir.
• Add the potato and carrot chunks and stir, making sure all the veg are coated.
• Add the stock, bring to the boil and simmer until the veg starts to go just mushy.

But, I had loads and loads of potato mix left, and as it happens a packet of puff pastry in the fridge.

So I made them into some spicy veggie puffs to take into work tomorrow  :)

What you do....

• Roll out pastry.
• Cut with large cutter (mine is around 6")
• Blob some potato mix into the centre.
• Dampen round the edges then fold and seal (they will pop open)
• Sprinkle with onion seeds.
• Pop into oven at Gas Mark 6 for around 20 mins or until golden brown.

Enjoy  :)

Experiments with Okra

Have you ever tried Okra?  I LOVE it, it's one of my favourite vegetables - when served in a restaurant. Not so easy to get up here in Carlisle.  Occasionally you can pick some fresh up in our only Asian food shop, but last time I was in I noticed they had some frozen bags, so I bought a couple.

I cooked some that night - YUK !  It was horrible, slimy and very unappetizing.

I tried again a few days later and - YUK !!

So, for the last few months a bag and a half of Okra has been languishing in my freezer.  Yesterday was a 'freezer clean out' day.  Now I have never been one for throwing things out, especially not food.  the trouble was making this particular food edible.

I Googled "What to do with frozen Okra" and came across this recipe....

Let's try it  :)

First of all it took me about 3 hours to dry the Okra, it just stayed slimy. I tried in a colander  then a baking tray, then a cooling tray. In the end I patted it for ages with a clean tea-towel.

I duly spinkled with salt and left for half an hour, then tossed it in the flour mix & popped into a hot oven.

The problem was I expected the flour to cook or burn off, but it just stayed stuck to the Okra,  like flour.

This is it cooked - all floury.  I ate it for dinner last night with AIioli.

It was slightly better than YUK !  But not a lot.  Luckily the garlic hid the taste, and the slimyness had gone.

Today, at lunch, I opened the fridge to find the left over (baked) Okra.  Still cannot bring myself to throw it away, so I heated up some olive oil in a frying pan and fried it.

I added a blob of peanut butter (no idea what inspired me to do that) the peanuts burnt and the smell coming from the pan smelled like donkey poo. I turned the pan off quickly and piled it onto a plate.

(Donkey poo or not, I was still gonna eat it)

It was crispy, actually being baked then fried probably meant it was burnt to a crisp, but much more edible.

It is safe to say I will never be buying frozen Okra again.  It's gone now, and I will be ordering it in restaurants only from now on  :)

Looking forward to having something different for my next meal  :)

Silloth & The Hobbit.

Sunday, day of rest.

Rest, to us, is not sitting on the sofa watching TV, that bores the life out of me. No.... 'rest' is blowing away the cobwebs, spending quality time with loved ones, that kind of thing.

We like to walk the "Wainwrights" which is a range of Lakeland fells walked by Alfred Wainwright. So far we have walked 16 out of 214, so we have quite a few to complete. We would have normally planned a Wainwright, but I have had a bit of a cold and my lung capacity is not as healthy as it should be at the moment.

So we decided to have a nice walk along the sea front at Silloth.

Silloth is our "sea-side",only 23 miles from Carlisle, it's where you took the kids for a picnic when they were young, car packed up with buckets, spades, sandwiches and old tatty towels.  At this time of year the one amusement arcade is closed down, and the only people around are dog walkers.

Nowadays, when we visit, it's just us, a Springer Spaniel and a pocket full of poop bags.  But a nice walk all the same.

I love the sea. I love the sea when it's sparkling and blue, I also love it when it's grey and dismal.  Today it was mucky brown and dull, but it's still enchanting.

We had a lovely 50 minute brisk walk which made our eyes water, our noses run and our ears flap (well, Dotty Dog's ears flapped).

This afternoon we popped along to the local cinema to watch 'The Hobbit', what a fantastic film, superb effects and I was really frustrated to find it was 'Part 1' and that 'Part 2' would not be along until July  :(

After the cinema we were walking back to where we had parked the car, having to pass an Indian restaurant named Rafiks.

Just before Christmas Shona (my daughter), Lezley (my friend) and I had been invited to this restaurants 1st Birthday Party (we are regular attendees of their 'Bollywood Night' events - a meal and Indian film) and I had made them a birthday cake, which I took in my cake dome.  I needed to pick up the dome as I have made a few cakes since and had nothing to transport them in.  Oh.... this is a photograph from our "Carlisle Living" magazine from the night (Lezley refused to have hers taken, wish I had!!)

Anyway, I digress, as we were passing the restaurant on the way to the car, we thought we should pop in and pick up the cake dome, only we ended up staying for a meal   :)  Tut Tut.  We had all the stuff at home for a stir-fry too !!

I feel really full and rotund now, and tired.  Need to sleep.  Got a 7 hour shift at work tomorrow.

Let me show you how far the crocheting has come along since last night.....

Getting there.