Archive for the ‘Recipes’ Category
Valentine Special – Take Away Dinner for Two
Friday, February 11th, 2011
Surprise your loved one to fine dining at home. Ready for collection on Monday 14th February pm.
- Starter -
Scallops with a tarragon and butter sauce, served with homemade bread
(Served in a half shell with a brioche crust, all you need to do is flash them under the grill and lightly warm the bread)
- Main -
Slow braised pork belly with bang bang sauce served with garlic mash and stir fried bok choy
V- Pressed aubergine, tofu & courgette terrine with bang bang sauce served with garlic mash and stir fried bok choy
(Flash the pork belly also under the grill or in the oven, re heat the mash in the micro wave or oven, re heat the boc choy in the microwave or a quick toss in a hot pan).
-Dessert-
Mini homemade doughnuts with 3 dipping pots
Dark chocolate and fresh mint
Merry berry splashed with brandy
Dreamy creamy White chocolate
£35 per couple
Tags: cardiff, Catering, Food, Meal for Two, Ready Meals, Valentine's Day
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Foodie News – Menus of the Week 11th February and Valentine’s Day
Friday, January 28th, 2011
We are running two extra special ‘menus of the week’. If you wish to give someone a treat, or have guests coming to town, why not give this delicious menu a try. You relax with your guests and let us do the cooking!
Home Counties – Take Away Dinner –
Collection on Friday 11th February 2011
Scottish Starter Canapés
Scottish smoked salmon with caper and lemon butter
Arbroth smokie pate on teeny tiny toasts
Fillet of Aberdeen Angus with horseradish cream
Creamy Arran blue tartlets
Welsh Main – Course please choose one
Cawl Cymru with winter roots – served with rustic garlic spuds
Welsh beef braised in brains SA with flat field mushrooms and shallots – served with creamy mashed potatoes
(V) Gooie leek and goat’s cheese strudel
Irish Pudding
Irish chocolate coffee shot mousse
English petit four
Crab apple toffee apples
£22 a head (collection only)
Valentines Take Away Menu –
treat your loved one to a romantic dinner at home – ready for collection on Valentine’s Day – please see the Valentine’s Menu under ej @ Home.
Tags: cardiff, Catering, Food, Irish, Meals, Scottish, welsh
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Recipe blog – Packed Saffron Rice
Sunday, October 24th, 2010
It all began i couple of months ago when in a meeting my creative mind took over, a paella for 150 guests cooked in a 1 meter wide pan. Saffron rice packed with onions, garlic, paprika, smoked paprika, real chorizo, free range chicken, squid, salmon, king prawns and muscles all finished with fresh herbs and blanched green beans. I was very animated and my client could hardly resist, i had painted a picture that left us both drooling, hungry and our imaginations hunting around our heads for a fork!
But as the day of the event came closer my imaginative mind saw the other side of cooking rice for 150, a sticky mess, burnt solid to the bottom of my gorgous 1 meter pan, uncooked fish pocking out rudely, i had a sleepless night tossing and turning, seeing the buffet que looping round the bedroom and out the door, helpless, devastated and of course hungry.
A healthy nerve doesn’t do you any harm. I came to work very focused and took my mis en place extremely seriously. Harry and i talked it through a couple of times during the day.
The moment had arrived. I put the meter wide pan on a large flame and added a good slug of olive oil and huge knob of butter, i throw in my finely chopped red onions, 3 bulbs of squashed garlic’s cloves , sliced chorizo sausage, marinated sealed chicken thigh, saffron, paprika and smoked paprika. The fat started to come out of the chorizo, the onions began to cameralise and the smell began to fill the kitchen, it was fun. I added 4 kilos of good quality paella rice, salt and pepper and stirred with a large paddle we normally use in our bratt pan. The chicken stock to be added next was in a large plastic storage box which i had to heave up with all my mite. The pan bubbled, boiled, a couple of waitresses took interest and guests popped their heads in draw by the aromas. Once the pella rice was 2/3rds cooked i added the cleaned and thinly sliced squid rings, salmon trim and king prawns. The yellow saffron rice now really beginning to go creamy, not a sight of sticking and so in went the cooked muscles, another few minutes ( just over an hour in total for a pan that size) i throw in a mound of chopped parsley and a box of blanched chopped beans. The green lifted the yellows and the pinks it was just my excited meeting had promised. I carried the hot heavy pan across the marquee and feed the expectant hungry guests.
Serve 6
250gr or 2 cups Pealla rice
1 sliced red onion
5 cloves squashed garlic
5 strands of saffron
1 tsp Paprika
1 tsp Smoked paprika
1 tsp Dried herbs
2 good quality Chorizo sausages
2 free range Chicken thigh. Sealed and cut into to chunks
250ml or 2 cups Chicken stock
50gr Salmon, small chunks
50gr Peeled king prawns
50gr Squid rings
5ogr Muscles
50gr Green beans, blanched and sliced
Large hand ful Parsley
Follow the recipe in the story. Cook yours in a good size frying pan with a good heavy non stick base, Use equal amounts of rice to stock and expect it to cook in half an hour
I took a small bowl for myself and sat eating on an up turned box out the back of the marquee the best man brought me a chilled cerveza.
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Recipe blog – Mixed cheese soufflé
Sunday, October 24th, 2010
Last week I arrived at work and realised I had only brushed my hair on one side of my head! I had got fed up with chasing the kids around with a hair brush, started mine and then caught them unawares but having ticked that box I moved on and before I knew it I am at work running my fingers threw the left side of my hair. I bet I am not the only one who has done that or worse! It is very hard to be a working mum and most of the time I am happy, more than happy to be a bit of a scrappy doo. I cannot produce lightly poached plums in a sticky orange scented syrup after a day on my feet cooking for 150 wedding guests. My fridge is nearly always a mess and I have that top shelf filled with old jars I don’t really ever touch. It needs sorting but after a day in the office writing menus, answering questions and making endless decisions, a sandwich and half a bottle of wine will have to do. My father was a surgeon – we never had a plaster or pill in the house. For this week’s recipe I have chosen a soufflé which may seem like an odd choice but it is important to ignore the fear factor; a soufflé is only a white sauce with a flavour – cheese, spinach, fresh herbs, smoked haddock, broccoli – all possible left over ingredients waiting to be used on that top shelf! Don’t tell anyone how easy a soufflé is – after all it does come with some goddess status.
Mixed cheese soufflé
(1 ½ pint soufflé dish, round dish with high sides)
3 oz left over Cheese – cheddar, blue, goats – all work nicely
1 oz freshly grated parmesan, for the sides
3 large, fresh free range eggs, separated
1 oz butter, plus a little to butter the dish
1 tbs Flour
5 oz milk
Nutmeg / cayenne / salt / pepper
Pre heat the oven to gas 4 / 160oc
Prepare the dish by buttering the sides, sprinkle the parmesan cheese in and roll around the sides to lightly cover. These unsmooth sides give the soufflé something to hold onto and climb up whilst cooking.
Melt the butter in a pan and whisk in the flour to form a roux. Add the milk and whisk until smooth. Turn off the heat. Grate all the cheese and separate the eggs. Now add the cheese and the egg yolks to the slightly cooled white sauce, season with nutmeg, a pinch of cayenne, salt and black ground pepper.
Whisk the egg whites to a soft peak and with a metal spoon fold the whites into the cooled cheese sauce in 3 goes, this helps to keep as much air as possible in the whites. Pour into the soufflé dish and place into the centre of the oven. Now turn up the oven to gas 5 / 180oc. This rising heat helps lift the soufflé. Cook for 30 minutes and eat straight away with a salad – for example spinach, walnut and endive salad with a tart lemon dressing.
Note to self – remember to brush hair
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Recipe blog – Courgette and Chocolate Cake
Sunday, October 24th, 2010
People have been asking me, have I tried chocolate and courgette cake?
So the other day when in a meeting with a client discussing her birthday menu she mentioned the same cake and I asked for the recipe, after all it has to be a good way of getting courgettes into little ones.
Courgettes are in season at the moment and in bulk in allotments everywhere so I understand it has to be a novel way to use them up. Courgettes are also not the most popular of vegetable and I thought I must give the cake a go.
Courgettes are part of the summer squash family and although usually thought of as a vegetable are technically fruit. They are high in water and low in calories making them very good for dieting and are also high in Vitamin C, which is good for pretty much everything!
I called a friend, a good cooking buddy, and ask if we could come and cook one in his house, his kitchen is bigger and I promised to clear up the mess!
We settled the little ones safely in the middle of his central island, peeled the courgettes and weighed out the ingredients into little pots. It looked like a cookery show!
My daughter Molly put the ingredients into the kitchen aid and her brother Jake turned the beaters on and off with great skill. Very sweet if not a little gender specific.
The cake mixture filled our tin and we popped it into the oven and went to watch some well earned Cbeebies. Molly and Jake kept remembering they had cake coming soon, “Mummy cake, Mummy cake, cake Mummy!”
Courgette and Chocolate Cake
120g soft butter
100g caster sugar
200g soft brown muscovado sugar
125ml sunflower oil
3 free range eggs
130ml milk
350g plain flour
2 tsp baking powder
4 tbsp cocoa powder
100g dark chocolate – cut into chunks
450g courgettes, peeled and grated
Beat the butter and sugars together until light and fluffy, add the oil and eggs and keep beating. Add half the sieved flour and the milk and lastly fold in the remaining flour, cocoa, dark chocolate chunks and courgettes. Pour into a lined eight inch cake tin and bake at 190C for about 45 mins.
Of course we had to eat ours warm and straight from the oven but I think the cake has improved as the days have gone on.
The recipe is easy, the oil and courgettes keep it moist, the chocolate makes it rich and slightly glossy. I have tweaked the recipe a little but the idea of courgettes in a chocolate cake, though odd, does get the thumbs up from us all young and a little older.
This week people keep asking me if I have seen the Great British bake off, sorry no but this could be the ideal recipe.
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Recipe blog – EJ’s Energy Bar
Sunday, October 24th, 2010
Wales the True Taste 2010 is just under a month away. The True Taste Awards are the Welsh awards for small and large producers of everything from free range chicken, confectionery, cheese, sausages, dairy, lamb, beef, wines, beers and juices. It includes the best well-sourced deli and vegetables grown in Wales.
We won an award last year for our homemade lemon and thyme cordial. The accolade allows great marketing potential and support from the Welsh Assembly Government.
This year we entered the long and difficult tender process to cater for the awards dinner, research, menu planning, local sourcing, budgeting and creative ideas all went into my long tender document and I was thrilled to be awarded the job. It is a great honour as all the guests are very knowledgeable food lovers.
All the food must be sourced from the county in which the awards dinner is to be held and each year this changes giving every county their time to show off their produce. This year it is Pembrokeshire and there will be 500 guests attending the event. The event attracts many major sponsors. I organise the staff – there will be more than 50 – and the table hire, including more than 4,500 pieces of cutlery, 3,750 items of crockery and I am yet to calculate the total number of glasses!
We hire in all the equipment required for the kitchen in order to get the meal out quickly, efficiently and of course piping hot. It is a mammoth but exciting task.
Last week we held the menu tasting at our kitchen in Clive Road, Cardiff. It is a fun, full-on day and lots of decisions were made. I don’t want to give the menu away at this stage so my recipe this week is for the energy bars I will making for the chefs to keep them going throughout the day which will be long, full of pressure, heavy loads and deadlines.
Ej’s energy bar
12 oz oats
2oz toasted sesame seeds
3 oz of walnuts
2oz pumpkin seeds
4oz crunchy peanut butter
4oz Welsh honey
Juice of half an orange
Zest of 2 oranges
3oz dried chopped apricots
2oz dried chopped prunes
2oz golden sultanas
2oz dried cranberries
Feel free to adapt the nuts and dried fruits to suit your taste or what’s already in your cupboard
Place all the seeds and nuts on a large baking tray and toast in the oven for about 5-10 mins. Watch carefully you do not want them to burn, just turn golden brown and fill the kitchen with roasting smells.
In a saucepan melt the honey and peanut butter with the orange juice and zest
Add all the dried fruit and nuts to the pan. Line a baking tray with cling film and then firmly spread the mixture into the baking tray. Put in the fridge for at least an hour – overnight is best.
Turn out and cut into wedges. For a really decadent version coat one end of each wedge in melted dark chocolate. It does not have to be all healthy it just has to keep us going!
Tags: chilled soup, Food, recipe
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What’s in the Freezer and Menu of the Week
Tuesday, August 31st, 2010
Hello Foodies
Here’s what’s ready cooked and in the freezer waiting for collection this week. Give us a ring if you’d like us to take it out of the freezer in the morning so that it’s defrosted in time for tea!
Frozen Meals
Free range chicken and chorizo cassoulet in a rich red wine and smoked paprika sauce
Welsh beef and aubergine curry
Coq au Vin
(£4.50 for 1 portion or £8.50 for 2 portions).
Chocolate & Courgette cake (£3.00 for 2 portions)
And here’s our Menu of the Week, as usual, orders in by 4.00 pm on Thursday.
3rd September 2010
Goat’s cheese and caramelised red onion filo tart
Welsh lamb tagine with butterbean, apricot and roast cumin seed
(V) Vegetable tagine with butterbean, apricot and roasted cumin seed
Mini pavlova nests filled with summer fruits
Wine – we have a delicious MadFish Riesling (Australia) in stock which would work well with the tagine.
Tasting notes – limes, passion fruit and floral characters while the palate is clean and refreshing with citrus to backup the riper fruit flavours @ £9.65.
10.09.10
Smoked trout mousse with watercress and roasted hazel nut dressing
Local lamb shanks cooked in a rich red wine and sweet tomato coulis
(V) Roasted root vegetable in a rich red wine and sweet tomato coulis
Pear and apricot upside down cake with cream
2 course – Meal for 1 @ £10.50 or Meal for 2 @ £20.00
3 course – Meal for 1 @ £13.00 or Meal for 2 @ £25.00
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Menu of the Week & Other Foodie News
Tuesday, August 24th, 2010
It’s all happening in the kitchen…
Today – we are busy preparing some of our ‘Granny Anne’s Lemon and Thyme cordial’ for the Cardiff Harbour Festival this weekend and have made an extra stock for the shop. This refreshing zesty cordial won a commended True Taste of Wales award last year and would make a quirky little gift for someone @ £3.50. Please pop into the shop if you’d like to buy some.
Tomorrow (Wednesday), freshly prepared and in the fridge by the end of the day:-
Free range chicken and chorizo cassoulet with a trio of beans and pulses in a rich red wine and smoked paprika sauce
Welsh beef and aubergine curry with a crush of ej’s special spices
£4.50 single portion or £8.50 for a double portion
Friday – we are baking some deluxe dark chocolate and lemon & mascarpone cupcakes @ £2.50 each. If you’d like to order some let us know asap, baking on Thursday!
There has been a slight change of plan (by request) for this week’s menu, as follows:-
27th August 2010
Tapas – homemade hummus, baba ghannouj, vine leaves and flat bread
Coq au vin
(V) Puy lentil and mushroom strudel with fresh tomato coulis
Served with creamy mash and chef’s choice of seasonal vegetables
Chocolate and courgette cake with chocolate sauce
3rd September 2010
Goat’s cheese and caramelised red onion filo tart
Welsh lamb tagine with butterbean, apricot and roast cumin seed
(V) Vegetable tagine with butterbean, apricot and roasted cumin seed
Mini pavlova nests filled with summer fruits
Wine – we have a delicious MadFish Riesling (Australia) in stock which would work well with the tagine.
Tasting notes – limes, passion fruit and floral characters while the palate is clean and refreshing with citrus to backup the riper fruit flavours @ £9.65.
2 course – Meal for 1 @ £10.50 or Meal for 2 @ £20.00
3 course – Meal for 1 @ £13.00 or Meal for 2 @ £25.00
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Menu of the Week
Tuesday, August 17th, 2010
This week’s Friday night takeway – place your orders by Thursday 4.00 pm, collect on Friday between 3-5.00 pm.
20th August 2010
King prawn and water melon salad with a light chilli dressing
Free range chicken breast with a three cheese stuffing wrapped in Parma ham (very 70’s but also very tasty!)
Nectarine steam pudding and homemade custard
2 course – Meal for 1 @ £10.50 or Meal for 2 @ £20.00
3 course – Meal for 1 @ £13.00 or Meal for 2 @ £25.00
And now over to you…
Marie Ducroq-Slip, Menu of the Week, 13th August 2010
… it was fab thanks. I’ll be back!
Rachel Wilton, Menu of the week, 13th August 2010
It was great thanks. Enjoyed by all.
Linda John, Menu of the Week 13th August 2010
Lovely soufflé and fishcake – would order these every week!
Sheila Adams, EJ@Home, Dinner for 8, 11th August 2010
… delicious as usual!
Clare Hudson, EJ@Home, 11th August 2010
Thank you so much for the lovely food you prepared which I picked up yesterday – the boeuf bourguignon, chicken and pancetta, and the lasagne. We have already tried the first two – and they were absolutely delicious. Best wishes and thank you for the delicious food.
Sheila Adams, EJ@Home for Visiting Guests, Dinner for 8, 27th and 28th July 2010
Thanks you so much for the meals last week. they were delicious and everyone loved them. So much so in fact I would like to order another dinner for 8 on Wednesday 11th August. If possible could I have the same as last Friday – if you can!
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What’s Cooking this week…
Tuesday, August 10th, 2010
What’s cooking today…
The following dishes are being freshly prepared today, ready for you all to pop in and collect any time. Make the most of a freshly prepared, nourishing, preservative free supper:-
Free range chicken and pancetta in brandy and mushroom sauce (today’s batch sold out – fresh batch tomorrow)
Boeuf Bourguignon
Single portion £4.50 Double portion £8.50
What’s cooking this week…
We will be baking some scrumptious large white chocolate cupcakes (similar to the dark chocolate image attached) @ £2.50 each. If you fancy a treat place your order asap. They will be baked on Friday morning, ready to collect on Friday afternoon.
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