Soba noodles with chicken

Oooh, nice Monday surprise. This easy peasy lemon squeezy dish was a sheer delight to make and was enjoyed by everyone. Soba (buckwheat) noodles in a chicken and dried mushroom stock with roast chicken left-overs, black beans, broccoli and spring onions. Not much to add really, just another addition to the favourite family dishes and I wave the flag for victory against predictable and unappealing family dinners. 

Good thing dinner was an easy task on Monday as I had an appointment at the physio for my lower back. Has been slightly achy for a while but thought going to the physio was all about getting rid of the pain...nooo, I am wearing the biggest plasters along my spine to keep me from overstretching or arching. Can't actually reach the top shelf of my spice collection so this week there will be no ready made fajitas, guacamole, lemon or rosemary salt (expiry date some time in July, 2010 though!!!). Instead we are cooking fish cakes, pasta with salsiccia and veal escalope with tabbouleh. 

Ingredients (original recipe here Soba med kyckling)
8 dried mushrooms (any kind will do but Chinese are preferred)
200 g soba noodles
1/2 roast chicken
2 tbsp concentrated liquid chicken stock + 1l of water
1/2 tbsp dark soy sauce
1 tbsp rice vinegar
1 tbsp sugar
1 bunch of spring onion
1 tin of black beans
1 head of broccoli
a little bit of grated horseradish for those with grown-up taste

Preparation

Place the dried mushrooms in a pan and cover with hot water. Leave to soak according to instructions (can be left over night too). 

Cook the noodles according to the instructions. When cooked, drain and rinse with cold water. Return to pan and cover with a lid. 

Remove the meat from the chicken and tear it into smaller pieces. Chop the mushrooms and save the water it soaked in. Slice the spring onion finely and cut the broccoli into florets. 

To do the stock, add the water to a pan, add the concentrated chicken stock, soy sauce, rice vinegar, sugar, chicken and mushrooms. Bring to a boil then reduce to a simmer. Season to taste with the left over mushroom water, salt and pepper. 

Add the spring onion, black beans (rinsed), broccoli and noodles. Cover with a lid and leave to simmer for one minute. Serve in bowls and top with some grated horseradish. 

You can't eat soup every day!

The cold I caught just before my birthday managed to get the best of me last week too. Only really did the most essential stuff so that I'd have some energy left for the girly lunch I had planned at my place on Friday. Which of course meant I didn't manage to take photos or post here. During the weekend the rest of the family followed my lead and so we have spent it convalescing. Around lunchtime on Saturday I put the little one to sleep and left the other two in each others' company watching a movie in bed, grabbed a quick lunch and my new cookbooks for an hour of exhilarating inspiration. See, I am so easy to please! 

The soup was left-over from Friday's lunch and I've had it for lunch both Saturday and Sunday to the point where my oldest said "Mummy, you can't have soup every day!" She probably thought it was some sort of treat, like the Saturday sweets she is used to, as I made these aaahs and ooohs every time I tasted a spoonful. Parsnip and coconut soup with ginger and lime. Today I had it with a toasty of my homemade sourdough fruit and nut bread full of delicious gruyere cheese, then a latte and my healthy muesli biscuits baked from one of my newly acquired cookbooks. 

I've just put all the food shopping away for next week's dinners. We are starting off with a Swedish dish called Kalops, a beef stew with succulent meat and allspice served with beetroots. 

Tuesday: favourite salmon teriyaki

Wednesday: Lamb shanks with couscous and peaches

Thursday: Pasta with tuna and tomato sauce

Friday: Adobo on chicken

By end of this week, you'll have these recipes and then I'll put together a shopping list for you so if you want, you can just copy paste the dinner recipes from this week to the next including the shopping list. 

Hope you've had a good weekend! 

Parsnip and coconut soup 

Original recipe Parsnip and coconut soup

Ingredients for 4 

3 parsnips

1 large leek

2 cloves of garlic

2 tbsp vegetable stock (I use liquid)

400 ml tinned coconut milk

2 lime

1/2 thumb of fresh ginger

green chili 

fish sauce to taste

Preparation

Peel the parsnips and chop into 2 cm pieces, slice the leek and garlic. Place in a large pan, cover with water, add 2 tbsp of vegetable stock. (I added half a small medium hot green chili too since the kids were not eating this). Cook until the parsnips are soft. 

When cooked, whiz into a smooth texture with a hand mixer. Add the coconut milk, add water to thin if necessary. 

Grate the zest of the lime. Peel and grate the ginger then squeeze out the juice and discard the fibrous left-overs. Add the ginger juice and lime zest, add a bit of lime juice and season to taste with fish sauce, salt and pepper.

Girly lunch! 

Carrot soup

The mother of my daughter's school friend said she often cooks soup for her kids and amazingly they eat it. I have tried several times and failed. Well, let's give it another try, I thought, as I looked through one of my favourite cook books. I found this unassuming little carrot soup, checked the ingredients, made it and, oh goodness, it was fabulous, did I actually make this?!

So, you ask, did the kids eat it? Nope, is the answer, but you know what, it did not matter because I had their portions too before saving this (smallish) bowl for my husband!

The original recipe (in Swedish again I am afraid) can be found at the below link. I changed my soup a little bit though. http://hemmafru.taffel.se/2009/04/03/randig-morotssoppa-med-vanilj-citron-och-kanel/

Ingredients (four our small family)
1 kg organic carrots
1 cinnamon stick
1 lime leaf (can be excluded)
50 g butter
1/2 tsp vanilla bean dusting
1 lemon
1-1 1/2 tbsp agave (or maple) syrup
creme fraiche to serve

Preparation
Peel and chop the carrots. Put them in a pan with the cinnamon stick and lime leaf and add water to cover plus a little bit more.  Leave to cook until very tender. Remove the cinnamon stick and lime leaf. Mix the carrots and its water with a hand mixer into a purée. Add the butter, vanilla, lemon zest, the juice of half (add more if you want) and syrup. Add water to thin if necessary. Salt and pepper to taste. Pour into bowls and add a dollop of creme fraiche for serving.