a sort of goulash

We had friends coming for supper on Sunday evening – lovely, as I love cooking for people, and don’t do nearly enough of it since we moved! I wasn’t sure what I wanted to cook, but I went to the butcher and bought some beautiful lean pork, and there was a big bag of mixed peppers in the fridge, so that was a start. I wanted to use some beans too, to pad it out, so found some dried butter beans on the pantry shelf on Saturday morning, stuck them in to soak, then cooked them in the slow cooker overnight.

I started off by deseeding and slicing thinly four peppers, red and yellow, and a huge spanish onion, and cooking them down in some olive oil. I added some cumin seeds and a splash of honey and some garlic, and it was heading towards Middle Eastern. Then in went some paprika, and we were off with goulash. More paprika followed, some fennel seeds, some caraway and then a jar of roasted peppers, sliced up. These give a lovely depth to a dish, and when cooked in the slow cooker, they sort of melt into the sauce. A carton of chopped tomatoes, some rosemary, thyme, bay leaves and seasoning, and the sauce was done.

This all went in the slow cooker (now devoid of its butter beans), and I diced and browned the pork, hurled it in the cooker, and then we just left it completely alone apart from the odd stir for about seven hours. The butter beans must have been very old – I know they accompanied us from Somerset – because they needed another 40 minutes on the boil, so they were added a bit later.

The dish was gorgeous – it made six servings, and four have gone in the freezer, as unfortunately our friends had to cry off due to illness.

We followed it with Molten chocolate cakes with raspberries and cream. There’s two of them left too. <parp>.

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Mirrored from Reactive Cooking.

weekend 5/6 sept 2010

Pete has been suffering from A Lurgy, so we weren’t sure whether our planned day out to Lincoln’s Day of (Morris) Dance would come to pass, but he felt OK providing he didn’t have to drive, so off we went.

I love Lincoln – I love all mediaeval cities like Norwich, Chichester, Salisbury, York etc. We’ve only visited once, but it’s going to be somewhere we go regularly, I’m sure. Quite possibly in a fortnight, as there’s a bird of prey display at the Castle, and we found someone who can mend our barometer too!

We gawked in the expensive shops – I fell completely in love with a handbag in a lovely shop where they didn’t seem to mind a bit that I couldn’t afford it, but just brought out different colours for me to try :) We had tea from bone china cups in a little tea room, toiled up and down the hills, decided once again to leave the Castle for another day (see above), and spent quite a bit of time at the Lion and Snake, watching the dancers, particularly the Raving Maes, who I’m thinking about applying to join (although the costumes are probably a bit young for me!)

We had a distinctly indifferent lunch at the pub, and I may well complain to the chain: 35 minutes to produce a couple of sausage baguettes, with a couple of teaspoons of cold caramelised onions from a jar, no cutlery until after the food arrives, *and* a deep sigh when I asked for salt, does not please me particularly. Nor did the advertised “mayo” – no idea what it was, but mayo it most certainly wasn’t. Nice day out, mind, and we bought a couple of splendid stuffed mushrooms, which are destined for tonight’s supper (nice Mr Butcher was quite happy to keep them for us while we wandered round).

On Sunday, I got up fairly and went for a bike ride – 12.82 miles around the north of the city, to Anlaby Common and thence on to Kirk Ella and West Ella, and home. There are *hills* around there – it’s just on the edge of the Yorkshire Wolds, and it was hard work, but I did it all, so was dead chuffed (and puffed). Came home and ate bacon and egg and sossidge for breakfast, then constructed a huge vat of goulash, and some molten chocolate puddings, for supper with friends. Very sorry to say that they had to cancel due to ill health, so I hope they’ll be well enough to come and eat with us soon – there was enough goulash to freeze! As it happens, I started coming down with the Lurgy last night, and Pete and I were in bed by 9 p.m., so it may have worked out for the best …

Mirrored from kestrel.org.