Posts tagged ‘healthy’
Fit for a king?
Well, it appears the original Caesar salad was not something served up for an emperor as I first thought, but a chef who was running out of almost everything in his restaurant. I like those kind of desperation-born inventions. The chef in question was Caesar Cardini who laid claim to making the first Caesar, hence the name, on an Independence Day in the 1920’s. Customers to feed and cupboards bare, he threw the lettuce in a bowl, coated and tossed it with a mix of garlic, egg, Worcestershire sauce and olive oil. Now I wonder if they would have come up with that with those five on ‘Ready, Steady, Cook’?
Caesar’s salad was a hit, his salad empire grew, thank goodness, with many a variation being served up all across the globe with his recipe still be bottled up and sold all over the US.
To make it now, any crunchy lettuce will do – romaine, cos or little gems works too. Over the top, scatter grilled bacon, fish or chicken, with croutons or without. Then there is the dressing – with or without egg yolks, anchovies, capers. There is a Spanish version with chickpeas and Manchego, one with seared rump, even a fried oyster Caesar.
I keep the tangy anchovies in and the egg – coddled; boiled for 45secs to keep the end sauce thicker. I add quite a bit of lemon juice and a large teaspoon of Dijon, basically, for me, the sharper the better. I do like the odd caper thrown in now and again as well.
Really, I just love it because it ‘feels’ healthy (just like flapjacks do because they have wholesome oats in) and that is good enough for me.
Top tip, wash and prep the leaves way before, allow to dry and then chill before serving. It keeps them crisp fresh.
Oranges and lemons. Fruits I normally like squeezed in my glass, rather than additions to a bake, especially when the recipe calls for the whole fruit, peel, pith and all. That said, the simplicity of the Claudia Roden orange cake recipe (first published in 1963), cited in the excellent The Flavour Thesaurus by Niki Segnit, intrigued me. Just five ingredients in Claudia’s cake with no fat nor gluten in sight, the kind of recipe you’d look and think something must have been left out.
The fruit is boiled for two hours prior so the peel looses its bitterness and the juices become sweeter, the whole fruit is then pulped and added to the mix, then baked for an hour. The result is – I don’t say this very often – fantastic. A really light, fresh slice of cake that really does melt in your mouth.
I added a lemon to the stewing oranges to up the more zesty flavours. I want to give some other nuts a try like hazelnuts and different fruits – like cherries or even plums might be worth a go.
As it is, this is definitely, my new favourite.
Do not let the weather get you down. Do not. Make these instead, the ultimate ‘cheer up’ biscuit.
Light and not too sweet, the wafts from the oven are so good, I bet you sink one even before the kettles boiled.
These were adapted from a Popina recipe; using dates instead of sultanas with more oats, less flour plus fresh ginger. Also nice with a squeeze of lemon.
I recommend making double.
I know it is so very British to complain about the weather but seriously ‘damp and wet’ must end soon or I will be knee-deep in things to make from scratch to enjoy once the sun comes out. I have literally started a summer hibernation making all sorts of sauces, preserves, jams and granola.
Granola gets mixed responses as a healthy whole food in that, like flapjacks, although it’s all grains and seeds, they can be overloaded with fat and sugars. This does not have to be the case and neither do you have to take out the nice bits and feel like your munching on taste-free rabbit food to be eating ‘right’. Like with anything, a bit of common sense moderation is required and if you are going to eat 150g of the stuff for breakfast, perhaps you might like to walk/run/paddle to work. I like it full-fat and full flavoured as a sprinkle over the top a massive bowl of ripe fresh fruit and yoghurt.
Rachel Allen’s recipe is a good base with the ratio of grains, seeds, nuts and fruit with sugars well-balanced although I did find this one overly sweet with too much going on and I did have to omit the dried apricots – not for me thank you.
The recipe below is simplified therefore cheaper version with no seeds but still packed full of flavour. As long as you keep the dry weights the same you can swap and change your nuts, dried fruits, sugar, spices too – try pecans with dried banana and maple syrup or figs with pistachio and a squeeze of lemon in with the honey. You can also use olive oil for the fat, although personally I love the more buttery flavour. How about with some chunks of dark chocolate over vanilla ice cream?
Store in a big clip top jar and hope you get to munch on it at least one sunny day this month.
These are a perfect little guilt-free snack to munch on any time of day.
No sugar or fat yet you wouldn’t know it from the taste. I add orange zest
or fresh ginger to them sometimes too.
Niknoks 