No-kitchen cooking - Sausage rice

So as the kitchen has started to come into shape, I started to bring back some of the storecupboard items I'd been missing.

I'd really been wanting to have a comforting yellow khichdi so I planned this, until I remembered the kids aren't desperately fond of it, and I also discovered that I didn't have very much moong daal.  My mother has since told me that actually she makes this with masoor daal, so I'll do that next time.  I don't want too many half used bags of lentils in my new kitchen, I want to streamline my ingredients and stores and make it a much easier place to work in.

Anyway, I had a couple of Bulgarian smoked sausages (something similar would be a Matteson's sausage) left from a packet I'd opened a few days before to make an aubergine pasta sauce with, so I sliced those up into half moons and fried them in a little oil in the IP.   Once they'd coloured a little on the cut surfaces, I removed them, added a little butter and fried some thinly sliced onion.  After these had some golden tinges to the edges, I put back the sausage, and added a half teaspoon of turmeric, a teaspoon of salt, 2 cups of rice, 2 slices of ginger, whatever yellow mung/moong lentils I had left, and 3 cups of boiling water.  I also put in a little garlic and onion salts, and also obviously a little Marigold, and I decided to add some green peas for some colour.

I cooked the whole thing on the IP rice setting and it was done before I had finished clearing up and getting the kids organised!

They definitely enjoyed it, but it did make WAY too much for just us.  We had a whole lot left that easily fed 3 more people.  Most of us ate it drizzled with a little Frank's Hot Sauce, even Tiny!

more on no-drain pasta - in which leftover chicken is utilised

As I've mentioned before, I have an issue with draining pasta.  This is partly due to the fact that I have problems with my wrists and hands, and lifting and tipping a full pan of water is painful and uncomfortable for me.  But partly I just don't like doing it.  It feels slow and wasteful and somehow just annoys me.

So when I stumbled across this method for cooking pasta in 4 minutes in the Instant Pot (IP) with minimal water - like an absorption method of cooking pasta - I HAD to try it!  And it is fantastic! Admittedly I probably spend as much time using a slotted spoon to scoop out the pasta as I used to do waiting for water to boil etc, but somehow this just makes me less stressed and irritated than the standard method, and that can only be a good thing! In the future I may use this method to cook the pasta in the IP when I can then just stir something directly into the pot and then serve straight out - cream cheese and smoked salmon/ham springs to mind...

Anyway, I started by letting Tiny choose a pack of bow tie pasta from the corner shop, and we used the whole 500g pack in one go.  This gave us PLENTY of pasta - after cooking, I filled a locknlock box with cooked pasta which was a nice quick and easy lunch for Tiny on the weekend - and the rest served 4 of us generously with another couple of lunches.

As the recipe in the link says, we added about 4 cups of water to the IP, so the pasta was just about covered, maybe a few corners poking up here and there.

I then set the IP to cook for 4 minutes on manual.  I had added boiling water so this went even more quickly than normal.

Once the pot has cooked the pasta for the 4 minutes and beeps that it is finished, switch it off immediately and perform a quick release.

Remove the pasta with a slotted spoon and if required box some up for another day.

I then fried some chopped onions and garlic in a little oil straight in the pan I'd just taken the pasta out of, and then I added a chopped up chicken breast left over from a very frugal Lidl roast chicken supper we'd had recently.  Then I added a bag of prepared cauliflower and broccoli florets which I'd bought in Lidl, along with the obvious spoon of Marigold, and a good squirt of mild mustard.  I finally chucked the cooked pasta back in, and stirred through some soured cream which we'd opened for the not-so-chilli recently.

The result was completely delicious and moreish.  The chicken was not dry, the veg was still slightly crunchy, the creamy but tangy sauce was very comforting and the whole meal was filling and satisfying!  The kids all devoured it hungrily, and the 2 little ones both asked for seconds!  Big'Un and I ate it drizzled with Frank's Buffalo Wings hot sauce, and the little ones even had a taste that way too, and really enjoyed the added flavour.  And when I went to put the leftovers into a tupperware, and I picked a box that was slightly too small, Godpapa was more than happy to just eat up what wouldn't fit, straight from the pan!

One pan hob tomato pasta

This came about because I *hate* draining pasta.

I have no idea why, but everyone in my family knows it.

I've made a few one pan, bake in oven type pasta bakes, but I wanted something quicker and less house heating and less gas guzzling.

Google helped me with a few thoughts, and then I conjured up this:

Fry chopped onion and garlic until soft and add mixed herbs if desired. Add a carton of passata, flavoured if liked, and a carton full of boiling water. I also added half a bottle of Cirio passata but I'm not so sure it was needed to be honest.

Bring to boil and stir in 350-400g dry pasta. Bring back to boil and simmer, covered, for 20 mins. Stir once in a while.

Flavour with Marigold (obvs) and season to taste.

Just before serving, stir in half to a full pot of mascarpone and 2-3tbsp balsamic vinegar. Finally add a teaspoon of brown sugar.

Serve sprinkled with grated cheddar or parmesan if preferred.

Every child loved this. Hurrah!