Twitter Updates

    follow me on Twitter

    Monday, March 16, 2009

    Garden Puree for Bruschetta


    This was a recipe from Tyler Florence. I really like his The Ultimate Series” on TV.

    I got 3 meals out of it.
    Lunch: Served on Bruschetta
    Dinner: Tossed into spaghetti
    Dinner again: And as a topping for baked Kumara.
    (You could use baked potatoes, just as successfully)

    What a versatile dish.

    The pasta recipe below I thought would be great for "Ruth's Presto Pasta Night" this week hosted by Pam of Sidewalk Shoes have a look at her site here

    1 cup frozen peas
    200 gms asparagus
    200 gms French green beans
    3 spring onions green tops only
    1/2 cup ricotta cheese
    Extra virgin olive oil
    Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

    Take hard ends off the asparagus and peel the stem cut into 2 1/2 cm pieces
    Top and tail beans and cut to same size as asparagus
    Bring a large pot of water to the boil
    Season and add the beans, asparagus and spring onions
    Cook until bright green and just tender about 3 minutes
    Throw the frozen peas in for the last minute.
    Drain into a bowl of iced salted water, to stop cooking
    Salting the iced water keeps the flavour at its peak.

    Drain again and place in food processor

    Add ricotta, drizzle of olive oil and freshly ground black pepper
    Whizz, test seasoning and add sea salt if necessary.

    Toast some slices of French or country bread
    Spread with puree.
    Of course I have these superb tomatoes, so I topped the bruschetta with that
    A little sea salt and freshly ground black pepper and
    As you can see I couldn’t wait I had to take a bite.
    That night I sautéed some prawns with garlic, chili and lemon zest.
    Squeezed some lemon juice over them and reduced a little

    Cooked some spaghetti
    Drain and tossed with 3 tablespoons garden purée
    Into serving bowl
    Top with prawns and then poured the pan juices over the top.

    A grind of freshly ground black pepper

    Dinner!

    Two days later, we had Steak and Roasted Red Onions, accompanied by Baked Kumara topped with the Puree.

    Delicious

    I really liked the steak and onions cooked like the following.

    While I was baking the Kumara, I also baked a medium red onion each
    After 1 1/2 hours at 180C, I removed the onion, peeled it and cut into chunks.

    Meanwhile I seasoned a piece of Rib Eye Beef (300 gms, about 2.5 cms thick)
    Rubbed it with a little olive oil.

    Onto a hot pan 2 minutes 1 side
    Flip
    Another 2 minutes and into a 200C oven for about 6 minutes.
    Remove steak and set aside to rest

    To the pan, I added a good slosh white wine and a heaped teaspoon French mustard.
    Stir to deglaze pan and bring to boil then reduce a little
    Add the chopped onions
    The beef was a little rare when I sliced it so I tossed it around in the onion mix for a minute or two and then served with the Kumara

    Sorry the steak looks a bit messy but it was fabulous.

    The Garden Puree and Kumara would make a good lunch -– solo.

    6 comments:

    pam said...

    Wow! I love how you have used this three different ways! Excellent! Thanks for your entry!

    Nancy/n.o.e said...

    That puree looks so green and spring-like. Perfect on pasta (and the other two ways also)
    Nancy

    Joanne said...

    This looks really great! An interesting take on pesto.

    Vivien said...

    May i know what camera you are using in regards to photos in your food blog? I am doing a personal survey before buying a new camera as current photos in my blog kinda sucks, i am using a 5-years-old Pentax Option4S. Thanks for your help

    possible email me back at vivien_1223[at]yahoo[dot]com

    Karen said...

    Hi,

    We at Menu Mania really like your blog.

    Would you be interested in becoming a voluntary contributor to our blog at http://www.menumania.co.nz/blog?

    We'd be really interested in having you create blog entries that are different from entries than what you have on your own blog (so Google doesn't penalise either of our sites for duplicate content), but along the same theme. You can place a link to your blog at the end of each entry of course.

    We'd like to expand our blog offering to represent what's on the menu at home, to compliment the focus of the site which is: what's on the menu for dining out or taking-away.

    Let us know your thoughts.

    PS: Sorry I could not find any other way to contact you.

    Warm regards,

    Karen

    So So Simple said...

    Karen Yes I would like to contribute to Menu Mania...contact me at cajun(dot)moon(at)xtra(dot)co(dot)nz

    Cheers