What’s on your plate? October

Thistles and Kiwis

When it comes to cooking and eating, what does ‘comfort’ mean?

So begins the latest book from the Ottolenghi stable, Comfort. It is a good question, and one that means different things to different people at different times. Pasta is always a comfort food for me, along with scrambled eggs on toast and a perfect warm cheese or sultana scone, slathered with butter. For Karl, comfort food means pea soup, korv stroganoff and, natually, meatballs.

Stroganoff meatballs

Imagine his joy then when I suggested the stroganoff meatballs from this new book. I make meatballs reasonably often, so thought I would see what was different about these ones. The actual meatball recipe was pretty standard, though with dill as one of the seasonings. I had to use the dried herb as fresh is unavailable at this time of year. The sauce was excellent, made with mushrooms, garlic, paprika, shallots, brandy, mustard and sour cream, and I served it over pappardelle with a rocket salad on the side.

Verdict? A definite do again when we want meatballs and not traditional Swedish ones (ie served with mashed potatoes and the special gravy).

Sausage and lentils with mustard crème fraîche

For tonight’s (ie Wednesday) dinner, I made this version of sausages and lentils, a dish I also make and wanted to see what differences there were to change things up a bit. The recipe suggests using Polish sausages, and as we have an excellent local producer, The Polish Sausage Company, this sounded like a good idea. The accompanying mustard crème fraîche was also a bit different, though I used sour cream since I had some left from Sunday (see the little red bowl below). Other ingredients called for were onions, garlic, celery (which I had already prepared and chopped up into bits at the weekend), thyme (from the garden), a bay leaf, rainbow chard and I swapped out the green capsicum for a carrot because I didn’t read the recipe and had chopped up the carrot (and had had red capsicum as part of a stir fry the night before).

Verdict? I should have used capsicum, which would have definitely added something to the dish, but using these sausages instead of the usual pork and fennel certainly worked well. The mustard crème fraîche accompaniment is one I would use again.

Have you tried anything from the latest Ottolenghi? I’m thinking of the Puttanesca-style salmon traybake or the potato, fennel and smoked salmon bake or the spinach and asparagus loaf or….maybe the one-pot chicken with orzo and porcini or linguine with miso butter, shiitake and spinach?

This well be entered in the What’s on Your Plate blog challenge hosted by bloggers Widow Badass and Retirement Reflections which happens on the first Wednesday of the month (I am almost a day ahead of them….at this time of year, 20 hours to be precise).

Thistles and Kiwis is a Wellington, New Zealand based blog written by Barbara, who likes cats, summer, good food and pretends to garden.

You can find Thistles and Kiwis on Facebook, and also on Instagram @thistlesandkiwis. 

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Published by Thistles and Kiwis

Loves summer, sunshine and cats. Beginner gardener, likes eating, cooking and reading about food

30 Comments

  6. They all sound very interesting. And I shall attempt the stroganoff sauce next time I do meatballs. Comfort food for me is a baked potato with butter and grated cheese, sausages and cabbage, or stew and dumplings or any kind of home made soup. All very much winter meals. Like Lisa, your posts always make me hungry too!

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    1. Oh yes a baked potato! Haven’t had one in ages. As I said to Laurie, it is harder to think of summer comfort foods – potato salad comes to mind, but maybe we need less comfort in summer? 🙂

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  8. Hi, Barbara – Thank you for being a regular at What’s On Your Plate. I was just thinking about Comfort Foods recently. For me, comfort foods definitely include meatloaf, mashed potatoes and macaroni and cheese. It’s fun to discover what the term comfort food means to others.

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  14. Hi Barbara, I’ve never tried any of Ottolenghi’s recipes (I hope you will still talk to me after that admission!). Both recipes look like something Mike would enjoy so I’m off to the library to see if I can get the Comfort book. Thanks for sharing with us at #WeekendTrafficJamReboot and I have selected your post as one of my favourites to feature next week. xx

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  15. Pingback: What’s on your bookshelf: October – Thistles and Kiwis

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