Spaghetti Bolognese

This is a Nigel Slater recipe and is definately the best Spaghetti Bolognese recipe you will find. The cream that goes in at the end really adds to the flavour making it ultra rich - just make sure the seasoning is right at the end and its excellent. The only thing I changed was the meat - I used a veal and pork mixture and added a few chopped up chicken livers.

Ragu Bolognaise
50g butter
70g cubed pancetta
a medium onion
2 fat cloves of garlic
a carrot
2 stalks of celery
2 large flat mushrooms - about 100g
2 bay leaves
400g minced beef or lamb
200ml crushed tomatoes or passata
200ml white wine
200ml stock
a nutmeg
200ml full-cream milk or cream
To serve: tagliatelle for 4
Melt the butter in a heavy-based pan - I use one of cast iron, about 24cm in diameter, then stir in the pancetta and let it cook for five minutes or so, without colouring much. Meanwhile, peel and finely chop the onion and garlic and stir it into the pancetta, followed by the carrot and celery, scrubbed and finely chopped. Lastly, finely chop the mushrooms and add to the pan, then tuck in the bay leaves and leave to cook for 10 minutes over a moderate heat, stirring frequently.
Turn up the heat and tip in the meat, breaking it up well with a fork. Now leave to colour without stirring for 3 or 4 minutes, then, as the meat on the bottom is starting to brown, stir again, breaking up the meat where necessary, and leave to colour.
Mix in the tomato, wine and stock and a grating of nutmeg, salt and pepper, letting it come to the boil. Turn the heat down so everything barely bubbles. Partially cover with a lid and leave to putter away for a good hour to an hour-and-a-half, stirring from time to time and checking the liquid levels. You don't want it to be dry.
Pour in the milk or cream a bit at a time, stir and continue cooking for 20 minutes. Check the seasoning, then serve with the tagliatelle and grated Parmesan. Serves 4.

Beer Battered Hake and Garlic Alioli

I really wanted some proper battered fish so tried out this Spanish version using Hake. In Spain Hake is very popular and still relatively cheap.
Here is the batter recipe.I'd never used beer in batter before but it tastes really good - there is just a hint of it in the final taste but it gives the batter a certain lightness.

225g/8oz self-raising flour, plus extra for dusting

salt and freshly ground black pepper 

300ml/10fl oz fridge-cold lager

Mix these thoroughly together, coat your fillets and fry until nice and brown. I served two of these each with a large salad and some good quality Alioli. This is a lot lighter that stodgy fish and chips so its a bit better for the summer - its also very quick - all you are really doing is quickly frying the fish.

"Balti" Chicken and Spicy Potato Cakes

This was an emergency meal that turned out pretty good. I had some chicken in the freezer and cold mashed potato from the night before.
For the potato cakes I fried finely chopped onion, garlic, chilli and red and green peppers until they were soft. Then I added a couple of teaspoons of cumin, a teaspoon of garam masala and a bit of turmeric and fried for a couple of minutes. I let this cool then mixed it with the potato which I then made into flat patties. These are then egg and breadcrumbed and deep or shallow fried til brown. They turn out sort of like an Indian style bubble and squeek and the breadcrumbs give a good crispy texture against the soft inside. Good with yoghurt mixed with mint, garlic, coriander etc.
Frozen, skinless, chicken breasts are one of the most tasteless meats you can eat so I spiced it up just by coating it in Pataks Balti paste with a bit of extra chilli and garlic. I left it in the spice paste to marinade all day then griddled it until parts went nice and black so it kinda tastes bbq'ed.

 Vegetarian version