Jun 27 2009
Smokin!
A lovely little tea but one which requires good smoke extraction!
The other night we had a little tomato sauce left over from Dougal’s pizzas (I don’t know what he puts in his pizza sauce but it is gorgeous!) and I fancied something a bit italian. I grabbed my wee cast iron griddle pan (50p in a house clearance, best culinary bargain known to man!) and sliced some thin discs of courgette and sides of red pepper. A wee coating of garlic oil and much smoke later and we had some lip-smackingly good griddled veggies.
Then I threw together a batch of pancake batter- feeling italian I used Mary Contini’s recipe for Crespelle from Dear Francesca (more on that book, at some stage I’m sure) but I think in future I’d stick to the Usborne Kids cookery book recipe. These seemed to stick particularly badly in the pan which made cooking them a little fraught.
We served the pancakes with a couple of pieces of griddled veg inside and the remainder of the pizza sauce. Rolled up, topped with parmigiano and served with a big salad with lots of tomato and rocket and avocado this made for an interesting and different tea. Perfect summer eating!
I make the pizza sauce different every time!
This time I heated some garlic oil gently and added cumin seeds and one or two other things. Then some cider vinegar. Then I just dropped in a tin of chopped tomatoes and let it bubble away.
Ooh looks lovely! Re: smoking pan, did you oil the pan or just the veg? (oiling the pan as well as/instead of the veg will make it smoke) Was the pan smoking hot before the veg went in?
Really want pizza now…but don’t want to turn on the oven. ;)
hmmm… can I face a smoky kitchen? The above is a rather inspiring concoction and I might just have to pursue it
oi Stanton… whaddya mean by “one or two other things”? These are the vital secrets that might just transform a dull sauce to a subtlety special one….
Well, like I said, I just make it up so I never really remember from time to time. I think it might have been paprika or maybe some chilli powder.
Or maybe I’m just trying to maintain an air of mystique? ;-)
There was a wee bitty oil on the veg, none directly on the pan, and I’m pretty certain it was smoking hot to start with- in fact it was pretty much too hot to take too long in flipping the pieces with the tongs because of the heat coming back up at you!
fair enuff ǂ-)