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As mentioned in Day 2 of The Challenge A friend got me 1 kg of Fenugreek seeds recently. The seeds have a beautiful, sweet, tangy smell to them. A little midnight research during a recent night shift suggested that used as they are they have a bitter flavour, but if toasted they become richer and sweeter. Apparently they have been used medicinally for centuries as an anti-inflammatory and pro-lactation ingredient. I'd never used it and was curious, so I made a couple of curries with it recently, but with so many different flavours, it is hard to identify a single note in order to figure out what it-s like and how it interacts with other flavours. This was therefore an experimental dish with fewer flavours to try and tease out the fenugreek's properties and taste. I opted for porridge as it is good base coat that I hoped would welcome and show up any variations of the fenugreek. Based on the description I thought it might match well with something citrusy and with other "sweet" spices - orange peel, cinnamon and cloves, matched with yellow raisins. Ingredients: 1 cup oats 2 cup milk 2 tsp fenugreek seeds 1 tsp ground cinnamon 1/2 tsp ground cloves 2 tsp of orange peel, dried a handful of yellow raisins 1) Put oats, milk and raisins in a saucepan and heat slowly, stirring occasionally. As porridge thickens, add cloves and cinnamon. 2) Put fenugreek seeds and orange peel in a dry pan and toast gently. 3) Add fenugreek seeds and orange peel to the porridge, and serve into two bowls. For an experiment, this came out well but it does need some tweaking. It was still a bit bitter and needed a bit of sweetness to bring out the flavours. We added a shake of a cocoa spice blend my sister brought me back from Hawaii (cocoa, cardamom, cane sugar etc.). It helped but wasn't enough. Next time I would try it with some dates, honey, or a tsp of brown sugar per bowl. I might also toast the seeds a bit further. The porridge wasn't as creamy as I would have liked either as I ran out of milk and used some water instead. The flavours did come together very nicely aside from the bitterness. the orange, raisins and spices payed off each other beautifully. I usually have my morning porridge a lot simpler, but I would definitely try this again, and I feel that the experiment to feel out the properties of fenugreek was a definite success. Other ideas are forming and bubbling up to test this new spice further... Watch this space for the next, and do chip in if you have ideas. EDIT: We tried this again, but with a couple of changes and this time, I think it is a keeper! Instead of dry roasting the spices, I fried the fenugreek seeds and orange peel in about 2tsp of butter for a few minutes, then added the cinnamon and cloves and about 8 dates, quartered. I let those all cook together for a further 5-7 minutes and then added them to the porridge and it was delectable. My husband added fresh figs to his too. I did not find that it needed further sweetening but if you did, then I think honey would be your best bet. creamy and sweet with warm spices, this was a tasty cold morning treat, and only took a little more effort than my regular porridge.

So this is a bit of a spin on last year's Potato and Cabbage Pie, using sweeter root vegetables and some greens. It is still quite dense but packed with flavour and super satisfying. Sweet potatoes and squash were on sale so they were the base for this pie. I like the cabbage leaves as the pie casing, steamed and then roasted with the pie. We put bacon over the top of this one, but really it would have been just as good without it. Ingredients: 6-8 cabbage leaves 4-5 sweet potatoes, chopped 2 apples, chopped 3 carrots, chopped 1/2 butternut squash, chopped 3 eggs 1/2 - 1 c cheese, grated 1 tsp thyme 1 tsp oregano 1/2 head broccoli, chopped 2 tbsp butter 1 tbsp chutney (I used last year's Green Tomato Chutney) 6-8 strips of bacon Salt and pepper to taste 1) Steam the cabbage leaves until pliant. Boil the sweet potatoes and apples until tender, about 10-15 minutes. Roast the butternut and carrots with the butter at 180°C until tender, about 20 minutes to a half-hour. 2) Roughly mash the veg together, and mix in the eggs, cheese, and herbs, salt and pepper. Add broccoli and mix well. 3) Butter an ovenproof dish and line it with the cabbage leaves, reserving one for the "lid". Fill with the vegetable mix, spread chutney over the top and close it with the cabbage leaf lid. Lay the bacon strips over the top and bake at 180°C for 25-30 minutes. This came out very tasty. Next time I would put the bacon on before the cabbage leaf lid though so that it can cook and melt into the veg rather than just larding the top. I might add a bit of a zingier flavour to it too, but not necessarily. It was very sweet and could have done with a dash of acid of some kind but was very tasty and filling as is. Certainly an idea worth working on though!

The bacon could be skipped for a vegetarian version of this.

Now, I know this is a weird one. It is as odd an idea as it sounds, but hear me out. They actually worked quite well. Done the first way, no one could tell they were turnippy. They were moist, tender spice cookies. Here's how I arrived at these. I've been cooking with Little Bit since he was tiny. He has a toy kitchen of his own, and he frequently "cooks" for us and has us try his meals. Sometimes they are things he has seen us make, sometimes not so much (like strawberry and banana soup). I want to encourage his creativity and interest in cooking, so I like to try out his ideas. Sometimes they are a direct request to cook together, like "Mama, we can make pear sorbet", sometimes just an idea in play, like "Mama, smell my turnip cookies". Either way though, I try to honour them and make his ideas a reality, and show him that they are viable. So hence the idea of turnip cookies, from my 3-year-old asking me to smell his turnip cookies. I don't know if he really registered that it was an unusual idea, or when a few weeks later, we bought a turnip and made the cookies, I don't know if he made the connection between the two. Cooking to my 3-year-old's imagination is an interesting challenge though, which I enjoy taking up. I spent a couple of weeks turning the idea over in my mind and playing with flavours I could pair with the turnips before settling on these two variants. The first batch, I had wanted to be almond and spice cookies, and so they were, but less almondy than I wanted as I discovered that I was out of almond extract when I went to start baking. I played around with different proportions of different sugars to achieve the flavour I wanted in the first batch, too. The second batch is a heavily adapted spiced molasses cookie from Claire Saffitz's book. As for the turnip itself, I wasn't sure how best to include it. Raw, like grated carrot in a carrot cake? Or precooked somehow? And if precooked, then in what way? I ended up going with the pre-cooked idea, first boiled and mashed, then roasted and blitzed. In terms of just eating the turnip, the roasted one was beautiful, but in terms of the cookies, the boiled ones were more subtle. The roasted ones somehow developed a strong negative turnip flavour from somewhere that wasn't apparent at every bite, but often enough that it bugged me a little. I would therefore steer clear of that method and boil the turnip for both cookie variants. I decided against the raw, grated ones as I wasn't sure how bits of turnip would work, rather than being smoothly incorporated into the cookie dough. Recipe Cook time: approx. 1 hour -- Portions: about 30 cookies -- Difficulty: Easy Almond and Chocolate Spiced Turnip Cookies Ingredients: 1/2 turnip (small) for 1/2 - 3/4 c boiled and mashed turnip 3/4 c butter, soft 3/4 c light brown sugar 1/2 c white sugar 1/4 c dark brown sugar 2 eggs 1 1/4 c ground almonds 2 1/4 c flour 5 cloves, ground (5 is Little Bit's favourite number. Very important!) 1/2 tsp ground ginger 1 tsp cinnamon 1/4 tsp cardamom 1/4 tsp cumin 1 tsp bicarb 1 tsp vinegar syrup (from pickled peaches) OR 1/2 tsp molasses and 1/2 tsp vinegar 100 g dark chocolate chips 1) Boil the turnip until fork-soft and mash. Cool. 2) Cream the butter and sugars together in a bowl. Beat in eggs, then the turnip. 3) Mix in the dry ingredients and combine well. Add vinegar and chocolate chips. 4) Place teaspoonfuls of cookie dough on a lined cookie sheet and bake 8-10 minutes at 180°C. Molasses Turnip Cookies Ingredients: 1/2 turnip 2 tbsp butter 3/4 c butter, melted 1 1/2 c dark brown sugar 2 eggs 1/4 c molasses 1/4 c liquid honey 1/4 c milk 3 3/4 c flour 1 tbsp baking soda 2 1/2 tsp ground ginger 1/2 tsp finely ground black pepper 1/2 tsp allspice 1/4 tsp cloves 1/2 c oats 2 tsp apple cider vinegar (Or homemade rosehip vinegar) 1) Cut the turnip into cubes and roast with the butter at 180°C for about 20-30 minutes, until fork-soft. Cool. 2) Cream the cooled, melted butter with the sugar. Beat in the eggs, then the molasses and honey. 3) Blitz the cooled turnip with the milk until smooth and add to the batter. Mix thoroughly. 4) Stir in the dry ingredients, mixing well, then add the vinegar (this is important both for the flavour balance and to activate the baking soda). 5) Roll dough into 1" balls and place on a lined cookie sheet. Bake at 180°C for 10-12 minutes. Both of these cookies turned out very nicely indeed, although, as stated above, I would stick with boiling and mashing the turnip for both recipes, as the roasting brought out some less desirable flavours. On the whole, I wouldn't know which of the two I liked better. Everyone I shared either with (and not just sycophantic family members who have to tell me they're good) said that they enjoyed both cookies. Each time, I waited until after they had been tasted to divulge the tuber secret, just to avoid a placebo or nocebo effect. Overall, odd as turnip cookies sound, I can't work out what it should be any odder an idea than carrot cake, or red velvet for that matter, which was traditionally made with beets. Side note, I've started using a silicone baking sheet mat instead of greasing cookie sheets. I find it works across different types of cookies and therefore doesn't waste the extra butter or shortening. Feel free if you prefer to grease your cookie sheets or to use baking paper instead. Swaps and substitutions: In both recipes, the different proportions of white to brown sugar can be played around with, although be aware that this will affect the texture and flavour of the cookies. Try preparing the turnip different ways - raw, boiled, roasted - and see how it differs. See how the difference between smooth incorporation and pieces (I would recommend small pieces) of turnip affects the flavour profile. As with the sugars, the proportion of honey to molasses can be played around with in the second recipe. It shouldn't affect texture too much, but it will change the flavour balance a little - darker and deeper with more molasses, lighter and more golden with a higher honey proportion. Try adding some almond extract - only 1/2 tsp or so to the first recipe, as I had intended (and plan to do at the first opportunity). As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.

We went up to my parents' for the weekend last week, and neither Hubby nor I managed to remember to bring the bread from the bread box. As a result, when we came back five days later, we had multiple stale loaf ends. What to do with so much stale bread? With leftover tomato sauce from a pizza-making stint, I decided to make a savoury bread pudding of sorts, layering tomato sauce with the bread. Little Bit was calling this "bread pizza", which I am not sure about, either as a name or as an accurate descriptor, but it came out tasty either way. The tomato sauce can be plain, with or without meat. Ours had mushrooms in too, and some cream as it was a little too spicy for Little One. Ingredients: 6-9 slices of stale bread (depending on their size and the size of your dish) 1/2 c white cooking wine 4 ish cups tomato sauce 1 c cheese, grated (I used aged Gruyère) 1 sweet potato, sliced 1 onion, sliced 1 tbsp butter 1) Butter a shallow baking dish. Place the bread slices inside in as near as you can get to a single layer. Douse in white wine and toast int he oven at 180°C for about 20 minutes, until the bread is winey inside and beginning to toast outside. 2) Remove from the oven and place the bread on a plate. Spoon one third of the tomato sauce into the baking dish. Spread it out evenly and place half the bread slices over it in a single layer. Spoon over another third of the sauce, sprinkle on the onions and the sweet potato slices, and sprinkle over half the cheese. Add another layer of bread, the rest of the sauce and then the last of the cheese. 3) Bake at 175°C for about 45 minutes to an hour. Serve hot. This came out very tasty, but due to a slight miscommunication between Hubby and I, the temperature was turned down a bit early so the sweet potato and the onions came out a little under done. Maintaining the right temperature for a bit longer should do it though. The sweet potato and onion could be left out. It was definitely better on the first night than reheated, but it still worked reheated a day or two later. And there you have it. Pizza Bread.

In the new cookbook I got for Christmas, Salt Fat Acid Heat by Samin Nosrat, there is a double page of 10 vegetable soup recommendations with topping suggestions, but no recipes (or I'm simply blind and missed them). One of the suggestions was Aubergine Soup with Harissa. As Aubergines were on sale and we seemed to have an endless supply of them, and because it sounded good, I decided to try it. Somewhere along the way I wasn't sure I would be able to get what I needed for the Harissa though and noticed that I had a jar of frozen nettles, so I thought of trying to make a spicy nettle sauce to top the soup. I did end up finding what I needed for the Harissa in the end, but still added the nettles. And then I remembered that I had Queso Blanco left over from my cheese making efforts. I decided I would top the soup with some of this too, and at the last minute added some of this to the harissa too - although at this point I don't think it can any longer be called harissa, but I don't know what else to call it. The soup came out beautifully with a deep, rich flavour, offset but a dash of lemon and the not-too-spicy Nettle Harissa. I found that the queso blanco certainly added something to the soup, but it would have worked well without for anyone wanting to make it vegan or keto friendly. Ingredients: For the soup: 4 aubergines 1 tbsp olive oil 1 onion, chopped 1/2 head garlic, minced 2 - 3 c vegetable stock 1 tsp sumac Juice of 1 lemon Salt and pepper to taste Queso Blanco (or other fresh cheese) to serve For the Harissa: 3 cloves garlic, roughly chopped 3 dried chilis, chopped 3 - 4 sundried tomatoes 2 tsp cumin seeds 2 tsp coriander seeds 3 - 4 tbsp olive oil 3 - 4 tbsp nettles (mine were briefly steamed then frozen) 1 tbsp queso blanco juice of 1 lemon 1) Roast the aubergines in the oven under the broil setting at 200°C, turning regularly, until they are soft on the inside and browning on the outside (you could even let them get some char marks) - about 45 minutes to an hour. Cool and then chop. 2) Heat oil in a heavy bottomed soup pot. Sauté onions and garlic until soft and translucent. 3) Add the aubergine and the remaining soup ingredients except the cheese and cook for about 10 minutes. Blitz until smooth and set aside. 4) In a small frying pan, dry roast the cumin and coriander seeds until the first few begin to pop. Stir the pan around a few times to ensure even roasting. Remove from the heat. 5) In a blender, combine all the ingredients except the nettles and the queso blanco. Taste test, then add the nettles and blend again. Taste test, then add the cheese. 6) To serve, ladle soup into bowls. place dollops of the queso blanco around the perimeter of the soup then place briefly in a warm oven (100°C roughly) for a few minutes to encourage the cheese to melt a little. Remove and place a dollop of the harissa in the centre of the bowl. I loved this and will certainly be coming back to it! Hubby and Little Bit liked it too. Little Bit is getting better at using a spoon, but after a few spoonfuls he gave up and started stuffing soup into his mouth by the fistful. Not a bad endorsement! On a different note, I noticed recently that all of my cooking happens either while wrangling Little Bit, or while listening to and Audiobook. When linking the Broccoli and Cheese Scone recipe to the post about making mascarpone to pair with sweet scones, I suddenly had a vivid image in my head of a sedan chair being carried through rice paddies. It took me a second to place it, but then I realised that it was from WS Maugham's The Painted Veil which I had been listening to when I made the scones. After realising this, I scrolled back through older posts and for a fair number of the recipes I could effortlessly conjure up which part of which book I was listening to while making that recipe. This being the case, I have decided to start including a note on what I was listening to at the time on some posts. While making this soup, I was listening to an early part of The Bridge of Sighs by Olen Steinhauer. It is a gritty muder/spy mystery taking place in the late '40s in Eastern Europe. While playing around with my nettles and aubergines, our young beleaguered inspector is following clues in a prominent murder case which he realises he has been given to fail... It's been a while since my last crime book and I thoroughly enjoyed it!

Day 37 of The Challenge (I lied. We cooked tonight rather than eating leftovers before leaving on our trip). We roasted the last of our Georgia candy roaster pumpkin this evening, and had 250g of chanterelles left. It was either pumpkin pasta with a mushroom sauce or risotto. We opted for the risotto, and the pumpkin pasta will have to wait (although not to long. I do so love it and it had been a little while since I pulled out my pasta maker). This was creamy and filling (and orange) and very tasty. Ingredients: 250 g of Arborio rice 1 1/2 c roasted pumpkin in chunks 3 onions, chopped 1/2 head of garlic, peeled and chopped 250 g of chanterelles 3 tbsp olive oil 1 c of milk 1 1/2 - 2 c of water, broth or reserved mushroom water (like from prepping a chanterelle tart) 1 1/2 tsp sumac 1 tbsp lime juice 2 tsp thyme 1 tsp sage 1 tsp urfa biber (Turkish black chilli pepper) salt and pepper to taste Parmesan for sprinkling 1) Heat 1 tbsp of olive oil in a frying pan and sauté onions. When they go translucent and then begin to char a little on the bottom, add in the garlic and then keep them moving. 2) Heat the rest of the olive oil in a saucepan and add the rice. Stir until translucent then add the water/mushroom water/broth. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the liquid is absorbed. Add milk and stir. 3) Once garlic is soft, add the chanterelles, the thyme and the sage and lower the heat. Cook gently, allowing the mushrooms to give off their liquid. 4) As the rice cooks and absorbs the liquid, add the pumpkin and stir. Add sumac, and once the milk is absorbed, add lime juice and urfa biber. 5) When the rice has thickened and cooked, add the mushrooms and onions to the rice and mix. Salt and pepper to taste. Sprinkle desired parmesan over the top. Super tasty. I love making risotto and find them relatively quick and easy once you figure them out. They are endlessly adaptable too. The flavours played off each other beautifully in this tonight. It would have worked with bacon, but I wouldn't go so far as to say that it lost out by not having any.

I started making my own apple pectin last year, and have used it a couple of times for jellies (like my Lemon and Ginger Chilli Jelly). Apple pectin is entirely naturally occurring in apples, and in the presence of sugar, it helps gel things. I wondered if it would be possible to use pectin instead of gelatine in other things, like Panna Cotta. I do like panna cotta and like playing around with flavours for it occasionally (like my lemon-topped one, or my savoury lemongrass and coconut one!). I was a little worried that the pectin would both flavour and colour the panna cotta as it is a pink colour. As for the flavour, I decided to run with it and pair it with applesauce. The idea has been bouncing around for a little while and I finally decided to try it. Recipe Cook time: 20-30 minutes + chill time 4 hours to overnight -- Portions: 4 -- Difficulty: Easy Ingredients: 2c cream 2 c apple pectin 3 tbsp brown sugar 1 c apple sauce 1 1/2 tsp cinnamon 1/2 tsp allspice 1) Pour cream and pectin into a saucepan and heat slowly. Stir in sugar. Bring to a slow simmer and cook for about 15 minutes. 2) Mix the cinnamon and allspice into the applesauce and spoon it into the bottom of 4 or 5 glasses. Gently pour the cream mixture over the top of the apple sauce and chill overnight in the fridge. This worked. Ish. Better than I had feared but not as well as I had hoped. I initially started with 1 c pectin, but while the cream did thicken, it didn't gel. I poured it all (apple sauce included as I couldn't seem to get just the cream) back into a saucepan, and added the third tablespoon of sugar and another cup of pectin. I cooked it again and chilled it again. This time it worked! The cream was the right consistency for panna cotta, and absolutely delicious, with little bits of apple and lots of spice caught in it. The only problem was that the cream was a solid layer on top of a layer of juice. I don't know if it was from the apple sauce or from the pectin, or a little of each, but as soon as we started eating the panna cotta, the juice seeped up and mixed with the cream, and it was all a liquidy mess. Next time, I think I need to reduce both the apple sauce and the pectin a bit further to prevent that. It was still tasty though! So very tasty! Science experiment successful though. Pectin works to gel things other than jellies, as a replacement for gelatine. With some caveats! The other issue with using homemade pectin, scientifically speaking, is that it is not going to be a uniform strength. What took 2 cups of pectin this time might take 1 1/2 or 3 next time, there is no real way to know... I guess I will just have to play that one by ear. Luckily, that is how most of my cooking happens, so I'm ok with that. Also, it didn't turn pink, but was a little coloured by the spices. I will have to try this one again, with reduced ingredients, to see how it goes then. Served in little glasses, I think this could work quite nicely as a party food!

This could easily be made with vegetable stock, making this vegetarian, and for a fancier look, it could

As mentioned in Day 17 of The Challenge This is one of our own creation. Born of leftover Mulligatawny soup and a love (read obsession) for soufflés which developed during our time in South Africa, this is a big favourite in our house and not done nearly as often as I would like! Light and fluffy, the mulligatawny flavours are attenuated but present. We tend to serve it on a bed of spiralised and sautéed veg, usually carrots and courgettes. This lends the meal a freshness, while also bulking it out (soufflés are basically very tasty air...). Ingredients: For the soufflé: 3/4 c mulligatawny soup (see recipe here) 2 tsp butter for the roux, 1 tbsp for the dish 2 tsp flour 3 egg yolks 8 egg whites 2 tsp cumin seeds 1 tsp garam masala 1 tsp cinnamon 1 tsp fenugreek seeds fried in 1 tsp butter Parmesan, grated, for the top - approx. 1/4 c. For the veggie beds: 3 courgettes, spiralised 2 carrots, spiralised 2 onions, spiralised 1 tbsp peanut oil 1 tsp white sesame seeds 1 tsp black sesame seeds 2 tbsp soy sauce 1 tbsp rice wine vinegar 1 tsp cooking sake 1/2 tbsp pomegranate molasses 1) Make a roux by melting the butter in a saucepan and mixing in the flour. Add the mulligatawny soup, then beat in the egg yolks. 2) Beat the egg white to form stiff peaks. Mix one third of these into the mulligatawny roux, then carefully fold in the rest of the whites. 3) Butter a soufflé dish thoroughly, then mix together the spices. Coat the inside of the buttered dish with the spices. 4) Pour the soufflé batter into the prepared pan. Sprinkle parmesan over the top. 5) Place this in an oven-proof dish filled with hot water (about half as high as the soufflé dish), and place the whole thing in the oven at 200°C for 35-40 minutes (if using a big dish. With individual dishes, 8-10 minutes only!) 6) Meanwhile, heat the oil in a large pan over medium high heat. sauté the onion for a minute then add the carrot, sauté a couple more minutes then add the courgette. 7) Add sesame seeds, soy sauce, vinegar and sake to the pan and toss. Don't add too much as you don't want these to be soupy. Also, don't over cook them. A little bite is good. 8) Dish, and drizzle a little pomegranate molasses over the top. Remove the soufflé from the oven and spoon immediately over the veggie beds before it collapses. I personally love this. I wasn't sure how it would go when I first went off script with soufflés, and then when I went even further off by using soup for a base instead of a batter, but things turned out rather well. I encourage anyone to try their hand at soufflés! Be creative with them! Let me know if you have any suggestions, anything you want me to try, and then share the results from, or anything you tried and want to share.