Autumn Soup

As I mentioned in past posts. we seem to have dived straight from summer to winter. The leaves fell from the trees over a single weekend in one great whoosh, the weather went from balmy to miserable almost overnight, and the evenings went from 'light at 8pm' to 'pitch black at 5pm' almost as soon as the clocks went back.

So to convince myself that all is well with the world, I have created an autumn soup as a nostalgic look back to those years when the third season of the year meant leaves were red, evenings were dusky but warm, and people's outerwear was interesting.

Why 'autumn soup'?, Well, the ingredients say something about about summer - the fresh green peas, the spring onions and broccoli - and some say something about winter - the smoked cured sausage and the barley. As anyone knows; summer + winter = autumn. It's simple maths really.

Just down the road from where we live, the Marylebone farmers' market have fantastic fruit, veg, bread artisan foods and meat stalls every Sunday morning. That's where I bought most of the ingredients for this soup. As Xmas looms, I will be there buying even more wintery veg for my winter soups - Jerusalem artichoke and celeriac spring to mind. Delish. Can't wait.

Cost-wise, this soup comes in at a very reasonable £1.50 per huge serving. Not that you need a particularly huge reason at this time of year to stay in and cook.

Serves 2

INGREDIENTS:

1 onion, peeled and finely chopped
1 tbsp olive oil
1 head of broccoli, cut into very small florets
150g smoked cured sausage, cut into thin slices
50g pearl barley
1 litre chicken stock
100g peas
3 spring onions, finely chopped
Salt and black pepper

In a large saucepan/crock pot over a medium heat, sweat the onion until soft, and add the broccoli, the sausage and barley - then turn everything in the oil until well coated. Add the stock and simmer for an hour until the barley has swelled up. Add the peas and cook for a minute. Serve with the spring onion as a last minute garnish. Season to taste.

Miso Soup

WARNING! THIS RECIPE IS NONSENSE.

I love eating at sushi restaurants but I'm getting sick and tired of the big con. Years ago sushi in the UK would be expensive because non-one really ate it; therefore only a few restaurants did it, and because they couldn't guarantee selling everything they bought they would factor in a huge wastage amount into the dish prices.

These days, however, sushi is pretty much a British signature cuisine. There's a sushi place every 50 yards in London and every 100 yards everywhere else. I'm not counting supermarket sushi or Pret a Manger ('no raw fish!' they proclaim, proudly for some reason), but I am including Yo Sushi, Wasabi and You&Me. The thing they all have in common is that the salmon and tuna is pretty much as exotic as it gets in these High Street places. And THAT is the big con. Order in any normal restaurant a tuna nicoise salad or a salmon fishcake and it'll cost you £8 maximum. Go to a sushi restaurant, however, and half that sized portion of fish is £20. AND THEY DON'T EVEN COOK IT!

Me, on the other hand, a veteran of a few Far Eastern trips, prefer eating the more obscure gungy stuff. I love sea urchin, any number of fish roes, raw molluscs and raw octopus. The weirder and more repugnant, the better (I'm not truly happy until I shudder at the very thought of putting the food in my mouth). But whatever I eat and wherever I eat it, I always need a miso soup to accompany it. It's very comforting.

For years, I was afraid of miso. When stirred in a soup, it clouds up. After settling for a minute, it looks like a living breathing amoebic organism. It is, regardless of its questionable looks, delicious and packed full of that mythical sixth taste, umami.

What I didn't know, was that it doesn't need cooking. You just stir and dissolve some of the fermented soya paste into some boiling water and add some cheap garnishes. In a way, a miso soup is closer to a Nescafe beverage than real food. It lasts forever (it's already fermented, FFS) and so there is no wastage. So why the f**k are the restaurants charging more than a pound a bowl? Some of the more 'upmarket' places charge a fiver! Since I discovered the secret, I refuse to eat it anywhere that charges more than a pound. Lie: I mean 75p.

One other thing to add, is that miso paste is not only completely delicious, but probably quite versatile too. It's hard to keep my fingers out of the jar. Over the course of the next few days, I'm going to experiment with it and see whether I can make some soup dumplings with it, maybe a salad dressing, maybe a dip. Whatever it is, will taste bloody brilliant.

At £4 for a big jar, a single serving comes in at 40 pence, including the garnishes.

It may be cheap, and not much of a recipe, but this soup is absolutely delightful. Buy some white miso paste flavoured with dashi (a type of dried fish flake, called bonito) and you won't look back.

Serves 1

INGREDIENTS:

1 tablespoon of white miso paste, flavoured with dashi (or without dashi, if you're a veggie)
400ml boiling water
50g block tofu, diced
1 spring (salad) onion, chopped
1 small piece wakame (seaweed), optional

Dissolve the miso in the boiling water and add the garnishes. Not very difficult, eh?

Malaysian Curry Laksa Soup

Can you see from today's recipe photo that it is slightly out of focus on the right side? That's because I was in such a hurry to eat this laksa that I was already pulling the bowl nearer to myself before the picture had a chance to fully expose. What a greedy guts.

You can't blame me though. Every now and again I cook something so unbelievably incredible, that I go a little bit crazy. Laksa is not really 'cooking' in the narrowest sense of the word. It's really an assembly job, and the key is to assemble as many ingredients as you possibly can. More is definitely more, so to speak.

Mrs Ribeye and I ate a delicious laksa at Makan Cafe on the Portobello Road, which was delicious and came with lovely king prawns, and so I resolved to make my own at the first opportunity. Mine however, comes with king prawns, chicken, tofu puffs, and fresh chillies.  I'm sure that mine is not as 'Malaysian street food authentic' as a laksa is supposed to be, but I certainly didn't see anyone complaining when I served it as part of my Asian-inspired dinner party last week.

I served my Asian Salad as a starter, which was vividly bright and refreshing, followed by this rich, creamy, spicy soup. A fabulous combination of flavours and textures.

Sorry to be banging on so much about this soup. Although I'm no stranger to a bit of shameless self promotion, I really feel like this recipe could become my signature dish, so I'm allowing myself a little bit of extra backslapping.

As far as Laksa paste is concerned: Yes you could make it yourself with your blender or pestle and mortar or authentic bamboo and rock plate equipment, but I wouldn't. Go to your local Asian grocer, who specialises in ready-made authentic pastes. It's not a bit lazy or shameful - even in the Far East, pastes are sold in every market and grocery store. Although making a Thai green curry paste is better from scratch, because the ingredients are that much fresher, laksa paste is better shop-bought for some reason. Maybe it's because the main ingredients are dried or woody, rooty things, rather than fragile herbs. Who knows? Anyway, a Malaysian company called Dollee make the best one by a long way - it comes in a foil pouch.

Oh, and one last thing: Don't bother making your own tofu puffs either. When buying your laksa paste, you will find a big clear polythene bag of fried tofu puffs in the chiller section. They are utterly sublime (and if I'm honest, the best thing to scoff straight from the fridge after a heavy night out. The other night I ate ten. Oops.).

Depending on what you put in your laksa, the cost will obviously vary. Today's recipe comes in at £3 per serving, but you could be more austere and leave out the prawns, or more luxurious for special occasions and put in some crab or lobster. It's completely up to you.

Serves 4

INGREDIENTS:

1 x 200g foil pouch of Dollee (or other brand) curry laksa paste
1 x 400g tin of coconut milk
1.5 litres water
4 chicken thighs, skinned and boned and cut into 2cm dice
200g rice noodles, soaked until tender
200g beansprouts
200g cooked king prawns
8 tofu puffs, halved
2 red chillies, cut into fine rings
Fresh coriander leaves
Fresh root ginger, peeled and cut into fine matchsticks

In a large pot, heat the laksa paste, coconut milk and water until it is simmering. Add the chicken pieces and cook until tender (20 minutes approx). In large bowls, place portions of rice noodles and beansprouts. Pour the soup over and pile the chicken pieces on top of the noodles. Add the king prawns to the pile of chicken and place tofu puff pieces around the edge of the bowl. Garnish with the chillies, coriander leaves and fresh ginger.

100% Authentic Chinese Pork and Vegetables in Broth with Egg Noodles

Chinese food in the U.K. is not like Chinese food in China.

Don't get me wrong, I love English-Chinese food like they serve in Wong Kei in Soho, but for the real McCoy, you've got to either go to China for a meal, or for the next best thing, go round to my mate Ying's place for dinner. There's no nuclear-orange chicken dishes or crispy duck. There's proper rich-tasting authentic grub from a recipe originating from his village somewhere in the People's Republic. I absolutely loved it, and couldn't wait to interrogate him for the exact formula.

To my surprise, the formula is dead simple: Apart from the usual onion/garlic/ginger flavour base as in most Chinese dishes, the only specialist ingredients were Xiaoxing rice wine and Szechuan peppercorns. There was a bit of soy sauce thrown in here and there, but soy is hardly a specialist ingredient these days, is it?

Xiaoxing rice wine is a bit like dry sherry in taste and body, but a world away from dry sherry in terms of Chinese authenticity. My mum, Mrs Ribeye Sr, bought me a Ken Hom Chinese cookbook for an anniversary present (3 years married - eek!) recently, and Xiaoxing rice wine features in about 75% of the recipes. Luckily I happened to have bought a bottle in London's Chinatown recently.

As for Szechuan peppercorns, they are not really pepper - they are a berry of a citrus plant, and ludicrously sour they are too. Nothing else will do. I accidentally crunched down onto one at Ying's place and my mouth went numb for about half an hour - no joke. Trying to be cool, I sat there quietly, hoping the effect would wear off quickly, but to no avail. It's not an unpleasant feeling actually, just a bit weird.

One of the dishes Ying made, was a simple stir-fry of bacon and cucumber. With the addition of the rice wine and peppercorns, it turned a couple of work-a-day ingredients into an exotic feast. If you want to try making it, just add bacon strips and thinly sliced cucumber to a wok with some oil, Xiaoxing rice wine and Szechuan peppercorns, and stir-fry very briefly without colouring the bacon at all. It's utterly delicious.

Anyway, back to today's recipe. You have got to try this authentic soup, it makes any other Chinese soup seem a bit... English.

I added pork belly and a few spare ribs to my broth, but you could add chicken, beef, or just vegetables. Noodle-wise, I added egg noodles because I happened to have some to hand, but you could use rice noodles or even vermicelli. Once you have the stock recipe sorted, it doesn't really matter what you put in, as long as it doesn't mess with the flavours too much.

Cost-wise, it's so reasonable. £2 per serving is all.

Serves 4

INGREDIENTS:

For the soup stock:

2 litres vegetable or chicken stock
1 thumb of ginger, whole
3 garlic cloves, whole
1 onion, halved
1 star anise
3 Szechuan peppercorns
75ml Xiaoxing rice wine
25ml soy sauce

The rest of the ingredients:

6-7 short pork spare ribs (300g approx)
3 small pieces of pork belly (300g approx)
400g egg noodles
400g mixed vegetables (I used baby corn, mange tout, tenderstem broccoli, fine beans)
Handful of spring (salad) onions, finely chopped, to serve

Boil the stock ingredients together, with the spare ribs and pork belly, on a simmer for 2 hours. In a separate saucepan, cook the vegetables and noodles until just tender. Remove the pork belly pieces from the stock and cut into bite-sized pieces. Strain the stock to remove the flavouring ingredients. Place some of the spare ribs, pork belly pieces, cooked vegetables and noodles into serving bowls and pour over the stock. Sprinkle with chopped spring onions and serve immediately.

Thai Coconut and Coriander Soup with Courgettes and Mussels

Over the weekend, I made a joint birthday lunch at my sister Roxanne's house for her and our mum, Mrs Ribeye Sr; and the rest of our family were in attendance to shower them with gifts and love. It was a fantastic day.

Because it was a lunch do, and my stepfather Stefano was taking my mum out for a birthday dinner in the evening, I decided to cook a fairly light fish-centric meal, consisting of this soup as a starter, followed by my Pan-Fried Salmon in a Mushroom Cream Sauce (recipe to follow soon click on the link!) as a main course. 

The 'eating light' plan got buggered-up though when Roxanne presented a chocolate birthday cake, jam doughnuts and assorted sweets to the table as dessert. As a token gesture, she also brought to the table a large platter of assorted fresh berries and grapes - it was barely given the time of day.

Neither my stepfather, nor my eight year old nephew Rocky can stand too much spice, so I decided to adapt a Thai green curry recipe, but take out the curry part, or at least the chilli, to make this soup. The result was amazing. A fragrant coconut broth which can be used as a soup base for almost any garnish ingredient. I chose cooked and shelled mussel meats, which are delicious and cheap to buy, together with courgettes, which add a welcome vegetable-y accompaniment to the shellfish.

Of course, Roxanne and I piled on the chillies ourselves after the soup was served. The Ribeye family are total chilli-heads - and I'm sure Rocky will follow suit once he is a year or two older.

You could make this soup with chunks of chicken, king prawns, or even butternut squash, instead of the mussels/courgettes if you fancy; but you must try this combination. It really went down a treat. 

Cooked mussel meats to buy from the local supermarket are about £1 per three generous servings, for a starter. Using these ingredients, I managed to keep the cost down to a very reasonable £1.25 per serving. Even if you used lobster meat instead of mussels, I reckon you'd still be under your Potless budget.

Serves 4

INGREDIENTS:

1 portion of Thai Green Curry Paste - but omit the chillies, if you like

2 tablespoons of olive or sunflower oil

1.5 litres of chicken stock

1 x 400g tin of coconut milk

2 large courgettes, cut into 1cm dice

300g cooked and shelled mussel meats

Pinches of salt and pepper

Fresh basil, to serve

Fresh chillies, finely cut into rings, to serve

Fry the Thai paste with half of the oil until fragrant, and add the chicken stock. Simmer for 20 minutes and add the coconut milk, and simmer again for a further 20 minutes. Sieve the soup to remove the paste ingredients and return to the hob. In the meantime, fry the courgettes in the remaining half of the oil, until soft and translucent, and add them to the soup with the mussels. Season to taste. Heat the soup through for a further 5 minutes to warm up the mussels without overcooking them, and serve with the basil leaves and fresh chilli rings as a garnish.

Mrs Ribeye Sr.'s Completely Inauthentic, but Totally Delicious, Gazpacho

I'm all for authenticity, unless it makes no sense to me.

Having tried as hard as I can to acquire a taste for Thai shrimp paste (you know the stuff - the stinky blueish grainy condiment in jars, sold in all Asian grocers), I have finally admitted defeat. It is truly disgusting. I happened to watch a Rick Stein travel programme, where he explained that in the old days the Thais were grateful for shrimp paste, as it was likely to be the only protein they would get, along with their predominantly rice-based diet.

It got me thinking - why should I acquire a taste for something which has no relevance in today's world of butter mountains and wine lakes, just so that I can pretentiously say I use an 'authentic' ingredient? Why should I continue eating rubbery old Spam, just because it was a Second World War rationing staple? I turned off the TV, walked over to the fridge and bade goodbye forever to the hellish, fetid, outdated shrimp paste. No more airing out the flat for a week, after cooking a Pad Thai noodle or my Thai Spicy Chicken dish - I'll simply leave the whiffy paste out of the recipe.

My mum has no truck with the poncey world of authentic ingredients. She puts olive oil in recipes which traditionally demand butter, just so she can reduce the cholesterol levels in the dish. She puts mixed herbs in her chopped liver, and her gazpacho bears no resemblance to the Spanish peasant's soup that it always was.

Gazpacho was originally a stale bread soup with store cupboard flavourings and a few vegetables chucked into the mix. My mum's contains no bread at all ('why use bread? -we have passata!') and is all the better for it. I'm sure I'll be villified by the Spanish cold tomato soup cognoscenti for this abomination of a recipe, but I don't mind. I say 'try it and see' - isn't the point of cooking to actually enjoy what you are eating, regardless of the recipe's history? 

I am, of course, a complete hypocrite. In other posts, I'm likely to rave on about sticking to traditions and not letting new fads kill off age-old, tried-and-tested classic recipes, but for today, I'm with Mrs Ribeye Sr.

Stick to this delicious fresh, modern gazpacho recipe, until you've got some stale bread left over from the day before and you fancy the old school version instead (which is, admittedly, fabulous).

But whatever positive thing I have to say about those classic recipes, that shrimp paste is definitely staying in the bin.

Even doing my gazpacho this way, instead of with stale bread, this recipe is still peasant-priced(ish). £1.25 per bowlful, is all it'll set you back.

Serves 4

INGREDIENTS:

Gazpacho Base:

1 litre passata

200ml water

1 cucumber, cut into large chunks

1 green pepper, deseeded and cut into large chunks

1 red onion, peeled and cut into large chunks

1 clove of garlic

100ml olive oil

50ml red wine vinegar

Pinches of salt and pepper

Garnishes and Dressings:

1 cucumber, deseeded and cut into 1cm dice

1 green pepper, deseeded and cut into 1cm dice

1 red onion, peeled and finely chopped
2 tomatoes, deseeded and finely chopped
Toasted bread croutons
Olive oil and red wine vinegar in small pouring bottles

Blend the gazpacho base ingredients until smooth, and refrigerate to let the flavours intermingle and develop. Place the garnishes in separate bowls and allow guests to select their own combination of garnishes and dressings themselves.

Hong Kong Street Cafe-Style Spare Rib Noodle Soup

I reluctantly admit, I occasionally have trouble suppressing my sadistic streak.

On a trip to Hong Kong a few years ago, with a not very well-travelled colleague, I noticed his discomfort at eating food in establishments which did not have an English menu. Because I feel that the biggest benefit of international travel is that you can broaden yourself by sampling a life completely different to the one you are used to at home, I felt the need to experience as much of the authentic domestic lifestyle as I could cram into the short week away that we had, regardless of Norman's feelings on the matter.

Unfortunately for Norman, that meant that when it was my choice of an evening meal venue, I would invariably choose a cafe without a single Caucasian patron, eating food that I could barely recognise, and, naturally, completely away from the tourist trail.

Norman would huff and puff, and as the week went on I started to become irritated at his pained expressions as he would plead with me to choose a western-style venue, or at least a local place with a western menu, or at the very least a local place with a menu with Chinese writing, but at least some photographs of the food selection, or at the very very least a McDonald's with an English menu, colourful photographs and smiling counter staff wearing familiar uniforms.

By the last day, I had completely enough of Norman's wimpish, and in my opinion, mildly xenophobic attitude, and I surreptitiously led us well away from the beaten track and chose the mankiest, most repugnant  looking s**thole I could find for us to eat dinner. The menu was non-existent. There were crates of soft drink cans as seats. There was a pale of dirty water containing barely washed chopsticks, waiting to be used by the next diners. The clientele was entirely local, and the chef in the open kitchenette looked surly and unkempt. I inwardly felt mildly reluctant, but I couldn't back down. The place was perfect.

I asked the only person who was standing up, who I assumed correctly to be the waiter, if we could order 'two specials', and then we sat down at the nearest formica-topped low table to wait for whatever 'two specials' constituted.

Norman, whose eyes were darting everywhere and nowhere, was close to tears as two steaming bowls arrived. The joke was on me. The enormous chipped bowls contained the most attractively scented broth packed full of spare ribs, noodles, Chinese cabbage and spring onions. Norman was elated - I was disappointed. I was hoping for some indeterminate offal or a diced sheep's head, or something indescribably nasty, but it wasn't to be. Never mind, dinner was great and Norman had a story to tell the folks back home.

And today's recipe is the dish we ate. For complete authenticity, I suggest you serve this soup, like they did in 'Rat Alley', with some fiery chilli oil to stir into the broth - oh, and ensure your chopsticks have been left in a dungpile for a few weeks before you lightly rinse them off to use them.

As befits a working man's cafe dish, this recipe is a cheapy. £1.25 per generous serving, is the meagre cost.

Serves 4

INGREDIENTS:

500g pork spare ribs
2 litres of chicken stock
Thumb of ginger, unpeeled
1 whole (unpeeled) onion
2 whole (unpeeled) cloves of garlic
1 star anise
1 cinnamon stick
1 dried chilli
1 tablespoon of dark soy sauce
1 tablespoon of toasted sesame oil
Pinches of salt and pepper
300g dried egg noodles
1 head of Chinese cabbage or 2 bok choy, cut into large strips
2 spring (salad) onions, finely chopped, for sprinkling

In a large pan on a moderate heat, place the stock, ginger, onion, garlic and spices and cook, on a simmer, for 2 hours. Strain the stock to remove the flavouring ingredients and add the ribs. Cook ribs until done (1-1.5 hours approx) and then add the noodles until soft (10 minutes approx). Add the Chinese cabbage until al dente (5 minutes approx). Sprinkle the soup with the spring onions and serve immediately.

Courgette Soup with Zuchini Fritti Croutons

Minus 12c in London? Has the world gone mad? There's only one thing for it: Soup.

Courgette soup is pretty much as easy as it gets - just fry up a few big 'uns with an onion, add stock, blend it all together and BOOM: dinner.

If you're not a zuchini fan, substitute them for any vegetable you fancy; but this one is so delicious and easy to make, that you'll be hard-pressed to do better. Also, because courgettes are so substantial, you won't need potatoes or any other thickener to bulk the soup out.

The zuchini fritti croutons are what really turns this soup into a 'Wow' recipe. If you are not making courgette soup, just make regular bread croutons, or make fritti out of whichever vegetable your soup ingredient is. Or just use the zuchini fritti anyway - they go really well with almost any soup.

Three courgettes are £1 in my local supermarket at the moment, so this dish comes in at 75 pence per serving. You could serve this soup with The Easiest Bread in the World, and still come in way under budget.

Serves 4

Courgette Soup

INGREDIENTS:

3 large courgettes, chopped into 1cm rounds
1 onion, coarsely chopped
1 tablespoon of olive oil
1.5 litres of chicken or vegetable stock
Pinches of salt and pepper

Fry the courgettes and onions in the olive oil in a large pan, on a moderate heat, until soft and translucent (20 minutes approx). Add the stock and simmer, uncovered, for 30 minutes. Allow to slightly cool and then blend to a smooth consistency. Season to taste, and serve immediately with a few zuchini fritti croutons.

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Zuchini Fritti Croutons

INGREDIENTS:

1 large courgette, cut into 1cm dice
1 egg, beaten
50g breadcrumbs
Pinches of salt and pepper
Sunflower or vegetable oil for frying

Dip the courgette chunks into the egg and then the breadcrumbs. Deep fry until golden and crunchy (2-3 minutes approx). Season with the salt and pepper.

Cheat's Jewish Chicken, Kneidle, Lockshen and Kreplach Soup

Chicken soup should not just be eaten when you're ill. It is a low fat, quick, delicious meal which can be as substantial as you like - depending on how many accoutrements you decide to add. Here, I have added the classic lockshen (noodles) kneidles (dumplings) and kreplach (wontons/tortellini), but you can add a combination of any of these.

There is a cafe in north-west London which serves this soup exactly as I do here. Not a chicken in sight and as authentic as Jewish chicken soup should be. My mum, Mrs Ribeye Sr, would hate this soup - she thinks chicken soup should actually contain chicken. Whatever you do, don't add fresh carrots - the tinned variety are just perfect for this recipe.

Mrs Ribeye demands this soup on a Sunday night instead of a sandwich -and who am I to deny her? This winter staple comes in at an incredible £1.50 per serving.

You could bump up the cost a bit, and still stay under budget by adding some shredded, cooked chicken. But a chicken soup containing actual chicken would be complete sacrilege, regardless of what my mum says.

Serves 4

INGREDIENTS:

4 tablespoons of Telma chicken soup powder, or 3 regular chicken stock cubes
400g tin of sliced carrots, drained and rinsed
1 litre of water
1 egg
75ml water
100g matzo meal or dried breadcrumbs
100g dried tagliatelli, or other noodles
100g dried beef tortellini
Pinch of black pepper, to serve

Mix the Telma or stock cubes with the litre of water in a large pan and add the carrots. Simmer on a low to moderate heat. Mix the egg, 75ml of water and matzo meal or breadcrumbs in a bowl and leave for 5 minutes to allow the gluten to develop. Roll the paste into golfball sized dumplings and plop them gently into the soup. Add the noodles and tortellini and simmer for 15 minutes. Serve with crusty bread.

Pig's Trotters in Chinese Broth with Noodles

I have never bought and cooked pig's trotters before, but I certainly do love eating them. For my first foray into trotter territory, I have decided to adapt a roast pork (char sui) noodle soup recipe, which I ate in Hong Kong a couple of years ago - to rapturous delight.

Use beef bones and chicken or vegetable stock to make the broth, because I think that using pork bones and pork stock will make the finished dish a bit too... piggy. Besides, a combination of stock flavourings is very authentic to the Hong Kong one-stock-fits-all philosophy, very nicely.

Pig's trotters are a total bargain. £1.70 per kilo, makes this dish a total bargain too, at £1.50 per generous bowlful.

Serves 4

INGREDIENTS:

1kg pigs trotters
4 tablespoons of sunflower oil
2 tablespoons of demerara sugar
2 teaspoons of Chinese five spice powder
3 large beef bones
1 large onion, coarsely chopped
2 thumbs of ginger, coarsely chopped
3 whole garlic cloves
1 star anise
1 cinnamon stick
3 litres chicken or vegetable stock
50ml rice wine or dry sherry
50ml dark soy sauce
Pinch of black pepper
100g dried egg noodles
2 spring (salad) onions finely chopped
Handful fresh coriander, finely chopped

Preheat oven to 160c and spread the trotters with the half of the oil, Chinese five spice powder and sugar. Roast the trotters until dark in colour (2 hours approx). While the trotters are roasting, place the beef bones in a large stock pot with the rest of the oil and cook over a moderate heat until the bones slightly toast (approx 10 minutes). Add the onions, ginger, garlic and soften slightly to release their fragrance (approx 3 minutes). Add the stock, wine or sherry, star anise, pepper and cinnamon stick and boil until the trotters have finished roasting (approx 2 hours), and then strain the stock. Pour the stock back into the pot. Take the trotters out of the oven, and with a cleaver or big knife, cut them each into 4-5 pieces each. Add the trotters and the noodles to the stock and cook until the noodles are soft (approx 5 minutes). Serve the soup with a sprinkling of spring onions and fresh coriander.

Belgian Mussel Chowder

Who doesn't love moules mariniere? This recipe is not just an homage to the great Belgian dish - it's an improvement! By adding just the mussel meats, leaving out the shells and turning the dish into a rich soup, you get all the flavour, less preparation before, less mess and clearing-up afterwards, and for some crazy reason, it's cheaper! What's not to love?

While we're talking about cheaper; cooked mussel meats are around half the price of the netted, shelled ones, at £2 per 375g, which means that this delightful seafood concoction comes in under a fantastic £2 per serving.

For a substantial lunch or light dinner, serve with The Easiest Bread in the World.

Serves 4

INGREDIENTS:

1 large onion, finely chopped
4 celery sticks, finely chopped
4 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
Large knob of butter
1 tablespoon of plain flour
350ml dry white wine
350ml water or vegetable stock
Pinches of salt and pepper
750g cooked mussel meats
150ml double cream or creme fraiche
Handful of parsley, finely chopped

Sweat the  onion, celery, garlic and butter in a large pan on a moderate heat until the vegetables are translucent. Add the flour to the vegetables and cook for 3 minutes, stirring continuously. Add the wine and stock and bubble away the alcohol  (approx 5-10 minutes). Add the mussels and the cream/creme fraiche and gently fold everything together until the mussels are heated through (approx 3 minutes). Take the chowder off the heat and sprinkle over the parsley, allowing it to slightly wilt in the residual heat. Serve immediately.