A Big Brunch, Potato Cakes with Smoked Salmon and Poached Eggs, Crispy Mushrooms and Roasted Tomatoes

My longest blog title ever.

In order to give you all a break from Thailand posts (I am nearly done I promise) and because we have a long weekend coming up I thought I would share some ideas for a big brunch.

I made this for my Husband and Mum on mother’s day and both dishes are easy and can be prepped in advance.

So quantities here are rough, I made double the potato mixture and ate them again the next day.

Potato Pancakes
You need for 2
2 medium potatoes
50-100 ml semi skimmed milk (add as little as this or more if you need it)
glug of olive oil
4 spring onions, chopped
seat salt and cracked black pepper

1. Boil your potatoes, I like to leave the skin on, until they are cooked through then mash with the olive oil and get them as smooth as you can. Warm your milk and add little by little mashing more as you go, this will give you even smoother mash (despite having skins in there), finally season and add the spring onions.

At this point I popped the mash in the fridge until the morning of the brunch, where I then shaped into little pancake shapes ready to fry.

2. Heat your frying pan with a little olive oil and fry for 3-4 minutes each side.

Done… easy!

I served these with some smoked salmon and poached eggs… I know I have talked about this before but these are Burford Brown eggs and they really are amazing.

One of my egg yolks actually separated from the white, but it still came out running and didn’t break. This so wouldn’t happen with normal eggs.

I served them with some Portobello mushrooms and tomatoes which I roasted in the oven for 25 minutes.

To make the mushrooms a little special I just sprinkles some herbed breadcrumbs on top. I mixed some dried oregano and basil in with the crumbs. Again simple, simple but something different to make the brunch feel special. 

Phuket Cookery School – Stir Fried Chicken with Cashews

One of the great things about this cookery school is the set up, this is where the chef’s did their demonstrations before we tried ourselves, the mirror above meant we could see everything they did. Very handy.

This dish is called Kai Pad Med Ma Muang and is another classic dish you can get almost anywhere in Thailand.

You need, for 2 people;
30g cornflour
30ml light soy sauce
pinch ground white pepper
150g chicken breast, thinly sliced
30ml vegetable oil, and enough to deep fry the vegetables
2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
60g sliced onions
60g straw mushrooms, cut in half
30g sliced carrot
30g water chesnuts, cut in half
60g cashew nuts, deep-fried or roasted (do in advance)
15 ml oyster sauce
15ml light soy sauce
5ml seasoning sauce
5ml chilli oil
5g palm sugar
40g spring onions, cut into 1 inch lengths
10 small dried red chillies, deep-fried or roasted for garnish
5g coriander leaves, coarsely chopped for garnish

1. Whisk the cornflour, light soy sauce and pepper and then add the chicken and stir until coated. Heat your oil in a wok and fry the chicken turning occasionally for about 3-5 minutes until tender. Then place them aside on a paper towel until you are ready for them.

2. Heat the oil in the wok and fry the garlic until it begins to brown then add the vegetables and nuts and fry until they are cooked but firm to the bite, roughly 1-2 minutes, then add the chicken and season with the oyster sauce, soy sauce, sugar and chilli oil to taste and stir until well mixed. Sprinkle in the spring onion, cook for a further 30 seconds then remove from the heat.

Serve with the chopped coriander and chillies and plain steamed rice.

Again this is such a simple dish once you have all your ingredients ready, and your cupboards stocked up with the seasonings. So worth doing if you want to eat Thai food more often.

Phuket Cookery School – Spicy Seafood Salad

Our next dish was a classic spicy Thai salad with noodles and seafood – called Yam Woon Sen.

We also had another tutorial about presentation and learnt how to make a rose from a tomato.

Here is our teacher with her perfect rose.

My very small rose. (I kept messing up)

You need for 2 people;
1 tbsp pickled garlic syrup
3-5 bird’s eye chillies (depending on how hot you want it, I used 3 and had very tingly lips)
3 tbsp lime juice
2 tbsp fish sauce
2 tbsp sugar syrup
1 tsp coriander root, washed and finely chopped
2 tbsp dried shrimp
30g chinese celery, coarsely chopped
1 spring onion cut into 1 inch lengths
2 red shallots, (shallots or red onion will work) finely sliced
100g vermicelli noodles, soaked, drained and cut into shorter lengths
150g prawns, peels, deveined and blanched
50g minced chicken, blanched
60g squid, washed and blanched
5g pickled garlic, sliced

1. Put the noodles in boiling water and cook until soft, 1 minute will do it, drain and put into a bowl of cold water to prevent sticking.

2. Mix the prawns, chicken (or pork) and squid with coriander root, pickled garlic, syrup, chillies, lime juice, fish sauce and sugar in a mixing bowl and toss until well mixed.

3. Add dried shrimps, chinese celery, shallots and spring onion and combine.

Serve immediately.

Such a simple dish, and so tasty.

With a lovely view.

Kale, Bacon and Butternut Squash One Pot Wonder

Monday again… how did that happen?

A quick post today as I am in for a busy day, this is something I made last week for a quick healthy dinner with the aim to use up a big bag a kale we had.

You need:
1 small-medium butternut squash or large sweet potato, cut into bite size chunks
1 bag of kale (200g ish)
1 pack of thick cute smoked bacon, chopped
a few sprigs of rosemary (leave in tact) and thyme (leaves stripped) and a couple of sage leaves
3 large shallots, peeled and cut into quarters
250ml vegetable stock
some tasty bread to serve

1. First heat up some olive oil in a large saucepan, then add the bacon and fry until cooked through. Then add the squash and shallots and your herbs and fry until the edges are nicely brown.

2. Add the stock and cover, leaving to simmer for 15 minutes or until the squash is cooked through.

3. Finally remove the rosemary and then add the kale and stir through, cover again and leave for 2 minutes.

Serve with some bread and butter.

Having eaten this between three people I think it can be seen as more of a side dish but it is a great healthy and tasty meal, if not massively filling.

Original recipe here

Pan-fried Salmon and Avocado Salsa

A little easy recipe for you to try, this might be a few favourite dinner. I can see myself making various versions of this over the next few weeks. I can get obsessed.

It’s something inspired by a photo tweeted by Monica Shaw of her sweet potato and avocado salsa. I loved how colourful it looked so set out to make my own.

You need:
1 large avocado
2 tomatoes
1/4 cucumber
1 large red onion
juice from 2 limes
sea salt and black pepper
1 bunch coriander

Chop it all up and mix together! Delicious, I was eating this from the bowl before it even hit dinner time.

To go with it I just seared some salmon fillets in a pan with some olive oil on both sides for about 5 minutes turning once so the skin got crispy and the top looked nice and brown.

I then finished them off in the oven for another 7-8 minutes.

I also roasted some sweet potato chunks with olive oil and salt and pepper for about 40 minutes.

Another ridiculously simple dinner that is also super healthy. I even have some salsa and sweet potato for my lunch today I might add some smoked mackerel and already that’s one variation that requires no cooking.