Avgolemono Soup

Plague has befallen the home of The Littlest Anchovy.
When I say plague, I mean something in the form of a cold/flu/bronchitis hybrid that has lingered for 2 weeks, claiming the spark and liveliness of both myself and the Bearded Gamer. Bottles of cough syrup have replaced olive oil on the kitchen bench and we wander the house in a congested and weepy-eyed daze.

Which brings me to that soup you see up there. That is Avogolemono, a traditional Greek soup made with chicken, stock, eggs, rice, lemons and that is about it. Fabulously beautiful in its simplicity and powerful in its ability to make even the sickest of sick anchovy's feel a whole lot better.

I was worried about how much effort and brain power I might need to make the soup but the most effort that it took was squeezing a lemon and shredding up a chicken. The rest was all about pouring and simmering and slurping. And maybe a little whisking..

It was hard to know which Avgolemono recipe to choose to make "the soup that would cure" and I am sure that in future the method I use will evolve depending on the recipes I might be reading at the time. 

The below recipe is cobbled together from a few but I largely followed this one here because, well, I was too sick to make my stock from scratch and yet I loved the idea of getting more chicken goodness in there from the whole chicken simmering in the ready made stock. Maybe if I were to make this another time (when I am not at Death's door), I would make my stock from scratch. I think I might also like to try using orzo instead of rice to see what that would be like.

I was a little afraid of adding the eggs and watching them curdle before my red bleary eyes but it turned out just fine! All I had to do was whisk the eggs and add the hot broth, one ladle at a time until the eggs were nicely tempered and then add the lot back into the soup to make the creamiest, silkiest chicken soup that may not have cured me on the spot but I like to think played a big part in lifting the great plague of 2011 from The House of Anchovy.

Avgolemono Soup

Adapted from here, here and here

1 small whole free range chicken

2 litres of good chicken stock

1/2 cup of short grain rice - I used carnaroli

2 eggs or 1 per litre

Juice from 1 lemon

Salt and pepper to taste

1. Place the chicken in a large, heavy bottomed pot with the stock and bring to the boil.
2. Cook the chicken for approx 45 minutes, skimming off any fat or scum during the cooking process.
3. Once cooked, remove the chicken and set aside to cool.
4. Add the rice and cook for about 15 minutes. Season with salt and pepper.
5. Remove the skin of the chicken and shred the meat. Add back into the pot with the rice. Turn the heat down low and keep warm.
6. Whisk together the eggs until light in a separate bowl with the lemon juice.
7. Slowly add a ladle of the stock to the eggs and stir through until combined.
8. Ladle the stock into the eggs four times, stiring well each time and then add the egg mix back into the soup. Stir to combine and be very careful not to let the soup boil at all.
9. Ladle some of the shredded chicken and rice into a bowl, top with the soup and garnish with fresh parsley if you have it to hand.
10. Slurp and enjoy.

Blood Orange Panna Cotta

Ever since I made the decision to start a food blog, I knew I had to make something with blood oranges. I have been waiting with bated breath for them to come into season so I could get my little mitts on them.
I love blood oranges, not just for the beautiful ruby veins that run through the flesh, but for their flavour; slightly more tart than your average orange, but with an almost berry like flavour lurking in there. 

I chose to make a Panna Cotta with my haul because, well, I have never made it before and as I have mentioned before, this a place for learning, children...and then eating.
I found this recipe on epicurious. I chose it because of the fact that it calls for Greek yoghurt which would be a perfect foil for the sweet syrup which is spiked with fragrant cardamon. The combination is to die for. 

Not only that, but it is dead easy to make and the only hard part is waiting for the thing to set! Don't reduce the syrup for too long, I only did it for around 10 minutes because it is very sweet and you don't want to overpower the delicate flavour of the panna cotta. 

Enjoy!

Blood Orange Panna Cotta 

adapted from this recipe at epicurious

Serves 3 large portions (pictured) or 6 small

2 1/3 Cups of freshly squeezed blood orange juice.

• 1 3/4 tsp powdered gelatine
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 7 teaspoons finely grated blood orange zest
• 2/3 cup fat-free Greek yoghurt
• 2/3 cup thickened cream
• 1/2 teaspoon lemon juice
• Approx 16 cardamom pods, crushed
• 1 blood orange, peeled, pith removed and segmented

For the Panna Cotta

• Pour 1 cup of the blood orange juice in a saucepan with the gelatine stir and then leave to stand for 10 - 15 minutes.
• Add 5 tsp of the grated zest and 1/2 cup of sugar. Stir untill the sugar desolves over a medium heat.
• Strain into a jug, pressing on the zest to extract as much flavour as possible. Set aside to cool
• Meanwhile, whisk together the yoghurt, cream and lemon juice in a bowl. 
• Once the juice has cooled, whisk through the yoghurt/cream mixture until pale pink and well combined.
• Transfer the mix back into a jug and divide amongst your vessels of choice.

For the blood orange and cardamom syrup

• Stir the remaining 1 1/3 cups of juice together with 1/2 cup of sugar, cardamom and remaining 2 tsp of zest over a medium heat until the sugar has dissolved.
• Bring the heat up to a boil for 10 minutes (stirring frequently)  or until the syrup has reduced to a consistency of your liking. 
• Take off the heat and cool in the fridge until needed. 

Once the panna cotta is set, spoon a couple of teaspoons of the syrup over and top with a segment of blood orange. 

My Rainbow Chard is ready...somewhat

Remember my little rainbow chard seedlings? Upon consulting a gardening book that was recently gifted to me, I found that I have potted them a little too snugly together which will inhibit their growth.  Next time I will make sure that I plant them at least 30 cm apart.

That's ok; good things come in small packages and it means that I can harvest tender little stalks for weeks to come now. Now there is new growth coming through, my imagination is running wild at the possibilities for my little rainbow runts. For my first taste I decided to make something that devoid of meat so that it was all about the chard. Something that even if the most carnivorous of carnivores were to try it, they wouldn't care because they were so satisfied. You know what I mean?

I consulted my trusty copy of The Cooks Companion by Stephanie Alexander to see what she had come up with for Rainbow Chard. After an hour of getting side-tracked (as I am known to do with this book) I found a recipe for sautéed silver beet with olive oil, pine nuts and currents. Then I thought that this would be great on some crusty sour dough, topped with crumbly, sharp goats cheese to cut through the sticky sweetness of the currents.
The result is beautiful and the Bearded Gamer has confirmed that there was no need for meat here, it was all about the Rainbow Chard.

So tell me: What do you think I should make for my next rainbow chard dish?


Rainbow Chard,Pine Nuts, Currents and Goats Cheese Bruschetta 
Adapted from Stephanie Alexander's 'The Cooks Companion'
Makes 6 pieces, with some leftover for the cook


Approx 12 stalks of rainbow chard with the leaves (silver beet works just as well)
1/4 cup of olive oil
1 small red onion, finely diced
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped plus an extra clove to rub on the bread
1/2 cup of dried currents
80g pine nuts, toasted
4 slices of good sour dough bread or ciabatta 
Goats cheese, to taste, crumbled.
Chopped parsley

• Separate the chard leaves from the stalks. Chop the stalks into small dices, roll the leaves up into a cylinder and slice so that they are shredded.
• Heat half the olive oil in a heavy based pan and add the onion, cook until soft and slightly browned.
• Add the chard stems and garlic and cook for at least 5 minutes or until the stalks are tender. 
• Add the leaves drizzled with the rest of the oil and place the lid on to steam until the leaves are soft.
• Add the pine nuts and currents and toss to combine.
• Toast the bread under the grill on both sides and rub with a piece of garlic
• Place the chard onto the toasted bread and top with the crumbled goats cheese and chopped parsley, drizzle with extra virgin olive oil if desired.

A Tale of Two Food Blogs: A dual post

So there I was, staring at these frozen pork and apple cider sausages sitting on the table that I had bought on my trip to Small Acres Cyder in Orange. I eventually had to stop staring at them and get them back in the freezer because they were starting to melt and these little piggies had no preservatives. I could have just cooked them up on the bbq, they would have been nice, but really, who wants to blog about some snags in bread? Well, maybe I do…one day, but not with these sausages, plus I don’t have a BBQ, so that ruled that idea out.

A Fresh Start for Spring

Yikes. The last few posts (not including the garden update) have been, how do I put it? Rather calorie laden? Very tasty but tooth achingly sweet and full of sugar ? Sent straight to my thighs? All of the above? Bingo. Time to clean up, straighten up and fly right.