Here is a quick recipe that I tried yesterday (Thanks Michelle!) – it was delicious!! No photos I am afraid… Next time!
Korean Bulgogi
1lb lean boneless pork or beef (cut into thin slices)
3 tblsp soy sauce
2 tblsp crushed garlic
1 tblsp grated ginger root
2 tblsp brown sugar
2 tblsp red pepper sauce (which I didn’t have, so I used a big tblsp chopped red chili)
2 tblsp rice wine vinegar (which I also sisn’t have, so I used a slosh or red wine, and a dash of white wine vinegar)
2 tblsp sesame oil (I onlt had toasted sesame oil, and I find it’s flavour overpowering, so I used about a teaspoon of this)
1 onion, thinly sliced
Chopped spring onion if you have it
A few sprinkles of sesame seeds
Combine all the ingredients for the marinade, and stir – add the meat and marinate for as long as possible!
Stir fry on a high heat, and serve with steamed rice. I fried the meat in batches, and set aside each batch as it was done – then combined all the meat, the veg, and the rest of the marinade t the end.
I also added some small pieces of broccoli, which I had boiled for a few minutes, some asparagus, also slightly cooked, and some chopped green peppers.
I haven’t posted anything in ages and ages so I will be posting a lot of recent photos & updates over the next few days. Here is a tasty recipe I tried out last weekend -
Buy some frozen ready cooked shrimps with the tail on. The night before you will cook them, take them out of the freezer and put them into a zip-lock bag with some freshly squeezed lime juice, some olive oil, come shredded coconut and some chili. Leave to defrost in the marinade in the fridge overnight. When you are ready to cook them, thread them on some skewers, squeeze over some more lime juice, and then BBQ or grill them! Yum!
Found a recipe for Chicken Jalfrezi the other day which was really good, and also fairly quick and easy to make!
I promised to email Michelle the recipe, but forgot, so will post it here instead!!
Serves 2-3
Ingredients: 2 chicken breasts, 1 tsp cumin seeds, 1 onion sliced, 2 chopped bell peppers, 2 crushed garlic cloves, 1 tsp chopped ginger, curry paste (didnt know what exactly they meant, so I made a paste from 2tsp tikka spices, 1 tsp curry powder, 1/2 tsp garam masala and a few drops of olive oil – I’d say you can use something similar!), 1 tsp chopped chilli, 1 tsp ground coriander, 1 tsp ground cumin, 1/2 tsp salt, 1 can chopped tomatos, chopped coriander leaves.
Method: Cube the chicken. Heat some oil and fry the cumin seeds until they splutter. Add onions, peppers, garlic and ginger – fry for 6-8 minutes. Add the “paste” and fry. Stir in the chilli, coriander, cumin, salt and a few tablespoons of water to stop it sticking. Fry for 2 mins more. Add the chicken and fry for approx 5 mins. Add the chopped tomatos and coriander leaves. Cover and cook for 15 mins.
I was having look at my stats for my website, and after the search “Nicola Keegan” can you guess which search terms have directed the most traffic to my site?? Photography? Ireland?
No, you are all wrong! The answer is .. “homemade chicken goujons”!! So I can deduce that a whole lot of people want to know how to make chicken goujons at home!!
So.. the original post is here. But I wanted to add one or two things now that I have made it loads of times! I have tried a few different variations that taste really good too.
Sometimes I crush some garlic into the butter while I melt it. This is especially tasty if you add some grated Parmesan cheese to the breadcrumbs!
I nearly always add a little bit of grated cheddar, and some chili flakes to the breadcrumb mix for a delicious cheesy flavour.
One time when I was making this recipe, I didn’t have any breadcrumbs, or suitable bread for making any, so I crushed some old “Tuc”/”Ritz” type biscuits, and that was very tasty too!
I don’t like lunch. It’s one of those meals that I wish I could skip. I think it’s because I just don’t like cold food very much.. I don’t particularly like breakfast either, but I can cope with that.
Somehow you always end up eating a sandwich or something equally boring. Especially at convention time, I dread having to think of some lunches that are even remotely appetizing.
This year I put a bit of effort into it, and decided to make some mini “Calzone” type pizzas (not too much mess, and not too gross cold), some quiches, and some pitta bread stuffed with a mixture of rice and lentils. Hopefully lunch and I will be reconciled…
I have been expreimenting with my dear Photoshop Elements again!!
I wanted to create some scrapbook-looking recipe cards to either upload and print in a book, or print out myself at home and add to my recipe folder. So here is one I came up with. Quite pleased for a first attempt! You are welcome to download it if you like…
I just added another card for download if you wish. Its for my white chocolate mousse.
On Saturday night, I decided to try a variation on my chocolate mousse. I was originally hoping to buy some chocolate pudding to use, but Tesco Ireland doesn’t ever seem to stock any.
So, I put some chocolate cake/sponge in the bottom of each individual serving dish. Then I drained a tin of black cherries in syrup, and poured the syrup over the sponge. Then I put some of the cherries in each of the bowls, on top of the cake. Next, I made a chocolate mousse using a mixture of dark and milk chocolate, butter and egg yolks, and folded in the whipped egg whites. A few dollops of the mousse went into each bowl, topped with a dollop of whipped cream, a cherry and some dark chocolate shavings. Voila!
Dessert is a white chocolate mousse – melt 175g white chocolate in a bain-marie. Add 90ml milk, stir and set aside. Whip up two egg whites and 1tblsp lemon juice until stiff, and fold into the chocolate. Whip 225ml cream also until stiff and fold that into the whole mixture too. I filled half my little glass dishes with the mousse, then put on a thin layer of mashed raspberries, and then filled the glasses up. Put in the fridge for at least 2 hours. Put some dark chocolate flakes on top, and a whole raspberry to decorate.
A really easy and delicious starter that I had at an Italian restaurant in Kildare Outlet Village and really liked.
So you get half a ciabatta, or white crispy roll, drizzle on some olive oil and spread on some pesto. Then you get a jar of roasted peppers (thank you Aldi! You could roast them yourself if you really wanted), and put a few pieces on each piece of bread. Add some goats cheese on the top (thanks again Aldi!), drizzle a little more olive oil on top & put under the grill for a minute or two till its heated up.
Serve with rocket with a little more olive oil, and maybe some balsamic vinegar. Voila – easy and tasty!
I found another yummy looking recipe on the Jamie Oliver site, and tried it out at home.It’s a really rich, squidgy in the middle, naughty, fudgey, chocoately, scrupmtious cake!
The only thing I changed from the receipe was that I added a bit more fudge (mixture of vanilla and chocolate fudge), and I found that it needed almost double the stated time in the oven (although that may just have been my oven!).
Ingredients
200g good-quality dark chocolate (70% cocoa solids)
175g butter, plus extra for greasing
120g soft brown sugar
100g blanched almonds
2 tablespoons cocoa powder
a pinch of salt
4 large eggs, preferably free-range or organic
150g self-raising flour
100g fudge
crème fraîche or vanilla ice cream
Serves 8
This cake is best made using a food processor, as you can simply add everything and blitz it up together, but you can easily make it by hand if you buy ground almonds and grate the chocolate into the mix.
To make your cake
Preheat the oven to 160°C/320°F/gas 2
Break up the chocolate, put it into a food processor with the butter, sugar, almonds, 1 tablespoon of the cocoa powder and the salt, and whiz until smooth
Crack your eggs, one at a time, into the food processor and add the flour
Whiz again until smooth
To bake your cake
Get a deep baking dish roughly 25 x 25cm in size
Butter the dish really well and sprinkle the remaining tablespoon of cocoa powder over it
Shake it around a bit so it lightly coats the whole surface of the dish
Pour the cake mixture into the dish, using a spatula to scrape it all out of the processor
Break the fudge into pieces and sprinkle these over the top of the cake mix, pushing any larger pieces down into the mixture
Pop the baking dish into the preheated oven and cook for 18 to 20 minutes
Take the cake out of the oven and stick a fork into the middle of it
If there’s a little bit of cake mixture on the fork when you pull it out, that’s okay – you want the cake to still be a little moist inside so that it’s nice and squidgy
However, if it seems a bit wobbly, pop it back into the oven for another 3 to 5 minutes to firm up a bit
To serve your cake
Let your cake cool slightly and serve it warm and gooey
Lovely with a dollop of crème fraîche or a scoop of vanilla ice cream
I found another yummy looking recipe on the 
