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Sunday, January 22, 2012

Crazy weather ... Grrrr!!!


After tops of 35C (100F) it's gone cool with a southerly breeze and overcast here. Unreal weather - shorts and "T's" one day, woollen shirts and "Trakkie Daks" the next. At lest last night was a good sleeping night - nice and 'snug' (thanks mummy) LOL! We had 18mm (3/4 inch) of rain yesterday, so now the grass has started to shoot again and will need cutting.

Cooking slow cooker Goat meat on the bone in a mushroom, carrot and onion ragout today and will have that with pasta tonight.

Went to the markets on Friday and bought a whole bag of seafood - 2kg of uncooked king prawns (shrimps) baby octopus, squid tubes and whole baby squid, New Zealand blue lip mussels, Tasmanian salmon fillet and skinless and boneless Basa fish fillets. Chopped, sliced and diced it all up and parcelled it into four batches, froze three down in 'Vac Paks' for later.

Cooked up the other for dinner. Did it as a seafood Marinara in a tomato and grilled olive sauce. I add chopped chives crushed and diced cloves of garlic, some olive oil and a few spicey leaves of Vietnamese mint (finely chopped) and a couple of shallot onions. I let it brew in a covered bowl in the fridge for a few hours, then lightly fry it up and add the sauce, stir through and heat through. Serve straight to the table. Ate that with slices of crusty Italian bread that was baked in wood fired ovens.

4 comments:

LindaG said...

I'm coming over to your house for dinner. ;-)

JohnD said...

Only cost you air fares to nearest IntX Airport (Canberra) Linda! :)

Cindy@NorthofWiarton said...

Not too sure about the squid or the mussels, however I will go for the rest. Temps have been sitting around the -13 Celsius here the past couple days, so the woodstove has been constantly fired up.

JohnD said...

Hmmmm - Clean the squid and score the soft (inner) side of it in a 'lattice' pattern - do not cut all the way through and then cut it into 2" squares or rectangles. It curls and rolls up on frying and looks quite attractive and adds a 'chewy' texture to balance some of the soft fish textures.

Cut the squid tubes into rings and you have calamari rings - really nice.