The Food Monologues

I got out my new pasta maker and wondered how I should make pasta. The recipe for egg pasta is strong plain flour and eggs, water and a little salt (optional). Mix one egg to one cup of flour and get a firm dough (extra water or flour may be needed if the mixture is too wet or too dry). Knead the dough until it is a consistent texture and then leave to rest for a few moments whilst I set up the pasta machine. The rollers are set to its thickest setting and a small piece of d0ugh is sacrificed to clean the mechanism. Once the machine has been cleaned, the rest of the dough can be rolled through on a sucession thinner and thinner settings until fine sheets of pasta have been rolled out. Then putting the sheets through to the cutter, 1/4 inch wide strips of tagglatelli were cut and dusted with a little flour to stop the pasta from sticking. The pasta was then boiled for a minute or two in rolling boiling water and served with a nice chicken and mushroom sauce I made. The vedict on the pasta? It tasted nice and had a nice texture but it took a while to make the pasta and I understand why dried pasta is so much easier to deal with. However, the next thing I would like to try out with the pasta maker is to make either ravioli or tortellini or even better I wonder if i can make wonton pastry?

This year for Christmas, I got lots of kitchen related presents - which is great for when I move in with Tim in the New Year. Tim and I got some plates, mugs and cutlery from my parents. My little sister got me a blow torch and some ramekins to make creme brulées with. One of my other sisters got me a singing reindeer cookie jar. Tim's older sister got me some grow your own garden herbs and his parents bought me a spice rack and a pasta machine which I can't wait to use. Tim also got some useful things for the kitchen, a set of three steel saucepans, though I am on the look out for some nice non stick pans (to replace the one I broke, though I do think the non stickiness was lost through by it being put through the dishwasher too many times in my opinion).

Last night, the way back to Tim's house, we got off the motorway a couple of junctions early because there were queues ahead and just off the motorway is an Asda supermarket and we went in to see if we could find Tim a jumper since it is very cold in his office. However, it was closing time (I assumed that this Asda would be 24 hours, like the one at Asda Minworth but this one closed at 10pm) and we noticed that they had displayed all the reduced bread items at the front of the store. On closer inspection, we saw that they were selling off all their loaves of bread for the sum of 2p each! A bargain, so we bought 4 loaves to freeze for 8p and then the shop closed (this must be the lowest price I have seen bread on sale ever). However, we didn't get the jumper - oh well. Back home, I made some sandwiches for work the next day and calculated that one ham and coslaw sandwich cost 15p to make which makes you wonder what the mark up is on the prepacked sandwiches from the shops that charge around £2.50 for sandwiches.

If you calculated how much you spend on lunch in a week buying prepacked sandwiches and you work 5 days a week:

Eating Prepacked Sandwiches Meal Deals:
£3.00 x 5 days = £15.00 a week
£15.00 x 48 weeks = £720 a year

Eating Homemade Sandwiches and Can of Coke:
£1.00 x 5 = £5.00 a week
£5.00 x 48 weeks = £240 a year

Saving £480 a year which can be spent on things like a nice holiday, or loads of shopping or even money to be saved for a rainy day!

Ingredients (Makes 12 Muffins)

3 Small Clementines
4 oz Butter
4 oz Sugar
8 oz Plain Flour
3 teaspoons Baking Powder
3 Eggs
2 oz Plain Chocolate Drops

Method

Preheat the oven to 180C
Cook the clemetines whole in the microwave for 3 minutes, with a tablespoon of water and turn over halfway through cooking time. Then allow to cool. Cut open the clementines and remove any pips and then put them into a blender and blend until a smooth paste.

Place pureed clementines into a bowl and add the butter and sugar. Beat until well mixed in and then add the eggs, flour and baking powder and mix until all incorporated. Then add the chocolate chips.

Spoon the mixture into 12 muffin cases and bake in the oven for 20 minutes, or until golden brown and cooked through.

Labels: Recipe