Chicken stir fry with egg noodles (or how to cheat cooking Chinese food)

Stir fries are usually very quick to prepare, and they can also be a very healthy meal if you prepare it properly.
They can get even faster if you cheat a little and use all the making-your-life-easy packs available at local supermarkets. And the noodles are still going to taste beautifully.

Below, I'm presenting both recipes: the original if you want to try, and the cheating version, if you wanna be quick. Both versions serve 4 people.



Original:

Ingredients
2 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 clove garlic, squashed
1 medium red green or yellow pepper(s), chopped
1 packet beansprouts
2 carrots, grated
100 g mangetout
5 tablespoon soy sauce
3 teaspoon fresh coriander
1 pouch Blue Dragon Oyster & Spring Onion Sauce
800 g chicken breast, uncooked, skinless, in cubes
4 portions Sharwoods Medium Egg Noodles

Cheating version:

Ingredients
2 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 packet stir fry vegetables
5 tablespoon soy sauce
1 pouch Blue Dragon Oyster & Spring Onion Sauce
800 g chicken breast, uncooked, skinless, in cubes
4 portions Sharwoods Medium Egg Noodles



Instructions

Cook the noodles in plenty of boiling water until tender, about 5 minutes.
Drain well and sprinkle soy sauce and a bit of oil, mixing well.

Heat the oil in a wok or large frying pan and stir-fry the chicken until cooked thoroughly (not pink inside) with 2 spoons of soy sauce. Add all the vegetables and stir fry for 4 - 5 minutes.

Tip the cooked drained noodles into the wok or frying pan and stir-fry over a medium-high heat for 1 minute, stirring all the time.

Add the Chinese sauce and soy sauce to the wok. Stir-fry for another few moments, until thoroughly heated. Season to taste, then serve.

Tips:
1 - You can always substitute the oil for light oil spray, if you want to maintain the calories down;

2 - Substitute the chicken for pork, beef, or prawns, or combine them the way you want;

3- Substitute the Oyster & Spring Onion Sauce for any other type. There are many different types of sauce you can use for stir fry. I definitely recommend the Black Bean sauce, the Chow Mein, and the Hoi Sin & Garlic sauce.

Enjoy!

Greek cheese pies (and how to fold a flag)

Ingredients:

• 200 gr feta cheese
• 1 pack filo pastry (200 gr) (you can find it in Sainsbury' s)
• 2 eggs
• black pepper
• dry spearmint
• sunflower oil
• kitchen paper
  

Grate all the feta cheese in a deep bowl.
Add the two eggs (white + yolk) , some black pepper and some spearmint. The amount of black pepper and spearmint is your choice :)
NB: If you don't have spearmint then just add black pepper.

Fill of the cheese pies:
Mix all the ingredients together in the bowl using a fork. Don't use force. You want to mix them not flatten them!

Filo preparation:
Clean some space on a flat surface and lay the filo pastry.
NB: The filo pastry that is not being used, should be covered with a clean kitchen towel so that it doesn't become dry.
Use a sharp knife to cut the filo in half along its length so that you have stripes of 5-6 cm width and approximately 30 cm length.

Cooking:
Put some sunflower oil in a frying pan and heat it. You don't need to put a lot. Perhaps 1 mm depth.
With the fork take a small amount of the fill, add it on the edge of a filo stripe and start folding the pastry as you would fold a flag (see Fig. 1 bellow) until you have a triangle.

Fold a cheese pie:



Repeat this with each stripe and when you have the triangular cheese pies ready, reduce the fire to minimum and place them on the frying pan. Be aware as they cook very fast so you will need to turn them as soon as you see them becoming golden at the bottom. When they are ready, place them on a plate on top of which you will have laid some kitchen paper that will soak the excessive oil.



The oil in the frying pan must be quite hot when you put them to cook, but while cooking them the fire must be low. You want to make sure that the egg is cooked and that the pies are golden and not black!

It is likely that you will not use all the filo that is in the 200 gr pack. In that case, fold the remaining filo and cover it with some cling film as it was when you opened it, so that it is not in contact with air. Store it in the fridge.

Enjoy the cheese pies.

Chocolate cream with meringues

Ingredients:
01 litre of milk
02 cans of condensed milk (800g)
04 tablespoons of cornflour
05 tablespoons of chocolate/cocoa powder
01 can of extra thick cream (285g - extra thick double cream can also be used)



Preparation:
Simmer the milk for 5 minutes; do not allow to boil.
Add the condensed milk, chocolate and cornflour (dissolved in a bit of milk).
Keep whisking the cream so it won't burn.
When the cream starts to thicken, turn off the heat and allow to cool mixing from time to time.
After the cream is cold, add the cream, folding until you have a homogeneous mixture.
Serve cold with meringues.

Serves 8

Brazilian 'feijoada'

Ingredients for the feijoada:
- 750g Black Beans
- 300g Pork (Streaky slices), diced
- 50g chorizo, diced or in round pieces
- 150g smoked Bacon, diced
- 300g British Beef, diced
- 200g Pork, diced
- 1 Smoked Sausage, diced
- 1/2 red pepper, chopped
- 1/2 pack of coriander, chopped
- 1 onion, chopped
- 1 lime, juice of
- 1 1/2 tbsps tomato purée
- 4 Bay leaves
- 2 pork stock cubes
- 2 Spring onions
- Black Pepper and Salt
- 3 tablespoons of Cumin
- 2 tablespoons of Paprika
- 1 clove of Garlic, squashed
- 5 tablespoons Olive Oil/Oil

Preparing:
The night before, soak the beans in a large bowl with water to cover at least 3-4 inches (for around 12h).
Cook in a high heat until the beans are soft (around 1 1/2 hours), adding water when necessary to keep beans covered.

On a separate pan, add the olive oil and when hot, add the onions, garlic and red pepper. When the onion is gold, add all the meat, paprika, tomato purée, lime juice, and cumin. Mix well and cook for around 30 minutes.

Add the coriander, spring onions, black pepper, bay leaves, stock cubes and the cooked meat to the beans and cook for another hour and a half.

A good feijoada should have a creamy consistency when done.
Serve with white rice, sliced oranges, cabbages and 'farofa'.



Ingredients for the cabbage:
- olive oil
- 1 clove of garlic
- 1 savoy cabbage, cut into thin strips
- 1 tbsp Aromat

Sprinkle olive oil on a frying pan, fry the garlic until golden brown. Add the cabbage and sprinkle the aromat on top of it, mixing well.

Ingredients for the cassava meal:
- 300g cassava (Gari)
- 2 tbsps butter
- 1 onion, chopped
- 1/2 pack of parsley, chopped

Melt the butter on a frying pan, add the onions and fry a little. Add the cassava, and the parsley, mixing them well until the flour is a bit toasted.


Serves 12

Cooking club first meeting

Today, our cooking club started.
The menu was a bit of a mixture of things (Brazilian feijoada, Greek feta cheese pies, and chocolate cream with meringues), but everything was lovely (thank God!). :)




You're gonna find all the recipes from our meetings here in this blog. And some of the photos as well.



Here, you can see Yvonne, Natália, and Mini trying to cook three things at the same time. On my very small kitchen. :)



It was a very pleasant meeting, and I hope we can do it again very soon.



Our next meeting will be on the 7th September, on Julie's place.
We are going to learn how to make pizza from scratch.
Hope we all can make it.

And finally, welcome to you all.