Roasted cauliflower salad

July 7, 2019

Here's another gem from the lab farewell cookbook, shared by Saras. It's a recipe that she got from her cousin in Jerusalem for a salad with my favourite clash of flavours and textures - savoury cauliflower and hazelnuts refreshed with celery and parsley, in a sweet and warmly spiced dressing, all scattered with pretty, tangy pomegranate seeds. We're already familiar with a very similar salad made by Ottolenghi, but I like that Saras' version uses some of the celery leaves, not just the stalks, and those fresh pomegranate seeds replace dried fruit. 

This is such a versatile recipe: it packs well for picnics, potlucks, and workday lunches; it passes as a light but satisfying meal on its own, and makes a bright side dish for just about anything else. We matched it oddly but very happily with a batch of kimchi, gochujang & cheese scrolls. 

Roasted cauliflower salad
(a recipe shared by Saras,
which she credits to her cousin)

1/2 cup hazelnuts, roasted
1 large cauliflower, chopped into bite-sized pieces
2 tablespoons olive oil, plus more to roast the cauliflower
1 tablespoon white wine vinegar
1 1/2 teaspoons maple syrup
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon allspice
1/3 cup pomegranate seeds
2 stalks celery, sliced thinly
1/4 cup celery leaves
1/4 cup parsley

Preheat the oven to 240°C.

Place the cauliflower in a baking tray, pour over olive oil and generous salt, stirring it through the cauliflower. Bake for about 20 minutes, until the cauliflower is tender, and browning around the edges. Set aside to cool.

Place the olive oil, vinegar, maple syrup, cinnamon, allspice, and some more salt in an old jam jar. Screw on the lid and shake the dressing until emulsified.

Roughly chop the hazelnuts.

Toss everything together in a big salad bowl and, Saras recommends, "bask in the praise".

Nonna's gnocchi sauce

June 29, 2019

What a privilege to receive my friends' beloved family recipes in the lab farewell cookbook! My long-time officemate Pia went so far as to press her Italian grandmother for a record of the gnocchi sauce she makes by memory and to taste. 

We initially gave it a go on a Saturday night, but this is a quick and comforting formula that could easily be accomplished after work. I would never have thought to include grated vegetables in such a sauce, but I liked the heft they added to it. And I reckon with the vegetables on board, there's far less risk of the gnocchi coming over too gluggy or setting up like glue in your stomach.

Nonna's gnocchi sauce
(a recipe shared by Pia)

1 bottle passata
olive oil
1-2 cloves garlic, crushed
1 large carrot, grated
5-6 mushrooms, grated
a good handful of parsley, chopped
red wine
basil
salt and pepper

Heat the oil in a large pan, and add the garlic. When the garlic has just browned, add the carrot, mushrooms and parsley. Cook them until they start to dry out.

Slosh in some red wine and turn up the heat, cooking until the liquid has evaporated. Turn the heat back down and add the passata. Cook for a little while; add basil, salt and pepper to taste.

Vegan, gluten-free self-saucing chocolate pudding

June 29, 2019

This is a dessert recipe crying out to be made mid-winter! It comes from Mick, who was my very first supervisor when I arrived in Melbourne, and of course it's part of the lab cookbook.

This self-saucing pudding uses a trick that I would've been very skeptical of if I hadn't seen it before: it has you placing a teeny portion of cake batter in a baking tray, and then pouring half a litre of boiling water over the top! Amazingly, it doesn't turn into a curdled mess of cake clumps floating in water; rather, the cake expands in the oven and the water settles underneath, picking up all the flavour it needs to form a thick sauce. 

The other appealing features of this pudding are how diet-inclusive and pantry-friendly it is. I didn't need to shop for a single ingredient before I set to work. I will admit that I didn't have the highest of hopes for a vegan, gluten-free pudding based on rice flour, no-egg powder and only a small amount of cocoa. More fool me! The cake was plenty fluffy with a lovely crumb, and there was abundant dark, chocolatey sauce to go around.

We had a little leftover salted caramel coconut-based vegan icecream brought over by our friend Nat, and it was the perfect thing to scoop on top.

Vegan, gluten-free self-saucing chocolate pudding
(a recipe shared by Mick,
who credits it to taste.com.au)

pudding
60g Nuttelex
1/2 cup caster sugar
1 cup rice flour (Mick recommends Coles' organic)
2 teaspoons baking powder
2 generous teaspoons cocoa
1 teaspoon Orgran no-egg
1/2 cup soy milk

sauce
3/4 cup brown sugar
2 tablespoons cocoa
2 cups boiling water

Preheat an oven to 170°C. Lightly grease a high-walled baking dish.

In a large bowl, cream together the Nuttelex and caster sugar.

In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, cocoa and no-egg. In turns, gradually beat these dry ingredients and the soy milk into the butter mixture, to form a cake batter. Pour the batter into the baking dish.

Sprinkle the brown sugar and cocoa over the top of the pudding. Pour the boiling water over it all, and bake for 45 minutes.

Serve with a little vegan icecream.

Samba's Jhol Momo

Edit 02/01/2021: Samba's Jhol Momo has closed, and been replaced by Luther's Scoops.

June 20, 2019

This article prompted a some compelling critiques about Australian food journalism on twitter, but it also alerted me to the existence of Samba's Jhol Momo, a newish Nepalese place tucked just off Sydney Road. They specialise in jhol momo - hot dumplings served in a thick broth - and have two dishes: meat and vegetarian.

We grabbed two bowls of the vego option ($10 each) and settled in. There are jars of good quality chilli sauce on the tables, so I immediately spooned some over my dish. This is probably unnecessary - the broth is brimming with spiciness already. It's perfect winter food, with maybe a hint of Sechuan pepper to really add to the kick. The dumplings themselves are freshly made and filled with a mix of veggies, garlic and ginger, but it's the broth that really shines here. 

It's great to have another cheap and delicious option in the neighbourhood - this is a perfect place for us to stop off on the way home for a fast dinner when we need a break from Kevabs.

____________

Samba's Jhol Momo

528A Sydney Rd, Brunswick (entry on Blyth St)
facebook page

Accessibility: There's a flat entry way to a fairly crowded interior, with regular tables. You order at a low counter. The toilets are unisex, but quite a trek through some narrow paths and uneven ground to the corner of the carpark.

Joma's lemon cordial

June 5, 2019

This cordial is a simple and appealing recipe from the lab cookbook that I didn't expect to get around to until next summer. But it's very much lemon season right now, and we've received lots of lemons from friends.

The only challenge remaining was to buy tartaric and citric acids, which I've never cooked with before. It turns out that citric acid sits near the baking powder in most supermarkets. Tartaric acid is in the same spot but stocked less frequently. After a few false starts I tracked it down at the SUPA IGA on Sydney Road. 

I made just half the quantity listed below and still made lots of cordial with just 3 lemons (two-and-a-bit of the bottles pictured above). Recipe-sharers Chris, Freya and Roy recommend freezing it into icy-poles, or drinking it with soda water, but at this time of year I'm content just to dilute it with regular ol' tap water.

Joma's lemon cordial
(a recipe shared by Chris, Freya and Roy,
who credit it to the Nursing Mother's Association Cookbook)

juice and grated rind of 6 lemons
2 kg sugar
30g tartaric acid
60g citric acid
8 cups boiling water

In a very large bowl, mix together the lemon juice and rind, sugar, and acids. Pour over the boiling water slowly. Mix until the sugar is dissolved and allow the mixture to cool. 

If you want to, strain out the rind (I didn't). Bottle and seal the cordial. Dilute with lots of water or soda water; enjoy it as a drink or freeze it into icy-poles.