Chinese flovoured chicken in slow cooker or Instantpot

I've had an InstantPot now since last years Amazon Prime day and to be honest I have not used it half as much as I should do as keep thinking of it as just a pressure cooker but it does a lot more. So my latest trials with is using it's slow cooker function.  We were out yesterday morning so I wanted something that wouldn't take to long to cook in the afternoon.  I looked around at timings and then threw this in to the InstantPot

2 sliced carrots

2 peppers cut in chunks 1 red 1 green

small pack of baby corn cut into chunks

3 or 4 biggish spring onions cut up

1 small tin of water chestnuts drained

2 tablespoons Chinese 5 spice powder

1 tablespoon powdered coriander

pinch of chilli flakes

5 skinless boneless chicken thighs cut into bite size pieces

few garlic cloves chopped

tablespoon of ginger puree, could of used fresh but had puree in fridge

salt and pepper

toss all this together and cook for 4 hours

It came out looking a little less appetising.  Smelt so good though.  I took a teaspoon of cornflour and a few tablespoons of pineapple juice we had and blended together and then stirred through the chicken mixture in Pot on Saute function until it thickened.  I added a glug or two of dark soy sauce for seasoning and colour and it looked a lot better 

The chicken broke up a little, and I served it over noodles,  definitely a do again recipe as went well with all.

This could be done on high in a slow cooker to if you don't have an InstantPot.

And just because I took a photo today here's a picture of the back of the king Alfred statue from the park and ride bus in Winchester.

That's it for today.  We have the granddaughters visiting and lots of fun going on, well I hope all that noise equals fun ;-)

Take care 

Jules 

pasta cake??

Someone posted a video on Facebook a few weeks ago and although I can't find it now I remembered it mostly so gave it a go on Monday night. I boiled up some pasta tubes to just cooked and drained them and added them back to their cooking pot and stirred through a big handful or so of grated Parmesan type cheese. Then taking a spring release type of cake tin I then stood the tubes upright in the oiled tin until it was full.  As I had some pasta left over I lined a loose bottomed 4 inch pork pie tin with the pasta as well.  Didn't actually take that long at all really.

While I was making the pasta I had taken the home made bread out of the oven, It was so good but to more ish. We had this along side the pasta and salad.

I had precooked a thickish meat sauce like for spaghetti bolognaise and spread this on top of the pasta. It should go into the tops of the tubes so doesn't need to be to dry.

Then I added lots of lovely grated cheese on top. and baked in a moderate oven for around 25 minutes until the top was bubbling and everything was piping hot.

Then the exciting bit taking it out of the tins. The small one worked the best.  How impressive does this look?

And from the top. Taste good to.  Although I think the base needed more cheese as it was a little bland, but once mixed with the sauce when eating it didn't matter.

The big one however as you can see was less sturdy and a lot of it fell over. So no pretty plate photos.

All in all was a pretty standard mine and pasta recipe elevated to new heights with the 'cake' idea. Would I make it again? Yes more than likely just to see if I can get them all staying stood up enough to slice and serve next time.

Take care 

Jules xxx

Gadget review Verteggo

Anyone who knows me well knows that leaving me with a laptop and the internet when bored is dangerous.  Especially when left online surfing on Amazon or eBay.I have to admit most the purchases are good bargains but also most of the time I didn't know I needed or wanted the things until I saw them. Am worse than a kid on pocket money day some days. So in my defense I am going to say it was YouTube that tripped me up this time.......I can't remember what I was watching but it had something called a Rollie egg something or another which is a vertical cooker for eggs.  Then if that wasn't clever enough the eggs rise out the top when they are cooked. Watched a few of these gadget reviews on this then headed on over to Amazon. Just to look you understand..... Found a very very similar product that does the same thing called the.....wait for it....... the.....Verteggo. The rest as they say is history.  It arrived at our house yesterday. 

Looks pretty much like a travel coffee cup. Plug it in and the light is red

When it is hot enough light goes green.  Pretty simple so far.

Instructions say to spray inside the tube with non stick spray.  We have Frylight so that is what we used. Then crack in 1 or 2 eggs. There are other recipes but for now we just have been doing eggs

Put in a skewer if you like but not needed you can tip the eggs out onto a plate or use tongs.

Then the fun starts at the 6-8 minute mark roughly the egg starts to rise up. 

And up.......

Keeps going up.........

So magical for the easily amused like me!

And here it is out on a plate.  Now I admit you can't do the family a big plate of eggs all at once.  But this is a lot easier to clean up than a pan and utensils, and a lot less thought to it if just one person wants eggs

The eggs come out not quite hard yolked but not runny. Tender and not rubbery at all.  You can play with the times to find your favourite way.  There is no timer so you can pour out the eggs early if you like.  If the eggs aren't done to your liking you can pop them back in the tube again.  Big bonus for me is the upper bit of the Verteggo doesn't get hot not even in the inside upper lip so it is not to dangerous for little inquisitive hands to hole while trying to get a look in, or by helping crack the eggs in.

With 3 of us at home now we all have different breakfast habits, especially during the week.  This may be very amusing at the moment but for an antisocial, slow, and on autopilot Mum like me first thing it could well be the answer to the perfect eggs for one son in the mornings.

Not glazed carrots!

I discovered glazed carrots a few years ago, really loved them.  Being I am following the slimming world lifestyle I choose not to make them because I didn't want to use all that butter in carrots.  I tried this way out one day ( or rather forgot these were still cooking) and discovered although it wasn't exactly the same it made some delicious carrots.  So I thought I would share with you all how I do them.

I start with chunky cut carrots, If you try this you can cut them however you want I will not shout at you.  And one oxo cube, can be any flavour, Vegetable and chicken ones are the ones we prefer.  Put the kettle on to boil.

I put the carrots in a non stick pan with the crumbled oxo cube and poured enough boiling water  to just cover the carrots, bring to the boil and keep the neat to a medium maybe a touch more. DO NOT put a lid on or it won't work. 

The liquid should start to boil down to a syrupy consistency

It's hard to see here but the trick is when the bottoms just start to caramalise to take them out.  That crusty looking coating on my pan just took a wooden spoon to scrape it off.

I like doing my carrots this way as they come out quite sweet, tender but not overcooked.  If they aren't quite cooked through when water runs out I just add more water to the pan and keep an eye on them, Adding thyme or other herbs to the stock in the first step is a good thing to.

BBQ ribs

 Bit hard to make these look attractive being they were on there own when photos were taken an then ate with much speed that all were left were a pile of bones, so you will have to excuse the lack of pictures.  Ribs don't last long in our house as the men in the family love these.  I have done a few version of ribs in the past. Our current favourite is from a masterchef book.  They are so good but take a fair chunk of time so aren't made often for a week day meal.  These however I can have knocked out in under an hour and possibly less with a few short cuts.  

They are fall off the bone, melt in the mouth tender.  And take 2 ingredients. Spare ribs and your favourite BBQ sauce.  You could use any flavour sauce you liked though, sweet chilli sauce might be great. I have an Instant Pot and put the ribs in with a couple of cups of water and set on high pressure for 15 minutes.  Any pressure cooker would work I think.  After 15 minutes are up and pressure has been released I took the ribs and placed them on a lined baking sheet.  Brushed liberally with BBQ sauce and placed in a hot oven until the sauce glazed and started to bubble.  You could also do this stage under a grill but the couple of times I have done this I have had the oven on anyway so they have gone in alongside roasting veg.

One more shot for good luck. Will be trying these out on the BBQ next weekend.

Take care and stay crafty

Jules x 

Blast from the past

A little while ago we were very lucky to be given some old cookery books and sewing bits.  More recently I bought an instant pot from Amazon in a lightening sale.  Being I remembered there was a pressure cooker recipe book in this box I was delighted to grab it to look up a few recipes to try. As I opened the book a double page from the Daily Express fell out dated June 14th 1984.  It took us down memory lane to say the least.  I was only 13 when this was published.

It turns out Dungeons and Dragons was dangerous and might cause children to kill themselves.

What sounds like a eccentric professor, I am going to have to look him up on Google and see how he got on with that one.

And music systems all us teens wanted, top of the range at the time 

And how young does Toyah look here? Wow.  I have had the song 'it's a mystery' going on in the back of my mind on and off for days now.

And my Instant pot. Which is still fairly new.  Has 7 functions. I have been craving rice pudding lately But waiting over an hour in the oven or stirring a pot for ages is not my idea of fun today.  So I used the instant pot.  There was still a little stirring going on and not quite as fast as people would of had us believe before we bought it. But it was good rice pudding.

Here it is after it had finished cooking and ready for eating still warm.

Here it was now cooled down and had absorbed more liquid so was thicker. With a lovely blob of wild strawberry jam.  Not my bowl I am sad to say as it tasted so good.  But after a roast dinner and being on a diet I allowed myself a smaller portion.  Was so good but none of us managed to finish it all.  Got a feeling the boys are going to be eating the rest of it for breakfast.  Made enough for 6 big portions and there are only 3 of us now.  Definitely a make again recipe. Only thing I would have to complain about is there is no skin on the rice pudding. We will live though.

All this nostalgia has me thinking of roller skates with a key, spangles sweets and long summer days spent with family and friends as a youngster.  Ahhhhh the hazy days of times gone by.

Take care and stay crafty
Jules x