Christmas Menu of Wild Rice Stuffed Squash, Cider Braised Red Cabbage & Gluten and Dairy Free Bread Sauce

I know it is a bit late in the day but I thought I would finally get around to posting about our Christmas dinner dishes. This is more of a theoretical exercise as we are going to my other half's family on Christmas day. So here is my virtual Christmas day menu.  Below are links to recipes I would use followed by my recipes for wild rice stuffing for the squash, braised red cabbage and bread sauce.

Maple Glazed Turkey for the meat eaters

Stuffed Squash for the veggies or Parsnip, Cranberry & Chestnut Loaf

Wild Rice Stuffing

Roasted Root Vegetables

Roasted Green Beans with Lemon & Garlic

Cider Braised Red Cabbage

Gravy, Cranberry Sauce & Bread Sauce 

Followed by 

Christmas Pudding & Brandy Butter

Quite a bit of it could be made in advance and reheated on the day for an easy relaxed Christmas morning in the kitchen. The day before I would make the wild rice stuffing up until the point where you put it in the oven, I would also make the red cabbage to be reheated in a crockpot or in a pan the next day. I would also steep the milk with the onion, bay leaves and cloves overnight. A family tradition is to all help to peel and cut up our root vegetables the night before which are then left in cold water overnight until needed the next day. Yes you will lose some of the water soluble vitamins but for one day does it really matter? If you do all this the hopefully, apart from the turkey cooking in the oven, everything else can be done in the hour leading up to serving.

 Merry Christmas everybody!

Warming Winter Bean and Cabbage Soup

I am finally back to the blogophere following some nasty computer viruses invading my laptop combined with, on a much nicer note,  a wonderful winter sun holiday in the canary islands. Much tapas was consumed along with  goats cheese, bread, olives and for J at least half a pig in the form of various hams and salamis. This holiday has really endeared me to the Spanish as who couldn't love a culture that has brought such yummy dishes to the wider world. As winter draws on I am looking forward to turning up the heating, shutting the curtains and eating some tapas dishes I have recreated and pretending, if only for a night, that we are back in sunny Fuerteventura. 

In the meantime I will post a couple of recipes that I had ready to publish in November, before my laptop got very sick. The first is this winter soup recipe that really is filling and hearty and makes a great warming lunch or light supper served with bread and or a hunk of cheese. If you want some meat than some thick chunks of Chorizo, added at the same time as the beans would make a great addition although you might want to reduce the amount of smoked paprika.

Vegetarian & Gluten free Okonomiyaki- Japanese Pizza/Pancake

Whilst looking for a recipe to recreate a for a thin crispy pizza that I had had in Singapore I kept coming across recipes for Okonomiyaki which is often described as Japanese Pizza. I was so intrigued that I abandoned my original quest for another day.

Now to be clear that apart from being round, cut into slices and varied through the addition of lots of tasty ingredients, I really don't think this has any other similarities with a pizza. It is more like the Asian relative of the Spanish omelette or the Italian Frittata and very delicious. It is basically a savoury eggy pancake with lost of cabbage and other yummy stuff topped with a sweet tangy sauce.

Ok, so this recipe is unlikely to be very authentic as I have never tried the original version and from what I have seen on the internet there are multiple types and regional variations. If you want a more authentic recipe then try this one from just hungry. However, I had just enough of the ingredients needed to make my own version. Give it a go and feel free to try lots of different ingredients both authentic and otherwise.You can add meat such as pork slices or seafood if you are that way inclined.

If making gluten free then check the ingredients for the miso as some such as barley miso are not gluten free but most are. Also check the sauces used in the toppings are gluten free as although all mine were fine other brands may not be.