Best recipes for leftovers: Crisp potato salad with saffron, salad onions and chives recipe
Danny and I are not Salad People. I don’t know quite what Salad People are – I imagine them chomping quinoa and feeling rather smug about their bowel movements. We tried quinoa once. This summer I have been seducing D with salads and dressings that have made this meat and two veg man finally throw down his fork and rush for the salad seed section of the garden centre. This salad was an experiment that turned out to be a bit of a winner. I’ve been playing with saffron quite a lot over the past couple of months. I decided to slice some...
read moreBest recipes for leftovers: St Clements chicken, Romano pepper and rice noodle stir fry
Danny found some rice noodles on the condemned food counter at Tesco and we decided to try making a stir fry with some of the leftover St Clements chicken and gravy. This was really quick and easy to make and quite delicious. Packed with lots of subtle, summery flavours, the sweet Romano peppers balancing the citrus hints of the chicken. St Clements chicken, Romano pepper and rice noodle stir fry recipe (for 2) Ingredients: I large handful of cooked diced St Clement’s chicken 100 ml of left over gravy (from the St Clement’s chicken) 1...
read moreBest recipes for leftovers: Baked Portobello mushrooms with ham, parsley sauce and parmesan recipe
We cured and smoked our own ham this year. It was delicious and a proper old fashioned half leg. We were thrilled that it worked out as I had tweaked our bacon cure, upping the salt by 25%. This is still far less than the HFW cure and every other recipe that I’ve found on my researches. We smoked it for a good 24 hours in the smoke chamber above our wood burner. The latter opens into an old chimney, rather than a flue. I had saved some seasoned apple wood for this very special smoke. I finally roasted the joint for us on Christmas Eve and it...
read moreTransform leftover pastry scraps into deluxe cheese Christmas snacks
If Danny loads the dishwasher when I get back from work and the cycle finishes before supper has reached the table, I know that I’m running a bit late. The cycle is 108 minutes. This morning I discovered some chicken and ham pie filling in the freezer – all that I had to do was make the pastry. Anne Mary’s recipe for Magimix pastry works perfectly each time. Danny was amazed that I had made pastry in five minutes in the food processor. It normally needs to rest and chill in the fridge for an hour but I decided to speed up the process....
read moreThe slow cooker chef: comforting low fat cottage pie recipe
During a cold snap a few weeks ago I had a longing for a really good Cottage Pie. So I made a version of this dish in the slow cooker (crock pot). Adding vegetables from our garden – the cottage kitchen smelt wonderful for hours. The slow cooker is a great way of cutting the fat content of a dish as the meat doesn’t have to be browned in oil, or the onions fried. When the filling was cooked, I strained off the juices and put the bowl in the refrigerator. The fat was easily removed a couple of hours later. The dish was delicious but the...
read moreBest recipes for leftovers: Low fat stir fried coriander lamb with mange tout, baby corn and lime infused noodles
We cooked Spanish lamb last weekend and still had lashings of lamb and sauce left over. Sometimes we are well intentioned, making a Shepherd’s pie with the remains. More often the remnants are jettisoned into the freezer and six months later the dogs polish off the bounty. Cold lamb doesn’t look wildly appealing. This week I was determined to use up the remains of lamb (500g) and the wine sauce in a stir fry. So this recipe is designed to follow on from our slow cooked Spanish lamb recipe. I’d bought a book on stir fries from Homebase....
read moreLeftovers: Summer Shepherd’s Pie recipe
“Do you like carrots in your shepherd’s pie?” “Yes please!” Danny looked suspicious, “What else are you going to add?” I was planning to cook a traditional British Shepherd’s Pie with the leftovers from a shoulder of lamb. He visibly relaxed. But when I went to the fridge that evening the shelves were bare. For weeks Danny had been stockpiling carrots, buying every bag that he found on the Tesco condemned food counter. At one stage the fridge was bursting with them and I’d considered making...
read moreLeftovers: Spicy new potatoes and cabbage on the side recipe
I’m not a great one for being imaginative about small leftovers. They are usually shoved into the dogs as a relish on the top of their complete dog food. In the past I used to put them into small bowls, hoping for inspiration and they would be forgotten as they were gradually pushed to the back of the fridge. Danny calls these “offerings to the fridge gods” as he removes them two weeks later. Now I’m enjoying using up everything that I can. The little scrappy handfuls are the most fun to transform into something that...
read moreGreat recipes for leftovers: Summery spiced chicken curry recipe
Many years ago Danny and I stopped for a curry in an Indian restaurant beyond the outskirts of Soho. When we pushed open the door we found that we were the only non Indian people in the restaurant. The meal was amazing. Hot, succulent and flavoursome. Nothing like the Indian restaurants that we know and love. A year later the yearning for their food was so overwhelming that we motored down to London to sample their food again. The restaurant had vanished, We walked up and down the street several times and eventually drove the 70 miles back...
read moreBest recipes for leftovers: Quick and easy pork and summery vegetable risotto recipe
I always used to choose risotto in Italian restaurants as I imagined that it was a complicated dish to cook. “Let them do all the stirring and sweating.” I’d think as I pointed to my choice on the menu. Recently I discovered that risotto is easy and quick to make. And a great way to transform the leftovers from the Sunday joint into something delicious. You can use uncooked meat and fish in a risotto but this recipe is designed to breathe life into pork or chicken that you find kicking about in the fridge. There are two...
read more
Most Recent Articles
I made two litres of dog food by mistakeOn Monday I decided to test out the theory that cottage pie is best made with pieces of beef rather than minced… »
Recipe for meatballs and spaghetti with red wine, tomatoes and bell peppers. Foolproof slow cooker/crock pot recipes“Please don’t buy mince again. I just don’t like it.” Danny grumbled out of the kitchen. “But you like… »
Win £50 worth of B&Q vouchers with The Cottage Smallholder and Direct Line Grand DrawFor those of you who missed out on the metal bedstead competition: we’ve got another great prize to offer you!… »
New layout for CSH – testers wanted pleaseDanny here, everybody. 14% of our visitors use mobile devices, such as tablets, iPad, smart mobiles and so on.… »
Update on the remaining Min PinsIt’s been seven weeks since The Conteesa died suddenly in her sleep. Danny buried her in the garden under the… »
It’s the little things that make the differenceI don’t often write much about the little things that give me pleasure. They initially seem too insignificant to… »
Recent Comments
{ I was thinking the same as Magic Cochin but then like you I don't have my phone attached by an umbilical cord wherever I go.... } – Wed 8 :47 pm
{ Good point but I don't tend to take it about with me everywhere 
} – Wed 7 :25 pm
{ Doesn't your mobile phone have an alarm setting? C x } – Wed 6 :32 pm
{ I would put it towards a bbq, it's just a shame you can't purchase some sunshine from b&q } – Wed 12 :04 am- { Hi Lesley The clucking means that she is brrody also plucking her own feathers is a sign too. } – Tue 11 :58 pm
- { Hi Lesley They have to stay in the broody coop 24/7. Could you put in a garden shed or garage? } – Tue 11 :57 pm
FD