Kitchen Nomad globe-cooking recipe (France) : Tomato Slices & Sardine Pâté

 I was gutted last week to learn that Kitchen Nomad are stopping their monthly globe-cooking subscription service. However, I've found another very similar company so the globe-cooking adventure will continue with Kitchen Trotter ! For this final Kitchen Nomad box, the destination was France so we tried out their recipe for Tomato Slices with Sardine Pâté.

The recipe called for two products from the box - sardines and sea salt, but I left out the sea salt because the sardines were already very salty.

The recipe also included cream cheese so I went for some St Moret, to keep in with the French theme.

I mixed up the St Moret with some chopped capers, finely sliced shallots and lemon juice.

 I mixed in the mashed up sardines and sprinkled over some fresh coriander leaves.

The original recipe says you should serve this with slices of different coloured tomatoes (red, green, purple, yellow) but we could only find red ones so I opted for grilled tomatoes on toast, smothered in the sardine pâté. Very nice indeed and perfect for a light supper with a bowl of soup.

Other blogposts you may be interested in :

Kitchen Nomad globe-cooking recipe : Korea - Sweet Potato Noodles

Kitchen Nomad Globe-Cooking Recipe : Pakistan - Spiced Courgette & Aubergine Pakoras

Kitchen Nomad Globe-cooking recipe : Mexico - Autumn Stew with Pipian

This month's Kitchen Nomad box ... Destination La France !

I always love the moment a new Kitchen Nomad box arrives at The Madhouse. First, you have the excitement of discovering which country is being showcased this month, then you look at all the exotic ingredients wondering how to pronounce them and what on earth you are supposed to do with them before finally looking at the recipe cards to see what globe-cooking delights you'll be eating in the coming weeks. Well, this month's culinary destination is ... France. Not quite as exotic as some of the other far-flung countries that have been featured in previous boxes (Korea, Vietnam, Lebanon, Greece, Mexico and Pakistan so far) but France has such a rich gastronomical heritage that I couldn't wait to see what had been selected.

This month's box contains :

Sardine fillets in Organic Sunflower oil from Fish4ever

Traditional Organic Sea Salt from Clearspring

Clear honey from Rowse

Dark Green Speckled Lentils from Just Natural

Mediterranean Salad Croutons from La Rochelle

Dijon Original Mustard from Maille

Broken Walnuts from Just Natural

Thyme from Nature's Kitchen

I have to admit, I was a bit disappointed to see some already well-known and widely available supermarket brands in there such as Maille (admittedly French) and Rowse - I'd have preferred some less well-known alternatives actually sourced in France in authentic French packaging to really provide the full virtual gastronomic tour experience.

On to the recipes themselves ... This month we have :

Tomato Slices and Sardine Pâté

Carrot Tarte Tatin

Chunky Savoie Salad with a Walnut Vinaigrette

Beer-doused Ham Hock

Walnut and Caramel Tart

Being married to a Frenchman, I was sure I'd already know half of the recipes backwards but I'm pleased to say, they're all new dishes that I'm really looking forward to discovering.

Watch this space, I'll be showing you how we get on. A bientôt, mes amis !

Disclosure : I received a discounted Kitchen Nomad subscription in order to keep you up to date with their latest boxes.

Other blogposts you may be interested in :

Kitchen Nomad Globe-Cooking Recipe : Mexico - Black Bean Soup

Kitchen Nomad Globe-Cooking Recipe : Greece - Dolmades (Stuffed Vine Leaves)

Kitchen Nomad Globe-Cooking Recipe : Vietnam - Bo Kho (Beef Stew)

Kitchen Nomad globe-cooking recipe : Korea - Sweet Potato Noodles

To accompany the Sauteed Eggplant that I told you about earlier, the second part of our Korean feast was Sweet Potato Noodles.

I found all the exotic ingredients that I needed in my Kitchen Nomad box - sweet potato noodles, sesame oil, soy sauce, sesame seeds and dried shiitake mushrooms.

The noodles are made with sweet potato starch and are also called glass noodles - it became apparent why when I cooked them. I had a real fight getting some out of the pack because they were all tangled up and had to call in Sophie as reinforcements with a pair of scissors !

The dried shiitake mushrooms need soaking before you use them and this isn't marked on the recipe card so I almost missed out this vitally important step. I soaked mine for half an hour in boiling water but you can soak them for longer - mine stayed a bit hard.

The photo doesn't really show it but, once cooked, the noodles do look strangely glassy and transparent.

I decided to replace the spinach in the original recipe with kale, which worked really well. After quickly cooking it for a few minutes, adding garlic, sesame oil and soy sauce gave it a lovely flavour - something I'll try again as a side serving of kale or green vegetables with a meat or fish accompaniment.

I pretty much always adapt recipes to suit what we have in the fridge so the beef was replaced with leftover cooked pork and chicken. I love all the barely cooked veggies in this dish - carrots and shallots were next to go in, along with the shiitake mushrooms.

Time to unceremoniously dump the whole lot in a bowl and mix it all together with the soy sauce and sesame oil. I actually totally missed out the sugar in the recipe, not noticing it until I'd already served it, but I don't think it needed it at all.

One lovely colourful plateful, but what would it taste like? Well, very nice actually ! I wasn't at all sure about all the different flavours going together but it works really well. Madhouse Daddy said he'd have liked a bit of a kick so I'll add some extra chilli powder next time. Our first foray into Korean cuisine was definitely a hit though.

Disclosure : I received a discounted Kitchen Nomad subscription in order to keep you up to date with their latest boxes. 

Other blogposts you may be interested in :

Kitchen Nomad Globe-Cooking Recipe : Mexico - Black Bean Soup

Kitchen Nomad Globe-Cooking Recipe : Greece - Dolmades (Stuffed Vine Leaves)

Kitchen Nomad Globe-Cooking Recipe : Vietnam - Bo Kho (Beef Stew)

Kitchen Nomad globe-cooking recipe : Korea - Sauteed Eggplant

I dipped into last month's Kitchen Nomad box last night, cooking up a Korean feast featuring not one but two of the recipes from it. The first one was Sauteed Eggplant.

This called for four ingredients from the box - sesame seeds, sesame oil, soy sauce and Korean chili.

The sesame seeds from the box were actually labelled Roasted Till Seed but I've discovered that that's just another name for sesame seeds. They look like minute orange lentils and they have a lovely nutty flavour that is more intense than usual - maybe because they're roasted?

The first job is chopping and stir-frying the aubergine with garlic and shallots. (The recipe called for spring onions but I couldn't get hold of any, neither at the supermarket nor the farmers' market, so I figured shallots would have to do !)

I'd never used sesame oil before - it has a dark colour and a strong nutty flavour so it needs to be used sparingly but gives food a lovely flavour, whether used for frying or as a dressing.

Korean chilli seems coarser and less fiery than the usual chilli powder I use.

It's a really simple dish - it's just a case of stir-frying then seasoning.

I'm not usually a fan of aubergines but I did really like these. Sprinkling sesame seeds over the finished dish gave it a lovely taste and texture and the sesame oil and soy sauce worked well too. This is designed as a starter but we ate it as a side dish with the second Korean dish, Sweet Potato Noodles, that I'll tell you about later.

Disclosure : I received a discounted Kitchen Nomad subscription in order to keep you up to date with their latest boxes. 

Other blogposts you may be interested in :

Kitchen Nomad Globe-cooking recipe : Mexico - Autumn Stew with Pipian

Getting ready to discover the cuisine of ... Korea

Kitchen Nomad Globe-Cooking Recipe : Pakistan - Spiced Courgette & Aubergine Pakoras

Kitchen Nomad Globe-cooking recipe : Mexico - Autumn Stew with Pipian

Having picked up a butternut squash at the farmers' market this week, I decided to make Autumn Stew with Pipian using ingredients and a recipe from the Mexico-themed Kitchen Nomad box. It's a vegetarian stew that can be made with pumpkin or squash.

This called for three ingredients from the box : Anchos Chillies, which we'd already tried in the Black Bean Soup, and Pumpkin Seeds.

Plus some rather lethal-looking Chilli de Arbol !

I chopped up the butternut squash but also added in the remaining half of the celeriac, leftover from the celeriac remoulade. This needs to be tossed in oil with spices (cumin, cinnamon) then tranferred to a roasting tin.

In a separate tin, I roasted some apples.

This may look like tea but it's actually chopped chillis soaking in boiling water !

Dry roasting the pumpkin seeds in a frying pan was good fun because they kept jumping, which made the kids laugh ! I told them we were having Mexican jumping beans for tea ! It really brought the flavour out and is something I'd do again to create a healthy snack because the kids loved nibbling on them.

Preparing the pipian was hilarious - as soon as I started reducing the pumpkin seeds to a paste with a stick blender, they started flying everywhere ! I ended up balancing Tupperware lids and a tea towel on the top of the bowl as damage limitation ! Adding basil and coriander gave it an almost pesto-like flavour, then it was time to incorporate the chillis, to give it some heat. (If you google pipian, there are lots of different recipes to play around with.)

After adding extra stock and mixing in the apples and butternut squash/celeriac, it looked a bit strange but tasted divine - I'll definitely be making this again (but will have to rethink the stick blender episode !).

Disclosure : I received a discounted Kitchen Nomad subscription in order to keep you up to date with their latest boxes. 

I'm joining in with the World Cup recipe challenge over on the Cooking Around The World blog

Other blogposts you may be interested in :

Kitchen Nomad Globe-Cooking Recipe : Mexico - Chilli Honey Crumble

Kitchen Nomad Globe-Cooking Recipe : Pakistan - Spiced Courgette & Aubergine Pakoras

Kitchen Nomad Globe-Cooking Recipe : Greece - Dolmades (Stuffed Vine Leaves)

Kitchen Nomad Globe-Cooking Recipe : Mexico - Black Bean Soup

Saturday night has traditionally become soup night here at The Madhouse. It's about the only meal (besides barbecue) that Madhouse Daddy cooks and it's usually vegetable soup so it's a great way of clearing out any veggies that are still lurking in the fridge from the week before. Last night, I told him I wanted to try the Black Bean Soup from the Kitchen Nomad box instead though. You can see the recipe on their website, created by Thomasina "Tommi" Miers, who is the founder of the Wahaca chain of Mexican street food restaurants and 2005 MasterChef winner.

The Mexican-themed Kitchen Nomad box contained all the exotic ingredients I'd need : Mexican dried oregano, bay leaves, ancho chillies, cooked black beans and chipotle sauce.

The Mexican oregano looks very similar to regular oregano but has a more robust flavour. The ancho chillies are quite mild with a slightly sweet, smoky flavour.

Here's what the black beans look like once they've been drained. I'm sure they could be replaced with red kidney beans, which are much easier to get hold of and have a similar taste and texture.

I was delighted to see that Madhouse Daddy took over on this one !

It's a really simple, throw-it-all-in-the-pot recipe that is not only quick but also absolutely delicious. The spices, beans, onions and tomatoes create the ultimate warming comfort food. (We used tinned plum tomatoes, as it was what I had to hand, and it worked fine and meant that we didn't even need to whizz it with a blender.)

After adding the stock (we used a Knorr vegetable stock pot and boiling water), you only need to leave it to simmer for about 15 minutes for the flavours to develop.

The proper recipe suggests topping it with feta and coriander, but we decided to keep the feta for trying out the soft baked feta recipe (that I'll tell you about later in the week) and sprinkled on some gruyere instead.

We'd reduced the quantity of anchos chilli from three tablespoons to two and added a spoonful of the chipotle sauce which has a lovely smoky almost bbq flavour, so our soup was only mildly spiced, but you can make this as hot or as mild as you like. It is utterly delicious, perfect for keeping out the winter chill, and we'll definitely be making it again.

Disclosure : I received a discounted Kitchen Nomad subscription in order to keep you up to date with their latest boxes.

I'm joining in with the World Cup recipe challenge over on the Cooking Around The World blog

Other blogposts you may be interested in :

Getting ready to discover the cuisine of ... Korea

Kitchen Nomad Globe-Cooking Recipe : Mexico - Chilli Honey Crumble

Kitchen Nomad Globe-Cooking Recipe : Pakistan - Spiced Courgette & Aubergine Pakoras

Getting ready to discover the cuisine of ... Korea

This month's Kitchen Nomad box has just been delivered and, as always, I couldn't wait to see what would be nestling inside and which country's cuisine I'd soon be discovering. At the first glance, I could already tell that this was something Far Eastern but had no more precise idea than that. Well, it is in fact Korea being showcased this month, a country whose food I knew very little about - apart from the obvious "they eat dogs there, don't they?" comment which is what I'm sure everyone instantly thought of !

The ingredients in this box look fabulously exotic and unknown :

- Korean Chilli Powder

-Dried Shitake Mushrooms

-Seasame Oil

- Sesame Seeds

- Sweet Potato Noodles

- Soy Sauce

- Kimchi (a fermented vegetables dish)

- Korean Ginseng Drink

- Bamboo Skewers

The recipes this month have been put together by Cecilia Hae Jin Lee and include Sauteed Eggplant, Sweet Potato Noodles, Beef Skewers and Seasoned Tofu, accompanied by Kimchi and Korean Ginseng Beer. I have absolutely no idea what to expect so I'm looking to a gastronomic voyage of discovery !

Disclosure : I received a discounted Kitchen Nomad subscription in order to keep you up to date with their latest boxes.

Other blogposts you may be interested in :

Kitchen Nomad Globe-Cooking Recipe : Greece - Dolmades (Stuffed Vine Leaves)

Kitchen Nomad Globe-Cooking Recipe : Vietnam - Bo Kho (Beef Stew)

Kitchen Nomad Globe-Cooking Recipe : Pakistan - Chicken Yakhni Pullao

Kitchen Nomad Globe-Cooking Recipe : Mexico - Chilli Honey Crumble

Apple crumble is such a simple dessert to make that I don't think I've ever followed a recipe to make one before. When I saw the dessert suggestion in the Mexican Kitchen Nomad box for Chilli Honey Crumble, I did read the instructions carefully though because I wasn't at all sure the flavours would work. 

The recipe called for a couple of ingredients from the Kitchen Nomad Box :  Gran Luchito Chilli Honey (I actually had a big jar of this - you may remember our review of the range of Gran Luchito products a while ago) and masa harina which is the flour for making tortillas, although you can use plain flour instead.

I chopped up the apples and added the chilli honey, leaving the flavours to mingle for half an hour. (I actually made two crumbles, one with and one without the chilli honey, in case the kids didn't like the spiciness.)

After mixing up the butter, sugar and flour, I sprinkled it over the top then sprinkled over some crucnhy demerera sugar to give it some nice texture.

It actually made a really nice crumble. The kids weren't keen, so I'm glad I made two, but the grown-ups liked it, especially with some clotted cream melting on top to give the contrast of chilli heat and coolness.

Disclosure : I received a discounted Kitchen Nomad subscription in order to keep you up to date with their latest boxes.

I'm joining in with the World Cup recipe challenge over on the Cooking Around The World blog

Other blogposts you may be interested in :

Kitchen Nomad Globe-Cooking Recipe : Pakistan - Spiced Courgette & Aubergine Pakoras

Kitchen Nomad Globe-Cooking Recipe : Greece - Dolmades (Stuffed Vine Leaves)

Kitchen Nomad Globe-Cooking Recipe : Vietnam - Bo Kho (Beef Stew)