Cinco de Mayo Taco Fever

Dinner last night was sublime, If I can say so myself….

We wanted to pay homage to our Mexican brothers and sisters but weren’t really wanting burritos or fajitas anything other than TACOS!!

I’ve never made tacos before so wasn’t really sure what I was doing but went into the kitchen with a can-do attitude!

The end result were these delicious pockets of spicy meat, guac and cheese. I mean what else could you ask for!!

If you want to see how I made these bad boys, please my recipe below.

Ingredients:

500g minced beef

1 medium onion, diced

1 red pepper, diced

1Tbsp Tomato Puree

1tsp cayenne pepper

1tsp chilli flakes

1tsp paprika

1tsp cumin

Salt and pepper

Taco Shells

To Garnish:

Guacamole

Sour Cream

Lettuce

Grated Cheese

Method:

I started by dry frying the minced beef, once cooked I added the spices followed by the onion, pepper and tomato puree. I added a dash of water so that everything could come together nicely but this evaporated in the cooking process.

Once the meat was cooked I filled the taco shells with the meat mixture, lettuce, sour cream, guacamole and cheese.

Saturday Sandwich

Charles and I always like to have competitions to see who makes the best food in a certain category, we are both quite competitive and things usually get quite interesting. I of course am always the winner, naturally.

I have become quite a pinterest addict as of late and thought our next challenge should be ‘The Ultimate Sandwich challenge’

mind you I was starving at this point and Pinterest was not proving very helpful with all its photos of delectable sandwiches.

So yesterday was challenge day, I made a toasted sandwich of crispy bacon, creamy melted brie and caramelised onion chutney, which we have named the Brunch and Charles made his favourite New Yorker with beef, mustard, pickles and cheese.

See the photos below, which I am sure will make your mouths water and make you want to try these sandwiches for yourselves.

Chloe + Charles

Risotto with Peas and Bacon

A few nights ago, I was rooting around the cupboards trying to use up ingredients.

I came across a bag of rice which we normally do not eat, so can only assume we bought it on a whim.

The only time we ever eat rice is when we have Risotto or Charles makes his incredible Paella!

So I figured I would do some experimenting and try and make a risotto with normal rice – it was delicious.

Now I know there are purists out there who would most probably be very disapproving to the fact that Risotto rice was not used in this recipe

But I would definitely recommend giving this one a go. You can add any yummy goodies you like, it doesn’t have to be peas and bacon, that’s is just what I happened to have lying around.

That’s the thing I love about Risotto, it’s so versatile, an expressive dish of your own tastes and flavours.

Ingredients:

1/2 Cup of rice, this made two healthy sized portions

1 onion, diced

Knob of unsalted butter

Glug of olive oil

½ a glass of white wine, this can be left out but it adds a lovely flavour

1 litre of chicken stock, you can use homemade but I just use a cube

1 cup peas, frozen

6 rashers Bacon

½ cup grated parmesan, or any hard cheese you have

Method:

Firstly, get your stock nicely heated up and leave on a low heat so that it stays warm throughout.

Next, fry up the bacon in a hot pan so that it gets a bit of a crunch, this is a personal preference but I think it adds texture.

Add your butter and olive oil to your pot on a medium high heat. Once the butter has melted add your onions.

You wanted to cook them so that they are translucent, but not discoloured.

Once the onions are ready add your rice and stir so that all the grains are coated in the butter and oil.

Next add the wine and stir until all the liquid is gone – I love this stage, it smells great!

Once this is done, turn the heat down a bit and start adding the stock, a ladle full at a time, each time stirring until the liquid is absorbed by the rice.

This takes about 15 minutes, you want to cook it so that the rice still has a bite but is not crunchy in the middle.

About 5 minutes before this is done, I add the peas so that they can defrost and cook in with the rice. Season as required.

Lastly add the bacon and cheese give it a stir and put the lid on the pot leaving it for 2 minutes, I learnt this from Jamie Oliver, it makes the Risotto creamy, oozy and delicious!

Eat straight away.

Chloe + Charles

Update…

We have been quite bad at updating our blog lately, partly out of laziness and partly as we have been drawn into the instagram world, you should definitely check us out @charleschloefoodwinediary.

Chloe + Charles