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WHEN IT COMES to cooking, it’s all too easy to get stuck in a rut or be overwhelmed by all the options out there.
But the secret to having something easy to cook every day is a simple repertoire of recipes you know well and you can adapt to suit your mood, your cupboards and your pocket.
There are many classic dishes that might work – but for ease and everyday magic, try mastering these six recipes and you shouldn’t ever be stuck, hungry or bored again…
Yes, a full roast dinner is great on the weekends when we have time for carving and gravy. But midweek you want a fast, comforting fix and a one tray roast is absolutely foolproof.
There’s an abundance of these recipes out there, mostly chicken-based but sausages are a great option too. Then you add chopped up veg, seasoning, into the oven, all in one dish and that’s it. Assembly should take no more than a few minutes and cooking should be under one hour. Find the right recipe and you’ll never look back.
I swear by Nigella Lawson’s chicken with chorizo and potatoes. She tells us in her book Kitchen: “When I’m frazzled, I firmly believe that the tray-bake is the safest way to go. Enjoy the easefulness of the oven: you just bung everything in, and you’re done. I think I’d go to the supreme effort of laying on a green salad as well but, other than that, you may kick up your flamenco heels and enjoy the fiesta.”
Can’t argue with that. Nigella adds orange zest to hers which keeps it moist and zingy and you should look for recipes that have a little extra flavour boost like this. For vegetarian versions, a quick Google will throw up some great meat-free options featuring cauliflower, aubergine and squash as the main ingredient.
A stew is one of the most straightforward and satisfying recipes you can master and it doesn’t need much mastering. Stewing simply means long slow cooking in liquid, it can happen on the hob or in the oven.
In her book The Art of Simple Food, legendary chef and food writer Alice Waters applauds stews and slow cooking for their ease and economy. “Once assembled a stew or braise cooks in a single pot, largely unwatched. It can be made ahead and reheated the next day, without a worry, and it will be even tastier.”
Economy is a bonus for this dish. As a rule heartier, inexpensive cuts of meat and root vegetables will stew best. You want food that can stand up to a few hours of cooking and mingling of flavours that will extract the juices and tastes for a rich stew intensity.
Lilly Higgins has a few extra tricks to maximise the taste:
Use a little brandy to deglaze the pan after you fry the meat or add a tin of Guinness or bottle of craft beer. The end of a bottle of red wine is great too. Be confident with flavours. Loads of herbs, a teaspoon of Dijon mustard and black pepper always result in great flavour. Sometimes I add a splash of soy sauce or Yorkshire relish for that umami depth.
She also recommends a slow cooker which can be a great investment for stew fans.
This is up there with one of the easiest, speedy suppers where the payoff for the effort put in is phenomenal – and you’ll be surprised how adaptable a recipe it is. At its most basic this dish is spaghetti with bacon, Parmesan cheese and eggs and it should take no more than 15 minutes to put together.
Cook the pasta, fry the bacon, beat the eggs and mix it all together and lots of cheese to finish. I turn to Nigella again for advice on perfecting this dish she calls her “favourite – along with my other favourites” and she rightly proclaims: “It feels like a proper dinner, only it takes hardly any time to cook.”
I find often it’s in the adding of the eggs that most people go wrong. Nigella advises “Be patient: whatever you do don’t turn the heat back on or you’ll have scrambled eggs; in time, the hot pasta along with the residual heat of the pan will set the eggs to form a thickly creamy sauce that binds and clings lightly to each strand of pasta.”
Ingredients-wise you can play around and bulk out the dish by adding some vegetables in like mushrooms or spinach. Lilly Higgins suggests you “throw a few peas in there too to be controversial”. She also offers an bacon-free alternative “Use smoked salmon or trout instead of bacon for a change.”
One could argue that a salad doesn’t really need a recipe – but the difference between an edible and a great salad is just a bit of thought before you toss it all together. Then, it can make an excellent side, lunch or dinner.
Alice Waters reckons it’s “the immediacy that makes a salad so compelling and seductive, so use ingredients that are fresh, radiant and in season. Almost anything good can be turned into a delicious salad.”
Lilly Higgins recommends a good chopped salad taking inspiration from the Middle East – she chops radish, cucumber, peppers, tomatoes, loads of herbs like parsley or oregano and then dresses them in olive oil, lemon and crunchy sea salt. “It will sit in your fridge happily for days,” she says, “and you can serve it with almost anything.”
Versatility is the advantage with salads. Get your basic ingredients ready then check your fridge and cupboards and then check again. Are there a few loose radishes or scallions in the bottom drawer? An egg to boil and crumble on top? Nuts or seeds that can be toasted and sprinkled across? Almost anything can be turned into a salad ingredient. In his book Cook Well, Eat Well, Rory O’Connell urges us to look at less likely salad ingredients like “shaved brussel sprout, tiny bits of kale or even finely shredded green cabbage”.
Ideally, you’re aiming for contrasting but complementary flavours, textures and colours. And for dressing remember it should blend with as opposed to mask the flavour of your ingredients. A basic vinaigrette is one part vinegar to three parts oil, salt and pepper and if desired a teaspoon of mustard.
Perhaps the most versatile and straightforward recipe is an omelette. It makes a light, quick, nutritious breakfast, lunch or supper with minimal effort and is super adaptable. Cooking bible Larousse Gastronomique warns us that “the success of an omelette depends as much on the quality of the pan and the quantity of distribution of the butter as on the cooking”. So get a heavy-bottomed frying pan for cooking and plenty of butter for flavour.
Then it’s basically whole eggs, beaten, seasoned and cooked flat or folded and with as few or as many additions as you like. Darina Allen writes in her book Grow, Cook, Nourish that a classic French omelette is the ultimate fast food “but many a travesty is served in its name. The secret is to have the pan hot enough and to use clarified butter if all possible”.
She simply adds a teaspoon of chopped fresh herbs to hers to eggs to make Omelette Fines Herbes and reminds us: “Your first omelette may no be a joy to behold but persevere, practice makes perfect!”
Lilly Higgins recommends adding cheese. “Caramelised onion and Cashel blue cheese is an incredible combination – or use dollops of cool soft goats cheese and then drizzle with harissa paste.” Omelettes are also are a great vehicle for making leftovers into a meal – chopped-up meat or vegetable leftovers are great added into a folded omelette.
An Italian rice dish, the name risotto literally means ‘little rice’. It has a reputation for being difficult and finicky to cook but the reality is quite the opposite.
It’s simply rice sautéed in butter or sometimes olive oil, usually with onion. Then hot stock is added a ladleful at a time. As the rice cooks and expands the starch oozes out which is what gives it the creamy consistency, not added cream (as is a common misconception).
It does take a bit of stirring, which may put people off, but persevere says Alice Waters: “Risotto is actually a basic one-pot dinner that pleases everyone.” It’s adaptable to any food, tastes and flavours.
A basic risotto bianco, delicious on its own, can also be a blank canvas for meats, vegetables, seafood and cheese. A good rule of thumb when adding raw ingredients, advises Waters, is to “add them at twice the normal cooking time”. So if you have prawns that normally take five minutes to cook, add them to the risotto 10 minutes before it’s done. This can be applied to almost anything.
Play around with flavours. Darina Allen does a carrot risotto where she adds carrot juice to the stock and assures us this is “super delicious on its own or with pan-grilled lamb chops”. Clodagh McKenna adds dillisk to her seafood risotto.
If there’s a dessert that is as universally appealing as it is simple it has to be fruit crumble. Comforting, nostalgic and a cinch to put together, I’ve often cobbled one together from seemingly nothing.
At its most basic (and indeed its most complicated), crumble consists of a fruit base and a topping cooked in the oven until the fruit is tender and the crumble is golden and crisp on top.
Traditionally the topping is made by rubbing fat into flour like when making pastry, then sweetening with sugar – but many modern recipes make use of oats or leftover bread. The fruit can change with the seasons or indeed what’s in your fridge, freezer or cupboard (some tinned fruits work great). Alice Waters has a strong list of suggestions: apple and pear, apple and blackberry, rhubarb, plum, peach and raspberry – you can really use any fruit.
“Every season has fruit to offer,” Lilly Higgins agrees. Her suggestion is as follows:
Use any fruit as a base – plums with orange zest, apples with blackberries, rhubarb with strawberries etc. And then cover in a crunchy blanket of buttery carbohydrates. Pure comfort food! I use a mix of rye and regular wheat flour, porridge oats, brown sugar, and a pinch of cinnamon to my crumble topping and I always use salted Irish butter. Ground almonds or hazelnuts can be added to the crumble topping too. It’s a great dish to experiment with and build confidence. Serve with softly whipped cold cream and everyone will love it/you.
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Last year Kelly pledged €35 million for the homeless crisis, following the death of Jonathan Corrie
As of last week DCC had received 1 million.
Judge a politician by their actions, not their words.
GUILTY
There are more agencies than the DCC receiving monies, plus homeless people exist outside of the pale too. Not using all the facts, jamming, guilty as charged. Kangaroo courts, eh jamming? Your lot use them well.
Kelly should be wearing oversized red shoes to go along with his Red nose the clown. Totally delusional for him to think he has done a good job about anything other than lining his pockets and the pockets of his cronies.
Gene Kerrigans put it well in his latest column….
“The State makes demands on our loyalty – and that in turn imposes on the State a duty to ensure that our shelter receives a higher priority than the right of anyone to make a profit. Fine Gael would stand that on its head – the State will ensure your right to shelter by protecting the right of builders to make the biggest possible profit.
We used to expect better from the Labour Party. The party of Connolly, of Larkin. The party of – for what it’s worth – Frank Cluskey. It became the party of Gilmore and Rabbitte, it’s now the party of Burton and Kelly. It’s now the party that looks at the problem of homelessness and immediately spots the real villains – the McVerry Trust and Focus Ireland.”
The full column is worth a read, I can’t post a link to it for some reason.
Hey Alan if your so happy with the way your shelters are going spend 7 nights staying in one.Let’s see how good they are then.
The €3.8 million DCC spent on a football pitch would have gone a good way towards putting a roof over the heads of some of the people sleeping on the streets atm
So the issue isn’t Alan Kelly not handing over the money he promised, its with DCC spending other funding on other projects?
Everyone elses fault except the minister who has overseen homelesnes double on his watch, right leargas?
If Alan Kelly believes what he says then I challenge him to spend a week in emergency accommodation.
This should bot be beyond the remit of a Labour TD who regard themselves as representing the oppressed… or is is all lies?
So the DCC have no blame in this? They spent €3.8M on a football pitch and voted in a reduction of the LPT reducing their potential funds to address this issue. The DCC and Department of the Environment share equal responsibility in this. blaming Alan Kelly while overlooking the DCCs idiotic actions is just stupid and stinks of a person who cares nothing about the issues or the people at risk but only cares about government bashing every opportunity they get!
“.. and voted in a reduction of the LPT reducing their potential funds to address this issue.”
Nothing about the 20% of the LPT that was taken from Dublin to be used as a slush fund in swing constituencies down the country leargas, no?
Like I said, everyone elses fault except the people running the country. Weere it not for the likes of McVerry and Focus Ireland, the government would HAVE to deal directly with the crisis. FG/Labours way of saying thanks is to point fingers at the people who are devoting themselves to alleviating the problem.
You are deflecting again, you’d rather bash the government than address some of the real issues, by reducing the LPT by 15% the DCC directly reduced their income by roughly €13M, how many homeless people would that money have homed?
It is not everyone elses fault, I did not say that, try read my comment rather than jump to your biased conclusions, they share equal responsibility, but blaming the government and overlooking and even defending the DCC is just disgraceful, you do not care about the people at risk here, just about making a political point, shame on you!
“We’re on top of the (power pyramid and don’t give a damn about the) homeless crisis” – Alan Kelly.
‘THE MINISTER FOR the Environment Alan Kelly has suggested that he is on top of” the Labour Vote crisis currently
being seen in Ireland.’
Dreadful situation when the homeless have to rely on a coincidence betweeen thier plight and Kelly needing to spend money in order to gather up a few votes.
I hope the people of Tipperary will see through this fraud and vote him out next time around. He has almost lying single handedly destroyed any credibility the Labour Party once had.
Tipperary? they keep voting In Michael Lowry. i wouldnt hold my breathe!
Between Alan Kelly, Michael Lowry, Mattie McGrath and Noel “ISIS” Coonan the Tipp electorate isn’t exactly covering itself in glory but in their defense, Alan Kelly ran as a Labour candidate in 2011 a la water charges as a red line issue, act as a counter-balance to Fine Gael policy, etc.
Whatever about the other four muppets, they were lied to by Alan Kelly.
Good to hear. Now that he’s on a roll, next week he can sort out global warming and the week after the Middle East.
China have requested his services to sort out their stock exchange !!!
I don’t know where their going to put the thousands of refugees their planning on bringing into the Country..
google “kosovo refugees 1999″ we did ok there!!!
We’ve always taken in refugees, we done it during the Vietnam war and even thousands came down from the North when things kicked off in the early 70′s, but we didn’t have a homeless crisis back then..
The Curragh camp? Plenty of space for temporary refugees.
The illegals have made it clear they don’t want to be in safe secure camps, that isn’t good enough for them.
We took 1,000 Kosovans and it was not enough for our Presidential whiner Mary Robinson. Now it looks like we are going to take far more migrants from an alien culture against the wishes of the silent majority on the basis of one (tragic) photograph. Madness.
They could clear out trabolgan, just like they did with Mosney. Look how well that turned out
“Silent majority” oh you mean racists and bigots. you’re quiet welcome to organise a protest in any city you like against taking in refuges. That’s the freedom of living in an open democracy. a luxury you have, not like the refuges from Syria. :)
Sertorius. I wouldn’t expectly call Syria alien. It’s a diverse country made up of civilized people who until very recently lived in quite a westernized society.
I’m referring to the recent Irish Times poll (hardly a bastion of bigotry and racism) where a clear majority they were opposed to large scale. resettlement of refugees. Tar them if you wish with those overused labels.
Muris the vast majority of the refugees are Sunni Muslim. Historical Sunni Muslim immigration from integration perspective has been a disaster for Western Europe.
a clear majority of 4%, been interesting to see a poll again after the images of this week.
If you base your opinion on the image of a child who drowned because his parents embarked him on a rickety boat from a safe country (Turkey) where thousands of Irish people enjoy holidays every year, well then more fool you.
ahaha…. yep, 1,000′s of Irish visit their ever year as tourists. so easy for us to travel, unfortunately Syrian refugees don’t have passports. Over 4 million have fled Syria because of an on going war for last 4 years where 100,000+ have died. The 2% of the 4 million refugees that are trying to make it to Europe for a better life face untold misery. Its so easy for you to judge. We live in the EU and as citizens of Europe we we should and will take in refugees. Thankfully your opinion wont mater. as for implying I’m a fool, it just enforces my comment of you been a racist.
have a nice day :)
If nations such as Britain, the Americas and Australia had closed their borders when the Irish refugees where being crammed onto coffin ships during the great famine OR if europe had closed its borders to the refugees during the second world war many many more people would have died due to starvation or military action. We are happy to boast that this great little country can take over the word on Paddy’s day. But remember why this happened, it’s not because we loved to travel.
Many of our forefathers put their children on rickety coffin ships because it was better than what they faced at home.
America did not allow those Irish to just land and demand. Processing took place at Ellis Island, then those who made it through were told where they could go to.
Just make more Irish homeless.
Yep. He ain’t lyin about being “on top” of this crisis. But isn’t that the problem really? So far “on top” that they have no connection to the reality of the homeless situation. So far “on top” that they have no clue about how the poorest & most vulnerable in our society are surviving. They have attacked them at every turn. Thrown them/us under the wheels of the bus in order to provide ‘stability’ to their banking & corporate buddies.
You & your ilk disgust me Kelly. I guess this comment qualifies me for a hosing down with slurry, eh?
Genuine question. Is Alan Kelly delusional, unfathomably stupid or just a liar? Because he cant possibly be serious about most of the stuff he says.
He’s a deluded liar
All 3 Peter…..
He probably banking on all those poor refugees will eventually be happy irish water customers and he can increase the eurostat figures
Mickey Mouse wears an Alan Kelly watch….
Plank..
A face only a mother could love.
When he was born the doctor smacked his mother.
Rodney Dangerfield.
One of these people knows what they are talking about and the other one is a spooofer.
kelly lives in labour la la land where everything is rosey in the garden and labour are 28% in the polls,, meanwhils on planet earth ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,
This gombeen is another reason not to vote for the f/g labour despots.
Sadly Kelly is yet another politician who’s creditability is non existent….
@Kerry Blake: I read that as Sandy Kelly!
It’s a pity that he’s the type of person that will be voted in for years to come by simpletons. He’s not going to disappear anytime soon.
The mans a p#xy puppet
Let me say there’s no issue with budget
obviously there is if DCC where left short 16 million after his governments last big budget
Mirror mirror on the wall
Who’s the greatest of them all.
Listening to alan kelly this morning. The Man is clueless. Talking about the refugees and what would be done to house them. His answer liase with local authorities around the country. He is the minister and should surely know local authorities have waiting lists in the hundreds for people applying for local authority housing. This was his answer. The Man is a Muppet.
James Connolly must be cringing in heaven looking down on the right wing anti poor clowns in the Labour party.
They might be able to find an unlimited energy supply if they can harness all the spinning Connolly must be doing in his grave.
Oh! he must have worked out a way to monetize the issue, for the benefit of his cronies, in a way where no one is held accountable for the inevitable embarrassment of ineptitude, corruption and ineffectiveness down the line. Nice one, Alan!
Well, he is an ordained member of the corporate church, they do train them well.
Eh, where are all the refugees goin to live?
Do try and keep up Kevin. 6,000 people on a Facebook page have pledged to house them.
Here’s an article from the Indo reporting on a Deutsche Bank in 2012.
There are 289,000+ vacant homes in Ireland. Why do we have homeless crisis? Because large portfolio (property) owners are sitting on large tracts of homes.
Just like the Great Genocide (famine) there was enough food back then for everyone in the country. Most of the food was escorted out of the country under armed guard, and that left was out of reach for the general population due to high cost.
Same now with property. We have more than enough for our own and refugees but due to Irish laws, both indigenous and foreign landowners are permitted to keep hundreds of thousands of homes empty while strangling the rental market.
We could fix the entire property market forever more if we passed a law that stated that no one person, institution, or organisation may own a property portfolio consisting of more than two residential properties, unless they make all subsequent properties available for sale or lease within six months of purchase?
Failure to do so would result in hefty fines that could be used to build affordable housing. At least then, no Charity, State Agency, Hedgefund, nor landlord (including NAMA) may be permitted to sit on large portfolios of property while the market is being starved, and people going homeless.
Correct and right but don’t forget under Noonans watch large amounts of distressed mortgages were sold to large vulture funds along with distressed property portfolios. So under this man who is a bond holder and investor in gold what hope have the little people and homeless people got. Noonans motto appears to be profit before people.
Empty properties are owned by someone… Said individuals (or other) are free to do what they want with them. The availability of empty properties alone won’t solve the housing crisis we have at present.
Just make another few thousand Irish homeless. Look at our housing estates now at present and see how the houses are being handed out to anybody but the Irish
He just gets worse that man..what a tw*tbag
Tosser
Yes another on my lost of people I don’t trust and dislike… Mostly FG it turns out
If the pro open border loonies have their way, the homeless crisis will inevitably get exponentially worse, and will never get any better.
We are far from on top of our homeless crisis and are about to import thousands more homeless people, watch as the imported illegals get preferential treatment over our own struggling people.
Hey, do you remember the good old days when we had no homeless people? Oh wait, that never happened anywhere ever? I see. Seems like a stupid reason to complain about refugees then.
ESY…those old times when people with drink problems and drug ended up on the streets….these days they are joined on the streets by families put out of their homes by the banks they helped to bail out and by landlords looking for as much money as possible regardless of the consequences.
Yeah, the streets are awash with families like that.
I heard Alan Kelly’s first ever golf shot was a hole in one. What a guy.
I heard he bought to male pandas for the Springfield zoo and got them to mate successfully.
I heard Alan Kelly was the first man to walk on the sun
I disagree with you entirely on that. What you say may well have an element of truth in it, but I didn’t see a hole just an arse (sic)
He cheated Shakka…he did it at night.
Kelly the man who said he would like to spray slurry over the water protesters. Sad man Mr Slurry Tank Kelly.
What a clown, does he even know what reality is
If he says it, it must be true…
Lies, damned lies and statistics
The ref should step in and stop this fight.
Kelly is on the ropes and getting such a battering I genuinely fear for his political life at the moment.
There’s carnage in the ring.
Let him take the blows….we don’t want a rematch.
I dunno why anyone would bother wasting their time and energy on kelly. I dunno why hes even still in the job, to be honest.
I dunno why this gov is still around, come to think of it. I believe the country is in a far worse state than they are letting on. All the economic data they are releasing is just doctored lies and spin. The only true believeable data came from that eurostat report on irish water.
Donnelly, Murphy and Shortall. 3 of the most impressive TDs we have. Depending on who they put forward in my constituency, I’ll be giving them a high preference come polling day….
Wrong article, apologies. Damned smartphone!
Still relevant though.
Minister for the Environment! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!
Who is more likely right? A cynical, self interested and unprincipled politician, devoid of compassion or a compassionate and principled campaigner with no self interest involved?
It’s a hard one!
In Alan Kellys world everything is fine and dandy. Someone should explain to him how things are in the real world where real people live. Come back down to earth minister and smell the roses
deluded nutjob
It is very irresponsible of Peter McVerry to actively advise people to sleep rough. I would have thought that McVerry would know better. It does the homeless, themselves, no favours whatsoever to sleep rough when there are beds available, and it does terrible harm to the image of our nation’s capital to see homeless people strewn out all over the place (I can only imagine what tourists think).
By encouraging homeless people to do this, it makes you wonder if Peter McVerry is trying to make the situation physically appear worse than it is in order to make a political point, and to have more taxpayers’ money given to quangos.
John (and anyone who cares about what a homeless person goes through) should watch a documentary called Streets Of Plenty. Its about a normal person in Vancouver who decides to go homeless to see what it’s actually like. Just watch the part where he’s in a homeless shelter to get a basic look at what life is really like inside one of those places.
Now, think about being someone who is homeless, not through drugs, just an unfortunate series of events that made them homeless, and wonder what its like for them the first time they go to one of these places.
These people are better off sleeping rough and Fr McVerry is correct.
” image of our nation’s capital” good man John good to see you have your priorities set…..
Kelly you are a gent
Lets all have a moan at Alan Kelly, a man who was voted in by the people. It annoys me so much that these politicians, who have been voted in by the Irish people, are given so much abuse in the media when it was our fault for allowing this to happen in the first place by voting for them. Lets vote Enda Kenny in again for a laugh will we? Why not, otherwise it will be someone else that you’re going to moan about. Am I wrong? No. Lets resurrect Hitler and get him to run for taoiseach, I’m sure he would make enough valid points for you to vote him in before you realized your mistake.
Mickey…….they were voted in with different policies and to keep FG in check…not to become bluer than FG.
Al Ca , spot on.
McVerry knows what homelessness is about. Kelly is just playing politics with the issue.
Democracy requires elected representatives to be accountable, open to criticism and to be reminded of the principles they have reneged upon.
I don’t like FG values but FG does not pretend to seek any kind of social justice or fairness.
Alan Kelly is a naked hypocrite and needs to be challenged on his dishonest hypocrisy. His obligations and duty are not waived just because and after he was elected.
That’s the theory Anthony. Unfortunately, history has proven to show what actually happens as opposed to what should happen.
Alan Kelly was voted by the people ,because they told the people at the doorsteps while canvassing, that under no circumstances would WE pay for water, And now Kelly the clown is the Top man collecting the water bills , Mr bean couldn’t make it up.
Politics is about power ,money, pensions, The people are way down the line ,party loyalty ,been loyal to the leader ,gets you a ministerial seat ,payback for selling your principles ,your voters ,Then its awarding your cronies onto quangos,We have been promised change but left bitterly disappointed ,disillusioned and angry ,To blame people like Fr. Peter McVerry and others for your own failings and your parties betrayal is contemptible ,Hopefully the citizens of Ireland will give this lowlife and his fellow traitors their answer in the general election
have your say