Soufflé, s'il vous plaît

Being a vegetarian, as it turns out, is a lot easier than I thought it would be. I've yet to hold up a Burger King or punch someone with a ham sandwich in the face. I haven't even been tempted to cheat when I'm positive there are no witnesses about. All in all, it's going pretty well. There is one ingredient, however, that is featuring quite regularly in my meat-free meals. Cheese. Strictly speaking, a lot of cheeses contain rennet and so couldn't be considered vegetarian at all but I'm circumventing that conundrum by deliberately not reading the ingredients on cheese packaging. As far as I know, they've all been rennet-free.

To celebrate my ever growing appreciation of cheese in all its glorious forms I decided to make one of the most notoriously hard cheese dishes there is - the cheese soufflé. As somebody American once said, go big or go home.

40 Days of Lentils

I'm usually not a big adherer to the fasting ritual surrounding Lent. In fact, my go-to joke has always been that I gave up organised religion for Lent years ago and it just stuck. However, this year I will be showing my respect for Jesus by only eating vegetables. It's what he would have wanted, I'm sure. Now, I've had meat-free meals before, I've even had meat-free days, but to last 40 days and 40 nights without wrapping my lips around a succulent pork chop or chicken breast I'm going to need a plan of attack.

(I Can't Get No) Satay-faction

The other day my brother asked me, "What can you do with this?" I turned to find him holding up a jar of smooth peanut butter.

"I really love peanut butter," he continued, "but I'm sick of eating it with a spoon."
"I could make grilled chicken with a satay sauce," I said.
"Do you even know how to make satay," he queried mockingly.
I stood silent for a moment before my eyes started to flicker uncontrollably. "I do now," I said finally.

Hellas, A Bit of Greek

So this recipe isn't strictly Greek. In fact, calling it Greek could quite possibly start a riot. But it does have feta, so I'd definitely call it Greek-ish. So what are we eating? Well thank you for asking. We're going to be tucking into some pork medallions, baked potatoes with feta, some greens (because they're good for you) and some homemade hummus and pita for dipping. I know what you're thinking. Well, I don't know for sure but I'm going to tell you what you should be thinking. Isn't lamb far more Greeky meatwise? Yes, yes it is. So by all means, use lamb chops if you prefer but I'll thank you not to interrupt me again. Now, on with it.

A Home-cooked Valentines

I have just learnt that my oyster guy has packed up shop after sustained pressure from the clam cartel. My imported Belgian chocolates did not make it through customs due to trace amounts of cocaine in the praline. And after the strawberry debacle of 2010, we won't be going down the fresh fruit-dipped-in-stuff route again. So, this year I will be cooking an alternative Valentine's Day dinner for me and the missus. Steak, asparagus and garlic potato gratin. Now that's a sexy dish.