And the one where I Learn How To Do Things.
So. You start with your veg – I’ve used a couple of parsnips, two carrots, a large baking-type potato and a small waxy one, some swede, and an onion:
I peeled all the things that needed it
then I sliced them very finely, in this case using a mandolin slicer (with essential finger guard because I quite like having intact fingers) and put the slices into slightly acidulated water (i.e. with a squeeze of lemon juice in the water).
The next step was to crush 3 cloves of garlic with pestle and mortar, with a few salt crystals in there to assist with the crushing action. Then I added a little olive oil and some sunflower oil as well:
I built up a bunch of layers of the different vegetable slices, interspersing the layers with a few grinds of fresh black pepper, and a drizzle or two of garlicky oily goodness. Already smelled good, even before I was done with that bit.
And then I added some totally cheaty stock-cubey stock, with a few lovely gorgeous strands of utterly beautiful saffron, which should (I hope) infuse through the whole dish, put on a lid, and threw it in the oven.
While it was bubbling away (I checked it about every 20 mins, prodding it with a sharp implement to see if it was properly cooked 0 in the end it took about 45 minutes or so), i chopped some mushrooms and red romano pepper, and threw some quorn pieces (I’d rather have used chicken or salmon or something) into a pan with the last of the garlicky oil from the main dish:
When it came out of the oven, the layered veg dish looked pretty much like this:
And then I served it all up, adding a very plain salad of shredded iceberg lettuce with a homemade dressing – just olive oil, vinegar, mustard and seasoning.
Verdict:
Delicious, would have been better with some dairy something in there instead of quite so much stock, but I’ll use the stock as the basis of a soup later in the week. All the different root veg flavours were quite distinct, but without cream or something in there, the saffron disappeared. What a waste of good (bloody expensive) saffron! Next time, I’ll ignore the request to put in no dairy, and make it with creme fraiche and cheese. And a LOT more garlic, and black pepper. Still, not a complete disaster. Pretty easy, if a little time consuming with all the slicing and layering. Mind you, with the mandolin the slicing bit went by very fast compared with trying to do waffer-theen slices all on my own.
Followed up with pannetone and a nice commercial peach and passion-fruit yoghurt. NOMS.
foodporn 