The Recycled Cook

The Recycled Cook Mushrooms on Toast (with a twist) A nice healthy vegetarian breakfast blog today (well healthyish), taking that old favourite, mushrooms on toast and giving it a bit of a twist. As with all of my recipes there are no formal rules or rigid quantities as much of it is down to what you happen to have in your fridge and your own creativity.  I used a mixture of Browncap and Field mushrooms but any variety that takes your fancy will work just as well. For me the best tasting are wild mushrooms and sometimes I will go and forage for them but it is not something you should do unless you are very familiar with picking them. I learnt by going out with experts but will still rely heavily on some very good reference books, even with them I take the view that if I am not certain of the variety I will leave it alone. My advice is do not pick your own unless you are either with someone who knows what they are doing or you take the trouble to learn thoroughly, gettin...

The Recycled Cook By Adrian Sleeman Lentils and sausage In the spirit of recycled cooking, today I am revisiting a previous blog of mine, Lentils  that great alternative and versatile staple much loved by health food shops and Indian restaurants. While trying to find something to make for dinner yesterday I remembered that I had two lots of leftover lentils in the freezer, along with a tomato based sauce that had once accompanied a pasta dish. Be creative and see what else you could add to change the character of the original dish. Before I froze the sauce I pushed it through a conical sieve (also known as a Chinois because of its resemblance to a traditional Chinese hat). Lentils and Tomato sauce Chinois Just combine the sauce with the lentils, heat through and reduce until it reaches the desired consistency. Taste and adjust the seasoning, in this case I added a little  Pimenton  (smoked paprika) and some coarse ground black pepper. Be careful w...

The Recycled Cook By Adrian Sleeman Recycling food, a way of life Having had a break from writing this blog I have had time to look at the whole concept of recycling food in a new light. When I first started to write this blog it was based on the notion that past generations had always tried not to waste anything in the kitchen. Not only that but they seemed to be able to extract more flavour from simple foods. They didn't do it because they felt it was socially responsible or politically correct they did it because they had very little choice and could not afford to waste anything.  When I first started thinking about the whole idea of recycling food it was based on the nostalgia of remembering how good food used to taste when we were children growing up in Wales. Mostly, after the initial introduction to the idea of recycling I posted recipes for meals based on what I had available at the time. What I have now come to realise and will hopefully be reflected in where ...