Jamie Oliver's 30 Minute Meals - Tapas Feast

The lack of update to the blog this weekend can be explained by what I chose to do with my weekend off – fit a new bathroom suite. All went well (other than my missing tiles, damn you B&Q!) but unfortunately this left me with little time for cooking.

Luckily, I took Monday and Tuesday off work to recuperate, and decided that, on Tuesday, I would be cooking an adventurous meal of Tapas. This coincided with the broadcast of the Tapas Feast episode of Jamie’s 30 Minute Meals on Channel 4, so I was able to settle down and watch Jamie cook before attempting the feast myself.

The feast comprises of a Spanish Tortilla, Glazed Chorizo, Rolled Anchovies, Stuffed Peppers, and Manchego Cheese with Cooked Meats. I was a bit more worried about this one; I think it was because of the large number of dishes. We took a trip into York, mainly to get the meat. Unfortunately, Henshelwood’s were not able to help, stocking… I can’t remember what it was exactly, but it was £4.95 for 100g. Looked great, but no thanks! We went to the Hairy Fig next where we settled on Serrano Ham. I also bought a few French soft drinks. I’ve developed a real taste for French style traditional soft drinks lately. Taste test to come at some point when I can get a tasting partner (the Mrs won’t drink fizzies!).

So when we got home, I turned the telly on to see how Jamie did it. Looked dead easy to be honest! All I had to do was half the ingredients as I was cooking for two… I know, lets do the pomegranate drink from another menu as well!

I then read the recipe book, and it instantly hit me that some things in the TV show were missing from the written recipe. In the TV show, Jamie puts oil in the pepper stuffing mixture; this is not mentioned in the book. Jamie also made a point of using the flower heads from the thyme; no mention of this in the book.

Nevermind, time to get started. The recipe specifies baby new potatoes for the Tortilla, but I used large new potatoes. They were much better value and I couldn’t see the taste difference being massive once chopped up and fried. I chopped the potato and added to the hot oil, tossing the potatoes just like Jamie did… man, I should be on TV! Onion was added, followed by fennel seeds five minutes later when I realised I had forgot to add them… A sign of things to come?

Then I moved onto the Chorizo. I was using the wok, as I wanted to use our small frying pan for the tortilla, as it was serving two. Straight in, keep tossing the Chorizo with the potatoes. I was surprised by how little oil came off the sausage, but this didn’t seem to present any problems.

On to the Stuffed Peppers. It was the first time I had cooked with chargrilled jarred peppers. Apart from being difficult to get out of the jar they were pretty easy to cook with. I also managed to tear one of them. The stuffing was pretty difficult to knock up with my hand blender to be honest. I think I should have added the ingredients gradually. Anyway, with a lot of shaking and tipping upside down the stuffing was finally made, although the motor of the blender was very hot by the time I was done! I opted to follow TV Jamie and add oil to the stuffing. The peppers were stuffed full like banker’s pockets, drizzled with olive oil and whacked under the grill.

Time to do the cheese board. This one was dead easy to be honest, and makes an easy target for people saying that half Jamie’s dishes are not real cooking. However, while watching TV Jamie prepare the dish, I was struck by the techniques that Jamie was trying to pass on – the laying of the meat for preparation, and the use of honey and coffee with the cheese (this worked really well by the way!).

Cheese done, and garlic added to the chorizo, and to the tortilla along with seasoning and rosemary. Then I added honey and red wine vinegar to the chorizo. The smell was divine – the sausage was really starting to look great. Until disaster struck.

Feeling confident, I was starting to coast a little. And royally cocked up by cracking an egg into the chorizo pan rather than the Tortilla! NOOOOOO!!! I rescued the situation by spooning the sausage away and letting the egg cook slightly to let it take shape. The sausage was then transferred out of the wok into a griddle pan, but I fear that a lot of the glaze was lost to the egg.

This also really threw my timing out, so I started cracking eggs into the Tortilla pan to get that cooking. Unbelivably, the peppers were not quite cooked! The Tortilla stayed on the hob until the peppers were finally ready to come out, and the Tortilla got put under the grill. OK, so the cheese and peppers were now finished. The Chorizo was about down, and was put in a dish and then put to one side. The Mrs took control of the pomegranate drink. All I had to do was give the fruit a good squeeze to make sure we got all the juice.

While the Tortilla was cooking, I started on the Anchovies. I didn’t have any cocktail sticks so served the anchovies out with tomatoes (this was only the second time I had tasted Anchovies, the first being the previous Sunday in a supermarket restaurant. I did fear them, I’m now a great fan!). I had been forced to pre-grate the lemon as the Mrs needed half of it for the pomegranate. It was very difficult to spread over the fish, and ended up, not so much lemon zest but a few dollops of yellow. Any subtle lemon flavouring was undoubtedly lost. Anyway, the anchovy fillets were garnished with Parsley, and put to one side. Another dish done!

Finally, all I had to do was wait for the Tortilla to take a full colour under the grill. This done, I added half a packet of rocket, squeezed lemon over the top… and served!

So, how was it? Well, first things first – this was not a 30 minute meal. I ended on 42 minutes. This can partly be explained the Chorizo vs egg incident, but there are still some extra minutes on there. I just don’t think our grill gives a decent performance.

And the taste? Mistakes on my part aside, pretty good! I was very proud of cooking so many items, for the first time. The Chorizo in particular was excellent, and this is something that I will be doing again. I wouldn’t say the same about the Tortilla. The Mrs said it was great but I wasn’t so bothered. It just seemed a bit… bland.

Another success for 30 minute meals… 2 out of 3 ain’t bad! 

Jamie Oliver's 30 Minute Meals @ Amazon.co.uk

Jamie Oliver's Tapas Feast recipes @ Jamieoliver.com

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