Tag: BFree

Huevos Rancheros – Mexican Breakfast Eggs

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Although I can’t drink, eat, cleanse or exfoliate in anything containing milk, thankfully for me (for the time being and hopefully forever, please God, *praying hands), I can still eat eggs in moderation. A fantastic feat for someone like me, who, until time began would literally crack an egg over anything needing sprucing up. Whether it’s egg and soldiers, scrambled egg on toast, egg on a curry (don’t knock it until you’ve tried it) or the humble boiled egg sliced over a summer salad, I’m a big fan of the yellow and white stuff. So much so, I have an actual egg supplier in the countryside who supplies the freshest, most yellow eggs you could ever lay eyes upon.

Weekends for me are all about the egg – have I said the word ‘egg’ enough yet? On the whole, I pretty much plan my Saturday and Sunday all around an epic breakfast, containing none over than the King of the breakfast materials – the egg. For some reason a few weeks ago, I woke up with the most agonising hunger pang I’d experienced in a good week (I’m always hungry if you hadn’t noticed already) and felt an overwhelming need to rustle up something a bit more special than my usual scrambled concoction. After roaming through my cupboards, I stumbled upon a nice tin of tomatoes, sugar and a delicious crusty cob from BFree. Suddenly my mind catapulted back to a recipe I used to throw together many moons ago called Huevos Rancheros, AKA, Mexican breakfast eggs. This dish is extremely easy to make and uses up the store cupboard essentials you usually have lying around – all you need on the side is a warm, crusty cob smothered in butter to mop up the sweet and spicy juices.

Ingredients

  • 2 eggs
  • 400ml tin chopped tomatoes
  • Tsp sugar
  • Tsp oregano
  • 1 red onion
  • 1 red pepper
  • 1 tsp Bull’s Eye New York Steakhouse Sauce (optional)
  • Salt & pepper
  • Knob of butter (I use Pure Free From sunflower spread)
  • Sprinkling chilli flakes
  • 1 garlic clove
  • Violife cheese

 

Method

  • Pre-heat the oven to 190C.
  • Chop the onion and garlic clove. Grate two slices of cheese in preparation.
  • Heat a knob of butter in a saucepan, add the red onion and red pepper and cook until soft.
  • Add the garlic and fry until golden. Pour in the tin of tomatoes and tsp of oregano and stir well.
  • Season with salt and pepper. Add a sprinkling of chilli flakes to taste and a tsp of sugar.
  • Add a drizzle of the steakhouse sauce and stir.
  • Leave to simmer for 5-8 minutes.
  • Transfer the sauce into an oven proof dish and make two hollows in the sauce.
  • Crack the two eggs into each hollow.
  • Sprinkle over the grated cheese and then bake in the oven for 20-25 minutes until the eggs are cooked.
  • Warm a baguette up in the oven (usually for around 5-7 minutes according to pack instructions) and smother with butter.
  • Serve straight out of the ovenproof dish or in a bowl.

Fish Friday: Mussels in a creamy paprika sauce with wine & shallots

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Easter 2019 marked the third year of mine and my Dad’s ‘mussels and vino’ cook-off. It all started one Good Friday, when of course the long-held tradition is to avoid meat in favour of fish. Sure, battered cod and chips was our common go-to dish for years, but with our new love of mussels and red wine, we decided to make this a yearly tradition.

I have to admit that I’d never ordered anything at a fish mongers until a couple of years ago. I somewhat anxiously headed to the stall at Morrisons unsure of what ‘weights’ I had to specify in order to get a bowl full of mussels that were enough for two people. I was pretty impressed when I came away with a net full at only £3 something.

Our first attempt at cooking a mussel dish went well. We’d copied a recipe that we’d had only a few months prior at a pub, containing bacon, onion and a white wine sauce. This year though, me and my Dad whipped up a bowl full of meaty mussels with a delicious creamy sauce, in what we described as a ‘best ever,’ AKA, in our family that means we’ve hit the next level in the cooking delicious meals category.

If I’m honest, I completely made this recipe up based on a photo I’d seen on Instagram of something similar, but boy was it good! Like me, you have to keep sampling the sauce and adding more ingredients to suit your own taste buds. Whatever you do, make sure you have a nice crusty cob to mop up the sauce and a large glass of vino to wash it down with. Bon Appétit!

 

Ingredients

  • 5 shallots
  • 3 garlic cloves
  • Alpro soya cream
  • Paprika
  • Hot chilli powder
  • White wine
  • Salt & pepper
  • Crusty baguette (I used the BFree Demi Baguette)
  • Dairy free butter

 

Method

  • Chop the shallots into quarters and peel the garlic cloves
  • Melt a good dollop of butter in the pan and add the shallots. Fry until soft and golden
  • Add a generous sprinkle of paprika and stir
  • Press the garlic cloves into the mix and stir
  • Add a good glug of white wine and stir
  • Add three quarters of the soya cream to the pan and mix in
  • Add more paprika until the sauce turns a golden colour
  • Add a touch of chilli powder if needed. Add more wine to taste

Gourmet Burger Kitchen’s gluten free menu

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Let’s be honest here, any person out there with a wheat intolerance or Coeliac’s would probably admit to really craving a burger every now and then, especially after being out on the town all night. Horrible as it may seem, a great big greasy beef burger is probably one of the only things giving you the strength to not pass out in the middle of a pavement at 5am as you stumble back from the clubs (never happened to me *cough cough*)

However, as free from foods have expanded, so have our options to eat out at restaurants catering in what we would always have considered ‘no-go’ areas, i.e. Gourmet Burger Kitchen

Since finding out that BFree, one of my favourite gluten free companies on the market, was supplying its cobs to this nationwide burger chain, I had to go along to my local restaurant to find out what all the fuss was about. I am proud to say I did so by ordering the biggest burger on the gluten free menu – The Mighty.

Consisting of not one but two juicy beef burgers cooked to my liking of medium rare, served with crispy bacon and omitting the cheddar cheese and mayo as I am also dairy free, my feast looked like a postcard picture of what the advertising campaign for McDonald’s burgers looks like. Although fortunately for me, this burger did not disappoint in flavour as a McDonald’s burger would.

The one problem I did have was luckily through no fault of the restaurant. I had the unfortunate task of trying to keep the BFree bap and burger partnered together throughout the duration of my scoffing. I guess you have to prepare yourself for the setbacks when you decide to be a greedy guts and order two burgers on a bap which is only designed to structurally support one. Yes the bread did disintegrate a little as I was eating due to the pure weight of the burger, but the normal cob that my friend was eating also did the same, so I can’t entirely blame the crumbly consistency solely on it being gluten free.

Sadly, I couldn’t sample the chips as they weren’t gluten free and I have to admit it would have been nice if they could have been included within the price of the burger that my friend ordered, as the meal was quite expensive for just a burger alone.

The other major plus point about Gourmet Burger Kitchen is that they sell Celia organic and gluten free beer. Personally I miss being able to drink a nice cold beer when dining out and I think this adds to the attraction of the restaurant.

I do believe there are improvements to be made – most notably I think chips or salad should be included as a free side dish, and I was not particularly pleased about being charged for the salsa sauce that I ordered as a condiment.

Also, I ordered the priciest option but looking at the other diners burgers, I think that they are relatively small when taking into consideration the price. Maybe I am judging based on my experience of American portion sizes, but in my opinion I just believe that if you are a restaurant solely specialising in burgers, they should have that ‘wow’ factor when they arrive at your table.

Overall though, I had a relatively good experience of this restaurant and would recommend to any gluten free person out there wanting a burger restaurant. Controversial maybe, but I think that Gourmet Burger Kitchen is the burger equivalent of Nando’s, you’ll either love it or hate it.