You know sometimes I get home from work and I really fancy some rich,
sticky comfort food... but I just haven't got the time. So I've come up with a recipe
that will give you all the comfort that you'll want, three great dishes,
all in under half an hour. I'm gonna do the most amazing sausage-style cassoulet, and
then to go with it I'm gonna do the most lovely steamed greens with a brilliant tomato dressing,
and then for dessert I've got a cheat pavlova with crushed raspberries and yoghurt.
Pans and trays are on, first job is the sausage cassoulet. Let's get some lovely smoked bacon,
you just need about four rashers. I'm gonna slice it up about a centimetre thick. So in a tray a
little bit of olive oil goes in, the four rashes of bacon. So I just want about one and a half
red onions. Bacon's just starting to get a bit of colour there. So I'm gonna slice up these onions.
Just roughly. I'm gonna use leeks as well. Take the bare ends off the stalk. Just get the leek,
carefully slice all the way down the length, gonna give that a wash.
Shake, okay. So I'm gonna turn this pan up to full whack now. Go in with the onions.
Got a lovely bay leaf, I've got thyme tips, don't even need to pick those, I've got sage leaves
just maybe tear them up a little bit, rosemary bit of rosemary in there. Look at the colours.
Try and slice the leeks reasonably thin, just clank through it. The leeks give you a
lovely sort of onion-y sweetness and silkiness. Coat that in all that lovely flavour and fat.
I just wanna put a swig of water in there, from the kettle.
Fill my pan up with water.
Season that water as well.
Put a lid on there. Okay that little swig of water in here will evaporate quickly, but in the time
it takes to evaporate which will be a few minutes it will really help soften those veggies quickly,
share the flavours quickly, and then it will start frying and caramelising again.
I'm using chipolatas, get quality ones from supermarket or butcher.
Right so get your sausages in there. There's about 400 grams of chipolatas in there,
and that'll be enough for about four people as well. Whack them in the oven.
Now I wanna do a crispy breadcrumb topping. So really all you need is about four or five slices
of bread. You know, about that much. Just add a little salt and pepper and a little olive oil.
Put a couple of bits of garlic in there don't even bother peeling them,
just throw 'em in. And also if you want to flavor with any other herbs
just grab some more of those herbs used in the base and just whack it in there as well.
Nice. Because you put the oil in it's all gonna go golden crisp. While this is all kind of snuggly
just ticking over I want to get the first bit of the dessert done. So first things first,
if you go into the supermarkets or even good bakers and delis, they have got pre-made pavlovas.
I'm gonna put four of them on a nice little board like this. The one thing I'm gonna do to sort of
invest in flavour, is if I just get a bowl and take most of those raspberries, save a few back
for decoration. Just put a little honey in there and then get a fork and just
mush up these raspberries. We just made like a homemade raspberry sauce. Get my yoghurt here.
Okay, and just put it in there, one or two really big tablespoons of yoghurt in there.
And then what I want to do is just marble this up okay, I want it sort of rippled. I'm just
gonna let that just sit there, that's ready to go and be assembled later on. Cassoulet if you look
in here I've just turned it down because I don't want it to run away with me, it's sizzling away.
To turn this into a proper dish what I want to do is grab some butter beans and some haricot beans,
I'm gonna put the beans and the juice into the tray. Haricot beans in there as well.
That moisture from the pack immediately starts to take off, see the sticky goodness here
on the bottom, you can literally scrape it off. I'm using some passata. You can absolutely use a
tin of chopped tomatoes, I'm gonna use about half, three quarters of a jar. I'm turning
it back up to full whack now so it starts to boil. So just a little bit of salt and pepper.
That's gonna come up to the boil. These have had about 15 minutes. What I wanna do now is
put half of the bread crumbs on top, almost like a little separator. Then get your sausages and just
sprinkle them in and around. And then, breadcrumbs on the top again. For flavour and for looks
really. I wanna get some more herbs on the top there. So I've got some lovely sage leaves here.
Just put a little olive oil in your hand and just move the herbs around - if you just put herbs dry
onto anything they'll be hideous. And you can see look it's boiling away nicely. Just gonna whack
that straight back into the oven to get golden and crisp, that'll be another five or so minutes.
The last thing I'm going to do is to make greens beautiful. So first things first i've got my onion
and just sort of grate it. That's all I want really, not quite all of that.
Garlic is the second thing, half a clove of garlic you don't need much garlic, squeeze it in there.
And here's the interesting thing I've got two nice ripe tomatoes here. Just cut them in half
and just squeeze the seeds out, and then what I do is I use this grater and I use the skin-side on my
hand, and I just grate. You sort of create this tomato slush. And that on greens is just amazing.
We have a nice pinch of salt going in, a little pinch of pepper. Gonna go extra virgin olive oil,
about three tablespoons. Juice of one or so lemons, have your fingers underneath to
catch any pips. This is such a clever way to make greens incredible. So broccoli goes in.
So full whack. So the broccoli needs just about three minutes,
now let's finish the dessert. We've got this pavlova now I want a combination that really
makes it sing. So I've got that lovely lemon curd, just put one heaped tablespoon in each one.
Then we've got this ripple. Take a nice wadge of it and then just gently put it on here.
Try and be gentle about it, you know you want to see all the ingredients and you know what as well,
we're going to have plenty of leftovers. And this raspberry and yogurt is brilliant for breakfast.
Then what's quite nice is just cut a raspberry up in half. Get yourself four nice sprigs of mint.
To look pretty but also to taste lovely. I'd be mad not to just get one of the little flowers
from these little thymes, you know, it is a good delicate flavor.
Get your honey, hold it from here, and when it starts to get really straggly just...
just do each one. So, a beautiful dessert done. And my broccoli here
has had just over three minutes so I've gotta be careful now.
Try and make a point of draining it and then just shake it in, and the steam and the heat will just
suck up all of that flavor. And dress it almost like a salad. Now that is what it's all about,
you know, so we've got beautiful greens done. And I know for a fact that this is done.
Have a look at that, absolutely lovely just blipping away there, you know the sausages
have stayed crispy, the sage here has just gone lovely and crispy as well that'll be good to eat,
and you've got the breadcrumbs which is lovely. It's got everything: crunch, flavour, stodge.
So there you go look at that! Comforting sausage cassoulet, those lovely summery greens, and that
lovely dessert. All of that in well under half an hour, who would not want to come home to that?