I'm going to give you a recipe that I think will put a little bit of love
and excitement and colour into your weekly cook, it's gonna be a green rice dish, light and fluffy,
full of flavour and the good stuff, loads of spinach. And then we're gonna cook fish and I want
to give you a principle that you can use in your life in loads of different ways and you can get
really creative. First up a principle of cooking the perfect fluffy rice. A lot of people in the 25
years I've been doing TV and cooking have really struggled with sticky rice, overcooked rice,
rice that's not very nice. so if you get a regular builder's mug here, fill it with basmati rice,
and this will be enough for four people. Then grab the same mug, I'm just gonna do this to kind of
get you to visually understand what I'm trying to teach you here. This method of cooking rice
is what I call the absorption method. So what does that mean? It means that
in the time that this rice takes to cook it will absorb exactly twice its volume
in water and it will give you light fluffy rice. So, this rice will go into our pan.
I'm now gonna teach you how to turn regular fluffy rice into something extraordinary and exciting,
so I'm taking one bag that you get from the supermarket, 100 grams of washed spinach.
Put that into a liquidizer. Spinach, great, it could be Swiss chard, it could be kale,
pick any greens that you love, it could be herbs, if you're in a real rush it could just be like
frozen peas and bit of pesto, you know use your fantasy, just anything green. I'm gonna take a
herb, I'm gonna use coriander today, steal a few just for garnish later. Whole bunch goes in, whole
bunch. Now it could be mint it could be basil right, so use your fancy. Then I'm gonna take a
whole bunch of spring onions, take one for garnish later, whole bunch just goes in right, it could
not be easier. Then two cloves of garlic for that lovely perfume and gorgeousness, so easy right,
really easy, you could do this midweek no trouble at all. Then we're going to go in
with our water and we're gonna simply liquidize it, no dramas at all. So lid goes on, whizz it up.
Beautiful colours.
Easy right? We're gonna go over to our rice and we're gonna boil this for five minutes okay? Hard
and fast. Get that rice cooking. Season it with salt and pepper and that's gonna be beautiful.
Give it a little stir, look at that vivid green colour it's telling you that it's good for you.
Let's talk about fish, cod or haddock to start off with that's what's very common in
Britain but we should try and use some other fish. That is what I'd use for a portion,
you can cut it in half, this is for four people this dish, all happening in one pan. You can have
fun with it. I've got here some clams which is you know, fairly affordable. You only need
two or three and they give off the most amazing stocks. You can throw in some prawns if you want,
right? We've got a bit of squid. You're gonna cook something absolutely mind-blowing but I want you
to feel that you could do this for a dinner party and really do something flash. So look it's green,
it's bonkers, it's exciting and it's delicious. So we're about five minutes in, so I'll give
it one last little stir. Can you see how the rice is beautifully absorbing? Look at that!
Come on don't tell me that's not exciting. Now we go from high heat to a lower heat.
I'm gonna place, I've cut the fish so it's gonna cook more in kind of harmony with the prawns,
you don't want to have that cooked and that overcooked, we want a harmony right. So if
you're ever worried you can just cut the fish in half a little bit to let the fish in. So just use
your common sense, okay. Lay the fish in - look at the colour! The rice being half cooked creates the
perfect trivet for the fish, kind of lay it out like a portion right because you're gonna, and you
can kind of snug it in there. Lay the prawn over the top. I put the clams right in to the rice.
Why? Because they're going to release the most amazing stock, delicious. The squid is delicate,
I'm just gonna pop that on top. The legs are less delicate so you can put them in the rice,
and then all you have to do now is season, tiny bit of pepper, and then just a kiss of olive oil.
Now, the lid goes on, we've turned it down, about seven minutes, no more. So to go with this,
I love rice with yoghurt, I just don't know why it works really like the kind of comforting
moreish flavours with the tangy and the kind of fresh and the cold, love it. So let me show you
the easiest way to kind of bring to life standard yoghurt. I'm using a Greek yogurt by the way,
I'm gonna have like four tablespoons of yogurt there. Another little ingredient that I love is
harissa, fresh cold, hot and fragrant, you take a little bit of this,
two teaspoons let's say, and I'm just gonna ripple it look at that, and that will be a wicked thing.
A little drizzle of olive oil and that's just joyful. That, lolloped on your plate, it's
gonna be amazing! So, let's just talk finishing the dish, like that's it. Minus the talking,
that's the easiest prep. Lemons. Just cut them into little quarters.
I've got some leaves of coriander here, quite nice just to have that as a little sprinkle. And
I saved back one spring onion, again as a little sprinkle so this is - look you can call it garnish
it's not, I mean it is a garnish, but I think for me garnish is also about you've got the cooked
spring onions and coriander in that lovely green sauce, if you want to put a little bit
of fresh chili in as well. So this has had just under seven minutes okay, so the heat goes off.
Come and have a look, it is gonna be delicious! The rice is cooked, the fish is pearly white
and gorgeous, I think that is a celebration of the sea. Now what I would do is sprinkle it with
the spring onions and that little bit of chili
and a little bit of the coriander leaves, just to tell the story but for texture as well. Go over
with some lemon like this, come on, you know this makes sense right? So this all goes to the table.
What a lovely thing imagine taking that to the table, I think this is a gift of a recipe.
Maybe a tiny kiss of olive oil. So let's just plate up a portion and then you can kind of
bear me tasting it and telling you, like I know it's gonna be good, but I'm gonna
do it just for you because I'm a professional. Yoghurt and harissa. Okay, so bearing in mind
I haven't even put all of my portion in there, look at that. That my friends is an exciting,
easy, modern contemporary plate of food. Right I'm gonna go rice first be cause I've got an urge.
Oh! Now if that doesn't get you excited about fish, I don't know what will. Take care