Smokey BBQ pork tenderloin

This is an easy and quick dish to make for a tasty midweek dinner.

Smokey BBQ pork tenderloin served with an onion sauce and Nappa cabbage with pancetta

Hazelnut chocolate torte

Hazelnut is my favourite nut in desserts. I love the sweet and nutty taste of it and the crunch it lends to biscuits and cakes.

Last summer, ahead of a couple of friends visiting me to see my new-ish home, I made this hazelnut chocolate torte to go with teas.

Hazelnut chocolate torte

Flaugnarde aux poires et à la noix de coco (Pear and coconut flognarde)

To test out my newly aquired Pyrex flan dish, I made this coconut pear flaugnarde. 

Pear and coconut flognarde

Carne asada

I discovered that the butcher I usually go to carries flank steak a while ago. The price was appealing, so I picked up a slab and made carne asada with it.

Carne asada is a fairly simply dish to make. The trick for great flavour is to let the flank steak soak in the marinade for at least four hours and preferably overnight.

Carne asada with baby gems and sautéed potatoes

Peanut butter cake

This is a peanut butter cake I made by frosting a yellow cake with peanut butter cream cheese. I've written about the yellow cake, adapted from a wonderful recipe I found in Dr William Davis's 'Wheat Belly Cookbook'. 

Peanut butter cake

Coconut fenugreek curry with lamb meatballs

Inspired by a cooking presentation that a friend took me to a few weeks ago, I made this lamb meatball curry from scratch a few days later. 

Coconut fenugreek curry with lamb meatballs

Napa cabbage au gratin

Years ago, I asked Husband-then-Boyfriend to pick up a head of cabbage on the way home from work. I thought this would be fairly straightforward for an Irish lad. He came home with cabbage alright, but rather than the green or white variety that's commonly found in Ireland, he presented me with a head of napa cabbage. When I asked him how come he picked this 'exotic' variety, he said, rather logically, that he assumed I'd want it as I was Asian ...

So years later, whenever I see napa cabbage in the shops, I'm reminded of the incident and would enjoy an inner chuckle.

A few weeks ago, I picked up a beautiful head of napa cabbage and smokey cubed pancetta. For dinner, I made a dish that my mum used to make when I was a kid -- napa cabbage au gratin, complete with homemade, wheat-free Bechamel.

Napa cabbage au gratin

Nectarine salsa

For a light accompaniment to my pan-fried sea bass fillets and barbecued garlic chicken, I made a nectarine salsa with whatever was already available in my not-so-full fridge. So technically this is not a salsa in the strictest sense, but nonetheless refreshing and complemented the mains well.

Nectarine salsa

Caprese salad

I started growing basil out of a tin a few months ago. By the end of July, three stalks had sprouted and reached 20+ centimetres. A couple of stalks had also started to bloom. So last weekend, I pinched off the blooms, harvested the leaves, and pruned back the stalks. 

The leaves I harvested was more than enough for me to make two generous plates of caprese salad.

Caprese salad, with homegrown basil