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

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

Baked Mediterranean salmon

Dinner on 15 January 2016 was a darn of baked Mediterranean salmon, half of a spicy roasted whole cauliflower, and peppers stuffed with cheese.

Seafood porcini risotto

Seafood porcini risotto

Aubergine lamb rolls with tzatziki

We were on holiday in Abu Dhabi for 10 days in late June. The hotel was lovely and the food wonderful, fresh and very high quality. After returning home, I wasn't in any mood to cook, so we lived on shuǐjiǎo (boiled dumplings) for a few days. Even though they were tasty, the wheat used to make the pastry didn't agree with me (I don't need to say more...).

When I finally put in an order for grocery, I decided to extend the holiday feel a bit and make tzatziki, something that was available at breakfast and dinner in the hotel, to go with lamb. And the resulting dish was grilled aubergine rolls stuffed with lamb and feta, drizzled with tzatziki. 

Grilled aubergine lamb rolls with tzatziki

Trio of pepper torta

Wanting something vegetarian for dinner tonight and to use up the bell peppers that had been sitting in the fridge for a few days, I made a trio of pepper torta (like the Spanish tortilla but sans the patatas).

Slice of trio of pepper torta

Baked vanilla cheesecake with chestnut biscuit base

Having attempted pie/cake bases with almond flour and coconut flour, I decided to experiment with chestnut flour to make a base for a cheesecake.

I bought a bag (500g) of ground chestnut flour at Fallon & Byrne a while ago thinking that it would make for a good wheat-free substitute. I didn't realise that chestnut flour was high in carbohydrate content, making it an unacceptable safe flour according to Dr Davis of Wheat Belly fame. But I hate wasting food, so after a couple of months of letting the bag sit in the cupboard, I went ahead. Because of the use of chestnut flour, this cheesecake is strictly an occasional treat.

Baked vanilla cheesecake with chestnut biscuit base

Baked cheesecake with almond biscuit base

Baked cheesecake was a firm favourite of mine till I went wheatless. I hadn't tried baking any cake/pie base/crust using nut flours as I wasn't entirely sure how it would work out. After making several batches of chocolate chip cookies using almond flour with great success, I felt confident enough to give making a wheatless cheesecake base a go. So this experiment is really about the base.

Cheesy herb biscuits

Following the success of my first batch of cheesy biscuits, I made more with a bit less salt, different and more cheeses, and additional herbs.