Hello lovelies! We first had this recipe last week when I was so tired after work. Working in retail in the holiday season is no joke, but especially during a pandemic--all that extra work of wiping stuff down and keeping track of numbers of customers makes for a very tired Spidergrrl. Now as the virus has mutated, I am suddenly off work as nonessential shops are closed. I am still quite tired so it is great to have something quick and easy and delicious in my pocket.
I saw THIS RECIPE on the BBC website recently--it was a Nigella Lawson recipe so I wasn't holding out much hope. But I was pleasantly shocked that at the bottom she listed a way to make it vegan.
Her recipe called for
Spaghetti--yep
Garlic--yep
Water from a just boiled kettle--yep
Chili flakes--yep
Parmesan cheese--no problem, use a vegan substitute
3 TB olive oil--no problem, use some vegetable stock
Chard--no problem, substitute my old favourite kale
8 anchovy fillets--nope! But these were there to give a punch of umami flavour so I knew I could substitute something. Can't remember what umami is? Click {HERE} to refresh yourself.
It sounded fast and it sounded delicious--and it was on both counts. This will definitely be added to the rotation. To substitute for the umami of the anchovies I used mushrooms cooked in tamari/soy sauce and a bit of yeast extract (Like Marmite...but the Tesco brand one which is gluten free.)
Umami Spaghetti
1 white onion, diced very small
6 cloves crushed garlic
100g button mushrooms, diced small
2.5 TB tamari or soy sauce, divided
3/4 tsp yeast extract, divided
1/4 cup vegetable stock
1/2 tsp red chilli flakes
100g kale, destemmed and torn into bits
200g dried (GF) spaghetti
2 TB parmesan cheese (and more for serving) like Good Karma or make your own (see recipe below)
1. Fill your kettle. Fill your pasta pot with 1/2 cup water.
2. In a larger pot, cook your onion and mushrooms in the vegetable stock until it is softened and most of the liquid is gone. Add the garlic, chilli flakes and 1 TB of tamari/soy sauce and 1/2 tsp yeast extract. Stir to coat.
3. Start your pasta pot water on high and boil your kettle. Add your boiling water to the pasta pot and put the lid on and in a minute you will have a pot of boiling water. Add your pasta and set the timer for whatever the recommended cooking time is (mine is 8 minutes). Stir for a few minutes until the pasta releases some starch and turns cloudy. Scoop 1/2 cup of that starchy water and put it in with the umami mushrooms and add the kale and turn up the heat to medium. Keep stirring the kale in the starchy water until it wilts and reduces.
4. Before you drain your spaghetti, scoop out another half a cup pasta water. Drain your pasta and put it in with the greens and umami mushrooms. Add the additional 1.5 TB tamari/soy sauce and an additional 1/4 tsp yeast extract.
5. Add a TB or two of the saved pasta water if it seems claggy and doesn't stir well.
6. Stir in 2 TB parmesan cheese. Use additional parmesan to taste.
That's it. This was crazy delicious, full of flavour, filling and done in under 30 minutes.
Hello lovelies! I cannot believe I have never blogged this recipe. It is my special holiday recipe. We eat it every year on my birthday and Christmas eve. I am not sure why we don't eat it more to be honest. Every time I eat it, it just feels like a warm soupy hug.
It is easy to make and just feels special. It became our go-to holiday soup from the first year we were married because it reminded us of England because we ate it at the Café in the Crypt at Saint Martin in the Fields church on the day we got engaged in 1990. Maybe it was also the leeks. Which now also remind us of Wales as leeks are part of the national emblem of Cymru. We used the soup as a sort of talisman to help us get back to the UK and here we are, so it must have worked.
In the US it was much harder to find leeks (this was nearly 30 years ago, times may have changed) but we had to go out to Albertsons to buy them as I recall.
This recipe makes 4 big bowls of soup. Also, I don't normally cook with vegan butter, but I like the leeks cooked in a TB of melted vegan butter, but it is not a necessity.
Leek and Potato Soup
1 TB vegan butter (or a splash of water)
2 large or 3 smaller leeks (the white parts only...not the thick green leafy bits at the top)
garlic
500g potatoes, diced
3.5 cups vegetable stock
splash of tamari or soy sauce
1 tsp yeast extract like marmite
1 tsp mixed herbs
1/2 cup unsweetened plant based milk
black pepper to taste
1. Melt your butter or heat your splash of water in a big pot. Cut the root end off your leek and slice lengthwise. Check for dirt. leeks love to hide dirt in the crevices. Then slice your leek into lots of pieces (they will be a sort of C shape) and throw them in with melted butter. It will look like a lot of leeks but they will cook down. When they have softened and reduced a bit throw in some garlic.
2. Add in your diced potatoes, tamari or soy sauce and yeast extract and stir to coat. Add your vegetable stock and mixed herbs and bring to the boil. Reduce heat and simmer with the lid on for 25 minutes.
3. Remove from heat and add your milk then using an immersion blender puree until as smooth as you like--we like it smooth with some whole chunks in there, but you could make it completely smooth.
4. Check to see if it is warm enough (does it need a little more heating since it has been off the hob for a few minutes?) and top with black pepper.
This is delicious and simple to make. It tastes like your dreams coming true (if your dream was to someday emigrate to the UK.)
Hello and welcome to Fairy Tale Friday. Are you sitting comfortably? Good. Then I'll begin.
Today marks the last of the Fairy Tale Friday explorations of Snow White. I have been writing about versions of this tale since the 3rd of April 2020 and now the time has come to wind it down. Thank you for coming with me on this journey (as well as Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood and Murder Ballads before this.)
I will leave you with a funny video in the Key of Kristin. Here is Kristin Key who summarises everything that is wrong with Snow White set to a jaunty tune.
Thank you again for coming with me as we explore fairy tales. My life has gotten really busy with some other writing I am doing (I am working on some short story bundles to sell as well as my next novel) and so I am going to let Fairy Tale Friday rest for a bit to catch up on other creative endeavours. But I am sure in 2021 I will come back to explore another fairy tale--possibly Sleeping Beauty.
Hello and welcome to Fairy Tale Friday. Are you
sitting comfortably? Good. Then I’ll begin.
We are to the end of our Fairy Tale Friday look at
Snow White. Today we will look at the 1937 Disney film. Chronologically, it
should have come earlier, but I wanted to save it for last due to its
significance. For many of you, this film was the gateway to a Disney obsession.
While I can agree it was visually spectacular (and it truly is—when you think
of all those choppy/jerky Betty Boop cartoons, they were only a few years
before this) I have never liked the passivity of the heroine waiting (and doing
nothing but housework and sighing) until her Prince comes.
The following information all comes courtesy of
Wikipedia:
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs was to be the
first full-length cel animated feature in motion picture
history. His brother and wife tried to talk Walt out of it. He had to mortgage
his house to help finance the film's production, which eventually ran up a
total cost of $1,488,422.74, a massive sum for a feature film in 1937. But it
clearly was worth it as it was a massive success.
The film itself was released in Los Angeles in 1937,
followed by a nationwide release on February 4, 1938. This was one year
before The Wizard of Oz. Some interesting Oz trivia: The voice of Snow
White Adriana Caselotti had an uncredited role in The Wizard of Oz. She
provided the voice of Juliet during the Tin Man's song, "If I Only Had a
Heart", speaking the line, "Wherefore art thou Romeo?" More
Oz trivia: (because I will shoehorn Oz into any conversion) the slinky
wicked queen in her cowl and crown was an early costume design for the witch in
Oz based on the success of Snow White. Gale Sondergaard did a screentest as a
slinky sexy witch but opted out when they decided to make her ugly.
It was nominated for Best Musical Score at
the Academy Awards in 1938, and the following year, Walt
Disney was awarded an honorary Oscar for the film. This award was
unique, consisting of one normal-sized, plus seven miniature Oscar statuettes.
In 1989, the United States Library of Congress deemed the film
"culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" and selected
it as one of the first 25 films for preservation in the National Film
Registry. Whether I like it or not, it is a game changer.
Another bit of interesting trivia: The
dwarfs’ names were chosen from a pool of about fifty potentials, including
Jumpy, Deafy, Dizzey, Hickey, Wheezy, Baldy, Gabby, Nifty, Sniffy, Swift, Lazy,
Puffy, Stuffy, Tubby, Shorty, and Burpy.
Below is a summery courtesy of Wiki. I will insert
comments and video clips into it.
Snow White is a lonely princess
living with her stepmother, a vain Queen. The Queen worries that Snow White will
be more beautiful than her, so she forces Snow White to work as a scullery
maid and asks her Magic Mirror daily "who is the
fairest one of all." For years the mirror always answers that the Queen
is, pleasing her. Note:I
admit I did not re-watch this one in its entirety, but I have no memory as to where her father
is meant to be. I presume dead. The film opens with an illuminated manuscript
which basically says exactly what Wiki does above but mentions her father not
at all.
One day, the Magic Mirror informs the
Queen that Snow White is now "the fairest" in the land; on that same
day, Snow White meets and falls in love with a prince who overhears her
singing. Note: I do remember being
in awe of the mirror but think Snow White herself was a bit of a drip.
Watch the Magic Mirror scene here:
Here we also see Snow White in her very ragged dress (well done) and a pair of rough wooden clogs that don't make a clip clop noise which annoyed me. She is so good and sickly sweet it made me feel like I might go into a diabetic coma. Also all those pigeons would be crapping all over her wishing well if this was real. She does seem to have quite a lot of lippy on but then so does the Prince.
The jealous Queen orders her Huntsman to take Snow White into the
forest and kill her. She further demands that the huntsman return with Snow
White's heart in a jewelled box as proof of the deed. However, the Huntsman
cannot bring himself to kill Snow White. He tearfully begs for her forgiveness, revealing the Queen wants her dead and urges her to flee into the woods and never look back. Note: I liked that the Queen presented the Huntsman with a box with a heart with a dagger through it for a lock that she must have either just had laying about as a sinister object or had it specially made for just such an occasion as this.
It
is nice to see the Huntsman’s reluctance. Several films, he is in cahoots with
the Queen (or under her spell sexually) It does feel very sinister seeing the sunlight glint off his knife and his
shadow fall over her as he creeps up to kill her. The lost in the woods scene
also made an impression on me as a child. I found it very frightening and
disconcerting.
Watch it here:
What I noticed from re-watching this scene is that she has changed clothes. She has been a scullery maid in literal rags with wooden clodhoppers on her feet but a moment ago, but to go out and pick flowers in the woods she gets spiffed up in the dress we think of as a Snow White dress (no holes) and heeled shoes (no clogs). That makes no sense.
Lost and frightened, the princess is befriended by woodland creatures who lead her to a cottage deep in the woods. Finding seven small chairs in the cottage's dining room, Snow White assumes the cottage is the untidy home of seven orphaned children. Actually, the cottage belongs to seven
adult dwarfs—named Doc, Grumpy, Happy, Sleepy, Bashful,
Sneezy, and Dopey—who work in a nearby mine.
Note: Here we have the famous Heigh-Ho song. Many years ago
we had a cassette of weird and wonderful cover versions of Disney Songs and
there was a great, gritty cover of the Heigh-Ho song by Tom Waits. (would you
expect anything less?) Listen to it below:
Returning home, they are alarmed to find their
cottage clean and suspect that an intruder has invaded their home. The dwarfs
find Snow White upstairs, asleep across three of their beds. Snow White awakens
to find the dwarfs at her bedside and introduces herself, and all of the dwarfs
eventually welcome her into their home after she offers to clean and cook for
them. Snow White keeps house for the dwarfs while they mine for jewels during
the day, and at night they all sing, play music, and dance.
Note: I know cooking and cleaning are important, but why
does it all fall to her? Their house was a mess when she arrived and then they
happily go on being lazy now that they had a dolly bird to pick up after them.
Even as a child I felt like she aught to make them do their share of the work
since they lived there too. Also as a child you think "wouldn't it be great to have woodland animals help you do your chore," but as you get older all you think is, "that is so unsanitary."
Watch Whistle While You Work here:
Meanwhile, the Queen discovers Snow White
is alive when the mirror again answers that Snow White is the fairest in the
land and reveals that the heart in the box is that of a pig. Using a potion to
disguise herself as an old hag, the Queen creates a poisoned apple that will put whoever
eats it into the "Sleeping Death," a curse she learns can only be
broken by "love's first kiss," but is certain Snow White will be
buried alive. Note: I find this scene genuinely
scary, even now. I have seen many transformation scenes, but this is one of the
best. I love the way the spell was cast--both with witchy stuff and science (she has a whole chemistry lab in her lair). I love the bit in the transformation where her hands grow old and a flash of lightning reveals the bones inside for a brief moment. Also, the way lightning makes the potion go from still to sparkling made me laugh.
Watch (and shudder) here:
While the Queen goes to the cottage while
the dwarfs are away, the animals are wary of her and rush off to find the
dwarfs. Faking a potential heart attack, the Queen tricks Snow White into
bringing her into the cottage to rest. The Queen fools Snow White into biting
into the poisoned apple under the pretence that it is a magic apple that grants
wishes. As Snow White falls asleep, the Queen proclaims that she is now the
fairest of the land. Note: Trust the animals. They can see through her disguise and try to peck her death in a scene reminiscent of Alfred Hitchcock. The thing that made me laugh out loud though, was in between all the fuzzy forest creatures there were a pair of vultures sitting in a tree. Then the old hag pulls a Sanford and Son, and clutches her chest and fakes a heart attack. Snow White is so gullible here and simple-minded, it makes my head hurt. The old hag is clearly using her evil voice in between bouts of her old helpless lady voice, but our heroine does not pick up on those subtle clues.
Watch the poison apple bit here:
The dwarfs return with the animals as the Queen leaves the
cottage and give chase, trapping her on a cliff. She tries to roll a boulder
over them, but lightning strikes the cliff before she can do so, causing her to
fall to her death. Note: Though
I am all for restorative justice in my real life, I find I really like a sense
of punishment and justice in my fairy tales. This is a great “gets what is
coming to her” ending. The vultures are here again and she runs away, gets trapped on a conveniently place cliff top situated in running distance of the forest, and tries to use leverage to release a boulder down on the dwarfs below. Instead, lightning cracks her cliff and she falls into the abyss with the boulder falling on her instead like Wile E Coyote.
The dwarfs return to their cottage and
find Snow White seemingly dead, being kept in a deathlike slumber by the
poison. Unwilling to bury her out of sight in the ground, they instead place
her in a glass coffin trimmed with gold in a clearing in the forest. Together
with the woodland creatures, they keep watch over her. A year later, the prince
learns of her eternal sleep and visits her coffin. Saddened by her apparent
death, he kisses her, which breaks the spell and awakens her. The dwarfs and
animals all rejoice as the Prince takes Snow White to his castle.
Watch the ending here:
That is the last of the Snow Whites. However, I will
treat you next week to one last Snow White. A hilarious comedy song I stumbled
across whilst writing this last post. Stay tuned next week for death by fruit.
Hello lovelies! Times are busy and I am tired (Working retail is no joke in the run up to Christmas!) so I wanted a meal that I could do without a recipe to follow--one I knew how to do all the parts off by heart. Plus one that didn't require extra shopping.
We had 2 sweet potatoes and a red onion--I knew how to roast those in the oven.
We had kale--I knew how to sauté it with a splash of tamari/soy sauce.
I had just made cheese power using THIS RECIPE and so we could have Macaroni Cheese. This sauce is great--you make ahead so always have cheese powder ready for action. The ratio is 1/3 cup powder to 1 cup milk per person (also 1 cup pasta per person, but sometimes we just make it as a cheese sauce for nachos)
Dinner is sorted.
Roasted Sweet Potato with Macaroni Cheese and Savoury Kale
1 large or 2 smaller sweet potatoes (about 400 grams), cubed
1 red onion, cut into large chunks
1 TB olive oil
100g kale (3 big handfuls)
splash tamari or soy sauce
2 cups macaroni (or other) pasta--use GF pasta if you need to
2/3 cups cheese powder--just make THIS RECIPE and you have instant cheesy sauce at your fingertips
2 cups unsweetened plant based milk--we used soya
1 TB lemon juice--bottled is fine
1 tsp wholegrain mustard (optional, but nice)
1 TB vegan buttery spread (optional to make it richer)
Preheat your oven to 200C/400F
1. Put your chopped sweet potatoes and red onion in a big roasting tin and drizzle on the TB of oil. Stir to coat. Roast in the oven for 15 minutes, then take it out and stir and roast again for another 15 minutes.
2. Meanwhile, in a medium sized pan boil your macaroni according to package directions then drain and set aside. While your macaroni is boiling, in a large pot sauté your kale on medium high with a splash or two of water until it wilts and softens. Then add a splash of tamari or soy sauce and stir to coat your greens. Then take off the heat. Put on a lid and set aside.
3. In the same pot you cooked the macaroni, add the TB of vegan butter if you wish and let it melt then add the 2 cups milk, 2/3 cups cheese powder and the TB lemon juice and mustard (if using.) Whisk together and continue to whisk until the cheese sauce thickens. Add back in the pasta and stir to coat.
4. By this time the roasted sweet potatoes should be done. Remove from the oven. Mix the hot macaroni cheese with the kale you set aside and then spoon into two bowls and top with roasted sweet potatoes.
