garlic, lime and chili mussels with spelt pasta

It's like a ghost town on this blog a the moment.. and not for any other reason than the fact that I am down and out with the flu.

I am truly miserable right now, coughing, sneezing, moaning and carrying around roll of toilet paper to blown my nose. I feel like I'm suffering the 'man-flu'.

Joel has been great, bringing me cups of peppermint tea first thing in the morning and offering to get me anything I need. I am so glad my husband works from home.

Enough of my misery. I haven't been adventurous in the kitchen recently, as you can imagine. However, as they say on the cooking shows - here is something I prepared earlier.

Ingredients

(serves 2)

70g wholemeal spelt pasta

1kg organic live mussels (in shell)

1 tblsp olive oil

1/2 garlic sprig, minced

1 lime, finely grated rind and juiced

1/2 small red hot chili, finely sliced

1/4 c dry sherry

2 handfuls of green peas, roughly chopped

1/4 c finely chopped parsley

salt and pepper to taste

Bring a medium sized pot of water to the boil and add pasta, cook until al-dente then drain and set aside.

As the pasta is cooking, heat the oil in a saucepan/wok and add garlic, chili, sherry and lime rind - cook until fragrant and sherry has mostly evaporated.

Turn off heat and stir through the peas.

Bring a large pot/saucepan of salted water to the boil and add the mussels.

Boil for about 5-7 minutes until the mussels have opened.

With two-thirds of the mussels, remove the flesh out of the shell and add to the garlic mix - keeping the remaining mussels in the shell for decoration.

Re-heat the saucepan/wok and add in the pasta, parsley and lime juice tossing and heating through for a minute or two.

Serve and decorate with the mussels in shell.

cherry and caviar lentil salad with sherry dressing

Joel did the groceries at the markets this past weekend.

It’s the first time since we’ve been married that he has done groceries on his own (over 4 years).

The reason being, that he wanted for us to have a whole day out together without having to worry about getting to the markets in time for groceries.

To be able to spend the day out, just us, as a bit of a belated birthday day for me.

He set the alarm for Sunday morning and got up super early. I know how he does not like getting up early, especially on a weekend! It means so much that he would do that for me - aw!

We went out for brunch and spent the day in each other’s company enjoying the sun. It was so lovely – but of course, time went too quickly.

Anyways, he went off to do the shop while I got to sleep in and praise be to him, he did well.

When he came back, I unpacked the groceries spying a bunch of fresh cherries. Trying not to think about food miles, I knew they were going to be part of a dinner this week.

Digging to the back of my pantry (a bookshelf cupboard), I pulled out a bag of caviar lentils - they are a favourite of ours.

Delightful little pops, they don’t require a massive amount of cooking time but can add a bit of class to the old brown lentil.

Mixed with a few other ingredients and topped with a sherry dressing, oh boy did this salad go down well.

Ingredients

(serves 4)

1 c caviar beluga lentils, soaked for 12 hours

¼ c pine nuts

1 c roughly chopped parsley

15 (or more) fresh cherries, deseeded and roughly chopped

5 shallots, finely sliced

1 lebanese cucumber, diced
2 celery stems, diced

Dressing

2 tblsp dry sherry

2 tblsp quality olive oil

pinch or two of Murray River salt flakes

Place lentils in a heavy based saucepan, cover with water and bring the boil.

Simmer for 15 minutes, drain and rinse with cold water to cool it down – set aside

Next, heat a heavy based saucepan and add pinenuts.

Toss constantly to ensure even toasting – once toasted remove from heat to cool and set aside.

Combine parsley, cherries, shallots and cucumber in a large bowl.

Toss through pinenuts and lentils.

For the dressing, whisk sherry, oil and salt together and pour over lentil salad.
Serve x.