cherry nothing (CNOT)

Octarine Kale with sweet & sour chutney

ingredients
Dinner for N people; chutney keeps overnight well, too so make too much.

• N fistfuls of Red/Black/Purple/Blue/Sea Kale
• N dozen small potatoes
• N onions
• N small bulbs of fennel
• N inches of ginger
• N*3 capfuls of good cider vinegar
• very small amount of sunflower oil
• tablespoonfull of olive oil
• (optionally) orange zest
• sea salt to taste

soundtrack
Part of the new Go Go Bordello album which you then take off and replace with the last Go Go Bordello album which was much better.

process
This recipe uses a kale of some kind. Kale is a brassica like savoy cabbage or panfry, but it has a confusing and contradictory nomenclature. The variety I used is variously known as 'red', 'black', 'purple', 'blue' or 'sea' kale, depending on where it is. As you can probably guess it's an amazing colour - sort of like what forest green would be if it grew up with a lot of litigious purple role models.

Put the spuds on to boil - they're going to be the backdrop of the meal. While they're cooking wash the kale and de-stalk it. Then chop the onion and fennel bulb into small pieces (also chop or grate the ginger into bits) and get two frying pans out (one big and one small). Place the onion and fennel in the small pan with the sunflower oil. Gently heat, and when they start to sweat put in the cider vinegar and the ginger. While the chutney mixture does it's thing, fry the kale in the big pan with plenty of olive oil. Start grating orange peel to add to it but then realise that this isn't an organic orange so it probably tastes horrible. Discard orange zest, consume orange. The kale will be fine without it.

Drain and half-heartedly smash the finished spuds and restrain yourself from adding butter or anything - just some salt. Serve the kale on top with plenty of chutney (which should be glistening; not dripping). There should be a 2:1 kale:spud ratio. Eat with ales.

There is still no decision about which microformat to use for recipies, otherwise this entry would be using them.

216-digit Lime, Ginger and Spring Onion Tofu

ingredients
makes dinner for 1. Scaling determined by rice.

• juice of one lime
• two inches of ginger
• one clove of garlic
• Three bloody big spring onions from the chinese shop
• soya sauce
• tablespoon of ground cinnamon
• tablespoon of fine flour
• one stalk of smashed lemongrass
• one slightly old red pepper
• half a block of tofu
• boiled rice

soundtrack
Pi (the film)

process
Finely chop up the ginger & garlic and lay them in a bowl. Chop the tofu into trianglar sections and lay them in the bowl. Add the smashed lemongrass. Drench in lime, and splash soy all over it. Go and ring your parents. After you get off the phone, mix the cinnamon & flour and roll the marinaded tofu in it. Begin heating some oil in a wok. Chop up the bottom parts of the spring onions really thinly. Tear the pepper and the tops of the spring onions apart with your hands. Frythe tofu on both sides, and then chuck in the veg. Take the lemongrass out of the marinade and chuck it in the pan as well. Serve with rice while it's still a bot crunchy.

verdict * * *
Lime & ginger are a great combination - I've used it as the base of a soy marinade frequently. It works especially well with tofu. The 'innovation' here was to chuck in a truly excessive amount of spring onions, and some lemongrass. It more or less works, especially the wee bit of garlic. It could do with being hotter though - I'd use a chilli next time.

There is still no decision about which microformat to use for recipies, otherwise this entry would be using them.