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By clare, February 8, 2012

This is a flavoursome, fresh pasta sauce which goes well with the taro gnocchi mentioned in the adjacent post.  It is gluten free and dairy free but thanks to the pumpkin seed meal and olive oil has a creamy texture.

It can also be used as a salsa or dip, or added to tacos, tortillas or salad rolls.

The celery seed salt is a recipe I’ve posted here.

If you want to deepen the red colour of the sauce, add a teaspoon of annatto/achiote powder.

The ripe mamey sapote adds a sweet intense back-note to the flavour, similar to tomato paste.  Mamey sapote pulp freezes well, so if you have a very ripe fruit, consider freezing it in small batches to use when needed as a tomato paste substitute.  My tropical reference cookbook, tropical cuisine: cooking in clare’s kitchen, has a section in the encyclopaedia which goes into detail about the selection, ripening, preparation, storage and culinary uses of mamey sapote.

fresh tomato and pumpkin seed pasta sauce

Fresh tomato and pumpkin seed pasta sauce

1/4 cup pumpkin seeds, ground finely

1 1/2 teaspoons celery seed salt

1/2 teaspoon finely chopped rosemary (about 2 tips)

1/4 cup finely sliced sweet basil (about 3 sprigs)

12 garlic chive leaves, finely chopped (substitute with onion chives if needed)

1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

1/4 cup olive oil

1/4 cup very ripe mamey sapote pulp (substitute quality tomato paste if you don’t have mamey sapote)

2 medium tomatoes, briefly blanched, peeled and finely diced

2 teaspoons lime juice (about 1/2 a lime)

Mix all ingredients together, cover, and leave to stand at room temperature for an hour or so for flavours to develop prior to serving.  Makes about 2 1/2 – 3 cups of sauce, enough for 2 – 3 people when used as a pasta sauce.

(C) Clare Richards 2012

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By clare, August 27, 2010

Yes, it’s finally underway! tropical cuisine: cooking in clare’s kitchen is on its way to print and will be available in November. To celebrate and give people a sense of the book to come, I have a free 40 page sample of pages from the cookbook which is sent out to subscribers. So to receive your copy, simply sign up in the column to the right and the link to the download will be sent to you. Look forward to your comments!

warm regards

Clare

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By clare, August 9, 2010

don't waste the cooking water! stock in the making... © Catseye Productions 2009-2010

Having packed over 250 recipes into the recipe chapters, over 45 produce profiles in the A to Z, an Essentials section and lots of photographs into tropical cuisine: cooking in clare’s kitchen, I’ve run out of room for anything more. So I decided to list some extras here on the website, including the following three stock recipes. Stock is not something I make to an exact recipe, but it can be handy to give a general idea of times and flavours to include, so here they are: Continue reading 'Stock standards'»

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By admin, December 7, 2009

Duck and Lychee Salad (plum sauce out of shot) image © Catseye Productions 2009

This a such a beautiful combination of flavours, and given the short season of lychees is one to enjoy right now.  As well as this salad recipe, I will have my roast duck recipe in Tropical Cuisine: Cooking for Clare’s Kitchen.  For now, either buy ready roasted duck if you have access to it, roast a duck according to your current recipes, or for a quicker route, pan cook or roast a duck breast per serve.

If you don’t have access to fresh or frozen Davidson Plums, and you can’t buy a ready-made Davidson Plum sauce (try Rainforest Bounty), then you can make a plum sauce using temperate blood plums.

The recipes below are general in their directions, and will be more specific in their final form in the cookbook:

Davidsons Plum Sauce

About 500gm fresh or frozen Davidsons plums

2/3 cup castor sugar

2 cloves

2 cardamom pods, crushed slightly

6 allspice, whole

1/2 tsp salt

water to cover plums

Place plums, spices and salt into a saucepan just big enough to fit them in one layer, cover with water and bring to the boil.  Add castor sugar, and reduce to a low simmer until the sauce has thickened.  Run the mixture through a food mill or pick the stones and spices out by hand then blend with a stick blender.

Duck and lychee salad

to serve 3 – 4 people

1 roasted duck or 4 cooked duck breasts, sliced or torn into edible amounts, excess fat removed

equal amounts of watercress and rocket sprinkled in two layers on each plate

about 8 pitted fresh lychees, torn in 1/2, per person

Compile the salad by laying the rocket then watercress onto each plate, scatter over the duck pieces, the torn lychees, then top with a drizzle of Davidsons plum sauce aiming to get it mostly on the pieces of duck.  Serve.

© Clare Richards 2009-2010