Category: Favourites

These are the recipes my family or I liked best.

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Favourites Linda's recipes

Pecan Cake

From: Linda McCartney’s Home Cooking, p. 163

A light and fluffy cake that rises very well and is just perfect in the afternoon with a cup of tea.

As I do not like cakes too sweet, I reduced the sugar to 120g- and it still was quite sweet. I also made one cake with chocolate chips instead of pecans as my son is allergic to nuts.
The batter is very fluffy and light and rises very well- the only problem is that the pecans or chocolate chips sink to the bottom of the cake tin during baking. My daughter thought this was great- she asked me to share a slice with her. She chose the bottom half (with the chocolate!) and gave me the top…

Gluten-Free: I tried a flour mix from Austria, called “Biskuit& Kuchen Mix” from Mantler Mühle. It contains mainly corn-, potato- and rice flour plus some stabilizers with threatening E-numbers. It worked well for the cake, but seeing the list of ingredients I think I will not buy it again. You can use any gluten-free all-purpose flour for this recipe (e.g. Doves farm).

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Favourites Linda's recipes

Mexican Corn Bread

From: Linda McCartney’s Home Cooking, p. 64

A moist corn bread with sweetcorn and cheddar cheese.

This corn bread recipe is my personal favourite from all corn bread recipes described in Linda’s book (see Cheese and Green Chilli Corn Bread on p. 93, Corn Bread on p. 61, and Corn Bread Mexiacan Style p. 63). It is moist and has a great crumbly consistency. It has a lot of flavour but is not too rich, and it is easy to make and to adapt as vegan or gluten-free. Another favourite! Great served with a big salad, soup or Chilli Non Carne.
The bread keeps well for 2-3 days. If you pop it in the microwave for a few seconds it tastes like fresh.

I wonder why Linda chose to add 85g of honey to the bread. I had reduced this to less than half and found the sweetish taste very unpleasant in this bread. I would suggest omitting the honey. Butter or margarine can also be reduced to 2 tbsp.

Variations: If you like a less spicy bread, use chopped red and green pepper instead of chillies. This also adds some colour to the bread.

Vegan: I used 25g of pureed silken tofu instead of the egg and omit the cheese. Add 2 tbps. of nutritional yeast and 80g of plant-based yoghurt if you like.

Gluten-Free: Use gluten-free flour instead of pastry flour (I used Plain Flour from Doves Farm).

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Favourites Linda's recipes

Bisque of Mushroom

From: Linda McCartney’s Home Cooking, p. 52

A creamy soup with an intense mushroom flavour and nice texture. It can be served as a starter or with bread and a salad as a light lunch. Serves 6-8 as a starter and 4 as a main course.

I reduced the butter to 25g for the white sauce and 15g for the mushrooms, and took 100g of cream.

Vegan: Both milk and cream can be substituted for plant-based alternatives. I used oat milk and oat cream and the taste was very balanced. The non-vegans at the table did not notice they were not eating dairy and enjoyed the soup very much.

Gluten-Free: For best results, use rice flour.

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Favourites Linda's recipes

Cottage Cheese Pie

From: Linda McCartney’s Home Cooking, p. 96

A great pie with a potato filling that is light but very tasty. Definitely a favourite!

I was surprised to find that this Cottage Cheese Pie does not use any egg for the filling and that the amount of cottage cheese and sour cream used is quite small. For a pie, it is quite light but still very satisfying and just delicious! I used my own recipe for gluten-free shortcrust pastry and pre-baked the pastry for 15 minutes. I think this pie is best served warm, but cold leftovers also disappeared quickly!

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Favourites Linda's recipes

Aubergine Caponata

From: Linda McCartney’s Home Cooking, p. 81

A cold dish with sautéd aubergine, celery, onion, capers, and olives, stewed in tomato sauce.

This is a great dish for a warm day. It needs to be prepared in advance, which means there is no work on the day it is served 🙂 .
We had my brother-in-law and his family around and enjoyed our lunch in the garden in lovely spring sunshine. I had also prepared a Cottage Cheese Pie (p. 96) which went very well with the Caponata. Serve with a salad or steamed vegetables (we had some crisp asparagus salad- yummy!).

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Favourites Linda's recipes

Sweetcorn Noodle Soup

From: Linda McCartney’s Home Cooking, p. 58

An unusual combination of fresh sweetcorn, noodle and egg – and really delicious and quick to make. A new family favourite!

If you do not have fresh sweetcorn, try to use frozen and not tinned. The frozen sweetcorn tastes nearly as good as the fresh sweetcorn and does not have this “tinned” flavour.

Gluten-free: Make sure the noodles you use are gluten-free. I find it best here to use noodles that do not have a strong taste of their own, as do noodles made from beans, chickpeas or lentils. Rice or corn noodles work really well (not surprising, given that it is a sweetcorn soup 🙂 ).

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Favourites Linda's recipes

Lemon Meringue Pie

From: Linda McCartney’s Home Cooking, p. 162

A lovely pie with a tangy lemon taste and creamy meringue on the top.

Lemon Meringue Pie. Photo by Almut Spaeth

At first I was a bit reluctant to try out this recipe as I have had trouble with gluten-free pastry in the past. Now, with a new recipe, it did actually work well! The pastry case stood the test of blind-baking without sticking to the greaseproof paper I covered it with. It also survived being filled with the lemon custard and was easy to remove from the pie dish when cooled. Relief!

The next tricky bit was the pie filling, which was too rich for my taste. The amount of sugar and eggs used was just more than I was willing to take. A look through the other recipes revealed that there is a very similar recipe in “Home Cooking”: The Coconut Cream Pie (p.158).
This recipe suggests a filling that is less rich and the pie is also topped with meringue. Using the Coconut Cream Pie recipe, I omitted the vanilla essence and dessicated coconut and added the grated rind and juice of two lemons.
It made a lovely filling with a great meringue topping and looked very special. Today, I shared some with a friend over a cup of tea (while sticking to the rules of social distancing because of the corona virus…) and she loved the pie, too.

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Favourites Linda's recipes

Pavlova

From: Linda McCartney’s Home Cooking, p. 163

An easy recipe for making meringue- you just need to be patient during the long baking time.

This pavlova recipe is very similar to my Mum’s recipe for meringue (or “Baiser” as it is called in France and Germany, meaning kiss…). We used to make small meringue nests on easter and filled them with tiny sugar eggs.

Pavlova. Photo by Almut Spaeth

In Linda’s recipe, half of the sugar is folded in at the end. This way, the sugar is not dissolved and will give you a grainy meringue. I suggest adding all of the sugar gradually to the egg whites and to continue beating until the mixture is shiny and forms stiff peaks.
You should also add a pinch of salt to the egg whites as it will balance the sweetness of the sugar.

You can use a piping bag to pipe the mixture onto a baking tray lined with greaseproof paper. Try making smaller, individual-sized meringues to later cover with cream and fruit.

The oven needs to be around 90-100°C; the 140°C specified in the recipe is too hot and will result in the pavlova turning brown on the outside. You should also open the oven door every now and then to allow the steam to escape and to help the pavlova to dry out completely. When finished, the pavlova should be very light without any sticky bits in the middle. To cool, turn off the oven and loosen the pavlova from the baking tray. Leave it on the tray and put back in the oven. Use a wooden spoon to keep the oven door just a little bit open and let the pavlova cool in the oven.

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Favourites Linda's recipes

French Fried Vegetables

From: Linda McCartney’s Home Cooking, p. 136

Deep-fried vegetables, covered in a batter. Serves 6 as a very special starter- great served with a dip (such as the Cucumber, Dill and Sour Cream Sauce on p. 144) or chutney. The kids will love the fried veg with tomato ketchup.

Variations: As we had an Indian meal, I decided to flavour the batter with 1 tsp. tandoori powder, 1/2 tsp. harissa and 1/2 tsp. salt- delicious.

I did not parboil the vegetables- some of them cooked through during frying (e.g. mushrooms), others (e.g. broccoli) retained some bite which I prefer.

Gluten-Free: I used 80g rice flour and 80g chickpea flour. The batter was very creamy and coated the veg well.

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Favourites Linda's recipes

Ratatouille

From: Linda McCartney’s Home Cooking, p. 117

A great recipe for a classic ratatouille.

After watching the film “Ratatouille” about a cooking gourmet rat, it was easy to decide what to cook today.
Linda’s recipe is straightforward and gives an easy method to steam or slow-cook the veg in its own juice. I think there is no need to deseed the tomatoes; instead I would use the seeds and the juice of the tomatoes as fluid to help start the steaming process.
It is important to cut the aubergine (no need to peel the aubergine!) and the courgette in rounds and layer them over the mushroom and pepper mix. There is no stirring involved during the whole cooking process.
Another very simple and delicious dish that will impress dinner guests!

Serve with tagliatelle or new potatoes.