Tag: gluten-free

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Linda's recipes

Delicious Watercress Soup

From: Linda McCartney’s Home Cooking, p. 55.

A hot and creamy watercress soup with potatoes and cream.

Watercress was one of the ingredients I had not tried before starting this cooking project. And I must say I really enjoy its fresh and sharp taste when used in salads. This soup boils the watercress with the potatoes and purees both at the end of the cooking time.
Even though the soup tasted pleasant, boiling altered the taste of the watercress and made it taste almost like leeks. I would have preferred keeping some of the distinct watercress taste- maybe by adding it at the last minute before blending and then serving immediately? Will try this out.

Vegan: Use plant-based milk and cream and mit the egg yolks (or add 100-200g of silken tofu before you blend the soup).

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Linda's recipes

Spanish Omelette

From: Linda McCartney’s Home Cooking, p. 123.

A simple omelette, filled with cooked tomatoe, peppers and celery.

A great quick lunch that still contains a lot of vegetables and is full of flavour. If you have the time, let the veg simmer for 20-30 minutes to allow the flavour of the tomato sauce and the peppers to develop.
This recipe is a little unclear in the description: You need to use a SECOND frying pan to cook the eggs- this is not stated clearly.

Vegan: Use a vegan egg replacer, e.g. from Orgran. Or make a vegan pancake batter and fill the pancake with the tomato and veg sauce.

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Teriyaki

From: Linda McCartney’s Home Cooking, p. 128.

A great marinade for burger chunks or pieces of firm tofu.
I made vegetable kebabs and used some tofu cubes marinated in this teriyaki sauce in beetween the veg- great!

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New Potato Salad

From: Linda McCartney’s Home Cooking, p.76.

A plain and fuss-free potato salad with majonnaise, celery and pickle. When served chilled this potato salad is a nice addition to any picknick or barbecue in the summer.

Vegan: Use vegan majonnaise and plant-based yoghurt.

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Favourites Linda's recipes

Coconut Custard

From: Linda McCartney’s Home Cooking, p. 160

A lovely recipe for custard topped with coconut meringue.

My family just loves when I try out the sweet deserts from Linda’s book and this was just one of the surprises. The recipe is simple enough: Make some custard, top it with beaten egg whites, icing sugar and desicated coconut and bake in the over for 20 minutes. The result looks very impressive and would be great for a special family dinner.

When making the Coconut Custard, the custard started bubbling and spilled into the oven- next time I would make sure to put it on a baking tray to avoid cleaning the whole oven. Also, the custard was REALLY hot after baking, so it is best to leave it to cool for 10 minutes before serving.

To avoid having to “destroy” the lovely coconut topping when serving, use four individual ramekins.

Vegan: This recipe works well with soya milk and soya cream. For the meringue, use vegan eggwhite replacement or aqua faba (the liquid drained from tinned chickpeas)- works just as well as egg whites.

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Sour Cream and Beetroot

From: Linda McCartney’s Home Cooking, p. 142

Hot cooked beetroot in a mustard and sour cream sauce with onion and herbs.

As I had already planned to try out the Harvard Beets (p. 137), I decided to give this recipe a go at the same time. This way I only needed to cook beetroot once and then made small quantities of both dishes. I did like the Sour Cream and Beetroot better than the Harvard Beets as the taste was more interesing and the sauce smoother and not starchy. Unluckily, half of my family do not like beetroot at all, so my daughter and I ended up eating all of this dish- but we would certainly love to have this again soon!

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Harvard Beets

From: Linda McCartney’s Home Cooking, p. 137

Cooked beetroot in a cornflour and cider vinegar sauce, served with melted butter.

I found that with this recipe, the sour and starchy sauce was too dominant and I did not like the sweetness of the sauce either- so this is one of the recipes I am not too fond of. If you like to try this out, I would recommend using either no sugar at all or just very little. You can also half the amount of cider vinegar used.

Vegan: Substitute the butter with olive oil or vegan butter.

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New Orleans Okra

From: Linda McCartney’s Home Cooking, p. 138

Sautéed okras, simmered in a tasty tomato sauce.

Okras were another of the vegetables not usually found in our grocery store around the corner. So when I discovered some while visiting a small greengrocer’s in the city center (yes, I do like looking around grocery shops and could spend ages discovering all the vegetables, fruit, pulses and spices to be found there…) I knew that this recipe would be next.

I was a bit worried as the okras are chopped before cooking, which makes them release a slimy juice that is usually not wanted in okra dishes. Surprisingly, with this recipe the okra juice just blended with the tomato sauce and the consistency was find. As the sauce is simmered for quite some time it gets a very round taste and the sliced okras are just beautiful to look at: on the cut they look like little flowers.

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Hearts of Artichoke with Mushroom Sauce

From: Linda McCartney’s Home Cooking, p. 101

Boiled artichoke hearts, served with a creamy mushroom and tarragon sauce.

This recipe has been on my list to try out for quite some time, but I was a little afraid of preparing artichokes as I have never done this before. However, when I spotted nice-looking artichokes in a small vegetable store in town, I decided to give it a go.
With the help of the internet and Linda’s description, I managed to cook the artichokes sucessfully and my family and I enjoyed dipping the leaves into the sauce and eating the tender artichoke at the bottom of the leaves. The artichoke hearts are very small, so I would recommend to serve this dish as a starter and I would certainly also serve the leaves along with the hearts (in Linda’s recipe, the leaves are not used). Dipping and eating the leaves is a very social and nice start for a meal with friends or family!

Alternatively, you could serve the hearts of artichoke and the leaves with a mustard and honey vinaigrette- great for a summer dinner party.

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Burgers Chop Suey

From: Linda McCartney’s Home Cooking, p. 89

Veggie burgers covered with asian-style veg and baked in the oven.

This is one of the many burger-based dishes in the book and I have to admit that I do tire of all those burgers. To make a change (and also because it goes well with the asian-style veg) I used smoked tofu instead of the burgers. The combination of veg and tofu was great, but baking the veg after cooking did overcook it and it lost some of its taste and all of its bite. I also did not like the starchy sauce the veg gets mixed with and would have preferred a lighter version with just soy sauce and maybe some curry powder. Why not stir-fry the veg and tofu next time and season with soy sauce and some light spices and serve with some rice or rice noodles?