Thai Red Beef Curry

A few months ago, I posted the recipe for Thai green chicken curry. Now it's the turn of another favourite, red beef curry! As for the green curry, I strongly encourage you to make your own curry paste as opposed to using a shop bought one, as it makes a substantial difference to the dish. Thai food is all about a delicate balance of hot, sweet, sour and salty flavours that can only be achieved by using the freshest ingredients. A food processor does make your life easier, but in its absence you can use a pestle and mortar. I promise that the end result will compensate your efforts!

King Prawns in a Prosecco & Cream Sauce

Prosecco is a delicious, dry sparkling wine from the cooler, Northern regions of Italy (tipically Veneto and Friuli Venezia Giulia) that in my opinion has little to envy to his more popular cousin the champagne. Italians tend to drink it as an aperitivo (pre-dinner drink) or during a fish meal. A fish dinner accompanied by few glasses of prosecco definitely comes high on the list of my favourite things in life, and it inspired the idea for this dish: juicy king prawns in a creamy sauce delicately flavoured by the prosecco and fresh garlic, with crunchy zucchini slices sautéed in parsley and olive oil, on a bed of fragrant basmati and wild rice. If you are planning to make an impression on a special someone, I suggest you invite them for dinner and make this dish as one of the key elements of your plan of seduction :-)

Quiche Lorraine

My previous attempt at making a quiche, and specifically the pâte brisée (shortcrust pastry) had been a disaster! The pastry was dry, sandy and generally horrible. I couldn't understand what went wrong as I had followed the recipe religiously, and the poor results discouraged me from giving it another try any time soon. Until I moved to Belgium, and signed up for a cookery course run by Catherine, a wonderful French lady who taught me how to make proper pâte brisée at my first lesson. It's surprisingly easy, provided that you follow the few necessary steps carefully and do not try and take shortcuts. Now, making shortcrust pastry does not scare me any more, on the contrary I can't wait to experiment the endless sweet and savoury combinations it lends itself so well to. If you too want to find out the secret to great shortcrust pastry, keep on reading...