#10 - Traybake Chipotle Mushroom Soup + Pastitsio
Some cosy recipes perfect for the start of the year
Hello lovely subscribers, and welcome to 2024!
The new year inevitably brings to the surface lots of conversations surrounding self-improvement and change. “New Year, New Me!” is the common refrain we shout to promote renewal in our lives, but I find that some of the conversations around it can feel quite pressured, and generate nasty, niggling feelings of shame when we don’t quite hit the mark.
I am very much of the belief that food is joyful, and never a thing to punish ourselves with, but even I wrestle with these thoughts at this time of year. I am not immune to the pressure to become THE BEST and MOST HEALTHY version of myself this January. The truth is that a lady can’t live off lasagne alone. So yes, I like eating pasta, but I am also a person who looks in the mirror some nights and thinks WHY DID I EAT ALL THAT PASTA, no matter how hard I try to fight it.
For me, it’s all about balance. Lots of veg in an attempt to renew, but also the normal comforting cheesy things for morale, because this time of year can be pretty challenging on the old mental health, and really you should just be eating things that make you feel good. This means vegetables for your health, and a jacket potato for your soul. Also, not beating yourself up for enjoying said jacket potato.
So no, I will not be scrapping bread, cheese and butter from my diet. Yes, I will be eating more vegetables. Whilst I hate resolutions, as I almost always fail at them and feel worse about myself as a result, these are my January cooking rules, which to be honest is the same way I approach food and eating the rest of the year, but here you go anyway:
Eat lots of vegetables, and do it in a FUN way.
Use the weekends (or whenever you have the time and inclination) to cook more indulgent, hearty meals that bring you comfort.
January is a rubbish month, so don’t make it worse by depriving yourself of meals that make you feel good, whatever they may be. With this in mind, here are my recipes for a nourishing soup, and an equally nourishing pastitsio (think of it like a Greek lasagne, but less faffy), ft. my tips on how to make the best ragù, and the best vegetarian friendly restaurants to hit up in London. Cosy things to make you feel marvellous! I think I deserve it, and so do you.
The Recipes
Traybake Chipotle Mushroom Soup
A veg packed soup is one of the easiest ways to load nourishment into your body on cold evenings when energy is low. This one is even more so as it is all roasted in one tray, meaning you can curl up on the sofa and watch The Traitors whilst it ticks away. Think of it like a cream of mushroom soup, but the spicy version. The method is inspired by a really delicious portobello mushroom steak recipe by Ixta Belfrage in Flavour, where she confits the mushrooms whole in the oven with lots of spices and olive oil. This uses lots of the same flavours and methods, albeit whizzed up in a blender to give it a new form.
A soup needs texture, which comes here in the form of a salsa macha, which is a Mexican salsa packed with sesame seeds, peanuts, oil and dried chillies. In the interest of keeping the ingredients list short and the produce easy to source, I’ve used chipotle chilli flakes and regular chilli flakes here. Not entirely authentic, but you get the idea. You will have extra salsa at the end, but it is excellent with so many meals - on fried eggs, drizzled over salads or eaten with rice and greens.
Serves 4
For the soup:
2 tsp cumin seeds
1 tsp coriander seeds
1 onion
4 cloves of garlic
1 red pepper
4 portobello mushrooms
3 tsp chipotle chilli flakes or paste
2 tbsp tomato puree
400g tin of chopped tomatoes (Mutti are my favourite)
800ml stock (chicken or veg is fine)
100ml creme fraiche or sour cream, plus more to serve
handful of fresh coriander leaves
salt and olive oil
For the salsa:
2 garlic cloves
70ml olive oil
2 tbsp sesame seeds
1 tsp cumin seeds
3 tsp chipotle chili flakes
2 tsp chilli flakes
25g peanuts
½ lime
Heat your oven to 170°C fan.
Take a large wide lidded saucepan, and add your cumin and coriander seeds. Toast them on a medium heat for a minute until they are fragrant. Tip these into a pestle and mortar, and grind them to a rough powder.
Peel your onion and chop it into wedges, then peel your cloves of garlic. Cut your pepper into chunks, and quarter your mushrooms too, then throw these into the wide casserole dish.
Get your toasted spices, chipotle chilli flakes or paste, tomato puree, chopped tomatoes and 3 tbsp olive oil into the pan, as well as a big pinch of salt, then give it all a good mix.
Pop a lid on the pan, then place it in the oven to bake for 30 minutes.
Whilst your soup base cooks, make your salsa macha. Peel and finely slice your garlic.
Add your olive oil to a small frying pan, and tip in your sesame seeds. Cook this over a gentle heat for a couple of minutes until they are sizzling. Add your sliced garlic and cumin seeds, and continue cooking until the garlic has crisped up and is just starting to colour on the edges. Tip in your chipotle chilli and regular chilli flakes, and give it a mix.
Tip the mixture into a pestle and mortar, along with your peanuts, and bash it all so that all the peanuts and garlic have broken down into a crumb. Add your lime juice, then season it to taste with salt. Leave it to cool.
Back to your soup. Remove the lid from the pan, and give your mixture a stir. Return it to the oven without its lid for another 30 minutes, stirring it partway through to prevent it from sticking.
Tip your mixture into a blender along with your stock and creme fraiche, then whizz it to a smooth consistency.
Pour your soup into a clean saucepan, and season it to taste with salt. Get it back on a simmer to heat up.
Once your soup is hot, spoon it into bowls. Top each bowl with a dollop of creme fraiche, and a drizzle of your salsa macha. Scatter over some coriander leaves, then serve it up. It’s nice with a hunk of bread, but even better with some tortilla chips.
Pastitsio
Lasagne comes pretty high on my death row meals list. What comes higher still, though, is a baked ragù and pasta dish flavoured with typically Greek things like dried oregano, cinnamon and feta. Enter pastitsio, lasagne’s Greek cousin! It is less effort than a lasagne too, as you only do 3 layers - one of pasta, one of ragu, one of white sauce thickened with eggs. The base pasta layer also means you get the added bonus of crispy pasta edges all around the base of the dish. Fit.
The ragù itself is traditional in that it uses beef and spices, but in the spirit of January, I’ve snuck a little more veg in there. Red peppers are rarely found in Italian soffritos, but my mum always put one in when she made bolognese, so I’ve done that too. It lends sweetness but also some veggie bulk, which I am all here for. I pulse the soffrito in a food processor for speed of prep and cooking, but you could hand chop it if you didn’t have one.
Just a note to say also that pastitsio normally uses ziti pasta, but seeing as this is rather hard to find in the UK, I’ve swapped it for macaroni. Barilla make a shape that is quite chunky and long, which I think works best here.
Rules of ragù: