The holidays just seem to run away with you if you let them especially if you are working from home and have a houseful most of the time. It has been a busy morning so I didn’t have a chance to mess around with my website until this afternoon but then I saw how busy my blog and website had been in the last 24 hours and I am rather pleased with myself. I don’t know what I am doing to attract this many visitors but I am working on it to find out what attracts viewers. I am starting to stress now about how to keep people interested. However, I am going to keep doing whatever it is that I am doing and not worry about it too much. As I am enjoying writing about food and the things I love and I am happy to share it then that is how I will continue. Let me know if there is anything you would like me to write about in the comments below.
Anyway back to the matter in hand – Garlic!!
Tomorrow is “National Garlic Day” so I am going to share my recipe for homemade garlic dough balls with a twist. It is one of the best alliums on the planet. So versatile and so strong and intense in flavour that a little goes a long way. It is very easily burned so care has to be taken when frying the garlic before adding the other flavours to the dish.
Last night my daughter made a dinner which had garlic in the ingredients.She made a chicken dish where she marinaded the chicken in various herbs, garlic and oil which she found in the cupboard. All she did was rub the marinade into the chicken pieces and then transfer them to the foil tray which I enclosed to keep the moisture in. Whilst in the oven the juices came out of the chicken and if I had been quick enough I would have made a sauce out of the liquid which remained in the foil tray. All I would have done is take the juices and add some to a small amount of melted butter with flour in it to form a paste and then a sauce. A type of roux sauce. This would have finished the dish off completely and given a type of gravy to the meal.
It was served with mediterranean vegetables i.e., courgettes, red onion, peppers, cherry tomatoes which were roasted in the oven. These were drizzled in a oil containing balsamic vinegar, herbs and black pepper prior to cooking. Also we had sweet potato wedges which were lightly sprayed with oil and salt was sprinkled over them. The meat was very light as no batter or thick coating was used on the chicken. The meal could have been improved with the addition of a sauce, as I said earlier, but in future at least I know how to improve this meal further. I will share this recipe later. The whole meal was a hit with the whole family and a great way to get vegetables into their diets.
My daughter and myself, have already prepared the garlic butter balls for the dough tomorrow which I will make tonight. I am going to leave the dough over night to prove and make the dough balls for lunch tomorrow. More photos tomorrow.