Tuesday 6 September 2011

255: Slim Pickings....Courgette Rice....is quite nice

Courgette production is now dying off. One of the plants has died completely and the other three are just of limping along. The tomatoes likewise continue to look very sorry for themselves. Tiny little pea sized tomatoes are ripening; if I leave them, they don't get any bigger they just split on the plant. Here's the latest batch of tomatoes, courgettes and a mighty 5 raspberries (woo-hoo!)

Sunday found me in no mood to go shopping, as Saturday we'd been at a wedding and foolishly I'd also agreed to follow up this over-exurberance with a morning 10k race. Truly daft. I'm 42, I ought to have learned by now. So, by the time I returned, there was no shifting my rear from the settee.

By the time I was able to move again, the shops were shut and the fresh food in the house amounted to:
- a chicken
- the above tiny courgettes and tomatoes
- the abundant garlic and onion I've previously reaped

Fingers firmly crossed, the Chicken was roasting. Nothing interesting to report there; just plenty of salt of top to ensure a nice cripsy skin. To serve with it though, I needed a filler - which the easiest I could find was rice. And lo, courgette rice was born!
  • Chopped (fairly fine) and slowly fried two medium onions in olive oil
  • Added three large choped cloves of garlic (well..... it needs some taste) and plenty of salt and pepper
  • Cut into 1cm pieces the courgettes and then added these also; turning the heat up so that they gained a bit of colour but only cook for a short amount of time so they retain some crunch
  • Chopped and added the tomatoes
  • .....meanwhile I boiled a pan of rice; attempting to time this to be cooked by the time the tomatoes had suitably mushed down into my vegetable mix
  • Drain the rice; mix
  • Eat
And here it is. Not the most elegant meal; even by my own inelegant standards. However, with all that garlic, some moistness from the tomato and some bite to the courgette it was all pretty decent. It would even have been healthy too if I hadn't eaten all the lovely lovely chicken skin. Oh well.

    5 comments:

    1. OOh yes chicken skin - yum. Choc is going to read this and faint (sorry Choc). I think it looks a very good meal indeed. My raspberries are well over, you must have been sensible and planted some autumn variety. We planted patty pan squashes this year and I definitely recommend them - much tastier than your average courgette. Ours are starting to rot off too now though. Tomatoes are taking an age to ripen and are mostly tiny too. Although we have had some lovely golden ones.

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    2. looks marvellous!... elegance is so over-rated don't you think?

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    3. Choc would've been ok with the rice.... kind of like a deluxe (although some would dobut that) Batchelor's savoury rice. Which may well indicate the limit of my ambitions.

      'Patty pan' is making me laugh. Not quite sure why. But I'll try to have a go next year. I've wasted too much time on peas again this year; they grow but it's a lot of effort per handful.

      Cheers both.

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    4. I'm absolutely fine with the rice and am valiantly ignoring the chicken skin. In fact your rice with a bit of grated cheese melted in would be more than fine, but I am not known for my elegance. We've just about come to the end of our courgettes too and still crossing fingers some of our tomatoes will ripen. Like you though, we have plenty of garlic. I'm impressed with the 10k run and a long rest on the sofa sounds well deserved.

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    5. Oooh cheesey rice - liking the sound of that.

      The winds might just have finished the tomatoes off, they fell over again. They've spent more time horizontal than vertical.

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