The Confident Cook
Coconut and Curry Fish Soup
All of my favourite things come together in this recipe: fish, shellfish, coriander and coconut. Redolent of saffron and spicy tones, this soup makes a great luncheon dish on a cold day.
Courgettes, Baked Onions, Shallots and Bacon with Caper and Chilli Dressing.
This is a tasty salad that can be served as an entrée or as a main course dish with steak or lamb. The dressing is really zingy and the chilies add a spicy punch to the taste buds.
Crab Meat with Mint and Orange Salad
This is a terrific zingy-tasting starter if you can get fresh crab meat. I love the fresh crabs we often gather in traps not far from our beach house, but it’s terrifically hard work and always seems to take ages to shell the crabs and extract enough meat. Luckily you can buy Waikanae crab meat from a good fish supplier, and fresh crayfish meat can always be substituted for a similar taste. There are great textures in this dish, as the celery adds crunch to the crab and the orange supplements the...
Crayfish Summer Salad
I always treat crayfish – the richest of all seafood, I think – as a real treat, and find I need only a little of it to make me happy. Served like this, with refreshing cucumber and chunks of papaya and avocado, it makes a simple and elegant starter that can be prepared ahead for festive occasions.
Cream of Potato and Watercress Soup
A delicious soup made as a puree, sophisticated and suitable for a first course at a dinner party. The flavour is dependent on the stock, so ensure your stock is rich and tasty. When I was a small child, my mother used to entertain often, when she served a soup like this, she’d accompany it with thin slices of toast made by lightly buttering slices of white bread on each side and baking them in the oven until golden brown (about 10 minutes). We used to sneak around and pinch a couple of slices before the party....
