Garlic and Chilli Prawn Pasta

This is one of those dinners I kind of stumbled upon one night while chucking together stuff that was in the fridge. It was devoured so quickly last night that I forgot to take a photo, but I will add one asap! The quantities here are for 4.

Ingredients

• Long pasta - spaghetti, linguine or similar (aprox 75g per person)
• King prawns
• 2 Red chillies - I leave the seeds in, but you can de-seed one or both to suit your taste.
• 4 cloves of garlic crushed or chopped very finely
• Juice of half a lemon
• Hand full of basil
• Olive oil

Method

• Chop  the garlic and chillies (and de-seed if required). Put in a wok with a good glug of olive oil.
• Put the pasta on to boil.
• Heat the wok over a medium heat and then add the prawns.
• Lower the heat if required and cook the prawns through.
• Juice half a lemon and tear or chop a good hand full of basil.Add the lemon juice to the wok and stir in well.
• Drain the pasta and add the basil to the wok
• Put the pasta into the wok and toss well to make sure the pasta is well coated in the oil and the prawns and basil are distributed evenly (ish).
• Serve in bowls while piping hot and add a big chunk of warm, crusty white bread on the side.

This dish would also work well with bow or shell shaped pasta, minus the prawns and served cold on a summer buffet.

Nachos and Chilli

Chilli con Carne is one of our family favourites. I usually make it with beef mince and serve with rice, but Hubby and I were at a comedy club recently and this is how it was served, just one large plate in the middle of the table for a 'sharing' dinner.  I have also decided to use chunks of casserole steak for this - it just seemed 'right' somehow!

Nachos and Cheese

Ingredients:

• 1kg diced casserole steak
• 2 tins chopped tomatoes
• 2 cartons tomato passata
• 1-2 tsp cayenne pepper (to taste)
• 2 red chillis, de-seeded and chopped
• Tabasco sauce, to taste
• 1 shot bourbon - aprox 25 ml - Optional
• 2 small red onions, diced
• 2 cloves garlic
• Dried chilli flakes, to taste
• 1 Large packet of tortilla chips
• Sour cream
• Salsa
• Grated cheddar cheese - as much or little as you like.

Method:

• Soften the onions, garlic and chilli in the pan.
• Add the steak and bourbon and brown fairly quickly.
• Turn down the heat and add the tomatos, passata, cayenne, tabasco
• Leave to simmer on a low heat for at least 2 hours, or transfer to an oven proof casserole dish and pop in the oven at gas 3 for 2 hrs or so.
• Just before you are ready to serve, put all the tortilla chips on a really large plate and cover with grated cheese.
• Pop under the grill until the cheese just starts to melt.
• remove the plate from the grill, ladel the chilli over and then serve in the middle of the table for everyone to help themselves.
• Serve sour cream and salsa in dishes to accompany the Nachos and Chilli.



P.s  I served this on a large plate, aprox 1and a half foot long and 1 ft wide. It served 4 of us with little left over. However there was enough chilli left in the oven dish for hubby to take to work for lunch the next day.