Uncategorized

ONE PERFECT INGREDIENT…RINGING THE BELL FOR PEPPERS!

“In cooking, as in all the arts, simplicity is the sign of perfection.”
Curnonsky

IMG 7491

My ‘One Perfect Ingredient’ would be ‘BELL PEPPERS’.

When Maninas: Food Matters left me a message the other day, I did a little jig. Said it was OK to post for the ‘One Perfect Ingredient Competition’ for the book from Marcus Wareing ‘One Perfect Ingredient’…even if we weren’t resident in the UK or Europe.

Quoting from Maninas…’Marcus Wareing is one of the best British chefs today: he is a two Michelan-starred chef, he worked with the (in)famous Gordon Ramsay, and he won the Great British Menu competition with his custard tart with Garibaldi biscuits. The winning dessert was served to the Queen and her guests at a banquet celebrating her 80th birthday.Focusing on one ingredient at a time, Michelin-starred chef Marcus Wareing presents at least three imaginative, delicious but simple ways of cooking with it, offering a wealth of fresh ideas on how to use the everyday ingredients that repeatedly show up in your shopping basket. (…. Read the rest of the review and find out more about Marcus’ new book here.) To win the book, all you have to do is tell us about your favourite ingredient, including why it’s your favourite and what is your favourite way of cooking it.’

One+Perfect+Ingredient

Red & yellow bell peppers are rich in nutrients, vibrant & colourful, delightful to eat…& simple to cook. Ever since these have been grown locally last year on, they’ve become part of my everyday shopping basket. I use them religiously in any form; cut up in salads, char grilled, pan grilled, roasted, as crudites, in pastas…innovating all the time. They say to try & include different colours in your everyday food to draw maximum nutrition…red & yellow is usually there first!

collage8

Want to color your life healthy…join me!

Brightly colored bell peppers, whether green, red, orange or yellow, are rich sources of some of the best nutrients available. To start, peppers are excellent sources of vitamin C and vitamin A (through its concentration of carotenoids such as beta-carotene), two very powerful antioxidants. A wonderful combination of tangy taste and crunchy texture, bell peppers are the Christmas ornaments of the vegetable world with their beautifully shaped glossy exterior that comes in a wide array of vivid colors ranging from green, red, yellow, orange, purple, brown to black.

Onto my recipes :
  • Roasted Bell Pepper CoulisIMG 6225

Ingredients:
Bell peppers – Red & yellow / 1 each
Tomatoes – 2
Garlic – 4-5 cloves
Fresh basil leaves – a handful
Olive oil – 1-2 tsps
Sea salt

collage Method:

  • Roast the bell peppers in a hot oven for 15-20 minutes; turning once to ensure grilled all around. Remove once the skin is charred, put into a Ziploc & seal baggie. Leave to sweat until cool. Once cool, peel off the charred skin, remove any seeds. Chop & reserve in a bowl.
  • Roast the tomatoes for a minute or so on the fire, turning frequently to ensure the skin chars right around. Peel off the skin, chop & add to bowl.
  • Repeat the same with the garlic, & chop it up. Blend all these until smooth. Season with sea salt & pepper. Add chopped basil leaves & enough olive oil to get the required consistency.
  • Serve warm or at room temperature with breaded/grilled fish, chicken etc. I served it with Chicken Kiev, sauteed beans & French loaf.
  • ‘Grilled Pepper Slices’ & ‘Bell Pepper Dip with garlic & basilIMG 6870IMG 6166

Ingredients for grilled bell pepper:
Bell peppers – Red & yellow / 1 each, sliced around into circles (reserve the left-over bits)
Olive oil – 1 tbsps seasoned with sea salt, pepper & Italian grill herbs.

Method:

  • Brush both sides of the slices of bell pepper with the seasoned oil, & place on a hot grill pan.
  • Grill both sides for a minute or two till slightly soft. Don’t over grill. Serve with grilled chicken, fish or cottage cheese (like I did) .

collage

Ingredients for the bell pepper dip:
Hung Yogurt – 1 cup (can use Greek yogurt)
Cream – 1 tbsp
Juice of 1/2 – 1 lime
Left over bits of bell pepper from the slices above/ chopped fine
Garlic – 2 cloves /grated fine (I use my microplane)
Basil leaves – 4-5 / chopped fine
Salt to taste

Method:

  • Whisk the yogurt + cream + lime juice + salt until smooth.
  • Mix in the finely chopped bell pepper bits, garlic & basil.
  • Chill until served. garnish with fresh basil leaves! Serve with grilled fish, chicken or cottage cheese. Also great with oven roasted potato wedges & crudites.
  • ‘Spring Salad with Bell Peppers & Cherry Tomatoes’IMG 5946

Ingredients:
Bell peppers – Red & yellow / 1 each; cut into jullienes
Cherry tomatoes – 100 gms (about 15-20) / halved
Spring Onions with greens – 4 / sliced into circles, greens included
Cucumber – 1 / halved lengthwise & finely sliced
Green grapes – handful / halved horizontally

IMG 5533Dressing:
Vinegar – 1 tbsp
Juice of 1 lime ( to taste)
Garlic – 1 clove /minced
Honey -1/2 tsp
Sea salt & freshly ground pepper
Fresh basil leaves – 5-6 / torn up

Method:

  • Toss all chopped salad veggies into a big bowl. Chill.
  • Whisk all ingredients for dressing in a small bowl.
  • Just before serving, drizzle in dressing, toss well. Adjust seasoning if required.

IMG 6209

This post partially sums up my fascination for this one perfect ingredient on my mind for now. It pairs well with vegetarian & non-vegetarian fare, adds colour to presentation & comes with the added bonus of vitamin C and vitamin A (through its concentration of carotenoids such as beta-carotene), two very powerful antioxidants. Red peppers are one of the few foods that contain lycopene, a carotenoid whose consumption has been inversely correlated with prostate cancer and cancers of the cervix, bladder and pancreas.

BON APETIT with my ‘One Perfect Ingredient’!’

About me: I am a freelance food writer, recipe developer and photographer. Food is my passion - baking, cooking, developing recipes, making recipes healthier, using fresh seasonal produce and local products, keeping a check on my carbon footprint and being a responsible foodie! I enjoy food styling, food photography, recipe development and product reviews. I express this through my food photographs which I style and the recipes I blog. My strength lies in 'Doing Food From Scratch'; it must taste as good as it looks, and be healthy too. Baking in India, often my biggest challenge is the non-availability of baking ingredients, and this has now become a platform to get creative on. I enjoy cooking immensely as well.

18 Comments

  • Andrew

    I love bell peppers. It is unfortunate that they are a little bit expensive where I live, so I can’t buy them all the time.

  • Saswati

    deeba the pics look lively and colourful….bell peppers are agr8 favorite in my house too:)

  • arundati

    i love the mild sweetness of bell peppers too….what fabulous creations deeba…all that colour on the table….i am trying this coulis soon!!

  • Bellini Valli

    These are some delicious looking dishes. Sweet peppers are even sweeter when roasted…I love them:D

  • Dhanggit

    i love love this grilled peppers!! cant wait to install the barbeque grill in the garden to try this 🙂

  • Happy cook

    I love pepers in any dishes.
    But my hubby get headache from it. So i don’t use that much anymore unless if i am cooking just for me.
    Just looking to all the pictures i am drooling.
    You are such a wonderful cook nit to mention baker

  • AnuZi

    Wow chica! You are one talented chef. I love bell peppers! the taste and the fact that they add such beautiful colors to a dish. Pics look gorgeous.

  • Lisa

    Some impressive recipes! I think I have missed the deadline, and if I had been more organized, mushrooms would have been my theme.

    Speaking of mushrooms, they are the featured ingredient for April’s No Croutons Required.

  • Proud Italian Cook

    Beautiful photo’s, colorful and so fresh looking! Your food always looks so appetizing!!

  • Simran

    I grill the peppers on the open flame as well. Quicker, and so much easier than the oven.

    But somehow I never tried tomatoes, thought they were too delicate. Thanks for the tip – I thought roasted tomato soup was too much of an effort, but not any longer.

  • Rosie

    What beautiful photos Deeba!! Those roasted peppers look delicious you really have so much talent in your cooking and baking!

    Rosie x

  • mimi

    what absolutely beautiful photos! love the colors. i also love roasted pepper anything. it’s so easy to do yourself (instead of buying a jar).

  • Ivy

    They are really a perfect ingredient considering in how many dishes we use them in. Lovely pictures Deeba.

Thank you so much for stopping by. I'd love to hear from you.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

C is for Chettinad Simply Delicious Lotus Biscoff Desserts Baking Pretty Eggless Desserts