Friday, June 08, 2012

I like Jamie Oliver, I do, really....but COME ON!!

Following on from today's earlier post... I made the summer veg lasagne from Jamie's 30 Minute Meals for dinner Only the lasagne, I didn't even attempt to make the salad and the dessert in the alloted half an hour.
It's possibly the most expensive dinner I've ever cooked as I bought a cast iron baking dish to cook it in and asparagus is out of season so that'll teach me to be a rebel! That aside, it did taste absolutely lovely and I will do it again.

If you're only making one of the dishes from the menu it's a little tricky as there are no timings, so for someone who's not a natural cook it's quite hard. Everything took so long and at one stage I was practically twirling round and round getting pans, baking dishes from various cupboards and ingredients out of the fridge.

The first pan I used was nowhere near big enough for all the lasagne filling so I had to change to a bigger one - add on perhaps a minute for this.

Also there's a bit in the recipe that tells you to add a little water to some cottage cheese - so I had to go and get our emergency water from the larder - add on another extra minute for this.

Oh and why did I need to get our emergency water, you ask. Well Lloyd and I have been pretty ill recently so we decided to get our water tested. Remember we are on rainwater tank water. Well it turns out that we have E Coli. Oh joy. For drinking water the reading of E Coli is supposed to be 0 ours was 50CFU/100 mL. Somewhat on the high side of high! No wonder we've been so sick.

Anyway, I digress.

By this time I was absolutely sweating.
But eventually it was finished, and it actually looked pretty good.






  I was cooking all the time, I can't imagine how I could have gone any faster.

So, Jamie's 30 minute meal, guess how long it took me?

Go on..guess...

guess!

An hour and a half.

23 comments:

  1. Anonymous9:38 pm

    I'm afraid I'm not a Jamie fan - my brother loved him and bought all his books until he discovered that there was no way his posh nosh fed a normal family! I reckon his wife and kids have take-out all the time!!!! lol

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  2. yeah, I think he's an either love him or hate him! :)

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  3. Looks good......this is a great option for me....I can't eat regular lasagne because of the tomato sauce. I think I will just Google a recipe for it though...thanks for sharing.

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    1. are you allergic to tomatoes? Lloyds mum is - well her hands are and she can't grow them, but she can eat them!
      I can copy out the recipe if you want, but it's all over the place on google!

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  4. Curious about the E-coli, we had a rain water tank for all our drinking/washing needs growing up and never (to my knowledge!) had problems with it. Do you how how it came to be contaminated?

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    1. It's bird poo off the roof. ( or/and possum and rat!) we don't have a first flush system. We've been here for 8 years and this is the first time we've been so ill, but in the past we have had milder tummy probs and have just put it sown to something we ate. Now, I'm beginning to wonder. Maybe your dad bunged in some Janola every so often, that's what the water lady said we could do!

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  5. Every recipe that I have made of his has been very high on the Wow factor. Have you made his grape and chicken. Its to die for.
    Hugs

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    1. I haven't, but I love grapes and chicken!! I must admit I really do like his recipes - I think his basis risotto is absolutely brill. It's just the time they take!!

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  6. Lurrve Jamie! Never made a dish of his I haven't liked! Do you not have a filter for your water, we have one as it comes into the house we should have one under the sink too but that's never been put in ;)

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    1. Oh yeah, we have a filter, 2 infact. One at the tank and another as it comes into the house. We ALSO have the drinking water filter - you know the one that has a separate drinking water tap in the sink. Yep, we've got them all - and they are changed regularly too - still managed to get flipping E Coli! There is a lot of bird poop on the roof just now. When money allows we may now invest in one of the UV filters.

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  7. Oh my goodness...scary stuff...not the lasagne, the e coli. So very glad you got the water tested. I just bought Jamie’s original naked chef book at a yard sale, haven’t tried any recipes yet, but they all do look good. Lovely lasagne; bet it was scrummy.

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    1. It was scrummy - but theres far too much for 2 - or even 4! I think the recipe I followed would feed 6!!

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  8. Guess what I cooked for dinner? Laura's spanish tortilla! And being my first time it took me ages too LOL. Hmmm, I've been wondering about our water too. If it's not too much to ask, did you just feel yuck or did you have more particular symptoms and did you both always have the same at the same time -'cause we often have episodes here but never all of us at once...

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    1. Did you like it? It does take a while to make - I reckon it takes me about an hour. The water. Well without going into all the gory details ... severe stomach cramps, having to rush to the loo... and you can imagine the rest. We have had symptoms before, but not nearly as severe. Lloyd thought I just had a bit of IBS.( because I must have a wimpy tummy that seems easily upset - so sometimes it was just me - but this time it was both of us) and this went on for ages - around 2 weeks or more - and we were beginning to wonder what on earth was going on. I had mentioned the water ages ago, then we sort of forgot. Then last weekend when I was away I was totally fine, no cramps etc. and as soon as I got home they were all back. So we got the water tested - and voila! Neither of us have been physically sick. But our symptoms are text book E Coli now that I've looked! It's easily fixed though - just treat your tank with either chlorine, bleach, bromine or a tank sanitizer. The lady that come to do the testing said most people just bung bleach in their tanks - but work out the quantities - cos that could make you feel a bit blergh!

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    2. Ta, I've wondered 'cause Mr Eternity has bad guts heaps. When we got back from hols we were both a bit sick and that made me wonder...think I'll get ours tested just to be safe! I loved the tortilla. Looked at another recipe which said parboil the potatoes first which I did (I just can't help but compare 10 recipes, put them all together and then it's never as good, when will I learn?). Next time I'll follow your recipe exactly, it's been even yummier today!

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    3. Yeah, to be safe I would. I'm not sure if there are self testing kits? We got a person it. TBH now that I know how easy it is to treat, we're just going to treat the water so it doesn't happen again. Glad you liked the tortilla. I know my recipe is a bit of a faff, but I only do it this way cos my spanish friend taught it to me! I'm sure there are loads of different was to do it. It is even yummier second day. Do you like it cold? Lloyd does - but I have 'issues' with food I think is supposed to be hot when it's cold!

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    4. jeepers ignore all the typos in that last paragraph! I just got up!!

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  9. I can believe it, I have watched him make that one. It looks lovely, but I find the format a bit irritating as it is hard to follow unless you make all three courses - and of course have hours to spare. Bet it was jolly nice though.

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    1. funnily enough I had just watched him make it too, and thought - well, he's not frenzied round the kitchen, he's taking his time and not even cutting everything up in a fast cheffy way. Surely it can't take too much longer for a normal person to do it! How wrong I was! But you're right, it was jolly nice. I'm not going to be put off making the 30 minute meals,I just know I need at least an hour!

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  10. I love Jamie's recipes, but I've heard from many people that his 30 minute meals take nowhere near 30 minutes. I think it must be after having a few practice runs and also doesn't count any clean up from washing the 4 pans and 5 bowls and everything else you had to use. Your lasagne looks fantastic! Terrible news about your water too, good that you know the problem though.

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    1. I'm really glad it's not just me! The lasagne was good, though. Mmmm the water, well it's now been treated but Im very nervous about using it - and I had a thought today - all the dishes etc that have been washed will have been washed in E Coli water. I don't know if the dishwasher gets hot enough to kill it????

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    2. Looks really yummy Laura, I may give it a go too :-) I told K about your e-coli and think we need to get ours tested too as our tank hasn't been cleaned in over 5 years! Can you taste the bleach you add at all? I love the flavour of our water and can't drink mains anymore because of the chlorine taste, yuck! It looks like the temperature required is 140, see here http://www.jorbins.com/home-improvement-decorating/discussions/tp-404.html xxx

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    3. We only had our tank cleaned last year. Turns out that it's more likely it got into the tank when we filled it from the stream.
      We put in some bromine and can't taste it at all. I'm with you though, when we go into Kerikeri I think the water tastes absolutely disgusting!

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I love it when you leave me comments, it lets me know there are folk out there reading my ramblings! Thank you, I appreciate them loads and loads
Laura x