Roasted Butternut Squash, Lentil & Spice Pasties with Yoghurt Dressing

The natural laws of photographing food state that hot dinners and good photographs cannot coexist. I think it's pretty obvious which one I went for in this instance...It was a damn fine pasty though. The recipe is from the October issue of Cook Vegetarian Magazine.

For the pastry (I confess I am a pastry cheat and buy mine most of the time.)
300g plain flour
1 tsp turmeric
1 tsp salt
60ml olive oil
125 ml iced water

For the filling
880g butternut squash, peeled and cut into 2cm cubes
2 tbsp olive oil
1 onion, finely chopped
2 garlic cloves, crushed
1 tsp grated fresh ginger
1 tsp ground cinnamon
400g tin lentils, rinsed and drained
soya milk to brush

For the yoghurt dressing
250g plain soya yoghurt
1 1/2tbsp extra virgin olive oil
2 tbsp lemon juice

To make the pastry, put the dry ingredients into a large bowl. Add the oil and the iced water and mix with a fork until the dough comes together, Transfer to a lightly floured surfacem knead until smooth and elastic. Divid into 12 balls, cover with a damp cloth and leave to rest for one hour.

To make the filling, preheat the oven to 200oC. Put the squash on a large baking tray, drizzle with 1tbsp of the oil and season with sea salt and black pepper. Roast in the oven for 30minutes or until golden. Heat the remaining oil in a large frying pan over a medium-high heat. Add the onion and cook, stirring occasionally for five minutes until softened. Add the garlic, ginger and cinnamon and cook for about two minutes. Transfer to a large mixing bowl and add the lentils and squash. Roughly mash with a fork and season to taste. Leave to cool.

Roll out each ball of pastry dough into a 10cm circle on a lightly floured surface. Spread 2-3 tbsp of the filling over one half of each circle. Brush around the edges with water and fold the pastry over to enclose the filling and make a semicircle. Press the edges together with a fork. Put the pasties on a baking tray, brush with soya milk and bake for 25 minutes or until golden. Sprinkle some sesame seeds onto the pasties after brushing with soya milk if you like,

Mix togther all the yoghurt dressing ingredients and season to taste with sea salt and black pepper. When the pasties are ready, serve with yoghurt dressing sprinkled with paprika and drizzled with extra olive oil.

Moroccan Lentil Soup with Yoghurt and Chilli-fried Onions

I fell off the cooking wagon this past week, what with all the snow and general busy-ness. I also developed a potentially quite debilitating addiction to mince pies which impacted on my desire to cook anything. Apart from mince pies that is.  This time I'm starting the week as I mean to go on and working my way through some recipes I've been hungrily pouring over from another of my latest obsessions, Cook Vegetarian magazine. Mock me if you wish, but not before you've checked out their new website and drooled over the food photography for yourself.

3 tbsp olive oil
1 onion, finely chopped
2 sticks celery, finely chopped
3 garlic cloves, finely chopped
1 tbsp ground cumin
1/2 tbsp ground coriander
280 red lentils
400g can chopped tomatoes
1.2 litres vegetable stock or water
salt and pepper
6 tbsp roughly chopped coriander plus extra to garnish
for the chilli-fried onions:
2 onions, very finely sliced
2 tbsp olive oil
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
2 tsp soft brown sugar
1 red chilli, deseeded and finely chopped
juice of 1 small lemon
soya yoghurt, to serve

Heat the oil in a large saucepan and saute the onion and celery until soft but not coloured. Add the garlic and spices, cook for another minute before adding the remaining ingredients apart from the chopped coriander. Bring to the boil, reduce to a simmer and cook for 30 minutes or until the lentils become a puree. Season with salt and pepper and stir in the chopped coriander.

To make the chilli-fried onions, quickly fry the onions in very hot olive oil until golden brown and crispy. Add the cinnamon, sugar and chilli and stir until the sugar has melted then add the lemon juice. Serve the soup will a spoonful of yoghurt, the chilli-fried onions and coriander leaves.

Butternut Squash & Lentil Stew

Before you make this recipe you should be aware that I was assaulted by this stew. I went for a taste straight from the pot (bad move) and a piece of leek fell out and stuck to my lip and burnt it. So folks, approach the pot with caution as this stew bites...

1 leek, sliced thinly
4 cups of peeled and cubed butternut squash
4 carrots, diced
5 stalks of celery, diced
4 parsnips, diced
10 cups vegetable stock
2 cups dried red lentils
1 teaspoon ground mace (if you can't find mace substitute with some cinnamon and nutmeg to taste)

Place all the vegetables in a large saucepan and saute for 5 minutes over a medium heat. Add the vegetable stock, lentils and mace and mix well. Cover and simmer for 30 minutes. If you want a more soupy texture you can soupify (official term) it with a hand blender.

The original recipe calls for pumpkin, but it's not too easy to find pumpkin in the UK any other time except for halloween. Note that the recipe makes 12 servings, so you probably want to halve the recipe unless you want to be eating this stew every night for a week.