Friday night didn't go according to plan...

It's not much to look at in
the TMServer

Borscht - generally following TM recipe.
Sadly I added 1 carrot & 1 parsnip so the soup probably wasn't as 'fine' / smooth as it should have been. Also added less water as the vegetable weight increased.

Dash of cream upon serving
& maybe a green garnish?

I only had two beetroots and that was quite enough. The carrot wasn't a great addition and was quite earthy as well. I shall remove this in future. The parsnip sweetness was drowned out, so sadly this didn't work as well as I hoped. But mom loved it. She says it's not as smooth as the one she remembers but the taste is almost there!

Yippee! so a few more tweaks and this could be the Russian Borscht of her memories! Guess what she's going to have on Mother's Day dinner? *sniggers*





Instead of planned risotto, I bought some mussels at Coles. These were fresh enough - tasted delicious. Yes there's a recipe in the EDC but it wasn't very tomato-ey, so I varied the recipe from the Recipe Community:


Chilli sauce:
4 cloves of garlic
1 red chilli (parents not into spice)
1/2 red onion
1 small brown onion, quartered
100g tomato paste
1/2 tbspn TM vegetable paste
1 can Roma tomato (whole, skinless)
300 mL of Chardonnay

Method:
1. Fine chop onions, garlic & chilli (7 seconds, speed 8)
2. Use spatula to scrape moisture off sides of bowl. Add 50mL of olive oil.
3. Sauté the mixture (3 - 4 mins, 100 C, speed 2)
4. Add tomato paste, TM veg paste, Roma tomatoes & wine. Close lid.
5. Place cleaned/de-bearded mussels in Varoma receptacle. Place on top of TM with lid. Steam (15mins, Varoma, speed 2).
6. Serve mussels in TMServer, pour in sauce.

Tip: works best if mussels can be cover or stirred & left to rest in sauce for a little while before eating.

I'm not big on the loads of fresh herbs like parsley and basil Or dried oregano - this drowns our the natural sweetness of the mussels. I thinks properly done chilli tomato/garlic sauce is the cleanest way to go.