Blog Party # 3 - The Big Game Night

I have been cooking up a storm this whole weekend and I hope I am not too late for this month's Blog Party with our lovely host, Stephanie from Dispensing Happiness. I missed the second edition but I am determined not to be left out from the third one. This month's party is all about the Big Game (yeah!) which is such a great theme.

One thing Splashie Boy and I love is Formula One Racing and every race weekend, you see both of us right smack in front of the telly looking at all those whizzing cars. This year, we started watching the races with a group of friends at a restaurant cum bar which has a big screen television and it is such great fun. Sadly the race season has ended last weekend but the great thing is Renault won the Constructors' Championship and Fernando Alonso was crowned this year's World Champion. It was a close race with Mclaren Mercedes but they triumphed over them at the end.

In honour of the World Champion who is from Spain, I thought I will do some Spanish Tapas dishes for my blog party. Here's the spread for tonight: Slow-Cooked Tomato Squid, Tortilla and Pomegranate Juice.

The first tapas dish was this yummy Slow-Cooked Tomato Squid that smelt so great with tender squid. It is pretty easy to make and just involved simmering the squid hoods for thirty minutes in a fragrant tomato sauce. I used some lovely paprika that a friend had given me from her recent trip to Prague and omitted the capers as I did not have any. The recipe is from Donna Hay.

Slow-Cooked Tomato Squid

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 brown onion, chopped

1 garlic clove, crushed

2 teaspoons mild paprika

1 teaspoon dried oregano

500g squid hoods, cleaned and halved lengthways

400g can of diced tomatoes

2 tablespoons dry sherry

1 tablespoons capers, rinsed

sea salt and cracked black pepper

Heat a medium sized saucepan over medium heat. Add the oil and onion and cook for 4 minutes or until the onion is soft. Add the garlic, paprika and oregano and cook for 1 minute. Cut the squid hoods into thirds and add to the pan with the tomatoes, sherry, capers (if using), salt and pepper. Reduce heat to low and cover with a tight fitting lid and cook for 30 minutes or until the squid is soft and tender.

This is essential whenever you go to a tapas bar, tortilla. This version from BBC Good Food is low fat as it omits the cream and instead of cooking it on the cooker, you bake the tortilla. The tortilla on it's own is yummy and went beautifully with the squid and it's sauces.

Tortilla Tapas

3 tablespoons olive oil
1 large onion, thinly sliced
3 medium sized potatoes, peeled and thinly sliced
2 garlic cloves, crushed
2 large red peppers, quartered and thinly sliced
6 large eggs, lightly beaten
1/2 teaspoon crushed chilli flakes
handful of parsley, chopped

Preheat oven to 180C. Heat 2 tablespoons olive oil in a pan. Tip in onion and potatoes and fry gently for 20 minutes until potatoes are tender, turning frequently, adding garlic and peppers for the last 5 minutes. Tip into large bowl, season and allow to cool for 5 minutes. Stir in the eggs, chilli flakes and parsley. Leave to sit for 5 minutes, then put a non-stick 20 cm square pan in the oven to heat up. After 5 minutes, remove from oven and brush with oil. Pour in egg mixture and return to oven. Cook for 15-20 minutes. Once cooked, remove and cool for 5 minutes. Turn out on a board and cut into squares to serve.

For drinks, as I did not have any red wine in the house to make sangrias, I made a pomegrante drink instead. Just a simple splash of juice from the packet but I added a touch of Spain as I had some fresh pomegranates from Spain. They are a bit different from the ones I got before from India as these ones are a pale pink rather than jewel ruby red. They make it up with their sweetness as the Indian ones can be a bit tart.



Thanks to Stephanie for hosting as I had great fun with the food.

The round up is online, so hop over to Stephanie's at Dispensing Happiness to view those yummy snacks and drinks.