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A casserole can really be any kind of oven cooked stew - meat or even veg. A cassoulet doesn't even necessarily go into an oven.
Cassoulet is a particular name for a dish, the same way bangers and mash is.
Traditionally in a French cassoulet, it would be a big pile of meat with white beans and some veg like celery / carrot. Duck is traditional, as is pork - usually meat and good stinky French smoked sausage.
Here is a "proper" cassoulet
There are some variations, and when I can't be bothered doing the full quantities of meat, I make something like this great Delia Smith recipe -
https://www.eatyourbooks.com/library/recipes/541165/poor-mans-cassoulet
It cops out on the great stuff but still makes a tasty dinner.
When I'm going for it I usually make this or something similar with some variations
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bonappetit.com/recipe/classic-cassoulet/amp
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Casserole is a way of cooking. Cassoulet is a specific recipe. A cassoulet is a type of casserole.
That's how I think of it anyway, might be wrong but it makes sense to me. -
Or what Reg said.
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Nice one.
Cheers Reg, excellent post.
Will give that a go I think.
Very much in my wheelhouse of cooking. -
Probably the Delia level mind. Its hard to get specific things here and I'm always on somewhat of a budget.
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The hairy bikers do a good healthy (ish) supermarket friendly version. I tend to use decent bacon lardons in place of whatever pork is in the recipes if I can't be bothered to mess about.
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Just go with what suits. I've never seen cassoulet look that instagrammed before so don't fret if it looks browner than that. Brown is how it should look."Plus he wore shorts like a total cunt" - Bob
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I assume a garlic heavy polish sausage could work?
Big polish population here so readily available with good options. -
Maybe, might be a bit overpowering though. Smoked pork is probably the flavour I most associate with it rather than garlic.
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OK, well smoked should be easy as well.
I have an Italian and a Polish market within half a mile, both with meat counters so should be able to sort something close. -
Just stick it all together and eat it. As long as there's plenty of rendered fat and the beans are soft it'll be amazing. Fat and time is win."Plus he wore shorts like a total cunt" - Bob
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SpaceGazelle wrote:Just stick it all together and eat it. As long as there's plenty of rendered fat and the beans are soft it'll be amazing. Fat and time is win.
That is literally my kinda cooking. -
Gonna make this tonight:
Indian butternut squash curry from bbcgoodfood. Hopefully it's tasty.
I don't have curry paste so have to do something for that, but other than that it seems pretty straightforward. Mainly posting because you all were talking veggie on the previous page. I'm trying to have at least one vegetarian meal a week and slowly up that to 2 or 3. That way I feel less bad about buying big chunks of meat at the butcher.
After buying chicken that had gone bad at the supermarket, I'm not very keen on buying meat in the supermarket anymore, I already was starting to get fed up with the choice of steak, steak, steak and chicken breasts, so am happy going to the butcher.
Can still smell that chicken, it was so nasty. -
I'm pretty sure I've made that curry before and enjoyed it.
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Butternut squash curry is great. You cant really go wrong there.
I know that chicken smell btw. Early on in my cooking attempts I bought a spatchcocked chicken, in my naivity I thought it would be fine a couple of days post use by date. OMG that smell when I opened it up!!!
It never really leaves you, I smelt it coming from a bin near a kebab shop not long ago, had to cross the street. -
Curry paste is relatively easy to make if you have the spices to hand. Or for a shortcut you could just fry some curry powder in oil. -
Thats pretty much what I do, dont really buy paste just fold in powders with everything else and add oil/water if needs be.
I have one of those Indian spice tins and just add from that until it tastes good.
For ref my tin has...
Ground coriander
Ground cumin
Turmeric
Ground ginger
Cinnamon
Nigella seeds (kalonji)
Fenugreek
Thats what my mate's Indian mum told me to get, others will vary. -
That cookbook that has recipes with 3 ingredients has a great butternut squash curry recipe, with coconut milk. It's become one of my regular go to meals.
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That book is ace."Plus he wore shorts like a total cunt" - Bob
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Is that the Hugh Fernly one?
If so I bought it and really should use it more. -
Yeah, that one. I judge the value of a cookbook on whether it can add any regular meals to my repertoire, and it has added several. So it's a winner.
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Is it called Three Good Things? Might get that then, the only cookbook I have here is Madhur Jaffrey's Ultimate Curry Bible which was also recommended by Kow I think, and I love that book.
It does have curry pastes in it as well, but I'm missing things for all of them. -
Just dug it out.
I bought a load of reduced decent supermarket sausages the other day so will start with the sausage, cabbage pasta. -
It's really great."Plus he wore shorts like a total cunt" - Bob
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There's a casserole thing in there with chick peas, cherry tomatoes and aubergine, which is just spectacularly good.
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I'm not a fan of aubergine but could swap out for courgette.
Looking through that seems to be a great thing about the recipes, being simple you can swap similar ingredients in to taste.
I have a can of crab, red chilli and potatoes to use so the squid, chilli, potato recipe seems a win. -
I wasn't a fan of aubergine until I realised you have to cook the shit out of it for it to taste good. It can't be even slightly undercooked
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The only time I like it is in moussaka, which is slow cooked and the aubergine should be sliced thin so maybe thats the key.
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I've ordered the book. Let's hope it's a good as you all say it is.
I've always been curious about baba ganoush, which seems to be a very heavy oven roasted eggplant that then is mashed with other ingredients. Don't think I've ever had it, but seems a good way to use eggplant. Should be good with falafel.
The best eggplant I had was in Barcelona, that was really thin, quickly fried and then had honey drizzled over it. -
That curry turned out really good, but I'm now one of those people that is "this is a good recipe but I changed x, y and z".
I roasted the squash, I made my curry paste (combo of Liv's list of spices and the Ultimate Curry Bible paste recipe), then fried some onion, added the paste, added tomatoes and a little bit of water. Once the tomatoes are soft, add chickpeas and after a minute or so add the roasted squash. Then I added a small pack of coconut creme, it's way thicker than coconut milk and gave it a nice consistency.
Definitely things I can improve (think roasting fenugreek seeds before the onion could work well, some fried onions for crunch could work, or maybe fresh cilantro as a topping. Naan would also work well with this I think), but I'm happy with this.
I did use anchovies in the paste, but other than that this might count as vegan? Think coconut creme is fine, right? Not really that bothered by the labels myself, but it's nice to know some things to make if you needed to cook for people who are vegan.
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