Barbecued Corn with Roasted Pepper and Mint Salsa

In my previous post I wrote about attending the John Lewis barbecue evening where with a bunch of food bloggers we created some wonderful and tasty barbecue dishes. My three foodie friends, Jagruti from jagrutiscookingodyssey, Manjiri from travelsfortaste and Lisa Moore and I are featured below with one of our signature dishes.

One of the dishes my group created was Barbecued Corn with Roasted Pepper and Mint Salsa. It turned out really delicious and I could not wait to recreate it again at home. The smokey flavours that barbecuing gives to food is lovely and this sweetcorn paired really well with the mint and roasted pepper salsa.

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Barbecued Corn with Roasted Pepper and Mint Salsa

by Nayna Kanabar May 21-2017

Barbecued sweet corn with a lovely roasted pepper and mint salsa, the mint, the spices and the lime sets this dish off beautifully.




Ingredients:

• 4 Fresh corn on the cob
• 2 Long red peppers
• Few sprigs mint
• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• 3 tablespoons honey
• Juice of 1 lime
• 1 lime cut into wedges for serving.
• 1 teaspoon sumac powder
• 1 teaspoon paprika powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon chilli powder(optional)

Method:

1. Place the sweet corn on the barbecue and roast it until its cooked, keep turning it to get an even roasting. 2. Add the peppers on the barbecue and roast them too, keep turning them to get them roasted evenly. 3.Remove the roasted corn from the barbecue and cut it into bite sized rounds pieces approx 2 cm thick .4.Remove the peppers from the barbecue and peel off the charred skin, remove the stalk and seeds. Roughly chop the peppers up and put them into a large bowl.5. Reserve 6 mint leaves and finely chop the remaining mint and add it to the bowl with the peppers. 7.Add the sumac, paprika, chilli powder, salt, juice from the lime, honey and olive oil to the peppers and mint and mix well. 8. Add the sweet corn to the salsa and toss it well so that its coated thoroughly with the salsa. 9. Transfer the corn to a serving dish and garnish with a few more mint leaves and lime wedges

Details:

Prep time: 10 mins Cooking time: 15 mins Total time: 25 mins    Serves: 6-8 people

Roof Top Barbecue with John Lewis.

The month of May has brought so much rain that my longing for a spell of dry weather is growing intensely. I know that rain is good for farmers and the gardens and the soil etc but I do hate wet weather and I can't wait for a proper summer to emerge. I love being outdoors and relish alfresco dining so when John Lewis invited me to their recent roof top barbecue, I jumped at the chance all along keeping my fingers and toes crossed that the sun shines on the day. As if by magic my request was fulfilled as the evening turned out bright and sunny and warm with not a sign of a raindrop!! The venue a film studio -Brunswick studious with a terrace garden set in residential area of Kilburn was perfect and really quaint.

The barbecue was organised to showcase John Lewis's finest electric and gas barbecues and we all had a wonderful opportunity to test them out. Our chef for the evening was non other than Ed Smith from Rocket and Squash, a lawyer turned chef who has recently launched his cook book "On the side" which has a collection of 140 side dishes. Ed showed us how to "burn" food on the barbecue!!!! I think he really meant how to char. 
I loved the electric and gas barbecues, but If you have a small garden like I have and don't have enough space to have these beautiful full size barbecues there are smaller tabletop barbecues available for smaller spaces like these portable grills  from Globo Surf.

We watched a demo of beetroot and red onions being char grilled and then served with a lovely dill and feta dressing. This followed by char grilled leeks and spring onions and baked butternut squash and sweet potatoes. The leeks were served with a romesco sauce made from char grilled red peppers and almonds. Ed also barbecued some lamb for the non vegetarians.

Ed showed us that barbecue food does not have to be boring and all you need to do is be a little more imaginative with your ingredients. With this thought in mind we split into groups, mainly vegetarian and non vegetarians and created our own dishes from all the lovely produce that John Lewis had provided.

With three other foodie friends, Jagruti from jagrutiscookingodyssey, Manjiri from travelsfortaste and Lisa Moore we set about making our two dishes. Jagruti and I concentrated on the savory dish of Barbecued Sweet corn with Roast pepper and Mint salsa whilst Manjiri and Lisa created a sweet dish Smoky-n-Crunchy BBQ Pineapple. 

The other teams created some skewers of vegetables and lamb, roasted sweetcorn and sweet potato mash, sweet potato wedges served with a lovely creamy dip and a dessert of baked apples made on the barbecue served  with vanilla ice cream.

All our creations were photographed by Charlie Richards who is the photographer for the John Lewis Magazine. Once the photo shoots were over, we all tucked into the lovely barbecued feast over lots of chit chat and prosecco. The evening ended with gifts of beautiful signed copies of Ed's book.

You can find the recipe for the Barbecued Sweet Corn and Roasted Tomato Salsa with mint dressing recipe in my next post.
I would like to thank  John Lewis for inviting me to this lovely event, it most certainly brightened the rainy month of May. All the opinions and views expressed in this post are my own as are all the photographs.

Masala Milk- Mums Recipe.

Mothers day is celebrated all over the world, in the UK it is usually celebrated in March, however in other parts of the world its celebrated in May. Mothers are special and there can never be too many days to honor their status. This May, Mayuri Patel a very good blogger friend of mine who writes at  Mayuris Jikoni has set a challenge to create a post dedicated to your mother.

My mother passed away when I was very young, however I still have fond memories of my mum mostly about her cooking. She was a wonderful cook and homemaker and she spent endless hours in the kitchen creating scrumptious dishes.
As a child I was a picky eater or so my family tell me and I still remember my mum encouraging me to drink milk which I hated. However I never had any problems gulping down this delicious Masala milk she used to make. The masala milk was flavored with saffron, cardamom, nutmeg and had a blend of  mixed nuts which are rich in protein, fibre and essential fats. When we were running a temperature or had a cold she used to add a pinch of turmeric to the milk too. This was definitely "Mothers love and goodness in a glass."

You can make the milk masala in bulk and store it in an air tight jar to use as and when needed.

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Milk Masala

by Nayna Kanabar May  05-2017

Creamy and Delicious saffron and cardamon flavoured Masala Milk




Ingredients:

• 50 g Almonds
• 50 g Cashew Nuts
• 50 g Pistachio Nuts
• 1/2 teaspoon Saffron strands
• 1 teaspoon Cardamon powder
• 3/4 teaspoon Nutmeg powder
• 400 ml Milk (I used skimmed milk but you can use any)
• Sugar to taste

Method:

1. In a coffee grinder, coarsely grind the nuts. 2. In a bowl add the ground nuts, stir in the cardamom powder, saffron and nutmeg and mix thoroughly.  3.Fill  a sterile glass jar with the masala mixture and use as and when required. .4.To make the masala milk, pour the milk in to a milk pan and bring it to boil. Add two tablespoonful of the milk masala and add sugar to taste. Simmer the milk with the masala for a couple of minutes. 5. Pour the masala milk into tall glasses and serve warm or cold as per preference. You can stir in a pinch of turmeric if desired. 

Details:

Prep time: 5 mins Cooking time: 5 mins Total time: 10 mins    Yield: 2 servings of milk.

NB- For this recipe you will only need two tablespoons of the milk masala, the surplus can be stored up to a month in an airtight jar for future use.

To see what other fellow bloggers have posted as a tribute to their mothers, do check out the links below:

Strawberry and Pomegranate Swiss Roll
Beetroot Cutlets
Rajasthani Raabdi
Mango and Coconut Mousse Tart
Aloo Paratha
Mogre ka  Sharbat
Malpua
Paal Poli
Classic Apple Pie
Lavender Corn Muffins
Mango Cream Cake
Matar Kachori
Apricot Sweet Rolls
Mustard Green Chilli Pickle
Thengai Podi
Pogaca