Chilli Up North Blog

This mint and chilli tea was kindly sent to me buy the guys over at Mr Scruff I was quite excited to try it after drinking a rather large amount of the teapigs chilli tea and chilli chai.

The first thing that strikes you about this tea is the packaging, it’s lovely and clean with a great little character and loads of great bits of info.
According to the info on the box tea is:

Organic mint and chilli, a winning combinationfor a proper cheeky brew. Really refreshing and very popular!

A blend of peppermint & spearmint, was combined with a pinch of chilli to give it a cheeky twist, without going over the top. The peppermint & spearmint are refreshing, especially with or after a meal. The chilli gives it an extra mini tickle factor. You will be pleased to know that this tea is a lot tastier than a red curry with toothpaste in it, and is also caffeine free. Can’t be bad! The chilli takes a little longer to infuse than the mint, so the longer you leave the bag in, the more chilli you will taste.

I’ve not drank most of the box of it and I can tell you it’s blooming delicious, it took a couple of goes for me to get the brew time right, if you don’t leave it in long enough (as the info above says) you don’t get much chilli.

The mint is well balanced, not to sweet and sickly and pretty refreshing, the chilli adds an extra dimension by giving the brew a little background heat and a hint of heat.

It makes  a great pick me up, despite the lack of caffeine and it’s also really refreshing. I can also see it working as an iced tea so once things warm up again I will be giving that a go.

It’s not quite as spicy as the Tea pigs tea’s, nor are the bags quite so fancy but they don’t detract from an excellent product.

Chilli Up North Verdict: If you like your fruit/herbal tea’s then this is definitely worth a go, once you get the brew time right to find your preferred balance then you are on to a winner. 7/10 (heat 2/10)

Mint and chilli tea

This is a lovely light and flavoursome dish with added chilli zing. I can’t find my picture of it so if anyone makes it please could they take a picture and send it this way..

Ingredients

• 1 fresh mango (peeled and diced)
• Hand full of fresh pineapple (skinned and diced)
• Fresh mint
• Fresh coriander
• 3 spring onions (finely sliced)
• Juice and zest of 1 lime
• Squirt of honey
• 1 chilli or some chilli flakes
• 2 chicken breasts
• 2 sweet potatoes
• fresh ginger (grated)
• salt + pepper
• 1 tablespoon of creme fraiche
• knob of butter.
• olive oil.
• white rum or tequila (optional)

Method

1. Pre heat oven to 200 degrees
2. Mix the mango, pineapple, chilli, spring onions, lime. mint, coriander and honey together in a bowl and add a splash of white rum.  Set aside
3. Microwave the sweet spuds for a few mins so they are part cooked then place in the oven until really soft on the inside.
4. Flatten the chicken breasts, season with salt and pepper and rub with a little olive oil, cook on a hot griddle pan. place on a baking tray and place in oven to keep warm.
5. Warm the salsa in a hot pan until the alcohol has cooked off and the salsa is nice and soft.
6. Place the ginger in a bowl with the creme fraiche, butter and some salt and pepper, add the insides of the sweet spuds and mix well ,either eat or discard the skins.
7. Remove the chicken from the oven and plate up, top with the salsa and serve with the sweet potato mash and veg.

It’s that time of year when I need to start thinking about what I am going to grow, start cleaning the greenhouse, washing all my plant pots, ordering extra seeds etc etc.

I really should be planting my chilli seeds now but it’s still a bit cold with all of this snow we have been having so I have decided to leave it a few more weeks, maybe until the middle of Feb, I will just see how the weather plays out.

Everything has been a bit neglected of late because i’ve been so busy, things are calming down a bit now so you can expect to see more very soon.

In the meantime if you are wondering how to get your chilli growing off the ground then take a look at these posts from last year:

Growing Chills – Intro

Growing Chillis – Part 1 : Getting Started

Growing Chillis – Part 2 Germination

Growing Chillis – Part 3: Potting on

Growing Chillis – Part 4: Watering and Feeding

If you have any questions please get in touch

Compared to the jam that i made with the fish cakes this is a lot less sweet and more of a proper chunky chutney, as with all my recipes you may want to use more or less chillis.

Tomato and chilli chutney

I used a mixture of yellow, red, chocolate and black tomatoes to give the chutney a nice deep colour.

Also if you would like to make it more thicker or a little bit sweeter, the 500g of tomatoes should be able to take up to 300g of sugar.

Ingredients

• 6 red chillies
• 500g  Tomatoes
• 1 green pepper
• 2 cloves Garlic, crushed
• 1 tablespoon fresh ginger (grated)
• 150g caster sugar
• 90ml red wine vinegar

Method

1. Finely chop the chillis, tomatoes and the pepper, place in a heavy bottomed pan along with the rest of the ingredients.
2. Bring to the boil
3. Simmer for 30-40mins
4. Place into sterilised jars and allow to cool.

Serve with cheese, meats, pate’s or what ever takes your fancy.

The Daily mail today had this story and a rather funny video about chillis so I thought I would share it with you.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1236701/Revenge-chilli-Why-pepper-seeds-designed-burn-mouth.html

This is an adapt ion of a Jamie Oliver recipe  that I spiced up a little, you can also use jarred red or green pesto if you are after an even quicker fix and just add some dried chilli or chilli flakes.

Serves 2

Ingredients

• 1 x 400g cod loin fillet (skinned and boned)
• 1 pack of parma ham

for the pesto if you want to make your own:

• half a jar of sun dried tomatoes (drained but keep the oil)
• 2 tablespoons of parmesan
• Small bunch of basil
• 1 fresh or dried chilli
• 1 tsp tabasco
• pinch of oregano
• salt and pepper

Method

1. If making your own pesto put all of the ingredients in a blender and whizz up, slowly adding the oil you reserved from the tomatoes until you get a nice spreadable consistency.
2. Pre heat oven to 200 degrees
3. Form a “sheet” of ham by slightly overlapping each slice of ham.
4. Spread the pesto down the middle of the ham
5. Place the cod on to the pesto and wrap the ham around the cod.
6. Place on a baking tray and bake in the oven until the ham is crispy.
7. Plate up the cod, drizzle with the juices from the baking tray, you can also mix the juices with a little extra pesto if needed.
8. Serve with Veg and potatoes of your choice.

Sorry about the poor pic, I have a better one which I will upload later

Here is my other fave soup (along with the chorizo one here  and home made mushroom soup) i got sick of normal parsnip soup so tried to make my own version

Sorry if its a bit rough but i tend to do it out of my head when i make it so just add extra bits to taste

Ingredients:

• 3 or 4 parsnips – peeled and roughly chopped
• 2 litres of Chicken stock
• 1 fresh red chilli, chopped
• 1 clove of garlic, crushed
• 1 teaspoon of chilli flakes (i usually use 2 but that makes it quite firey)
• Grated ginger (to taste) i usually use a good thumb sized piece
• Honey or maple syrup.
• 1 onion or leek finely chopped
• splash of milk (optional)
• A couple of knobs of nutter
• Salt and pepper
• Olive oil

Method

• Preheat oven to 200 degrees
• Par boil the parsnips in some water, then drain, add a knob of butter and a drizzle of olive oil to a frying pan and heat, add the parsnips and fry for a few mins until slightly browned, sprinkle with chilli flakes ,ginger and drizzle the honey over, fry for a few more minutes.
• Empty the parsnips onto a baking tray and bake until nice and golden,  (you can skip this step by keeping them in the pan longer but i always end up burning the honey)
• In the meantime fry the onion in a knob of butter until soft and then add the garlic.
• When the parsnips are ready, mix them with the onion.
• Blend with the milk and stock until you have your desired consistency, i usually strain the soup to remove lumps and then liquidise the lumps with the remaining stock until the soup is nice and smooth and creamy.
• Season to taste with salt and pepper

If you prefer thicker soup you can add a potato or 2 or leave the parsnip lumps in.

I like to serve it with homemade parsnip crisps on the top and homemade bread.

After demolishing Jules & Sharpie’s Hot Mango Chutney I decided it was time to start on another of the jars of joy they sent me, it was time to pop open the Hot Pepper Jelly.

Just like the Hot Mango Chutney it retails at £3.99 for a 340g Jar, When you first open it you are hit with a lovely sweet chilli smell and the jelly glistens in the light.

I stuck a spoon straight in and scooped out a big chunk, it was quite thick and gloopy (in a good way) so i wasn’t sure if it would spread well or not, but to my surprise it spread like a dream, ow this might sound a bit weird but it really did spread well, nice and evenly with not too much effort, so a big thumbs up there.

The first time I tried it was with cheese on toast – WOW what a taste sensation, sweet, spicy and full of flavour, It wasn’t blow your head off hot but it was hot enough that after a while you knew you had eaten in. It went perfectly with the cheese. I have also added it to gravy for with spicy sausages, this also worked a treat, but by far my favourite way to enjoy it is with roast chicken and stuffing sandwiches, the sweetness compliments the chicken and stuffing really well (a bit like cranberry sauce) but the chilli adds that extra kick and a whole new dimension, I’ve actually been buying chicken just so I can make that combo over and over again.

If you want to try it for your self (and i know you do) you can buy it from www.julesandsharpie.co.uk

Chilli Up North Verdict: Fantastic what ever you choose to eat it with, sweet, spicy and leaves a lovely chilli tingle on your tongue 8/10 (Heat rating: 7/10)

Well I did my bit for National Curry Week, I made the curry I mentioned here, The only differences were that i added some peppers and green beans to the lamb, and instead of roasting the sauce in the oven then adding the lamb, I made the sauce, friend the lamb, fried the veg for a bit then added it all to the slow cooker for 9 hours on a medium heat. Finally adding the yoghurt, lime and extra herbs at the end just before serving.

The result was brilliant, a lovely flavour packed curry, my only criticism was it could have done with a bit more chilli, next time I will either use some hotter chillis or increase the number of chillis I used.

The result can be seen below:

I was recently contacted by some nice people via twitter who sent me a press release regarding Nando’s National Chilli Week,  It started on the 23rd and runs all week, this was news to me, I’ve been in a little bubble all of my own for a the last week or two so I thought I had better spread the word ASAP, here is the info I received:

Nando’s survey proves that Brits have a taste for heat!

As the winter fast approaches, Brits are cranking up the heat…and we’re not talking central heating and thermal underwear. New National Chilli Week research released today by PERi-PERi professionals Nando’s  reveals how a third of us are now munching on the hot stuff at least once a week, whoever said British food was bland?

Eating far more chilli now than we ever did 10 years ago, stats show how a staggering 98% of us now add spice to our food on a regular basis, with only 2% of cool cucumbers revealing how they don’t eat food spicy at all.

Knowing chilli’s reputed aphrodisiac qualities, nearly 1/2 of those asked admitted they would use it to add some spice to their love life!  Surprisingly, there was a clear split between men and women = showing that both sexes are as eager as each other to use chilli to get steamy under the covers and put some heat back in the bedroom!

Our growing Tongues of Steel is something that has not gone unnoticed by Nando’s Chilli buyer Michael Plumber “In the past year alone we  have seen consumers charge up the heat scale in our restaurants…orders for our Extra Hot chicken has gone up by over a third, with our milder  Lemon & Herb baste slightly reducing…it seems that if people are fancying a bit of spice, they are going the whole hog…no half measures on the Peri-o-meter here!”

As well as the rising sales figures, celebs are increasingly being put on the hot spot, with a host of famous faces being caught in Nando’s restaurants having a quick chilli fix.  JLS, Dizzee Rascal and Pixie Lott are forever waxing lyrical about the spicy chicken, the members of the X-Factor house are using it to lubricate the vocal chords and  Denise Van Outen is a devoted fan “I am a chilli chick…it not only tastes great, but its also known  to give you an extra kick in more ways than one’

Denise is of course referring to the aphrodisiac qualities of the spice, not only giving the taste buds a toasting, research proves   chilli may also work to loosen up the libido, Plumber comments “maybe that’s the reason behind the steady increase, we are just in the mood  for love!

They also sent me some rather cool chilli facts but I will save those for another day.