​I liked Jock Zonfrillo, I found him nice, and hearing about his passing upset me. I didn't know him personally, but I watched his food videos and liked his personality and liked what he cooks.

So I decided, like I do for some other chefs I like, I like to cook something of theirs as a tribute to them, to keep there memory alive through their food. So today I'm posting his focaccia recipe, so that I won't forget him, nor will anyone that re4ads this recipe..

This recipe gives to you two focaccias, feel free to halve the recipe if you don't want to make two. You can make them plain with just a sprinkling of salt, or you can top them with olives, fresh cherry tomatoes or sun dried tomatoes, you can top them with garlic and rosemary, honestly you can put on anything you like on a focaccia.

I'm adding a video of Jock making a half batch variation of this recipe as a little tribute here.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_pm_gxzCdE&t=25s 

This is quite an easy recipe, the dough comes together well. Now I have added extra rising time to Jock's as I'm making this in winter and it needed a little extra time, but look at your dough and you decide how fluffy you want it.

So if you feel like trying something new, here is a focaccia recipe I made in memory of Jock.

Recipe adapted from The Two Good Cook Book by The Two Good Co

Makes 2 focaccia

2 x 7g sachets dried yeast 
1/2 teaspoon caster sugar
1kg 00 flour
3 teaspoons fine salt
150ml olive oil
sea salt flakes, for sprinkling
4 rosemary or sage sprigs, leaves picked
olive oil, for drizzling

optional toppings: garlic, olives, cherry tomatoes, sundried tomatoes
​
Place 250ml (1 cup) warm water in a bowl, then add the yeast and sugar and stir to dissolve. Stand in a warm place for 10 minutes or until it starts to froth.

Add the flour and fine salt, then add the olive oil and another 375ml (1½ cups) warm water and stir to make a soft dough. Knead with a damp hand, in the bowl, as the dough will be sticky, for 6-8 minutes or until smooth. Then lightly oil the bowl and turn to coat the dough in the oil. Cover with a tea towel and stand for about 2 hours or until doubled in size.

Line two, 20 x 30cm baking trays with baking paper. Add olive oil into the centre, about 2-3 tablespoons.

Release the dough from the side of the bowl, using a damp hand. This will deflate it.
Perform a set of stretch and folds on the dough. To do this, wet your hands, then take a section of the dough furthest from you and stretch it up and fold it onto itself towards you. Rotate the bowl 90° and repeat the process. You need to do a total of 8 stretch and folds. You will get the dough roughly shaped like a ball.

Then, take two forks and divide the dough into two equal portions—eye the centre of the mass of dough, and starting from the centre and working out, pull the dough apart with the two forks. 

Place each half in your oiled baking trays, fold each dough twice, you kind of get a rectangle shape, rotate the dough 90 degrees, so the long ends of the dough match the long ends of your baking tray, then flip over, you need the fold side down, stretch out slightly from underneath and rest uncovered for 45 minutes to an hour until the dough fills up the baking tray.

​Preheat oven to 220C/200C fan forced.

Pour two tablespoons of oil over the dough. Rub your hands lightly in the oil to coat, then, using all of your fingers, press straight down to create deep dimples. If necessary, gently stretch the dough as you dimple to allow the dough to fill the pan. 

Sprinkle with plenty of sea salt flakes, to taste, and scatter over the rosemary or sage leaves (or olives or tomatoes, if using), then drizzle generously with extra virgin olive oil. 

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​Soup is liquid gold in my house, it is made so often, at least twice a week, and it loved by us all. This soup, this is comfort food in my house, a hearty chicken and vegetable soup, it is just perfect on a cold winters day.

This soup came about when my husbands grandfather was in hospital and he asked me to make 'eingemacht', I love that I said no problems, not having a clue what it was, not knowing how to spell it, to even look it up. As we left the hospital, I asked my husband what is it, he also had no idea. I came home went on a google search with how I think it is spelled, came up with nothing. Then my husband called his parents in Croatia and asked them what it is and they told us it's a soup all cooked in one pot. Well that is easy, so ajngemahtec, not eingemacht is something we had been cooking for years, we just didn't know what it was called. 

Now I'm not sure of the origin of this soup, but I suspect, by it's name, that it could be Austrian or German, and with my husbands family having Austrian/German ancestry, I feel this could be accurate. Eingemacht, is a German word which roughly translates as "all together" or "all in one."

This soup is like a clean out the fridge soup, use the recipe as a guide, I use whatever I have in house, then just add in extras if needed. You could easily add in other vegetables like capsicum, kale, swede or zucchini for instance. 
If I have chicken carcasses or duck bones in the freezer, I'll use that instead of chicken wings. Here I cook the carcasses in water with an onion, a stick celery and a carrot, for an hour and a half, then continue with the recipe, discarding the bones (my husband and I eat the meat off the bones, or you can add them to the soup at the end). 

I add chicken hearts or giblets to the soup as my husband, one of my kids and I love them, but you don't have to add them, you can just add a little extra chicken instead. Cut giblets into bite sized pieces.

Ajngemachtec is often served at the beginning of the Sunday family lunch, but it also cooked during the week as a healing agent if you are sick with a cold, flu, or a hangover, a plate of hot ajngemahtec always seems to make things better. Croatians love soup, we eat them so often, usually it is a broth kind of a soup, but other times we make thick and hearty soup.

Now for the dumplings, my mother in law taught me how to make this when I first got married, they are delicious. They are soft and delicious. Just make sure to let the mixture rest for 30 minutes before you add them to the soup.

If once you have added all your ingredients to the soup and you find you have added too much water, you can add a little small soup sized pasta to the soup to add substance. Likewise, if you don't have enough water, add some more water, then just adjust seasoning if you need to.

So if you are looking for a hearty soup to make, this one is delicious.

Recipe adapted from recepti.index.hr/ 

Serves 6

1 tablespoon sunflower oil
500g chicken for soup (wings, legs, hearts, giblets)
200g chicken thighs, skinless, boneless, cut into bite sized pieces
1 onion, diced
2 carrots, sliced
1 stick celery
1 large potato, peeled, cut into 1-1.5cm cubes
1/2-1 tablespoon vegeta, to taste
200g frozen peas
1/4 cup chopped parsley
1/4 head of cauliflower, cut florets into bite sized pieces
1 head broccoli, cut florets into bite sized pieces
salt and pepper, to taste

Griz Knedle (Semolina Dumplings):
40g vegetable oil
100g fine semolina
2 eggs

Heat a large pot and add oil. Add onion and sauté for about 5 minutes. Add the chicken and fry for a further 5 minutes.

Add carrots, celery and potato, sauté for 3 minutes and then pour 2-3 litres of water, enough to cover the soup  and to be able to fit in nicely the remaining ingredients once it is time to add them. Add vegeta, season with salt and pepper, to taste. Cook over medium heat until boiling. When it boils, reduce the heat and cook gently, uncovered, for 45 minutes.

In the meantime make the Griz Knedle: In a small mixing bowl add the oil, semolina and the egg. With a fork whisk it together until combined. leave to sit for 30 minutes.

After 45 minutes, add cauliflower and broccoli florets, peas and parsley and continue cooking for another 10 minutes.

Place the prongs of a fork into the boiling soup. When hot, use the fork to cut small strips of the semolina and add them to the soup. Bring it to the boil again, simmer for 5 minutes or until cooked through. Check soup for seasoning. Serve immediately.

To save the recipe to your favourites go to www.whatscookingella.com/ajngemahtec-s-griz-knedlama.html
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​This is probably my favourite way to eat broccoli. It's simple and it's delicious. I could easily double this recipe and my family would eat it all, they love it.

The broccoli is also great roasted on its own with some olive oil and salt. My daughter if she spots broccoli in the fridge will make this for herself for lunch, anytime she can.

Use the measurements in this recipe as a guideline. Add more or less broccoli and then everything else is to taste. 

Broccoli stalks are delicious raw. Just cut off the tough outer layer and inside is a fresh crisp stalk, perfect for you or your kids to munch on.

Give this a try if you want to try something new, it's delicious.

​Recipe adapted from Erin Gleeson's cookbook The Forest Feast-Mediterranean

Serves 4
​
2 heads broccoli, broken into florets
1 large red onion, sliced into medium pieces
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 teaspoon red chilli flakes, to taste
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
Salt and pepper, to taste


Preheat oven to 220C/200C fan forced. Line a large baking tray with baking paper.

Place the broccoli in a single layer on the baking tray. Scatter around the onions. Drizzle generously with olive oil. Sprinkle over the chilli flakes and garlic, season with salt and pepper.

Bake for 12 minutes, toss everything together, bake for an additional 12 minutes or until some edges on the broccoli have blackened and are crispy.

Serve immediately as the florets lose crispiness as they cool.

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​This is my first attempt at making a curry paste from scratch. I was browsing a cookbook, looked at the picture of the recipe, knew I felt like eating it, so gave it a go.

It was fabulous. I was so excited by the end result, and it was easy, really easy.

It is so simple you could serve this to family and friends with confidence.

I loved the chicken, it doesn't get overcooked, I loved the eggplant, it was delicious, I loved the beans. I loved everything about this.

If you like your curry spicy, add more chilli flakes than stated in the recipe, as this is not that spicy, but you could also just add chilli powder to the table if someone wants more spice.

The curry paste has a lot of ingredients, it will make 5 cups. This recipe only needs 2 1/2 cups of the paste, I just froze the rest for another time. It can be made several days in advance and kept covered in the refrigerator. Don't fret over the amount of ingredients or the effort in making it, the food processor does all the work for you, it is so easy to make.

Overall, I will still on occasion use bottled pastes as they are convenient, but this recipe I will definitely be cooking again and again. YUM!

​Recipe adapted from Annabel Langbein's Cookbook 'The Free Range Cook'

Serves 6

South East Asian Curry Base: Makes 5 cups
4 large onions, peeled, each onion cut into 8 wedges
1 whole hand of ginger, peeled, chopped into chunks
1 whole head garlic, peeled
4 green chillies, or more to taste
2 kaffir lime leaves, remove central rib
2 cups roughly chopped fresh coriander, roots included if available
Grated zest of 3 limes
1 cup grapeseed, rice bran, sunflower or other neutral oil
2 teaspoons dried shrimp paste
1 teaspoon dried chilli flakes
3 teaspoons ground cumin
1 teaspoon coriander seeds
2 teaspoons turmeric
1 tablespoon fish sauce

Curry:
2 1/2 cups South East Asian Curry Base
3 cups chicken stock
1 cup coconut cream
1 heaped tablespoon grated palm sugar or brown sugar
Salt and Pepper
3-4 Japanese eggplants, sliced into 2cm pieces or 400g regular eggplant, sliced into 2-3cm pieces
1kg boneless, skinless chicken thigh fillets, cut in half
2 tomatoes, chopped
400g green beans, trimmed and cut into thirds
1/2 cup cashew nuts, roasted and ground

To serve, steamed rice and poppodoms


For the curry base: Place the onions, ginger and garlic in the food processor and blitz for 5-10 seconds to start chopping it up. Add the remaining base ingredients and blend to a paste.
Roast the cashew nuts whole in a 180C/160C fan forced, preheated oven briefly, 5-10 minutes until they start to colour or you can dry fry them for a few minutes in a frying pan. Then blitz them in a small food processor.

I used a large wok, as I have one, but you can use a large pot if that is what you have.

Place 2 1/2 cups of the south east Asian curry base in your wok and fry it over a low heat for 15 minutes, stirring frequently until very soft, but not browned.

Add the stock, coconut cream and sugar. Season with salt and pepper, to taste. Stir to incorporate and bring to the boil.

Add the eggplant and simmer for 10 minutes. Add the chicken thighs, simmer for another 10 minutes.

Add the tomatoes, beans and half of the ground cashew nuts and simmer for a further 15-20 minutes, simmer for as long as it takes for the chicken to be cooked through, the eggplant to soften and beans are just cooked. Undercooked eggplant is unpleasant to eat, and the beans shouldn't be crisp, but also not mushy.

Spoon into serving dishes and sprinkle with the remaining cashew nuts to serve.

Serve with steamed rice and poppadoms.

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​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​If you make this recipe, please let me know! Leave a comment below or take a photo and tag me on Instagram or Twitter with #whatscookingella