What I'm making for Valentine's day

So me and my boyfriend decided we were gonna stay in for V-day this year, and cook something super special, figuring even if we buy the best ingredients, it'll still be cheaper than going out for a posh meal. So here's what I'll be making tonight... Pictures to come! Where's the main, you ask? Well, the boy's making beef wellington (lucky me!) using Gordon Ramsay's recipe... so if you want that, go have a Google!

Starter: Grilled field mushrooms with pesto and parmesan

Ingredients: 

2 large field mushrooms
1 small baguette
1 jar pesto
2 tbsp grated parmesan
olive oil
2 eggs

Method:

1. Chop off about 2 slices of your baguette, and put that and two teaspoons of pesto into a blender, and blend until it forms a paste. Put the kettle on.

2. Wash and fry the mushrooms for about 2 minutes on each side in the olive oil, then remove from the pan. Spread the mushrooms with your pesto mixture, then sprinkle the parmesan over the top.

3. In the same frying pan, add some more olive oil, slice two big slices off the baguette, and fry until they've soaked up all the oil and are nice and crispy (like two big croutons). Put the mushrooms under the grill until the parmesan has gone nice and crispy.

4. Meanwhile, poach the eggs. Fill a saucepan with boiling water, add a few drops of vinegar and swirl the water around so it makes a little whirlpool. When it's doing this, quickly and gently crack your eggs into the water. This way they'll stay together and you'll get perfect poached eggs. After about two minutes the eggs should be done, remove with a slotted spoon.

5. Assemble: put the croutons on the bottom, followed by the mushroom, followed by the poached egg. Slice through half of the poached egg so that the yolk oozes all over the mushroom (it makes it look posh).

And you're done!! An impressive and pretty simple starter.


Dessert: Melting chocolate pots (makes 3)

Ingredients:

110g butter
75g flour
55g good quality dark chocolate, minimum 75% cocoa solids
150g sugar
2 eggs

Method:

1. Grease 3 ramekins.

2. Melt the butter and chocolate together slowly in a bowl over a pan of slightly simmering water, making sure the bowl doesn't touch the water.

3. Whisk the sugar and eggs together until thick and pale, then fold the flour in gently, then the chocolate mixture. Separate equally into the ramekins, and chill until needed, or for at least an hour.

4. When you're ready, preheat the oven to 200C and bake the chocolate pots for 12-14 minutes, or until the tops have set. Remove from the oven and leave for about 5 minutes. Tip them out and serve with cream.


Enjoy your Valentine's day guys! Love is all around xx