When you have two chefs in the house, you really have no worries about what to pack for lunches when they each both decide to cook something..
Yvan had made ‘meat for the week’ – a large meat dish with a weeks worth for a couple of people (less with more mouths of course). In this case he had made a typical ‘Yvan ragu’ – improvising on spices and sometimes additions that you won’t normally see in a traditional bolognese (like the beetroot that turns the mix bright pink.) When divided up into meal-size portions these can stay in the fridge for a week or longer in the freezer: think home made microwave dinner, except far better. Yaël on the other hand had her interests in trying a daal from the curry book, another straight-forward dish. Apart from serving with rice, you can use it as a dip or even as a soup.
With such an assortment of dishes, there was little to do but add more greens to the lunch!
Top tier
Top tier contents: Steamed broccoli with sesame, daal with grape tomatoes, steamed french beans with lemon slice, steamed beans, beef and beetroot ragu with carrot slice.
Bottom tier
Bottom tier contents: rice with sorrel stem and sesame furikake, crabsticks, edamame, cucumber and lemon slice
A simple furikake tops the rice: since I had used sorrel for a soy pickle (in a way originally intended for shiso) I had lots of the course – but more potent – stems. The chopped stems are heated briefly (to avoid discolouring) in a lightly oiled pan seasoned with some soy sauce and sesame seeds. Again, a strange collection of items but a filling and pretty healthy lunch results.
Ragu & Daal
