While I studied for my first teaching qualification, I stayed with a nice couple at their home in the south of England. It was only for four weeks, which I think says something about the level of qualification I received, but I enjoyed my stay as Fran cooked excellent vegetarian food and was quite happy to share some of her recipes. By the end of the four weeks I could definitely cook better than I could teach.
When I finished the course I was immediately let loose on some Italian students. They weren't really interested in learning English except to say things like, 'Two pints of beer, please.' and 'Your place or mine?' and in class they were happiest watching videos and playing cards until they could escape into town for the afternoon extra-curricular activities. When the Director of Studies came into the classroom he would invariably find us egaged in some role-play activity, where I would be pretending to teach the students and they would be pretending to learn something. Generally, we all got on really well and I quickly came to the conclusion that if you can't teach it doesn't really matter; if the students are happy you get paid anyway. If, on the other hand, you can't cook then your day-to-day quality of life suffers, so in retrospect I think I can say that I made the most of those four weeks on the south coast.
This is one of the recipes I learned. There aren't many things you can do to make Brussels sprouts tasty, but this is certainly one of them.
Ingredients
400-500g sprouts
250-300g cooked and peeled chestnuts
1 onion
1 clove of garlic
I heaped dessert spoon of flour
A large glass of dry red wine
1 teaspoon of tomato puree
A few crushed black peppercorns
A third of a teaspoon of dried rosemary
1 small bayleaf
Olive oil
Salt
Wash the sprouts and pull of any particularly loose and worn looking leaves. Trim the stalks if they look as if they need it (nowadays sprouts often come ready trimmed). Chuck the sprouts into a pan containing a few centimetres of boiling water and cover tightly. Cook the sprouts for about 7 minutes then drain and save the cooking liquid.
Chop the onion and fry in olive oil until it starts to turn golden. Add the flour and chopped or crushed garlic and cook for another minute, stirring well. Pour the red wine and cooking liquid from the sprouts into the pan and stir to mix everything well, then add the tomato puree, sprouts, chestnuts and seasoning. Bring to the boil, stirring occasionally and thin the sauce with a little water if necessary. Partially cover the pan and simmer for about fifteen minutes.
This dish is good served with rice, boiled whole potatoes or mashed potatoes.