QUARANTINE DIARIES, COMFORT FOOD & ALL THE SMALL THINGS THAT KEEP US GOING
We have news from London!! Some of us keep working full time, or more, but the joy of being at home means more cooking! A beef casserole: mosharaki me hilopites from Vivi, North London.
Head straight to the recipe.
A few words about you and where did the quarantine find you?
Quarantine in London – worst hit city – I have spent my quarantine properly locked down , I wasn’t going out even for shopping! My fiancé was furloughed so he was volunteering for the supermarket trips!
What did it change for you ?
It didn’t change much actually, neither for me or my fiancé. We just had more time to experiment with cooking and make things we have never done before!! Best achievement HAS to be the country style bread!
How many loo-rolls can you count in your cupboards?
I panicked at the start as I could not find any for quite some time but I never went mental in bulk buying. Got 2 x 9 packs from a local shop and we have since been secured!
Comfort food: Beef stew with pasta, mosharaki me hilopites
Comfort food could be many things : some nice pastichio like your grandma used to make for you, could be a nice chicken curry with rice or even a long roast on a weekday!! <3 I am happy I made Mageiritsa for the very first time this year (!!!) and Easter cookies (!!!)
Below is a quick every day staple though: beef stew with pasta, mosharaki me hilopites
Beef stew, mosharaki me hilopites
Ingredients
- 1 pack of beef approx. 500 gr
- Olive oil
- 1 onion finely chopped
- 2 gloves of garlic minced
- 1 cup of red wine
- Salt & pepper
- A few crushed chillies
- 1 tabspn tomato paste
- 400 gr chopped tomatoes
- A pinch of cinnamon
- A splash of Worcestershire sauce
- 500 ml beef stock
- 250 gr of hilopites For 2
Instructions
- Heat up some olive oil in the pot. Fry the beef until golden brown, add 1 onion along with the mince garlic and sautee.
- Add 1 cup of red wine- drink some while you do that because why not!!
- Add salt, pepper, crushed chillies and bay leaves.
- Follow in with one tablespoon of tomato paste, one can of chopped tomatoes some cinnamon and a splash of Worcestershire sauce.
- Add 500ml of water with a beef stock and let the mix simmer for 1 hour or more until the beef is soft and can be cut with the fork.
- Once the meat is soft, add some boiling water if needed and add your hilopites (250g enough for 2 people). Let it cook according to the cooking instructions (aprox 7 mins) but keep whisking as it could stick to the bottom of your pot!!!BON APPETIT!
How do you cope?
I like working from home!! It definitely has some good and some bad things in it (i.e. I don’t have a proper office or chair to work from home so my ‘’office’’ is the same place I am ‘’after work’’ (poor sofa and ever more poor me :() To add to that, the bad thing is that you don’t have proper lunch breaks anymore and you also end up working more hours that you do in the office. Good thing is that I can be in more casual clothes, not having to be in large packed groups of busy tube lines and trains and I definitely sleep better.
Where will you go eat once this madness is over?
I WANT TO GO HOME ( Athens – Greece )
Share a wish, just so we can finish on a happy note.
I wish that everyone will get to see their family and their loved ones soon, because after all, family is what matters the most <3
from London with love,
Vivi
PS: If you wish to be part of my quarantine cuisine diaries and share your experience on Eat Yourself Greek (EYG), please drop me a line here. Thanks, Eugenia
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