Writing down the instructions for a recipe – key
Chicken With Watercress Pesto And Fennel
Serves 2-3 Prep: 20 min Cook: 20min
1 fennel bulb
4tbsp olive oil
6 spring onions
150g shelled broad beans
255 (approx) chicken mini-fillets
2tbsp flour
For the pesto:
1 large garlic clove
2tbsp toasted pine kernels
50g watercress
6-7tbsp olive oil
3tbsp finely grated Parmesan (cheese)
1 lemon
Boil (the) kettle. Halve (the) fennel, cut out the core and slice thinly across the halves. Soften, stirring occasionally, for 5 min (minutes) in 2tbsp olive oil with a large pinch of salt. Trim and finely slice (the) spring onions.
Do you notice the note form used in these instructions? – for example ‘boil kettle’, instead of ‘boil the kettle’. When we read the recipe out we usually add ‘the’ and ‘of’.
Silent letters: did you spell the verbs ‘halve‘ and ‘soften‘ correctly?
Did you add the second ‘r‘ in ‘stir’ – eg ‘stirring / stirred?
Spelling: Did you spell occasionally correctly, with two ‘c’s and two ‘l’s, but only one ‘s’, pronounced like a ‘z’?
Quantities: a pinch = a small amount of something, such as a powder, especially the amount which you can hold between your first finger and thumb
Saying: If you take sth with a pinch of salt you are sceptical about the truth of something; you do not completely believe something that you are told, you think it is exaggerated or unlikely to be true.
Eg I think we’d better take what he promised to do with a pinch of salt.
To trim sth is to cut off a small amount of sth, or the ends of sth. Eg We trim a hedge, or an untidy edge on a piece of paper / card.
finely slice (the) spring onions – this could have been expressed ‘slice (the) spring onions finely’.
Stir them into the fennel, cover & cook for 10 min more until (the) fennel is tender. Meanwhile, boil the broad beans for 1 min (minute). Drain, spread on a plate to cool, then pinch off the rubbery skin. Stir (the) broad beans into the fennel and keep warm.
drain – verb – remove the water from. We also use the verb ‘strain‘ for the same action when cooking – eg strain the vegetables / drain the vegetables.
To pinch sth off – to remove by using the thumb and index finger
Dust (the) chicken with flour, shake off (the) excess (oil) and fry in two batches in 2tbsp (of) olive oil for 2min a side until golden. Meanwhile, blitz (the) peeled garlic, (the) pine kernels (the) watercress and (the) olive oil to make a thick purée. Scrape into a bowl and stir in (the) Parmesan (cheese).
To dust sth is usually 1) to use a cloth to remove dust from the surface of something:
Eg He’s dusting the books on his bookshelf.
In cookery this verb means 2) to cover sth with a fine powder – eg ‘dust the top of the loaf with sugar’.
A batch – a group of things or people dealt with at the same time or considered similar in type
eg I’m waiting for today’s batch of bread to arrive (= all the bread).
They’re going to deal with the passports in two batches = i.e.in two different groups / piles, on two separate occasions.
Fry for 2 minutes a side = fry for 2 minutes on each side
to blitz sth – verb – is to put it in a blender or food processor and cut it up very quickly. You may hear someone tell you to ‘give it a quick blitz in a blender….’
If you have to scrape sth off or out of sth it means it is sticky, so you have to remove it by putting some effort into it – you can’t just pour it out.
Pile (the) vegetables on two warmed plates, top with (the) chicken and dribble 1tbsp pesto over and around (the dish / the plate).
To top sth is to put it on the top. Another verb used in recipes is ‘line‘ when you put a layer of sth in the bottom of a pan or dish – eg ‘line the tin / dish with a row of peaches’ = put a row of peaches along the bottom of the tin / dish.
dribble / drizzle – both these verbs are used in cookery to mean to cause a liquid to flow very slowly in small amounts