H is for Harissa, Halloumi, and HOMETIME

The last couple of months have been super busy, with lots of trips away, including two weeks at home in New Zealand for fun times in the snow and visiting friends. We were lucky enough to house sit for a good friend in Wanaka for the first week, which included their beautiful cat and dog Coco and Harlow, then a couple of nights staying with some more friends in Dunedin, then five nights in Queenstown with more snow and good times. We ate our way through way too much good food, platters and drank wine and cc CC and dry to wash it down. Highlights included Florence's cafe and Red Star Burgers (hands down better than Fergburger) in Wanaka, Mexican in Dunedin at Del Sol, and breakfast at Vudu in Queenstown (even if the food did take ages, it tasted pretty good). The whole trip made us think seriously about whether it might be worth investing in a holiday house back home in NZ, as the snow in particular is definitely somewhere we will keep going back to, but we will just have to wait and see how many pennies we manage to save now we are lucky enough to no longer be paying much rent (a whole other story). 

Anyway, I got back to Melbourne from New Zealand and realised I am well overdue for the letter H - this is one I had saved up for awhile, and it was well worth it - Halloumi aubergine burgers with homemade Harissa relish.

Harissa Paste
(adapted from taste.com.au)
 
6 fresh chillies
2 garlic cloves, crushed
1 tsp salt
1 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp ground coriander
1 tbs olive oil

Halve the chillies, remove the seeds and discard. Chop chilli and garlic cloves. Using a mortar and pestle, crush all the ingredients together to make a smooth paste.

Halloumi Aubergine Burgers

(adapted from BBC good food)

Serves 2

2 tbsp olive oil

1 onion finely sliced

2 tbsp dark soy sauce

4 round slices of fresh aubergine

4 slices halloumi cheese
1 tbsp soft brown sugar
1 roasted red pepper chopped
2 tsp harissa paste
2 rolls with the bread in teh middle pulled out (it's just a filler!)

4 tbsp hummus (you can use the basic TMX recipe or buy some)

Add half of the oil to a pan and cook onions until soft. Set aside. Heat remaining oil and add aubergine. Pour over soy sauce. Fry for a few mins on each side until tender. Set aside. Fry halloumi until golden. Set aside. Add the onions, pepper and harissa into the hot pan. Cook until the sugar has melted. While the relish is cooking, spread the rolls with hummus, laying halloumi and aubergine slices on top. Spread relish and serve. You should have some extra relish left over to put in your lunch the next day :)