Category Archives: Eating at Home

Foodie Penpals

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Last month I finally signed up to Foodie Penpals - a great parcel exchange idea organised by This is Rock Salt who I had the pleasure of meeting late last year.

How does it work? Each month you are assigned a penpal to send a gift of £10 value to, and in return a penpal sends you a gift. There is some email exchange beforehand so you can give your dietary requirements or requests if you want!

My two penpals were both UK based so I didn’t request anything special, and neither did my penpal. I stupidly forgot to take a photo of my parcel before I sent it off, and my penpal doesn’t blog – but here is what I sent: whiskey tablet from The Good Spirits Co, Glasgow. I had popped in there to pick up some Nucoco chocolate as I was going for a locally produced (in Glasgow) theme! I got a bag of the dark chocolate (70%) chocolate drops which you can use to make hot chocolate – but recommend eating them with yoghurt! Added to the parcel were some Scottish oatcakes, as well as two small taster bottles of Auchentoshan (single malt Scotch whisky made just outside of Glasgow). I hope my penpal liked everything she got!

Here is a picture of the parcel I received:

Foodie pen pal parcel

I could smell the popcorn from outside the box! It was pretty enticing, I’ve never received a popcorn-smelling-parcel before. My penpal obviously had a wee peek at the blog and saw that I like all things healthy and natural! In it there is Pearled Spelt, a couple of Munchy Seeds, Chorley Cakes and Eccles Cakes as well as the two bags of homemade popcorn. Because life has been chaotic I haven’t had a chance to try anything apart from the popcorn (YUM!) but I look forward to trying it all this week.

Thanks to This is Rock Salt for organising such a huge endeavour  and thanks to my penpal for my great parcel. Head over to her blog if you’re keen on taking part yourself.

What would you send if you were sending a foodie parcel to someone?

 

Chicken and feta sausage rolls

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This recipe is my go-to saviour for when I need to make something to take a dish along to a party or gather. I am not a baker in the traditional sense (I could happily live a cake-free existence if required) so I always like to take something savoury. I also have a load of friends who are way better at making cakes than I’ll ever be!

A friend of mine suggested it to me, and after making it once I was hooked. These will convert people who will proclaim “but I don’t like sausage rolls!”. Well, if they like chicken, they will love these. I did start wondering whether a “sausage roll” is still a sausage roll if it’s made from chicken. Hmm, tough philosophical question … I’ll come back to that another day (or you can comment below and let me know what you think!)

Top view of the sausage rolls

500g minced chicken meat
1 small eshallot, finely chopped
grated zest ½ lemon
4 tablespoons chopped rocket
4 tablespoons fresh breadcrumbs
½ teaspoon chilli flakes
100g feta cheese crumbled
2 sheets ready rolled puff pastry
1 egg, beaten

Combine all ingredients except pastry and egg and mix well with your hands. Season well with salt and pepper. Halve each sheet of pastry. Divide meat into 4 sausages the length of the pastry, and place one slightly off-centre on each strip. Brush one edge of pastry strip with beaten egg and then fold over the other to enclose sausage meat. Press down to seal with the back of a fork. Brush with beaten egg. Cut each roll into 2 or 3 smaller sausage rolls, and prick each with a fork. Repeat with the rest of the pastry and meat. Chill for at least 30 minutes. Bake in preheated 220°C oven for 25 minutes, or until golden. Serve warm. Makes 8-12.

Side view of the sausage rolls

The recipe is originally from The Australian.

In the UK it can be hard to find chicken breast minced, so I just buy breasts and put them in the magic bullet to mince them up. Works perfectly! I then do the same with the rocket and crumble the feta by hand. If you make these, be sure to comment and let me know if you loved them. These always go down a treat at a party!

Tomato and butter pasta sauce

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I read about this recipe while we were in Australia, I can’t remember where from now but there are lots of recipes floating around. It is impressively simple, and yet packs a huge flavour punch. Give it a try one night when you need a comfort meal like a hug, and can’t really be bothered cooking anything more complicated.

Tomato and butter pasta

Tomato and butter pasta

Ingredients:

2 x 400 gram tins of tomatoes (preferably whole tomatoes, and a fancy brand if you feel like lashing out)
4 tbs of butter
Pasta – any kind works well. I used a packet of casareccia pasta which I got at the Zizzi launch – they use it in a pasta dish with chicken, tomato and spinach. It is a really lovely pasta that is soft and delicate, and holds the sauce really well.

  1. Simply melt the butter in a saucepan, and add the tomatoes. Bash them a little bit so they break up. Leave the sauce to simmer for about 45 minutes.
  2. Serve over your (cooked) pasta. Don’t overload the pasta with sauce – you want a nice coating but not drowning in sauce.

You might be reading this and thinking “but that’s it?!” … yes, that’s it. The butter and tomato taste amazing together, and sometimes it’s the simple recipes that really rock your world. I dare you to try it and tell me what you think of it.

Eating the Cupboards

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I think I invented this, or at least gave something that already exists a new name. Before we left for Melbourne, we were furiously penny pinching and had heaps of food in the cupboards. So about two weeks before we left, we stopped buying food in an effort to run down our supplies, as well as save money.

To do this needed a little bit of planning.

1. I wrote a list of everything we had in the cupboard (pantry), fridge and freezer. 

What's in the cupboard?

What’s in the cupboard?

2. I started thinking about what would go together. If you think about food as proteins and carbs, this makes it a bit easier to work out a meal. With the help of google, I would put a couple of ingredients in and see what it came up with. As you can see at the bottom of the list, I did need to buy a few things – tomatoes, ricotta and potatoes. But overall, I used what we had.

Recipes for the week

Recipes for the week

3. I then wrote down all the days of the week I had to cook for, and started slotting meals in. If you are cooking for two people, but the meal serves 4, make sure to put down the leftovers for your lunch the next day.

This was incredibly successful! It is best if you have an idea of how much of an ingredient you will use (for example, a 400g bag of spinach will probably be enough for a dinner sized meal for four).

Some of the meals we made were hideously awful, I’ll be honest. Mushroom and cabbage lasagne was probably the worst thing I’ve ever made. It doesn’t even sound nice! Others were a big hit – lobster risotto was surprisingly luxurious for a risotto made from soup and tinned lobster.

Overall though, it was a great experience and made me bit more inventive. I can be a bit lazy and resort to going to the shops, when I could think of something delicious for dinner from what we have. I had friends over a couple of days before we left, and they were impressed with the dips I served up from what we had in the cupboard, as well as home made breads.

Rice paper rolls

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I am a huge fan of rice paper rolls and make them every now and then for lunch or dinner. What is great is that you can put whatever you want in them, there is no set recipe. I made them last night, and a few people asked me how they’re made so I thought I’d put this post up!

Rice paper rolls

Rice paper rolls

Ingredients:

  • Rice paper roll sheets – I use Blue Dragon brand which you can buy at Whole Foods Giffnock
  • Protein filling – last night I used cooked prawns, I have also used cooked chicken and tinned tuna in the past. Any meat would work well and perhaps something like tofu if you are vegetarian
  • Noodles – I use vermicilli or any kind of thin rice noodle
  • Vegetables – again, feel free to use what you have. I used carrot (pickled in soy and rice vinegar) and green capsicum (pepper)
  • Herbs – fresh mint and coriander are absolutely heavenly
  • Sauce – you can either make a dipping sauce, or a sauce to include in the wrap. I made satay sauce from crunchy peanut butter, coconut cream, mint and soy sauce.

Method:

  1. I started off by prepping the prawns. They were already cooked, so I just marinated them in some lime juice (half a lime for around 300 grams of prawns). 
  2. For the noodles, I had got a packet from Asda which just required a zap in the microwave for a minute. I did this early on so they wouldn’t be warm when it came to wrapping up the rolls.
  3. Chop your capsicum (pepper) – long thin strips work best.
  4. Pickle the carrot – this is totally optional. You could just use carrot as it is, but I really love pickled carrot. I used 1tbs of rice vinegar and 1tbs of soy sauce for 1 large sized carrot, shaved with a speed peeler.
  5. Make up your sauce. I used around 2tbs of peanut butter, and then about 2tbs of coconut cream, 1tbs of soy and a sprinkle of mint. Just mix it all up until it has a loose consistency.
  6. Chop up all the herbs.
  7. Then you’re ready to go! The rice paper sheets have instructions on them – simply put a sheet in warm water for around 15 seconds. Then transfer onto a clean tea towel and dab off the excess water. Put on some noodles, capsicum, carrot, prawns, then the sauce and prawns in a pile in the top, middle of the sheet.
  8. Wrap by starting with the bottom, fold it up and over the filling. Then fold over the left hand size, and roll.
Rice paper roll

Rice paper roll

Based on what we ate last night – one person could eat around 3 of these for dinner. We ate 4 each and that was a bit too much really! To make 8 rice paper rolls we used 300g of prawns, one capsicum, one carrot and one small bag of rice noodles. These are great for a super fresh tasting dinner when you feel like something that will refresh you. I also love a no-cook dinner every now and then.

Please let me know if you try them and if you come up with any different combinations!  

Back from holidays!

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So we’re back from three weeks in beautifully sunny Melbourne. We had a totally amazing time and will bring you a post with a few reviews of the best places we ate. Before we left, I had a bit of an “eat the cupboards” challenge whereby we stopped buying food and just ate what we had. This resulted in some really great recipes which I’ll post up soon. Added to that, we have a tonne of places in Glasgow to visit now we are home again – the first review post will be up next week!

Glad to be back. Let me know if there were any great places you discovered while we were away that we should visit!

Hotel Chocolat Valentine’s Day giveaway

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Hotel Chocolat recently sent me a Valentine’s Day present – a 50g slab of “To my Valentine” chocolate to try, and another one to give away!

photo 1 (5)

I had some on Friday night while having a relaxing night in – just me, a glass of wine and watching Girls. What better way to treat myself than to have some chocolate too? I have been posting recently about I Quit Sugar (which I still love) but sometimes you need to indulge a little. I really liked this chocolate – it’s traditional 40% milk chocolate with a strawberry heart middle.

photo 2 (5)

All you have to do is comment on this post! I want to make sure the winner gets this for Valentine’s Day on Thursday, so this is going to be a short competition and will run until 9pm on Monday 11 February 2013. You can only enter once. I will do a post on Monday 11 February announcing the winner – you will need to get in touch with me with your details so I can give you the voucher. If I don’t hear from you by Tuesday 12 February at 9pm I’ll re-draw the prize. I’ll post it out by first class mail to the winner. This competition is open to residents in the UK only.

Good luck!

Portuguese Caldo Verde (kale and chorizo soup)

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I have become a bit of a soup addict, as I mentioned recently. I love how you can make a batch and it lasts for so many meals. And it’s a really lovely winter warmer, as everyone knows! I was recently contacted by Sunvil to make one of their supper club recipes - Portuguese Caldo Verde, or kale and chorizo soup.

Simmering away on the stove

I love kale, and Graeme loves chorizo so I was excited to try this recipe. It was easy enough to make as you can see from the recipe – it didn’t need too much attention while it was simmering away on the stove. As the chorizo cooks in the soup, it releases some of its spices to give it a lovely warming flavour.

This recipe made about 6 servings of soup which kept us going all weekend! Some simple changes you could make would be to use sweet potato rather instead of potato, and for a vegetarian friendly dish just omit the chorizo. You’d then want to include some paprika in with the onions to give it the flavour that the chorizo would normally provide!

Portuguese Caldo Verde soup

Thanks to Sunvil for sharing this recipe with us. I’m adding it to our folder to make again when we are back from Australia!

Sunvil provided a gift voucher to buy the ingredients with. Thank you!

Book review – I Quit Sugar Cookbook

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I got lots of lovely nice feedback on Twitter about my I Quit Sugar post! Thanks to everyone who tweeted – your feedback was really nice and uplifting.

I thought I’d do a follow up post about what you actually eat on the I Quit Sugar programme. As I’ve been doing it for a while now, I am getting more inventive so will do a few of my own recipe posts in the upcoming months.

So here are a few things I’ve made, so you can get an idea of what you’d be eating if you gave it a try.

Coco-nutty Granola

Coco-nutty granola on pancakes (made from eggs, cottage cheese & oats)

Sarah has posted on her website the recipe for her granola – she says this is her most popular recipe from the Cookbook. I think this is because it is so easy, very delicious and easy to adapt to whatever you have in the cupboard. I have made this a couple of times, and I really enjoy it as well. It is great with yoghurt and berries for breakfast or a snack.

Straight out of the oven: coco-nutty granola

Fennel soup

Fennel soup with chicken, yoghurt and Parmesan

I was browsing the Cookbook as I had some fennel, but wasn’t sure how I could use it. To make this recipe I just needed leeks so I went ahead and made it. I am slowly becoming a soup addict – I used to find soup always left me hungry, but that was because I was eating the tinned variety. When you make your own soup and control what goes in, I find it is more satisfying.  I made this soup and then added in some extras at the ended – shredded chicken, Parmesan and yoghurt. But the soup on its own was delicious and I can’t wait to make this again. I ended up with about 5 servings from this recipe as well and it freezes really well, which makes it great for when you forget to make lunch.

Hash

Sweet potato, pumpkin seed crush

The best way to describe the hash recipes is that it’s just a mix of a variety of vegetables and nuts in whatever combinations you like. The first hash I made pretty much followed Sarah’s recipe and had sweet potato and pumpkin seeds in it and topped with yoghurt. It looked more like a dessert than a dinner! I put it in a bowl and struggled to finish it – it was really filling. It is also great to use up whatever you have in your fridge like herbs with a nice refreshing lemon dressing. This also makes a great, quick lunch to take to work if you have cooked the vegetables in advance. You could also add in bacon bits, shredded chicken, cheese or tuna to add in more protein.

Crushes/pesto

Pea and almond crush

I am addicted to crushes and pestos now. These are such a great way of eating more raw vegetables while still having a snack or meal that fees like a treat. I have it on toast, mixed into a hash, used as a pasta sauce, as a dip or as a pizza base. They are versatile and could really be used for anything! My husband isn’t a huge fan of the pea crush but I really like it – it has a tangy zing from the lemon and Parmesan.

Sweet stuff

The Cookbook also has a section of sweet treats – sugar free desserts to enjoy without feeling guilty. I made the cheesecake which we took to a friend’s house a while back. The judges were split – two of us liked it, and two didn’t. It was very savoury! It was the first time I’d used stevia and I don’t think I put enough in. I also can’t get used to the taste of stevia and will try xylitol when I finish our carton of stevia (we are currently using it up to make mojitos!).

The Cookbook warns about going overboard with the sweet stuff – so these are sometimes treats, not daily ones! Thankfully I don’t have too much of a sweet tooth so just make do with a small piece of 70-85% chocolate when needed.

Hopefully that is a useful insight into the recipes in the eBook. There are loads more! Generally, the recipes contain lots of nuts, coconut, vegetables and avocado. Some ingredients I haven’t been able to find in shops (such as almond flour) so some recipes I haven’t been able to try. But overall, I like the recipes and they are generally really quick and easy to make. I preferred reading the eBook and then the Cookbook to see all the things I could eat. I think they are much better when read in conjunction as they help you stay on track and remember why you’re trying to quit sugar.

If you’re interested in I Quit Sugar, you can check out the bundle using this link, which as I mentioned in my last post is an affiliate link, meaning I get some money because you buy the book via me. The eBook and Cookbook are both 50% to celebrate Australia Day until Tuesday 29 January – so get in while it’s super cheap!

I’ve got lots more posts for you this week – including my long overdue review of Nachos Southside and a couple of cookbook reviews! Let me know if you have any questions on IQS below, or via twitter.

(All the images here are photos I have uploaded to instragram, in case you were wondering about the filters!)

I Quit Sugar

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Yep, it’s true! I downloaded the I Quit Sugar eBooks from Sarah Wilson‘s website back in October last year. I am a huge fan of Sarah Wilson – for those of you who don’t know who she is, she was an editor of Australian’s women’s magazines, and then hosted the first series of Masterchef Australia. She now writes her blog and books about quitting sugar. You can read more about her here if you’re interested.

She is one of those people that are really hard not to like. She comes across on TV as really natural, friendly and passionate. Her blog is addictive – I’ve been reading it for over a year and is really inspiring. I have found a lot of great things on her blog – how to make cream cheese being the most recent one (watch for a post about that soon).

I had been reading about her I Quit Sugar journey on her blog, and had the initial reaction that most people do – “huh, that’s stupid”. But I read more and more about it anyway. This was around the time I was thinking about October Unprocessed, and generally eating better. I started playing roller derby with Glasgow Roller Derby and was really taken with the idea of being fit and strong but most of all, healthy. I don’t talk about it on this blog, but I also have Crohn’s Disease which has caused me a lot of health problems over the last 10 years.

I had quit sugar before – I used to be hugely addicted to coca-cola (think 2-3 litres per day) and went cold turkey. This ended up making me quite sick, I think my body couldn’t handle the shock. It was pretty scary! I used to wake up in the morning and feel like I really, really needed a coke. I hated that feeling of being addicted to something I knew wasn’t good for me.

I started the I Quit Sugar programme in October 2012. Sarah takes a quite gentle approach – it’s not cold turkey, it’s being aware of the sugar you’re consuming. Over the 8 weeks you follow the programme, up your intake of good fats (avocado, full fat dairy, bacon, animal fats etc) and gradually cut out all sugar. Including fruit. This was the part I found hard to reconcile, but it isn’t forever. It’s a short term thing, and then you can reintroduce fruit. I now eat a couple of pieces of fruit a day – 1/2 a banana and a kiwi fruit, or berries, for example.

I found it really easy. Probably one of the easiest things I’ve ever done. We were at the stage we didn’t eat a whole heap of processed food anyway, so it was just a matter of checking anything with a label for the sugar content. I would happily eat anything with under 6 grams of sugar per 100 grams. Anything over that, I’d have a think about it. Did I really want it? Was it going to be good for me? Probably not. And I’d find something else to eat.

Of course there were days I had sugar. You can see this just from reading this blog! I ate cheesecake, I ate dessert while I was out, I had cocktails etc. All of that is ok. Because I was conscious of doing it, and noted how my body felt afterwards. I am perfectly ok with eating some sugar now – for example, sharing a dessert when I’m out. But that is a rare occasion. Generally, in the house on a day to day basis I have barely any sugar. And I feel really good for it.

I wanted to share this post, even though it was hard to write. I think quitting sugar is a good thing. It definitely isn’t doing you any good! And if you read the news, it seems like a lot of people are getting on board with the idea that it isn’t fat that is what is causing people to put on weight, it’s actually sugar. This article from the Guardian is really good, and there are many more.

If you want to quit sugar, you can take advantage of the special this weekend for Australia Day. The eBook is 50% off – being only AUD$15 (around £10.00). If you use my affiliate link, I will get some money from your purchase. I’ve also proudly proclaimed my love of IQS in my sidebar (also an affiliate link!).

I’m going to post again this week with some examples of the kinds of things you can make from the IQS book (you’ll need to buy it for the recipes though!) and I’ll also blog some IQS recipes of my own! There is a great IQS community out there, you can find a lot of posts on instagram for example using the #IQS hashtag. If you have any questions about IQS, why don’t you let me know?