Comfort food

After a pretty busy and stressful week all I wanted was a homely warm meal. You know the type of food I mean, the type that reminds you of mum.

So I decided to cook a bacon joint, mash potato, veg and a cheese and parsley sauce. No cook book required :-)

I always buy a cooked bacon joint, then to warm it up I place it in a pan of boiling water and I turn the heat right down. It is left to simmer while I cook everything else, I just turn it every now and then.

I cheated and used frozen peas and sweet corn, as I just love these with mash and bacon. Finally peel and chop the potatoes and put them on until soft (cooked). I recently brought a potato ricer and I use ths instead of a masher, I find it makes a lovely smooth mash, I just add salt, pepper, dash of milk and knob of butter and stir until all mixed together. I then put cover on to keep warm

The last thing is to then make the sauce. Melt butter in a pan, approx 50g,

Then stir in 50g plain flour, and stir until a smooth paste. Keep it on low heat while you do this as it helps to ensure you don't get a floury taste to the sauce. Then slowly add milk, add drop at a time and stir well each time until smooth, keep doing this until sauce is the correct consistency. I don't know how much milk to recommend as everyone likes the sauce a different thickness but allow about 1 pint.

As you keep on the heat the sauce will thicken so don't leave it alone or it can go lumpy, this is why I ensure everything else is cooked and I do this last, as I can just concentrate on it. Once the basic white sauce is cooked add your flavours, I added 2 tsp parsley and 2 hand fulls of grated cheese, I never weigh as I just taste and add to taste. Quick tip is you can buy pre-grated cheese :-)

Then all done just stir this in, keep on heat 2 mins and stir! It takes about 30-40 minutes to prepare and cook.

So yummy and feels like home.

The way to MoMo's heart!

My eldest daughters favourite food is pie, so much so that for Christmas she brought me the higgerty pie cookbook and excitedly shouted as I opened it 'Cuz I love pie!'

There is a recipe in this book I have made a few times now, and it's become a firm family favourite. So when I want to treat Morgan I surprise her with it. It's called chicken pot pie, it's gorgeous. It contains chicken and ham, and the sauce has a mild cheesyness to it. It takes a good hour to make and well worth it! It's one of the meals I make where everyone ends up wanting seconds.

I will say though that not too good when frozen, so if not all eaten then put in the fridge and use up within the next few days. If frozen the sauce isn't as good it kind of congeals. 

I've put a link below to the recipe - enjoy! 

Chicken-Pot-Pie

3 course dinner ala Chez Aspinall!

You would think because I like cooking so much I would be having dinner parties every 5 minutes... But alas we never pull our finger out to arrange this. However I decided to treat my husband to some of his favourite food as he's been so stressed and working long hours, so to cheer him up and help him relax I made our own little dinner party.

As it was just me and Jim it meant I could be a little creative and not do my normal thing of scouring through cookbooks. So I pulled together things I know he likes 😊

To start I made chicken goujons with a chilli jam.

This was combining 2 different meals I've made before. The chicken nugget recipe I made for the children but just cutting the chicken into dipping size fingers, and in ainsley Harriet's meals in minutes cookbook he has a meal called chilli jam gammon, I love the chilli jam recipe. I use it a lot now, it's simple and takes 10 minutes and I bet most of you have all the ingredients for it in your cupboard!

I have tried to find a link on internet for it, but can't find one. So if interested look for Ainsley Harriet's Meals in Minutes.

As a starter this worked really well.

For the main I did try and wing it! Jim loves lamb, so I brought lovely lamb steaks from the butchers and decided to just griddle them and serve with champ mash, veg and a red wine jus. Champ mash is easy, just normal mash but you fry cabbage/leeks in butter then stir them into the mash. I used leeks and Savoy cabbage, but I've seen it with just leeks or just cabbage. Now what not to do is what I did and forget you were frying them so you burn bits... Haha!! I picked the worse bits out, and apparently it added to the flavour (oh he is so lovely). 

Red wine jus..... Never made it before.... Red a few different recipes and thought... Doddle! Ermmmm no...! I used shallots cooked until soft (in olive oil), then added beef stock, ref wine and reduced... Seasoning and adding butter towards the end (oh and chopped rosemary). It was ok, but not as strong a taste as I wanted and also really runny, I didn't reduce enough. But all in all was a lovely meal, and I used a ramekin to shape the mash trying to improve my presentation.... Think it still needs work 😁

So finally Jim loves hot puddings with icecream. I had some apples, so decided to make crumbles. Little hint, you can use eating apples for crumble just don't stew them! I layered individual pots with sliced apple, sprinkled a tiny bit of caster sugar on top then added the crumble mix. I made it using flour, butter, caster sugar but also a little rolled oats, to give it a little bit more of a nutty texture. Can't remember quantities, I just judged by eye and consistency of the crumble. I then added a ball of icecream, and no I didn't make the icecream, this is something I have never tried. I brought toffee ripple... Mmmmmm

The whole meal was a success, I chose things that meant I didn't have to stay in the kitchen too long in between courses, so mash was made and kept warm, etc. I only had to griddle the lamb which took 5-10 minutes. We ate it on trays watching a film, no formalities just a lovely relaxed evening. It did what I set out to do, will definitely do it again.

LFC - Lesley Fried (baked!) Chicken.... Finally beat the fast food chain 😜

I did it!!!

After stating awhile ago I would start making my own nuggets so we don't even need to use frozen I finally did it 😁😁!

I found the recipe using my 'All recipes UK' app on my phone. It looked simple. Chicken breast, breadcrumbs, a little salt and pepper, Parmesan, and mixed Italian herbs. Literally coat chicken in the breadcrumbs and bake in the oven. It took 5 minutes to prep and about 25 minutes in the oven. One thing that did surprise me is normally with this sort of thing you dip in beaten egg before putting in the breadcrumbs, but with this recipe it calls for melted butter. 

So to make this abit more authentic I chopped up a corn on the cob and boiled them until cooked, then peeled potatoes and made some chips in my actifryer (air fryer). 

So all in all no deep frying involved yet we had chicken nuggets and chips!

Verdict - half hour to make, children love it as fun activity making the nuggets, and completely clean plates. They think they have had a naughty meal when in fact all perfectly healthy. Great meal and will become a regular in the Aspinall house.

Wonton soup surprise!!!

Last week I made the decision to make wonton soup from my Thailand cook book. The thought process behind it;

1) fun to make wontons with kids

2) family loves prawns

3) healthy

4) I have rice paper wrappers in the freezer.

5) looks easy!

Ok mistake number 1.... It's not easy! Oh actually it would be easy if I had not made mistake number 2... Using thin rice paper wrappers normally used for dimsum rather than pastry wonton wrappers.... Doh!

Now if I were making the wontons alone it would be so fast, but I had 2 helpers who loved making the little parcels, and as well as testing my patience it took twice as long as it should.

Now I have learnt the hard way that if you place wontons made with rice paper into boiling water to cook they explode. Sigh. So out of my lovely plate full only 4 managed to remain in tact, 1 each, lucky hey!

The soup itself is made using very simple ingredients, Chinese cabbage, beansprouts, soy sauce and stock. You then cook king prawns at last minute and add the wontons.

Now why is this post called wonton soup surprise I hear you ask? Well surprise number 1 was exploding wontons and surprise number 2 is when I tasted the soup I thought "oh dear.... It's just cabbage water", and I was prepared for the kids to spit it back at me, baked beans were on stand by. Imagine my surprise when they ate every drop, and the old man had seconds! You see each component on its own was nothing great, pretty tasteless. But together, it was so moorish.

So yes, this is another one I will make again, but next time I'll buy the correct wrappers.

Taking those next steps towards smugness!

 As you're all aware I already try my best to ensure that all our meals are home cooked, only resorting to takeaway, ready meals or jarred sauces as a last resort. Well I decided that in an effort to ensure we are only eating the freshest produce, supporting local business and also in an attempt to save some money, that instead of doing all my shopping at the supermarket I will now use the farm shop and local butchers buying only what's remaining at the supermarket. But I wanted to do this without effecting my daily routine too much, basically I only wanted to do this is if it was easy... See at least I'm honest! 

So I changed my routine, instead of planning on a Saturday and doing all on line I now plan on a Thursday. The reason for this is that looking at my whole week I had 30 minutes on a Friday between picking Morgan up from school and her swimming lesson, and I worked out that gave me enough time to stop in the high street and go to green grocers and butchers. So now me and Morgan go walking down high street with my little old lady bag on wheels and get our shopping before her lesson, and she finds it fun as she helps me choose and after 3 weeks of doing this I am finding the produce so much better, quality and taste, and also I'm saving between £10 - £20 per week! Oh and I feel rather funky with the bag... Ha!

I then on Friday after dinner order all the remaining on line (that way if I can't find everything in town I can add it to the supermarket list)

My next step towards smugness is trying to make my daughters packed lunches less processed! She always has the following;

*sandwich

*piece of fruit

*yoghurt

*meat snack (eg mini pepperami)

*cheese snack (eg cheese string)

*biscuit or chocolate 

So the last 2 weeks on a Sunday me and the girls have baked cake, this is then cut up and substitutes the biscuit or chocolate in the lunch. This is lovely, because it's still a sweet treat but all homemade so I know what's in it and the best part is the girls do it with me, so it's a fun relaxing job.

Last week we made lemon drizzle cake, which was gorgeous even if I do say so myself;

Today we made a chocolate tray bake, not as good as the lemon cake if you ask me but the girls love it.

So there you go.... I'm slowly getting there.

Salmon parcels, not everything low-fat is tasteless

Friday night was salmon parcel night, now this is a tale of positives and negatives.... Easy to make, did not take too much time, and myself and my old man liked it.... However the children ermmmm let's just say not to their taste. Now they both like salmon so that is not the problem, but I will explain more later.

The recipe is out of my 1000 low fat recipes book, it's an old book and you can buy it on amazon etc, I've had it so long I can't remember when and where I got it. It's a simple idea, salmon fillets wrapped in filo pastry with mushrooms, tomatoes and basil. Served with a tomato sauce and I added new potatoes and green beans. Fun to make as kids can help make the little parcels and a simple fresh meal. I brought ready made filo sheets as it's so much easier! Then just pop in oven.

Now the kids were excited as they like salmon and pastry however the disappointment on their faces when they saw the mushrooms was a sign of what would happen. Following points of critism from my children;

1) why would you spoil it by putting mushrooms in there?

2) OMG there's tomatoes in there too...why?

Finally... (3) mummy why put it on top of the tomato sauce because you've made the pastry soggy! (Ok I was trying to make the presentation better)

I didn't have to cook anything else as they ate the potato and veg, picked off and ate the pastry, and scrapped all veg off the salmon and ate bits of the salmon.

It took about 45 minutes in total however that included messing around with kids whilst doing it. But probably will not be able to make again as not a popular one, unless I just wrap the salmon with no veg inside but that would be boring!

Wow.... Pan Haggerty mmmmmm

Thursday night and the plan was to cook pan haggerty from the hairy bikers "mums know best" book, and yes people I stuck to the plan 😊

I chose this recipe as it was a one pot dish, looked simple to make contained all ingredients my children love, and it was certainly a good choice.

It didn't say timings on the recipe but looking through I thought well this should take half hour.... Big mistake! It took an hour so instead of sitting down at 6:30pm we were eating our dinner at 7pm. The main reason for this is the preparation, lots and lots of sliced potato carrot and onion! I am no professional chef and this took ages.

But you can get kids involved, Florence loved helping me layer the food in the pan.

Turned into a craft project rather than dinner haha! Oh and I did cheat and buy ready grated cheese, it just saves so much time!

Once all cooking everything done in 25 minutes, so I will do this again but next time I'm going to prepare everything in the morning or night before. Save a lot of time on the evening.

So verdict, timing can be improved on, ingredients... Simple and cheap! Taste... Wow! This is now one of our favourites. Kids literally licked the bowl clean, Morgan stated it was just yummy! So yes we will definately be having this again, big success!

Oh and I worked out for the one I made 520 calories for 1/4 of pan.... Brilliant! It's decievingly healthy!

For the recipe please visit hairy bikers web page, buy book or follow link below;

http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/panhaggerty_93163

Enjoy!

#hairybikers

#panhaggerty

#bacon

First day back on horse!

Well I did it, I started back on planning and my general organisation routine, first day in and so far feeling loads better for it.

For this week I have planned the following;

Today - sesame chicken 

Wednesday - japenese noodle salad

Thurs - pan haggerty

Fri - salmon parcels

Sat - lamb steaks

Sun - roast chicken

So tonight I cooked sesame chicken with celeriac mash from 'Holfords, nutritional cookbook'. Patrick Holford writes the optimal nutritional bible. Please find link to his site below;

https://www.patrickholford.com/books/the-optimum-nutrition-cookbook

 I had to cheat... Could not find celeriac and was running out of time so improvised and brought ready made mash from marks & Spencer's, chose carrot, swede & potato. Have to admit it was a really good accompaniment. Yes I know I could have made own mash, but time was against me. The chicken itself was a simple dish, coated in sesame seeds and grilled. It used potato flour instead of wheat to reduce my gluten, and was a simple dip and grill routine.

Point to note... Keep close eye on chicken it can burn quick!

End result was liked by all family, (except Florence who didn't like mash.... But I didn't make that so hey ho), 3 clean plates! Chicken was really moist, and nice balanced meal. Looking at it I was worried it would be dry as there was no sauce, but it did not matter, it really did not need it.

All in all took me 20 minutes, but probably add another 10 minutes for fresh mash.

#chicken

Breaks over, just had AS blip....

I'm back!

I warn you this blog post is not really cooking related and may contain some moaning and an insight into the more bleak less organised side of my life....

For those of you that have noticed I've not really posted anything for about a month, reason being is I just ran out of steam! I suffer from a medical condition called Ankylosing Spondylitis (AS) which is an arthritic condition that effects all of my joints and can effect organs. With me it also effects my eyes (I get bouts of iritis) and my bowels. With joints hard tissue forms between joints which can then harden and turn in to bone, the end result is that bones fuse together. I take medication for the condition and also following lots of reviews and guidance from my consultant I do yoga every day to open my joints and prevent fusion and cycling etc to keep muscle at a good level to protect joints. Well... What has this got to do with my blog I hear you ask....? A side effect of AS is chronic fatigue. I don't just mean a little bit sleepy I mean fall asleep whilst standing up sleepy. 

For awhile my work/job has been pretty stressful as I'm under staffed and trying to do several things at once. This results in me working really long days. It has been all I can do and taken every ounce of energy to get home at night, feed kids, get them to bed, finish whatever report I was working on then when I relax... I fall straight to sleep. So basically work and fatigue have taken over and I've been a bit if a zombie. My planning went out of window and yes if I'm honest we've lived on 50% take away as I've been in too much pain to stand in kitchen or honestly so tired the thought of cooking made me cry! So we have slowly used up all frozen meals I made, my husband has been cooking, I've done some simple meals or it's been take away.... I told you I was not superwoman! My friends probably wonder where I am as I have vanished, you see when I get like this I can't function, conversations are difficult to hold and just getting through the day is enough. It is really difficult to explain. Imagine you are just a shell, you see that you are you in the mirror and your going through your daily activities but that spark is missing. So I apologise to my friends, those close know me and understand but still I love you all and I'm not ignoring you.

Anyway I have just had a holiday, I feel refreshed and today finally I feel my old self. So it's back to planning :-) I'm about to go and plan this week, I have today off and will get myself sorted, shopping etc.

Spent the weekend in a tent looking at the sea, best tonic ever!

AS though does have its up sides... Without it I would not have gotten into cooking like I have, you see I researched how to naturally cope and found that by reducing certain food groups and processed foods you help your body as it uses less energy to process these foods and this energy can be used to fight the condition. So I reduced meat, gluten & processed foods and really did see a benefit. Please note I said reduced, you don't have to remove them, this makes life harder and I'm trying to improve. I told my consultant who thinks its great. 

Also rather than breaking me down AS has made me stronger! Stronger in mind and more determined, nothing is going to beat me... It won't beat me!

So on a lighter note, I'm back, recharged and ready to get back into action and kick AS's butt! After all I have a family to take care of can't be sleeping... So less of that and back to food! Cheers 😊

Planning catch-up!

 



 Did I manage it this week then?

 

All but 1 day.... which I think is good going :-)

So what did I plan for the week after?

 

 

Monday - Pasta in tomato sauce (from the freezer - homemade, Jim in Scotland I will be back late so something quick for just me and the kids)

Tuesday - Something with chips....Morgan's choir concert and Jim in Scotland (so will be late back)

Wednesday - Beef & Onion Braise (I will be in Somerset, this is a slow cooker meal that I can put on in the morning and it will be ready when I get back)

Thursday - Spaghetti Bolognaise

Friday - Fresh Salmon Wraps

Saturday - Left free as we may go out

Sunday - Depending on weather, either roast dinner or BBQ.

 

Now I know I am a week behind so at this stage I know if I was successful.... but I'm keeping my lips sealed. Today I will catch up on last weeks meals... be prepared for blog over load!

 



 

 

 



Muu Parlow... or Thai Braised Pork

 

 

I have a lovely Thai  cookbook which is simply called 'Thailand'. It is full of every kind of Thai food you can think of.... Street food, Curries, Snacks, Salads etc...

 

Link to site to view / purchase the Thailand Cookbook

 

So last Saturday as we were having a day around the house I decided to indulge and cook something that requires time, and also something that I thought the children would also eat. After flicking through the book I found 'Muu Parlow', which is a Thai Braised Pork dish, and it takes about 2.5 hrs to cook, and it was one of the nicest smelling dishes I have ever made. However it took a bit of effort to source the ingredients.... it required a Pork Hock  which I discovered is really difficult to get and I ended up ordering one from the local butchers. I did plan to make this a week beforehand but due to this fact had to wait a week (on the positive side its a cheap cut of meat - the whole hock cost £3.99)... also it uses something called Kecap Manis which is a Thai sweet soy sauce. Again could not find that in local stores but did find it to order over the Internet.

 

OK, so once I got all the ingredients together...

 

Time to start cooking. This was another easy one, which I loved! The most complicated bit was at the beginning when you have to blanch and then deep fry the meat before you start. The sauce itself was easy... dry fry the spices, then add stock, meat etc and leave for 2 hours or until meat is falling off the bone.

 







 

Oh and another thing is towards the end you add in hard boiled eggs, which I love. One of my favourite things is curry etc with boiled egg in. To accompany the meal I cooked rice and mange tout.

 

It was absolutely delicious. The sauce the pork was cooked it had a spice I did not expect, and it was just completely moorish! The kids did make a comment that it was spicy, but this was overcome as they both liked the taste, so I just ensured they had meat from the centre of the hock (therefore not coated in the sauce) however they both had an egg each which was covered. The rice and mange tout complimented it lovely.

 

I got the thumbs up from all the family and would make this again.... would I change anything, well yes 1 thing! It recommends everything is done in a wok. So you deep fry in the wok, drain the oil, then make the sauce and add the meat. However I found that my hock did not sit fully in the sauce and therefore was not as falling apart as I would have hoped, also the sauce reduced too much. To rectify this, I think once sauce is made next time I will put everything into the slow cooker, I may also consider getting 2 small hocks rather than 1 large one.

 

Highly recommend this one, but only if you like a bit of spice. Its not mouth burning hot, its about a medium.

 

#thaifood

#pork

Warning.... Gnocchi is messy to make 😄

I had my first attempt at making gnocchi, last week which I was told was simple! Well technically it was, however if your making it with children, believe me not so easy....several smashed eggs and picking shell out of the dough mixture later... We end up with a very soft dough.

Now you need a soft dough, but it's pretty difficult to roll out, and takes a bit of patience. My kids found it hysterical, and loved playing with the squidy dough. Think they got a bit annoyed with mummy being boring and telling them to stop playing and concentrate on making dinner as we've all got to eat this. But in the end to roll it out I used 'a lot'! of flour on the board.

 

Just realised I have not mentioned where I got recipe from....  It's from 'Leon - fast vegetarian' link to Leon website below. Recipe called 'Mitch tonks potato gnocchi.

The recipe called to make a truffle & Parmesan sauce to mix in with the gnocchi. I can not explain just how simple this sauce was. 3 ingredients that you throw in a pan and stir!

You then drain gnocchi when it's finished, and add to sauce making sure it's properly mixed together and serve!

This was a hit, gnocchi was gorgeous and light, and the sauce was lovely and creamy... But there is a but! Unfortunately it's too creamy for our tastes. You go from thinking oh this is yummy, too a bit sickly! However all bowls were cleaned.

Also took about 30-40 minutes but next time should be quicker now I know how to roll the dough out, and hint... Literally a couple of minutes to cook gnocchi so don't drop them in boiling water until you are ready!

I will make the gnocchi again but I think my family are not ones for creamy sauces... If you are then go for it 😊

http://leonrestaurants.co.uk

Oozy mozzerella chicken

It's been a pretty busy week which has resulted in unfortunately me not even having time to sit and write this blog, which people is not good as this blog is one of my relaxation moments. Just me alone with my thoughts, typing, happy little Lesley.

Last Thursday I planned to make Ainsley Harriet's oozy mozzerella chicken which is another recipe out of his meals in minutes book.

I will give it to Ainsley unlike other chefs who have created cookbooks his timings are pretty spot on! So this was all done in about 30 minutes!

Pretty simple dish, basically chicken wrapped around mozzerella and grilled of course there are some herbs thrown in! But as you are probably aware I can not say much due to copywrite law etc.

What I will say is the meal lacked vegetables for me, so I added peas. Also he pairs it with mashed potato with leeks mixed in. I personally don't think this combination worked. Also my husband felt the dish was too dry. By that I don't mean the chicken was dry, but he is not a big potato fan so he wanted something to pour over potatoes. I would make this dish again as everyone loved the chicken, but I had quite a bit of mash left on plates! I think that next time I will use either chips or some form of pasta. Also potentially make either a tomato or white sauce.

Oh and a hint.... I used low fat mozzerella with this and you could not tell the difference!

Joy soy lamb and ginger rice

Yet another good one to report on from last night folks 😊

For myself and Jim (remember its Tuesday so kids eat at the in-laws) I made Joy Soy Lamb with Ginger Rice from the Ainsley Harriet's 'Meals in minutes'. Apologies I can not find a link to the recipe on line but the book is available to buy.

First main point to make is I love this book, so far all the recipes I've made are tasty, secondly the timings are pretty accurate and finally it gives calorie count for each recipe. Which for someone like me following a calorie controlled diet (I use fitbit) it's really handy.

This recipe claimed to be 30 mins with 10 mins prep, and I did the whole thing in 35 minutes. It was a lovely subtle dish, I was worried it would be too overly spiced but it was well balanced and the flavours were wonderful.

Wouldn't alter it, and was a hit with us so I will do it again!

My pizza!

Had a day off today and spent it with my baby, we went shopping... Oh yes I brought shoes! Oh and when I say shoes I don't mean flashy expensive stilettos I mean chunky soled black leather sandals. I'm not a stiletto gal!

Came home and made pizza dough ready for later, there is a recipe I love from ainsley harriets 'friends and family' cook book that is really simple to make but needs to rise for an hour.

My kids love watching the dough magically form... Or in Florence's case, stare at her reflection in the mixer bowl!

After an hour it's all ready to go.

While it's rising I make the tomato sauce ready for the base, I make a simple one, cook garlic in olive oil, add chopped tomatoes and simmer, then add chopped basil. Finally blend until smooth. Then roll out your dough and smooth the sauce on.

This is the bit the kids love. I chop all toppings up beforehand then let the kids just add what they want on. It's then 10 - 15 minutes in oven.

Lovely yummy irregular pizza!

As I said you need about 1.5 hrs so not a quick one but good for getting kids involved and an hour of it you can get on with something else, so a good Saturday meal.