4 Meals in 1 Hour

Time is of the essence at the moment and I managed to squeeze in a shop at Morrisons between my sons hospital appointment and my youngest son's baby signing class.

Just recently, I've been wasting meat as I've either not had the time to cook it or have forgotten to freeze it.  So today, instead of cooking tonight and tomorrows evening meals, I cooked

Slow Cooker Sunday - Full O'Veg Pasta Sauce

This recipe makes a vat of pasta sauce and will save you a fortune on dolmio/ragu, particularly if you buy a cheaper passatta.  I've tried expensive and budget brand and can't tell the difference, just taste to ensure the salt is right.

Oh, I have a huge 6 litre slow cooker so just halve the quantities for a normal size appliance!

Ingredients

2 small aubergines
1 leek
1 onion
5 small carrotts
250g mushrooms
3 cloves of garlic
1 red pepper
1 yellow pepper
6 basil leaves
3 litres of passatta (6 cartons)
1 tbsp caster sugar
Salt to taste

Method

Rinse the aubergine, slice into circles and sprinkle with salt.  Leave while you chop the rest of the veg.

Wash and slice the leek

Dice the onion

Peel and dice the carrots

Peel and chop the mushrooms

Crush the garlic (or add 3 tsp of lazy garlic)

Dice the peppers

Rinse the aubergine well, dice and throw everything into the slow cooker.

Add the passstta and the sugar

Stir and cook on low for 5 hours

Blend with a stick blender and salt to taste.

Voila!!

Meal Planning Monday - Fresh Freezer Food Week

I've been quiet on the meal planning front as I'm in the throes of getting every aspect of my life organised!  An extra child has really thrown me and things were starting to get even more haphazard and last minute than usual, so I'm setting up systems and routines to make sure things run more smoothly.

So, the meal planning has had a massive overhaul.  The freezer in the garage has been fired up and I've planned a month in advance.  I'm having cooking days where I prep several meals and freeze them so I can just grab and cook which is saving me at least an hour everyday.  Some meals I'm freezing raw, ready to defrost then bung in the slow cooker and some I'm fully cooking and just need to bung in the oven.

So here's this weeks plan...

Monday

BBQ Chicken Buns

from the Fullbellysisters Blog

 

 

Tuesday

Hairy Dieters Steak & Ale Pie

 

Wednesday

Slow Cooked Chicken Casserole

 

Thursday

Chilli and Rice

 

Friday

Steak & Chips with Onions and Mushrooms

 

Saturday

Possibly a home made curry

Probably a take away curry

 

Sunday

Toad in the Hole

 

Do you utilise your freezer to the max?  What meals do you find taste good after freezing?

 

Let me know and have a fab week!

 





10 Meals from A jar of Red Pesto

This keeps in the fridge for a month in a jar and is a staple to have in if you want to add tastiness to your meals.It's also really cheap to make and can really be spun out.

I usually make a batch of this for my Slow Cooked Italian Roast beef and then use it up over the next couple of weeks in various ways.

The recipe for the pesto is on the Slow Cooked Italian Roast Beef Post.

So here's 10 ways I get 10 meals from this cheap to make pesto.

1. Baked Cod with Red Pesto Crust

2. Garlic Bread With Tomato

3. Baked Gnocchi

4. Bruchetta topping

5. Calzone

6. Minestrone Soup

7. Italian Style Quesidillas

8. Slow cooked Pork Casserole

9. Crispy Chicken Strips

10. Slow Cooked Italian Roast Beef

I also use the pesto to add oomph to spag Bol sauce and to spice up shepherds pie mince.

So what do you use pesto for? Please leave a comment and share your ideas

This post is linked up with Creative K Kids Tasty Tuesday

Meal Planning Monday - New Years Eve 2012

Given that I'm currently being eaten out of house and home, I'm going for a bit of a freezer clear out this week with filling family meals. 

Monday - Shepherds Pie

Tuesday - Meat pie and boiled potatoes

Wednesday - Chilli Con Carne (this is gluten free chilli con carne)

Thursday - Bangers and Mash

Friday - Roast Beef with all the trimmings

Saturday - One Pan Vegetable Biriyani

Sunday - Slow cooker Italian beef roast (recipe scheduled to be posted on Sunday)

If you need more inspiration, there's loads of links to other meal plans over at At Home With Mrs M.

To make the above, here's this weeks shopping list...

2.5kg Mince (this does a big batch of slow cooked Chilli Con Carne, 1 family sized shepherds pie and 2 meat plate pies)
Celery
2lb carrots
Beef stock cubes or stock pots
Worcester Sauce
Roast Beef Joint (Aldi is the best value for this) (get one which can be cut in half for Tuesday's roast and Sunday's slow cooker)
Fresh Yorkshire Puddings
Peas
Cauliflower
3 tins plum tomatoes
1 tin of chopped tomatoes
Carton of passatta
2 tins red kidney beans
1 tin borlotti beans
Mild chilli powder
4 sheets of ready rolled short crust pastry
5lb potatoes
Packet of rice
4 chicken breasts
1 jar of balti paste
Green beans
1 jar of sundried tomatoes
Tube of garlic paste
Extra virgin olive oil

Meal Planning Monday - 7th January 2013

We've a jar of red pesto to be used up this week from yesterdays Slow Cooked Italian Beef so there's a bit of a theme this week!

Monday - Spaghetti Bolognaise

Tuesday - Cod with Red Pesto

Wednesday - Garlic Mushrooms with Garlic Bread with Tomato Pesto

Thursday - Macaroni Cheese

Friday - Chicken Stir Fry

Saturday - Vegetable Chilli

Sunday - Slow Cooked Country Chicken Stew

If you need more inspiration, there's loads of links to other meal plans over at At Home With Mrs M.

To make the above, here's this weeks shopping list...


(This will make a large batch of veg chilli and Bolognese for the freezer) 1kg minced beef (this is enough for about 12 portions of Bolognese) 3 tins choppedtomatoes 2 tins plum tomatoes Dried Italian herbs Knorr stockpot (beef) 3 medium onions 1.25 kg mushrooms (for Bolognese, vegetable chilli and garlic mushrooms) 2 cod fillets or loins 5 lb potatoes Green beans 10 Carrots 1/2 bottle of barefoot white zinfandel rose wine Garlic puree Natural breadcrumbs Golden breadcrumbs Butter Cheese Macaroni Milk Plain flour Ready made pizza base Sir fry mix 6 chicken breasts Tin of condensed cream of mushroom soup Cabbage Small Aubergine vegetable or sunflower oil 2 medium courgettes 1 yellow pepper 1 orange pepper 500g passatta 1 400g tin red kidney beans 1 400g tin cannellini beans vegetable stock Mild chilli powder (or to your own taste)

Kickin Vegetable Shepherds Pie

If you're wanting to cut the calories on the Christmas run up, this is a fab way of doing it, by replacing meat with vegetables.  Although this does have a kick as I make it with a portion of my Batch Cooked Vegetable Chilli 

It's also a fab timesaver dish.  Defrost a batch of Vegetable Chilli, make some mash and top it.  Bung it in the oven for an hour and your done!

Its so easy, I don't need to even write the recipe!

Great when you're short of time or money.  I reckon two pounds of spuds will cover it, so on a tight budget week, it's ideal.  Or put what you have saved in your savings pot!

Batch Cooking: 10 Ways With Vegetable Chilli

Batch cooking not only saves you time but money and it really need not be a case of dragging the same thing out of the freezer and eating an monotonous menu.

Here's what you can do with Vegetarian Chilli

1. Eat it as it comes with Rice.

Vegetable Chilli with Rice

2. Wrap in in a fajita wrap and have it for lunch or dinner (it tastes just as good cold)

Vegetable Chilli Wrap

3. Use it as a filling for Vegetarian Lasagne.

4. Defrost some filo pastry and make samosas

5. Serve with polenta or over a jacket potato (ooh! thats 2 options!!)

6. Fill taco shells with it

7. Top with mash for vegetarian shepherds pie

8. Add extra passatta and do a vegetable pasta bake

9. Use smaller portions as a spicy ratatouille accompaniment

10. Mix with rice and coat to make rissoles.

As you can see one basic recipe can be extremely versatile and save you time and money.

So...if you need a recipe for Vegetable Chilli, click through here

Enjoy and just think of the time you save by just grabbing it out of the freezer!

Vegetable Chilli Pasta Bake

You know me, I love batch cooking as it's cheap and more importantly saves me cooking everyday!

Always to be found in my tiny freezer is at least 4 portions of Vetable Chilli.  There's at least 11 ways to eat this as listed in the post "Batch Cooking: 10 ways with Vegetable Chilli"

This week, we're having it re-incarnated in the form of Pasta Bake.

As I tend to adopt the do it and leave it approach to cooking, the chilli needs a fair bit of liquid adding to it to allow the pasta to absorb and soften.

So, how to do...

Serves 4

Ingredients:

1 batch of defrosted Vegetable Chilli
2 handfuls of pasta per person (I use bows or shells as they absorb the best)
500g of passatta
250ml of vegetable stock
Grated Cheese to cover

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 160C

2. Mix in the passatta to the defrosted chilli

3. Add the pasta and stir well.  If the mix seems too dry, add the vegetable stock until it is quite a liquid mixture.

4. Cook for 20 minutes and check.  If it is drying out too much, add a little more stock.

5.  Grate the cheese over the top and cook for a further 20 minutes

6.  Serve with a lovely garlic bread and italian salad.


It seems a bit hit and miss with the stock but this is due to the original consistency of your chilli.

Enjoy and let me know what you think!

Claire

Vegetable Chilli - Batch Cooking Recipe

This post is part of the #FaveFamilyRecipes Competition with BritMums and Tilda Rice. Every pack sold will provide a meal to an expectant mum in need in support of the World Food Programme’s Mothers Helping Mothers initiative in Bangladesh

This is one of my Batch Cooking staples. It's the basis for all dishes on my Ten Ways With Vegetable Chilli post.

So how do I make it?

It started as a low calorie Gino De Campo Recipe from his I Diet book but I found it wasn't quite chilli enough and wasnt quite filling enough for the children so I've adapted it quite a bit.
Ingredients:
Small Aubergine - diced
1 tbsp vegetable or sunflower oil
1 onion - diced
2 medium courgettes - diced
200g mushrooms - diced
2 carrots - diced
1 yellow pepper - finely chopped
1 orange pepper - finely chopped
2 medium potatoes - chopped to the size of small roast potatoes
200g green beans
1 tbsp garlic paste (or a clove)
1 400g tin chopped tomatoes
500g passatta
1 400g tin red kidney beans
1 400g tin cannelloni beans
250ml vegetable stock
2 tbsp Mild chilli powder (or to your own taste)

Method:
1.  Put the diced aubergine in a colander and sprinkle generously with salt.  Leave for about 30 minutes while you chop up everything else.  After 30 minutes rinse well in cold water and drain.
2. Heat the oil, add the garlic and saute the onion until it goes soft.
3. Add the aubergine, courgettes, mushrooms, carrotts, yellow pepper and orange pepper and saute for about 4 minutes.
4. Add the chopped tomatoes and passatta and coat everything well.
5. Rinse all the beans before adding to the pan and give a really good stir.
6.  Add the vegetable stock and the Chilli powder to taste.
7.  Simmer for 30 minutes, stirring occassionally.
8. Add the green beans and cook for a further 15 minutes

And there you have it, your basic chilli to do with what you wish from serving on a jacket potato to filling a samosa.  This is probably the most versatile recipe in my Batch Cooking collection.
Please let me know if you find any other ways of using this basic recipe to create a meal.