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Ingredients

• 1 pack of less than 5% fat beef mince
• 2 garlic cloves, peeled & crushed
• 1 large onion, roughly chopped
• 1 large carrot, peeled & finely diced
• 1 stick of celery, finely diced
• 125 ml red wine
• 1 tin of chopped tomatoes
• 150 ml passata
• 1 beef stock cube, 1 vegetable stock cube
• 1 tbsp tomato puree
• 1 tbsp Worcester sauce
• 1 tbsp each dried basil & oregano
• 1 tsp dried rosemary
• 2 courgettes, washed but not peeled

Method

1. Gently fry the onions and garlic until softened. Add the carrots & celery and cook for 5 more minutes.
2. Increase the heat, add the mince to the pan, sprinkle liberally with cracked black pepper, then constantly stir until browned.
3. Add the wine and let bubble away for about 3 minutes before adding the tinned tomatoes and passata. Stir well.
4. Once combined, remove from the heat and stir in the remaining ingredients – crumbling in the stock cubes.
5. Add the final mixture to your slow cooker and cook for 8+ hours on low.
6. Your bolognese will likely be too sloppy after this point, so cook down on a medium-high heat on the hob until the sauce has reduced. This may seem like a faff but it is really step 2 of the magic.
7. Whilst the bolognese is cooking down, spiralize your courgettes and then steam for 2-3 minutes until slightly tender.
8. Serve all together with freshly grated Parmesan!

I adore my spiralizer. It is a magic way to eat more awesome-looking vegetables. This is the one that I own and it is brilliant, however there are many more out there these days. Definitely check one out. They are quick, they are easy to clean, and they make awesome spirally vegetables!

Sweet potato is something beloved by all babies and toddlers (surely?) and I know mine also adores tuna. The addition of peas also means there is a vegetable in there – however I’m already planning my next batch and thinking that I might mix in some grated courgette for extra veggies. Overall the fish cakes are soft, tasty, and very comforting. And the Toddler loved them. Ate the first portion, and then seconds, and then thirds! Easy, fuss-free, and something that you could easily get your older toddlers to join in with making.

Ingredients

• 1 tin tuna (in whatever liquid you bloody wish – it’s for kids)
• 1/2 large sweet potato, peeled & cubed
• 4 tbsp frozen peas
• 1 tbsp butter
• 1 tbsp fresh chives, chopped
• 1 egg, beaten & placed in a bowl
• Golden breadcrumbs spread on a plate

Method

1. Put the sweet potato cubes into a saucepan & boil or steam until soft. Remove from the heat, add butter and seasoning & mash until smooth.
2. Add the tuna, peas, and chives in with the sweet potato – either in the same pan (saves on washing up) or a separate bowl. Mix well until evenly combined.
3. Pre-heat the oven to 200 degrees, and line a baking tray with some baking parchment.
4. Get stuck in! Use dampened hands to shape the mixture into 8 cakes, then dip each one into the egg briefly before rolling in the breadcrumbs. Pat until they become the shape you want.
5. Bake all of the cakes in the oven for 25 – 30 minutes until golden-brown and slightly crispy on the outside. It’s best to turn once during cooking.

Curry is a weekly occurrence in my house, usually on a Monday. It really helps to beat away the back to work blues if you know you’re going to have a delicious curry for your dinner. Most any curry goes as well – meat, vegetable, dry, saucey, Indian, Thai. All curry is good.

Years ago though I did use to struggle with coconut flavours, or curries made with coconut milk. I honestly have no idea why now, as they have quickly become some of my favourite curries. This recipe is adapted from one published in the third Hairy Dieters book (on this: The Hairy Dieters recipes are genuinely brilliant and there are very few that I’ve ever been unhappy with, however as with everything in life things taste better with a few personal tweaks!). And it is extremely delicious. It is also one of the first curries I’ve ever served without either rice or cauliflower made into rice – it was eaten with cumin-roasted cauliflower and a fresh courgette salad.

Don’t be put off by the fact that it’s a “grind your own spice mix” kind of recipe – it took me literally 3 minutes with the pestle & mortar, and if you really can’t be arsed there’s a fix for that.

The timing of this recipe is the best bit – I made the spice mix/marinade the night before, shoved the beef in with it overnight, then in the morning just stuck it all in the slow cooker. And then, when I got home, gorgeous amazing curry just waiting for me. Yum.

Slow Cooker Beef & Coconut Curry with Cumin-Roasted Cauliflower & Courgette Salad

INGREDIENTS

• 1 pack of lean diced beef steak
• 2 onions, thinly sliced
• thumb-sized chunk of fresh ginger, peeled & grated
• 4 garlic cloves, sliced
• 2 chillies, finely chopped
• 3 tbsp red wine vinegar
• 200ml reduced fat coconut milk

SPICE MIX

• 4 cloves
• 2 tsp mustard seeds
• 1 tbsp coriander seeds
• 1 tsp chilli flakes
• 1 tsp turmeric
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 2 tsp salt

SIDE DISHES

• 1 whole cauliflower, florets separated
• 2 tbsp cumin
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 courgette, grated
• handful of mint leaves, finely chopped
• 1 tsp white wine vinegar

METHOD

1. Make the spice mix first – add the seeds, cloves, and chilli flakes to a grinder or mortar & then grind to a powder before mixing with the turmeric, cinnamon & salt. FIX: If you REALLY can’t be arsed with this, just substitute 1 tbsp garam masala & 2 tsp salt. But do give it a go, I promise you’ll be pleased!
2. Put the beef in a bowl, cover with the spice mix, and then add half the onions, ginger, garlic, chilli, and vinegar. Mix well and then leave in the fridge overnight (or for at least one hour).
3. Whenever you’re ready to start cooking, add the beef mix to the slow cooker along with the coconut milk and cook on Low for 8+ hours.
4. Remove the mix from the slow cooker & add to a pan on a medium-high hob to cook the liquid down – this curry dish should be fairly low on sauce. Remember to stir often.
5. Meanwhile, place your cauliflower florets on a baking tray, spray with low-calorie cooking spray & then sprinkle with the cumin and salt. Place in the oven at 180 degrees for 30 minutes. You can parboil these first if you want, however I prefer the slight al dente texture of plain oven-baked.
6. Mix the grated courgette with the chopped mint and white wine vinegar.
7. Once the liquid in the curry has reduced significantly, fry the remaining onions over a medium heat in a frying pan until they are golden brown.
8. Add the onions to the curry mixture and then serve all together!

I honestly can’t wait to cook this again, however I do try to avoid doing the same curry twice in one month…because I’m weird like that.

This is the perfect dish for someone who doesn’t want to stand over the oven constantly of an evening – there are two main bits to the cooking, and you can just leave the food to do its thing. Plus, there is just something about roasting vegetables that makes them taste even BETTER than usual – they soften, the flavours deepen, and then there are the juices. OH THE JUICES.

But anyway. This casserole is straightforward and actually relatively quick – perfect for a weekday evening. Even more perfect for a weekend evening with a big vat of wine. Also perfect for summer or winter. It’s OK. No need to thank me.

Roast Vegetable, Bean & Bacon Casserole

Ingredients

• 1 large onion, roughly diced
• 1/2 butternut squash, cubed
• 3 red peppers, cut into large chunks
• 2 cooked beetroots, cut into chunks
• 1 tin butter beans, drained & rinsed
• 1 tin borlotti beans, drained & rinsed
• 4 rashers of bacon, fat removed & cut into strips (you can leave the fat on if you so wish)
• 1 tin chopped tomatoes
• 1 vegetable stock cube
• 1 tbsp Worcester sauce
• 1 tbsp tomato puree
• 1 tsp paprika
• 1 tsp dried rosemary
• 1 tsp dried oregano
• 1 tsp dried basil

Method

1. Put the onion, butternut squash, peppers, and beetroot onto a large baking tray. Drizzle with olive oil or spray with cooking spray, sprinkle with the dried herbs & season well. Roast at 200 degrees C for around 25-30 minutes until soft & beginning to char.
2. Fry the bacon in a large casserole pan or dish until browned and starting to crisp.
3. Add the roasted vegetables and all remaining ingredients to the pan. Add up to a cup of water. Bring to the boil and then simmer for 10-15 minutes until the liquid reduces to a thick consistency.
4. Serve with cheese on toast triangles. Trust me.

I’ve been trying to eat low carb. I know that it’s almost boringly predictable, but for me and my PCOS body, it’s also almost perfect. Often I only have to look at a pizza base to put on half a stone (only a slight exaggeration). So, I’ve been eating low carb. And the roast on Easter Sunday seemed to be the perfect outing for a dish I’d been idly drawing up in my mind for a few weeks: the Ultimate, Perfect cauliflower cheese.

For me, cauliflower cheese for me has always been a total Coldplay of a dish. Dreary, depressing, reminds me a bit of dishwater. Has occasional flashes of brilliance in some places, but overall is pretty boringly bland. I’ll stop here with the coldplay analogy because I know people love them (WHY??!). But yes: I’ve never been a massive fan of cauliflower cheese. It’s always been too gritty, or too soggy, and there is never enough cheese.

Well, it turns out that eating low carb is the pathway to perfect cauliflower cheese, because holy moly.

Tip to reduce the cauliflower smell. I sacked off the bechamel, or indeed any flour-based sauce. And, because we’re having a bit of a Red Leicester-aissance (did that work? Probably not) in our house, cheddar got side-lined to only a bit-player. And guess what?

IT’S ONLY BLOODY AMAZING.

Seriously. This is the perfect cauliflower cheese. It’s creamy and super cheesy and has bite and a lingering savoury deliciousness that means you’ll be scraping the dish. It’s probably not something I’d recommend you eat every day (or even every week). Mainly because the fat content probably renders the actual cauliflower-goodness useless. But, as a treat, it’s…well.

THE ULTIMATE, PERFECT CAULIFLOWER CHEESE

Ingredients

• 2 small/medium heads of cauliflower (or 1 1/2 large), florets split down to just slightly bigger than bite-size
• 2 bay leaves
• 200g cream cheese (any fat level you wish, really)
• 200ml sour cream
• 100ml double cream
• pinch of freshly-grated nutmeg
• 1 tsp English Mustard powder
• 100g mature cheddar, grated
• 250g Red Leicester, grated
• salt & pepper to season

Method

1. Put the cauliflower and bay leaves into a large pan and cover with cold water. Add 1/2 tsp salt and bring to the boil. Boil for 1-2 minutes, then drain. Tip the cauliflower back into the pan and cover with new cold water. Leave for 30 seconds, then drain again and leave to dry. Preheat the oven to 180C.
2. In the same pan used for the cauliflower, tip the cream cheese and sour cream and place over a low heat. Stir until melted to a thick liquid. Add the double cream, nutmeg, English Mustard powder, and seasoning. Stir through, then tip in the cheeses. Increase the heat to medium and stir constantly until the cheeses are fully melted into the sauce. At this point, if it looks like there won’t be enough sauce, add some more double cream.
3. Tip the cauliflower into a roasting tin and pour the sauce over. Bake in the oven for 20-30 mins until the sauce is golden brown and crisping on top. Serve alongside any roast, or to be fair even by itself.

I can see this also being delicious with added broccoli, or pretty much any other vegetable. I’ve tried it once again since with leeks, and yep: still awesome. There’s just something about that orange, creamy sauce. And the perfectly-cooked cauliflower. Oh boy. Try it.

Oh hey! It’s been a while, right? There’s been a whole lot going on that I will definitely write about at some point, but for now I just wanted to share something I made a few weeks back. It’s food. Of course it’s food. It’s Carnitas Nachos with super easy guacamole. Basically, I was invited by The Ideas Kitchen to try out one of the recipes on their new (awesome) site and, well. Once I saw it was guacamole I was racing to the shop faster than 2017’s summer has disappeared beyond the horizon.

Because, come on. Guacamole. Or, as my mother-in-law memorably called it once, “that green stuff”. Good guac is one of the absolute best things ever.

The Ideas Kitchen’s food processor guacamole recipe is a dream of a whizz. Yes, it’s made for food processors, and I know what you’re thinking. “Surely it’s easier to just mash up the avocado with a fork and mix the other stuff in?!” Well, maybe. But, actually. no. I’ve always made my guacamole that way and let me tell you: chucking everything in the food processor and giving it a few pulses is way easier.

Seriously, though. When you’ve got a food processor involved there’s no need to try to chop everything neatly. Just sling it in and give it a few buzzes. Perfect texture. Perfect thickness. Mmm. I’m so grateful to The Idea’s Kitchen for this. (FYI: they have loads of neat recipes over on their site – as well as the food processor recipes there are blender and bread maker recipes too that look FAB).

And the proportions in this guac recipe are pretty perfect, too. I normally make my own up, slinging whatever in and coming to okay-ness by trial and error. So following a recipe that resulted in perfection was quite the eye-opener! However I DID leave out the coriander and the olive oil, because two avocados is enough rich and tasty fats for me. But it was great. GREAT.

decided to team my guacamole and nachos with a tried and tested recipe of mine that produces the darn tastiest pig product you ever did put on a fork – carnitas. I wrote about them years ago here, but only briefly. Carnitas are the marriage of pork and orange and spices and low slow cooking. It’s such a beautiful dish – so many flavours! Such MEAT. Even when cutting out a lot of extraneous fat and sugar, it’s still beyond tasty.

We normally eat carnitas with tacos, but guess what? Yep, turns out they’re even better when turned into Carnitas Nachos! Carnitas layered with nachos and cheese and mango and tomatoes and jalapeños and that creamy, delicious guac. Layered, and then baked in the oven until the cheese melts and the nachos crisp up. Carnitas nachos are amazing.

To be fair, this dinner would’ve been fab enough as just the guacamole and the nachos, but the carnitas nachos really kicked it up to 11. A big plate of nachos stinking with cheese and guacamole and sour cream is one of my very favourite meals as it is. Adding delicious pork to that? Ooh, baby.
The carnitas nachos recipe is below. Don’t be put off by the length – the long cooking time is mainly down to the slow cooking of the pork. You can basically chuck it in on Saturday morning, then come back later that day and prep the best weekend dinner you’ll ever have. You can click on any of the links above to get to the guacamole recipe. And you should. You should you should you should.

Carnitas Nachos Bake

An indulgent mix of crispy nachos, succulent and spicy slow cooked pork carnitas, creamy guacamole, tart mangos, hot jalapeños and sweet tomatoes, all smothered in melted cheese and baked together.

• Prep Time 40 minutes
• Cook Time 6 hours
• Total Time 6 hours 40 minutes
• Servings 3

Ingredients

FOR THE CARNITAS

• 4 pork loin steaks fat removed
• 2 oranges juiced
• 2 limes juiced
• 200 ml chicken stock
• 2 tbsp tomato puree

SPICE BLEND 1

• 1 tsp garlic granules
• 1 tsp chilli powder
• 1 tsp ground cumin
• 1 tsp salt

SPICE BLEND 2

• 1 tsp paprika
• 1 tsp oregano
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp garlic granules
• 1 tbsp red wine vinegar
• 3 garlic cloves crushed

FOR THE NACHOS

• 200 g cheddar cheese grated
• 1 mango diced
• 5 spring onions sliced
• handful cherry tomatoes quartered / halved
• 2 tbsp sliced jalapenos
• 1/2 portion guacamole (from linked recipe)
• 3 tbsp sour cream
• 1 bag nachos

Instructions

1. Prepare both spice blends. Mix the spices for Spice Blend 1 in a shallow bowl, and mix the ingredients for Spice Blend 2 in another bowl. Set Spice Blend 2 aside.
2. Add the pork steaks one at a time to Spice Blend 1 and coat on both sides. Set the steaks aside.
3. Heat a frying pan to a high heat and add 1 tbsp of your favourite oil. When sizzling, add the pork steaks and cook for 30 secs – 1 min on each side until well browned. Move the steaks directly to the slow cooker.
4. Add the stock, tomato puree, garlic cloves, and Spice Mix 2 to the frying pan and deglaze. Really scrape up any burnt or charred bits of pork or spices. Let the liquid simmer for 2 mins, then add the citrus juices and pour over the pork in the slow cooker. Cover and cook on Low for 5 hours.
5. After 5 hours remove the pork steaks from the slow cooker and use two forks to shred to pieces. They should be tender and flake easily. Add the shredded pork to a bowl and spoon in a ladleful or so of the cooking liquid. Leave to sit whilst preparing the rest of the ingredients for the nachos.
6. Preheat the oven to 200C (fan 180C). Make the guacamole as per the linked recipe and prep the remaining nachos ingredients.
7. In a large baking dish, scatter a thin layer of nachos. Drizzle over 1-2 tbsps of the liquid from the slow cooker, followed by a thin layer of the pork and a scattering of cheese. Add a light sprinkle of each of the mango, spring onions, tomatoes, and jalapeños. Repeat with layers of nachos, pork, cheese, and the trimmings as you wish, remembering to dollop spoonfuls of the guacamole as you go. When finished, scatter the remaining cheese over the top and bake in the oven for 15-20 mins, until the cheese is fully melted and the tips of the nachos are starting to crisp.
8. Serve in bowls, or in the dish if you’re feeling lazy, with sour cream spooned in blobs on the top. DIG IN.