Who is up for a challenge?

[francesbean]

Ive been making 'wait and see' since mine were toddlers - (as in whats for tea mum......) deffo a family favourite and vquick:

One or two tins of pink salmon (remove skin and bones) - cost 1.60
Onion, Pepper, fresh tomatoes (all sliced)
tinned sweetcorn
Lots of fresh thyme, little garlic and black pepper - spiceit up with chilis or hot sauce if liked.

Cook onions, peppers garlic and tomatoes until softened - addthyme sweetcorn etc
Add salmon about 5 minutes from end - lightly crush - you want bits rather than mush.
Leave in frypan with lidon to steam and bubble - you could addjuice from salmon tin if goes a bit dry.

I serve with potatoes and a green veg, broc or beans or peas.

Its kind of a take on caribbean fish dish.I think it even counts as feed family for a fiver from store cupboard kinda thing.

[Rhona]

ooohhh... I love a culinary challenge! So, healthy, with secret veggies, able to reheat... hmmm...

Vietnamese food is fabulous, healthy and quick! And very nice at this time of year. A sparklingly quick version is to make the aromatic paste in the morning - in the food processor a few seconds, stick in some chicken thigh fillets (or breast whatever) to marinade all day. In your 30 minutes once home, pop the whole lot in a pan with a couple of tins of coconut milk, a pair of diced sweet potatoes and some peas and bring to the boil. Simmer for 20 minutes, stir in a good couple of handfuls of coriander and basil, a little sugar, squeeze of lime and some fish sauce, and you're done.

Serve with rice that you've been cooking at the same time, or even quicker and easier, with some of those instant noodles.

So, you've got lean meat, veggies, and and lovely fresh green leaves. It'll reheat perfectly - just add another squeeze of lime and maybe sprinkle with more herbs. This can be as spicy and aromatic as you want - turn it up or down.

Let me know if you the sound of this and I'll post the spice paste etc.

[Finedon.Dandy]

Yes Rhona please post more details - sounds scrummy. Kids do eat a mild curry but its a jar of Uncle Bens that I use but I want to get away from that sort of convenience stuff cos its loaded in sugar, salt or fat most of the time.

Looking forward to starting some of these recepies out this Thursday and will keep you updated. Keep ideas comming in, until I decide a winner anyway but by the sounds of some of the ideas that wont be too long!

Thanks for all your help.

Tammy

[Rhona]

Okay! Although it's sometimes tempting to leave the odd thing out, the backbone flavours of this are the star anise (remove it when cooked); the lime, fish sauce (doesn't taste fishy); and the coriander. Like I said in earlier post - wind any ingredient up or down according to your family's tastes, but I would try to get all the core flavours in.

Re: the coconut milk - buy two 400 g tins and spoon off the thick cream into a bowl; use the thin milk towards the bottom to make spice paste


Spice Paste (sounds like lots of things but just all popped into the food processor):

Onion
2 x garlic cloves
large thumb of fresh ginger
green chili - maybe just a little to start with
few tablespoons of thin coconut milk to create liquid consistency
1 -2 tablespoons of garam masala or medium curry powder
tsp ground coriander
tsp ground cumin
zest of lime if you've got time (and a zester!)

other ingredients:

chicken (or just veg; or raw prawns - whatever)
corn oil
star anise
2 cloves
2 x tins coconut milk
2 sweet potatoes
peas - fresh or frozen
2 limes
fish sauce
black pepper
coriander
basil

1. Whiz spice paste ingredients in small bowl of processor, adding thin coconut milk to make slushy, stir in chicken pieces, coating everything; cover and leave in fridge.

2. When home, heat corn/sunflower oil; add chicken and all of marinade to saucepan. Don't worry about "colouring" chicken - doesn't matter. Just cook on medium heat, stirring, until everything is aromatic and the spices start to sing - about 3 minutes.

3. add remaining coconut milk; star anise (whole) and 2 cloves. Add cubed sweet potato (skin on or off) and peas. Grind in some black pepper - no salt at this stage; bring to light boil then simmer for 20 minutes.

4. The chicken and potato will cook through in about 20 minutes. If the sauce is thick, add water. Then add a little salt, a little sugar, and the juice of two limes. Add the fish sauce - you should aim for around 2 tablespoons, but maybe start your kiddies off on slightly less - depends how they take to it!

5. Roughly chop two large handfuls of coriander and basil and stir everything together, check seasoning, remove star anise, or wait for someone to find it on their plate, and serve with jasmine rice (best), or basmati (almost as good) or noodles (still pretty good!).

Hope they like it. I don't write recipes down much so if I made a glaring omission - apologies! x

[Rhona]

p.s. find out where your local Chinese supermarket is - most sell wholesale AND operate as a little supermarket too. The difference in price is ridiculous - get all your spices, fish sauce, coconut milk and fresh produce there if you can. My local one is madly cheap, and I've discovered the most amazing things there too - tofu freshly made every day; and awesome veggies. This is a cheap dish once you've got your spices sorted.

p.p.s thinly sliced spring onions scattered on top is a great final touch.

[MrsC]

what about home made pizza? you can always add veggies finely chopped to the tomato base, get the kids to make them and think of a design. you could use french bread, naan bread, pizza dough, bagels even. potato boats, microwave a potato, chop in half, remove the potato and mash up with anything you want, top with cheese, veggies or whatever you like, when cooked put a cocktail stick in with slices of cucumber/lettuce for the sail.

[Winged one]

A great standby for us (it's actually in the oven on the timer for tonight!) is one I have since the girl guides! Smoked fish pie.

Put your smoked fish (recipe called for haddock, but I've used cod and coley very successfully as well) into a pot and cover with milk. Put on the lid, bring to the boil and turn off the heat.

Cut lots of brocolli into tiny florets - put in a layer (not too think) on the bottom of an oven-proof dish. Flake the fish over this.

Make a white sauce using the milk you've cooked the fish in - other wise regular white sauce. (Be careful if making it straight away as hot milk might cause lumps - I use cornflour so if making with hot milk, stir a little cold milk from fridge in first to get roux "wet", then add the hot milk as I whisk and bring to boil). Pour this over the fish and brocolli.

Cover with a reasonable layer of mashed potatoes and you can then top with a thin layer of breadcrumbs and some grated cheese (I like a strong cheddar).

Bake at 180 degrees for 30-45 mins.

This can be frozen either before or after the oven, and also works very well reheated in microwave. It's one of my standby's for "make on Sunday afternoon to eat on Monday" - keeps fine in the fridge overnight.

[Finedon.Dandy]

Sheherd's pie! With veg de jour.

Ok - I tried Shepherds Pie last night -not tried them with that for quite a while as Hannah doesnt like mash - kids ate it all! Its like going for an interview this - I was so nervous!! - LOL!!!

Flummery you are in the lead at the mo (not hard considering you were first!!!)

Oh edited to say; had peas and cauliflower (why I cannot stop weeing this am!) with it, had onion, 1/3 pepper, tomatoes and grated mushroom and carrot in it so not too bad eh!

[Naomi]

If it's not too late I will add my recipe which can be done in half an hour (or less) in the morning.
Slow cooked chicken
Fry a large onion in oil or butter, when nice and see through add a big tablespoon of flour, it will go lumpy and yucky looking, but keep cooking for a minute to soak up all the oil in the pan. Put this in the bottom of slow cooker. In same pan brown some chicken legs/thighs (skin removed) and put this on top of the onions. Chop up one or two leeks into big chunks and put it in, and also chop some carrot quite big and put this in. (I sometimes substitute the carrot for a cooking apple - delicious) You can also put in your potatoes if there is space. Crumble a couple of oxo over the top and fill with water so that the meat is covered. The flour in with the onions will help thicken the gravy, and when you get home you will be greeted with a wonderful smell of chicken casserole! just serve with your choice of veg.

[TPeers]

Can I chip in with a lamb recipe?

Again a slow cooker job.

Get any cut of lamb you can afford - trim off all bone and fat - cheaper cuts work best for this dish.

Brown the lamb in a dry frying pan and put into your slow cooker, add a teaspoon of yellow (english) mustard and half a jar of redcurrant jelly. A sprig or two of finely chopped fresh rosemary and a couple of whole garlic cloves. Top to cover the meat with hot water.

Leave to cook on low for a good 6 hours or so.

In the evening, strain the meat and pour the juices into a saucepan, thicken with cornflour.

Serve with noodles, 'trees' and/or any other veg you like.

Also goes well with rice or couscous.

[Flummery]

Ive been making 'wait and see' since mine were toddlers - (as in whats for tea mum......)

In our family it was Windmill Pudding. (If it goes round, you'll get some!)

[Waffler]

Sausage casserole. Reckon this could be done in a slow cooker, but as I've never used one I'm not sure. If not, just cook on a while longer in the morning, so less cooking needs doing in the evening.
Fry sausages off with onion and garlic. Chop sausages and return to pan with: tin of chopped toms, tinned pulses (or baked beans work well too), big squirt of tom puree, shake of worcestershire and seasoning, chopped or grated carrots, chopped potatoes (take on all the flavours: yum!), chopped mushrooms and peppers, peas and sweetcorn (omitting or squishing to a pulp those least favourite veg or replacing with preferred veg.)
Cook in preferred way until potatoes are tender (or part cook and finish later).
Cheap and cheerful! Reheats perfectly!

[batpixie]

Have you tried roasted vegetable pasta? I made this last week and it was very tasty. I roughly chopped 5 fresh toms, a courgette, a pepper and a red onion(I cut the toms into 8 and everything else approx the same size), drizzled it with a little oil and stuck it in the oven on a fairly high heat for about 25 mins until the tomatoes were squashy and the other bits were soft. I just threw this into some cooked pasta with a little chilli sauce and served. If you are pushed for time at night you could cook the veggies in the morning and just reheat at night. If your kids aren't keen on eating veggies you could whizz it all up in a food processor and just heat it up while you cook the pasta. If you like it spicy add a bit of chilli, if not add some balsamic vinegar, a pinch of sugar (to counteract the acidity) and some herbs. Serve up and enjoy.

[JILLY JACKSON]

Areia's Recipe

[The recipe i just found was posted in May,i hadnt tried this variation,but i made it tonight for my family and they loved it!Hunting for more ideas now.Also written down a tomato sauce recipe,as i am hoping for a large harvest of them this year,thanks all,keep em' coming!