Go Go Gadget {chip cutter} Video

A quick, easy, yummy (and healthy - er) version of hot chips.

Super simple ... preheat oven to 200C/400F
Chop up some potatoes ... see videos below for easy chopping method !! (took me TWO minutes)
Lay on a baking tray or two ... do not overlap them ... the bottom ones don't cook well.
Drizzle with oil ... I like olive.
Bake til they are the way you like them ... mine take somewhere between 15 and 30 minutes.
Pull out of oven ... sprinkle with crushed sea salt.
Eat immediately !
We dip ours in vinegar ...

PS ... please ignore the dork factor. I have my video voice on !

Talk {To} Me !

Been doing some more reading !

I got this book from the library the other day and read it just over an hour. It's full of lots of good, simple info and references. I've since been back onto the library website and reserved a few more books in this series ! Can't wait til they arrive !

I had a very inspirational cup of coffee with a friend the other day. Well, the cup of coffee wasn't inspirational, she was ! I went away with a bunch of thoughts and ideas running around in my head. I won't spill the beans on all of them but I do want to get your input on one thing ...

HYPOTHETICALLY speaking ... if SOMEONE were to think about teaching a cooking class ... possibly online ... would you find yourself interested ? Be honest ! I'm trying to feel out what would be interesting to people and what would be doable ... for someone.

What sorts of 'classes' or online video 'tutorials' would be helpful to you, your daughters, your sons, your friends, your co-workers ?

Healthy eating?
Unprocessed eating ?
Menu planning ?
Grocery budgeting ?
Simple recipes ?
Fancy recipes ?
Feeding children who won't eat ?
Freezer recipes ?
Slow cooker recipes ?

or something totally different ? I'm really wondering what your interests would be ... or even what you think would be beneficial to the people around you ...

Would you leave me some comments with your thoughts ? I'll come back and leave comments too ... maybe get a bit of a discussion going !

Dessert {Pizza} Experiments

We had dessert pizza at our friends place ... made in a wood fired oven ... a while back. The kids rave about it still so I thought I'd give it a go ! My pizza dough recipe actually makes four thin crust pizzas. I just roll one smaller one and three equal size ones. I use the smaller one for the dessert ...

For the blueberry and nectarine ... I just spread thickened cream on the base. Added frozen blueberries, slivered fresh nectarine, and then sprinkled with our nut/oat mix. Drizzled with a bit of maple syrup and into the oven. 400F/200C - still on from the dinner pizzas (!). 15 minutes or so ... but watch so the oats don't burn ! I drizzled with thickened cream to serve.

The second experiment was actually with a different dough (you can see it in the previous post if I forget to come back and link it !) that I like even better. The toppings were 1 cup mango - blended with a couple tablespoons of thickened cream and 5 dates. (I just threw those three things in my hand mixer and whizzed 'em into a thick paste) Spread that paste onto the dough. Sprinkle with same oat/nut mixture ... except that we've now added sultanas (raisins) and goji berries to the mix. 15 minutes in the 400F/200C oven and dessert is served. You could probably top with cream again but we didn't. This one was even better than the blueberry one !! Can't wait to try more ....

40 Clove Garlic Chicken Pizza

We had leftover 40 clove chicken the other night and I decided to try a little experiment. Seriously ... I think that's pretty much all I do these days ... experiment ! I wanted to try and change up the dough a bit. Last time I made it, I found it a bit hard to roll out and I had read that adding a small amount of gluten flour will help with elasticity. So ... I made my dough like this ....

1 and 1/3 cup water
2 TBLS honey
2 TBLS olive oil
2 cups whole wheat flour
2 cups whole wheat spelt flour
1 TBLS gluten flour
3/4 tsp salt
1 and 1/4 tsp yeast

This dough was really nice. It is much wetter and required more flour on the surface to roll but the taste was great ! I think I'll try adding half as much gluten flour next time and see what that does. I'll tweak it til it's perfect !! :)

Here's the pizza before we put the mozzarella on top ...

The toppings went like this :

Tomato Sauce:
2 TBLS tomato paste
1 TBLS thickened cream
Leftover garlic and onions from the 40 clove garlic chicken

Mix and spread on dough.

The Rest of It:
One small potato, unpeeled, uncooked and thinly sliced
Leftover 40 clove garlic chicken, maybe we used about 1/2 a cup ? Do it to your liking.
A handful of fresh baby spinach leaves
A dozen or so kalamata style olives
Three homemade sun dried tomatoes, defrosted earlier and cut into chunks
Red onion, sliced
Spring onion, chopped
Camembert cheese, slivered

And then top with mozarella cheese. Bake in oven 15/20 minutes on 400F/200C.

ABSOLUTELY DELICIOUS !!

Donna's Buttermilk Biscuits {but} Whole Wheat

My friend Donna gave me my first ever biscuit recipe a few years ago. I used to make them quite often. I've been trying to find a good whole wheat dinner bread roll but I'm just not keen on kneading and rising time and all that ... I need quicker and less effort for the life we lead ! I am so glad I decided to give this recipe a bit of a tweak to fit in with our whole unprocessed journey because these biscuits are the answer to my dinner roll dilemma !! They are quick, easy and most of all TASTY !!!

Here's my modified recipe ...

If you want to use white flour, just use 2 cups flour.

1 cup whole wheat flour
1 TBLS gluten flour - put it into a one cup measure and then fill the cup the rest of the way with whole wheat spelt flour. Does that make sense ? (If you eat gluten free, maybe try the whole 2 cups with the whole wheat spelt flour !)
1 TBLS baking powder
1 tsp salt
1/4 cup butter
1 cup buttermilk

Mix dry ingredients. Cut in the butter. Do you know how to cut butter in ? I will have to show you another 'favorite gadget' next time I make these. I never knew how to cut in butter ... nor did I know about this gadget til I made these the first time. So ... you cut in the butter til the butter is pea size. Then add the buttermilk. Put it onto a floured surface. I sort of push it down to 1/2 inch thickness and then use my biscuit cutters (also had to buy those to make these the first time !!) and put the cut biscuits onto baking sheet (I line mine with baking paper). Bake in 400F/200C oven for about 15/20 minutes ... depending on your oven. Mine seems to run hot so I check them after 10 minutes, they usually take 15 but I always check because burned biscuits are not so nice. I just break one in half and make sure they are not wet in the center ... that's my best way to tell you how to check !

Menu Plan Monday - Bonnie - 22 February 2010

Menu Plan Monday is hosted by Laura at I'm an Organizing Junkie

Lots of new recipes this week so will be posting them in the next week or two ...

Saturday 2oth Whole Wheat 40 Clove Garlic Chicken Pizza I changed up the crust a bit, will post new recipe and also 40 clove garlic chicken pizza recipe this week !! Sunday 21st Soak Black Beans in Crock Pot all day Make Tortillas to Freeze (try adding spelt and gluten)

Chicken with Lemon and Garlic (SP CB page 184) - double recipe Homemade Oven Chips Avocado and Orange Salad (SP CB page 118) Rinse Black Beans, Recover with water, Cook in crock pot all night long ...

Monday 22nd Freeze Black Beans in 1 cup serves ... include water Baba Ganoush - Hummus Pasta (RR CB pg 28) Spinach with Raisins and Pine Nuts (SP CB page 121)

Tuesday 23rd Albondigas con salasa de tomate (SP CB page 204) - double recipe Whole Wheat Biscuits

Wednesday 24th GOING OUT TO DINNER WITH FRIENDS

Thursday 25th Crock Pot Lamb Chops - use Spin/Orzo CP Lamb Recipe add ww cous cous to juices Spinach, Feta, Tomato Salad Try making Naan with ww.spelt and gluten flour ... honey instead of sugar.

Mango Prawn Salad {with} Chicken

I found the inspiration for this recipe over at the good mood food blog.
I made a few changes, especially since I'd spent the day cutting up mango and just couldn't resist adding it to this already delectable looking ensemble ! Here's what I did ....

Serves 2 (whopping huge salads ... we had ONLY this for dinner !)

spring onions , chopped
1 garlic clove,peeled and crushed
1 tbsp soy sauce
Freshly ground black pepper
10 uncooked king prawns, my fish shop has ones marinated in garlic and parsley ... I used those.
1 chicken breast
fresh spinach leaves
fresh rocket
watercress (don't know that I'll worry about the watercress next time !)
1 ripe avocado
2 tomatoes, sliced
1 cup fresh mango, chopped into rather large pieces
Juice of 1 lemon
Handful of fresh basil, torn
olive oil

Heat the olive oil in a large frying pan over a medium heat. I used my big electric fry pan and was able to cook the chicken on one side and then the prawns on the other, only mixing them when they were cooked. Add the spring onions, crushed garlic, soy sauce, black pepper and chicken. Cook til chicken is just about done and then add the prawns. Cook til both chicken and prawns are cooked through. Arrange your salad ingredients on your plates ... I plated them onto two individual plates rather than doing in a big bowl. Top with chicken and prawns. Dress with lemon juice. Serve and enjoy !

Mango Madness

I adore mango. I haven't always. Well, I'm fairly certain that I'd never tried a mango until I went to India. The way they ate it there was to cut the top off and suck the flesh out. I found the skin to have a very unpleasant taste and came away thinking mango was a bit soapy. I didn't let that stop me from trying one when we got to Australia though ... and boy am I glad ! The mango here is insanely delicious ! So sweet. So juicy. It's a treat ! I loooove when mango season hits. This year was a particularly good season too ! Some of the mangos we ate were ENORMOUS ! So ... a month or so ago, not wanting to leave it too long and miss my chance (like I did last year) I bought a box of mango. This box cost me $20 ... which made them $2 each. That's a very reasonable price !

The way a fair dinkum Aussie eats a mango is to cut the two 'cheeks' off ...
as close to the seed as possible ... like you can see in the photo above.



Then you score it and push the flesh inside out and eat the luscious pieces just like that.
I, however, took it one step further ... I cut the pieces off and filled a ginormous bowl.



When I was done cutting it all up, I scooped one cup serves into snack size zip locks
and popped them into the freezer. Perfect for pulling out later to make mango ice cream !!!

Jamie

My brother in law posted this video to my facebook page earlier today. I couldn't watch it until just now and WOW (!) I'm so inspired ! It is a 22 minute video so make sure you have some time ... ideally 22 minutes ... before you start it ! But ... if you don't have time now, do come back later. I think this is a message that needs to get out.

And really ... it so lines up with what I am trying to do with this whole unprocessed thing. One huge motivation is my kids. I want them to know how to eat and feed their families food that will keep them well ... not kill them.

Have a look ... I'll be surprised if you come away uninspired ...

Change in Plans ...

I cooked this caraway cauliflower and potato dish a while back. Got the recipe out of a library cookbook. Totally can't remember what book ... and can't find it in the ones I've still got at home so must have returned it. Probably not something I'd cook again anyway ... although, it did have an interesting mix of flavors so maybe I might have. Oh well ... maybe I'll come across the recipe again one day !

I've been thinking about my pre-planned menu plans and I've decided to do them a bit different than I originally thought. It is too tricky to try and do the plans along with what I'm cooking ... mainly because I try so many recipes and who knows if it will even be good !

So, what I've decided it to make a few menus and grocery lists using recipes I've already made and know are good. I will be able to balance the cost that way too ... I'm hoping to get some time on the weekend to put a few together for you all to try !

I'll let you know when they are done and where to find them ....

Raw Lasagna on Big Honkin' Mushrooms

These were so yummy. I have done this raw lasagna as a dip before but wanted to do it as part of a main meal. This worked really well. I just got some humongous portatbello mushrooms, grilled them in my sandwich press right before we were ready to eat, spooned to (already prepared a few hours earlier) lasagna onto the top. EASY ! YUMMY !

1/2 a zucchini, finely sliced

2 cups tightly packed fresh spinach, processed til finely chopped
1/2 cup avocado, mashed
AND
1 ripe tomato, seed and chop (1/2 cup)
1/2 cup homemade sun dried tomatoes
1/2 cup red bell pepper
2 tbls olive oil
1 tsp oregano
1 tsp basil
1 clove garlic
1/2 tsp salt
--
Process everything under the AND ... til smooth.
--

Layer zucchini, spinach, avocado, tomato sauce. Do a few layers. I think I got three in a rectangular tupperware and four or five in a square tupperware ... It's best if you leave it set a few hours in the fridge before you eat it. The flavors really develop !

Sun Dried Tomatoes

One of the things I can't get without preservatives is any sort of sun/semi dried tomato. Total bummer. There are just so many things that taste so much better with them than without ! Luckly for me, Shay had a solution ! Here you go !

You'll need a bunch of tomatoes ... I used Roma Tomatoes and I bought two bags. Cut them in half and lay them on a baking tray lined with al foil to make cleanup a breeze !

In a bowl, mix 1 tsp salt, 1/4 tsp pepper and two tablespoons of fresh herbs of your choice. I used rosemary and thyme. Brush your tomatoes with olive oil then sprinkle with herbs.

Pop 'em in a preheated oven ... 250F / 120C ... and roast them for about four hours. She said they should be dehydrated but still meaty when they are done.

I don't know if mine are exactly right (according to this recipe) but they sure taste GOOOOOOD !



And I froze them in 1/2 cup measurements ... so easy to pull out and use in recipes !!!
Mmmm ... we had them on pizza the other day and wow ... what amazing flavor they added !!

Menu Plan Monday - Khrista 02.15.10

We recently moved from Alaska to Texas and are steadily getting settled into our new home.
After living in a few hotels for 2 weeks and eating out A LOT, we are SO ready to eat at home again!

Here's the plan for this week:

Monday - Wild Rice & Celery Root Soup with Hillbilly Bread (LOVE this soup, and I'll share the bread recipe soon! It's THE BEST!!!)
Tuesday - Zucchini Ankara
Wednesday - Sweet Pepper Pasta Toss with Kale
Thursday - Black Bean & Sweet Potato Chili with Cornbread (new recipe from the magazine on newstands now: MixingBowl.com, great site too!
Friday - Pizza Night (I will be trying Bonnie's Whole Wheat Pizza Dough recipe)
Saturday - Vegetable Lasagna 

I will try to share the recipes that do not have links soon!

Menu Plan Monday - Bonnie - 15 February 2010

Menu Plan Monday is hosted by Laura at I'm an Organizing Junkie

Sorry ... no time to add photos today ....

Sunday
Creamy Parmesan Mustard Chicken Pasta
Frozen Peas

Monday
Blueberry Pancakes but with modifications to follow ...

Tuesday
Crock Pot Chicken and Artichoke Casserole
Try making Donna's biscuits with whole wheat flour
Both of these are new recipes ... I'll post them after I've made them.

Simple Spinach and Tomato Salad
( just slice 3 roma tomatoes, lay on top of 2 handfuls baby spinach )
(dress with equal parts olive oil and vinegar of your choice and sprinkle with a nice sea salt ...)
(you could also add thinly sliced red onion and green olives ....)

Wednesday
Omelets

Thursday
40 Clove Garlic Chicken (Crock Pot)
Pumpkiny Fritters
Simple Sesame Asparagus

Friday
OUT TO DINNER !

Saturday
leftovers

Here is my first PRINTABLE menu and grocery list !

It's a two page document with all the necessary items to make this menu. Obviously, you can't do it just yet as I have not posted the recipe for Tuesday ... but I'll try to do that Tuesday night ! When the menu/grocery lists are complete ... I'll post them in the side bar for future use !! But ... I just wanted you to see ... it's very simple. Maybe I'll pretty it up in future but for now ... this is it ! Let me know what you think !! I'm getting ready to use my printed copy right now to go check what ingredients I already have on hand and then do my on-line shopping for this week !! Hooray ! I'm excited !!!

40 Clove Garlic Chicken

I got this recipe from Coupons and Cooking. I didn't change any ingredients ...

2 kg chicken pieces
1 large onion, sliced
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 teaspoons sea salt
2 teaspoons paprika
1 teaspoon pepper
40 garlic cloves, peeled

Put your sliced onions on the bottom of the crock pot. Add chicken. Mix remaining ingredients in a bowl and pour on top of chicken. Mix with hands to coat. Do not add water. Cover and cook on low for 6-8 hours, or on high for 4-6.

**

Note from Bonnie ... I used chicken legs and chicken breast. The legs were great, the breast ... not so much. Too dry. I will just do legs, and maybe thighs next time.

I served this with yummy pumpkiny fritters and simple sesame asparagus.

Simple Sesame Asparagus

I just whipped this up as a side dish the other night.
I often whip this up ... or something similar ... as I adore asparagus !

1 or 2 bunches of asparagus, chopped into 1/5 inch pieces

sesame oil
rice wine vinegar
soy sauce

I use a big cast iron fry pan with a bit of olive oil and cook these puppies up til they are tender. I don't like mushy asparagus but I like them not too firm either. Once they are cooked, I turn off the heat, add one cap full (approx. equal amounts of each) of sesame oil, rice wine (or you could use balsalmic but I don't as I haven't yet found one without added colors ...) and soy sauce. That's it. Sometimes I sprinkle with sesame seeds. Sometimes I don't.

Pumpkiny Fritters

I got this recipe from one of my favorite cooking blogs. Possibly my favorite. I changed it very very little. Like not really at all ! Here's what I did ....

2 cups grated kent pumpkin

1/4 cup fresh herbs - I used parsley and garlic chives
a couple spring onions - chop 'em up
1/4 cup crumbled feta
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1 egg
salt and pepper to taste
2 tablespoons oil

Mix all ingredients minus the oil ... I accidentally mixed the oil in and it was fine so don't worry if you make that mistake too ! Heat the oil ... if you haven't mixed it in ! And then scoop the mixture into the pan and cook til golden brown on both sides. He said about 4 minutes each side but mine took a bit longer than that ... just watch 'em so they don't burn !

Serve with Tsatsiki ....

To Answer {Your} Question ...

Amy asked me what books I have been reading and what plan/eating style I am following. The answer is not short so I thought I'd do a post about it ... I read A LOT. The librarian teases me every week because when I come in I empty the reserve shelf ! I always look at the sources that people quote and try to find the books they've quoted from ... and that way, along with recommendations from blogs and friends, I keep myself loaded up with new books to read.

My journey really started when after I saw Dr Oz and Dr Roizen on Oprah a few times and decided to read a couple of their books. I started with You - The Owners Manual. And moved on to You - On A Diet. Two really informative books that changed a lot of my thinking. Really started moving me towards veggies and whole grains. Next, I discovered Dr Fuhrman's book Eat To Live. This book challenged me even more with how many veggies I should be eating and feeding my family. I fall WAY short of his standards, even still ! But I love the info and how much I've learned for his books ... The second book I've read that probably really got me started on this whole unprocessed track is called Disease Proof Your Child. Amazing book but don't read it unless you want your eyes to be opened to how much damage we can do to our kids with the food we feed (or don't feed) them ! Additive Alert is an amazing little resource specifically for Australia. It tells you about every additive/preservative and the possible adverse reactions associated with them. Again ... very eye opening. Scary, actually. Blue Zones is one that I've been dying to read, and still have only read half of it because I could only have it for two weeks and didn't get it finished, for ages. I saw the author on Oprah and it is so interesting. I'll get it out of the library again and finish it. It deals with more than just food ... but is all about the few places in the world that have the most people who live past 100 ! And they are HEALTHY and of SOUND MIND. Amazing. Fascinating. Inspiring.


Nourishing traditions is one that I'm currently reading. Great book ! It is a little different to some others that I have read but I find that a lot of what they say rings true.

I read a lot of blogs about health, raw food, clean eating, veganism, vegetarianism, and blogs that I find who post lots of whole grain / minimal sugar recipes. There are lots of them out there. One of these days I'll have to share my favorites with you.

I am not a vegan ... never could be. I'm not a vegetarian either. I don't care to eat a lot of meat but I do eat some. I'm just not convinced that it is the healthiest thing to eat none. I try to make meat be part of the meal ... not the main focus. And we do eat meat free meals quite regularly too.

This year ... the focus is on eating preservative/additive free. NO sugar. NO white flour. NO refined grains. Really ... that is the plan I am following ... of course, with our few exceptions but you can read all about that here. And see what we had to get rid of here.

How's that Amy ? Answer your question ?? :)


(FYI:The links connected to Dr's names and book names are for their specific websites ... not for the books ... lots of good info on each website ... you should check them out if this sort of stuff interests you!)

Some Thoughts {on} The Whole Unprocessed Thing

I've recently come to a few startling realizations. The first one is that it is next to impossible to eat unprocessed in this day and age. The second is that I still want to eat unprocessed in this day and age.

I have seen such good results in this first month. The biggest one being that my cravings are gone. I do not crave any food - ever. It's crazy. Cravings have been such a huge part of my life for sooooo long. To not be totally controlled by them has brought me much freedom. Freedom that I never knew I needed to experience. I guess I just always accepted uncontrollable (??) cravings as part of life. Now I know better.

The other big thing is weight loss. I've lost 10 lbs already and I keep going down ... little by little. This has never happened to me before. I might go down a little but then I go up, further up. Then I go down a little but then I go up again ... more than before.. The little I go down has always been overtaken by the more I go up. I thought that I was doomed to stay like that. Now i know better.

I feel good. I feel healthy. I eat without guilt. My bowels move healthier and more regularly. (I won't tell you any more about that ... at least, not until I'm on Oprah, where everyone goes to talk about their poo.) I feel like I'm doing right by my kids. Teaching them healthy habits. Helping them to know better.

I feel like there is a lot more to do. And I don't want to give up.

I don't do that easily. Give up, I'm talking about. If something isn't going the way I want it to, I attack it with everything I've got. I research and plan and talk to people and plan and organize and rethink and plan and read and ... have I mentioned plan already ?

I've been trying to come up with a solution. My problem at the moment is time. I don't have as much of it as I used to. I know this is a common problem that many of us face.

This morning I was talking to Shay ... ya'll know her right ? It's too bad if you don't. You really should. Anyway ... she and I problem solve each others lives all the time and this morning was no different. In throwing ideas back and forth, we've come up with a couple of things that I think are going to be really helpful.

The first was an amazing idea by Shay to have meal portions in the freezer. So ... frozen tortillas, cooked rice, bread, etc ... I do some of those things but I'm going to concentrate on doing more. The tortillas are going to be my first task ! Getting homemade tortillas into the freezer will be a great help. That will make burritos and chimichangas and fajitas quick and easy meals again !!

And dips. I'm going to concentrate on trying lots of new dips. They are great to have on hand when you are eating so many vegetables !! Especially for school lunches ....

The second is that when I make my menu plans from now on, I'm going to make myself a master grocery list for that week. That means that in future weeks, if I find I'm busy and can't make a menu, I have some already planned, I can just re-print the grocery list, cross off what I already have in the house and be on my way ! Easy, right ? I'm hoping so ....

I hope it will give me a good supply of ready planned menu's and shopping lists. I will try to figure out how to make the shopping lists available here too for anyone of you who might want to use them ...

The third thing is that I just really really really have to be organized. Today I will sit down with my schedule and work out what day I will menu plan, what day I will shop (and get my online shopping happening again !!) and what day I will do the cooking to keep our freezer stocked. It just takes a little planning and a bit of work getting into new habits but sheesh ... that's the story of my life ! Once the habits are formed, and the plans are made, the work is minimal. And the reward is great.

Those are my thoughts at the moment. In my schedule planning as well, I'm going to work out how best to get recipes posted. It may just mean, I have to do them every other day rather than every day like I once aspired to do. But ... flexibility plays a bit part in having my fingers in as many pies as I do !!

I hit publish post before I read through this whole thing and it ended rather abruptly. But ... I don't really have all that much else to say ... so, there you have it.

The End.

CRAZY BUSY

I want to post ... sooooo much ... but I've got so little time at the moment. I'll get myself sorted and be back to posting regularly soon !! Who knew having two children in school, swimming, tennis, working five days a week, organizing stuff for the missions month at church, taking on a new job, training and setting up a new system for checking people in, training people to help me, doing my current job, having a husband go overseas for a week and taking care of a home would leave so little time to blog !!!

Be back soon.

PS ... it's hard, very hard, to eat unprocessed at the moment. We're doing our best but have made some great realizations. I'll write about them soon !!

Homemade Sweet Chili Sauce {!!} & Chicken & Prawns ...

Ok ... so I found a recipe in a cookbook to make your own sweet chili sauce. I had to modify it a fair bit since it had heaps that we can't use at the moment. Here's what I came up with.

For the Meat ...

2 chicken breasts, chopped into bite size pieces
As many prawns as you like ... I think we did about 5 each
2 kaffir lime leaves, get rid of the middle 'rib' and chop the leaves small
juice of one lime
2 tablespoon peanut oil

Mix lime juice, oil and kaffir lime leaves. Soak chicken and prawns (I soaked in two separate bowls) while the BBQ heats up. Cook on BBQ.

For the sweet chilli sauce ...

1 TBLS peanut oil
2 coriander roots, washed and chopped
4 garlic cloves, minced
5 long red chillies ... to taste (seeded and chopped)
a few squirts gold label (or you could use fish sauce)
1/2 cup palm sugar, grated
1.5 TBLS coconut, desicated
1/4 cup rice wine vinegar
1/2 cup water

Use stick blender to blend chili, coriander roots and garlic (with 1 TBLS water) into a paste.

Add mixture to saucepan with remaining ingredients. Boil and simmer, til sauce thickens. ( I think it took 10/15 minutes)

Serve on a bed of steamed baby bok choy with BBQ'd chicken and prawns ... drizzled with sweet chilli sauce and a sprinkle of cilantro (fresh coriander leaves) !

Lime {and} Cilantro {and} Salmon {and} Rice

My inspiration for this dish came from this recipe but I changed it a little bit ... The original recipe used the oven but I don't have a dish that can go between stove top and oven so I didn't mine a bit differently ...

Here's how I did mine.

¼ cup fresh lime juice
2 tablespoons finely grated lime zest
2 tablespoons honey
2 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro, plus additional for sprinkling
4 teaspoons soy sauce
1 tablespoon olive oil
¾ cup sliced shallots (about 3 large)
1 ½ cups brown basmati rice
3 ¼ (or more) low-sodium chicken broth
2 salmon fillets salmon fillets
2 bunches broccolini, chopped

Mix lime juice, lime zest, honey, 2 tablespoons cilantro, and soy sauce in a small bowl; set aside.

Heat oil in big electric frying pan over medium-high heat. Add shallots and sauté til beginning to brown. Add in rice, and broth; bring to a boil. Cover tightly with lid and cook til rice is 10 almost cooked through.

Push the rice to the sides to make room for salmon. Add salmon to frying pan ... seasoning both sides with salt and pepper, and a bit of lime mixture. Add broccolini. Cover.

Cook until salmon is done to your liking (I turned it once). And I think I broke it up into smaller pieces to allow it to cook faster ...

Once fish is cooked, drizzle remaining lime mixture and chopped cilantro oven fish and rice.

I served this with spicy potatoes and kale crisp !

Menu Plan Monday - 1 February 2010

Menu Plan Monday is hosted by Laura at I'm an Organizing Junkie

We've been spending soooooo much on groceries ! Seriously, before we even start this week, we are like $50 over budget ! So ... we're trying to feed ourselves this week and next week totally on next week's budget so that we can start the third week fresh. I'm afraid it's going to be a pretty plain week !! We have raised our weekly grocery budget though. I'm glad about that. It's unrealistic to try and feed a family of four, the sort of fresh, unprocessed food we want to on the budget we used to struggle to stick to !!

I haven't been writing my captains logs either. I might get back into it, I might not. I didn't get much response and I sort of feel like maybe they are a bit boring to read. Plus, I have not got as much time as I used to so I think I'll just concentrate on sharing recipes and maybe a few experiences along the way, in the recipes ! What do you think ??

Anyway ... here's this week's menu ...

Friday
Two Simple Pizzas (and froze 1/2 the dough to try from frozen)
We had a cheese pizza ... kids favorite !
And a veggie one that was just garlic cooked in butter/olive oil for the base,
topped with onion, pumpkin, zucchini and mozzarella ! So yum.

Saturday
Mystery Lamb bits marinated in Red Wine and Cooked in the Crock Pot
Roast Potato, Pumpkin, Onion and Whole Head of Garlic (!!)
Green Peas

Sunday
Weber Time !
Whole Chicken Marinated in Jamie Oliver Sauce
Potato topped with garlic and melted Camembert cheese.
(wasn't as good as I hoped it would be ... bummer)
Corn on the Cob

Monday - Salad Night
Went to a birthday party ...
But came home and cooked a big pot of pasta
with a bolognaise sauce for lunches for the rest of the week !

Tuesday
Using the frozen dough to make pizza again.

Wednesday
Chicken Fajitas with Homemade Tortillas.

Thursday
I didn't plan anything for Tonight.
I'll have to get creative out of the pantry ... or maybe I'll have to shop a day early ...
We'll see !

I hope to get some recipes posted soon ! I have a bunch waiting ... I've done the photos ... I just need to sit and write out the recipe ! I have started working 5 days a week and the kids just went back to school so we're sorting out a new routine around here !! So far so good ... except this morning, instead of getting out of bed at 5:00 to have my hour of computer time, I laid in bed listening to the pounding rain ! It was lovely ... but no blogging ! Maybe tomorrow ... We'll see ! If it's raining, I may just have to opt to enjoy that simple pleasure again !!