Jacket Potatoes

To quote Mr VST sometimes there's nothing better than a jacket potato. These beauties were baked in the oven only as nature intended and tasted great with cheese and home made houmous. 

Beetroot Risotto

Sunday evening saw the return of a pink favourite, beetroot risotto. The beetroot was very sweet and it even tempted me to think about making beetroot brownies again. Only a thought at the moment though! The risotto was nice and we even managed to get a few salad leaves out of the garden to go with it. 

Spinach Pie

On Sunday Mr VST made his now famous spinach pie with feta. He was ambitious with the amount of spinach this time and so it was a little bit too wet. Still tasty though. 

 Served with some salad, including a few leaves from the garden.

Leek and Feta Frittata

Once again I find myself nearly a week behind on the old blog! So, going back to last Tuesday I made an old favourite that I haven't made for a while. Leek and feta frittata with lots of lovely salad, including some leaves from our own garden.

I made it with five rather than four eggs this time as Mr VST was hungry!

It was a lovely healthy meal. The broccoli is there because I had to use it up, strange addition I know!

Roasted Vegetable Pasta Bake

After having such a crazy weekend I hadn't managed to plan our meal for the week. I found myself with a load of veggies but not wanting to make another curry or Mexican. There was also a tub of crème fraîche in the fridge. I decided to roast up the veggies, you can't really go wrong with roasted veggies, and mix them with some cooked pasta and top with cheat's cheese sauce from the Summer Lasagne recipe.

You take 300ml of crème fraîche, season it, grate some nutmeg in and grate about 50g mature cheddar into it and mix.

I mixed up the roasted veg and cooked pasta with a tin of tomatoes, spread the crème fraîche mix on top, added a bit of extra grated cheese and popped it in the oven for about 15 mins.

Filo Pizzas with New Potatoes and Salad

Love this quick, easy tasty alternative to pizza and we had it on Friday night with some lovely quinoa, roasted beetroot and feta salad and the creamy Lil Christow Devon new potatoes. Lovely.

Beetroot, Feta and Quinoa Salad

I had been meaning to roast some beetroot this week but wasn't quite sure what to do with it. I also had half a slab of feta and some quinoa in the cupboard and started to get an idea! I googled it and found it wasn't so weird to put them together and so I did. I made a little dressing of olive oil, balsamic vinegar, honey, cider vinegar and lemon juice with a bit of salt and pepper. It was lovely and pink (see filo pizza post) but I'm still not a great fan of beetroot, especially not in such big chunks.

Quinoa, Black Bean and Toasted Cumin Seed Salad

Another recipe from Appetite for Reduction, another new ingredient, quinoa. I have eaten it once before this, with a curry, as an alternative to rice and I wasn't impressed. In this salad though with black beans, spring onions, tomatoes, lime juice and a little oil, it went down a treat and just as it says in the book it was better the day after once all the ingredients had soaked together. I toasted my cumin seeds as directed and added them to the salad but I couldn't really taste them. The quinoa made a good base for this salad with its light, grainy texture and slightly nutty taste.

 We had it with some of the left over pink coleslaw from earlier in the week and our first crop of home grown potatoes, which were a little disappointing compared to last year's creamy crop.

We also had some Linda McCartney vegetarian (and vegan) sausage rolls which are always a hit. 

Roasted Vegetable Lasagne

Mr VST had been away on a stag weekend this weekend and on Sunday I was planning on making a roasted vegetable version of the summer lasagne I made a few weeks ago. Unfortunately I was on call and called out which meant that I couldn't get to the shops to buy the crème fraîche or the fresh lasagne sheets. Thankfully I did have some dried lasagne sheets in the cupboard and also some goat's milk that needed using up in the freezer so I made it the old fashioned way with cheese sauce. 

Veggies, pre-roasting

Post roasting and with two tins of tomatoes mixed in

Roasted vegetable lasagne and salad

Leek and Feta Frittata with Salad

Lovely leek and feta frittata on Thursday evening accompanied by some salad and grated beetroot. 

Beetroot Risotto

The lovely pink beetroot risotto this evening made by Mr VST. The usual recipe calls for goat's cheese but they didn't have any when I went to buy some so I went for some creamy, herb and garlic le roulé instead. It made a tasty difference and I think we'll be using it in future. We had it with the left over mange tout and salad.

Salad, Potato Salad, Quorn Burger and Veggie Sausages

Having subsisted on crumpets for the whole day I decided that I should really try and balance out my intake of the basic food groups. I grilled us up some Quorn burgers and Linda McCartney sausages and made myself a burger using my home made bread, it was very tasty. 

 I used up the remaining, delicious, Devon new potatoes by making them into a potato salad with some light mayonnaise and black pepper.

 I topped it off with a salad made from iceberg lettuce, spinach, cucumber, grated carrot, sweetcorn and red pepper with a balsamic, honey and mustard dressing.

Quorn Tortilla Stack with Spicy Sautéed Potatoes

On Tuesday I made a lovely Quorn Tortilla stack. I only had new potatoes so I sliced them up and sautéed them with some cumin, tumeric, chilli powder and paprika, yummy!

Pumpkin Curry with Chickpeas

On the Sunday my Mum and her partner had the newlyweds and a few of their friends around for lunch. There was a beef in beer option for the meat eaters and this lovely pumpkin curry for the vegetarians. These were served with baked potatoes and salad and of course left over wedding cake. Mum had also made a proper chocolate mousse and a boozy tiramisu too. They were delicious. I will have to get the recipes.

We were lucky enough to have some left over curry, jacket potatoes and salad to take home with us. We had a few mouthfuls in the car on the way home but were very full up and so didn't have any dinner.

We were still full up on Monday which was Mr VST's birthday. We had the day off work which meant a lie in and a late breakfast (11am). We ate the jackets, curry and most of the salad for lunch - at 3pm! We were planning on going out for dinner but didn't because we were too full up.



Mr VST was starting a new job on Tuesday and wanted to take in some birthday cake so I made carrot cake number two. I managed to take a photograph this time though. I made the icing with double the butter to make it thicker and therefore easier for Mr VST to transport. I also remembered to take a photo of the finished article this time!

Good Pizza Alternative

I made this easy, tasty pizza alternative this evening with salad and new potatoes this evening.

Vegetarian Birthday Barbecue

As I'm sure I've already said it is Mr VST's birthday a week on Monday and we were down in Cornwall this weekend for an early celebration as we are off to a wedding next weekend. We met up with our friends on the beach on Saturday for a barbecue.

We usually do the same old things on a barbecue but I decided as it was a birthday barbecue and I fancied something different I would have a go at some of the recipes I had found. I did the usual quorn burgers and some of the new Linda McCartney Italian style sausages.

I got together the ingredients for these portobello mushroom burgers too. I used my home made ciabatta as the bun, Mr VST cooked the mushrooms on the barbecue with some chunks of yellow pepper and some haloumi cheese rather than provolone. We put them all together with some pesto mayo and they were delicious if a bit messy to eat on the beach. The mushrooms cook really well on the barbecue and the combination of ingredients was mouthwatering. I will definitely be making them again. Unfortunately I don't have a photo, although I had every intention of getting the camera I didn't actually manage to. I think hunger, busyness and alcohol might have something to do with it!

Pesto Mayo

Inspired by another recipe from Ezra Pound Cake I made a huge batch of salad. I used the same dressing but a can of mixed beans instead of black beans and added some diced cucumber to the mix as well. I didn't have any left over cornbread but I did have some left over spelt bread in the freezer so decided to toast that to use for crutons instead of cornbread. It's a really easy, tasty salad. 

Mixed bean salad with spelt croutons

For dessert we had birthday cake which was carrot cake as Mr VST had requested. I will post separately about that.

Leek and Feta Frittata

An easy mid-week favourite tonight. The recipe is here, it's a lovely, easy vegetarian supper.

I Heart Leeks!

Served with salad leaves from the garden

Perfect Pizza

Mr VST had an interview for a promotion at work this week and he has therefore been very busy swotting up all week so I haven't seen very much of him. He said that he would treat us by taking us out for (his favourite) dustbin lid pizzas but I decided to treat him to some yummy home made pizzas instead.

A good test for my new olive wood rolling pin

This recipe is so easy and works every time. Mr VST added some mushrooms, sweetcorn and olives to the top of his. We had the first of the home grown salad leaves on the side. The pizzas were so big that the salads really were on the side, they had to have their own, separate plates!

Best thing about this recipe is that it makes four pizzas and there's only two of us which means there's more for tomorrow's lunch. 

Quorn Tortilla Stack with Potato Wedges and Salad

I love this easy tasty recipe. Its nice to do something different with quorn mince than a spag bol or cottage pie.  I thought I may have gone over the top with the spices today but all was well!

 

I accompanied the stack with some home made potato wedges. I made them smaller than usual and par boiled them so that they cooked quicker - it worked! 

Home Made Spinach Gnocchi with Tomato Sauce

I would never think of making my own pasta but I would also never think of buying gnocchi. The shop bought ones I have tried (and some at Carluccio's restaurant that Mr VST had one time) were like little stodgy, heavy balls of pasta and weren't very nice at all.

My Mum made these for us once when we went to visit and they were so good I had to get the recipe from her.
(serves 4)
Ingredients:
600g floury potatoes
350g spinach
150g plain flour
50g flour for dusting
1 egg yolk

1. Peel and boil the potatoes and boil for 20 minutes, drain very well, then mash.

2. Cook the spinach on a large pan over a medium heat, mixing regularly until wilted and soft. Drain well and squeeze all the excess water out (I used a potato masher and a colander to help with this!). Once drained finely chop the spinach.

3. Mix the mashed potatoes, spinach, flour and egg yolk together and season. This makes quite a goey dough.

4. Dust your hands and a board and take small nuggets of the dough roll into balls (about 2-3cms round).

5. Gently flatten the top with a fork (I'm not sure why this is but all gnocchi seem to have grooves on them!)
6. Heat a large pan of water to just boiling point and then reduce the water to simmering temperature. Add just enough gnocchi so they have room to move around and cook for two minutes or until they float to the top. Remove and drain well and then cook the next batch.

7. I then layered mine with a home made tomato sauce and a little grated cheese and popped the dish in the oven for about ten minutes and served them with salad.

They are little balls of light doughy heaven that melt in your mouth. When I started making them Mr VST was especially pleased, they are one of his favourites. I was telling him how long they take to make (which is probably 1 1/2 - 2 hours altogether) and he said that they were worth it. I told him that he could make them next time!