Euro 2016 Food Challenge: Turkey: Tabbouleh

I love tabbouleh. It's really simple and quick to make, and it tastes so lovely and fresh. I first ate it when I went to Syria in 2004 with my friend Hala, so it also brings back memories for me of all amazing food I had over there, not to mention all the wonderful people I met! I've loved Middle Eastern food ever since, and this is no exception.

There are literally hundreds of variations of this recipe, but this is my SW friendly version.

Ingredients 

100g bulgar wheat

3-4 fresh tomatoes

3-4 Spring onions

A quarter of a cucumber

A large bunch of parsley

A small bunch of mint

Juice of half a lemon

Put the bulgar wheat in a bowl and pour over enough boiling water to just cover it. Chop the tomatoes finely, and put these on top of the bulgar wheat so the juices soak in. Set aside for 30 minutes.

Finely slice the Spring onions. Finely chop the cucumber and herbs. 

When the bulgar wheat is ready, fluff the grains up with a fork, and stir through the chopped ingredients and the lemon juice. Season with salt to taste.

Serve on a bed of lettuce leaves.  We had ours with roast chicken, and it was lovely.

 

Euro 2016 Food Challenge: Spain: Lamb Albondigas and Patatas Bravas

I used a recipe on the BBC website as the basis for this, but I've made it syn-free and I've baked everything to make it a bit more low maintenance (running around after a three-year-old = much easier to prepare stuff and bung in the oven than watch the hob!)

Ingredients

Meatballs:
500g lean lamb mince
2 garlic cloves
1 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp ground coriander
1 tsp hot paprika
2 tbsp. chopped fresh herbs (the original recipe says parsley, I used oregano and mint)
1 egg
salt and pepper
Frylight

Sauce:
1 onion
1 carrot
1 stick of celery
3 garlic cloves
1 tin of chopped tomatoes
1 tbsp. tomato puree
0.5 tsp crushed chillies.
1 tsp sweetener

Patatas:
3/4 large potatoes
Frylight
Season-all seasoning

Preheat the oven to 200C.

Make the sauce.  Finely chop the onion, carrot, celery and garlic.  Spray a frying pan with Frylight and sauté the veg until softened.  Add the tomatoes, tomato puree crushed chillies and sweetener.  Leave the sauce to simmer while you make the meatballs.

In a large bowl, combine the meatball ingredients together with your hands.  Divide into 16 meatballs and place in a casserole dish. 

Pour the tomato sauce over the meatballs and cover the dish with foil.  Place in the oven to bake for about 1 hour.

Chop your potatoes into cubes and par-boil for 3 minutes.  Drain.  Spray a roasting tin with Frylight and tip the potatoes in.  Spray with a bit more frylight and sprinkle with season-all seasoning.  Put in the oven for the last 40 minutes of cooking, turning them once or twice.  Take the foil off the meatballs for the last 15 minutes of cooking.

Euro 2016 Food Challenge: Poland: Golabki

Big thanks to my gorgeous Polish friends for help with this one - all the Polish recipes I found in researching this looked lovely, but heavily based in pastry and other naughty things!  So they sent me a couple of ideas and I ended up making this. I used this recipe as a basis, but changed the sauce to use free foods instead.  Very scrummy it was too.  A bit of effort in the making, but incredibly filling and very tasty.

I served ours with SW roasted new potatoes.

Ingredients

1 large cabbage, cored

1 large onion, chopped

500g lean beef mince

250g lean pork mince

1.5 cups cooked brown rice

1 garlic clove, finely chopped

1 tsp salt

0.5 tsp black pepper

800g passata

Half a tube of tomato puree

2 tsp sweetener

2 tsp Worcestershire sauce

Put the cabbage head into a large pan of salted boiling water.  Cook until the cabbage leaves are softened enough to remove from the head (about 3 minutes).  Remove from the pot and let the cabbage sit until it's cool enough to handle.

Separate off the cabbage leaves, you will need about 16-18.  Cut out any tough centre ribs.  Set the whole leaves aside.  Chop the rest of the cabbage and scatter it in the bottom of a casserole dish.

Cook the onion in frylight until softened.  When cooled, mix the onion with the mince, rice, garlic, salt and pepper. 

Preheat the oven to 180C.

Take a small handful of the stuffing mixture, place in the centre of a cabbage leaf and wrap the leaf around it, tucking in the sides and then laying in the casserole dish.  Repeat until all the mix and leaves are used up.

Mix the passata, tomato puree, sweetener and Worcestershire sauce.  Pour over the top of the cabbage rolls and cover the dish with foil.

Bake in the oven for about an hour, until the cabbage is tender and the meat is cooked through.

Euro 2016 Food Challenge: Germany: Frikadellen

As written in one recipe I read, "the original hamburger". Another variation on a meatball theme, but why change a winning formula.

The recipes I looked at all required breadcrumbs, but I had some cooked rice leftover so thought I'd try that instead.  Worked a treat.

Ingredients

350g lean minced pork

350g lean minced beef

1 cup of cooked brown rice

1 onion, finely chopped / grated

A handful of chopped parsley

1 tsp smoked paprika

1 egg

Plenty of salt and pepper

In a large bowl, mix all the ingredients together with your hands.  Take handfuls of the mixture and form into small hamburger like patties.  Spray a large frying pan with Frylight and fry the Frikadellen, about 5 minutes each side, until cooked through.

Serve with potato salad and some veggies / a garden salad.

Euro 2016 Food Challenge: Switzerland: Rösti

This recipe was borrowed extensively from the oven-baked rosti cake recipe on the BBC Good Food site.

Very tasty, but if I did it again I'd probably use a bigger dish, to increase the surface area / crispyness.  Proper comfort food, pair it with meat of your choice and a big heap of veggies to keep with the food optimising...

Ingredients

1.5 kg Maris Piper potatoes, peeled

6 bacon medallions / equivalent fat-trimmed bacon

1 onion

Frylight

Heat oven to 190C / 170C fan / GM5.

Chop the bacon into short strips and dry fry until cooked through.

Boil the potatoes for 5 minutes, drain and plunge into cold water.

When they are cool enough to handle, pat the potatoes dry and grate into a large bowl.  Spray each layer with Frylight as you go, to stop the potato sticking together too much (the original recipe uses oil for this purpose - my mixture was quite sticky so I also used my hands to separate it out as much as possible). 

Peel and grate the onion (or cheat and blitz in the food processor like I did!).  Add this to the potato with the cooked bacon and use your hands to gently mix it all together.

Put a large baking tray in the oven for 5 minutes to warm through. 

Spray your chosen cooking dish liberally with frylight.  I used my silicon cake tin, which is great for not sticking.  If you're worried about the mixture sticking to your dish, line it with greaseproof paper first.

Scatter the potato in your cooking dish, being careful not to pack it down.  Spray the top with Frylight.  Place on the hot baking tray and bake in the oven for 1 hour 20 minutes, until the potatoes are cooked through and crisp on the top.

Euro 2016 Food Challenge: France: Summery Pistou Soup

Having holidayed, studied and lived in France at various points in my life, I'm no stranger to French cuisine, so for the Challenge I wanted to do a dish I've never tried before. So I found this. A summery, minestrone type soup characterised by its Pistou sauce - basically a French pesto.  Intensely garlicky, but simple, fresh, healthy, and very tasty.

Ingredients 

2 leeks

1 courgette

3 tomatoes 

100g green beans

1 can cannellini / haricot beans, drained and rinsed

2 pints vegetable / chicken stock

Frylight

Basil

Garlic

Olive oil

Chop all the veg.  Spray a stockpot with Frylight and fry the leeks until wilted. Add the rest of the veg and the beans and fry for another minute. Add the stock and cook for about 20 minutes.

Now make the Pistou sauce.  Chop a handful of basil. Peel 1-2 garlic cloves, chop roughly, then sprinkle over some rock salt and grind the garlic to a paste with the back of your knife. Stir through the basil and add enough olive oil to bring it together as a sauce (synned as necessary - I used 1 tbsp).

Serve the soup with a spoon of the Pistou sauce on top.

Euro 2016 Food Challenge: Ukraine: Borscht

This could probably count for a few countries, but my recipe book says it's Ukrainian so I'll go with that.

This recipe is incredibly easy, and makes loads so you can freeze some for another day.  The original recipe used raw beetroot, but I'm lazy so use pre-cooked!

Ingredients
1 large onion
3 fat garlic cloves
3 large carrots
1stick of celery
600g cooked beetroot (2 Asda packs = 10 beets)
A big squirt of tomato puree
1 chicken stockpot
2 tsp caraway seeds
1 tsp paprika
2 pints boiling water

Peel the onion, carrots and garlic.  Finely chop all the veg (or blitz in a food processor).  Put in a large stock pot with the rest of the ingredients.  Bring to the boil and simmer gently for 45-60 minutes.

Serve as it is if you want to leave it chunky, or blend for a smoother texture. Season to taste. Serve with a dollop of soured cream if you have syns to spare.

Euro 2016 Food Challenge: Portugal: Caldo Verde

Caldo Verde, a.k.a. Portuguese Green Soup.  This is the only Portuguese recipe I know, but it's one of my favourites, and as chorizo is so high in syns I thought I'd have a bash at a syn-free version. 

I first saw this on one of the Hairy Bikers' programmes, and I've cooked their recipe so many times I know it off by heart:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/caldoverdeportuguese_73565

In my slimmed-down version, I've swapped the chorizo for gammon and smoked paprika, and used a mix of swede and potato to up the speed food content. 

Ingredients

Frylight

2 large onions, peeled and sliced

4 garlic cloves, sliced

1 large potato, peeled and diced

300g diced swede

250g lean smoked gammon / bacon, cubed

1 tsp sweet smoked paprika

1 tsp hot smoked paprika

2 pints chicken or vegetable stock

2 bay leaves

A large bunch of spring greens, finely shredded

Spray a large stock pot with Frylight and sweat the onion over a low heat until translucent.  Add the garlic and gammon, and fry for another couple of minutes before adding the potato and swede.

Add the paprika and stir well to combine. 

Fry for a couple more minutes then add the stock and bay leaves. Simmer over a lowish heat until the potato and swede are cooked.

Use a potato masher to mash the potato and swede into the soup.

Put the greens into a pan, pour over boiling water and leave to stand for a minute.

Drain the greens and add to the soup one spoon at a time until you get the consistency you like (if you want a heavy soup add more, for a lighter soup add less).

Season and serve.

Carrot, Coriander, Quinoa and Ginger Soup

Another recipe adapted from the Best of Quinoa book. I cooked this up for my parents at lunchtime, and they loved it.

1 onion

4 cloves garlic

5 cm fresh ginger root

2 tsp ground coriander 

1kg carrots

3 pints hot vegetable or chicken stock

80g quinoa

0.5 pints hot water

1 handful coriander leaves

Peel and slice the onion, garlic and ginger (quick tip: the easiest way to peel ginger is by scraping the skin off with the back of a teaspoon).

Spray a large stockpot with Frylight. Fry the onion, garlic and ginger on a low heat, until the onion has softened.

Peel and roughly chop the carrots. Add to the pot with the ground coriander and fry for a further 30 seconds before adding the stock.

Bring to the boil and simmer for 40-50 minutes. 

Blend the soup.  Return to the pan and add the quinoa and hot water.  Simmer for another 10 minutes.  

Chop the coriander leaves and stir them through the finished soup. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Herby Hummous

We've got a glut of oregano in the garden, so I thought I'd try it in a bit of SW hummus. It's good, if you like stuff herby! Quite an earthy taste, and needs a good bit of salt and pepper to bring the flavour out. It's a winner for me though. Maybe try mixing it up with different herbs if you haven't got oregano - I reckon thyme or coriander would work a treat.

1 tin of chick peas

1 garlic clove

A small handful of oregano

Fat free plain yoghurt

Salt, pepper and lemon juice, to taste

Chuck the chick peas into a blender or food processor with the oregano. 

Make the garlic into a paste - this might seem a bit faffy, but it softens the taste and makes it blend into the mix better, so I think it's worth it. Chop finely, sprinkle over some salt and use the back of a knife to grind it into a paste (before and after pics below!)

Add the garlic paste to the chick peas and herbs, and start blending. 

When the mix is fairly well chopped, add some lemon juice and a dollop of yoghurt (technical term) and continue blending until it comes together as a rough paste, adding more yoghurt if it needs it.

Add more lemon juice if it needs it, plus plenty of salt and pepper, to taste.

Serve with a big bowl of pepper, carrot and celery crudités.

My best slimmed down tzatziki

Tzatziki is one of my all time favourite things, and thankfully the recipe stored in my head was easily adapted to be syn-free. Here it is.

500ml fat free yoghurt (Total is worth the extra spend, it's twice as nice as own brand)

1 cucumber, peeled and grated

3-4 spring onions, finely sliced

2-3 garlic cloves, crushed

A handful of mint, chopped

Lemon juice, to taste

Salt and pepper, to taste

Mix it all together.  Enjoy.

Quinoa Stuffed Peppers

I made these yesterday for a dinner party and they were delicious. I'm a bit quinoa obsessed at the moment, and this recipe is based heavily on one in the "Best of Quinoa" booked I borrowed from the library last week. Seriously good, they'd make a great accompaniment for a barbecue.

(We also tried the "Turkey Sausages" from the quinoa book, but they weren't nearly as successful - although I reckon they could have potential with a bit of spicing up... Will post a recipe if I get round to trying them again.)

Quinoa Stuffed Peppers

- 90g quinoa, rinsed and drained

- 240ml cold water

- 2 large red peppers, halved and seeded but with the stalks left on

- 250g cherry tomatoes, halved

- 2 garlic cloves, crushed

- A handful of basil, chopped

- 2 tbsp capers

- 2 tbsp balsamic vinegar

Preheat the oven to 180C.

Put the quinoa and water in a small saucepan and bring to the boil.  Cover and simmer for 10 mins until the water is absorbed (keep an eye on it towards the end so it doesn't burn in).

Set the quinoa aside to cool completely.  Put the tomatoes, garlic, basil, capers and balsamic vinegar in a bowl.  Mix well.  Then mix in the quinoa when it has cooled.

Spray a baking tray with Frylight. Put the prepared peppers in the tray, cut sides up.  If they don't sit straight, cut a fine slice off the bottom of the pepper, being careful not to cut through.

Stuff the peppers with the quinoa mix, spray a bit more Frylight on top, and bake for 20-30 minutes until the peppers are tender.

Roasted Squash and Sage Soup

I confess this is my other half's concoction... Super easy and super tasty, the instructions are a bit approximate though (that's how we cook in our house).  The amount of stock will depend on the size of the squash and how thick you like it. I'd start with a pint and add more if you need it.

• 1 Squash (any variety), peeled and in thick slices / chunks

• 1-2 Red Onions, peeled and roughly chopped 

• 1-2 Carrots, peeled and roughly chopped 

• Garlic Cloves, peeled

• A handful of sage leaves 

• Frylight 

• Chicken Stock

1. Toss the veg and sage together with some Frylight and roast in the oven until the veg is cooked (200C, keep checking on it until it's soft).

2. Mix with chicken stock

3. Blend

4. Heat through and serve

Syn-free Gravy!

I'm a certified gravy addict, so rationing it was pretty unthinkable to me.  I was so excited to perfect a Slimming World syn-free gravy, I thought it rude not to share.

• 2 onions, sliced
• A handful of chopped celery
• 2 garlic cloves, peeled but left whole
• Frylight
• Chicken stock

1. Preheat oven to 200C  / 180C fan.

2. Place the veg on a baking tray, spray with Frylight, and roast in the oven for about 15-20 minutes, until the onions are softened and crisping up around the edges.

3. Place the roasted veg in a pan with about some chicken stock (I use a chicken stock pot made up with about a pint of hot water).  If you are boiling any potatoes / other veg for your meal, reserve the water when you drain them and make the stock up with this - it'll add to the flavour.

4.  Bring to the boil and simmer for about 20 minutes. 

5.  Now put the gravy in a blender, and blend until smooth.

6.  Put the blended gravy back in the pan,  back on the heat, and simmer to reduce it to your preferred thickness.  

7.  Check the flavour and add seasoning to taste (salt and pepper - or another stock cube if you think it needs it).

Dry-Roasted Broad Beans

I joined Slimming World after Christmas (finally accepting that it's time to lose the baby weight, now that said baby has started school...)

So far so good, turns out we ate pretty healthily already, just a bit heavy handed with the olive oil and butter... I am now best friends with Frylight and the pounds are dropping off.

One thing I've really missed so far is crisps (which you can still have on SW, but I'd rather save my syns for booze...) so I've been on a mission to find a "free" crunchy snack to cure my munchy cravings of an evening. 

After a number of mediocre attempts, and some almost broken fillings, today I think I've cracked it (the recipe, not my teeth). Inspired by the classic Spanish snack of Habas Fritas, here is my syn free version. These are dry roasted flavour, using "Season-All" seasoning. Just add different spices to change the flavour.

After trying out a number of different recipes online, I found this one to be the best - http://www.thedailyspud.com/2009/03/04/posh-spicy-beans/

- if you follow the link, there are a few flavour variations too. The recipe below is heavily based on this, but made SW friendly with a liberal spraying of Frylight.

The recipe requires dried split Fava beans - I ordered mine online from http://hodmedods.co.uk/ - 

You can do it with normal broad beans, but they are far better made with the dried version. If you can't get hold of any, buy tinned broad beans, drain and pop the beans out of their shells. No need to soak or pre-cook then, just spray, spice and bung in the oven.

These do come with a bit of a health warning - they are VERY moreish, so if you are on SW be careful not to overeat on them!  Some SW purists might say it's cheating, but I think it's worth it to keep me off the crisps!

Recipe: Low Fat Dry Roasted Broad Beans

125g dried split broad beans

Frylight (I use the Olive Oil one)

2-3 tsp "Season-All" seasoning

1. Soak the beans in plenty of water overnight.

2.  Drain the beans, rinse well, and put in a pan with about a pint of fresh water.  Bring to the boil and simmer over a medium heat for about 7 minutes. The beans should be softened but not mushy.  Drain, and set aside to cool a little.

 (If you are using tinned beans, you come in here...)

3.  Preheat oven to 180C

4.  Spread the beans on a baking tray in a single layer. Use two trays if necessary - if they're too crowded they won't crisp up properly. Spray liberally with Frylight and sprinkle with the seasoning, then toss it all together in the tray to ensure an even coating.

5. Bake for about 30 minutes, until the beans are golden and crisping up.

6. Leave the beans in the trays to cool (I left them in the oven with just the fan on, this seems to dry them out a bit more and makes them extra crispy)

Cajun Spiced Wedges (or "pimped up" SW chips)

Adapted from a recipe in the Dorling Kindersley "Eat More Vegetables" book.  These are lush.

4 potatoes

1 lemon

1 bulb of garlic

3 red onions

1-2 tbsp Cajun spice mix

Frylight

Cut each potato into 8 wedges, leaving the skin on.

Cut the lemon and red onions into wedges and separate the garlic cloves, discarding the outer papery skins but leaving the cloves unpeeled.

Parboil the potato wedges for 3 mins. Drain and leave to one side while they steam dry. 

Spray a roasting tray with Frylight. Tip in all the ingredients and toss them together.  Spray with a bit more Frylight and roast at 200C for 30-40 mins, turning occasionally.

I served mine with the pulled pork recipe from SW mag May/June 2016, and the hot and spicy coleslaw from the SW website. Delish!