There are few nicer things than a lovely, hot vegetable bake on a rainy day. Especially when it is comfort food you’re craving but still want to have something healthy.
I had this lovely romanesco in the house and really wanted to make something nice with it, so I decided on a vegetable bake. Not least because that gave me the freedom to use up some other vegetables in dire need of being eaten.
For this bake, you can use whatever vegetables you have in the house, there’s no need for a regimented shopping list, but as a guide, this is what I used (serves 6 – generous portions):
1 head romanesco, washed and pulled into florets
2 large carrots, peeled and diced
800g potatoes, peeled and diced
1 can kidney beans, drained
2 stalks celery, washed and diced
3 spring onions, washed and cut into rings
350 ml cream (use a mix of milk and cream if you’re worried about fat!)
1 tsp mustard
grated nutmeg
1 tbsp dried parsley
100g grated cheese
salt/pepper
The little pot next to the beans is full of toasted quinoa. It’s nothing you need, but I like the crunch of it, added to the cheese on the top of the dish. So feel free to do that also! As you can see, I’ve chopped the vegetables quite small as to help them cook in the oven. The kidney beans were a last minute addition to add some extra protein.
After having prepared all the ingredients, I mixed them all up and filled them into a large oven proof dish. Once you’ve done that, in a large jug, whisk the cream (and milk, if you’re using it) together with the mustard, nutmeg, parsley, salt and pepper. Pour the mixture over the vegetables and make sure they’re all just about covered. Add a little more cream if they aren’t.
Sprinkle the cheese across the top, add a bit of toasted quinoa for crunch and off with the whole thing into the oven at 200C for 25-30 minutes. Eh voilà:
I did have a taste and a quick picture last night. However, after a big debacle of Cub 4 having turned the oven temperature down and me having fed the kids the Wholemeal Bread I had baked earlier in the day, we will be having it for dinner this evening instead.
It was delicious though! Notice the steam, hot and wonderful.
Don’t get me wrong: my children are the best thing in the world to me. When they’re up to mischief, more often than not, I’m laughing about it as much as they are. Take Cub 4, for example. His little big sister, Cub 3, came running into the kitchen the other night and shouted at me that Cub 4 is stuck. Of course I rescued him, but what kind of mother would I be had I not taken a picture of him first:
Fun as they are, boy did they drive me mad yesterday! Every single button they could, they pushed.
After the usual, and expected, Monday morning madness of trying to get the four of them up, washed, fed, and dressed, I thought that I’d get a little break while they’re all in school, preschool, childcare. Well, if by break I meant time to clean the house, put on a wash and do the dishes, then I got it.
The real trouble started when I picked up Cub 4. He didn’t want to go in the buggy. Not having had his full rain gear and it being a rather incessant soft day out there, I made him sit in it anyway, much to his annoyance. From there we went to pick up Cub 3, who cried all the way home as her legs were tired and I hadn’t brought the double buggy (less than 10 minutes walk, but she can make it seem hours!).
By the time I had to get them out again to pick up Cub 2 from school, I decided to drive and get a couple groceries while I was at it. At least cubs would stay dry and no more crying about walking – until, at the supermarket: my car wouldn’t start again!!!! Rather inconvenient that to say the least.
On the phone, sending a message to the husband about the misbehaving car, I try a sixth time, and voilà: the car started up. Typical. (Hubby is going to check it out and fix that little snag, hurrah!)
Thinking that my bad luck for the day was all used up, I started making some bread and while that was left to rise, I dove right into Mt Washmore.
Mt Washmore, you see, is higher than Mt Everest. Believe me when I say it is. I’ve never really managed to conquer it. I fondly remember the days before the cubs, single and more or less organised. I used to wash one dark and one white wash a week. Ah – memories! It took me a solid hour to fold all the washed and dried clothes, never mind putting them into the closets.
Cub 1 returned from school with one of her best friends, and the two of them had a great time. Add another friend and still, all was well. Add Cub 3, who shares the room with her big sister, to the mix: an eternity of screaming, shouting, missiles throwing later, we had tears and tantrums with me left wondering where their tiaras were.
Only three casualties though:
The clock: it fell off the wall (completely by itself, would you believe. No? Me neither…)
The ceramic horse: a bad decision to use that as a missile. It broke a leg, but the husband glued it. I was ready to throw it out. Good cop, bad cop. Guess I’m the bad one again. Sigh.
The beaded necklace: lovely clatter as it was torn apart by the two pulling on it, then blaming each other for breaking it.
Of course, after all that was resolved, and peace restored it still wasn’t the end of things. I’m not actually sure how much coffee I drank yesterday, but it was a LOT. You see, while holding the mug, I’ve got my hands full and can’t go strangle them. I hear that’s frowned upon anyway, so probably better I drink coffee!
I had finished the bread, and gone on to make dinner. You see, I had this gorgeous romanesco in the house still and needed to make something yummy with it. I love romanesco. So much nicer than just cauliflower. I think it’s the texture as well as the look and the slightly nutty flavour.
So I chopped and stirred and created and pre-heated the oven at 200C and then shoved the vegetable bake in. It takes around 25 minutes to cook in the oven.
When I checked it after around 20 minutes I was disappointed to see the veg wasn’t even nearly cooked through. Doubting myself, I resigned myself to having to wait. After a few more checks and at 45 minutes I realised why it wasn’t cooking: Cub 4 had taken to turning knobs and pushing buttons whenever he got his fingers on them. I found the oven at 110C. No wonder it wasn’t cooking!
What else was I to do but serve up the freshly baked bread sandwiches for dinner, accompanied with carrot sticks and a few crisps on the side (rare that I do that, but hey, it was that kinda day!).
On the plus side, today’s dinner’s already done and only needs re-heating!
Another rainy day, already having been to the shops, and realising I hadn’t nearly enough bread in the house. What else was I to do but to simply bake my own?
I threw a few things together willy-nilly and hoped it would work. By golly, it did! It’s one of the most delicious breads I’ve tasted in a long time. And healthy, too!
The treacle I used in this bread is made of 100% sugar beets and 25g of it contains 64% of your daily requirement for iron, 24% of magnesium, 23% potassium and 65% folic acid. Add to that the goodness of the seeds and you’re on to a winner!
Excuse the bad picture but my kitchen’s rather dark and the artificial light does it no justice!
To make this bread, you need:
400g wholemeal flour
100g chickpea flour
1 sachet dried yeast
1 tsp salt
2 tbsp sunflower seeds
2 tbsp pumpkin seeds
1/4 cup treacle (or molasses to some of you, but sugar beet one, not sugar cane!)
water
Method:
Mix the flours, salt, yeast and seeds together. Add the treacle and just enough water to make a pliable dough. Knead it through for a good 5 minutes.
Leave it to rise in a warm, draft-free place until it has risen to twice its size. My kitchen was rather cool, so it took nearly 1.5 hours to rise, but if you want to speed it up, leave it somewhere warm.
Once it’s risen, knock it back and knead it through one more time on a floured surface. Then form it into an even loaf and bake it in a pre-heated oven at 180C for about 40 minutes or until the bread sounds hollow when you gently knock on the bottom of it. That’s how you know your bread is done.
In order to get a lovely crust, leave a small oven proof dish full of water in the bottom of the oven while the bread bakes and brush it with water about half-way through.
Leave it to cool on a wire rack before cutting. That’s if you can wait that long. I’ve had my first slice as soon as it was cool enough to handle.
This is a rather firm bread, that is full of goodness and fills you up nicely.
All day Saturday was simply mad. I dared take three of the four cubs into one of the busiest shopping centres around, right smack bang in the middle of the day. Let’s just say, it wasn’t the best of ideas!? Apart from the fact that it was insanely crowded, hard to get through the shops with a double buggy and I’m not a shopper at the best of times… sentences such as, ‘Cub 2, stop rolling around and get off that shop floor NOW‘; or, ‘Cub 2, I swear if you hide in the middle of the clothes racks one more time I will leave you there‘; and indeed, ‘Cub 4, stop eating the clothes off the hangers!‘, were heard all day. Much to the amusement of other shoppers. I failed to see what was so funny about it. I hadn’t had nearly enough coffee for that trip.
But, much to my – and the cubs’ – amazement, we all survived that trip and the cubs have some much needed new clothes to show for it.
However, the trip took a lot longer than anticipated, so by the time we were home and all the cubs in bed, I was so wiped, I couldn’t do another trial run of the vegan, gluten free apple pie I was going to bake for Sunday’s apple pie contest.
Fast forward to Sunday morning:
The current husband took the four cubs out to the seafront where the school had a sponsored walk for all the kids to raise funds for new maths equipment. Mind, during the night I was convinced it wasn’t going to happen, as we’ve had a thunderstorm with downpours of epic proportions. Alas, the weather had changed and even the sun was out! Happy days! They were out in the fresh air and I had peace and quiet to bake my contest entries!
But of course, nothing’s ever straight forward when it comes to me. Be boring anyway, right? Right!?
Problem number 1: my last attempt at the gluten free, vegan pastry hadn’t really worked as it lost its form, and had a funny aftertaste when eaten by itself.
Problem number 2: I couldn’t decide which dish to bake. After all, I have a tried and tested Cinnamon Apple Recipe. Well, when I say I have one – I mean, I bought it. It’s the cookbook that has it, really. Brilliant book though ‘La Dolce Vegan!’ by Sarah Kramer. Look it up guys, it’s absolutely full to the brim with fabulous recipes and then some!
How did resolve the problems? Well…
In order to have some sort of chance, I decided to forego the experimental pastry and simply make the pastry that was on the recipe, which was neither vegan, nor gluten free: it was simply vegetarian. I could live with that though, time was of the essence after all: It was 11am and the entries had to be at the venue before 2pm. Really not the time for more experiments.
Result Number 1:
Sarah’s fabulous Vegan Cinnamon Apple Muffins
(I’m not sure on the copyright of the recipe – can you tell I’m new to this? – so I will possibly share this recipe at a later stage when I found out!)
I knew I had all the ingredients at hand. I had baked them several times before, and also knew they were quick and fool-proof.
Until I needed the egg replacer. My go-to egg replacer is ground flaxseed and water. I always have ground flaxseed in the house. Except Sunday. I still don’t know what happened to it, because I don’t remember finishing it!!!! No matter, there are other ways to replace an egg. I had bananas, but I didn’t want to put an overpowering banana taste into an apple-centered contest! Apple sauce then. Again, the cupboard came up emtpy!
Man, that clock ticked loudly in my ears!!!
Not one to give up easily, I quickly peeled and de-seeded one of the cooking apples and, with a touch of vanilla and water, made my own apple sauce which turned out delicious if I do say so myself!
The oven door wasn’t quite shut on the muffins when I immediately jumped to the apple pies. You see, it was an apple pie contest, but I couldn’t bring myself to just make a traditional apple pie. I wanted to stand out of the crowd and have people go, ‘Oh wow, look at that!‘
And what did I do? I did what every person would do these days: I asked Google to give me ideas. And boy did I find one, right here: Apple Pie (in the apple) <- and hers look truly stunning, pity I don’t have such pretty flower cutters!
Which brings us to result 2:
Apple Pie (in the apple)
I used the recipe given on her blog for her ‘sweet pie dough’ exactly as described (well, besides the fact that I had no baking powder left! Honestly, no idea what is going on with me! So I substituted it with 1/2 and 1/2 of Cream of Tartar and Bicarbonate of Soda!):
Ingredients for the pie crust:
1/2 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup corn starch
1tbsp sugar
100g butter, cold
1 egg
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp baking powder
Put all ingredients in the jar of a food processor and mix only until it forms a ball. If necessary, add a few drops of cold water. Don’t over mix. If you want do do it manually, mix the dry ingredients in a bowl. Add the butter and rub the mixture with your hands until you have a crumbled texture. Add the egg and mix until it comes together into a ball. If necessary, add a few drops of water. Do not over mix.
(This recipe does indeed make enough for 8 lids on small apples, or 5 lids on large apples. I kept the remaining pastry refrigerated, wrapped in cling film, to do mini quiches for school lunches!)
The apples themselves, however I changed a bit to suit my own tastes. Here’s what it looked like in my kitchen:
INGREDIENTS for filling:
insides of two Cooking Apples
1 tablespoon raisins
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon vanilla sugar
1/2ish teaspoon carob syrup (or treacle!)
I cut a thin lid off two big cooking apples and used a spoon to take the flesh and core out, careful not to get break the sides. I then discarded the core, chopped the apple flesh into small chunks and mixed those with a tablespoon of raisins. I then added a teaspoon each of cinnamon and vanilla sugar and just enough carob syrup to coat the lot before spooning it back into the apples.
Pastry lid on top and off into the oven! I baked the apples at 170C (fan assisted oven) for 25-ish minutes. The recipe says 40 minutes but by that time, my apples would’ve fallen apart. I needed them to keep their shape and for my apples, that time was just right, the pastry was just right and all looked well.
In other words, keep an eye on your apples! If the pastry looks done, poke your apples carefully to see if they’re soft to avoid overcooking them.
And here they are, my creations, at their destination: The Happy Pear!
The creations being judged… the crowds had gathered! And take note of the most rare phenomenon: sunshine 🙂 Who’d have thunk it after the Monsoon the night before!
To wrap it all up – I didn’t win. Quite happy with the judges’ comments though, they were all-round happy with the baked apples and one told me afterwards that he’s not quite sure why I hadn’t won. Heh. They were all fantastic though, I didn’t envy them their job to chose winners at all.
Best part of it? Besides the fun to enter and having a good time there, we were let loose on the creations after judging and got to taste them all. It was the most delicious Sunday in a long time. I’ll be back next year – and hopefully with a perfect vegan, gluten free pastry!
Apt, don’t ya think? Another day for the ducks out there… but then, the Irish must’ve lied an awful lot when they were 17. Heh.
Not a bad day at all otherwise today – at least so it seemed. Until, every time I turned around, the little monsters I’m raising got into another thing they weren’t allowed. Like the time I was bursting for the loo and dared to go:
Tiniest man decided he wanted milk. He opened the fridge and brought a glass he had liberated from the clean dishwasher. At least that’s what I’m thinking as no other glasses were within his reach. No matter though, as I only found him when he stood in the middle of the glass shards, shouting, “Oh no! Mami! Glass broken!”
Shouldn’t have gone to the toilet. *Note to self: Invest in some adult nappies…*
Or the time I went upstairs to get the tiny man out of the bathroom, where he happily played with the running water at the sink – thankfully not overflowing it this time! Came back down within 2 minutes. Did you know that 2 minutes are enough for a 3 and a 5 year old to completely and utterly cover the living room floor with toys? Apparently, she wanted his rocket ship. He didn’t want to give it to her and somehow that meant that all other toys were used as missiles.
Have I mentioned that i had banned all toys to their rooms? Mustn’t have paid enough attention at school during Physics. Only after having children have I realised that living rooms are indeed magnetic. At least where it comes to toys. Those toys might not stick to the fridge, but by golly do they stick to the living room!
And to the bottom of my feet… well, they didn’t stick to them, per se. More into them. Lego, how I loath thee!
At some point during the day between two school runs, I did have a lovely half an hour at a friend’s house, who supplied me with some wonderful chickpea flour – and a delicious coffee before I headed off into the day again.
That chickpea flour was going to be one of the ingredients in my trial for Sunday. You see, I decided to give an Apple Pie contest a go. It’s this Sunday. But, I want to make it gluten free and vegan. Better try it out – and good thing I did!
The pastry I made – didn’t really work the way it was supposed to. Darn tasty nonetheless – besides the funky aftertaste when eaten by itself. Ahem.
Here’s a sneak peek… full details of the final dish, and the recipe, will be revealed on Sunday night 😉 Hopefully, it won’t look like some sort of Halloween Ghost in food form then!
I have to say, when it came out of the oven, it smelled divine! It didn’t look the part, but hey, I was willing to follow my nose and ignore my eyes. I carefully poked it with a fork, before it even cooled a little bit, and took a bite. Two words:
FOOD PORN
It was delicious!!!! So delicious, I immediately called the cubs to try and rejoice in my creation. First cub up was the 5 year old boy cub. Who immediately pulled a face and wildly gestured for a tissue to spit out the offending food. He then proceeded to claw at his tongue and asked for a drink to get rid of the taste.
Next cub up was his little sister. Same reaction.
Tiniest cub made it a hat trick.
Everyone’s a critic!!
Then, the 9 year old girl cub to the rescue – she took one bite and immediately declared it DELICIOUS and wanted more. So I shared the rest with her.
Is it wrong to have favourites…? *innocent whistling*
There’s nothing more wholesome and hugging in the autumn or winter than a nice hot bowl of soup.
And what’s more, with Halloween only just around the corner, there are pumpkins galore to be found in the shops. I like making this soup with a butternut squash, but there’s absolutely no problem to make this with any other pumpkin. So why not use the pumpkin flesh you take out of your Jack-o-Lantern you carve for Halloween?
This soup doesn’t call for many ingredients at all.
When it is finished, it will be pureed, which means there’s no need to cut everything meticulously into tiny pieces. Saving you time and effort!
You see the big bowl – it’s full of chunky butternut and sweet potato pieces. And see what snuck in on the bottom left? A piece of fresh ginger. It’s actually a lovely addition at this time of year as it gives an extra little warming sensation to the soup. It’s like the extra squish of a lovely hug, in a bowl.
And there’s my favourite herb trio: Thyme, Rosemary & Majoram. Those three amigos really work well together and make this soup just this little bit more delicious! As a side note: did you know Thyme is incredibly rich in Vitamin K and Iron?
It only takes 15-20 minutes simmering on low heat to be ready for blitzing with a handheld wand!
And there it is!!! All its goodness in a bowl. The recipe makes enough for 6 very generous helpings. I usually serve this with soda bread or brown bread (GF bread if you prefer that!) with either an olive spread or hummus.
Finally, it’s Wine o’clock! And the fire’s blazing to make it toasty warm!
It’s been one of those days. You know the ones. Where you feel like you’re in a Stephen King novel: you get up and the birds are chirpy and all seems fine in your world, but by lunchtime you feel the hair in the back of your neck stand to attention and come evening you wonder how on Earth you survived.
Well, let’s start this morning: All four cubs got up. All four cubs got dressed (well, okay, I dressed the 2-year-old), they all had breakfast, brushed their teeth and got to school on time. A miracle in itself, really.
Yes, it rained like it was trying to prove a point (see my earlier post on puddle jumping) and yes, I got soaked to the bones bringing my cubs to school and into crèche. But then I got a nice hot cup of tea while getting some time to update here and do some housework. See, all was good in my world.
Come lunchtime, I had picked up the two small ones and was now going to pick up the 5-year old from school. By car (which is something I rarely do, only living a few minutes’ walk away from the school!), and that’s where the trouble started.
It was also the only thing that started, because the car didn’t. And, of course my husband had the second car with him at work. So, conscious that I was now late for the school run, I quickly unbuckled my two and re-buckled the tiniest one into his stroller. Which he hates, but he had to live with that, and his little big sister got to complain about her tired legs all the way.
Frazzled and late, I finally got to school to pick up the big boy, who I now had to break it to that the promised trip to the toy shop to spend his birthday money was cancelled due to the car (at least his teacher complimented me on his school lunch – *proud moment* – leftover Quiche from last night).
Cue 3 unhappy kids and that 10-minute walk home felt a LOT longer. Not only that, but the next problem I had was that I had banked on that toy shop run, because I needed to buy nappies (diapers to some of you) and above all, tomorrow morning I need to get to work (I do irregular work as a voice over) and that date couldn’t be moved. I was in a right dilemma!
However… things then started to look up, just for a tiny bit:
My husband, who wasn’t even supposed to come home today as he was meeting friends after work, sent me a message saying ‘Driving home now‘ – he left work early. He’s a superhero!!! Not only did he drive home and leave me the second car, he also fixed the main car and even filled it up! Hurrah!
The roller-coaster was going up. I should’ve known that it wasn’t going to last.
So, after dropping the husband to the train so he could get back to work, we went to The Toy Shop after all.
Only in a toy shop can even the happiest parents lose their will to live. I could see it on other parents’ faces and they could see it in mine. After the fifteenth time (yes, I counted!) of my 3-year-old trying to see if something 60+ Euro would fit into her 10 Euro budget (all the while I was trying to stop the little man from pulling a guitar off a shelf!) I had a wee second of ‘I’m either going to laugh out loud or strangle her‘. The latter is at least frowned upon, so I decided to laugh; which resulted in a very sympathetic mum turning to me and saying, ‘I know, I’m right there with you.‘
Half and hour and two toys bought later, it appeared to all go well again – until: ‘Mum, why are we home? I thought you needed to buy nappies?‘
I wanted to bite the steering wheel at that point.
Instead, I pulled out of the drive again to get the groceries needed. Finally, an hour later than intended, the dinner was cooking. Just as I was about to drain the pasta, the 3-year old comes into the kitchen to inform me that her little brother had taken his vest off. Okay, let him be cold. I continued to drain the pasta, add the pesto and stir through the peas I had steamed over the pot. While I put the food on the plates, she came in again, saying that he’s undressed himself.
I should have known then. I think I did know then.
I still wish I could bleach my brain.
I walked into the living room to find the tiniest boy had not only taken his arms out of his vest and pushed it off his shoulders; he had pushed it past his hips, and also pushed down his trousers and his nappy.
Which was open and hanging off him, full to the brim.
I’ve recently tried out Michelle’s wonderful Chickpea Nuggets. They’re amazingly easy to make and taste just divine.
All four cubs agreed and even the husband enjoyed them! Of course, that was before I started this blog and so I didn’t take my own photos of them. But a few things I can say about this dish:
Most of the ingredients you might already have in your cupboard – which is a great thing about this recipe. And if you’re missing something, it’s easy to substitute to suit your own taste!
I made the nuggets with a whole can of chickpeas and simply increased everything else a little bit also. And that made 16 small nuggets – enough for the six of us for dinner (I served them with a potato and broccoli mash, and baked beans as cubs requested those)
Here’s one of Michelle’s pics of her creation.
Doesn’t your mouth water just looking at those? Mine sure did and when I ate these, there certainly was no disappointment at all. Just great taste!
Click CHICKPEA NUGGETS to get to her recipe! And please take a look around her site, Peachy Palate if you haven’t already!
This morning, while walking my kids to school, I think I heard even the ducks complain about the weather.
It’s certainly a far cry from the usual ‘soft day’ (light, gentle, misty rain – for those not familiar with the Irish weather!). In actual fact, I am tempted to just put some shampoo into my hair when picking them back up – the rain out there has a higher pressure than my poor shower!
Certainly a great day for putting the fire on later, all snuggled up on the couch and enjoying a nice cupán tae (as a cup of tea is known here), or, as I’ve amusingly seen on an Irish Translations Forum, ‘I love you’ in Irish! True to an extent, as a cupán tae really does do the world of good and is the No. 1 go to remedy for anything that might ail ya.
But what does rainy weather have to do with insanity or good parenting? A lot. Just think about this:
As an adult, going out by yourself and simply jumping around in puddles – well, let’s face it, it might be the application for your one-way ticket into the looney bin.
However, having children to go out and jump in those puddles with – that’s good parenting 😀
So, the next time it is lashing (raining heavily) your end of the world, put on your wellies, rain coats and rain trousers and just go for it. Your kids will thank you.
And afterwards, warm up by the fire if you have one, and even if you don’t: a nice hot chocolate for the kids and a lovely cupán tae (possibly with a bit o’ whiskey and honey – for medicinal purposes you see) for the adults.
Don’t forget to look out for that pot o’ gold at the end of the rainbow.
I shall leave you with a typical picture – taken at the seafront close to where I live: Note the apocalyptic dark sky with the beautiful rainbow.
It was seconds before the rain caught up with us and yes, we stood in beautiful sunshine. Who needs only one season per day, eh?
Today I am going to write a bit about my weekly menu planning.
There are six people in our household and that inevitably also means that there are several different ideas of what a nice dinner looks like. It isn’t easy to get them all to agree on food you’re making, but it is not impossible. What I am writing now, is what works for my family. It might not suit yours perfectly, but it might give you ideas on how to tackle the daily fight of ‘What’s for dinner’.
Every weekend, I sit down and write the menu for the week ahead. Not every meal, but the two main ones: school lunches and family dinners. This helps me keep the food costs down as I shop for the meals I am going to make and rarely go outside those boundaries; and, almost more importantly, it keeps the fights over what food it is at a minimum. Kids see what’s on the menu and the board it is written on doesn’t allow them to argue back. It’s written down and rarely gets changed.
Why don’t I plan for breakfasts? Because that is a staple in our house that doesn’t change much. Breakfast is a very important part of the day. I make sure my children have a good breakfast before they head off to school; it is important for their concentration and all-round wellbeing.
However, to keep it simple and make sure they eat healthy, I have one simple rule: During the week, there is only one choice. And that is to either eat your porridge, or eat your wheat biscuits (We favour the cheaper Aldi brand) – both these breakfasts fill them up well and give them a power start to the day. On Fridays, I let them have a teaspoon of chocolate spread in their porridge or a squeeze of honey over their wheat biscuits. Friday is our treat day.
You know best the likes and dislikes of your family when it comes to food. For example, I know my 3-year-old would be perfectly happy to eat pasta with pesto every single day of the week. As tasty as that is, it isn’t something I’m willing to entertain. I vary our dinners as much as possible by keeping the costs down by using similar ingredients.
This is a sample dinner menu for our week – recipes for all these will be posted over the coming days:
Beanburgers with potato & carrot mash
Vegetable Soup with brown bread
Pizza
Vegetable Rice with naan bread
Maccaroni Cheese
Chickpea “Chicken” Nuggets with Wedges and corn on the cob
Lentil Stew
As different as the dinners are – shopping wise, they are quite similar. Once you have your freezer stocked with petit pois, sweetcorn, corn on cob – you’re half-way there. This sample menu – which is a typical one for us – uses these fresh, raw vegetables/pulses:
There are carrots in 4 of the dinners. Potatoes in 3. Butternut and sweet potato in 2 of them. You see where this is going – but that’s not all. I also sync the school lunches with the dinners. The night I make pizza: I make extra dough to make mini calzones for their school lunch the next day. Potato and carrot mash left over? I add an egg, a few frozen peas and some cheese to make a dough and bake them into potato cakes for their school lunch next day. It’s a welcome change from the old cheese sandwich.
A little imagination goes a long way to keeping lunches different, healthy and tasty – and your wallet a bit fuller by the end of it! 😀
I’m very aware how long this post already is, so I will leave it at this until the next post of school lunch ideas and will report back when the recipes are up for each dinner listed!
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