Recipes

Ingredients:

300g oats

100g sliced almonds

25g walnuts, coarsely chopped

6 tablespoons vegetable oil

6 tablespoons maple syrup

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

50g dried cranberries

50g other dried fruit of choice, finely chopped

Preheat oven to 180 with rack in the middle.

Oil a 4-sided sheet pan or line with parchment paper.

Stir together oats, almonds, and walnuts in a large bowl.

Heat oil, maple syrup, cinnamon, and 1/2 teaspoon salt in a small saucepan over low heat until heated through. Stir into oat mixture.

Spread evenly in sheet pan and bake, stirring once, until golden, 20 to 25 minutes.

Cool granola completely in pan (it will crisp as it cools), then stir in fruit.

Serve with yoghurt for a scrummy breakfast…Gorgeous!

This recipe is from Ben (it’s actually called Daddy’s Fish pie) who is my very busy neighbour who runs a project called The Oxfordshire Project and has a photography business!

I would love to know how you get on with this, as always, but it looks scrummy to me!

INGREDIENTS:

1 Medium onion

Half a lemon

A big pinch of Parsley

100g butter

50g Plain Flour

400ml Milk

500g smoked skinned Cod

250g Tiger Prawns

200 grams of smoked salmon

Salt and pepper

1.4 kilos of Potatoes peeled or unpeeled

70g Grated Cheddar cheese

Melt half the butter in a large saucepan. Add the chopped onion and cook until soft.

Stir in the flour and slowly add the milk until you have a thick sauce and let it simmer for a couple of minutes. If the prawns are uncooked fry them gently in a little oil and then add them to the sauce with the salmon and the cod, now you can season with the parsley, a little salt and some pepper. Now add the juice of half a lemon, and stir it all together. Once the sauce is bubbling take off the heat and set it aside.

Peel and chop the potatoes into chunks and then boil in salted water until soft. Add a little milk and the rest of the butter and half of the cheese and then give the mixture a good old fashion mash.

Place the fish mix in to a lasagne dish or something similar and then layer the mash on the top and finish with the rest of the cheese scattered across. Place in an oven at 180C/fan 160Cgas4 until the cheese turns a delicious orange brown colour which will be around 30 minutes.

Serve with fresh vegetables or a green salad.

This recipe has come been sent in from Dani Miller. I’ve been asking her for ages to put something together as I have been lucky enough to sample her cooking and it’s wholesome, vegetarian goodness! Dani is training in Homeopathy and is qualified in Reiki I and Reiki II and you can find out more about her at www.wellbeingoxfordshire.co.uk

For 4 people you need:

• 675g/ 1 ½lb sweet potatoes
• 225g spinach
• 3 tbsp pine nuts, toasted
• 1 onion, chopped
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 1 garlic, crushed
• 2.5 cm/ 1 in piece fresh root ginger
• ½ tsp cayenne pepper (or more depending on how spicy you like it)
• 400ml vegetable stock
• salt and ground black pepper

Pre-heat oven to 220°C/425°F/Gas 7.

Peel the sweet potatoes and cut into 2.5cm/ 1in chunks.

Heat the oil in a large frying pan, add the garlic, ginger, onion and cayenne pepper and fry gently until the onion is softened.

Add the sweet potato chunks to the frying pan and stir to coat them in the oil and spices.

Transfer into casserole or other oven-proof dish with lid, COVER WITH THE VEGETABLE STOCK… and cook for about 50 minutes or until the sweet potatoes are soft.

In the meanwhile wash and shred the spinach and toast the pine nuts.

When the sweet potatoes are soft, take the pot out of the oven, stir in the spinach and pine nuts, then return to the oven and cook for a further 5 minutes. Add seasoning and serve with jasmine rice. Yummy!

Another incredibly easy and cheap recipe that warms you from the inside all the way to the outside!

Top and tail and wash and slice, around 3 or 4 leeks. In a large saucepan, have a big blob of butter  (technical term for about a tbp) melting over a medium to low heat (you don’t want the butter to burn). Add the sliced leek into the pan and stir so that the leeks start to separate and the butter coats all the pieces.

Then add some salt, some pepper and either some chopped fresh thyme (my preference) or about a tsp of the dried stuff. (With the salt and pepper, you can always add more to taste before serving). Add a pinch of sugar and then mix all around again so that all the pieces of leek are covered. Turn the heat down to low, put the lid on and ‘sweat’ for about 15/20 minutes, lifting the lid occasionally and stirring.

Take 2/3 small to medium sized potatoes, skin on, and cut into 4 pieces. Now add them to the mix of gorgeous soft leeks and stir together.

Now add about a pint of stock. Use an oxo cube and add the water to that to make stock or use a homemade stock made from the remains of your chicken. Have the heat on medium and tilt the lid of the pan and simmer for about 20 minutes.

While that’s simmering away you can make the Garlic Croutons.

Take one of the crusts from your loaf and cut into squares of about ½ inch. Melt some butter in a frying pan and add some crushed garlic. Over a medium heat, allow the butter and garlic to become good friends and then add the bread chunks. Stir and fry then stir and fry and croutons will be ready in about 10/15 minutes. Put to one side and put the remainders of the garlic in the frying pan, into the soup mixture.

Allow a little cooling time and then use your hand blender to create the soup. Taste and either add more water (a very little at a time) if it’s to thick and also make sure your seasoning is right.

Serve the soup with a pile of croutons on top and some wholemeal bread and enjoy!

Briami Brimai Briami…oh how I love you. This particular dish tantalises all my senses allowing me to close my eyes and imagine that I am once again sitting in a Greek Taverna in moments. The Greeks use a lot more vegetables in their food than other European countries and have lots of stand-alone vegetable accompaniments making being a vegetarian in Greece an utterly pleasurable experience. Have you ever tried stating that you don’t eat meat to the French! And in Spain, you’re likely to be presented with an omelette.  What I really love about this dish, is it’s simplicity. It’s ingredients are basically what grows in the heat of the sun….what could be more simple.

This is traditionally baked in the oven and cooked very slowly. I actually make mine in the Slow Cooker which simplifies it even further.

Over a medium heat, fry two onions, sliced in about 2 tablespoons of Olive Oil for around 10 minutes. Then add two crushed garlic cloves and continue to fry for a further 2 minutes, moving around the pan frequently infusing the onion and garlic and keeping the oil evenly distributed.

Now, into the slow cooker put 1 large seeded and chopped red pepper, 400g of thinkly sliced courgettes, 400g of unpeeled ½ inch sliced small waxy potatoes like desiree (although to be honest, I use whatever potatoes I have in the house!), 2lb of ripe roughly chopped tomatoes (peeled ideally if you have the inclination – I don’t!), 1 tsp of Oregano, a handful of chopped fresh dill (if you fancy), ½ tsp of cinnamon, salt and pepper and the onion and garlic mix.

(If you have some spare vegetables, you can add those too. I’ve put some broccoli in the one in the picture….but for your first Briami, I would urge you to cook it as it is meant to be made as it is soooooo good!)

Add a good splosh (that’s officially cooking terminology) of Olive oil into the vegetables and gentle mix around for an even coating.

I would probably cook this on slow for no more than 5 hours and on high for around 3 hours…there’s no meat so it doesn’t need forever. On first cooking anything on the Slow Cooker, I think it’s probably wise to check after a while so that you know at what point a dish is cooked, or even, how long could you leave it cooking so that it cooks to your exact taste while you go about the business of doing something else.

Serve alone, with a chunk of bread, with fish or chicken. However you eat this, close your eyes from time to time , smell the oregano and picture the sunset…..bliss!