Boursin and Bacon Pasta

I'm not having the best of weeks, it was my weigh day yesterday and I managed to stay the same this week and that is pretty amazing considering the food thoughts I have been having and the treats I've allowed myself!  Like a lot of the UK population I am really fed up with the manky weather, it seems like the cold dampness has just been going on for too long now....seriously where are you spring???!!!   The weather is bringing me down, which in turn is making me lose some motivation, I feel like this is happening to a lot of people at the moment and any advice to conquer the gloom and boost motivation would be much appreciated!

My current motivation plan is trying to think about summer clothes! There are few material possessions I love more than a summer dress, so I'll keep that in the front of my mind, stop looking at cake on Pinterest and browse clothing instead! I'll let you know how it goes and hope I don't 'accidently' make and eat some muffins later!

So today I tried to expand my love affair with Boursin, someone suggested trying it with pasta and bacon - so I did.  Something to smile about is that Boursin light is only 1.5 syns per 25g so surely its an ideal ingredient  it created a creamy filling and flavourful dinner in the time it takes for pasta to boil, what more could I ask for!  Also maybe I need to get out more, but just using a new pasta shape excited me today....you gotta take what you can!

Boursin and Bacon Pasta

Pasta (I used 250g for 2.5 people)
100g Boursin light
Bacon
Splash of milk

Put your pasta to boil in a large pan of salted water
Whilst thats cooking cut your bacon into strips (fat removed dieters) and fry with some spray oil in a large pan
Once the bacon is cooked add the Boursin and melt over a low heat
Mix in a splash of milk and stir really well
Once your pasta is cooked add to the Boursin bacon mixture toss together and eat immediately

Slow Cooker Taco Chicken

So I think I have mentioned before how (pathetically) food can literally make or break a day for me, and yesterday my day was broken!  In 2 weeks its mine and Jons 5 year wedding anniversary, at this time of year I get sentimental and think a lot about our 'big day'.  We had sausage and mash as our wedding meal, I can't really tell you why, I like a sausage as much as the next person, but like is as far as I'll go.  Then there is the mash, which is the worst offender in my world of potato hatred, so all in all a pretty odd decision, maybe it was for the best though as I couldn't breathe in my wedding dress let alone eat!

So reminiscing about our wedding day meant that sausage and mash was on my meal plan for this week.  This is a real staple family meal for many, but for me (and I always seem to forget) it is my worst cooking nightmare, especially when I am on a diet.  When I am not, I buy mash and stick it in the microwave with frozen peas, I use sausages that I actually like and its a fairly quick tolerable meal.  Now when I'm dieting, I have to faff around peeling potatoes (THE WORST JOB) to make something I loathe so its syn free, I have to eat sausages that taste like cardboard, I decided to steam cabbage and make an onion gravy.  Basically everything was going on all at once and all of it on my small stove top, it was stressful, my tiny kitchen was making life difficult and I had a teething toddler weeping at my feet, needless to say it wont be repeated.

Right melodrama over, todays dinner was a triumph, and this meal always is. It is everything I love and instead of blathering on any more I will simply make a list of its fantastic qualities:

• It is very low budget
• It stretches expensive meat outrageously far
• It is extremely tasty
• It is extremely filling
• It is extremely versatile
• It has 6 ingredients
• It takes 1 minute to prepare
• It is ready when you want it
• Even the leftovers are great
• Everyone loves it
• Its mexican inspired, my absolute favourite

I could keep going but I have to go and get weighed!  Seriously try this it is amazing!

Slow Cooker Taco Chicken

2 Small chicken breasts

1 Tin kidney beans

1 Tin black eye beans

1 Tin tomatoes

1 Tin sweetcorn

1 sachet of taco seasoning (I like Old El Paso)

Simply empty all tins and sachet into slow cooker (drain the beans) and mix

Add the chicken breasts whole

Put slow cooker on high (I left mine for 5 1/2 hours) if you go out to work stick it on low, and maybe add half a tin of water

Half an hour before eating remove the chicken and shred it, mix it back in

Bada bing bada boom.  I dare you to find a quicker satisfying meal

Now to the versatility you could:

• Simply serve on its own or with rice
• Make burritos by loading tortillas with rice, this chicken, salsa, cheese, avocado, spring onions, sour cream and doritos (my personal favourite)
• Make into tacos soft or crunchy with salad and cheese
• Make into tostada pizzas

Really the possibilities are endless.  If you like your food really spicy, add some chopped chilli or extra chilli powder to the mix and it will be devine.

Leftover Chicken and Mushroom Risotto

I think I speak on behalf of the majority of the UK when I say that we are ready for Spring already. I have had the song 'Rainy days and Mondays' stuck in my head all day, its a Monday and its raining around here that means only on thing.....comfort food! I have a funny relationship with leftovers, well its not particularly funny I just don't like them. Leftovers make me edgy and mainly bored, I feel that a new day deserves a new food and I am also married to a human vacuum cleaner - so even if there could be food for two days, there will not be by the time Jon goes to bed. Roast chicken is my only exception, I love cold roast chicken its versatile and amazing. I have been craving chicken pie recently, and this was just the thing to satisfy that craving. I know its not the same, but this is full of the rich, filling and mellow goodness that chicken pie is made of AND its slimming world friendly - unlike puff pastry!

People seem to get a bit uptight about risotto, I think alot of that its based on the snobbery surrounding stock. By all means go ahead and make a killer stock using the bones from your roast, but frankly most of the time there just isn't enough hours in the day and you can buy great stock, I say get over it. I used oxo cubes today, and whilst I'm on the topic, has anyone else found that they are REALLY hard to crumble these days? Another way I'm going to offend risotto connoisseurs is by saying I don't add any parmesan. I find it makes it too rich, but its all about personal taste so stir in a handful of finely grated parmesan at the end if thats what floats your boat.

This made too much for 2.5 people it would have been great for 3 - 4. Also I usually add spinach, but I forgot to buy it!

Chicken and Mushroom Risotto

Butter (optional)
1 Onion
250g Arborio rice
1.5 - 2l Chicken stock
Chicken (however much you managed to save)
Big handful of mushrooms

Start by making up your stock, make about 2l - you may not need it all and you may need a little more. Check the flavour of your stock - basically if that tastes good your risotto will taste good
Chop the onion as finely as you can manage and fry over medium heat in a large frying pan with some spray oil, I used a tsp of butter for flavour - its your choice
Once the onion is transparent, add the rice to the pan and let it mingle with the onion
Now all you need to do is add the stock a cup at a time (as I get bored the quantity gets bigger!)
They key to risotto is just keep stirring.
When the rice has soaked up all the liquid add another cup About 15 minutes in, add the chicken and mushrooms
After about 20-25 minutes have a taste you are checking to see how cooked the rice is and to adjust seasoning
Just keep adding stock until you get the texture you like, (mine took 35 minutes) if you run out of stock just use hot water
Add spinach at this point, if you want, and let it wilt in

Once you are happy with the rice you can add parmesan (or not) and serve and enjoy!

One pan, Lemon Roast Chicken, Veggies and Hassleback potatoes

If Sundays were captured in a smell, it would surely be the scent of something roasting.  We often spend Sundays with my family, but today we are holed up at home keeping warm and dry and enjoying the blissful aromas of roasting chicken.  This is a simplified roast dinner because, like most people, I am of the opinion that my Mum makes the best roast dinner ever - so what is the point in even trying to match it?!

I love the one pan aspect too, because if Sunday was captured in an activity, washing up would be a top contender.  The vegetables and potatoes cook right along with the meat so you don't really have to worry about timings.  Whilst we are on the subject of potatoes, I have to admit that whilst I am not a picky eater at all I hate potatoes, its not just a mild dislike.....I loathe them.  With this loathing in mind, I constantly try to come up with new ways to cook them, just incase I stumble across one that I actually enjoy.  So many of the meals I make still use potatoes, and that is because Jon and Millie like them, but also I want to like them, and these come close.  I used to make them with olive oil, if you can have oil, go ahead and use it because it works great, but don't feel sad dieters spray oil works well too!

I used one medium chicken for 2.5 people so we can have leftovers tomorrow, I have left all the quantities open so you can tailor it for your family - just bear in mind how much vegetables shrink when roasted!

Lemon Roast Chicken

Whole Chicken
Lemon
Garlic
Small potatoes
Veggies of your choice I used:
Carrots
Red onions
Mushrooms
Courgettes

Pre heat oven to 180-200 degrees
Place your chicken in the centre of a large pan, cut the lemon in half and put into the cavity along with a whole head of garlic cut in half and beaten up a little
Chop your vegetables, thinking about their cooking time i.e. carrots take forever so keep them fairly small, keep mushrooms whole, red onions and courgettes chunky

For your potatoes, you need to make several cuts across the top of the potato,
Finely slice some garlic and poke pieces of it into the cuts
Surround the chicken with the veggies, potatoes and some crushed garlic and spray them all with oil or drizzle with olive oil

If have a large chicken, you may want to hold back the softer vegetables and add them about and hour from the end
Season everything well with salt and pepper and stick in the oven using the guidelines on the chicken packet
A few times in the cooking process baste everything with the juices
Allow the chicken to stand before carving, in that time you can return the pan to the oven to keep warm

Enjoy!

Meal Plan 18/3 - 24/3

Good morning!  I hope you are all having a good weekend, sorry there was no post yesterday I spent the day in London with my beautiful friend Kitty.  Kitty and I went to university together and we met at Giraffe on the Southbank which is right next to our campus and where we went with another beautiful friend when we first started at Kings College.  Apart from making some good friends, my university experience was overall a ridiculously stressful and extremely turbulent time in my life, which left me a quivering wreck.  With those memories in my mind, it was hallowing being back in a place so familiar, but on the flip side it was fantastic being back in such a dynamic and exciting part of brilliant London.  Everywhere you look there is great food to be eaten, and we certainly ate our fair share!  It is however a new day and a new week and I enjoyed my flexible day yesterday and looking forward to getting straight back to eating well this morning.

Here is this weeks meal plan, we are having roast chicken this afternoon (see post for how later) and using the leftovers tomorrow.  Other than that I have tried to keep things really simple and with a couple of great meals for when you have zero time.  Enjoy your Sunday xxx

Friday night treat; Banana and Chocolate 'Ice Cream'

Happy Friday!!   This week seems to have been endless at times but now its nearly done and its no cook Friday again!  Friday night is movie and take away night, I do like to make something to pick on later in the evening and today I have landed on banana 'ice cream', now these are big inverted commas, if you don't like bananas hit close now!

This idea is all over the place at the moment and first tried it out a couple of months ago and I have to say I was impressed.

Banana and Chocolate 'Ice Cream

Bananas
Hot Chocolate powder (Options/highlights)

Literally all you need to do is chop bananas into slices, and stick them in the freezer for 3 or more hours
Once frozen put the banana into a food processor and blitz
The bananas break into tiny shards and you need to keep scraping the sides down to push the chunks back in way of the blades

Eventually you get a smooth consistency, keep blitzing and it gets a smooth and light texture
Its very edible now but, I like to add a bit of chocolate powder to give it a real treat feel, there are loads of things you can add to make it more exciting, pretend its ice cream and add sauces or whatever you fancy

Since I first made this my freezer permanently has a bag of frozen bananas so we are always just a couple of minutes away from a sweet treat.   I would also recommend you use bananas that are fairly new, the more brown your bananas the more overpowering banana flavour. I also have to warn you if you are following slimming world, this is not a free food, because the banana has been altered you have to count it as syns, but do so in the happy knowledge that its still good for you!

Slow Cooker Sticky Balsamic Pork

Tonights dinner is a really new addition to our family, I only made it for the first time last week and it blew my mind.  I heart sticky sweet anything and this even better because it sits around in the slow cooker for ages.  I have been looking forward to eating this all day, and even when my day got pretty stressful the promise of this meal carried me through, yeah...thats quite sad!

Diet wise, the wouldn't be an obvious choice for many people as it does contain an eye watering amount of sugar but it should be well within your daily allowance of treats.  I am doing slimming world and the pork works out at about 6-7 syns for half this quantity, mainly down to the fact that pork fillet is so lean.  Speaking of quantity, this amount fed 2 starving and very greedy people! Original recipe from Lets Dish.

Sticky Balsamic Pork

350g Pork fillet

1-2 Cloves garlic

Salt 

1/2 cup water

-Glaze-

1/4 cup Light brown sugar

1 tsp Corn flour

2 tbsp Balsamic vinegar

1/4 cup Water

1 tbsp Soy sauce

Take your pork fillet and score with a knife, rub in crushed garlic with a good pinch of salt

Put pork into slow cooker with 1/2 cup water and set on low for 6 hours or high for 4, keep an eye on the water level, it can dry out

An hour from the end of the cooking time, combine all glaze ingredients in a pan, heat gently whilst stirring, it will get thicker

Pour out most of the cooking water, your pork will look kinda manky at this stage but don't panic

Over the last hour baste your pork several times, it should be falling apart by now and starting to look great

 

We had this with ribboned courgettes (zucchini).   To recreate, just hack at a couple of courgettes with a vegetable peeler making loads of ribbons, add to a hot pan with spray oil, pinch of salt and half clove garlic, keep it moving for about 5 -10 minutes and it should be ready to go