Author: Emma Hawkins
Pesto Salmon and Sweet Potato Traybake

Pesto Salmon and Sweet Potato Traybake

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So I’ve got to the end of detox January and on the whole it’s been pretty successful. I’ve found that making healthy dishes look appetizing is extremely hard, but you can still make meals that are super tasty. This one, for example, may look green, textureless and as though it’s come straight out of a 1970’s cookbook, but it tastes insane. Even better than that, it’s low-effort and only needs 6 ingredients!

Note: If you’re not a fan of the strong fishy taste that comes with salmon this also works really well with cod, and if you’re not a fan of sweet potato you can easily use any other root vegetable!

Recipe

Serves 2

Time: 45 minutes

Ingredients

  • 2 Sweet potatoes
  • 1 tbsp Olive oil
  • 2 Salmon fillets (I went for tail fillets as they’re cheaper and cook quicker)
  • 2 tbsp Pesto
  • 1 Red pepper, de-seeded and cut into chunks
  • 100g Vine tomatoes

Method

  1. Preheat the oven to 200°C.
  2. Cut the sweet potatoes into batons and then put into a deep roasting tin, (you can leave the skins on the potatoes). Drizzle with the oil, season with salt and pepper, and then mix to coat.
  3. Put the tin into the oven and roast for 20-25 minutes.
  4. Once the potatoes have been in for this long you can start on the salmon. Put the salmon onto a sheet of tin foil, skin side facing down. Spoon the pesto over the fish, spreading it out into an even layer. Wrap the foil loosely around the salmon so it’s in a little, enclosed parcel.
  5. Put this salmon parcel into the tin with the sweet potatoes, (you may need to move the potatoes to one side of the tin to make room). Mix the potatoes around in the tin so that they can crisp up evenly and then put back into the oven to roast for another 10-15 minutes.
  6. 5 minutes before the end of this cooking time add the chopped red pepper and tomatoes to the tin to roast slightly.
  7. When the salmon is ready it will be pink and should flak easily when prodded with a fork. When it reaches this point take it out of the oven and let it rest for 5 minutes.
  8. Serve with the roasted veg, and a side salad!

Thanks for reading, I’m going to be focusing on comfort food over the next few weeks so keep an eye out for that!

Emma x
Vegetable Curry

Vegetable Curry

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I love a good authentic curry as much as the next person, but when you go to make your own at home it can often end up  bland and lacking in flavour – nothing like the ones you get in restaurants or at take-outs. A good way of avoiding this is to make your own paste for the sauce, but who honestly has the time in the middle of the week to spend ages grinding spices in a pestle and mortar?? I’ve found that the best way of getting a flavoursome curry with as little elbow grease as possible is to cook the spices a little before using them in the sauce. This will unlock the aromas and give the curry more oomph. The best way of doing this is to add the spice mix to the onions once they’ve just started to caramelise, and then fry it all together for another 2-3 minuteness before adding the wet ingredients to make the sauce.

I chose to make a vegetable curry for this post as I had a lot of vegetables floating around my kitchen which I wanted to use up, but a homemade curry is also a really good way of using up cooked meat. For example leftover roast chicken or turkey can be shreded up and then added to the sauce with some vegetables and voila, you have a delish meat curry ready to go!

 

Recipe

Serves 8

Time: 1 hour (including cooking time)

Ingredients

  • 1 Large potato
  • 1 Sweet potato
  • 1 Aubergine
  • 1 Red pepper
  • 1 Corguette
  • 2 tbsp Vegetable oil
  • 6 tbsp Medium Curry Powder
  • 1 Red onion
  • 430g Tomato Passata
  • 400g Coconut milk
  • Salt and pepper to season

Method

  1. Preheat the oven to 200˚C.
  2. Now prep the veg. Peel the potato and sweet potato and chop into chunks. Chop the aubergine into similar sized pieces. De-seed the pepper and chop it into small chunks, slightly smaller than you chopped the potatoes and aubergine. Then slice the corguette down the middle and then chop it into bits of a similar size.
  3. Put the chopped vegetables into a large roasting tin and drizzle with 1 tbsp of the oil. Sprinkle over 2 tbsp of the curry powder and stir around the tin to coat evenly. Put into the oven to roast for 30-35 minutes, stirring half way through, until the veg are soft and just starting to crisp.
  4. Meanwhile peel and dice the onion. Put the rest of the oil into a large saucepan and put over a medium heat. Add the onion and fry, stirring occasionally, until it begins to caramelise and go brown.
  5. Add the other 4 tbsp of curry powder and stir to coat the onions in it. Fry for another 2-3 minutes to slightly cook the powder and then add the passata and coconut milk. Stir to combine and then leave on a gentle simmer for 10 minutes.
  6. When the vegetables in the oven are ready take them out of the oven and add them to the sauce. Leave everything to simmer for another 5-10 minutes until all the veg are cooked through and infused with the spices in the sauce.
  7. Season the curry with salt and pepper to taste and then serve with rice and/or naan bread!

Thanks for reading!

Emma x
Fruit Muffins

Fruit Muffins

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In every person’s healthy eating phase there comes a time where the ‘healthy muffin’ makes an appearance. They’re a sort of comforting link to the world of cakes, and yet are considered to be way more healthy (not sure why, but they are).

Whilst not great for the carb-free seekers, these are low in refined sugar, full of fibre and packed with fruit. The Greek yoghurt in the recipe might seem odd but it’s a clever way of  getting really light muffins. The acidity in yoghurt reacts with the baking powder to send it into overdrive and causes it to make lots of lovely CO2, which will make your muffins really light and airy.

Recipe

Makes 16

Time: 25 minutes

Ingredients

  • 160g Wholemeal flour
  • 50g Plain flour
  • 40g Rolled oats
  • 1 ½ tbsp Baking powder
  • ½ tsp Bicarbonate of soda
  • 200g Greek yoghurt
  • 2 Medium Bananas, mashed with a fork
  • 2 Large eggs
  • 100g Honey
  • 2 tsp Vanilla
  • Handful of blueberries
  • Handful of raspberries

Method

  1. Preheat the oven to 180˚C. Line a 12 hole muffin tray with muffin cases.
  2. Put the flours, oats, baking powder, and bicarb into a bowl and mix together.
  3. In another bowl put the yoghurt, mashed bananas, eggs, honey, and vanilla and whisk together.
  4. Make a well in the centre of the dry ingredients and pour in the wet ingredients. Whisk to combine, then add the berries and whisk them a little more to mix them in. The mixture should be pretty thick, but if it’s too thick to work with you can thin it out with 2 tbsp of milk.
  5. Distribute the mixture between the muffin cases and then bake in the oven for 15-20 minutes, until a skewer inserted into the centre of the muffins comes out clean.
  6. Leave to cool on a wire wrack and then they’re ready!

Thanks for reading!

Emma x
Chia Seed Breakfast Pots

Chia Seed Breakfast Pots

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Chia seeds are the new super-food that is flooding cookbooks and blogs. They’re full of fibre, omega-3, calcium, protein, phosphorus and much more, and they can be used to help tackle diabetes, heart problems and obesity. So if you’re looking for a nutritious breakfast, simply bung some of these in.

These little pots can be put together the night before so you can gobble it down in the morning without any fuss or bother. I’ve used berries to make the compote and to decorate, but you could use any fruits you like (mango and passion fruit is a really good combo!) You can also present these differently if you want to. I went for jam jars as I think they pretty cool, but you could also just make up the individual elements and serve them up in a bowl if you want.

 

Recipe

Serves 2

Time 20 minutes, plus chilling time

Ingredients

  • 100g Frozen raspberries
  • 100g Frozen strawberries
  • 100g Frozen blackberries
  • 1 tbsp Honey
  • 80g Chia seeds
  • 450ml Almond milk
  • 1 tsp Vanilla bean paste
  • 300ml Greek yoghurt/fruit yoghurt of your choice
  • A few fresh berries to decorate (I went for cherries, raspberries and blackberries)
  • 2 tbsp Granola

Method

  1. Begin by making the fruit compote. Put the frozen fruits and honey into a small pan and heat gently until they’ve softened and pulpy. Set aside to cool and then put into the bottom of a jar.
  2. Now make the chia seed middle. Put the chia seeds, milk, and vanilla into a jug and stir with a fork. Let sit for 15 mins then stir again to break up the clumps. Put into fridge for at least 2 hours to set (overnight works well to).
  3. When the chia seed filling is ready spoon it over the fruit compote. Then take your yoghurt of choice and spoon it over the chia seed filling. Top with granola and fresh fruit and serve!

Thanks for reading!

Emma x
Tomato Soup

Tomato Soup

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Over new year I spent some time in Northern Italy, and for me there’s nowhere where the food is better. One of the things that really sticks in my mind from the trips I’ve made out there is their tomatoes. It’s an odd thing to pick up on, but their tomatoes are 100% better than any you find in the UK. Because of volcanic soil they manage to grow ones which are full of an intense, sweet and sour flavour which makes incredible tomato sauces and soups.

Whilst we don’t have direct access to this incredible produce, the UK does have it’s fair share of delicious vegetables and this soup is a great way of making use of this. Especially now we’re hitting the cold and wet season, and everyone seems to be getting flu, a quick, warm and nourishing bowl of soup is what we need. Packed full of good stuff and deliciously filling this soup is a perfect mid-week winter warmer.

Recipe

Serves 6

Time 25 minutes

Ingredients

  • 1 White onion
  • 2 Garlic cloves
  • 1 Medium Carrot
  • 1 Celery Stick
  • 2 tbsp Vegetable oil
  • 900g Ripe tomatoes
  • 2 tbsp Tomato puree
  • 2 Stock cubes
  • 1 Litre of boiling water
  • Salt and Pepper to season
  • Basil and Pine nuts to garnish

Method

1. Begin by prepping the vegetables. Peel and dice the onion, garlic and carrot. Then take the ends off the celery and chop it into chunks about the same size as the carrot.

2. Put the oil into a large saucepan and heat gently. Add the prepared vegetables once the oil just starts to bubble, and gently fry until the onions begin to caramelise – this’ll take about 5 minutes.

3. Meanwhile chop the tomatoes into chunks. Once the vegetables are ready add the tomatoes and puree to the mixture, stir to combine. Then leave with the lid on for 5 minutes to soften.

4. Next make up the  stock by putting two stock cubes into a jug and pouring over the boiling water. Stir with a fork until the stock cubes have dissolved.

5. Pour the stock over the vegetables and leave on a medium heat to gently simmer with the lid off for about 15 minutes, or until all the vegetables are soft and the liquid has reduced slightly.

6. Take a hand-blender and blend the soup until it’s as smooth as you want it. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

7. Ladle into bowls and garnish with pine nuts and fresh basil. Serve with fresh bread and enjoy!

Thanks for reading!

Emma x