Category: Main Course
Lentil and Kidney Bean Bolognese

Lentil and Kidney Bean Bolognese

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We all have that one vegan friend. You know, the one who eats falafel and carrot sticks and likes to remind you that they’re vegan? Well soon that’s gonna be me! My friend Kat and I are planning on going Vegan for Veganuary, however as that’s a pretty big step we’ve decided to work our way up to it by first going vegetarian and refined sugar free for November (bring on the hummus and carrot sticks!). I was veggie a couple of years ago, and so I’ve got a few recipes up my sleeve to start with like this insanely good Bolognese. This is something I made all the time way back when and I now make it way more than the beef version. It’s full of beans and lentils so it’s got lots of protein in it and as lentils can be kept in the cupboard for years you can rustle this up whenever you want! For any meat eaters out there who are thinking why make something meat-esk, just use meat, try this. It tastes amazing. You won’t regret it.

Recipe

Serves 4

Time: 25 minutes

Ingredients

  • 2 tbsp Oil
  • 1 White onion
  • 2 Carrots
  • 2 Garlic cloves
  • 500g Red lentils
  • 400g Chopped tomatoes
  • 1 tbsp Tomato puree
  • 1L Vgetable stock
  • 1 tsp Mixed herbs
  • 500g Spaghetti
  • 400g Kidney beans
  • Chedda cheese, grated to serve (optional)
  • Fresh Basil to serve (optional)

Method

  1. Put the oil into a large saucepan. Peel and then finely dice the onions and then add them to the oil. Place over a medium-high heat and fry until starting to caramelise.
  2. Peel the carrots and garlic cloves and then dice them. You want the carrots in chunks and the garlic to be finely diced. Add to the onions, mix and then fry for another 2-3 minutes until soft.
  3. Put the lentils, chopped tomatoes, tomato puree and vegetable stock into the pan and leave to simmer for 15-20 minutes until the lentils have cooked through.
  4. Meanwhile put another pan of water on a high heat for the spaghetti. Bring to the boil and then add the spaghetti and cook to the packet’s instructions (normally about 10 minutes).
  5. Add the mixed herbs, kidney beans to the bolognese mix and leave to simmer for another 3-5 minutes.
  6. Drain the spaghetti and serve with the bolognese, grated cheese and a little basil!

Thanks for reading!

Emma x

 
Easy Spaghetti Carbonara

Easy Spaghetti Carbonara

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Things I have learnt from uni so far:

  1. Do not boil pasta in a kettle (thanks for that one Ivo).
  2. Banana and pasta is not a bad combination, but equally I would not recommended it.
  3. You can have too many chilli flakes in tuna pasta.
  4. There’s nothing you can do to pasta that will make it taste bad. Apart from puree it.

Ok so, I’m not cooking for myself this year at uni, but I am getting to cook for myself at the weekend! I thought would be this really cool thing to look forward to but apart from my experimental pumpkin pie (fyi a golden syrup bottle does not work as a rolling pin!) I’ve returned to just making a LOT of pasta. As this seems to be a uni staple I thought I’d represent one of m’ faves on here.

There seems to be something at Oxford called the 5th week blues, which is basically the wave of sadness and despair that hits everyone just after the half way mark in the term. Having just blindly walked into too much to do, with the words ‘do not over commit’ ringing strongly in my ears as I continue to over commit myself, I turn to a big bowl of this to solve all my problems. 5(ish) ingredients, 2 pans, easy to portion. What’s not to love?

Recipe

Serves 2

Time: 10-20 minutes (depending on how quickly your spaghetti cooks)

Ingredients

  • 4 Rashers of Bacon (or 2 slices of ham)
  • 8 Chestnut mushrooms (or one large closed cup mushroom)
  • 50g Dried spaghetti
  • 300ml Double cream
  • 50g Cheddar cheese, grated
  • A few leaves of fresh basil (optional)

Method

  1. Take a large sauce pan and put over a medium-high heat. Chop the bacon into strips with scissors into the pan and fry until cooked through and crispy.
  2. Meanwhile chop the mushrooms into rough slices (or dice it if you’re using a large mushroom). Add the mushroom to the pan with the bacon. Fry for 2-3 minutes, stirring occasionally until the bacon is crispy and the mushrooms have shrunk.
  3. Whilst waiting for the bacon to crisp up, put a pan of water on a high heat to pre-boil for the pasta. Once boiled add the spaghetti and a pinch of salt. Stir once and then leave the pasta to boil to the packet’s instructions (about 10 minutes).
  4. To finish off the sauce pour the cream over the bacon and mushrooms. Then add the grated cheese and stir until the cheese has melted. Leave on a low heat to warm the cream through and simmer gently, but do not boil.
  5. Drain the spaghetti once it’s ready and then add it to the sauce. Mix everything together and then serve with fresh basil!

Thanks for reading!

Emma x
Chicken Ramen

Chicken Ramen

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Ladies and gentlemen, I have flu. Like really bad flu. Like the rip your nostrils out, shove a fog horn down your throat kinda flu. So whilst I was going to do something more halloween-y for today’s post, I’ve resorted to what I’d actually want to be eating right now – this soothing bowl of chicken ramen soup. Think of this as pot noodle+. It’s pretty quick to make, and I can safely say that no matter how hung over, ill or dead you are, you will be able to make this. So if you’re like me right now and you feel like the walking dead, rustle yourself up (or find a nice person to do that bit for you) and glug down a decent bowl of this and I promise you you’ll feel a little bit better.

Recipe

Serves 2

Time: 25 minutes

Ingredients

  • 2 Chicken Breasts
  • 1L Chicken stock
  • 2 ‘Layers’ of Noodles
  • 4 Spring onions
  • 2 Handfuls of Baby spinach

Method

  1. Pre-heat the oven to 180˚C. Put the chicken breasts on a sheet of tin foil and then wrap it up around the chicken so the join of the foil is on top. Then put this in a small roasting tin and roast in the oven for 15-20 minutes until cooked all the way through (so it’s not pink inside).
  2. Put the chicken stock into a pan and heat up. (You can make this by putting 1L of water into a pan with a chicken stock cube and bringing it up to the boil.)
  3. Add the noodles and boil until they’re soft but not too floppy.
  4. Meanwhile take the spring onions and chop the tops and tails off them. Then finely slice them into little discs. Add half the spring onions to the stock, keeping the other half for later.
  5. Once the chicken is ready slice it into 1cm slices.
  6. Ladle the stock into 2 bowls. Then portion the noodles between the bowls.
  7. Top with the slices chicken breast, the rest of the spring onions, and a handful of baby spinach on each bowl. Serve!

(Note: If you don’t have an oven you can chop the chicken into chunks and then poach it in the stock until it’s cooked all the way through!)

Thanks for reading!

Emma x
Pumpkin Lasagne

Pumpkin Lasagne

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Did you know that 18,000 tonnes of pumpkin is wasted in the UK every year from pumpkin carving?! That’s a lot of delicious soups, lasagnes, and roast pumpkin salads in the bin. One of my first food memories is having pumpkin soup round one of my friend’s houses when I was at pre-school, and so I have a bit of a nostalgic fondness for pumpkin and it’s definitely not a veg to throw away. It’s a bit of a bitch to cut up and prepare as they’re so flipping massive when they’re whole, but roasting them before scooping out the filling can make it bearable! On the other hand, if you’re carving out the filling for lanterns anyway problem solved. These are a great vegetarian variation of the classic lasagne and is so much easier to make than the classic as the cheese sauce is just a ricotta mixture. So don’t throw your pumpkin away this year, use it!

Recipe

Serves 4

Time: 1 hour, plus roasting time for the pumpkin

Ingredients

  • 1kg Pumpkin pieces (about 1 medium sized pumpkin)
  • 1 tbsp Olive oil
  • ¼ tsp Ground nutmeg
  • 1 tsp Dried sage leaves
  • 350g Ricotta
  • 1 Egg
  • 100g Cheddar cheese, grated, plus extra for topping
  • 8 Lasagne sheets
  • 80g Butter
  • 2 tbsp Chopped walnuts
  • 12 Fresh sage leaves

Method

  1. Pre-heat the oven to 180˚C.
  2. Cut the pumpkin into quarters and then place it on a baking tray. Drizzle with the oil and the salt and pepper. Cover with foil and then roast for 20-25 minutes until tender.
  3. Put the pumpkin into a food processor and puree. Add the sage, nutmeg, and a lot of seasoning, and pulse until the mixture is smooth. Spoon the  mixture into a bowl and set aside for later.
  4. Now make the cheesy layer. Wash out your food processor and put the ricotta, egg and cheddar cheese into a food processor with some seasoning. Whizz together until smooth.
  5. Cover the base of a 24cm oven-proof dish with a layer of lasagne sheets. Spread over half the pumpkin mix. Then top with another layer of lasagne sheets. Spread over half the ricotta mix and then repeat the same layers again. Sprinkle the top layer with some more cheddar and then bake for 20-30 minutes until golden and the edges are starting to crisp.
  6. Heat the butter, walnuts and sage leaves in a pan and heat until the butter starts to bubble.
  7. Remove the pan from the heat, spoon the walnuts and sage over the lasagne and then serve with a side salad!

Thanks for reading!

Emma x
Hangover Breakfast

Hangover Breakfast

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Pretty much everyone who knows me knows that I’m really not a heavy drinker. I’m that person who’ll maybe have a cider at the start of a party but that’s about it, and completely forget about clubbing when it comes to me. So it might seem a bit weird that I’ve got a go-to hangover breakfast, but alas there is a reason. I’ve just started Uni (as of yesterday!) so it’s fresher’s week for me and as most of my friends are now uni-based I thought a hangover breakfast might be useful for all you guys who are planning on turning into the walking dead this week. I hope this helps with any upcoming hangovers, but it can’t solve everything so please drink responsibly!

Recipe

Serves 1

Time: 10 minutes

Ingredients

  • 2 Rashers of bacon
  • 2 Slices white bread
  • 1 Large egg
  • 35g Cheddar cheese, grated
  • 1/2 Beef tomato
  • A handful of salad leaves (I went for baby spinach)

Method

  1. Put a frying pan over a medium heat and fry the bacon until crispy all over. Take the bacon out of the pan and set to one side for later.
  2. Next take one of the slices of bread and fry it in the pan with the bacon grease for a couple of minutes until it’s toasted.
  3. Take a 7cm round cookie cutter (or just cut a hole with a knife) and punch out a circle in the other slice of bread. (You can eat or discard the circle you’ve just cut out).
  4. Put this slice of bread into the pan and crack the egg into the hole you cut out. Fry for 3-4 minutes, until the egg white has cooked all the way through and is opaque.
  5. Sprinkle the cheese around the edge of the bread and fry for another 1-2 minutes until the cheese starts to melt.
  6. Meanwhile slice the beef tomato and arrange it over the bottom slice of bread (the one without the egg on it). Then scatter the salad leaves over the tomato and top with the slices of crispy bacon. Finish by putting the slice of bread with the egg in it on top and enjoy!

Thanks for reading!

Emma x