Weekend cooking - cottage pie

Last week, when I blogged that we were having cottage pie for supper, I think it was Jenny who left me a comment and asked me what it was.

I thought everybody knew what cottage pie was until I mentioned it to Dion. Apparently it is a UK thing so many Americans won't know about it.

So here is my recipe, although I am putting some links at the bottom of this post for the "authentic" recipes.

Ingredients

2 medium potatoes

Cheese for the top

120g beef mince, extra lean

200g red kidney beans

garlic & ginger, salt & pepper to taste

Worcestershire sauce

150g tomato & onion mix

200g onion, carrots and mushroom

Method

Make mashed potato with the potatoes. Because I'm healthy, I don't use butter and I only use fat-free milk. Of course I love butter melting on hot mashed potato as much as the next person so I do indulge sometimes.

Cook the rest of the ingredients (except the cheese) into a stew/ casserole as you normally would.

Spoon the beef mince mixture into two mini casserole dishes like this.

Then spoon the mashed potato over the top and make pretty patterns with a fork. I learnt this from Nigella. I then put some Italian herbs on the top (just because I like that taste)

Then sprinkle the cheese on the top...

And bake in a pre-heated oven. Or you can use a microwave... but the oven works better.

It should look something like this. You can serve with a side salad. I was short on time and because I use such a lot of veggies, it is healthy without needing anything extra.

Enjoy!

Here are some links I found for other cottage pie recipes.

http://www.jstott.me.uk/recipes/cottagepie.php

http://www.cuisinedumonde.com/cottage_pie.html

http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/database/comfortingcottagepie_14505.shtml

Weekend cooking - pizza pancakes

As you know, there are only the two of us, so when I make pancakes, I generally use 1 – 1 ½ cups of flour. My usual thing with pancakes is a ratio of 1:1:1 as in flour: eggs: milk/liquid.

Ingredients
1 cup flour
1 egg
1 cup fat-free milk
Onion
Mushrooms
Tomatoes
(use as much vegetables as you like – the actual recipe calls for green pepper but we don’t eat peppers so I skipped those)
About half a cup of cheese (or more, if you like)
Salt & pepper & Italian herbs, to taste
Oil for frying
A tomato-based sauce for spreading – I used the All Joy pasta sauce (I love, love, love these sauces)

you know how I like to prepare everything before I start?

Method
Mix the flour, egg and milk.
Add the vegetables and cheese.
Heat the oil and fry the pancakes.


I tried lots of ways to do this because I don’t follow cooking directions very well (except for baking – which I follow religiously since Nigella mentioned that baking is like science).

First, I tried to fry some of the veggies, and then I poured some batter, swirled it around and flipped when that side was ready. This didn’t work so well. So don't do this one!

Then I tried it the way the recipe intended :--)

However, the batter is so thick with the vegetables that it takes FOREVER to fry and frankly, I don’t have the patience for all that standing around.

Secondly, I tried frying it very thin and rolling it like a real pancake with tomato sauce and cheese on top. Looks a bit like an enchilada.

Third, finally I settled on a way that made me very happy.

I fried the pancake like normal. Then while still in the pan, I spread a teaspoon or two of the All Joy pasta sauce. I then grated some cheese and let the heat melt it.

Then it looks like a pizza and we ate it like that.


This is how I would do again, if ever I was mad enough to do all this work.

But please!!! Don’t let my laziness put you off. It’s just I’m not a fan of long meals. You know that anything I normally cook takes 30 minutes at most to prepare!

Weekend cooking - homemade vegetable soup

The thinking behind my soup
I didn’t try to make soup for many, many years. In fact, I only made my first pot about 2 years ago. Then I realised that you really can’t go wrong and I became much, more creative. So while I wrote down exactly what I put in this time, I usually just throw add vegetables in any amounts! It sounds vague because it is.

Money-saving tip
If you can see that you’re not going to get to use vegetables before their use-by date, and you don’t want to waste any (like me), toss them in a Ziploc bag and into the freezer. You can always use them in soup as the quality doesn’t matter because it will be liquidised anyway.


I like to have a protein in soup so that it’s a complete meal once you add a bread roll. So I added lentils. If you are using it as a starter, then you don’t need any protein and you probably don’t want it as thick as this one is. Just add more water until you’re happy with the consistency.

Ingredients
200g onions
220g carrots
200g marrow
100g spinach
410g canned tomato & chilli
400g lentils (cooked)
Tomato stock cube
1 tablespoon garlic
1 teaspoon salt (or more, to taste)
Worcester sauce
2L water


Method
Heat a few millimetres of water (or 1 tablespoon of oil) in the pot.
Leave the pot on very high heat and add the onion and carrots. Cook through for about 5 minutes.
Add the garlic (you don’t have to add such a lot but I do because we’re going into winter and garlic is good for the immune system).
Then add the rest of the vegetables except the tomato.
Dissolve the stock cube (you can use beef, chicken or tomato – I like tomato) in some of the water.
After another 5 minutes, add the stock and the rest of the water to the pot.
Reduce heat, add the can of tomato and cook through for about 30 minutes.
Add the cooked lentils and the Worcester sauce (I didn’t measure – a couple of shakes of the bottle?).
At this point before you liquidise, check that there’s enough salt and pepper, to your family’s taste.
once you’re happy, pour the soup into the liquidiser until smooth.

Serve with a wholewheat or garlic roll!

This made 9 portions of about 300g.



Here are all my containers for the freezer!

Weekend cooking - pizza pasta casserole

Ingredients
500g mince (I only had 280g so I added 220g lentils)
1 Onion, diced
Carrots (I buy Pick & Pay’s prepared julienned carrots and then roughly chop them)
Bottle bolognaise sauce (I used the low-fat Royco one at Pick & Pay – about R15)
1 tablespoon olive oil
Salt, garlic, pepper to taste
500g spaghetti (I didn’t have spaghetti so I used the twisty pasta)
Cheese


Method
Heat pot and then add oil and onion.
Add mince, spices and brown.
Add carrots and then bolognaise sauce.
Cook for about 10 minutes.


Add pasta and mix thoroughly.
Pour into a casserole dish.
Add cheese to the top and top with your favourite pizza toppings.

I use mushrooms because I don’t like mixing meats but you can top with salami, bacon, sausage, etc.

Serve with a side salad and some bread.

About the picture
I forgot to take a picture of the completed one before I started serving and I couldn’t blog an ugly one, now could I?

Weekend cooking - kidney bean soup

This is a totally vegetarian soup with kidney beans, a wonderful source of low-fat protein.

Ingredients
120g onions
200g carrots
70g marrow
210g broccoli
200g pumpkin
1 X 410g can tomato & onion
300g cooked kidney beans
Tomato stock cube
1 tablespoon garlic1 teaspoon salt (or more, to taste)
Worcester sauce
2L water


Follow a normal soup recipe. In fact, with soup you honestly can't go wrong (unless you add too much salt or something like that).

I always liquidise my soups so they come out nice and creamy.

Serve with bread rolls and enjoy!

Aren't these little Portuguese rolls cute?

And of course, I freeze the rest of the soup.

Tip

For any tomato-based soup, spray your container and lid with an oil-based spray like Spray and Cook (I think you guys in the US call it Pam). Then your containers stay nice and clean forever!

For more vegetarian recipes, head on over to Overwhelmed with Joy.

Weekend cooking - Easy lemon fridge tart

Ingredients

1 pkt tennis biscuits (any biscuit that will make a nice base)
1 tin condensed milk
1 tub cream
½ cup lemon juice
Use a square dish - mine takes about 3 X 3 biscuits

Method
Beat cream (I use low-fat), add lemon juice and condensed milk.
Keep one biscuit aside for sprinkling on the top
Arrange one layer of biscuits
Pour half the mixture
Arrange second layer of biscuits
Pour rest of mixture
Put the one biscuit in a ziplock bag and mash it fine with a rolling pin – good stress relief too ;)
Sprinkle "biscuit dust" on top

Put in fridge to set for about an hour

As easy as that – you are done.

It takes about 10 minutes to do and is a hit every single time!

Weekend cooking - spicy tomato lentil sauce

Ingredients
200g cooked lentils/ kidney beans/ chickpeas*
50g onions
225g tomato (from a can is just fine)
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tsp garlic & chilli
1/2 tsp curry powder
salt & pepper to taste

* pulses are a great source of low-fat protein

Method
Heat oil.
Add onions and saute until translucent.
Add tomato.
Add garlic and all spices.
Then add cooked lentils/ kidney beans/ chickpeas
Cook over low heat for about 5 minutes.

Serve over a +-200g baked potato.



If you want, you can sprinkle cheese on the top and zap in the microwave for 30 seconds. Enjoy!

Serves 2