Raw courgetti spaghetti

This quick thrown together supper just saved us from ordering a Chinese takeaway!  That may not sound like a good thing, but it is.  A Chinese really would do me no favours right now.

It was another case of fridge gazing to see what happened. And what did happen was really rather wonderful!

I grabbed:
1 courgette
1 carrot
about 1 cup of pre-cooked quinoa left over from the weekend
1 large lemon wedge
1 small pot humus
handful fresh parsley
pinch seasalt
very small handful blanched almonds
small handful parmesan shavings
A hand blender
A spiraliser

Then I spiralised the courgette and the carrot on the narrowest spaghetti sized blade and threw it in a big bowl with the leftover quinoa (it only takes 15 mins or so to make fresh quinoa or you can actually buy it ready cooked too).

Then I finely chopped the parsley in the hand blender and added that in, along with nearly a full little tub of humus, the juice from the lemon wedge and the sea salt.

Finally I crunched up the almonds a little bit in the blender and stirred them in too with the parmesan.

It served two of us with some left over for lunch and was totes delish.  Very satisfying but light, tasty thanks to the humus and parmesan, full of wholesome goodness and tangy thanks to the lemon and carrot. We had it with a wholemeal pitta but would have done without to be honest!

I'm really happy with this recipe and will definitely be making it and version of it again. Yum,

Dilly-cious!

I haven't written a blog post on here for so long but I have been SO busy in the kitchen. We've been eating so amazingly well recently it's left me no time to write about it at the same time. 

But since tonight's dinner was so quick, easy and yummy I decided to just jump right in and quickly write it up. 

I wanted something light but satisfying, comforting and creamy with enough protein without using meat since I seem to have gone off it again. 

Anyway I grabbed the following:

1 full handful fresh dill

1 garlic clove

Half a lemon

Half a tub of Greek yogurt

1 courgette

1/2 cucumber

Tin butter beans 

Generous pinch seasalt

Few flakes Parmesan 

Drizzle olive oil

First I whizzed up the dill, garlic and yogurt in a hand blender. 

Then I spiralised the courgette and cucumber on the fat noodle blade - without one you could just use a peeler to slice off thin strips. 

Warm the veggie noodles in some olive oil in a sauté pan before adding the drained butter beans and a sprinkle of Maldon sea salt. Warm it all through then squeeze in the lemon juice, stir through the dill yogurt mix and the Parmesan.  

And eat! 

I served it with some cracked black pepper and a toasted whole grain pitta bread and a little bit of feta over the top as I had some left in the fridge. 

It was absolutely delicious. Really fresh from the dill, tangy from the lemon but creamy from the yogurt and Parmesan. The beans made it nice and satisfying and the spiralised veggies meant it felt like eating pasta but without the pasta!

So nice.  Enjoy!

Idiocy and Invention

It could be said that the world's best inventions have not sprung into the world already fully formed and perfectly functioning.  Instead they tend to evolve through a process of failure and learning.

Or in other words, I tried to make something the other day that went spectacularly wrong, but I worked out why and made something even better out of the remnants. Go me!

I had seen Ella Woodward's courgette fritters on my Deliciously Ella app (sorry, can't find the recipe online to link to) and really wanted to give it a go.

You're supposed to grate a load of courgette and potato but in my infinite wisdom I decided that was too much work and too boring so I shredded them in a mini blender instead.

You're also supposed to squeeze out the liquid which was impossible and hurt my wrists (what a woofter).

Then you add mint and apple sauce.

Then I cursed and moaned because my mixture was rubbish and wouldn't stick together at all and all just fell apart in the frying pan.

Then I remembered a crucial piece of information that had been hiding in my brain and that I could have done with several moments earlier - blending stuff releases WAY more water than grating.  Oops.  Mega fail indeed.  Not only were my bits too small so there was nothing for it all to grab onto and bind itself around to make fritter shapes, it was all far too watery thanks to my stupid blending and my limp wrists.

Hey ho, lesson learned, dinner ruined.

NOT.  I chucked a whole load of it in a pan, patted it down and then cracked an egg on top to make a rather yummy fresh, minty courgette frittata thing.

WINNER!

There was still a load of mucked up courgettey mixture left so I put it in a tupperware and lo and behold another piece of info from the deep dark depths of my brain sprung forth...kitchen roll!  I placed a few sheets on top of the mixture before sealing the lid and popping in the fridge.

Next day, much of the liquid had now been absorbed by the paper towels so I mixed a load of it up with a packet of turkey mince, some dill and some worcestershire sauce, formed the (now sticking together) mixture into patties and fried/steamed them up into super delicious, light turkey burgers.  BOOM!

Another win.  I served them with the first thing ever made in my new spiraliser, courgette sort of sproingy things and cucumber noodles coated in herby oil I made by blitzing dill, mint, parsley, olive oil, lemon juice and seasalt in a blender.  Super yum!

The rest I just made into a sort of hash to go with a random plate of loveliness a day later.

So, thank you Ella for the inspiration.  I'm still not convinced the original recipe would ever have worked but I bow to your superior knowledge and experience.  When I can be bothered, I shall try again.  Properly this time!