Truffled Mushroom & Leek Tagliatelle

This is a really quick and simple vegetarian pasta dish perfect for mid-week as it can be made in 20 minutes, is loved by all the family, tastes great and is a good option for Meat Free Monday too.

I used a black truffle oil I purchased in Rome recently, but you can pick this up easily in the supermarket, and whilst it's a slightly expensive, indulgent ingredient; you only need a tiny bit to give a fantastically earthy, rich flavour.

We all enjoyed this - including my 18-month old, Bridget who is living up to my pen-name for her of Toddler Foodie. 

Truffled Mushroom and Leek Tagliatelle

Here's how:

• 250g fresh tagliatelle (can use spaghetti, linguini or any other long pasta)
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 1 clove garlic
• 2 leeks
• 200g mushrooms (a mix is great - I used ordinary and chestnut) 
• 125ml single cream
• 50g Pecorino Romano (other hard cheeses such as Parmesan, Cheddar or )
• Pinch black pepper
• Salt
• 1 tbsp truffle oil

Firstly fill the kettle and place on to boil. Now add the olive oil to a pan and place on a gentle heat.

Peel and crush the garlic and slice the leeks and add to the warming oil to gently sauté.

Slice the mushrooms and set aside for a moment. Grate the cheese and also set aside.

Once the leeks have softened; the oil will be beautifully flavoured too. Now add the mushrooms to the pan and at the same time add the boiled water to a saucepan with a pinch of salt and place the pasta in to cook. TIP: Cook for one minute less than the packet instructs and drain.

While the pasta is cooking add to the leeks and mushrooms, the cream and the Pecorino Romano and season generously.

Once the pasta has been drained, add to the pan with the mushrooms and toss to ensure all strands of tagliatelle are nicely coated in the sauce.

Now finally add the final flourish - the truffle oil - drizzle over the whole thing then mix through to ensure an even distribution. Taste to ensure you're satisfied with the flavour - if too subtle add a tiny drop more until you're happy. Enjoy!

Salmon with Crushed Vegetable Mash

This is a simple but incredibly delicious and satisfying dinner, that's great for family meals mid-week as it doesn't take long to pull together.

The crushed vegetable mash is a sort of hybrid colcannon but I include thinly sliced leeks and curly kale gently sautéed in a tablespoon of butter so it keeps its’ bite and add some herbs from my kitchen windowsill selection - parsley and chives. The potatoes are baked in the skin while you can crack on with everything else; and then just peeled and the soft, fluffy flesh scooped out and combined with the vegetables after a gentle mashing with just a drizzle of olive oil.

I serve with peas and asparagus cooked in boiling water and the salmon is steamed on a plate, covered in tin foil on top of the pan to save on washing up!

For Glen and Bridget I poach an egg each to soft, in the vegetable water while dishing up as an added protein hit and it's a real family winner for our toddler foodie as well as us adults too.

The below serves two adults and one child portion. 

Salmon with Crushed Vegetable Mash

Here's how:

• 2 large fillets of salmon
• 3 large potatoes
• 150g curly kale
• 2 leeks
• 1 tbsp butter
• 1 tbsp wholegrain mustard
• Handful fresh parsley and chives
• Handful Asparagus spears
• 100g frozen peas
• Pinch salt
• Black pepper
• 3 eggs (optional) 

Firstly place the oven on a high heat around 200-220 degrees to pre-heat and place the potatoes in the microwave for six minutes.

Fill and boil the kettle.

Once the potatoes come out of the microwave, place the end of a metal teaspoon deeply inside of each, and place directly on the shelf of the oven to bake for 25 minutes. The metal teaspoon (a skewer would work as well) will speed up the heat working its way through and so will cook quicker).

Now add the butter to a heavy-bottomed pan and place on a gentle heat with a tiny drizzle of olive oil to prevent it burning or cooking too quickly.

Now slice the leeks and add to the pan. After four minutes on a gentle heat add the kale and stir with a wooden or plastic spoon and cook for a few minutes. Now remove the kale and leeks to a bowl and set aside for the minute.

Place the salmon fillets onto a plate and cover with foil. Now place the peas and asparagus into a different pan and cover with the boiling water, place the plate with the salmon on top and cook for 6-8 minutes.

While that’s cooking remove the potatoes from the oven, de-shell and place all of the soft and fluffy potato into the pan that cooked with leeks and kale. Add a knob of butter and mash with a fork, or a potato masher. Then stir in the buttery kale and leeks with a wooden spoon and place on a very gentle heat to keep warm.

Once the vegetables and salmon are cooked, use a slotted spoon to get the vegetables out of the water and place into a colander, then if you’re having poached egg, pop these into the vegetable water – they only take 3 minutes to poach to soft, so will be ready by the time you’ve dished up the rest of the meal. Enjoy!

TIP: If you prefer your salmon to be cooked through more, then leave to steam over the eggs as they poach.

Winter Vegetable Soup

Here's a lovely meat-free soup recipe perfect for a speedy mid-week supper or lunch in the cold winter weather.

The beauty of this soup, is you can add whatever vegetables you have lurking in the fridge, odds and ends welcome.

This particular version makes enough for two hearty portions of around 370 calories per portion so perfect if like me you are on a healthy eating regime or fat fighting. 

Winter Vegetable Soup

Here's how: 

• 1 onion
• 1 clove garlic
• 1/2 red chilli (optional) 
• 1 bay leaf
• 3 carrots
• 3 parsnips
• 2 leeks
• 50g peas (I used Birdseye Frozen Peas) 
• 1 Knorr Vegetable Stock Pot made up with 1 pint water (or other vegetable or chicken stock)
• Black pepper
• 1 tsp coconut oil

Firstly add the coconut oil to a thick bottomed pan and switch onto a low heat.

Now peel and finely dice the onion and garlic and add to the pan. Slice the chilli if you are using and add to the pan.

Allow to soften whilst you prepare the vegetables: peel and dice the carrots and parsnips and slice the leeks.

After a few minutes add the leeks to the pan and allow to gently fry for two minutes before adding the carrot, parsnip and peas. Now top up with the stock, add the bay leaf and a generous pinch of black pepper.

Pop the lid on and cook on a gentle heat for thirty minutes.

Remove from the heat and allow to cool for fifteen minutes. Now blitz with a hand blender or pop into a blender.

Return to the pan and re-heat till piping hot. Serve with crusty bread if your calorie count allows. Enjoy!

Courgetti in a Creamy Bacon & Vegetable Sauce

I've been trying to adhere to a 1200 calorie count in a bid to shed the last stone of baby weight and just live an overall healthier lifestyle since 1st January and so far so good.

Allowing myself weekend treat meals and alcoholic beverages works well for me but sometimes I really crave the more comforting mid-week meals such as pasta.

To make up for this I have been experimenting with courgetti and butternut pasta - both to some success and here is the recipe for a creamy, yet low fat bacon, leek, mushroom and pea 'pasta' using courgetti or courgette pasta that I just love and that really ticks the comfort food box for me. Also it gives me the chance to use my spiraliser - win, win.

If you haven't got a spiraliser; you can buy courgette pre-prepared from the likes of M&S, Tesco and Sainsbury's but the fresher the courgette the better for it to hold it's shape a bit.

The below is enough for two people and each portion comes in at 380 calories.

Courgetti in a Creamy Bacon & Vegetable Sauce

Here's how:

• 2 courgettes
• 1 small onion
• 1 clove garlic
• 2 rashers smoked bacon
• 100g mushrooms
• 100g peas
• 2 leeks
• 2 tbsp half fat crème fraiche
• 30g Grana Padano cheese
• Pinch black pepper
• Small handful fresh parsley (flat or curly is fine) 
• 1 tsp coconut oil

Firstly spiralise the courgette on the finest setting to be left with spaghetti like spirals of courgette and set aside for the moment.

Add the coconut oil to a non-stick pan and place on the lowest heat setting.

Now peel and very finely dice the onion and garlic and allow to soften.

Chop the bacon into very small pieces and add to the pan.

Now slice the leeks and mushrooms and once the bacon is almost cooked through, add to the pan.

After a few minutes add the peas and cook for a further two minutes.

Now add the crème fraiche and the Grana Padano and stir. Season here and cook for a further five to ten minutes.

In the meantime, chop the parsley, ready to stir through before serving.

Now add the courgetti to the pan and stir through. You want to heat this through, but for it to remain in shape and not become to floppy - essentially for it to still have some bite.

Now remove from the pan and stir through the parsley before serving. Enjoy!

Applewood Spreadable Challenge: Cheese and Vegetable Pie with Kale and Chorizo

This is my third and final recipe that I have created as part of the Applewood Spreadable #SpreadStirShare challenge in which 20 food bloggers have been tasked with devising some interesting and delicious family recipes using Applewood Spreadable as an ingredient. I have already posted my Cheesy Pea, Leek and Pancetta Gnocchi Bake and the Creamy Pea, Courgette and Mint Risotto, and my final recipe that I enjoyed last night was a Cheese and Vegetable Pie with a side of Kale with Chorizo.

Of the three recipes, this has to be my favourite – but then I do love anything encased in gorgeous pastry, it’s so comforting on a cold, wet winter’s day, and this is a delicious pie filling that I will absolutely be making again.

I used pumpkin, broccoli and leeks in my pie, but you could experiment with whatever you had to hand really. I made a traditional roux – mixing equal parts of butter with plain flour as the basis for this unctuous, decadent cheese sauce, as well as mixing equal parts of the smoky Applewood Spreadable cheese with unsmoked Cheddar.

The kale and chorizo side was to convince the boyfriend that we can sit down to dinner without a big hunk of meat or fillet of fish and with, instead, just a little smidge of meat-stuffs and I’m happy to report he agreed after this lovely meal. This served the two of us comfortably with one portion left over for lunch today – just increase the portion sizes to stretch further!

Here’s how:

1 small pumpkin

1 broccoli head

2 leeks, trimmed

50g plain flour

50g salted butter

65g Applewood Spreadable

65g Cheddar (I used some Cathedral City I had in my fridge)

300ml milk (I used full fat)

Salt & Pepper

Pinch of nutmeg

250g puff pastry (I used Jus Rol)

1 beaten egg

100g kale

100g chorizo cooking sausages

Firstly cut the pumpkin in half carefully, and scoop out all of the seeds. Either retain to toast and enjoy later on or discard. Place on a piece of baking paper on a baking sheet and place in the oven at around 180-200 degrees and bake for 30 minutes.

In the meantime chop off the florets of broccoli and chop up into bite-size pieces. Plunge into some boiling, salted water and cook for 3-4 minutes, to ensure there will be no biting into rock hard vegetables in the pie. Then drain and put to the side.

Once the pumpkin is out of the oven and cool enough to handle, remove the skin and chop into small, bite-sized chunks. Place into an ovenproof dish, and then add the broccoli.

Chop the leeks and then add these, raw to the pie dish with the broccoli and pumpkin.

Next up it’s time to make your cheese sauce. Firstly weigh everything out equally in advance so there is no mad scramble mid-sauce-making as it is a bit of a delicate procedure and needs care and attention! Add the butter to the pan (a tip is to add it in small little knobs so it takes less time to melt and is less likely to burn) – keep on a low heat throughout.

Once the butter is melted, gently add a little of the flour at a time stirring in each time with a wooden spoon or whisk in gently with a balloon whisk. Keep repeating this process until all of the flour has been mixed in.

Now you will add your milk, a little at a time. You may not even need the 300ml, it will depend on how you prefer the consistency of the sauce to be. Once you’ve added about half, add the cheese. I firstly added the grated Cheddar and mixed through until melted through and part of the now-thickening sauce. If you need to, add a little more milk and then add the Applewood Spreadable, again stirring all the while.

Once you are happy with the consistency (it should be thick enough to coat the back of a spoon and velvety smooth with no lumps), continue to cook on a low heat for a further five minutes to ensure the flour is all cooked out.

Remove from the heat, season generously and add a pinch of nutmeg or even cinnamon to add a little warming spice. Taste at this point to ensure it has the right flavour to your taste, if not add more cheese for a cheesier flavour or a little more milk for a milder taste.

Now cover the vegetables with the cheese sauce, using a spoon to ensure each piece of vegetable is nicely coated and place to the side for a moment. If you hadn’t already – get your oven pre-heating at this point at 180-200 degrees.

Now roll your pastry out accordingly so it will fit snugly over the pie. I baked this as a ‘pot pie’ with a just a pastry topping to cut the calories down a little, as it still gives that huge comforting joy of eating a pie, but isn’t quite as naughty. You could of course also top this with mashed potato and a little grated cheese too, but for me puff pastry is king.

Once you’ve covered the pie, egg wash it so it becomes lovely and golden and place into the oven. If you are artistic you could try and make a beautiful puff pastry garnish out of the excess pastry – if you are artistically challenged like myself, you could create something less adventurous:

The pie needs baking for 25-30 minutes, until golden brown and ten minutes before the end of baking you can start preparing the side dish. 

Firstly chop 100g chorizo sausages into small cubes and add to a dry pan on a medium heat. Chorizo always exudes its own oils, so none is needed here. Once the chorizo has cooked for a good few minutes and is nicely charred on all sides, add the washed kale to the pan and mix continuously. It is more cabbage-like than spinach in the heat and does retain its pretty shape, a few minutes of cooking and this is ready to serve.

Remove the pie from the oven and dish up. Enjoy!

To keep up with the remaining Applewood Spreadable challenge follow the #SpreadStirShare hash tag and check out the Applewood blog for details on the winner due to be announced at the end of this month: http://applewoodcheese.co.uk/blog.php

Applewood Spreadable Challenge: Cheesy Pea, Leek and Pancetta Gnocchi Bake

The lovely people at Applewood Cheese invited 20 food bloggers, including myself, to take part in the #SpreadStirShare challenge – a fun initiative to come up with family-friendly recipes using their latest product – Applewood Spreadable. I was sent a lovely hamper filled with some gorgeous fresh produce, a sample of Applewood Spreadable and a bottle of Concha Y Toro Sunrise Merlot all of which certainly gave me some food for thought!

Applewood Cheese has been around since 1965, when it was developed in Ilchester; and is famed for its’ distinct, smoked flavour that’s finished with a sprinkling of paprika. Being a fan of smoky cheeses I was keen to try the Applewood Spreadable to see if this new variety had kept all of the qualities that make the original stand out. I was impressed with the strong smoky flavour that has remained in what really is a versatile product.

The challenge is entitled #SpreadStirShare to highlight the many ways in which Applewood Spreadable can be enjoyed and I’m happy to say that outside of the three recipes that I’ve created and will share over the following three posts, I have ideas for many more dishes in which Applewood Spreadable could work well.

My first recipe is a Cheesy Pea, Leek and Pancetta Gnocchi Bake that’s finished with a crushed walnut crumb to give a lovely nutty crust and added texture. Served with some salad this made a delicious, hearty meal for four.

Here’s how:

500g fresh gnocchi

100-150g fresh leeks, trimmed

2 cloves garlic

150g pancetta

75g fresh peas

2 tbsp crème fraiche

60g Applewood Spreadable

7-8 sprigs fresh thyme

1 tbsp crushed walnuts

10g grated Cheddar or Parmesan

Salt & Pepper to taste

1 tbsp olive oil

Firstly chop the leeks finely and crush the garlic. Add the olive oil to a pan on a medium heat and gently sauté the leeks and garlic.

Dice the pancetta and add to the pan once the leeks have started to soften. Stir through and allow to cook for five minutes.

In the meantime cook the gnocchi in a pan of salted, boiling water – two minutes maximum as the gnocchi will be baked in the oven and otherwise they will become a mush if overcooked. Drain and set aside for a moment.

Add the fresh peas to the pan with the leeks and pancetta and allow to cook for another minute or so; and then stir through the crème fraiche and the Applewood Spreadable. Once the cheese has melted into the crème fraiche to make an even, silky sauce, remove from the heat and stir through the drained gnocchi, ensuring every little piece is evenly coated.

Season generously and then run your fingers through 3-4 sprigs of the thyme to extract the leaves and stir through then transfer to an oven-proof dish. (I used a dish suitable for both the hob and the oven to save on washing up!)

Either place the walnuts in a food bag and crush with a rolling pin or do the same with a pestle and mortar or a food processor and scatter over the top of the dish to make a crumb that will turn golden brown during cooking. Scatted over the 10g of grated hard cheese and finally place the remaining sprigs of thyme across the dish.

Place in the oven and bake for 25-30 minutes, or until the top has turned a glorious golden brown. Enjoy!

To find out more about Applewood Cheese, Applewood Spreadable and the #SpreadStirShare challenge as well as keeping up with the other recipes from some fabulous other bloggers check out the Applewood news blog: http://applewoodcheese.co.uk/blog.php

Creamy Mustard Chicken One-Pot

Cold wintry nights call for hearty, warming dishes, and mid-week, after a cold and often wet commute, sometimes it’s absolutely necessary to call on the classic one-pot style of cooking. One-pot cooking means you can prepare everything you need, bung it into the oven, or leave it cooking on the hob, and then go for a steaming hot bath or shower or get on with household chores, Christmas gift-wrapping or just relax with a book or your favourite TV show.

This is a dish I cook for solace when I’m rushing around doing 101 things, Creamy Mustard Chicken.

I use chicken thighs or drumsticks which are also a cheap choice, so great for towards the end of the month when purses are light, whole grain mustard for some much-needed heat and flavour and double cream for a decadent, naughty feel – although you could substitute this for crème fraiche, which is equally good if you want to feel virtuous. Chopped leeks give a good onion flavour and are a lot easier, and most importantly, quicker to prepare than an onion.

This dish is a bit of a chameleon for me, as it changes each time I make it according to what vegetables I have in the fridge – peas work well, as do chopped parsnips, carrots and squash and mushrooms add a delicious woody taste. If you wanted to add a meatier dimension you could even fry some pancetta or smoked bacon and chop up and scatter into your baking dish.

When I prepared it this week, I was going for speed and solace combined, and forgot the vegetables – I cooked some green beans separately towards the end and that worked a treat too. I made enough for two plus a portion for lunch the next day.

Here’s How:

4-6 chicken thighs or drumsticks

250ml double cream

2-3 cloves of garlic, no need to peel

2-3 leeks

2 tablespoon’s Wholegrain mustard

50-60ml chicken stock

New potatoes

Vegetables of your choice

A few sprigs of thyme

Firstly half and par-boil your potatoes – use boiled water from the kettle and cook at a high heat for ten minutes to really start them off.

Trim and slice your leeks and place into an ovenproof dish and scatter over the garlic cloves.

Wash and pat dry the chicken pieces and arrange into the dish. Season to taste.

In a jug pop the cream, mustard and chicken stock and stir thoroughly.

Once the potatoes have been on long enough, and you can just push a fork through, take off the heat and drain and place in the ‘holes’ around the chicken in the dish.

Cover completely with the sauce mixture and season again. Add a few sprigs of fresh thyme and place into the oven. 

Cook for 35-45 minutes until the chicken is cooked through and the sauce is bubbling. Take out of the oven and leave to rest for a few minutes before dishing up your one-pot wonder.

It’s particularly good with some crusty bread dipped in too.