Blog

Healthy eating Pt 2

Posted on by Crafty Kestrel

Well here I go another Blog about cooking a healthy meal. My family had a Greek evening meal Friday made by me from scratch and I am impressed that it actually looked ok after a lot of chickpea squishing and pitta bread toasting. This is what I did.

Falafels

 
Serves 4
 
Ingredients
1 x 400g chickpeas
about half a can of red kidney beans
1 teaspoon allspice
A sprinkle of lemon juice
1/2 a bunch of fresh coriander
Method
Drain the chickpeas and beans. Then mix in a bowl with allspice, lemon juice and coriander. I used a stick blender and made a smooth paste. Then shape the mixture into round patties. Shallow fry them until golden, do not move them around too much in the pan until they have a golden base. When they are golden on both sides pop them into toasted pitta breads.
Hummus
 
200g chickpeas
1 tablespoon lemon juice
2 big grinds of dried garlic
A sprinkle of cumin
a glug of Olive oil
Method
Blend the ingredients together until smooth.
Tzatiki
 
1/4  washed cucumber
2 grinds of dried garlic
1/2 tablespoon olive oil
A sprinkle of lemon juice
A small handful fresh mint leaves chopped
About 4 tablespoons Greek Yoghurt
Method
Cut the cucumber in half and discard the seeds . Grate the cucumber into a bowl, pat the excess water out of it with a piece of kitchen roll. Mix in the rest of the ingredients and season with salt and pepper.
 
 
 
 

 

Healthy Eating

Posted on by Crafty Kestrel

 

Happy New Year everyone, well out with the old and in with the new. My lovely husband has eaten his body weight in Christmas cake and chocolates which is always the way this time of year so I played around with some old recipes. I made us all an alternative Sunday lunch, vegetable hot pot with broccoli and peas with a pudding of baked apples. It was really tasty. All of the ingredients I had in cupboards or the freezer.

Recipe


Vegetable Hot Pot


Serves 4 with leftovers.

Sauce ingredients

Small amount of oil or butter
1 onion, chopped ( I prefer red onion, but I am sure any will do)
2 carrots diced
garlic granules to taste or a couple of cloves if using fresh
half a pack of mushrooms diced ( or to taste)
2 bay leaves
1 tablespoon mixed herbs
1 can green lentils in water
50ml or a big splosh of red wine ( optional)
600ml vegetable stock ( to taste depending how much sauce you like)
2 tablespoons tomato puree

For the crispy topping

2 big potatoes sliced up after being washed ( I did not bother peeling)
big handful grated cheddar
salt and pepper

Method

To make the sauce heat up the oil and fry off your onions, carrots and garlic until soft ( do not let them brown). Add the mushrooms, then cook for a few minutes. Stir in the herbs, and the tin of lentils. Pour over the wine and stock and then simmer for 5 to 10 minutes until everything is looking sauce like. Keep checking and stirring and if it is too watery just keep simmering.

While everything is cooking wash and slice the potatoes into thin slices and part boil. Then drain them.

Heat the oven to about 200 C , I think that is about a Gas 5 or 6. Then assemble the hotpot, the filling on the bottom of a casserole dish then arrange the potato slices over this. Scatter the cheese over the potatoes and I cover this in foil and baked for 20 minutes then I took off the foil to brown the potatoes for about 10 minutes.

I then served this with lots of broccoli and peas my favourites.

Now the baked apples were just four big green apples I had in the fruit bowl. I washed them took the centre out of them leaving a bit of apple in place at the bottom so I could fill them with dried fruit. Each apple was filled with the fruit, a small knob of butter and a tea spoon of honey. I popped them in a high sided metal tray and covered the whole thing with foil. I then cooked them until the apples were soft which took about 30 minutes as the apples were big, but I did check them after about 20 minutes.

Meet Snowy.

Posted on by Crafty Kestrel
Been very busy working on items for my stall this weekend. Thought as it is Christmas we needed a snowman, so meet the newest member of my creature family, Snowy the Snowman.
Lets hope he doesn’t melt away in his lovely warm scarf and boots.
That’s also my new make for this week covered, so my challenge is progressing nicely.

 

Week 2 of the make challenge

Posted on by Crafty Kestrel
So as we go into the second week of my ‘a make a week’ challenge, I have a little wooden house Christmas decoration.
wooden house
Made from recycled children’s building blocks, matchsticks and lollipop sticks and with fine pearl glitter for snow, it will eventually form part of a small Christmas village. I will keep posting progress as the developers finish building.

 

My First Post – and a new challenge!

Posted on by Crafty Kestrel

Well, here we go, my first ever blog entry. I have started this blog to encourage more people to make things, and in a hope they will enjoy crafts as much as I do. If no one reads my blog, then this will be the diary of a mad woman.
I have challenged myself to produce a new make every week for a whole year, and if I can manage more with a family to look after, a dog to walk, and a job to go to I will.
robin

My first make is a knitted robin which I have designed for a craft fair I have a stall at on 26th November at the Priory Theatre in Kenilworth, Warwickshire. I made him long and skinny, just like the one that visits my garden every day. I hope you like him.