Courgetti estate

Some friends gave us three courgettes and a handful of broad beans over the weekend so I thought about making a dish with them on a Monday evening to keep the freshness.  We have had spiralized courgettes before instead of pasta, very quick to cook, much fewer calories and delicious to boot, so I thought of using the veg for a nice summery dish.  I was really pleased with the results so thought I'd share it before I forgot how to cook it!

Ingredients

1 dessertspoon olive oil

2 banana shallots, peeled and sliced

3 cloves garlic, peeled and sliced thinly

½ a stick of celery

½ a teaspoon of vegetable stock powder

A handful of runner beans

A good handful of peas (I used frozen)

A small handful of fresh basil and marjoram

A dessertspoon of half fat soured cream

3 medium to large courgettes, spiralized

Method

Spiralize the courgette and place in a bowl or colander with a little salt for 10 minutes or so.  

Heat the oil in a pan and add  the shallot and garlic, fry over a medium to low heat until soft but not coloured.  Add the celery and cook for a couple of minutes more.  Add the stock powder and stir.

Remove the strings from the runner beans and slice them into 1cm pieces, I normally slice them on a 45⁰ angle but you don't need to do that.  Wash them and add the frozen or fresh peas to the colander.  Chop the marjoram and the basil.

Rinse the courgette and try to drain as much moisture off as possible, ideally use kitchen paper and pat dry. 

Add the beans and peas and cook for 3 minutes, then add the cream and herbs and stir to combne them all.

Now add the courgettes and cook for 2 or three minutes - don't overcook, you want to keep a little bite to the courgette.  Season with salt and black pepper to taste, then serve with a little grated Parmesan.

If you want some carb to go with that, you can serve with bread, but it's fine just as it is.  Enjoy!

Mango and Sweetcorn salsa

This came about as I had a mango and some sweetcorn left over.  Great Mexican style salsa I thought, put it together and everyone loved it, so here's the recipe.

Ingredients

1 large mango

2 corn on the cob

1 red and 1 green pepper

1 green chilli

1 small onion

2 limes

1 large bunch coriander leaves

Salt

Black pepper

Method

Remove the husk and the silk from the cob then slice the kernels away from the cob, wash and boil for 2 minutes - yoou want to keep a little of the bite.

Peel and slice the mango, then chop into bite size pieces. Core and seed the peppers, the chop into bite size pieces.  Chops the chilli finely, you can remove the seeds if you don't like it too hot but I don't usually bother as the green chillies we get are pretty mild even with the seeds.  Peel and finely chop the onion. Juice the limes. Chop the coriander leaves finely.

Chuck everything into a big bowl, mix it all together and add salt and pepper to taste and serve with pretty much any Mexican dish or even just as a salad.

Nepali Mushroom Curry

This recipe is taken from a recipe I frost saw by Atul Kochhar.  I've not seen a published version of it so thought I'd post it here as we had it and it was a really good curry side dish.  I hope you enjoy.

Ingredients

A few sprays of vegetable oil

1 teaspoon fenugreek

1/2 teaspoon asafoetida

1 teaspoon finely chopped garlic

2 medium onions, finely chopped

Salt to taste

400g assorted mushrooms, wiped clean and sliced in half

1 teaspoon chilli powder

2 teaspoons cumin

1 teaspoon turmeric

1 teaspoon coriander

1 large packet fresh chives, chopped

1 large tomato, cored and chopped roughly

1 tablespoon fat free natural yoghurt

1 fresh chilli finely chopped

1 large packet coriander leaves

Method

Heat a frying pan large enough to hold all the ingredients under a medium heat, when hot spray with a little oil and add the fenugreek, asafoetida and garlic and sweat for a couple of minutes until the garlic is cooked but not coloured.

Add the onion and salt and cook while stirring until the onion has softened, make sure the onion doesn't start browning.

Now add the mushrooms and a little water, stir and cook for 4 or 5 minutes.  The mushrooms need to be cooked but keep their texture and not go too soft.

Add the chilli powder, cumin, turmeric and coriander and stir it in until the mushrooms are well coated.

Now add the chopped tomato and chives and stir the curry together to combine all the ingredients.

Finally, add the yoghurt, chopped chilli and coriander, stir everything in and serve.