Friday 30 January 2015

Sweet Potato Chips


This recipe for sweet potato chips comes from Anna O'Connell (annabanana-1 on Tumblr or annaoconnelll on Instagram).  It's fairly simple for when, like me, you're not a very good cook!

Ingredients

Sweet potatoes

Instructions

  1. Preheat oven to 160 degrees Celsius with the fan on.
  2. Peel and shape sweet potatoes into chips.
  3. Cook chips in oven for about 30 minutes.

Sunday 25 January 2015

Potato & Cauliflower Curry


Today for lunch, my grandma made this potato and cauliflower curry that she found in the January 2015 edition of the Asda magazine.  It's full of delicious vegetables and is good to eat both on its own as well as with rice.

Ingredients (to serve 4 people)

1 level teaspoon fennel seeds
1 level teaspoon mustard seeds
1 level teaspoon ground cumin
1 level teaspoon ground coriander
1 level teaspoon turmeric
2 tablespoons sunflower oil
1 medium onion, halved and sliced
1cm piece root ginger, peeled and grated
2 green chillies, deseeded and finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, crushed
400g potatoes, peeled and cut into 2cm chunks
1 bay leaf
225g pack cherry tomatoes on the vine, removed from the vine and quartered
1 cauliflower
1 tablespoon chopped fresh coriander, plus leaves to garnish

Instructions

  1. Crush the fennel and mustard seeds in a pestle and mortar, or put in a small bowl and carefully crush with the end of a rolling pin.  Mix with the cumin, coriander and turmeric.  Set aside.
  2. Heat the oil in a large pan and cook the onion until soft and translucent.  Add the ginger and chillies and cook for 2 minutes.  Add the garlic and cook for 1 minute.  Reduce the heat, add the spice mixture and stir for 1 minute.
  3. Add the potatoes and the bay leaf and stir to coat.  Add the tomatoes and 400ml water and heat until simmering.  Cover and simmer for 5 minutes.
  4. Meanwhile, cut the cauliflower into florets, discarding the tough stem and any leaves.  Add to the saucepan, cover and simmer for 15 minutes.
  5. Gently stir in the chopped fresh coriander.  Garnish with extra coriander leaves.

Friday 9 January 2015

Berry Smoothie


First of all, a belated Happy New Year!  Second of all, it's the middle of exams here and everything's a bit of a mess, but after my deadline this afternoon, I have nothing until my presentation next Friday morning, so I'm going to give myself some time over the weekend to do a few non-academic things that need doing, such as writing a letter about an exciting little project that is coming up in February (the Food Festival), putting more stuff together for that, planning a few more radio shows, and catch up with a little bit of reading (which has been taking a back seat lately).  Thirdly, my only New Year's resolutions are to eat even more fruit and drink more water than I do already, and to sing, dance and enjoy life.  Tying in with the eating more fruit thing, yesterday, as well as three tubs of fruit (apple slices, oranges and grapes) during the day, I also rode the Sustrans smoothie bike that was at uni this week and made myself a yummy berry smoothie to drink while I was revising!  Here's how you can make it at home without a bike:

Ingredients (to make one cup)

1/2 a banana
a handful or two of mixed berries (e.g. raspberries, blueberries, blackcurrants, strawberries), chopped
a "glug" of apple juice

Instructions

  1. Gradually mix all the ingredients together in a blender.
  2. Once the mixture has reached a smooth consistency, pour into a cup and enjoy!