Mexican Roast Potatoes & Beans

We seem to be alternating between pasta and rice for carbs recently, so I googled 'potato main meals' and turned up this Mexican Bean & Potato Bake.  It is a pretty versatile bake - the original recipe says to use kidney beans, but I was going to use pinto beans until I discovered I had leftover Chilli con Veggie.  You could also use Chilli con Carne if not vegetarian.  

Serves 4

1kg potatoes, cut into bite sized pieces

2 tbsp olive oil

1 pepper, cut into bite sized pieces (optional)

400g drained kidney, pinto, black beans, or leftover chilli

400 g tin chopped tomatoes

2 tsp smoked paprika (if not using using leftover chilli)

1 tsp ground cumin (if not using using leftover chilli)

1 tsp hot chilli powder (if not using using leftover chilli)

Salt & pepper

100g cheese, grated

Preheat the oven to 200C/190C Fan.

Toss the potatoes in the oil in a lasagne dish and roast for 45 minutes, stirring around half way through the roasting time, until lightly browned and nearly cooked through.

After 45 minutes, stir through the beans/chilli, tinned tomatoes, spices, salt and pepper. Sprinkle cover the cheese, and return to the oven for a further 30 minutes until bubbling hot, the potatoes are cooked through.  

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Air Fryer Brussel Sprouts, Chestnuts, & Squash

I bought a pack of reduced 'Red Darling' brussel sprouts in Aldi a few weeks ago to decorate our Christmas wreath, but had quite a lot left over.

I'd bought Aldi Whole Chestnuts around the same time, and had half a small pumpkin that needing using too. So I thought I'd toss them all in the air fryer.

If you like kale crisps, this is definitely one for you, as the outer leaves go lovely and crispy.

Serves 2

200g ready to eat chestnuts

200g trimmed brussel sprouts, halved

200g cubed squash (butternut squash, pumpkin)

1 tsp extra virgin olive oil, plus extra for drizzling

A large pinch of salt.

Place all the ingredients into a air fryer liner, and toss well to coat in the oil.

Air fry at 180C for 8 minutes, stir everything around, then air fry for another 8 minutes.

I was going to make hummus to serve this on but ran out of time, so instead made a hot salad with some lettuce and thinly sliced onion.  I made a tahini dressing with 2 tbsp tahini, 4 tbsp kefir (or plain yoghurt), and crushed garlic.

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Vietnamese Noodle Soup (Pho)

A little bit of leftover roast pork inspired me to make Pho (apparently pronounced 'fuh', like 'huh' but with an f)

It can be made with chicken, beef, pork, or tofu.  A lot of online recipes suggest homemade stock, and whilst authentic I made it with good quality stock cubes.  Even using stock cubes, the broth still requires a lot of spices.  I note that ready made pho broth is available in UK supermarkets, but no vegetarian option as far as I can see.

Serves 4

1 tbsp vegetable oil
3 shallots or 1 onion, peeled and finely sliced
3 garlic cloves, peeled and finely sliced
1 lemongrass stalk, halved and squashed
2.5cm piece ginger, sliced
3 star anise
1 cinnamon stick or 1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp coriander seeds or ground coriander
¼ tsp Chinese five spice
8 black peppercorns
1 tsp caster sugar (optional)
1 tbsp fish sauce
1.5 litres good quality chicken (for chicken or pork pho), beef (for beef pho), or vegetable stock

4 rice noodle nests (I used wheat noodles as I didn't have any other noodles)

A handful of sliced cooked pork, chicken, or beef.  For vegetarians/vegans -a 200g block of sliced tofu, or 
1 large carrot, shredded or peeled into ribbon with a vegetable peeler
8 pak choi or Chinese Leaf leaves, cut into 2cm strips
Large bunch of fresh coriander, chopped
Small bunch of mint, chopped

4 spring onions, finely sliced 
1 red chilli, thinly sliced, or ¼ tsp dried per bowl
1 kaffir lime leaf, thinly sliced (optional)
1 lime, cut into 4 wedges

In a saucepan big enough to take 1.5 litres, fry the onion and garlic in the vegetable oil over a medium high heat for about 5 minutes until lightly brown and caramelised.

Add the stock and the rest of the flavourings.  Cover and bring to the boil, then simmer for 15 minutes.

Whilst the noodles are cooking according to the instructions on the packet, chop/shred all the remaining vegetables and herbs.

When the noodles are cooked, drain and divide between four large bowls.  Divide and arrange the pak choi, carrot, meat/tofu/mushrooms (the mushroom slices can be browned in a non stick frying pan over a high heat to give a little more depth of flavour) on top of the noodles, followed by the coriander, mint, spring onions, chilli, and kaffir lime leaf if using.

Pour the hot stock over the four bowls when the 15 minutes is up, and serve immediately with a quarter of lime to squeeze over.

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Hot Chocolate con Chilli

It may look like ordinary hot chocolate, but this simple Mexican inspired version packs a little punch!

Serves 1

1 mug whole or plant milk 

1 tbsp 100% cocoa powder

1/8th tsp ground cinnamon 

Large pinch of chilli powder to paste

Add the cocoa, cinnamon, and chilli to a mug together with enough milk to mix everything to the consistency of double cream.

Fill the mug with more milk, stirring in the cocos mixture.

Microwave for 2 minutes on high power. 

If you don’t have a microwave pour the contents of your mug into a small saucepan and heat gently, whilst stirring constantly to ensure it doesn’t catch on the bottom, until piping hot.  Pour back into the mug to drink. 

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Feijoada, Brazilian Pork & Bean Stew

Last night was the first slow cooker meal of the autumn/winter, prompted by a glut of beans.

It was such a treat to come home from tidying the allotment during the tail end of Storm Amy in southern England to dinner already cooked.

Serves a hearty 4

8 pork belly strips (I had 4, as my butcher cut me 4 massive one!)
4 cooking chorizo (I used 8 mini chorizo, or use 200g cured chorizo cut into 8)
1 large onion, peeled and thinly sliced
2 large garlic cloves, peeled and crushed
2 bay leaves
2 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp red wine vinegar
A pinch of hot chilli flakes
2 cans beans (black, borlotti, pinto, cannellini), or 250g dried beans, soaked and cooked

If using dried beans, soak and cook these before hand.  Keep the cooking water.

Brown the pork belly and the whole chorizo in the olive oil in a frying pan over a medium high heat, and place in the slow cooker in a single layer on the bottom of the slow cooker that is warming up.

Turn the heat down under the frying pan and gently fry the onion and garlic until soft and translucent.  You can brown the chorizo now if it didn’t fit in the frying pan with the pork belly. Add a little more olive oil if required. Spread over the pork belly in the slow cooker when soft.

Heat the liquid from the cans of beans or the equivalent of two cans of cooking water (about 400ml) in the frying pan, together with the vinegar, chilli flakes, and bay leaves.  When boiling pour over the pork belly and onion mixture. The liquid should just cover the pork belly at the bottom of the slow cooker (don’t worry about covering the odd piece of chorizo or onions).  If it doesn’t cover the pork, add little more boiling water from the kettle but go easy.  Slow cooker dishes can be quite watery as they do not reduce like casseroles in the oven or on the hob.

After 5 hours on High, stir in the canned/cooked beans.  Leave for another hour on High to heat the beans through.

Serve with white rice and a Kale Chimichurri.

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Sweet Potato & Lentil Mulligatawny Soup

Mulligatawny is a curried vegetable soup from the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu, taking it's name from the Tamil words for 'pepper' and 'water'.  The traditional Indian version is vegan, but the British of the Raj liked to add chicken or mutton - Mulligatawny with Lamb.

This vegan Mulligatawny is from diabetes.org.uk's recipes, with a few tweaks of mine.

Serves 4 (original recipe suggests 8 servings)

2 tsp olive oil
1 large onion, peeled and diced
1 carrot, diced
1 sweet potato, diced (250g)
400g tin tomatoes
75g red lentils
2 cloves garlic, peeled & crushed

1cm root ginger, roughly chopped (optional)
1 vegetable stock cube
1 tbsp medium curry paste (or powder)
1 litre boiling water
75g brown rice

Soften the onion in the olive oil in a soup pan for about 5 minutes until it starts to brown.

Stir in the carrot and sweet potato (I did not peel either, as the soup is liquidised), and cook for a further 5 minutes stirring regularly.

Add tomatoes, lentils, garlic, stock cube, curry paste/powder and 1 litre of boiling water. Bring to the boil, turn down the heat, cover and simmer for 15 minutes.  I added cooked rice at this stage, not realising the recipe said to add it after the soup had been liquidised, for texture.

Blend the soup with a stick blender or food processor until smooth.

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Spicy Aubergine & Bean Soup

I was gifted several large aubergines that needed eating.  The one that didn't find it's way into an Aubergine Parmigiana or Babaganoush has been made into a warming hearty soup on this frosty day.

Serves 4

2 tbsp olive oil

1 large onion, peeled and diced

1 large aubergine, cut into 2 cm cubes

1 large garlic clove, peeled and crushed

400g tin of borlotti beans, pinto beans, or chickpeas

400g tin of chopped tomatoes

100g roasted red peppers, chopped into bite sized pieces

1 tsp cumin seeds

1 tsp smoked paprika

1/4 tsp hot chilli flakes

1 tsp red wine vinegar

500ml recently boiled water

2 vegetable stock cubes, crumbled

Chopped flat leaf parsley or coriander to garnish (optional)

In a soup pan, fry the onion in the olive oil over a medium heat for about 5 minutes until it starts to soften.

Add in the aubergine and fry for another 10 minutes until lightly browned.  The aubergine will absorb the olive oil.  You can add more olive oil if you wish, or keep moving it around the pan to brown.

When the aubergine is browned, stir in the garlic and cumin seeds, and then the rest of the ingredients apart from the parsley/coriander if using.

Simmer the soup for 20 minutes. Serve with a sprinkle of chopped herbs if you have any.  The herbs not only add a nice contrast of colour, but another layer of Middle Eastern flavour.

This soup can be thickened into a stew by adding 100g red lentils or 50g soup pasta with the wet ingredients, or simply reducing the water by half.  Serve over couscous or rice if serving as a stew.

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Zoe Science & Nutrition Baked Root Vegetable Medley

With beetroot and half a butternut squash to use up on New Year's Eve, and a vegetarian to cater for, I tried this recipe I saw on @Zoe instagram account.  In spite forgetting to set an oven timer due to the jollity of board games and sparkling wine, it turned out well.  I had the last serving today on homemade wholegrain sourdough toast drizzled with extra virgin olive oil.

Serves 2 as a main or 4 as a side 

1 sweet potato

1 small squash

1 beetroot

5 Jerusalem artichokes (didn't use - used several small beetroot and large sweet potato instead)

1 handful cashews, soaked in boiling water for at least 10 minutes

400g tin of white beans (recipe said drained, but I didn't) 

1 tsp miso paste

a few sprigs of thyme

2 cloves of garlic

100ml milk of choice (used the bean liquid instead)

2 tbsp olive oil

Salt & pepper to taste.

Preheat the oven to 190C.

Thinly slice your vegetables using a knife or mandolin and layer into an ovenproof dish with fresh thyme.

In a blender, combine the beans, soaked cashews, garlic, milk and miso paste into a pourable sauce. Taste and adjust the seasoning as needed.

Cover the vegetables with the sauce and push down to ensure they are submerged. Drizzle the olive oil over the top and place in the oven for around an hour until the vegetables are soft and the top is golden and crispy.

My tips; brush some additional olive oil over the bottom and sides of your baking dish.  Also, my vegetables were not submerged by the sauce so I covered the dish with some aluminium foil.

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Sloe or Damson Port

This recipe was on an allotment Facebook group I was on a few years ago.  I saved it as a screenshot, but am now saving to my blog for easier reference.

The recipe presumes you have made Sloe Gin.  More recently I have been making Damson Brandy, and this port works just as well if not better with brandied damsons.

500g drained sloes, after straining your sloe gin.

750ml cheap red wine

100g sugar

200ml brandy

Add (return) the sloes to a large preserving jar, together with the red wine and the sugar, seal and shake.

Shake (or stir - one of my cheap preserving jars leaks if upended) the jar every day for 3 weeks to dissolve the sugar.

After 3 weeks add the brandy and shake/stir again, then leave in a dark place for 3 months.

Drain, decant into bottles, and finally discard the sloes.

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Chicken, Sweetcorn, & Egg Noodle Soup

A quick filling soup made with leftover cooked chicken (or Christmas turkey). Vegetarian and vegan alternatives are detailed at the end of the recipe

Serves 4

3 litres chicken stock

3 nests rice noodles 

340g tin of sweetcorn or 1 mug frozen sweetcorn

2cm root ginger

1 large garlic clove

300g shredded cooked chicken

1 egg, beaten 

4 spring onions, chopped

Sesame oil

Chilli Oil

Liquidise the sweetcorn, ginger, and garlic with the water from the tin, or some warm chicken stock to thaw the frozen sweetcorn.

Bring the chicken stock to the boil. Add the liquidised sweetcorn and the noodle nests.  Cover, bring back to the boil, then turn down to a simmer. Cook the noodles according to the packet instructions. I used Aldi Brown Rice Noodles which say take 5-10 minutes to cook, and in the end took 7 minutes.

Stir in the shredded chicken, turn up the heat a little, and bring back to the boil.  When bubbling, dribble over the beaten egg.  Leave for a minute for the egg to cook in the hot soup then divide into four bowls.  

Sprinkle a chopped spring onion over each bowl and drizzle with sesame oil and chilli oil to serve.

A vegetarian version can be made with vegetable stock and grated firm tofu instead of chicken.  And a vegan version can be made with vegetable stock, tofu, and 2 tbsp cornflour mixed with 2 tbsp cold water stirred in instead of egg to thicken the soup a little. 

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Air Fryer or Oven Roasted Vegetable Salad

Now it is Sunday Roast season, I am putting a tray of mixed vegetables in the oven whilst the roast is cooking if there is space, or after.  These vegetables are then a potted up with some pulses, seeds/nuts, and a dressing as a grab and go midweek packed lunch.

Last Sunday I roasted half a cauliflower and half a squash, and mixed in a can of drained chickpeas after roasting the dish.  As the spice mix (leftover from my son making southern fried chicken) I tossed the veg in before cooking was really quite spicy, I made a cooling tahini dressing with a few spinach leaves whizzed in just for colour. It filled three takeaway containers.  A few weeks before I roasted 500g beetroot and 750g sweet potato

Firm vegetables roast well; squash, sweet potato, cauliflower, beetroot, carrot, parsnips, celeriac, fennel. But softer vegetables (aubergine, courgette, onion, peppers, cabbage) work well too, just with less cooking.

Toss the vegetables in a few tablespoons of olive oil and roast for around 45 minutes at 200C in a fan oven, or 20 minutes in an air fryer at 180C. You can add a little salt, paprika, cumin, or harissa as you wish. Toss/stir around halfway through the cooking time. 

Add a tin of drained green lentils, beans, or chickpeas, sprinkle over some mixed seeds, add some cheese (feta, goats cheese, cottage cheese) if you like, and a dressing like tahini dressing, vinaigrette, chermoula, chimichurri, zhoug, or salsa verde.

If feeling the need for some more carbs, adding some cooked quinoa, pearl barley, pasta, couscous etc

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Vegan Curried Parsnip Soup

During Veganuary a few years ago, I came up with the bright idea of adding cashews (or white beans if you have a nut allergy) to my 'normal' curried parsnip soup rather than dairy cream. This is now my new 'normal'. 

Makes 4 large bowls

200g parsnips

50g carrots

250g white potatoes

1 tbsp vegetable oil

1 large onion, peeled and roughly chopped

1 fat garlic clove, peeled and roughly chopped

1 tsp medium curry powder

1 tsp garam masala

25g unsalted cashew nuts, or a can of white beans

1 litre recently boiled water

2 vegetable stock cubes 

Scrub the root vegetables with a vegetable brush, trim, roughly chop, but there is no need to peel.

Fry the onion in the soup pan with the vegetable oil over a medium heat until it starts to turn a golden colour.

Stir the ground spices into the onion, then stir in chopped root vegetables, and add the rest of the ingredients. If you want a more presentable soup, you can keep the cashews aside soaking in 100ml of the boiled water.  Liquidise the cashews and water separately to make a cashew cream, and swirl this into the liquidised soup before serving.

Cover and bring to the boil. Once boiling, keep the lid on and turn down to a simmer for 20 minutes.

After 20 minutes, take off the heat and liquidise.

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Pear & Date Chutney

Every year I hunt around for my tried and tested Pear & Date Chutney recipe, so I have finally typed it up and posted it so I can find quicker next time.

1kg firm pears, peeled and cubed

2 onions, finely chopped

250g dates

500ml pickling vinegar
500g sugar

1 tsp salt

1 tsp ground ginger (optional)

1/2-1 tsp chilli flakes

Simmer pears, onions, dates, vinegar and spices for 20 minutes to soften the onions.  Add the sugar and salt and simmer for another 20-40 minutes until the chutney is dark and glossy.  Stir frequently to ensure it is not catching on the bottom of the pan.

Pot in sterilised jars and seal with clean lids scalded with boiling water.  Keeps for at least 12 months.

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Minestrone - Italian Vegetable, Ham & Pasta Soup

A few years ago Princess' fondness for all things tomato led me to revive a favourite from my childhood in Italy - Minestrone or Italian Vegetable, Ham, Bean & Pasta Soup.

I used to have to purée the soup for her as she has cerebral palsy and has difficulty chewing, plus puréeing hid the vegetables from her younger brother and sister.  But now not only to Sprout & Baby Boy help me make it, but the 'lumps' are positively looked forward to.

Minestrone is great way of getting a hugely healthy amount of veg and pulses into the kids. I remember supermarkets in Italy selling ready chopped minestrone packs of vegetables, but like any traditional family recipe the variations are endless. I feel that tomato, beans, bacon, pasta, and a green vegetable are key to the taste - but you may not. A vegetarian version can be easily make by leaving out the bacon and using vegetable stock cubes

Makes 4 hearty servings

1 medium onion, peeled and diced (optional if you are using leeks)
1 large clove of garlic, peeled and crushed
1 large carrot, diced
1 large stick of celery, diced
100g bacon bits, lardons, or leftover chopped ham
1 can of chopped tomatoes
1 can of beans (haricot, cannellini, kidney, whatever)
1 litre recently boiled water (or ham stock if you boil a ham)
2 chicken stock cube (optional)
Half a small cabbage, finely sliced (or leeks, spring greens, courgettes, kale...)
50-100g soup pasta, macaroni, or broken pasta (50g makes a more soupy consistency, 100g a thicker 
1 tbsp olive oil for frying
1 tsp herbes de provence or oregano or 2 bay leaves (optional)

Soften the onion, carrot, and celery in the olive oil in a large saucepan over a medium heat. 

When slightly softened, add the bacon/ham. Stir around for about a minute then add the rest of the ingredients. If using ham stock, do not use stock cubes.

Cover with a lid and bring to the boil, then turn down to a simmer for 20-30 minutes until the pasta is soft. Stir from time to time to stop the pasta from sticking to the bottom of the pan.

My mum always used to say that this soup was better the day after, as the flavours seemed to develop more, but I am never organised enough to do this nor have enough space in the fridge to keep it cool overnight. The closest I get is to make it on a Sunday morning whilst the kids and Dad are having breakfast, then turn the gas off and leave it on the stove with the lid on firmly whilst we go off swimming in the local pool and have this for lunch 3-4 hours later with a sprinkling of grated cheddar (it should be parmesan but I never have it in).

November 2025: Big Boy is now 17 and 6' 2".  He takes Minestrone in a flask as a packed lunch to Sixth Form college. 

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