from somewhere in my imagination

Leek, Broadbean & Chicken Barley 'Risotto'

I love risotto, but I have find that white rice is increasingly playing havoc with my belly.  I stopped eating it completely (hello 3 day reflux) when I was pregnant with J and have never really re-introduced it to our regular diet.

With the 12WBT kick off imminent I have been adapting and creating some new <300 calorie meals and I trialled this one on Wednesday with resounding success.  Sebastian declared it a winner (after I fed it to him forkful by forkful, which is often the case with new dishes).  It is a dish that comes in at 309 calories per serve for the option without chicken or 386 calories per serve with the chicken.

Without chicken it is also super super cheap because leeks are in season right now, it's a meal you can easily bring in under $10 for the no chicken option.

The barley is really yummy, nutty like brown rice is, and unlike traditional risotto you don't have to stand and stir, you could even pop it in the slow cooker once you have your leeks cooked down and add your broadbeans just before serving.

Leek, Broadbean & Chicken Barley 'Risotto' - Serves 6

Ingredients

400g Chicken (for calorie boost option)

2 cups pearl barley, washed and soaked at least 4 hours in cold water.

3 Leeks, trimmed, washed well and thinly sliced

300g broad beans, shelled to give about 200g (I just use frozen ones, leave them to thaw before shelling)

2-3 tsp Olive Oil

2 cloves garlic, crushed

Thyme, fresh if you have it but dried is fine

1L homemade or salt reduced chicken stock

To Serve

50g finely grated parmesan cheese (or leave it off to drop the calories down to 279)

Freshly ground black pepper

Method

If you are adding chicken heat 1 tsp olive oil in a heavy based saucepan and cook chicken, turning once.

Heat up your stock either in the microwave or on the stove.

Remove chicken when it is nearly cooked (it will be going back in to the pot later so it is better to leave it slightly under done at this point than cooked right through so it doesn't get tough).

Add a further 1-2 tsp olive oil and cook leeks and garlic until they are nicely softened.  Splash in a bit of stock to help scrape the caramelisation off the bottom of the pan.

Drain your barley and tip it into the saucepan while still wet.  Stir it around and get a bit of toasting action going on.  Throw in some thyme followed by the stock.

Leave it to simmer and bubble about 15-20 minutes until barley is al dente (you could tip everything in the slow cooker at this point).  Stir a few times to make sure it's not sticking to the bottom.

Divide between 6 serving bowls and finish with a sprinkle of finely grated parmesan and a good grind of black better.

Seriously delicious.

What do you think?  Will you be adding it to your weekly meal plan sometime soon?

Tatum xx

 

Something Delicious - Pear & Almond Cake

I've had a bit of a hankering for some sort of cakey something with pears and almond meal so last night I twisted a recipe together and surprised the kiddos with some cake and vanilla bean yoghurt for dessert.

They have been super helpers for the last couple of days and nothing says thankyou like a cuddle & kiss and bit of a sweet treat, better still an after dinner one because it is a total rarity in this house!

Pear & Almond Cake - Makes 16 pieces

Ingredients

180g Unsalted Butter, Softened

100g Brown Sugar + 2 Tbs extra

1 tsp Vanilla Extract

3 Eggs

120g Wholemeal SR flour

100g Almond Meal

1 tsp Cinnamon

1/2 tsp Nutmeg

1 1/2 tsp baking Soda

1/2 Cup Buttermilk

4 Small Pears (I used Lemon Bergamot, they are my favourite) peeled and sliced

Method

Preheat your oven to 160C

Cream the butter, sugar and vanilla together, I waited for the butter to be at room temperature and used a hand whisk but feel free to use something more powerful.

Once it's looking nice and light add the eggs one at a time, whisking until each is just incorporated.

Add your dry ingredients and start to fold into the wet mix before adding the buttermilk.

Finish folding through and smooth into a standard square or round cake pan.  I used my favourite 20cm silicon square.

Bake in the oven for about 20 minutes then pull it out and spread your pears evenly over the top.  Sprinkle with the extra 2 Tbs brown sugar and pop it back into the oven for another 30 minutes or until cooked through.

Serve warm dolloped with vanilla yoghurt (or cream or icecream) but the vanilla yoghurt is nice and tangy against the pears.

This is bit of a decadent treat and Ill be twisting it into a lower cal version for my 12WBT friends.

The perfect sort of thing to partner with an afternoon cup of tea.

Speaking of tea, I'm off to T2 at lunchtime to stock up on some yummy teas...any favourites you want to reccomend for me?

Tatum xx

 

Black Bean Chilli Sans Carne - Meatless Monday

Mexican style food is awesome in the USA.  You can even find fast food style Mexican that rocks.  Chipotle was our favourite.  The black beans you get in your burritos are amazing.  It took a while for me to figure out a method for making black beans for burritos, I couldn’t find anything that didn’t use tinned black beans, and I’ve found the dried ones much easier to find.  I’ll tell you about black beans for burritos another day though.

A month or so ago I bought Hugh Fearnley-Whittingsall’s Veg Every Day.  Oh my golly.  There is enough inspiration in that book to have me happily vegetarian for weeks trying out recipes.  There is a recipe for pinto bean chilli in there that looked pretty appealing but I wanted to make a black bean version, with slightly different flavours…allspice, red wine and oregano didn’t seem quite right for the taste I was looking for.

So tonight we feasted on Black Bean Chilli and it was good...unfortunately photos of black/brown food are hard to getting looking good ;)

Black Bean Chilli - Serves 4-6

Ingredients

2 ½ cups of dried Black Beans, rinsed and soaked in water overnight

2 Tins diced or whole tomatoes

3 Capsicums, diced as finely or chunky as you desire

2 Red onions, diced

3-4 cobs of corn, cooked and kernels cut off

2 Tbs Olive Oil

3 cloves garlic, crushed

1 Tbs ground Cumin

1 Tbs Ground Coriander

1 Tsp Ground Cinnamon, or two cinnamon sticks

Bunch fresh coriander

2 Limes

As much chilli as you want.  I used about 2-3 tsp dried chilli flakes.  You might want to use more or less dried, some fresh or even chilli powder for serious kablammo

Method

Heat the olive oil in a large saucepan and fry off the onions, capsicums and garlic until they are starting to soften

Add in spices and chilli and stir to coat the onions and capsicums and get the spices toasting

Tip in your drained but still wet soaked black beans and stir again

Add the tins of tomatoes followed by 2 tins of water

Leave to simmer until the beans are soft, this will take a while depending on how much bite you like in your beans

Alternatively you could tip the lot into your slow cooker and leave it to bubble away until dinner time.

You might need to add a bit of extra water towards the end of the cooking.  Throw in the corn a couple of minutes before serving, more to heat it up than cook.

Stir through the chopped fresh coriander and juice of two limes just before serving.

To Serve

I served it up in bowls with guacamole, grated cheese, salsa (because we were out of jalapenos) and some organic corn chips to sweeten the deal for the kids.  I couldn't convince Sebastian there was no meat involved and the girls all loved it.

You could use it in place of meat in burritos or tacos.

The leftovers are amazing heated up in a ramekin with an egg cracked in the middle huevos rancheros style, hello lunch tomorrow!

I’m loving cooking more vego meals, I aiming to get the count up to 3 regular vego days a week.  I’m also enjoying some cooking sessions with my wonderful friend Ali via instagram.  Want to jump in the kitchen with us?  A big instagram cooking session, how much fun would that be?

I'm linking up with Veggie Mama for meatless Monday.  Happy Days!

Tatum xx