Challah-la-la-la!

This week's Weight Watchers meeting talk is all about taking control of leftovers. Because most of the tips and recipes provided by WW are focused on turkey and other Christmassy fare, I wanted something to give out to my Jewish ladies that might be more appropriate for the dangerous leftovers lurking in our kitchens. This is what I came up with - a delicious recipe for low fat french toast using leftover challah; I'll be handing out copies in my Hendon meeting tomorrow, and having just trialed the recipe for my melave malka, I can confirm that it's delicious - real comfort food!

INGREDIENTS

2 slices slightly stale challah (approximately 80g)
1 egg white
4fld oz skimmed milk
Splenda, nutmeg, cinnamon to taste
Frylite
10g honey

Mix the egg white and milk in a shallow dish and soak the challah pieces for about one minute. Grease a baking dish with spray oil and place the slices inside, spraying the tops of the bread too. Sprinkle with a mix of splenda, cinnamon and nutmeg. Bake in an oven preheated to 160' for 45 minutes. Drizzle with the honey and enjoy!

This serves 1 person and is 8pp.

Little lemony pies

I was in the mood to bake something a bit different this week and came up with the idea of trying to do low in pro points lemon meringue pies. After a bit of research I came up with a recipe - I wasn't sure if it would work but they came out better than I could have imagined!! Amazingly, these are only 1pp each (or 2pp for 2, 4pp for 3). They were quick and easy to make and look fantastic.

INGREDIENTS

BASE:
12 x wonton wrappers, defrosted

FILLING:
2 tblspn sugar
2 tblspn splenda
2 tblspn lemon juice
1 egg yolk
20g cornflour
1/3 cup water
1 tsp low fat spread, melted

TOPPING:
1 egg white
2 tblspns splenda
5g cornflour

Preheat the oven to 180'. Prepare the wonton wraps by spraying both sides with frylite, and pressing each one into the base of a muffin tin. Bake for 5 minutes on 180'c.

To make the filling - mix the cornflour with the water, add the remaining ingredients and blend well with a handblender. Cook in the microwave until thickened, for 1 minute at a time on 'low'. This took me about 3 minutes. Stir after every minute.

To make the topping - whisk the egg white until it begins to thicken. Add the splenda and cornflour and whisk until it forms stiff peaks.

Remove the wonton baskets from the muffin tray and place each one into a paper muffin case on a baking tray. Put a dollop of lemon curd filling into each basket, and top with a spoonful of the meringue. Bake for a further 5 minutes until the meringue starts to brown.

Enjoy!!

Latkele, latkele hop on the .... baking tray

This Shabbos I will be serving my Grandma's famous potato latkes for lunch. They are super-yummy and melt in the mouth but she certainly doesn't cut corners when it comes to her ingredients, so I dread to think how many propoints they would each contain.

Weight Watchers is all about making it easy for yourself to stick to your guns, so I knew that if I was serving latkes I better have a darned good alternative waiting for myself! These baked courgette latkes fit the bill, and even better they are 0pp for 1, 1pp for 5 and 2pp for 9!!

INGREDIENTS
1 medium onion
2 medium courgettes (zucchini)
2 egg whites
40g wholemeal flour
1 tsp salt
pepper to taste

Grate the onion and courgette in a food processor and mix with the remaining ingredients. Drop by tablespoons onto a baking tray lined with silicone paper and bake for 15 minutes on 200'c. Then carefully turn with a spatula and bake for a further 12 to 15 minutes.

Makes 15 small latkes.

Short and sweet... X 2

Hello everyone!

I don't have time this evening to post a full blog but I cooked/baked two different things today that I wanted to share with you at least in part.

The first was a chicken mince shepherd's pie (no photo, was too hungry - sorry!!). I cooked the mince in my usual way - dry frying it, then simmering in passata with herbs. But at the last minute I had a brainwave and added a splash of teriyaki sauce to the pan. It really gave the chicken a more 'meaty' edge - I know it worked because I was scraping my spoon round the edge of the pan after dinner, trying to get the last bits out, and I haven't had the urge to do that since I stopped cooking with beef mince :-)!! I made the mash for the pie out of swede with a drop of low fat spread and about 20g of egg white. The whole dish came to 4pp (for 150g chicken mince) and was a beautifully warming, filling meal.

The second thing I made today was inspired by a recipe I saw in one of the Jewish magazines last weekend - either Binah, Family First or Ami Living, but I can't remember which one, sorry. It was for chanukah gelt (money) cookies - I thought it was such a novel idea that I made them myself; I used the recipe posted on here a while back for chocolate chip cookies, only I left out the chocolate chips and the dried cranberries. As soon as the cookies came out of the oven I pressed a parev chocolate coin (small size) onto the surface and then left them to cool and harden. The recipe made 20 cookies of 2pp each (that includes the chocolate). Lovely chanukah treat!

A very happy WW chanukah!

We've been talking so much at Weight Watchers about the Pro Points values of festive foods over the past few weeks, that I've become super-aware of just how pointy those Chanukah delicacies really are... I think last year, because I still had so much weight to lose, I could get away with underestimating the odd doughnut or latke, but not anymore. I mean, 7 pro points for a small Grodz doughnut is outrageous! 3 bites and it's gone!

Fortunately though, over the last 18 months I've also been honing my 'enlitening' cooking skills and I think the version of baked doughnuts I've come up with here is really as close as you're going to get to the real deal without so much as a hint of oil. They are 4pp each, and really very tasty!

JUDY'S BAKED DOUGHNUTS
(this method works with the dough cycle of a breadmaker, and ingredients should be added in the given order. I'm sure it would work by hand too - but I haven't tried it so can't say for sure)



5.5 fld oz hand-hot water
1 tblspn melted low fat spread            
1 egg
6 dessert spoons sugar
0.5 tsp salt
2.5 cups strong white bread flour flour
1 packet instant dry yeast

Once the dough has come through the dough cycle, punch it down, roll it out and cut into rounds with a biscuit cutter (I actually used a plastic drinking cup). I made 13 doughnuts. Leave to rise in a warm place on a tray oiled with frylite, until nicely puffed up. Bake for 15 minutes in an oven pre-heated to 180'c. I then injected each doughnut with 2.5ml of sugar-free strawberry jam (using an old medicine syringe). Just before serving I sprayed each doughnut with frylite and rolled in granulated sugar.

Say it with a snicker (or a smirk...)

OK this is not one for the squeamish and may not appeal to all! And as a disclaimer it looked fairly gross so I didn't bother with a picture...

BUT! If you're in the mood for something sweet, warm and filling with a little hint of savoury, and you're a fan of chocolate-peanut butter confectionery, this is one for you. I got the original idea on the WW online forums, but there was no way I was wasting all the propoints necessary to make it the proper way with peanut butter and nutella... So thanks to the boards for inspiring me to lighten it up a bit... And a big thank you to my friend Yael for leaving me the peanut butter powder on her last trip to London!

INGREDIENTS

30g porridge oats
1 banana
180ml boiling water
1 x 15g sachet instant diet-friendly hot chocolate (I used Ko-sure - available in Kosher Kingdom and elsewhere in the UK; for those who do not need Chalav Yisrael, Options or Highlights will do too)
12g powdered peanut butter - I used PB2

Put the porridge oats, hot choc powder and peanut butter powder in a large bowl. Mash a banana and mix in. Add 180ml boiling water (straight from the kettle) and microwave on high for 2.5 minutes. Stir well and leave to sit for 1 minute. Enjoy!! 5pp in total and you will feel incredibly full afterwards.

Burgerfest!

I have admittedly been neglecting my blog a bit of late but I promise I haven't been neglecting my cooking! I have quite a few new recipes I want to blog, it's just a question of finding the time.

This is a quick one - last night's dinner, inspired by an idea from my colleague Lizanne.


INGREDIENTS

Juicy Chicken Burgers

500g chicken mince
1 tblspn soy sauce
40g breadcrumbs
Pepper, garlic powder and paprika to taste.
Onion, sliced into rings

Mix together all the ingredients except the onions and shape into 7 burgers. Grill in a "George Forman" for 10 minutes. Meanwhile fry the onions with spray oil to serve alongside them.

I also served these with my homemade wholemeal bread rolls, and the usual additions of lettuce, pickles, ketchup and mayo of course! The burgers are 3pp each. Apologies for the rubbish picture too! My daughter did not appreciate me turning her meal into a photo opportunity and whisked away her plate :-)

Blueberry breakfast

It seems that I often come on here and say that I've created a new recipe out of boredom with what I normally eat for a given meal on a given day - and maybe that's no bad thing. In our house, Sundays usually mean toast for breakfast and eggs for lunch - but when planning my menus for this week, I decided I wanted to make cheese toasties for Sunday lunch, which meant toast for brekkie was just too samey.

And this is what I settled on - blueberry drop scones, AKA scotch pancakes. They're pretty low in pp - I made 43, which work out at a paltry 3pp for 4 scones. Quick and easy to make too, and no need to restrict them to breakfasts - I've made them in advance tonight so I can serve them easily tomorrow morning, which means that's tonight's meal sorted too ;-)

INGREDIENTS

250g plain flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
2 teaspoons splenda
2 medium eggs
10fld oz skimmed milk
150g blueberries

Mix together the flour, baking powder and splenda in a bowl and make a well in the centre. Crack in the eggs and then stir, working in the milk to create a smooth batter. Stir in the blueberries. Spray a pan with frylite and heat over a medium to low flame. Drop in the batter by dessert spoons - turn the pancakes as the edges start to firm up and the batter develops bubbles - about 1 minute - and then fry on the other side for about 45 seconds more. Can be reheated in the microwave to serve at a later time.

The ultimate winter warmer!

The first time I made a version of this yummy stew, I posted it on the daily menu thread on the Weight Watchers message boards. One of my lovely 'virtual' WW friends (you know who you are Louise) contacted me with great concern, worried that I didn't realise chorizo sausage is actually made of (shhh, whisper it quietly) pork... Of course, what I'd actually used was a kosher beef 'chorizo' - there are 2 on the market, one made by Gilberts and one by another brand whose name now escapes me. So now whenever I post this as my dinner on the menu thread, I make sure to refer to it as 'kosher chorizo'!

INGREDIENTS (this is the quantity I use for five people, but I make mine in a separate container, sans potatoes, so I can be totally sure of how much chicken and chorizo I'm eating... I've given my quantities in brackets where relevant - my portion comes to 6pp).

600g chicken breast cut into cubes (140g)
1 packet of kosher chorizo sausage - roughly chop each piece (25g)
1 tin chick peas, drained (35g)
2 tins chopped tomatos
1 carton passata
3 cloves garlic
1 red pepper
1 green pepper
2 large white onions
2 red onions
2 small courgettes
2 large potatoes
500g cubed swede
2 tablespoons chicken stock
Salt and pepper to taste
Sprinkling of chili flakes

Chop the vegetables roughly and add to an oven proof dish with all the remaining ingredients. Mix well and bake, covered, for 1 hour 45 minutes.

Not a piggy in sight :-)

Not hairy, just yummy

The other day I decided I was bored of my usual workday lunch fare of scrambled eggs on toast or wrap melts in the sandwich toaster. I decided I would do something new and different, and I also decided that the something would involve quorn mince.

Lately, everyone on the WW forums has been raving about the recipes of a duo who call themselves the 'Hairy dieters'. Not having a TV I have never seen them in action, but I've read enough to know that one of their most popular recipes is their lasagne, which uses leek instead of pasta between the layers. That was my starting point - this was the result (apologies for the picture, it isn't overly attractive - you'll have to take my word for it that the end result was utterly delicious.)

INGREDIENTS

1packet quorn mince
1 large tomato, diced
Some sliced mushroom
1 onion chopped
1 small courgette chopped
1 stick of celery chopped
1 carton passata
Mixed dried herbs, salt and pepper to taste
2 large leeks
20g low fat spread
20g flour
8fld oz skimmed milk
15g light grated cheese

To make the sauce, fry the quorn with the vegetables until it has defrosted and the veggies begin to soften. Then pour over the passata, herbs and spices and mix well. Bring to the boil and simmer till fully cooked. Meanwhile peel away the large outer leaves of the leek and boil till completely cooked in salted water. Drain and cool.Take a 9x9" pan and layer as a lasagne, using the leek slices instead of pasta. Now pour the milk into a small pan and add the spread and the flour. Stir continuously until well mixed and then continue to stir until it comes to the boil and thickens. Remove from the heat and pour over the lasagne , sprinkling the grated cheese on too. Bake covered in an oven preheated to 180'c for 40 minutes. Serves 4, 4pp per serving.

Berrylicious!

To be honest I can't actually remember where I first came across this recipe - in its original format it was already pretty propoints friendly, 4pp a piece, but that wasn't enough for me so I've lightened it further, to 2pp a square! It was all I could do not to eat a few pieces straight from the oven this morning, but I've employed the old  get-it-in-the-freezer-fast trick so it should be safe until Shabbos now!

INGREDIENTS

60g low fat spread
50g sugar-free applesauce
10g splenda
1 egg
1 egg white
0.5tsp vanilla essence
125g plain flour
1 heaped tsp baking powder
130g frozen mixed berries

For the streusel topping:

25g flour
15g low fat spread
15g granulated sugar

Preheat the oven to 180' and line a 9 x 5" tin with baking paper. Spray paper with frylite. Make the streusel topping by rubbing the low fat spread into the flour and sugar, and set aside.

Beat the low fat spread, splenda, applesauce, egg, egg white and vanilla. Fold in the flour and baking powder. Spread half the mixture into the base of the tin and sprinkle 75g of the fruit over it. Spread with the remaining mixture and then add the remaining fruit. Sprinkle the streusel topping over the whole cake.

Bake for 50 minutes and check that it's fully cooked with a skewer.

Cool on a wire rack and cut into 12 squares of 2pp each.

A tale of beans, barley and chick peas

I was planning on blogging tonight's dinner (chicken, chick pea and [kosher] chorizo stew if you're asking) but when I got home from delivering my first Weight Watchers meeting (had to get that in somewhere) I was so exhausted that I gobbled it all up without taking a picture first. So that will have to wait until next week.

But seeing as we're already in the realm of no pictures, I'm going to indulge Gina, who specifically asked me to blog my cholent recipe - and wasn't interested in the fact that a)I can't take a photo of it on Shabbos for obvious reasons and b)it really wouldn't look that appetizing after 24 hours in a slow cooker anyway.

Appearances not withstanding though, my cholent recipe (traditional Sabbath bean stew for the uninitiated) is especially delicious and extremely low in fat! So here goes!

INGREDIENTS

1 cup haricot beans, soaked in cold water overnight
1/2 cup pearl barley, rinsed well
1 large onion, sliced
1 leek, sliced
150g chopped butternut squash
2 medium potatoes, peeled and chopped
6 cloves of garlic, crushed or finely chopped
2 tablespoons paprika
1/2 tsp hot paprika
1/2 tsp cumin
200g chicken breast, cubed
150g shin meat, trimmed of fat as much as possible and cut into large chunks
1 pint cold water

And that, my friends, is it. You bung it in the slow cooker on high, turn it down to low after about 4 hours, and it's ready to roll on Shabbos morning. I have to tell you that this recipe did nearly start World War 3 in my house - you'd have thought I was starting to add pork to the beans, not chicken... but after a couple of months of no further complaints made, the husband and children did sheepishly admit that they rather liked the addition of the chicken after all.... What can I tell you? A propointer always knows best.

Make mine a spicy fries...

I just ate my dream 'melave malka' for 6pp so I am eager to blog and share it with you all!

A couple of years ago I used to have a regular motsei shabbos (Saturday night) date for coffee with a friend where I would invariably order hot chocolate and chips. Indeed, as I've recently learnt in my Weight Watchers training, food associations are a very real and strong phenomenon, so it's hardly surprising that I get definite cravings for them on Saturday nights in the winter!

But I'm pleased to say that thanks to my actifry, I have now come up with the perfect solution...

Judy's Lightly Spiced Fries with Parev (dairy-free) hot chocolate' (because as regular readers of my blog will know, my actifry is most definitely 'meaty'...)

INGREDIENTS

FRIES
600g potatoes
1 teaspoon soy sauce
0.5tsp hot paprika
0.25 tsp garlic powder
0.25 tsp cumin
Olive oil fry light

Peel and cut the potatoes into chips, then parboil in the microwave for 5 minutes. Dry thoroughly with kitchen paper and spray with frylight. Mix the soy sauce and spices together to form a thin paste, then coat the chips well. Add into the actifry and spray again. Cook for 25 minutes till crisp on the outside and soft on the inside! A third of the portion (200g raw potato) is 4pp.

DIP
30g Hellmans extra light mayo (can be purchased OU parev from Kosher Kingdom, labelled 'low fat mayonnaise dressing)
1 tsp garlic powder
2 tsp mixed dried herbs
1 tsp lemon juice
1 tsp water

Mix ingredients together - as long as you only have half of the quantity, it's 0pp.

PAREV HOT CHOCOLATE (serves 1)
12g drinking chocolate
3 sachets non-dairy creamer powder

Mix the drinking chocolate and creamer well, then add a little boiling water and mix to a paste. Fill the cup with the rest of the hot water, stirring continuously to ensure it's well mixed. 2pp in total.

Bon appetit! And a shavua tov to all :-)

It's how the cookie crumbles!

Long ago in the days before Weight Watchers I used to make an extremely scrummy and decadent dessert of pear and chocolate chip crumble. I must admit I miss it! This morning I decided to see if I could come up with a low propoints variation on the theme and I think I might have managed it! I combined the pear and chocolate combo with a tried and tested flapjack recipe and this is what I came up with...

JUDY'S PEAR AND CHOCOLATE CHIP CRUMBLE COOKIES - 2pp each!

INGREDIENTS

15g honey
75g melted low fat spread
0.5 tsp bicarbonate of soda
0.5 tsp baking powder
50g plain white flour
100g porridge oats - the more 'jumbo' the better
40g soft brown sugar (just for you Jacqueline)
1 pear, peeled
1 tablespoon hot water
50g chocolate chips

Preheat the oven to 180'c and mix the honey, spread, bicarb, baking powder and hot water together. Stir in the flour, porridge oats and sugar and mix well. Grate the pear over the top of the mixture and blend in. Finally, stir in the chocolate chips.

Place 18 fairy cake cases into muffin pans (I do like my fairy cake cases!) and put a heaped teaspoon of mixture in each one. Bake for 10 minutes, turning the pans half way through. Cool in the pans for about 8 minutes and then carefully peel away the paper cases and allow to cool on a tray.

Yummy.

I'm still here!

I feel very guilty for neglecting my blog this week, but I've been on a Weight Watchers leader training course which was extremely intense (although wildly enjoyable I must say!!).

The recipe for the blackcurrant and liquorice cakes I'm posting today is what I made for dessert last Shabbos - have to say I was pretty much making it up as I went along (well, adapting anyway...) so I wasn't sure how they would turn out, but they were a huge success and the liquorice flavour was the perfect touch. If you don't have liquorice tea you can still make the cakes, but I have to stress that it added a lot to the final taste!

INGREDIENTS

3 tablespoons sugar-free blackcurrant jam
3 tablespoons boiling water
1/2 cup plain flour
4 tablespoons ground almonds
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 cup very strong liquorice tea (I use the Higher Living brand teabags)
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
1 egg
1/4 cup melted low fat spread
6 tablespoons splenda

Glaze: 3 tablespoons splenda mixed with 1 tablespoon berry juice (you could use drinking fruit juice for this, but I actually used the juice that appeared in the bowl with the berries I'd defrosted for my breakfast!).

Preheat the oven to 180'c and put 12 fairy cake cases in a baking tray.

Mix jam and boiling water till nicely blended. Mix flour, almonds, cinnamon, baking powder, baking soda in a bowl. In a third bowl, beat the egg with the low fat spread and splenda until it thickens slightly. Stir in the jam, tea and dry ingredients, alternating between additions. Mix until full blended. Drop by the tablespoon into the fairy cake cases and bake for approximately 15 minutes (but check after 10). Once cooled, mix up the glaze and spread on each cake with a teaspoon.

Makes 12 little cakes of 2pp each. DISCLAIMER: The cakes were a horrid greyish colour when in raw state but they went a lovely rich brown when cooked so don't panic!

Actifry Chicken Korma

It's been hard to fit in time to blog over the past few days and with my Weight Watchers leader training beginning tomorrow it's only going to get harder! I have still been cooking of course - last night's 'fakeaway' Chicken Korma was really excellent, another winner from Kuli80 on the Weight Watchers community recipe swap. My version with a few slight amendments is below. This is made in an actifry and the timings are appropriate for this method of cooking, but it could just as easily be made in a wok or frying pan - simply adjust the timings accordingly.

INGREDIENTS

430g chicken breast cut into bite size pieces
2 onions, chopped
3 garlic cloves, chopped finely
1 green chilli pepper, chopped finely
4 cardamom pods, soaked in warm water
0.5tsp turmeric
0.5tsp cumin
0.5tsp dried coriander
1 tsp salt
2 tsp tomato puree
170ml light coconut milk (I used Blue Dragon)
20g ground almonds (more Pesach leftovers!)
0.5tsp ginger
0.5tsp cinnamon
0.25tsp garam masala
0.5 inch cinnamon stick

Spray the actifry pan with frylight and cook the onion, chilli and garlic for 5 minutes. While it is cooking mix all the herbs and spices with the tomato puree, and add the seeds from the softened cardamom pods. This mixture will form a kind of paste. Add to the actifry together with the chicken, mix well and cook for about 7 minutes. You may want to stir it halfway through to ensure the paste is coating everything evenly. Add the coconut milk, ground almonds and 225ml hot water and cook for a further 10 minutes. Keep an eye on it to check the sauce isn't drying out - you want to catch it just as it begins to thicken up nicely.

I served this with rice (miracle rice for me) and a 0pp vegetable curry that I made by throwing a tin of tomatoes into a saucepan with some mushrooms, frozen spinach, frozen cauliflower and chilli powder. It makes 3 good sized portions of korma, 6pp each.

Sometimes, more is more...

When embarking on a 'weight loss journey' one of the most important things to learn is portion control. I think most of us have had a moment where we weigh out a standard portion of cereal, or pasta, and think 'is that it?!'! I like to think that I've pretty much got used to smaller portions now - 135g cooked pasta is plenty, as long as I bulk it out with lots of chunky 0pp tomato sauce, for example.

But sometimes - on days when you're feeling extra hungry, or having an 'eyes bigger than stomach' moment - you do just want to see an enormous portion on your plate. Well I do anyway! So here's the confession - see the picture of my chicken aubergine bake below?  I ate the whole thing! In one sitting!

And it was only 5pp....:-)

INGREDIENTS - for a one-hungry-person-portion

200g raw chicken mince
1 aubergine
1/2 small courgette
1/2 onion
A few mushrooms
1 carton of passata
Mixed herbs
Salt and pepper to taste
Garlic salt
Frylight

Chop the onion, courgette and mushroom finely and brown for a few minutes until just beginning to soften in a pan sprayed with frylight. Add the chicken mince and break up with a fork until it all turns white. Add the passata, herbs, salt and pepper to taste and simmer for about 30 minutes.

While the chicken is cooking, slice the aubergine as thinly as you can and spread out on a baking tray. Spray the tops with frylight and sprinkle with garlic salt. Grill until the pieces are soft and golden.

Once the chicken is cooked, layer it in an oven-proof dish with the aubergine slices, as you would a lasagne. Then cover and bake for 45 minutes on 180'c.

Hungry day - be gone!

Happy trails!

This recipe for my fat-free granola mix started out as a quest to discover the perfect low-in-propoints crumble alternative. There was one disastrous effort involving ground tortilla wraps that is probably best not mentioning (if only my family would stop making running jokes about it, I might have a chance to forget it...). Since that attempt, I've mostly given up, and on the rare occasion that I do make a crumble I just stick to the fruit filling.

Over the weekend I had a sudden brainwave however, and after Googling granola recipes, tweaked one to get it just right. Propoints-wise it works out the same as porridge oats (ie 1pp per 10g). And sprinkled over stewed fruit with a bit of custard, it's a heavenly dessert!

For those more concerned with overall health than their waistlines, it also makes an excellent trail mix or breakfast cereal when mixed with a variety of different 'toppings' - in the picture below I've added pumpkin and sunflower seeds, sultanas, cranberries, pistachio nuts and honeyed cashews. Chopped apricot or dried banana slices also go very nicely.

INGREDIENTS

150g good quality jumbo porridge oats (I use Tesco Finest)
20g runny honey
60ml water
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
Splenda or sugar to taste (I used 1 tsp splenda)

Preheat your oven to 240'c. Whisk the honey, water, vanilla  and sweetener together and mix with the oats until they are thoroughly coated. Spread out on a baking tray and bake for approximately 15 to 20 minutes until golden brown and toasted. Check and stir the granola every 5 minutes as it burns quickly. Once cool, pour into an airtight container.

Hunter chicken pieces with rich vegetable stew

I invented this recipe in the early hours of this morning after realising late last night that I need a bigger slow cooker. You see, I had planned to make a slow cooker chicken casserole for dinner this evening, using a lovely recipe from the Weight Watchers community swap. It was only after I'd bought all the ingredients and started defrosting the chicken pieces that I remembered trying to make this dish last winter - and discovering too late that my slow cooker was too small to fit enough ingredients in to feed a family of 6.

I'm very pleased with the resulting dish however, so I'll stick with my little crock pot for now! One word of explanation before I get started though - this recipe features Bisto gravy powder rather heavily.. I was shocked when I first discovered this is kosher (only the original gravy powder mind you) and used to hide it at the bottom of my Tesco trolley because I was worried about what my fellow Jewish shoppers would think of me! Just in case you weren't aware that this little packet of magic is KLBD approved, I'm pointing it out to you (and finally coming out into the open - yes, I buy Bisto!)

HUNTER CHICKEN PIECES - Ingredients

5 chicken thighs, skinless and boneless
5 chicken drumsticks, skinless
1 carton of passata
2 teaspoons Bisto powder
Half a teaspoon of cumin powder
White pepper to taste
Good shake of garlic powder
2 tablespoons of soy sauce

Prepare the chicken pieces in a roasting dish. Mix all the sauce ingredients together and pour over the top. Bake covered for 60 minutes on 200'c and then uncover for a further half an hour. Only the chicken needs to be propointed.

RICH VEGETABLE STEW (Made in a slow cooker)

2 large white onions, sliced
1 red onion, sliced
2 leeks, sliced
10 baby carrots, peeled and halved
500g chopped swede
Half a punnet closed cup mushrooms, sliced
4 teaspoons of bisto powder made up to a pint with cold water
1 tin of chopped tomatoes
1 tablespoon mixed herbs
White pepper to taste
2 tablespoons cornflour

Place all the ingredients except the cornflour in your slow cooker and leave on 'low' for at least 10 hours. In the last 30 minutes before eating, mix the cornflour to a paste with some of the gravy from the slow cooker, and then stir it back in to thicken the stew. 0pp per portion - serves 6 - 8 people as a side dish.

Apologies if the picture tonight doesn't look too pretty - the steam from the plate kept misting up my camera lens, and ultimately I wanted to sit down and eat, so what you see is what you get!

The Muffin Woman of Golders Green...

As the weather has turned colder, I've been getting cravings for toasty things - and have not stopped thinking about crumpets and muffins and other delicious carbs. To the point that I've even ordered a Tesco Value toaster for the office so I can have toast and jam for breakfast...

Last night when Shabbos went out I put my breadmaker onto the dough cycle and decided to try my hand at making 'English Muffins' - the kind that look like a roll, and go with savoury or sweet toppings, as opposed to a cupcake.

The dough turned out beautifully but when I tried frying them as per the recipe, with frylight rather than oil for propoints purposes, they just burnt. Thanks to Google I soon came up with an alternative method though, and the resulting muffins were magnificent, if I do say so myself. They range between 2 and 3pp each depending on size and weight; I had two small ones with sugar-free jam last night for melave malka, and a larger one for lunch today with a poached egg - beyond yummy!

INGREDIENTS

450g strong white bread flour
1.5 tsps salt
12 fld oz water
1 tsp splenda
15g low fat spread
1 sachet dried yeast

Add the ingredients to your breadmaker in the following order; water first, flour sprinkled on top, then splenda, salt and low fat spread in one corner of the pan each. Make a small well in the centre of the flour and add in the yeast, then turn the machine to the dough cycle.

When the dough is ready, knock it back and roll it out, then cut out rounds with a biscuit cutter (or in my case, a plastic drinking cup). Place the rounds on a baking tray dusted with rice or potato flour (excellent for those pesach leftovers) and sprinkle some more rice or potato flour over the top. Leave in a warm place to rise for half an hour.

Meanwhile preheat the oven to 200'c. Prepare some oven-proof ramekins or aluminium foil muffin tins and grease them with frylight. When the muffins have risen sufficiently, place them on the baking try and invert a ramekin or muffin case over each one. This helps them keep their shape as they bake and cook at a slower pace. Bake for 10 mins, then remove the tray, turn each muffin over and replace the ramekin. Bake for a further 5 minutes. Finally, remove the ramekins and bake for another 3 to 5 minutes until the muffins are golden brown.

To serve:
Split them and toast lightly.

Serving suggestion: Top with a lightly poached egg and some steamed spinach and grilled tomato slices.

Makes between 15 and 22 muffins. The muffins should be treated like bread for the purposes of washing for hamotzi (and taking challah if you make a larger batch than this).

Baked and baked again...

This blog post, and recipe, is all credit to my excellent friend and lunch hostess Nicole. Nicole saved me from a fate worse than chocolate brownie the other day - namely, chocolate brownie AND giant chocolate chip cookies - by bringing out a tray of fat-free fig and pistachio biscotti just as my inner demon was about to get the better of me!

I've adapted her recipe somewhat - these biscotti are made with splenda, and flavoured with blueberry and pumpkin seeds. But they are (I think!) just as delicious, and best of all - only 1pp each!

INGREDIENTS

250g plain flour
13g splenda
1 teaspoon almond essence
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 tablespoon lemon juice
2 medium eggs
50g dried blueberries
75g pumpkin seeds

Preheat the oven to 180' and line a baking tray with greaseproof paper. Mix the flour, splenda, almond essence and baking powder in a bowl and slowly add the beaten eggs and lemon juice until you have a stiff dough. If it is too stiff to work with, add a little egg white until the dough becomes malleable. Then knead in the seeds and blueberries.

Divide the dough into 6 balls and shape into sausages about 1" thick, slightly flattened. Place on the tray and bake for 25 minutes. Then remove from the oven and cool for 10 minutes. Slice each sausage into approximately 7 or 8 pieces with a serrated knife (on the diagonal), turn the oven down to 150' and bake for another 10 minutes.

Keeps for ages in a tupperware container - absolutely delicious! Thanks again Nicole X

Sometimes only soup will do...

The inspiration for the soup I made today came initially from a recipe I saw in Binah magazine for caramelised onion soup - I'd mentally filed it away as an idea for a later date. But then my friend Tanya told me about the ginormous flask she'd bought to take BNS soup to a chol hamoed outing and I thought - brilliant idea! It hadn't even occurred to me - as the granddaughter of Hungarian Jews when you say thermos to me, I think coffee (and a nice slice of kokosh cake....)

But today we took our two youngest daughters cycling to Grafham Water - a ten-mile round cycle - and soup was the perfect way to warm ourselves up when we took a break. I don't have a cool new thermos - mine is more of the retro variety - and  I didn't have all the ingredients I'd need for the exact Binah soup, so I took it as a starting point and this is what I came up with!

INGREDIENTS

3 large onions, sliced
2 carrots, sliced
1 leek, sliced
3 cloves garlic, chopped
Half a packet of frozen cauliflower
3 cubes of frozen cilantro
A few mushrooms
3 stick of celery, sliced
1 tablespoon parev chicken soup powder
1 teaspoon paprika
1 teaspoon turmeric
1 teaspoon salt
Good shake of white pepper

Put a kettle of water on to boil and meanwhile brown the onions in some frylight. As they begin to soften, add the rest of the vegetables and top up the pan with boiling water so they are well covered. Then add the cilantro, soup powder and other herbs and spices. Bring back to the boil and leave to simmer for at least an hour. Blitz and serve - or reheat and store in a nice big thermos flask! (By the way, this soup is 0pp - the best kind! I drank 4 cups...!)

Toasty and warm in the succah...

When I planned out my succos menu several weeks ago, tonight's chol hamoed dinner was intended to be 'wrap pizzas' (that Weight Watchers staple!) and oven-baked potato wedges. But as today wore on and I thought about chopping the veggies for the pizza topping, I realised that I was never going to manage to get everyone sitting down to eat at the same time if I needed to make 5 pizzas and a tray of wedges in my little oven at once...

After mulling over a few different possibilities I came up with the idea of calzones, which take up far less space than a pizza. And then it occured to me that if I made them in my sandwich toaster, they would seal much better as well.

I'm pleased to say it was a big success! After making each calzone I slid it into the oven to stay warm as the wedges baked, and we all sat down to eat at once.

INGREDIENTS

1 pack of (3pp) tortilla wraps
1 bag fresh or frozen spinach leaves
1 punnet closed cup mushrooms
2 tomatoes
2 peppers (I used red and yellow for the colour)
2 onions
Frylight
Grated cheese (I used chevington light - the blue bag)

Chop and fry two onions in a little frylight, and while they are softening, wilt the spinach in the microwave. Remove half the onions from the pan and set aside, and then add in the spinach, finishing it off with the onions. Once the spinach mixture is done, remove and set aside. Then add back in the remaining onion and fry with the mushrooms, sliced thinly, until a rich, brown colour. Again, set aside. Finally, fry the chopped peppers until they begin to soften, at which point add in the tomatoes cut into sixths, and fry until they get very soft and fall apart.

You now have 3 different calzone fillings.

Take each wrap and spray with a little frylight. Add a heaped tablespoon of the filling of your choice and sprinkle with 30g light cheese. Fold in half and toast in the sandwich toaster until the cheese begins to sizzle.

And that's it! Each calzone toastie is 5pp if you use 3pp wraps and my suggested amount of light grated cheese. You can also sprinkle some mixed herbs and garlic powder onto the different vegetable fillings as they fry.

Moadim l'simcha!

Low in fat, not low in taste..

I was chatting with someone at the gym last week about my weight loss and was hugely inspired when she told me that she had been overweight as a teenager and kept her weight off for over 30 years! But she mentioned that she cooked very healthily at home, "except for desserts of course", because otherwise her children would complain and be upset...

I felt that this was a bit of a shame and a missed opportunity; since starting this journey myself I must admit that I HAVE changed the kinds of desserts I cook for everyone on Shabbos and Yom Tov, and I don't think that anyone has been worse off for it! Occasionally I'll make a full fat apple crumble, and serve myself a portion with just fruit, but in general we all eat the same and nothing has more than 4pp in it... My Succos dessert menu includes baked apples with sultanas and parev custard; the poached pears in pomegranate juice I described in an earlier blog; and lots of different baked goods served up with sugar-free compotes.

This recipe, for summer fruit mini muffins, is a new one I developed for our pre-Yom Kippur meal, and judging by the oohs and aahs I got, and pleas for seconds, no-one felt deprived by the lack of oil or margarine! I hope your family will enjoy them too.

INGREDIENTS

100g low fat spread (eg Smartbalance)
10g splenda
2 large eggs, beaten
0.5 tsp almond essence
125g flour
3/4 tsp baking powder
Frozen summer fruits

Preheat the oven to 160'c (fan-assisted) and prepare 18 fairy-cake cases in appropriate trays. Combine all the ingredients except the fruit into a smooth batter and drop by heaped teaspoons into the cake cases. Drop about a teaspoon of frozen fruits on top of the batter in each case. Bake for approximately 20 minutes or until cooked through and starting to brown on top.

These are excellent served warm. Less than 2pp each!

Fishing for Compliments

Sometimes I just get bored of making gefilte fish every Shabbos. Not least because my dear husband won't touch the stuff that comes in the freezer ready rolled, and there is a dearth of fishmongers in the area with sensible opening hours.

At times like these, I have a great standby - vegetable fishcakes. Just as low in points as gefilte fish, and actually much less of a palaver to make - no standing over a smelly pot for ages! These are equally nice served hot or cold, and would make an excellent light meal as well as a Friday night starter. They work out at between 1 and 2pp each, depending on how large you make them.

INGREDIENTS

200g potatoes, peeled
150g butternut squash, peeled and chopped
450g frozen plaice fillets - defrosted
1 onion
Salt and pepper to taste
4fld oz matzo meal or fine dried breadcrumbs
0.5 tsp paprika
2 medium eggs
0.5tsp baking powder

Boil the potatoes, onion and butternut squash in a pan of water for about 15 minutes. Add the plaice fillets and continue to cook for another 10 minutes. Drain and cool slightly. Blend the potatoes, vegetables and fish in a food processor and add the remaining ingredients. Roll into balls with damp hands and place on a greased baking tray. Spray the tops with frylight. Bake for 30 minutes on 160'c.

Makes approximately 20 - 24 fishcakes. Can be frozen.

A Lesson in Leftovers - it's a wrap!

Like many people, I'm struggling to finish up the yom tov leftovers in my fridge before it's too late! One of the really successful dishes I turned out over Rosh Hashanah was my smoked salmon salad with avocado salsa - unfortunately I can't show you a picture of my beautiful plating efforts (masterchef eat your heart out) but I can give you the recipe for the salsa and show you what I did with it this evening...

TANGY AVOCADO SALSA

2 medium avocados
Half a cucumber
1 large tomato
2 limes
1 tsp dried dill
2/3 tsp dried mint
1 tsp splenda or other granular sweetener

Peel and chop the avocados and the cucumbers. Place in a bowl and squeeze the limes over them quickly, before the avocado has a chance to turn brown. Stir in the dill, mint and splenda. Add the chopped tomato and mix well. Serve on a bed of smoked salmon as an elegant starter!

Alternatively - spread a tortilla wrap with a teaspoon of low fat mayonnaise and sprinkle some chilli flakes on top. Lay 40g of salmon and 2 tablespoons of the salsa in the centre of the wrap and fold up takeaway-style.

The only thing you need to point in the entire salsa recipe is the avocado itself  - my wrap this evening cost me 6pp in total.

Winning ways with pomegranate juice!

OK so Rosh Hashanah has just ended and ostensibly I'm a bit too late with this pomegranate post. But some of the pomegranate-inspired dishes I came up with this yomtov will definitely bear repeating over Succos, so I thought I'd share them with you!

The base I started with for each recipe was a bottle of Pompure juice - any pomegranate juice will do but try and make sure it is pure juice and not a 'pomegranate juice drink' as this will be much more watery as well as not as good for you, and the resulting flavours won't be anywhere near as intense.

JUDY'S POMEGRANATE MARINADE AND DRESSING

1 bottle pomegranate juice
2 tablespoons splenda or other granular sweetener
3 tablespoons honey
2 teaspoons cornflour

Boil up the pomegranate juice until it is about 50% reduced. Add the sugar and splenda. Take out about a tablespoon of the juice and mix it with the cornflour to form a paste, then stir this back in. Simmer for a few more minutes to thicken and remove from the heat to cool.

POMEGRANATE CHICKEN

Pour the pomegranate marinade over the chicken pieces and leave for about 6 hours. Bake covered on 160' for 90 minutes, then uncover for a further 30 minutes. Scatter with pomegranate seeds before serving.

WARM SALMON SALAD

Bake cubes of salmon in a sauce of equal parts honey and soy sauce with a sprinkling of garlic powder. Serve on a bed of spinach leaves with grilled cherry tomatoes, and pour over some of the warmed pomegranate dressing.

The pomegranate dressing is also excellent served cold as a regular salad dressing with the veggies of your choosing!

POACHED PEARS IN POMEGRANATE JUICE

1 bottle pomegranate juice
2 cinnamon sticks
6 conference pears

Peel the pears and sliced a little off the bottom so they are able to stand upright. Place in a pan and cover completely with the pomegranate juice. Add the cinnamon sticks to the pan as well. Bring to the boil and simmer until the pears are a deep pink colour and the flesh is tender.

Serve warm in a dish with a little juice. Goes beautifully with meringues.

Bolognese Light - Dare to be Different!

Before I started Weight Watchers my family used to eat quite a lot of red meat; probably twice during the week and then again on Shabbos. Apart from the fact that it's not very healthy , red meat is quite expensive, so switching us over from the cow to the chicken was probably one of the best things I've done. These days, I barely ever need to buy any beef - one packet of goulash meat stretches to about a month's worth of cholent (for which my fat-free recipe will no doubt be appearing one day soon...)

In fact, nearly every recipe that calls for beef or lamb will work just as well with chicken or turkey instead, particularly when it comes to mince.

This recipe for chicken bolognese is so much lighter than the traditional ragu sauce in every way - less calories, less fat, but just as much taste. It's softer and stickier to work with than minced beef, and obviously paler in colour - but besides that, you can barely tell the difference.

MOCK BOLOGNESE SAUCE

Ingredients

2lb minced chicken
1 tin chopped tomatoes
1 carton passata
1 large white onion
1/2 punnet of small closed cap mushrooms
1 tsp bisto gravy original powder
Mixed dried herbs
2 garlic cloves
Salt and pepper to taste

Finely chop the onion, garlic and mushrooms and fry in spray oil until starting to soften. Then add the meat and break up with a fork until well mixed with the vegetables and about 80-90% of it has cooked through.
Add the chopped tomatoes and passata, followed by the bisto and herbs. Mix well and lower flame to a steady simmer. Cover and leave to cook for about 45 minutes. Can be served immediately or refrigerated/frozen and reheated (once defrosted) for 45 minutes on 160'c.

Serves 6 at around 4pp per very large portion!

Judy's Fudgy Chocolate Brownie Squares

My little girl turned 3 today and I couldn't decide whether or not to carve out a sizeable chunk of my propoints allowance for what would probably be a miniscule slither of her bakery-bought birthday cake.

Fortunately, I did some baking of my own this morning, and it occurred to me that one of my fudgy chocolate brownie squares would make a very satisfactory alternative while everyone else tucked into the 'proper cake' - all for a very respectable 2pp... (though in the end of course I did a fair amount of fondant-icing picking and cream-filling swiping, so it was lucky I had some extra propoints floating about as emergency cover!).

This chocolate brownie cake is lovely and moist and very quick and easy to make. It goes extremely well with ice cream, a bit of squirty cream, or lightly warmed with some 0pp fruit compote.

JUDY'S FUDGY CHOCOLATE BROWNIE SQUARES

Ingredients

2 large eggs
1 egg white
1/3 cup unsweetened applesauce
1/2 cup plain flour
3/4 cup splenda
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
Pinch of salt
4 tablespoons ground almonds
1 heaped teaspoon coffee granules dissolved in 4fld oz hot water
8 tablespoons cocoa powder
1 tsp vanilla essence

Beat the eggs, egg white and applesauce till smooth and add in the dry ingredients. Mix well. Stir in the coffee and vanilla essence and beat again till no lumps remain. The mixture will be extremely runny - don't panic. Pour into a greased 8 x 6" tin and bake for 30 minutes in an oven preheated to 160'c. Leave for 5 minutes then turn out onto a wire rack. Cool and cut into 18 small squares of 2pp each.

Serve warm or at room temperature.

A bit of a squash in here!

I haven't made any soup other than the obligatory chicken for ages. After a winter of having it for lunch every single day, enough was enough!

But now that yom tov is on the horizon, it's time to get a bit more adventurous with my soup flavours - there are only so many nights in a row you can eat chicken soup with kneidlach without turning into a giblet...

Butternut squash has already come up once in this blog and it'll probably come up again before too long - it's such a versatile veggie, I can't really get enough of it! I have to confess I am lazy though - after a bad experience trying to peel and chop an entire squash, I now buy them ready prepared. It's one of those things I like to pass off as a 'necessary expense'.

When I put this soup on my Rosh Hashanah menu I planned to prepare it as a straightforward Butternut Squash Soup - but when I took out my saucepan this morning I was overcome with the urge to zing it up a bit. The result was surprisingly different and delicious!

GINGER AND ORANGE BNS SOUP

Ingredients

1kg chopped and peeled BNS cubes
1 large onion, roughly chopped
2 sticks of celery, sliced  
5 cups of water
3 teaspoons chicken stock
0.5 teaspoons dried ginger
2 garlic cloves, crushed
3 dessert spoons freshly squeezed orange juice
2 cubes frozen coriander
Salt and pepper to taste
Spring onion to garnish

Put all the ingredients in a pan and bring to the boil. Simmer for about 30 minutes until all the vegetables are soft. Blend and add more water if it's too thick for your tastes. Serve garnished with spring onions and some onion and garlic croutons.

This soup serves 6 and works out as 0pp a bowl (though it may come to 1pp for more than a bowlful!)

Freezes well.

Honey and spice and all things nice...

During my first year on Weight Watchers when the weather turned colder, I found I started to get hungrier in the evenings and crave warm, comforting food. Because my propoints allowance didn't automatically increase as the temperature dropped though, I had to find ways to 'make do', and that's when I first discovered the joys of baked fruit. A baked apple with some raisins and a splodge of custard is heavenly for only 2pp, for example. But why stop there? There are so many fruits that taste amazing after spending some time in the oven, particularly, I've found, those with stones at their centre.

This evening I was looking for a dessert idea to follow my curry, and this is what I came up with. It was just the right blend of spicy but refreshing, filling but light, and tasted absolutely delicious for 0pp (or 1pp if you decide to use the meringues).

BAKED SPICED FRUIT BLEND (serves 2)

INGREDIENTS

1 apple
2 yellow plums
2 apricots
0.5tsp mixed allspice
0.25tsp ground ginger
1 cinnamon stick
Seeds from 5 dried cardamom pods
10g honey
Frylight

Chop the fruit and place in a baking dish. Sprinkle the spices over the top and spray with a little frylight. Drizzle the honey on top. Cover and bake for 40 minutes on 150'c.

I served these with three Walkers meringue stars per person and a small amount of Gefen sugar-free chocolate syrup.

Currying favour...

The beauty of a takeaway lies mainly in its 'instantaneousness' and the lack of effort involved - you phone in the order, answer the door to the delivery guy, bung it on a plate (or not...) and you're all set.

Making a 'fakeaway' is always going to involve some effort on the part of the cook. But all the fakeaway recipes I've tried out from the Weight Watchers Community Swap can be made in advance and frozen, which does create a helpful sense of immediacy on the day you want to eat them! Some of the recipes, the curries in particular, taste even better when given some time to mature.

As I know I won't have time to cook tomorrow evening, I made this fakeaway in advance, right after Shabbos ended. My 'chicken jalfrezi' curry, prepared using the fabulous recipe Kuli80 posted on Weight Watchers some months ago, is now sitting neatly in the fridge in a takeaway-style foil container - all I have left to do before Sunday night's dinner is to cook some rice to go with it, and heat it up.

FAKEAWAY CHICKEN JALFREZI

Serves 2

INGREDIENTS

355g chicken breast, cut into strips
1 onion
1 green pepper
1 chilli pepper
1 tsp dried ginger or 1" fresh ginger root, chopped
1 garlic clove finely chopped
225ml chicken stock
2 tspns lemon juice
0.5 tspn salt
1 tin of tomatoes
1 tblspn tomato puree
1 tsp splenda or sugar
2 tspns garam masala
2 tspns ground coriander
2 cubes frozen, chopped coriander leaves

Fry the onion in some frylight in your actifry or wok. Meanwhile mix together the tinned tomatoes, chicken stock, tomato puree, chilli pepper, ginger root, lemon juice, salt, splenda, garam masala and ground coriander. When the onions are softened, add the sauce to the pan and simmer until bubbling and slightly thickened. Add the chicken pieces, chopped pepper and frozen coriander leaves and continue to simmer until cooked through (about 15 to 20 minutes in an actifry). Serve with rice (or miracle rice); you can also use a wrap in place of the more authentic chapati or naan bread (having never seen either those in a kosher store unfortunately...yet!)

The only ingredient that needs 'pointing' here is the chicken, so it comes in at a very low 5pp per person.

Showing "wonton" disregard for fat content....

With Rosh Hashanah and Succos looming I have been thinking lots about my yom tov menus. I recently posted on the Weight Watchers boards, asking for suggestions of low fat alternatives for vol au vents as a starter. Someone came back to me with the idea of 'filo baskets' - placing sheets of filo pastry in muffin cases and baking them to use as a little container for my filling of choice (mushrooms). As filo pastry is very thin though, I realised I'd need to use quite a few sheets to achieve a solid basket, and the points value wouldn't differ very much from a pastry vol au vent case.

Eventually, I came up with the idea of using wonton wraps to make the baskets instead (thanks mum, for that inspiration!). Each wonton wrap is only 1pp and you only need one per basket so it's a fantastic low points alternative. These look great and I think they'll make a perfect hors d'oevres for a Yom Tov meal.

MUSHROOM BASKETS

INGREDIENTS

1 packet of Gefen wonton wraps
2 punnets of closed cup mushrooms
1 large onion
Chicken soup powder
Frylight
Pepper, garlic powder to taste

To make the mushrooms: wash and slice the mushrooms and finely chop the onion. Place in a roasting dish and spray with frylight. Mix in 2 teaspoons of chicken soup powder, cover and bake for 40 minutes on 160'. Add garlic powder and pepper to taste if required. Set aside to cool completely.

To make the baskets, defrost the wonton wraps and spray a muffin baking tray with frylight. Push one wrap into each hole in the baking tray, then spray again. Bake for around 7 to 8 minutes on 200' but keep an eye on them as they burn quickly.

Once they turn golden brown, remove from the oven and leave them to cool.

And that's it! Once both the filling and the cases have cooled completely, put a teaspoon of filling in each basket. You can freeze them like this if you prefer to make them in advance.

In search of the perfect chocolate chip cookie

The title of this blog is a little misleading because I already discovered the perfect chocolate chip cookie about 19 years ago when I was in seminary in Israel. Every erev Shabbos I used to go to the (now sadly defunct) "Croissanterie" bakery in Jerusalem and buy a bag of their white chocolate chip and double chocolate chip varieties. They were meant to last the whole weekend but were inevitably all gone by the end of the evening - I dread to think how many propoints I must've been consuming in one fell swoop there!

Since then I have had an abiding love for chocolate chip cookies (who doesn't?!) and was pleased to see a recipe for a propoints friendly version on the Weight Watchers website. Always keen to get more for less though, I've adapted the recipe quite a bit - my cookies are bigger, for less points, and I use white chocolate chips and cranberries (because that's the sort of thing the Croissanterie would have done).

These are super easy to make and they store beautifully in a tupperware container. I'm sure they can be frozen as well, but I've never tried because they just don't last long enough...

WHITE CHOCOLATE CHIP AND CRANBERRY COOKIES

INGREDIENTS

50g low fat spread
4 tablespoons sugar-free applesauce
2 teaspoons vanilla essence
A good pinch of salt
200g plain flour
0.5 tsp baking powder
20g splenda
2 medium eggs
70g white chocolate chips
80g dried cranberries

Cream the spread, applesauce and splenda and stir in the vanilla, salt and beaten egg. Sift in the flour and baking powder. Finish by folding in the cranberries and chocolate chips.

Drop heaped teaspoons onto baking trays covered with baking parchment, leaving space between each cookie. Bake in an oven preheated to 170' (or 190' for non-fan assisted ovens). Cool on the trays for about 2 minutes and then remove with a spatula.

Makes 24 cookies (2pp each).

Fat-free potato kugel - a contradiction in terms? Erm - no actually!

This recipe for fat-free potato kugel was first introduced to me by my friend and colleague Leah. I soon realised that I had the cookbook it comes from - Nechama Cohen's 'Enlitened Kosher Cooking' - sitting idly on my bookshelf from a time I reviewed it for The Jewish Chronicle many moons ago. I guarantee you that no-one eating it will be able to tell  it contains no oil whatsoever - it's just as fluffy, golden and delicious as the next potato kugel!

I've made a few minor adaptations to the recipe which mean I can turn it out even more quickly, and I often serve it as mini 'kugelettes' rather than one big kugel, as you'll see from the image below.

FAT FREE POTATO KUGEL

INGREDIENTS

5 to 6 medium white potatoes, peeled        
1 large onion
2 egg whites
2 large eggs
1 tablespoon chicken stock powder
2fld oz boiling water
Salt and pepper to taste
2 tablespoons white flour (the original recipe called for wholemeal or soy flour but that was a step too far for my shabbos table!)

Preheat the oven to 160'c (or 180' if not fan-assisted).

Chop the onion in a food processor then immediately switch to the grating attachment and grate the potatoes. Quickly add the eggs and egg whites to prevent the raw potatoes from going grey. Dissolve the stock powder in the water and stir in to the mixture along with the rest of the ingredients. Turn into a tin sprayed with frylight and spray the top of the kugel with frylight to help it crisp up.

Bake for 70 minutes for one large kugel, 55 minutes for 3 loaf tin kugels, or 45 to 50 minutes for 'kugelettes' (makes around 16 to 20 in fairy cake cases, of 1pp each).

Can be frozen.

A Fishy Story...

Today's recipe is one I've been making for years; a version of my Grandma's 'salmon kakletten', (or salmon patties for the non-Yiddish speakers among you).

It's a great example of how you can lighten the calorie load of so many different types of foods - I switch the salmon for tuna, cut down on the eggs, and bake instead of fry and - hey presto! - less than 1pp each!

As an accompaniment I've started making 'cauliflower mash' - a concoction I discovered on the Weight Watchers boards that is surprisingly close to mashed potatoes in both taste and texture...it doesn't even smell like cauliflower.  The original recipe calls for Light Philadelphia which I believe has an OU(D) hechsher - I use J&J reduced fat whipping cream cheese, which is very light on the points. For those whose minhag (Jewish custom) is not to eat dairy and fish at the same meal, you could try replacing the cream cheese with tofutti, or just low fat spread (but you do lose out on the potato-like texture without the cheese).

TUNA AND RED ONION MINI BURGERS

INGREDIENTS

390g drained tuna in brine (about 3 cans)
70g dried breadcrumbs
20g low fat mayonnaise
1 large egg
2 egg whites
Tablespoon mixed herbs
1 red onion finely chopped
1 tsp chilli flakes (optional)
Salt and pepper to taste

Mix all the ingredients well and shape into small patties. Place on a baking sheet greased with frylight and spray the top of each patty as well to help them crisp up. Bake for 30 mins in an oven preheated to 160' (fan assisted). Makes between 22 and 26 mini patties of just under 1pp each (today I made 26 in total and ate 6 of them for 5pp).

CAULIFLOWER MASH

INGREDIENTS

8 to 10oz frozen cauliflower florets
30g light cream cheese
Paprika, pepper, salt

Boil the cauliflower until very soft, then drain and stir in the cream cheese. Blitz with a hand blender until smooth and creamy. Add salt and pepper to taste, then top with a little paprika and bake alongside the tuna burgers until ready to eat! As far as I'm concerned, this makes enough for one person, and it's just 1pp.

Simple doesn't have to mean boring!

Monday night is always chicken night in my house - I'm a bit predictable like that!

In the winter months I prefer to do something hearty and warming with chicken pieces in the crockpot, but in summer, some form of joint that you can potentially eat with your fingers seems more appropriate: Here are two ridiculously simple ways of preparing chicken drumsticks, along with an idea for making 'low fat' roast potatoes.


CORNFLAKES CHICKEN

INGREDIENTS

4 skinless chicken drumsticks (approximately 400g)
40g cornflakes crumbs
1 teaspoon hot paprika or chilli flakes (optional)
2 egg whites

Coat the chicken in the egg whites then place in a pan. Mix the paprika or chilli flakes into the cornflake crumbs and sprinkle over the chicken until covered. If you prefer, you could put the crumbs into a plastic bag and give the chicken pieces a good shake in there, to ensure they're coated on both sides.

Then bake uncovered for 90 minutes on 160' (fan assisted).

This serves 2 adults or older children, and is 6-7pp per person, depending on the weight of the chicken.

LEMON CHICKEN PROVENCAL

INGREDIENTS

4 skinless chicken drumsticks (approximately 400g)
Juice of 2 lemons
2 teaspoons mixed dried herbs
1 teaspoon dried parsley
2 cubes of frozen coriander (Dorot style)
0.5 teaspoons garlic powder
0.5 teaspoons paprika

Mix the herbs and spices with the lemon juice and place with the chicken in a plastic freezer bag. Rub the marinade into the chicken well and leave for about 6 to 8 hours in the fridge. Then bake for 90 minutes covered, in a preheated 160' fan-assisted oven, and an additional 15 to 20 minutes uncovered, until nicely browned.

LOW FAT ROAST POTATO CHUNKS

INGREDIENTS

3 or 4 medium white potatoes, cut into sixths but not peeled  
3 tablespoons light mayonnaise
2 tablespoons onion powder

Spray a roasting pan with frylight and add the potato chunks in a single layer. Mix the mayonnaise with the onion soup powder and coat the potatoes thoroughly with the mixture. Roast for 90 minutes at 160'.

Serves around 4 adults as a small side dish, approximately 4pp per person.

Make it AND fake it..

Once upon a time, long long ago, in the days before Weight Watchers, when Marcus still sat on his deckchair outside his infamous kosher Chinese Takeaway on Finchley Road, Sunday night was takeaway night. All I had to decide on was a number 25 (sweet and sour chicken) or a number 42 (beef chow mein) and I was set.

I don't remember what I ate for dinner on my first Sunday on Propoints, but I have a feeling it was fairly miserable. Luckily, it wasn't too long before I stumbled on the 'Fakeaway' concept, courtesy of two ladies on the WW boards (known only as 'GreenBronte1' and 'Kuli80'). Armed with their incredible recipes for Chinese and Indian fakeaways, and my trusty actifry, Sunday nights were transformed once again into a cornucopia of culinary delights.

I started off serving these 'fakeaway' dishes with either noodles or rice, but recently stumbled across the amazing 'miracle' rice and noodle products (on sale via Amazon or for slightly fewer £££ in Kosher Kingdom). If you can get over them looking and feeling a little bit like worms, and focus on the fact that each bag contains only 5 calories, then they're a really incredible way of bulking up your dish and allowing you more points to spend on the good stuff.

Tonight's 'Fakeaway' is my own invented 'Hot n Sour soup' recipe followed by Lemon Chicken (thank you once again to GreenBronte1). I really do think it's better than anything even Marcus could rustle up - with far less oil and not even a hint of MSG. The entire recipe comes to 2pp for the soup and just over 14pp for the chicken (for a 328g packet of chicken breast), so assuming you're cooking for 2 adults, it's an 8pp meal (more if you use rice or noodles).

LEMON CHICKEN

I make this in my actifry, which is great for thickening the sauce and cultivating that 'gloopy' takeaway consistency, but it can just as easily be made in a wok or even a frying pan.

INGREDIENTS

1 egg white
1 packet of chicken breast cut in strips (I buy the chicken stir-fry packets from 'Menachems')
3 tspns cornflour
Salt
2 tspns sesame oil
3 tablespoons lemon juice
Lemon zest (I'm often lazy about this and miss it out)                          
100ml chicken stock
1 heaped teaspoon splenda
2 tblspns Heinz reduced sugar and salt ketchup
1 tblspn soy sauce
2 tblspns sherry
1 clove garlic
1 red chilli pepper
4 spring onions

Combine the egg white, 2 tspns of cornflour, salt, sesame oil and chicken in a bowl. Coat chicken well and leave for 20 minutes to marinade.

Spray the actifry (or wok) with frylight. Fry the chicken for a few minutes and stir to prevent it sticking.

When the chicken is cooked through, remove it from the pan. Add the stock, lemon juice and zest, splenda, soy sauce, ketchup and sherry. Mix and add chopped garlic clove and chilli pepper. Bring to the boil, and add a paste made of the remaining cornflour with a little water. Simmer till thickened, then add the chicken back in, along with the spring onions, shredded or chopped, and cook until warmed through.

Lovely served with rice or 'miracle rice'.

HOT n SOUR SOUP

I literally threw this together at the last minute from ingredients I had in the kitchen; it's probably not even vaguely authentic but it tastes great and is extremely low in points, so why not?!

INGREDIENTS

500ml leftover Shabbos chicken soup
1 tin of bamboo shoots
Handful of sliced mushrooms
1 tablespoon of soy sauce
1 tablespoon rice vinegar
1/3 cup water
2 spring onions
1 teaspoon sesame oil
1 slice chicken breast deli meat
Pepper and garlic powder to taste

Bring the chicken soup to the boil, add soy sauce, vinegar, sesame oil and water, followed by the bamboo shoots and mushrooms. Bring back to the boil and simmer till mushrooms begin to soften. Add in spring onions and deli meat (cut into strips), season to taste and simmer till fully cooked. Serves 2.

Budgets, binges and butternut squash

If there's one thing I've learnt over the last 16 months of my 'Weight Watchers journey' it's the concept of balancing a food budget.

So yes - today is Friday and I fully intend to eat my fluffy homemade challah with mayonnaise later, along with the requisite gefilte fish, chicken soup and kneidlach, roast chicken with 'all the trimmings' (and those chocolate madeleines to finish!). But if I don't want to end up going overboard, I have to compensate elsewhere - at lunchtime to be precise.

Today's blog offering can't really be called a 'recipe' as such, but rather an indication of how it's possible to eat light at lunchtime, while still starting off with an EXTREMELY full bowl of appetising and very filling food.

To give credit where it's due, the salad dressing below was created by my friend Gina and it has literally reinvented my lunchtime menu - no longer do I need to scrounge around for a propoint to cover a mayonnaise dressing, Gina's dressing is 0pp and it is the perfect complement to practically every salad in existence!

Chef's Salad with Sesame Dressing and Butternut Squash Chips

Ingredients: mixed salad leaves, red onion, cucumber, cherry tomatoes, pickled cucumber spears, pickled beetroot slices, sliced baby carrots and 2 pieces Tivall 'roast chicken' style deli slices.

Dressing: Good squeeze of lemon juice, tablespoon of soy sauce, 3 drops of sesame oil, shake of garlic powder. Optional: up to 5g of honey.

Butternut squash chips: Arrange cubed butternut squash on a baking tray and spray with frylight. Sprinkle with hot paprika if you like your chips spicy. Bake for 40 minutes on 200'c and serve with Heinz reduced salt and sugar ketchup

As you can see from the pictures, this meal is enormous - but in WW terms it only 'eats' 2 of your propoints allowance and will keep you full till Shabbos!