Pesach starts here!!

Over the next few days I hope to blog lots of my Pesach recipes, as I go along in the kitchen. Apart from chargrilling my thumb while preparing chicken breasts, coming up with this recipe is about the most exciting thing that's happened to me today! I often make baked apples with a crunchy oat topping, and wanted to come up with a pp friendly alternative for Pesach. See what you think - each apple is 2pp in total and makes a special, but really healthy, dessert for your yom tov meal.

INGREDIENTS

7 medium Braeburn apples
60g sultanas
20g honey
40g pistachio nuts
25g dessicated coconut
1 tablespoon powdered sweetener
25g potato flour
Spray oil

Core the apples - if you can, leave a little bit in the base of each apple so the hole doesn't go all the way through and the filling doesn't fall out! Mix the sultanas with the honey and stuff into the centre of each apple.

In a food processor, combine pistachio nuts, coconut, potato flour and sweetener until the mixture resembles a crumble topping.  Place each apple in a little foil dish - I used mini pie dishes scrunched around them to fit the shape, but you could make these yourself out of tin foil.Spray each apple with spray oil and sprinkle 10g of topping over the top - press down gently with the back of a spoon. Place all the apples in a larger dish with about an inch of water at the bottom. Bake at 180' for 30 minutes. Can be frozen and reheated. (NB you will have a little topping left over).

How low can you go? 2pp lunch!

I've been seeing recipes for risotto everywhere I look recently; I even made a super declicious one from last month's Weight Watchers magazine - but it was 9pp a portion and I don't often like spending that much on a meal during the week.

Yesterday in a moment of inspiration I did some googling and found a method of making risotto with miracle rice. The resulting dish was only 2pp and it was incredibly filling and really tasted like proper risotto. The broccoli soup is 0pp a portion (2pp for the whole thing) and the broad beans gave it a creamy consistency that I really enjoyed.

BROCCOLI AND BROAD BEAN SOUP

650g frozen broccoli
1 onion, chopped
1 leek, sliced
1 sachet 10 calorie Knorr 'chicken' soup
Salt, pepper to taste
2 garlic cloves, chopped
80g broad beans

Add all the ingredients to a large saucepan. Cover with boiling water but stop just before you reach the surface of the broccoli - as it is frozen it will start to shrink very quickly and if you add too much water at this point the soup will be watery. Simmer until all the veggies are cooked and softened, then blitz with a handblender. Makes 5 portions.

LEEK, MUSHROOM and 'CHICKEN' RISOTTO

1 leek, finely sliced
Half a punnet of mushrooms, sliced
1 bag miracle rice
1/3 tsp onion soup powder
90g firm silken tofu
15g light grated cheese
 Fry light

Rinse the miracle rice well and dry fry in a saucepan for 3 to 5 minutes. Add half a cup of  boiling water and the onion soup powder, and leave to cook until the liquid has reduced by at least a half.

Meanwhile fry the leek and mushrooms in frylight. Just before they are completely ready, add in the tofu and crumble into small pieces as you stirfry. Pour the contents of the pan into the reduced miracle rice and stir in the cheese. Serves 1 - large portion, as a side dish this could stretch to 2 people.

Night vision

I've been getting bored of my veggie side dishes so decided to have a go at 'down-sizing' a Jewish classic this morning - glazed carrots or tzimmes if you like. This was so easy it was laughable and really delicious. It's 1pp for a quarter of this recipe but that would be a very large portion and as it's quite sweet, you probably don't need that much at all.

INGREDIENTS

5 large carrots, peeled and sliced
25g low fat spread
20g agave nectar or honey
Dried dill

Put the carrots in a large pan and cover with water. Bring to the boil and simmer on a fast burn until they soften and a lot of the water has been absorbed / evaporated.

Drain the carrots and stir in the low fat spread and honey/nectar. Sprinkle a generous tablespoon of dill over the surface.

Purim Sameach!

Thought I would just blog these 2 recipes in the hope of making your Purim a little easier and a little more propoints friendly! The challah recipe is not particularly 'dietetic' - but my idea of creating a pull-apart bread will help; I don't especially like challah rolls as it's too much crust and not enough 'inside' for me - with the pull-apart challah you get the advantage of a self-contained piece that is 4pp, but also the advantage that it's been baked as part of a bigger loaf, so still has the softness of a slice of challah.

The Hamantons are a more of an idea than a recipe really - but I'm quite proud of them as they are INCREDIBLY yummy and extremely low in propoints :-). Any readers of this blog who aren't Jewish and not interested in purim - make these anyway, any old shape you want to! Trust me they are worth it.


PURIM CHALLAH

INGREDIENTS

675g strong white bread flour
50g granulated sugar
1 heaped teaspoon salt
1 sachet dry yeast
3 tablespoons oil
2 eggs
11fl oz water
1 cup sultanas

Mix the dry ingredients in a large bowl and make a well in the centre. Pour in the wet ingredients. Mix with a wooden spoon until a dough just starts to form. Add the sultanas and continue to mix, switching to kneading by hand when the spoon becomes impossible to move about. Knead until a strong, elastic dough has formed. Place in a greased bowl and cover with a teatowel. Leave in a warm place for about an hour.

I made one large challah and one pull-apart one from this amount of dough. I divided the dough mix into two, and then one batch into 4 to make the large challah, and the other part into 10 equal sized balls. Roll out the balls into a strand, then knot and place in a 'flower' shape in a greased tin.

Glaze with egg white.

Bake the pull apart challah on 180'c for about 22 minutes, and give the larger challah about 5 minutes longer.

JUST BEFORE SERVING (not pictured): melt some honey in the microwave and brush onto the surface of the challah. Sprinkle liberally with 100s and 1000s (coloured sprinkles).



HAMANTONS

1 packet round wonton wrappers
1 bag frozen apple slices
Vanilla, splenda, cinnamon
Egg white
Icing sugar

Make the filling by either cooking up the apple slices on the stove top till soft, or baking them in the oven (covered) for about 45 minutes. Blitz and add splenda, cinnamon and vanilla essence to taste.

When cooled, put a teaspoon in the centre of each wonton wrapper. Fold up like a hamantasch. Brush the surface with beaten egg white.

Bake on 200'c for about 10 to 12 minutes until starting to crisp up and dust with icing sugar before serving.

2pp per every 3 hamantons!



Wishing you all a purim sameach!

Just add hot water...

This lunch recipe is my take on a healthy pot noodle - it required a bit of advance preparation but the final steps of heating it up at work were easy peasy. And it's so low in propoints!

INGREDIENTS

A few slices of mushroom
2 spring onions sliced
5 pieces of baby corn, halved (tinned or fresh)
A handful of frozen, cut green beans
1 sachet 10 cal parev chicken soup
1 packet miracle rice
1 sachet (or tablespoon) soy sauce
100g firm silken tofu, roughly chopped

Cook the mushrooms and the green beans in the microwave till almost dehydrated. If using fresh baby corns cook them too. Drain the packet of miracle rice and dry fry until all the water on the surface of the non-stick pan has been absorbed (about 4 minutes on a full flame, stirring continuously). Place the cooked veggies and the miracle rice in the bottom of a lidded soup cup or a tupperware container and stir in the spring onion. Pack the chopped tofu separately, and take along the soy sauce sachet and the soup sachet. At lunchtime, add the contents of both sachets and the tofu to the cup, and add boiling water to cover. Leave to sit for a few seconds so the rice and the dried out veggies reabsorb the water. Stir and enjoy! (NOTE: the water will cool quite quickly because of the volume of other ingredients in the cup, so you may wish to give it a quick blast in the microwave before eating).

The only propointed ingredient here is the tofu, which is 1pp. Great for a day when you need to keep your pp values low for a meal out - or add some crackers or a tortilla wrap to bulk out the meal. So much nicer than a shop bought instant soup pot could ever be!

Happy Purim!!

OK there are still about 10 days to go till Purim is actually upon us - but hey, we're in the right month so let's bake Hamantaschen!

These are totally fat free and only 2pp each. It's a recipe I found online somewhere last year, my first Purim on Weight Watchers. I'd like to be able to give credit where it's due but I can't actually remember where it came from.

Happy Purim one and all!

INGREDIENTS

200g white flour
80g sugar free applesauce
0.5 tsp vanilla essence
1/4 tsp salt
1 tblspn skimmed milk or water (I used water)
1 tsp baking powder
50g white sugar
6g splenda
1 egg white
Reduced sugar jam - approximately 8 tspns

Mix applesauce, sugar, splenda and egg white in a bowl. Stir in the flour, baking powder and salt, and then finally add the vanilla and the milk/water. Mix and knead into a sticky ball of dough and chill for 1 hour.

Divide into 16 balls and roll out to small circles approximately 3.5 inches across. Place half a teaspoon jam in the centre of each one and pinch closed into triangles. Bake on a greased cookie sheet for 15 minutes (check after 10) on 375'c.

An absolutely perfect dinner!

For the past few weeks I have really not been 'feeling' my Tuesday night dinner of tuna burgers, swede mash and green beans. It'd be great if I was sitting down to eat with the rest of the family, but I only get in at about 9pm on a Tuesday and I just want something hot, filling and 'straight away'! So this morning I decided to make myself a vegetarian-style stew that I could have piping hot and ready for me the moment I walked in the door. After spending 2 hours in the freezing cold, it was incredibly welcome!

BUTTERNUT, CHICK PEA AND LENTIL STEW

INGREDIENTS - serves 1, 6pp

Half a butternut squash
Small red onion
5 mushrooms, sliced
5 cherry tomatoes
2 'lumps' of frozen spinach
100g tinned chick peas
20g dried puy lentils
15g light grated cheese
1/4 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp coriander
1/2 tsp paprika
2 cloves garlic, chopped

Preheat the oven to 180' and place the butternut squash on a baking tray. Spray with frylight and bake until soft, approximately 45 minutes.

Place the puy lentils in a pan of boiling water and cook till soft. Drain.

Fry the onion, mushrooms and garlic in frylight until starting to soften. Add the frozen spinach and cherry tomatoes and continue to fry over a medium heat until the spinach has totally defrosted and wilted slightly, and the tomatoes start to burst open. Stir in the spices and the drained chickpeas and continue to fry for about 5 minutes longer. Drain the cooked lentils and stir in. Remove from the heat.

Remove the butternut from the oven, peel and cut into chunks. Stir into the stew with the 15g cheese. Serve immediately or reheat before serving in the oven or microwave.