Smoked mackerel, fried cherry tomatoes and fine beans

It has been a bit of a long day for me today and my boyfriend didn't really feel like cooking anything that took too much time either. In the end we decided to have smoked mackerel, as it didn't need much cooking at all and can be ready in about 10 minutes.

Ingredients:

1 pack of trimmed fine green beans

1 pack of smoked mackerel

1/2 can of tomatoes

1 - 2 garlic cloves, finely sliced (or 3 if you like it very garlicky like us)

Small handful fresh basil, roughly chopped

1 pinch of chilli flakes

1 teaspoon of sugar

Salt and pepper

1 pack of cherry tomatoes

Oil

Method:

1. Boil some water and cook the beans for approximately 4 - 5 minutes in boiling water and drain when cooked through.
2. Flake the smoked mackerel and put to one side.
3. Put a frying pan on a medium heat and add a little oil to the pan. Add the garlic and cherry tomatoes and fry for 2 minutes until the tomatoes have started to soften.
4. Add the tomatoes, chilli flakes, sugar and cook through for another few minutes.
5. Add the chopped basil to the sauce, stir through and take off the heat.
6. Serve the beans, mackerel and cover with the cherry tomato sauce.

Cinnamon Rolls

A while back, I saw a recipe for cinnamon buns and decided I wanted to bake something this weekend as I hadn't for a while. I'm trying not to bake as much, in a bid to shed a couple of pounds before I go on holiday in June. 

For my first ever attempt at cinnamon rolls, I don't think they turned out too bad. I will definitely make them again and there are a couple of tweaks that I would make. I was going to make a healthier version I'd see, but decided as I hadn't made anything like this in a while that I would just make this instead.

They did turn out quite large, so I think potentially I would prefer to make smaller ones next time. These are ok as a treat, but I don't think I could get away with eating these all the time. They did taste nice though and were sweet but not overly sweet.

You can find the recipe that I used here over on Lauren's Latest . I think it was easy to follow and didn't really take much effort. Definitely one I will be trying again. These also went down a treat in my house, so it's already on the request list to make again at some point!

Meal Plan 21/04/13 - 27/04/13

This week, we have decided to eat a little more meat than we have been recently. We saw some rib eye steaks on offer so decided it would be good to treat ourselves a little bit. We're still trying to vary our diet, so we have tried to incorporate some fish into our meal plan for this week. We're also eating at my mums on Sunday too, so we've got 6 meals planned for this week.

Meal Plan 21/04/13 to 27/04/13

Cod in chorizo sauce with tender stem broccoli and fine beans

Turkey mince chilli

Jacket potatoes with turkey chilli

Bacon and mixed pepper frittata

Smoked mackerel with fine beans and roasted cherry tomatoes

Rib eye steaks with potato wedges

Shopping List

Item Price 

2 x ribeye steaks (2 for £7 offer) £7.00

Bacon ( £4 for 2 x 10 rashers) - 1 packet £2.00

Small white cabbage £0.64

Low fat mayo (250 ml) £0.48

1 carrot (0.12 kg) £0.11

Seeded Batch £1.50

GF Bread £2.48

Carver Ham £6.00

Bananas (1.755kg) £1.19

Asda satsumas (600 g) £1.00

Turkey thigh mince (450 g) £2.22

chilli beans £0.48

Frozen mixed peppers  (500 g) £0.55

2 x jacket potatoes (approx 0.67 kg) £0.87

Frozen mixed peppers  (500 g) £1.00

Onions £1.00

Baked beans £0.68

Mackerel £3.00

Fine Beans £1.00

Cherry Tomatoes £1.20

Napolina hard cheese £1.30

Asda extra special chorizo £2.00

Chopped tomatoes x 2 £0.78

tender stem broccoli and fine beans £1.20

2 x cod £4.00

Apples (0.67 kg) £1.31

Milk £1.00

Basmati rice (500 g) £1.08

Total  £47.07

Checked on asda.com on 21/04/13

Leftovers from the previous week: cornflakes, porridge oats, potatoes, eggs, tomato purée, garlic

Breakfast: cornflakes, porridge oats, bacon, eggs

Lunch: sandwiches, leftovers

Snacks: bananas, satsumas

Bangers and mash with onion gravy

So we had some leftover gluten free sausages in the freezer, so decided that we would have bangers and mash. It's sometimes good to have something easy and comforting. Also, I do like to have sausages every now and again. 

We cooked our sausages in the oven. Fried some onions on a low light and used Anthony Worrall Thompsons Gravy and served with some home made mashed potatoes with milk and butter. We do make our own gravy, but sometimes it's good to have something that takes no effort.

This time we used Asda's Butchers Selection Gluten Free Pork Sausages, they were 2 packets for £3.50 when we bought them (I checked this on 18/04/13 and they still had the offer on). These sausages tasted nice, had a nice texture and had 72% British pork in them. I would definitely buy these sausages again, particularly because they weren't expensive when buying 2 packs. I must admit though that I do also like D&A Pork Sausages Harrogate. They are 97%, extremely meaty and taste great, but are that little bit more expensive at £2.60. 

Keralan prawns

We had half a pack of frozen king prawns left in the freezer, so decided that we needed a recipe to use these up. We both love prawns and curry, so we thought this would be a great way to use our leftovers. I was also pretty impressed with the low calories in this recipe.

Once the sauce had cooked out a little, the flavours started to come through. We did make some slight alterations to the recipe though: 1 spoonful of sugar, an extra garlic clove, chilli flakes and salt and pepper. This seemed to balance out the flavours a bit. 

If you're looking for an easy, low fuss and low calorie mid week meal then this is the recipe to try. You could add some extra spices or curry paste, if you are looking for a more "traditional" curry but I enjoyed this recipe and it was naturally gluten free.

You can find the recipe i used here.

Mushroom and rice one pot

This mushroom and rice one pot was a very easy dinner to make, hardly any fuss and not a lot of preparation time. It would be great for an easy evening meal, when you don't want to spend hours slaving over a hot stove. It has a really good flavour to it and I really do love mushrooms, so guess you could always add some different types for different textures too.

I think that I will definitely be making this recipe again, not only is the flavour good but it seems like a great base to use your leftovers in your fridge and cupboards. I would love to use chorizo in this recipe (but then again, I love chorizo and I'd like to use it in every recipe ;-) ).

You can find the recipe that I used here, I didn't really use any substitutions this time as I was just using the leftovers that I had before shopping for the week ahead. I will definitely be changing the flavours up a bit next time though.

Notes: Make sure that your stock is gluten free, I used Knorr stock cubes.

Meal Plans 14/04/13 - 20/04/13

This week the meals that I've planned are an attempt at trying to balance out our diet to make sure that we're not eating the same thing, as well as use up some of the leftovers in the freezer. On the Sunday, we're going to my mums for dinner, so there will only be 6 dinners planned this week.

Meal plan for 14/04/13 to 20/04/13

Gluten free spaghetti bolognese (with lentils and carrots)

Baked potatoes with tuna mayo and sweetcorn

Pork Steaks, wedges and home made coleslaw

Keralan Prawns and rice

Bangers and mash with onion gravy

Thai green chicken curry

This is my shopping list that I got from Asda on 14/04/13 except the baby aubergines:

Shopping list:

Seeded batch loaf £1.50

Warburtons Newburn White Bread £2.48

Eggs  x 12 free range £1.98

Bananas (1.52 kg) £1.03

Gluten free spaghetti £1.40

Coriander £0.65

White cabbage £0.64

Shreddies (500 g) £1.00

Whole earth organic and gluten free cornflakes £1.48

Sweetcorn (sweet crisp) £0.57

Carver ham £6.00

Extra  lean beef mince 250 g £2.15

Thai green curry paste £1.98

Tuna (2 cans) £1.94

Cucumber £0.50

Chicken thigh fillets (515 g) £3.58

Urban apple and pear x 1 and mango £3.00

Fresh ginger (0.095 kg) £0.20

Natural low fat yoghurt £0.45

Milk (4 pints) £1.00

Lemon grass £0.67

Philadelphia (2 x 200 g) £2.00

Carrots (0.735 kg) £0.66

Coconut milk £1.19

Oranges £0.50

Tomato Purée £0.55

Sugar £1.38

Basmati rice (1 kg) £1.48

Desiree potatoes £1.98

Lime £0.30

Onions £1.00

Baby aubergines (from Sainsbury's) £1.69

Pork steaks £2.00

2 x chopped tomatoes £0.78 

Total £49.71

Leftovers in the freezer: 1/2 pack of frozen raw king prawns, 1 pack of gluten free sausages, millet flakes

Breakfasts: Cornflakes, Eggs, Millet porridge, Toast

Lunches: Sandwiches (Ham or Egg mayonnaise), leftovers

Snacks: Packs of urban apple and pear, urban packet of mango

Notes: My boyfriend isn't gluten free so he does eat cereal and bread with gluten in them.