Shepherd's Pie

Shepherd's Pie

To make the chilli mince:

Ingredients:

• Knob of Butter
• 1 Large onion
• 1/2 cup roasted red peppers
• 1 tsp Chilli powder
• 1 tsp Paprika
• 1 tsp ground Cumin
• 1/2 tsp Dried Marjoram
• 500gms Minced Beef
• 400gms Canned chopped tomatoes
• Concentrated Beef Stock

Directions:

Melt butter in a frying pan, add diced onion and cook till tender, add mince and brown.  Add the rest of the ingredients, there will be a lot of liquid so you need to let it simmer for 10-20 minutes, the sauce will reduce down and create a delicious thick rich sauce.  The leftovers are even better!

For the Cauliflower Mash:

Ingredients:

• 1/2 head cauliflower cut into small pieces
• 1 tablespoon cream cheese
• 1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese
• 2-3 cloves of roasted garlic (roast it in the skin for 30 minutes and then squeeze the garlic out)
• 1 Tbsp finely chopped fresh rosemary
• 1-2 Tablespoons butter
• Freshly ground salt and pepper

Directions:

Boil your cauliflower in a pot for approx 6 minutes, once cooked then drain well and do not cool, pop the cooked cauliflower on lots of paper towels and more on top, pat dry as much as possible, I actually do this about 2-3 times to get all the liquid out of the cauliflower which is why my mash looks so "dry" just like mashed potato.  (you can also use a salad spinner which works quite well too)

In a bowl add the remaining ingredients and the cauliflower, use a stick blender to puree until almost smooth.

Lynda from A Change of Life adds an egg to hers to make it more potato like.
In a medium sized dish lay out your mince first and then top with the mash, then top with a combination of colby and parmesan cheese and a little extra chopped rosemary, place under the grill until browned.

I have tested this recipe on several people and it gets the huge thumbs up, M who doesn't even like Sheperd's Pie let alone cauliflower absolutely loves this and devours the lot! Trust me it's goooood!!!!!

Turkey & Sage Meatloaf

Turkey & Sage Meatloaf:


This is another awesome recipe from Megan Roberts!!! Thanks so much for sharing with us all Megan :)

Makes 4 generous or 6 smaller servings

2 x packs of Turkey mince, approx 325gms each. (from Countdown)
1 medium size red onion, finely diced
1 egg
2 heaped Tablespoons of almond meal & 1 heaped teaspoon of cumin
Lots of fresh finely chopped sage, a couple tablespoons worth.
Streaky Bacon to line your dish with.

I flattened out/rolled the strips of streaky bacon between 2 sheets of baking paper to make them thinner & wider, first of all to make it go further and second because I didn't want the bacon to totally overpower the turkey mince.
Line your dish with the bacon, then put the mince mix in, pushing it down so there's no holes anywhere.
Bake for an hour at 180degress.
When it was done, I flipped it out of the dish and put it back in the oven for 10mins so the bacon was on the outside and got some colour. (I wiped off any congealed stuff from the juices).

While the meatloaf is in the oven, you can prep & cook your cauliflower, and make your zucchini noodles & beans.
Chop up and cook the cauliflower iin some chicken stock, once cauli is cooked whiz it up in the blender with a knob of butter or a splash of cream & salt/pepper.  Toss the zucchini noodles in a non stick pan with a knob of butter, add finely chopped green spring onion near the end. Nuke the beans in the microwave.

This would also work well with chicken or pork mince.

Costings:
Total came to $19.84 (using free range eggs & bacon).
(Turkey mince is $19.49kg - I used this price in my costings but I got the 2 packs of mince reduced to clear so it was about $5 cheaper for me).

Zucchini Pesto Muffins

This awesome recipe was sent in by one of my readers Megan Roberts who is a fantastic cook, she has even worked out how much they will cost you! Thank you so much Megan, you are a legend!!!

Zucchini Pesto Muffins

• 6 free range eggs
• 90gms cream cheese, softened
• 40gms pesto (a large tablespoons worth)
• 1 large tomato, deseeded and chopped
• 1 spring onion, chopped
• 2 decent sized zucchini (150gm each), grated and moisture squezzed out

Mix all these together, I whisked the eggs, cream cheese and pesto together so there were well combined, then added the veggies.

• 20gms coconut flour
• 20gms almond meal
• 1 heaped teaspoon baking powder
• a good pinch of salt and a good grind of pepper

Sift all these together and then mix the wet and dry together, spoon into large texa muffin cups (I use silicon ones) bake at 180C degrees for approx 40 minutes, I checked mine at 20 minutes, then 30, then took them out at 40 minutes when they were starting to go golden brown.

I cost these out on my spreadsheet and for 6 muffins it was NZD $11.80, $3.00 for the free range eggs (at 50c each), $3.00 for the zucchini and $1.40 for the tomato - these two things will get cheaper as the weather gets warmer.

Creamy Feta Chicken with Zucchini Noodles

First off thank you to one of my readers Megan Roberts for reminding me how good zucchini "pasta" can be! I have made zucchini strips a while back http://primaljourney.blogspot.co.nz/2009/11/i-think-its-about-time-i-posted.html and http://primaljourney.blogspot.co.nz/2011/06/its-been-crap-week.html but I don't do it much because slicing it super thin with a knife is pretty time consuming, so I got a julienne peeler and viola it's easy peasy!

This is one of my favourite concoctions:

Ingredients:

Serves 2:

• 1 large breast of chicken chopped up into bite sized pieces
• 4 strips of streaky bacon chopped up
• 5-6 pieces of Dutch salami chopped into strips
• 5-6 large sundried tomatoes chopped up
• 75gms Creamy feta (more or less depending on your taste preference)
• Handful of frozen or fresh spinach
• 200-250mls Cream
• 2-3 zucchinis julienned mixed with 1 Tbsp Basil Pesto
• Knob of butter
• Garnish: Freshly Grated Parmesan Cheese and Salt & Pepper

Instructions:

Fry the bacon, once browned put aside, fry the chicken using the bacon drippings.  Once the chicken is almost cooked throw back in the bacon, salami, sundried tomatoes, spinach and the cream, start to reduce the sauce by just simmering for a few minutes on a low heat, then add your feta for the last remaining minutes.  Take off the heat and put aside.

In a separate non stick frying pan melt a knob of butter and flash fry the zucchini and pesto mixture, you don't want to do it for long otherwise your zucchini will go mushy, add the noodles to the creamy chicken and serve immediately, grate some fresh parmesan on top and some freshly cracked pepper and salt.

Warning: Super rich!!!

Pratty's Feel Good Teas

Yesterday I started googling to find a fusion teapot for fruit tea and came across Pratty's Feel Good Teas, I ended up ordering the teapot, 2 tins of tea and 3 free samples and it arrived this morning, talk about excellent fast service :-)

I was pretty stoked to find an amazing online store like this in New Zealand, such a great looking website offering awesome well priced products, the range of teas is pretty mind blowing and some very cool creative names like Steamy Pina Colada, Lime with Envy, Jim Jam'n Pear, Bundle of Joy and Nutty Apple crumble just to name a few.  I love her story also, goes to show if you have a huge passion for something you can turn it into a successful business!

Just to let you know that I am in no way affiliated with Pratty's teas nor have I ever tried this tea before but I just had to share with you guys because the fruit teas that I've just sampled this morning are pretty amazing!

At the moment I'm trying to break my dependence on decaf coffee and too much dark chocolate as most of you know I eat a lot! So I've decided to do a wee challenge and only have 2 squares of 85% Lindt and only 1 decaf Nespresso with cream & sugar per day! I have been having about 3 coffees and up to 100gms of choc a day, suffice to say its gotten a little out of hand. So the reason I've chosen to replace that habit with fruit teas is because they are much lower in carbs and calories plus the fruit teas have no caffeine! They taste so fresh and healthy too :-)

See the pics below for a little sample of what she has or visit the online store for her full range which has every kind of tea you could imagine.  http://www.prattys.co.nz/