WHAT TO DO WITH CELERIAC?!

Similar in taste and texture to parsnip but with a prominent flavour of celery, many

of us are unsure what to do with them which is a shame when they are so easy to grow.

Celeriac can be cooked and mashed with potato, diced and added to stews and soups,

chipped or roasted like a spud or grated in coleslaw.

Here however, I  have made a cheesy gratin with poppy seeds and roasted pumpkin that you can 

eat on its own or as a side dish. 

Ingredients

One Celeriac - peeled, quartered and thinly sliced

1 tsp chopped chili

1 tsp poppy seeds

1 tbsp cream cheese

250ml single cream

Roast pumpkin (optional)

Grated Cheddar for topping

Olive oil

Salt & Pepper

Warm the olive oil in a large frying pan, add the chili and let it sizzle for a few seconds.

Add the sliced celeriac and salt and pepper and fry for about 5 minutes turning regularly.

Add the poppy seeds and the cream cheese and continue to stir carefully until the

cheese has melted.

Stir in the single cream and bring to a gentle bubble before tipping into a gratin dish.

Place into a preheated oven (180 degrees) for about half an hour.

Five minutes before the end, grate on a generous helping of Cheddar cheese

and place back in the oven to melt.

(We also added some left over roast pumpkin which was a delicious addition but you can leave this out) 

Absolutely delicious

So next time you walk passed them in the supermarket, drop one into your trolley

and have a go at this!

SPICY SWEET POTATO AND BUTTERNUT SQUASH SOUP

Try this super quick, super tasty vegetable soup with a hunk of bread and butter.

A healthy, meat free lunch or tea with a spicy kick.

Ingredients

50g butter

1 medium onion, chopped

½-1 tsp green Thai curry paste (depending on how hot you like it!)
½-1 tsp red Thai curry paste

2 sweet potatoes, peeled and cubed

350g butternut squash, peeled and cubed

700ml of vegetable stock

160ml coconut milk or cream

Natural yogurt and chopped coriander to garnish

Melt the butter in a saucepan and gently fry off the chopped onion until softened.

Spoon in the Thai pastes and fry for another minute or so.

Add the cubed sweet potato and butternut squash and cook for a further 5 minutes on a medium heat to soften a little and take in the curry flavours.

Add the stock, bring to the boil and simmer for 25-30 minutes

to allow the vegetables to cook through.

Take off the heat and blend until lump free.

Add the coconut milk

Its now ready to serve

Spoon on some natural yogurt and sprinkle with chopped coriander, parsley or lovage

Serve with a hunk of bread or toast

BUTTERNUT SQUASH AND CELERIAC CURRY

A tasty vegetarian curry with rice and homemade onion bhajis

As hot as you  like! This one was pretty spicy but you can tame it down a little by adding

 less fresh chilli and chilli powder.

This is not an authentic recipe, its just mine but its very good.

Curry first and then the bhajis....

Ingredients

1 butternut squash

1 celeriac

1 large parsnip

6 tomatoes

1 large red onion

Fresh ginger (approx 40mm piece)

2 cloves garlic

1 red chilli

1tsp ground coriander

1tsp garam masala

1tsp ground paprika

1/4 tsp chilli powder

1/4 tsp cinnamon

600ml vegetable stock

200ml coconut milk

Fresh coriander to sprinkle

Peel and chop the red onion into large chucks and pop into the blender with the garlic, fresh chilli and all the spices.  Whizz until smooth, adding a splash of water if necessary (a drop at a time) to get a paste like consistency.

Peel and seed the vegetables and chop into large chunks

Heat two tablespoons of vegetable oil in a large pan and then add the curry paste, cooking for 5 minutes whilst stirring.  Stir in the chopped vegetables and cook on a medium heat with the lid on, regularly stirring. After about 5 minutes, add in the stock.

 Simmer until the veg is cooked through but not breaking, approx 30 mins. 

Add the quartered tomatoes and cook for another 2 minutes.

Lastly, stir in the coconut milk and 

serve with rice and onion bhajis (see recipe below)

Garnish with chopped coriander and a drizzle of coconut milk.

Onion Bhaji Ingredients

2 large onions

100g self raising flour

1tsp of cumin seeds or ground cumin

1tsp turmeric

pinch of salt

Finely slice the onion into a bowl and add the flour, salt and spices and mix together.

Once combined, start squeezing the ingredients together . This will squeeze the moisture out of the onion into the flour to help bind.   

Mix in three tablespoons of water, so that the mixture has a wet stretchy dough consistency. 

To shallow fry, cover the bottom of a frying pan with a cm of oil and heat to a medium high heat .

You want the bhajis to cook through without burning on the outside so the oil should be just hot enough to bubble when you add the mixture and not be smoking.  You can test this by dropping a small piece of the onion in.

When ready, take a heaped spoon of mixture and drop into the hot oil.  Choose the size of spoon to the size of bhaji you want to make.  We used a teaspoon. 

Cook until golden brown on both sides.

Take out of the pan and lay on a plate covered with a piece of kitchen roll.

Put into a low oven to keep warm.

AVOCADO & BACON SALAD, HUGHS POLENTA AND OTHER NON POTATO DISHES!

Mealtimes over the past few weeks have been quite a challenge, particularly lunches as Marie, my wife, is avoiding potato's and bread.  I hadn't realised how much we rely on these day to day but we've managed to find some tasty alternatives and have been enjoying various salad, bean and polenta dishes. 
Here's just a few...

Avocado and bacon salad which literally takes 5 minutes to make

and is surprisingly filling.

Mixed leaves, spinach and sliced avocado topped with pan fried bacon and chorizo

and a free range poached egg

I have never made polenta before and was unsure what to do with it.  Having trawled all my cookery books, I eventually found this recipe on line from Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall.

Hugh's polenta fingers (olive oil, chilli, garlic & rosemary) with garlic & tomato sauce

and a fresh green salad.

Recommend you try this!

Click here for Hughs recipe

Sausages with lentils, cream,wilted spinach and roasted tomato's

Utterly delicious!

Swede, carrot and parsnip rosti topped with thick shredded ham and 

a poached free range egg or two! 

There's no shortage of eggs in our house, as you know, so they do turn up in many

of my dishes at the moment.

Fortunately the salad and beans counteract the eggs, if you know what I mean.

SPINACH AND RICOTTA CANNELLONI

We love meat in our family but at least twice a week we try to eat vegetarian.

Pasta's always an easy option and this spinach and ricotta recipe is a great example.

Ingredients

Tomato sauce

Two tins of tomatoes

Two clove garlic

olive oil

Filling

250g Spinach

250g Ricotta

100g Gorgonzola (optional)

Nutmeg

Clove garlic

Egg (optional)

Light Cheese Sauce

50g butter

50g flour

1 pint milk

50g Parmesan

A box of cannelloni tubes

Make up a tomato sauce by frying off the garlic in a little olive oil and then adding the tins of tomato to warm through. 

For the filling, fry off the garlic in olive oil, grate in the nutmeg and add the spinach.  Toss around the pan until wilted and leave to cool.  In the meantime, mix together the ricotta with the gorgonzola and the egg.  When the spinach is cool enough, mix into the cheese.

Make the cheese sauce.

Put the tomato sauce into the bottom of a baking dish large enough to take all the cannelloni.

Fill a pipping bag (or freezer bag with the corner cut off as I did) with the ricotta mix and fill the pasta tubes placing into the dish as you go.

Pour over the cheese sauce, grate on some extra Parmesan and cook in a pre heated oven at 180 degrees for 45 minutes.

Just look at that! Smooth creamy cheese and rich tomato sauce are a match made in heaven.

An unbelievably satisfying tea.

Serve with a green salad and if your going for the full blow out, homemade garlic bread!