Category Archives: Simple meals

Chicken Broccoli Casserole

22 Wednesday Feb 2012

Posted by in Simple meals, Soup and stews

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Chicken Broccoli Casserole

This is a recipe that my mom made for us as kids.

I have no idea where she got it but I am sure it was on the back of a soup can.

It’s easy and perfect if you are craving comfort food and has become a staple in our house.

Here is what you need:
1 Bag of Egg Noodles
1 Can of Cream of Mushroom Soup
1 8oz Container of Sour Cream
1-2 Cups of Shredded Cheddar Cheese
1 Head of Broccoli (Steamed)
1 Rotisserie Chicken Shredded

The prep for this dish is to have your chicken shredded, your broccoli steamed and your noodles cooked.
Once you have done that, combine the sour cream and soup in a separate bowl. Mix well.
Pour the soup mixture over your chicken and mix thoroughly….I find using your hands instead of a spoon works best.
Lay your noodles in your baking dish.
Next, put the chicken mixture on top.
Then, you will place your chopped broccoli over the entire dish.
Top with cheese and bake for 25 minutes at 325 degrees.
YUM!

Joy

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Leek and Bacon Quiche

24 Monday Oct 2011

Posted by in Simple meals, Tarts, Uncategorized

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Apologies for the photo – it was taken with my phone…

I went round to my friend Claudia’s for a bit of cooking, and we made leek and bacon quiche, cheesy bits and a beautiful tarte tatin. I’m going to explain how to make a very easy and yummy  and the cheesy bit – you’ll have to wait a little for the tarte tatin.

For our quiche we used bacon and leek but you can really use anything you fancy so this is a good one if you have left-overs and want to make something a little fancy. We were left with a bit of pastry so we made my special cheesy bits – they are great for an apperitif.

What you will need for the quiche:

Short-crust pastry (ready-made or freshly made – see our tomato tart for this recipe)

4-5 eggs
300ml of single cream
2 handfuls of grated cheddar cheese
4 slices of bacon
1 leek
Pepper

Pre-heat your oven to 180C . Cover a tart tin with the pastry. Heat a pan and add a bit of butter or oil and add in diced bacon, once they start to brown add thinly sliced leeks until they are softened.

In a bowl whisk all your eggs and add the cream – you can also replace the cream with milk or go half milk half cream. Now add the cheddar, bacon and leek and a some ground pepper to taste. You don’t need to add any salt due to the cheese and bacon. Put the mixture into the tart tin and place in the oven for about 20-25 minutes.

What you will need for you cheesy bits:

Short-crust pastry left-overs 
1-2 handfuls of grated cheddar cheese (the more the better)

Mix your pastry and cheese together and then roll it so it looks like a stick, you can do this in small bits. Then cut into small pieces. Put in a pre-heated oven at 180C and it should be ready in about 15mins!

It’s that easy! And the quiche will feed 4 people, serve with a green mixed salad and there you have it a yummy but simple meal.

Mel

Sweet and Sour Chicken

02 Sunday Oct 2011

Posted by in Chicken, Simple meals

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I’m hooked on Masterchef Australia at the moment and this sweet and sour was inspired by their sweet and sour pork. What’s great with sweet and sour sauce is that you can use any meat, prawns or just have it with vegetables and your meal will be ready in 15 minutes! I love sweet and sour takeaway but never knew exactly what was used to make it. What surprised me is  how simple it is and that it’s made with ingredients that can be found in any kitchen, that’s ketchup and vinegar! Now the quantities I’m going to tell you to use are a guideline as it really all comes down to taste and also how much sweet and sour sauce you want.

What you need:

Two chicken breasts – cut in small pieces
3 tbsp of ketchup
2 tbsp vinegar (any type is fine)
A small tin of pineapple (if you have fresh pineapple all the better)
Chilli flakes (if you like the heat)
1 large pepper (the colour of your choice) – cut in small chunks
Half an onion – sliced
1 clove of garlic – chopped
40g of finely sliced ginger

Rice or noodles

In a frying pan or wok fry your onions on a medium heat until they look soft and add in you chicken until it starts browning, then add in your pepper, pineapple (keep the juice to one side), garlic, ginger and chilli. Stir all the ingredients together and then add in your ketchup, pineapple juice and vinegar. Cook all the ingredients for about 5 minutes. Taste and add in more vinegar or ketchup depending on taste.

I used rice noodles which are super easy to make as all you need to do is place them in a bowl and pour over some boiling water and they are ready within seconds.

Serve up your sweet and sour chicken on top of your noodles or rice and there you have it -dinner in 15 minutes!

Enjoy 🙂

If you use fresh pineapple then you can caramelise it with a bit of sugar and also add in a bit of pineapple juice.

P.S I’ve just made Masterchef’s cheesecake but with a twist – it’s in the fridge so fingers crossed!

Mel

My Favorite Grilled Cheese

27 Wednesday Jul 2011

Posted by in Meals in one, Simple meals

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I’ve been eating grilled cheese like this for about ten years now and often forget that most people don’t add extras like I do.

Eating becomes a challenge when you are taking care of a newborn. Because I am breastfeeding, I have to incorporate healthy foods throughout my day.
This has been my “go-to” when I only have a few minutes to cook but want to feel full and satisfied.

Here ‘s what you need:
2 slices of whole wheat bread
2 slices of cheddar cheese
1 avocado (sliced)
1 tomato (sliced)
1 teaspoon of butter

I buttered one side of each slice of bread and put the butter side down on a hot pan on medium low heat.

Each slice of bread gets a slice of cheese. One piece of bread gets the avocado and the other gets the tomato.

The two slices of bread are cooking simultaneously (open faced) because this grilled cheese is so thick that it’s too hard to flip.

Once the cheese has melted, I place one slice of bread onto the other so that I can enjoy all of the ingredients in every bite.

*Please note that this sandwich is also good cold and great for picnics.
 The ingredients do not take up a lot of room, can be easily assembled and you can usually find the ingredients in any country.
 You can use the exact same ingredients or you can use a fresh baguette and Philadelphia Cream Cheese.

 Mel and I have eaten this sandwich quite a bit when exploring a new city because it is easy to share with someone and inexpensive!

Joy

Quick and Tasty Meatballs with Cumin

03 Sunday Jul 2011

Posted by in Beef, Simple meals

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I came home after work to nothing in the fridge 😦 and I really didn’t feel like going food shopping. Thankfully I had some mince in the freezer and an onion, so I thought I’d make some meatballs and I got a thumbs up from my lunch club at work when I brought the left-overs in, I always use this as my thermometer of success.

I didn’t have any fresh tomatoes, only canned ones so I thought I’d try adding cumin to give my sauce a bit more flavour.

What you will need:
(feeds 3)

400 grams of mince
1 onion
1 tbs of cumin
Chilli flakes (to taste)
Stock cube
2 tbs Soy sauce
1 tbs of sugar
2 garlic cloves
Thyme (or any other herb you fancy)
Salt and pepper (to taste)

Spaghetti

In a bowl put you mince and add to it chopped garlic, chilli flakes, thyme, salt and pepper and massage together. You can also add an egg, but I didn’t have one and it worked fine without. Make small balls of meat (you can make them the size you want), I made them about the size of brussel sprouts.

In a sauce pan heat your oil and add the onions, after 1 minute add the cumin, stock cube, soy sauce, sugar, tyme and salt and pepper. Stir ingredients and once it comes to boil add the meatballs, cook for 5 minutes and then turn the heat down and let it simmer for another 15 minutes. Serve with spaghetti.

Ps:
You can simmer your tomato sauce for longer if you have time before adding your meatballs. You can also fry your meatballs in a pan before adding them to your sauce, all depends on how hungry you are 🙂

Mel

Here Comes the Sun

10 Sunday Apr 2011

Posted by in Simple meals, The Lunch Club

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I have to confess that this week I haven’t done a lot of cooking. I have hardly been home let alone near my kitchen. I did however have lovely lunches, one of which was shared with at least 5 of my colleagues. It was a perfect lunch club lunch where we all got to sit down and share our food.

 It started off with my return from France and a suitcase full of smelly cheese, cornichons, saucissons, wine, mustard, paté and quite a few other yummy things. I brought so much cheese back that I halved it all and brought it into work along with some saucissons, paté and cornichons. I invited everyone from my team to join me for lunch and enjoy the French goodies, on one condition, that everyone was to bring something along. We ended up with a fantastic feast.

With the sun coming out and the weather being so beautiful I think it’s the perfect way to spend your lunch break. You don’t have to bring back cheese from France, all you need do is bring in a couple of things and share. Why not get a blanket and go find a park to sit in and I promise it’ll help your working day go by (you might even get to start working on that tan!).

 Mel

 PS:
Cornichons (French gherkins that I’ve never been able to find anywhere else but France)

Morel Omelette

05 Tuesday Apr 2011

Posted by in Salads, Simple meals

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Morel mushrooms

Three days in the French countryside and I come back with at least 4 blog’s worth of material!

So I think I’ll start from the very beginning and that would be my father’s excitement at finding about 10 morels (crazy looking mushrooms) under one of his trees. It is the season for this kind of mushroom in France at the moment. Ok, they aren’t truffles but they are still quite a sort after kind. ‘Mushroom pickers’ go off to their secret spots in search of them and in no circumstance do they share their locations. Well that’s how it is in my village.

Mushrooms are a fantastic ingredient to adding flavour to the simplest of things, from sauces to omelettes. My parent’s neighbours have chickens and so we went and bought 12 eggs to make an omelette, to which we added the mushrooms. Now these eggs are nothing like supermarket eggs! The yolk is bright orange and so full of flavour; you really see the difference between a chicken running about the countryside and one that’s cooped up in a cage.

How to make an omelette

When making an omelette I’d say you need about 2/3 eggs per person, butter and anything you fancy adding to it. You also need a very good, non-stick pan. If it’s not non-stick your omelette will end up looking like scrambled eggs.

 So, in a bowl crack your eggs and whisk (do not add any milk). Butter your pan, put on heat and add your ingredients (in this case mushrooms),once they are cooked add your eggs.

 Now, there are two cooking techniques that I know of for the perfect omelette; the French way and the Spanish way. Your omelettes will look quite different depending on which technique you use but they will both give you a perfect omelette.

The French way: Once the side of the omelette on the pan starts to cook fold the omelette in half (so it becomes a half circle) and let it continue to cook for a while. The heat of the folded omelette will cook the inside.

The Spanish way: Once the side of the omelette on the pan is cooked take a plate, put it onto the pan and tip the pan so that the omelette is on the plate. Then slide the omelette from the plate back onto the pan so that the uncooked side is face down.

Serve with a side salad, and there you have it, a healthy and cheap meal.

Caution
Please do not go picking any mushrooms unless you are absolutely sure that they are edible.

Mel