Three Delicious Meals

This weeks meals so far have been a mix of cheating and proper cooking! It has been a very busy week at work and I haven't had much energy for cooking! This week has been a week of good news! I now have an estimated completion date on my flat of the 3rd-11th May, so I really needed to start emptying my freezer. I now seem to only have single portions of things, so I'm not sure what I am going to cook for my sister on Sunday evening! This means that hopefully I will move in sometime at the beginning of June.

I also found out on Tuesday that I have been accepted to do a Masters in Library and Information Studies at UCL! This is fantastic news as it means I can finally become a qualified Librarian, and although it will take two years and be really hard work, I can't wait to start!

Monday's dinner was Quorn and pesto fillet with roast cherry tomatoes, lemon spaghetti and steamed veg. I had never tried Quorn before, but was always curious as to what it tasted like, so I bought some pesto filled fillets which were on offer in Sainsbury's to try. The packet suggested roasting some tomatoes with it and this worked a treat and provided some liquid to what I think would otherwise have been a very dry meal. This I teamed with this Lemon Linguine recipe that I had had bookmarked for quite a while. I used spaghetti instead of Linguine as this is what I had in the cupboard, it was a huge success and both parts of the meal went really well together, and actually the Quorn wasn't too bad, tasted like chicken really!



On Sunday I tried another recipe that I had bookmarked, this time it was French Baguette Casserole (with Egg, Spinach, Mushroom, Onion and Gruyere). I left this one in the oven a little too long hence the too brown colour! But it was really tasty and I have frozen some into portions for lunches in the next few weeks.



Tuesday was the first and only night of proper cooking this week. I went for Seared Tuna with Asparagus and a Hot Rice Salad. I had been to a private view of an exhibition near Kings Cross earlier in the evening, which was bizarre and very dark. You couldn't really talk to people as the room was too dark to see people's faces! The installation itself was also a bit strange.

This was slightly tipsily made which may explain the slightly empty plate and that there was no effort made to wipe the plate before photographing it! This is one of those dishes that I made a lot a little while ago but have not had recently, and it was still delicious. I also had lots of leftovers to make a bento for the next day.



Seared Tuna with Asparagus and a Hot Rice Salad
(Serves 1)

1 tuna steak
1 tbsp olive oil
salt and freshly ground black pepper

For the hot rice salad
2 tbsp olive oil
3-4 asparagus spears
½ pepper, deseeded
140g/5oz rice, cooked

For the dressing
handful of basil, coriander, parsley and chives, roughly chopped
½ lemon, juice only
pinch of curry powder

Drizzle oil over the asparagus and griddle for three to four minutes until tender.
Griddle the pepper until the skin blisters and goes black.
Remove the skin and slice the pepper.
Make the dressing for the salad by combining all the ingredients in a bowl.
Add the rice, peppers and asparagus and stir through.
Drizzle the tuna with oil and season.
Sear in a hot pan for one minute either side, or a little longer if the tuna is thick.
Serve the tuna on top of the rice.