Meal Planning Monday and Spanish Chicken and Rice Salad

I thought I'd share with you one of my lunches from last week, which doesn't really warrant a whole post by itself. I was looking at the salad in Marks and Spencer for inspiration over half term and came across a Spanish Style Chicken with Rice Salad with Sherry Vinaigrette. It looked delicious but expensive and I reckoned I could make it myself. So I did! It is a little bit different but the basic principles are there.

I marinated my chicken breast in half a tsp each of sweet, hot and smoked paprika and a tsp of oil and then I baked it for 30 mins. The rice is leftovers of a Spanish rice dish I made the night before (recipe to follow). I mixed some butter beans and pepperdew peppers together to make a little salad and then added the rocket to the box. I also made a sherry vinaigrette to pour over the salad, using sherry vinegar, olive oil and smoked paprika. Delicious!

This weeks meal plan is varied and uses lots of Internet recipes. I struggled to think of things to make for lunch as always, I like variety but it's hard to think of ideas! I'm also really busy this week with french class, zumba, going out and a training course this necessitates quick and easy meals trying to finish some of the stuff in my fridge.

Monday
Honey Mustard Chicken Pasta Salad
Sweet Potato and Smoked Haddock Pie

Tuesday
Broad Bean and Mint Soup with a Ham and Mustard Sandwich
Out either at Mishkins or MEATmarket

Wednesday
Tuna Rice Salad
Broccoli and Blue Cheese Pasta

Thursday
Smoked Sausage and Coleslaw Sandwich and Crisps
Chicken Enchilada Courgette Boats, Bread and Butter Pudding

Friday
Spicy Crab Noodle Salad
Prawn and Broccoli Stir Fry (WW Cooking for One)

Saturday
Chicken Fajita Lasagne

Sunday
Spicy Sausage Pizza

Don't forget to check out Mrs M's blog for more meal ideas.

Leek, Potato and Cheese Tortilla

I have been trying out lots of new recipes and weirdly I've never made a tortilla before. I had some leeks from my Uncle Stan's allotment so I found this potato, leek and cheese tortilla recipe. Simple but delicious and great with brown sauce!



Leek, Potato and Cheese Tortilla (from Good Food Magazine May 2008)
(Serves 4)

butter, for frying
1 leek, thinly sliced
225g potatoes cooked and cooled (about 1-2 medium size ones)
6 eggs
85g cheddar
1tbsp chives, finely chopped
1/2tsp smoked paprika

Melt a knob of butter in a medium, nonstick frying pan, then cook the leek for about 5 mins until softened. Meanwhile, cut the potatoes in half, then into slices about ½cm thick. Beat the eggs, season, then stir in the cheese and sage.

Add a little extra butter to the pan if needed, tip in the potatoes, then the egg mixture. Turn the heat to low, then cook for 10 mins until nearly set. Place under a hot grill, then cook for a couple of mins more until the top is set and golden. Slice into wedges and serve with a green salad.



I used the tortilla to make a bento, my first one for ages. I served it with the potato and okra salad from the day before, coleslaw, cherry tomatoes and cheddar. The blue pot has brown sauce in it to dip the tortilla in.

Two Beef and Rice Bento

Just a couple of Bento today:

Sticky Rice, Beef and Green Beans, Red Pepper in Oyster Sauce with Sesame Seeds.



Sticky Rice with Pickled Ginger on top, Beef and Green Pepper Stir Fry.

Beef and Green Pepper Stir Fry (from Bento Love by Kentaro Kobayashi)

(Serves 1)

100g thinly sliced beef

1 large green pepper

1/2 clove garlic

1/2 nub ginger

salt and pepper

1 tsp oyster sauce

1 tsp soy sauce

2 tsp oil

Cut the beef into bit sized chunks. Deseed the green pepper and cut into thin strips. Mince the garlic and ginger.

Add the oil to a heated pan and saute the garlic and ginger until fragrant. Add the beef and saute over a a medium high heat.

When meat is lightly browned add the green peppers. Lightly season with salt and pepper.

When the green peppers are tender quickly pour in the oyster sauce and soy sauce. Stir and coat.

Spring Roll Bento

Just a quick entry today and a bento that I wanted to share with you.

I had this for lunch one day last week, and I actually like the mix of colours and flavours that went into it. Better than my normal attempts!

It contains: Prawn and Coriander Spring Rolls, Egg Fried Rice, Grated Courgette with Soy Sauce and Rice Wine Vinegar, Pickled Ginger and a Cat full of Sweet Chilli Sauce.

Two Bento

The microwave at work has broken and I am making more Bento as they can be eaten cold as well as hot. I'm really enjoying the variety of food, rather than just a microwaveable pasta dish. It nice to be able to look forward to lunch!

The first bento is a Salmon Nicoise Bento, based on the Barefoot Contessa Roasted Salmon Nicoise Platter. It has lettuce, french beans, olives, cherry tomatoes, boiled potatoes, marinated salmon and a hard boiled egg. I also had vinaigrette in a separate pot.



The second is cheese ravioli with tomato and mascarpone sauce and grated cheddar on top, with chicken sticks and mustard in the rabbit and then a tomato and green bean salad with vinaigrette again in a separate container.

A Couple of Bento

I have a couple of bento to share with you, the first one I'm entering into the British Themed Bento Event at Bento Box Blog. I made a ploughman's bento ages ago, I took it to the British Library with me when I was studying, but what is more quintessentially English than the ploughman's lunch?!

So I had: two slices of bread, an apple, cheddar cheese, salami, pickle, coleslaw, cherry tomatoes and little gem lettuce.

The second is probably Lebanese or at least from somewhere round there! I had hummus with falafel, couscous with mint, green pepper, pine nuts and cherry tomatoes and cucumber halves on top for a bit of decoration.

Summer Chicken and a Bento

I have again been trying to use up some of the courgettes from the garden, luckily I am now in somewhat of a lull, they are too small to use at the moment which is good as I am away all next week. The beans are also doing well, why is it that veg always tastes better when you grow your own?

Last week I made a Courgette, Feta and Olive Rice Salad for a bento. It is something I dreamed up last year when my Mum had too many courgettes. It is based on a risotto recipe but is really nice as a rice salad. I had this with raspberries from a pick your own, waffle and a bunny of sugar for dipping.



Then I snuck some into a recipe that didn't call for courgettes at all. This is a really lovely good food recipe which is perfect both in summer and on long dark winter nights when summer is just a memory. I served it with home grown peas, beans and colcannon.



Summer Chicken (adapted from Summer in Winter Chicken, Good Food Magazine, February 2005)
(Serves 4)

1 tbsp olive oil
4 chicken legs, skin on
200g pack cherry tomatoes
1 courgette, sliced
3 tbsp pesto
3 tbsp crème fraîche (half fat is fine)
fresh basil, if you have it

Preheat the oven to 200C. Season the chicken legs all over with a little salt and pepper, place on a baking tray and bake in the oven for about 40 mins or until the skin is golden and crispy.

Heat the oil in a frying pan and saute the courgettes until they are golden brown. Halve the tomatoes and throw them into the pan, stirring them around for a couple of minutes until they start to soften. Reduce the heat and stir in the pesto and crème fraîche until it makes a sauce. Pour the sauce over the chicken, scatter with a few basil leaves if you have them and serve.

Many Bento

I have a huge backlog of Bento, I have taken a bento to work at least twice a week for the last couple of weeks and it is so nice to have something to look forward to for lunch. I love my Laptop Lunchbox, it is really useful for a hot meal and salad which is what I have nearly every Monday and Thursday.

The first is quiche on salad, with a side car of mushroom pasta salad, cherries and a babybel cheese.

Next is leftover egg fried rice from the lemon chicken, with fish balls, cherry tomatoes on a bed of alfalfa sprouts, with a green rabbit of sweet chilli sauce, and a blue strawberry of vinaigrette.

Then we have three mushroom rice, with salad, a plum, Japanese chocolate filled mini puff pastry, vinaigrette in the container, and a babybel.

This one is smoked salmon and cream cheese bagel, a plum, and some multi-coloured goldfish crackers.

Next I had cod gratin, with salad, strawberries, container of vinaigrette, and olives with feta cheese.

Finally pesto couscous, falafel, olives with feta cheese, muhumarra on a lettuce leaf. Meringues and strawberries in the side car with a bunny of sugar for dipping.

Lunches

So whilst I haven't been doing much actual cooking for evening meals, I have been making some yummy lunches, and trying out my new sandwich box. I love having something nice to look at lunchtime, that I have taken care to think about and make, and this is definitely the case with bento.

The first is left over Chinese in my laptop lunch box; lemon chicken (one of my favourite dishes, which I nearly always have when ordering take away), Chinese stir fried mixed veg, egg fried rice with edamame, and then a goats cheese babybel and two cherry tomatoes for a snack.

Usually if I take sandwiches for lunch I use tin foil to wrap them in, which is a costly way of doing things and not very environmentally friendly, but when I was last at the Japan Centre I saw some sandwich boxes which looked perfect. They have a removable separate container for fruit or crisps, and then a main section for sandwiches. It is slightly too wide to fit two sandwiches horizontally, but fitted bagels perfectly vertically with a space at the side, so much easier to pack this way. I'll try cutting the sandwhich in four and see how that fits vertically next time.

This one is red leicester cheese, parma ham, homemade chutney and cucumber sandwich, strawberries (half price in sainsburys at the moment), goldfish crackers and a rabbit with sugar in for dipping the strawberries in.

The second is smoked salmon and cream cheese bagel with capers, strawberries, edamame and french beans with french dressing and two cherry tomatoes. Two side cars, one with raisins and brazil nuts for my morning snack, and one with smoked cuddy's cove cheese, triscuits and two cherry tomatoes for a snack in between work and the theatre tonight.

I am completely addicted to triscuits now. I was sent some black pepper and olive oil ones from my partner in a snack swap I participated in and I love them, they are fantastic with cheese and really tasty. Its so annoying how expensive it is to get American food in the UK. I also love the goldfish crackers, I bought the plain ones when I was in New York but I got some multi coloured ones through the snack swap too and I cannot wait to see how they look in bento!

Three Bento

I have been away over the Easter period with no Internet, hence no blogging. I spent the weekend in Northumberland with my mum, relaxing and resting. I have done a little bit more to my tapestry and knitted a cuff and part of a sleeve for a cardigan! The knitting is very slow going, but I will persevere, even if it takes me the next year!

These are just a few catch up bento from last week. I really like the laptop lunchbox, its so useful for a hot meal on longer days because the containers are microwaveable, and its much handier than carrying around numerous Tupperware pots!

First up was left over fish pie with a salad, some grapes and a mini crunchie, vinaigrette for the salad and a tiny bit of mushroom pasta salad. This kept me filled up throughout the day.

Next we have couscous salad with courgettes, red pepper and feta, the blue container has vinaigrette, and the green chick has hummus. In the top layer is three falafel, a mini cadbury's caramel bar, grapes and cherry tomatoes.

This one was yesterday's bento, ham, cheese and orzo casserole with salad, a blue container of vinaigrette, goldfish crackers, a goats cheese babybel and two chocolate and orange mini rolls.

More Bento!

I had three bento this week. Monday's bento was the first outing of my new Laptop Lunchbox! Whilst this was a very expensive lunch box it is just so cool! The red container has Leek and Gorgonzola Bake, I used Danish blue cheese instead of Gorgonzola as that what I had in at the time and it was still just as tasty. The purple one has salad, green had goldfish crackers which I brought back from the States, and the yellow one has a piece of rocky road and a container of vinaigrette for the salad.
This system worked really well, the pasta container had a lid so that kept it all safe in there, the rest didn't have lids but the food remained in place, apart from a stray lettuce leaf, throughout my journey to work. I also love the little fork and spoon you get with it, it was nice not having the use the greasy cutlery from work!



Wednesday's bento was cold soba noodles with sesame seeds and spring onion, this had a dipping sauce to go with it which is not pictured. Then the top layer was carrot kinpira from Maki at Just Bento, cocktail sausages on picks, some watercress, hoi sin sauce in the green chick and a piece of Kit Kat Chunky. Unfortunately the Carrot Kinpira leaked somewhat and I had a soy sauce tasting Kit Kat!

Thursday's was leftover curry, chicken tikka markhani, spinach pilau rice, a piece of naan bread, chicken samosa, goats cheese babybel, 2 cherry tomatoes, a yellow bear of raita for the samosa and a green chick of hoi sin sauce for the babybel.

Bento

I had a couple of bento lunches this week, they are definitely more interesting to take to work than a sandwich and bag of crisps. I also invested in a Laptop Lunchbox, which arrived really quickly, I ordered it on Thursday and it arrived on Saturday, although the postman did wake me up at 8am! I'm hoping to use this to make sandwich and salad bentos, although I'm not sure how well it will hold things in place as only one of the inner containers has a lid. It does come with a spoon and fork set though.



Wednesday's Bento was leftover rice salad from Tuesday evening, with a green chick of sweet chilli sauce. The top layer held three fish balls, 2 cherry tomatoes, a cucumber slice and a mini cadbury's caramel.



Thursday's Bento held a cheese and onion quiche, with salad, and then a side car of chicken samosa, blue strawberry of raita, a babybel and a mini flake.

Two Bento

This week I have been trying to get back into bento, as I think I said in an earlier post. I love the cute boxes that I bought ages ago, but I hardly ever use them. I prefer my trusty Lock & Lock boxes which can be microwaved, but even then I don't make a bento style meal! However it is a good way to have something appetising to eat at lunch time, and to use up leftovers.

The first one is partly left over Chinese from Friday night; Pork Balls with Stir Fried Noodles and Veggies, and sweet chilli sauce in the green chick pot. The other layer was some ardennes pate, with a cherry tomato and some crackers underneath, and an inarizushi. I forgot to bring any soy sauce for the inarizushi, but had some left over sweet chilli sauce from the pork balls which was I used to add some flavour.

Yesterday I did some extra hours in the purchasing unit for work and made another Bento! This one is a potato salad bento in my pretty two tiered blue bento box. I am really sorry for the awful photo. When I used the flash it bleached the potato salad white and without it the photo is too dark! On the left is frankfurters which were marinated in Honey and Mustard, two cherry tomatoes, and my last two kinder schoco bons. The left is pesto potato salad, with red onion and cucumber.

Pesto Potato Salad

(Makes 1 portion)

2 medium potatoes

1/2 red onion, chopped

2/3 slices of cucumber quartered

1 tbsp mayonnaise

2 tbsp natural yoghurt

1 tsp pesto

Boil the potatoes for about 15mins until cooked through, then cut into smaller pieces.

Mix the yoghurt, mayonnaise and pesto together so that it all combines. Add in the potatoes, onion and cucumber and serve.

Green Bean Beef

On Thursday night I had planned to have smoked haddock fish cakes for dinner and then I realised that I was only working until 6.30pm so I could spend more time cooking dinner and so I opted for something more complicated but just as quick (the smoked haddock fishcakes came out of a packet for Sainsburys!). Whilst I was at the farm shop last week I got some stir fry beef with the idea of making some Asian inspired dishes, and I came across this one on Livejournal's community Picturing_Food. The community does what it says on the tin, it is people taking pictures of food and then sharing them with other people in the community. It has provided me with some really good ideas for meals.



This is Green Bean Beef made by Pita of No Sin Sans Sugar. I served it on a bed of egg fried sticky rice, and the sauce for the beef was absolutely delicious, so thank you Pita!

I made far too much sticky rice and so I decided to use the leftovers for lunch the following day in my new Bento Box. I broke my small square snack bento box last week by dropping it on the floor, not a good idea! So I went to the Japan Centre on Piccadilly on Wednesday to try and buy a new one. They didn't have any square ones, so I was seduced by a small yellow and white really cute looking box. It has two layers, and the top layer has a divider and a Tupperware top so I can take just the top layer for my snack on late nights, but I also wanted to try and see how much food I could fit into it. The answer is quite a lot!



The bottom layer has egg fried sticky rice with a pig full of soy sauce, the top layer has three meatballs, and some sugar free carrot kinpira from Maki over at Just Bento, the green chick is some hoi sin sauce for the meatballs and then I have Chocolate and Strawberry Koalas in the side car. This was the right amount of food and kept me full until dinner time, its amazing how so small a box can carry so much food!

Jacket Potato

One day last week, when I arrived back home late after a day out, I decided a jacket potato was in order! Its just a simple jacket potato but it tasted delicious and it came from my mum's garden. The weekend before last I met my parents had a day out in London. We started at 202's, a restaurant in a Nicola Farhi shop in Notting Hill, I had an Iced Chocolate and a Salmon and Cream Cheese Bagel. There was so much smoked salmon it was unbelievable, I actually took what was left over home with me, and had it in my Jacket Potato. The iced chocolate was delicious as well. We then went for a wander down Portobello Road and I bought lots of lovely fruits for the week. In the afternoon we went to Kew Gardens, which were spectacular and thankfully we had wonderful weather.



As I am very interested in all things Japanese, I made sure that we went to the Japanese Gardens, this is a picture of the Japanese Pagoda, which unfortunately you couldn't climb up.

The Jacket Potato



I pushed a skewer through the middle of the potato and baked it in the oven for an hour. When the potato was cooked I cut it in half and scooped out the middle into a bowl, I then added some garlic and herb cream cheese, the smoked salmon, some spring onion and a crushed clove of garlic, and mixed all this together. I then put the filling back in the potato skins grated some cheddar and blobbed some ricotta on top and then out it under the grill until it went golden brown. This was then served with a side salad.

I couldn't eat all the jacket potato in one sitting and so that other half went in a bento for lunch the next day. This was joined by a salad, brazil nut and raisin mix, 2 green gages and some water biscuits for a pot of hummus which isn't pictured.



My second bento of last week, was even better than the first one. The bottom layer was brazil and raisin mix, some cherries, a green gage, some gyoza dipping sauce in the container, and two chicken and vegetable gyoza. The top layer, had cold soba noodles, with stir fry courgettes, carrots and beans, with spring onion, pickled ginger and sesame seeds on top. I also had some dipping sauce in a separate pot.



In the end I didn't need this bento as I left work at 1.30pm, but it was just as nice eaten at home!
As this week is my last week at work my co-workers gave me some flowers and these are them. They smell gorgeous!



These are all coming out in wrong order! I will speak more about the bank holiday weekend in my next post I just need to upload the photo's first!

Courgette and Pesto Pasta

So this is not strictly a recipe more just a dinner I threw together, but it was so delicious I thought I'd share! Last week was kinda busy with a trip to the theatre and various other things happening, so not much time for cooking.



All I did was simply cook up some fresh tagliatelle, whilst the pasta was cooking I sauteed some courgette in butter and oil. then I added the two together and stirred in some basil pesto from a jar. I had it with a lamb and apple burger and some green salad and it was delicious!



I also have a bento to share. I got into making bentos a few months ago and joined a couple of communities on live journal, bentolunch and eat_my_bento.
These have fantastic ideas for lunches and I love looking at the pictures! It has now become a regular thing and I find myself packing bento's almost every day, although most are very boring, I still love the thinking that goes into it and it has definitely made me eat a more balanced lunch!



This one contains: matzo fish balls, dried mango, brazil nuts, carrots fried with soy sauce and sesame seeds and rice with furikake on the bottom layer. The blue strawberry has sweet chilli sauce in it and the pig contains soy sauce.

I am coming close to the end of my contract at my current job, I finish in a week or so, and although I have another job lined up, it doesn't look like its going to start directly after I finish this one. This has me somewhat worried as I was originally offered the job back in May, and that I will loose out on pay, so whilst September will be ok, October may be a different matter, I guess I will muddle through. Hopefully the time off will give me a well needed break and also mean that I can do some more cooking, I already have plans to make bread and rolls this weekend, and I need to get some nice warming pies and stews stashed away for the winter, so I'm trying to take positives out of this rather than stressing out too much!

This weekend I am off up North! My parents have a holiday cottage just north of Newcastle, so I'm off to spend the weekend up there with them. On the way up there we'll stop at Morehouse Farm Shop. Where once I asked if they sold pigeon and the gentlemen behind the counter said he could go to the barn and shoot a couple for me. They do the most delicious meat, and I cannot wait to have some of their sausages again. I intend to have a very restful and relaxing weekend, making bread as I said earlier and reading and just generally lazing about! I'll also go to Barter Books and take some books to them and buy some new ones, I cannot wait to look at what they have in the cookery section. It is such a fabulous place, I would be very happy getting lost among the thousands of books they have there. I'm also hoping to walk to the Beach which is about a mile from the house. I'll let you know how my weekend goes!