Salad!

Mmmmm, salad......

Well, I looked through the last post and the spelling was atrocious, except where I deliberately misspelled, that's different.

Anyway, made a salad tonight. I roasted some beetroot the other day because I felt like it and it was cheap, didn't use it because by the time it was done I didn't want it anymore.

So, 200 grams fresh green beans
3 roasted or boiled and peeled baby beets wedged up
1/2 a packet hi fibre pasta (I used Vetta Gnocchi, which isn't really Gnocchi because it's dried, cup shaped stuff, but it's cute and it was on sale in Safeway)
100grams Fetta (I use Dodoni because it's real Fetta, you can use whatever you like)
2 soup spoons (genuine measurement I'm sure) salted baby capers, rinsed

Now, make your salad, on the plate throw the hot pasta, top with hot beans, top with cold wedged baby beets, crumble fetta over the top and sprinkle with capers.

In a deli near me I found a pack of tiny bottles for a total of $2.50, lemon oil, garlic oil, chili oil, olive oil and balsamic vinegar so I leave that on the table as a condiment. We dressed our salad at the table using this and it worked well. You could make a dressing of 1:1 parts oil and vinegar, add chili and/or garlic and/or lemon at will as it worked well (mixed my oils).

Total cost was something like $5 and it would have fed about 6 people had we not been pigs. All the veg was on sale as was the pasta.

PLUS, I can apparently make this one again. YAY!

Til next time.

xx

Small discoveries.

Well, I was taking photo's of food I'd made for this blog, the meals tasted great adn fit al criteria but I am no photographer and the finished meals presented beautifully on the plate at home, the photo made it look like dog food.

Most disappointing.

Discovery 1) I cannot take pitchers.

Capers to the Salt - Capers packed in salt are the best thing EVER! Capers in brine or vinegar, meh, keep'em, I wouldn't touch'em and I wouldn't feed them anyone, at all, ever again!

Discovery 2) Add rinsed salted capers to a marinade made up of olive oil, balsamic vinegar and garlic. All to taste. Marinate any red meat or pork for 20 minutes or so. Roast in the oven til cooked.

Capers turn into crispy balls of happiness.

Fry Capers until crisp in olive oil, stir through cooked pasta with some fresh garlice, drizzle over some olive oil, sprinkle with fresh parsley and parmesan.

Ohhhhh yeah!! Food excites me!!

Thanks for your recipe Jasper, I will definitely try it. Patch, send me your recipes, and I promise to post more of mine! Even veg ones for the newest reader of this blog. :-)

til next time...

xx

Hoisin Chicken stir fry

Well, I thought if I'm going to blog about cheap and easy food I should do it properly, by that I mean taking pics of finished dishes and actually costing out the ingredients.


Well, 2 out of 3 ain't bad. No photo, but it does look good when finished.

100 ml Hoisin sauce
2 tsp Sesame Oil
1 red capsicum
1 bunch Choy Sum (other green leafy Asian veg) once chopped ensure leaves and stems are separate
1 pkt baby corn
1 diced onion
1/4 cup water
2 Chicken breast fillets (Coles had crap thigh fillets again! $5 for 2 breasts annoys me though!)
1 pkt cheap dried Asian noodles.


Fry off chicken and onion in sesame oil, add Hoisin sauce and water and all veg expect the leaves, wait 5 minutes and add leaves.

Boil noodles, place in bowls, serve meat and veg over the top.

This cost exactly $9.50 to make and served 4 comfortably. Oh, and it tasted great!!