30 Stash Meals for when you're away from home...

These are for those of us out there who cook on the weekend for a busy week ahead, or are going away and leaving the family behind to their own culinary devices!   Bookmark on Pinterest and share with your friends, you'll come back to this post to save you time and worry about what you or your loved ones are going to eat when you're not around to make it on the spot!

Fast Food on a Friday: Tasty Thai Turkey nuggets

OK I'm a bad parent.  I lied to my kids and told them these were chicken nuggets with some extra flavour.  But you know what?  They didn't care!  I was craving some thai fish cakes and didn't have any suitable fish and turkey to use.... and also wanted to prepare something quick and easy to reheat for a night hubby and I were going out... so I killed a few birds so-to-speak.

Didn't expect that hubby and I would like them so much - so instead of 3 stash meals for the kids - there was one and hubby and I ate the rest - whoops.  Best news is they are not fried but oven-baked and quite lean in the scheme of things.  We served them with a garden salad and rescue wedges.

These would be equally as good as a canape.. with a sweet chilli sauce!


Ingredients:
3 spring onions, finely diced
1 large carrot, finely diced
1 tsp minced ginger
2 tb smooth peanut butter
3 tb red curry paste (I used an Asia at home sachet - perfect size)
1/4 cup fresh coriander, finely diced
500g lean turkey mince
1/4 plain flour
canola spray


Method:
Preheat oven to 200 degrees c

In a bowl mix all ingredients with exception of flour and canola spray.

Spray a baking tray with canola oil and spread your flour out onto a plate or container. Roll the mixture into two-inch diameter balls and flatten slightly. 

Lightly roll in flour and place on tray.  Spray some canola oil over the top and place in the oven for about 15-25 minutes until cooked through.

Serve right away or if freezing, allow to cool completely then seal in airtight container in the freezer for up to 6 weeks - cook from frozen for about 15 minutes.

Serving vegetarians? Stash for later cheese and spinach quiches

In the aftermath of Christmas I like to wind down.  In the week leading up to Christmas I make a few 'stash away' meals so I can really recover from Christmas and just enjoy my family.  This year I've made some lasagne, some swedish meatballs, some chicken drumsticks and two of these.   Any can be defrosted and reheated with a minimum of fuss and served with a salad.   I obviously still enjoy leftovers (don't forget my leftover christmas ham bake) but having a few meals in the freezer over Christmas can really make a difference - because let's face it, most of us are over cooking at least for a few days if we've been cooking up a storm leading up to Christmas.

This one is also a great 'stash' meal if you're entertaining vegetarians or like a vegetarian option.  I make two of these at a time, but the recipe is written for one quiche, so multiply if you wish!

Ingredients:

Pastry

225gr plain flour

100g chilled butter

1 egg yolk

chilled water

Filling

1 cup steamed spinach (I used rainbow but use what you like)

50g tasty cheese, grated

125g ricotta cheese

10g parmesan cheese, finely grated

5 large eggs

2 tb cream

salt and pepper

Method:

Put all pastry ingredients in a food processor and process until becomes like fine breadcrumbs.  Add water until pastry comes together - it will be like damp sand.

Place in clingfilm and into the fridge for 1hour.

After chilling, preheat oven to 190 degrees c.

Roll out your pastry onto a floured surface and roll out onto your greased pie or flan tin.  Prick with a fork to dock the pastry and ensure a crispy crust.

Cover with baking paper and prepare to blind bake by using pastry weights or dried beans or rice.  Bake for 20 or so minutes until cooked.

When cooked arrange your spinach in the bottom of the dish

Cover with tasty, ricotta and parmesan cheese.   In a bowl mix eggs and cream and roughly whisk with a fork.

Pour egg mix over the quiche mixture and ensure it gets into the nooks and crannies of the spinach and pastry shell 

Bake for 25-30 minutes until browned on top and cooked through.

If storing, cool completely cover with foil then gladwrap and freeze up to 2 months

Shepherds' Pie

Hello everyone, I've felt a bit poorly for the past week, went to the docs yesterday and we'll soon know what the issue is - probably just having three kids and a hectic life!    So feeling poorly there's only one thing to eat and cook:  comfort food.  For me that is easy, yummy food.  Shepherds' pie always seems to fit the bill!

I made it in the AM before it got too warm, and also meant I could rest in the afternoon.  Truth be told, I wish I would make a few of these at a time, because they freeze really well.  But I never seem to........ will make sure I do next time though.  This recipe actually serves our family dinner plus makes 2 lunches for hubby.

Ingredients:

1kg lean lamb mince

1 large brown onion, diced

1 large carrot, diced

1/4 cup peas (I omitted but only because I forgot in my illness, but add them or sliced beans if you prefer)

1 large or 2 small stalks celery, diced or finely sliced

2 tb tomato paste

1 litre beef stock

2 tb worchestershire sauce

2 bay leaves

2 tb wholemeal (or plain) flour

salt and pepper to taste

1.5kg desiree potatoes

1.5 cups milk

2 tb butter or margarine

Method:

In a large frypan, add a little oil to the pan, and then brown the lamb mince.

Add the onion, carrots and peas (or beans) keep cooking until onion becomes transparent

Add half the stock, the worchestershire sauce, tomato paste, salt and pepper and bayleaves.  Leave to simmer for about five minutes, then add the flour to the remaining stock, and gradually add as the liquids absorb/sauce thickens.

The end result will be a rich gravy after about 25 minutes simmering (not too sloppy) with occasional stirring.

Whilst it is simmering, peel your potatoes and boil or steam them.  Drain and mash with milk and butter.  Add milk gradually to ensure the consistency is stiff but creamy.

Preheat oven to 200 degrees c

In a large baking or pie dish, pour in your gravied lamb, and then with a large spoon paste on the potato.  Run a fork over the top to make it more 'crinkly'.  This will make beautiful crunchy bits in the oven.

Bake in oven for 30-40 minutes until top is nice and browned to your taste.  Ultimate comfort food!

Hop on over to Blog This and share your comfort food in their latest challenge, issued by a celebrity blogger!

Summer Harvest Vegetarian Canneloni

My hubby is a devoted carnivore, but when we started dating, I was pescatarian - this meant essentially I was vegetarian apart from fish and seafood.  I ate this way for about 5 years and only started eating red and white meat when I was pregnant with my first child, Eloise.

If it were up to hubby we would eat red meat every day of the week - oh maybe 6, and have pork the other day because the man adores a pork roast.  But me, I still love my fish and so many meat dishes is just too heavy for me, let alone it's not really all that healthy!

So last week I went scouring for a way to use up some of the tomatoes, eggplant and silverbeet (spinach) we have going crazy in our vegetable garden, and I found a great recipe on taste.com.au - I tweaked it a little, but I knew it would appeal to the kids as it had pasta and tomatoes in it - it wasn't a predominantly spinach dish, so hubby would be happy and it was veggo, which makes me happy!

It was yummy.  In fact I think this one will be made again, and soon - good to freeze this one and will be a great way to use the produce I have in the garden when I need to make room for my autumn crops.

You can also use non/low fat options in this recipe to make it easy on the waistline too!  As all the veges are in season at present, it's affordable too - so put it on your mealplan for this week!

Serves 6

Ingredients:
3 cups pasta sauce (I used homemade from tomatoes,  carrots, red wine, onion, garlic, basil and oregano and a little tomato paste)
1 large eggplant, sliced
2 leeks, finely sliced
1 bunch silverbeet - stalks cut off and then cut into ribbons
1 large or 2 small clove/s garlic, finely diced or minced
2/3 cup evaporated milk
250g tub ricotta cheese
Fresh pasta sheets (Lasagne) or make your own fresh pasta (I used 2 cups Tipo 00 flour, 2 eggs, 2 tb olive oil and 2 tb warm water)
1/2 cup tasty or mozzarella cheese

Method:
Place eggplant on a baking tray sprayed with canola oil, and bake at 200 degrees for about 10 minutes, until it softens, take out of oven and set aside.

Place 2 tb of olive oil in a frying pan and add the garlic and leeks, fry until leeks become transparent and then add the spinach, if you have a lid for your frypan, put it on and turn the heat down until it wilts. If not, stir until wilts.  Turn heat off and set aside.

Place 1/2 of your pasta sauce in a medium sized baking tray.

Lay out a pasta sheet, or make your pasta into 10-15cm x 10cm lengths.  Cut your eggplant into long strips (I sliced mine in thirds) and lay out on the pasta sheet.  Top with about 3 tb of the leek/spinach mixture and then top again with more eggplant.

Dip a finger into some water and wet the edge of the pasta sheet furthest away from you, roll up the pasta sheet until it's a roll - the water at the end should glue it together.  Place the rolls into the baking tray in the pasta sauce. Continue until you run out of eggplant/spinach/pasta sheets.

Preheat oven to 200 degrees c

Pour over the rest of the pasta sauce.

Mix the evaporated milk and ricotta cheese in a bowl, season with pepper.  Then pour over the canneloni and pasta sauce.

Sprinkle with tasty cheese and then place into the oven for 40-50 minutes until browned on top.  Serve immediately of refrigerate/freeze for later!

Vegetarian 'Rainbow' Lasagne

Those vegetarians out there, take heart!  My kids dubbed this 'Rainbow Lasagna'.  It might have had something to do with their obsessions about rainbows, but I'd like to believe it's because of the diverse colour of the produce in this lasagna.

When I made this, it made a large baking dish of lasagna and a smaller one.  So you could make 2 medium ones and freeze one - these can be made ahead so if you are catering for vegetarians or want a vegetarian option for any occasion.

I like to serve a vegetarian meal at least once a week, and I'm enjoying making my old favourites from the years I didn't eat meat, convincing my hubby, is a little less enjoyable, but I'm getting there!

Ingredients:

1.5 cups grated tasty cheese

1.5 cups grated mozzarella cheese

1 cup ricotta cheese

1/4 cup grated parmesan

3 cups pasta sauce, bottled or home-made

1 packet of dried or fresh lasagne pasta, or make your own easily with this recipe

1/2 butternut squash or pumpkin, sliced in 5mm thickness

1 large kumera or sweet potato, slice din 5mm thickness

1 red onion, finely diced

2 cloves of garlic

6 roma tomatoes, sliced

1 eggplant (or I used 4 mini eggplant) sliced

4 small zucchinis sliced

3 stalks of fresh basil

3 stalks of fresh oregano

2 stalks of fresh continental parsley

Method:

Grease your trays and preheat your oven to 190 degrees c.

Prepare your ingredients - chopping, mincing etc.

Prepare your pasta

Then arrange!

Layer of pasta, with butternut squash, 1/3 of the ricotta, 1/4 of tasty and mozzarella, a sprinkle of parmesan and garlic and sprinkle of oregano, basil and parsley - plus season with pepper and salt.

Then add a layer of pasta,  Layer of eggplant, red onion and again,  1/3 of the ricotta, 1/4 of tasty and mozzarella, a sprinkle of parmesan and garlic and sprinkle of oregano, basil and parsley - plus season with pepper and salt.

Next layer, add pasta, zucchini, sliced tomatoes, sweet potato, and  remainder of the ricotta, 1/4 of tasty and mozzarella, a sprinkle of parmesan and garlic and sprinkle of oregano, basil and parsley - plus season with pepper and salt.

Then, pour your pasta sauce on top, before adding the last layer, pasta, remainder of tasty and mozzarella, a sprinkle of Parmesan then if you like, leave it plain or I've topped it with cherry tomatoes and other times I've put vegetarian bacon.. plus  of course season with pepper and salt.

Cover with aluminimum foil and bake for 75 minutes.  Take off aluminium foil, and bake for further 15 minutes.

Fast Food on a Friday: Swedish Meatballs

If you're like me, any trip to Ikea wouldn't be complete without picking up a couple of bags of frozen meatballs.  But in my effort to be both frugal and slow-food conscious and also just have the satisfaction of making something from scratch, I decided to have a go at making my own.

The meatball mix I made below, made us two meals - roughly 60 meatballs.  These freeze well so I figured why not make two lots... I'd also use this quantity if serving them as canapes.  you could serve it with the sauce as a dipping sauce.


Ingredients:
meatballs
500 grams beef mince
500 grams pork mince
3 potatoes, peeled, boiled, and mashed
1 medium onion, finely diced
1 cup breadcrumbs, lightly toasted (or make breadcrumbs from toast!)
2 eggs
3/4 cup cream
salt and pepper


sauce/gravy
1tsp beef stock powder
200ml water
100ml cream
splash of soy sauce
pepper
2 tb cornflour


Method:
Mix all meatball ingredients together in bowl.  Mix thoroughly at first with a spoon, then when liquid is evenly distributed, mix it up with your hands!

Heat about 3 tb butter in a frypan, when hot, add walnut-sized meatballs and fry for about 2-3 minutes and turn over gently.  Transfer to baking tray, add butter to frypan as required, and repeat until all done!

Then make your sauce!
Basically combine water, cream, stock powder, soy sauce and pepper, sprinkle cornflour on top and whisk over medium heat until smooth

Allow to simmer and thicken.

Pour over your meatballs, or in bowl to dip if serving as canapes

Hummingbird Cupcakes

This week I managed to pick up some super-sweet pineapples for $1 each! I know! Great right?  So I cut them up and put them in the fridge but I also wanted to cook with them too... and here's what happened - Hummingbird Cupcakes.

Hummingbird cake has a jamaican origin which when you read the ingredients, makes a lot of sense.  Pineapple, banana, brown sugar....  They are lovely, and for those of you with kids who don't like fruit or have a lactose intolerance, this could work for you! 

Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups plain flour
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
3/4 cup firmly-packed brown sugar
3/4 cup vegetable/canola oil
3 eggs
1/2 cup pecan nuts, coarsely chopped
2 (300g) bananas, mashed
1/4 (150g) medium fresh pineapple,chopped
Shredded or dessicated coconut to sprinkle..

Method:

Preheat oven to 180°C. . Sift flour, cinnamon and bicarbonate of soda into a bowl. Stir in sugar.

Add oil, eggs, pecans, banana and pineapple to flour mixture. Mix well.

Divide mixture between paper cases. Sprinke with coconut (Aren't the Robert Gordon Australia Paper Cases adorable, you don't even need a muffin/cupcake tray - they stand on their own!)

Bake for 20 to 25 minutes or until a skewer inserted into 1 cupcake comes out clean.
Cool and devour.

These also freeze well.

Recipe Sourced from Super Food Ideas, October 2007 via www.taste.com.au

What's for dinner... Dahl....????

Now even if you're not a vegetarian, and you've never had Indian food, or the indian food you've eaten hasn't been your cup of tea, this might make you change your mind...  It's moorish, seriously.

Did you also know that it's National Vegetarian week?  Could you pledge to try veg?

I have been a long-time order-er of Dhal Markhani at Indian restaurants (oh I miss going out to dinner!) and I was so thrilled when I came across this recipe in an old Womens' weekly years ago, I tore it out and kept it ever since.. (don't sue me ACP!) - it tastes really authentic actually, and I'm super fussy! (No recipe mix in sight either!

It's mild enough for those non-curry lovers and my kids had seconds! 



Ingredients:
3/4 cup dried split yellow peas
3/4 cup dried red lentils
1 420gram tin brown lentils
2 tb butter
2 medium onions,  finely diced
2 cloves garlic, minced/finely diced
1 tb fresh minced ginger/ginger grated
2tb black mustard seeds (If you can't find at the supermarket try a large fruit market or deli, I got mine from fruit market for $2.49)
2tb ground cumin
1 tb ground coriander
2 tsp ground tumeric
2 x 420g tins crushed tomatoes
1 litre vegetable stock
100ml coconut cream
Fresh coriander, roughly chopped to finish

Method:
Soak your split peas and red lentils in about 1.5 litres of water overnight, you could get away with about 4 hours if you forget..

In a deep frypan, melt butter and add onions, garlic, and ginger until soft.

Add mustard seeds, ground coriander, cumin and tumeric until aromatic (about 1 minute)

 

Add drained red lentils,yellow split peas and brown lentils.

 

Add the tomatoes, and top up with roughly 250ml of stock, simmer until absorbed, and add more stock as needed.  Should simmer for about 1 hour.When that is done, stir through the coconut cream.

 

Lastly, cut ends of coriander leaves with scissors and stir through. 

 

This is how I served the girls, with white/brown rice combo and plain pappadums

(I so love that you can microwave them instead of frying!)

 

Canape, Snack, Lunch, Breakfast - the humble corn fritter...

I remember corn fritters very fondly in my childhood, in fact my mum would make a fritter out of any leftovers!  Corned beef fritters were also a fave too.  I make zucchini and carrot ones, but these ones are by far the favourite of my girls who will request them any time of the year - if they want a warm-up or a 'special breakfast'.

They're easy to make and you don't need a lot of ingredients... fresh corn on the cob, tinned kernels or even frozen ones (like I used this time) all work well.  Looking forward to having our own corn this summer!

For a snack or lunch I serve these with tomato sauce
For breakfast  I serve with grilled peppered cherry tomatoes - great alternative to bacon!
For a canape - I make them smaller and serve with sweet chilli sauce.

Great news is these do freeze well and you can reheat in the oven when you want to eat!


Ingredients:
1 cup self raising flour
1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate soda
1/2 teaspoon sweet paprika
1/2 teaspoon ground coriander
2/3 cup buttermilk
2 eggs
2 cups corn kernels \
3 shallots, sliced
2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley
1 tablespoon chopped fresh coriander
Sea salt
Freshly ground black pepper
Olive oil


Method:
Combine flour, soda, paprika in a bowl; whisk through buttermilk and eggs to form a batter.

Combine corn, green onions, parsley and coriander in a large bowl. Stir through the batter; season with salt and pepper.

 

Heat oil in a frying pan over medium high heat. Add tablespoonfuls of mixture into pan. Cook fritters for 2-3 minutes on each side until golden.