Nutty Super-food Salad

It is so much easier to eat healthily in the Summer I find. I actually crave salad, whereas in the Winter I crave stodge. Occasionally I pick up lunch on my way home from work, before I pick up the kids. Unfortunately, in my line of work, your job is to cook other people lunch, not cook or eat your own! Marks and Spencer is probably best for ready-made salads. Although I know that Waitrose also do quite and extensive range. Most of the ones I have tried, may sound nice, but are usually disgusting. They always seem to try just a bit too hard, chucking in any combination of trendy ingredients – black quinoa seeds, Camargue red rice, cranberries, amaranth leaf, black barley -  and the dressings are always really nasty – too much Japanese rice vinegar and Yuzu!. 

The other day I bought a selection of two different salads, both which unannounced contained seaweed!  Surely if you are going to add seaweed to your salad, you would mention it in the name, not just hidden in a long list of ingredients which are far too small to read with human eyes. Well my eyes anyway. I couldn’t work out what this slimy, sort "off-fishy" taste was in my salad. Narrowed it down to the Wakame which was eventually mentioned in the list of 30 ingredients, now that I had been forced to put my reading glasses on. I even like seaweed, on say nori rolls, where it is meant to be, but this was disgusting and both pots of salad ended up in the bin. 

However, I am pleased to say, after much trial and error, I finally found a ready-made salad that I really liked. Marks and Spencer Nutty Superfood Salad. Featuring green beans, peas, broccoli, carrots, black-eyed beans and quinoa plus peanuts, almonds and pistachios, it is absolutely packed with delicious ingredients. It comes two ways, either on its own or served alongside a dollop of cannellini bean hummus and with a soy and ginger dressing. 

It may seem like a lot of ingredients, but it is super easy. Make up a large batch and dress it as required. What is so fab about making it yourself, is you don’t have to skimp on your favourite expensive ingredients, which inevitably the supermarkets always do!

Nutty Super-food Salad

To serve 4

2 Broccoli florets, shredded

1 Handful of peas

100g French beans, cut into 1 inch pieces

1 large carrot, finely chopped

100g spelt (wheatberries, barley or farro) you can buy ready cooked

100g soya beans

200g cooked black eye beans (or another type of bean – haricot, cannallini)

50g quinoa (You can buy ready cooked)

1 tsp. poppy seeds

1 handful pumpkin seeds

1 handful peanuts

1 handful pistachios

1 handful almonds

A little freshly chopped coriander

For the dressing, mix together:

2 tbsp. soy

1 tsp grated ginger

1 tsp sesame

1 tsp honey

Juice ½ lime

½ tsp. chilli paste

Put three pans of water on to boil. In the first add the quinoa. Cook 12-15 minutes until all the quinoa has gone squiggly. Drain well. In the second add the farro, cook for 20-30 minutes until tender. Drain well. In the third pan, add a pinch of salt and then the green beans. When cooked, add the shredded broccoli, bring back to the boil and add the peas and soya beans. Bring back to the boil and drain. Drain well.

Combine the salad ingredients.

Mix the dressing ingredients together and drizzle over each portion or alternatively, toss through the entire lot in a large bowl.

Spicy Chipotle Maple Roast Sweet Potato and Brussel Sprout Grain Bowls

Do you know what a “Grain Bowl” is? No, neither did I. Turns out it is a quick and easy, one-dish meal, which contains among other things, one or a variety of grains. In England I guess this is just called “Lunch” but in America, where they simply have to invent a name for everything, they are very big, as part of a healthy, well-balanced diet .

The basic idea is you pick a grain – brown rice, Freekeh, quinoa, Farro or couscous.

Add salad or leafy greens – anything from raw kale, spinach, rocket, radicchio or salad leaves. (Not too much apparently, as then it is a salad and not a grain bowl!)

Add cooked seasonal vegetables– roast beetroot, squash, sweet potato, cauliflower, broccoli or Brussel sprouts for example.

Add protein – fish, chicken, beans, chickpeas, edamame or an egg, poached, fried or hard boiled.

Add dressing or a sauce – a basic vinaigrette or a themed dressing such as Asian, Moroccan or Thai. Use ingredients such as Harissa, curry pastes stirred into yogurt or mayonnaise, coconut milk, miso and lots of herbs and spices.

Add garnishes – toasted nuts, seeds, crumbled cheese, avocado, broad beans or crispy bacon.

So as you can see, the possibilities are endless. My fridge though is packed with sweet potatoes and Brussel sprouts from my weekly veg box, so this seemed a good place to start.

My choice of grain was cous cous although I am a great fan of Farro too. I am off quinoa ever since I discovered that it comes with a heavy environmental footprint. Due to the huge rise in demand, Bolivians can no longer afford to buy Quinoa, as its price is now so over inflated, and as a result they are starving. The demand has also resulted in decreased soil fertility and erosion due to over farming. I don’t know all the ins and outs, but quite frankly I can survive without it. For those who require a gluten free option, try the less popular, and therefore less destructive, Amaranth. But for now Quinoa, along with unsustainable Palm Oil, which is threatening the future of Orangutans, has joined my list of avoided products.

My sauce is based on the Spanish Adobo sauce. It turns up all over the Americas too, in various guises. I opted for a smoked Chipotle chilli, which is my favourite and ready available, and I was really pleased with the outcome. The combination of chilli, garlic, ginger and cumin is one that I use so often, that I know that I will be using this recipe all the time. In fact, I used it again this week in my Spicy Sweet Potato and Bean Burgers.



I have never tried roasting Brussel sprouts before. I never thought they would work, but I was wrong. The combination of the Brussel sprouts roast with sweet potato, maple syrup and my home made Adobo sauce was enough to convince me that I will be making this again too.

Finally, my garnish was Crispy Roast Chickpeas. They are an old favourite, though I have never used them in a "Grain Bowl" before. Up until now I just put them on a salad!

Adobe Sauce
4 or 5 Smoked Chipotle Chillies (soaked in water)
Large knob of ginger
2 cloves garlic (peeled)
2 tsp ground cumin
½ tsp salt
2-3 tbsp olive oil
Peel the ginger by scrapping off the skin with a teaspoon, roughly chop and put together with all the other ingredients. Whiz up with a hand blender. Add a little water if necessary to get a smooth paste.



Spicy Chipotle Maple Roast Sweet Potato and Brussel Sprout Grain Bowls.
200g Brussel sprouts, stems trimmed and cut in half
1 tablespoon maple syrup
1 teaspoon Adobo sauce (more if you like it spicy)
½ small sweet potato, peeled and cut into 1 cms chunks
Sea salt
Freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon coconut oil
100g whole wheat couscous
Wild Rocket
½ lemon
Extra virgin olive oil
1 tbsp Mayonnaise (leave out for vegans)
1 tsp Adobo sauce
 Crispy Roast Chickpeas

Preheat the oven 200C. Line a baking sheets with parchment paper. Toss the Brussel Sprouts and sweet potato with the maple syrup, Adobo, a little salt and pepper and coconut oil. (If you keep your coconut oil in the fridge like I do you might want to melt it in the microwave for a minute or two.) Spread on the sheet. You can add your chickpeas (see recipe below) at the same time. Check the veg and chickpeas regularly and move round the trays if necessary to ensure even cooking. The Brussel sprouts are done when they are turning golden brown and beginning to caramelise.

Meanwhile put your cous cous in a bowl with a little salt and olive oil. Mix well and cover with boiling water. Leave to sit for 15 minutes.

Make a dressing from the juice from the lemon, some olive oil and a pinch of salt. Whisk well. Dress your salad leaves with the lemon dressing and put in the bottom of your bowl. Next fluff up your cous cous with a fork and add the roast vegetables. Check seasoning and pile on top of the rocket, finally scatter the roasted chickpeas on top. Mix the mayonnaise with a little more Adobo sauce and let it down with water until you have the consistency of single cream. Drizzle over the salad.

New Year's Resolutions

What are my New Year's resolutions? Write my blog more often. It is already the 17th January and this is my first post of the year. Brilliant start! 

The others were drink less and eat more healthily. I managed to go six days without any alcohol which is probably the longest stretch I have managed since I was last pregnant, 9 years ago. 

As for the healthy eating; I have been scouring the newspapers and magazines for the latest ideas. Deliciously Ella is very last year now but Amelia Freer’s second book Cook. Nourish. Glow. seems to be very “of the minute”.  She is a Nutritional therapist and wants to completely re-educate the way you eat. She explains that we eat too much sugar, dairy, processed food and gluten. To summarise, somewhat briefly, she believes in buying good, seasonal, preferably organic produce and taking a little time to cook them at home. Good news for all my readers because that is exactly what you have been already doing for years. Not exactly rocket science!

But my personal diet message to myself as I get older, is all about re-hydration. There is no doubt as we age everything: our hair and nails and skin gets drier and moisturising from the inside as well as the outside can really help.  We are used to rubbing fatty moisturisers into our skin, but this is constantly at attack from the environment, so it would seem that it might be more effective to put the fats inside you, so that your body can do the job of lubricating you itself. Of course, by this I mean good fats rather than bad fats, namely Omega 3 fats, essential fatty acids. I think we all panic at this word, imagining that we have to consume bucket loads of sardines and mackerel to achieve our daily quota, but whilst fatty fish are clearly good for you, all sorts of vegetables, seeds and nuts are also excellent sources.

Here are a few to try and include in your diet
Flaxseeds
Walnuts
Beef
Brussel Sprouts
Cauliflower
Winter Squash
Broccoli
Kale
Spinach
Green Beans
Parsley

It is not only Omega 3 which provides good fats. Monounsaturated and Polyunsaturated fats are also good. A moderation of saturated fats are also acceptable from whole milk, coconut oil and grass-fed meat but tran-fats should be avoided at all costs in commercially baked goods, packaged snack foods, margarine and commercially prepared fried foods.

To make sure you are getting enough good fats (Monounsaturated and Polyunsaturated) stock up on avocados, olives, nuts (almonds, peanuts, macadamia nuts, hazelnuts, pecans, cashews and walnuts), seeds (sunflower, sesame and pumpkin seeds), flaxseed and fatty fish.

Luckily I had a couple of Avocados in my Riverford box this week, so I set about making up a new salad. I am particularly pleased with the salad dressing which turned out really creamy and fresh. I just used tarragon, which always goes well with chicken and some basil for added zing. 

I also like chicken cooked in this butterflied method as it cooks in minutes, as it is so thin, and stays really juicy and tender. Finally, of course you can add any other vegetables you have to hand and your salad leaves are up to you too. I used a mixture of rocket, watercress and a few sprigs of mint. So get hydrating!

Grilled Chicken with Almond Dressing, Avocado and Vegetable Salad

Dressing
50g almonds, soaked
A few sprigs of what herbs you fancy – coriander, basil, parsley or
tarragon, leaves picked

100ml extra virgin olive oil
2 x 150g chicken breasts
Zest of a lemon

Dried oregano
Extra virgin olive oil
Mixed salad leaves and maybe a few sprigs of herbs
1 bulb fennel
1 carrot
1 small courgette
1 ripe avocado
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
lemon wedges, to serve

For the dressing drain the almonds, add the olive oil, the herbs, a good pinch of salt and pepper and some water and puree with a hand blender until smooth and creamy. Add more water to get a good consistency and check for seasoning.

Take each chicken breast and cut it through the from one side to the other, stopping just short of the edge. This is difficult to explain so please follow link. Unfold the chicken breast and lay flat. Season with salt and pepper, dried oregano and lemon zest on both sides. Drizzle with olive oil.
Shave the fennel, courgette and carrot with a mandolin. Peel and thinly slice the avocado. Dress the salad and shaved vegetables with a little olive oil and a small pinch of salt. Arrange on plates. Heat a griddle pan of just a large frying pan. Arrange the avocado on the plates with the salad. Grill the chicken on both sides until just cooked. Place on top of the salad. Drizzle with almond dressing and serve with a wedge of lemon.