(I spend too much time here, apparently  ...)

LMAO! 

But hey as a cheese lover, I fully support your research! 

Harriet wrote:

 I better stop now!

But only in the interest of science, of course. 
 

I forgot to defrost some meat for dinner, so I was looking in the pantry for ideas and decided to do something with a tin of tuna. Found a recipe for a simple curry here, added a few extra ingredients (green onions and baby spinach). It was delicious! Probably really cheap too. I will definitely make it again.

Last edited by ukaunz (November 4, 2015 8:20 am)

Sounds yummy! 

I need to start eating more of the darker green vegetables... but I'm so broke and I have a few eating disorders... sometimes there's things I just can't eat, and I never really liked those dark green vegetables. 

I saw my doctor today because I've been so exhausted lately. My iron and vitamin balance is really low... (big surprise when I've lived off toast, garlic bread, pasta and cheap cheese for months). 

Any good ideas for very, very easy dishes with those dark green things? preferably stuff that doesn't involve too many ingredients either...

I never really learned to cook, and my back and hips doesn't make it too easy to work in the kitchen either.  

Well, I have a recipe for Turkey Tortellini Soup that doesn't have too many ingredients in it and includes chopped up spinach leaves.

3 cups (750 ml) of frozen or fresh cheese tortellini
1 tbsp. (15 ml) of olive oil
1 cooking onion chopped
1 clove of garlic minced
6 cups (1.5 L) of Chicken (or Turkey) stock - you can use the boxed stuff
1 carrot finely sliced
2 cups (500 ml) of left over turkey (or you can use chicken) diced
2 cups (500 ml) of chopped spinach leaves
S/P to taste

Bring a large pot of water to boil and add tortellini
Then bring it back up to a boil and cook them for about 5 minutes until they float. Drain and set aside

In a soup pot heat the oil over medium heat and cook the onion until softened.  Add garlic and cook for another 2 minutes

Add the stock to the pot and bring to a simmer

Add the carrot to the pot and cook until tender.  Then add the tortellini and meat to the pot.

Add the spinach and season.

Now I always have Herbes de Provence, on hand in my kitchen (it is one of my favourite flavour blends) and I add this to the pot too and it makes it taste devine.  This recipe serves 6 - 8 servings and if you don't add all the tortellini to the pot you can freeze the broth and the separate torts and put some of it away for a bit.

It is a fairly easy soup to make (especially if you have left over turkey or chicken), cooks up very quickly, and it has loads of spinach in it.  You can garnish it with some Parmesan Cheese and it really adds to the flavour too.


I made an interesting recipe tonight for the first time that had asparagus in it, but I included broccolini in it too because I had it on hand (it is just as good for you as broccoli but easier to digest).

It isn't as easy to make as the soup but it is very health conscious (my husband is diabetic so I have to be careful and make low Glycemic Index meals if possible).  This actually comes from a special diabetic cookbook...

Pasta Primavera with poached Salmon

6 oz of thin pasta (fettuccine or spagetti or even linguine) and in non Imperial terms that is a big handful
500 grams of skin on salmon
6 or so whole peppercorns (or if you want to fancy it up use 10-15 pink peppercorns)
2 sprigs of fresh dill (or you can you the jarred weed -  4 ml or so)
Grate a whole lemon for the rind
2 tsp. of olive oil (25 ml)
2 cloves of garlic minced
1 medium red onion thinly sliced (I used about a 1/2 of leek because red onions don't like me)
6 - 8 large asparagus spears ( I used about 20 very thin ones) halved crosswise
2 cups (500 ml) of snow peas trimmed and halved
1/2 cup of frozen peas (100 ml)
2 tbsp. lemon juice (more if you are including the mushrooms)

2 tsp. of finely chopped dill weed (25 ml)
2 tbsp. of flat leaf parsley chopped (30 ml)

I also added about 3 medium sized mushrooms and about 30 ml of rinsed and drained capers and a small bunch of broccolini trimed and rough chopped

Pasta: cook in a pot of boiling water until tender and drain. Set aside

Fish: in a large sauce pan bring the 5 cups of water to a boil with the fish fillets, dill sprigs, peppercorns, half of the grated lemon rind in it.  Reduce the heat and simmer for 8 minutes (turn the fillets over in the pan at the 4 minute halfway point)

Remove the fish from the water and put it on a plate to cool. then take the skin off and flake the fish into a bowl.

Veggies: in the poaching pan (once it is cleaned out) heat up the oil over medium heat and cook the onion. garlic, and asparagus (and broccolini if using it) as well as the mushrooms until the green veggies are tender.  Then add the peas, snow peas, lemon juice, capers, pasta, the remaining lemon rind and the fish.
Stir until hot. Remove from heat and add the capers and herbs.

Serves 4

-Val

Thank you Val and Yitzock!! I will have a good look at those recipes! 

Take out fish and chips.

(An explanatory aside!) I am currently under supervision of a doctor at the local hospital, for weight loss...well I'm there for something else, but the prescription was weight loss! So basically if I eat anything more thn whole meal bread or fruit...I put weight on!
However I will try and call in here after the many 'special meals' there are at this time of year...in case I've sampled anything else of note.
Poor hubby is such a good cook and enjoys making me tasty veggie meals...but I just have to stop eating them, or I just put weight on!

Well, it wasn't dinner but I made Eggs Benedict for the first time today for breakfast. 

It was delicious so I definitely will have them again (and Dan loves runny eggs so he devoured them too).

Tonight I am making Chili Con Carne with a conbination of minced lamb and beef.  It will be based on several recipes but since I don't like too spicy of food I will go a bit easy on the chilies.

I like Chili as a cold weather food and it keeps so well for leftovers.

-Val