Prawn Laksa

I was first introduced to Laksa by a friend who cooked it for our ‘one-pot’ games night. It’s a delicious Indonesian dish of many rumoured origins- Malaysian, Chinese, Vietnamese… but comes in somewhere between a Thai green curry, noodles, and a soup.

Ian absolutely loves it, and it’s seriously quick to make, so I love it too! Google it, and you’ll find many interpretations from the traditional to the easy. Mine’s a decent mixture of the lot and is designed to be easy without compromising on taste! Don’t be put off by the list of spices and Thai ingredients, just add what you’ve got and don’t panic if you haven’t got it all!

To make:

– Warm some vegetable oil in a pan, and add a dash each of: Ground coriander, ground cumin, cumin seeds, and turmeric. Then add chopped garlic, chillies, onions and ginger, and lemongrass if you have it. Add lime rind and stir, allowing the spices and others to brown slightly, before adding a splash of fish sauce (‘nam pla’) and a little coconut milk, to keep it all from sticking.

Note: If you prefer even more authenticity, blend the above before you start frying it

– To this, add the rest of a can of coconut milk (or, to taste) and 200mls of chicken or vegetable stock. Bring to the boil and reduce, adding matchstick carrots if you wish. If you don’t want to reduce, simply don’t add all the stock and coconut milk- about half will do!

– When the sauce is reduced slightly, add your noodles (pre-cooked if they aren’t ‘straight to wok’) and your prawns, along with the juice from the lime. Here you can also add spring onions, beansprouts, spinach or pak-choi to the pan if you wish to.

-Serve in deep bowls with a lime wedge and extra slices of chilli on top for those who like it hot. Yum!

Yummy Chicken Tagine

Now this is really delicious!

The unusual Moroccan flavours really bring the chicken to life, and you can make it using any old bit of chicken- even cheap drumsticks! I bulked mine out with extra onions and also carrot sticks, but chunks of sweet potato or butternut squash work just as well! Some recipes call for preserved lemon, but I used curls of lemon rind stripped from a raw lemon, and this worked just as well!

You will need:
– 1-2 pieces of chicken per person. Try chunks of breast, thighs, drumsticks or whole legs!
– 1 small onion per person.
– Ground ginger (and/or grated root ginger)
– Cumin seeds (or ground cumin)
– Coriander seeds (or ground coriander)
– Dried apricots
– Enough chicken stock to cover (around 500ml)

Optional extras:
– Butternut squash or sweet potato (chopped into chunks and peeled)
– Olives, preferably purple.
– Carrots (matchsticked)
– Honey

Marinade the chicken in the spice mix for as long as possible.

If you are using brined olives, soak in hot water for as long as possible to reduce the taste. Better yet, buy olives in oil!

Fry off the onions, and place in a casserole dish. Then brown the chicken, and fry with the spice mix for a couple of minutes.

Pour it all into the casserole, along with carrots (if using), olives (if using), dried apricots and butternut squash.

Cover with the stock (and honey if using) and place in oven at 180C for an hour to an hour and a half. If you wish, the lid can be removed for the final half hour to allow some of the liquid to evaporate and the sauce to thicken slightly.

Serve with couscous, quinoa or rice to soak up all the juice. Leftover juice can be eaten as a soup the following day- it was delicious!!

Sunday Roast- Make Less Feed More

Welcome to the Sunday Roast Specials…

Up this week- how to make a little meat go a long way without people feeling cheated!

“As the queen of keeping it cheap, making less feed more is one of my most important skills. Here are some of the cheats I use on my Sunday Roast to keep it frugal!”

• Buy more unusual cuts, such as belly of pork or lamb breast (you can see recipes here!).
• Generally speaking, chicken and pork are cheaper than beef or lamb, so try to stick to these.
• Shop around- Aldi does  1kg no-bone pork shoulder joints for as little as £3.49!
• Bulk it out using cheap potatoes. As a rule I use one small potato each if I’m doing other root veg, but do two, or three…. so people won’t notice they aren’t getting as much meat or a variety of veg! You could even make two potato dishes (mash and roast, for instance) to disguise the fact you’re filling people on potatoes!
• Onions are also cheap- add them to your veg roasting dish for the last hour to bulk it out further!
• Carrots are cheap too- instead of roasting them, try making them as a separate side dish! The extra dishes on the table and piles on the plate draw attention away from how little there is in each pile!
• Pick what’s in season. Leeks are in season now, and are cheap, and brussels are coming to the end of their season. Savoy cabbage is cheap this time of year and can be blanched then fried with a little bacon for a yummy side dish that even fussy kids will eat!
• Adding stuffing made from a stuffing mix is another way to ensure people are full up without feeling left out! It’s cheap too!
• Don’t buy gravy, make it from the juices that leave the meat during cooking, and save yourself a fortune! (It tastes better too!)
• Don’t forget to use the leftovers! A leftover chicken carcass can be used for my chicken soup and leftover roast chicken can be made into a pie. Leftover pork is brilliant in sandwiches with sauce, and old roast potatoes can be made into potato cakes for tomorrow!

Go on, make that roast go further! And if you have any more suggestions, please comment! I’d love to hear your thoughts!

Next Week: Foolproof Crackling!

Cheesy Chicken Sautee

Ah. Heaven!

This meal is simple, but delicious enough to make my mouth water just thinking about it! It has become a firm favourite in this household, and Ian keeps telling me I need to think of a new name for it, because this one doesn’t let on how AMAZING it is!

It is ridiculously cheap at around 80p a portion, and is divine enough to drag out for friends!

– Chicken. I use leg quarters from Aldi for 1.15 a pair- they’re cheap, and it doesn’t matter about the bones! One is enough per person!
– Canned tomatoes (x1 between 2 people)
– Onion (1 between 2)
– Fennel seeds, thyme and garlic to marinade (yes, the fennel seeds ARE essential- they are what makes this meal go from standard to special!)
– Cheese

• Marinade the chicken legs in the fennel seeds, thyme, garlic, and salt and pepper for a few hours. I put them in there in the morning, so it is ready to start when I get home.
• Brown off the chicken in a frying pan, then remove.
• Fry the onions until soft, then add the tomatoes for a couple of minutes.
• Pour the tomatoes over the chicken in a casserole dish. Leave in oven (170degrees) for 30minutes with lid on.
• Remove lid and allow sauce to reduce.
• Grate some cheese over the top, and return to oven until cheese is browned (5-10minutes)

 

I serve mine with a great big jacket potato. Definitely serve it with something that can mop up all that cheese-y, tomato-y juice!

 

And ta-dah. Another frugal meal to make you all smile!

Rock on!

How to Butcher a Chicken

Hello hello hello!

This may seem like slightly out of my normal crafty comfort zone, but I have long been comfortable with butchering chickens. See me, aged 5… lazy Sundays, picking the chicken we were going to have for dinner, killing, plucking, and gutting it (all before lunch) then sitting down to go through the internal organs with my mum (early signs of my veterinary career to come, methinks!).

Keeping your own chickens is rewarding and far cheaper than buying them from the shops. However, you don’t have to keep your own to get chicken a little cheaper! Have you noticed how expensive chicken breasts are? This is because they’re in high demand! Boned thighs are just as useful for things like fajhitas, curries, and fried chicken, and they’ve long been far cheaper than breasts. However, now most people have cottoned on to this, boned thighs are also getting more expensive.

So here’s my plan: buy a whole large chicken for £4.75 from Aldi. If you were to buy the legs (thighs and drumsticks), wings, and breasts seperately it would add up to about £6.50. Not to mention that you wouldn’t get the amazing carcass to use for stock or, even better, soup! The breasts on these beasts are humongous, and I usually cut them in half, getting four breasts that are still bigger than the ones you get from the shop!

So here we are: A quick lesson in getting the most from your chicken! This guide is for righties (sorry lefties) but can probably be reversed for all you leftie odd-balls!

1. Buy yourself a whole chicken. I get a large free-range one from Aldi for £4.75. Let me know if you know of anywhere cheaper!
2. Take it out of its packaging and place it breast-side up on a chopping board, with the legs facing towards you. Ensure you have a sharp knife to hand- I usually sharpen mine especially.

For the legs:

1. Grab the leg nearest your left hand, and slice the skin on the upper surface with a knife or scissors.
2. Using the thumb of your left hand, feel for the hip joint. Here’s a diagram to show you how the hip joint works:
   With your four fingers on the bottom of the leg acting like a lever, and your thumb near the hip joint, pull the leg out away from the chicken and down towards the chopping board, using your left hand to stabilise the chicken. The right hand diagram above shows the ball-and-socket nature of this joint- you need to dislocate it. The hip joint will ‘clunk’ and the femoral head will appear on the upper surface of the leg (near my thumb in photo below).

   

3. Put the point of the knife into the joint, and apply pressure, slicing away any meat still attaching the leg as you go.
4. Now repeat with the other leg. Being a rightie I tend to turn the chicken around so that the leg is still on my left, but have a fiddle and see what you find easiest.
5. If you want to seperate the thighs and drumsticks, feel for the joint again. Slice away the meat over the joint, then put the point of your knife through the joint. If you are in the right place, it will go through easily.

For the wings:

1. You can’t pop the wing joint like you can with the hip, but otherwise the technique is similar. Grab the wing nearest your left hand and cut away the skin on the upper surface.
2. Feel for the joint with your thumb (this time it is further in/deeper). Instead of popping the joint outwards, place your knife into the joint and press down towards the chopping board. You may need to readjust it, but once you’re in the right place it should be easy to get through.
3. Cut away any flesh still holding the wing on.
4. Now repeat with the other wing. Again, I usually turn the bird around so that the wing is still on my left.

Now for the breasts:

1. Stretch the skin tightly over the breast, and feel for the breastbone. Holding the skin taut, slice carefully right over the breastbone- you should get through the skin and hit the bone.
2. Move your knife slightly to one side (I go for right) and slice down carefully. If you feel resistance, angle the knife outwards slightly. 
3. You are aiming to follow the curve of the breast bone whilst keeping as much meat on the breast as possible. Continue, cutting through any meat that still attaches the breast to the carcass.
4. Repeat for the other breast.
5. Neaten the breasts, trimming away any fat and other bits, if you wish.

Now place all the bits into little freezer bags and label them (its hard to tell them apart once they’re all frozen and wrapped up!). You can trim meat off the carcass if you wish, but I prefer to make a soup from it. For instructions, go to my chicken recipes section.