Category: Mains

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Quick and Easy Mince & Baby Sweetcorn Lasagne

We don’t always have time to make lots of different sauces to finish a popular dish at home.  Some great meat from a local butcher can be eked out really well to ensure there’s enough food for a whole family.

I made this lasagne with good meat and cheap sauce.  It’s delicious and you can vary it as much as you want by adding herbs and spices.  This recipe gave me enough for one night fresh, and I froze the rest for another night.

Quick and Easy Mince and Baby Sweetcorn Lasagne

Lesley S Smith
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Prep Time 15 minutes
Cook Time 45 minutes
Total Time 1 hour
Course Mains
Servings 8

Ingredients
  

  • 1 kg Mince
  • 200 g Baby Sweetcorn Cut into thirds.
  • 200 g Petit Pois
  • 1 Large Onion Chopped.
  • 2 Jars Dolmio Bolognaise Sauce
  • 2 Jars Lasagne White Sauce
  • Lasagne Sheets
  • Olive Oil

Instructions
 

  • Add a little olive oil to a frying pan or thick bottomed pan. Fry the onions gently until they are soft, but not brown.
  • Add the mince and use a wooden spoon to bash it down and separate it as it browns and cooks.
  • Add in the baby sweetcorn, peas and 2 jars of Bolognaise Sauce, simmer for 5 minutes.
  • Add half of your mince mix to the bottom of a baking tray or large dish.
  • Line the top of the mince with lasagne sheets and pour over the remainder of your mince mix.
  • Add another layer of lasagne sheets and simply pour over the jars of white sauce.
  • Cover with tin foil and bake at 180 degrees for 35 minutes.
  • Check to see if your lasagne sheets have gone soft, if they have, remove the tin foil and bake for a further 10 minutes to begin browning the top. This is an optional choice.
  • Serve and garnish.

 

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Lactofree Cream Cheese Stuffed Chicken Breast – (Bag Roasted)

This is one of the ultimate easy fast foods.  Perfect for a lunch or just for a treat.  This lactofree cream cheese stuffed chicken breast is make by using a simple roasting bag and then adding some herbs on the top.  I think this will be served up next time I have others to cook for at a lunchtime.

Lactofree Cream Cheese Stuffed Chicken Breast – (Bag Roasted)

Lesley Smith
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Prep Time 5 minutes
Total Time 5 minutes
Course Mains

Ingredients
  

  • Chicken Breast Fillets 1 Per Person
  • Chives
  • Rainbow Peppercorns
  • Nutmeg
  • 2 tablespoons Cream Cheese I used Lactofree Cream Cheese
  • Tomatoes To serve
  • Roasting Bag

Instructions
 

  • Put your chicken breasts into a roasting bag and into the oven at 200 degrees for approximately 40 minutes for large chicken breasts, or 25 minutes for small ones. Ensure they are fully cooked.
  • Simply take the chicken breasts out of the roasting bag and spoon a teaspoon or two of juices over the top of your chicken breast to keep it moist. Save the rest of the juices if there are enough to make stock, or freeze for another day.
  • Slice the chicken breast down the middle and simply spoon in the cream cheese.
  • Grate peppercorns over the top of the cream cheese, close the chicken breast and sprinkle with chopped chives.
  • Lastly, a half teaspoon of nutmeg sprinkled across the top of the chicken gives the look of barbequed or fried chicken. Garnish and serve.

Notes

Be free with this recipe and don't hold to the ingredient amounts. Just add enough of whichever spice or herb you like to taste and enjoy.

 

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Fillet Steak, Bag Roasted in Red Wine

Using roasting bags is a relatively new find to me. I’ve usually roasted in tin foil, but have found that roasting in a bag actually gives me a much better texture and taste.

Fillet Steak 7

It actually doesn’t look like much on a plate, but it tasted absolutely heavenly. I’m not quite sure how else I would ever cook a fillet again, as this has spoiled me rotten. Our fillet steak came from Andrew Gordon Butchery and Fine Foods as does most of the meat on this blog nowadays. It’s always easier to have a successful meal when we start with great ingredients.

The addition of red wine made me a little nervous when I was making it, but I needn’t have worried. I’d love to try it in stout another day. The piece of fillet was gorgeous, and I think that’s what made me nervous about cooking such a great piece of meat this way, but for us, it was amazing.

Fillet Steak

Fillet Steak, Bag Roasted in Red Wine

Lesley Smith
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Prep Time 20 minutes
Cook Time 1 hour
Total Time 1 hour 20 minutes
Course Mains
Servings 5 - 6

Ingredients
  

  • 800 g Fillet Steak
  • 5 Large Carrots Cut into batons.
  • 3 Large Onions Sliced in strips.
  • 100 ml Red Wine
  • 500 g Tomato Passata
  • 1 teaspoon Rainbow Peppercorns
  • 1 teaspoon Salt
  • 1 Clove Garlic

Instructions
 

  • This is so easy to do. Simply rub the pepper and salt evenly into the fillet steak.
  • Put the passata and wine into the roasting bag first, and then add the other ingredients one by one. Gently hold the neck of the bag and allow the contents to mix and coat the vegetables.
  • Add the fillet steak to the bag and gently move the ingredients around until the fillet steak is fully covered by the ingredients.
  • Pop in a pre-heated oven at 180 degrees c for approximately an hour. If you like your meat well done, leave it for 1.5 hours and check on it. If you wish to thicken your gravy, pop it in a pan and reduce or thicken it for a few minutes until it reaches the texture you prefer.
  • Serve with mash, bread, rice or salad.

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Sticky BBQ Chicken, Cherry Tomatoes & Cucumber

Sticky BBQ Chicken 570

Much easier than it looked, I think I’m now hooked on cooking in the bag. This time round, I bought Maggi So Juicy to try it, but after seeing it is a Nestle product and knowing the boycott around them for the advertising campaigns at mothers in third world countries to get them to buy baby formula, I doubt I’ll buy it again. My next attempt will just be a roasting bag with herbs and spices in it.

I didn’t see anything to worry me on the ingredients list, although I’d have preferred to do without the Maltodextrin if it was at all possible.

All there is to it, is to open the top, take out the bag and pop your chicken into it. Then shake the seasoning into the bag, tie the end with the clip provided and turn the bag over and over until all the seasoning coats the chicken.

I used chicken breasts from my favourite online butcher. I forgot to pierce the 4 small holes in the top of the bag, but it didn’t seem to do any damage. I added 5 whole chicken breasts to the pack and there was plenty of room for them to cook despite being huge.

The bag expands a fair bit so make sure you put it in the lower to middle of your oven, otherwise, you could end up like me with the top of the bag sticking to the upper rack and having to peel it off.

Thankfully the bag stood up to a fair bit of punishment all in all, and I did spend longer cooking it than was recommended on the pack. I cooked for an hour, whereas the recipe said 30 – 40 minutes for drumsticks. I reasoned that the big chicken breasts would take longer to cook and they came out just perfectly.

I served with Potato fritters, cherry tomatoes and cucumber.

My next job is to try it without the ready made herbs and spices.

Sticky BBQ Chicken 2

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Kangaroo and Buffalo Burgers

Buffalo Burger Cooked 570

My favourite online butcher, Andrew Gordon Butchery and Fine Foods has taken in some wonderfully unusual meat for burger making.

He now frequently has Kangaroo, Waygu, Buffalo and Zebra burgers, as well as a few Springbok ones in stock.   I was in past and came away with some Kangaroo and Buffalo burgers.

Buffalo Burger 570

The man seemed initially skeptical of the contents or taste of the burgers, but once cooked, he was highly delighted and ate two whole massive 200g Buffalo Burgers to himself.

A quick shallow fry in a frying pan in some rapeseed oil, popped in a bun with a cheese slice, lettuce, tomatoes and radish.

Buffalo and Kangaroo Burgers Cooked

Fabulous.

 

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Roasted Stuffed Peppers with ONION, MUSHROOM AND CHEDDAR CHEESE, SERVED WITH QUAILS EGGS AND SALAD

Filling peppers is a very cheap and tasty way to fill bellies.  There is no limit to the amount of combinations that can be filled and roasted.  Add some lovely side salad and eggs, and the plate looks lovely.

Roasted Stuffed Peppers – Onion, Mushroom and Cheddar Cheese, Served with Quails Eggs and Salad

Lesley Smith
4 from 1 vote
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Prep Time 15 minutes
Cook Time 20 minutes
Total Time 35 minutes
Course Mains, Starter
Servings 6

Ingredients
  

  • 6 Whole Peppers Red, Green or Yellow (can be mixed)
  • 500 g Mushrooms Chopped
  • 2 Large Onions Chopped
  • 250 g Cheese Grated
  • 12 Quails Eggs
  • Salad
  • Salt & Pepper
  • 3 tablespoons Olive Oil

Instructions
 

  • Put your oven on to pre-heat at approximately 180 C.
  • Slice the top of your peppers and put it to one side. I had to take slivers off the bottom of mine to make them stand up, otherwise they just toppled over. If you buy your peppers loose, you can look for the perfect peppers to do this with. Hollow out the peppers and remove the seeds.
  • Fill the peppers with grated cheese, pop the lids back on and place them on a baking tray. Sprinkle salt and pepper over the top, and drizzle olive oil over the top of the peppers.

  • Bake in the oven for approximately 20 minutes, or until the peppers are soft.
  • Lightly fry the mushrooms and onions in a frying pan and put the Quails eggs on to boil. 4 minutes in boiling water only.
  • When the peppers are cooked, place them on a bed of lettuce or salad leaves. Take off the top and fill with the onions and mushrooms, add sliced quails eggs and serve.

How to cook quail eggs.

Stuffed Peppers2

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Spinning Chicken – Ekeing out Quality Meat to avoid buying Mechanically Processed Meat – Part 2

From the mango chicken I made in my first post about ekeing out quality meat, the second half of the batch went straight into being a Chicken and Mango Tikka Masala.

I think the very real after effect of the horsemeat scandal is that we really don’t know what’s in processed food, even if it tells us the ingredients on the wrapper.

This was the second half of my intention to feed a family of 6 twice with each half of the batch.  One portion for eating, and one for freezing for another day.

Step two. Chicken and Mango Tikka Masala.  Again, accessories spun out the meat, with a filling pasta and nan bread accompaniment.

Chicken and Mango Tikka Masala Pasta

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Servings 6 -12

Ingredients
  

  • HalfMango Chicken Batch http://scottishmum.com/mango-chicken-wrap/
  • 1 Clove Garlic
  • 0.5 Jar Pataks Tikka Masala Paste
  • 1 Teaspoon Sugar
  • 500 g Pasta Tubes
  • 250 g Tub Mascapone or fresh cream (You will need 250g more when you defrost the portion destined for the freezer.)
  • 500 g Carton or Jar of Tomato Passata
  • 100 ml Water
  • 1 Teaspoon of Mixed Herbs
  • 2 Onions

Instructions
 

  • Lightly fry your two chopped onions in the oil, add the garlic and don't allow the onions to brown. You want them to be a lovely soft texture.
  • Mix the Mango Chicken with the cooked onions and garlic.
  • Add half a jar of the Tikka Masala Paste, the tub of passata and sugar and mixed herbs. Bring to a very low simmer for 5 minutes. Your chicken is already cooked, so it is just a case of combining the ingredients and flavours until they are mixed in. Add water slowly until it becomes a texture similar to a very thick pasta sauce.
  • Split your batch into half. Put the half for freezing to one side to cool. With the batch you will be eating, add the cream or mascapone and finish the meal. If you freeze the portion for another day with the cream or cheese in, it may separate on defrosting. Leave adding the dairy to that portion until you are ready to eat it.
  • Cook between 500g and 1kg of pasta, depending on whether you plan to freeze cooked pasta with your Chicken and Mango Tikka Masala. If you do plan to freeze some pasta, I would be tempted to combine the pasta and Mango Chicken Tikka Masala. I prefer defrosting cooked pasta that has been combined with a sauce, but it would be just as simple to use rice, or cous cous when you eat your frozen batch.
  • Add your cream or mascapone to your Tikka Masala. If you want your sauce thinner, simply add a little more water until it reaches the right consistency.

 

 

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Spinning Chicken – Ekeing out Quality Meat to avoid buying Mechanically Processed Meat – Part 1

My challenge for a lot of this year is to find ways to make quality meat affordable and a good purchase for everyone.

Bearing in mind that my family would wolf down a big pack of chicken nuggets in one go, it would work out about a fiver a meal just for those, which is likely to have e-numbers, additives, sugar, added salt and much more depending on the manufacturers.

I think the very real after effect of the horsemeat scandal is that we really don’t know what’s in processed food, even if it tells us the ingredients on the wrapper.

I get chicken from the Andrew Gordon Butchery in Aberdeen.  It costs on average £25 for 10 very large chicken breasts.

To buy the same in a supermarket, I’d probably have to get 15 – 20 breasts weight wise, and at todays prices, that seems to work out quite high to me.   I live happier knowing that the meat I eat has had a good life before it hit my plate.

I used all 10 chicken breasts to make mango chicken for wraps, with the intention of splitting the batch down the middle as soon as it was cooked.  To spin it out even further, a cook could add vegetables, lentils, noodles or much more to the cooking process.

The intention was to feed a family of 6 twice with each half of the batch.  One portion for eating, and one for freezing for another day.

That would give me the equivalent of a full belly x 24 for the £25 worth of good meat by adding cheap and healthy ingredients to bulk it out.

I cooked the second half of the batch on the same day, with one portion in the fridge for the next night, and another one in the freezer for another day.

Come back tomorrow to see what I turned the Mango Chicken into.

First step, the Mango Chicken.  I added salad vegetables, wraps and sauces to make the meat spin out.

[gmc_recipe 10534]

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How to make a simple chicken pie with help from the slow cooker.

Chicken pie recipes are as many and varied as there are hot dinners in the year.  I wanted to have something no fuss, with full flavour, and easy to make.  Puff pastry is the one pastry that I cheat with.  It is such a faff to work with, that I always have some on standby in the freezer to make emergency pies or puff pizzas.  A little puff on the top of a dish can complete something that has been a bit of a disaster in the kitchen and needs a topping, or to finish a slow cooked recipe with fantastic flavour, by turning it into a pie.

The chicken is slow cooked, but the puff pastry has to really be popped into the oven with the pie filling to finish off the dish.  The filling is what makes the result spectacular in a pie.  Slow cooked food has a taste and aroma that I feel no other way of cooking can produce.

According to the kids, this was the best chicken pie ever, so how to make a chicken pie had to be turned into a blog post.  I get my meat, as always these days from Andrew Gordon Butchery and Fine Foods and the traceability, quality and texture never let me down.

Slow Cooked Chicken Pie Recipe

Lesley S Smith
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Prep Time 30 minutes
Cook Time 8 hours
Total Time 8 hours 30 minutes
Course Mains

Ingredients
  

  • 1 Chicken Breast per person Cut into strips.
  • 2 Tablespoons Rapeseed Oil
  • 100 g Vegetables Per Person
  • Water Tailor to your recipe.
  • Salt Pinch
  • Pepper Pinch
  • Cornflour
  • Pack of Puff Pastry

Instructions
 

  • Switch on your slow cooker to high and add a couple of mm of water in the bottom. Look out a thick bottomed frying pan and your oil. This recipe is not cut and dried. There is very little that can go wrong, so choose how many people you will feed to decide how much you make ingredient wise. When you know your amounts, it is easy to judge how much of everything else that you need.

  • Lightly fry your chicken in a tablespoon of rapeseed oil, so that the edges all round have gone white. Once the meat has been sealed, it can be added to your slow cooker.

  • Choose which vegetables you use. I had 6 chicken breasts, and I added 2 chopped onions and 2 sliced carrots to my pan with the remaining rapeseed oil. I lightly fried those before adding them to the slow cooker.

  • I add another cup or two of water to half cover the ingredients, give it all a quick stir and pop on the lid. It can be left for 4 hours on high, or turn it down to low for approximately 7 - 8 hours.

  • When it's ready, you can thicken the gravy if you wish by using cornflour mixed in water, and adding it slowly until you reach the thickness of gravy that you prefer as a cook.

  • Spread the slow cooked chicken evenly along the bottom of a baking tray.

  • Roll the puff pastry out until it is the size you need to cover your baking tray. Lay it over the top, press the edges down and use a fork to make holes in the pastry at reglar intervals. You don't have to be perfect with the edges.



  • Some people will baste the top with egg or milk. For puff pastry, I never bother, and it always comes out fine. After being in the oven at approximately 220 degrees for 20 - 25 minutes, or until the pastry rises, take it out and score the top. The lovely flaky texture of the pastry makes a pie almost a whole meal in itself.



  • The lovely flaky texture of the pastry makes a pie almost a whole meal in itself.

 

 

 

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Traditional Scottish Stovies with Oatcakes and Beetroot – Slow Cooked & with the Kids Baked Beans to serve.

What better cold weather fare could there be.   Stovies used to be made in generations gone by in our ancestors family when it was washing day, or when the nets had to be hauled down to the boats and the women didn’t have time to make a big meal for the family.

They stayed close to home on stovie days as they had to carry their men onto the fishing boats to keep them dry.  We’re talking little women carrying huge strapping 6 + footers from the side of the piers right into their boats.  With their skirts and feet soaking and cold in the North Sea, it was a hard, miserable and tough life.

Often battling against misery and exhaustion, they would come back to their stovies simmering on the pot, and ready to fill empty bellies.

Unable to stray far from the home while they were cooking, this was a method of slow cooking that needed regular stirring couldn’t be made on market days when the women would have to carry the catch in a creel on their backs for miles to sell it at market.

Most people who make stovies today, are really only  making a type of hash with boiled potatoes and meat mixed in.  For real stovies, the potatoes need to be stoved.  They are dry and not waxy, and they break apart in the mouth when you eat them.

I’ve only ever made them in a thick bottomed pan before, so this method is a new (and easier) way of doing it for me.

The quantities mentioned in this recipe are for guidance only.  This would generally have been Monday’s meal, after the Sunday roast, and using up the leftovers of meat, potatoes and sometimes other vegetables would be added in a sort of bubble and squeak effect.

My stovies are wickedly tasty ones, made with the meat and gravy from nice large chunks of a fillet steak joint that I got from Andrew Gordon  Butchery in Aberdeen.  I am always spoiled for choice when I go in there and good meat really makes a difference to the taste of a finished dish.

Slow Cooked Traditional Scottish Stovies with Oatcakes and Beetroot (and the kids beans)

Lesley Smith
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Prep Time 30 minutes
Cook Time 8 hours
Total Time 8 hours 30 minutes
Course Mains
Servings 6

Ingredients
  

  • 3 KG Potatoes Maris Pipers, King Edwards or Roosters - Peeled and Chopped
  • 1 - 2 Onions Chopped
  • 100 Grams Dripping Beef Dripping, Goose Fat or Vegetable Dripping
  • 1 KG Meat Usually Pork or Beef - Already Cooked
  • 200 Grams Gravy From the Pork or Beef
  • Salt & Pepper For cooking.

Instructions
 

  • In a saucepan, melt approximately 100g of your lard. This will be quicker than you expect.

  • Add the onions to the pan and lightly fry.

  • Make sure that the onions are still white and are not cooked long enough to begin turning brown.



  • Add the onions, lard and your potatoes to the slow cooker and stir until all the potatoes are coated in lard. If you have to add some more, add it a teaspoon at a time, as it is easy to use too much lard.

  • Add a few spoons of the gravy from your meat, a couple of tablespoons of water, and a couple of pinches of salt.



  • Cook for 8 hours on low, or 4 hours on high.

  • You will need to check the pot every hour and if you need to add a little extra water, do it a teaspoon at a time. You only want just enough to stop the potatoes from burning into the pot.

  • Don't mash the potatoes as when they are ready, they will break down with the stirring.

  • Add in your meat with a few more spoonfuls of gravy.

  • Cook until the meat is thoroughly heated.

  • Normally, you would shred your meat or cut it really small, but my boys like their meat in hunky chunks so my pictures are not the effect you would get if you shredded your meat before adding it.




  • Serve with oatcakes and beetroot with a glass of milk for the traditional fare, or add beans like the Scottish Mum Kids.


If you want to make your own oatcakes, try Traditional Scottish Oatcakes.

 

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How I Cooked the Aberdeen Gordonian Best Steak as a Roast

We took home a lovely piece of meat from Andrew Gordon Butchery and Fine Foods and had a lovely and luxurious meal fit for a King and Queen.

Questions that people often ask are around how to roast a joint of meat, or how to cook roast beef properly so I thought I’d write it down.

This piece of meat is a new steak that is sweeping the meat-eating population of Aberdeen off their feet.  Tempted to try it, I went a bit further and had a whole roast for our Sunday dinner last week.

This picture shows the Gordonian Best Steak Roast in all it’s glory.  It is actually upside down as there’s a layer of fat on the other side that allows the roast to drip juices and keep it moist as it cooks.  My pictures are upside down to show the effect of the quality of the rich colour in the beef.

As a tender piece of meat, the roasting time can be slightly shorter and at a slightly higher temperature than a cheaper, or less tender roast of beef.

It’s a truly gorgeous piece of meat that anyone would be proud to have on their table for a cracking and filling meal.

The best way to roast a tender piece of meat is going to be in the oven, and after searing all sides in a pan first.

Tender cuts of meat always do well roasted.

The purpose of the roasting is only to use the fat to cook the roast, simply and with the occasional baste (spooning juices over the top) to help it along.

To seal the roast in, the easiest thing is to use a frying or sauté pan to help seal in the juices and help along the crusty and full of flavour outside of the roast.

While you are preparing and sealing your roast, make sure your oven is on to pre-heat. You want the oven nice and hot before it goes in to be finished.

Make sure your roasting pan is big enough to hold your roast, but not as large as the juices all escape and leave you nothing to baste your roast with as it cooks.  You really want enough juices left over to make awesome gravy as a trimming.

Cook a roast in the oven to finish off the process at around 180 – 200 C, or Gas Mark 6 for approximately the following times per pound of meat.

– Rare (15 – 20 minutes)
– Medium (20 – 25 minutes)
– Well Done (25 – 30 minutes)

I cooked my roast for the kids, which needed an extra 20 minutes on top of the cooking time to ensure there was absolutely no pink at all in the meat.  I know that isn’t the ideal way to cook, nor the way that butchers or chefs would recommend, but any redness at all and my kids won’t eat it.

For fabulous roasts, they really do need to rest after they’ve been cooked.   Once it’s cooked, just put it to the side for about 15 – 30 minutes and cover  it very loosely with some tin foil to help keep the heat in.   Resting lets the meat reach a more consistent texture and helps the meat to be consistently juicy.

Use the juices left over from roasting to make wickedly tasty gravy and serve with veg, and sides.  I have to apologise for the lack of plate pictures on this post, as I took a couple of hurried pictures as the family were so hungry, and neither of them came out.

The meat was fabulous.  The roast only had a teensy bit left over at the end of the meal, as the man and kids both had seconds.

I had hoped to have enough to make Gordonian Best Steak Roast luxurious stovies the next day, but alas, my boys cleared too much of it at the first sitting.

 

 

 

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Kids Make Chicken Fillets Decorative

I decided to let the kids get creative with their supper.   They were not liking how it looked on the plate when they got a plateful of Costco Chicken Fillets with some stir fried veg for supper.  This is how dads plate looked when it was dished up.

While not impressed, they decided to take presentation into their own hands so I could put it on the blog.  So here goes the version of chicken fillets, with stir fried veg, à la Scottish Mum kids.