Advent Photo Day 4 - Vegetable Christmas pie.

Our Daughter-in-law to be ( Dec 2016) is vegetarian so at Christmas I like to find something interesting for her while all around are tucking into a traditional meal. She's told me about some of the awful meals she's been offered on Christmas meals out, when for some reason restaurants think that just because a person is vegetarian they don't want the roast potatoes, parsnips and all the other tasty Christmas things, and dish up some weird pasta meal or worse, an omlette!

Last year I made individual veg and nut layered  roasts ( the recipe is on the separate page) this year mini pies using Puff pastry,squash,chard and Mascarpone cheese. The recipe is adapted from 2 I found online and really should be made in one of those 4-on-a-tray Yorkshire pudding tins, but I don't have one so did them in my deepest bun tray tin.

Christmas Veggie Pies

Half a pack of puff pastry ( when I buy these I always cut them in quarters before putting them in the freezer)
The narrow end of 1 small squash
Colander of chard (or equivalent bought spinach leaves), wilted, chopped and drained really well.
Half Tub of mascarpone cheese.
Ground black pepper
Squirts of tomato puree ( or mustard)

I rolled out the pastry as thin as possible and cut large circles,fitted them carefully into the bun tin and put a squirt of tomato puree in the bottom of each (one recipe said mustard ). Slicing the narrow end of the squash into very thin rounds - after peeling of course. I then layered squash slices, spinach and cheese finishing with squash-  ground pepper on each layer, brush the edges with water and cut circles to fit. Slide the tray into a big freezer bag and freeze. If only I had thought of it I could have cut some holly leaves from the pastry off cuts.

 I made these for the first time last week to check they were going to be OK. After taking out of the freezer I cut a couple of slits in the top of each pie and brushed with egg.
They were cooked on a medium oven temp for about 30mins I think ( I'm a bit vague about temps and times sorry.) Anyway we ate them with roast potatoes and parsnips and Brussels sprouts and they were very tasty. I've made them again today and added a few snips of dried tomato with the cheese.
When these are served on Christmas day, I'm going to warm some cranberry sauce to spoon over the top.

I'm always worried when I pass on home concocted recipes in case people try them and think they are awful because me and Col eat almost everything home made with great enjoyment! We had 1 and a half each and that was enough but reheated the other 3 in the microwave next day and they were good too. You could make half this amount, but it seemed silly to fiddle about for just 3 pies. I shall keep R company on Christmas day and join her with eating these and I expect some the other family members will want to try a bit too.

What else happened yesterday?
Ah yes, I spent nearly 2 hours searching for one of the sets of car keys, I'd locked the car up Wednesday  but where the heck had I put them. I went up and down the garden around all the sheds, in the freezer, amongst all the shoes and coats in the utility room, every drawer and cupboard in the kitchen, dirty laundry basket, in the garden shed, in the wood shed. All round the field ( even though I'd walked round the field in the morning and lost the keys in the afternoon!). Eventually after I'd been everywhere three times I found them........in the peg bag hanging on the back of the utility room door! How? Then I remembered, on the way back from locking up the car I'd got the washing in, didn't have a pocket for the keys so laid them on top of the peg bag on top of the laundry.
Phew. Hate losing things.

I keep forgetting to say that the advent photos are linked to Julie's Scrapbook where you can find several other people's advent pictures or on Julies blog some wonderful old cartoons.

 Back Tomorrow
Sue

30 Ways to Save £1-- Day 20 + Roast Squash and Chard Lasagne

Our sons partner is vegetarian so when they come to stay I like to try out a new vege dish. Although I always try it out on us first! Also, because when they come I'm never sure which meals they are going to be here for as they often go to visit friends, the meal needs to be something that I can make beforehand and take out of the freezer.

So yesterday for dinner we tried this new recipe.
I only thought about writing this after we had eaten it so no photo. But I expect everyone knows what a lasagne looks like anyway!

The recipe is actually Roast Pumpkin and Spinach Lasagne but as usual I altered it!
The introduction says this is a bit of a faff to make but easier if separate parts are done on different days. I roasted extra squash the day before and I had made a big batch of tomato sauce  several days earlier and put in the freezer.

This is the recipe as written.
Roast Pumpkin & Spinach Lasagne Serves 6

750g Crown Prince Pumpkin or butternut squash, de-seeded and peeled and sliced
2tbsp olive oil
500g spinach - washed
1tbsp butter - plus extra for greasing
nutmeg
fresh lasagne sheets
100g Parmesan
Tomato Sauce
I medium onion finely chopped
1tbsp olive oil
1 celery stick finely chopped
400g can cherry tomatoes
2tsp light muscovado sugar
Bechamel Sauce
500ml full fat milk
Black pepper
half onion
1 bay leaf (remove before using sauce)
50g plain flour
50g butter

Roast the pumpkin with the olive oil until tender approx 40minutes
Make the tomato sauce by softening the onion and celery, adding tomatoes and sugar and leaving to simmer for 30 minutes to make a thick puree, season to taste
Put the spinach in the saucepan with the water that still clings to it after washing, cover and cook over medium heat for a few minutes until wilted, turning with tongs frequently. Leave to cool and squeeze out excess water. Chop and put in pan with butter, gently heat until spinach is coated. Season inc nutmeg.
Make the bechamel sauce as usual.
Assemble the lasagne as normal in layers starting with pumpkin,then tomato sauce, lasagne,  bechamel, spinach, cheese, lasagne,pumpkin,tomato sauce,lasagne and bechamel and all the rest of the cheese.
Bake for 40 minutes until bubbling and golden 180C fan/gas6

MY WAY
I used our own butternut squash,
I used a colander full of chard from the garden.
My tomato sauce was made using my big plum tomatoes from the freezer, no celery.
I never use full fat milk.
I forgot about the nutmeg with the spinach.
I always use value packets of dry lasagne.
I made 1 lasagne for 4 and a small one for 2 people
I used Cheddar instead of Parmesan
I'm sure I didn't do the layers exactly as written.
After cooking I wrapped them in foil, popped them in a plastic bag and put them both in the freezer as I wanted to make sure that they froze well.

I defrosted the two portion lasagne in the fridge over night. Reheated starting on a low heat and then increasing it for about  35 - 40 minutes in total.
Result - Very Tasty
So now I know one of the things we will be eating when they come to stay in a couple of weeks time.

 Number 20 of the 30 Ways to Save £1, was
20. Cut the bottom off tubes of toothpaste and other creams etc. when you think they are empty and you will find enough for a few more days.
Everybody reading yesterdays tip said they already do this, so I'm preaching to the converted again.

Seeds arrived in the post today.

 As soon as I get more time I shall be doing a blog about the varieties we grew this year, how they did and what we are growing in 2014. Something exciting for you to look forward to!

Awful weather here on the edge today. Freezing first thing and icy drizzle at 7.30 when I let the chickens out, then really heavy rain later. Him Outside should have been repairing a fence for someone this morning, but decided to cancel until next week after he watched the forecast last night. Good thing he did.
Back Tomorrow.

A vegetable Curry- almost our cheapest meal.

Lots of blogs mention meal plans and I'm always surprised that so many people, including those purporting to be frugal, eat meat almost everyday.

For financial, health and 'green' reasons we are always being told that we should eat less meat. Most weeks here we eat probably 3 meat meals and 3 without. (  I rarely cook on Sundays, we make do with scrambled eggs or something similar). When we have a chicken week or a ham week then  we eat more meat, but stretch it to last for several days.

The veggie meals we have regularly are pizza, omelet, macaroni cheese, vegetable quiche, egg and chips,vegetable curry, tomato and herb sauce over pasta, vegetable chow mein, cheese and onion pasty, veggie burgers, and less often - cauliflower cheese, aubergine and pasta bake, leek fritters. Our fish meals, are fish and chips (using frozen fish and home made chips) which we have maybe once a month, mackerel fillets, pilchard lasagne, tuna and tomato sauce over pasta, fishcakes, tuna, pasta and broccoli bake, and for a special meal, salmon( Sainsburys value  bits) parsley and cream sauce with tagliatelle.

Of all these, our home made veggie curry must be one of the cheapest. We have this about once a fortnight. This curry always starts with an onion and an apple, then depending on the time of year I add courgette, leek, cauliflower, squash or pepper or a combination. In winter or the hungry gap then dried fruit such as prunes and apricots are used or even a banana, with broad beans from the freezer and cooked potato.The other ingredients are a knob of butter, a dessertspoon of curry powder and 3 of flour, a good dollop of any home made fruity chutney, a teaspoon of sugar, black pepper, pinch salt and boiling water.
This is served with rice and homemade naan bread and sometimes onion bhaji too.
The ingredients for today ( the plate at the back is for the onion bhajis) were

part of a damaged squash, a courgette too big to sell, 2 windfall eating apples, part of a red pepper too damaged to sell and parts of two onions that are ones sorted to use first as they were rotten on one side. If you were to read that as a list of ingredients you would probably think they were heading for the compost bin!
But after melting the butter, softening the chopped apple and onion, adding the flour and curry powder, cooking for a few minutes, adding the boiling water, bringing back to the boil adding everything else, it looks like this. The pepper was very mouldy inside so only a tiny bit was usable.
This pan full made enough for 2 meals tonight and 2 for the freezer.

Cook for twenty minutes. Cover and turn it off.
Then later re-heat and serve with rice.( Curry is always best re-heated) and naan bread. My naan bread recipe is HERE.

If I get round to it we have onion bhajis too. My home made bhaji mix was invented after reading the ingredients of a packet of bhaji mix from Approved Food, sent to me by my friend S, so I could test it out.
Bhaji Mix
To each 100g of chickpea flour add 1 tsp turmeric,1 tsp cumin, 1 tsp chilli powder, 2 tsp baking powder, 2 tsp bicarb., 1 tsp coriander powder, 1 tsp garlic powder, half tsp salt. ( The packet mix also contains dried onion, black onion seed and dried jalopeno pepper. As I didn't have any of those, I've left them out.)
I mixed up a big tub full, gave it a good stir around and the each time I use it I tip 75g into a bowl, stir in 2 large or a 4 small onions - thinly sliced. Then add water a little at a time until it all sticks together. Drop tablespoons full in hot oil, turn over and press flat. This is not exactly like a bhaji from an Indian take away,as it's not so hot, but it's a lot cheaper. The crunchiness is a good contrast to the curry.

2 delicious  plates full of vegetable curry, onion bhajis and naan bread. All home made and costing very little.