An Honest Kitchen - Makeovers

AN HONEST KITCHEN Makeovers by Kathryn Elliott & Lucinda Dodds

ISSUE 6 | 2013

An Honest Kitchen Š 2013 Kathryn Elliott & Lucinda Dodds This work is copyright. Apart from any fair dealings for the purpose of private study, research, criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright Act, no part may be reproduced by any process without written permission. All rights reserved.

Disclaimer: The use of this material is not a substitute for health or professional services. Consult competent professionals to answer your specific questions. For further information regarding An Honest Kitchen contact: Kathryn Elliott (kathryn@ kathrynelliott.com. au) or Lucinda Dodds (lucindadodds@yahoo.com.au) Publication Design by Luisa Brimble Cover photograph by Lucinda Dodds Published by: An Honest Kitchen, Australia, June 2013 2

AN HONEST KITCHEN Makeovers by Kathryn Elliott & Lucinda Dodds

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INTRODUCTION

We all have meals we love, the ones we look forward to, crave even - comfort meals. But so often these favourite dinners are neither healthy nor easy to prepare.They might be packed full of cream, fat, cheese, carbs and stodge, or they take ages to cook and involve multiple processes.

In this issue of An Honest Kitchen we’ve taken on the challenge to revamp some of the most popular meals around. Our Makeovers include the traditional roast, pasta meals, fish and chips, egg based meals and even tacos. We’ve deconstructed them, changed different elements, streamlined the cooking, adjusted the portions, added a lot more vegetable and worked out tricks to boost the flavour while cutting back on the kilojoules. Plus our Makeovers have more fibre, less salt and more nutrient complexity and variety.

All our Makeovers are better meals - easier to cook and better for you and your waistline. More than that, we have also, of course, focused on flavour. How to make these meals healthier and easier, while still satisfying and tasting delicious.

The original idea for Makeovers came from a reader who wanted us to give the An Honest Kitchen treatment to popular recipes. It’s an idea we both loved immediately and in the course of putting together Makeovers we’ve actually worked out some basic guidelines which you can follow to makeover your own favourite recipes.

Kathryn & Lucy

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CO N T E N TS

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Introduction

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How to Makeover a Meal: Our Guidelines

Roast Dinners

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Oregano Roast Lamb with Vegetables

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Five Spice Roast Chicken

Eggs

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How to Make an Omelette

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Tomato, Rocket & Feta Omelette

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Roast Onion & Thyme Tart

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Makeover: Steamed Vegetables

Tacos & Tortillas

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Beef, Chickpea & Tomato Tortillas

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Sweet Potato & Bean Tacos

Fish & Chips

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Fish & Paprika Wedges with Lemon & Parsley Yoghurt

Pasta

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Oven Baked Beef & Vegetable Ragout

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Spaghetti with Fennel & Sardines

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Macaroni & Cauliflower Cheesy Bake

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Thanks

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About An Honest Kitchen

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ROAST DINNERS

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FIVE SPICE ROAST CHICKEN A twist on the normal roast chook. Rather than cooking a whole bird we’ve used chicken thighs, on the bone.

Using a smaller cut of meat with a bone in it means you can cook the roast in a fraction of the normal time, but still end up with a juicy and flavour filled dinner. We particularly like using thighs as they are inexpensive and a much more forgiving cut than breast meat, which can dry out. The whole meal is cooked on a baking tray, so you’ll either need one large tray, to fit all the ingredients, or spread them out over two smaller ones.

Serves 2

2 chicken thighs on the bone (about 400g)

Preheat the oven to 200°C.

Remove the skin from the chicken: If your chicken thighs have skin 2 teaspoons Chinese five-spice on them, then it’s easy to remove. Take hold of the skin at one end and powder gently, but firmly, pull it away from the flesh. You may need to use a 2 teaspoons soy sauce knife to help it along. Cut the chicken skin off, using a sharp knife.

1 tablespoon Chinese cooking Flavour the chicken: Slash the chicken pieces all over, with a knife. wine or dry sherry You can do this quite enthusiastically, as you want each piece to have ½ lemon several deep cuts on both sides. Place these on a large baking tray. In a small bowl, whisk together the five-spice powder, soy sauce and Chinese 1 tablespoon olive oil cooking wine. Pour the marinade over the chicken pieces and, using 400 - 450g potatoes your hands, rub the mixture into the chicken pieces. Make sure you 2 red onions push the marinade into the cuts in the chicken and all around the bone.

Squeeze the juice from the lemon over the chicken. Roughly chop up 3 carrots the leftover lemon shell and add to the baking tray.

200g green beans Add the potatoes: Cut each potato into chunks, about 4cm in size. Add these to the baking tray. Drizzle over the olive oil. Place the chicken and potatoes in the oven for 20 minutes.

Prep the vegetables: While the chicken is cooking, peel the red onion and cut each into 6 wedges. Scrub the carrots and cut into 2cm-ish chunks. Trim the beans.

Add the vegetables: After the chicken has been cooking for 20 minutes remove the baking tray from the oven. Turn each piece of chicken and potato over. Add the onion, carrots and green beans. Move them briefly and gently around in the five spice flavouring. Place the baking tray back in the oven and cook for a further 20 minutes.

Let the chicken rest: Take the baking tray out of the oven. Gently remove the chicken to a plate, cover with tin foil and leave to rest for 10 minutes. Give the baking tray with the vegetables a quick wiggle, to spread the vegetables out and then place the baking tray back in the oven, while the meat is resting. After 10 minutes serve the chicken, together with the vegetables

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COOKING NOTES:

CHICKEN SKIN

• Chinese cooking wine is made from rice and is often called Chinese rice wine or Shaoxing Wine. Taste-wise it’s a similar to sherry, although it has a more bitter, stronger flavour. Some supermarkets stock Chinese cooking wine and it’s also available from Chinese grocers. You can buy Chinese rice wine in many grades and a brand at the cheaper end of the scale is fine for this meal.

In this recipe we ask you to remove the skin from the chicken thighs. It’s easy to do, only takes a few seconds and it does make a difference nutritionally. Roasted chicken, with the skin on, has almost one-quarter more kilojoules than skin-less chicken and about double the saturated fat.

• Chinese five spice powder is a staple in Chinese cooking. It’s a mixture of five spices, star anise, cloves, cinnamon, sichuan pepper and fennel seeds and has a wonderful aromatic smell and manages to be sweet, sour, bitter and pungent, all at the same time. Five spice powder is available from the spice section of many supermarkets. It can also be purchased from Chinese grocers

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DON’T LINE THE BAKING TRAY When you cook this recipe the chicken and vegetables may slightly stick to the tray and some of the juices will burn. To save on washing up you might consider adding more oil or lining the baking tray with parchment paper. However, please don’t as neither are necessary.

The sticky bits in the pan provide a richness of flavour, which is one of the main reasons this meal is so delicious and if you line the baking tray the results won’t be as good. To get a really good roast going you need a direct connection between the food and the tray. If you line the baking tray, the paper gets in the way and stops the delicious caramelisation which should be going on. Instead of baking, ingredients come out steamed; cooked through but not browned around the edges and they’re a poor substitute for properly roasted meals.

The easiest way to clean a sticky baking tray is to pour in some boiling water, along with a squirt of dishwashing liquid, straight after use. Then, by the time you get to the washing up, the water has cooled down enough to be handled and it’s easy to remove the burnt sticky bits, no elbow grease required.

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EGGS

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KEEP IN TOUCH

www.anhonestkitchen.com ON TWITTER @AnHonestKitchen

@kathrynelliott @lucy_nourish_me

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