The problem that is lunch - solved!

Ever since I've been attempting (with ups and downs) to follow this anti-inflammatory diet, I've had a problem with two meals - breakfast and lunch.  Breakfast is another blog post entirely, but lunch has continued to be a problem right up until I remembered soup.

Of course, the fact that we're now into the chilly autumnal days that lead into true winter does help.  Gone are the days of whipping up an interesting salad for lunch.  Take this salad - these days I am not "allowed" the fresh tomatoes or the Feta cheese - and the Kiwi's are only tolerated because of their high Vit.C. content.

It's not so bad though, because there are a myriad collection of vegetables that are at my disposal.  All the green leafies, and basically anything that's not a carbohydrate are open to me to use.

I went through a stage of eating stir fries at lunchtime, until it dawned on me that I was probably overdoing the oil content.  Olive oil is very good when you're on an anti-inflammatory diet, but when you're trying to lose weight as well, you need to just ration it a bit.  Okay, a lot.

Rubbish presentation - bet Monica wouldn't put that in front of Michel!

It's the same thing with oily fish.  Mackerel is easy-peasy, as you can obtain a tin of mackerel in brine for less than £1 and pop it on toast for lunch - but you can't do that every day of the week, not without going off mackerel and anyway the toast is a no-no.

I had a flash of inspiration and put mackerel with an avocado, which went beautifully.  However again, you can't be having that every day.

So when the desire to have something warm, comforting and "food-like" - you know, something that you know you've eaten by the end of it; something that doesn't just fall into the black hole that is your stomach and disappear; something that won't mean you're hungry again by the time you leave the table - came over me, I was so happy when I thought of soup.

I have, so far, made two soups - both of which are versions of one another.

Mmmn, warm, filling, lovely!

The original, Lunchtime Soup, I have already posted about.  However, today's version was even better - and made more agreeable from an anti-inflammatory point of view by the addition of some chilli.

Today's lunchtime soup involved sweating off in some olive oil, a chopped onion, a crushed clove of garlic, two finely chopped sticks of celery and some finely chopped carrot.

Next, I added (all finely chopped) a leek, a parsnip, a courgette, some swede and a sweet potato.  Stirred them all around to get them covered in the olive oil and added 750ml of Swiss Vegetable Bouillon.  Brought it to the boil and then simmered, covered, for 5-10 minutes or until the vegetables were looking half-cooked.

I then added some finely sliced Savoy cabbage and left the soup until everything was cooked through and tender.

Next, using a hand blender, I blitzed approximately half the soup and mixed it in.  Had a taste, adjusted the seasoning and sat down for lunch.  It probably took around a half an hour to make from start to finish - and I've got enough left for the next two days.

Now, from an anti-inflammatory point of view, it works out to be around +340 per serving, which is absolutely great!  The only vegetables that registered a negative score were the parsnip (-35) and the swede (-9).  The savoy cabbage (+1), leek (+8) and celery (+8) are very worth including for their flavour, but don't add much to the cause otherwise.  However, the cause is very much boosted by the addition of the chilli (+170), onion (+257), garlic (+107), carrots (+144) and a majestic +232 from the sweet potato!

In my attempts to find something nice to eat for lunch, I made a Skinny Cauliflower Cheese a couple of days ago.  Now, as a low fat Cauliflower Cheese, I'd say it hit the spot.  However, it missed being suitable for an anti-inflammatory diet, by quite a mile, unfortunately.  However, because it was successful for what it was, I've included the recipe here.

When I was thinking about how to go about this, I realised that in losing some of the intensity of the cheese flavour, I'd need to replace it with something.  Now because I'm a vegetable-lover and it's getting close to Christmas, immediately Brussels Sprouts sprang to mind.  I just adore those little green jewels - and cooked carefully, I felt they would add some interesting flavour notes.

I blanched the brussels along with the cauliflower, for just 2-3 minutes, then cut them in half.  I felt a half a brussels sprout would be more acceptable to find on your fork than a big mouthful.  More in keeping with the size of the cauliflower, too.


The sauce was made by heating a tablespoonful of olive oil, then adding two tablespoonfuls of flour and a heavy teaspoonful of English Mustard powder.  Of course, it would be difficult to call this a roux, as there wasn't nearly enough oil to qualify.  It was more of a r... than it was ever a roux!  However, having mixed everything together, I began to add a pint of skimmed milk and stirred out the lumps.  I added a good quantity of black pepper and a pinch of nutmeg and stirred again.

It wasn't burned, honest - just lightly singed!

Next into the sauce, went a half a tub of low fat ricotta, some grated Leicestershire cheese (I had around 50g to use up!) and some low fat double gloucester.  In fact, the double gloucester was the remains of a truckle of double gloucester with chives & onions - which lent another very successful flavour note to the sauce - and successfully used that up, too.

Once the cheese is all mixed in, put the vegetables into a baking dish and pour the cheese sauce over.  Add a micro-grating of parmesan to the surface and bake for 30 minutes or until golden and bubbling.  As you can see, I left mine in for a weency bit too long - but it still tasted marvellous.


Regrettably, at a score of -48 per serving (I was so sure that cauliflower had a greater anti-inflammatory rating than it did), it was a poor show in that regard.  Maybe next time, I'll add an onion and some chilli - that'd do it!


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King Prawn Frittata

Isn't it pretty?

There we were, on Monday afternoon, pondering what we could have for Tuesday's "Pizza day".  Son & heir will be happy busily working his way through a pizza, which leaves us room to make and have something that is likely to make his hair stand on end in horror, should he find it on his plate.

We were both trying to think along the lines of "what would be good for Jenny's Anti-inflammatory diet", which rules out the likes of pasta, potatoes and bread.  Some cheese is good, some cheese is bad, likewise for meat.  Beef & fish (especially oily fish) are good, chicken is not so good.

How the thought process goes, is that we focus in on what we "feel like" - what we're hankering towards at the time.  We were both agreed on fish - and I suddenly remembered the King Prawns that we'd used in a risotto recently.

Well, that got hubby's brainbox going and before you could say "Frittata" (or "Fritatatatatatatata", as it has become known), he'd thought up the most delightful recipe.

We mused over the inclusion of chicken along with the prawns (after the style of a Paella), but threw that idea out in the end as being just a bit too confused.

We also pondered on using tomato along with the red pepper, but that got ditched because raw tomato isn't good from an anti-inflammatory point of view - and these tomatoes would be cooked lightly.  However, do experiment with tomato if you feel like it - I'm quite sure some halved or quartered cherry tomatoes would be lovely included in the mix.

We used just ordinary free-range hen's eggs, but if you were wanting to pimp your Frittata for guests, I can recommend using the lovely Burford Brown hen's eggs.  The colour is amazing in these eggs and would look terrific against all the beautiful colours of the Frittata.

Hubby served the Frittata alongside a few of the leftover watercress & spinach leaves, dressed in a balsamic vinaigrette and with some gorgeous mozzarella (a good cheese for the A-I diet) torn over the top.  So simple, yet quite amazingly good for you.

KING PRAWN FRITTATA  (serves 3)

Ingredients :


10 spears of asparagus cut into 1cm lengths
2 tbsp olive oil
1 medium onion, peeled & roughly diced
1 red pepper cut into 1cm diamonds
1 rasher streaky bacon sliced very finely
3 large mushrooms, diced
1 tsp smoked paprika
250g King Prawns, bisected lengthways (reserving 6 prawns for garnish)
100g frozen peas, defrosted
4 large or 5 medium eggs
1 tbsp milk
sea salt & freshly ground black pepper

a small handful of baby spinach, rocket and watercress.

Method :

1.  In a small pan, blanch the asparagus in boiling salted water for 3 minutes before refreshing in a bowl of iced water.  Set aside.

2.  Heat the olive oil in a large flat bottomed frying pan and gently cook the onion, red pepper and bacon until soft.  Add the mushrooms and cook until tender.  Stir in the smoked paprika and allow to cook out before adding the sliced prawns, asparagus and peas.

3.  In a medium bowl, beat the eggs and the milk together, with some seasoning.

4.  Turn the heat under the frying pan to maximum, before adding the beaten eggs and sprinkling with the green leaves.  Fry for two or three minutes before placing the frying pan under a hot grill to cook the top of the fritata.

5.  Remove from the grill once the surface of the fritata is golden and bubbling.  Use a small knife to open the centre of the fritata to check that no liquid egg remains.  If so, then return to the grill for 30 seconds or so until soft, but not liquid.

6.  Transfer from the pan onto a chopping board and cut into wedges.

7.  Serve with a mixed green salad with torn mozzarella pieces and a balsamic vinaigrette.

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Let down by Celery Soup, bonus Baked Apple & an unexpected supper

With roasted butternut squash - just in case you wondered!

You might remember that I was, last week, planning on making a Chicken Supreme.  The intention was to use (as per the recipe) a tin of Cream of Mushroom Soup to make the sauce.  What happened though, was that I picked up the tin of Cream of Celery Soup instead (in error) and had opened it before I realised my mistake.

I was committed to using the Celery soup then, as I wouldn't be able to use it the following day for lunch (I had half a stir-fry mix to use up).  I had a bit of a ponder and thought it might do.  So I put the mushrooms and garlic back in the fridge and went with chicken and sweetcorn.


Oh dear.  Well, it wasn't disgusting or unpalatable - but it was bland.  Very, very bland.  Oddly, it seemed to be quite rich as well because both hubby and I had problems getting through our chicken ration.  I'm sure we wouldn't have had those problems with the mushroom version.

So, there's two lessons learned.  One, look before you open the can and two, Cream of Celery Soup needs some help when used as a base for a sauce.

One day last week, I forget which now, we had our lunch and dinner upside down (lunch at dinner time and dinner at lunch time), which meant I missed out on my dinner (for some reason which I've also forgotten!).


Later on that evening, after sitting for a while listening to my tummy growling, hubby went out in the kitchen and rustled and clanked with packets and plates.  Eventually, this is what he turned up with :

Isn't it just lovely?  He'd tried to keep it all within the anti-inflammatory diet guidelines and did so very well with that.  From the top, we've got smoked salmon & capers on rice cakes, then a blob of taramasalata with two celery sticks with which to eat it.  A pickled gherkin, some pickled onions, cucumber, cherry tomatoes and a piece of cheese.  Gorgeous!

Something else that wasn't especially planned, was the two baked Bramley apples that I made for Son & heir's (and my) dessert recently.  Hubby doesn't like baked apple, so he abstained.

The recipe is very similar to my Rum Soaked Baked Apples, in that I drizzled rum over them before baking, but this time I filled them with sultanas and glace cherries (2 at the bottom, 3 at the top), then added the brown sugar and butter.

Half an hour in a medium oven (mine was 180deg C) and they're bursting with juice and delightfully foamy.


Somehow - goodness only knows how (hollow legs, I think!) - son & heir managed to eat his entire apple in one sitting.  Mine lasted for two and was just as good second time around as it had been the day before.


I tend to forget about baked apples, but I really should make them more often.  Son & heir loves them - and I really enjoy the smell of them baking, as well as the eating part!


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