Herby pea risotto

Serves 1

80g arborio rice
250ml stock
1 onion
100g frozen peas (or a mix of peas, broad beans, green beans etc - whatever's in the freezer)
teaspoon lazy garlic
fresh chopped chives and basil
parmesan
knob of butter
splash of white wine

Melt the butter and gently fry the onion and garlic for a couple of minutes. Add the arborio and coat in the melted butter, then add the wine and stir until it evaporates. Add the stock slowly, stiring until each spoonful of stock is absorbed before adding more. A couple of spoonfuls of stock from the end add the frozen peas and stir in. When all the stock is absorbed and the rice is cooked add the cheese and herbs, stir, season, stir a bit more and serve.

Fennel and Leek Risotto

This is another Abel & Cole recipe. The one thing that annoys me about that website is that they rarely say how many it serves. I made roughly half of this, and it made two big portions, and was pretty good.

It also gave me an excuse to finish the bottle of wine...

Turmeric spiced bulgar wheat

I got inspiration from this from the BBC website.

Ingredients
255g/8oz bulgar wheat
425ml/½ pint boiling water
1 tbsp olive oil
½ yellow courgette, diced
1 large spring onion, chopped
½ tsp paprika
1 tsp turmeric
55ml/2fl oz white wine or white wine vinegar

Method
1. Preheat a large frying pan.
2. Place the bulgar wheat in a large bowl and pour over the boiling water.
3. Cover the bowl with cling film and leave to steam for at least 5 minutes.
4. Heat the oil in the frying pan. Add the courgettes and spring onion and sauté for 2 minutes.
5. Add the spices and sauté for 2 minutes.
6. Pour in the wine and turn up the heat to reduce the liquid.
7. Remove the cling film from the bulgar and toss half the bulgar into the frying pan.
8. Reserve the remaining bulgar for the chilli-roasted tomatoes recipe.
9. Fry the bulgar for 2-3 minutes until it is soft, fluffy and heated through.
10. Remove bulgar from heat and serve with the Harissa Swordfish.

I pretty much followed the recipe except (having had the foresight to read all the way down before starting), I realised that I only needed half the bulgar, as the other half was for a difference recipe. I also used a full green courgette because that's what I had (and I almost always round up to the nearest whole veg), and a normal onion instead of a spring one (again, what I had). I used wine instead of white wine vinegar.

It worked pretty well actually, so thumbs up to the BBC again.

Pumpkin and Parsnip Cassoulet

2 tbsp olive oil
2 large onions, chopped
500g pumpkin, deseeded, peeled and diced (I used carnival squash because that's what Tesco had, and a whole one, which was more than 500g but I threw it all in)
500g parsnips, diced
3 garlic cloves, crushed
2 x 425g cans mixed beans, drained
780g can tomatoes (have to admit I've never seen a can that big so I used two normal size ones)
225ml red wine
300ml vegetable stock
2 large sprigs fresh thyme (I used dried)
1 tbsp sugar
75g fresh breadcrumbs
25g parmesan, grated

1. Heat oven to 180c. Heat the oil in a large pan or wok, addonions, then fry for 5 minutes until golden. Add pumpkin, parsnips and garlic and cook for a further 3 minutes. Stir in beans, tomatoes, wine, stock, thyme, sugar and plenty of seasoning. Bring to the boil, then transfer to a large casserole dish, pressing the beans and vegetables beneath the liquid (I actually did everything in the same pan, I've got a casseroley thing that's also OK on the hob).

2. Sprinkle the top with breadcrumbs and grated cheese. Cover, then cook for 40 minutes. Uncover, stir well (not sure how you do this without disturbing the topping?) and cook for a further 40 minutes.

Nutrition info - serves 6, per serving 368 cal, 16g protein, 53g carbs, 9g fat, 2g saturated fat, 14g fibre, 3g sugar, 2.16g salt.