Veggie Lasagne

1/2 large butternut squash (about 600g), peeled and diced
1/2 red pepper, cut into strips
1/2 yellow pepper, cut into strips
2 small courgettes, trimmed and thickly sliced
1 red onion, roughly sliced
1/2 aubergine, cut into 2cm cubes
125g cherry tomatoes
rosemary
1 garlic clove, crushed
4 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
2 x tins chopped tomatoes
250g pack fresh lasagne sheets (6 sheets)
2 tbsp olive oil spread
2 tbsp cornflour
600ml skimmed milk
60g grated mature cheddar

1. Pre-heat the oven to 200C.
2. Place all the veg, rosemary and garlic in a large roasting tin, toss with the olive oil and roast for 30 minutes.
3. Make the cheese sauce by whisking the spread, cornflour and milk together over a medium heat until thickened, then adding the cheese.
4. Stir the tomatoes into the vegetables once they are cooked.
5. Make up the lasagne - layer of lasagne, 1/3 veg, 1/3 cheese sauce, lasagne, 1/3 veg, 1/3 sauce, lasagne, 1/3 veg, 1/3 cheese sauce (I prefer to save a bit more of the sauce for the top, using less on the lower layers)
6. Bake for 40 - 45 minutes.

I was tempted to put some more grated cheese on the top but resisted. The sauce isn't the cheesiest I've tasted, but the veg mix is lovely.

Serves 4 (farily generous portions, but apparently still only 339 calories each).

Vegetable Tagine

Another one from the trusty BBC Good Food website (always useful when I'm planning my cooking at work without any recipe books handy.

Recipe here

Summer vegetable pasta

All the BBC Good Food recipes seem to make loads, and this pasta dish was no exception.

I had fresh broad beans for the first time, so wanted something nice to eat them in. As I actually like broad beans I decided not to hide them in a soup recipe. It felt very summery eating it outside in the garden. I made half the recipe and am going to eat the other half as a salad.

Tumbet

This is another Rose Elliott recipe, and is red pepper, aubergine, courgette, potato onion, potato, parsley and garlic with a tin of tomatoes tipped over it and cooked in the oven for 2 - 3 hours. A nice easy one.

Vegetable Risotto

I was thrown tonight, I was expecting another helping of root veg and I came home to peppers, courgettes, tomatoes and green beans! Cue a bit of hasty rethinking of what to cook tonight. I ended up with this:

1 red pepper, chopped
2 tsp olive oil
1 small onion, chopped
1 clove garlic, crushed
150g brown rice
180ml vegetable stock
500ml water
2 medium courgettes
3 medium tomatoes, chopped
20g parmesan cheese, coarsely grated
1 tsp dried oregano

Heat oil in a large pan, cook onion and garlic until soft. Add rice, stock and water, bring to the boil, reduce heat and simmer for 30 minutes (until tender and almost all liquid absorbed).

Cut courgette into thin strips lengthways - a mandolin or vegetable peeler works well for this.

Stir courgette, pepper and tomato into rice. Cook for about 3 minutes or until vegetables soften. Stir in the cheese and oregano.

Serves 2.

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.

Courgette and goats cheese pasta

Here's a little quickie I made up earlier to use up some stuff that had been festering in the fridge.

1 courgette
2 tomatoes
30g goats cheese
some olive oil
some red wine vinegar
100g pasta

I sliced the courgette and tomatoes while the water was boiling for the pasta.

I put the pasta in to cook (10 minutes) and then fried the courgette and tomatoes in the olive oil for just a bit until the tomato juice started to run out and get a bit juicy. I added some red wine vinegar to keep it nice and juicy, then took it off the heat and stirred in the goats cheese and some dried herbs until it melted and went nice and creamy.

Then when the pasta was cooked I drained it and stirred that in too, ground some black pepper over the top and bob's your uncle. Not the most exotic recipe ever, but a decently cheesy and vegg-y quick post work meal.

Carrot and Courgette Salad

1 courgette
3 carrots
1 orange
1tbsp olive oil
salt/pepper

Grate the carrots and courgette. Grate the rind of the orange and juice it, then mix together with the olive oil. Season, and pour over the carrots and courgette, marinate for 15 minutes.

Serves 2 - 3