Quorn Jambalaya

Hi folks

I have been making this recipe for years but had not made it for a while and when I searched through my online recipes here I was amazed to find it wasn't here. I think this might be because it was not from the Quorn book and I just never got round to it, either way, this is a fab and filling alternative to a classic jambalaya with chorizo, chicken and prawns. This uses both quorn fillets and sausages (when I lived in the UK I used the frankfurter/hot dog style sausages which were perfect but you cannot get them in Australia - normal sausages work fine).

You will need (makes 6 portions):

1 pack of quorn fillets (defrosted)
3 quorn sausages (or 2 of the hot dog style sausages) chopped into chunks
1 stick celery, chopped
1 pepper, any colour, chopped
1 large onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, chopped
1 tbsp olive oil
200g rice (I used basmati but any will work)
1 tin tomatoes
1 tbsp cayenne pepper
1 tsp paprika
1 litre veg stock

Start by chopping the defrosted fillets into chunks and rolling in the combined cayenne and paprika, put to one side.

Heat the olive oil in a large pan (I used my wok for this as it has a lid), add the chopped onions, pepper and celery and cook for 5 mins or so until they have softened, add the garlic and cook for another few minutes, stirring occasionally. 

Add the quorn fillets, tin of tomatoes and the rice, stir together. Add the hot vegetable stock, stir again and leave to come to the boil.

Once it has come to the boil turn it down to a simmer and stir in the sausages. Leave for around 30 mins or until the rice is cooked and the liquid has reduced, you will need to keep checking and stirring to stop the rice on the bottom sticking and burning. 

Myfitnesspal tells me this recipe works out at 174 cals per serving and 5g of fat so pretty healthy and I can confirm it is very tasty and very filling. Enjoy!

Thai Style Quorn Coriander Cakes

G'day

It has been a while and I apologise for that, in between a busy work life and a crazy social life, as well as running another couple of blogs and helping admin a facebook page (yes, I have been cheating on you) this one has been a little neglected of late.

I promise I will be trying to get back on the horse and when I saw this recipe idea (on the Australian quorn website no less) I just had to give it a try. SO glad I did, these are excellent and such an innovative use of quorn fillets - they taste amazing and have a texture not dissimilar to fish cakes. I wondered whether these would be tricky to shape and cook but actually, as you can see from the pictures, they held their shape well.

So, I thawed a bag of fillets overnight and then whacked them in the food processor with a bunch of coriander, a 2cm cube of fresh ginger, 5 spring onions, 2 cloves of garlic, 1tsp sugar, 0.5 tsp turmeric, 0.5 tsp chilli flakes and an egg. I blitzed it until it was all minced up and clearly ready to make into patties (this took a couple of attempts, stopping and using a spatula to clean down the sides). 

As each patty was formed I dipped it in flour, then eggwash then breadcrumbs and then placed them in the fridge to chill for half an hour - this is what they looked like formed and ready to chill:

After chilling I fried them off in grapeseed oil (I use this as it has no particular flavour) for around 10 mins on each side, they browned up beautifully, this is them when cooked:

And served with some sweet chilli sauce they are delicious, a very 'meaty' texture and packed full of Thai flavours:

This mix made 7 cakes for me (though the recipe states 8) and based on 7 cakes they work out at 159 calories per cake when cooked in 2 tbsp of oil. This makes a very satisfying starter or side dish for the calories. I will definitely be making these again and now I know how well quorn can be blitzed into a texture suitable for patties it opens up some interesting possibilities. Enjoy!  

Quorn Tikka Masala (adapted from The Hairy Bikers)

Last weekend I tried a recipe from a UK book which a few of my friends have been raving about, the book is the Hairy Dieters Eat for Life which I had to buy the kindle version of (rather than paying extortionate postage costs to get it shipped to Australia!).

One of the reasons I was interested in this particular book was that I knew it contained a section entitled 'Fakeaways' which revolves around creating low calorie versions of favourite takeaway dishes. I was curious how I might be able to adapt any of these using quorn to further enhance the 'good for you' element.

So, last weekend, while I had time on my hands, I decided to try the low fat 'tikka masala' curry. I actually made two versions simultaneously, a chicken version (true to the recipe) and a version made with quorn pieces which worked astoundingly well!

First off, I made a marinade which consisted of:

2tbsp medium curry powder
1.5 tsp smoked paprika
1tsp salt
15g chunk of ginger, peeled and finely grated
2 garlic cloves, crushed
6tbsp plain fat-free yoghurt

This mixture I added to a whole bag of quorn pieces and mixed until they were completely covered. I then left it in the fridge for a good 5/6 hours

Marinading quorn pieces

For this recipe there is a little extra effort required because you make the sauce separately and need to use a hand blender for that part too ahead of the actual cooking - but it is well worth it, the flavours and textures are the closest to a proper Indian restaurant (British Indian) I have ever been able to create at home.

So, for the sauce stage you need:

1tbsp oil

2 medium onions (I only used 1 in the quorn version but use 2 if you really like them)

15g chunk of ginger, peeled and finely grated

2 garlic cloves, crushed

1tbsp medium curry powder

2tbsp tomato puree

2 tsp caster sugar

1 tsp salt

350ml water

2tbsp single cream

fresh coriander to taste

1. Heat the oil in a large pan and cook the onions until softened then add the garlic and ginger and cook for another few minutes until it is all translucent and fragrant.
2. Add the curry powder and cook for another 2 mins, stirring continuously.
3. Add tomato puree, caster sugar and salt and stir for another minute.
4. Pour the water into the pan and let it simmer for 5 minutes - do not worry that it looks very watery at this stage (I was convinced it was not going to work at this stage because the consistency was all wrong - but it comes together later, I promise).
5. After 5 mins of simmering, take it off the heat and blitz it with a hand blender (or tip it into a food processor) and blend until it is smooth. Leave this to one side.
6. I then used the same pan (less washing up) to heat a small amount of oil and saute the marinaded quorn/chicken pieces. Let them brown up and caramelise a little so you get some colour and stickiness in the pan.
7. Now, pour the masala sauce back into the pan and and bring it back up to a simmer.

It starts to look more like a curry at this stage...

8. Finally, add the cream and the coriander and there you go - fab tikka masala.

I tried to get a picture before my husband dug in but the smell was driving him crazy!

Amazingly, based on 4 portions, this works out at only 302 calories per serving which means you can have a measured portion of rice with it and still come in around the 500 calories mark. Pretty incredible when you taste it and realise how indulgent it seems!

This was a real winner in our house, I tried both versions (the chicken was awesome too) and can testify that the flavours really are amazing. The quorn seems to soak in the intensity of the spices quite well and it is definitely a recipe I will be making again.

If you could get hold of the quorn beef or lamb pieces (I cannot in Australia unfortunately) then I reckon this recipe would be equally impressive with those too.

This recipe is best followed on a weekend due to the various stages and need for time - but it is well worth the effort.

Enjoy!

Feta, Spinach and Tomato Filo Pie

Ok, so this recipe technically does not involve quorn, but it is vegetarian and I am going to be expanding this blog to include other recipes too.

This recipe was actually from the Good Food magazine and it can be found online here. It so happened that I had everything in the house to make it with and seeking a recipe for a light Sunday night dinner it seemed to fit the bill perfectly.

One thing I loved about this is that it is rough and ready and quick to prepare, we really enjoyed it - these are classic flavours that work well together and I would likely make this again and probably adapt it, maybe throw some pine nuts in for a bit more texture.

The recipe calls for: 

3/4 sheets of filo pastry
175g sun dried tomatoes in oil
100g feta
200g spinach
2 eggs

1. Line a 22cm springform pan with filo - I used the oil from the tomatoes as recommended and brushed it on liberally. I used 4 sheets instead of the 3 in the recipe and staggered them around the pan. It doesn't matter if you get the odd tear as long as it is covered by the other layers, this is the beauty of filo pastry!

2. Wilt the spinach (I just tipped a kettle full of boiling water over it instead of 'cooking' it - worked perfectly fine!). Drain it - I used a heavy bottomed saucepan to apply pressure to the spinach while it was in the colander draining, it always amazes me the amount of water that comes out.

3. Roughly chop the spinach and tomatoes and chuck in a bowl, crumble over the feta and mix the eggs in thoroughly then pour the mixture into the centre of the prepared pan and fold/scrunch over the pastry.

This is what my pie looked like before I folded the pastry back over:

4. Stick it in the oven (160 gas - see recipe for other temps) for about half an hour until it is golden - to be fair I probably should have left mine in a bit longer but we were hungry and impatient and I could see it was cooked. 

This is what mine looked like when I pulled it out and cut into it:

Cooked but not overly golden

I really enjoyed this as a light tea, Stu had it with a jacket potato but it was plenty for me on its own. Each portion contains 250 calories and 5g sat fat, the Weightwatchers propoints per portion is 7.

Slow Cooker Cashew Quorn

Hello all

It's been a while and I hope you have had a fab Christmas and new year. One of my new year resolutions is to start creating new recipes for this blog because I have been overwhelmed by how often it gets pinned on pinterest and searched and visited still, every week, even when I am not updating it! You deserve better than that and so I will endeavour to make 2014 the year of new and exciting quorn based recipes (as well as posting some non-quorn veggie offerings).

I actually found this recipe on pinterest - the original version is here and was intended for use with chicken (and I can confirm it is AWESOME) with chicken. I realised it could quite easily be adapted for use with quorn pieces and accordingly decided to give it a go. It is a pretty simple throw-it-in-and-go slow cooker recipe (my favourite kind!) and also uses lots of store cupboard ingredients so you shouldn't have to buy too much to make this.

I have turned the measurements for this recipe into the English versions (ie not in cups) as this is what I use and you can see the cups version at the above link.

Anyway, here is what you need for my version:

1 bag quorn pieces (could use chicken or beef/steak strips or even sliced up fillets)
1 yellow pepper chopped
60g flour (I used self raising)
1/2 tsp (about 6/7 good turns of a grinder) black pepper
60ml soy sauce
2 tbsp rice wine vinegar
2 tbsp ketchup
1 tbsp soft brown sugar
1 garlic clove crushed
1/2 tsp fresh grated ginger (a piece about the size of the top knuckle of your thumb)
1/4 tsp red chilli flakes (I doubled this as we like it hot)
60g raw cashews (just a big handful really)

The method with quorn is easier than with chicken as there is absolutely no need to brown it. You DO want to coat it in the flour/pepper though as you want the flour to thicken the sauce slightly and make it go to a fudgey consistency - so:

1. Put the flour and pepper in a bowl and mix around to ensure evenly distributed. Chuck the quorn pieces into this (defrosted will work better than frozen as the moisture will pick up the coating better) and toss around to coat.

2. In a small bowl mix together the soy sauce, wine vinegar, ketchup, sugar. garlic, ginger and chilli flakes.

3. Put the quorn into the slow cooker with the chopped pepper and pour over the sauce, give it a good stir then add around 50ml of water (this replaces the juice that would naturally come out of the chicken and stops it drying out). This is what mine looked like ready to switch on.

4. Switch on to low and leave for 3-4 hours then add the cashews and leave for another half an hour.

And there you have it!

Served over egg fried rice

I served mine with some egg fried rice and it was lovely. The quorn really sucks in the flavours and there was enough to portion up a few for the freezer too.


In new Propoints, this makes four portions and each portion is 4 points (as per the calculator on the ww website).

Enjoy!

Dragon Noodles - Cheat's Phad Thai

Hello

Sorry, I know it has been a while again, safe to say we are starting to feel very settled in our new Australian lives and slowly, now that the house and the job are sorted, I am starting to have the time to blog again.

This recipe is one which I found on the amazing Budget Bytes website and which I have tweaked slightly for ease of finding the ingredients in Australia, this really is a fantastic veggie recipe though for quick and easy noodles which are very tasty indeed and evoke the spirit of a quick and dirty phad thai. I cook this all the time now, it is our go-to Saturday lunch and I can knock it out in around 15 minutes so it has quickly become a favourite in our house.

Basically you need:

1 200g pack of dry rice noodles (I use Erawan brand in Aus, you could use ready cooked to save further time, this serves 2 so buy enough for that)
3/4 spring onions
1tblsp soy sauce
1 tbslp sugar (I use soft brown)
1 tbslp hot sauce (I use the standard chilli sauce sold here but the original recipe uses Sriracha which I cannot find)
1 egg - beaten
Chilli flakes
a splash of oil
Chopped coriander 
Half a fresh lime
Chopped nuts

And what you do is: cook the noodles for the necessary 6/7 minutes and while they are boiling mix the sugar, hot sauce and soy sauce together into a sauce (I always dip a finger and adjust to taste, usually adding a further small amount of sugar or soy), put this to one side and chop your spring onions and coriander ready for use later. 

By now your noodles should be done so drain them and heat your wok or a large pan with a splash of oil (orig recipe uses butter but I am trying to lessen the calories a little), add your chilli flakes and heat until the oil is hot then drop in your beaten egg and LEAVE IT ALONE for about 30 seconds. At this stage you should give it a stir to break it up into nice chunks.

Turn the heat down and chuck in your noodles and then immediately add the sauce and stir it all together until the noodles are coated. Whack in the spring onions and coriander, give it another stir and bob's your uncle. Very tasty noodles.

I then add a bit of lime juice and also some chopped nuts if I have them (I didn't in the below pictures but it further enhances the phad thai feel).

In the wok at the end of cooking....

Bowl of tasty noodles!

In terms of health, each portion, based on the above ingredients, is around 460 calories and 3.7g of sat fat (11.5g overall), 88.7g of carbs (as calculated by Myfitnesspal).

Vegetable (or Quorn) Tandoori Masala

G'day all

I know it has been a while - I have been in the process of emigrating to Adelaide and it has therefore been rather a manic time...but things are starting to settle down and I have every intention of maintaining this blog as a place to find great, tasty vegetarian recipes.

I have to say there is a much more limited range of Quorn available in Australia (I am finding so far) and also that it is VERY expensive. Around $6 (£4) for a standard bag of frozen pieces or mince - I have yet to find any of the chilled ranges either.

We were aware from previous visits that finding decent Indian food - at least UK style Indian which is fabulous - is very difficult indeed. We have never on any of our trips found a curry house worth mentioning and in general the curries we have tried have been bland, watery and weird or dry and sauce less (much like Indian food in India but not the UK variant we are used to and love). It makes you realise how blessed the UK is with a fabulous British Asian identity and cuisine.

So - anyway - after two more disappointing curries in the last week I decided that enough was enough and ad libbed this Tandoori Masala from what I know of cooking curries - I did it with loads of veggies I needed to use up but it would work equally well with a bag of Quorn pieces (just chuck them in frozen) although I would also add veggies to the quorn version for a bit of texture.

We really enjoyed this and it scratched the curry itch we had so here is the recipe:

2 onions

3 cloves garlic

1 long red chilli or a couple of short ones

5 tblsp Pataks Tandoori paste (or other brand)

1 tin coconut milk

400g passata

Then I added:

1 large sweet potato cubed

1 yellow pepper cubed

2 small courgettes sliced

2 large field mushrooms chopped

Handful of chopped fresh coriander.

or you could add a bag of quorn pieces and some of the above veg to suit - just use up what you have to hand.

Method:

Chop the onions and stick them in a tbsp of oil on a low heat to sweat down while you finely chop the chilli and the garlic. I left the seeds in as we like it medium/hot but remove the seeds if you want it milder. Chuck in the garlic and chilli and sweat it all down until softened and fragrant.

Add the curry paste - amount is approximate, I used about a third of a jar. It should be sizzling away, stir it around the onions etc into a thick paste. Let it sizzle for a few minutes until you can smells the spices out of the paste.

Add the passata and give it a good stir, let it come back up to a simmer then add the coconut milk a little at a time (I did it in thirds) stirring in completely each time and bringing back up to simmer (doing it this way makes the sauce a very even colour). Add a can full of water and repeat.

Now if you are using any harder veg which require longer cooking add them now (sweet potatoes for me) and bring back up to a simmer, leave for ten minutes simmering then add everything else, give it a good stir and simmer for 20-30 mins until your veg is tender (or your quorn is cooked through).

Keep tasting it - does it need more chilli? A pinch of any salt?

Right before you serve it stir through the chopped coriander and there you have it!

Easy, tasty, UK style curry. Enjoy!

Quorn Slow Cooker Beef Madras

Hello all

It has been a while, I do apologise - we are caught up in preparing to emigrate and all the chaos that goes with it. I have not forgotten my pledge to continue blogging quorn versions of classic meals though and this one, I am proud to say, is entirely my own creation!

I wanted to make a slow cooker curry, having not done so before, and I had made a beef one with some cheap and cheerful stewing steak a couple of weeks before with moderate success. I knew, however, that a) it was nowhere near hot enough for my husband and b) it would need to be tweaked as no actual 'browning' would need to go on.

I am pleased to say that having balanced the spices (the slow cooker tends to cook the heat out of chilli so I had to allow for this) and changed the method somewhat, this version actually made a very nice, hot curry - I used steak strips for my beef but you could happily turn this into a 'chicken' version using the pieces or even fillets cut into chunks. I have noticed quorn have started selling lamb strips too - so maybe give that a go!

Anyway, this is what it looked like served up over some basmati rice:

You can see that the sauce is pretty thick - which is exactly how we like our curry, but you could aim for a thinner curry by adding extra water at the relevant point.

So, this is my recipe for a beef madras, Quorn style....

Makes 5/6 portions

2 medium onions
4 garlic cloves
square inch of fresh ginger, peeled
3 fresh chillies (whole)
4tsp ground cumin
4tsp ground coriander
2tsp ground turmeric
1tsp hot chilli powder
2tsp garam masala
2 cans of chopped tomatoes

fresh plain yoghurt and fresh coriander to taste

Method:

1) In a blender blitz the onions, garlic, ginger and chillies into a paste, you want it finely chopped and you leave the seeds in the chilli for a madras level strength (tweak accordingly if you do not want so much heat).

2) Heat a frying pan until very hot and then add the paste and cook it for a few minutes until the paste smells very fragrant and is sizzling.

3) Add the cumin, ground coriander and turmeric and stir into the paste for a minute or so until you have a dryish mixture which smells amazing.

4) Tip your bag of quorn pieces/steak strips into the slow cooker and add the onion mixture, tomatoes and half a can of water (or a full can if you want a thinner sauce),the chilli powder and then mix well. Switch on to low and leave for 8 hours or put on high for 4/5 hours.

5) Stir at intervals whenever you get the chance throughout the day.

6) 30 minutes before you are ready to serve, add the garam masala and a dolllop of fresh yoghurt, stir, taste and get it to the heat/taste you want.

7) Just as you serve stir through a handful of chopped coriander.

And there you have it!

Enjoy! 

Slow Cooker Quorn Sausage Casserole

Hello all

It's been a while I know - sorry about that, we have had a lot going on - not least of all organising and preparing to emigrate in March next year and lots of things associated with that. 

Anyway, I have a number of recipes ready to go on here and now I just need to get round to posting them. Those that I post now will be my own take on various recipes, usually using quorn or other veggie products. I love to create veggie versions of traditional dishes and proving that they can be equally tasty and I promise I will get back on the horse and start posting again!

So, as the days are getting shorter and the nights are closing in I have been using my slow cooker - A LOT!! I love being able to bang stuff in there in a morning, leave for work and come home to a fantastic, aromatic dish all ready to serve. I use my slow cooker for meat stews quite often and decided to wing it with a quorn sausage casserole, it turned out brilliantly and therefore I share it with you here.

The beauty of this recipe is also that you can ad-lib with whatever you have to hand, I used mushrooms, sweet potato, onions and some borlotti beans but you can use whatever veg and/or pulses you have to hand to bulk it out. This is a wonderfully hearty dish and makes 4 large, filling portions.

I used a packet sausage casserole mix but completely ignored all the instructions etc and just used it as a shortcut to a casserole base. You could also stick this all in a standard casserole dish for around 60 mins on about 180 degrees (for a fan oven) and achieve the same result.

Here goes:

In your slow cooker place two chopped onions, your quorn sausages, whatever veg you fancy (I used mushrooms and a large sweet potato), a tin of beans/chick peas (I used borlotti) and a tin of chopped tomatoes.

Fill the empty tomato tin with boiled water out the kettle and then stir the sausage casserole mix into this and sling it in the slow cooker, half fill the tin again and chuck that in too.

Add either a stock cube or stock pot in and stir everything together thoroughly (I used a knorr veg stock pot).

Switch the slow cooker to low for 8 hours or high for 4 hours and leave.

About an hour before you want to eat your casserole you can add some veggie dumplings by mixing 50g atora veg suet with 100g self raising flour and binding with 5-6 tbsp of cold water. Make a soft dough and split into 8 pieces then roll each piece into a ball and sit on top of your casserole. My husband is always starving (he runs a lot) and hence you will notice from the photo below that there are more than 8 dumplings - I do one and a half times the dumpling recipe to make it 3 dumplings per portion and try to fill his hollow legs. The propoints values below are based on this so if you only make 8 dumplings you can knock a point or 2 off the total (I haven't calculated it so this is a guesstimate).

Casserole with dumplings in towards the end of cooking (I promise that is not a deliberate placement of the Quorn cookbook, that's just where it lives!).

A hearty portion of casserole.

And there you have it! No added fat in this dish at all (aside from the suet in the dumplings) and it tastes amazing! I serve it either on its own as it is incredibly filling but my other half mops up the tasty juice with crusty bread. This recipe makes 4 substantial portions.

On it's own the weight watchers propoints value of each portion of this casserole is 14 (so a sufficient meal anyway!) broken down as follows: quorn sausages (4), beans (2), sweet potato (2), suet (2), flour (2), stock pot (1), casserole mix (1).

Quorn Thai Noodles

70/70


Well, this is the end of an era for me - the final recipe from the Quorn book and the end of this project (but not the end of the blog, worry not!).


It has taken me a while to do these last few because they were all salad-esque recipes and in the UK our summer has taken forever to arrive this year. However, this last few days have been glorious and this week I finally made Quorn Thai Noodles which is a light meal, perfect for warm weather.


There is no online recipe for this at the Quorn site but it is a very simple one and I will detail it here.


Basically you use quorn fillets for this and all you need to do with them is defrost them and saute them until browned and cooked through, then slice them diagonally into large chunks and put to one side. Your dressing is made by mixing the juice and zest of one lime, 2 teaspoons of soy sauce, 2 teaspoons of sweet chilli sauce, two chopped garlic cloves and a tblsp of oil (I used peanut). Tip this dressing over the chopped quorn chunks and leave to marinade for as long as you like.


The key with this recipe is to prep everything so it is to hand, this way it is very quick to cook, so chop one carrot and one pepper into thin slices, one small bunch of fresh coriander roughly and 4 spring onions finely. Cook 60g fine rice noodles and then drain and put to one side along with a good handful of bean sprouts. Now you are ready to assemble the dish! 


In a wok heat a tblsp of oil and fry off the noodles and chopped veg/beansprouts for a few minutes before throwing in the quorn pieces and marinade plus the spring onions and coriander, this is what it looks like while cooking:

You then literally warm it through and its done. The book advises to serve this at room temperature but I served it straight from the wok, here it is served:

Presentation wise I wish I had used a red pepper instead of an orange one as the overall look is quite orange and the contrast would be better but taste wise this was very nice indeed.


We did find it quite dry as there is very little marinade as you can probably see, the strongest flavours were the lime juice and the coriander but that did mean that the dish tasted quintessentially Thai.


This is quite a nice light supper dish and I probably would make it again, I would be tempted to beef up the marinade with more sweet chilli and soy sauces next time but it would be very easy to tweak.


In terms of propoints, although the recipe states this makes 4 portions, I made it make 3 as we had it for a main meal rather than as a lunch or light portion, based on it serving three therefore each portion works out at 7 points which is a bit of a bargain! It breaks down like this quorn (2), noodles (3), oil (2).


I quite liked this recipe and will do something similar in the future I am sure. I would give this a 7/10.


And that, folks, is all of the recipes from the Quorn book done!


I will blog soon with a round up of the experiment and my intention is to carry this blog on with more recipes (quorn and other) proving that veggie food can be fab!


Thanks for sharing this journey with me! x

Quorn Beef Empanadas

69/70

Ok, so Beef Empanadas then - I cannot find an online version of this recipe so will be explaining it with a bit more detail than normal. I knew this might not be one of our favourites as we are not too keen on shortcrust pastry in our household and that is probably why it got left so close to the end.

In terms of how they looked I was pretty impressed, this is the picture of the filling when ready to use:

And this is the finished empanadas:

Now, I must admit I cheated and bought ready-made pastry because I just did not fancy the hassle of making my own for a recipe I was not that keen on. It also made the whole thing a lot quicker and easier. The recipe calls for eight 6" circles of pastry to be cut out ready to make the pasty like empanadas.

Basically the filling is fried off steak strips, garlic, onion and peppers with some red wine, chilli and paprika. Quite a tasty filling. You then spoon a small amount into the centre of each circle of pastry, top with a small amount of grated cheese (the recipe asks for emmental but I used mature cheddar) and fold the pastry over into a semi circle before sealing and glazing with egg wash.

The empanadas take 20-25 minutes to bake in the oven and then they are ready to serve. I served them with potato wedges and it all looked a bit beige as you can see!

This recipe is labelled as a light bites/snack so I guess the implication is you would only eat one. I had one and found it quite substantial anyway due to the heaviness of the pastry. I would certainly not want to eat two. I also found it overwhelmingly salty - but I think this may be my use of mature cheddar instead of emmental cheese. I did not overly enjoy it to be honest.

And then there is the propoints. Of course the minute you wrap something in pastry the values shoot through the roof. Each empanada will cost you 11 propoints! This is because the pastry alone is 8 - the breakdown is as follows: pastry (8), quorn (1), cheese (1), oil (1). This is based on around a tbslp of oil to saute everything in and a very small amount of cheese in each empanada.

So pretty high values for a dish I was not overly keen on - but if you like pastry and these kinds of foods then it might be your bag! Personally I gave it a 5/10 and I don't think I would make it again but it is a new way to use quorn so fairplay to them for that.

Spicy Coconut & Quorn Noodle Soup

68/70

Over the Easter weekend I did two of the final three recipes in the book, this is one of them: Spicy Coconut Noodle Soup.

It is another Thai inspired soup, using curry paste and coconut milk as the base but it is surprisingly quick and easy to sling together and quite tasty and filling too. I had no shitake mushrooms and used chestnut instead of button for the fresh but it was fine.

Here are some pictures of the dish served:

Please note that the recipe in the link above is double the quantities of that in the book - my version served 4 good portions and was half of all the quantities of ingredients.

Very easy to make, first you set the dried mushrooms to soak (I had picked up a big bag of mixed dried Asian mushrooms from Aldi the other week for a quid so this was great timing!). Then you literally fry off the paste in a big pan, add the coconut milk, water from the mushrooms and quorn pieces and simmer for five minutes then add all the other ingredients in two batches (mushrooms then everything else) simmer for another few minutes and Bob's your uncle!

As it contains noodles this is quite a filling soup and would actually make a great light meal on its own. I did find it rather hard to serve because the soup base itself is very watery but the noodles mean it drips a lot and hangs in clumps - the easiest way to get it from pan to bowl was with a spaghetti server and then a ladle!

Based on this serving 4, each portion totalled 10 propoints which seems quite high but then the noodles, coconut milk and paste all have values which needed adding in, this is broken down as follows: noodles (5), quorn (1), light coconut milk (3), paste (1).

I did find this quite tasty but I am not sure I would make it again in a hurry as it sits uneasily between a full meal and a soup to me and also it is SO hard to serve without making a mess! Nevertheless we gave this a 7/10.

Hoisin Quorn Fillets with Zesty Rice Salad

67/70


Wow, this one was a real winner in our house! A hoisin quorn fillet rice salad with a zesty dressing. Filling, fairly healthy and pretty easy to throw together - although I have to say that (as usual) I tweaked it around our tastes and what I had in the house.


I cannot find an online version of this recipe at the moment so no link I'm afraid, but I will walk you through it. Firstly the fillets were marinaded in Hoisin sauce (just a shop bought jar). Now the recipe said to mix 3 tbslp with 1 tbslp of oil but I couldn't see the point of adding oil here so I simply used the sauce - and I didn't measure it either, I just slathered most of the jar over the fillets (which I had left to defrost in the fridge overnight first).


I left the fillets in the sauce for a good few hours to marinade and meanwhile made the dressing for the rice. This consisted of a clove of garlic, chopped (I used 2), 3 tblsp of fresh orange juice, zest of two oranges and 3 tblsp of olive oil. This ready to pour into the rice I chopped all the veg.


Two peppers and a courgette were chopped into batons and the recipe called for a cucumber too but we do not like cucumber so I ignored this. I also chopped a handful of fresh parsley and a handful of fresh mint and put them to one side. Doing all this prep means that the dish itself is speedy to prepare.


Next I cooked the rice (200g - I used basmati) and then once it had cooled a little I stirred the dressing into it and left it for 10 minutes to marinade. Next you mix together all the raw veg and the herbs into the rice (the recipe also includes 2 segmented oranges but I left these out too as I can't have too much citrus due to migraines). This is what the rice salad section looked like when it was ready:

Next the fillets were put under the grill for about 6 minutes on each side, until I could be sure they were cooked through. I then served the fillets and the rice on top of a bed of salad leaves.

We both really enjoyed this meal and I thought it looked pretty appetizing too! The dressing through the rice was lovely and the flavours really worked well together, the sauce on the fillets had baked on and this was a nice touch, I will definitely use that method with cooking fillets again in the future.


In terms of weight watchers points each portion works out at 12 (based on the recipe serving 3 with 2 fillets each). This is broken down as follows: rice (6), quorn fillets (3), oil (2), hoi sin sauce (1). Considering this is a pretty filling and incredibly tasty meal I think this is pretty good. 


I would definitely make this again and it is a great recipe to tweak to your own tastes too, top marks Quorn - I wish I had made this one earlier! We give this an 8/10.

Quorn Thai Salad

66/70

I can almost see the finish line with this project! Only four more recipes to go!

Anyway, as the weather in the UK is akin to mid-summer at the moment (despite it being March) it was lovely to do another of the salads from the book.

This is a Thai salad and it does indeed involve many Thai flavours, it is also quite a filling salad as it is full of raw veg as well as the quorn pieces. It is easy to make and the dressing is lovely and light, as you will see below it also ticks all the boxes in terms of how healthy it is so a winner all round!

First things first, you need to marinade the pieces in green thai curry paste, I used a couple of tablespoons because we like it spicy. I left it for around an hour before doing everything else. The salad consists of shredded white cabbage, a sliced pepper, diced mango, blanched green beans and a couple of chopped tomatoes.  The marinaded quorn pieces are then cooked off until the marinade has browned and the pieces are cooked through.

The dressing is simply garlic, ginger, soy sauce, lime juice and zest and a small amount of oil. This is why the salad is so zingy, the combination of lime, soy, ginger, garlic and the final coriander garnish is very Thai tasting and delicious. The veg and quorn mix, along with the dressing are then tossed with salad leaves to create the final salad dish.

It is also a very colourful salad, as you can see here:

I thoroughly enjoyed this salad (which is quite something as it is not a style of dish I particularly like). The mix of textures and the vivid flavours made it very enjoyable and I will definitely be making this one again - fantastic on a warm day.

In terms of weight watchers points, only the quorn, paste and oil in the dressing carries any points and therefore, based on this serving four, each portion is only 4 points as follows: quorn (2), oil (1), curry paste (1). An absolute bargain in terms of daily points!

We would give this salad an 8/10 and I think it is my favourite salad to date from the book.

Quorn Steak & Red Pepper Broth

65/70

Another soup from the book (only one more soup to do after this one!) and this is definitely more of a hearty broth. As this one contains noodles and is almost a main meal in itself I really quite enjoyed it - it reminded me of the ramen style dishes you can get in Wagamama.

Very quick and easy to make, the base of this is chopped ginger and garlic simmered in hot vegetable stock for 5 minutes. Before I set to creating the stock base I marinaded the steak strips in Chinese 5 spice powder and some szechuan sauce. The recipe calls for only a tablespoon of the sauce but I whacked in a full 'Blue Dragon' sachet and personally I liked the heat this gave to the soup.

Once your stock is simmered you drop in the marinaded pieces, chopped pepper (I used frozen) and chopped pak choi and cook for a few more minutes to heat through, then add in the noodles (cooked and refreshed in cold water) and heat the whole thing through, garnish with spring onions and fresh parsley and serve.

This is what it looks like served:

Because of the noodles this feels like less of a soup and more of a main meal and we really enjoyed it. I think for us it would have been a bit bland if I had not bumped up the amount of szechuan sauce in the dish but obviously you can tweak this to suit your own tastes. The ginger and garlic and also the 5 spice come through really nicely and make for a very aromatic dish. 

As the ginger and garlic are simply cooked off in the stock there is no fat in this recipe at all which is a real bonus. In terms of weight watchers points, using the recommended 50g egg noodles per person, each portion works out at only 6 points as follows: noodles (4) and steak strips (2). Everything else in this recipe is zero points!


I would personally make this again, the dish had a real vibrancy to it and the flavours were very distinct, it also has the added benefit of being healthy whilst also filling, we would give this an 8/10 and it is probably my favourite soup by a long chalk from the Quorn book.

Quorn Bacon & Sweetcorn Chowder

64/70


Today I have tried another soup from the remaining handful of recipes, this time a chowder style using Quorn smokey bacon strips. I actually really did enjoy it too!


This is a pretty simple soup to make and full of flavour, the smoky bacon strips work really well in it and from start to finish it only takes about half an hour to prepare. To start cut about 4 bacon rashers into thin strips, I used the frozen ones and defrosted them for a minute or so in the microwave, you then fry these off in a tblsp of oil until lightly browned. Chuck in a finely sliced small onion (I used a red onion) and sweat for a couple of minutes until the onion is softened.


Next add one medium potato chopped into 1-2 cm cubes and ml vegetable stock, bring up to the boil and simmer for 5-6 minutes. Next mix 2 tsp cornflour with 2 tblsp milk (taken from the 350ml total you need for the recipe) to form a paste and add this to the pan along with the rest of the milk. The recipe calls for semi-skimmed but I used skimmed and it worked fine.


Now, simmer for another 6 or so minutes - until the potato is tender, then add 175g frozen sweetcorn and stir through until this has warmed. Sprinkle in a handful of chopped parsley and it is ready to serve.


This is what it looked like served up:

You can see this is quite a creamy looking soup and I guess if you used whole or semi-skimmed milk you would get a creamier result, I have stuck with skimmed as it's what we have in the house and in any event will bring down the points total per portion. This recipe makes 4 normal size portions.


The propoints total per portion is 6 broken down as follows: quorn bacon (1), oil (1), sweetcorn (2), potato (1), milk (1). This is of course based on using skimmed milk and the total would need to be adjusted if you choose to use semi or whole milk instead.


This is a very tasty soup and the smoky bacon flavour works really well with the sweetness of the corn and the creamy texture, it is a lovely idea on a cold afternoon and I actually found it quite filling - probably due to the potato. This is definitely my favourite soup from the Quorn book so far.


I would make this again and we give it an 8/10 - definitely one to try!

Hearty Bean and Pasta Soup

63/70

This is the first soup I have attempted from the Quorn cookbook. It's pretty easy to make but the recipe is not on the Quorn website as yet so I will talk through it in more detail than normal.

The method is the usual one for any soup base, a chopped onion is sweated until soft and then 2 cloves of crushed garlic are added, next 3 tblsp of tomato puree along with a teaspoon each of dried thyme and marjoram and a tbslp of fresh chopped rosemary are added.

Next the wet stuff goes in, a tin of chopped tomatoes, a tin of canellini beans and 1.5litres of veg stock. Give it a good stir, season to taste and bring it to boiling point then turn down the heat and add the quorn pieces (175g) and simmer for 12 minutes (I chucked them in frozen). Lastly add the pasta shells (100g) and simmer for a further 12-14 minutes until the pasta is cooked.

What you end up with is a very hearty and thick stew like soup. The step I have missed out above is that is asks you to remove half of the soup before you add the quorn pieces and blend it until smooth and then add it back to the pan. This seemed like way too much hassle to me so I used a stick blender in the pan itself and just blitzed away until I judged that about half was liquidized.

This is what it looked like during the simmering:

And here it is served:

It was actually very tasty indeed and so thick and substantial that it felt more like a filling meal than a soup usually would. This was a nice way to use the pieces and I would probably use this as a base recipe for creating other soups with whatever I have in the fridge.

In terms of pro-points, if you base this on 4 substantial portions each one works out at 6 - this is broken down as follows: quorn (1), pasta (2), beans (2), oil (1). This is high for a soup but considering how filling this is it makes sense. I do think it is worth 6 points as it leaves you feeling very full!

We would give this a 7 out of 10, it's not the most exciting of recipes but it is easy to make and very tasty. Great on a cold winters day.

Quorn Ceasar Salad

62/70

I should probably start by saying that I am, in general, not really a fan of salad per se. I have, therefore, pretty much left the salad section to do last and therefore unfortunately I am now faced with the 'salad days' of this experiment....

So, this weekend I attempted the Ceasar Salad - a salad which I am fairly familiar with as I have had it previously in restaurants. My knowledge of it was only that it is a creamy cheese flavoured dressing and that it contains raw egg. I am not overly fond of it but needs must so off we set...

For a start I tweaked the cheese content because 100g of grated parmesan is just EXCEPTIONALLY high. I actually used 75g of cheese of which 25g was my precious (bought back from Lucca) parmesan and 50g was finely grated cheddar, I figured the stronger flavour of the cheddar would make up for the smaller quantity of cheese and I was right, the cheese taste was definitely the strongest.

The dressing is made by blitzing the cheese, egg yolk, clove of garlic, white wine vinegar and lemon juice and then adding the olive oil with the blender still switched on until smooth. The recipe suggests 200ml of olive oil but again I ignored this measurement and just used enough until it was the consistency I wanted (about 125ml).

You end up with a stunningly pretty buttercream yellow dressing which smells quite strongly of the cheese and lemon. To my mind it did indeed smell like a ceasar salad as I remember it.

Effectively you then just toss the fried off quorn pieces with some lettuce leaves and the dressing and top with ciabatta croutons. Simple.

This is the salad as served - you can see I burnt my croutons by trying to do too many things at once....

So, in terms of propoints, this is the points for the version I made with less cheese and oil. Based on using a quarter of the dressing per portion this is a calorie laden nightmare of 14 PROPOINTS!!!! FOR A SALAD!!!!

Yes, I had to recalculate twice just to check. It is because it is still a huge amount of oil and cheese per portion, the points break down as follows: cheese (2), oil (7), quorn pieces (2), croutons (2) egg yolk (1).

To my mind it did taste quite nice (for a salad) but at these points values there is no way in hell I will recreate it! If I am going to spend that many points on a meal it has to be something that feels like it is worth it and for me this just does not do it. If you are a fan of ceasar salad then my guess is that you will like this because it is a great quorn version of the standard chicken dish but if you are trying to eat healthy then it is probably one to avoid!

For me this is a 5/10 - I can see what the recipe is trying to do but for me it is just not that enjoyable for the amount of points in it.