Dressing up, a little bit naughty and very nice

Christmas can be a stodgy affair…but it doesn’t have to be!

Its like wearing that very expensive little something with bargain basement everything else and the whole ensemble looking super chic – if you aren’t careful it can go the other way; it is a question of thinking, balance and taste.

(Obviously I am not talking here about allergies regimes for illness, be aware and take care of your situation).

We don’t want to feel horribly deprived or be the boring one who says “Oh no, I can’t eat that, I am not eating XYZ” to the person who has slaved over a hot stove for weeks (yourself included) neither should we throw all caution to the wind and end up feeling ill.

There are lots of ways, but here are a few ways, to have a healthier Christmas:

Firstly drink lots of water, take your apple cider vinegar, and enjoy the satsumers and fresh nuts!

If you are having people over for drinks make a platter of delectable nibbles that will suit everyone – mix pumpkin and sunflower seeds with sea salt and a drop of olive oil in place of roast salted nuts, a creamy humus without lots of oil, recipe here Here, and with lots of crudites – radish, carrot and cellery sticks, cauliflower florets, chunks of avocado tossed in tomatoe salas (so easy to make, why do people buy the stuff?!), olives, bake small mushrooms and serve with a dollop of pesto on top, the list is endless really, you just need a bit of imagination and a lot less time than making cheese straws and endless bruschettas!

Simple things like loading your dinner plate with more veggies and less of the heavy stuff, not filling up on bread, snacking on more olives, radishes, cherry tomatoes and fewer vol au vents, nibbling some really good chocolate rather than mindlessly gorging on piles of sweet stuff will make your Christmas get togethers enjoyable rather than destroyable.

Try melting some good chocolate (even better make some raw tempered chocolate if you have the ingredients) and dip cherries, bananas or clementine segments into it. Store them in the fridge, not least to stop you eating them all, yum!

 

Think about it, that’s all, you know what is best and at this time of year it is lovely to enjoy the indulgencies but not to the point of feeling bloated, guilty, even sick. You can make good choices and avoid anything you simply can not eat because there are usually so many alternatives.

If you are the chef look at the balance of the meal. A traditional Christmas meal is actually very healthy if done well. The danger zones are the nibbles, patés, sauces and stuffing’s.

To start how about keeping it lighter maybe a mushroom paté, green pepper corns, oatcakes and some sliced figs made rich and sticky by heating in the oven with a spoonful of honey and splash of balsamic for about 20 mins. Pop them in as it heats up for your turkey then remove and mix up to serve later. Have small portions for taste not filling up, rather to chat and pull crackers over.

There is the meat. I would choose a higher welfare bird or organic – it has had a better life, is more nutritious and provides more meat. It is a good buy. Use the bones for stock. Serve less of it and more of the accompaniments.

Fill your stuffing with lots of chestnuts, onions, prunes, nuts, mushrooms and herbs for scrumptious flavour and texture. I make a meat based one for meat eaters with a small amount of organic pork (about 300gm for enough for 8 people), lots of chestnuts, mushrooms, prunes, onions, pecan nuts, garlic, sage, thyme, salt and pepper and an egg to bind it all together. Full of gorgeous flavours. Quantities below.

For my vegetarian one I use similar ingredients but in place of the pork I use more mushrooms and chestnuts and some chopped olives. I usually change the fruit and use figs, probably some walnuts and cashews in place of the pecans, extra onions and olives and some capers for depth. Quantities below.

The vegetarian version is as popular as the pork one with the meat eaters, it also makes great veggie burgers for any time of year!

Offer lots of vegetables, I usually roast some potatoes (of course!) and parsnips, steam sprouts and top with some butter and nutmeg and poach carrots sticks in orange juice. I serve mashed sweet potatoes and celeriac rather than more starchy potatoes.

Chop and boil sweet potatoes celeriac. When just tender strain, keeping the liquid for your gravy, add lots of black pepper, some butter and an egg to bind and make it deliciously creamy and mash it all together until smooth. Taste and add salt if needed, the celeriac has a lovely salty flavour so it’s a good place to hold on the salt. Recipe below.

I often add in some chopped kale or savoy cabbage at the end for a tasty and nutritional boost! This can all be prepped in advance and popped in the oven to reheat. Make it easy! Here is another recipe using cauliflower.

For the gravy I am purely indulgent – it is made with the meat juices, a stock made from giblets, carrot, onion and celery, any vegetable cooking water left after I make the vegetarian gravy, red wine and port and thickened in the traditional way with flour. No excuses for that today. There are lots of great gravy recipes to be found online. The vegetarian version involves some butter and flour, onions, garlic, vegetable cooking liquid, marmite, mushroom ketchup, some dulce (we are looking for the umami here) a glug of red wine and port.

For both recipes allow reduction time, as that builds the flavour.

I also make cranberry and bread sauces to compliment the meal and go with the left overs.

I LOVE the left overs, they are my favourite bit with pickled onions, homemade mayo, lots of leavy salad and Boxing day films.

Don’t forget to use the hand test, it helps me everytime, remind yourself here.

Merry Christmas, I hope you will be warm and happy, with or in touch with loved ones and most of all loving yourself. Thanks for reading my posts this year and motivating me to be healthier and happier and boosting my own health.

With love,

Desri XXX

Pork stuffing serves 6ish

300gm organic minced pork

1 cup chestnuts

1 cup chopped mushrooms

1/2 cup pitted chopped prunes

2 finely chopped onions

½ cup crumbled pecan nuts or walnuts

2 crushed cloves garlic

Handful sage leaves chopped

Sprig of thyme leaves picked – use the leaves not the stick!

Big pinch salt

10 grinds of pepper

1 egg

Vegetarian stuffing serves 6ish

11/2 cup chestnuts

11/2 cup chopped mushrooms

¾ cup pitted chopped prunes or figs or half and half

2 finely chopped onions

½ cup crumbled pecan nuts or walnuts or mix of either with cashews

¼ cup chopped green of black olives

2 crushed cloves garlic

2 teaspoons rinsed salted capers chopped

Handful sage leaves chopped

Sprig of thyme leaves picked – use the leaves not the stick!

Big pinch salt

10 grinds of pepper

1 egg

 

Mash for 6-8

1KG sweet potatoes

1KG celeriac

Black pepper

1 dessertspoon butter

1 egg

Taste and add salt if needed.

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One chicken many ways

I believe that if you are going to eat meat, choose organically raised animals that have been treated well and lived outside in their most natural way.

Lots of people thrive better with meat, it is hard to make a vegan diet work long term without serious learning and dedication to balancing the nutrients we need, though (I have to say it) I believe a regime light in meat, dairy and processed grain and sugars is best and learning to eat well is worth it.

People always say to me that eating raw vegan is so expensive and also eating organic meat or fruit and vegetables is so expensive – well yes it can be but so can eating a standard diet. It depends on what you choose. If you buy it all fresh and seasonal and choose well you can eat really well for less.

Last week I saw organic chickens for sale, buy one get one half price. I paid 12€ for both.

For the first time ever I boiled a chicken.

This is how I did it.

I simply put the whole chicken, 2 whole carrots, an onion cut in quarters, a stick of celery plus the leaves from a couple of other sticks in a big pan. I threw in a sprinkle of whole black peppercorns, ½ teaspoon of salt, some fresh thyme, rosemary and sage out of the garden – dried would be fine.

Water , about ¾ of the way up the chicken, if I had used a smaller pan with a more snug fit it could have covered it. Popped the lids on, brought to the boil then turned down to a simmer and left it for just over an hour.

When it was cooked I removed the chicken, which was messy as it all fell off the bone it was so tender. I pulled all the meat off and put the carcass back into the pan and left it, with the lid on to simmer all afternoon, about 4 or 5 hours altogether. Then I strained and put the stock into jars and when cooled into the fridge. At this point you could freeze the stock so that you could use it for a longer period of time.

I was amazed at how much chicken there was and how good it tasted.

The chicken was packed into a glass storage box into the fridge.

Meals from 1 chicken.

1. Ramen
   

Carrots

Cabbage/bok choy/kale

Red pepper

Leek

Mung beans

Chicken or mushrooms

Dried chilli

Noodles (optional)

Stock

Miso/lemon grass/garlic/ginger/seaweed/ coriander leaves – all or none, its optional

I chopped carrots into sticks, shredded bok choy and kale (any cabbage would work), about ¼ chopped red pepper. NB just use any veg!!

I heated some oil in a pan and gently fried sliced leek for a few minutes with some chopped lemon grass (not necessary but I had some) and a crumbled red chilli (I have a small tub in the cupboard, they keep for yonks!) then added the vegetables and stir fried 2-3 minutes. I added some stock (I wanted it like a soup so added enough for two of us – you know how much you need 😉 and a spoonful of miso and stirred as it heated. This went into bowls with some soba noodles for Robin which I had cooked and rinsed in cold water and a handful each of sprouted mung beans that I had sprouted myself. Shredded chicken on top.

You could add a boiled egg on top too if you need more.

I sprinkled seaweed over.

OK, I know all that looks a lot but if you have dried peppers and dried seaweed flakes in the cupboard, they are a bit pricy to buy but last for ages and you don’t need to use a lot. Miso same thing; and it makes a really good savoury drink any time. Lemon grass can be bought and chopped and kept in a freezer bag in the freezer. Ginger the same, just peel it (easy, scrape it with the back of a spoon) and pop it in the freezer then grate as and when you need it. If you don’t have home made stock use a cube, a Miso cube is lovely.

The whole think took me ten minutes.

2. Sandwich

Robin is putting insulation in the roof up a ladder, going up and down all day long and needs calories. He also does fine with bread so a few sandwiches made from good bread, packed with leaves and cucumber and chicken served him very well.

3. Savoury Pancakes

Chickpea flour

Fresh herbs (I used coriander, sorrel and dill as I had them)

Leaves (I used spinach and water cress)

Avocado

Salsa optional

I made Socca pancakes (chickpea flour with same quantity water – ie 1 cup flour, 1 cup water OR as I did ½ cup chickpea flour and ½ cup coconut flour, you need a bit more water for this) heat one side in a pan that can go into the oven then pop in the oven for the top to cook.

I stuffed these with lots of leaves, chicken, fresh herbs, mungbeans, avocado slices and some homemade salsa I had in the fridge.

See how to sprout your own mung beans here Friday bits and bobs

4. Soup

Mixed fresh vegetables

My usual think I just threw in the veg I had (Squash, leeks, parsnips this time) added the stock and blended with a wand blender when cooked.

5. Chicken n chips

Sweet potatoes

Raw beetroot

Cooked chicken

Salad or coleslaw

I chopped sweet potatoes and beetroot into chips and shredded some sage leaves. Tossed all in olive oil, ground cumin and a pinch of salt and cooked in the oven. I served with the chicken and some salad with a lemony dressing on it; I have also served it with homemade coleslaw.

So that is 9 meals and there was still a bottle of stock left which I didn’t use in time and was too concerned to keep after a week so had to throw away, annoyingly.

Do you ever do that, think it is so precious you need to keep it and then it goes off. The mango I treat us to then save for the perfect moment and it is black inside….

Reminds me of a beautiful little outfit I had when Aimee was a baby and I kept it and kept it until it fit then she was to big for it in a couple of weeks.

I still do it /:

SO, 9 meals using the expensive chicken plus fresh veg and store cupboard items.

All fast.

All easy.

All flexible with ingredients and quantities.

All in all really nutricious, warming, tasty and inexpensive meals!

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