Lunchtime..

avon pasta salad apr 16

Ingredients

  • 200g Tagliatelle or 150g Spaghetti
  • 2 tablespoons Olive Oil
  • 1/2 medium Red Onion, thinly sliced
  • 1 Garlic Clove, crushed
  • 1 Red Pepper sliced
  • 50g Pitted Black Olives, quartered
  • 10 Cherry Tomatoes, halved
  • 75g Sundried Tomatoes, roughly chopped

Directions

1. Cook pasta as per pack instructions. Drain and toss in 1 tablespoon of olive oil and leave to one
side.
2. Heat 1 tbsp olive oil in a large frying pan and then add onion followed by garlic. Fry for 2 minutes,
add red peppers & continue to cook for 1 minute.
3. Reduce heat and add cooked pasta to the frying pan. Stir in olives, basil, cherry and sundried
tomatoes.
4. Transfer to a serving dish, top with Avonmore Grated Cheddar & Mozzarella cheese and scatter
with rocket leaves.
5. Season with cracked black pepper & serve immediately.

Darina Allen’s Sea Spinach Soup

 

darina allen sea spinach soup

Sea Spinach Soup

Sea spinach is at its sweetest and most delicious at present…. I absolutely love it and really want you to know about it so if you live near a rocky strand, look out for it – the shiny green leaves are unmistakable. It is, in fact, the ancestor to most cultivated varieties of beet, from beetroot to spinach beet. It can be cooked exactly like garden spinach and used in the same way, for example, try serving it in Middle Eastern style with raisins and pine kernels and a touch of cinnamon. Not surprisingly, because sea spinach is washed by the tides, it is full of iodine, minerals and other trace elements and it has an addictive salty tang. Sea spinach is tougher and slightly stronger in flavour than garden spinach, so it takes a little longer to cook.

The trick with these green soups is not to add the greens until the last minute, otherwise they will overcook and the soup will lose its fresh taste and bright green colour.

50g (2oz/1/2 stick) butter

110g (4oz/1 cup) onion, chopped

150g (5oz/1 cup) potatoes, chopped

600ml (1 pint/2 1/2 cups) homemade chicken stock, vegetable stock or water

425-600ml (3/4-1 pint/2 – 2 1/2 cups) creamy milk (1/4 cream and 3/4 milk)

salt and freshly ground pepper

225-350g (8-12oz/3 cups) sea spinach, destalked and chopped

Freshly ground nutmeg

Garnish

2 tablespoons (2 American tablespoons + 2 teaspoons) whipped cream (optional

Freshly chopped parsley

Melt the butter in a heavy-bottomed saucepan. When it foams add the onions and potatoes and turn them until well coated. Sprinkle with salt and freshly ground pepper. Cover and sweat on a gentle heat for 10 minutes. Add the boiling stock and milk, bring back to the boil and simmer until the potatoes and onions are fully cooked. Add the sea spinach and boil with the lid off for about 3-5 minutes, until the sea spinach is tender. Do not overcook or the soup will lose its fresh green colour.

Liquidise and taste and add some freshly grated nutmeg.  Serve in warm bowls garnished with a blob of whipped cream and some chopped parsley

Ballymaloe Cookery
@BallymaloeCS

 

Knockout Night-time Cookies

mbg night cookies

Haile Thomas is only 19 but has already graduated from the Institute for Integrative Nutrition as a certified integrative nutrition health coach (at age 16) and launched a nonprofit, called HAPPY (healthy, active, positive, purposeful, youth). She was inspired to launch her health journey after her father developed type 2 diabetes and since then has begun working as a wellness and compassion activist and a vegan food and lifestyle content creator. Her first book, Living Lively, has 80 delicious, wholesome, super-powered plant-based recipes—including this one.

Help your body wind down in the evenings with these tasty and calming cookies. Have a cookie (or two!) a couple of hours before going to bed to get in all the natural melatonin (which helps to balance our sleep cycles) from almonds and cherries.

Knockout Nighttime Cookies

Makes 6 servings

Ingredients

  • ½ cup mashed banana (about 1 medium banana)
  • 2 tablespoons almond butter
  • ½ cup unsweetened shredded coconut
  • ½ cup chopped raw walnuts
  • ½ cup dried cherries
  • ⅓ cup rolled oats (gluten-free if needed)
  • ¼ cup flaxseeds
  • 1 tablespoon chia seeds
  • 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Method

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F. Line a sheet pan with parchment paper.
  2. In a large bowl, stir together the banana, almond butter, coconut, walnuts, cherries, oats, flaxseeds, chia seeds, vanilla, cinnamon, and ginger until thoroughly combined. The batter will be moist.
  3. For each cookie, roll 2 tablespoons of the mixture into a ball and place on the prepared baking sheet, gently flattening the top with the palm of your hand. Bake for 12 to 15 minutes, until golden.
  4. Cool on a wire rack and grab a cookie! The cookies keep in an airtight container for up to one week.