Homemade pizza

Saturday night is treat night. For several years now, we have planned, cooked and eaten (well, my boyfriend largely does the planning and cooking) healthy meals during the week, and on Saturday we can forget about diets and weight loss and cholesterol, and splurge.

It's a great trick because it's not that we can't eat pizza, burgers, ice cream, chips - we just have to wait until Saturday, so it helps with will power when one of us is trying to lose some weight. It also means we don't get too tired of eating healthy meals, or too tired of cooking, because we have usually eaten out on Saturdays, or got takeway. No cooking, no washing up.

Then we had a go at homemade pizza. I don't think we will ever again be able to spend €30 between us on a couple of takeaway pizzas, when we can make even more fabulous homemade pizza for half that, and have enough to invite some friends over to share it with us. We can even open a nice bottle of wine, or some craft beer, and still spend far less than we would in a pizza restaurant.

Homemade burgers followed, with homemade bread buns, grilled cheese and bacon. Yum. Why go out to a noisy pub when we can enjoy something so much nicer and cheaper in the comfort of our own home? (I've been checking out recipes for barbeque sauce, might have to have a go at that.)

I strongly encourage everyone to have a go at homemade pizza. I've been making bread for years and thought pizza dough would be difficult, but its the easiest bread recipe I've come across. I use this recipe from the River Cottage Bread Recipe Book. It only needs to rise once before baking, so I can have it from the bowl to the oven in less than an hour, or it can be left to develop more. 

 

My boyfriend mixes up a paste from tomato concentrate, which we always have in the cupboard. The only thing we need to go out and buy for this is the cheese, ham or other toppings. It's super quick and super tasty and super filling.

Saturday night is still treat night, but we are increasingly using it to invite people over. A couple of pizzas, a bowl of salad and a bottle of wine makes for an incredibly easy but really nice evening. Throw in some decent ice cream or even a pre-prepared tiramisu and we can call it a dinner party. 

I've even been able to add some fresh basil - my first homegrown ingredient on a homemade pizza.

On the menu today: More turkey

Yesterday I turned my hand to Paul Hollywood's recipe for turkey, stuffing and cranberry sauce chelsea buns. They look really colourful and were surprisingly easy to assemble - I think I didn't roll the dough thin enough, though. Next attempt will be thinner. It tastes and smells amazing! This is breakfast...

Homemade Toasted Muesli

Perfect breakfast, no? I'm really finding that switching back to yoghurt has made a big difference, but it does need something else and what better than homemade toasted muesli? In a recent tv programme on the Beeb, they demonstrated that when someone ate 100g of oats a day over a period of weeks, the levels of 'good' bacteria in his stomach increased, so yet more reasons to include a daily dose of oats in your diet.

The recipe I use is almost entirely 'borrowed' from this recipe from Amanda at Easy Peasy Organic - almost the only change I have made is converting it from cups to grams, but I thought I'd share it for all those people who have scales but not cup measures. All credit to her for developing this delicious recipe. Royalties, commissions and donations should be directed to her. The second change I've made is to replace most of the oats with rolled mixed grains (wheat, spelt, barley, corn, rye etc), which I find tastes better, but feel free to combine the two and just use oats.

Toasted Muesli
50g rolled oats
115g rolled mixed whole grains
150g-200g seeds and/or nuts
3 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp honey (or agave/maple syrup for vegans)
150g dried fruit
1/2 tbsp brown sugar
Dash of cinnamon
1/2 tsp vanilla essence

1. Preheat oven to 180C
2. Mix oats, grains, seeds and nuts in a bowl. Warm the honey and oil in a small pan, pour onto the oats mix and stir until combined. Add brown sugar, cinnamon and vanilla (optional).
3. Spread in a thin layer on a baking tray and bake 20-30 mins, turning frequently to prevent burning.
4. When cool, stir in fruit and store in an air-tight container.

(Original recipe here)

Variations

There are endless variations to this recipe, so every time I make it, it is slightly different. Different grains, different nuts, different seeds, different fruit. You could also try different oils, or replace the honey with agave or maple syrup (which would also give you a vegan muesli). This is delicious with milk or yoghurt and the addition of fresh seasonal fruit, or Amanda serves it with cooked apples as a kind of deconstructed apple crumble.

How to: Hot mulled apple juice

When you're feeling a little under the weather, there's nothing better than mulled apple juice to give you a boost. It's a fruity, spicy, nourishing, warming kick that's like getting hugged from the inside. You will need:

- Apple juice
- A lemon and/or an orange (or other citrus fruit of your choice), preferably unwaxed
- Cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, cloves, mace, other wintry Christmassy spices lurking in your cupboard
- Honey

Stick some apple juice in a pan. Could be litres, could be one mug's worth. Add in some slices of (washed) citrus fruit, a dollop of honey and a generous sprinkling of spices. Warm through for half an hour or more.

Drink.

I usually dilute this a little as the flavours can become very concentrated but it's just lovely if you have a cough/cold, or as an alcohol-free alternative to mulled wine at Christmas. 

Warning: If making more than you will drink in one sitting, store in the fridge and drink within 2-3 days. It starts fermenting really quickly, and goes all bitter, tangy and slightly fizzy. Deeply unpleasant. To be avoided. Drink it fresh and hot!

One loaf is not enough

Yesterday I finally tried out A Girl Called Jack's soda bread recipe. She calls it 'airy fairy easy peasy soda bread' - and it's by far the simplest, quickest, easiest bread I've ever made. It came out beautifully tasty - so much so that one loaf was not enough, and I made another one.

 It's so quick! From start to stomach in an hour. My second loaf was lighter and I reckon I could get it lighter still with time. Both were utterly delicious. I just can't get over how easy and quick! It's a loaf I can make after work that's ready in time for supper, and the ingredients are all things I have in the cupboard/fridge all the time so no planning or shopping is required. It's so simple that I didn't even have to refer to the recipe second time around. Thank you Jack!

The difference between choice and necessity

Many of the blogs I read on simple living, cutting back, slowing down and so on are written by people who have made a choice about the lifestyle they want to lead. These are sometimes prompted by changes in circumstances, but are predominantly about choice.

However, recently some blogs have started appearing which are not drive by choice. People living on unbelievably and unsustainably limited budgets, feeding their families for £10 a week or less. For these people, the lifestyle they blog about is not chosen but a seemingly inescapable and terrible fate. I have only really read one blog but the level of resilience, creativity and passion in such dire circumstances is something that demands respect. So now I'd like to introduce her to you.

Photograph: The Guardian

 

In her own words: A Girl Called Jack

Poverty isn’t just having no heating, or not quite enough food, or unplugging your fridge and turning your hot water off. It’s not a tourism trade, it’s not cool, and it’s not something that MPs on a salary of £65k a year plus expenses can understand, let alone our PM who states that we’re all in this together.

Poverty is the sinking feeling when your small boy finishes his one weetabix and says ‘more mummy, bread and jam please mummy’ as you’re wondering whether to take the TV or the guitar to the pawn shop first, and how to tell him that there is no bread or jam.

Hunger Hurts, written 30 July 2012.

Jack's blog is a fantastic resource of tasty, varied recipes on a shoestring budget (around 10-30p per serving). I can't wait to try out her super-simple soda bread recipe, and the sheer variety of dishes is impressive. She won the Fortnum and Mason food blog award, and a quick trip to her blog will show you why. (Her record? Carrot, cumin and kidney burger, 9p.)

Her blog is more than that, though. It's a a passionate and biting comment on modern politics and poverty. She identifies two kinds of food poverty - lack of funds, yes, but also lack of knowledge, skill and confidence about cooking on a budget. She comments on the misperception that ready meals are cheaper than cooking, and calls on us not to accept the availability, convenience and price of ready meals as an excuse for child obesity. I totally agree with her that we need home economics to be taught in schools - how to budget, how to cook, how to maintain your living environment.

Please go visit her blog and take a walk with her along the food poverty line.

Salted caramel sauce

I have recently become a slight addict to salted caramel. I first discovered it when I tried some salted caramel ice cream, and now I'm hooked. Only I'm rationing myself, because it's so damn more-ish. (Is that how you spell it?)

I found this great recipe from Nigella (our heroine for all things indulgent) in Stylist magazine which I have adapted to make is a quick and easy job for pouring over vanilla ice cream or into hot chocolate. This takes me about ten minutes.