Friday 8 April 2016

Recipe Time with Simply Cook

I love a variety when it comes to food and can't eat the same things week in week out but oh my days it gets hard trying to think up different meal plans! Yes spaghetti bolognese makes it onto my recipe list fairly often as does a good old chilli but I love the new era of food delivery boxes or recipe help. So after trying a few expensive food delivery boxes and not being able to afford to keep them up I heard about Simply Cook so had to give them a try.

After browsing though their lovely list of recipes you pick your favourite 4 and will receive a little box of recipe cards along with base ingredients to make your meal happen. All you need to do is shop the big essentials e.g. chicken, rice, veg. etc and they can even email you the ingredient list so you don't forget. I know, I did think £8.99 for the herbs and spices however you get really condensed pots of product and it's great quality plus the meals so far have all been SO TASTY as well as healthy and no more expensive then my normal shop. 

Here's my favourite meal from last week and how you can give it a go (I've added in a guess of the herbs and spices plus an extra pepper so you can make it however it won't be quite as good as Simply Cook's version!) 



Spicy Cajun Chicken Quinoa 

What you'll need:

2 chicken breasts
70g dried quinoa
70g dried apricots, cut in half
100g ready to use puy lentils
1red onion, sliced
100g frozen peas
Garlic Paste (buy or make from 3 cloves of garlic, pinch of tumeric & a little water)
Cajun spice (buy or make from salt, garlic powder, paprika, black pepper, onion powder, cayenne pepper, oregano, thyme, and red pepper flakes until evenly blended)
Chicken Stock
 Tzatziki (optional)
Coriander (optional)

Heat the oven to 200C/180C  and toss the chicken breasts in the Cajun Seasoning and place them on a lined baking tray. If you can marinade earlier in the day or overnight it'll be even tastier. When the oven is hot bake the chicken breasts for 20 mins.

Bring 400ml of water to the boil in a saucepan. When boiling, stir in the Chicken Stock. Add the quinoa to the stock. Give it a quick stir then reduce the heat to medium and cover with a lid. Let it simmer for 10 mins. If you want to be really lazy (I definitely was!), try the microwaveable quionoa from Sainsburys - already flavoured and so tasty! 

If you're doing the quinoa the proper way once it's simmered, add the apricots and lentils and cook through for 5 mins more.

Heat 2 tbsps oil in a frying pan over high heat and add the sliced onion and peppers and stir-fry for 1 min. Add the garlic paste and stir-fry for 1 min and then add the frozen peas and stir-fry for 2 mins more.

Remove the chicken from the oven and set aside. When the quinoa is fully cooked add it to the frying pan with the onion, peppers and peas and mix together thoroughly on a medium-high heat for 1 min.

Divide the quinoa between 2 plates and top with the cajun chicken and some yoghurt on the side with coriander sprinkled over if you have some.

If you want to try a box for £1 (if you don't like them you can cancel after your £1 box but I'm sure you'll LOVE it). then click here Remember you can choose to have a new delivery weekly or monthly so if you're like me have a week off meal planning per month. 

Let me know what you think! 


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