Today was a big day for me, as I went into Radio Leicester to cook live on air in their kitchen. It’s not the first time I have been into their kitchen to cook, but I was still very nervous.
You can listen to the program here. I was cooking from the start of the program for the first hour.
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A couple of weeks ago, a lady called Kimberley had asked Radio Leicester if they would help her to learn to cook from scratch, on a family budget. They asked three ‘Experts’ to help her out (which made me laugh as I’m just little ‘me’ with no training whatsoever). I was very humbled to be one of them.
They also invited a lady from Derby, who said she came from a family that has always cooked from scratch and she was trained in catering and hospitality at Southfields College and another lady who teaches cookery on behalf of Leicester City Council and writes for the ‘Love Food Hate Waste’ website that you can find here.
I couldn’t ‘boil peas’ when I left home and my friends used to call me the ‘packet mix queen’, so knowing this I tried very hard to make sure that the recipes that I made were easy and quick to cook and were in my usual ‘Notjustgreenfingers’ style, of ‘cheap to make’. I used ‘value’ ingredients to prove that good food can be made cheaply, so you can live well on less.
I started by showing Kimberley how to cook a Thick And Creamy Vegetable Soup, that I wrote about a few weeks ago. I did have a problem with their Electric hob as it took 45 minutes to heat up and then in the end it went on ‘super hot’ mode instead.
Thick And Creamy Vegetable Soup
You can find the recipe here.
I worked out that each bowl cost me approximately 40p to make.
This soup freezes well too.
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Then I showed her how to cook Fish in a Parsley Sauce:
Fish In Parsley Sauce
You can find the recipe for the parsley sauce here.
I worked out that the fish in parsley sauce costs just 82p per portion.
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I then followed this with a quick and easy Microwaved Jam Sponge, which is so quick and easy to make. It’s great to make when you have unexpected guests for dinner.
I have worked out that each portion costs an amazing 9p to make.
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Microwaved Jam Sponge Recipe
100g margarine, plus some for greasing the bowl
100g granulated sugar
2 eggs beaten
100g self-raising flour
2-3 tablespoons of milk
2 tablespoons of jam
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Beat the margarine and sugar together.
Add the beaten egg.
Fold in the flour and add enough milk to achieve dropping consistency.
Grease a microwave bowl with margarine.
Drop the jam in the bottom of the bowl and put the mixture on top.
Cover the bowl with a small plate or Microwave Clingfilm, leaving a small gap for the steam to escape.
Microwave on ‘high’ for 8 minutes (based on an 800W microwave).
Leave to stand for a couple of minutes before turning it out.
Serve with custard or ice-cream.
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Just to finish off I showed Kimberley how to make a multipurpose ‘Old fashioned cleaner’ out of white distilled vinegar and a few drops of Tea Tree essential oil.
White vinegar is a great mulitipurpose cleaner and if you add a few drops of Tea Tree oil it then becomes a multipurpose antibacterial cleaner.
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I hope people enjoyed listening to the show.
Pumpkin Recipe Week:
Yesterday, I started my Pumpkin Recipe week.
All of this week I will be looking at ways to use pumpkins, so they are not wasted after the Halloween pumpkin has been carved.
Today’s recipe is great to serve at Halloween parties.
It’s a variation to the jam sponge recipe above:
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Microwaved Pumpkin Scary Syrup Sponge Recipe
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100 grams Margarine, plus some for greasing
100 grams Sugar
2 Eggs beaten
100 grams Self-raising flour
200 grams raw pumpkin
2 tablespoons of golden syrup
1 teaspoon baking powder
A few drops of food colouring (you can use any colour that you have, I used orange)
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Cook the pumpkin in a pan of boiling water until it is soft. Drain the pumpkin and mash it a little bit
Beat the margarine and sugar together.
Mix in the beaten egg and food colouring.
Fold in the flour, baking powder and the pumpkin.
Grease a microwave bowl with margarine.
Drop the golden syrup in to the bottom of the bowl and put the mixture on top.
Cover the bowl with a small plate or Microwave Clingfilm, leaving a small gap for the steam to escape.
Microwave on ‘high’ for 8 minutes (based on an 800W microwave).
Leave to stand for a couple of minutes before turning it out.
Decorate with scary things.
Serve with custard with a few drops of food colouring in for effect.
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Thank you for reading my blog today.
not just greenfingers 
Thank you for all the wonderful recipes. I can see you had a great time while cooking on the radio ; )
Have a great day.
Thanks Monique Elisabeth.
My friend also tried cooking on the radio. It is very funny 🙂 Thanks for sharing.
The recipes look great as usual! I am unable to use them now though 😦 😦 My husband has had to go on a diet as he has been found to be carrying a massive amount of wait that is turning out to be increadibly bad for him (duh :P) and the diet he is on is a version of the Paleo diet (specs found here http://www.marksdailyapple.com/#axzz2B0s6QyjY) (not that you need to read it, only that if you google ‘Paleo diet’ you get so many variations your hair could go grey before you’ve sussed them all out, lol) um, let me see, I’ve lost my train of thought…. oh YES! The reason I am telling you this! Um, he cannot eat any grains or sugars or, well carbs in general, SO! If you happen to know any variations of your recipes that are favourable to my plight, I would be mOST interested! And in the mean time I am more than happy to drool over your recipes, lol!
Oooh! And more radio talk! Big thumbs up!
It makes me laugh that they ask me to cook live on air. The other two ladies were train chefs and i’m trained in nothing!lol
I’ll have a look at the diet as I’ve never heard of the ‘Paleo diet’. It sounds like you have your work cut out for you now, to make your food interesting and enjoyable.
Ha! Who needs to be trained when you have enthusiasm??
Well, these are the dishes I’ve done so far:
Pizza and chippy night Michael had fish pizza (made with a slice of boneless fish, tomato paste as the base, sprinkled with mixed herbs, then a sprinkle of stuffed olives, and some diced red capsicum, and then topped with motzerella cheese) and sweet potato chips (fried in butter).
When we had pasta I used my own home made pasta sauce (one of them, can’t remember exactly what blend I put into it, only know what I DIDN’T put in, lol!) on top of some peeld zukhinni wedges, and grated tasey cheese on top.
I have phased out his potatoes for either pumpkin or sweet potato, depends on what we’re having.
Oh! nd tonight, when the rest of us had some home made rhubarb pie topped with cream, Michael had some apple sliced fried in butter with freshly squeezed orange juice, cinamon and nutmeg and topped with the cream, and he liked that 🙂
The thing with the diet is he is not cutting out the fat, only the carb’s.
The theory is that because he is not doing enough excersize to but the carbs, they are storing as fat, and eating less carbs does not solve the problem, as they will get stored no matter how few or many he has. By eating the fat he is less hungry and eats less overall, AND the fat that you get out of butter, cream, meat, etc, gets burned by doing normal stuff like working around the house, AND it is supposed to be burnt faster and easier that the carbs over all.
I only have used this diet because I have seen it work on an increadibly lazy friend of mine, and she didn’t change her lifestyle AT ALL, only her diet, and she has lost 15 kilo’s in just a few months by doing nothing!
I’ve got to say, the food you have cooked sounds lovely…it’s a good job he has you to cook for him.
Yes. And he’d better not forget it either!!
heheheh
Great recipes. And congratulations on the radio program. Move over Delia!
Lol…Delia would make her meals look much more ‘posh’ than I do!