A while ago I was contacted by the lovely people at Rachel’s Organic. They are running a “Moments” campaign – they want to know how people spend their precious moments to relax, unwind and indulge. Lucy Hyder is the head chef for Hand Picked Hotels, and has developed some recipes using Rachel’s Organic Yoghurts.
A Brief Background On Lucy Hyder (sent to me by Rachel’s)
The only female head-chef of Hand-Picked Hotels, Lucy began her cookery career working an apprenticeship at The Mirabelle restaurant before being promoted to the position of Head Chef at The Hotel on The Park Cheltenham. At just 23 years old, Lucy’s culinary expertise successfully awarded The Hotel on The Park with their third Rosette. Her creative flair and passion for cooking saw Lucy win The British (food) Championships, representing Great Britain at the Food Championships in South Korea and even win the regional’s of Gordon Ramsey’s Scholarship competition 2003. In her current position as head-chef at Buxted Park, East Sussex, she offers her diners good quality British food, sourcing local produce with simple, but hard hitting flavours with contrasting textures and high visual appeal.
They sent me a lot of yoghurts and some recipes to try out.
A lot of yoghurt! The apple and elderflower yoghurt is so refreshing, and the greek style with honey was so luxurious. I also had some of the coconut, banana and pineapple with was lovely (although I would swap out the banana for something like lime as I am not always a fan of banana flavoured things). I am really looking forward to opening the coconut yoghurt!
Lovely with a chopped pear as a post run snack 🙂
Anyway I was asked to try out a Moroccan Lamb Tagine (I did check before I agreed that they would not mind me subbing the lamb for lentils!).
The recipe is here on the Rachel’s website, so you can make it yourself if you want to! All I did was swap in lentils for the lamb, and use vecon stock instead of lamb stock.
I served mine with some roasted orange veg (sweet potato, carrot and butternut)- it was very spicy but also very filling. The yoghurt was a nice touch to cool it down a bit- I never usually add yoghurt to savoury things but I am thinking it would go well with my chickpea stew too.
I am not sure I liked the apricots in it- I think the prunes added a nice sweetness but I think maybe the apricots were a bit too sweet? I am not usually into the sweet and sour combo, and I think it reminded me a little of that. A lovely winter warmer anyway.
Lucy also complied her top culinary tips:
Ø Top tip for an autumn day – warm raspberries thrown in to a pan with a little bit of sugar served with granola and yoghurt – perfect start to the day!
Ø On fireworks night or Halloween – enjoy pumpkin soup while outside enjoying the fun. Top tip – dry out the seeds from the pumpkin and create toasted seeds to add texture. Great with a lightly spiced yoghurt too!
Ø Selecting a healthy option when dining out – In order to select a healthy option, always discuss recommendations with your waiter – ask for sauces and dressings to be served on the side to give you the option to eat or not.
Ø Food presentation – use a piping bag for items such as mashed potato and purees. Think about colour and food height on the plate too.
Ø Finishing touches – use fresh herbs to garnish plates for extra appeal.
Ø Extra flavour – season water for blanching vegetables to enhance the flavour and also retain their colour
Ø Drink water – while dining to clear your palette to enjoy the food to the maximum
Ø Super food booster – Lucy makes her own muesli that contains a variety of nuts and dried fruit. Add granola for more of a treat.
Ø Super dooper curry booster – Daal curry is a superfood option cooked with lentils and works well as a vegetarian or meat option. Serve with yoghurt, with added cucumber and onion for a great finish!
Ø When holding a dinner party – always serve a cold (prepared) starter, a hot main and pre-prepared dessert to allow maximum time with guests and minimal kitchen time.
Ø During the summer months – use the fresh seasonal items and make soup, chutneys and jams and freeze for consumption during the winter months.
I am also going to make a cake with the yoghurt- sounds yummy right?
What is your favourite way to use yoghurt?
And what do you do to relax/ unwind and have time to yourself? I find baking so relaxing and rewarding, and also getting some fresh air (either a run or a walk) can help blow those cobwebs away. But for a special treat I love to sit down in the afternoon with a good book and a cup of tea- normally I read before bed so reading in the afternoon somehow seems like such chilling out time.
Excuse the action shot that seems to be rather blurry!
Then topped it with some marzipan stars. I was wondering if I could use marzipan in the mix instead of the chocolate- I might try that next time.
They need to be wrapped up and stored in the fridge I think, and they are pretty tasty. I think some lemon zest or something like that would add to it, but they have the seasonal flavours that I like. Also could do with more marzipan! 🙂
I got a fluorescent vest to wear over the top of running clothes- should make me feel safer when I am out running in the dark now.
They need turning/ shaking a few times- these took around 20 mins.
Yum! Leave to cool, then store in an airtight jar. I will make a variation of these as Christmas gifts.
I have also been making some more warm lunches.
Another from my squash box- this was a red onion squash- with such vibrant orange flesh.
This was chopped up along with a couple of carrots and a massive sweet potato, and roasted in the oven for 30 mins with a little rosemary. By the way, I walked up to Aldi today (I actually went to go to Sweatshop to spend my race vouchers, but it was closed despite having Sunday opening hours of 11-5pm, anyway..) and I got a big bag of sweet potatoes for 69p! And a big bag of apples for 69p! And 3 peppers for 69p! Super cheap.
Then I cooked 50g quinoa and 50g wholewheat giant cous cous with some vecon stock, added a tin of tomatoes, chilli flakes and a tin of black eye beans.
This made 5 servings all layered up, and some more roasted veg for dinner on another day. After all that chopping I have very orange fingers, so to match I nibbled on;
Yum- Montezumas Milk chocolate with orange- soooooooo good!
Saturday started with some gingerbread porridge (2 boxes for £3 in Waitrose, but they only had 1 box left!)- nice but I think it could do with more ginger! I think I am a spice addict.
This was meant to be my post run snack, but I actually forgot to drink the milk. The Larabar was amazing though- tasted very similar to the almond fudgy bars.
Then heat 220ml almond milk and add 2 tsp dried yeast- leave to bubble for 10 mins. As the almond milk was sugar free I also added a tsp sugar here to help the yeast.
This gets sticky! You may need to add a little more flour to make it into a soft dough.
Then leave covered for 2 hours to double in size.
Hooray!
Then put it on a board and roll out, pour on the fruit mixture and knead it all in.
Then split it into however many loaves you want (I did 3). Roll each one out, put some marzipan in (which seems to be vegan? For some reason I thought it contained egg whites but the ones I have are just sugar and almonds) and sprinkle a few flaked almonds inside.
Then roll up into a loaf shape and attempt to seal the crack down the middle. Leave for an hour to rise. Then heat the oven to 200C.
Bake for 40-45 mins, and then dust with icing sugar. This is in the recipe but also handily covers the bits where the dough opens back out again.
I could not wait to try some (with some lovely vanilla rooibos tea). My one came out blurry, but look at this slice;
The marzipan in the middle is the best bit! 🙂