Seafood Chowder

As parents we did something wrong along the way. From an early age our lovely daughter used to walk into a restaurant and say "Do they serve crab here" or to direct quote "Does this place serve crab?"

Our response "not on the children's menu kid."

Having said that we want to encourage her to eat diverse foods but seafood, especially shellfish can be pretty pricey. One way around this is to buy Marinara mix (I think Americans call this mixed seafood). It usually contains shrimp, salmon, calamari rings, a white-fleshed fish and mussels.

I use it for pasta marinara and in seafood pies. It's great for a seafood pizza topping. 

The easiest way is in a seafood chowder. I made one for lunch this week.

Seafood Chowder

olive oil and butter to cook (You need butter or the soup won't thicken)

1 onion diced

1 carrot diced

2 celery sticks diced

1 teaspoon dill

1 garlic clove crushed

6 small potatoes or 3 large potatoes diced

1 tin corn

1/3 cup flour

3 litres of seafood stock (can use chicken if you like)

500g Marina mix

1/2 cup cream

1. Heat butter and oil in pan and then add next 5 ingredients. Cook 5-10 minutes until onion translucent.

2. Add corn and flour and stir till combine, making sure flour well distributed.

3. Add stock to cover veggies (if not covered add water). Cook till veggies soft.

4. Turn off liquid and add seafood. Leave 10 minutes and it will poach in soup mix.

5. Use a stick blender to puree to preferred consistency - you may like it smooth or a bit chunky like traditional chowder.

6. Return to the heat till hot and stir through cream. Season to taste.

Enjoy!

Easy wonton soup or why I love the Chinese grocery store

Today I was at my local shops and popped into the local Chinese grocery. I love it there because it has different foods and lots of things we use day to day like vermicelli noodles, 2 minute noodles, Asian sauces and even some sweet treats at great prices.

I was thinking about making some soup so I had a look in the freezer cabinet and found some great little wontons. Two little containers for $6 was a bargain so i grabbed them and with 5 ingredients made a yummy wonton soup.

Easy wonton soup
1 container of chicken wontons
1 container chicken consomme
1 pack 2 minute/ramen noodles (minus seasoning)
1 bunch baby bok choy washed and chopped
soy sauce

1. Bring consomme, soy sauce and 2 cups water to the boil.
2. Add wontons and cook for 6 minutes.
3. Add 2 minute noodles cook 1 minute. Add bok choy and cook 1 minute.

Enjoy!

Menu and Easter planning

It's a short week with Easter and the end of the first school term. How it can possibly be April already I do not know.

My menu plan therefore is brief:
- Honey mustard chicken, brown rice and green veggies
- Steak sandwiches and onion rings
- Soup and homemade bread, baked apples for dessert
- Taco night

The weekend is still up in the air plan-wise but I do know we are having my folks and my mother-in-law on Easter Sunday.

I am thinking:
- seafood chowder
- BBQ leg of lamb with a pumpkin rice bowl and greens
- dessert

My daughter thinks she and I should make the dessert on the cover of this month's Australian Good Taste magazine which is a Chocolate Salted Caramel Cheesecake. It looks delicious but I am worried my mother-in-law will go into diabetic shock...so the jury is still out on that.
http://www.taste.com.au/good+taste/

Lentil Soup or Pantry Soup

To give you an idea of how nutty Sydney weather has been last weekend I didn't want to cook inside the house because it was too hot and by Tuesday I was making lentil soup for lunch. Crazy right?

It was cool, though not cold  at lunchtime and yet by the afternoon warm enough for my husband and daughter to go down to Shelley Beach at Fairy Bower, Manly for an after-school snorkel.

So I decided to make this very simple Lentil Soup. It can also be called pantry soup because really most of these ingredients lurk in the kitchen cupboard all the time and can be easily substituted. I like this soup because it is high in fibre and low in carbohydrates. I don't eat a strict low-carb diet but I try to be aware of how many I eat and as a way of making sure I don't have loads of them. I find lunch which I tend to eat alone a great place to cut carbs and soups are a great way of doing it.

It's pretty simple - this was enough for 4 serves of soup. So I checked the carbs on the tins I used. And each serve comes to less than 7g of carbs which is pretty good.

lentil soup
1 onion diced (I used a red onion because I had one)
2 bacon rashers chopped (omit if you want it vegetarian)
2 celery stalks diced
3 1 carrot diced
5 basil leaves chopped
1 garlic clove crushed
2 tablespoons tomato paste (I didn't have this so i used 1/2 cup passata)
1 tin of brown lentils (drained and rinsed)
1 tin chopped tomato
olive oil for cooking
salt and pepper
parmesan cheese to serve

1. Heat olive oil in sauce pan then add bacon, onion, garlic, celery, basil and carrot and cook over a low heat until onion softens.
2. Add tomato paste and brown off to release flavour.
3. Then add lentils, tomato and 1 1/2 tins of water (use lentil tin to measure).
4. Cook 20-30 minutes. Season to taste.
5. Serve in bowls topped with grated Parmesan cheese.

Enjoy!