Spinach, Pumpkin, Fetta, Mushroom, Pine Nut Risotto

I make this risotto all the time. My little ones LOVE it and I usually try and put as many vegies in as possible. It's also pretty thrifty, being vegetarian. What's not to love.

Depending on what I have available, I will include a combination of: spinach (I ALWAYS keep frozen spinach in the freezer, so easy), mushroom, roasted pumpkin, fetta and pine nuts. Yummy, yummy.

I won't go into details about how to make this, except to say that I heat some butter, add onion and garlic, then add the rice and cook the risotto. I usually add the frozen spinach when the risotto is about half way done and everything else goes in when the risotto is pretty much ready.

If you try this out, you will certainly add this to your list of regular meals.

Enjoy,

Mary xx

Chicken Tagine

This picture doesn't do this dish any justice at all. It is a lovely full flavoured dish and is incredibly aromatic. For a lovely hearty winter warmer, give this dish a try, you won't regret it.

Ingredients:

• Aprox. 1kg chicken thigh fillets
• 1 onion
• about 3 cloves garlic
• 100g of blanched almonds
• 150g green olives
• 1 lemon
• about 500ml of chicken stock
• 2-3 potatoes chopped into chunks
• enough oil to fry the onion and garlic (I use canola oil)

Method:

1. Chop the onion and garlic finely and then fry this in the oil.
2. Cut the chicken pieces in half and then add them to the onion and garlic and lightly brown.
3. Add the blanched almonds, the finely sliced lemon, olives, potatoes and the stock.
4. Allow to simmer on low heat for about 30 minutes.

I like to serve this with cous cous, although you could certainly eat this alone or with a nice polenta. Perhaps you would serve this with something else, I would love to hear any other ideas.

Mary xxx

As you might have noticed, i'm not particularly precise with my recipes. Often this is because I just use what I have on hand that day. I also tend to adjust recipes to suit my tastes and I encourage you to do the same :)