The Recipes - Melon Ball, or Fresh Fruit in Fresh Orange Juice Starters

 It's always good when entertaining friends to have attractive and tasty, yet light starters. These two tick all the boxes! The first one, melon balls is done with a melon ball implement. You can get hold of one here  We chose three different coloured melons for visual effect which works well here. Then we presented them in Tulip wine glasses (available here). For added pizazz we later added a sprig of fresh mint on top which we always have growing in our garden! We served these here with flavoured Marks and Spencer's yogurt, in little dip holders so that guests could take as much as they wanted. 

The second starter features fresh fruit of various sorts, in fresh orange juice. Some of our older end viewers remember making a version of this sort in Domestic Science at school years ago! We chose strawberries cut up, green grapes, red and/or black grapes and blueberries for this and then simply poured some chilled fresh orange juice (not concentrated and not too much) in the bottom, of the dish just before serving. Here we like to do things in style...

Here is the recipe

The Recipes - Fresh Tomato Soup with celery, carrot, onion, veg stock and cornflour. (Vegan friendly)

Well, who doesn't like fresh tomato soup? Especially in winter. The problem is though tomatoes are out of season then, so its best to make this soup in summer when they are always ripe and freshly available. If you do choose to make this soup in winter, Christmas say like we do,  always source the supermarkets' reddest and juiciest tomatoes you can find. The carrot content in this recipe replaces sugar as they provide the sweet flavour to it. If you want it more sweet shall we say, like a certain very popular supermarket brand, just add a little extra carrot than specified. But be careful!! And always serve this with a nice crusty bread roll.....

Here is the recipe

The Recipes - Roasted stuffed peppers with aubergine, coriander, tomatoes and goat's cheese.

This recipe started out as basic one from a book. I tinkered with the ingredients, lost the breadcrumbs and decided to brush the peppers with olive oil, because when they are roasted in the oven in this way the taste is amazing! The peppers look better served in a little dish at the side of whatever you are having with them. You can serve them with fresh salad, or new potatoes and veg, or roast potatoes and veg - any way you want. 

Here is the recipe

 

The Recipes - Microwaveable Old School Chocolate Pudding with a Mint Custard.

 Well who doesn't love a chocolate pudding. Microwaveable as well, so it's fast and easy. Maybe too easy ha! The chocolate pudding we had to mess about with the water content to get it just right. So we had to try many samples.....that's our excuse anyway. Then there was the mint custard. Although my daughter who was five at the time and didn't like mint, would say mint was the worst thing that she had ever tasted! So we have to do a custard version just for her. Oh well more for us...i could have made it a pink colour but she would still know. Kids have amazing sensory perception. There never seems to be any of this particular chocolate pudding  left over for the next day either? Oh and it's good with custard too, and cream, and.....you choose.

Here is the recipe

The recipes - Tzatziki

This is a real cooling, refreshing dish. You can even use fresh garlic instead of dried in it if you wish. Don't forget to put it in the fridge as soon as you have made it so it is properly chilled. The first time I tried out this dip was on my mum and her friend when i bought some onion bhajis. Her friend frank said he didn't like cucumber. Fast forward to the end of the meal and mum's friend picks up the bowl and said "Can I finish this off?" So I let him - even though I also had my eye on finishing it off too! This goes really well with the onion bhajis on the YouTube channel even though it is a traditional Greek dish!

Here is the recipe

The recipes - Cauliflower Cheese.

You  can't beat a good cauliflower cheese. You need to use the whitest and freshest cauliflower though! My daughter didn't want too much mustard in it so this is why we ended up using just half a teaspoon. To be honest this gives  a more subtle taste. We usually have this with mashed potatoes, steamed carrots or cabbage. You can even use little portions of it on your main Christmas dinner.

Here is the recipe

The recipes - Spinach and Edam bake

 This recipe was one that I tested out from a book. I then added more spinach, messed about with the ingredients and got a much nicer taste. If you want a runnier bake and to put them in small separate dishes, don't drain the spinach as in the video and you will end up with little creamier bakes. We sometimes have this with just a salad or you can have it with new potatoes and veg of your choice! 

Here is the recipe.