Recipes Archives - Page 5 of 14 - One Girl and her Thermie

Homemade Tomato Ketchup

Everyone loves ketchup, Heinz Ketchup in particular. But it’s loaded with so much sugar that making your own homemade ketchup has to be a better alternative.

There are many recipes for homemade tomato ketchup but I find this one the best. I love it because you sweeten the tomatoes not with oodles of sugar but with ripe plums.

It certainly passes the ‘Stopa kids’ taste test but I have to warn you, I do have to put it in a glass jar labeled Heinz. Yes, my son will consume it happily from any bottle or jar but my daughter, who is all about branding and awareness these days, won’t eat it if she doesn’t think it’s Heinz. She hasn’t quite worked out that the colour, consistency or taste is completely different than Heinz nevertheless as many parents do, I just deal with it. My favourite trick your child story recently is where one parent called pea and mint soup, ‘Incredible Hulk Soup’. The changing of the name made all the difference to the willingness of the children to consume it. So in my case, I haven’t changed the name just the delivery receptacle. I’ll do anything to make them eat healthier.

Because as Malcolm Gladwell once explained, Heinz doesn’t just taste good, or even great. It tastes objectively perfect: When Heinz moved to ripe tomatoes and increased the percentage of tomato solids, he made ketchup, first and foremost, a potent source of umami. (19 Aug 2014)

Credit: This recipe is from the TM31 Fast & Easy. Now long out of stock but still one of my favourite Thermomix books

Chocolate Swiss Roll

2 Comments / Baking (Sweet), Snacks

I love chocolate. Anything chocolate. One of my favourite things about Christmas was that since I hate mince pies, Christmas pudding, and cake, my mum would buy me a Chocolate Swiss Roll instead. I have to admit I grew up on Cadbury’s or supermarket ones, the Waitrose or Marks & Spencer deluxe versions, but it’s only recently that I discovered how easy it is to make a Swiss roll.

This easy chocolate Swiss roll recipe is a classic! A Swiss roll is a very impressive cake and looks quite difficult to make, which is why people often shy away from baking them. A homemade Swiss roll is so much nicer than shop bought and they are much easier to make than you might think. This chocolate Swiss roll has a vanilla buttercream with yoghurt filling, which is full of flavour and a little easier on the calories. The vanilla and chocolate work extremely well together.

This Swiss roll cake could be served as a delicious dessert recipe topped with lashings of cream. This chocolate Swiss roll recipe takes 50 mins to make and bake and serves 4-6 people. This chocolate Swiss roll recipe is perfect if you want to bake something a little different, it’s great for sharing with a cuppa or can be smothered in custard or served with ice cream for dessert.

Courgette Soup

2 Comments / Soups, Vegan & Vegetarian

This courgette soup recipes are perfect for packed lunches and light suppers. Take your glut of courgettes and turn it into a healthy, tasty and filling soup, made so easily in the Thermomix.

I love courgettes, I really do. One of my first memories of being able to cook was a courgette side dish, onions, tomatoes, garlic and courgettes sauteed in a little oil (or butter). Simple, so simple that I could enjoy it as a side dish, served on toast or just for the midnight munchies. So when I had kids and realised not everyone loves courgettes as much as me, I needed to be creative, creative enough that they would still eat courgettes but in a way they could consume it; courgette soup.

What I love about this soup is how thick and creamy it is, even before you add cream. The courgettes blend together to make the soup smooth and silky in texture. Therefore, if you want to make this soup dairy free you can easily skip the cream altogether and replace the butter with some olive oil. You can make the dish vegan, by using olive oil and no cream.

Courgettes are rich in minerals and vitamins that include potassium, phosphorus, magnesium, calcium and vitamin C. Its peel (which is blitzed into the soup) is a good source of dietary fibre which will help if your little one is suffering from constipation.

Avocado pancakes

Leave a Comment / Baking (Savoury), Breakfast & Brunch, Vegan & Vegetarian

I was out the other day and ate brunch at Andina last weekend in Shoreditch. The Peruvian cuisine is very hipster chick at the moment and whilst my husband and I could have devoured the entire menu, the only thing that caught my kid’s’ eye was avocado pancakes.

I couldn’t be happier as avocado is something I struggle to get them to eat – they won’t it in salads, run from guacamole so I need to sneak it into things. The only thing they haven’t noticed is Thermomix Frozen Fruit Sorbet so anything that gets them to eat avocados is a good thing in my life.

If you love avocado as much as I do, the thought of avocado pancakes will make you very happy. The super creamy ingredient makes the batter nice and soft with a light, fresh flavour. The beauty is that they look exactly like regular pancakes but we know it’s the healthier version.

The recipe is easy peasy, it just needs someone to be a little bit adventurous and try it. Perfect for upcoming Shrove Tuesday as an alternative to the standard pancake batter recipe.

Serve with a poached egg or crispy bacon for a luxury weekend treat and you’ll never look back! If you’re really, really short on time you can make these up ahead of when you need them. Whip up the batter, cook the pancakes and leave them covered in the fridge until you’re ready to eat them. Then all they’ll need is a couple of minutes in a hot pan to warm through!

Matcha Smoothie Bowl

Leave a Comment / Breakfast & Brunch, Dairy, Snacks, Vegan & Vegetarian

Matcha Smoothie Bowl is perfect to make for a quick nutritious snack or in my case, these days, breakfast. Packed with superfoods like fresh strawberries, bananas, spinach and topped with shredded coconut, cacao nibs, and chia seeds this matcha (green tea) smoothie bowl is light, fresh and delicious.

Unlike smoothies which are normally ‘drunk’ or slurped in my case, every time I make a smoothie bowl, I feel like I’m eating a meal. The fact that I eat it with a spoon makes me feel pretty full. And I also eat is slowly, unlike a smoothie, which is gone in a minute.

Smoothie bowls aren’t new to anyone, but I felt like they needed more admiration. And to be honest, I don’t make them as often as I’d like. This smoothie bowl only takes a few minutes to make and will be nice for a healthy fancy breakfast.

Breakfast on the go in one minute. This breakfast is super start to your “five a day” with this superfood and an antioxidant-loaded bowl of goodness. The creaminess of the yoghurt with the frozen banana turns this protein- and fibre-rich breakfast into a soft-serve-like treat. Add the goodness and earthy flavor of the matcha powder (holds 137 more antioxidants than brewed green tea), the contrasting textures of the fresh berries, seeds and nuts and you will feel ready to tackle whatever the day ahead throws your way.

Satay Sauce

Leave a Comment / Meat, Poultry, Starters

Satay lovers rejoice! This is the stuff food dreams are made of – chicken marinated in an authentic homemade satay sauce, then simmered in an incredible Satay Peanut Sauce. No hard to find ingredient and ready in under 30 minutes.

Satay sauce or peanut sauce is typical recipe usually contains ground roasted peanuts or peanut butter (smooth or crunchy), coconut milk, soy sauce, tamarind, galangal, garlic, and spices (such as coriander seed or cumin). Other possible ingredients are chili peppers, sugar, fried onion, and lemongrass.

I’ll be using the satay sauce as a serving dip with my chicken/ beef satays in another blog post but thought this needed its own post as it will keep in an airtight container in the fridge for about a month.

Thermomix Butter

4 Comments / Dairy, Vegan & Vegetarian

Making homemade Thermomix butter is delicious and an ideal way of maximising your Thermomix. I’m a big fan of President’s Butter but at £2 a pop and the amount of baking we do at home, it’s expensive. Making homemade butter is therefore not only cost effective but allows me to flavour the butter so it’s individual to our family tastes (salty) and special for dinner parties (think, olive butter, sundried tomato butter, garlic butter etc.)

I always tend to make butter after Christmas and New Year, as I have an excess of cream building up in my fridge. Ever since I have had a Thermomix I always keep an eye out for cartons of cream that are nearly at their expiry date. Usually, these cartons are discounts at about half-price or more.

If you use the cream that is close to its expiry date, it will separate faster when you are whipping it. If you use fresh cream that has a long expiry it will take longer to separate, so this is a great recipe to dig out that cream at the back of your fridge or going cheap in the store.

Butter can be frozen and 600ml of double cream makes about one block of butter and 250ml buttermilk.

Mango sticky rice

2 Comments / Baking (Sweet), Dessert, Noodle, Pasta & Rice

Mango sticky rice is a traditional Thai dessert made with glutinous rice, fresh mango, and coconut milk, and eaten with a fork, spoon, or sometimes the hands. Although originating in Thailand, it is consumed throughout the Indochina region of Southeast Asia, including Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam.

As the weather gets colder in the UK, I want to hibernate and for some reason, my palate leans towards all Asian dishes. This mango sticky rice dessert with coconut milk – a simple, heavenly Thai classic hit the dessert spot every single time.

I have converted this recipe to Thermomix but used this BBC Good food recipe as a guide.

Red pepper & tomato soup

Leave a Comment / Soups, Vegan & Vegetarian

This red pepper & tomato soup is probably one of my favourite Thermomix soups. A long time ago, it was a TM31 demonstration staple and I still love it. It reminds me of the good old, university days (before Thermomix, obviously) when Heinz Tomato & Lentil Soup was a regular in the kitchen cupboard in my rental flat.

The reason why this recipe is so good and showcased during the demonstration is for many reasons. Firstly, we’d grind the lentils to show the grinding ability of the lentils to a powder and also because they are ground, the cooking time is super speedy; perfect for a mid-week meal. In addition, the lentils add a little protein and thickening to the dish. The red pepper skins disappearing into the soup was always a wow factor at commercial demonstrations as any other kitchen appliance doesn’t blend the pepper skins so beautifully. With Thermomix it simply disappears.

Do try this recipe, I’m sure you won’t be disappointed. It’s warming and wondering as a soup and if you have any leftovers it’s wonderful as a pasta bake too.