Browsing Tag:

carrot

Lunch/ Vegetarian

Purple Pasta

purple-pasta

All my children love this: it’s their favourite and they ask for it all the time. What’s good about this sauce is that you can make it on the spot and stir it straight through some hot pasta. Add some shredded chicken or garlic prawns for a bigger meal.

Purple Pasta

Print Recipe
Serves: 4-6 Cooking Time: 10 mins

Ingredients

  • 400-600g pasta shapes (approx. 200g for 2 people)
  • 1 red pepper (raw or roasted)
  • 3 small ready-cooked beetroots
  • 1 carrot (raw or roasted)
  • few slices of Cheddar cheese and extra grated on top (optional)
  • 400g-tin plum tomatoes
  • 3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
  • sprinkle of salt and pepper (for children over 12 months)

Instructions

1

To roast the pepper and carrot-Preheat the oven to 220°C/200°C Fan/Gas 6. Cut the pepper in half and discard the stalk and seeds, chop the ends of the carrot, peel and halve. Place on a baking tray and roast for 30 minutes. Personally I don’t brush them peppers with oil, but you could.

2

Cook the pasta according to the package instructions.

3

Meanwhile, put all the other ingredients in a food processor and blitz until smooth.

4

Drain the cooked pasta and stir the sauce through before serving and top.

5

Adults may prefer to have their sauce heated first and for extra flavour to be added. Mixed herbs bump up the flavour, as do a few drops of tamari or chilli sauce.

Notes

* Left over sauce keeps for up to 5 days in the fridge * Freezable for up to 6 months- but you must either blanch the carrot for 5 minutes or heat the sauce for 5 minutes if using it raw then leave to cool completely before freezing. *You can also store and freeze the pasta but for best results freeze the sauce separately and make the pasta fresh for when you need it.

Breakfast/ Juice/Smoothies

Sunny Smoothie

sunny smoothie

I was really pleased with this smoothie, as it’s a vegetable smoothie that still tastes refreshing and sweet – just the thing to have on a summer’s day. The amount of vitamin C and calcium is all the more reason to drink it.

Did you know?

We can’t store vitamin C in our bodies so we need a supply from food daily. Vitamin C is so important for many functions in the body and will help boost your child’s immunity. A daily supply from food is crucial for a child’s development.

Sunny Smoothie

Print Recipe
Serves: 2 Cooking Time: 5 mins

Ingredients

  • 1 romano red pepper, deseeded and chopped
  • 2 carrots, peeled and cut into chunks
  • 200ml milk (or half milk and half water)
  • 1 teaspoon of vanilla powder (optional)
  • 1 tablespoon of ground flaxseed
  • 1 tablespoon honey

Instructions

1

Put all the ingredients into a smoothie maker or blender and blitz until smooth.

Notes

* Keeps for 24 hours in the fridge but best to drink freshly made. * Not suitable for freezing

Breakfast/ Juice/Smoothies

Berry and Beetroot Juice

beetroot berry juice

Smoothie’s can be very refreshing, especially in the summer when you would rather drink than eat. Be aware of the amount of sugar that can be found in one smoothie – adding water is a good way of cutting this down. But it’s still much better to consume sugar from fruit than from sugary treats that have no nutritional value.

Berry and Beetroot Juice

Print Recipe
Serves: 2 Cooking Time: 5 mins

Ingredients

  • handful of frozen raspberries
  • 1 ready-cooked or raw beetroot (if using raw, cut up first)
  • 4cm chunk of cucumber
  • 100ml pure apple juice
  • Juice of ½ lime

Instructions

1

Put all the ingredients into a smoothie maker or blender with 100ml water and blitz until smooth.

Notes

* Get younger children to count the raspberries as they put them in. For older children, tell them each raspberry is worth 3p or 5p, and ask how much the raspberries are and get them to calculate how much you paid for the raspberries? * Keeps for 4 days in the fridge, but will be at its best freshly made and used that day. * Not suitable for freezing