Lasagne, Lasagna "I've Heard it both ways"

Sorry about the title but I do love "Psych" the TV Show.

So cooking again yay, well my blog is call dyslexic cooking so after a few weeks of doing none, well apart from the bog standard family meal that rule my life. But hey I do work full time have a toddler and a husband and trying to have a life so whipping up culinary masterpiece everyday is not feasible, when I win the lottery and have my dream kitchen I promise to cook every day lol.

This week I have been busy I cooked up another Prawn Pasta (see the 9th June blog for full recipe details)

Love this dish as it quick and easy and you can make loads so it last a few night.

Much the same with my next recipe as you know I'm trying, and not very successfully I might add (see the buns and the bacon sarnies post for proof) to do Slimming World. I have lost 10lb which I suppose is better than putting it on,  but considering I being doing since January not great. Although one of my New Year resolution was to loose weight (Luckily I didn't put how much) so if I can just not put it all back on by Dec 31st for the first times I would have achieved a resolution lol.

Any who I made a Slimming World Lasagne as we say here in the UK.

Ingredients for this:

500g of 5% fat lean mince
1 chopped onion (I was lasy and bought pre-chopped)
500g of veg for roasting (this can be anything you fancy I like bell peppers and courgettes/Zucchini)
100g of Mushrooms
Carton of Passata
Can or Carton of chopped tomatos
300g of Fat free Greek Yogurt (For the white Sauce)
Lasagne Sheets (Dried)
and not featured in the pic but any herbs and spices you might want to add.

Firstly I put on the oven and cooked the roasted vegetable, I used 1% spray oil to keep it nice and healthy.

they go on at 200c oven for 25 minutes.

Then when they were firmly underway cooking, I started to brown the meat and the onions.

I then added in the mushrooms

cooked them off for a minute or two before adding the Passata and the chopped tomatoes.

Then once the vegetables were nice and roasted I added them too.

Which made a lovely pasta bolognese sauce, but we are making Lasagne so on-wards.

After grabbing a deep dish

I added a layer of the meat to the bottom.

Then layered on some pasta sheets.

Then covered the sheet in a layer of the Greek yogurt.

I then repeated this process and just for me (if you don't want the calories and what it to be syn free don't add it) a bit of low fat mature cheddar on top (40g)

baking in a 200+ degree oven for 35 minutes

You then end up with was a delicious, filling, tasty and very very low in fat dinner for two nights.

Add it with a bit of salad and you got a meal that will leave you full but without the guilt.

So I hope you give it a go :)


My one last thing before signing off this week is how exciting was the news about the Disney World expansion at Disney Hollywood Studios?? if you haven't heard about it, what have you been living in a little box? you can read about it here

As you know I am a huge Disney fan and a bit of a Star Wars geek so to be able to geek out with the Star Wars in the same place I can geek out with the mouse I think I'm going to have some sort of fit lol.

Although am a bit bummed that they are not starting work till 2017 and with how long it took them to do the Fantasy Land expansion I can see it being another 3 years on top. The only thing that is a plus side is my little one will be around 8/9 when it is completed so I would say Optimum age for Star War Madness yay.

So with Disney being so prevalent in the news I have decided to start a holiday fun to fund a trip for me and the family (think I mention that I wanted to start one a while back,but hey I'm dyslexic so we have idea and then another one takes over that why if it not on my to do list is ain't happening lol) but this time I have started it.

I have costed up a total for my trip and it's not going to be cheap and currently as it stands the fund is just getting to about the 1% mark of the total amount. So a long way to go (Think Star Wars land will be open before I hit the total lol)

I have decided I will achieve the total by getting some stuff that has been sitting around on ebay, cutting back on excessive spending, more batch cooking and going to use the train problems I have to my advantage and every time I get a delay repay compensation I will stick it in the fun so come on delays and cancellation lol

My Disney Dream is currently 99% away from target, but hey at least it's not a 100%

Pondering over Soup

Not a particularly busy week in the Dyslexic cooking household.

Apart from the usual running around that comes with having a 21 month old son. 

The major event is we had the local priest round to sort out our son's baptism. 

It went well but not till after a particularly bad Dyslexic episode. The interview started with the priest asking loads of question about my son himself and us but as I got so flustered. I first couldn't spell our address and secondly got my son's date of birth mixed up. In the end I had to get my husband to step in as I was getting more and more stressed so more and more crap at everything.

I managed to pull myself together and we got it all sorted.

although that did get me to pondering. I find it hard in stressful situations to remain calm, cool and collected and then fluff things. Not sure how many more of you out there get this happen to you. It got me to thinking what people who don't really understand Dyslexia and Dyspraxia think of us.

Especially as I messed up my son's date of birth I would hate to have someone have the perception of me as not caring or a bad mother "She can't even remember his date of birth". I also sometimes mess up the spelling of his full name as he got 2 middle names. Now going forward knowing this, it  will stress me out more.  So when I filling in forms for School and other stuff I am now more liable to mess things up.

It's hard going through life with these disorders as there so much people don't understand about them and I have a sneaking suspicion that some people perceive it as just being lazy or not paying attention. Coupled that with the dyspraxia and it many manifestation, people just think I'm a bit manic and clumsy. I hoping being different and having these condition will make me a funner parent. Although currently its turned me into a anxious mummy mess.

Oh well at least there is cooking to cheer me up.

Did something really simple this week just made a 4 ingredient soup.

Butternut Squash with Sweet & New Potato Soup

Take 400g (0.8 lb) of Butternut Squash, Sweet Potato's 

With around 6 new potatoes peeled and chopped. 

Bring the to the boil then simmer alll together for 20 minutes

after you drained them blended all the Veg together.

Then added about 400ml (13 Floz) of stock gradually to the blended vegetables whilst stiring

What you ended up with is a super simple, super delicious and super healthy soup.

Which was eaten in a flash :) 

Look out for next week's blog as this weekend I am super excited to be going to the Whitstable Oyster Festival for the whole weekend - Friday and Saturday Night just me and the girlies (The same ones from the Amsterdam and the last Whitstable trip see previous post for shenanigans) before the Hubby and the little one join us Sunday for lunch.

I expect it to be a jam pack blog post which will slightly more fun filled :) 

A Quick Pasta Recipe

Before all the fun of the fair well The Kent County Show tomorrow.  I'm so excited!! 

Thought I'd post a quick and easy pasta recipe 

I roasted some courgettes and mushrooms 

20 minutes in a 200 degree oven. I used spray oil to keep it nice and healthy.

I think boiled some corn on the cob 

I cooked them for around 8-10 mins then used the water too cook some pasta in.

I added red onions and prawns to a pan 

Along with the roasted vegetables, I chopped of the kernels of the corn added those.

Stirred in the cooked pasta and added some Philadelphia lightest cream cheese.

All in all it took less than half an hour and it is very low in fat. If you're on Slimming World like me I used my Healthy A and it was Syn Free :) 

Which is great as I think I might be slightly naughty at the show tomorrow as there be too many good Produced in Kent suppliers I won't be able to resist. 

Low Fat Shepherd's Pie

Been on a cooking frenzy this week to help with my weight loss 

So I've made a very low fat dish and if you're on a Slimming World it's Syn free..

Shepherds Pie:

Chop/dice

1 red bell pepper

1 yellow bell pepper

300g Mushrooms 

250g baby tomatoes 

In a pan boil up 1 potato a couple of carrots and a swede. 

While in another pan brown off 500g of Turkey mince. Adding in some red onion.

Add the chopped veg to the pan with some tinned chopped tomatoes. 

Simmer for 10 mins before adding it to a oven proof dish.. 

Mash up the potatoes, carrots and swede and spoon on top of the mince.

Bake in the over at 200 degrees for 20-25 mins 

Sever with some Salad and voilà you've got yourself a yummy health meal.

Also as you've made so much you can always reheat the leftovers the next day to say you cooking again..

So far so good

Well my New Years resolutions got off to a flying start.

I've managed to lose 5.5lb (2kg) in my first week of dieting with Slimming World.

I'm so happy but it's not all been plain sailing, as the the below comparison picture shows.

My Husband and I, thanks to my Parents got to go for a nice meal out at a local Kent Pub - "The Farmhouse" in West Malling toddler free. which you all know meant I could eat without a screaming fit.

 I had a seafood linguine to be good. The other half had a burger followed by their sticky toffee pudding and I had nothing. He also left a bit of it, it took every inch of willpower not to finish it but I managed lol.

With trying to eat healthy I've been cooking up a storm.

This week I've made Turkey Chili.

All you need is:

Turkey Mince

1, Courgette

1, Bell Pepper

Mushrooms

Red Kidney Beans

500g chopped Ttomatoes

Chili Powder (I had hot but you can have mild)

1 vegetable Oxo Cube

Brown the mince add all the veg, kidney beans, Oxo cube and tomatoes and simmer for 20 minutes.

To top it off I added home made chips (Fries) and added Salad.

I've been a busy bee in the Kitchen and with a young child it is difficult as we have a low oven so if I'm doing a lot of cooking I have to put the baby gate up so he keeps away from the hot oven. He obviously doesn't like it and stands at the gate and makes his feeling known lol.

So I spend a lot of my cooking time running over to him and giving reassuring hugs that I'm only cooking and haven't abandon him in favor of a Kitchen appliances. 

I used the basis of the Slimming World Quiche recipe and made.

Roasted Aubergine (Egg plant) & Courgette (Zucchini) Salmon Quiche

I roasted 1 bell pepper with 1 Aubergine and 1 Courgette at the same time cooked for 20 Minutes the Salmon. 

While this was cooking I took 4 eggs and 300g of fat free cottage cheese and mixed added a bit of Salt and pepper for seasoning and mixed together. 

Then when the salmon and the veg were done I lined a bottom of a dish with the roasted Aubergine poured over half the egg mixture then added the courgettes, peppers and the flaked Salmon before Pouring over the last of the mixture.

I then put this back in the over for another 20 minutes at 200 degrees.

What your left with is pastry free delicious quiche. 

To add to my busy cooking schedule last week I also had to attend a two day course to get my re-registration of my Prince2 (Project Management) Practitioner exam. The course was very intense and with the little one demanding most of my attention when I got home it was a bit tricky to do the home work. So fingers crossed I passed (I won't find out for a few weeks).

The upside is the training facility was in an Awesome location. Right next to Tower Bridge and the Tower of London. As the weather was nice (Chilly but nice) I did a bit of sightseeing in my lunch.

I do love London even though I've seen these sight loads of times before I still love it when I near them.

On Sunday I was up early but due to one thing an another getting the little one up and fed. I decided I wanted something slightly more interesting for breakfast so I made Syn free Spicy Potato cakes.

All you need is a potato a grater and some Quark (a soft low fat cheese).

The process is so easy I made a little video:

So as I said a great week so far on the Diet front still need to get my other resolution off the ground but I am feeling healthy and fairly happy. Must be all the vitamins from all the fruit I've been snacking on.

So wish me luck with this weeks endeavors.

Think I'm just glad to be cooking again as it was a bit weird having a cooking blog with no cooking lol...