A gluten free meal plan for the week 19 – 22 September 2016
Monday
Chickpea and coconut korma curry with pumpkin
I might add in a bit of orange kumara if I don’t have enough pumpkin, but I’ll also only be doing 3/4 of the recipe, because there are four of us, not six.
Tuesday
https://www.myfoodbag.co.nz/recipes/details/2931-rosemary-beef-with-vegetable-wild-rice
I got sucked in by a product demonstrator at the supermarket last week and bought a searingly expensive bag of Thai Black Cargo rice, so I’ll be using some of that instead of the wild rice called for in the recipe.
Also, on the advice of said product demonstrator, I’ll be adding a quarter of lemon and a stick of lemongrass to the water when I cook the rice.
I still have pumpkin seeds left over from the other week, so I’ll be using those instead of the “mixed seeds” in the recipe.
Pistou is basically pesto but without pinenuts. I’ll see what’s available.
Wednesday
Nadia says “five spice mix”. I’ll just use five spice, which is already a mix.
Thursday
I’ll be making a pork and noodle soup.
The inspiration for the soup was https://www.myfoodbag.co.nz/recipes/details/3007-pork-and-fennel-dumplings-with-spiced-noodle-broth, but the broth spice paste threw me. At first I thought it might be a laksa paste, but laksa is usually made with coconut milk, and this is not, so I don’t think it’s that (though it does look a lot like that in the photo too).
I consulted Mr Everwright, who is a self-taught Asian food afficionado, and he suggested I work from “the Cheltenham chicken soup”.
Before we were married, I spent six months living and working in Cheltenham while Mr Everwright lived and worked in Cambridge. We spent the weekends together, in one city or the other, or London, or somewhere more exotic.
One weekend he came to visit me when he had a heavy cold or light flu. He needed chicken soup, and preferably Asian chicken soup. When I’d had flu in Amsterdam he’d fetched me chicken soup from somewhere nearby, but Cheltenham, like most of the UK, was a good-Chinese-or-any-other-Asian-food desert.
I had my recipe (Chicken and Noodle Soup from Jay Solomon’s ‘A Taste of the Tropics’), but the ingredients were a bit more challenging. Fresh lemongrass did not exist. I finally found a health food shop selling dried lemongrass powder. I also couldn’t get fish sauce, and made do with a dollop of oyster sauce, kindly offered by my Malaysian flatmate.
This time I’ll be working with the original recipe, but instead of a chicken cut into 6 to 8 pieces, I’ll be using Pork and Fennel meatballs.
The pork meatballs will be made from this recipe.
The recipe for the noodle soup is as follows:
3 oz rice noodles
pork and fennel meatballs
6 cups chicken stock
3 shallots, minced
3 sticks celery
1 1/2 tablespoons avocado oil
2 tsp minced fresh lemongrass
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 tsp minced fresh ginger
1 small mild green chilli pepper, seeded and minced
3 green onions, chopped
1 cup shredded bok choy, kale or chinese cabbage
3 tablespoons fish sauce
1 1/2 tablespoons lime juice
2 teaspoons minced fresh coriander
1. Prepare the pork meatballs (baking method)
2. Place the rice noodles in hot water for 3 minutes, then drain and cut into 2-inch sections
3. In a large pot, saute lemongrass, garlic, ginger, onion and chilli in oil over medium heat for 2-3 minutes until the vegetables are soft.
4. Add the chicken stock and celery, bring to a simmer.
5. Add green onions, bok choy, fish sauce, lime juice and pork meatballs. Return to a simmer.
6. Add cooked noodles and coriander, simmer another 4 to 5 minutes over medium heat, stirring occasionally.
To serve: remove celery sticks so your children who don’t like it won’t know it was there. Transfer the noodles with tongs to soup bowls, ladle soup and meatballs over the noodles.
Weekly gluten-free meal plans 