Today I realised that I had rather a lot of "going wrinkly and soft" veg on my vegetable rack. I was also lacking some inspiration as to what to have for tea. With freezers so full I can barely shut them, today wasn't the day to go shopping.
So I had four parsnips, one leek, one onion, some potatoes, a very old butternut squash, and loads of carrots with those horrid going black bits on. So what to do?
I was sure I could do a root vegetable "bakey thing", and a quick flit round t'internet decided me on a gratin.
So what did I do? Peeled two potatoes, three parsnips, half the squash, and two large carrots. I also dug out the tub of double cream from the freezer that I had bought "yellow stickered" from M and S at Christmas for 35p a pot.
I chopped half the onion and put it into a pan with the cream and some marjoram found in the herb store, brought it to a near boil and turned it off
I used the vegetable peeler to cut the veg into wafer thin strips and, in a lasagne dish, layered potato, carrot, parsnip, squash And then repeated.
The onion creamy mixture was poured over and some cheddar grated on top (the recipe said gruyere but I didn't have it in - it would probably have been a little less greasy if I had)
Baked for an hour in an oven at 160 c
Grr, still having trouble updating using the Ipad - I will get used to doing this properly, promise.
Anyway, the above was made and was delicious. WIth the remaining half onion, the leek, remaining squash, parsnips and some more "blackening" carrots I made some vegetable and lentil soup.
I sweated off the onion and leek (chopped of course) in a good dollop of butter. Left it for about 5 minutes over a low heat with pan lid on, stirring occasionally. Whilst this was doing, I cut the squash, carrot and parsnip into small dice and then added to the pan, stirring to coat in the butter. I added cumin, and turmeric and cooked that off. After another couple of minutes I added 2 litres of bouillon (a veg stock cube made up would do) and a couple of table spoons of red lentils. Cooked it for about 20 minutes and then blended with a stick blender.
it made 6 portions.
When cold I popped them into the freezer. I will take one to work every day for my lunch. So easy to transport frozen and then can be microwaved when I get there.
I also found three manky bananas so made this
Yep, yet another banana bread.
