Deliciously Ella Brazil Nut and Rocket Pesto Pasta

I was given the Deliciously Ella cookery book for my birthday and have already made a couple of things from it; I’m never going to be as health-conscious as she is, and certainly don’t think it’s likely that I will ever switch to a vegan or vegetarian diet, but it’s definitely good to switch things up and every now and then eat some super-healthy meat-free meals.
 

 

 

I liked the idea of her zucchini noodles with a minted avocado sauce but I wasn’t quite brave enough to make the zucchini noodles – at least not at this point, because I don’t really like courgette but I also don’t really like avocado! But I do have a spiralizer and I reckon if I made a different sauce with the ‘courgetti’ (courgette spaghetti) it would be OK, so watch this space!

 

 

I decided therefore to cook regular spaghetti but make the sauce as I have a lot of mint growing in my garden and love to find recipes I can use it in.

 

As Ella says, this is a very rich, creamy pasta –I left out the mushrooms as I can’t stand them though Ella does say they add a “next level of deliciousness” so if you like mushrooms then do add them in.

 

I chopped the nuts in a food processor and added the avocado, oil, lime, mint leaves and salt and blended until I had a chunky sauce. The beauty is that this doesn’t need to be cooked so it is so quick. It’s nice heated through a little so when I drained the pasta I returned it to the pan with the sauce. It was surprisingly good given I don’t really like avocado and I felt very virtuous!

 

 

 I'm sharing this with Meat Free Mondays, hosted by Jacqueline at Tinned Tomatoes.

Jen's Food is hosting Extra Veg this month on behalf of Helen at Fuss Free Flavours and Michelle of Utterly Scrummy; this is a great way to eat some extra veg almost without noticing!
 

 

Emily at A Mummy Too is hosting Pasta Please on behalf of Jacqueline at Tinned Tomatoes so I'm sharing this recipe.

 

 

Deliciously Ella: Fennel, quinoa and broad bean summer salad

It's been a lovely bank holiday weekend and we've been to a barbecue today for my boyfriend's mum's 60th. It was hosted by her other son so I wasn't needed to provide the food (and didn't get to make the cake unfortunately!) but I did want to help out if I could. I was asked to make some sort of cous cous salad - since the other bases were already covered - and immediately thought of Deliciously Ella.

Have you come across Ella Woodward yet? Her cookbook was the fastest selling debut ever - though Ella had already become something of a celebrity through her blog, Deliciously Ella. The recipes are all extremely healthy, as Ella changed her way of eating after being diagnosed with a rare illness. I'd seen some of her recipes online and they appealed to me, so for my birthday I asked for - and got - a spiralizer and a copy of her recipe book.

The recipe I chose for my salad dish is available online here. It actually uses quinoa, though I found that the quantity wasn't really enough so added couscous as well (after all I was asked to make a cous cous dish!). It involves a whole host of other vegetables, including avocado which I have never cooked with before, and I thought that since my boyfriend's mum is a vegetarian she might enjoy it. It's certainly a very colourful, summery salad, and far more substantial and interesting than a bowl full of lettuce, tomato and cucumber!

Preparing the fennel mixing with the marinade

Cooking the quinoa

Red pepper and avocado

Adding the sweetcorn and broad beans

With the cous cous and quinoa, the fennel and the marinade some extra lemon juice and seasoning

I'm sharing this with Alphabakes, the blog challenge I co-host with Ros of The More Than Occasional Baker, as the letter she has chosen this month is Q.

I'm also sending this to the Food Year Linkup, hosted by My Recipe Book, as it's National Vegetarian Week and also this is perfect for BBQ season.

 This recipe is ideal for No Croutons Required, the salads and soups blog challenge run by Jacqueline at Tinned Tomatoes and Lisa at Lisa's Kitchen.