Bunny's Awesome Pumpkin Lasagne

 We have found that low-carb 'lasagne' is particularly good with slices of pumpkin (or butternut squash) substituted for the pasta. Also, gorgonzola (just a bit) really gives the mince a great flavour. I believe Bunny does his without white sauce, but with a good bit of cheddar and possibly parmezan as well. So it's just the mince sauce, the cheeses, and the pre-microwave-steamed slices of butternut. Extremely good. Not quite keto but pretty low-carb. 

Vaguely Middle Easter Chicken and Salad

This is the one I nearly blew the house up with my turning the BBQ gas cylinder the wrong way. Anyway, started it on the BBQ but it was frankly a pain, plus the gar ran out so finished in the oven under the grill. Tasty, and easier. Meat and salad combo. 

For the chicken: 

Bone the whole chicken ahead of time and soak for a few hours in velveting mix (a couple of spoons of salt and bicarb in soaking water, in a tub in the fridge). 

Rinse, pat dry, and apply Moroccan rub (or Baharat or whatever you're using) and in this instance a quarter of a preserved lemon, finely diced, applied to the innder side. 

Flatten it out with a BBQ-mesh thing so you can flip it - or just lay out on a rack. Grill. Flip. etc. 

For the salad: 

Baby spinach, grilled pumpkin, grilled courgette, chopped mint, pepitas. 

For the dressing: 

Point of difference - Spoon (or to taste) almond butter, good amount of lemon juice to loosen it up, salt and pepper, couple of spoons of Greek yoghurt. This was a pretty zingy sauce that went well with the chicken. Apply liberally. 

Cut up the chicken prior to serving. 

Bunny's elusive almond hamburger rolls

 We don't have a recipe for this, it's a placeholder to try and find it. A really simple thing where you have egg, almond meal, and some baking powder and put it in a ramekin in the microwave and less than a minute later you have a slightly crunchy, but weirdly morish low-carb 'hamburger' bun. I tried it and it turned into more of a wet omelette - guessing I didn't put enough almond in. Even the wet omelette was sort of useable for a mini-pizza. 

Lara's spicy one-pot Couscous

Ingredients

•  2 tsp olive oil 
• 2 red onions, thinly sliced 
• 4 chorizo, sliced 
• 1.5 tsp dried chili flakes (or rather less) 
• 2 tsp rosemary leaves, chopped 
• 2 cups instant couscous 
• 2.75 cups chicken stock 
• 150g baby spinach leaves 
• 0.5 c continental parsley, chopped 
• Lemon wedges 
• garlic aioli 

Method

• Heat the oil to mediu to high heat
• Add onion, chorizo, chili and rosemary. Cook for 7-9 mins until onions are golden. 
• Add couscous and chicken stock to pan. 
• Reduce to low, simmer for 7 mins, or until stock absorbed.
• Stir through spinach and parlsey 
• Serve immediately with lemon wedges and aioli. 

Problem lamb kebabs with coronation slaw

 These are a problem because the kebabs got dry. I don't really want to add more fat, I'd rather work to keep the fat that's there in the kebab and not washing away. Anyway the taste was good so I'll work on it. 

Kebabs: Half onion, allspice, parsley/and or rosemary, baharat, japaneno, 'pine nuts' (used walnuts instead). 

Original recipe didn't cook the onions but I don't think that's wise. So I did. The whole Baharat thing was nice. Skewers were mean to be flat, mine weren't, it was fine as far as slipping off goes. I think on the next trial I'm simply going to reduce cooking time to max 3 mins per side, grilled.

Baharat: Corriander seeds, cumin seeds, whole cloves, black peppercorns, cardamom pods seeds only (toast them and whiz), plus unsmoked paprika and grated nutmeg. 

Topping for kebabs: 

Masscerate thinly sliced red onion in lemon for a few hours prior. Add in sumac and chopped parsley at the end. Was pretty effective. 

A side slaw with: 

Yoghur, lemon, curry powder (in this case cabbage, red oinion, carrot, sultana equivalent... or walnut) 

Effectively 'coronation' slaw. Kinda ok.

These were actually pretty tasty inside a wrap, if you can stomach the carbs.  

Dancakes (Oatcakes)

 They're 'Dancakes' because it's a riff on something Dan Churchill from Centr made. Also, the oat flour is ridiculously expensive in the shops but it's perfectly fine to blend some normal oats and hey presto it's cheap again. I like these things with lots of lemon juice and some Greek yoghurt on top. 

Dancake mix recipe

Mix

3 cups oat flour

1 cup plain flour

¼ cup sugar

3tsp cinnamon, cloves, allspice mixed

2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp salt

 

To cook, per portion:

1/3 cup mix

1 egg

1 tbsp Greek Yoghurt

Keto Lemon Bars

 Like normal lemon bars only much chewier. Can't say they're the best but needs must. 

Crust with: 

• 80g butter
• 130 g almod flour 
• 40g sweetner 
• tsp lemon zest 

Combine and bake as usual. 

Filling: 

• 60g butter 
• 50g sweetner 
• 80ml lemon juice w lemon zest 
• 3 eggs 
• some gelatine and some cornstarch to thicken 

Cook the curd as normal. They put in the starch and gelatine later. I guess that'll keep it to a minimum. They also cook the curd together with the butter, instead of adding it later. Not sure why. 

Pour onto semi-cooked almosd base. REturn to heat. 180 for 15 mins, or as needed.