Chef and food writer Nina Parker treats us to a delicious vegetarian bake

This really has that Middle Eastern, even Moroccan feel to it with the chickpeas, tahini, spices, lemon and sesame seeds.  You can swap the vegetables around, depending on what you have.  Aubergine would be great for the summer months and broccoli florets would also work well.  If you had any toasted sesame oil to drizzle over at the end that is great, but not essential. The tahini dip at the end really cuts through the sweetness with citrus and bitterness. This is a great one for when hosting a dinner party too!

Serves 4. Vegetarian. 

Ingredients:

4 tbsp olive oil

1 whole cauliflower, divided into equal florets, leaves separated and sliced lengthways

280g cherry tomatoes, halved

2 sweet potatoes, chopped into 3cm chunks

6 garlic cloves, skins left on

1 red onion, roughly sliced

200g chickpeas (1 tin)

Zest of 1 lemon and a small squeeze of juice

2 tbsp sesame seeds

Salt and pepper

For the marinade:

500ml hot vegetable stock

2 tbsp tomato purée

2 level tsp ground cumin

2 level tsp ground paprika

1/2 tsp dried chilli flakes

2 tbsp olive oil

For the tahini dip:

220g plain yoghurt

4 tbsp tahini

Small squeeze of lemon

Pepper

Method:

Preheat the oven to 190C and gather two baking trays (one larger, roughly 30cm by 25cm, and one smaller, around 20cm by 25cm).  

Divide the cauliflower, tomatoes, sweet potatoes, garlic and onion between the two.   

In a measuring jug, add all the ingredients for the marinade and stir together.  Pour this over the two trays and season with salt and pepper.  Mix everything together so that the veg is coated.  Drizzle over two spoons of olive oil.  

Bake in the oven for 30 minutes and divide the chickpeas between the trays.  

Remove the garlic cloves and squeeze out from the skins.  Use a spoon to squish into the sauce. Drizzle over another 2 spoons of olive oil and roast for another 15 mins. 

In a small bowl, add the ingredients for the tahini dip and mix together.  Sprinkle sesame seeds over the veg.  Serve with the tahini either on top of some of the vegetables or on the side.  

Eat straight away, or keep for up to 3 days. 

Nina Parker tells us how to get maximum Mexican with minimal washing up

Taco night is one hundred percent one of my favourite dinners.  I love how interactive it is and all the zingy flavours just seem to make everyone happy.  Usually there are a lot of moving parts, but this one-tray bake does all the hard work for you.  The extras below are easy to whip together and then just load it all up for a taste explosion!  Remember that the pieces need to be bite-sized in order to to fit in a taco. 

Serves 4. Vegan / GF

Ingredients:

1 whole cauliflower, divided into equal florets, leaves sliced in half lengthways

2 red peppers, deseeded and thinly sliced

1 large red/white onion, thinly sliced 

8 garlic cloves, skins left on

2 tbsp olive oil

2 tbsp pickled jalapeños, roughly chopped

12 tacos 

Salt and pepper

For the marinade:

Zest and juice of 2.5 oranges

Zest and juice 5 limes

1.5 tsp cinnamon powder

6 tbsp olive oil

4.5 tbsp white wine/apple cider vinegar

1 level tsp chilli powder

Extras:

1 tin of black beans fried in olive oil, 1 tsp cumin and 1 garlic clove, using the water from the tin 

2 avocados, sliced

Lime wedges

Soured cream

Bunch of coriander

Method:

Preheat the oven to 190C and grab a large baking tray. Add the cauliflower, peppers, onion and garlic to the tray.  

Put all of the ingredients for the marinade into a bowl and mix together.  Pour this into the tray,  seasoning with salt and pepper.  

Toss everything together and roast for 35 mins, then add two more spoons of olive oil and mix everything again.  

Roast for another 20-25 mins or until it looks golden and soft.  Remove the garlic skins and squish into the sauce.  Sprinkle over the jalapeños. 

While the vegetables are roasting, you can prepare the extras and warm the tacos.  Load spoonfuls of the roasted veg into the tacos and top with the extras.

Alex makes chef and food writer Nina Parker’s curry recipe so often that she created a new one and named it after her!

This is a very simple curry paste that can easily be frozen and you can adapt the vegetables depending on what is in season.  So for spring, I would use asparagus, peas and roasted broccoli; come summer, add roasted aubergine, tomatoes and green beans; in autumn, try pumpkin or sweet potato and cauliflower.  This is great for using up any leftover odds and ends of vegetables that you have lying around at the end of the week.  Serve with plain rice.  

Serves 4. Vegan / GF

Ingredients:

3 tbsp sunflower oil

2 medium carrots, roughly chopped

200g button mushrooms

800ml hot vegetable stock

2 cans of coconut milk (800ml)

80g baby corn, sliced lengthways

2 pak choy, chopped

2 handfuls of chopped cashews

2 spring onions, thinly sliced (optional)

Zest of 1 lime and the juice of half, plus extra lime wedges for serving

For the roast squash:

1 medium squash (1300g), peeled, deseeded and chopped into even chunks

5 tbsp sunflower oil

Pinch of salt and pepper

For the paste:

1 banana shallot, peeled and halved

8 cloves garlic, peeled

2 small thumbs ginger (45g), peeled

2 lemongrass, ends trimmed and roughly chopped 

2 mild medium chillis (depending on heat preference), tops trimmed and roughly chopped

1 tsp ground coriander

1 tsp ground cumin

50g fresh coriander

Method:

Preheat the oven to 190C and prepare a large baking tray. Add the squash and toss in the oil, salt and pepper. Roast for 30 minutes or until golden and cooked.

While it roasts, you can start on the paste.  Throw all the ingredients for the paste into a blender and mix until it makes a rough paste. 

Set a large saucepan to a medium heat and add 3 spoons of sunflower oil.  

Then add the chopped carrot and fry for 3 mins before scraping in the curry paste and remaining 2 spoons of oil.  

Allow this to simmer for 4-5 mins until cooked through.  

Pour in the vegetable stock and bring to the boil, then down to a simmer for 2 minutes until the carrots are cooked.  Then add the coconut milk, baby corn, pak choy and mushrooms, and cook for 3 minutes before removing from the heat.  

Scrape in the roast squash, zest of lime and a squeeze of the juice.  Season with salt and pepper to taste.  

Serve straight away with rice, lime wedge, cashews and spring onions on top.  This curry also freezes well! 

The first of 4 exclusive recipes (that will be dropping weekly!), chef and food writer Nina Parker brings us an easy taste sensation

I find that anything with baked feta is a bit of a cheat because it creates intense flavour with minimal effort. The classic combination of mixing chilli, feta and lemon together is always a winner. This is proper comfort food!

Serves 4. Vegetarian

Ingredients:

Method:

Preheat the oven to 190C and grab a large baking dish.  

Add 8 tablespoons of olive oil, feta, onion, garlic cloves and chilli flakes. Make sure everything is coated without breaking the feta.  

Place into the oven for 20 mins.  

Throw the broccoli into a bowl and add the last two spoons of olive oil. Season with salt and pepper.  

Remove the tray and scatter the broccoli around.  Place back into the oven for another 20-25 minutes or until everything is cooked. 

Squeeze the garlic out of their skins and put the cloves into a small bowl.

In the last 10 mins of cooking, start on the pasta. Set a large pan of water to boil and when bubbling, salt water generously!  Then add the pasta and cook to the packet instructions.  

Just before the pasta is ready, scoop out about 150ml of the cooking water and add this to the garlic cloves.  Use a spoon to mash it all together.  Pour this over the baking dish along with the drained pasta, wilted spinach, lemon zest and juice.  

Toss everything together, breaking up the feta and season with more pepper.  Taste to check the seasoning adding more chilli flakes if needed. 

Serve straight away! 

You can find more recipes on NinaFood.com

We have swapped most of our favourite meat dishes with vegetarian alternatives and I can safely say we do not miss it. And this is from someone who hated cauliflower until I was in my thirties.

This recipe is so tasty, super easy, quick to make (another reason I love cooking with vegetables!) and is enough for dinner for two with leftovers later in the week – try your leftovers with Aldi’s Peshwari naan. This curry also freezes really well.

Feel free to make your own curry paste, but this jar works great and as you only use half, there’s enough to make another batch at another time! 

I have also made this without chickpeas on numerous occasions (but I think they add something here and really help to bulk up the dish).

Serves 4 (or 2 with leftovers)

Ingredients:

Oil for frying

1 cauliflower chopped into small florets

1 tin chickpeas drained

1 tin chopped tomatoes

1 tin coconut milk

1 medium onion chopped

Thumb sized piece of ginger – peeled and finely chopped (optional – we use if we have it)

1/2 fresh chillis or handful of chilli flakes (optional – to taste)

Tikka masala paste – half a jar (280g)

Few curry leaves (optional)

Method:

Heat a glug of oil in a pan on a medium heat

Add the chopped onion, fresh chilli (if using) and ginger, stir and cook until soft.

Add the cauliflower and cook for 10 minutes

Add the curry paste and stir well

Add the drained chickpeas and stir though

Add the chopped tomatoes and stir

Add the coconut milk and stir

Add the curry leaves and simmer for roughly 15 mins (while it’s simmering is a good time to cook your rice if you’re using to serve).

I know quite a few of you will have got air fryers for Christmas, so I have a question for you: how are you getting on with them? As much as we love ours, it isn’t necessarily the best buy to suit all households, so I thought I’d talk about a few pros and cons we have experienced.

Firstly, we have found it really easy to use. As yet, we have only really used the air fryer option, even though it has many other functions such as dehydrate or grill. We have a basic air fryer cook book which we found useful with getting to grips with the timings, temperatures and functions, but for everything else we Google timings and recipes.

We have found it great for things that are a bit of a faff cooking around kids, like sweet potato fries or cod in breadcrumbs. It cuts the time it takes for food to cook but most importantly, you don’t have to stand over a hob or check on the food. Once you know your timings, the food comes out pretty much perfectly and the same every time. I loved prepping bacon sandwiches for my parents in it, as I could put the rashers in the air fryer then chat to my parents whilst it was cooking without being distracted, so it is quite handy for hosting.

I think it’d really come into its own when renovating, and wish we’d had one when we didn’t have a kitchen! And I know a lot of people who barely use their oven since getting one BUT I do believe there are a few cons that come with an air fryer and they definitely won’t work for everyone.

Pro: It can save 5 times the energy of using an oven, depending on what you are cooking and how much. For example, Which? found that it’s the cheapest and quickest way to cook chips (23 minutes, 10p for two portions) but if you needed to cook for a lot of people, it might work out cheaper to use the oven and cook all at once, rather than cook in batches in the smaller space of the air fryer.

Con: It’s not especially attractive. There is such a niche for something that doesn’t compromise on style (in my opinion!).

Pro: Things cook quicker, so you save time. Again this only applies if you are making smaller batches (most air fryers cater for around 4 people).

Con: They’re not cheap, they’re generally around the £100 mark (and I am always dubious/cautious of spending hundreds on items to save money) . I remember seeing £30 Lidl ones, but they sell out pretty quick. And the cheaper you go, the less space there is.

Pro: Generally you use less oil (saving money) which makes your cooking healthier.

Con: It takes up a lot of space in your kitchen. Like most people, worktop space in our home is prime real estate! If you have a designated space for it, then great.

Pro: It’s relatively easy to clean.

Con: It’s not really easy to clean. Once you’re doing it it’s easy, but realistically it just sits unwashed in our sink for days. I haven’t tried them yet, but you can get silicone air fryer ‘sheets’, which means you can wash those rather than the air fryer tray and have them on rotation.

Con: For me, it slightly takes the joy out of cooking. I love chopping and seasoning for the oven and trying new things.

I probably wouldn’t replace my oven with an air fryer. It’s good to have it alongside, but then that’s an extra cost (and huge privilege!).

We did cook a small roast chicken in our air fryer and it came out brilliantly! And I find it lets out less aroma generally (which again, for me, is a pro of cooking!).

I hope that has felt like an honest review! It’s the kind of thing I would have liked to read before trying ours, as they are a big purchase and I am always a little bit dubious of items that cost a lot in order to save money. If you think you’d get a lot of use out of it and have the surface space (or even better: storage for one!), then I really think they’re a great investment. It’s also great for students, small households, people living on their own, renovators and those wishing to save on bills.

We have since donated ours to a friend living on her own who was after one, as we decided we wouldn’t get enough use out of it to warrant it being on the side constantly.

Author, drinks writer and presenter Helen McGinn’s advice for choosing the best wines that won’t break the bank this Christmas 

The supermarket shelves are currently stuffed with Christmas wine offers, so if you see something you know you love and there’s 25% off, fill your boots accordingly. But if you’re not sure where to start, here are a few of my favourite wines guaranteed to see you through the festive period – and all well under a tenner. 

The Sparkling Wine

Outrageously good value for a sparkling wine that’s made in the same way as Champagne (meaning it gets its fizz from a second fermentation inside the bottle). From the quietly brilliant Loire Valley in northern France, this is a blend of mostly Chenin Blanc (the local star grape) with some Chardonnay. Light, fresh and lemony with a hint of just-popped toast, this one’s a proper party starter.  

The White Wine

Made by star winemaker Corlea Fourie from grapes grown on the granite slopes of Groenberg Mountain in Wellington, northeast of Cape Town, she’s added a dash of Grenache Blanc, Vermentino and Viognier to the blend, too. The result is fantastic, with lemon peel aromas and red apple flavours. One for the turkey feast.  

The Red Wine

Bordeaux doesn’t normally come this cheap – and if it does, it’s not usually as good as this one! Made from a classic blend of Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot, the warm vintage has brought out Merlot’s plump side together with a hit of blackcurrant from the Cabernet. Proper comfort and joy in a glass.

Use the code FRUGALITY15 for a 15% discount on Helen’s new online wine course – An Expert Guide to Enjoying Wine with Create Academy. Head to @knackeredmother on Instagram for plenty more drinks inspiration!

A deliciously easy recipe that doesn’t involve much thought – even my kids eat this!

Ingredients:

Oil of choice

2 chopped onions

2 chopped carrots

1 chopped fresh chilli or chilli flakes (not essential)

Sprinkling of ground cumin, thyme and ground coriander (for butternut squash)

1 butternut squash

Handful of coriander

800ml vegetable stock

1 tbsp double cream (plus extra for drizzling)

Method:

Preheat the oven to 180ºC and add 2cm chunks of butternut squash drizzled in oil, ground cumin, ground coriander and thyme. Roast for roughly 20-25 mins. Or airfry if you prefer!

Meanwhile, chop the onions, carrots and coriander stalks (set the leaves aside to use on top) and add to a deep pan with oil on a medium heat. Add the fresh chilli/chilli flakes if using (if making it to eat with kids, I use the chilli as a garnish on the adult portions instead).

Once softened, add the butternut squash, mix it all in, then add the stock. Bring it to the boil, then let it simmer with the lid on for 25 minutes. Turn off the heat and blitz – we use a simple hand blender.

Add a tbsp of cream, stir in and serve with a sprinkle of coriander leaves (and chilli if you fancy). It’s also amazing with homemade breadcrumbs – just tear up the ends of a loaf of bread, mix with oil and garlic powder and stick in the oven at 180 degrees (preferably while the butternut squash is cooking) for 12 minutes.

An easy, affordable meal for when you can’t think of what to cook.

Serves 2 with some leftover.

Ingredients:

Spaghetti or linguine (enough for 2)

1 tin shredded crab meat

1 tin chopped tomatoes

Chopped parsley

1 chopped onion

1 chopped chilli (not essential but we love it)

Splash of wine (if you have)

Chopped chives (if you have)

1 tbsp cream/creme fraiche (whichever you have)

Method:

Add the onion to a pan with oil, once softened add the chilli and parsley. Fry for a few minutes, add the wine and chopped tomatoes.

Stir in the drained crab meat, simmer for around 15 minutes. Add the cream and stir in.

Meanwhile, boil the spaghetti or linguine. Drain and add to the sauce with a little of the pasta water.

Stir through the chives and serve!

If you have any sauce left at the end, try using it on toast with a sprinkling of hard cheese/parmesan. Delicious!

This is such a simple one pan dish we love making at home – I particularly love that all the ingredients are (reasonably) long life so it’s something you can always have in the cupboard.

Prep time: 5 minutes

Cook time: 10 minutes

Ingredients (serves 2 as a main or 4 as a side):
1 x medium onion (sliced)
110g Chorizo Ring (chopped and diced)
Sage (we use a good sprinkling of dried)
1 x garlic clove (chopped)
1 x 400g can chickpeas (drained)
1 x 400g chopped tomatoes

Extras: Salt and Pepper (to taste), cooking oil

Method:
Heat a tablespoon of oil on a medium heat
Add your sliced onions until softened
Add the chopped chorizo and stir, letting the oil turn the onions a hint of red
Add a sprinkling of sage, salt and pepper and garlic, stir through
Drain the chickpeas and add to the pan, cook for a few minutes, stirring occasionally
Add the chopped tomatoes, simmer for 5 mins (the longer you leave it, the better – but still tastes great either way!)
Serve

We eat on its own but it would taste great with rice, or with a fried egg on top!