I try to eat seasonally. At the moment, what that means for me is I have loads of strawberries, avocados, sorrell, nasturtium leaves, parsley, mint and coriander in my meals. I am trying to eat well at the moment after winter comfort eating so it is back to healthy recipe inspiration for me!

I love daydreaming about ways to prepare food. What this means is I’ll be in the veggie patch or fruit and veg shop and look at what is available and think ‘How can I prepare this, in a delicious way?’

Wrap It Up

I like adding a variety of leaves to my salads. While I was picking some of these leaves, I thought these leaves could be used as wraps. The beauty of wraps is that you can add what you like to eat to them.

Sorrell leaves have a lemony flavor. Nasturtium leaves are peppery. I love smoked salmon (and I had some in the fridge) so it was smoked salmon wraps for afternoon tea. The salmon went well with both the lemon and peppery flavours of the leaves.

For me, other combos would include: satay tofu and snowpeas, good old ham and cheese or avocado, red capsicum and carrot.

Herby Goodness

I was going to a kid’s birthday BBQ. As much as I love a snag in bread, I also wanted to offer a healthy alternative. As I was already bringing the salads and picking herbs for this, I looked around at the mint and coriander. I knew there was also some random basil that had popped up and was hiding somewhere in the patch.

The week before I had been reading a recipe book by Nom Nom Paleo. There was a delicious sounding chicken marinade in there….and I had all the ingredients at hand….the fresh stuff literally, it was there in front of me!

This is the original recipe for Fiona’s Green Chicken

Ingredients

1 medium sweet onion, chopped (about one cup)

1 1/4 cups basil

1 cup coriander (leaves and stems)

1/4 cup mint

3 garlic cloves

1/4 cup Paleo friendly fish sauce

2 tablespoons apple juice

1 teaspoon Aleppo Pepper or red pepper flakes

1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper

Finely grated zest from one medium lime

3 pounds chicken drumsticks or thighs

2 limes, cut into wedges

Substitutions: Ok, I swapped some of the ingredients.

Sweet Onion to red onion

Paleo fish sauce to regular fish sauce

Aleppo Pepper to Smoked Paprika

And as this is a US recipe, it has pounds as the measurement. I used 1.5 kgs of chicken thighs.

You could also swap the coriander for parsley, if you don’t like coriander (I know it can be a strong taste – and you either love it or hate it!)

Method

Whizz all the ingredients in a blender.

Pop your chicken in a dish, pour all that herby goodness over the chicken.

Marinate the chicken for at least an hour to overnight.

Bake at 200 degrees for 40 mins. Turn the chicken halfway through cooking.

Tip: Use a wire rack over a baking dish when baking. Pop your chicken on top on the rack. Then bake away….

Serve with the lime wedges for added zestiness!

This transported really well to the BBQ. I wrapped the chicken up in a foil parcel. It was then put into a glass baking dish and covered. By the time, we got to the BBQ 45 mins later, it was still warm. Extra juicy as well as the chicken had time to rest.

If you like the crisp factor on chicken, you could also cook this on a BBQ.

Sweet Treats

It is strawberry season here in SE Qld. Strawberries galore! A wonderful way to enjoy these plump berries is to bake them with balsamic vinegar and maple syrup.

I would watch recipe shows and see them add balsamic vinegar to strawberries to enhance the flavour. I never understood this until I tried it myself and now I’m hooked. I found this recipe in a Womens Fitness magazine.

Combine 1/3 cup of balsamic vinegar to 3 tablespoons of maple syrup in a bowl. Add 3 cups of halved strawberries to this mixture. Stir.

Pop in a baking dish and bake at 180 degrees for 30 mins, give the strawberries a stir half way through.

Let these cool for 5 minutes. I have burnt my tongue by tasting too soon…which is a bit sad because then you can’t taste anything for the rest of the day!

Tip: You can swap the maple syrup for honey. This is delish warm on top of oats or cold with yogurt. Toast a handful of pine nuts and coconut to sprinkle on top. It also stores well in the fridge for a few days, the flavour intensifies and the syrup is thicker.

My mum used to make us a milkshake out of avocados, nutella and milk when we were kids. I used to love it but my friends did think it was weird when I told them about it. Now chocolate and avocado has become a trend- mum you were ahead of your time.

I don’t add nutella to avocado any more but I do like this simple sweet treat.

1 avocado, 1 tablespoon of cacao powder, 1 tablespoons of maple syrup. You can adjust the maple syrup and cacao to taste.

For the smooth factor, you do need to use a small food processor. If you don’t have one just mash this all together. Spoon into a bowl and add berries on top. Enjoy!

You could also turn this into a smoothie by adding the above ingredients into a blender with a small cup of milk – yum.

 

So there you have it, some recipes making the most out of seasonal produce. Inspire us with your recipes! Please feel free to share in the comments below.