Roast chicken with garlic, ginger, chilli, lime and coriander

Roast chicken with garlic, ginger, chilli, lime and coriander

I have a confession to make... I've only ever cooked one whole roast chicken in my life! Until today which marked roast chicken number two! And what a roast chicken it was!

Being quite an amateur in the roasting department, I was worried about over-cooking the chicken and drying out the meat. However, the Waitrose recipe* I used kept the meat deliciously moist and juicy.

And it was cheap as chips to boot! We bought a #SOS chicken last night down from £5 to £2.99 and I also had some shelf limes to use up which were reduced from 35p to 5p each. Roast chicken with garlic, ginger, chilli, lime and coriander it is then!

Here's how:

1) Preheat oven to 190 degrees.
2) Finely chop a small piece of ginger, a few cloves of garlic, and two fresh chillis.
3) Zest and juice a lime.
4) Throw all the ingredients into a food processor with a small bunch of coriander, a glug of olive oil and blitz into a paste.
5) Using your hands, push the paste underneath the skin of the chicken and spread evenly over the breast of the chicken.
6) Rub the rest of the chicken with the remaining paste.
7) Roast the chicken for the correct time according to the weight of the chicken.
8) Baste with the juices from time to time.
9) Leave to stand before serving.

We had it with roast potatoes (the potatoes were from the shelf too and cost 5p!) and mixed veg. I also popped some lime wedges into the oven just before serving - warming the wedges made the limes even juicier and easy to squeeze.

The photo doesn't do this chicken justice - the meat was so moist and the skin tasted divine (not burnt as the photo might suggest!). I think I shall be cooking roast dinners more often now having discovered this recipe!

* The original recipe I followed can be found on the Waitrose website at: http://www.waitrose.com/home/recipes/recipe_directory/s/summer_roast_chicken_with_ginger__chilli_and_lime.html

Spicy parsnip soup - 50p for four portions!

Spicy parsnip soup

Feeding four people for 50p?! It can't be done I hear you cry - oh yes it can with a bit of shelfing action!

I made this spicy parsnip soup a few weekends ago for around 50p and there was enough for four healthy portions.

I had bought a bag of #SOS parsnips for just 15p - down from £1. They had been lingering in my fridge for a while and were in need of using up so when I spotted a pint of #SOS milk for just 10p I knew their time had come!

I followed a Jamie Oliver recipe* but did add an extra chopped chilli to the proceedings for added punch. I also didn't add butter which was called for in Jamie's recipes to cut down on the calories. Here's the recipe for my version:

1) Chop an onion, a few cloves of garlic, a fresh chilli and a small piece of fresh ginger.
2) Gently fry them in a large saucepan with some olive oil until they are soft.
3) Add a tablespoon of garam masala.
4) Peel and chop some parsnips into chunks (I used four) and put them in the pan and give it all a good old mix.
5) Pour in 500ml of milk and one litre of vegetable stock, season well and bring to the boil.
6) Turn down the heat and simmer for 30 minutes with the lid on.
7) Once the parsnips are soft, remove from the heat and whiz up - I used a hand blender to do this.
8) Add salt and pepper to taste.
9) Serve with a few fresh coriander leaves sprinkled on top.

This soup really packed a punch and was very filling. Mr Kate certainly enjoyed it!

With the 15p parsnips and 10p milk, when the cost of the other ingredients were added to it this cost around 50p for four portions. I bet Jamie Oliver's cost a little more than that! ;-)

*The Jamie Oliver recipe can be found at: http://www.jamieoliver.com/recipes/vegetarian-recipes/spicy-parsnip-soup

£22.89 worth of food for £9.33 - £1.99 for a whole pheasant!

£22.89 worth of food for £9.33 - £1.99 for a whole pheasant!

Still no cut-price pumpkins (think I'm going to have to resign myself to the fact that I've missed out this year!) but did discover a great haul of quality food from Sainsbury's #SOS shelf last night.

Two whole Taste The Difference pheasants down from £5 to £1.99 each, a whole chicken down from £5 to £2.99, two Covent Garden soups down from £2 to 69p each, fresh pot of basil down from £2 to 49p and a pot of houmous down from £1.89 to 49p. £22.89 worth of food for a grand total of £9.33 - bargainous!

Roast chicken for Sunday lunch it is today then, one pheasant in the freezer and one as a present to the parentals for helping out with the decorating this weekend!

Now to see what #SOS veg we have left over to use for this roast dinner...!

£32.22 worth of food for £12.13!

£32.22 worth of food for £12.13!

The aim of tonight's shelfing was to find some cut-price pumpkins to create some delicious autumnal soup - alas the only pumpkins I found were still full price! I'll keep my eyes out for one in the next few days!

However, although there were no pumpkins to be found, there was plenty of other cut-price fare to fill my fridge and freezer! Four rotisserie chicken portions down from £2 to 50p, four packs of barbecue chicken wings down from £3.40 to £1.19 (I gave one pack to the parentals and the others are in the freezer), a quiche down from £1.34 to 21p, a pack of Pringles down from £2.49 to £1.29, three packs of Waitrose fresh minced beef down from £3.19 to £1.49, a meat feast pasta salad down from £1.97 to 31p and a pot of my favourite edamame beans down from £1.25 to 59p.

£32.22 worth of food for £12.13 so I mustn't grumble about no pumpkins!

I did have to stop myself from buying all manner of cut-price Halloween chocolates and cakes including packs of fresh cookies down to 10p - my waistline can do without those at the moment!

Fingers crossed for a cut-price pumpkin tomorrow!