This post is sponsored by Nuffnang.
A couple of weeks ago I tried two new recipes by using the cooking videos with Curtis Stone on the Coles Recipes & Cooking site. I have now tried another couple with fabulous success – the family devoured both meals with no complaints!
I have a number of requests recently asking if I can include downloadable versions of the menu plans, I publish each week here on the blog and their associated shopping lists. This week I have added them at the end with the menu plan and it includes both the Beef and Vegetable Pasties and Roast Chicken recipes shown below as they have been added to the menu planner.
Let me know if you find these useful. If enough people are interested, I can continue adding them as a part of the weekly recipe and menu planning post. On to the recipes!!!!
Beef and Vegetable Pasties
These Beef and Vegetable Pasties are your traditional Cornish Pasties. Curtis Stone even tells you the origin of this humble pastie in the video.
This is one of those meals that are easier to prepare if you do the entire cutting etc first and have the ingredients ready to go.
One of the things I really like about the videos is how Curtis encourages you to make the dish your own, for example in this one, to add you favourite veggies to the pastie and he gives you ideas of other veggies to add.
The video also lets you pick up on tips that just aren’t as clear as in the written form. I have never used fresh (meaning not from a tin!) corn kernels in a dish before, so it was great to see the easiest way to remove them from the cob.
The video was great as well for showing an easy way to handle the pastry and to turn it into a pastie.
The kids had great fun with the excess pasty, making ninja pastry men and other odd shapes.
The pasties were delicious. I doubled the ingredients though to make sure I had enough to feed my brood and there was only one left over.
The ninja men weren’t quite as tasty though!
Whole Roasted Chicken with lemon and shallot asparagus
This Whole Roasted Chicken with lemon and shallot asparagus recipe from Curtis Stone is a great way to make Roast Chicken a little more special with the flavours from spring.
I have never put anything underneath the skin of the chicken before. It is such a great technique to give the chicken more flavour and keep it moist – love this idea! Curtis shows you in the video how to get underneath the skin and then massage the butter mixture evenly over the chicken.
He also shows you how to tie the chicken up so it cooks evenly. The technique he shows is fab and my chicken held together perfectly.
I had never roasted celery before either and was very much pleasantly surprised at how nicely it turned out.
I have to admit to not being an asparagus fan and neither is Mr I. Mr I ate and enjoyed the asparagus and our eldest son, who adores aspragus loved the dressing and happily polished off mine for me!
The chicken teamed with the green asparagus looked lovely plated and tasted delish! Really loved the freshness of the lemon through out.
Our Family Menu Plan For This Week.
Baking: Choc Chip Muesli Slice
Monday: Meatballs With Rice
Tuesday: Chicken Lasagne
Wednesday: Left Overs
Thursday: Fried Rice
Friday: Baked Penne With Bacon
Saturday: Whole Roasted Chicken with lemon and shallot asparagus
Sunday: Beef and Vegetable Pasties – Cornish Pasties
Free weekly menu plan donwloads:
- Weekly menu plan without recipes to print (one page)
- Weekly menu plan with recipes to print (six pages)
- Weekly shopping list
NB. I have added the recipe for baking on Wednesday for which the evening meal is left overs, so you can ensure you have the ingredients to make the treat for school lunches boxes.
And remember, if you are looking for further recipe inspiration, check out my complete list of Family Friendly Recipes. All of these recipes are in the database of the Planning With Kids Free Menu Planner. You can use the menu planner to plan a week of meals for your family and then print out the associated shopping list.
Have you planned your meals this week?