🌿 Zesty Dill Potato Salad

12 Recipes To Cook This Week + Thai Spiced Lime Almonds (Bonus Recipe)

Happy Sunday folks!

This week, I have a brand-new potato salad recipe for your carb-loving hearts! This one is good and must be made ASAP!

Zesty Dill Potato Salad

Baby potatoes, roasted until golden and tossed through a zesty lemon garlic dressing and finely diced crunchy, zingy bits like shallots, capers, spring onions and lots of dill. Creamy, mouthy and heaven in every bite. My current salad love!

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What To Cook This Week

Weather plays such a huge role in how we cook and eat every single day. Our Spring days are warm but a cold snap and regional snow mean that mornings and nights are chilly. It is the best of both worlds. Salads and ceviches during the day and something warming and hearty at night.

It’s Sunday and it’s meal prep day. I browse through my collection of recipes and pick what I want to cook. It is like shopping for recipes that have been tried and tested. It is amazing. And this is what I am cooking and prepping today.

Breakfast & Lunchbox Prep

1. Baking my Basic Banana Muffins first up. These have been made hundreds of times over the past two decades and are consistently delicious with a beautiful cafe-style high-top and super easy to make.

2. While they bake, I’ll quickly mix a batch of Blackberry Overnight Oats. I use frozen berries and you can use any berries you like but the blackberry version tastes like the world’s most delicious ice cream!

3. Then pop a pot of spaghetti to cook and mix all the ingredients for these delicious Spaghetti Fritters.

Lunch & Dinner Prep

4. Next, I’ll make the absolutely moreish Rainbow Veggie Dal! The chana dal/split chickpea has been soaking in water since last night (so remember to soak yours if you plan to make this the next day). There are 5 kinds of veggies in this dal, so a lot of chopping which is super meditative. But it is the kind of heartwarming, spiced, creamy, luscious dal that you want to dig into with a spoon on a cold evening. Once everything is in the pot, it happily simmers away and frees me up to do other things.

5. Time to make Singapore Noodles! With a total cooking time of only 25 minutes, this is one of my favourite noodle dishes to make because the rice noodles need only soak in hot water for a minute or two and then be stir-fried with the rest. So easy and so much flavour. These noodles also keep well in the fridge for almost 3 days.

6. I’ll then make a double batch of this gorgeous Vegan Makhani Sauce. This one is quite the hit with my readers and I love to hear about the amazing ways people use this sauce. Most of them make roast veggies and drizzle this sauce over. Others serve it with steamed veggies and rice. It tastes like a Butter Chicken sauce but is vegan, gluten-free and utterly light and healthy. It lasts for almost a week in the fridge. I love boiling some eggs and making an Instant Egg Curry with the sauce. A pan-fried wild-caught fish fillet also goes well with the sauce.

7. I’ll blitz up some Fresh Salsa Verde in the mini food processor. This will be great for dipping, spreading on sandwiches or topping up my lunch bowls during the week.

8. Cabbage Thoran (A South Indian dry cabbage curry) can also be eaten as a warm salad or an accompaniment to any dish. I like to think of this warm, spice-infused cabbage stirfry as the Indian cousin of kimchi. Quick to make (10 minutes total!) and lasts for days in the fridge.

9. Then I’ll pop on a pot of a really good Minestrone Soup. Perfect cold night dinner every time you score a good loaf of sourdough at the bakery.

10. And last but not least, I am making these Beetroot Carrot Fritters (my fave fritters in the whole world!). These are unlike any fritters you’ve eaten. Whole spices are crushed and added to the batter for texture and taste. Crispy on the outside and great topped with avocado and salsa verde.

11. A quick batch of the Best Asian Slaw (veg and dressing stored separately until ready to mix and eat) for later in the week. Honestly, I am so addicted to this one, I have been making it every week. 7-8 fresh veggies shredded in a bowl with a slurpy Asian dressing. Whats not to love?

12. And finally this utterly delicious Blueberry Cream Cheese Loaf. Blueberries are in abundance at the moment and this loaf with layers of sweet fruit and salty cream cheese encased in a soft, golden crumb is just bliss.

These last three recipes are from “Live More Veg”.

“Live More Veg”, the paid section of my newsletter is filled with brand new, veg-loving recipes from my ongoing online cookbook plus weekly cooking inspiration to get you cooking and eating more fruit and veg. More than 80 exclusive recipes in a year, delivered every week to your inbox!

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BONUS RECIPE

Many years ago on a media trip to the Barossa, I bought a little tub of Thai-spiced almonds at the Barossa markets. They were so incredibly more-ish and delicious that I HAD to try and recreate them. After many batches of pan-toasted spiced almonds, this beautiful recipe was born. It was later published in my cookbook released in 2014. I am making these almonds today and thought I’d share the recipe with you. They are the perfect snack!

Thai-Spiced Lime Almonds

Makes 2 cups

Ingredients

• 2 tablespoons neutral oil

• 6 makrut lime leaves, very finely chopped

• 1 1/2 teaspoons red chilli flakes

• 1 teaspoon garlic granules

• 1 teaspoon flaky salt, crushed

• 1/4 teaspoon sweet paprika

• 2 cups (360g) raw almonds

• 4 whole makrut lime leaves, roughly torn

Method

1. Heat oil in a large frying pan on medium-low heat.

2. Add lime leaves, chilli flakes, garlic, salt and paprika. Toast lightly for a few seconds until the garlic starts turning golden (this will be very quick). Add almonds and toss and mix well making sure spices coat the almonds.

3. Reduce heat to low and continue toasting for 25-30 minutes, tossing occasionally until fragrant and toasted. Keep an eye on them so they cook evenly. Stir through the torn lime leaves and cook for a minute or two until the lime leaves are glazed.

4. Remove from heat and cool completely. Store in an air-tight container for up to 2 weeks.

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Cook Republic Cooking Club

The cookbook of the month in September is Vietnamese Vegetarian by Uyen Luu. Come and join us as we cook through this beautiful book packed with delicious salad, dumplings, light soups and dessert recipes.

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Some Substack Newsletters I enjoy reading!

Letters From Tuscany

A beautiful newsletter written by Giulia Scarpaleggia whom I first became acquainted with through her blog Juls Kitchen. She is a food writer, author, cooking instructor and podcaster. She runs a cooking school in Tuscany and has authored 6 cookbooks, her latest is called Cucina Povera which I am really enjoying cooking from.

The Department Of Salad : Official Bulletin

Written by brilliant food writer Emily Nunn, a former magazine and newspaper journalist turned salad aficianado. With a tongue-in-cheek humorous style of writing, Emily shares a lot of wisdom about a lot of things but mainly salads. And they are delicious!

To All The Recipes I’ve Loved Before

Sonya Gee, a digital editor from Australia shares all the new recipes she tries out from various sources throughout the week.

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That’s all from me this week folks! Have a wonderful weekend. Eat well. be well. Until next time! x