15 Minute Meals - Week 1

After having a lovely lunch over at my friends house thanks to a recipe from Jamie Oliver's 15 minute meals I decided to get back on it and have a go myself. Turns out this was a great idea as my oven broke the first day of this menu (whilst baking bread) and luckily none of these recipes uses an oven, as it's all quick cooking you just use the hob. A real lifesaver!

Just before little one was born I used Jamie's book to get me through tired pregnancy days whilst working and looking after my eldest (who was then 2 years old) And I wondered why I had stopped? They're tasty, healthy and quick, plus it helps me really carefully budget for the week.

So this is my first weeks choice of meals. 

Day 1 - Tasty Daal Curry - Page 240

I forgot to photograph the accompanying lemon and tomato pickle which was the tastiest bit! This was delicious. We used green lentils rather than red lentils as it's what we already had in the store cupboard but the flavour didn't suffer from the substitute. This was Millies favourite one of teh week I think.

Day 2 - Pasta Pesto With Garlic and Rosemary Chicken - Page 172

This one was super yummy. I substituted the fresh lasagne sheets on this one for dried fettuccine as this was on special offer when I went food shopping making it loads cheaper than the fresh pasta and it stores better for future meals.

Day 3 - Blackened Chicken with San Fran Quinoa Salad - Page 46

I wasn't completely sure about adding mango to a savoury salad and being a slightly more expensive purchase I was a bit dubious however this was delicious and we all nommed it without complaint. This was my favourite.

Day 4 - The Best Fish Baps - Page 214

I used Pollock for this one as it was one of the cheaper white fish fillets I could find. Only £1.80 for all of us. This was made with home made rolls, which are obviously not included in the 15 minute make time. But I make my own bread all the time rather than buying it so this was no extra effort.

Day 5 - Sausage Fusilli with Creamy Garden Salad - Page 176

This is what had been made for me for lunch a week earlier and inspired this weeks menu. Everyone loves this one, it's a real crowd pleaser, who doesn't love sausage and pasta in a yummy tomato sauce. 

Day 6 - Happy Cow Burgers with coleslaw and corn on the cob - Page 222

These aren't really a substitute for a good beef burger, however they are really tasty and much healthier bean burgers. A great way to get some hidden veg into the kids. 

Day 7 - Chilli Con Carne Meatballs - Page 58

I will be making my meatballs and pasta like this from now on. They're full of flavour and work amazingly well. The original recipe here calls for Bulgur wheat but as I had some dried fettuccine left over from day 2 recipe I just used up the rest and saved myself a bit more money along the way. 

Lunches (Well some of them)

Spring Frittata - Page 242

Mexican Salad - Page 238

(Cooked just before my oven broke!) - Goes well with beer. 

Next weeks menu looks just as exciting and delicious. To be continued!

Scarlett's Veg Box - 2 Months

Mary, Mary, quiet and trary,

How does your garden grow?

With silver bells, and conker shells,

And pretty maids all in a row.

This is Scarlett's version of it anyway. The version she loves to sing whilst tending her own little garden.

Scarlett removing the weeds

The veggies are loving the warmer wet weather at the moment and they are growing like mad. Hopefully it won't be long until we have some peas! 

Fun Lunches - Flowers and Butterflies

For this month our theme was nature.

Using a butterfly cutter I have for cupcake making I cut out some pieces of carrot. I placed these with some slices of cheese which I cut into flower shapes using another icing cutter.

Scarlett then helped me make some pitta pizzas for her lunch. She chose mozzarella, chicken, sweetcorn and basil for her topping. She then cut the pitta into a star shape (as we don't have a flower cutter large enough) and we baked them in the oven. She was quite proud of showing these off to daddy when they were done.

Wholemeal pitta pizzas proudly made by Scarlett.

Finally for pudding we added a rice paper flower onto of a jam tart for a sweet treat to match our theme.

I think she liked it as it was all gone when I picked her up from preschool. Along with the fruit kebabs, smoothie and oddities I'd also packed. Love it when they eat well.

Baby Pinata

This will seem a bit of a random blog as I've not yet mentioned but our little-one is turning one very soon, so I'm in full party planning mode.

The theme of the party is yet to be revealed, however I've been racking my brains trying to think of party games for 15+ children ranging from 5 months old to 10 years. We have a bouncy castle booked but I wanted to add something a bit different to the usual pass the parcel. So I came up with this one, baby-friendly Pinata's. The idea of my older toddler trying to hit a box full of sweets with a stick around a load of babies did not fill me with joy, but this will hopefully fill them with joy.

These are pull Pinata's. Hopefully even the very little ones will have fun with these.

The finished baby pinata's ready to make a mess.

Essentially these are mostly toilet roll/ kitchen roll centres stuffed with crepe paper and toys, which you hang high above the children. The toys are tied with ribbon which when pulled will release the confetti and toy.

Firstly after collecting the rolls of different lengths and widths, I placed a paper end on the roll to stop the filling falling out. I cut a little slit to pass the ribbon through. The paper used is matching wrapping paper to the party theme.

I used 4 different papers which look good miss matched on each roll. I wrapped the rolls to completely cover. I then threaded the ribbon through the slit and tied it to a toy. I bought a load of party bag filler toys for only 15p - 25p each. Obviously only selecting light weight items in case they land on anyone. I part filled the roll with cut up crepe paper then placed in the toy. I topped the toys with paper to hide the toys inside.
Tip: I marked the inside of the roll to indicate whether the toy was one for a girl, boy or unisex. Therefore on the day I can make sure no boys get any butterfly hair clips and avoid any upset.

Filled tubes with long ribbon for pulling.

I then used a sharp pencil to make two holes in the top of the rolls to make a handle to hang the Pinata's.

The great thing about these is they cost less than £5 for all of them finished and when they are hanging they will add decoration to the venue.

Fairies in the Garden

Spring has sprung and the tulips are in bloom so we decided to keep the flower fairies happy by creating a little home for them. The idea of a little home quickly turned in to a princess style tower under Scarlett's direction. So here we have it: Fairy Towers. 

Fairy Towers

To make the fairy home and garden we collected a pot tray to contain the whole thing, a plastic tube for the tower (this was an old tennis ball tube), pink fish tank pebbles, a sheet of craft foam, a handful of coloured lollypop sticks from the craft supplies, some sparkly bits to decorate, 2 plastic party cups and a marker pen. 

We then set about the garden to get some plants for the fairies. I took some rockery plants, a small thyme plant and ivy. I planted the ivy into the two party cups, cutting a hole in the bottom for water to drain. 

I then cut the end off the tube to become the roof.

Ready to add to the tower

I also made a window for the second plant to grow out of. I dropped the cups into place pulling the ivy out of the windows. I then wrapped the tube in the foam sheet, in hindsight I would have drawn the bricks onto the foam BEFORE sticking it to the tube, not after, it was annoying!

Please ignore the tape, this was put on whilst waiting for the glue to dry so we could carry on making the tower, who knew 3 year old's were so impatient! 

After adding a door outline with a different colour felt we added the tube to a plant try filled with soil. 

We built up the soil around the base of the tower to add support and depth to the small garden. We planted the thyme next to the tower to look like a small tree and planted the other plants around the mini garden. I made a picket fence with the coloured lollipop sticks and used the pink pebbles to create a path. We made a swing (to match Scarlett's one, on her request) out of lollipop sticks. Scarlett decorated the roof with sequins and glitter glue whilst I added on details with the marker pen. We made a right mess but we had fun. 

Almost completed.

We then very carefully carried the fairy house into the rockery corner of the garden ready to find a new inhabitant. It's nicely sheltered there so hopefully wont be too destroyed by the elements. I just need to add a bit of moss around the plants to bring it to life. 

A quiet little nook. 

After picking the rest of the pink pebbles out of the lawn we scattered them along the fairy path to lead to the house, nicely tucked away waiting to be discovered by fairies and children alike. 

Fun Lunches -Commotion in the Ocean

Scarlett had such fun with her Robot lunches last month I thought I would continue the themed lunches every now and then. I used Scarlett's current favourite book Commotion in the Ocean (it's a great read for toddlers and a lovely colourful book) for inspiration.


In preparation for the lunches I bought some rice paper shapes, star fishes, octopuses and crabs. These only cost £1.09 delivered and I've got plenty to keep us going for a while.


I started by making some fun shaped mini bread rolls. They're supposed to be a crab, octopus, then two round rolls topped with the rice paper shapes which I put on before baking so they stuck on properly. The shaped rolls are he ones Scarlett enjoyed the most, she has a good imagination!

Sea creature rolls

For her first lunch she chose the crab roll. I cut out some seaweed shapes from green felt to accentuate the theme. I did her a veg snack box and cut out some carrots into fish shapes, Made some colourful fruit kebabs and some pretzels for whale tails.

Crab Lunch

The next one was the octopus. I then folded a strip of card and used it to hold some Indian snacks and a pot for home made ketchup. I then used cauliflower and cucumber for a coral look.

Octopus Lunch

And finally the star fish lunch. This one has more "fish" themed food as my shopping had been delivered by this point. I have some fish shaped baked crackers, in the jar (old plastic container from cake sprinkles) are ocean shaped fruit chews mixed with yoghurt covered strawberries. I then made Jellyfish fruit picks, made from a strawberry and a length of banana cut with a star cutter to give the ridge look (I covered the banana in lime juice to stop them from browning). Finally a sandcastle yoghurt pot.

Starfish Lunch

These aren't the most artistic lunches I've seen online, but they are fun and best of all Scarlett really enjoyed eating them.

Fancy Dress Clothes Rack..from a CD storage unit?

Scarlett loves her imaginary play which means her fancy dress collection is quite vast, taking over half of her wardrobe and numerous toy boxes. So as part of my on going plans to put both girls in the same bedroom and create a dressing room in the spare room I decided to have a go at making a dressing up clothes rack with built in bits and bobs storage.

The end result. 

I found an old CD shelving unit which we bought from Ikea about 8 years ago and set to work with a jig saw and screw driver to try and create something a bit more useful and pretty.

 The selves before. 

After taking apart one half of the selves I used the two longest lengths as my side pieces to the rack. I cut out a curved top to remove any sharp edges.

Tip: I cut both sides at the same time so both end pieces matched even if I went a bit wobbly with the jig saw.

The unit sides

I took apart the second half of the shelves and cut down two lengths to make the base sides and the backing card to the shelves became the bottom of the storage tray. I used these cut down pieces as a template to cut an old gardening hoe handle which is now the hanging pole. 

I screwed together the side pieces to the base sides.

I then screwed in the hanging pole and lastly tacked the backing card to the underside of the base to create the storage tray.

Lastly using over some left over paint from decorating the hallway and our bedroom I painted the unit. I kept the hanging rail free from paint as it would wear off after time anyway.

I did the last coat of paint this morning and it was finished. I've just ordered some wooden hangers which should make it look a bit more uniform and ordered.

Scarlett loves it as she can reach all her favourite dresses and change outfits as many times as she likes.