Janneke Vreugdenhil - Solo Food

Put the pan back over the heat, add a little more olive oil, if needed, and sauté the garlic and chilli flakes for a minute. Add the tomatoes and cook until they soften and get a little sauce-like, around 3–5 minutes. Add the prawns and the butter, and season with salt and pepper. Add a tiny splash of the pasta cooking water to the sauce, then drain the pasta in a colander.

Add the tagliatelle to the sauce, stir to coat in the sauce, then heat through for another 20–30 seconds. Tip out on to a plate and sprinkle with parsley.

Lemon couscous with salmon & cherry tomatoes

Preparation Time

20 minutes

80 g instant couscous

a small handful of frozen peas

juice and zest of 1/ 2unwaxed lemon

a small knob of butter

150 g salmon fillet, with skin

olive oil, for frying

150 g cherry tomatoes (cut any big ones in half)

a small handful of flat-leaf parsley leaves, coarsely chopped

salt and freshly ground pepper, to season

Put the couscous, frozen peas, lemon zest, 1 tablespoon of lemon juice, the butter and a pinch of salt into a bowl. Pour in 125 ml boiling water, cover the bowl with a plate or cling film, and allow to swell for 15 minutes.

Meanwhile, sprinkle the salmon with salt and pepper. Heat a small splash of olive oil in a frying pan and cook the salmon fillet, skin-side down, for a few minutes over a medium–high heat. Turn over and cook for another 1–2 minutes. Make sure you don’t overcook the salmon – the middle should still be coral coloured.

Remove the fish from the pan, add the cherry tomatoes to the same pan and cook for 2–3 minutes until soft, shaking the pan occasionally.

When the couscous is ready, fluff it up with a fork then stir in the parsley and taste to see if it needs more lemon or salt. Turn it out on to a plate, place the salmon alongside and spoon over the softened tomatoes.

Salad of butter beans, tinned tuna & shaved fennel

Preparation Time

10 minutes

1 small shallot, sliced into thin rings

1 small tin (about 200 g) of butter beans

1 small fennel bulb

a small handful of rocket leaves

2–3 fresh mint leaves, finely chopped

1 tbsp capers, rinsed, or 1 tbsp finely chopped peel from a preserved lemon (lemons preserved in salt)

juice of 1/ 2–1 lemon

a splash of olive oil

1 small tin (120 g) of tuna in olive oil

salt and freshly ground pepper, to season

Sprinkle the shallot rings with a little salt and let them stand for a bit. Rinse the butter beans under cold running water and drain. Clean the fennel and shave it paper thin on a mandoline, or slice it very thinly with a knife. Squeeze as much liquid as you can out of the shallots.

Mix together the beans, fennel, shallots, rocket, mint and capers or preserved lemon peel, and dress the mixture with lemon juice, a splash of olive oil, salt and freshly ground pepper. Drain the tuna and flake it over the salad in large chunks.

Good old steak sandwich

Preparation Time

15 minutes

1 shallot, sliced into rings

a small splash of red wine vinegar

1 entrecôte steak (around 150 g)

1/ 4baguette or a crusty bread roll

1–2 tsp Dijon mustard

1 1/ 2–2 tbsp mayonnaise

1 head Little Gem, leaves separated

salt and freshly ground pepper, to season

Preheat the oven to 200°C/180°C fan/400°F/Gas 6. Put the shallot rings into a small bowl, add the red wine vinegar and let it sit for 10 minutes.

In the meantime, place a griddle pan over a high heat until it’s very hot. Rub some salt into both sides of the entrecôte. Fry the meat for 1–1 1/ 2minutes on each side. Place it on a cutting board, grind over some pepper and let it rest for a bit.

Warm through the baguette or bread roll in the hot oven (or slice it open and toast in the steak pan). Meanwhile, stir the mustard into the mayo in a little bowl, to taste. Slice the warmed bread in half lengthways, then spread both halves with a generous amount of the mustardy mayo and add some lettuce leaves.

Slice the entrecôte on the diagonal and arrange the slices in the sandwich. Squeeze as much liquid as you can out of the shallot rings and sprinkle them over the meat. Top with the other half of the bread, and dinner is served.

SMART COOKING

One of the things I came up against when I started cooking for myself was that I always ended up with leftovers. I had been used to sharing my table with three hungry men, so I was still figuring out how much I actually ate myself. Does this sound familiar? In my experience you gradually get better at this, but it’s still easy to cook too much, especially of things like rice, potatoes and noodles. That’s why I’ve written this chapter, featuring recipes that you can use to turn leftovers from Day 1 into something entirely different on Day 2. Because you don’t want to waste food, and you also don’t want to eat the same thing day after day. What’s more, cooking with leftovers saves time, because rice and potatoes easily need 20 or 25 minutes to prepare. Do it all on Day 1 and that’s time you can save on Day 2 so that you’re done in 10 or 15 minutes. When cooking solo, it pays to be smart!

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