Lunch - without bread!

Another day, another lunch without bread for those of you who think you can't eat lunch without bread!  I do eat bread sometimes, but I try not to most of the time, particularly when I am at home.  This meal is a fresh combination of salmon, egg and vegetables.  My salad greens were a mixture of endive, rocket, and cos, but you could use whatever you had at hand. Or just one type.

Ingredients

Mixed salad greens
105 gr can pink salmon
6 cherry tomatoes
1/2 Lebanese cucumber
1/2 red capsicum
1 small carrot
1 hard-boiled egg
1 tbs lemon-infused olive oil

Mode

Place salad greens in serving bowl
Chop cucumber and capsicum and add
Peel and cut the carrot in strips and add
Slice egg and add
Add the tomatoes and salmon (including liquid from the can)
Stir to combine
Sprinkle over the oil
Toss thoroughly until all ingredients are combined and the oil and salmon liquid cover the other ingredients.

Lunch!

I snapped a photo of my lunch earlier and not long later got a comment on Instagram that it was not at Couple Cinos, a cafe run by some friends!  True.  Well, Nemo, this is just to prove to you that I often prefer the comforts of home at lunch-time!

This is a quick, fresh lunch put together quickly from a range of ingredients that were on hand.  The flavours were lovely and I could easily have eaten more serves. However, the time has come to get on the straight and narrow after the eating excesses of the Christmas and New Year season.

For the wholegrain rice pilau, I used the remains of a packet of Tilda wholegrain pilau which I am very partial too.  It is wholegrain basmati flavoured with cummin, curry leaf and fenugreek.  If you wanted to add your own rice, I would add some extra cummin, curry leaf and fenugreek to get the added flavour. I like Vietnamese mint a lot, so I added quite a lot. You can add what feels good to you.


Ingredients

105 gr can pink salmon
200 gr cherry bocconcini
1 Lebanese cucumber
1/2 red capsicum
1 small carrot
Vietnamese mint
40 gr pomegranate seeds
150 wholegrain pilau
1 tbs lemon-infused olive oil

Mode

Drain the bocconcini and place in serving bowl
Chop cucumber and capsicum and add
Peel and cut the carrot in strips and add
Add the pilau, pomegranate seeds and salmon (including liquid from the can)
Stir to combine
Chop the Vietnamese mint and add
Sprinkle over the oil
Toss thoroughly until all ingredients are combined and the oil and salmon liquid cover the other ingredients.

Sweet potato, chicken and endive

I'm still experimenting with various ways of baking chicken in lemon juice. There seems to a be an endless variety of possibilities. This time I used chicken fillets, and cooked them with endive, sweet potato, and green peas! I also steamed the endive before adding it to the second stage of cooking in the oven. Again, I served it with wholemeal basmati, but it would be fine alone if you want to reduce carbs, or you could serve it with pasta. The meatless option is on its way!

Ingredients

600 gr chicken fillets (without skins)
2 dsp seasalt flakes
2 cloves garlic
2 tsp sliced ginger
2 tsp ground turmeric
1 sweet potato
2 tbs lemon-infused olive oil
juice of two lemons (about 150 ml)
1 cup of frozen baby green peas
1 bunch of baby endive

Mode

Preheat oven to 210c
Chop the chicken and arrange in a baking dish
Slice the sweet potato in rounds and then halve them
Add the sweet pepper to the baking dish
Sprinkle with salt flakes
Peel and crush garlic and slice ginger
Add garlic, ginger, turmeric and oil to chicken and sweet potato
Mix thoroughly
Roast for 30 minutes
Meanwhile squeeze lemons
Roughly chop endive and steam lightly
Remove the chicken from the oven and pour over the lemon juice
Add the green peas and endive and stir to combine
Return to oven and roast for another 20 minutes.