Easiest slow cooker curry

Serves 2-3

Check your medium sized casserole dish fits into the slow cooker with the lid on.

1/  chop a kumara ( or other hard vegetable) and put in the bottom of the dish.  I like the skins left on for extra vitamins.

Hard vegetables could be potato, carrot, parsnip, swede, or a mix of capsicum, cauliflower, egg plant etc.

2/.  Sprinkle in some sultanas (optional)

3/.  Add your chopped meat - any cut works - I have used chicken here but have also successfully used beef, lamb, sausages and pre cooked beans or chickpeas.

4/  sprinkle a tsp of curry powder over the mix to your taste.

Looks good so far...!

5/. Tip a tin of Indian flavoured tomatoes over everything.  

6/. Cover the casserole dish and place in the slow cooker.  Ensure the slow cooker lid is sitting flat and turn the cooker on low.

7/.  Leave the lid on and cook for 5-6 hours on low or 3 hours on high. Longer and slower is better.

Serve with rice or green vegetables.

The same method will work for other tomato based meals.  Swap the Indian tomatoes for morroccan and the curry powder for morroccan seasoning.  Or Mexican tomatoes and Cajun seasoning. Or for an Italian twist replace sultanas with olives and use plain tomatoes with Tuscan seasoning.

Nearly any vegetables will work but if you want to add onion you need to pan fry it before you add it to the slow cooker or it ends up hard and kind of bitter.

Yum easy dinner for two with left overs for lunch!

Pickled peppers

4 capsicums

3 tbsp salt

1 cup white vinegar

3/4 cup sugar

2-3 cloves garlic - peeled and finely diced

1 inch root ginger - peeled and diced

2 tsp yellow mustard seeds

1/ slice capsicum finely- mix with salt, cover and sit over night in fridge

2/ next day drain and wash capsicums - add all ingredients to a pot and bring to the boil.

3/ summer for an hour then bottle in the usual way

Red Hot Capsicum Jelly

Awesome flavour explosion

Easy to make

Ingredients

1 cup fresh chillies

1.5-2 cups red capsicum

1 green apple cored

1 cup white vinegar

2 cups sugar

Chop the chillies apple and capsicum in a food processor

Put in a medium pot with the vinegar and sugar

Bring to the boil then cook for 25-30 mins until the Kelly thickens

Bottle in the usual way.  Makes 3 small jars of intense flavour.

Made Up Marrow banana cake

I had brown splodgy bananas which no one will eat and are always destined for some form of baked good.

Recently I experimented with making cake with grated marrow as one of the main ingredients.  It was very tasty as I had used lemon and marmalade to substitute for most of the sugar.

Round two I thought but this time I would use stewed apple and banana to provide the sweetness.  

All was going to plan as I mashed and grated and mixed the wet ingredients. To the cupboard for flour and baking soda...

Very little of the former and none of the latter.  After searching the pantry I managed to pull together a mix of flours and cereals. And 1 small tsp of baking powder.

It is baking now and smells fantastic but I think it will be a dense slice rather than a proper cake.  As long as tastes nice with coffee I'm happy.

1 cup stewed apple

3 small ripe bananas

1.5-2 cups grated marrow

1 tsp vanilla essence

60 gm cranberries

3 tablespoons brown sugar

70 gm flour

130 gm cornflour

3 crushed weetbix

1 cup Allbran

1 tsp baking powder

Mix the wet and dry ingredients separately, then combine them together. Bake at 160c and hope for the best.

To make the cake as I planned use 3 cups of self raising flour and mix a teaspoon of baking soda into the wet ingredients just before adding the flour.