FeastforFamine

About FeastforFamine

Baking, Cheap, Cheap Meat Cuts, Food, Nourishing, Recipes, Store Cupboard, World

Hi there and welcome to FeastforFamine!

Are you bored with going home to another bowl of pasta, sandwich or reheated lasagna? Going out for a pizza, burger or a steak? If you fancy trying some of the other wonderful stuff going on out there in the world, welcome to my blog, FeastforFamine.

Come on in and join me on my journey around the world, creating food inspired by countries from Zimbabwe to Peru!

FeastForFamine has four main goals, specifically to…

Promote flavours and ideas from corners of the world less well-travelled or promoted.
Put my own interpretation on some of those and share my ideas with you.
Draw attention to some of the issues currently going on in those countries, many of which are suffering greatly from war and/or famine.

The emphasis is on inexpensive, wholesome, widely available ingredients which we don’t always think of pairing. Exotic cooking need not cost the earth, but sometimes takes only a slightly more adventurous approach to give our taste buds something new to look forward to.

Sadly, closer to home, several hundred thousand people in the UK now regularly rely on foodbanks. So, I have deliberately chosen a charity whose scope includes the UK, and hope that the ethos behind my ideas and recipes will make most of them accessible to as many people as possible.

Please feel free to leave any comments or feedback, or suggestions for enhancing any of the recipes. The whole idea of this blog is promote experimentation, exchange of ideas and learning from experience!

Scroll down and be inspired x

The Lockdown Larder – Chocolate Flapjacks

Baking, Cheap, chocolate, Easy, Food, Isolation, lockdown, Quaratine, Recipes

Fancy making a batch of these yummy treats with what you already have in? Then try these chocolate flapjacks as porridge oats aren’t just for breakfast and also uses up any bits of chocolate you have left at home!

Makes: 12

Prep: 10 mins
Cook: 15mins plus cooling time.

Ingredients: 225g of oats, 125g butter, 125g of brown or white sugar, 2 – 3 tbsps. of honey, on any type of syrup that you have, 40g/50g of any left over chocolate you have in the house white, dark or milk!

Method:

Preheat oven to 180F
Put the sugar and butter into a pan and melt over a medium heat
Turn off the heat and stir in the oats and honey or syrup
Pour into a lined baking tray (roughly 18×28 cms)
Cook in the oven for 15 mins
Allow to completely cool, then melt your chocolate on the hob or in the microwave for about a minute and drizzle all over your flapjack
Allow the chocolate to cool then cut into 12 pieces
Enjoy!

The Lockdown Larder – Vegan Chickpea and Coconut Curry with Pea Raita

Cheap, Curry, Food, Recipes, Store Cupboard, Vegan

Friday nights can still be curry night with a few store cupboard ingredients!

Serves: 4

Prep: 10mins
Cook: 20mins

Ingredients: 1 onion, 2 cloves of garlic, 1 large can of chickpeas (drained weight around 500g), 100ml of passata, can of coconut milk, 1 – 2 tsp of curry paste, depending on how hot you like it, a little oil for frying.

For Pea Raita which uses frozen peas, please click here Inspired by India – Potato and Sweetcorn Samosas with Pea Raita

Method:

Chop your garlic and onion and gently fry in a pan with the oil until softened
Add your curry paste and mix well
Pour in the coconut milk and passata, give it all a good stir
Add your chickpeas and bring to a simmer and cook for 20mins or until the chickpeas have softened slightly and taken on all of the curry flavour
And that’s it…serve with rice and the pea raita if you wish
Enjoy!

The Lockdown Larder

Food, Isolation, lockdown, Quaratine, Recipes, Store Cupboard

As we live through these uncertain times, I wanted to help those of you in lockdown, staying at home and self-isolating to find easy and nutritious ways to keep cooking without having to make a trip to the supermarket or local shop until it’s really necessary or spend hours week on week in an online shopping queue.

Last year I set myself a task of creating new dishes from around the world for 52 weeks. Through this experience I gained a huge insight to the different ingredients and types of cooking used throughout the world especially in countries that do not have access to the abundance of ingredients that many of us have in the Western world. My family and I have been on lockdown for two weeks so far and I am already finding that I am able to use the information gathered last year to better prepare for cooking within limits.

So as of now I will re-share some of my old recipes and create new ones, some of The Lockdown Larder Recipes are already there waiting for you, just click on the pink link, focussing on making the most of what you already have in your store cupboard, freezers and other staples that hopefully you will have at home. For some of the recipes created so far using mostly store cupboard and freezer ingredients, please click on.

I have also put together a list of products and ingredients you might want to add to your next shop. You may notice that this does not include that many fresh products as these need replenishing more often.

This is not a definitive list and should be used only as a guide to help you prepare for the weeks ahead…So here goes:

Fresh Produce

Bread (to then be frozen and used as needed)
Cream cheese
Cheeses like parmesan and strong cheddar
Butter or spread
Eggs
Bananas (can be peeled, frozen and added to smoothies)
Lemons/Limes
Potatoes
Garlic
Onions

Freezer

Frozen fruits like berries
Frozen veg like peas and butternut squash (great for tagines)
Chicken
Quorn
Mince
Fish
Fish fingers (of course!)

Store Cupboard

Porridge Oats (can also be used to make flapjacks)
Long life milk/Oat milk or alternatives
Pasta any type
Rice any type
Noodles
Coconut milk
Baked beans
Other various types of beans
Lentils (dried goes further than canned)
Tinned tomatoes
Flour self-raising, bread flour (can be used as pizza bases)
Sugar
Baking Powder
Tomato puree
Passata
Sweetcorn
Jelly cubes
Stock cubes
Dried herbs and spices
Honey or syrup
Harissa
Pesto
Curry paste
Olive oil/Sun flower oil
Vinegar
Mayonnaise
Jam
Peanut butter
Tinned Tuna
Mustards like wholegrain and Dijon
Sweet chilli sauce
Soy Sauce

Some little extras

Chorizo
Pancetta
Chocolate
Olives
Dried fruits
Nuts to add crunch, for baking and stir fries.

STAY SAFE, STAY HOME

Good luck x

Baking Bread…Corn Bread!

Baking, Breakfast, Brunch, Cheap, Comforting, Easy, Eggs, Food, Quick, Recipes

We are running low on bread this morning and as we are only going out when really necessary I thought I’d experiment with making my own…and here it is freshly baked cornbread with scrambled eggs and chilli oil…I’ve never made it before but was so simple and have loads left to keep me going, I searched a few different recipes online and managed to find one using what I already had in the cupboard!

Have a look online for loads of ideas and different types, I just added a bit of strong grated cheese to mine before popping it in the oven.

Let me know how you bake yours…

Happy Sunday x

Store Cupboard Vegan Green Lentil Hummus…

Cheap, Comforting, Easy, Food, Gluten Free, Quick, Recipes, Snacks, Vegan, Vegetarian

Looking for ways to stay healthy with ingredients you already have in your cupboards?Then lentils are your new best friend, cheap, filling and full of protein and fibre, have a go at whipping up this lentil style hummus…

Makes – As much as you want by adjusting quantities.

Cook – 5 -20mins if cooking lentils from dried.

Ingredients, (based on two cups of cooked green lentils), 2 cups of cooked green lentils, 1 tbsp. chilli oil, 2 tbsp of garlic infused oil, 2 tbsps of lemon juice, 1 tbsp of toasted sesame seeds, seasoning to taste.

Method:

1. Blend all your ingredients together, except the sesame seeds, using hand mixer or blender

2. Add more of the oils and lemon juice to suit your tastebuds and the consistency you want

3. Season

4. Sprinkle over the sesame seeds

5. Enjoy served on toast, with wraps, crudites, tortilla chips and more!

Have a look below at some of my other recipes using lentils and pulses:

How do you Dahl? With my Chickpea, Lentil and Coconut Dahl…

Inspired by Sri Lanka – Prawn and Yellow Lentil Curry with Cheats Pol Sambola

Indian Inspired – Chickpea Dahl with Eggs and Homemade Raiti

Inspired By Ecuador – Slow Cooked Pork and Bean Stew with Cheesy Potato

Cakes Inspired by Ethiopia – Berber Style Peas and Broad Beans on Toast with Feta

How do you Dahl? With my Chickpea, Lentil and Coconut Dahl…

Cheap, Comforting, Easy, Easy Entertaining, Gluten Free, Lunch, Main Course, Nourishing, One Pot, Recipes, Vegan, Vegetarian

I absolutely love dahl, it is one of my favourite comfort foods and I like to mix it up sometimes so please see recipe below for my latest version, using chickpeas, bay leaf and fennel seeds.

Serves: 4 with rice or Indian style bread

Cook: 1 hour

Prep: 10mins

Ingredients: 1 can of drained chickpeas, 400ml of coconut milk, 2 small cans of cooked lentils, (I used green), 1 onion finely chopped, 2 cloves of garlic finely sliced, 1 thumb sized piece of ginger peeled and finely sliced, 1 tbsp of oil, 1 tbsp. of tomato puree, 1 tsp of cumin, 1 tsp of tumeric, 1 tsp of mustard seeds, 1 cardamon pod, 4 dried chillies crushed, 1 tsp of fennel seeds, 1 bay leaf, salt to taste.

Method:

Start by frying your spices in the oil until they start to pop
Add your onion, ginger and garlic and allow to soften for a few minutes
Add your chickpeas and lentils to the pan and coat well in the mixture
Add your coconut milk, bay leaf and cardamon pod, bring to the boil
Allow to simmer for at least an hour, using a potato masher to break down the chickpeas, top up with a little water if it’s getting too sticky
Season with salt to your liking and serve with rice or indian style bread
Enjoy!

If you are looking for some further inspiration then, check out my other spicy dishes below…

Inspired by Bangladesh: Carrot Bhajis with Raita (also included extra recipes for homemade Lime Pickle and Spicy Tomato Chutney)

Spicy Oven Cooked Aubergines with my Bangladeshi Inspired Spicy Tomato Chutney!

Inspired by Yemen – Scrambled Eggs with Green Beans and Hot Spiced Yogurt, Served with Clove and Cardamon Black Tea

Inspired by Indonesia: Slow Cooked Beef Noodles, with Spinach, Fried Egg and Peanut Sambal

Inspired by Vietnam – Aubergine Buns with Veggie Pickles and Spiced Mayo

Inspired by India – Potato and Sweetcorn Samosas with Pea Raita

Inspired by Sri Lanka – Prawn and Yellow Lentil Curry with Cheats Pol Sambola

Thanks x

Say Happy Valentines with Austrian Butter Biscuits – Iced with Love

Baking, Brunch, Cheap, Children, Cookies, Easy, Food, Quick, Recipes, Sweets, Treats, Valentines

Showing someone you love them shouldn’t cost the earth, so why not make a batch of these lovely little biscuits and get creative with your icing and sprinkles.

These are made using a recipe given to me at Christmas by my friend Maya, for full easy, cheap recipe please click the link and adapt the recipe by using lots of heart cookie cutters instead and dashings of red icing! Fun to make with little ones too…

Inspired by Austria – Maya’s Butter Biscuits

Happy Valentines