Healthy Hake Fish Cakes

 

What to do with Hake?

My husband is a Salmon kinda guy and I’m Hake kinda girl.  I love fish cakes but the problem with most recipes is the high carbohydrate content with all the added flour and breadcrumbs.

I’ve adjusted the recipe accordingly and it was still pretty darn good, the mere thought of having a healthy fish cake was enough to make me smile.

Because I’ve used my carbohydrate portion for the fish cakes I only had salad with the fish cakes for supper. The left over Fish cakes was great for lunch the next day.

I’ve served the fish cakes with a sprinkling of Chopped up Fennel fond, what a taste sensassion!

Ingredients

Yields +- 15 Fish cakes 

500 g hake fillets (skinless and deboned) completely thawed.

2 shallots finely chopped

4 sprigs of spring onion chopped

8 baby potatoes peeled and boiled until soft

1 whole egg mixed

2 tbs flour

5 ml salt

5 ml Lemon juice

Olive oil for frying

For Garnish

20 ml Chopped fennel fond / Dill

Use a non-stick pan for these fish cakes.

Break up the hake fillets with a fork and sqeese  out most of the water out, add to your mixing bowl.  Add the cooked baby potatoes with the fish and mash together. Add the rest of the ingredients to the fish and the potato mixture and mix through.

Heat your non stick pan and add a little olive oil. Form small balls (about the size of Golf ball) with your hands and flatten.

Fry a few at a time in until golden brown on both sides.

Serve with a hearty Salad.

Tips 

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What is Fennel fonds? It is the top leaves of the fennel plant that have a distinct liquirice taste. You can also use Dill instead of Fennel with any fish dish.

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Low fat – Spicy Chicken Kebabs with Savoury herb rice

I think the idea of going on holiday have finally hit home with me, only 56 days to go!

With that happy thought also comes a bit of beach body anxiety, I’m still have 6 kg to lose before my reaching my goal weight and with all the work stress and other nonsense I tend to lose focus a bit.

I have been going strong with the exercise but I still have days where my training session needs to take the back seat over deadlines and family responsibilities….so dissapointing at times, but such is life.

As they say, a flat stomach happens in the kitchen and I have finally made peace with the idea of having Chicken and Fish 5 times a week instead of red meat, in fact not having Chicken daily makes me a bit nervous.

Off course eating Chicken fillets day in and day out soon becomes boring and then you have to put your thinking hat on to zoosh up something out of the ordinary to keep the family happy.

I’ve made these Spicy Chicken kebab’s last week. Marinating the Chicken overnight really made the meat moist and succulent and full of flavour.

Ingredients For Spicy Chicken Kebabs

500 g Chicken fillets

1 onion

1 red / Yellow pepper

1 green pepper

175 ml plain yogurt

1/2 tsp Masala powder

1/2 tsp Chilli powder

1/2 tsp Jeera & Dhania mix powder

1/2 tsp Turmeric powder

1 tsp Salt

1 Green Chilli seeded and chopped finely (optional)

Bamboo Skewers

Cut the Chicken fillets in bite size pieces and set aside. Cut the onion and Peppers in blocks and tread the meat alternatively with a piece of Onion and Peppers onto the Skewers. Place kebabs in an airtight container.

 Mix all the spices and the Chilli with the plain Yogurt and pour over the chicken Kebabs making sure every one is covered with the marinate by rubbing it onto each kebab with your hands.

Marinate Chicken Kebabs overnight (or at least 3 hours) and fry in a pan with a little olive oil until the chicken is done and browned on all sides.

Ingredients for the Savoury rice 

1 Cup of Basmati rice

Salt to taste

1 tsp Veggie Spices (I’ve used Ina Parmaan’s veggie spice)

2 sprigs of fresh Thyme

1/2 onion sliced

1 punnet of mushrooms

15 ml Garlic and Parsley butter

Cook the Basmati rice with Veggie spices as you would normally cook your rice, set aside.

Fry the onions, mushrooms and Thyme with the Garlic and Parsley butter.

Mix the mushroom mix with the rice and serve with the Kebabs.

Tips 

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If you don’t have the above spices available you can use 15 ml curry powder instead. 

Use 5 ml dried Thyme if you can’t get any fresh Thyme for the savoury rice 

Soaking the bamboo skewers in water before hand will prevent them from burning when roasting Kebabs on the grill or in the oven. 

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Healthy Apple and Grape Crisp (NOT a Crumble!)

Very interesting indeed, there is in fact a difference between a crumble and a crisp!

A crisp is a dessert made with a crisp topping that contains oats, nuts, brown sugar, butter, cinnamon  and flour sprinkled over the fruit.  A crisp have a coarser texture compared to the crumble because of the nuts and oats used.

A crumble is made with flour, butter, sugar that is sprinkled over the fruit, basically the same ingredients as a pastry except for the liquid.

Either way both taste fantastic and you don’t have to stick to just apples to make this dessert.

I’ve used grapes with the apples, this created two kinds of sweetness in one pie, just lovely.

Ingredients

Serve’s 4

5 Apples (peeled and cubed)

a handful of  seedless grapes

10 ml lemon juice

30 ml honey

50 ml flour

250 ml oat bran

50 ml “lite” margarine

50 ml brown sugar

1 ml salt

5 ml cinnamon powder

Grease a  pie dish and pre heat your oven to 180 degrees.

Place the apples in a saucepan, add a few tablespoons of  water to the apples, add the lemon juice and cook the apples for +- 10 minutes until soft but still firm. You can add water spoon by spoon is it cooks dry. Strain, add the honey to the apples,  mix through and transfer to your pie dish.

Cut the grapes in half and add to the apples in the pie dish.

Rub together the flour, oat bran, brown sugar, salt, cinnamon and margarine and sprinkle the mixture over the fruit.

Bake until the crust is brown.

Serve with low-fat custard, low-fat reduced fat cream or low-fat ice cream.

Fruit in the greased pie dish

Ready for the oven!

Tips

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If you don’t cook the fruit cover your crisp with tin foil and bake for 30 minutes, remove foil and bake for 10 minutes or until the crisp is browned.

Try using these fruit next time; rhubarb, strawberry and blueberries, peaches, mango or plums.

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Skinny Lasagna

As a BBC Food Fan I’m totally obsessed with the program Cook yourself thin. 

What a mind shift experience it was the first time I’ve watched it, you could actually have your cake and eat it!

I thoroughly enjoy the hints and tips and the recipes are so easy and exciting.

This recipe of Skinny Lasagna made my day, I love pasta especially Lasagna but off course if you are on a constant diet you never ever have lasagna.

I’ve adapted it to my own liking, do give it a try you will be amazed that something so low in fat and carbs could taste this good.

The secret to this recipe is to replace half of  the high carbohydrate lasagna layers with slices of gourgettes which taste absolutely divine and which by the way are well hidden under the white sauce and meat layers…great for fooling children to eat their veggies!

Meat Layer 

300 g Lean Mince meat

1 tsp Robertson barbeque spices

1 tsp Robertson Italian herbs spices

1 onion finely chopped

1 crushed glove of garlic

5 ml olive oil.

1 punnet button mushrooms sliced

1 – 2 carrots diced

1 small tin tomato paste

1 tbs brown sugar

Braise the onion in a little water in a pan until soft, when most of the water has evaporated add the olive oil and fry for a minute longer.

Lower the heat and add the mushrooms and Italian herbs spices. Add the mince meat and fry until cooked through. Add the crushed glove of garlic and the Barbeque spices. Add carrots and full the pan with just enough water to cover the meat and carrots, simmer until carrots are cooked trough. Add the tomato paste and the brown sugar and cook for a further 2 minutes.

White sauce layer

300ml Low fat milk

3 tbs Flour

1 tsp English mustard

Salt and pepper to taste

Mix cold milk with the flour and slowly heat, cook until thickened constantly stirring. Add English mustard and salt and pepper.

Gourgettes layer

1 punnet of gourgettes, thinly sliced length ways.

1 tbs garlic and parsley butter

Fry Gourgettes in a non stick pan with a little spray and cook until golden in color. Do this in two batches.

After frying the gourgettes add everything back to the pan, add the butter and give it a quick fry again.

The gourgettes soak up all the lovely flavors of the butter and gives the lasagna a sensational taste.

Lasagna layer

4 sheets of lasagna.

60g Mature Cheddar Cheese (using mature cheese means using less cheese with the same amount of cheese flavor.

I’ve used Simonsberg 4 month mature Cheddar cheese for this recipe.

Spray your baking dish with spray and cook. layer gourgettes on the bottom followed by the white sauce, meat and lasagna sheet, repeat and top with 60g Matured Cheddar Cheese. Bake for +- 30 minutes.

Serves 4

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Tips

 For a complete supper meal serve with a simply salad on the side.

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