Monday 30 July 2012

What shall we have for dinner?



I have been away from blogland for a few weeks.  Life has been a little difficult...as it is sometimes.  Hubby has been away for work for the past 6 weeks and we have really missed him.  We've had the usual run of winter bugs and lurgies, plus a few added dramas to add some grey hairs to my head.  But things have calmed down now - phew. 

So I stand in my kitchen this morning and stare outside, past the teapots and out into the garden where the rain is softly tumbling down.  Then I do what women (and men...but mostly women) do all over the world each and every day - I think "what shall we have for dinner tonight".  Okay, so if I am honest, this is usually the kind of thing I think about at around 4pm or 'gasp' much later (those are the days when little son gets real kiddy food for his dinner, like baked beans and sausages, while I figure out something more elaborate for hubby and me). 

Honestly, I really don't mind cooking, in fact I rather like it and consider myself to be quite alright at it, thank you very much.  But the monotony of deciding what to have can become a real bother.  However, I have a new wee fabulous pot of ideas I can dip into now...PINTEREST!  Yes, my addiction to the visual wonderland has been providing me with some fabulous ideas for our family dinners lately.  The great thing is that most of the recipes and ingredients are very family friendly - quite healthy and not too costly. FABULOUS!!! 


Tonight we are heading south of the border and having 'Mexican Chicken Casserole' - yummo!  Its brilliant frankly as it is such an easy thing to throw together in the morning (or the night before), then bang into the oven an hour before dinner time.  So here below is my creation for tonight's dinner:


It really was super easy to make (and I cheated a little too, just to speed things up).

I used:

2 chicken breasts (diced up)
1 can of organic adzuki beans (because I was out of red kidney beans)
1 can of cannellini beans
1 cup of frozen sweet corn
1 bunch of chopped up spring onion
1 clove crushed garlic
1 red onion
1 jar of pasta sauce (told you I cheated a bit!)
1 packet of taco seasoning (cheating again, I know - easy peasy!)


Then I just put it in the fridge until an hour before dinner.  Just before serving I will grate some cheese over the top and let that melt (any cheese is fine - I am going to use provolone tonight as I love the way it melts).  I serve it with a few plain tortilla chips (organic and store bought), which thrills my men folk to no end!


So there you have it - low fat, low GI, high fibre, economical and best of all easy to make!  The best thing is you can also adjust this recipe to suit what you have in your pantry/fridge or garden. 


Right, time to get back to the real world and tackle the beast that lives in our laundry, 'sigh'.  Have a fab week!  Becks xxx

Saturday 7 July 2012

School Holidays


Life has been crazy busy lately.  It's the winter school holidays here in New Zealand and so my little boy has been home, which is just bliss.  The time seems to fly by!  The poor lad has had to attend quite a few hospital appointments - he had problems with his heart a few months ago and the doctors are still doing lots of tests and things to try and figure out what is going on.  They have ordered a 'sleep deprivation test', which feels like absolute torture as it means nobody in the house gets any sleep - OMG!  I turn into such a grouchy beast :-(


Then we had a 7.0 earthquake on the one night we were due to get a good nights sleep and of course my poor boy was totally freaked out by that (so was Mummy!).  It felt like some giant had picked up our house and shook it, for what seemed like an age.  Scary!  No major damage though - just a crack in the ceiling upstairs.  Sigh.



So due to the above mentioned horrible things, we have been trying extra hard to have some fun too.  We started by going to the movies to see 'Brave', which was brilliant and so funny!  Then we wrapped up warm in our woollies and hit the beach to watch the giant waves, search for treasures like seashells and sea glass.  We bought our trusty thermos of hot chocolate with us and tried to eat our sandwiches without the wind blowing too much sand in them - I figure its extra fibre right? 















So needless to say I have once again been neglecting my blog and my lovely blog reading, but such is life.  Sometimes you just need to stop, hug the ones you love and forget about everything else. 

Hope your all have a great weekend!  Becks xxx