GEORGIE - Cheapy healthy eating for the weekend

Just a little thought for the weekend for you all... getting protein cheaply. It's always the most expensive part of our diet and it's also really important! I am surprised that I didn't suffer from malnutrition on the diet I used to survive on in my student years and into the early stages of my professional career because I basically ate carbs and veggies and the only protein I saw was sausages (which if manufactured enough are really just bread) the odd bacon butty and what was in a tin of baked beans!

Protein can be expensive. I am sure we would all love to eat fillet steak all the time but it's just not possible on the normal budget. What I've learnt over the last few years is to make friends with your butcher or your local fishmonger and let them help you eat within your budget. My favourite question is "what's the least expensive good fish you have?" or "which meat isn't breaking the bank at the moment?" and because they know I am a regular and because they know everyone is on a budget, you won't get any hard sell.

At the moment in the UK, Beef and Lamb are really expensive. They tend to be the more expensive meats anyway but the gap between beef and lamb and say, pork and chicken is really pretty large at the moment. Our butcher recently recommended me pork steaks and they're really great value (about 3 pounds for two people with normal appetites). And I know a little secret about Pork, (learnt from the Argentinean who knows just about everything there is to know about cooking meat) and that's lemon. Marinate your steaks in lemon juice in the fridge for a few hours before cooking them in a hot dry non-stick pan or griddle. They don't need fat to cook, and the lemon keeps the meat from drying up. I add the remaining lemon juice into the pan as the pork cooks and it gives them a dark brown glaze. The other secret I learnt from the Argie on cooking meat is to cook the first side for twice as long as the second.

Fish? Well cod has been expensive for ever and its a good and heavy white fish that really satisfies. My latest discovery thanks to our local fishmonger is Pollock (or Colin). Almost exactly the same, and about half the price!!! I found a really great recipe on the internet the other day, a few tablespoons of plain flour, paprika, salt and pepper all combined and then you dip the fish in it before putting it in a hot oven on a greased baking tray. Give the fillets a blast with a low calorie olive oil spray all over and they only need 10-15 minutes to cook. We sprinkled roasted almond flakes and a dessert spoon of melted butter and some lemon juice on the top and they were yummy!

Finally - turkey. Massive in America, not so loved in the UK. Turkey is the single loved protein of all american health freaks everywhere. It is MUCH lower fat then chicken and can taste good if cooked well. It's easily available but not so prominent here. I can highly recommend a good turkey chilli - buy turkey mince (which is ridiculously low fat) and cook it up as you would beef, pork or lamb mince with onions, paprika, chilli powder, garlic, chilli beans and chick peas! Yummy!

So it's actually 3 recipe ideas for the weekend - remember ASK your supplier what is good value. This is a recession damn it and we are all entitled to be thrifty. Less steak, more turkey = more shoes for me in the long run! ha ha!!

NEW MUMS - ROSIE WILL BE POSTING TOMORROW ON GETTING RID OF BABY WEIGHT!

LOTS OF LOVE AND HAVE A GOOD WEEKEND!

X

Z,G and R