HAPPY INTERNATIONAL CHILDREN'S DAY - 1ST JUNE

1925 the World Conference for the Well Being of Children proclaimed 1st June to be the International Children's Day. This is one of the most loved holidays back home in Bulgaria. It has always been a big deal over there and still is today. In my childhood all cars were driving with

SPINACH AND COURGETTE LASAGNE

I have been a Riverford customer for years and have always enjoyed experimenting with the ingredients I receive regularly. My CIME DI RAPA LASAGNE is one of my husband's favourite meals to date and it is still in the top 3 of my most read recipes! Following a 4.5 hour round trip to Heathrow airport (it should've only taken me 45 minutes each way!) to collect my mum last Friday I was nicely surprised to come home and find my latest box awaiting me by my front door. I love courgettes. Any recipe will do  - fried, baked, cooked..... even raw occasionally, I simply love them. Hubby however, is a different story. He only likes them fried. Baked - NO, NO, NO. Raw - even bigger NOOOOOOO. Cooked - he is unsure about that one. Recently I have been frying loads of courgettes but I really fancied something a bit different. So following that horrendous drive on a Friday afternoon before a Bank Holiday when half-term starts (Why on earth did none of this occur to me last month when my mum was booking her flight?!) seeing Bob's recipe for Courgette & Spinach Lasagne made me smile. The evening looked a bit brighter all of a sudden. Unfortunately I had to wait until Monday evening to try it out but the wait was worth it. I mean, this is a seriously good recipe and with fresh organic produce you can hardly go wrong. In fact, you cannot go wrong with this recipe. The spinach and the courgettes compliment each other beautifully and the rich velvety sauce is divine. My mouth is watering just thinking (and writing) about it. I promise you this is a recipe you must try. And then tell me if I was right (okay, I am sure I will be right, but I really hope I get some comments on my blog).

Ingredients: *

2 courgettes
a bag of spinach (kale, cime di rapa....)
1 small onion
200gr cream cheese
100 gr grated cheese, divided
1 egg
400 gr milk
35gr butter
35gr plain flour
1 bay leaf
pinch nutmeg
salt
pepper

Method:

Peel the courgettes and cut them into coins. Lightly fry them and set aside on a kitchen towel to cool down. Fry the finely chopped onion until soft and translucent. Chop the spinach and add to the onion until just wilted, 2-3 minutes. Add the cream cheese, some of the grated cheese, freshly grated nutmeg, salt and pepper and mix well. Leave to cool down.
In the meantime make the white sauce. Heat the milk either on the hob with the bay leaf or like me, in the microwave for 2 minutes. In a saucepan melt the butter and add the flour to make the roe. Keep the heat on medium and pour the hot milk while whisking for about a minute until all lumps disappear. Do not worry if some lumps remain, once the dish is baked it won't matter. Continue stirring until the sauce thickens. If it thickens too much, add a splash of milk to it. To give the sauce its velvety texture take the saucepan off the heat and add the egg. Stir until incorporated, add the rest of the grated cheese and leave to melt. Preheat the oven to 180C fan. To assemble: in a shallow casserole dish layer half of the courgettes. Lasagne sheets go on top, followed by a third of the white sauce then half of the spinach mix. Repeat with the rest of the courgettes, lasagne sheets, another third of the white sauce, the rest of  the spinach mix, more lasagne sheets. Cover it really well with the last of the sauce and sprinkle some grated cheese on top. Pop into the hot oven for about half an hour and enjoy! It makes great leftover lunch too.

XoXo
Desi in the Kitchen

* This is not a collaborative post. The recipe is adapted from Bob's recipe Courgette & Spinach Lasagne.

SPINACH AND RICOTTA CHEESE CANNELLONI

My husband used to smoke. As a direct result his taste buds were not working properly anymore and he disliked vegetarian food. In fact, he disliked most foods. He wasn't fussy, don't get me wrong. He would eat everything which I would put in front of him but some dishes he simply wouldn't like at all. 19 months ago he gave up smoking for good and I am so proud of him. He was worried he would put on weight, he would binge eat, he would be cranky, grumpy etc etc etc. The truth is he was. He was cranky, grumpy etc etc etc but only for a couple of months. I made sure to prepare healthy snacks for him to take to work and stopped buying ready meals. We were not eating these a lot anyway, maybe once or twice a week. But his desire to eat better and feel better forced him to sign up with the local gym where he is now going for a swim 3 times a week. He quit having 7 cups of tea a day with 2 teaspoons of sugar each! (no, this is no joke!) and he started having packed lunch at work 3 times a week. I am sure you are wondering where I am going with this story. Well, vegetarian dishes are now my husband's favourites. Over the last year he has become a great fan of veggie lasagne, veggie quiches, simple dinners of salads with new potatoes, even vegetarian pizzas! And cannelloni is his absolute favourite. So every time I make it, which is on average once every couple of weeks, I make enough to serve 4. We have half of it for dinner and the rest goes into two Tupperware boxes in the freezer ready for him to enjoy in the middle of day when at work.

RECIPE:

For the filling:
1 pack spinach (kale, cime di rapa....)
1 small onion
1 tub ricotta/quark
salt and pepper
nutmeg
a handful of grated cheese

White sauce:
25gr butter
25gr plain flour
about 300ml hot milk (plus more if needed)
a handful of grated cheese

12 cannelloni tubes
500gr passata

extra grated cheese to sprinkle on top

Method:

To make the filling:

Finely dice the onion and let it fry gently until soft and translucent. In the meantime wash and cut the spinach roughly, squeezing as much water as you can out of it. Add to the onion and stir for 2-3 minutes until it is just wilted. Turn off the heat and add the ricotta cheese, spices and the grated cheese. Stir until all is blended well, the grated cheese will melt from the heat. Leave to cool down for a bit.

White sauce:

Whilst the filling is cooling, melt the butter in a saucepan. Add the flour and some salt and stir until a roe is made. Add the hot milk (I always microwave mine for 2 minutes) to the pan and whisk vigorously for about a minute - you should end up with a nice smooth sauce. Let it thicken slightly, take off the heat and add the grated cheese to it. This dish is awesome as you can hide any mistakes you make! I made probably the worst white sauce I have ever made  - lumpy, lumpy, lumpy. I had no more milk otherwise I may have made a new one so I was forced to use it. The dish turned out just as good and you could never tell my sauce had any lumps in it!

Preheat your oven to 180C. You need a suitable dish which can hold the 12 tubes comfortably.
Pour half of the passata at the bottom of the dish. I add herbs to mine, whatever is in season or whatever I fancy that day. To fill the cannelloni - it is messy and there is no way round it. I used a piping bag - I cut quite a bit opening at the bottom. You will need to hold your tubes flat. I know it sounds tricky but it did work for me after the second one. Once all 12 tubes are filled arrange them into your dish. Pour over the rest of the tomato sauce. The cheese sauce is next - slowly pour it over, trying to cover as much of the tomato sauce as possible. Sprinkle with the last of the grated cheese and pop into the preheated oven for about half an hour. Serve warm and enjoy!

XoXo
Desi in the Kitchen