I went back to full-time study a few weeks back and life has been hectic to say the least.  After my first week it became clear that my family could not live on fish and chips and spagetti on toast everynight of the week.  So I went out last weekend and bought a slow cooker (also known as a crockpot).  I have to say this new kitchen appliance is a life saver!  I can put my evening meal in it at breakfast time and by the time I come home my house smells of a lovely home cooked meal and all I need to do is dish it up. Not only does it cook casseroles, you can put whole chickens in there too! If you struggle to get a meal on the table in the evening I recommend this appliance even if you use it only a couple of nights a week.

Steph xo

Food plays a big part in our family life, but having a 3-year -old means we don’t always experience meal times together. During the week, my husband usually gets home from work between 7-8pm. This is too late for dinner as a family, but he usually does story time. I sit with Scarlett at the table in the kitchen/diner while she eats dinner at around 5pm. She has a very healthy appetite, and snacks on fruit, nuts and raisins during the day (as well as odd treats). By dinner time she can be quite tired, so although she will sit down, it can take a long time for her to finish!
Luckily Scarlett will try anything and loves strong flavours. She prefers a choice of foods on her plate, rather than a one-pot dish. So, typically she will have pasta or chicken/fish/omelette with two types of vegetables such as home-made potato/butternut squash wedges, peas and she has cucumber batons with every meal! Some fruit, yoghurt or a lolly finish off her dinner with something sweet. We have recently gone through a phase of lolly-obsession, which made dinner rather prolonged! Scarlett loves to pick herbs from the garden to put on her dinner, and her Grandparents have a big vegetable/fruit patch so she has a good understanding of where some food comes from.

On Friday evenings, we are much more relaxed and we have a long aperitif with Prosecco and tapas-style dishes on the sofa all together. Scarlett will almost have a second dinner and picks at her favourite olives and chorizo happily whilst we all chat, and build Lego towers.
Nick and I eat together at the table after Scarlett’s story time. Lately bedtime is a bit fraught, so we often eat at 8.30-9pm. I cook during the week, and Nick cooks at the weekend. He is an experimental cook. He gives us exciting dishes using weird and wonderful equipment, which Scarlett helps him with-she is an expert egg cracker!

We often have a starter, then a main course. I have carried this on from eating meals made by my French mother, and my father being a French teacher and embracing every part of French culture. Though, when younger (1980’s) my sister and I ate standard chicken nuggets and chips when friends came over for tea, as a family and at the weekend it was different. We would have a salad/charcuterie starter, a main course and then cheese with green salad and dessert. My friends found this very funny and strange, though it was the norm for us. My mum’s home-made fries, gratin and vinaigrette managed to win most of them over! It was just fresh, simple food and not extravagant as it sounds. Mum still shops every couple of days like the Parisian she is. I love passing this heritage onto Scarlett, as well as the traditional English side which she enjoys at her paternal Grandparents. The best of both worlds!

At the weekend we have relaxed meals, the three of us or with friends/family over. As soon as the weather is nice enough we bbq some meat/fish and have with home-made bread and a selection of salads. Mexican wraps are also great for everyone to get stuck in. Home-made pizzas are great on the bbq too, and Scarlett enjoys putting the toppings on (and nibbling). These are our favourite meal times for catching up and relaxing. Eating outside is fantastic, when the weather is in our favour. We have dessert at the weekends, maybe a quick to make apple tart and Nick’s ice cream. I look forward to dinner times all week together as a family (soon to be of 4) in the near future.

We don’t eat out in restaurants much at dinner time, unless we are on holiday. These aren’t always relaxing outings as Scarlett doesn’t like sitting down for long. Although I want her to get used to this, I don’t see the point in making it a torturous experience for everyone. She loves food, cooking and family meals, and for now that’s enough for me!

Quick To Make Apple Tart

I don’t follow recipes generally (apart from baking), or always measure ingredients so I looked up another tart recipe to make sure the quantities were about right!
This serves about 6-8, and the tart is delicious cold so good for lunches the following day. Alternatively, use a smaller sheet and 1 less apple. Of course, you can always make your own pastry!

• Jus Roll Sheet of ready to use Puff Pastry (320g).
• X 6 Cox Apples
• 150g Unsalted Butter
• Tsp Cinnamon (or more if you like)
• Juice of half a lemon
• Seeds from inside Vanilla pod
• Caster sugar

Pre-heat oven to 220 degrees C/Gas Mark 7. Core, peel and thinly slice the apples. Squeeze lemon juice over slices and set aside. Melt butter with cinnamon, squeeze of lemon juice, vanilla seeds and tbsp of caster sugar. Allow to cool.
Use sheet of pastry in rectangular shape it’s in (or you could use dinner plate to cut around as template for round tart). Do this on silicone/ normal baking tray as it is difficult to transfer otherwise once apples are on! Roll out a little thinner, prick pastry base to stop it puffing up. Make a little ridge around tart with your fingers, to make a crust. Put a few dots of soft butter on base. Layer apple slices in rows, overlapping slightly. Brush the butter etc onto the slices, saving some to brush on in middle of cooking. Sprinkle apples with caster sugar.
Bake for 10 mins, then brush on rest of butter. Cook for about another 10 minutes or until apples are golden brown. Allow to rest for about 10 mins. Serve with vanilla ice cream, or cream.

- Laura

Here’s the recipe:

• 125 self-raising flour
• salt, freshly ground black pepper
• 2 eggs, separated
• 150 ml milk

Put flour and a little seasoning in a bowl, and drop in the egg yolks. Add a little milk and whisk, gradually pouring in the remaining milk to make a paste. Whisk egg whites until peaking, and gently fold in paste to form a batter. Heat a thin foil of oil in a frying pan. Take a spoonful of batter and drop in the pan so it spreads to about 8cm in diameter. I could fry 3 scones at the same time in my frying pan, of course it depends on the size of your pan how many you can fit in at the same time. When golden flip over and cook for another minute or so. Keep warm while you prepare the rest (this recipe made me 10 scones).

For the topping, mix crème fraîche with fresh parsley and chives (chopped), and a bit of black pepper. Serve the scones with the crème fraîche, smoked salmon, and a squeeze of lemon.

Bon appétit!

xxx Esther

My husband Paul and I both work and we both share the childcare responsibilities. I do the menu planning and a big grocery trip once a week while he does the small trips through out the week. Our dinnertime happens about 7pm. Paul cooks dinner most of the time. But I do the prep work for dinner in the morning after breakfast. I hate that feeling late in the day of having to prepare dinner but you don’t have any food or ideas. So I eliminate it by preparing food in the morning. Then Paul just has to throw it together.
My kids are still small (2 and 4) but we try to all sit down for dinner together in the dining room. We don’t have any real rules but the kids have to at least try the main course to be polite. There are certain vegetables my kids love like fresh peas and haricot verts so we usually have a side of those and then make sure there is some sort of protein. One of the best things about France is the bread and cheese so we have a baguette and cheese with our dinner most nights. About once a week we do green smoothies. Our kids love them and it’s our last resort for getting vitamins in our kids when they are feeling picky. (Basic recipe is: 2 bananas, 1 cup of orange juice, ice, 1/2 cup plain yogurt, and two giant handfulls of baby green spinach and water as needed to blend.) Since we moved to France we don’t do take out very often but we do have regular easy meals like one night a week where we buy a rotisserie from our local butcher. And when the weather is nice we grab a pizza on Fridays and go to the park across the street from our house for a picnic. Besides that we eat lots of soups and bean and vegetable salads. I’m really inspired by 101 Cookbooks and Ottolenghi Cookbooks. I usually prepare a salad in the morning then we eat it for lunch or as a side dish for dinner. My favorite salad is this lentil salad. I make it 2-3 times a week. It’s so good, simple and fresh.

- Jordan

Dinnertimes for me, in our house are the most important time of the day. It is the time when we all catch up on each others days and also helps my children to take turns in conversations. With five children life can be incredibly chaotic, especially during the week with Brownies, Guides, orchestra practices and sports matches. However apart from Tuesdays we manage to eat as a family everyday, with the occasional exception. We eat between 6 and 6.30pm everyday, which may seem a little late as our youngest is only five but with a healthy snack after school to stop the tummy rumbles, Kitty is more than happy to wait to eat all together.

I am very lucky as my husband cooks the evening meal most days. He loves to cook so doesn’t see it as a chore but a way of contributing to the endless list of tasks that family life throws at us. Between us we seem to have developed a list of go to dinner recipes that feature regularly, but then we also like to try new ideas, which stop dinners being boring! Chicken with pasta, rice or noodles are definately a favourite and we are quite traditional in that we have a roast dinner most Sundays, with BBQs and salads being the favourite Sunday choice in the Summer months.

With a large family there always seems somebody willing to help with the cooking, even if it’s just chopping some veggies or stirring a pan of something. Sadly this keenness isn’t so obvious when it comes to laying the table or doing the washing up!
We have a large farmhouse style wooden dinner table that is the hub of mealtimes. This is where we sit, chat, play Around the World in an Alphabet, laugh and sometimes whine that ‘I don’t like this’. Mobile phones are banned from the dinner table, something that my teenage sons have as yet not moaned about. With technology a part of everyday life it is nice to remove the distraction of phones from family dinner times.
I believe family meal times are incredibly important in teaching children social skills and manners. The time at the dinner table is vital to keeping my children talking about their lives and us spending time together as a family.

Apple Crumble has to be my favourite pudding and I love that you can change the fruit as the seasons change. So I wanted to share this recipe with you!

• 200g Self Raising Flour
• 100g Butter or Soft Margerine
• 100g Caster Sugar
• 4-5 Bramley Cooking Apples
• 1-2 tbsp Light Muscavado Sugar for sprinkling on top of the apples
• 1tsp Ground Cinnamon

Preheat oven to 180C. Peel, core and slice apples into a pudding or small casserole dish. Sprinkle cinnamon and muscavado sugar onto apples. Rub butter into flour to make breadcrumbs, stir in caster sugar. Pour crumble topping evenly onto apples. Place your crumble into the oven for about 25-30 mins until crumble is golden brown. Serve with cream, ice-cream or crème fraîche.
I like to add little balls of marzipan to the apples or a couple of handfuls of raisin or sultanas or try replacing some of the flour with ground almonds. Apples can be replaced by more seasonal fruit throughout the year, rhubarb & ginger is one of my favourites.

- Zoe

Living in Southern California means we eat a lot of mexican food and when I’m a little rushed I turn to my go-to meal of quesadillas or molitas (recipe below), black beans and rice with a salad on the side. We mainly prepare vegetarian dishes at home and save the meat eating for dinners out.  We try and use whole grain tortillas such as ezekiel rather than flour tortillas as they have loads more fiber and protein. We sometimes have black beans with just a dash of cumin and salt in them for added flavor or i will make an avocado and black bean salad. A simple pear, strawberries or whatever is in season works for dessert!

We make it a point to feed Elodie the same food we are eating. She eats a wide variety of cuisines because of this and hasn’t really said no to anything just yet. Still, getting a toddler to eat at dinnertime can be quite challenging. Someone recently said told me, “It’s not what they eat in a day but what they eat in a week that counts” which has helped me to relax a bit but i’m still known to bribe her every once in a while!

Molitas

• 2 teaspoons vegetable oil (anything that can handle heat, like canola)
• pinch of kosher or sea salt
• 2 taco sized corn tortillas (2 for every molita)
• 1/4 cup grated Monterey Jack cheese
• 1/2 cup beans (refried, whole, or black beans)
• 1/2 cup fresh white corn (optional)
• 1/4 cup spanish rice

Heat a cast-iron skillet, flat griddle, or other frying pan over medium heat.
Sprinkle the cheese on one tortilla and top it with a 1 1/2 tablespoons each of rice, beans and corn.
Cover the bottom tortilla with the top one.
Brush one side with the oil and put that side down in the skillet, then brush the other side with oil.
Cook for several minutes on each side, until it is developing beautiful crispy brown spots.

Avocado Black Bean Salad

• 1 tablespoon lime juice or vinegar
• 1 1/2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 can (14–19 ounces) black beans, drained
• 1/4 green bell pepper, finely chopped
• 1 garlic clove, minced
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 1/2 teaspoons chopped cilantro
• 1 avocado (8 ounces), cubed
• ground black pepper optional

Place the lime juice or vinegar in a large bowl and gradually whisk in the oil. Stir in the beans, bell pepper, garlic, salt, and black pepper (if using). Taste and add more lime juice or vinegar if you like. Stir in the cilantro. Add cubes of avocado just before serving.

- Elizabeth

Ok…let me begin this by saying that when I was asked by Esther to guest post my dinnertime rituals, I was thrilled!! So that night, when pesto pasta was on the menu, the camera came out hoping I could get some great snapshots. The kids were enthusiastic to help. Fantastic, I thought, I should get some fab pictures! Then within the next 10 mintutes my son Noah smashed one of my favourite glasses after I’d told him to calm down for about the fifth time, one of the cats was sick over the kitchen floor and the pan of water cooking the pasta boiled over and put out the gas on the hob….which I hadn’t noticed!! I became monster mummy!!!! Aggghhhhhh!!! Of course it isn’t always like this, but some days it is…

Most days we have dinner together as a family at the dining room table, at around 5.30pm. That way I feel the kids have some time after to digest their food before the whole bed and bath routine begins. My husband doesn’t cook, so during the week it’s down to me, and usually I’ll try and cook something we all eat, although at times this can prove very hard! Some of our favourites are, of course pasta, (who doesn’t love it, adult or child!), chicken schnitzel with crispy potatoes, and we love a roast!
Sometimes the kids do help me to prepare dinner, although to be honest they are usually fairly tired from school and prefer to either watch a movie or do some drawing. We do bake together though when time is not such an issue.

Friday night is take out night, and it’s a real treat for the kids as we sit around the coffee table on big floor cushions in the lounge with the food laid out on the table for everyone to try. I think it’s a great way for the kids to taste new and different things that they wouldn’t maybe try if their food was served up for them on their plate.
At weekends we always eat out, usually a big lunch, so evening tea would be something like beans on toast or a good sausage sandwich.

As I mentioned before, one of our favourite meals is a roast which I usually cook on a Monday as over the weekend we’re usually out and about and we have no after school clubs that day. Yorkshire puddings have to be on the kids’ plates otherwise it’s more than my life’s worth! So here is my fail safe recipe for Yorkshire Pudding:

• 5 heaped tablespoons of plain flour
• 2 eggs
• pinch of salt
• Enough milk until the batter is the consistency of double cream

You can prepare this batter as far in advance in the day as you like!
Heat your oven to 200 degrees and place a muffin tin with a little oil into each compartment into the oven for about 10 mins….you need the oil to be really hot!!
In a large measuring jug (this makes it easier to pour into the hot tin) add the flour, make a well in the middle of the flour and add 2 eggs and a pinch of salt. Gently start to whisk this together then slowly add the milk until it’s the consistency of double cream. Bake for approximately 40-50 mins until huge and golden brown!!! Yum!

Sarah xxx

Here in France we have some great patisseries, from croissants to profiteroles. But sometimes there is nothing more delicious to eat with a good cup of tea, than a piece of shortbread. I think even the French would agree…

My friend Audrey and I have made it our mission to put together the perfect recipe and, over the last week, we have been taking turns at turning up at work with a box of  freshly baked shortbread. We have been accused of trying to sabotage people’s waistlines, which could not be further from the truth! Finding the perfect shortbread recipe is a serious endeavor, and sacrifices need to be made!

I find it particularly interesting how many variations there can be for a cookie that is made out of 4 main ingredients: butter, sugar, flour and a pinch of salt! Who knew? So here is our recipe, I would love to hear what your think about it, especially if there are some genuine Scots out there who might have some secret tips!

Shortbread:

• 100 g of white sugar
• 170 g of soft butter
• 200 g of flour
• 100 g of rice flour
• 1 pinch of salt

Mix together the sugar, salt and the butter until the mixture colour and becomes pale yellow. In a separate bowl, mix the flour and the rice flour and add it to the butter/ sugar mix. Mix it until if becomes a big round ball. Wrap the ball in cellophane and let it cool in the fridge for at least 1 hour. Pre-heat the oven to 160° Celsius.  Roll out the dough to make a rough square and cut the dough into fingers. They should be about 5mm thick. Prick them a couple of times with a fork and bake until barely golden. Sprinkle with a bit of extra sugar. By the way you can replace the rice flour with normal flour, it just gives the cookie an extra bit of crunch.

- Emilie

Even being a trained chef, I find dinner time to feel like a battle: me versus the gastronomic enemies ahead. At one meal I have to think about a meat-loving husband, a vegetable-despising child, and a veggie me – all while caring for a newborn baby! At times, I like to imagine what we look like as I’m preparing dinner (picture it: child running around in a tutu while the baby cries and I’m cooking and rocking the stroller with my back side!) and I just have to laugh and give in. I think if you give into the chaos and not try and fight it (ie – control it like I think we want to do) then it works out better and you might even have fun.

My husband gets home late so that means all meal prep is left to me alone with the kids. Luckily my daughter is getting old enough that she likes to help so that takes care of one child’s attention needs! I try and get her involved so that her dislike of veggies disappears and she learns to at least try all foods because she can see where things come from (look! Red sauce is actually made from tomatoes!). We have a cozy corner bench at a small kitchen table where we eat our meals so it’s not too much back/forth for me. I usually try and feed the first dish (lunch is vegetarian so dinner time is non-vegetarian for those who want it) around 6-6:30 and then we all usually eat as a family together around 7:00. That goes for most days of the week, unless of course we’ve managed to sneak a nap in that day then we all have a bit more energy and our eating/sleeping schedule gets pushed back a bit.

We were always pretty relaxed with our daughter at the table and that’s translated not so well as she gets older. I’m being honest! She’s getting better at sitting at the table, finishing her meal and then getting down once she’s finished, but it’s still a struggle. The foundation has been laid now it’s just about us parents following through!

Training as a chef was probably the best investment of time/money I ever made. Even though I don’t do it professionally anymore, it’s the schooling I use most often daily! I cook all the meals myself as I’ve rendered my husband utterly useless in the kitchen. We try to give me a break at least once a week and either order in (I’m from NYC where, if we had had our kids, we would be ordering in A LOT more!) or we go to a restaurant on the weekends during the day. Having a new baby kind of limits the “going out” possibility as no one wants to sit next to a wailing baby at dinner!

We’re not only a blend of nationalities, but of palettes as well — my husband is Argentinian (which means MEAT MEAT and more MEAT!), me being a vegan (I like to say veggie because it’s less threatening to most people) and our daughter who is the pickiest eater EVER. Despite the fact that my husband and I had many disagreements about what we wanted to or should eat, we came together once we became a family and we eat about 80% veg, and the other 20% there’s dairy and meat for those that want it. It’s worked really well as we wanted to expose our kids to everything and let them make their own choices later (if they want to become veggie, etc). We do our best to make sure the kids eat organically, using whole foods from local ingredients whenever possible. Even though it sounds strict and regimented, we try and keep eating light and fun, even if it’s in a cupcake with bright blue icing as the occasional treat. It’s all about balance and moderation (and keeping it REAL!)

Since we all eat very different things (vegetarian, picky eaters, meat-lovers), I’ve had to become really creative with the good old stand-by’s that I can whip up and I know everyone will enjoy. I try to make sure that each meal has the same components: a protein, a vegetable, and a whole grain. This is a pretty simple way of planning out your meals, and once you get the hang of it, you realize that it leaves you feeling very satisfied and not craving anything afterwards. Except for something sweet maybe to balance it out! We don’t have a lot of dessert after dinner, but we have been known to use the “blackmail” trick with our daughter by enticing her with a cookie or piece of chocolate if she does a good job with her meal.

Our meals are based on whole foods as much as possible. We eat about 90% organic, most of which is suitable for a vegetarian diet. I find that people, even if they’re not vegetarian, are always eager to learn new veggie recipes because it’s good for their health, good for their wallet (it’s cheaper to be veg for sure!) and good for the animals.

In this recipe here I share how to make homemade falafel, which is actually much easier than it sounds. The most important part is that you buy dried chickpeas and soak them yourself, but then that gives you the opportunity to learn to use chickpeas in many different dishes – so you can use those extra chickpeas for things like – hummus, a chickpea curry, a soup, or roast them for snacking. The possibilities are endless and the cost is just the bag of the chickpeas!
The prep is quite easy, but you just have to plan ahead. I like to make the mix the night before with my daughter so that the following day we can just fry them up and get to noshing! We like to eat the falafel with fresh pita or flatbreads, a simple cucumber and tomato salad dressed with lemon juice and olive oil, hummus (store bought is good too!) and an easy sauce that you’ve probably had already had with falafel: tahina sauce. It can easily be prepared with tahina paste (ground sesame paste, think of it as the sesame version of peanut butter), lemon juice, salt and water – you just mix the ingredients until you have a consistency of a smooth dipping sauce. I like to keep it tasty with a kick of grated garlic and chopped cilantro, but that’s not to everyone’s liking. Once you get the hang of making this dish, the possibilities are really endless (try different beans, herbs, new sauces, etc)

Falafel (makes about 20 balls)

• about 2c soaked (not cooked!) chickpeas
• 1/2 large onion, cut in quarters
• 4 tablespoons (ea.) parsley and cilantro
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 – 1 teaspoon dried hot red pepper flakes
• 4 cloves garlic
• 1 teaspoon cumin
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 4-6 tablespoons flour or bulgur
• oil for frying

Place drained, washed, uncooked chickpeas and the onions into the food processor. Add the cilantro, parsley, salt, dried red pepper flakes, garlic, and cumin. Process until blended and chopped but not pureed.

Remove the mixture from the food processor and place in a bowl. Mix the baking powder, flour and bulgur (if using) until the mixture no longer sticks to your hands, but begins to bind to itself. Cover the bowl well with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least an hour (or left overnight is fine too).

Take out the mixture from the refrigerator after it has rested, and form the mixture into small balls, the size of large walnuts. Do not squeeze the balls too hard, just form them with your hands and gently squeeze your hands around them. If they do not stick together well, add more bulgur or flour.

Heat about 3cm/1” of oil in a deep pot or wok and test the oil to make sure it is hot enough. When ready, add the balls, once by one, in a clockwise or counter-clockwise direction, so that you can take care to flip and remove the balls once they are fully cooked and browned. Drain on paper towels and serve.

Joslyn
xxx

Here’s the recipe for 16 buns!

Hot Cross Buns:

• 375 ml milk
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• 1 tablespoon butter
• 2 teaspoons active yeast
• 565 grams flour
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon mixed spice
• 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 2 teaspoons sugar
• 3/4 cup sultanas
• 3/4 cup currants
• 1/4 cup chopped mixed peel

Crosses:

• 63 grams flour
• 6 tablespoons water

Glaze:

• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 1 teaspoon gelatine
• 1 tablespoon water

Heat the milk until almost boiling. Stir in first measure of sugar and butter until butter melts. Set aside until lukewarm. Sprinkle yeast over and leave in a warm place for 15 mintues or until frothy.  Combine 500 grams of the flour, salt, cinnamon, mixed spice and nutmeg in a bowl.  Stir in second measure of sugar.  Make a well in the centre of the dry ingredients.  Pour yeast mixture in. Beat to a soft dough, adding more flour if the dough is sticky.  Mix in sultanas, currants and mixed peel.  Turn onto a lightly floured board.  Knead until smooth and elastic or until dough springs back when lightly touched.  Lightly brush bowl with oil. Place dough in bowl. Brush top with oil. Cover and leave in a warm place until double in size.  Punch dough down in the centre and knead lightly.  Divide mixture into 16 even-sized pieces. Shape into balls. Place buns 2cm apart on a greased oven tray. Cover and leave in a warm place until double in size.  Pipe crosses on each bun.  Bake at 200 degrees celsius for 20 minutes or until golden. Remove from oven and brush with glaze. Cool on a wire rack.

Crosses:  Mix flour and water together until smooth and able to be piped.  More water may be needed.  Place mixture into a small plastic bag. Snip across one corner to form a hole for piping.  Twist top of bag to hold dough firm, and squeeze to pipe.

Glaze:  Put all ingredients in a saucepan. Heat until sugar and gelatine have dissolved, stirring constantly.

(Recipe from The Edmonds Cookery Book)

Steph xo

On the weekdays, I usually pick the kids up from daycare around 5PM and by the time we walk home it’s usually 5:30PM, so while the kids play I try to cook some dinner, it has to be something relatively easy and quick. My kids have a snack at school around 3:30 and they get pretty hungry around 6PM. My husband doesn’t get home until 6:45, so usually by the time we start eating, the kids are having their desert. Thursdays, it’s just the kids and me, so I try to make something they really enjoy, like pasta or grilled cheese. Fridays we alternate and eat at my mom’s or my in-laws and finally, the weekends are pretty chill, we sometimes eat out, order in, eat leftovers or frozen pizzas and sometimes I’ll make crepes.

My daughter is a “snacker”, she would rather eat a little all day while standing up (don’t ask!), and she could live on bread and butter, cheese and ice cream! She doesn’t like pizza, she doesn’t love pasta and I need to cut her grilled cheese in cute shapes, like a bunny for her to eat it, she has just started to eat meat and some chicken, but at least she likes fish. One meal both my kids enjoy is toasted bagels with cream cheese and smoked salmon, and I usually serve that with some fresh veggies and avocado.

My son on the other hand could eat pasta every night… He enjoys beef fajitas, pizza, grilled cheese and any type of raw vegetable; fish on the other hand he has a hard time with. If the kids want dessert, which usually consists of yogurt, applesauce or some type of berries, then they must eat a little and try at least one bite of whatever is on their plate. Dessert is always a great motivation or bargaining tool in my home!

The one meal the whole family can agree on is Spinach Quiche. This is pretty easy to make and you can substitute the spinach for so many different ingrdients such as mushrooms, asparagus, ham, olives… The kids will have some veggies with their quiche and us grown-ups will have a tomato and mozarella salad or a green salad of some sort.

Here’s my QUICHE recipe…

-Celina

I have just discovered Lunchbots! Do you know them yet? They’re little stainless steel food containers which are completely BPA-free and eco friendly and eliminate the need for plastic baggies and other waste. They come in different sizes and with different divisions, so they’re handy for littler snacks or for a bigger meal.  Great for inside lunch boxes, for after school snacks, for car rides or airplane journeys, etc. And the best part is that they’re dishwasher safe, so easy to clean! They’re  available in the UK from Little Acorns To Mighty Oaks.

-Courtney

Dinner is usually fuss free in our house. I don’t spend a lot of time preparing dinner and we mostly eat homemade food. If we have take-away we would buy fish and chips. My husband makes a mean pizza which is far better than a take-away pizza so if we feel like pizza we would have homemade. Eating out in New Zealand is expensive so for us we only eat out for special occasions. I have no problem with taking the kids to a restaurant though as we would often take them out when we lived in Holland and they are well behaved (most of the time!).

We are quite strict on manners at the table and the kids have to ask to leave the table. They also have to eat everything on their plate. Unless they really don’t like it and they have at least tried it. My daughter will eat pretty much anything (except lettuce!) but my son is a bit more picky. He is getting better the older he gets though. If they don’t eat much dinner they know there is no more food until the morning. The kids usually have plain unsweetened yoghurt with chocolate sprinkles for dessert. In the weekends we may have ice-cream as a treat.

In the summer I love to have salad for dinner with chicken or prawns on top. As the kids don’t like salad I would steam vegetables for them to go with the prawns or chicken and we would have a thick slice of bread on the side. At the moment I am loving prawn salad with a lime coriander chilli dressing. I just use whatever salad ingredients I have in the fridge. I added a nectarine to it the other week and it was amazing. Here is the recipe for the dressing:

• zest and juice of 2 small limes (our rental house came with a lime tree in the backyard, yay!)
• teaspoon chilli paste
• 2 teaspoons coriander paste
• 1cm grated ginger
• 1 spring onion finely chopped
• 1 teaspoon brown sugar

Mix all the ingredients together and add more lime juice or lemon juice to get the right consistency.

Sushi is a family favourite in our house.  I wrote about it here. I would have to say though that the most eaten meal in our house due to the quick preparation time is spagetti bolognese!

Stephxo

As I work full time, I only pick the kids up from school at 6pm, so it is a mad rush getting home, getting a meal ready, doing homework, squeezing in a bath and a bedtime story. I try to pre-cook at least 3 meals during the weekend, so I don’t have to think when I get home during the week. Big favorites are lasagne (a simplified variation on this one) and shepherd’s pie (with as many vegetables squeezed in as possible) and all sorts of soups (from vegetable to chicken noodle) — basically dishes which can be easily re-heated. I also often pre-make some pasta sauces in big batches and freeze them.

A BIG treat is crepes: the girls get the toppings ready while I make the batter and everyone is allowed to put together their own concoctions. Last time we did it, Violette insisted on a houmous and tomato crepe…. who can argue with that? I think I it is even possible to pre-make to batter the night before but I have never tried this! I do usually serve up a grated carrot salad first, as there is very little interest in vegetables once the crepes are ready. I do think that kids will survive if they don’t always get a freshly cooked meal made from scratch. Scrabbled eggs with toast and a salad is totally ok, too. The girls are given a fairly healthy 3 course meal for school lunch here in France, so I feel that dinner can be simpler.

We usually eat in the kitchen and I do insist on the girls sitting down properly and eating without getting up and down — it is such a good way of finding out how their day went! The girls are getting very good at setting the table and stacking the dishwasher after dinner. The table does always look a bit rock’n roll after they have set it, but, as they say, Rome was not built in a day.

Friday nights are our favorite nights, as I try to make it into a film night, with pizza (delivery), popcorn, ice cream and a movie we all like. We put blankets and cushions on the floor and a cheeky glass of red wine for me is mandatory. The girls get to stay up a little bit later and it is so cozy to relax and ease into the weekend.

Here is one of my favourite recipes for a chicken and broccoli stirfry that I can prepare the night before and then cook up in about 15 mins when we get back home. It so easy and delicious.

You will need:

• a small head of broccoli
• 2 small chicken breasts
• 1 egg
• 200 gr of egg noodles

And for the marinade: lime juice, soy sauce, fish sauce, garlic, 1 shallot, a pinch of sugar and anything else you fancy (coriander, chilli..)

In the evening I make a marinade out lime juice, soy sauce, fish sauce and pinch of sugar, a chopped échalotte and a crushed garlic clove. Then I cube some chicken breasts and add them to the marinade. I cover the bowl and stick it in the fridge over night and until the next evening when I get home. When I get home I quickly soak some noodles in boiling water. I then just need to put the marinated chicken into a wok with the sauce and start frying it up. While it is cooking, I wash and chop up a head of broccoli and stir-fry it with the chicken. Finally, I add in the noodles and for a finishing touch pour over it a whipped egg, to slightly blend all the ingredients together. It literally takes me 15 minutes from the moment I arrive through the door to the moment dinner is on the table! (It is a hectic 15 mins, I admit).

During the week, I usually make the kids their dinner and serve it to them around 6ish. I usually give them a bath before dinner, so they eat dinner in their pyjamas (see photo), and then when my husband comes home around 7pm, he can read them a book and put them to bed. I usually make something simple for them or I give them the left-overs from our dinner the night before. My kids are pretty good eaters, although there are some meals which go down better than others (pasta is usually a winner). After dinner I usually let the kids have a little square of chocolate if they’ve eaten their dinner. We’re not big dessert people, but we do like our chocolate!

On the weekends, my husband usually makes all the meals (so nice!) and we eat together as a family. Weekend dinners are more enjoyable because there’s no time pressure or strict bed times, and everyone is more relaxed in general (although it still requires lots of patience and loads of encouragement to eat their meals!).

My husband often makes pizza on the weekends and it’s always a popular dinner. He usually makes one pizza with olives and anchovies, and another one with buffalo mozzarella and tomatoes. The kids help put the toppings on (sneaking olives and cheese of course!), and then we all sit down to eat it once it’s come out of the oven. It’s my favourite meal of the week!

Our pizza dough recipe comes from Jim Lahey’s My Bread cookbook. We’ve tried several different dough recipes but this is our favourite. Here’s the recipe for two balls of dough (enough for two separate pizzas):

• 3 3/4 cups flour
• 2 1/2 teaspoons instant or other active dry yeast
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 teaspoon sugar
• 1 1/3 cup room-temperature water

In a medium bowl, stir together the flour, yeast, salt, and sugar. Add the water and, using a wooden spoon or your hand, mix until blended, at least 30 seconds. The dough will be stiff, not wet and sticky. Cover the bowl and let sit at room temperature until the dough has more than doubled in volume, about 2 hours. Remove the dough from the bowl onto a floured surface and gently form into a ball then divide the dough into two halves, spacing them 4 inches apart, and cover both with a moistened kitchen towel for 30 minutes.

When you are ready to make your pizza, preheat oven to 500°F and then roll out each ball of dough onto a rectangular, oiled cookie sheet. Then add toppings! (We usually put the tomato sauce onto the dough and cook for about 20 minutes before adding our toppings and cooking a bit more.)

x Courtney

Because I work full-time and often don’t start cooking until 5.30 or 6 pm, I usually cook something within an hour, or even half an hour. But since my work is fairly flexible, on occasions I am able to prepare dinner beforehand and I can make more time-consuming dishes. Sometimes I’ve had such a crazy day and I’m un-inspired to cook, and we order in: usually pizza, Thai food, or sushi (our favourite!). Or we prepare an easy dinner like cheese fondue (exception to the homemade rule: this comes from a package — always handy to keep in the fridge for an easy and quick dinner that we all love). On weekends, we occasionally take the kids to a restaurant, a treat!

Sometimes I cook a bit extra, because once a week my husband and I have date night — we go out for dinner together and Katherina feeds the kids and puts them to bed. To make her job easier I try to have a dish ready in the fridge! My husband and I have been going out for dinner once a week since our first child was born almost 7 years ago. We’ve been religiously doing this, and we both love it. It’s the one night where we are not surrounded by children (or laptops!).

I’m adamant about my kids being good eaters; I teach them to sit at their chairs during dinner, eat properly, finish their plates, etc. I do feel like Anita Renfroe’s ‘the mom song‘, and it’s not at all my favourite part of being a mum (and pretty exhausting), but I think good table manners are important. We usually discuss our day at the table — What did you learn today? Did you have a good laugh? Have you been sad at any point??
We only have one table in the house and it’s in our living room. It’s pretty big, and usually one part of it is taken up by my sewing machine, piles of paperwork, toys from the kids etc. I guess this is a serious ‘clutter zone’ (and it frustrates me majorly but that’s a different story).

My kitchen is tiny. I’m not kidding when I say that the counter space I can work on is limited to about 60 cms wide (2 feet)! To make the most of the space we have, we put a lot of pots and pans on the wall, which I actually like, it’s cosy! (You can see photos of our kitchen here.)

What I cook during the week varies since I’m dependant on what ‘De Krat’ brings me. Every friday, I get a surprise selection of seasonal, organic fruit and vegetables and some meat and/or fish, bread, cheese etc. I tend to make everything myself — I try not to buy prepared / processed food too much.

Last week we had on the menu:

- Wiener schnitzel (breaded veal escalope) with homemade fries and coleslaw.

- Grilled salmon, gnocchi, oven-fried kale chips, steamed broccoli and salade Caprese (made by Sara)

- Hamburgers with toppings to choose from, homemade pickles, and salad

- Penne with an as-many-as-possible-vegetables sauce, covered with courgette and cheese gratin; green salad. (I made loads so the kids and Katherina ate it as well when we were away for date night)

- Moroccan chicken with chickpeas and apple/cranberry sauce

- Mash of potatoes, homemade sauerkraut, bananas, sultanas and minced meat. (Sounds weird but it’s really delicious!)

I rarely make a dessert, or a starter — I try to keep dinner time fairly short as the kids need to be in bed before 8 pm. But I always have yoghurt with fruit for takers.

In summer, we eat in the garden as much as possible, and we use the BBQ a lot. We have a gas BBQ, which I know for a lot of people doesn’t count as ‘the real thing’, but I love that I can just turn it on and use it to grill fish, veggies, and the occasional sausage. Because we eat seasonally, a typical menu for the week would look completely different in summer than the one I just described!

Lastly, I wanted to share the recipe for the coleslaw I made with the Wiener Schnitzel (recipe found here). With all the cabbage I get in my ‘Krat’ these days, this is a recipe that I use all the time!

• 1 small cabbage, shredded or cut in very thin slices (I used a mix of white and red cabbage)
• 1 red onion, diced
• 2 grated carrots
• 2 stalks celery, in fine slices
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 cup white wine vinegar
• 3/4 cup olive oil
• 1 tablespoon salt
• 1 tablespoon mustard
• black pepper to taste

In a large bowl, combine cabbage, onion, carrots, and celery. Sprinkle with 1 cup sugar, and mix well. In a small saucepan, combine vinegar, oil, salt, mustard, and pepper. Bring to a boil. Pour hot dressing over cabbage mixture, and mix well. Enjoy when cooled down.

Bon Appetite!

xxx Esther

Lately I have been using juice and smoothies as a way to get my daughter the extra nutrients she might be missing from her meals. She’s sometimes dubious of the green juice but if I add a striped paper straw she’ll usually drink it right down! Here are some of our favourite recipes…

Simple Green Smoothie/Juice:

-add a handful of spinach to 125 ml of pineapple juice
-2 ice cubes
-blend

(If your child likes kale you can use that, but blend it really well!)

Coconut/Pineapple Shake:

-a handful of pineapple (fresh or frozen)
-almond milk (soy or cow’s also works)
-2 teaspoons shredded coconut
-1 tsp flax seed oil
-¼ of a banana or avocado
-2 ice cubes

(You can also add coconut water if this is too thick from the avocado.)

Almond Butter/Date Smoothie:

-one tbsp almond butter
-almond milk (soy or cow’s also works)
-2 dates
-1 tsp flax seed oil
-½ of a banana
-2 ice cubes

I’d love to hear some of your favorite smoothies and juices!

-Elizabeth

We’re currently enjoying a few days in Germany (in a little village called Diemelsee, very pretty!), and on the menu each morning is something called ‘Bircher Muesli’. Such a coincidence, as last week I spotted the same dish in my Sophie Dahl cookbook, Miss Dahl’s Voluptuous Delights, which by the way I can recommend — it has some great recipes, all organised by season and meal (breakfast / lunch / dinner). It’s available through Amazon (UK or US). Anyway, my eye was caught by her recipe of Bircher Muesli and since my husband had just made a fresh batch of homemade yoghurt we thought we’d give it a go. The principle behind Bircher Muesli is easy: you just stir together porridge oats with yoghurt, grated apple and some nuts and dried fruit, and leave it to chill overnight so the oats completely absorb the yoghurt and get nice and soggy, and the fruit is plump and swollen. The next morning you can just add some fresh fruit, honey or jam and enjoy a super healthy breakfast!

Here’s a rough how-to for 4 people, but you can totally vary!
Mix together:

Cover and place in the fridge. Leave overnight. Next morning, serve for breakfast with toppings like extra yoghurt, extra flaxseed, honey, and fresh seasonal fruit like banana, berries, melon, grapes, whatever you have. Or just some jam!

Bon Appetite!
xxx Esther

xxx Esther

PS The company delivering the organic box in Amsterdam is ‘De Krat‘, and in London I liked Abel&Cole.
PPS Cabbage recipe suggestions are very welcome!

My kids don’t need any prodding when it comes to eating fruit. They LOVE it! But when I made up these little apple cars after school yesterday, they went absolutely crazy for them. After gobbling them up, they insisted they make their own… so it ended up being a fun activity which took up a large portion of the afternoon. My kids were so impressed when they realised the cars actually go — the wheels (grapes) actually turn! Fun!

(This was another idea I spotted on Pinterest. I’m telling you — that site is soooo great!)

x Courtney