RECIPES & FOOD TIPS

Thank you for your support for a 'recipes' section. You can now put all your favourite recipes and helpful ideas under this heading, as well as trying out other people's new recipes that appeal to your individual taste.

Don't forget Dr Joshi's 'competition' where 8 contributors will be 'drawn out of a hat' to form a tasting committee when the recipes will be graded. The Mouth Cancer Foundation will sponsor the event (with an MCF T-shirt going to any non-UK winner)...see his previous post!

Happy cooking/eating and especially contributing below!

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Brenda Brady,

Sweet Potato Soup

4 med carrots, 2 large sweet potatoes, 2 regular potatoes,1 onion, 2 parsnips, 1 med butternut squash (optional unless you have super-strong wrist as hard as h*** to chop!)Peel and chop vegetables, cook in large pan with plenty of water and a veg. stock cube, garlic to taste. Cook (boil or steam)until tender. Put into blender and whizz until smooth. Swirl in some cream or creme fraiche.

There should be enough for more than one portion (depending how hungry you are) so freeze the rest.

For those of you who prefer a 'chunky' soup just blend half and mash or chop the remainder and mix together...enjoy!

Spinach Saute

Melt some butter ( about 2 TB) in a frying pan at about medium to low heat. Throw in some chopped garlic (a Tb or more, depending on taste, when the garlic has browned or softened add about 8 ounces (I don't measure - maybe 2 handfuls of fresh spinach. When spinach is starting to wilt, add some grated parmesan, romano or asiago, stir together and serve soon. Add salt as you want. Pepper is optional - I can't use it right now.

Here are two very easy to prepare desserts which slide down!

Ice cream with berry sauce
Put an assortment of fruits (strawberries, blackberries, blueberries etc into a saucepan on a very low heat - be careful not to burn them - no water needed as their natural juices will suffice. Once they are soft, blend down to thick sauce. Pour hot sauce over ice-cream. The tartiness goes well with the sweetness of the ice-cream but if you have a 'sweet tooth' you might want to add a bit of brown sugar to the sauce. The sauce should keep in fridge for a day or so, or freeze it.

Easy peasy mousse
Blend a punnet of raspberries with a carton of marscapone cheese, leave to set in pretty glass dishes, top with a blob of cream, a raspberry and mint leaf (if you have one!)

All my recipes are meant to be easy to swallow, as I cannot chew, so over to you to provide different types of ideas, plus I'm sure you are getting bored of seeing my face!

(Hello Teri - you popped in when I wasn't looking!)

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Brenda Brady,

Further to Brendas recipe for soup, I made up something similar but try adding some bacon as well - adds a bit of protein!!

I've just discovered that bananas and cherry together is really nice whizzed up with greek yoghurt.

Rosie

Hi Brenda; here's one you might like. (I leave out the jalapeno and pepper as I can't handle it now - too spicy) This freezes well also.

Avocado Soup

4 ripe avocados
1 jalapeno pepper, seeded and chopped
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 Tbsp. lime juice
1/4 Cup sherry
3 cups chicken broth
1 & 1/2 cups heavy cream
Salt and pepper to taste.

Combine avocados, jalapeno, garlic, lime juice, sherry, and chicken broth in a blender and puree. Stir in cream and add salt and pepper. Chill until ready to serve.

Emerald Green Soup

1 head of celery
3 med courgettes (zucini)
2 leeks
1 onion
2 oz butter
2 pints veg or chicken stock
salt and pepper to taste

Melt butter in large pan - add finely chopped veg and "sweat" for 10 mins. Add stock and small amount of salt and pepper; bring to boil and simmer for 30-40 mins until veg is soft. Liquidise.


+++++++++

Damson Fool

12oz damsons
sugar and water
8 fluid ounces custard
2/3 large tablsppons Greek yogurt

Stew damsons for 5 to 6 mins in a little water with sufficient sugar to ensure sweetness. Put through a fine sieve over bowl, using wooden spoon, until only stones remain in the sieve. Make custard with 8oz milk and when cooled and thickened add to sieved damson mixture. Add Greek yogurt. Put in blender until completely smooth. Serve with cream.

Avocados

Are a great source of goodness. I wizz them in with most of my pureed meals which makes the consistency more smooth and taste more creamy!

Short Cuts

If you can't be bothered to make soup yet want something of that consistency just put whatever you fancy as a sandwich (or whatever)into the blender and add a 'made-up cuppa soup', wizz until smooth (add half an avocado if you like) heat in pan or microwave. Then you have had a 'proper' lunch without having to chew! I do this with salad/salmon/tuna - anything that's not too fibrous.

Roasted Garlic Soup

4 heads garlic
2 small onions or 1 onion & 4 leeks (white parts only, chopped
4 cups chicken broth or veggie broth
1 cup heavy cream
lemon juice
1/3 cup sherry or dry white wine
butter
flour

Cut off the cloves of garlic in each head; drizzle or spray with olive oil; bake in an oven at 350 degrees for about 50 minutes or until golden and soft.
Meanwhile saute the onions and/or leeks in the butter until soft or browned. Add about 6 tablespoons of flour and cook for awhile ( 5 minutes)stirring. Add the broth and bring to a simmer. Add the garlic as it is can be handled as it it cools. Add the sherry. Cook for about 20 minutes; Let cool; then puree; add the cream and lemon juice to taste, reheat in the pan freezes well.

SWEET TREATS

Ok this is not a recipe, but it's as I think of them SWEET TREATS. Before my treatment I loved sweets, esepcially boiled sweets and chewy sweets. I was never a great chocolate lover, but I like milk choc now. I used to like white choc, but no longer like it at all. It just feels like neat fat - which it is.

It's all so weird. At first any chocolate was clutchy and trying just one was enough for a run to the bin to spit it out. My first success was with a Flake bar. Forget anything too hard and too heavy. It sticks.

The main thing with sweets is that you must have fluid nearby and I find tea or hot chocolate is the best to help soften and wash the sweets down away. It just feels so normal to be able to eat a sweetie.

The first sweets I managed were mint chocolate matchsticks dipped in tea. Orange ones are also ok. Next were the jelly fruits you can get and Fry's Turkish Delight - can you tell it was near Xmas. The fine chocolate coating was tolerable. In the beginning I could only manage one half of a turkish delight bar or less, perhaps just 2 bites. Cutting it with a knife into small squares also works well. (Again all washed down with tea)

Ok try small sweets.

Yes sweets for tots. I like various jelly sweets made for children that are smaller than your pinky nail. Marks do great ones. Investigate sweets for children for yourself. The thing that is great is that the bags are also tot size so you can try several types without waste. Very soft jelly gums work well and some wine gums in certain brands work too. Not all brands work so it is trial and error.

I used to love hard caramels. Unbelievable hard work post rads and I have given up on them forever - the caramel or toffee sweets never go anywhere. I suggest the softest caramel alternatives - fudge and curly wurlies kept at room temperature so they are softer. You can eat them easily if you soften them in tea or cut them up with a scissors into tiny bits.

Very small fudge bars are also ok and as the years have passed I have moved onto liquorice which is interesting taste wise - not quite as before, but interesting.

Sweets really need to stretch easily. So hard candy is out and I now find myself going for all the soft centres I once left alone in favour of the toffees.

Whilst sweets are far from the perfect nutrition, the iron in the chocolate is useful when you don't eat meat anymore and the normality of havinga few sweet treats just like others do when you watch tv is good for your mental health!
Will add a recipe soon Brenda.
Will post a recipe soon.

Hi Pauline, good to read your post on sweets, I too used to have a sweet tooth and my favourites were jelly babies. Also I loved cake, chocolate swiss roll - yum yum! I now find it difficult to eat anything dry, like you have to have tea with everything - also horlicks works well. I now make some instatnt custard and have with jam swiss roll - that's nice.

Yes boiled sweets and toffees are out, but try the M&S creme caramel it's gorgeous.

Good to talk

Love Rosie

Yes some of the desserts in Marks are very good. In the early days after rads pannecotte from there was successful. Although now I have to avoid the calories and cannot smother everything with double cream or even single cream as I used to.

I think the whole thing relates to people contantly experimenting and trying new foods, but maybe leaving a few weeks before trying a food item again. I agree the creme caramel will be easy for many people to get down.

You say Rosie you loved swiss roll. Well I regularly but Marks fresh cream chocloate roulade and find it goes down well as does the one by Morrisons. Try to find one that has along date so its softer. After 1 or 2 slices I slice and freeze the rest. Of course fluid is still essential.

You know I can't be brief!

Blueberry Scone Buns from Pauline Thomas

These are great for those who can manage some light cakes like muffins with a tea or coffee. My husband loves them too. If you are recently out of radiotherapy I can tell you I did manage scones early on even though regular cake was more of a problem. For ages I only managed a half a small ordinary scone and only very slowly with 2 cups of fluid. Now 4 years on I can manage one of these with just half a cup of tea.

Most fruits were too acid on my mouth for ages, but cooked blueberries were ok. This recipe is based on a scone mix, but because of the blueberries (which can burst) I bake them as little buns in fairy cake size paper cases. The blueberries also help make the mixture moist as they let off steam during cooking which takes longer to bake than normal scones because of this. They also make the raw berry taste much better when it is cooked.
I had tried them using a standard all in one cake recipe, but found the cake mixture taste too dominant and the blueberries would sink and I never seemed to taste the blueberries the same. In this mix the flavour of the blueberries are more dominant as the scone mix is blander than cake. It’s also lower fat for those like my husband who like treats, but control gallstones by diet.

The buns are cooked and cooled in the cases and this means the sides don’t dry out too much like on a regular scone. I also find I can eat one more easily as the burst of blueberry when you eat it also gives a welcome little burst of liquid – always a help for those with poor saliva.

Blueberry Scone Buns
Heat oven to 210 degrees Centigrade. Bake 16 or 17 minutes. Check at 15 minutes.
This recipe quantity make 8.
Lay 8 double layer paper cases in a patty tin.

Ingredients

6 ounces of self raising flour,
2 ounces of caster sugar
1.5 ounce of room temperature butter or Flora
150 gram pack of blueberries. (This is 1 cup of berries)

5 tablespoons of skimmed milk. (This is 2 fluid ounces of milk)

Keep aside an extra tablespoon of flour for rolling and getting the texture just so.

Method
Use fork or fingers to rub the fat into the flour and caster sugar. Drop in the blueberries and mix them round gently with hand. Add 4 tablespoons of the milk. Now use a spoon to gently draw the mixture together. You do need to be careful here when mixing and you’ll find a spoon better than a knife if you can use it gently to stop the blueberries breaking. Even if you are careful a few blueberries will probably split.

Add another spoon of milk and you should have a soft dough. You may find adding a teaspoon or two of extra flour helps to create the perfect dough dependant on the flour gluten content.

Divide the mixture roughly into 8 even bits of dough. Just shape them lightly into balls by rolling them on a floured surface. It's best not to use a scone cutter as that just splits the blueberries even more. The balls of dough can be quite uneven. Drop them into the paper cases.
Bake in an oven at 210 degrees Centigrade. Bake 16 or 17 minutes. Check at 15 minutes. Leave to cool in the paper cases.

Sadly I made 8 of these this morning and we now only have 4 left. By accident they were baked at 200 deg instead for 17 mins and I liked them just as much as they were very moist. Husband said he found them less crumbly and they were less browned. Maybe you should experiment with temperatures and your oven.

Being low fat, scones don’t keep long, but these do seem to stay moist a whole day. Generally I freeze the remains within hours. These buns freeze well and I can defrost one from frozen in about 35 seconds in my 900 watt microwave or of course just let it defrost naturally.

I have just found a new product - Lyle's Golden Spread (Spreadable). I can't eat jams, because of the acidity of the fruit, so this means that I can add a bit of sweetness to my morning toast.

Fruit Smoothie

I couldn't think what to have as a 'pudding' tonight so threw a whole load of stuff in the blender and it turned out quite nice;

a handful of blueberries
one peeled and cored pear
two dollops of greek yogurt
a few scoops of different flavoured ice-cream

Whizz in the blender until smooth - it slides down a treat! (makes enough for two helpings) Any fruit would do.