Vegie Smugglers

Because we all feed our kids sausages

June 30, 2011 · Filed under All recipes, Food experiences, Ham/pork · Tagged feeding the family, recipe, vegetables

Perhaps you’re a bit posh and they’re lamb & mint, garlic and beef or the good old mystery-meat-who-cares-just-chuck-them-on-the-bbq variety, but chances are your kids eat sausages. Up to 70% of Australian households eat them once a week (or so says a highly credible internet post) including mine. They are Mr Meat & Potatoes’ favourite dish.

I’ve got no great problem with this. I like everything in moderation, including my health food and my junk food. And it’s because I cram as many vegies into the kids as I can most of the time, that I’m not too fussed when they like to eat something for enjoyment rather than nutrition.

But a plain banger on a plate can be a little boring, so here’s my suggestion for a top-aussie bastardised dish that combines the lure of a chopped-up sausage with some vegies and rice. Make it Jasmine rice. Even though it’s the bad choice in terms of GI – we’re living DANGEROUSLY tonight.

Diffuse the sausages in this dish that packs in some vegies too.

Sausage fried rice

4 good-quality fresh sausages (such as gourmet beef & garlic)
1 tbsp peanut oil
6 spring onions,
thinly sliced
½ red capsicum, seeded, finely diced
1 carrot, peeled, grated
¾ cup frozen peas
125g can corn kernels, drained
3 cups cooked rice (any type will do but jasmine or long grain is best)
3 tbsp soy sauce

Preheat oven to 180°C. Line a baking tray with baking paper. Place the sausages on the tray and bake for 25 minutes or until cooked through, turning halfway through cooking. Set aside. When cool enough to handle, slice in half lengthwise then cut across to make half-moons.

Heat the oil in a large wok or frying pan over medium–high heat. Add the spring onion and cook for 1–2 minutes, stirring constantly. Add the capsicum, carrot, peas and corn and cook for another 2 minutes.

Add the sausage, rice and soy sauce and stir-fry until piping hot.

SERVES 2 ADULTS & 2 KIDS

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Lunchbox planner for term 3 – on sale NOW!

June 28, 2011 · Filed under All recipes, News, Vegie smuggling techniques · Tagged feeding the family, ideas, parenting, recipe, vegetables

As modern as tomorrow - I've got an E-book!

Dear fellow Smugglers…

There’s a new Vegie Smugglers product in the stable. My first e-book – and it’s a cracker! Welcome to ‘Lunchbox Inspiration for Term 3’, designed to ease the grind of the daily lunchbox routine and keep you inspired throughout next term.

Knowing myself the time constraints and drudgery of lunch preparation, I’ve aimed to provide easy ideas and recipes that will actually be do-able in your household, with the limited time that you have. Rather than asking too much of mums already bogged down in the zillion things that we do, I’ve gone for seasonal and simple.

The e-book is 25 pages, with a recipe a week. It’s deliberately quick and easy and designed to give a bit of variety without too much effort. Even better, some weeks you can make double batches and you’ve got dinner under control too.

I've tried to do the thinking FOR you!

Each week there’s also a lunch plan, with a shopping list and tips to help out too! So much! And only $4.95!

The file itself is 4.8mb and is delivered to you via email within 8 hours of your purchase.

The Vegie Smugglers business is a tiny one, with fabulous plans that can only eventuate with continued sales and support. Now you all know I’m not greedy – I give away most of my recipes for free, so if you enjoy the freebies, maybe take the time to also enjoy my paid products too.

You can view a sample here, or just go along and buy here.

I’m really proud of it and hope that you all enjoy it too.

thanks so much,
Wendy

Comments (4) »

I am not your slave (well, actually… maybe I am)

June 26, 2011 · Filed under News · Tagged family, lunchbox, parenting, recipe

Sunday night and we’ve just been through the weekly children’s hairwash, total body scrub and nail clip. As I crouched down to attend to child’s toenails, child farted at my face level. Yes, my child farted in my face. And laughed.

At least it wasn’t vomit. I’ve long held the theory that mums are the ONLY people we can vomit on. Girlfriends will hold back our hair and husbands will run and fetch the bucket, but the only person who will stoically be coated in our insides are our mothers.

Apparently we ARE all slaves to our children. From the second they slide out and latch on, we are immersed in a kind of servitude to our offspring that I never thought possible.

Child farts in my face. No big deal. At least it didn’t have follow through, like in the early days. I guess we are making progress.

—————–

Stay tuned, later this week I’ll have the Term 3 lunchbox planner on sale. It’s a BARGAIN at $4.95 for a 25 page e-book. There’s an easy, seasonal recipe each week and a daily guide to get you out of the lunchbox doldrums. You can download a sample here….

More details later.

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Meat-free Monday

June 19, 2011 · Filed under All recipes, Food experiences, Vegetarian · Tagged feeding the family, pasta, recipe, vegetables, vegetarian

Paranoid about protein, I eat a lot more meat now that I’m a parent than I ever did in my dink-chardonnay-socialist-vegetarian-exept-for-bacon-and-a-really-good-bit-of-sirloin days.

Luckily my vegetarian phase didn’t last long and mainly coincided with living in the UK where meat is not only expensive but vaguely tainted with the whole mad-cow thing. I was swayed too by a stint at an ashram where I attended endless lectures about the wholeness of everything and that when we kill creatures we are actually killing ourselves. Ommmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. Besides, the astonishingly creative and good vegetarian food there was quite a revelation.

But being a pragmatist, the main things that really convince me to be meat free more often are the environmental arguments and the hideous statistics about the wastage that occurs in order to raise animals for us to slaughter and eat. There’s a quick rundown here on “10 reasons why it’s green to go veggie”.

Which is all good, but raising vegetarian kids who are already fussy eaters can be a tricky business. Getting the nutritional balance right for them is tough (there’s a Vic health article here) and I think most of us who are toying with the whole thing give it a miss as soon as our tantruming-toddlers are silenced by a cutlet.

So perhaps now is a nice chance to join the meat-free Monday movement and help our health, the environment, and the universe… man. Peace.

This is a simple one-pot pasta sauce that not only hides veg but IS all veg.

Vegetarian bolognaise

A stick blender is entirely useful to get a convincing consistency for this dish.

800g can chopped tomatoes
1 red onion, finely diced
4 mushrooms, diced
1 cup broccoli florets
½ red capsicum, seeded, diced
310g can chickpeas, rinsed, drained
½ cup red wine (optional, but recommended)
2 tbsp sun-dried tomatoes in oil, sliced
1 tsp minced garlic
1 tbsp sugar
2 tbsp balsamic vinegar
2 tbsp finely chopped herbs (try basil or parsley)
1 bay leaf
Cooked fettuccine, to serve

Place a large saucepan over medium heat. Add all of the ingredients except the pasta. Bring to the boil, then lower to a simmer and leave it bubbling away for 30–40 minutes or until everything is tender.

Remove from the heat and discard the bay leaf. Use a stick blender to whizz the sauce it until you have a texture to suit your family. I keep small chunks in mine so that it looks like regular bolognaise.

Taste and season with salt and oodles of black pepper. Serve with fettuccine (or pasta of your choice).

SERVES 2 ADULTS & 3 KIDS

Comments (13) »

(More) reasons why I will never be mother of the year

June 16, 2011 · Filed under Craft for non-crafty parents, News · Tagged craft, family, parenting

Between drop off one and drop off two this morning, I found myself in traffic being cut-off. I mean, REALLY, cut off. The type of cut-off where someone has their foot flat to the floor accelerating stripping you of any opportunity to merge, even though your lane is running out and they are only going to achieve the golden prize of being ONE CAR AHEAD OF YOU.

This frustrated me.

I may have exclaimed an unkind phrase and made some kind of hand gesture to show my displeasure.

Luckily for me, an eagle-eyed Miss Fruitarian was in the car, able to take it all in and no doubt report it all back to a saintly daddy at bedtime.

Afterwards (of course) I felt remorse at yet another incident, which proves what a rubbish mother I am. There are many incidents. The time I slammed the car door shut onto Miss F’s fingers. When I accidently fed her Arrabiata sauce, forgetting in my sleep deprived state that it contains CHILLI. The happy memory of exposing Mr Meat & Potatoes to porn… ahhh the list goes on.

At the end of the day I know that I am just regular mother, doing her best, getting it right most of the time and wrong just often enough to keep a wave of guilt nearby. Over on Facebook the other day, Katrina posted “I like anything that makes parenting easier…it’s the toughest job on earth!”

I couldn’t agree more. It IS tough and we do our best. I remind myself that as the primary caregiver, I have way more chances to make all of the parenting mistakes. I’m sure if my best-friend was in charge of drop-offs, clean uniforms and school notes that he’d show a similar level of ineptitude as me.

But the guilt remains. So to appease it, here’s a quick alphabet tracing sheet to download and help your kiddlies with. It may just help restore some semblance of perfection to your mothering day.

Don't worry, the actual download is perfectly alphabetical.

Comments (9) »

Controlling, fat and unnecessary

June 13, 2011 · Filed under All recipes, Food experiences, Vegetarian, Vegie smuggling techniques · Tagged cooking techniques, feeding the family, mealtime, vegetables

Aren’t commas great? They make a mundane, uptight phrase so much more interesting.

You see, “controlling fat and unnecessary additives” should really be today’s headline, but it’s a bit dry, isn’t it. I much prefer ‘controlling, fat and unnecessary’, which sounds much more salacious and intriguing. You read that and think, “Is she talking about herself, her mother-in-law, who else?”

But actually, I’m talking about how just a little effort can go a long way toward improving your family’s diets.

Now, I’m as big a fan of convenience foods as the next stressed-out-over-scheduled parent, but there’s one mass selling processed food that I just don’t understand – frozen chips. And here’s why…

You have to preheat the oven to 200C. Open the packet; pour them onto an oven tray. Bake 10 minutes then turn and bake for another 10. And then you have a half soggy chip that has been processed in a factory and shipped in plastic, then bought (at a premium) by you and prepared.

Here’s what I do for my chips.

My new fav kitchen toy - makes vegies instantly more fun

I buy potatoes. Not in plastic. I preheat the oven to 200C. I peel my potatoes and chop them with my new favourite wiggly chopper. It takes about 3-4 minutes to do 3-4 potatoes. I put them on the tray, and toss them with olive oil, salt & pepper. After 10 minutes, I sprinkle over parmesan cheese and bake for another 10-15 minutes until they are golden and crunchy and delicious.

REALLY yum, REALLY easy.

So my total extra effort isn’t much. And the result is SO much better. You can control the amount of olive oil and salt that you use (remember that every teaspoon of olive oil contains 4.5g of fat – .621g of which is saturated).

Like my muesli bars and beetroot tzatziki, sometimes we can easily produce a better tasting, healthier version of ‘convenience’ foods at home. Just sayin’.

Comments (17) »

From pink to P!nk – the sprint to tween-dom

June 9, 2011 · Filed under Craft for non-crafty parents, News · Tagged craft, parenting

Your days are numbered cute dolly.

Miss Fruitarian announced at dinner the other night that she knows the feeling of touching tongues. And she likes it.

And recently she came home from the schoolyard ripe with the knowledge of what ‘sexy’ meant. So now she knows that all the songs on the radio are about KISSING ON THE MOUTH.

It’s all reported back to me with a smack of attitude and a glimmer in the eye that makes me realise that we are heading full force into the tween years, whether I like it or not.

Considering she didn’t sleep through until 3, it seems like a ripped-off, short amount of time between insanity and the loss of innocence. Sure, boundaries are blurred at the moment – she’s still dressed head to toe in pink, but getting all Katy Perry on my ass. The fairy party hostesses are slowly being phased out (last party was hosted by Hannah Montana’s ‘cousin’) and the whole vernacular is so much more hip now that she’s a big year 1 girl (as is the nonchalant dismissal of her mum, but I guess that’s a whole other post).

So it was with some relief that she requested a bit of girlie craft time. She still enjoys the birdie cutout, but is WAY too old now for the fruit garden colouring. I dug out a fairy mobile activity sheet that I started last year and she’s happy.

Good that I thought to finish it now – another 6 months and it would have been too late.

One last pink, fairy thing to make.

Comments (5) »

Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, YES

June 5, 2011 · Filed under All recipes, Chicken, News · Tagged chicken, dinner, feeding the family, parenting, pasta, recipe, vegetables

It’s officially winter, so a ‘winter warmer’ must be in order. And since in winter I am generally grouchy and irritable, I need a dish that can please me on many levels. Perhaps you are the same, so I offer you this chicken & tarragon one-pot recipe to try.

Here are some of the reasons it makes me happy…
Chicken and pasta (kids favourites, so will be eaten without any objection at all), one pot (mummy’s favourite), vegie smuggled zucchini, carrot, onion and peas (for an uber-mummy moment), suits everyone (you can even blend it up for baby food), freezes well (for up to 2 months).

It contains wine too. I tell you not as a warning (since it cooks away for 20 minutes before serving, so you’re unlikely to intoxicate your kiddies), but to give you permission to open a bottle on a mid-week night when you wouldn’t normally feel it justified.

chicken and tarragon one pot winter warmer by vegie smuggers

Chicken, tick; pasta, tick; vegies, tick; one pot, tick.

Chicken & tarragon one-pot

1 tbsp olive oil
500g chicken thigh fillets, trimmed, cut into 2-3 even pieces
1 red onion, chopped
1 large carrot, peeled, chopped
1 large zucchini, chopped (peeled first, if your kids hate green)
2 garlic cloves, crushed
2 cups chicken stock
1 cup white wine
2x10cm peelings of orange zest (use a vegetable peeler to do this)
1 tbsp chopped tarragon
1 cup rissoni
¾ cup frozen peas

Heat the oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add the chicken and brown for 2–3 minutes on each side to get golden patches. Remove and set aside.

Reheat the pan over medium heat and cook the onion and carrot for 2 minutes then add the zucchini. Cook for another couple of minutes until the vegies are softening then add the garlic for another minute.

Add the stock, wine, orange zest and tarragon. Season with black pepper. Bring to the boil, return the chicken to the pan, reduce the heat and simmer for 10 minutes. Add the pasta and peas and cook until the pasta is tender and the chicken is cooked through (about 8 minutes).

Remove and discard the orange zest before serving. Cut the chicken into pieces to suit your kids.

SERVES 2 ADULTS & 2 KIDS.

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Cutting corners

June 2, 2011 · Filed under Craft for non-crafty parents · Tagged craft

A friend’s little boy is having a tough time of school. He’s a bit of a perfectionist and is distraught over his second-rate cutting.

Nope, we’re not talking teens and self-harm, we’re talking kindergarten kids who think they’re the worst cutterer-outerers in the class. The teacher assures his mum that he’s doing fine, but there’s nothing more heart-braking than a little tucker trying their hardest and being disappointed. Poor little pet.

So this week we’ve got a Vegie Smugglers activity sheet to help the pre-schoolers get a bit of cutting practice before they hit kindy and the stakes get seriously high.

Another award to stick on the fridge....

And so they can REALLY feel like the big kids, it’s a merit award that they can cut out, write their name on, stick on a star and stick on the fridge.

Nothing but the best cut corners at VS HQ.

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Balayage and the freezer – (why neglect is a good thing)

May 31, 2011 · Filed under All recipes, News · Tagged feeding the family, freezer, recipe, vegetables

Did you know that there is a new hair trend at the moment called ‘balayage’? No, neither did I. But I found out about it at my most recent hair appointment. I like to pry ‘cool’ information out of my lovely hairdresser who is a whole 15 years younger than me. Being typically mum-busy, I rely on her to keep me up-to-date. You see, now that I AM a mum, I don’t really like LOOKING like a mum. Although the fact that I’m usually found in the school yard wearing a puffer vest is a bit of a giveaway (well it IS cold, and they ARE warm).

Anyhow, balayage, is a fancy French term for mega-long regrowth. WOW. And my hairdresser wanted me to PAY for that?

Armed with my new knowledge of ‘what’s cool’, I’ve managed to produce my very own balayage by avoiding the salon for 3 months and utilising that mummy beauty secret – NEGLECT. If only it worked as well on leg-hairs and fingernails.

So with neglect on my mind, let’s eat from the freezer this week – I’m far too busy growing my regrowth to possibly cook.