Yellow Thai-ish Chicken and Vegetable Curry.

Ingredients

• 400g chicken thighs $7.75
• 500g pumpkin $1.24
• 1/2 small cauliflower $2.19
• Bunch of coriander $2.45
• 3 Shallots $1.50
• Knob of ginger $0.80
• Sweet potato $1.41
• 1 stalk lemon grass $1.98
• 2 green chillies $0.65
• tsp coriander seeds $0.25
  
• tsp cumin seeds $0.25
  
• tsp ground turmeric $0.50
  
• 1/4 tsp cinnamon $0.05
• 2 cloves garlic $0.50
  
• Coconut cream 400ml $2.19
• 2 Roti $2.00
  Total $24.71
  

Method

1. Dice pumpkin, and sweet potato, par boil until nearly tender.
2. Break cauliflower up into florets
3. Grind spices
4. Roughly chop shallots, lemon grass, chilli, garlic toss in blender with spices and process until it forms a paste.
   
   
5. Slice chicken up into strips and fry in a deep pan with a little oil.
6. When brown remove from pan and toss in paste and fry until it smells nice.
7. Pour in the coconut milk and stir.
8. Dump in chicken and vegetables and stir until everything is hot.
9. Chop up coriander and stir through curry. Season with salt or fish sauce if you like.
   
10. Serve with roti to sop up the juices.

Time to cook: 40 minutes
Family Verdict: Vegies were a little firm, would have been better if they were softer. Wife ate the lot, 4 year old liked the curry wrapped up in roti and the 2 year old just ate whatever I stuck in his mouth. All in all a success.

Linguini with smoked chicken, asparagas and brocolli

Ingredients

• 2 skin on smoked chicken breasts $7.15
• 200g linguini $0.98
• Tin of anchovies $4.25
  
• 2 cloves of garlic $0.25
  
• 400g broccoli head $2.50
  
• 10 spears of asparagus $2.49
• dash of cream $0.50
• splash of chicken stock $0.50
  Total $18.62
  
  

Method

1. Stick an enormous pot of well salted water on to boil
2. Chop the chicken into bits, the broccoli into florets and the asparagus into slices.
3. When the water is boiling fiercely, stick the veges in small batches to blanch and turn bright green. Run them under cold water when you are done to stop them from cooking further. I think it does something chemically to the chlorophyll to keep 'em a pretty green when you finish cooking them later.
4. Put the pasta in to cook when you are done
5. Chop the anchovies and the garlic into a fine mince.
6. Fry off in a little oil (I used the oil from the anchovy tin) until the anchovies dissolve and the garlic is soft.
7. Chuck in the chicken and fry until a little browned.
8. Deglaze pan with chicken stock and add in vegetables and cream and heat through.
9. When the pasta is done drain (save a little pasta water just in case you need to loosen the sauce later) and pour into the sauce, stir through to coat all the pasta.
10. Serve with garlic bread.

Time to cook: 20 minutes
Family happiness: All and sundry ate with gusto.
Leftovers: 1 serve.

"Plenty of Pre Packaged Produce" Pasta

Ingredients

• 500g pre-packaged pasta $3.98 (I used chicken and mushroom ravioli)
  
• 500g chicken thighs $6.85 (no free range here)
• 200g swiss browns $3.98
• splash of stock $0.25
• 100g cheddar $2.20
  
• 100g colby $1.50
  
• 100g parmesan $3.50
• 250ml cream $1.28
• 1/2 pre-packaged garlic bread $1.98
• 1/2 head garlic $0.50 (special from the market)
  Total $25.49 (had another meal leftover though)
  

Method

1. Stick garlic bread in oven to melt/crisp up.
2. Chop up chicken thighs into very small bits
3. Slice mushrooms
4. Finely chop garlic
   
   
5. Fry the chicken thighs in a little olive oil (very little, they'll render out a fair bit of fat themselves). Make sure you let them get carmelised, otherwise they will taste insipid. Season them when they are about done.
6. Put the pasta in piles of salted water to cook.
   
7. Remove from pan and crank the pan up to stupid heat, toss in a pile of butter, the garlic and a splash more olive oil and fry the mushrooms. If they aren't sizzling they are stewing, so remove some from the pan to get the heat back up. Season the 'shrooms just before they are done and remove from pan.
8. Deglaze pan with splash of stock and dump in cream
9. Stir in cheeses and melt.
10. Add 'shrooms, chicken and cooked pasta into the pan and heat through.
11. If you've got it garnish with parsley (I didn't)

Time to cook: 20 minutes
Family contentedness: 2 year old had to be helped but ate it all, 4 year old ate the garlic bread then declared he didn't like mushrooms and had to be cajoled into eating the lot (which he did), wife ate the lot and reluctantly shared garlic bread with 4 year old.
Leftovers: another meal for 4 (sans garlic bread)