10 minute crab pasta

Britain isn’t eating enough zinc. It’s taking quite a toll on our energy and immune systems.
Let’s fix that.

British crab is an excellent source of this essential mineral and it just so happens that it make a really delicious pasta.
The trick is to use the richer, brown crab meat. White claw meat may get all the glory but it’s the brown crab meat that contains most of the zinc.

Top tip: Look for 50/50 pots of crab in supermarkets.
As the title may give it away, these contains half brown crab meat and half white. It’s the ideal balance between nutritious and flavour.

Ingredients
Serves 2

1 pot of 50/50 British crab
160g of pasta
1 onion, peeled & diced
1 stick of celery, diced
10 cherry tomatoes, halved
5-6 spears or asparagus or 40g of frozen peas
A large handful of parsley, roughly chopped
The zest and juice of ⅓ of a lemon
Extra virgin olive oil to drizzle
Sea salt and black pepper to season

Method:

1. Bring a pan of water to boil, add salt, the pasta and cook until al dente.
2. Drain the pasta, reserving 150ml of the salty pasta water.
3. Put a frying pan on a medium heat.
4. Add oil, the onion and celery and cook, stirring occasionally, until the onions and celery have softened
5. Add the asparagus to the pan, either as whole spears or as roughly chopped sections. Pour in the peas if you are using those instead.
6. Cook for a couple of minutes to soften the asparagus or peas.
7. Season well with sea salt and black pepper.
8. Stir in the crab and cherry tomatoes and allow them to heat through for 1 minute.
9. Stir in the pasta and add a generous splash of the pasta water. The latter should help the crab create a sauce. Add more pasta water if it’s looking dry or cook it for a little bit longer to evaporate more of the water if it’s looking a tad watery.
10. Add the grated lemon zest and juice and give the pasta a good stir.
11. Taste it to check the seasoning, adding more salt and pepper if required.
12. Serve by dividing the pasta between two bowls, topping it with a generous sprinkling of parsley and a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil.

Nutrient-dense egg curry

This frugal, family-friendly egg curry is big on nutrients.
The curry sauce is a blend of vegetables that work together to create a thick, creamy and sweet sauce.
Blending vegetables doesn’t just thicken the sauce, it also adds heaps of nutrients and fibre, making the sauce ‘nutrient-dense’.

Nutrient-dense = contains a high percentage of nutrients in relation to its caloric value

Nutrients aside, I really enjoy making curries (any curry) by blending veggies into the sauce. Items like carrots and peppers add natural sweetness and thicken the sauce at the same time.
Ordinarily, the sweetness and thickness is achieved by hours of cooking, or by making shortcuts (sugar and starches commonly), but here, the pureed vegetables step in.
It becomes a quicker and smarter way to make a nourishing curry sauce.

The protein component, and any extra ingredients, for that matter, are up to you.
Here, I added eggs and potatoes to keep the dish frugal, family-friendly and delicious.
Chicken, tofu or paneer would all be great additions.

A note on the obvious: this recipe is not as gas-inducing as you may think, with a few caveats.
Contrary to popular belief, eggs don’t cause wind. They are rich in methionine, which naturally contains and can cause sulphur to be released, but only in “specific conditions”.
Sulphur is the smelly wind culprit.
The specific conditions for its release include:
- A fatty or very high fibre meal (think beans/ pulses) - these slow how eggs are digested, meaning more of that sulphur may be released, which in turn may cause smelly wind.
- Under-cook rather than over-cook eggs. Here, the eggs are cooked for 6 and a half minutes, creating a “jammy” centre and leaving the eggs free of the sulphur-like smell that overcooked eggs are often associated with.
- Cook the eggs fresh for leftovers. The sauce makes great leftovers, but the longer eggs are left in the fridge, the more likely they are to release sulphur, potentially leading to smelly gas. Spending the extra 6.5 minutes to cook the eggs from fresh may be a smart move.

Serves 4
Takes approximately 30-40 minutes to make.

Ingredients

1 onion
1 large or two medium carrots
1/2 a pepper (any colour)
2 cloves of garlic, peeled 

A thumb-sized piece of ginger
A handful of coriander, separated into leaves and stalks (optional)
1 tin of chopped tomatoes

A fat of your choice for cooking, I used a tablespoon of butter.
3 large potatoes
1 tin of good-quality coconut milk
6-8 eggs, aiming for 2 eggs per adult and 1 per child
Rice and/or flatbreads to serve.

Spices

1 tablespoon of medium curry powder - don’t worry, it won’t be spicy with the volume of sauce

1/2 a teaspoon of turmeric
1 teaspoon of cinnamon
1 teaspoon of ground coriander


Method:
1. Peel and roughly chop the onion, carrot, garlic and ginger.
2. Roughly chop the pepper.
3. Add the onion, carrot, garlic, ginger, pepper, coriander stalks (if using) and chopped tomato to a blender. Blend until completely smooth.
4. Peel and cube 3 potatoes. The smaller the cubes, the quicker it will cook. The larger, the more tasty chunky pieces you’ll have.
4. Grab a medium or large saucepan. Put it on a medium heat. Add the butter/ oil and spices and allow this to mingle for 30 seconds.
5. Throw in the cubed potatoes and stir for a minute so the spices coat the potatoes.
6. Pour in the sauce from your blender. Let it cook for 10 minutes until the sauce has thickened up.
Stir it every now and then to make sure nothing sticks.


7. Pour in the coconut milk and allow it to simmer for 10 more minutes to thicken up.

Season well with salt and pepper.


8. Check to make sure your potatoes are cooked through. They may need longer depending on the size of the cubes. This is absolutely fine. If your sauce starts to look a bit too thick while the potatoes cook, just add a splash of water.
9. Set aside until you cook the eggs and sides (rice/ flatbreads).
10. Boil the eggs for 6 and a half minutes.
Peel and then add to the curry sauce. 


11. Ladle the curry into bowls. Serve with rice or flatbreads and a sprinkle of coriander leaves.

Scandi prawn open sandwich

Cold water prawns are often overlooked thanks to their smaller size, but I’m here to give them some airtime.
My reason: they are often much cheaper, while being very nourishing.

During my era of “accidentally” living in Sweden (2020 to 2022), I was fortunate to gain a lot of inspiration from Scandiland’s culture of open sandwiches.
These half sandwiches feature generous toppings piled on top of a single slice of bread.
Nutritionally, they strike the right bread-to-topping balance to create filling lunches.
Taste-wise, they were a big hit for being flavour-forward.
In a nutshell, this affordable cold water prawn open sandwich makes a great speedy lunch.
The filling can be left in the fridge for a day, if needed.

Ingredients to feed 2

1 pack of cooked cold water prawns (from the fridge section of supermarkets, approximately 200g)
A small handful each of dill & parsley
2 tbsp of mayo
1 tbsp of creme fraiche (add more mayo if you’d rather not buy an extra ingredient, or replace it with a thick yogurt )
Zest & juice of 1/4 of a lemon
Sea salt and black pepper to season
Bread to serve - suggested 2 large slices of sourdough bread
Rocket & radish to top

Method
1. Roughly chop the parsley and dill.
2. Put the prawns on the same chopping board and roughly chop those too.
3. In a bowl, combine the prawns, mayo, creme fraiche, herbs and the juice and zest of 1/4 of a lemon.
4. Season really well and stir to combine.
5. Top the bread with the prawn mixture. Sprinkle some rocket and the sliced radishes on top.
Enjoy!

The all-rounder herb paste

Herbs contain a whole heap of useful compounds that may give us a little wellness boost.
Namely:
- Useful antioxidants that may support our overall wellbeing
- Anti-ageing compounds such as apigenin found in parsley
- Nutrients that may support the immune system
- Antibacterial/ Antifungal agents that may support our gut health

The latter is why I recommend this herb paste to many of my nutrition clients.
Herbs such as oregano, thyme and rosemary contain specific compounds that may assist in the breakdown of particularly bloatey gut microbes.
Overall, this herb paste is just a tasty herb salsa/ pesto-type of condiment but with a side of goodness.
Use it like a condiment on top of food, 1 tablespoon at a time.

Ingredients:
Ideally, use all organic herbs since organic herbs are higher in antioxidants and gut-health supporting bioactive compounds.

1 bunch of parsley
1/2 a bunch of basil
1/3 of a bunch of oregano - you may need to reduce this quantity if the flavour is too strong
The leaves from 3-4 sprigs of thyme
The leaves from 2 sprigs of rosemary
The juice of 1 organic lemon
The zest of 1/2 an organic lemon - this must be organic. If you can't get organic lemons, then just use the juice but not the rind. (Non-organic lemons are coated in chemicals which aren’t useful to us.)
A generous pinch of sea salt
Extra virgin olive oil - a good quality fat is needed to help the absorption of those useful compounds

Method:
Wash and roughly dry the herbs.
Put the herbs, lemon juice and rind and salt in a blender.
Pour in a splash of oil and blend.
Add enough oil and blend to achieve the consistency of a slightly looser pesto/ salsa.

Storage:
Store in an airtight container in the fridge.
The mix will keep fresh for 3 days, after which a new batch needs to be made.
Freezing the mix in an ice cube tray also works.

Venison ragu

A rich, elevated twist on a classic. This hearty recipe brings together deep, savoury flavours and a focus on nutrient density, transforming a humble ragu into a wholesome, satisfying dish that’s as nourishing as it is delicious.

Now that the official intro is over, it’d be valid to let you in on why this recipe exists.
The brief tale begins at a luxury care home (yes, the ones for old folks, except this one is more like a 5* hotel), where I was tasked with helping older folk become healthier.
This statement may seem normal but it is nothing short of revolutionary.
The general landscape of feeding our elderly in a care setting is very much centred around just providing enough calories. Except calories do not make us healthy. They merely keep us alive.
Luckily, this revolutionary new luxury care home group let me work my magic by fully embracing the notion of wellbeing through food.
There was just one “little” issue: Having thoroughly researched this topic (via scientific reviews, not Googling), what I sadly realised is that in order to feed our over 75s the required amount of nutrients, we would pretty much have to ask them to put away 3 trays worth of food per day.
A minor curveball, some might say.
Undeterred, I carried on my research to land on venison and other British game meats. These underappreciated sources of food seemed to boast a better nutrient profile.
By further adjusting the content of meals via other highly nutritious ingredients, I could considerably reduce the size of meals but keep them, amazingly, just as nutritious.
This ragu is one such example.
A beautifully tasty dish that scores very high on the chart of essential nutrients.

If you enjoy “spag bol”, then trust me, you will get on with this recipe too.

Ingredients (makes 4 portions)

300g wild venison mince
1 organic chicken liver, 30g - 40g approximately
1 medium carrot
1 medium onion
1 stick of celery
1 clove of garlic

400g passata or chopped tomatoes

1 sprig of fresh rosemary
1 sprig of fresh oregano
2 sprigs of fresh thyme

Good quality extra virgin olive oil (I used Positively Good For You’s EVOO)

Sea salt 

Freshly ground black pepper



To serve:

A handful of fresh basil leaves

Parmesan cheese (optional)

350g of pasta, cooked al dente

Method:

1. Peel and dice the onion, celery and garlic.
2. Finely grate the carrot.
3. Pick the rosemary, thyme and oregano leaves from their stems. Roughly chop the herbs to release their flavour. 
4. Put the onion and celery in a casserole-style dish or a wide-brimmed frying pan.
5. Drizzle with a generous amount of olive oil, turn the heat to medium and allow the onion and celery to sauté for 5 minutes until they are starting to turn translucent.
6. Turn the heat up to medium-high. Add the carrots, garlic, rosemary, oregano, thyme and venison mince to the pan. Stir and break up the venison mince. Cook for a couple of minutes to lightly brown the venison.
7. Add the passata to the pan. Turn the heat down to medium. Season with sea salt and black pepper and allow it to simmer gently for 10-15 minutes. You may need to turn the temperature down to low.
8. While the ragu is simmering, trim the chicken livers and dice them finely.
9. Add the chicken liver to the pan and cook for a further 5 minutes.
10. Check the seasoning and season again if needed.
11. Stir in the pasta to coat it in the sauce. Add a splash of the pasta’s cooking water to loosen the sauce and stir again.
12. Serve with fresh basil leaves scattered on top and a generous portion of freshly grated Parmesan cheese.