Posted on June 15, 2016 by Kate Halsall

recipes

I was so impressed when google returned 126 Vegan Jamie Oliver Recipes – that I’ve made a list of 15 dishes I want to try! They range from cauliflower daal to fancy sprouts, are rated from easy to “show off”, and tell you all the nutritional information you would be interested in (fats, carbs, protein etc) – Brilliant!

But here’s the thing, I’m finding it hard to follow recipes to the letter without adding something (at the moment I add chipotle to everything), or switching some of the ingredients. So I was wondering if this is normal and whether you follow recipes?

I’ve just got back into properly cooking. Don’t get me wrong, everything I eat is freshly made; but what I mean is not just throwing things into a pan and calling it “stew”, “curry”, “stir fry” – I mean PROPER cooking. BUT – and here it comes…..

My food never ever ever turns out looking like the picture on the recipes (that’s why I opted for a picture of me prepping the food!). It sure as hell doesn’t take the same length of time to cook (or prep) that the recipe says (sorry Jamie, this Briam took 2 hours in the oven to cook, and that was after 45mins of chopping vegetables!!). And have you ever measured out 150ml of oil? It’s a lot! I poured half of it back before I even started the cooking process! I can’t be alone with this can I?

That said – it was really really tasty! Much nicer than my usual “cut it up, bung it in a dish and throw it in the oven”. The Briam is like a posh ratatouille. I had mine as a main course, my husband had it as a side dish to steak. The recipe also makes 6 portions – how’s that for prep!

So in summary, I’m going to keep using recipes, but I think I’m going to use them more as a guideline as to what should go in the dish, how long roughly it should cook for, and what it should at least slightly resemble when it’s done! And if you want an awesome tasting veggie side dish, I highly recommend something similar to the recipe below!!

http://www.jamieoliver.com/recipes/vegetables-recipes/briam/#z9mejPL1EZZwoHJS.97