Kiwi fruits: “a treasure of nutritional bounty”

My go-to nutritional guide book is Dr. Michael Sharon’s “Nutrients A-Z”*. This user-friendly manual is excellent as every entry is concise and enlightening, and you don’t need a PhD in organic chemistry.

So when I looked up kiwi fruit (or Chinese gooseberry), I was struck by two phrases: “a treasure of nutritional bounty” and “one of the acidic fruits that combines well with protein.” Ideal, I thought, as I love them. And I love combining them with yoghurts, especially when I have no time to cook.

Today’s lunch was two kiwis, six large strawberries and one mandarin orange, sliced up and mixed with a small tub of protein yoghurt. Quick, tasty, filling – and very healthy, as kiwis provide more vitamin C than oranges and more fibre than apples.

One kiwi fruit supplies up to 70mg of vitamin C, or just 5mg less than the average US recommended daily amount for women (it’s 90mg for men). This vitamin cleanses the body and helps boost resistance to disease. An average kiwi also supplies around 250mg of potassium, making it suitable for people with high blood pressure.

Kiwis’ fibre and mucilage content, and its special enzyme called actinidin, can also help with digestion and constipation. Mucilage is a jelly-like substance found in plants and is a rich source of dietary fibre (and is not to be confused with “fuselage”, which contains carbon fibre ;)).

This fruit provides around 9.2 grammes of fibre – more than a third of my daily need

Dietary fibre acts as a laxative, makes you feel full, combats too much cholesterol and sugar in the blood, and can help reduce obesity. Fibre is essential (and, judging by the above list, desirable) and we need to eat 25-30 grammes of it every day. So, as the average kiwi contains around 2.1, my lunch provided around 9.2 grammes, or more than a third of my daily need.

Kiwis should yield slightly to pressure (not be rock hard), are best peeled just before eating, and are nutritionally best when eaten raw. So my lunch idea was a nutritionally sound one. A fat-free yoghurt would also have worked.

So, if all that appeals, then get peeling a kiwi!

*Nutrients A-Z (A User’s Guide to Foods, Herbs, Vitamins, Minerals & Supplements)
Dr. Michael Sharon, Carlton Books, 2009. ISBN 978 1 84732 263 0

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Tasty food medicine: garlic chicken is delicious and packed with anti-ageing properties

My earliest memory of “garlic” is a bedchamber scene between Sid James and Joan Sims in the 1971 film Carry on Henry. Henry VIII’s wedding night ardour dies as his French wife Marie reeks of garlic, which she considers an aphrodisiac and refuses to stop eating it. Cue: divorce.

And who can forget comedian Peter Kay describing a conversation with his father about garlic bread. “Garlic…? And bread…?” “It’s the future! I’ve tasted it!”

Perhaps socially it is best shared or eaten with parsley, but garlic is both food and folk medicine. For thousands of years, it was believed to have medicinal properties – and science has now confirmed it.

Garlic is a low-calorie, nutrient-dense plant in the onion family that can help prevent and reduce the severity of colds and ‘flu. It appears to improve blood pressure and bone health, reduce cholesterol and lead toxicity, protect against the effects of ageing, and reduce the risk of Alzheimer’s disease and dementia. It may even improve physical performance and help you live longer. Those ancient doctors knew their stuff.

Best of all, garlic is delicious and easy to add to your diet, as this recipe proves!

Preparation time: 5-15 minutes
Cooking time: 30 minutes
Serves: Four

Ingredients:
1 medium chicken (about 1.5kg): jointed into eight pieces; skin on breast and wings, skin off legs and thighs
4 tbsp of olive oil
2 garlic bulbs: separated, skins on
6 bay leaves
200 ml of white wine or Fino sherry
100ml of water
Salt and pepper

Method:
1. Prepare the chicken as above and season with a little salt and pepper
2. Place a large heavy-bottomed saucepan or frying pan (that has a lid) over a medium heat and add the olive oil. When the oil is hot, add the garlic cloves and fry gently until slightly golden. Remove the garlic from the oil with a spoon and set aside
3. Add the chicken to the pan in batches and fry on either side until golden brown all over. Return all the chicken and garlic to the pan along with the bay leaves, and pour in the wine, shaking the pan as you do to help emulsify the wine with the oil
4. Simmer for 2 minutes to evaporate some of the alcohol while turning the chicken in the sauce. Stir in the water, cover with the lid and simmer for 15 minutes or until the chicken is cooked through. Add more water, if required
5. Season, then serve

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Big beautiful brassica: low-calorie, nutrient-dense cauliflowers are healthy, tasty, cheap and easy to prepare

Cauliflower is one of those vegetables whose reputations for taste and nutrition has been decimated by years of Britons boiling the life and flavour out of it. I can distinctly remember Sunday dinners with older relatives, bracing myself to eat something that resembled a pale green brain containing more salt than the Dead Sea.

Thankfully, those hypertensive days are over and the cauliflower can be reinstated for what it is – another nutritious and versatile brassica which would benefit us to consume more regularly. Its ingredients may help strengthen bones, boost the cardiovascular system and prevent cancer.

Cauliflower is rich in vitamins C, K, B6 and B9 (folate), and a source of calcium, magnesium, phosphorus, potassium, sulphur and many other important nutrients. It also contains fibre, which enhances weight loss and digestion, and choline that is essential for learning and memory.

Even better, it can also be extremely tasty! The recipe below uses pine nuts but flaked almonds are a fine alternative. If you do use almonds, add them to the dish at the end, just before serving, so they don’t become soggy.

Preparation time: 5-10 minutes
Cooking time: 35 minutes
Serves: Four

Ingredients:
1 medium cauliflower broken into small florets
3 tbsp of olive oil
1 large Spanish onion, thinly sliced
50 strands of saffron infused in 4 tbsp of boiling water
3 tbsp of lightly toasted pine nuts (or flaked almonds)
75g of raisins soaked in warm water
Salt and pepper

Method:
1. Place the pine nuts (or flaked almonds) on a sheet of baking foil under a medium grill for a few minutes, turning from time to time, until toasted. Care should be taken as nuts can burn easily
2. Break up the cauliflower, thinly slice the onion, infuse the saffron and soak the raisins
3. Blanch the cauliflower for a minute in boiling lightly salted water, drain into a colander and set aside
4. Heat the olive oil in saucepan until hot but not smoking, then add the onion and a pinch of salt. Stir well, reduce the heat to low and cook very slowly for about 15-20 minutes until golden in colour and sweet smelling. Stir the mixture every 5 mins to prevent sticking. Remove from the heat, drain the onions but retain the oil
5. Set the same saucepan back on the heat together with the saved oil. When the oil is hot, add the cauliflower. Fry until the cauliflower begins to colour, then add the onion, saffron-infused water, pine nuts (if used) and the drained raisins. Give everything a good toss and cook for 5 more minutes until the saffron water has more or less evaporated
6. Add the flaked almonds (if used)
7. Season well and serve

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Versatile vegetarian breakfast: Shakshuka combines tomatoes, onions, garlic, spices and poached eggs – but can be adapted to suit any palate

When I asked my friends and family for healthy recipe ideas, someone replied “Shakshuka.” After establishing this was the name of a dish and not a badly disguised sneeze, I looked up the ingredients and was immediately impressed. Healthy, tasty, easy, versatile – and a food combiner’s dream protein meal. I’d hit the recipe jackpot.

Shakshuka is a Middle Eastern and North African vegetarian recipe, combining tomatoes, onions, garlic, spices and poached eggs.

Traditionally, it’s eaten for breakfast but could suffice for any meal. And the use of herbs and extra ingredients – in this instance spinach – can be adapted to suit any palate.

The cooking process can be divided into two parts, starting with the sauce (tomatoes, onions, garlic, red pepper and spices), then adding the spinach, eggs and feta, and cooking with a lid on to poach the eggs before serving with chopped coriander.

If frozen spinach is used, cook it through completely in the tomato sauce before adding the eggs and feta. The sauce can therefore be made in advance and reheated on the stove, adding the final ingredients once hot. If the sauce becomes too thick, a little water may be used to thin it.

Preparation and cooking time: 40 minutes
Serves: 4-6 people. Use one egg per person

Ingredients:
2 tbsp olive oil
1 1/2 medium sized onions, chopped (red onions can also be used)
2 large red (or yellow) peppers, cut into long slices and halved
2 x 400g tins of tomatoes
Chopped spinach (frozen spinach can also be used)
1 small hot chilli (if you like it spicy!)
3 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
2 tsp sweet paprika
2 tsp cumin (optional)
1/2 tsp caraway seeds (optional)
1/2 tsp cayenne pepper (optional)
200g feta cheese, crumbled
4–6 eggs
Coriander leaves, chopped (optional)
8 tbsp thick natural yoghurt (optional)
Freshly ground black pepper

Method:
1. Chop all the ingredients as recommended above
2. Heat the olive oil in a large, lidded frying pan. Add the onions and peppers. Cook on a medium heat until just softened
3. Add the garlic and cook for a further 2 minutes
4. Sprinkle in the paprika and (if used) the chilli, cumin, caraway seeds and cayenne pepper. Add the tomatoes with a splash of water. Simmer for 10 minutes uncovered until the contents have reduced a little. The texture shouldn’t be too runny but mustn’t get too dry. Add another splash of water if necessary
5. When the sauce is reduced, add the spinach and cook until it wilts (or cooks through, if frozen)
6. Make some wells in the sauce for the eggs. Break an egg into a cup and drop carefully into a well, and repeat with the remaining eggs, then sprinkle over the crumbled feta. Cook for a few more minutes until the egg whites are just set and the yolks are still runny. Sprinkle over the chopped coriander (if used)
7. Serve, ensuring one egg per person (with the option of some yogurt on the side)

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Cream of mushroom soup: so healthy and delicious even mushroom sceptics might love it!

We all have them: foods that we’re just not sure about. This can range from mild dislike to utter loathing, and can be based on taste, texture, smell, colour or association. It can also be a mix of loving a food cooked one way but hating another. And it can be completely irrational. For me, this is mushrooms.

I only like mushrooms in cream of mushroom soup. By that, I mean tinned cream of mushroom soup and the freshly made version at Russian coffee house chain Shokoladnitsa. Anything else, I either feel like I’m chewing school erasers or it plays to childhood suspicions that I’m being poisoned by the Evil Witch who hates kids.

This can put me in an awkward position as mushrooms are often used in the only dish I can eat at restaurants with limited menus, especially risottos. It almost rendered me a freak of nature living in Russia for six years as mushroom picking is a national pastime. And for good reason, as these fungi are good for you.

Mushrooms come in many shapes, sizes and colours, though the most popular is the white or button variety. They are low-fat, low-calorie and low-sodium. They contain protein and fibre, and are rich in B vitamins and minerals, such as selenium and copper, and other antioxidants that can help protect the body against heart disease and cancer, and the damage caused by ageing, as well as improve digestion and maintain the immune system.

So for this logical reason, and the fact that I have actually walked through three feet of snow to eat it, is why I am including this delicious recipe for cream of mushroom soup. I dare any mycophobics out there not to try it and love it!

Preparation time: 20 minutes
Cooking time: 40 minutes
Serves: Two

Ingredients:
500g white button mushrooms
2 tablespoons of chopped dried mushrooms
20g butter
½ medium onion
1 clove of garlic
3 medium potatoes
200g of creme fraiche (for the soup and for serving)
500ml water
1 vegetable stock cube
1 tablespoon of unscented oil

Method:
1. Boil some water in a kettle and add to the dried mushrooms in a cup or small bowl until just covered. Leave for 15 minutes
2. Boil and measure out 500ml of water, add a stock cube and allow it to dissolve
3. Peel and finely chop the onion
4. Melt the butter in a large pan and add the onion
5. Sweat the onion on a low heat for five minutes with the lid on
6. Wash or wipe clean the button mushrooms. Remove the stalks of 8-10 mushrooms and put only the caps to one side
7. Finely chop the remaining mushrooms and all the stalks, peel and chop the garlic, and peel and dice the potatoes (1 cm square)
8. Add the remaining mushroom and garlic to a pan, stir, and sweat for five minutes with the lid on, stirring from time to time to prevent sticking or burning
9. Add the chopped potatoes, stir, and sweat for five minutes with the lid on. Continue stirring from time to time to prevent burning or sticking
10. Add the vegetable stock and stir
11. Add the rehydrated mushrooms and the liquid they are in and stir
12. Cook on a low heat for 20 minutes with the lid on
13. Add all but two dessert spoons of creme fraiche to the soup until thoroughly blended. Continue cooking on a very low heat for 10 minutes and ensure the potatoes are soft. Do not allow the soup boil or the creme fraiche will clot
14. Heat one tablespoon of unscented oil in a frying pan, cut the set-aside mushroom caps in 1/2 cm slices and fry on a moderate to high heat, turning as necessary until cooked through. Do not brown or burn
15. Liquidise the soup using a hand blender and pass through a sieve
16. Reheat the liquidised soup and add the cooked sliced mushrooms for texture.
Season to taste
17. Serve in warm bowls and put a tablespoon of the remaining creme fraiche in the centre of the soup in each bowl and create a decorative swirl
18. Eat with hot buttered rustic walnut bread!

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Buttered walnut bread: if some flour and yeast can be found, enjoy making and baking this delicious nutty loaf

If by a miracle you arrive at the supermarket just as the shelves are being restocked, then head straight to the home baking aisle, pick up some flour and dried yeast, and try this recipe for delicious walnut bread.

If you can’t find any yeast, or would like a quicker loaf, then opt for our recipe to make tasty rosemary and raisin soda bread.

But the mouth-watering taste is worth the wait!

Preparation time: 15 minutes (plus two hours’ rising time)
Cooking time: 45 minutes
Makes: one large loaf

Ingredients:
500 g/17 1/2 oz wholemeal flour, plus extra for dusting
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
20 g/3/4 oz dried yeast
40 g/11/2 oz butter, softened
60 ml/2 fl oz walnut or sunflower oil
300 ml/1/2 pint of water
150 g/5 oz walnut pieces

Method:
1. Put all the ingredients, except the walnuts, into a large bowl and then mix well with your hands for four minutes
2. Tip the dough onto a lightly floured surface. Using your fingers and the heel of your palm, knead the dough for five minutes
3. Put the dough back in the bowl and leave to rise for an hour
4. Lightly oil a baking tray
5. Break the walnuts into quarters and incorporate into the dough, shape into a ball and dust with flour
6. Place on the baking tray and leave to rise for an hour
7. Preheat the oven to 220 C / 425F / Gas mark 7
8. Using a sharp knife, cut a cross into the top of the dough, then bake the bread for 30 minutes until golden
9. Transfer to a wire rack to cool
10. Slice and serve or freeze

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Creme Dubarry: elegant by name, simple by ingredients, this recipe for cauliflower soup is a delicious classic

There are few culinary contrasts between a dish’s elegant French name and its common-or-garden contents than Creme Dubarry. I wonder if Louis XV’s lavish mistress would have appreciated her title becoming the moniker of cauliflower soup. Some consider it an allusion to her powdered wigs, whose many layers of curls resembled cauliflower curds.

For all its simplicity, Creme Dubarry is a wonderful, nutritious and subtle soup. It is also worth the effort involved in making it. This soup can also be eaten as a neutral meal by food combiners if vegetable stock cubes are used instead of chicken stock, as well as creme fraiche instead of milk.

Preparation time: 20 minutes
Cooking time: 45 minutes
Serves: Four

Ingredients:
20g butter
2 medium leeks (white parts only, finely chopped)
1 head of cauliflower (hard stalks removed and florets finely chopped)
1 clove of garlic (peeled and chopped)
1 vegetable or chicken stock cube
550 ml water
250ml UHT skimmed milk (or 100g creme fraiche and 100ml extra water for food combiners)

Method:
1. Melt the butter in a pan on a low heat
2. Add the leeks to the pan and sweat them with the lid on
3. When the leeks are translucent and soft, add the chopped cauliflower and garlic, and sweat with the lid on for five minutes, stirring occasionally
4. Heat the water in a kettle, measure into a jug and dissolve the stock cube in it
5. Add the warm stock to the pan, then add the milk or creme fraiche
6. Cook on a low heat for 30 minutes until the cauliflower is soft and mushy
7. Liquidise with a hand blender and then pass through a sieve
8. Reheat and season to taste

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Roast vegetable medley: a cheap, easy and tasty way to eat at least your five a day

One inspired marketing idea that supermarkets have devised for selling vegetables is to batch up a few of them, price them reasonably, and sell them as an ideal choice for a stew or casserole.

For the supermarkets, it’s an easy profit and appeals to the British love of “Sunday dinner” vegetables. For the consumer it’s a cheap, easy and tasty way of achieving their five a day.

The Casserole Vegetable Selection in Sainsbury’s is a good example. This is around 750 grammes of nutritious root vegetables – usually a swede, four carrots, a parsnip and an onion – and costs just a pound. For variety, other root veggies can be bought, such as beetroot or turnip.

All I need to add is some olive oil, rosemary and garlic pepper – and a large roasting pan, as I love my roots roasted.

As complex recipes go, this is on a par with making toast. And the result is a medley of healthy, moreish roast vegetables that can be added to any protein or carbohydrate meal, or eaten on their own as a hearty neutral snack.

So the benefits of this simple marketing trick make it well worth mentioning!

Preparation time: 10 minutes
Cooking time: 40 minutes
Serves: two-three

Method:
1. Preheat the oven to 200 C / 180 C fan assisted / 400 F / Gas mark 6
2. Wash the vegetables, peel and chop them into 2-3cm cubes, and spread them across the pan
3. Drizzle a generous amount of olive oil over the top and add some herbs and spices (my current favourites being garlic pepper and rosemary)
3. Put the tray in the oven for 20 minutes, then remove and turn the vegetables over to ensure they are evenly cooked, and then put them back in the oven for another 20 minutes or until they are cooked through
4. Remove from the oven and serve

And if you like your vegetables cooked Italian style, then try the recipe for Paul’s Mediterranean Roast Veggies!

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Red pepper soup: delicious, moreish and rich in vitamin C

The British hospital visitor takes a bunch of grapes for a patient. Jewish people feed chicken soup “penicillin” to the ailing. While a Polish friend cured my chronic sore throat with a mixture of grated apple, honey and sugar. Every nation has its traditional medicinal foods.

Many of these cures contain vitamin C, especially to help people overcome colds or ‘flu. But one of the richest sources of this vitamin actually comes from peppers, otherwise known as bell peppers or capsicums.

Like tomatoes, peppers are classified as fruits but treated in culinary terms as vegetables. A hundred grammes of raw pepper contains 97 per cent of the daily recommended intake of vitamin C. As the average pepper weighs between 113-142 grammes, then just one pepper is more than sufficient.

Vitamin C is easily lost through cooking so raw peppers remain the most nutritious. But this recipe ensures a lot of the liquids which the peppers are cooked in are retained as the lid can be left on the pan most of the time. So this red pepper soup should have some vital vitamin C as well as being extremely tasty!

Preparation time: 20 minutes
Cooking time: 35 minutes
Serves: Two

Ingredients:
2 large red peppers (deseeded and finely chopped)
½ onion (finely chopped)
1 small courgette (finely chopped with the skin on)
1 medium tomato (deseeded and finely chopped)
1 clove of garlic (peeled and chopped)
20g butter
2 tablespoons of white wine vinegar
Vegetable stock cube
500ml water
1 level teaspoon of sweet paprika
Salt and pepper to taste

Method:
1. Peel and finely chop the onion and courgette. Peel and thinly slice the garlic. Deseed and chop the tomato
2. Remove and discard the seeds and stalks of the red peppers. Chop the peppers into 1cm pieces
3. Boil the water in a kettle and measure out 500ml. Dissolve the stock cube in the water
4. In a small saucepan, boil two tablespoons of white wine vinegar and reduce it completely. Add the vegetable stock and set aside
5. Over a low heat, sweat the onion and pepper pieces in 20g of butter for five minutes
6. Add the courgette, tomato and garlic, and sweat for a further five minutes
7. Add the reduced vinegar and vegetable stock and simmer for 20 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add a level teaspoon of sweet paprika and stir
8. Liquidise the soup until very fine and sieve
9. Season to taste

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The lockdown Bellini: a little of what you fancy does you good. Just a little…

Writing an anti-ageing blog isn’t all about lauding seclusion in a Heligoland cloister, scout’s pace at dawn and eating rusks. A little of what you fancy does do you good – and that which makes you happy keeps you young. As ever, the key is moderation.

I’ve developed the “one in one out” rule when it comes to alcohol (and caffeine): for every drink I take, I also have a glass of water. I stay satiated, solvent and sober, and my complexion thanks me the next day.

It also means I savour my drinks. One of my favourites is the Bellini served at the beautiful Baur au Lac bar in Zurich. Peachy perfection.

We may be under lockdown but we still have supermarkets, tastebuds and virtual nights out. So, in the spirit of moderation meets imagination, here is the Lockdown Bellini, a recipe inspired by the signature cocktail at Baur’s Bar.

You need only a bottle of Prosecco and a tin of peaches in syrup (another type of tinned fruit would do but it wouldn’t be a Bellini). Put the bottle and the tin in the fridge along with two champagne coupes – for the full effect – or wine glasses. This keeps everything as cold as possible without adding ice and diluting the Bellini!

When cold, liquidise the peaches in their syrup, adding a little Prosecco to make the mixture more fluid (it should be the consistency of a thick juice not a puree). Take out the cold champagne glasses. Fill 2/3 of the glasses with Prosecco (it’s important to add this first so the mixture doesn’t froth too much) then fill up the final third with the liquidised peaches.

Then take your drinks, sit back, and imagine you are back in your favourite cocktail bar. Cheers! (NB don’t forget your glass of water…)

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