Minty Chicken Rigatoni Pasta!

This fresh pasta dish has a lovely taste but using ready-made stock can make it quite salty so don't season this dish until the sauce is cooked. It'll take about 30 minutes to prepare and cook - this recipe serves 2 and costs around £2.20 each.

Ingredients

200g rigatoni pasta

115g frozen peas

small knob of butter

1tbsp vegetable oil

1 small red pepper, seeded and sliced

2 boneless chicken breasts - cut into 1cm cubes

1small onion - finely chopped

1 garlic glove - finely chopped

100ml chicken stock

2tbsp chopped fresh mint

1tsp wholegrain mustard

100ml creme fraiche

How to make

Cook the pasta in salted boiling water for 10-12 minutes and add the peas for the last 3 minutes.

Heat the oil and the butter in a frying pan - add the red pepper and cook for 5 minutes until it starts to brown and then put on a plate to one side.

Add the chicken and the onion to the pan and cook over a high heat for 8-10 minutes until the chicken is browned - stir in the garlic for the last minute.

Add the stock and bring to the boil and cook for about 3 minutes to reduce by half.

Stir in the red pepper, mint, mustard and creme fraiche and season with pepper.

Drain the pasta, stir into the chicken and serve.

Spicy Pork with Stir-fried Greens!

This is a really tasty stir fry but it takes longer to chop everything up than it does to cook - about 25 minutes in total! To spice it up a bit more you can add some garlic and ginger if you have any - it will serve two people and works out at about £2.00 each.

Ingredients

1 tbsp vegetable oil

250g pork escalopes, sliced into thin strips

Bunch of spring onions - trimmed and sliced

175g broccoli - broken into small bite sized pieces

3 celery sticks - sliced

2 heads of pak choi - broken into separate leaves

2 tbsp chopped fresh coriander

Finely grated zest and juice of 1 lime

A few thin slices of red chilli and or a dash of sweet chilli sauce

How to cook

Heat the oil in a frying pan, add the pork and stir fry for about 4 minutes.

Tip in the spring onions, broccoli and celery and stir fry over a heat heat for about 5 minutes more.

Add the pak choi and cook until the leaves have wilted.

Add the coriander and the lime zest and squeeze in the little juice and add the sliced red chilli or the chilli sauce.

Season with salt and pepper and serve straight away with some jasmine rice - about 75g per person is about right.

Jacket Spuds!

Doesn't everyone love a jacket potato? They are easy to cook and a great base for a cheap dinner - these will take about 30 minutes to make and this recipe will serve two people and cost around a £1 each.

Ingredients

2 baking potatoes - you need to make sure that the potatoes that you buy are ok to bake - they need to be fluffy so Kind Edwards are best.

Salt and pepper

A little vegetable oil

Knob of butter

Tin of baked beans with sausages

Grated cheese

How to cook

Pre-heat the oven to 220oC /425oF / Gas 7 and Fan 200oC.

Wash the potatoes and pat them dry and then stick a knife (carefully) in to the potatoes in about 4 or 5 different places - to pierce the skin.

Pop them both in the microwave for about 8 minutes.

Take them out of the microwave, rub some oil on them, grind some salt and black pepper over the pop and pop them into the oven on a baking tray.

Bake them for about 20 minutes, depending on the size of your potato, poke them with skewer to check that they are done.

By cooking them in the microwave first you cut down on the cooking time in the oven which makes them crispy on the outside and fluffy on the insides!

Warm the beans and sausages in a small pan.

Cut a cross into the top of each one and push them open then mash a small amount of butter into the potato, add the beans and sausages and top with some grated cheese.

Nice with a bit of salad!

I lived below the line for 5 days & raised £180 for UNICEF!

I managed to Live Below the Line for 5 days on less than a £1 a day - I didn't feel too hungry but missed my protein, especially chicken and definitely started to feel more tired than usual by the end of the week.

I'm glad i did it though, it made me think a lot about how much we spend on food usually and how much choice we normally have.

It was ok for 5 days but I wouldn't like to have to do it for longer and I know that there are adults and children overseas and here in the UK that have very little money to spend on food all the time.

I saw comments some negative comments from people suggesting that it wasn't a true test as we didn't have to pay for shelter and power etc with the £1 - if you ask me that's a pretty stupid argument but then  there are people who always have to put down what others are doing - it makes me wonder what they are actually doing to help make a difference?

In the main though people were positive and really encouraging and I am really pleased that I have been able to raise £180 for UNICEF which I hope will help to feed children from Syria who have ended up in the refugee camps.

As Syria's civil war continues unabated, thousands of children have fled across the border, terrified and desperate for safe refuge from the spiralling violence.
Humanitarian needs are at critical levels inside Syria with more than 4 million people in urgent need of aid.

UNICEF is reaching families with blankets, foods and other essentials and helping children affected by the crisis cope.

Finally I'd like to say a HUGE thanks to everyone who sponsored me - I really appreciated your support - it kept me going!

Living Below the Line - 5 days & £5!

My mum decided to do the challenge with me so we had a total of £10 for both of us to cover the 5 days.

Every day we had cereals ( cornflakes ) with milk and a cup of tea - this was my least favourite bit of the whole challenge!

For lunch we had a cheese and ham sandwich, carrot sticks, a bag of 'crisp' type snacks and two digestive biscuits - not bad, quite filling but got a bit boring.

For dinner each night we had rice or pasta with vegetables in a different sauce and a yogurt for pudding.

We could have a couple more cups of tea each night and a last biscuit.

I didn't really feel hungry very often but i really missed 'protein' especially chicken!

I'll put some photos of the dinners we made below.

At the end of the week this is what we had left - a bowl of cornflakes, loads of tea-bags, a pot of black pepper which we hardly used and most of a jar of pickle.

I was really looking forward to breakfast on saturday morning!