Monday 16th January- Plenty of Lentils

Back to an old favourite for Monday evening- Delia Smiths lentils with marinated chicken kebabs - the green lentils are cooked with red wine and a bit of onion and rosemary. Chicken marinated in lemon. olive oil, garlic and rosemary. The recipe stated 3 tblsp oil, I used around half a spoonful and upped the lemon juice.

Tonight is going to be a beef stew. I know this doesn't sound like diet food, but what I'm doing is changing how I cook. So whereas three weeks ago I would have used vast amounts of meat, added dumplings and served with mashed potato laden with butter and maybe even cream, this weeks stew will be a different dish altogether!
The meat has been cut down to a small portion - I'm actually using frying steak which was fairly cheap, and is very lean. To this will be added a 'stew pack' of carrots, swede and parsnip. I'll cut all these up and make a sort of hotpot in layers, with some sliced potato at the top. Served with some purple sprouting - of course far too much was cooked, but the chickens enjoyed the stalks and the leftovers of this.