Jamie Oliver's Fiery Tomato & Chilli Pasta Sauce

I am pleased to say that Jamie Oliver's Fiery Tomato & Chilli Pasta Sauce (available in Tescos) is entirely Candida diet a-okay, and jolly tasty too. Kudos to Jamie!

New Recipe: Lemon prawn linguine

This recipe includes a dash of tabasco sauce. Now, while its main ingredient is vinegar, I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest it's okay in moderation...besides, you're hardly going to add more than a couple of drops to the sauce, unless you have an iron-cast tongue!

Lemon Prawn Linguine

Serves 1 hungry person!

frozen prawns, defrosted
juice of one lemon
half a small onion, or one shallot, finely chopped
wholewheat linguine (or spaghetti)
dash of tabasco sauce
olive oil spread
fresh herbs (i.e. parsley)
freshly ground pepper
manchego or other hard sheep/goats cheese, grated


Melt a good knob of olive oil spread in a pan. Add the onion/shallot and sweat until soft. Add the prawns and stir for a minute or two. Add the lemon juice, pepper and tabasco sauce to taste and simmer over a low heat.

Meanwhile cook the pasta until al dente. Drain and return to the pan. Add the prawns/onion mixture and stir into the pasta with a handful of chopped, fresh herbs.

Sprinkle with the grated cheese and serve with a simple green salad, drizzled with flaxseed oil. Delicious, even if I do say so myself!

Smoked Salmon

I know that smoked products are frequently prohibited for people following the anti-Candida diet, but occasionally I indulge. I figure it's better than eating a slice of chocolate cake! So, the other day, I bought some wafer-thin smoked salmon slices from Marks & Spencers. Yesterday, I had several slices with soft goats cheese on oatcakes for lunch, and this evening I finished off the rest of the pack in a pasta dish, the (slightly vague - sorry) recipe for which follows. (and jolly tasty it was too!).

Smoked salmon and broccoli pasta
(makes enough for one generous portion)

half a pack of wafer-thin smoked salmon slices
a handful of purple-sprouting broccoli
wholewheat pasta tagliatelle or spaghetti
wholewheat flour
goats milk
olive-oil spread
bay leaf
paprika
salt and pepper

Trim and cut the broccoli stems in half. Boil or steam until just tender. Meanwhile cook the pasta and make a white sauce (flour, olive-oil spread and milk) in a saucepan. Add a bay leaf and a sprinkle of paprika and cook gently until the flour has cooked, whisking all the time to create a smooth sauce. Season to taste. Meanwhile, slice the salmon into strips. When al dente, drain the pasta and return to a low heat. Add the drained broccoli, sauce (remember to remove the bay leaf) and salmon strips. Stir to combine and serve with a rocket, spinach and watercress salad, dressed with a spot of Olive oil.

Recipe: Brown Lentil Bolognese

Here's a recipe I tried out the other day. I adapted it from a Rose Elliott book on vegetarian cookery (again, I failed to make a note of the title). It wasn't bad. A good 'base' to work from in my opinion. I think in the future I may omit the celery (which I'm not especially keen on) and add chopped tomatoes or passata.

Brown lentil bolognese

225g brown or green lentils
2 onions, chopped
oil
2 garlic cloves, crushed
2 celery sticks, chopped
2 carrots, finely diced
2 tbsp tomato puree
salt & pepper

Cook and drain the lentils according to the instructions on the packet. Keep the liquid. Brown the onions in the oil, add the garlic, celery, carrot. Cover and cook gently for fifteen minutes until tender. Add lentils, tomato puree, seasoning and reserved liquid to make a thick, soft consistency.

Serve with wholegrain spaghetti and shavings of hard goats cheese.

Quick and tasty lunch idea

Wholewheat pasta tubes;
Olive salad mix (capers, sliced green olives and strips of roasted red pepper, in brine - comes in jars from Tescos);
Shavings of hard goat's cheese; and
Freshly ground black pepper.

Delicious! :)

Prosciutto and how to use it

Errata: When I originally wrote this post I had a bit of a brain freeze and talked about pancetta when - of course - I meant prosciutto ham. Duh! Sorry...

When I first started out on the Candida Diet I was told that I couldn't have smoked or cured meat in any circumstances. The idea being that cured meat has been hanging around in an environment conducive to yeast and mould growth. I've always felt a bit ambivalent towards this prohibition. After all, how much meat these days in cured or smoked in a shed or up a chimney, with no environmental/hygiene controls whatsoever? And wouldn't heating/cooking kill off any organisms which had managed to colonise my rasher of bacon, or slice of smoked salmon?

Over the two years since, these restrictions have been relaxed slightly (not least because I have a different nutritional therapist now): I'm now allowed to eat cured or smoked meat occasionally - mainly because there is a school of thought which considers the chemical changes that occur during curing/smoking as potentially carcinogenic. Nevertheless, the other day - as a treat - I bought myself some prosciutto from Marks & Spencers no least! ;)

Good prosciutto or parma ham should be okay - it shouldn't contain anything but pork, salt and possibly a bit of water. The only thing I found was that it did taste incredibly salty, which I think is a result of me re-educating my taste buds since I went on the diet. Anyway, apart from in a sandwich (made with soda bread) I did come up with a few ideas on how to use the rest of the pack.

Potato farls* with prosciutto and goats cheese

A couple of potato farls or pancakes
Two slices of prosciutto
grated hard goats cheese

Slice each farl/pancake width-ways. Place the farls cut side up on a baking tray/grill pan and toast under a grill for a couple of minutes. Remove, and on top of each farl place half a slice of prosciutto and some grated cheese. Place back under the grill and cook until the cheese is bubbling and starting to brown.

Delicious! But packed full of calories. ;)

(Sort-of) Pasta Carbonara

Okay, this isn't anything like a real carbonara, but it's kind of the same idea.

Sufficient pasta shells/spaghetti for one person
2/3 slices of prosciutto
cornflour
goats milk/soya milk
olive oil spread
paprika
salt & pepper
Goats cheese
olive oil

Put a saucepan of water on to boil. Add a spot of olive oil to the pan to prevent the pasta from sticking together. When boiling, add the pasta, cover and simmer until al dente. Meanwhile make a white sauce (add a dessert spoonful of cornflour to a pan, with a knob of olive oil spread and a dash of milk - whisk until smooth and cook on a low heat, whisking all the time to prevent the sauce from burning/going lumpy. Gradually add more milk until the sauce is a good consistency). Take off the heat and add the grated cheese, a sprinkle of paprika and salt and pepper to taste (remember, the prosciutto and cheese will be quite salty, so you may not need to add much salt).

Drain the pasta and put back in the saucepan. Tear up the slices of prosciutto into strips and add to the pasta along with the cheese sauce. Give it a good stir and serve.

*I thought that I'd written about potato farls/pancakes/bread before in this blog, but it turns out I haven't, so here goes. Potato farls tend to be candida diet-friendly (with caution). Predominantly made from potato, they do include a small amount of plain wheatflour and occasionally (as is the case with Marks & Spencer's version), vinegar. As ever, it's important to check the ingredients list, and if there's anything you're not sure about, it's best to leave it on the shelf.

Mother Hemp Red Pesto

Another of my finds at Tescos was 'Motherhemp' Red Pesto. It's fairly strong and flavoursome, so you only need a little bit to liven up pasta. For dinner this evening, I had it with oven-roasted vegetables (red pepper, courgettes, onion and aubergine) on Orgran Tricolour corn pasta, topped with crumbled feta for protein.

Here's a pic (from the Motherhemp website).

There was also green pesto version, but I believe that included Parmesan in the ingredient. Shame :(

Bty, the oils in hemp seed are supposed to be good for inflammatory skin conditions. And I'm sure we're all familiar with the sort of nasty inflammatory skin conditions Candida overgrowth can cause!