I thought it would be worthwhile to post a little review of my ‘Meat-Free March’. Generally we all really enjoyed the challenge of going meat-free for a month although it has to be said, some meals were enjoyed more than others by all the family. Week 2 was my least favourite week. Don’t get me wrong most of the meals were lovely, but they generally involved using more saucepans than I’d prefer mid-week. And I was completely OVER the whole fishy/dairy thing pretty quickly.

Paella - www.bbcgoodfood.com

Most of the recipes I was trying were new ones, so I thought I’d highlight my top 5 new things to cook, by category:

Favourite Childrens Meal
Pasta with Purple Sprouting Broccoli & Anchovy. This was a real winner with everyone, much to my surprise. The kids loved the broccoli, I loved the salty, savoury flavour from the anchovies and parmesan. Really easy to prepare and a fab mid-week dinner.

Favourite Girls Night In Dinner
Crispy Greek Pie If you’ve got a girls night in lined up, then this would make a fantastic meal, served with some salad with a simple balsalmic vinegar dressing.  And lots of red wine of course.  Really tasty, the left-overs made a fantastic packed lunch for my husband over following days.

Favourite Larder Feast
The gorgeous Thai Fishcakes from www.thekitchenrevolution.co.uk were beautiful. They were the right texture and consistency, didn’t break up in the pan and tasted fabulous. The dipping sauce to go with them was amazing, tangy, sweet, sour – it’s making my mouth water just remembering it! They used tinned salmon and didn’t need any mash, so were really quick to prepare – again great for a mid-week dinner. Unfortunately the link doesn’t work any longer to provide the recipe – but buy the book, it’s a fantastic feast of great dinner ideas.

Favourite Weekend Meal
This Lemon Butternut Lasagne is a perfect weekend meal.  It does take about an hour to prepare and uses LOTS of saucepans but the bonus is that you get an extra one to pop in the freezer for another time.  I have to say that this was more popular with the adults than the kids – but you can never guess from one day to the next what is going to go down well with children.  Well, not my little ones anyway.

Favourite Family Meal
Generally all our meals were well received by everyone, however this Paella was a doddle to make (one saucepan…can you see a theme??) and the kids enjoyed it very much too.  We had it for Sunday lunch but it would also be fabulous mid-week.  The big prawns we had were juicy and even my 18 month old enjoyed chomping her way through them.

Hopefully sharing some of these recipes will inspire you to try them out – even if your other half is a meat and two veg man….