Chicken and Mushroom Risotto

Serves 2

Extra Easy - 0 syns, HEXa

Ingredients
150g Risotto rice (Arborio)
1 pt Chicken Stock (more if needed)
4 Chicken thigh fillets, chopped into chunks and excess fat removed
Couple of handfuls of Chestnut mushrooms, sliced
4 shallots, sliced
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
4 tbsps grated Parmesan (HEXa)
1 tsp thyme
Salt & Black Pepper
Frylight

Method
1. Fry the shallot in a frying pan sprayed with frylight until slightly softened.
2. Add the garlic, mushrooms and chicken, then add the thyme and seasoning and fry until the chicken has whitened. Spray the pan with more frylight if needed and add the rice and stir through.
3. Add a glug of the hot chicken stock at a time, stirring until the liquid has been absorbed by the rice and repeat. Keep doing this until the rice is cooked and the stock has run out. If needed, add more hot water to the pan until the rice is cooked through.
 4. Take it off the heat and stir through half of parmesan. Serve with the remaining parmesan sprinkled on top and a grinding of black pepper.

Nigella's Meatzza

This is a recipe from Nigella Lawson's latest TV series, Nigellisima. It occured to me that this recipe was very easy to make SW-friendly so I thought I'd give it a go! It's basically a pizza, but with a meat base in place of dough. I'm sure you could experiment with toppings but this is the basic 'Margherita' version. You could even include the parmesan and porridge oats as HEXa and HEXb to make this recipe free.

Serves 4

Extra Easy -  2 syns per portion, HEXa

Ingredients  
500g Extra Lean Beef Mince
3 tbsps grated Parmesan (1.5 syns per tbsp or use as HEXa)
25g Quaker Porridge Oats (4.5 syns or use as HEXb)
1 tsp dried Mixed Herbs
2 eggs, beaten
1 large Garlic clove, finely grated
1 tin of Chopped Tomatoes
1 tsp dried oregano
120g ball of Mozzarella, sliced into 8x15g slices (part of your HEXa)*
Fresh Basil
Salt & Black Pepper
Frylight

Method
1. Preheat the oven to 220C and place the mince, parmesan, eggs and porridge oats in a bowl and combine with your hands. Add half of the grated garlic, mixed herbs and seasoning. (Don't overwork the meat when combining).
2. Spray a round cake tin with frylight and place the meat into the tin, pressing it flat with your hands.
3. Drain the the liquid from the chopped tomatoes and mix with the leftover garlic and the oregano, season. Spread evenly onto the meat base.
4. Arrange the mozzarella slices on top (allowing for 2 slices per portion) and place in the oven for 20-25 minutes.
5. Remove from the oven and scatter on the fresh basil leaves.Cut into quarters and serve.

* Full daily allowance = 45g

Basil Pesto

A recipe I found on the SW site that I've tweaked slightly. It's a non-oily pesto recipe that's a perfect accompaniment to pasta. It's 1.5 syns per portion or free if counting the parmesan towards your HEXa.

Serves 4

Extra Easy - 1.5 syns per portion or HEXa

Ingredients
50g (ish) fresh Basil leaves
100g fat free Fromage Frais
50ml Vegetable stock
2 Garlic cloves, roughly chopped
4 tbsps grated Parmesan cheese (6 syns or HEXa)
Mixed Herbs
Salt & Black Pepper

Method
1. Put all of the ingredients into a food processor and blast until it resembles a thin paste.
2. It's a simple as that!

N.B. If you like a bit of spice, add half a small roughly chopped red chilli to the food processor with the rest of the ingredients.

Chilli & Garlic Prawn Linguine

This is a dish you always see on menu's at Italian restaurants so I thought I'd give it a try at home. The best thing is that you can put as much or as little chilli in it as you like.

Serves 2

Extra Easy - 0 syns

Ingredients 
225g grey King Prawns
Carton of Passata
1 Red Chilli, finely chopped
1 Garlic clove, finely chopped
1 Onion, sliced
1 courgette, sliced and then halved
150g dried Linguine, Spaghetti or Parpadelle
Salt & Black Pepper
Frylight

Method
1. Cook the pasta according to the packet instructions.
2. Fry the onion and courgette in a frying pan, sprayed with frylight, and cook until soft.
3. Add the garlic and chilli and fry for one minute, and then add the passata and season well. Cook until the passata has reduced and thickened.
4. Add the prawns and cook until they turn pink.
5. Divide the pasta into two bowls and top with the prawns and sauce. Top with grated parmesan as part of your HEXa.

N.B. For added indulgence add 125ml dry white wine before adding the passata. Add 2 syns per portion.

Carbonara

Here is a firm favourite in my household that I found in an old copy of Slimming World magazine. It uses up your HEXa choice but I use slightly less than the advised daily amount so feel free to boost it up to your full allowance of 30g per person if cheese is your thing. Definitely one of my favourite dishes!

Serves 2 

Extra Easy - 0 syn, HEXa

Ingredients
150g dried Spaghetti
2 Eggs, beaten
40g grated Parmesan (HEXa)
4 slices of Bacon, fat removed, cut into strips
1 Red Onion, sliced
1 Courgette, sliced
Handful of Mushrooms, any variety, sliced
1 Garlic clove, finely chopped
Frylight

Method
1. Cook the spaghetti according to the packet instructions.
2. Meanwhile, prepare your vegetables and fry in a frying pan sprayed with Frylight until cooked.
3. Add the bacon and garlic to the cooked vegetables and fry until the bacon is cooked through.
4. Drain off the spaghetti and return to the saucepan. Add the eggs and half of the parmesan. Season with salt and black pepper.
5. Add the bacon mixture to the pasta and mix well.
6. Transfer the pasta to two bowls and cover each with the remaining parmesan. Enjoy!