Jamie's 15 Minute Meals

Do they really take only 15 minutes to make? Well if you've got the kettle turned on and a helper on hand, then yes maybe. But then there's the cleaning up and washing up to do afterwards.

None the less, Jamie's 15 minute meals recipe book is a real treat for anyone who wants to have a healthy meal that's relatively quick and easy to make.

I bought the book for Gaffa for Christmas since he's a massive Jamie fan, and I always complain that even though his cooking is amazing, it does take a tad longer than desired and I get a little impatient sometimes... (yes, there's my confession in black and white print).

Anyway, one afternoon I turned on the tv and started watching one of Jamie's 15 minute meals episodes. He was making a Greek chicken and veggie cous cous salad. I started noting the recipe down on my iPhone notes and decided to take on the 15 minute challenge. It took me about 30-40 minutes but it was relatively simple to make and didn't have anything too unhealthy in it. Plus Gaffa scoffed down about 3 bowls of the cous cous salad so it must've been pretty good!! The mix of the spices marinating the chicken went well with the usual Greek ingredients of olives, capsicum and feta cheese. All cooled down with a side of tzatziki.

Now since I bought Gaffa the cook book for Christmas, it was his turn to make something. Gaffa is well into making soups and we got given an awesome Kenwood stick mixer for Christmas with a soup mixer extension, so mushroom soup was the first recipe he tried out. The soup was a success since we ate all of it even though it was meant for 4 people! The creamy texture coupled with the truffle oil made this very moreish.

Our friends were coming over for dinner, after traveling overseas for almost a year. We'd met them in central America in June but we hadn't see them since. Being vegetarians, there were a good variety of recipes to choose from in Jamie's book. We made the soup as entree for them and Gaffa proudly announced that this time it did only take him 15 minutes to make the soup. For the main he cook a dahl. For those of you who aren't familiar with Indian cuisine, it's mainly spinach and chickpeas with a variety of pungent Indian spices to make you want to reach for a class of milk after your first mouthful - for me anyway, the other guys' spice tolerance are a lot better than mine!

For another night's dnner Gaffa made another curry - keralan veggie curry. It required curry leaves which we did buy from the supermarket but somewhere between leaving the supermarket and arriving home, the curry leaves went missing. It still baffles me where they are... This curry was really good, the sweet pineapple chunks infused with the spices, and the chargrilled cauliflower went well together. Another great meal for vegetarians.

So far so good, we're yet to find a Jamie recipe that disappoints. We highly recommend his cookbooks. Jamie's all about healthy eating, sharing food and passing on your cooking skills.