In a bid to shed some weight before my works Christmas party (and generally because I’ve been rather greedy of late) I’ve decided to revisit my self-fashioned ‘low saturated fat’ diet. It’s simple, eat what you like as long as there’s no saturated fat. Oh, and drink lots of water. Sod fad diets, no blocking out food groups for temporary fixes. Dodgy stuff that. Mini-rant over.

I popped into my local supermarket tonight before going home in order to grab some chicken (grilled chicken with peppers and tomatoes is a favourite of mine when I diet) for dinner. The chicken looked a bit ropey/pricey and I decided to browse the seafood section for some inspiration when I saw some tiger prawns which were half price so decided to give them a whirl. When I got back home I decided upon a soup/casserole.

INGREDIENTS:

• A pack of tiger prawns
• Button mushrooms
• Spring onions
• A single green pepper
• Plum tomatos in tomato sauce (tinned)
• Fresh garlic
• Extra virgin olive oil
• Sea salt
• A packet of wholemeal pitta

HOW TO MAKE IT
Use a decent pyrex dish (one with a lid is best), pour in a little olive oil and place into the oven without the lid on at around 93oC (200oF approx). When the oil is heated through, chuck in the prawns (including the prawny water stuff) along with two crushed cloves of garlic, some of the tomato sauce from the tin and a generous pinch of sea salt. Mix it around well and put the lid on for about 3-4 minutes.

While the prawns begin cooking, clean and chop up the mushrooms, spring onions and pepper; when you’ve done this, pop everything in with the cooking prawns along with the tinned tomatoes and remaining sauce. Replace the lid and shove it back in the oven for 10-15 mins (I like all my veg hard, so leave longer if you want yours softer). Just before the soup/casserole (sasserole?) is ready, heat a few of the wholemeal pitta bread under the grill. They make great dipping bread.

And that’s it 🙂 Apologies for the quality of the picture but I only had my mobile phone camera to hand! All in, the meal cost me less than a lady (£5). Bargain.