Simple & tasty meals are the best. Happy hump day.

Flick: Don't get me wrong, my cooking has definitely improved over the years but sometimes I just down right cant be bothered!!

Take the other day for instance, I was chatting with Dan and she was telling me about this delicious orange cake she had made for school lunches, I was really interested as Im trying this new thing where I don't let my fruit and veggies go to waste.  As a result I am cooking soups, muffins and whatever else I can muster up with my ingredients.  So I was interested in hearing more about the construction of Dans orange cake.  Then she mentioned.... ‘you just put it all in the blender’.  There was me thinking it was going to be some all day baking extravaganza.

We used to live together in Sydney and Dan would come home from work with her grocery bag of fresh fish and produce with the intent of making some yummy Thai dish of Salmon and crunchy apple salad and there was me standing there with my delicious combination of 3 ingredients....brussel sprouts, a can of tuna and soy sauce! (Dan: Gag!!) :)  Clearly, I like to keep it simple, but I am slowly evolving in to simple dishes that taste great.  So Dan has promised me this with our blog, simple, quick and all kinds of tasty. 

Dan: I used to love to cook, even entertain.  I loved planning and putting on dinner parties, loved going to dinner parties.  We even had a weekly cook up with our neighbours that meant a 3 course meal of something that we had never cooked before.  The meal plans were researched, thought out, involved and always so much fun.  Fast forward about 10 years and cooking dinner is mostly a chore.  However, I still like to sit down to a tasty meal and who doesn't love a dinner compliment from the husband and the culinary 5 year old!

So now I like to keep it tasty, try and keep it simple (with a relatively new bub) and for me at the moment I am trying to limit my carbs.  For no other reason than while I was pregnant I ate a lot of carbs.  So the meals you will see from me will most likely be low carb, healthy, gluten free, dairy free and refined sugar free (but not always).  Don't get me wrong, I still love all things decadent but just in moderation. :) I am also a sucker for a recipe, so I am not going to try and reinvent the wheel when there are so many amazing home cooks already creating such wonderful dishes so I will most likely share from them.

So keeping with the theme of being on the run this week and time being a huge factor I thought I would share this one with you.  I recently got given Luke & Scott's (from My Kitchen Rules) Clean Living cookbook.  I love it and I strongly recommend you go and buy it if you are interesting in a paleo diet with lots of fresh meals.  I also have been getting a lot of kale in my weekly delivered veggie box and I have been making a kale pesto that I found over at Donna Hay.  So I have used inspiration from one of Luke & Scott's dishes and mixed it with Donna Hays Kale Pesto and added a bunch of basil to the pesto for a fuller flavour.

Poached Tasmanian Salmon with Kale Pesto Zoodles

Donna Hays Kale Pesto

250g kale, stalks removed
¼ cup (40g) pine nuts, toasted
2 cloves garlic, crushed
½ cup (40g) finely grated pecorino, plus extra, to serve
1 tablespoon finely grated lemon rind
2 tablespoons lemon juice
⅓ cup (80ml) extra virgin olive oil
sea salt and cracked black pepper

Cook the kale in a large saucepan of salted boiling water for 1 minute or until just wilted. Remove with a slotted spoon and refresh in cold water. Pat dry on absorbent paper. Place the kale, pine nuts, garlic, pecorino, lemon rind, lemon juice, olive oil, salt and pepper in a small food processor and process until roughly chopped. Set aside.

Zoodles and Poached Salmon

4-5 large zucchini
1/2 cup toasted pine nuts
Sea salt to taste
400g salmon fillets, skinless and bones removed.

If you don't have a vegetable noodle machine to make your zucchini noodles or zoodles (I don't) then you can peel it thinly with a potato peeler and then slice long ways very thinly to create your noodles.

Place the zoodles in salted boiling water and wait for the water to return to the boil and drain and rinse.  Place in a large bowl ready for the rest of the ingredients.

Place the Salmon fillets in a pot of already boiled water.  Place the lid on to keep the heat inside.  Remove the fish after 7 minutes depending on how well you want your fish done.

Drain the fish and flake it apart with a fork or fingers.

Place the kale pesto on the zoodles and toss through being careful not to crush up the zoodles (or they will become mushy)

Add the fish and toasted pine nuts.  Salt and pepper to taste.

And there you go.  Super healthy, tasty and quick.

Tips: 1. I add a bunch of basil to the kale pesto and blend with the kale, I just prefer the stronger flavour.  2. I try to buy Australian fish where I can, from Coles you will usually find Tasmanian Salmon. 3. You do not have to use zucchini noodles at all.  You can skip this step all together and use spaghetti or any other pasta that you prefer.

I hope you enjoy.