Padding out meals

amyandoli

ecsb wrote: »

i pad out our bol with loads of veg, onions, mushrooms, carrots, peppers, courgettes and then once cooked, slowly, i blast it with the hand held blender so kids and hubby don't know what a healthy meal they are having. i quite often only use 500g of meat and make enough for 4/5 meals for a family of 4 by adding all the yummy veg.

glad im not the only one hiding veg in a grown mans meal! :rotfl:

catz747

amyandoli wrote: »

glad im not the only one hiding veg in a grown mans meal! :rotfl:

:rotfl::rotfl: I should try hiding veg in my own meals - great idea!!

carolt

Bit stunned that you normally use 200g of meat per portion - that seems an awful lot to me. I usually work on a rule of thumb of half that approx per adult, certainly in something like spag bol which has loads of veg anyway. Lots of tomatoes, onions, courgettes, mushrooms - all traditional in spag bol.

Have read elsewhere on old style of people using oats, weetabix or breadcrumbs as a filler, though haven't tried any of these myself. Baked beans often used in cheaper spag bol recipes, as suggested above.

Or just serve with more pasta???!!!

Gingernutmeg

I use half a packet of mince when I make spag bol ... I fry off a whole onion and some garlic, then the mince, then I add mushrooms, a stick of celery, then a grated carrot and a courgette, a few good spoonfuls of red lentils and some home-made arrabiata sauce, along with water and a beef stock cube. This makes four good portions - we usually have spaghetti one night and a sort-of shepherds pie the next, topped with either mash or cubed potato, which makes a lovely crunchy topping.

I've got so used to doing spaghetti this way that I find the 'mince-only' versions too much for me now, they're far too meaty lol!

Fizog

Aubergines are brilliant padders in all mince dishes. BUT you have to roast them in the oven first @ 180 elec / gas 4 for 30 mins . the aubergines collapse and you need to let them cool. Peel off the skin then chop and add to whatever!

johanne

i use soya mince, but make it up with a beef stock cube and fry it in the meat juices for a bit before straining.. you usually cant tell the difference and i find it doubles the amount without halving the taste!

kethry

I add everything i can to mince to pad it out. LOL (you've probably got visions of glace cherries in a shepherd's pie now..)

what i do is to boil 4oz green lentils for 10 minutes, then drain and wash. I then chop 4/6 onions, depending on size, and fry those, then add a 250g packet of mince (the very small ones you can buy from Asda or Tesco for around 70p to £1). i fry that, breaking it down so its not in big lumps, then add chopped peppers (of all colours), a chopped aubergine, a couple of chopped courgettes, a few sticks of celery, chopped up, lots of mushrooms, also chopped, grated carrot and peas. And any other veg i can get away with (i had a fennel hanging around in the fridge the other week for example). i saute those with the lid on, with the mince, then add the lentils. When they're all cooked - or well on the way to being cooked, i add an oxo stock cube and pepper. I then take out 1 part, which goes to make something like the filling for a shepherd's pie or sauerkraut dish (see this thread) - i put it in a seperate tin and add mixed herbs, boullion, pepper and so on as appropriate.

The remaining 3 parts have a couple tins of chopped tomato added to it, stirred well. 1 part gets removed to make a chilli - kidney beans and sometimes cannelloni beans get added, and of course chilli powder (and i make it hot so you need less of it to fork through rice). 1 part gets removed to make a beef curry - i add sultanas (very 70s, i know, but i like em) and a basic curry powder, again, i make it hot. sometimes i add cannelloni beans to this too. The final part goes to make a spag bol mix, with mixed herbs.

in this way i can stretch 250g mince to feed 8 portions (there are 2 of us), sometimes more.

Can anyone beat this?

keth
xx

Three_Dancing_Dragons

Nope. I only get six portions with 300g mince and 250g finely diced mushrooms (one big tin chopped tomatoes, 750ml bottle passata, tblsp worcestershire, 2 tbsp tomato ketchup and a beef oxo cube). Oh and a teaspoon of vegemite.

susank

3lb mince should feed 12 easily! - padding it out with Soya mince (I buy from Tesco dry and soak it and add it when I have browned off the mince should feed 16 people old style - adding loads of veg etc grated carrots too will help and lots of onions and celery chopped up really small. Then you will have loads to freeze for another day.

superstylin

Hi all, i had a tesco delivery yesterday (bought a lot of own brand/value things, used bogofs and a voucher from the forum of course) and i recognised that i spend about a quarter of the budget on meat. that's about £15 every shop for around 8 days of meals. i'm just wondering what everyone uses to replace the meat in their favourite dishes, or what you bulk out a meat dish with, so that i can cut back a bit? (in these hard times!)

btw i'm not much of a cook, or much of an mse'r! (but i'm working on it!) so far i know red lentils are good (but for what?) and pearl barley is up there too...?

thanks in advance