Raeward provides

On Tuesday afternoon, I was planning to swing by Raeward Fresh on my way home from work to get some fruit. Since I didn't have anything planned for dinner, I looked through the vegetable and salad recipes to come up with some ideas based on ingredients I could get from Raeward.

In the end, I decided to have stuffed mushrooms (p165) with egg salad (p177). I planned a one-third recipe for each of these, so all I needed was a courgette, three mushrooms and an onion. I also grabbed some mesculin for a plain green salad on the side.

The stuffed mushrooms were a piece of ease to make. Remove the mushroom stalks, and bung the mushrooms, cap side up, under the grill for a couple of minutes. While they're grilling, chop up the mushroom stalks and fry them up with chopped bacon and a bit of onion. I chopped up a leftover piece of my homemade wholemeal bread into breadcrumbs, added them to the frypan and used the mixture to fill the mushroom cavities. Then stick the mushrooms back under the grill. It's that easy.

While they were cooking, I threw together the egg salad. I'd thought ahead and I'd boiled some eggs earlier - which technically knocks off another 'recipe': boiled eggs (p95). That's one thing that might trip you up on this recipe - you need your eggs boiled and cold before you start. Somehow I always manage to underboil my eggs, so the yolks were still a bit runny when I chopped them. Never mind, it didn't affect the taste.


The other main ingredient was courgette. I'd never have thought of eating raw courgette in a salad, but actually it worked quite well. Sliced thinly, mixed with the chopped egg and some garlic mayonnaise, it made a very nice salad.

By the time I had made my egg salad and dressed the mesculin, the mushrooms were done - even a little overdone - and my dinner was ready. A tasty, healthy plateful of food that took less than 15 minutes to make.


I took the leftover salad and the third mushroom to work for lunch on Wednesday. The salad dressing had gone a bit runny, but otherwise it had kept fine. The mushroom wasn't looking too appealing when I first took it out of my lunchbox, but once it was reheated, it tasted just as good as it had fresh. I was even tempted to get some more mushrooms on my way home so I could make some more. This one's definitely going into my permanent 'quick meal' repertoire.