January Foodie Round-up – Healthy and seasonal

Well it’s day 12 of 2014 in the Raphael household, and you will find the house-mates are already struggling to continue with many a healthy eating resolution, as well as trying to comprehend how on earth it’s almost the middle of the month already!!

I imagine we are not the only ones going through this however, and many people will have vowed to live a healthier lifestyle  in 2014 that includes less of the bad stuff and more of the good. Hence this round-up that takes us into the new year properly will be a gentle one. Reader, there will be no fried foods here, no chocolate, no booze, and not that much cheese.   There will be cake however, as it would not seem correct and proper otherwise, and there will be seasonal food, as food that has travelled less and is in its prime has to have more vitamins and nutrients in it too right? So it’s just healthier all round.

We will begin with MamaCook’s No Added Sugar, Nut Free Granola. Now you can’t argue that that’s not a healthy start to the day?  

The delightful Bangers and Mash presents us with a gorgeously coloured (and terribly virtuous) Sweet and Sour Winter Salad Then Gannet and Parrot warms our cockles (they are seasonal too right now if you can get your hands on any!) with a lovely Super Celery Soup!

Wholesome Ireland keeps our pulses on the straight and narrow with Slow Cooker Beans, packed full of protein, they would work as well on toast as they would as a stew in their own right I reckon.

And for those of us taking part in Dryathalon for the month of January (and perhaps beyond?), here’s a vitamin packed Mulled Orange Juice from Croque Maman. Speaking of oranges, it’s blood orange season, and as well as making beautiful sorbets and juices, they work equally well in savoury dishes. I would be tempted to try them with Good Life Mum’s Orange Honey Lamb Cutlets, or perhaps her Whisky Orange Marmalade (not that that would be savoury, obviously!).

Considered a super food in their own right, Jerusalem artichokes (or sunchokes as they are also known) are in their prime, and instead of the usual soup I make with them, I will be trying Grab Your Spoon’s Jerusalum Artichoke and Potato Pie for a change – healthy and seasonal (and I happen to love Grab your Spoon’s description of them as Cinderella Vegetables – so true!).

Clams are also at their best, and what better than to make a New England Clam Chowder with them? Pineapple and Coconut has the best ever.

Venison. Not only is it in season, but it’s lower in fat and usually very reasonably priced. Mammasaurus’s Game Stew is a good example of what to do with it, or there’s a nice Venison Pie Recipe from Country Skills for Modern Life.

Not eating much meat this year?  Then how about Fishfingers For Tea’s Goats Cheese and Beetroot Pizza? It looks delicious, and we have to have some cheese for calcium now don’t we?

Over on Selma’s Table, not only will you will find an incredibly healthy Kale and Chickpea Soup with Lemon (Kale’s also in season!) but there’s a really delicious sounding recipe for Roasted Chicken, Potatoes and Chickpeas too.

Right. I think we’ve been good enough for some cake don’t you? These two are hardly going to do you much damage anyway.

Plus 2.4’s Vegan Banana and Raisin Bread is first in the running, proving that you don’t need dairy for a gorgeous looking cake.   And last but not least, the fabulously named Caked Crusader’s Apple and Blueberry Cake also looks divine.

That’s your lot! Happy New Year Foodies! I will be on the look out for Valentines recipes for next month (it couldn’t be anything else really could it?), so please do add yours to the linky below!

About Emma Raphael

Emma Raphael left the UK for Copenhagen in 2009, with her ever-patient husband and two small children. Having enjoyed a couple of years in Scandinavia, Emma and her family found they enjoyed Expat life so much that they now reside in Munich – where the pace of life is relaxed, her language skills are small, and the mountains and bier halls are very large. Being one half of a self-proclaimed foodie couple, Emma enjoys the new produce and restaurants in each new country she resides in, and has made it her mission to convince people that English food no longer deserves the bad rap it once had. She can be found in the kitchen when she’s feeling homesick, trying to recreate comfort food from home. She also has huge passions for travel, photography, art, wine, gardening (although according to her Bavarian neighbours, she’s not much good at that!) and her family (of course)!

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