I made a pledge today to eat more fruits and vegetables.  I wasn’t hungry this morning so breakfast was easy – a pear with 12 g of pistachio nuts (2 WW points).  Pears are delicious at this time of year.

I had a banana late morning and for lunch I made a salad from Veg every day!

Courgette and Green Bean Salad with Tahini Dressing (serves 4)

Tahini Dressing

Ingredients

• 1 small or ½ large garlic clove, minced
• 2 tbsp light tahini
• Finely grated zest and juice from ½ a lemon
• Juice of  ½ an orange
• ½ tsp clear honey
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• Salt and pepper

Method

1. Put the garlic, tahini, lemon, orange and honey in a small blender and blitz until smooth.  If you don’t have a small blender, put the ingredients in a bowl and mix well to combine.
2. Add the olive oil gradually, stirring so it combines with the other ingredients.
3. If the dressing is too thick, add some water.
4. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Courgette and Green Bean Salad

Ingredients

• 2 tbsp olive oil*
• 3 medium courgettes, sliced in to lengths
• Juice of  ½ a lemon
• 1 red chilli, deseeded and finely chopped
• 125 g French beans, trimmed
• 4 handfuls of salad leaves
• 12-18 oven dried or fresh cherry tomatoes
• Fresh mint, finely shredded (optional)

* DIET TIP 🙂 If you have a decent cooking brush, you can use a fraction of the amount of oil the recipe calls for.  I used less than  ½ a tsp oil on 1 courgette by dipping the brush in to the oil and then brushing the oil on to the courgette.  I fried them in a ridged pan and added no oil to the pan.  The oil I added to the courgette was sufficient to stop them sticking.

Method

1. I sliced my courgette lengthways, so they were easier to cook.
2. Heat the pan and fry the courgette until tender and slightly browned on both sides.
3. When they were cooked, I cut them in to bite sized lengths and transferred them to a bowl with the lemon juice and chilli.
4. Cook the beans in a pan of salted boiling water for 1 minute.  Then run under cold water, dry and add to the courgettes.
5. Put the salad leaves in the serving bowl or on the plate you are eating from, add the courgettes, beans and tomatoes (and mint if using – I didn’t).
6. Trickle the tahini dressing over the salad and serve.

I really enjoyed this lunch.  I like tahini and by using a small blender, the dressing ended up very smooth and I left it quite thick.  It was delicious and worked well with the salad ingredients.  Next time I will cook the courgettes a bit longer so they are browner – that would improve the texture.

I had the other half of the orange with it and it was lovely.

Supper was roasted vegetables with some leftover roast chicken.  I wash and scrub my vegetables and as I usually buy organic, I don’t need to peel any of them.  I just cut the tops off the courgette, aubergine and carrots which I put in the compost bucket. I chopped the vegetables up and put them in a roasting tray with 2 tbsp rapeseed oil and salt and pepper.

I heated the chicken through and dinner was served:  roasted aubergine, onion, red potatoes, carrots, courgette and red pepper with chicken, sprinkled with Cayenne pepper for a bit of a kick.

Simple, easy and delicious.  I kept my pledge today and intend to do the same again tomorrow.