Children’s food writer Liz Ashworth meets a budding young cook who has some handy recipes up her sleeve…
Nine-year-old Lucy Reid has invented a tasty new recipe and this is her story.
Lucy said: “For school, our teacher, Mrs Duncan, told us to make a meal for our families and sort it into the different food groups for our health and wellbeing.
“I combined my two favourite foods – which are pizza and pasta – and called my new dish ‘PISTA!’”
Lucy says: “You can use any vegetables you like in the recipe and change the topping too.”
Well done, Lucy – she made both of these recipes herself.
She loves cooking and hopes one day to have her own restaurant.
Lucy’s ‘pista’
Serves 4
Ingredients
- 1 tsp salt for the water
- 50g pasta shapes
- 1 tbsp vegetable oil
- 500ml tomato passata
- 1 tsp garlic paste
- 1 large onion, peeled and chopped
- 1 red pepper, cored and chopped
- 1 courgette, trimmed and sliced
- 115g mushrooms, sliced
- 1 tub cooked cocktail sausages
- Pinch of salt
For the toppings:
- Your preference of slices of pepperoni, salami and grated cheese
Method
- Turn on the oven to heat at 160C Fan/180C/350F/ Gas Mark 4.
- Boil water in a large pot, add the salt and then the pasta. Make sure it
is covered and simmer for 15 minutes. Do not over cook. - Meanwhile, cook the vegetables. Add vegetable oil to a pan or deep frying pan. Add the onion and stir a few minutes, then the pepper followed by the courgettes and lastly the mushrooms. Stir to ensure even cooking.
- Drain the pasta through a sieve and put into a large casserole dish. Dot evenly with the cocktail sausages.
- Heat the passata and stir in the garlic paste. Add more to taste if you like garlic.
- When the vegetables are cooked and passata is heated you can assemble the dish. Cover the pasta and sausages with the vegetables and then pour the passata over.
- Then comes the topping – Lucy added slices of pepperoni and salami and then grated cheese.
- “After that, cook in the top of the oven for 15 minutes – you can get
an adult to help with this bit – and…. YOU HAVE SOME YUMMY PISTA!”
Lucy’s raspberry muffins
Makes 12
Ingredients
- 225g plain flour
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 140g caster sugar
- 180ml milk
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 2 large eggs
- 150ml sunflower oil
Method
- Preheat the oven to 160C Fan/180C/350F/Gas Mark 4.
- Put all of the ingredients into a bowl.
- Beat with an electric whisk until combined and smooth.
- Divide the mixture into 12 paper cases and add a couple of raspberries to each case. It’s better if you break them into smaller pieces – halves or quarters depending on how large the berries are.
- Bake in the middle of the preheated oven for 25 to 30 minutes until well risen and golden. Enjoy.