Parenting experience

Being in a 24th week of my first pregnancy, I am still experimenting with different foods and menus to make me and my baby as happy and healthy as possible and still have time to rest or do other things during the day. Here is an idea for a simple healthy lunch, low on cholesterol, and rich with omega-3 fatty acids, proteins, and antioxidants!

Tomato soup (4 persons)

Ingredients:

• 1 small onion finely chopped
• 1 spoon of olive oil
• 1/2 litre of tomato puree
• 1/2 litre of water
• 1 tsp of green pesto (Genovese)
• 1 garlic clove finely chopped (optional)
• salt, pepper
• 1/2 tsp of brown sugar
• 1/2 cup of rice, or couscous

Preparation:

Put chopped onion into a large saucepan with the olive oil. Heat until it becomes soft (for about 2-3 minutes) and then add garlic (optional) and tomato puree together with water. Bring to the boil, add pesto Genovese, salt, pepper and brown sugar and simmer gently for thirty minutes stirring occasionally. Add rice or couscous and simmer for further 10 minutes (if it is rice) or 5 minutes if it is couscous.

Main dish: Fried hake in lemon sauce with potato salad (2 persons)

Ingredients:

• 450gr of frozen hake fillets
• some all purpose flour
• salt, pepper
• 1 tbsp of olive oil

Sauce:

• lemon juice (1/2 lemon)
• capers (2 tsp)
• 1 tbsp of olive oil or some butter
• freshly chopped parsley

Preparation:

Defrost hake fillets, season them with salt and pepper and cover sparingly with flour. Put them into a hot, no sticking pan with olive oil. Fry each side of fillet for 3-4 minutes, and then put onto a warm plate. Warm olive oil (or butter) in the pan, and then add the capers and parsley, heat for 1 minute careful not to burn it, and then add the lemon juice (it will sizzle a bit). Pore it over the fillets.

Potato salad:

• 2 medium potatoes
• 200gr of curly lettuce leaves
• olive oil, vinegar, salt
• one small onion finely chopped into thin circles

While preparing soup, you can save time by putting the carefully washed unpeeled potatoes into a saucepan, covering them with cold water, and leaving them to cook for about 45 minutes. After cooling them under cold water for about 5 minutes peel them, and cut them into round peaces, add carefully washed lettuce, and finely chopped onion and season to the taste with vinegar, oil, and some salt.

Dessert: Baked bananas (4 persons)

• 4 bananas
• grated rind and juice of 1 orange
• 1 tbsp of brown sugar (optional)
• good pinch of ground ginger
• fresh nutmeg, grated
• 1 tbsp butter

Preparation:

Preheat the oven to 180C/350F/Gas4. Peel the bananas, slice them and put them into a single baking dish, or 4 small baking cups. Pore the orange juice over the sliced bananas. Sprinkle sugar, orange rind, spices, and butter. Cover the dishes with foil or baking paper, and bake for 15 minutes. After it cools for couple of minutes serve it with natural yoghurt.

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