I have a recipe book full of what I call gourmet poverty food.
Sounds like you have a problem with blood sugar levels and carbs. If you switch to wholegrain carbs, eliminate white carbs entirely, see how it goes. Lots of fresh vegetables can be a good substitute and keep the meat content low. We shouldn't eat more than a piece of meat the size of the palm of our hand, two meals out of three a day. We generally eat far more than that.
I like to roast a mix of fresh vegetables. I saw that you can buy alfoil trays of vegetables to roast, already seasoned etc. I priced them - ridiculous! Tried them once to see how best to copy it. You don't have to only eat roast vegetables when you have roast meat, either. Even when I'm cooking a roast, I cook the meat on a rack with water underneath, and the vegetables are in another large pan all to themselves.
The method - cut vegetables into pieces two bites big. Put them into a plastic bag with no holes (gently inflate it first to check). I put in potatoes, carrot (generally whole, or cut in half lengthwise - tell the kids it's Bugs Bunny's favourite, roast carrot), pumpkin, kumara (orange sweet potato), beetroot, celeriac, turnip - anything. Be aware of total quantities. husband always says I cook too much but it generally gets eaten. Maybe two or three pieces get left, that's all. Having a range available is great.
Put all the vegetables into the plastic bag. Spice it if you want - I sometimes add a sprinkle of salt and a generous sprinkle of dried herbs. You can add a teaspoon of flour if you want. Close the bag, inflate it a little (blow into it until it puffs up a little) then toss the vegetables dry. Next, pour in a tablespoon or so of oil. I use macadamia oil or olive oil. Toss again, then tip the vegetables into a baking dish. Arrange them so no flat side is down. Then slide it right into the oven and bake for about an hour or so. Turn the vegetables about half way through cooking time. If you're baking something else like lasagne, this goes down well. Or you could cook a fish pie. Or anything.
That is the low fat roast method. Depending on your baking dish, you may need to oil it first but generally oiling the vegetables makes it easier to roast them without poaching them in oil.
This is easy. And if the kids say, "I hate this vegetable," then you can pick and choose who gets what. Or leave some of the more unusual ones out if they don't like them. Roasting whole onions or whole garlic heads is also great, but can be very strong.
We eat a lot of rice, but cook it in the microwave oven. Because Australia is these days very much part of Asia, we have a lot of rice varieties available. If you suspect carb load is causing problems, avoid white rice in any form. That means no risotto, no white rice. Substitute brown rice. You can cook it the same way you cook the white, but it needs to simmer for twice as long. Once you have cooked brown rice, you can do things with it, that you would do with white. I serve Chinese food with brown rice. I also make fried rice with brown rice. But skip risotto. Doesn't work.
Microwave instructions - find a deep enough dish. Put some rice in the bottom. Cover the rice with water, one index finger knuckle deep above the rice. be aware it will swell up three times its original volume. To cook - bring it to the boil in the microwave, then simmer it. I find about 2 minutes on high brings it to the boil, then for white rice, 10 minutes on medium low simmers it. Brown rice - 20 minutes simmering. Black rice/royal rice (it's purple, watch out - it stains) takes 30 minutes to simmer. The rice should absorb all the liquid entirely. Cooking times will vary a little with your microwave oven. When the rice is finished, immediately fluff it with a fork. Any remaining moisture will rapidly sort itself out.
Black rice (aka royal rice) is new here. I find it can be a bit indigestible. it is also a dessert rice. The Thai recipe is to mix the hot cooked rice with palm sugar then coconut cream. I often add a squeeze of lime juice, maybe some lime zest, passionfruit pulp and sliced mango. Chill it, eat it cold. Very filling, but too much upsets my system.
Potato is pure starch. Limit serve size to one piece per person per day. Sweet potato is fine, so is pumpkin. So is carrot.
Non-meat protein - what about eggs? I make my own pasta with eggs and flour. Have to use at least 50% white flour or it won't hold together. I gave up on wholemeal pasta years ago, unless I buy it commercially. Filled pasta is good, and fun for kids to make. Gnocchi is fun to make, I remember making it with difficult child 3 when he was only three years old. Your bread machine should have a pasta dough setting, although I tend to just do it by hand and then use a pasta machine (hand cranked rollers) to roll it out. I also use the pasta machine on bread dough - I roll out the dough into a flat rectangle, then add fillings. I roll up the rectangle and cut it into whorls, then stack them on their side in a cake tin to rise. Chelsea bun method, but you can make savoury ones too. I used to send difficult child 3 to school with home-made cheese and olive rolls - they looked like echidnas, I used scissors to cut spikes into the dough, sprinkled them with cheese and used sliced olives for eyes. They also go well with a fresh salad.
Anyway, that's a few simple ideas. Kids love to help make this stuff and especially with our annual village fair, it's fun to enter this sort of thing in the contests.
Marg
