Here is the recipe for sprouted chickpeas and prawn curry. Scroll down to take a look at how to sprout your own chick peas. Enjoy

Sprouted Chickpeas & Prawn Curry

Serves 2
Ingredients

• Sprouted Chickpeas
• 200g of large prawns
• 1 Red Pepper
• 1 onion chopped
• 1 tbsp vegetable oil
• 4 cloves garlic sliced
• 2.5 cm knob of ginger chopped fine
• 1 tsp turmeric
• 1 tsp ground coriander
• 1 fresh green chilli (or 1/2 tsp chilli powder)
• 1 tsp garam masala powder
• 1/2 tsp ground black pepper
• 1/2 tsp ground cumin
• 200g can tomatoes
• Bunch fresh coriander

Method

1. Fry onion in oil until starting to brown.

2. Add garlic, red pepper, prawns and ginger, fry for a couple more minutes. (prawns can be chopped in half if necessary)

3. Add spices and stir together for a couple of minutes.

4. Add tomatoes and cook together for 5 minutes.

5. Add sprouted chickpeas and cook for 10 minutes gently.

6. Add the freshly chopped coriander leaves and taste for hotness. Add more chilli if necessary

7. Leave to simmer over a very low heat for around 30 minutes

8. Serve with basmati rice, nan bread and a nice glass of red (or two!).

Sprouting chickpeas is probably one of the easiest things you could do. And yet, not many people attempt this task. However, with a small amount of ingenuity, two tablespoons of dried chick peas, a glass jar, and a jar lid with holes in it, you’re well on your way. Here’s what to do. Clean and sterilise a glass jar. Insert holes into the lid (hammer and nail). make sure you insert the holes from the top so that the jagged ends are underneath. Soak two tablespoons of dried chickpeas in a jar for 24 hours. Drain, and rinse with several changes of water. Change the water twice a day and either keep in a warm dark place, or alternatively leave in the fridge. I prefer to keep the chickpeas in the fridge even though they take longer to sprout. I suggest that one tablespoon of dried chickpeas is enough for one serving. If you use the fridge method of storing, expect to wait around 5/7 days. The warm dark cupboard method is around 3/5 days.

And that’s it!
In the next few days I will post the recipe for sprouted chickpea and prawn curry. Enjoy!

This is probably one of the most traditional cottage recipes that appears in most publications. This earthy vegetable soup is probably one of my favourites. Not only is the fusion of carrot and coriander beautifully complementary, but also gives a spicy, almost eastern flavour to it.

There is one simple method that I’ve come to learn when cooking soup, and that is to use two utensils that you will find so useful that you’ll wonder why you’ve never used them in the first place. And that is a pressure cooker and hand blender. I can’t remember the last time I used a liquidiser or food processor to blend my vegetable ingredients when making a soup.
One of the most offputting reasons for not making wholesome, earthly, healthy soups every week is the chaos it causes in the kitchen when cleaning up. Having to transfer cooked ingredients from a saucepan to the liquidiser, is an extremely messy process.
So this is what I do; I cook all my ingredients in a pressure cooker, pressure cook them for 5-10 minutes, after releasing the pressure (depending on the model), I use a hand blender to mix all the ingredients. The blender is then rinsed under the tap, dried, and put away.
So there’s really no excuse for making healthy soup several times a week. I promise you, you’ll never buy tinned or packet soup ever again.
The cost of the pressure cooker and hand blender are relatively cheap to buy but will pay for themselves many times over. Below are a couple of examples of prices (shameless ads!!).

These are mid range prices depending on your budget. Go to our shopping mall to see an extensive range of products

So to the recipe, carrot and coriander soup.

Ingredients
serves 4

• 2 large onions, peeled and sliced
• 1 kg/2 pounds of carrots, washed, peeled and cut into small pieces
• 150 ml/5 fluid ounces sweet sherry
• 150 ml/5 fluid ounces of chicken stock (or good quality vegetable stock)
• 75 g/3 ounces butter
• 2 tablespoons fresh coriander, chopped

Method
1. Melt the butter into a large deep Pan, or pressure cooker
2. Add the chopped onions, and when soft, add the chopped carrots
3. Mix them around in the butter and Cook on a moderate heat for around five minutes
4. Add to Sherry and season with salt and pepper.
5. Add the stock and one tablespoon of coriander, and cook slowly for around 25 minutes, or until the carrots are soft. (if using a pressure cooker, pressure Cook from around 5-10 minutes).
6. When cooked, liquidise and add the rest of the coriander and simmer for 5 minutes.

For more soup recipes and videos, check out our soup section