Tag: watercress

This is a super healthy recipe, especially good for anyone avoiding carbs, wheat or gluten. If you want to make this recipe vegetarian just swap out the meat and add in some peas, spinach, asparagus or whatever vegetables you enjoy and are in season.

Serves 2

Ingredients

1 onion, finely diced

1 clove of garlic finely crushed

1 butternut squash

Rapeseed oil

Tablespoon of butter

2 medium egg yolks

100g parmesan

50g watercress

4 rashers of smoky bacon, diced

1l of fish/chicken/vegetable stock

Large glass of dry white wine

1 teaspoon chilli flakes

1 lemon, zested and juiced

Handful of parsley

170g large raw king prawns

Salt

Pepper

1. Firstly prepare your squash, peel the squash and slice in half lengthways. Remove the seeds from the middle with a spoon. Then if you have a spiraliser pass it through there to create spaghetti shaped squash noodles. If you do not own a spiraliser the best option is to pass it through a medium sized grater of a food processer.
2. Put your stock in a saucepan and bring to the boil, once boiling turn down to a low heat. Add the egg yolk, parmesan, watercress, lemon zest and parsley to a food processer and blitz till all mixed together.
3. Place the onion with about a tablespoon of rapeseed oil and the butter in a frying pan over a medium heat until soft. Once your onion is soft then add the bacon to the pan till nicely golden.            
4. Add the garlic to the pan and cook for about thirty seconds, you don’t want to overcook the garlic or it will make your dish bitter. Once your garlic is ready put your squashetti in the pan and stir through the bacon, garlic and onions. To this add the white wine which will help to start cook the squash. Keep stirring the squash through the liquid.
5. Once all the wine has cooked down and the pan has just a small amount of liquid left in it start adding the stock a ladle at time, waiting each time until the pan has just a little liquid left in it. Make sure to leave one ladle full of stock for later.
6. To check the squash is cooked through (this usually takes around 8-10 minutes but differs depending on the heat of your hob, the squash and your pan) test it by trying a little, it should be soft but still with a little bite. Once it is cooked through remove the pan from the heat. Add a new frying pan to the hob and add a splash of rapeseed oil, you will need this in a minute for your prawns.
7. To the cooked squashetti a good squeeze of lemon juice, the chilli flakes, a good seasoning of salt of pepper and then add the egg yolk mixture with a splash of the left-over stock, make sure to do this off the heat otherwise you will end up with scrambled eggs. Stir this all through quickly and you will end up with a creamy sauce, add a little more stock to loosen if needed.  Check the seasoning and add more salt, pepper, lemon juice or chilli flakes if needed.
8. Put the squashetti to one side. In the new frying pan cook your prawns with a little salt and pepper, about 1-2 minutes on each side depending on the size of your prawns.
9. To serve, place a good amount of the squashetti into a pasta bowl or plate. Add the prawns to the top of this and garnish with some watercress sprigs.