A Mediterranean diet shopping list

[ComeBackPeterComeBackPaul]

Please write me a shopping list of your essential store cupboard items - the ones that allow you to cook a meal at short notice without detailing all your good work. Thanks.

They are if you do it properly. It's just people tend to get distracted by cake recipes.

As stated right at the very beginning, the Med diet is about wholegrains, seafood, veg, olive oil and nuts. Not large amounts of meat, cake and pasta.

But what we tend to get drawn to is Tuscan steak, big bowls of risotto and pasta, and some nice cake and baklava. That is all Mediterranean but you will get fat on it.

also I like tins as they are easy

We are a Mediterranean lot and my favourites are -

• fresh seared tuna steak on warm green beans, boiled egg halves, olives, cubed new potatoes, a little chopped onion/anchovies if you want, tomatoes, in vinaigrette
• cod fillets in tomato & black olive & parsley sauce with rice
• very thin flatbread topped with tomatoes, a few mozarella pearls, fresh basil, olives & popped under the grill for a few minutes. Top with fresh rocket & basil & black pepper
• feta, roasted red & yellow peppers & courgette frittata
• pitta with tzatsiki, spinach, roasted peppers & courgette
• roasted aubergine & tomatoes, topped with a little goats cheese, with flat bread & green salad

Tinned tomatoes are much better than fresh tomatoes in the UK in the winter months. They're also considerably cheaper, which matters to many of us. With beans and lentils, the choice is buy them in dried form, soak where necessary, cook, or buy them ready cooked in tins or pouches. The difference is price, time and convenience, not nutrition.

Tinned food is much maligned. It's actually pretty good and extremely useful to have as a standby.

Where would one buy fresh chick peas, fresh food fans?

Nothing wrong with tinned food. Tinned tomatoes have more flavour than most of the fresh tomatoes you can buy in the UK for starters. Paella is the equivalent of a Sunday roast in Valencia where it originates and would not be eaten every day or be considered a staple.

On the back of this thread I cooked this last night - wonderful, and my copy of Zaitoun arrived today! Thanks all.

That looks gorgeous! Might look out for that book.

That photo is from the Quick Roasting Tin book, but I am pleased that my effort looked remarkably similar and tasted wonderful! I bought it on my Kindle, which I don't love for cookbooks, and the Zaitoun is the hard-backed edition.

I've just made fish with med veg- pieces of white fish (reduced from supermarket, any fish will do) plus frozen 'Mediterranean veg' - find in freezer section of Asda or Tesco (and possibly others). It's in a basil oil so no need for any seasoning or anything else. Bake in tinfoil.

So quick and easy, it's a standard dinner in our house!

I just found this thread and am very interested in this fresh way of cooking.

:) Anyway want to resurrect the thread with me?