I say, go you tweekers!!

Makes our health problems look insignificant! Poor girl.

Sorry Karen but don't stop advising which meals are liked in your family.  I will try the other pasta dish you suggested down the track - that one is totally different so maybe he will be more accepting of it.  I think my vegetarian daughter would have liked the Fagioli though.

Good advice, hopefully I would have thought of that if I was using fresh.  Appreciate your comments as they can only help other cooks.

Name of Recipe:  Beef and spinach

Number of People: 3-4 servings

Ingredients:

 400 rump steak (1.5cm dice)
 2 cloves garlic
 2 red onions, chopped roughly                        
 1 stalk celery with leaves, chopped roughly                          
 30g olive oil
 1/4 cup red wine
 leaves from 4 sprigs fresh thyme
 1/4 bunch parsley, chopped roughly
 250g freshly cooked spinach (or use thawed frozen spinach but this is much finer than spinach you
                                                                    would cook and chop yourself)
1 tblspn concentrated vegetable stock
200 ms water
cornflour to thicken

Preparation:

Place garlic, quartered onions and roughly chopped celery in TM bowl. Chop for 5 seconds on speed 7. Add oil, saute 3 minutes 100o on speed 1.  Add the cubed beef, the wine and rest of ingredients except the cornflour and cook for 20 minutes on 100^oC on reverse, soft speed.  Thicken to your taste at the end of the cooking time with cornflour mixed with a little water.
Serve with mashed potato & vegies, over rice or place in casserole dish, top with some pastry and bake in the oven.  
The mixture is best left to sit for a while for the flavours to develop.

You could use freshly chopped spinach but I had frozen packs of home grown spinach in the freezer and find it easier to work with than huge amounts of fresh spinach.

members' comments

Thermomixer - if you have lots of fresh spinach then you could place it in the Varoma while doing the initial cook and it will wilt down to more manageable quantities to add to the TMX bowl.

babymaker - Mmm 5/5 from us! we put the uncooked fresh baby spinach in the thermoserver and topped with the cooked meat and sauce so the heat from that cooked it, we then did mash potatoes with steamed veg in the varoma to go with it.  You're right, the meat just got more tender sitting in the saver.

JD - Oct 2011 - I revisited this one today for the first time since I made it way back in 2009.  Changed things slightly.
I used 400g blade steak cut into 3-4cm pieces & 150g water - cooked 50 mins/90^o/reverse/speed 1 and used Thermomixer's suggestion of placing chopped fresh spinach in the varoma dish during this time to wilt.  Added it to the bowl and cooked an extra 5 minutes before thickening slightly. Also added a tablespoon of FOSM with the liquid.

Hi Amanda, just read yesterday's posting re Luigi's cookies and I agree, they certainly do not come together in 10 seconds! The 'do not over process' comment is a bit scary but I just went for it and I think I did it for a total of at least 30 seconds.  Still didn't look like it had come together but once you get the mixture in your hands you just work it together that way.  Tasty little morsels.  Wish they would tell us how many these types of recipes are supposed to make though as you never know if you are making them too big or too small.

Hi everyone, today I have got off my butt and into the kitchen for a change.  Thought I'd try the Pasta E Fagioli which Karen suggested the other day but only made 1/2 qty as I didn't think DH would like it as he is not a pasta lover.  Neither of us were that keen on it although it turned out perfectly so with the leftovers (3 cups) I made the cheese sauce recipe (pge 58 Everyday cookbook) but used 40g cornflour not 50g, added 1-1/2 cups leftover pasta mixture and a can of drained, flaked tuna for tomorrow's lunch. You could add a can of creamed corn here too but I forgot about that until after I'd put it in the fridge. Froze the other qty of pasta to use the same way in the future.  Can't do this too often either as DH doesn't like tuna much either! As you can see, I have my work cut out for me with a fussy and tiny eater.

I have also had a go at creating a recipe from scratch and will report on that after we have eaten it for dinner tonight.

Had another go at the carrot and orange juice, added 2 carrots and a teaspoon artificial sweetener this time and it was much better.  I think the main problem is that our oranges are just not like they used to be at the moment so the extra carrot helped give it a boost.