Spicery Meals and Garden Gluts

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I haven’t posted about our Spicery meals for a while but they are still as delicious as ever.

The Spicery

The Spicery is a little different to the other meal boxes we get from the likes of Gousto, Hello Fresh and the latest one we’ve tried ‘MyCook Box. Rather than providing us with all the ingredients we need for quick, easy and very tasty meals, the Spicery provides us with a selection of spices and a recipe card to make a much more complicated, slightly higher end meal. The process can be quite time-consuming and we need to source our own ingredients, but the results are always amazing. The whole thing is more of an event with the preparation and cooking itself a part of the process. It’s not the sort of thing you’d want for a quick meal after work on a weekday but it’s the perfect meal for a special ocassion or a weekend treat.

Date Night in Goa

The latest Spicery Box that we had this weekend was ‘Date Night in Goa’. The description from the Spicery says:

The spectacular food eaten in Goa is familiarly Indian but with cooking techniques and ingredients (such as vinegar and chillies) introduced by the Portuguese who colonially ruled there for 450 years. To begin we’ve got prawn cafreal served with coconut pancakes, mango raita and a cucumber and radish salad.

Next, a dish showcasing the Portuguese influence – chilli chorizo fry and a mustard seed and mint pilau. Finally, some moreish Indian snacks known as sooji gujiya, the sweet version of samosas, filled with mango and coconut and coated in a sweet, tangy chaat masala.

A Spicery Meal

It didn’t need too much in the way of unusual ingredients, but we did have to buy some chorizo sausage which we wouldn’t usually have in the fridge. Prawns aren’t a staple of ours either, but we did have some in the freezer. We also discovered partway through the preparation that we’d run out of rice so Anna made a quick dash into Borth to get some.

A dreary Saturday afternoon was spent with Anna and I in the kitchen chopping, slicing, blending, mixing, whisking, kneading, frying and cooking.

The prawn cafreal with potato pancakes starter was lovely. We only ever really eat prawns when we have a Spicery meal, but as usual we enjoyed them and really should eat them more often. The beauty of Spicery meals is the way all of the flavours come together. The spices used are fresh and pungent. Each part of the dish is good on it’s own but somehow when the flavours mix together it’s just perfect.

Prawn Cafreal

Prawn Cafreal

The Chilli Chorizo stir fry had a bit of a kick to it, but this was tempered by the mango raita and the salad.

Chorizo Stir Fry

Chorizo Stir Fry

There was loads of it too. The ‘Date Night’ boxes that we get are intended to serve 2 people but there is always loads of food. I guess the Spicery do this on purpose, after all, they aren’t supplying the ingredients, just the spices. If they tell you to cook more than is needed, everyone’s happy and they keep coming back for more boxes. It does work out as quite an expensive meal when you include the spices and the other ingredients, but it’s nice to treat ourselves once a month!

The pudding of ‘sooji gujiya’ was huge as well. They were deep fried sweet samosa’s made with poppy seed dough and stuffed full of mango, coconut and raisins. Anna could only manage two of them so I had to finish off four!

A delicious meal as always thanks to the Spicery. One thing I think they are missing is a recommendation of drinks to accompany the meal. They are so good at mixing flavours within their meals that I think it would be nice to know what they recommend to drink to bring out the flavours even more. Maybe an idea of an alcoholic drink (wine or beer) to accompany the meal, along with a non-alcoholic recommendation too would really round off the meal.

Meal Boxes

The other meal boxes we get from time to time are from the likes of Gousto, Hello Fresh and MyCookBox. These are always much easier to prepare and come with all of the ingredients that you need save for a few store cupboard staples such as oil, salt and pepper. We only buy them when we have an offer but that seems to be fairly regularly. There are almost always new sign up offers too.

For Example,

These boxes are perfect for busy weekdays. All of the ingredients are there ready to go, so there’s no planning involved. Most of the meals are ready within half an hour as well and they have all been tasty and balanced. At offer price it really isn’t any more expensive than buying all of the ingredients yourself and there is no waste as the ingredients are provided in the correct quantities. It also takes out the hassle of deciding what to have for dinner and then shopping for it.

We don’t have them all the time, but life is easy when we do have them. We have even had them sent to us on holiday before. What could be easier than turning up at your holiday cottage to find a box of fresh food waiting for you. Why waste time shopping, planning and preparing food while on holiday when you can have a meal box instead.

Using up the Garden Glut

The Spicery Boxes always come with a ‘free’ bonus sachet of spices as well. Some of these are for complete meals that are a little simpler than the main box. Other’s are for things such as chutneys or sauces. They are usually seasonal and this months was perfect timing. I mentioned in a blog post the other day that we had a glut of tomatoes and courgettes in the garden. As luck would have it, the free sample with this months Spicery box is a ‘Summer Veg Curry Blend’ that is supposed to be a ‘great way of using up a glut of seasonal veg’. The ingredients it needs from the garden are tomatoes and courgettes. Perfect! It looks as though I’ll be rustling up a delicious Keralan style curry this afternoon with pungent fenugreek, warming cinnamon and mustard seeds! If it’s anything like the amazing curry’s from the Spicery Curry Legend book that we have it’ll be a triumph.

Don’t forget, use Referral Code: ALAN-18497 when buying from the Spicery to save 10%.

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Alan Cole

Alan is a Freelance Website Designer, Sports & Exercise Science Lab Technician and full time Dad & husband with far too many hobbies: Triathlete, Swimming, Cycling, Running, MTBing, Surfing, Windsurfing, SUPing, Gardening, Photography.... The list goes on.

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