How are you today? We've had days of rain now in Scotland, days and days. The closest I've gotten to our garden, one of my happiest places, is popping out to top up the bird food for our beautiful little garden visitors.
I keep telling myself that we still have most of June and all of July and there's still time for a little sunshine to arrive. I hope so dear ones, I do love to potter around in our garden and of course there's always laundry to peg outside 😊
Well, since I haven't been able to be outside in the garden I've been pottering around inside our home instead. Tiny organising projects, including a perfect new storage system for those Ikea glass dishes I've been collecting to allow us to dump the plastic containers for healthier meal prepping, which I'll share soon.
Speaking of meal prepping, Hubby has been enjoying taking salad to work each day with him, all prepared on a Sunday evening and thanks to those glass dishes with the airtight lids, still as yummy on Friday as they were when I prepared them days earlier!
Of course I've been having fun making delicious dinners too. I love to experiment and since Hubby really liked the Chicken, peppers and mushroom oven bake in that creamiest of cheese sauces (seriously yummy!) I wanted to find something else I can coat in that fabulous cheese sauce and bake for him. Then this happened...
Do you remember my waffling on about the spiralizer we bought recently? I'm a woman on a mission! Constantly looking for new ways to cook assorted different vegetable noodles and we're not missing the pasta even the slightest bit 😊
Why not grab a cuppa then honeys, and maybe a cookie, and meet me back here in a few minutes and I'll share all...
Welcome back dear ones, put your feet up and enjoy your cuppa ☕
Seriously, this cheese sauce is so, so good that I'm deliberately trying to find ways to use it in our weekly dinner rotation and Hubby bless him isn't complaining in the least and having taken some of the chicken oven bake, made in this sauce, to work with him for lunch, he again took a dish of this yummy oven bake to work with him too 💖
This cheese sauce, with Italian herbs and garlic, takes literally minutes to put together and is simply the most delicious, irresistible sauce. Without further ado then, let's dive in shall we?
Zucchini & Carrot Oven Bake In The Creamiest 3 Cheese Sauce Ever..
Ingredients:
2 medium zucchini (or courgettes if you live in the UK)
1 large carrot
For the really, really, cheesey sauce:
75 gm mayonnaise
150 gm cream cheese
150 gm grated medium cheese (I used a combination of Scottish Cheddar & Red Leicester)
250 gm mozzarella cheese
Extras
Italian herbs - dried from the spice rack is fine honeys
Garlic - one clove if using fresh or again, head to the spice rack, either is fine.
Olive oil
75 gm mayonnaise
150 gm cream cheese
150 gm grated medium cheese (I used a combination of Scottish Cheddar & Red Leicester)
250 gm mozzarella cheese
Extras
Italian herbs - dried from the spice rack is fine honeys
Garlic - one clove if using fresh or again, head to the spice rack, either is fine.
Olive oil
Directions:
1. Using the spaghetti or noodle blade on a spiralizer, create a lovely collection of noodles with the two zucchini (or courgettes) and the large carrot...
If you don't have a spiralizer handy, you could grate or roughly chop them. They're going into an oven bake with the yummiest sauce after all and I just spiralized mine because I love the pretty veggie ribbons and because it was an excuse to use the spiralizer again 😊
2. Place your lovely noodles (or chopped or grated zucchini & carrot) into a saute pan, wok or high sided frying pan, whichever you have to hand, over a low to medium heat with a little olive oil and stir occasionally, turning and allowing them to cook through for about 8-10 minutes until they're almost but not quite soft yet.
Continue to stir through until everything is combined. Remove the pan from the heat and set to one side.
4. Set your oven to 160C (or 320F or Gas Mark 4) and switch it on. While your oven is pre-heating...
In a mixing bowl, add the cream cheese, mayonnaise, grated medium hard cheese (choose your favourite honeys, I used half Scottish Cheddar and half Red Leicester because I love them both, I suppose that technically makes mine a 4 cheese sauce..) another good pinch of Italian herbs and another good sprinkle of garlic granules. Mix ingredients all together using a spoon.
5. Add the zucchini and carrot noodles to the bowl containing the cheese sauce mix and stir gently until it's all well combined. Pout the mixture into an oven proof dish..
6. Cut the mozzarella cheese into slices and arrange across the top of the oven bake...
7. Top with a sprinkle of parsley (I do love using the little jars in our spice rack lol) and it's ready to be placed carefully into the middle shelf of the oven. ...
8. Bake your delicious oven bake in the pre-heated oven for 25-30 minutes until bubbling and golden on top...
9. There isn't enough yum in the world honeys! The gorgeous scent that floods the kitchen when you open the oven door of garlic and cheese is just heavenly!
10. Serve with your favourite side dish and await compliments and pleas from loved ones that you add it to the weekly dinner rotation 😊
We had a lovely, crunchy salad with ours but why not serve with baked potatoes or a lovely dish of fresh steamed vegetables?
I'm now on the lookout for other dishes I can add this yummy cheese sauce to. I'm thinking maybe a coating for cauliflower or broccoli? Or both? What about an oven bake with both cauliflower and broccoli in this too yummy sauce? I may have to try that... I'll report back on how it goes...
Any thoughts honeys? Did you try the chicken oven bake in this far-too-delicious sauce? Do you get giddy with happiness when using a spiralizer like me lol 😄 I can't help it! I love finding ways to cook the little veggie noodles and it's helping us be healthier too 💖
Whatever you're doing today, I hope you're avoiding the never-ending rain and finding a little sunshine. I know, I know, the rain is good for the garden but it's been non stop for too long now, I'm starting to forget what sunshine looks like 😊
Till next time dear ones, smile lots and hug even more, huggles always xx
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