I mentioned a couple of weeks back that I wanted to start cooking more Chinese dishes, because it is a type of food I never really ate because of all the grease and calories – but it always looks so good. I quickly realised that the easiest way to make a healthy Asian style dish is to make it soup/broth base, so you don’t have to go down the route of a stick sauce.
Seeing as winter is most definitely here now in the UK, and soup is on the menu pretty much every day in our home, this seemed like a great time to make a meal like this. The addition of meatballs is so good. You could leave them out completely though, and just add more vegetables, or you could add tofu instead. I used turkey mince, but you could use pork, beef, lamb or chicken – they would all work.
So, skip the takeaway this weekend and make a tasty and healthy Chinese dish yourself.
Ingredients – Serves 2:
– 140g udon noodles (or your favourite noodles)
– 200g/1 cup turkey mince
– 4 garlic cloves
– 2 red chillies
– 2 thumb sized pieces of ginger
– 4 spring onions/scallions
– 500ml/ 17 fl oz hot water
– 1 stalk of lemon grass (in herb section of supermarket or from any food oriental supermarket – can buy fresh or in jars)
– Zest and juice of half a lime
– Handful of fresh coriander/cilantro
– 2 large mushrooms, sliced
– 2 handfuls of kale
1) Put the mince, half the garlic (crushed), 1 red chilli (diced), 2 spring onions (diced) and half the ginger (diced) into a bowl and combine. Roll into meatballs. Heat some oil in a large pan and add the meatballs and cook for 10-15 minutes, turning over every few minutes.
2) Meanwhile, add the rest of the garlic and ginger to a food processor along with the lime juice and zest, lemon grass and coriander and wizz it up to make a paste.
3) After the meatballs have been cooking for around 2 minutes, add the mushrooms and cook for 2 minutes.
4) Add the hot water and the garlic, ginger and coriander paste to the pan and add the kale and noodles and for around 4 minutes on low.
5) Serve into a bowl and top with the rest of the spring onions (sliced lengthways) and the other red chilli (sliced)
Nutritional Information:
Calories: 337
Fat: 9
Carbs: 35.5
Protein: 25
Fibre: 4
Meghan says
Oh, I used orders Chinese takeaway lol. Next week I will make this instead. I have bookmarked it as it looks really good x
Olivia says
Looks yummy!
Sara says
I have been waiting for this 🙂 I think I will make this with lamb
Charlotte says
I really am amazed with all the recipes you come up with. I follow loads of food blogs and most of their meal ideas are boring. I love all your takeaway alternatives, as that is where I seem to be going wrong. I do well all week and the I blow it.
Samantha says
That’s tonight’s dinner sorted, thank you for the recipe. How spicy is it with the 2 chillis in it? I guess I will have to find out!
Felicity says
More Chinese recipes too. It is a bit of a weekly tradition for me and the bf but that tradition is not doing anything for our weight. I think the problem is that we always order way too much, which I know we don’t have to do. But it would be nice to make it as ourselves, as we have never really cooked together before. It could make or break us haha
Kathy says
I love the way you style your food. It looks like something in a magazine.
Tim says
My wife and I love all your recipes Dannii. We check your blog every day to see if there is something new for us to try.
In the summer I started having heart problems and my doctor told me that I needed to lose weight. I love food and I thought I would have to stop enjoying food to lose weight, but your recipes have proved me wrong.
Thank you for spending your free time to provide us all with healthy recipes that actually taste good and include real food. I have been on so many so called healthy recipe blogs and they use artificial ingredients to make them “healthier”.
You have shown my wife and I that it is about health, not weight loss.
Thanks again.
Tim and Faye.
Jen says
I was going to order a takeaway tonight, but then I saw this and thought why? I can make it myself and save myself money and calories. I can then enjoy some ice cream even more than I would have done.
Diane says
I saw you post this on Facebook last night and I was hoping you would upload the recipe in time for me to buy the ingredients for tonight. Thank You! My husband will be so happy, as Chinese is his favourite but we are watching our weight.