Salmon Peas Pilau
Whenever we order rice as part of an Indian takeaway, my hubby and I get peas pilau, largely as he is rather obsessed with peas! It’s a lovely side dish, which is a bit more interesting than just plain rice. In an effort to lighten up as many of our favourite takeaway dishes as possible, I decided to take this classic on, adding a lightly spiced turmeric salmon to it to ramp up the flavour and protein. The result was a triumph and it’s become a firm family favourite in our house
POINTS AND NUTRITIONAL INFORMATION
Serves 4 – per serving = 7 points or 419 cals, 21g fat, 23.2g carbs, 34.5g protein
Ingredients
1 red onion, finely diced
1 pepper, deseeded and finely diced
2 large tomatoes, diced into 1cm chunks
3 cloves of garlic, finely minced
1 red chilli (if you like spice), finely chopped
200g basmati rice
1 vegetable stock cube, crumbled
3 tsp pilau seasoning
100g frozen peas
2 tsp light butter
1 1/2 tsp ground tumeric
10g fresh coriander, finely chopped
1 lemon
4 x 120g salmon fillets
Low calorie cooking spray
For the spiced mint yoghurt
15g each fresh coriander and fresh mint leaves, roughly chopped
3 green chillies (deseeded if you don’t like things too hot), roughly chopped
2 garlic cloves, roughly chopped
½ tsp sugar
Juice of ½ lemon
200ml fat free Greek yoghurt
Method
- Preheat the oven to 180°C (fan).
- To make the mint yoghurt, blitz all the ingredients together and spoon into a bowl. Cover and pop in the fridge until you are ready to serve.
- To make the pilau, add the onion and pepper to a frying pan and spray with low-calorie cooking spray. Fry for 5–6 minutes until the onion is soft, adding a splash of water if the pan gets dry, and then add the tomatoes, garlic and chilli and fry for another 2 minutes. Turn off the heat.
- Meanwhile, in a separate pan, pop your rice on to cook, adding the crumbled stock cube and a teaspoon of the pilau seasoning to the rice pan. When the rice has 3 minutes left, add the peas to the pan.
- Once cooked, add the rice and peas to the frying pan with the vegetables. Pop the frying pan back on a medium/high heat.
- Make a well in the middle of the rice, add 1 teaspoon of butter, let it melt, then add 1 teaspoon of the turmeric and 1 teaspoon pilau seasoning. Once the spices have combined into the butter, stir-fry the rice so the butter melts nicely through all the rice.
- Remove the rice from the heat, toss through the fresh coriander and add the juice of half the lemon. Pop on a lid and leave to rest while you cook the salmon.
- For the salmon, spray a frying pan with low-calorie cooking spray and then add the salmon, skin side down. Sprinkle with 1 teaspoon pilau seasoning and fry for 3–4 minutes until the skin is crispy. Turn the salmon over and fry for 3–4 minutes on the other side until the salmon is cooked through.
- Add the remaining butter to the pan with the remaining ½ teaspoon of turmeric. Once the butter and turmeric have melted together, coat the salmon, fry for a further minute, and then turn off the heat.1
- Serve in big bowls with the rice on the bottom, salmon on top, a good slosh of spiced mint yoghurt and a wedge of lemon each.
Made this recipe tonight, absolutely delicious, would definitely make again .
So glad you like it June! Xx