National Vegetarian Week 2017 runs from 15-21 May, and it’s all about eating veggie for the week and enjoying delicious, exciting food. Everyone is welcome to join in and we’ve got loads of mouth‑watering recipes, tips and resource packs to help you make the most of it.

Running from the 15th to the 21st of May 2017, National Vegetarian Week is a celebration of all things veggie; helping you to enjoy delicious and exciting food without compromising on both colour and flavour on your plate!

A healthy lifestyle doesn’t necessarily have to have meat in it, and this celebration of all things veggie by the Vegetarian Society, could be the introduction to an alternative diet that you, your friends and relatives might have been looking for.

Being a vegetarian was once derided and in some cases ridiculed for being a silly way to try and live, but in many cultures and countries around the globe a vegetarian diet has existed for hundreds of years and is a great way to reduce your own carbon footprint simply by changing your eating habits.

Lifestyle choice or health decision, cutting out meat doesn’t mean you go without flavour or even a filling meal. Ditching the beef can even help your waistline!

National Vegetarian Week is also receiving backing from none other than the Hairy Bikers! Meatmen themselves, even the loveable Geordie beard wearers have signed up to provide a whole host of recipes, advice and information for budding cooks out there!

Speaking about National Vegetarian Week, the Hairy Bikers said: “As cooks, we’ve always appreciated our veg and they’re a hugely important part of our cooking. And lately, without really thinking about it, we’ve been eating less meat. The more we learn about cooking great food, the more we enjoy making use of all the amazing produce that’s on offer and creating dishes where vegetables, pulses and other plant foods are the stars of the show. That’s why we’re getting stuck into National Vegetarian Week this year… and we think you should too!”

“The more we learn about cooking great food, the more we enjoy making use of all the amazing produce that’s on offer and creating dishes where vegetables, pulses and other plant foods are the stars of the show. That’s why we’re getting stuck into National Vegetarian Week this year… and we think you should too!”

Of course, if you are a restaurant or foodservice business looking to capitalise on the increased customer desire for healthy meat-free foods, then we have a range of food preparation tools to help you make stellar veggie dishes!

Vegetable prep machines

High-quality vegetable preparation machines can help your kitchen improve productivity by reducing the time it takes to get veggies ready to be cooked or served.

Slicing, dicing, chopping, scrubbing, cleaning and more, these are the perfect addition to small or even large kitchens that want to serve large amounts of food!

But we’re not just here to improve your kitchen processes, here’s a lovely recipe courtesy of the Hairy ‘Dieters’ themselves!:

Sweet Potato Saag Aloo

Serves 4 | 200 calories per serving
Prep: 15 minutes | Cooking time: 25 minutes

Saag aloo is usually made with regular potatoes but we like our sweet potato version. The great thing about these little beauties is they are richer in nutrients – particularly vitamin C – than white potatoes and lower in starch. They count towards your five a day too, while regular potatoes don’t.

We like to make our own spice mix for this but if you prefer you can use curry powder.

Ingredients

• 1 tbsp vegetable oil
• 1 onion, thinly sliced
• 2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
• 20g fresh root ginger, grated
• 1 tbsp spice mix (see below) or mild curry powder
• 2 sweet potatoes, diced’
• 1 tomato, diced
• 300ml vegetable stock
• 150–200g bag of baby spinach, picked over and thoroughly washed
• a squeeze of lemon juice
• sea salt and black pepper

Spice mix

• 1 tsp coriander seeds
• 1 tsp cumin seeds
• 1 tsp fennel seeds
• ½ tsp ground turmeric

To serve

• a few green chillies, sliceda few sprigs of coriander
• a few sprigs of coriander

Method

1. If making the spice mix, toast the whole spices lightly in a frying pan, then grind them to a powder. Mix with the turmeric.
2. Heat the oil in a large flameproof casserole dish or a deep frying pan. Add the onion and cook it quite briskly until it’s softened and very lightly browned. Add the garlic, ginger and the spice mix or curry powder and stir until combined.
3. Add the sweet potatoes to the pan and stir to coat them with the garlic, ginger and spices, then add the tomato and the vegetable stock. Season with salt and pepper. Bring the stock to the boil, then turn down the heat, cover the pan and simmer very gently until the sweet potato is just cooked. This should take no longer than 10 minutes, but check regularly from 5 minutes as you don’t want the sweet potato to go mushy – it should still have a little bite to it. Loosen the sauce with a little more stock or water if necessary.
4. Add the spinach to the pan and cover the pan again until the spinach has wilted down. Stir very carefully to combine without breaking up the sweet potatoes. Add a squeeze of lemon juice and serve garnished with green chillies and fresh coriander.

Recipe is taken from The Hairy Dieters Go Veggie.