Don’t let spring veggies go to waste with these top tips and recipes

Everyone’s got a sad cucumber at the back of the fridge – but there’s still time to save it with these clever hacks and tasty recipes. By Hannah Twiggs

Fruit and vegetables are the most wasted foods in our homes (Getty/iStock)

One of the great things about spring is the rainbow of fresh vegetables, a welcome change for those looking to keep their food miles low and eat seasonally.

Recent research revealed that the average family wastes up to £720 of food per year, and that fruits and vegetables are the most wasted foods. While we’re not quite ready for summer salads, though, we can use these veggies to make lighter suppers, packed full of colour and nutrients.

With that in mind, meal delivery service Gousto has taken three of the best and brightest springtime ingredients – beetroot, cucumber and spinach. Applying their creative wizardry, the following hacks are sure to bring your taste buds out of hibernation and help use up that half bag of spinach or the end of the cucumber that’s looking a bit sad at the back of the fridge.

Beetroot

(Gousto)

Popular as a natural food colouring, beetroot is a real winner for the health fanatics out there, as it contains lots of iron, potassium and Vitamin C.

Beetroot tops can be used as a substitute for, or to compliment, greens, such as spinach, swiss chard and bok choy. They can be steamed, sauteed, braised, added to soups or even eaten raw. Sauteeing the stems with a little garlic, orange and shallot is a great way to have them tender and crisp – the perfect side for just about anything. Just make sure to rinse them well and they’re good to go!

The leaves can be a perfect addition to a stir fry, with some olive oil, garlic, sugar, seasoning and at the last second, red wine vinegar. Simply finely chop and add it to the pan, in place of spinach, kale or other greens. Beetroot is also best friends with walnut, so sauteing the leaves with butter, ground black pepper and salt, and topping with toasted walnuts makes for a yummy snack.

Roasting beetroot lessens the bitter flavour, and goes very well with carrots and sweet potatoes. It also works well in a stew with carrots and mushrooms, or grated into a delicious and healthy burger. Here’s one idea:

Honey roast beetroot with feta and spinach bulgur

This recipe enhances the natural sweetness of beetroot (Gousto)

The natural sweetness of beetroot is enhanced here by honey, the fragrant floral notes of thyme and crunchy toasted walnuts. Serve all this over a satisfying base of warm, nutritious bulgur wheat with spinach and feta stirred through. Beet that!

Serves: 2

Ingredients:

2 shallots

130g bulgur wheat

100g feta cheese

25g honey

10g thyme

2 garlic cloves

150g baby leaf spinach

250g cooked beetroot

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 220C/200C fan/gas 7 and boil a kettle. Peel and quarter the shallots. Add them to a baking tray lined with tin foil with a drizzle of olive oil and a pinch of salt and pepper. Put the tray in the oven for 10 minutes.

2. Meanwhile, add the bulgur wheat to a large pot of salted boiled water over a high heat. Boil the bulgur for 7-8 minutes or until cooked but with a slight bite, then drain and set in the sieve to cool (reserve the pot for later).

3. Meanwhile, quarter the cooked beetroot (reserve the juice). Strip the thyme leaves from their stalks. Discard the stalks and roughly chop the leaves.

4. Add the beetroot, beetroot juice and thyme to the part-cooked shallots. Bunch the lot together, drizzle over the honey, a little olive oil and season generously with salt and pepper. Return the tray to the oven for 10 min, then add the walnuts and cook for a final 5 minutes.

5. Meanwhile, peel and finely chop (or grate) the garlic. Wash the baby spinach, pat dry and chop it coarsely.

6. Return the reserved pot to a medium-high heat with 1 tbsp olive oil and a knob of butter. Once hot, add the garlic with a pinch of salt. Stir for 1 min, then add the drained bulgur.

7. Stir the chopped spinach through the bulgur and stir for a few min or until wilted. Once wilted, remove the pot from the heat and crumble in the feta. Season with plenty of pepper. Serve the roasted beetroot, walnuts and shallots over the spinach and feta bulgur.

Cucumber

(Gousto)

It’s easy to end up with half a cucumber lying in the back of the fridge if you’ve no intention of using it up in yet another salad. From pickling to sauteing to ribboning, there are loads of versatile ways to get the hydration and vitamin K from those leftover cucumbers.

It’s particularly tasty sauteed with a bit of oil and salt. Using butter or sesame oil is highly recommended, as the cucumber pairs well with nutty flavours. Remember: try to avoid peeling your cucumbers as the skin is full of nutrients and adds extra crunch.

Food waste tip: limp cucumbers can be revived by slicing off the end and standing in a bowl of cold water for a few minutes. They’ll be back to their crunchy glory in no time!

Senior chef Jordan Moore’s best tip for accentuating the crunch before grating is to leave the cucumber with salt for 20 minutes, then rinse and squeeze out any moisture with a kitchen towel.

You could also pickle your cucumbers, by cutting them in half lengthways and finely slicing, then soaking in rice vinegar, sugar and a pinch of salt.

But our go-to spring-time recipe is this one:

Bulgarian-style stuffed peppers and cucumber yoghurt

These peppers are inspired by the Bulgarian dish palneni chushki (Gousto)

These are no ordinary stuffed peppers. Inspired by the Bulgarian dish, palneni chushki, you’ll fill pepper halves with beef and pork mince before baking in a rich tomato sauce. Serve with cucumber and dill yoghurt and steamed rice.

Serves: 2

Ingredients:

250g pork and beef ragu mince

11g beef stock mix

100g Greek-style yoghurt

1 (400g) tin of finely chopped tomatoes

300g steamed white basmati rice

1 carrot

16g tomato paste

10g parsley and dill mix

2 tsp smoked paprika

1 red onion

½ cucumber

2 red peppers

3 garlic cloves

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 220C/200C fan/gas 7. Halve the red peppers and scoop out the seeds with a spoon. Put the red pepper halves into an oven-proof dish and put into the oven for 12-15 minutes or until softened but still holding their shape. Meanwhile, grate the cucumber and put into a sieve with a generous pinch of salt over a bowl, keeping aside for later.

2. Peel and finely chop the red onion. Peel and grate the carrot. Peel and finely chop (or grate) the garlic.

3. Heat a medium wide-based pan with a generous drizzle of vegetable oil over a medium-high heat. Once hot, add the chopped red onion with a pinch of salt and cook for 5-6 minutes or until starting to caramelise. Once the onion starts to caramelise, add the grated carrot and cook for a further 3-4 minutes or until softened.

4. Meanwhile, heat a pot with a generous drizzle of vegetable oil over a medium-low heat. Once hot, add the the chopped garlic and cook for 1-2 minutes or until fragrant. Once fragrant, add the chopped tomatoes with ½ Kallo beef stock cube, a pinch of sugar and a generous splash of water then bring to the boil. Once boiling, reduce to a simmer for 5-6 minutes or until thickened.

5. Once the carrot has softened, add the pork and beef ragu mix. Cook for 3-4 minutes or until beginning to brown, breaking it up with a wooden spoon as you go to frying pan. Once browned, add the smoked paprika, tomato paste and the remaining beef stock cube with a splash of water and give everything a good mix up.

6. Remove the red pepper halves from the dish, and pour in the tomato sauce. Add the red pepper halves on top and fill with the mince mix. Cover with tin foil then put into the oven for 10-12 minutes or until the mince is cooked through (no pink meat!) Meanwhile, chop the dill roughly. Add the chopped dill to a bowl with the drained grated cucumber (discarding any liquid), Greek-style yoghurt and a pinch of pepper, stirring to combine.

7. Squeeze the pouch of steamed white basmati rice to separate the grains. Tear the top corner of the pouch (just a little!) and microwave for 2 min or until piping hot. Tip: If you’re cooking two pouches, pop them in together but increase the microwave cook time accordingly. Chop the parsley roughly, including the stalks. Serve the Bulgarian-style stuffed peppers on top of the tomato sauce, with the cucumber yoghurt and rice to the side. Garnish with the chopped parsley.

Spinach

(Gousto)

An iconic green veg, spinach is known for being loaded with health benefits, such as vitamin K, magnesium and calcium, and is a go-to way of adding an extra vitamin hit to dishes. However, an uneaten, or half-eaten, bag of spinach quickly goes soggy, as our green smoothies can only take so much!

Using up spinach may seem like a task and a half, but sauteed or steamed spinach shrinks up surprisingly quickly, so don’t be afraid to add plenty to your dishes. Stir your spinach over a high heat until it’s wilted, as a higher heat will help any liquid it releases to evaporate quickly. This is definitely worth doing, if you want to avoid wet or slimy spinach.

Food waste tip: blending up spinach with some sauteed garlic, onion and stock to make a delicious sauce is another way to use up any leftovers. Remember, you can always freeze spinach for up to 6 months, after blanching, and simply add to any curries, as and when.

Pairing spinach with sesame oil and garlic transform the flavours to give it an Asian-inspired twist, such as in this recipe:

Japanese hambagu and sesame spinach

This is the Japanese version of a hamburger (Gousto)

Hambagu, pronounced ham-ba-goo, is what the Japanese call their version of a hamburger. It’s bunless and comes with plenty of rich, sticky sauce. We’re serving ours over nutty brown rice with spinach gomaae (sesame spinach).

Serves: 2

Ingredients:

130g brown rice

250g British beef mince

1 beef stock cube

2 tbsp Henderson's relish

45ml tomato ketchup

1 tbsp toasted sesame oil

30g panko breadcrumbs

1 spring onion

25g honey

10g toasted sesame seeds

150g baby leaf spinach

24ml of soy sauce

1 brown onion

Method:

1. Rinse the brown rice, add it to a pot with plenty of cold water and bring to the boil over a high heat. Once boiling, reduce the heat to medium and cook for 20-25 min or until it's tender with a slight bite. Once cooked, drain and return it to the pot and keep covered until serving.

2. Meanwhile, boil a kettle. Peel and grate the brown onion.

3. Add the grated onion, beef mince and panko breadcrumbs to a large bowl. Crumble the beef stock cube into the bowl and knead thoroughly with clean hands for 2-3 minutes. Once smooth, divide the mince into 2 and shape into oval-shaped burgers – these are your hambagu.

4. Heat a large, wide-based pan (preferably non-stick) with a drizzle of vegetable oil over a medium-low heat. Once hot, add the hambagu and cook for 6-7 min on each side until they're cooked through.

5. Meanwhile, trim, then slice the spring onion finely. Add the baby leaf spinach to a colander and pour over the boiled water so that it starts to wilt.

6. Add the wilted spinach, toasted sesame oil, toasted sesame seeds and a pinch of salt to a medium bowl and give everything a good mix up – this is your spinach gomaae.

7. Once the hambagu are cooked, transfer them to a plate and leave them to rest. Pour away most of the oil, leaving around 1 tsp in the pan. Return the pan to a medium-low heat and add the soy sauce, ketchup, Henderson's Relish and honey to the pan. Cook for 30 sec, whisking constantly – this is your umami sauce. Serve the hambagu over the brown rice and drizzle with umami sauce with the spinach gomaae to the side. Garnish with the sliced spring onion.

Recipes from Gousto, offering 60 meals to choose from weekly. To subscribe and for more hacks on how to eat seasonally and minimise food waste visit Gousto.co.uk.