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Celebrity chef Jamie Oliver has fun with meat-free meals in his new TVNZ 1 series Jamie’s Ultimate Veg. Jim Maloney reports.
Jamie Oliver has fun with meat-free meals.
Jamie Oliver has made a habit out of campaigning to make people change their eating habits, from making cooking simple and accessible to cutting out junk food and replacing it with nutritious meals.
Now, in Jamie’s Ultimate Veg, he is determined to change the way we view, and eat, vegetarian food by taking inspiration from around the world.
The chirpy chef gives his meals some typically ‘laddish’ titles such as ‘Cottage pie and bonkers chip butty’, ‘Scruffy lasagne and bigged-up broccoli’ and ‘Kick-ass chilli and pasties’.
“It’s all about veg, which is trendy at the moment, and these recipes are short, sharp and to the point,” Oliver says. “You’ve got comfort food and naughty stuff plus a few surprises. I think I’ve got the balance of what you want and also what you don’t think you want.
“I went to places in the world I haven’t been before while researching this like Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, and India. It blew my mind. What they do with ordinary veg to give you the same hugging feeling as a burger or pizza was amazing.”
Practical as ever, Oliver also looked at cost, simplicity and speed in getting the food on the table quickly and without breaking the bank.
“My Sunshine Pasta is done in 10 minutes and is always a hit in my house. Even baby River loves it and he’s three,” Oliver says.
“It’s a child-friendly dish, because, at my last count, I had a million children in my family. And for me, it’s a constant battle of how do we get the good stuff in them? The reality is the relationship between kids
and good nutrition is a constant agony and stress. I’m not saying my recipes are perfect, but if we can get more veg into our kids’ systems it’s win win.”
For the record, Oliver, 44, who is married to Jools, is a dad to five children – Poppy, 17, Daisy, 16, Petal, 10, Buddy, nine, and River, three.
Oliver says he was an active child himself and so was in good physical shape but he began to pile on the weight in his early 30s.
However, a combination lately of better eating – less meat and more veg – and exercise has led to a much slimmer version of himself.
“I pushed meat down, pushed veggie up, got more sleep and more movement. I also ate a lot more nuts. They make you half as likely to have a heart attack. Feed them to your kids as well. “I could be wrong but I think that now is the time to go quite hard and mainstream with veg. We’ve made vegetarianism more faddy than it needs to be. It has been depicted as quite a divisive thing – vegan, vegetarian, pescatarian. Which one are you? But it doesn’t really matter how you look at it, humans are absolutely deficient in veg, legumes and fibre. “Meat has always been an expression of progress. It’s a luxury. But when there is not a lot of money around people become very creative, as I discovered in my travels. There’s a wonderful diversity of textures and colours for really
“I still eat meat, maybe twice a week, but what I want to show is that you can have comfort food and naughty stuff without it. Veg is a celebration not a commiseration.” – Jamie Oliver
affordable vegetables such as onions and carrots. And when they are the filling for fritters they provide that same hugging feeling as a burger or a pizza. You’re kind of sitting there going, ‘I don’t want any meat. I’m really happy’.
“I still eat meat, maybe twice a week, but what I want to show is that you can have comfort food and naughty stuff without it. Veg is a celebration not a commiseration.”
And he is an advocate of frozen veg for its nutrition and simplicity.
“I don’t want people to think, ‘Oh I’ll just make that vegetarian meal at the weekend because I don’t have time during the week’. The recipes are not time consuming.
“Frozen is the future. The chances are that your frozen pea will be more nutritious, and in better condition, than your fresh pea that’s been sitting in a warehouse for a week.
“If you care about higher welfare and a cheaper price – frozen. If you care about lack of waste – frozen. Convenience, portion control, nutrition – frozen.
“Generally, what a child and what a family needs is the same as what the planet needs – more veg, more nuts, more seeds, more legumes.”