I’m calling this series “Same Same But Different” because I’m using the same ingredients in two ways. They will be tagged in order to make searching easier for you.

I love eating different cuisines and tend to get bored easily. Most of what I cook is down to how tired I am after work and how much time I have to make it. In order to make nutritious meals that taste different, are simple to make and be cost effective, can be quite a challenge. But I’m going to show you how.

Last week I used the following proteins: 4x chicken breasts, 500g Ostrich Mince and 240g Shrimp meat. You might have seen the posts on Instagram or read them over here, here and here.

I was only inspired after the chicken dishes, when I made the chilli con carne bowls to start this series. The first two dishes are not similar at all, just how I treated the chicken.

Meal One – Pan Fried/Grilled Spiced Chicken

Dish one consisted of tenderised chicken and some spices. I took a pack of 4 chicken breasts, cut them in half horizontally and bashed with with an empty bottle (use a meat tenderiser/ mallet lol). Cover them with cling rap so you don’t tear the flesh of the chicken. I separated the chicken in half, pan fried some with cayenne pepper, salt, black pepper and finished it off with fresh lemon juice. I marinated the rest with soya sauce, garlic and green chilli for my Chinese Chicken & Rice.

Meal Two – Chinese Chicken & Rice 

There was much more involved with dish two, I pan fried the chicken, made a sweet & sour sauce and served it with rice mixed with stir fried vegetables. This is one of my childhood favourites, I absolutely love this dish!

Meal Three – Chilli Con Carne Bowls

What’s great about this dish is that it is healthy and you can tailor it to your preferences. I used 250g ostrich mince but you can use beef. Serve it with rice or eat it plain, use it as your meal prep for the week – it’s so tasty I wouldn’t mind eating it every day! This recipe and the next one is a perfect representation of the “same same” logic. I used the same spices and protein,  but extended the meat in a different way. For the chilli I used kidney beans and for the Kofta’s I used a slice of bread soaked in water.

Meal Four – Kofta’s

I didn’t post this recipe on the blog, but saved the story to my highlights on Instagram where you can watch how I made it. It uses the same spices as the Chilli Con Carne Bowls but as I mentioned above I extended the mince with a slice of bread. Soaking the bread in water or milk and then squeezing the excess liquid out also acts as a binder. This is called a Panada. I managed to make 14 mini Koftas out of 250g of mince and put them in wraps with salad for a quick and easy supper.

Meal Five – Coconut Shrimp Noodles

This ended up being a very lazy supper. I was aiming for a Laksa or Khowse but it ended up absorbing a lot of the liquid and became quite thick. It resembled more of an Italian dish with Thai flavours but I’m not complaining as it was quick and tasty. I have also saved this recipe to my highlights on Instagram.

Meal Six – Shrimp Akhni

I used the same protein, vegetables and liquid for this dish as I used in meal five. Only the starch is different – I used brown basmati rice as opposed to the noodles previously. The dish is very simple and is loosely based on my Nanima’s Prawn Akhni. You could easily use prawn meat for this dish, I used shrimp just because of #Januworry. I wanted that Prawn taste but not for the price!