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Lisa Murrin

'I make this spaghetti at least twice a week': 5 crowd-pleasing dishes from a Dublin cook

Culinary Arts graduate Lisa Murrin favours low-prep dinners over fancy fare – here’s what she’s made recently.

EACH WEEK, WE ask a home cook about the dishes they’ve been whipping up of late. The kind of food you don’t need a recipe for, from quick snacks to empty-the-fridge dinners.

This week, Culinary Arts graduate Lisa Murrin (@the_health_balance) shared five flavour-filled dishes that are a hit with her entire family. 

“These dishes appear on our menu at home once every two weeks or so,” says Lisa.

They are quick, easy, can be adapted to whatever you have in the fridge and are suitable for little people, as I have three boys under three.

From steak tagliata to a mouth-watering pasta dish, below are five of Lisa’s favourite meals to make:

1. Lettuce cups with black rice, roast cod, avocado and mango salsa with sesame and soy dressing: I absolutely love Asian cuisine and this is a take on a dish I had when I was in Thailand. You can use monkfish, prawns or almost any white fish. I would recommend using regular white rice for ease as the black rice is definitely a little trickier to get right. You can substitute the salsa for whatever you like, onion, cucumber or tomato. Also toasting the sesame seeds on a pan for a couple of minutes adds another depth of flavour to the dressing.

image1 Lisa Murrin Lisa Murrin

2. Brown rice spaghetti with roast vegetables, olives, capers, chorizo, toasted pine nuts and pesto: I cook pasta two to three times a week in different variations based on what I have to use in the fridge. You can add almost anything to pasta and it will work. For this dish, I pan fry the capers so they are crispy and I use the oil from the sun dried tomato jar for more flavour. A good quality cheese definitely makes a difference when cooking pasta. Keep an eye on the pine nuts when toasting them, they go from nicely toasted to cremated in seconds!

image2 Lisa Murrin Lisa Murrin

3. Steak tagliata with homemade chips: This is one of my absolute favourite dishes. Get a nice piece of steak, pan fry for a couple of minutes each side and leave it to rest before slicing. Pop it on top of some nice peppery rocket, cherry tomatoes, Parmesan cheese and a really good quality thickened balsamic vinegar. My go to is the Lilliput Stores brand. I always do this dish with home made chips. I mix the sliced potato with chopped fresh parsley and garlic salt before baking until crisp. This dish has little or no preparation and little fuss, but is a massive crowd pleaser.

image3 Lisa Murrin Lisa Murrin

4.  Meat sung: Meat sung is typically done with pork but I tend to use turkey. Fry it off with mixed pepper, onion, corn, toasted cashew nuts and brown rice. This is great hot or cold so I typically make a big batch and the rest can be eaten the next day for lunch.

image4 Lisa Murrin Lisa Murrin

5. Steak pitta with halloumi, rocket, sauteed onion and peppers with mustard mayonnaise: Sometimes I am just not in the mood for ‘dinner’ at dinner time so I always turn to some sort of sandwich, wrap or pitta. Substitute the meat for chicken if beef is not your thing, or switch the mustard mayo for a pesto mayo if you prefer. A fried egg on top finishes it off nicely.

image5 Lisa Murrin Lisa Murrin

More: ‘The oven does almost all the work’: 5 recent must-try meals from a Donegal foodie

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    Mute Philip King
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    Apr 28th 2014, 7:15 AM

    I hope they get the resources they require. Look at the headlines over the past few months. Starting to feel like I live in Gotham City.

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    Mute Fergal Reid
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    Apr 28th 2014, 7:18 AM

    Just because there are more horrifying headlines doesn’t mean that society is actually getting more dangerous for the average citizen.

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    Mute Philip King
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    Apr 28th 2014, 7:44 AM

    Crime seems to be on the increase from my perspective or maybe I’m just paying more attention to it lately.

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    Mute Marc o brien
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    Apr 28th 2014, 7:48 AM

    Listen to yourself ! Does what you said actually make sense ?
    No ! Is the answer just incase your confused .

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    Mute Emilio
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    Apr 28th 2014, 8:23 AM

    Crime is constantly on the decrease in the western world, but that doesn’t sell newspapers (or support other, more sinister, agendas), so an apparent increase will be reported instead. Our mind is full of cognitive biases and we will fall for the media’s tricks.

    Despite the fact that this is true, and relatively easy to back up with data, I won’t bother even finding a link, because the great majority will ignore the evidence and go along with their ‘gut feeling’, that is, crime is on the increase.

    So please keep believing the world is increasingly more dangerous. It is useful to the powerful.

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    Mute Philip King
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    Apr 28th 2014, 8:35 AM

    Thanks Emilio. I’m well aware of the media hype surrounding events. I’m just speaking from my own experiences and observations. It does seem like crime is on the increase from my perspective. I know I’ve quoted the media as a source and I’m not one to read into the speculation and sensationalism in the reporting. Ill also admit I’ve looked at no stats or figures. Don’t get me wrong I’m not afraid to go out of the house. I’ve just seen and heard of a lot of crime of late.

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    Mute ThomasFrancisMeagher
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    Apr 28th 2014, 8:44 AM

    Sad thing is that the same few gurriers commit most of the crime here & will probably be arrested again tomorrow or the day after for a similar offence to the one they commit today & when eventually charged will get a suspended sentence ….. and go on to reoffend again & again. Time for our judicial system to start being fit for purpose & handing down proper sentences & time for a jail to be built to keep these gurriers away from the good people in society. If the Gardai weren’t arresting the same people over & over again they might be able to get more done.

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    Mute P O' Neill
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    Apr 28th 2014, 9:35 AM

    Time to crawl out from under the rock, Fergal.

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    Mute P O' Neill
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    Apr 28th 2014, 9:40 AM

    Totally agree! The Gardaí do tremendous work on limited resources. It’s the court system that has continually let this country down. Suspended sentences are rife, a quarter of sentence struck off for good behavior and let’s not forget early release, because the prisons are at breaking point.If only they built a super jail in the midlands, but it would cost an absolute fortune, which they
    can ill afford.

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    Mute David Burke
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    Apr 28th 2014, 12:25 PM

    Crime has been falling for decades and the long term trend is still down. Murders went up around 20 years ago when we started getting enough money for drugs which bring gang violence. But if you aren’t involved in drug gangs you are basically safer than ever before.

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    Mute Darragh Mcnamara
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    Apr 28th 2014, 7:03 AM

    Last photo straight out of Adam and Paul…..

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    Mute Emilio
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    Apr 28th 2014, 8:25 AM

    Great film that was. It was amazing to watch the rest of the audience as they went from thinking it was a comedy to taking it very seriously for what it was.

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    Mute Brian Ward
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    Apr 28th 2014, 10:27 AM

    I’d be very interested in the driving course allocation. Considering the amount of high speed pursuits that the gardai are now getting involved in I wonder how many guards have done the advanced driving course. You can’t expect a new recruit to get into a squad car and chase someone at 100mph+ on the basis that they have flashing lights and sirens. It puts the lives of the public at risk and the guards life at risk. The pursuit in Cork recently where a motorbike guard was badly injured is a prime example of this. Some of that pursuit was on the main Cork Limerick road where you can drive at speed but a large part of it was on roads where proper training for the gardai is essential not only to end the pursuit as speedily as possible but also to make sure that the garda’s life is not at risk.

    From what I’ve been told only about 25-30% of gardai have this training which is ridiculous when we the public expect them to put their lives on the line pursuing criminals.

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    Mute Shane Hogan
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    Apr 28th 2014, 3:05 PM

    A Gard on a motorbike will have done a training course. The issue is that it’s practice nowadays to get gardai to drive the patrol cars without training as long as they have a full licence.

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    Mute famousnotatall
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    Apr 28th 2014, 6:47 AM

    Hope they also talk about common sense…

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    Mute cosmological
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    Apr 28th 2014, 6:58 AM

    Also hope they introduce some enlightenment to policing in the 21st century.

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    Mute Montys Moonshine
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    Apr 28th 2014, 8:33 AM

    Enlighten them Cosmo, throw out some of your ideas and maybe they’ll pick up in them.

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    Mute John Clarke
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    Apr 28th 2014, 10:00 AM

    I’d say they’re waiting with bated breath for your suggestions.

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    Mute Paula Tully
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    Apr 28th 2014, 8:42 AM

    Oooooh a summer shirt now that’s important I was sweating buckets yesterday in me shirt and wool/nylon blend trousers. Aww happy thoughts of no tie in summer

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