12 March - lamb and beetroot salad

I finally used up the last of the chilli today for lunch on a baked potato with a dollop of plain yoghurt to tame the heat.

The vegbox always arrives with a little recipe leaflet. I usually have a glance through it, but only occasionally get inspired to try them. This week I spotted an idea for lamb and beetroot salad with a pumpkin seed and chilli dressing. You whizz up some toasted pumpkin seeds with chilli, garlic, lemon juice, parsley, mint and olive oil, then you use half the slush to marinate a couple of lamb leg steaks and keep the other half as the dressing. I made up a salad of spinach, roast beetroot and blood orange, then fried the lamb and sliced it on top. For the dressing, the slush looked a bit thick, so I added a bit more olive oil and it worked great. The dressing was really tasty, with just a nice bit of chilli kick in the background and the combination of the beetroot and orange in the salad made a really nice change.

14 November - pasta and baked squash

I picked up some out-of-season fresh peas in Waitrose this morning for a lunch of pasta with bacon, peas and cream - a bit against my usual seasonal principles, but sometimes you've just got to go with what you fancy!

Lacking inspiration, I was flicking through my folder of old recipes I've collected over the years and plumped for baked squash and corn with goats cheese by Jane Baxter from Riverford (who I get my vegbox from) I think cut it out from an old Guardian magazine. The baked squash is quite straightforward - just roasted cubes of butternut squash mixed with sweetcorn, garlic, chopped chilli and some goats cheese - but it's the pumpkin seed dressing that makes it worth digging out the recipe. You blend together:

• 40g toasted pumpkin seeds
• 1 clove garlic
• a chopped tomato
• a handful coriander leaves
• a chopped green chilli
• a splash of good olive oil

Served with corn tortillas, with the dressing drizzled over the veg mix, it's a really different, tasty supper with quite a kick.