This is in high rotation at our place through winter, and it earns its spot for reasons beyond being easy. One tray, a proper serve of protein, and enough vegetables that you do not need to think about a side.
Why the protein matters more than you think
Protein is the thing most women I talk to are short on, and it matters more as we get older.
The 46g a day figure most of us have in our heads is the Recommended Dietary Intake for women aged 19 to 70. It is worth understanding what that number is. It is set to prevent deficiency in most of the population, not to describe the amount that best supports holding onto muscle through your forties, fifties and beyond. Those are different questions, and the second one is where the interesting research is.
Muscle matters for more than strength. It is where a great deal of your glucose gets taken up, it protects against falls later on, and it is considerably easier to keep than to rebuild.
None of this needs a spreadsheet. It mostly means deciding what the protein is when you plan a meal, rather than building a lovely plate of vegetables and hoping.
Winter traybake with butter beans and tahini
Serves 4.
Half a butternut pumpkin, half a cauliflower, two carrots and a red onion, chopped into rough chunks. Olive oil, a teaspoon each of cumin and smoked paprika, salt and pepper. Toss it all together and roast at 200C for 30 minutes.
Add a drained tin of butter beans and your protein, then roast another 15 to 20 minutes.
For the dressing, whisk two tablespoons of tahini with the juice of a lemon, a splash of water and a pinch of salt until it loosens enough to pour. Over the lot, then parsley.
The protein options
Chicken thighs work well and go in with the butter beans.
A firm white fish fillet added for the last 12 minutes. Blue grenadier, ling and barramundi all hold together nicely.
A tin of sardines stirred through at the end. Cheap, low in mercury, wild by default, and they bring calcium with the bones. Under-used, and one of the better things you can put in a bowl.
Halloumi if you would rather keep it vegetarian, cubed and added for the last 15 minutes.
I run a separate tray for myself, since I do not eat chicken. Two trays, one oven, everybody fed.
The tahini is not only for flavour
Two tablespoons of tahini brings a useful amount of calcium, which is worth knowing if you are not big on dairy. Sesame is one of the better plant sources of it.
Sardines with the bones in do the same thing. If you use both, this becomes a genuinely good calcium meal without a scrap of dairy in it.
Swaps and notes
Sweet potato, parsnip or brussels sprouts all work in place of any of the vegetables. Use what is in season and cheap.
Chickpeas or cannellini beans instead of butter beans.
Tahini can seize and go claggy when you first add the lemon. Keep whisking and add water a splash at a time. It comes back.
It reheats well, so make the full tray even for two. The dressing is better made fresh, though it keeps a few days in the fridge.
For a bigger meal, brown basmati alongside. It does not need it, since the pumpkin and butter beans are already carrying the carbohydrate.
The takeaway: One tray, vegetables doing most of the volume, and a protein you decided on rather than defaulted to. The tahini and the sardines both bring calcium, which makes this a useful meal if you are off dairy. It reheats, it takes swaps, and it is very forgiving.
The science behind this post:
- National Health and Medical Research Council. Nutrient Reference Values for Australia and New Zealand: Protein. The Recommended Dietary Intake is 46g per day for women aged 19 to 70, rising to 57g from age 70. RDIs are set to meet the requirements of nearly all healthy individuals, not to optimise a particular outcome. nrv.gov.au
- National Health and Medical Research Council. Nutrient Reference Values for Australia and New Zealand: Calcium. The Recommended Dietary Intake is 1000mg per day for women aged 19 to 50 and 1300mg from age 51. nrv.gov.au
- Food Standards Australia New Zealand. Australian Food Composition Database. Calcium content of tahini, sesame seeds and canned fish with edible bones. foodstandards.gov.au