The Lake District Dairy Co have got all innovative and brought out a range of Quark-based cooking sauces. If you're not familiar with Quark, it's a spoonable, low fat, soft cheese that can be used to replace cream, cream cheese, crème fraîche or Greek yogurt in a whole array of recipes, sweet and savoury, drastically reducing the calorie and fat content of many meals. You can see some of the things I've made with Quark here on the blog - Pina Quarkada, Tropical Frozen Hearts, Quark New York Cheesecake, American-style Quark Pancakes, Instant Cheesecake...
The Lake District Dairy Co sent us through a fabulous hamper to try out their new savoury cooking sauces. There are three flavours available : Garlic & Herb, Tomato & Basil and Tikka.
They sent through everything I'd need to create three dishes, Spaghetti Quarkonara (a low-fat version of spaghetti carbonara), Chicken Tikka and Gnocci with Spinach and Tomato & Basil Quark Sauce.
I decided to start off with Spaghetti Quarkonara, as my usual version is a family fave. I gathered together my ingredients for the recipe - a tub of Garlic & Herb sauce, a pack of shreddded ham hock and some quick cook spaghetti. I also decided to add in an onion, a shallot and some mushrooms. (I would have added in some leeks, as I usually do, but I didn't have any in the fridge - that would have worked really well though.)
It's as easy as 1-2-3. Cook the spaghetti, cook the mushrooms/onions/shallots and mix with the ham, open the tub of sauce.
Drain the spaghettiand return it to the pan, add the sauce and the other ingredients and mix. As it was quick cook spaghetti that only took 5 minutes to cook, the whole thing was ready in 10 minutes, making it ideal for a busy weekday meal after a hectic day at work.
Taste wise, it was very nice. The texture was very similar to my usual carbonara made with low fat crème fraîche and the sauce gave it a lovely garlicky topnote. Everyone wolfed it down and the kids asked for seconds !
RRP : £1.75 for 200g
for more information: www.LakeDistrictQuark.co.uk
Disclosure : I received a hamper of ingredients in order to try out the recipes.
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I've just bought my first tub of quark! I normally have to avoid creamy cheeses but apparently this is fine with lactose intolerance so I'm looking forward to experimenting. This recipe looks delicious :)
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