Sweet and sour bean and vegetable hotpot

Welcome to two new readers - Alwayshappy and DHE. Lovely to have you aboard :)

This recipe is both gluten free and vegan.

450g unpeeled potatoes

1 tbsp olive oil

2 tbsp plain GF flour or cornflour

1 can chopped tomatoes or passata

150ml Apple juice

3 tbsp each : Demerara sugar, tomato ketchup, dry sherry (or chinese cooking wine), vinegar (I used up the rice vinegar I had in the cupboard) and tamari sauce (use light soy if you are not coeliac)

1 can chick peas

1 can borlotti beans

1 can butter beans 

1 finely chopped onion

A handful of mushrooms, sliced

1 carrot finely diced

2 tsp dried herbs or 2 tbsp mixed chopped fresh herbs

Put the cornflour, tomatoes, apple juice, sugar, sherry, vinegar and tamari sauce in a medium pan and whisk over a medium heat until it thickens. Simmer for about 3 mins, whisking occasionally.

Put the beans (you can use any combination of beans you wish here of course - I used what I had) with the vegetables (again you could use sweetcorn/peas/green beans etc ) and herbs in a large shallow casserole dish. Stir in the thickened sweet and sour sauce to coat thoroughly. You can season here, but I found it wasn't needed.

Finely slice the potatoes and lay, neatly overlapping, over the bean mixture. (Mr D's idea of neat rows varied somewhat from the recipe, but who cares!) Drizzle with the olive oil. 

Cover with foil and put in the oven at 200c for about an hour. Take the foil off for the final 20 mins to brown the potatoes. 

We served it with crusty bread and a nice crisp green salad. Very tasty and very healthy!

This is what my daughter is facing in New Jersey, America! It'll be the most snow she's experienced!