Twitter users are sharing their favourite recipes for meals that require minimal cooking and can be made and kept in the fridge as the UK faces unprecedented hot weather.
The ideas include colourful salads, homemade dips and Vietnamese spring rolls.
It comes as the UK is set to experience the hottest day on record this week, with some parts of the country expected to see temperatures as high as 42C.
The Met Office has issued amber and red alerts, warning of “potential serious illness or danger to life”, and people are being advised not to travel on public transport unless “absolutely necessary”.
Among those sharing dinner ideas to beat the heat is popular chef Nigella Lawson.
Lawson’s go-to dinner on warm days is marinated salmon with capers and gherkins.
“Add a cucumber salad and you have the perfect keep-cool collation!” she said. See the recipe here.
Lawson also recommends her sesame peanut noodles, which she says can be “stashed in the fridge to provide cool comfort when you need it”.
The recipe (see here) uses egg noodles that can be bought cooked and ready to use from supermarkets, which is good news for those who wish to minimise use of appliances.
One helpful thread, by Melissa Cox, an editor at a publishing house in London, includes several recipes which are both nutritious and vegetarian friendly.
Cox recommends food writer Diana Henry’s carottes râpées, which she says is the “best, simplest salad” in the world when eaten with bread and butter. See the recipe here.
She also highlights Baked By Melissa’s Green Goddess Salad, which recently went viral on TikTok.
The creation is packed full of green cabbage, baby cucumbers and spring onions doused in a vegan pesto dressing and is designed to be eaten with tortilla chips.
Cox’s thread, which has received more than 700 likes, showcases Alison Roman’s “Tuna Salad Salad”, which requires no cooking.
The salad consists of lightly pickled onion, mixed with tuna, mayonnaise, dill and capers on a bed of lettuce which be eaten alone or scooped on to toast lightly spread with butter.
Cox also suggests trying Vietnamese rice paper rolls. The summertime favourite does require boiling a kettle to soak the noodles, but there is no other heating or cooking involved. See the recipe here.
“Oh and obviously if you decide to just buy a Tex Mex Dip selection and a massive bag of Doritos, that’s cool too but drink some extra water and alternate Dorito with like, [I don’t know], a radish maybe,” Cox added.
