​Karen Wright: Bon appetit with tray bake for New Year

I want to avoid feeling stressed and running the risk of not being prepared for everything I need to do. I use a diary to help with this and write in it each day exactly what I want to achieve. I try to keep it simple and have just a few tasks each day to complete, small manageable chunks is always my approach. I find writing my to do list to help keep me motivated and it is a great feeling when I can tick them off and close the diary until the next day!

At busy times I don’t get over complicated with my food shopping and meal preparation either, I tend to stick to my tried and tested family favourite meals that I can just throw into a slow cooker or onto a baking tray and leave it do its own thing. As it is wintertime root vegetables can always be found in my vegetable drawer and these are the perfect things to use in a casserole or a traybake. When I say traybake of course I am not referring to a cake, I am talking sausages! Sausage traybake hits the spot for everyone. It can be vegetarian or vegan too depending on your sausage of choice, and whichever vegetable you like or have available can be used up too. Typically, I might use potatoes, sweet potatoes, parsnips, swede, carrots and onions. I might throw in some chopped up apples too. This is what I like to do. I heat the oven on to 180 degrees and place all the vegetables onto a large baking tray and drizzle over some olive oil. I add some minced garlic, thyme and about 200 ml of stock. I put it into the oven and cook until the vegetables are starting to soften, then I add some sausages. I season well with salt and pepper and cook until everything is tender, and the sausages are browned. As a final touch, and a pop of colour, I throw in a handful of frozen peas and for a sticky sweetness I stir through a tablespoon of marmalade before continuing to cook for ten minutes or so. I scatter over some chopped fresh parsley and a little orange zest for some zing!