Vegetable and chickpea curry with cashews from The Runners Cookbook by Anita Bean

This meal is a vegetable curry, with lentils, chickpeas, kidney beans and cashews and is delicious! It's good for runners because it's filled with low GI high fibre carbs, and they keep you feeling satisfied and full. 

I would eat it after a big run or maybe during a heavy training week. You could have it as a recovery meal because it's going to give you a big hit of carbs. 

It would be good for all types of athletes because it's got all the essential amino acids covered. You've got a mixture of proteins for a vegetarian diet. You've got your legumes, lentils, chickpeas and kidney beans which all have slightly different levels of essential amino acids. You've got some amino acids from cashews as well and even a small amount from the veggies. 

To cook it, you chop up all the vegetables - your carrots, onions, beans, garlic and coriander. I chop it all up in advance because it's easier to have everything prepared, then you can stand at the stove and chuck things in. Onion goes in first and gets cooked for about 5 minutes. Then the capsicum and garlic, which goes in for about 60 seconds, then the carrots, lentils and stock and then we just pop the lid on and let it simmer for 25 minutes. Then throw in the coriander and the cashews with the lemon juice, give it all a bit of a stir and then it's done. 

I added some rice to bump up the carbs a bit more and make it a bit more satisfying, which is good for me at lunchtime because I get very hungry otherwise with the amount of training I do. It stops me from picking at lollies all afternoon at work.

The Runners Cookbook by Anita Bean is a fantastic resource for all athletes. You can buy your copy here.