More good cookies

Posted by trish on Apr 11, 2012 in Eat | 0 comments

I’ve decided to start collecting recipes for chocolate chip cookies that claim to be The Best Ever.  I had one recipe, and now I have two. This one appeals because it says to make a log out of the dough, refrigerate it for an hour, then slice off rounds to bake.  I’m guessing you could freeze those logs too, ready for some day when you need a cookie hit.  Excellent.

So, cookie recipes… Stay tuned.  There’s plenty more where this one came from (ie the internet).

This one is from Aran Goyoaga from Cannelle et Vanille.

Recipe: Chewy Chocolate Chunk Cookies with Muscovado and Fleur de Sel
Makes 2 dozen cookies

You’ll need:
1 stick (110 g) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/2 cup (100 g) packed light muscovado sugar
1/4 cup (50 g) natural cane sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 egg, at room temperature
230g all purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon fleur de sel, plus more for topping
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup (170 g) chocolate chunks or chips

1. In the bowl of a stand mixer, combine the butter, muscovado sugar, natural cane sugar and vanilla extract. Mix with the paddle attachment on medium speed for 2 minutes until light. Scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl. Add the egg and mix until combined.
2. In a small bowl, whisk together the flour, fleur de sel, and baking soda. Add the dry ingredients into the butter mixture and mix on medium speed until the dough comes together.
3. Add the chocolate chunks and mix until thoroughly incorporated.
4. Scoop the dough onto a piece of parchment paper. With the help of the parchment, roll the dough into a log that is approximately 2 inches in diameter and 12 inches long. Wrap the log with the parchment and refrigerate for 1 hour.
5. In this time, preheat the oven to 350F (180C). Cut the log into 1/2-inch disks. Place them on baking sheets lined with parchment paper or silicone mats leaving 2 inches in between the cookies.
6. Sprinkle the tops with a bit of fleur de sel. Bake for 11 to 12 minutes or until edges set and start to turn golden. They might look a bit underdone, but this is fine. They will harden as they cool and slightly under-baking them will keep them chewy and moist.
7. Let the cookies cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes before trying to lift them. Store them in an airtight container for up to 3 days.

Caramel Mud Cake

Posted by trish on Mar 29, 2012 in Eat | 4 comments

This is the cake Madeleine requested for her 14th Birthday Cake.  I had never made such a cake and didn’t have a recipe but the fabulous Clare came to the rescue with her copy of The Australian Women’s Weekly BAKE cookbook.  It’s got a bright yellow cover, and apparently you can find it on the ‘remainders’ table at book shops.  Clare has given this a big endorsement so I’ll be buying a copy as soon as I can find one.  Meanwhile, here’s the recipe for Caramel Mud Cake and ohmygod it was good, and very easy to make.

(as you can see we didn’t bother with the ganache… so I have a lot of leftover white chocolate in my pantry.)

Caramel Mud Cake

180g white eating chocolate, chopped coarsely (I used Cadbury Dream)

185g butter, chopped coarsely

1 cup (220g) firmly packed brown sugar

1/3 cup (80ml) golden syrup

1 cup (250ml) milk

1.5 cups (225g) plain flour

1/2 cup (75g) self-raising flour

2 eggs

White Chocolate Ganache

1/2 cup (125ml) cream

360g white eating chocolate, chopped coarsely

1. Preheat oven to 160/140 fan-forced.  Greast deep 22cm round cake pan, line base and side with baking paper.

2. Stir chocolate, butter, sugar, syrup and milk in a large saucepan over low heat until smooth.  Cool for 15 minutes.  (I put the saucepan in the kitchen sink and half-filled the sink with cold water to hurry this along).

Whisk sifted flours and eggs into the chocolate mixture; pour into the pan.

3.  Bake cake about 90 minutes.  Cool cake in the pan.

4. Meanwhile make the white chocolate ganache.

Turn cake, top-side-up, onto serving plate and spread with ganache.

White Chocolate Ganache:  Bring cream to the boil in a small saucepan, remove from heat, add chocolate, stir until smooth.  Refrigerate about 30 minutes or until spreadable.

Riitta will be so pleased

Posted by trish on Mar 19, 2012 in Eat | 5 comments

My Finnish friend Riitta gave me her recipe for curing salmon about 18 months ago and I finally got around to making it over the weekend.  Actually, though, her recipe was tweaked a little, but I think she will still be pleased to know that I have finally cured some fish.  Tick that one off the To Do List!

These two recipes are inspired by Riitta, and created by Rob.

Rob is an old, dear friend of mine and PJ’s.  PJ used to be the Assistant Food & Beverage Manager at the Casino here in Canberra, and Rob was the Sous Chef (we’re talking mid-1990′s).  Rob was one of our groomsmen at our wedding.  Rob and his wife Rima have just moved back to Canberra after almost a decade away, and they are about to open a new Cafe… stay tuned for details on where to go for Canberra’s best cafe food.  I’m not even kidding, you should see what he’s got planned for the menu.

It was PJ’s 40th Birthday Party this past weekend and I persuaded Rob to do the catering.  I helped.  A bit.  I chopped stuff, I learned about marinating pork collar butt (hee hee) and about how to make puff pastry not puff too much.  And everybody who came to the party said it was just about the best food they’d ever had.  So over the next couple of days I’ll blog some of the recipes.

First up – the cured fish.

You should know that this is DEAD EASY.  It’s fiddly, but it’s easy.  Next time you’re having a dinner party, dish some of this up with tartare sauce as an entree or even just to nibble on while you’re having pre-dinner drinks.  Everyone will be very impressed.

Curing salmon means covering it in salt and alcohol and flavouring then letting it sit for 24 hours in the fridge, lying flat under something very heavy.  When it’s done, you wipe off the salt and alcohol and flavouring and are left with the fish, which is now a bit flatter and firmer and which you then slice very thinly.  That’s it.  See?  Easy.

I bought the fish from Costco.  I freakin’ love that place.

Hendricks Gin & Beetroot Cured Salmon

2 tablespoons black peppercorns, crushed

1 cup flat-leaf parsley, chopped

2 cups (600gm) Rock Salt

1 large beetroot, peeled then coarsley grated

3/4 cup (220g) white sugar (granulated sugar)

1/2 cup (160g) brown sugar

1/4 cup (60ml) Hendricks Gin (you could use any gin, or vodka instead)

One side of salmon, skinless and pin-boned.  Trim any thin bits along the edges and the ends so that you have a fairly even thickness.  Anything thinner than your pinky-finger will end up dry like salmon jerky.

Grand Marnier, Dill & Pink Peppercorn Cured Trout

600g Rock Salt

1 1/2 cups (330g) white sugar

1/2 cut (160g) brown sugar

1/4 cup (60ml) Grand Marnier

2 tablespoons Pink Peppercorns, crushed (from specialty food shops)

1/2 cup Dill, chopped

One side of ocean trout, pin boned. Mine had the skin on, which was OK.  Again, trim off the thin bits.

The method for both is the same.

Method:

Figure out how you’re going to keep the fish in the fridge.  I used my largest shallow baking tray, a lot of Gladwrap (cling film) and a roasting pan filled with cans of softdrink as the weight. You need to have the weight evenly distributed across the entire fish.  My baking tray was bigger than the fish, whilst the roasting pan was the big enough to cover the fish but sit inside the tray.

I didn’t take a picture on the day so I’ve just recreated it using the weekend paper’s Drive Section.

Pretend the newspaper is the fish.  Put it in the middle of the biggest tray you have (make sure it’ll also fit on a shelf in your fridge!)

Put another tray on top.

Weight it down with something heavy.  Big fat recipe books are good, tins of tomatoes are also excellent.

If, like me, you cured two pieces of fish at the same time, you need to be careful to make sure the flavours can’t mingle;  no matter how well you wrap it with Gladwrap it’s going to leak a bit.  In the end I put one of the Gladwrapped fish inside a plastic bag to keep it contained, and lay the two fillets side by side in my big pan.

Here’s Rob, trimming the salmon.  Or maybe that’s the trout?  I can’t tell them apart.  See the thin bit he’s sliced off?  We ate that.  Mmm… sashimi.

Tear off three long strips of Gladwrap.  Lay two side by side, then the third one down the middle.

Hendricks & Beetroot Mixture

Grand Marnier, Pink Peppercorn & Dill Mixture

Mix all the ingredients together in a bowl, and put about 2/3 of the mixture onto the Gladwrap so that the fish can lay over it.  So, don’t spread it out too far, just flatten it out in the shape and size of the fish.

Lay the piece of fish down onto the mixture (skin side down if your fish has skin on it).  Cover the fish with the remaining mixture, making sure it’s all spread out evenly along the whole fillet.

Carefully wrap the fish in the Gladwrap.  If you think it needs another layer, then go ahead and use up some more Gladwrap.  The idea here is to hold the flavour against the fish, and to stop it leaking out over the next 24 hours.

Lay the fish in the pan, put the weight on it, and put it in the fridge.  Twelve hours later, turn the fish over.  If any liquid has leaked out into the pan, pour it off into the kitchen sink.  My beetroot one leaked a lot of liquid in the first half of the curing period.

This is how the salmon (beetroot + gin)  looked after 24 hours.

And here’s how the trout looked:

Here they are side by side, so you can compare the colour.

But the real evidence is in the thin slices.  Rob used by super-sharp amazing boning knife that Clare gave me.  Here are a couple of wafer-thin slices of beetroot cured salmon:

And here’s some trout:

Rob made a couple of creamy sauces to serve with the fish.   I will bother him for the recipes shortly.

These two delicious things were served to the guests at PJ’s party who absolutely devoured it.  Fortunately, there was some left over and PJ and I have been snacking on it over the last couple of days.  The flavour is sublime.  You must try it sometime.

Pasta de la What’s In The Fridge

Posted by trish on Feb 1, 2012 in Eat | 1 comment

Penne with Broccoli, Peas, Pine Nuts, Goats Cheese Feta and some leftover herb/breadcrumb mix from when I made Cheat’s Chicken Parmagiana.

This actually turned out quite well.  I made a egg/cream sauce, so it was like a carbonara (one egg, 20oml of Philadelphia Cream For Cooking, whisked together).

While the pasta was cooking I toasted the pinenuts a frying pan and when they were done I removed them and toasted the breadcrumbs in the same pan.

I steamed the broccoli separately but in hingsight I could have tossed the florets and the frozen peas into the boiling penne when it had a couple of minutes left to cook.

After I strained the pasta/veg, I put it back in the pot and poured the egg/cream over it and tossed it gently until the sauce had coated everything.

I chopped the big cubes of marinated goats cheese feta into bits and sprinkled it on top.

I reckon this would be sensational if you started by pan-frying some pancetta or really good bacon.

Curried couscous

Posted by trish on Jan 15, 2012 in Eat | 1 comment

I’ve blogged this recipe before but it’s in the archives so I thought I’d put it up again, given the time of year.  This is a great salad to serve with bbq’d chicken or lamb.  My kids can make it, and they love to eat it.  And whenever I serve it up to guests, they ask for the recipe.

It comes from this book, which I first saw on the kitchen shelf of my American by-marriage-aunt, Susie.  When I went to New York in 2004 I bought myself a copy of it, and it falls open to this recipe.

Ina Garten (aka The Barefoot Contessa) – she has a website with more recipes!

Curried Couscous

1 1/2 cups couscous

1 tablespoon unsalted butter

1 1/2 cups boiling water

1/4 cup plain yoghurt

1/4 cup good olive oil

1 teaspoon white wine vinegar

1 teaspoon curry powder

1/4 teaspoon ground tumeric

1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt

1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

half cut grated carrot

half cup minced fresh flat leaf parsley (Continental or Italian)

half a cup dried currants

1/4 cup blanched, sliced almonds (pine nuts are also good)

2 spring onions (scallions) thinly sliced, white and green parts

1/4 finely diced red onion

Place the couscous in a medium bowl.  Melt the butter in the boiling water and pour over the couscous.  Cover tightly and allow the couscous to soak for five minutes.  Fluff with a fork.

Whisk together the yoghurt, olive oil, vinegar, curry, tumeric, salt and pepper.  Pour over the fluffed couscous and mix well with a fork.  Add the carrots, parsley, currants, almonds, spring onions and red onions, mix well and taste for seasoning.  Serve at room temperature.

Simple Salmon

Posted by trish on Jan 12, 2012 in Eat | 3 comments

I’m pretty fussy when it comes to where I buy fruit & veg, fish, meat and chicken from. At some time or another I have bought some of all these things and they have been such poor quality or so far beyond their use-by/best-before date that I’ve had to throw them away, and that bothers me more than just about anything (yes, I try to get refunds/exchanges whenever possible). So most of the time I stick to a couple of trusted suppliers and tend to shy away from the big supermarkets and bulk-buying butchers.

I’m particularly fussy when it comes to fish, but when I was at Costco the other day they had some salmon that was labelled as packed on that day. And it looked pretty good. I took a chance and bought a whole side of salmon, skinned and pin-boned. I think I paid about $30/kg for it, which is good.

Well, it was delicious. Definitely fresh, and the flavour was superb. I cut it up into 180g pieces, wrapped each one in a couple of slices of prosciutto, pan-seared them for two minutes on each side then finished off in the oven for about 7 minutes to cook them right through.  Since the oven was on, we had them with roasted kipfler potatoes and a quick green salad.

foodie mosaic

Posted by trish on Jan 3, 2012 in Eat | 0 comments

My twitter/blogging friend Helen inspired me to make a mosaic out of all the recipes I made and blogged about last year.  I got to 20 and fell asleep at the keyboard.  Also, as I was going back through all of these I was fixing up the formatting that had been mucked about by that script virus attack my blog suffered last year.

Now I need to post the links to each of these recipes… someday…

Helen not only did the mosaic properly, but her mosaic is of 30 things she KNITTED and CROCHETED which makes her the winner of the Who Has More Creative Energy contest.  She’s actually quite awesome, in fact.

pasta with prawns & rocket

Posted by trish on Oct 26, 2011 in Eat | 0 comments

The weekend that PJ took the girls to the coast to watch whales, I stayed home to host a Girls’ Weekend with several of my old school friends who are all turning 40 this year.  We booked in the weekend sometime last year when I discovered that there was a very cool date coming up – 7,8,9/10/11 (sorry, that doesn’t really work for you Americans who write it MM/DD/YYYY – oh well).  We talked about what we might get up to in order to appropriately mark the occasion of our 40th Birthdays and in the end Nina’s suggestion to stay in, cook dinner and drink excellent wine got the most votes.  So that’s what we did.  And here’s what she cooked:

JAMIE OLIVER’S SPAGHETTI CON GAMBERETTI E RUCOLA

(SPAGHETTI WITH PRAWNS & ROCKET)

Serves 4.

455g dried spaghetti

sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

extra virgin olive oil

2 cloves garlic, peeled and finely chopped

1-2 dried red chillis, crumbled (Nina used a fresh one, the rebel)

400g peeled raw prawns

1 small wineglass of white wine (that’s about 200ml, I reckon)

2 heaped tablespoons of sun-dried tomato puree, or 6 sun-dried tomatoes blitzed in a blender

zest and juice of 1 lemon

2 handfuls of rocket, roughly chopped

Cook your spaghetti in a large pan of salted boiling water according to packet instructions.  Meanwhile, heat 3 good lugs of extra virgin olive oil in a large fying pan and toss in the garlic and chilli.

As the garlic begins to colour, add the prawns and saute them for a minute.  Add the white wine and the tomato puree and simmer for a couple of minutes.

When the pasta is ready, drain it in a colander, reserving a little of the cooking water.  Toss the spaghetti with the sauce, squeeze in the lemon juice, add half the chopped rocket, adding a little of the reserved cooking water if you want to loosen the sauce a bit, and correct the seasoning.

Divide between 4 plates and sprinkle with grated lemon zest and the rest of the rocket leaves.

Can I just say – the lemon zest makes this dish.  Yum.

basics

Posted by trish on Oct 22, 2011 in Eat | 0 comments

When the weather is a bit cooler we have risotto a couple of times each month. When the weather starts to warm up we have it less frequently, but with spring vegetables.  Asparagus is perfect for risotto.

I always use the bones from a roast chicken to make stock which I then freeze, ready to use for risotto.  I’ve been using the same basic recipe for risotto for years but changing the ingredients I add to it.  I’m sure this method would horrify some risotto purists but it works for us so I continue to do it this way.  One day I might branch out and make a different basic risotto, but we all love this one so much I can’t really see the point.

My risotto is basically made with rice and chicken stock, with other stuff added.  The kids’ favourite is leek, chicken and roast pumpkin.  I recently made this version (pictured) with asparagus and fetta.  Peas and prawns are delicious.  There are a million combinations, just think about what pasta ingredients or pizza toppings you like and thrown them in (though less is more… two or three flavour combinations should suffice).  You can cook the meat and vegetables separately beforehand then add them when the rice is almost cooked to reheat them through.

RISOTTO WITH ASPARAGUS & FETTA

At least 4 cups homemade chicken or vegetable stock, simmering on the stove

2 cups Arborio rice

2 leeks, finely sliced (or one brown onion if that’s all you have)

2 garlic cloves, crushed

one bunch of asparagus spears, stalks finely sliced.   If you prefer larger pieces, pre-cook them and set aside.

100g crumbled fetta + extra for garnishing.

60g butter

1 tablespoon olive oil

Heat the stock in a pot on the stove and allow to simmer.  Put the kettle on to boil as well so you have some more hot liquid ready if you need it later.

Heat the olive oil and butter in a heavy based saucepan over medium heat.  Add the leeks and garlic and stir with a wooden spoon until softened.

Add the rice and stir to coat in buttery goodness.  Stir for 1-2 minutes.(You could add a glass of white wine at this point if you like, then keep going with the recipe after the liquid has been absorbed).

Add the stock to the rice about 1 cup at a time, stirring well after each edition.  The heat should be not so high that the liquid quickly bubbles up and evaporates; you want the rice to absorb it.  Aim for what looks like a gentle simmer.

When all the stock has been used up, taste a couple of grains of rice and see if they’re cooked yet.  They should be al dente, with a bit of bite.  If not, add hot water from the kettle half a cup at a time until the rice is cooked.

Add the fetta and stir through to melt.  Taste for seasoning.

Add the asparagus and stir.  Divide onto plates, sprinkle with the remaining fetta and asparagus spear tops if you’ve got them set aside.  Drizzle with a little olive oil if you like.

pancakes my way

Posted by trish on Oct 15, 2011 in Eat | 3 comments

Years of making pancakes on a Sunday morning for the pancake-loving second daughter in my life has taught me a couple of things.  First, it’s possible to under-cook a pancake and serve it up with a wet, squishy middle.  Second, pancake batter tastes remarkably better with a bit of sugar and/or some vanilla bean paste.  And third, you can get them extra-fluffy and light if you let the batter sit for half an hour after you’ve mixed it before you cook them up.

My Pancake Recipe (which is actually Donna Hay’s Pancake Recipe, slightly tweaked)

This makes about eight 15cm-diameter pancakes.

Add an extra cup of flour, an extra egg, an extra teaspoon of baking powder and some more milk to make 12-16 pancakes.

2 cups plain flour

3 teaspoons baking powder

2 eggs

75g butter

1 1/2 to 2 cups milk (or 1 cup milk plus buttermilk OR cream OR Philadelphia Cream For Cooking)

1/3 cup white sugar

splash of vanilla or equivalent amount of vanilla bean paste

Put the butter into the frying pan you’ll use to cook the pancakes and melt it over a low heat.  Meanwhile, combine the milk, eggs and vanilla before adding to the dry ingredients.  When that is all mixed in, add the melted butter and stir thoroughly to incorporate into the batter.  You won’t need to oil the pan any further, in fact you might want to wipe it out with some paper towel before cooking the first pancake.

I like the pancake batter to be thin enough to pour easily from the jug, but not so thin that they spread out immediately in the pan and you end up with a crepe.  Experiment with the batter until you get it how you like it.

Make sure the pancakes cook properly.  Don’t flip it over until the large bubbles have formed and then popped, and then don’t remove from heat until you’ve had a peek underneath to check it’s nice and brown (the pancakes in the first picture were undercooked by my impatient daughter).  Better to overcook slightly than undercook, I always say.

Serve with berries and vanilla yoghurt and drizzled with maple syrup.

salad

Posted by trish on Oct 13, 2011 in Eat | 0 comments

I had several of my school friends over for the weekend for a combined 40th birthday celebration (sooo much blog fodder) and Nina made this salad for dinner on Saturday night.  It’s from ‘Jamie’s Italy’ by Jamie Oliver, and it’s called Insalata Amalfitana – Amalfi salad.

This summer I am going to try very hard not to serve up the usual combination of lettuce, tomato, cucumber and capsicum.  I am going to try instead to find the most unusual combination of ingredients and see how that goes over with the family.  This salad was generally well received by the kids, and enthusiastically gobbled up by the grown-ups.You need lovely sweet oranges for this one.

JAMIE OLIVER’S INSALATA AMALFITANA

1 bulb fennel, washed

1 red onion, peeled

1 cucumber

a large handful of radishes, with tops, washed.

optional: a small handful of ice cubes

1 tablespoon good-quality herb or red-wine vinegar

good-quality extra-virgin olive oil

sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

4 oranges, peeled, segmented and pips removed

Remove the herby tops from the fennel and put them to one side, then trim the fennel at both ends and, if need be, lose the outside layer – it’s sometimes a bit dry.  Split the fennel in half and slice lengthways as finely as possible.  Put into a large bowl.  Remove both ends of the onion, then half it and slice it as finely as possible.  Slice the cucumber finely.  When it comes to the radishes, leave about 1cm of stalk on them.  Then slice a little off each radish, roll it on to the flat edge and finely slice.

If you want to throw a few ice cubes in the bowl and toss them together with everything, bizarrely enough this does cause the veg to go even crunchier.  Just keep them in there for a few minutes.  The cowboy way of doing this is to add the veg to iced water, but if you’ve ever done that then yes, the veg goes crunchy, but most of the flavour drains into the water.

Remove the ice cubes from the sliced vegetables. In a bowl mix together 2 tablespoons of good herb or red wine vinegar and 6 or so tablespoons of a good quality extra virgin olive oil.  Mix well, then taste.  You might want to add a little extra vinegar, depending on how sweet your oranges are.  Taste and season with salt and pepper.  Dress the salad with this and then add the orange segments and any juice.  Toss a few times, then divide between your plates and sprinkle wit hthe saved fennel tops.  Serve straight away.

muddy chocolate cake

Posted by trish on Oct 2, 2011 in Eat | 2 comments

I have used this recipe for Chocolate Mud Cake every time I’ve needed a really good chocolate cake for a special occasion.  The cake looks light and airy, but the first mouthful is intense and moist and very, very rich.  I only make it for special occasions because, to be honest, it’s a bit fiddly to put together.  But it is sooo worth the effort.  Give it a try next time you’ve got the inlaws coming for dinner and you need something to serve with all the new season berries.  Add a dollop of thick cream and you’ve got dessert.  You don’t need icing or ganache or anything else… just the cake.  Yum.

I don’t have a picture of this one, presented on a plate, because PJ took this – in its tin and wrapped in paper and Gladwrap – to the coast this weekend for the boys’ annual Footy Grand Final Weekend which happened to coincide with the 40th birthday of one of his best mates, Hugh, whom we went to high school and college with.  Happy Birthday Shug! Hope you enjoyed the cake!

‘Muddy Chocolate Cake’

from the marie claire book ‘flavours’ by Donna Hay (2000)

300g (10oz) dark couverture chocolate, chopped

250g (8 oz) butter

5 eggs, separated

1/4 cup caster (superfine) sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

3/4 cup self-raising flour

berries, to serve.

Preheat the oven to 130C (260F). Yes, that’s quite low.

Place the chocolate and butter in a saucepan and stir over low heat until melted and smooth.  Set aside.

Place the egg yolks in the bowl of an electric mixer with the sugar and vanilla and beat until the mixture is thick and pale.

In a separate bowl, beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form.

Fold* the chocolate mixture into the egg yolk mixture, sift the flour over the top and gently fold through.

Carefully fold the egg whites through the mixture and then pour in a 20cm (8 in) round cake tin,  lined with non-stick baking paper.**Bake for 75 minutes or until the cake is firm.  Cool in the tin.

Serve the cake with berries.  Serves 8-10.

The flavour and texture of this cake are best when it is served at room temperature, not chilled.

*Folding is one of those weird cooking techniques that makes you really nervous that you’re doing it wrong.  The point of folding is to maintain the air content in whatever it is you’re mixing.  The egg yolks will be quite light and airy, and if you beat the chocolate into the egg yolks you’ll beat all that air out of it.  Same goes with the egg whites.  So get a big wooden spoon or a large spatula, and try to stir in a way that lifts the mixture up and over itself, using big swooping light strokes that go up and over rather than around and around in the bowl.  The egg whites are tricky to mix in, and you’ll wonder how on earth it is possible to incorporate all that egg whitey-foam… just keep going.  You’ll end up with a really lovely moussey-light batter.  I fold the chocolate into the egg yolk gradually – if you can, get someone else to pour it into the yolks in a thin stream as you are folding, I think that just seems to make it easier for it all to mix together evenly.  Also,  I worry that the chocolate might still be warm enough to turn the eggs into scrambled eggs, so adding the chocolate in a thin stream means you don’t hit the eggs with a sudden wave of heat.

**I also spray the tin with cooking spray before I add the paper.  It’s an extra guarantee that the cake won’t stick, but it also helps to adhere the paper to the bottom and sides of the tin which is useful because that stuff has a tendency to want to roll back up again.I’ve been making this recipe in a 10 inch cake tin which serves 10-12 generously.  Obviously I increase the quantities of everything:

450g chocolate

375g butter

7 eggs

1/4 plus 1/8 cup of sugar

180g self-raising flour

80-90 minutes cooking time.

Saucy Spice Company

Posted by trish on Sep 20, 2011 in Eat | 4 comments

Foodie friends Andrew & Raewyn gave us a box of spices as a house-warming present.

I’ve seen these in shops before, but never tried them.

Mmm… Moroccan Lamb Tagine! Beef Massaman! Butter Chicken and Beef Rendang!I had some chicken in the fridge, so the first one I made was Rangoon Lime Chicken.

I love the packaging.

This is what’s inside; a little cellophane package of yumminess.The exhaust fan above our stove is on the fritz, so I opted to cook this outside on the wok-burner attached to our BBQ.

It was very easy.  Heat the oil, seal the chicken pieces, toss in the spices, mix it all about, add a few extra bits (the full recipe is enclosed in the pack) and simmer for half an hour.  I steamed some broccolini and made some basmati rice to go with it.  It was definitely ‘medium’ spicy; too spicy for the kids, perfect for PJ and I.  I’m going to visit their website and see what they’ve got in the ‘mild’ category.

It was delicious, and I can understand why it made it into the ‘Favourites’ box.

The kids have requested the Butter Chicken next.  I’m curious to see how it compares with the Butter Chicken I’ve been making for the past couple of years.

cookies part 3

Posted by trish on Aug 30, 2011 in Eat | 6 comments

The dough has spent about 60 hours ‘resting’.  Last night,  I took it out of the fridge so it could come to room temperature.  This morning, while the kids were eating breakfast and getting ready for school, I cooked three more batches.They were about 30g each, and I cooked the first batch at 180C for 10 minutes.

The next ones I cooked for 10 minutes, but I turned the oven down to 160C (I have a fan-forced Smeg oven)

Perfect, except I forgot the salt.

Cookie nirvana!

These are a much more manageable size.  30g is about a tablespoon and a bit.  And these are about the size of my palm, rather than the size of my foot which is how they would have turned out if I’d followed the recipe.  Also, I don’t believe they need to be cooked for 18-20 minutes, but you’ll need to experiment with your own oven.  These are still quite squishy in the middle, but they are definitely lightly crisp on the outside.  And the colour is good.  By tomorrow, they’ll be extra-chewy (the first batch have become delightfully chewy after 24 hours in an air-tight box).

So… the Recipe:  Here it is, cut&pasted from Kate’s blog.

My comments are in green.

CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES

2 cups minus 2 Tbsp. (8 ½ oz.) cake flour

1 2/3 cups (8 ½ oz.) bread flour (I used plain flour)

1 ¼ tsp. baking soda

1 ½ tsp. baking powder

1 ½ tsp. coarse salt, such as kosher

2 ½ sticks (1 ¼ cups; 10 oz.) unsalted butter, softened (310g of butter)

1 ¼ cups (10 oz.) light brown sugar (I used dark brown, and that definitely makes darker cookies)

1 cup plus 2 Tbsp. (8 oz.) granulated sugar (this is just good old white sugar)

2 large eggs

2 tsp. vanilla extract

1 ¼ pounds bittersweet chocolate chips or chunks, preferably about 60% cacao content, such as Ghirardelli (available now at your local CostCo! Whooppee!)

Sea salt or kosher salt for garnishing

Combine flours, baking soda, baking powder, and salt in a bowl. Whisk well; then set aside.

Using a mixer fitted with paddle attachment, cream butter and sugars until very light and fluffy, about 3 to 5 minutes. Add the eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Mix in the vanilla. Scrape down the sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula as needed. Reduce the mixer speed to low; then add dry ingredients, and mix until just combined.

(Unless you have a plastic guard that sits around the rim of the bowl, this will make a big mess at first, with flour flying everywhere. I found that carefully holding a dish towel around the top of the bowl helped a lot.)

Add the chocolate chips, and mix briefly to incorporate. Press plastic wrap against the dough, and refrigerate for 24 to 36 hours. The dough may be used in batches, and can be refrigerated for up to 72 hours.

When you’re ready to bake, preheat oven to 350°F. Remove the bowl of dough from the refrigerator, and allow it to soften slightly (this will take a long time to soften… allow an hour.  It’s almost worth dividing the mixture into half or thirds, and defrosting only as much as you’ll need).

Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or a nonstick baking mat.  Using a standard-size ice cream scoop – mine holds about 3 fluid ounces, or about 1/3 cup – scoop six mounds of dough onto the baking sheet, making sure to space them evenly.(This makes SuperSize cookies. Be warned, these cookies are very, very rich)

Sprinkle lightly with sea salt, and bake until golden brown but still soft, 15 to 20 minutes. Transfer the baking sheet to a wire rack for 10 minutes, then transfer the cookies onto the rack to cool a bit more.

cookie story

Posted by trish on Aug 29, 2011 in Eat | 3 comments

The recipe called for 3 and a half ounce mounds of cookie dough.  That’s about 75 grams.  A decent handful.  I decided that was too much, and reduced it to 50 grams.  They were still pretty enormous.

This is one 50gm ball, sitting on my iPhone.  See how big?  Huge.

(It took ages for the cookie dough to soften after being in the fridge – it was as hard as butter, not surprisingly.  Eventually I used an icecream scoop and moulded them into balls, but I wonder if it would have been better to bring the batter to room temperature before trying to scoop it out?  But then, wouldn’t they spread out even more during cooking?  Not sure…)

The chocolate chips melted into the dough.

I think the recipe intended for them to keep their shape; I think perhaps I just used the wrong kind of chocolate.

They spread out a lot, more than I expected them to, especially as I’d put them into the oven as barely-flattened balls.  They became quite thin, which is not my preference.  I like thick, chunky cookies.

I made a few batches from the same dough, all the same size, but adjusting the cooking time.  I can’t understand how you could cook these for 18-20 minutes without cremating them.  And the less time I cooked them, the better they looked.

The kids ate them while still very warm.

So, the verdict?

They are delicious.  They are too thin for my liking, but the flavour is pretty amazing.  I used very good quality chocolate (Lindt, bittersweet, 58% couverture) but I have since found a bag of “bittersweet chocolate chips for cooking” from Costco, which I think will be much better in terms of keeping their shape.

The cookies have a light, crisp shell and are definitely soft and chewy in the middle – but again, too thin.  I like my cookies to be much thicker and rounder, and this is what I’ll be hoping to achieve with the 48-hours batch.

The salt on top is absolutely divine.  The kids were fairly unimpressed with the salt but I think it really brings out the flavour of the chocolate.  My friend Ann agreed with me, so, the Defence rests.

I’ve made about a dozen, and I reckon I’ve got enough dough for two dozen more.  I’m going to bake much smaller cookies (30gm) and will cook them for 10-12 minutes.  I’ll let you know how they turn out.

1.25 pounds

Posted by trish on Aug 27, 2011 in Eat | 6 comments

The chocolate chip cookies I’m blogging/making this weekend (and let’s not kid around here… these chocolate chip cookies are absolutely worth three blog posts and a dozen or more Tweets) come from an American recipe.  I saw the quantity of chocolate chips (1 and 1/4 pounds) and figured that was somewhere in the vicinity of 600gm.  In fact, it’s a bit under that.  So I bought a 1kg bag of 64% bittersweet Lindt chocolate pieces and set about turning them into Chocolate Chips.  Three hours later I had small pieces and the added bonus of chocolate under my fingernails.

Here’s the dough, ready to go into the fridge.  I really didn’t think there would be enough dough in that bowl to swallow up all those chocolate chips but, well, you can see for yourself.  I’m now feeling more optimistic that there will be enough appetite in me to swallow up all the chocolate chip cookies.

Chocolate Chip Cookies

Posted by trish on Aug 25, 2011 in Eat | 2 comments

The other day a recipe on Pinterest caught my eye… It was called

The Only Chocolate Chip Cookie I Will Ever Need To Know How To Make For The Rest Of My Life.

Actually, the title was in ALL CAPS which is why it probably leapt out at me.  But then I read the recipe, and thought… oh yeah, baby.

Except, it’s one of those American recipes that askes for ounces of stuff.  And sticks of butter.  And cake flour.  And a pound and a quarter of bittersweet chocolate discs.  So… complicated.  Too complicated for me to bother with.And then today I was at the local supermarket and lookit lookit!

So I’ve been inspired to make these cookies.  But you’ll have to wait, because the recipe says you have to chill the cookie dough for at least 24 hours, and 36 if you can stand it.  So I’m going to do that, and then I shall report back.

If you want to join me in this culinary adventure, and you have access to cake flour and bittersweet chocolate disks and a set of kitchen scales that can help you out with the ounces, here’s the recipe.

And here’s a picture to whet your appetite.

(thanks to For Me, For You by Kate Miss for the recipe and the photo!)

easy as pie

Posted by trish on Aug 23, 2011 in Eat | 3 comments

My friend Ann gave me this recipe ages and ages ago, and I finally made it this week because I’m trying to cook more vegetarian meals.  And there’s nothing better than a vegetarian meal that also contains three different kinds of cheese.  Am I right?

Let me start by saying that this pie is ridiculously easy and yet it looks so impressive.  My mother used to make spinach pie the traditional way – you know, layers and layers of filo pastry with armfuls (arms-full?) of spinach she’d brought in from the garden.  Clearly that woman had too much time on her hands, what with her four children.

I took a quick look at Ann’s recipe and decided that there would be enough for a couple of pies if I just added another egg and a little more cheese.  Turns out I was right.  This is one of those recipes that can be tweaked quite a bit, ingredients-wise, just as long as you maintain the egg/milk : filling ratio.  I reckon you could do this as a quiche lorraine using bacon, perhaps some mushrooms, throw in some baby spinach… just maintain that egg/milk quantity so you do actually end up with something that looks vaguely pie-ish.

So this is Ann’s recipe with a couple of tweaks.  Thanks Ann!

ANN’S COUNTRY SPINACH AND FETA PIE

(serves 6 as an entree, or 4 for dinner)

250g packet frozen spinach, thawed (zap frozen spinach in microwave on high for 4 mins then strain in sieve to drain away the water)

3/4 cup grated parmesan cheese

100g feta cheese, crumbled

100g haloumi cheese, roughly chopped

2 shallots or green onions, chopped

2 garlic cloves, finely chopped

1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg

2 sheets frozen puff pastry, thawed

3 eggs

1/2 cup cream (or milk)

Preheat oven to 200 C.

Line two oven trays with baking paper.

Squeeze excess liquid from spinach.  In a medium bowl, combine the spinach, parmesan, feta, haloumi, shallots, garlic and nutmeg.  Stir well.

In a small jug, whisk the eggs and milk/cream together.  Season with salt and pepper if you like.

Place a pastry sheet on each tray.  Trim the corners to make a circle.  Divide the spinach mixture in half and put half in the middle of each pastry round, then flatten out with the back of a fork, leaving a 4cm border all the way around.

Fold the sides of the pastry up around the filling to encase.

At first, I just folded four sides up and pinched the corners.  This is wrong, I think.  You should fold up a little at a time, squeezing the pastry together so it’s sorta pleated.)  Then fill each pie with the egg/milk mixture.  You might need to coax the egg into the corners.Here’s a picture since I suck at giving descriptions:

Bake for 25-30 minutes, until golden.  Actually, this took about 15 minutes in my oven, so if I were you I’d check it after 15 and see how it looks.

A few minutes after you take it out of the oven it will expel most of the hot air that makes it looks so light and fluffy in the middle, and you’ll be left with something that looks much more like a rustic quiche than a country pie.  I’m pretty sure the taste is still as good.

Go forth and bake!

Cheat’s Chicken Parmigiana

Posted by trish on Aug 14, 2011 in Eat | 3 comments

I made this the other night after finding it on page 85 of this month’s delicious. magazine.  It was easy, and delicious.

First, make your tasty breadcrumbs. (hint: this just about makes enough for two meals; store extra in the freezer for next time).

Then, make your tasty tomato sauce topping.

Next, start cooking your chicken breast fillets.

Then assemble everything, and pop it in the oven.  See? Easy.

I’ve never made chicken parmigiana, or anything parmigiana, so I have no idea what aspect of this recipe makes it “cheating”.

CHEAT’S CHICKEN PARMIGIANA (serves 4)

1/3 cup olive oil

2 cups fresh breadcrumbs

1/4 cup finely chopped flat-leaf (Continental) parsley

1/2 cup grated parmesan

1 onion, chopped

2 garlic cloves, finely chopped

1 tbs tomato paste

1 tsp fennel seeds (I didn’t have these)

1 small red chilli (I omitted this too)

400g can chopped tomatoes

1 tsp Worcestershire sauce

pinch of caster sugar

4 x 170g chicken breast fillets

4 bocconcini, sliced

Steamed broccolini, to serve

Preheat oven to 200 C.

Place 2 tbs oil in a saucepan over medium heat.  Add breadcrumbs and cook, stirring, for 3-4 minutes until golden.  Cool slightly, then season.  Fold through 2 tbs each parsely and parmesan, then remove from pan and set aside.

In the same pan, heat 1 tbs oil over med-high heat.  Cook onion and garlic, stirring, for 2-3 minutes until soft.  Add tomato paste, fennel and chilli, then cook for 1 minute or until fragrant.  Add tomato, Worcestershire, sugar and 60ml water, then simmer, stirring occasionally, for 8-10 minutes or until thick.  Taste for seasoning… I used a tablespoon of Worcestershire sauce and about a tablespoon of sugar in the end.

At this point, I steamed some broccolini in the microwave until just-done.  Then I found some slivered almonds in the pantry (I had searched unsuccessfully for pine nuts).  I heated a frying pan over medium heat, tossed the almonds in and let them toast for a couple of minutes until they started to brown then I turned the heat off and left them for a while…

Heat remaining 1 tbs oil in an ovenproof frying pan over med-high heat (if you don’t have something that will go from the stovetop to the oven, just cook in the frying pan then transfer to an oven-proof dish).

Season the chicken and cook for 5 minutes, then turn and cook for a further 2 minutes until just golden.

Transfer to the oven and bake for 5 minutes…. I put some lemon-infused olive oil into the frying pan with the almonds and heated it up again.  When the oil was hot, I tossed in the broccolini…

…I put the now-hot veggies in a serving dish for everyone to help themselves to at the table.

Back to the chicken…

Spoon over sauce and top with bocconcini and remaining parmesan, then cook for a further 2-3 minutes until chicken is cooked through and the cheese is melted.

I forgot to take a photo of it in the baking dish with the breadcrumbs on top.

Slice chicken and arrange on plates.  (I skipped the slicing part).

Add some tasty greens and voila!

ladies who lunch

Posted by trish on Aug 9, 2011 in Eat | 4 comments

My friend Clare, the one with the chef qualifications and the one who taught me how to debone a chicken and who bought me a Kasumi boning knife for my 40th – that Clare – came around for lunch today which of course inspired me to make something delicious and ultimately very impressive.

Behold Bill Granger’s spicy roast pumpkin salad with feta and olives.

This was SO easy. And with my new and improved north-facing kitchen I no longer have to struggle to get enough light for taking photos.  Suddenly, everything I cook looks even better.

I halved the ingredients to serve two people, and didn’t really measure the fetta or count the olives.  I mean, who does that?

BILL GRANGER’S SPICY ROAST PUMPKIN SALAD

(from his book, bill’s food)

3 tablespoons olive oil

1/2 teaspoon ground cumin

1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper

sea salt

freshly ground black pepper

800g pumpkin, cut into 2cm cubes

100g baby English spinach leaves

150g marinated feta, drained and crumbled

20 Kalamata olives, pitted.

DRESSING

1 tablespoon red wine vinegar

60ml (1/4 cup) extra virgin olive oil

1 eschallot, finely sliced

Preheat oven to 200 C.

Place the olive oil, cumin, cayenne pepper, salt and pepper in a bowl and stir to combine.  Add the pumplin and stir to coat.  Transfer to a roasting tin and bake for 30 minutes, or until the pumpkin is tender and slightly caramelized.

Whisk all the dressing ingredients together in a bowl until combined.

Divide the spinach leaves among four serving plates and scatter pumpkin, feta and olives over the top.  Drizzle each salad with dressing.  (Or, put all the salad ingredients + dressing into a big bowl, turn it over a few times to get it all mixed together and serve at the table on a big plate that everyone can help themselves to.)

Serves 4