Tag Archives: food

Sourdough Oat Cakes

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Are they a pancake or are they a pikelet? Or a they simply an oat cake? I started making pancakes with oats in them quite awhile ago.

1/ It was something to do with left over porridge. (as an alternative to my grandmothers staple ‘mock brains‘).

2/ I added a lower glycemic index to the old pancake.

3/ I thought it was a bit tastier and more substantial than a traditional pancake recipe.

Not that I don’t love the traditional kind, but I am always hungry not long after, and with the added oats it keeps The Monkeys going longer as well. One day while talking to a Scottish friend, these little pancakes came up. She said that she had always made them and back home she called them oat cakes. There you go… oat cakes sounds much more appealing than porridge pancakes.

Now seeing as though I was well and truly aboard the sourdough train, I thought lets see what happens if I add some starter. I had originally wanted to make sourdough crumpets, but didn’t have any rings to cook in them so this was somewhere between. I was mixing it all up and Mr Chocolate went past asking what I was making… just playing. Seeing what will happen if I add this and this and then do this…

Verdict?

Deeelicious! Well thats what Monkey Boy said anyway. I’m sure the Little Monkey meant it too with his cheeks stuffed full like a squirrel. My oat cakes will now always be sourdough oatcakes. Gobbled up with in minutes.

Sourdough oatcakes

1 cup sourdough starter

1 cup plain flour

1 cup milk

50 gms butter

2/3 cup whole oats

1/2 tps bicarb soda

Put butter and oats in microwave together, (butter on top) and heat till melted. Add starter, flour, milk, buttery oats to mixer (I used a dough hook) and mix until well combined. Fold in bicarb soda and let sit for 3 hours in warm spot. Spoon into frying pan and cook as you would pancakes.

Crostata di Marmellata

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What did you make for dessert Mama?

Crostata di Marmellata

huh…?

Jam Tart little fella, jam tart.

It just sounds better when you say it in Italian. I was flicking through an old Gourmet Traveller and came across this delicious looking recipe. I needed something for the following day. Friends were coming for brunch and crostata di marmellata looked like it could be on the menu.

Adding some apple to the rhubarb jam, and slightly changing the recipe around- this was really tasty. The rhubarb jam I had a lot left over and the pastry not quite enough to do the lattice. So will have to make another to use up the left over jam… damn it. I think this one could become a firm family favourite.

Rhubarb was something that was always in my Nana’s garden. I don’t remember her cooking a whole lot with it, but it was always there. A Nana likes to have options you see. In the fruit shops or supermarket it always looks so tired looking and picked about a year ago. Then I came across some at the fox studios farmers markets– and hurray it was crispy, looked like it had been picked that morning and was just begging to be made in to something.

Rhubarb and Apple Jam

400gms chopped rhubarb

400gms chopped apple

800gms raw sugar

2 long strips of lemon peel

1 split vanilla pod

200mls water

Cook up, in the usual jam fashion. Simmering gently until jam has thickened and wrinkles (put small dish in freezer for 10 minutes, spoon small amount of jam on to it, if thickens and wrinkles, jam is ready.)

Pastry

180 gms flour
60 gms icing sugar
50 gms almond meal
1 lemon grated rind
1/2 tps vanilla extract
100 gms butter
1 egg
water (can’t remember how much I put in, enough to get dough like consistency)

Soften butter and mix in with dry ingredients until resembles breadcrumbs. Add vanilla, egg, water and grated rind. Knead well, until all incorporated. Chill until pastry is managable to roll out, and not be too soft. Roll out to desired shaped dish, add the jam and cook at 170C until golden.

Banana Honey Bread

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Honey is such a versatile ingredient for cooking. My pantry is never with out it, and no small jars of it for us. I have a 3 litre container of bush honey which my dad got for me from his local area and a pot of creamed honey I had bought at a local old lady charity shop down south. Both are delicious. Even though nobody in this household actually eats it straight, it is used in lots of different cooking. From smoothies, tea, coffee, chai, muffins, apple crumble, cakes, biscuits and for this recent recipe Banana Honey Bread.

Honey can be traced back to Egyptian times, used for the making of Mead, used medicinally, you can preserve  it for a really long time and as I like to use it- as a natural exfoliant when doing a facial. (Try it, the honey works really well.)

Today its for making bread though. Add some bananas that need to get used up, add a few more bready ingredients and you are away. A cheap, tasty snack or something different for breakfast.

 

Banana Honey Bread

* adapted from Jamie Oliver’s Happy Days with the Naked Chef

3 1/2 cups strong bread flour

100mls water

whizzed up banana- about 4 medium sized ones

1 tps cinnamon

1 tbs raw sugar

1 tbs salt

2 1/2 tps dried yeast

2 tbs honey

1/2 cup linseed meal

* extra honey and flaked almonds for the top.

Mix all ingredients with a dough hook in mixmaster, until combined well and pulls away from the edges. The dough looks quite wet and glossy. Cover with cling wrap and leave in a warm spot until doubled in size. Knock it back, quick knead, and leave to prove until doubled in size again. Shape the dough into small balls and place next to each other on a lined tray. Leave for half an hour. Drizzle more honey on top and scatter flaked almonds.

Cook at 210 C for about 20 minutes.

Easy thing to have for breakfast, a snack, or whack in the freezer and get out as needed. The Little Monkey loves these, and if he is having a fussy day eating, these always get gobbled down.

Recalibrated

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There are some things in life that just make me sit back, take a big outward breath and smile. There are some things that always make me feel like this and some things that take me by complete surprise. With that big deep breath taken, all momentary worries are gone. All stresses have been shelved and happiness raises its sunny head. It can be so brief, but with that moment taken, everything gets recalibrated.

The monkeys are going mental and the very average morning looks like its dragging into a very average long day. Then with the tiny few words of Monkey Boy saying something completely out of the blue. It stops me. That breath is deeper, actually filling my lungs, I smile, and everything gets re-aligned. Completely changing the rest of the days attitude.

Black cockatoos do it too. From a young child these beautiful birds seem to have had a spell over me. They are flying over head at dusk, looking for a place to rest for the night. Their slow and deep cry speaks to me. Stops me in my tracks, pulling my eyes towards them, watching their slow flight over head. That mournful cry, tugs at me. Making me smile… re-calibrated again.

The simple process of making bread at the moment is what I feel I need to do. The process of making, baking and then eating such a simple thing, really gives me a lot of pleasure. The simple tastes of freshly made bread, butter and my own jam. Can make a hungry stomach, a happy one with just one bite. With just a few mouthfuls, energy re-stored, mind re-aligned and city hippy farm girl re-calibrated once again.

Turkish Bread

Turkish Bread

* adapted from sbs Food Safari recipe

1 tbs dried yeast

pinch of caster sugar

375 ml warm water
480 g strong bread flour
1 teaspoon salt
60 ml extra-virgin olive oil
1 egg
50 ml milk
sesame seeds

Dissolve the yeast and sugar in 125 ml of the warm water and set aside in a warm place for about 10 minutes until frothy. Use your fingers to work 90g of the flour into the yeast to make a sloppy paste. Sprinkle lightly with a little more flour, then cover with a tea towel and set aside in a warm place for 30 minutes to form a ‘sponge’.

Put the remaining flour and the salt into a large bowl. Make a well in the centre and add the sponge, oil and remaining water. Use your fingers to work it to a soft, sloppy dough. Should be quite sticky.

In a mixer with a dough hook, on a low speed for 10–15 minutes until very smooth and springy. Transfer to a lightly oiled bowl, then cover with a damp tea towel and leave to rest at room temperature for 1 hour or until doubled in size.

Preheat the oven to its highest setting. Divide the dough in two, then form into rounds and leave, covered, to rest for 30 minutes. Mix the eggs and milk to make an egg wash. Place the dough on a lightly floured work surface. Use the heels of your hands to press and flatten each piece of dough out to a 20 cm oval.

Brush the surface liberally with the egg wash. Dip your fingertips into the egg wash and mark rows of deep indentations across and down the length of the dough, leaving a narrow border.  Sprinkle with nigella or sesame seeds and bake for 8–10 minutes until crisp and golden brown.

the chocolate gene

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Chocolate.

Chocolate seems to play a very big part in this family. I wasn’t so fussed on it until I met my husband, otherwise known as Mr Chocolate. He doesn’t need chocolate, chocolate needs him. If he stopped consuming, the whole chocolate industry may just tumble down. So it’s safe to say after we first got together, he has slowly infiltrated my chocolate past, to a home now that is not complete unless there is a little dark something hidden away somewhere.

The monkeys came along and they too have inherited the dreaded chocolate gene. Other sweets thrown aside and scorned, their eyes only on the good stuff…. chocolate.

Monkey Boy is rather partial to a piece of dark chocolate, and will happily savour it, holding it in his hand and slowly nibbling at the outsides. The Little Monkey will suck up anything in his path to get to it. With a spark in is eye, and very fast feet… “Choklo! Choklo!…. CHOKLO!”

A friend recently challenged Mr Chocolate on a Chocolate Extravaganza (who could eat the most), I was quietly skeptical, but remained cheerfully optimistic. My pint sized girl friend had not seen my man in action you see. She thought her modestly gutsy efforts in consuming a packet of Tim Tams would match the “why stop when there is still more” attitude of my husband. The Chocolate Extravaganza was cancelled. Scared off, with the rather sombre face of mine, and whispered words of “You don’t have a chance…. you will NEVER win against him…”

When I first met Mr Chocolate, any chocolate would do. Sure he had his favourites, but when it came down to the line, he wasn’t that fussy. Years have gone by, and more than a few kilos of chocolate later, that line is in a completely different position. We try to be as mindful as possible, on what brands and types we buy. A sucker for dark chocolate, we really like Whittakers Dark Ghana. It’s a New Zealand company, that uses Fair Trade Chocolate, readily available and doesn’t cost an arm and a leg. The Dark Ghana comes from Ghana (duh) and is bought through the Kuapa Kokoo cooperative. This Fairtrade certified cooperative of cocoa farmers has 45,000 members. Selling this way keeps the prices higher and more stable for the seller. Also investing in better farming methods that are more sustainable for their themselves and their industry.

Its great that there are more and more chocolate companies looking at changing their sourcing methods and encouraging fairtrade practices. This must mean that through greater awareness people are changing things with their spending dollars.  An example is Cadbury . Cadbury Schweppes is one of the largest producers of chocolate in the world  and has recently started producing a fair trade option for their Dairy Milk range in Australia. Be it a little controversially.

I know there are loop holes in these methods and problems will remain with things like child labour, but the more people talk about it and the more the consumer makes a choice with their shopping dollar the more, (I am ever hopeful) changes will come of it. There are more and more fairtrade chocolate options being made available, just have a peek.

so High Tea

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High Tea. Just the words bring lovely images to mind. Those cute little sandwiches, those fluffy scones, and sweet little cakes up the top.

What to do when a good friend is returning back to her home country. How do you say goodbye?…. Well saying goodbye in style is a good start, and high tea at The Observatory Hotel, Sydney just might be the place to do it.

Its Mothers Day and a few other people have thought it might be a nice idea to have high tea at the hotel as well. So they have upped the price and moved people around their two rooms used for dining. Now they were a little cheeky in that it is advertised as $49 for high tea, a booking was made at this price. Then my friend who had made the booking was contacted and told that seeing as though it was a special occasion there would be a price increase to $79 would we still like to keep the booking? Yes, yes, we will still be there. Then on arrival, right down the bottom of the menu is $89 for high Tea. A little cheeky yes, were we going to do anything about it?..No. A girly afternoon with out kids, this doesn’t happen often…. no indeedy not often at all.

The room we are in is lovely with murals on the walls, and tables not squashed together. A glass of sparkling wine starts us off, and a selection of 6 different teas is offered. The 3 tiered high tea comes out and it does look really inviting.

The sandwiches are small and daintily cut, the mini quiche lorraine buttery and melt in your mouth. The scones I thought a little on the small side but they were light and tasted good. The strawberry jam chunky, and the cream… well the cream has a couple of long fibres in it. I say fibres in the hope they weren’t hairs. Because I sure as hell don’t want hair in my $89 high tea cream!

The cakes were daintily presented, with the creme brulee being a stand out. The pannacotta was a lost cause- insipid tasting, with a watery strawberry sauce on top. Overall the presentation was elegant and restrained as I would expect a five star hotel high tea. I didn’t expect a big chip in my teapot, and I have to say it did detract… just a little.

The Observatory Hotel
89-113 Kent Street
Sydney
02 9256 2222
www.observatoryhotel.com.au

Party shoes and churros

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churros- a little late night snack

Churros. Pretty much a spanish doughnut, is what it could be compared to. There are so many variations of these in many Spanish-speaking countries. Served for breakfast, street food, or a late night snack. It seems the world loves them.

Usually I would have never made something like this. I’m not a big doughnut fun, and the healthy factor always stopped me from trying to make these before. Its dough fried in oil, rolled in sugar, not for the faint-of-healthy-hearted!

However I had been perusing a Gourmet Traveller magazine and damn it, the photography got to me. It was a Spanish special and no sooner than you could say “Yo no soy marinero soy capitan, soy capitan“, I had a spanish meal plan at the ready.

Much to an amused husband, I declared that I should give these Churros a crack. Although he was a little dubious, was also enthusiastic, as Churros dipped in Hot Chocolate is a happy food memory for him traipsing about Spain in younger days. With a backpack on his back, party shoes on his feet and a churros in hand, Spain was his oyster.

Churros

275gms ‘OO’ strong flour

1 tbs olive oil

1 tps salt

600mls water

Bring water, salt and oil to the boil in a large saucepan. Stir in flour, beating with a wooden spoon until smooth. Transfer to a piping bag with a fluted nozzle. Heat oil in saucepan, pipe dough into 7cm lengths into oil, cutting with scissors. Cook until golden, drain on absorbant paper. Toss in sugar and cinnamon.

Hot Chocolate

200ml cream

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 cinnamon quill

150 gm dark chocolate

2 large strips of orange rind

*adapted recipe from Gourmet Traveller Magazine.

Eat these hot and straight away. They do not keep, as they will be oily little flaccid sticks if you keep them for the next day.

Honey Ricotta Bread

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“Mama, this tastes better than cupcakes!”

Recently while watching Italian Food Safari a few weeks ago, they cooked up a wonderful looking Ricotta Bread but they hadn’t laid out any recipes on the website- much to my disappointment. Not finding any other recipes elsewhere that seemed just right, I decided to venture out in to the unknown by myself.

It was a little nerve-wracking, there was a dash of timidness, and a sprinkling of hope. I have only been playing around with breads a relatively short time, and I wasn’t exactly sure it was time to be branching off and making stuff up just yet… hasn’t stopped me before though. So feet first (so to speak of course) I dove into that dough. I figured at worst, it will be stodgy little brick and I will still have to eat it. At best, it will be delicious bready loaf and everyone gets to eat it.

Celia from Fig Jam and Lime Cordial had given me the heads up on a place that sold bulk bakers flour. So with 12.5 kilos of strong bakers flour sitting on my kitchen bench, it was time to get crackin’.

Honey Ricotta Bread

1 cup polenta

2 1/2 cups strong bakers flour

2 tps dried yeast

2 tps salt

250g ricotta

4 tbs honey

400ml water

With a dough hook, mixed everything up in the mixmaster. Once thoroughly mixed through, I left it for 10 minutes. A gentle knead on a floured surface then put in slightly oiled bowl, covered with cling wrap for 1/2 an hour, (or until doubled in size.). Another gentle knead, flattening the dough to an inch thick, folding over into 1/3, then folding again from the other side. Back into the bowl and then repeating the process in another half an hours time. Form into the shape that you want to cook in and let the dough rise for another 20-30 minutes or until risen by about a 1/3. Cook at 240 C until golden and sound hollow when knocked.

(Time varies depending on the shape you have cooked it in, ie. Bread rolls vs loaf)

Outcome? It was delicious! Thats when Monkey Boy said “Mama, this tastes better than cupcakes!” Now, if that isn’t a tick of approval I don’t what is.

Like Water for Chocolate

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The movie poster for Like water for chocolate

Like Water for Chocolate movie poster

Like Water for Chocolate- by Laura Esquivel, has always been a book that I have savoured. A book that involves romance, tragedy and food. Three key ingredients that can hardly go wrong in a best selling novel. A sumptuous feast of a book that follows the main character Tita, and her life long love Pedro.

Writing about  mindfulness recently, I was reminded of it, so I re-read it again.  This book talks of emotions being felt when cooking and the taste of that emotion in the end result. Causing anyone that eats the food to be effected by it. When the main character is in love, the love comes out in her cooking. When she feels sad and bitter while making her sister’s wedding cake, the eating result is everyone is left with a tearful longing, ending with a collective vomiting.

The scene of the final wedding feast where everyone has paired off after eating chillies in walnut sauce, makes for wonderful imagery.

I wanted to cook like Tita. Or at least a little Mexican influenced. So with Mole on my mind I did an easy version. Not because I wanted it to be easy, but because time availability dictates what I can cook. (The monkeys are busy business.) I wanted to play around with the flavours of different spices, the chicken, and the chocolate. To be cooked as mindfully as I could, and to put as much love and attention in as I could muster.

Having never tasted a dish like this before, I was unsure of what to expect. But I liked every ingredient that went in, so it had a good head start.

Tasting it, after I had made the sauce, my taste buds weren’t sure what was going on. It had an almost earthy taste, I’m guessing from the 85% Cocoa I had put in. A curious taste that had my mouth, zinging from one side to another  to find another different subtle taste to briefly savour. It had certainly been cooked mindfully, the monkeys were sidetracked and I could put all my love and attention into my little mexican novel cooking inspiration. But had I put too much?

Making the mole the the day before. The next day, I cooked it in a baking dish with chicken legs and added some tomato passata. I felt it needed the added zingy-ness that you get from good tomatoes. Cooked for about an hour at 200 C.

The end result?…

Not bad. I didn’t think “Woohoo Mama!”, and launch myself at my husband, but I didn’t start sobbing and vomiting either. It was certainly flavoursome, packed a chilli punch, and it was a stray out of the usual food street I walk. Served with some rice, flaked almonds and sesame seeds on top.

And when it really comes down to it… it was really all about the book anyway.

Chilli Chocolate Chicken

A good dollop of olive oil

1 diced onion

4 cloves of diced garlic

1 1/2 tps cinnamon

1 tps smoked paprika

1 tps nutmeg

2 tps cumin

2 tps coriander

1 tps dried chilli

salt to taste

2 tablespoons tomato paste

1/4 cup masala

1/4 cup muscavado sugar

250mls vegetable stock

50 grams 85% cocoa chocolate

Everything cooked in that order, with the broken chocolate added in at the end when the sauce has been turned off the heat.

Baby whale song

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Listening to a 1 year old sing, is a bit like listening to a whale sing its ocean song. Its enchanting, emotive, and brings a soft smile to your lips.

A 20 month old might not sound like a baby to some, but he is my baby. While he is still learning words and and a lot of what comes out his mouth is still gabble, to listen to him singing is enchanting. I turn my head at a tilt just so I can hear it better, just as I would as if I was listening to the magnificent creatures of the deep.

The soft lilting singing, the intonations, the placid look on his face while he goes about his monkey business singing as he does. This makes me want to squeeze him harder. This makes me want to stroke his downey soft baby curls on his head. This makes me want to plant kisses on the back of his sweet soft neck. I don’t though. I stop myself and hold back those hands, hugs and kisses. Hoping to let nothing side track him and detract from his baby whale song.

Apple Plum cake

125 grams butter

2/3 cup raw sugar

2 tps vanilla

3 eggs

1/2 cup natural yoghurt

1 1/2 cups self raising flour

100 grams ground hazelnut

1 tps cinnamon

1 apple and 4 plums pre-cooked

Add butter, sugar, and vanilla. Mixing in the 3 eggs and natural yoghurt. Add all dry ingredients. To a springform pan (20cm) add half the mixture, then a add a layer of the cooked fruit mixture. On the outside of the pan add the remainder of the cake mixture, leaving a hole in the middle for the fruit. Add any remainding fruit mixture to the middle and cook for 45 mins at 180 C or until golden.

Peanut butter and marzipan

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Musing one day I was thinking of what foods would sum me up in a nutshell… (why can I not write that without thinking of Austin Powers- “help, help I’m in a nutshell!”) I digress…

Five foods that are me. Foods that define who I am, what I am all about, combined together equal one city hippy farm girl. Five foods if given a week and could only eat these five foods, I would be quite happy. Five foods (not dishes) that are truly delicious and are me, me, me.

Peanut butter– crunchy, and slapped on so thick your tongue gets lost in the fog of it all. The natural one is the best, when its just crushed peanuts. Just quietly, I have been known to eat just with a teaspoon.

Coffee– Its the ritual, the aroma, the kick, and those damn cute little cups. I wouldnt waste my time with instant, its just not the same. The stove top precolator is my weapon of choice. Never to be rushed, always to be enjoyed.

Marzipan– the texture is quite unique don’t you think. It’s kind of gritty, it’s sweet, your not quite sure, so you have a little more. So the circle continues.

Granola/Muesli– it keeps me going and is just the kind of breakfast (or late night snack) that works for me. Lots of seeds and nuts added. Either eaten just with milk or with a dollop of yogurt.

Sourdough– the grainier and fruitier the better. I seriously will have to be cremated with a whole stack of sourdough when its my time to leave this earth. Then everyone can smell just how delicious sourdough is, when they are thinking of me. (a little odd, but think about it…its a good idea isn’t it.)

What would your top 5 be?

Orecchiette

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Italy is very important to me. It’s the country where my adored exchange student family is from. This is where I lived for 6 months as an exchange student when I was 16. This is where I returned to as a 19 year old and again as a 22 year old. This is where I felt loved and valued, and embraced as an Australian sister.

Back then Italy taught me how to short sheet a bed, (well actually my sister did). I tell you hours of giggly fun for two 16 year olds in there!

Italy taught me the love of the espresso. Still to this day 16 years later, when ever I hear and smell that stove top espresso pot percolating quietly I am transported back to Italy.

Italy also taught me the love of the simple margarita pizza. Pizza was never the same again.

If only I had had the interest of food that I have now back then. If I did I would have asked Nonna just how exactly to make those delicious Pugliese thumb pressed pasta pieces, known as orecchiette. I ate it with gusto. If only I had the foresight to ask how she made it 16 years before. I would kill now for a hands on pasta lesson from Nonna in the beautiful region of Puglia.

This week I was struggling to find a great orecchiette recipe. The recipe seems to vary a lot from equal parts flour to water and rest over night to 4:1 ratio. So I harnessed the Italian nonna within and decided to gauge it myself. Using a fine semolina, tepid water and a little salt. It was quite a hard dough, and was a bit of a labour of love. Usually I wouldn’t be able to designate this long to cook but the monkeys were napping and then other adults were on hand to entertain while I finished off. (We had gone away for the weekend so I was making full use of a much, much larger kitchen and other adults to keep the monkeys out of mischief.)

Quietly, and methodically rolling and knifing.

It was so quiet. The laugh of a far off kookaburra, the air outside so still, and the pesistant buzz of wandering fly.

Knead, cut, roll, slice, knife…..knead, cut, roll, slice, knife…. until half the table was filled with many beautiful ‘little ears’.

These are the quantities that I ended up using, which produced some happily eaten pasta. Possibly would vary with the type of flour that you use- so go slowly and jiggle.

900 grams fina semolina flour

400mls water

1 dessert spoon salt

Make a well on the bench with the flour and salt, slowly pouring in the water and mixing it to a stiff dough. Knead until smooth.

Cut off a portion, then roll into a long snake, then slicing off small portions. Then pressing down with a knife, push until the little circle starts folding in and looks like a thumb hat. It needs quite a bit of pressure. Orecchiette should be thiner on the bottom with thicker sides to hold the sauce. This is not a smooth pasta.

Would Nonna approve?… not sure.

Does it look right?… a little ‘rustic’ but passable.

Would it pass the  Italian taste test?….?

Will I make them again?….. yes indeed.