Tag Archives: food

Strawberry and Black Pepper Jam Tarts

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The queen of Hearts she made some tarts

All on a summers day

The knave of Hearts he stole those tarts

And took them clean away.

****

The humble jam tart is always an easy one to whip up for when people come over, an easy little dessert, or an afternoon treat. If you have some pastry already in your freezer it makes it even easier.

First roll out your pastry and cut out to your desired shape. (Really you can use what ever you have at hand. A big long tray can also look great. Just cut the pieces to suit then.) For a pastry recipe, you also try here.

Grease tray, and place strips of baking paper down. All this does is makes it super easy to flip out when they are cooked. Rather than baking blind, I pricked the pastry with a fork and baked until golden at 180C. When the pastry shells are cooled, you can add ANY jam you want. It all tastes good. For these little numbers. I melted a little dark chocolate and then drizzled a small amount on the inside of the shell. This just gives a thin layer of chocolate underneath the jam mixture. Then spooned a strawberry jam mixed with freshly ground pepper. The pepper isn’t overwhelming just gives a gentle hint of… ooohh, whats that?

The King of Hearts called for the tarts

And beat the Knave full sore

The Knave of Hearts brought back the tarts

And vowed he’d steal no more!

****

it’s all gone a rye

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When I was a little kid all I wanted for lunch was a white sliced sandwich in triangles. Ideally with devon, tomato sauce and slapped together with so much butter it would make even a French chef frown. Why did I want that? Because that’s what I didn’t have. That’s what other kids had.

I had the sensible bread with grains or wholemeal, with nutritious things inside. Up until about 9 years old I could potentially have a cheese, chutney and sprouts sandwich. This was my mum’s idea of a delicious sandwich, and perfect for a healthy growing-at- a-cracking-rate young girls lunch. At 9 years old though, enough was enough. My palate wasn’t that developed yet. Not developed enough for chutney and sprouts anyway.  Although I never threw my sandwich out, I did hastily eat it hoping it would just quickly fill me up and no one would see it and say ….ewww whats that? On the odd occasion it may have found itself under my bed…where it may have sat there, next to a book (The Secret Seven) and slowly grow its own penicillin…

Alright that only happened the once, but at 9 years old I decided that I would take over the reins of making my own sandwiches. No more chutney and sprouts thanks. Salami and cheese would be fine. Salami and tomato. Tomato and cheese. They were the three combinations I had pretty much throughout my school career. Until I got to my final year of highschool and I stepped it up a notch and had capsicum and cheese. They were certainly exciting sandwich times.

How things have changed now though. As an adult…phew. Bread and all its loveliness. All the wonderful concoctions you can have for a simple sanga. Since embracing the heady world of sourdough, those concoctions have got even more enticing. This Apple Walnut Rye included…

* So will The Monkeys be having white sliced bread with devon and tomato sauce for their school lunches? Hell no! Do you know what’s in that stuff?!

Apple Walnut Rye Sourdough

200gms starter

225gms of rye flour

225gms of plain flour

200mls water (approx)

1 1/2 tps salt

1/2 chopped apple

1/2 cup chopped walnuts

a shake of cinnamon

Mix up rye dough as usual, when it’s time for the first fold, add apple and nuts. Folding them carefully in. I did an over night ferment, then baked at 250C until top was golden looking. Then popped it out of the tin and baked a further 10 minutes, while turning the oven down to 200C.

The top came out a little messy, but I was happy with the consistency and it just feels so healthy when you eat it. I’m loving this one for breakfast at the moment. And to totally cancel out the health factor, slap some peanut butter on there- so thick you could walk on it…mmmm.

Light Rye Sourdough

350gms starter

300gms rye meal

300gms bakers flour

480 mls water

1/2 cup sunflower seeds

1 1/2 tps salt

Mix ingredients. Wait for 20 minutes, then add salt and mix again. Let it prove for 1 1/2 hours. First fold. Prove for another 1hour. 2nd fold. In oiled tin, rise for another hour. 11 hour ferment in fridge. Out for 1/2 an hour on the bench. Slash. Then baked at 250C for 20mins top shelf, (steam) then a further 15 mins on the second shelf.


*This post submitted to Yeast Spotting

Banana Chocolate Pecan Cake

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Hello…what have we here?

Banana Chocolate Pecan Cake

Oh Mama…delicious

How about a little more?

*****

Banana Chocolate Pecan Slice

50gms dark melted chocolate

75gms melted butter

3  bananas

1/2 cup honey

1/2 cup chopped pecans

1 1/2 cups s/r flour

Bake at 180C for approx 20-25 minutes.

A surprisingly tasty and simple cake. I had left over melted chocolate, and bananas that needed attention. Not too showy. The honey, banana and chocolate all seemed to harmonize well together. Not one of them jumping up and and vying for attention. Little Monkey approved.

Caramelised Onions on a simple sanga

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For two weeks I had been thinking of caramelised onions. Yep, I could have put my brain to better usage but no, it was all about the carmelised onions. On a pizza, teamed with a sausage, in a tart….oh caramelised onion what was I going to do with you?

Nope, I think it had to be a simple open sanga (Australian slang for sandwich).What you need is a loaf of your favourite bread. I used a three seeded sourdough. Now slice it up, and add your caramelised onions.

But how to make Caramelised Onions?

Slice a brown onion and pop it in a pot, add a good slurp of olive oil and give it about a 2 minute head start. Once its wilted down a bit add, two dessert spoonfuls of brown sugar and 2 good slurps of balsamic vinegar. Cook it until it’s reduced down, and gotten thicker.

Pop it on your bread, add a slice of your best cheese, and grill it. We used a tasty little St Claire from Tasmania. Mr Chocolate and I couldn’t stop smiling while we were eating this, it just tasted so good. A truly simple meal that has you begging for just a little more.

Lime and Coconut Cupcakes

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To the girl,

who wants to discover making sourdough

who will happily spend an hour discussing the intricate possible ingredients in a delectable dish

who softly sighs at the thought of a whole cellar full of her own preserved foods

that isn’t afraid to go skip diving with me (freeganing)

who will look at ceilings and bench space, wondering whether it’s possible to cure her own meat in a one bedroom apartment

who has spent the last 5 years perfecting the definitive banana bread

whose eyes would sparkle at the thought of a croquembouche challenge

who brought a watermelon to my home and now has Monkey Boy with hearts in his eyes, as there is nothing finer for him than watermelon

who has been living on the other side of the world and has been gone for far too long…

It’s wonderful to have you back my girl…

****

Lime and Coconut Cupcakes

125gms softened butter

1/3 cup sugar

1/3 cup honey

1 grated lime

juice of 2 limes

1 beaten egg

2/3 cup desicated coconut

1 1/3 cup s/r flour

Cream butter, sugar, honey, egg together. Add lime rind and juice. (Mixture will look a little curdled) Fold through dry ingredients and bake at 180C until golden.

icing

1 tablespoon mascarpone**

50gms softened butter

1 cup icing sugar

juice of 1 lime

In a mixer add all ingredients together until they combined and have a gorgeous creamy icing texture.*

* I didn’t pipe it, but it would look better if it was done that way. (Some days just aren’t piping days…not even for friends you haven’t seen for years. Sorry W!)

** I had made my own mascarpone recently so had some to spare. You could easily just keep it as a butter icing though.

Pan de Leche- the starfish

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Ahhh….the monkeys off my back.

Not MY Monkeys, but this monkey, (my Monkeys are frequently on my back.)

The starfish. No more shall I go to sleep muttering the words…starfish, starfish….no more shall I wake with bleary eyes, poke around for my days clothing, and wander as if pulled by an invisible chain to the kitchen muttering…starfish, starfish…

After stumbling upon this post, mentioning it to Celia who in turn sent me the instructions, then prompted by Heidiannie, then again asked by Joanna, who also sent me this post….I really just had to do it then didn’t I.

Pan de Leche dough sounded right for it. Pliable, not as eggy as a challah, it rolled perfectly and tasted like brioche. Got to love anything that tastes like brioche.

Pan de Leche- the starfish

200mls luke warm milk

2 tps dry yeast

1 egg

100gms softened butter

1/4 cup raw sugar

450gms flour

3 tbs olive oil

1 tps salt

Mix yeast in luke warm milk and set aside for 10 minutes. Mix remaining ingredients together (I used a mixer with dough hook) and also adding milk. Once mixed together, knead well until smooth and elastic. Cover and leave until doubled in size. Divide dough into 16 equal portions. Roll each portion out into a long snake, (leaving one aside to become a disk). Each snake should be the same length.

From here on in please refer to these posts, (one and two) as they will describe what to do far better than I will. The only difference being for the centre, I made a dough disk of about 1cm high to fill in the hole and then wound round a three strand plait, then tucked in again for the centre. Just before popping it in the oven, I brushed it all with milk. Baked at 220C until tips golden and then turned the oven down to 180C for a little further cooking.

* I’ve had a few posts about bread making recently. For so many people bread is a daily staple that plays a big role in the days meals. Making your own I can’t recommend it enough. It certainly doesn’t have to be like this, nor sourdough (although I’m sure you would love it). A simple bread maker machine quite often is enough. Comparing it to so many available shop breads, there really is no comparison in taste. Even if you only made one loaf a week it’s worth it.

Weaving bread and why its fun to play with your food

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I have this very fond memory from when I was a kid. Staying at my Nana’s house and being ‘let loose’ in the kitchen. She gave me a plate full of flour, sugar, milk, sultanas, an egg and spices. With these ingredients I could do what ever I wanted and then she would cook it. Blissfully happy, I have no idea how it tasted, but I remember vividly the pride I had that I could choose what ever I wanted to do with those ingredients. It never happened again, and if I was cooking at home I always had to follow a recipe. Mum said I had to learn the basics first before I tinkered. Actually she was right, darn right. Because I know a lot of the basics now, tinkering with food makes more sense then when I cooked that flour, milk, sultana  concoction.

Playing with food and its different flavours can be so much fun. The last few months I have been playing with sourdoughs, love it, love it, love it. The last few weeks I’ve been playing with plaiting sourdoughs, plaiting, plaiting, plaiting. Then just I was about to embark on a certain ‘starfish’ that needed an intricate amount of plaiting, my brain said oh oh oh…but what if we did this instead?…Cross this with that, then that with this…Oh ok…Lets give that a whirl.

sourdough woven bread

…and that dear people is why it’s fun to play with your food. As you never know what you’re going to get.

If you would like to weave your sourdough. Make up your usual dough and when its time to do the shaping make your self a large square. Cut equal strips to go down and across. (For this one I did 8×8 strips) Making sure the strips are well floured, otherwise they will just blob together when having the final prove. Then tuck and loop, tuck and loop. For the edges, trim and then gently tuck under to tidy the sides up.

This bread makes for a good addition to soup, as it easily pulls apart.

* This post submitted to yeast spotting.

Coconut Sourdough with lashings of Strawberry Jam

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Many many moons ago, when I was a footloose and fancy free youngster, I worked in England for a little old lady. Charged with looking after this delightful old lady, it was up to me to make sure she was cared for and entertained. Being a little old lady she didn’t like big meals but she sure liked lots of little ones. There was breakfast, morning tea, 11’ses, lunch, afternoon tea, dinner and supper…alright maybe it wasn’t that many. But it felt like it. Afternoon tea however was a must. At precisely 3pm, a cup of tea and a little something to tide her over until the next meal would be served. Now more often than not, she would be rather partial to a packet of crisps and a quick nod off in the comfy armchair. Only for her to wake up awhile later with fallen crisps surrounding her and only the backpacker carer to blame it on.

Sometimes though, she would like a piece of cake or bread and jam. Accompanied with a little recital from the poetry in “Alice in Wonderland”. As I  was always happy to make cake and love to read this was always a really nice way to spend the afternoon.

Winter sun peaking through the curtains, little old lady with jam and bread perched on her knee and footloose and fancy free backpacker reading… “will you walk a little faster? said the whiting to the snail, there’s a porpoise right behind me and he’s stepping on my tail…”

Coconut Sourdough with Strawberry Jam- just the thing for a little afternoon tea.

Strawberry Jam

750gms roughly chopped and hulled strawberries

750gms sugar

1 lime juiced

1/2 lemon juiced

Cook the strawberries and sugar together. As there is no water in this recipe, keeping stirring continuously until moisture comes out of strawberries (otherwise it will burn.) Add juice of lime and lemon and cook until gets to wrinkle stage or do the saucer test. Bottle it up or just keep in a bowl in the fridge, (it gets eaten pretty quickly round here.)

Coconut Sourdough Loaf

175gms starter

1 1/2 cups bakers flour

1/2 cup desiccated coconut

200-250mls water

2 tbs honey

3/4 tps salt

What I did was mixed, over night ferment, 2 folds over about 5 hours. Final prove in tin for about 20 minutes. Baked at 250C initially for about 15 minutes and then down to 180C for a further 10 minutes. This was only a small loaf as it was an experiment. I’m not sure whether it’s the honey or coconut which hinders the rising process for the sourdough, (or it could be both). There were a few holes, but it is a denser loaf compared to my normal sourdough.

A hit though for The Monkeys when they were whooping it up for a little something to tide them over until dinner time.

The Lobsters Quadrille Lewis Carroll

“Will you walk a little faster?” said a whiting to a snail,
“There’s a porpoise close behind us, and he’s treading on my tail.
See how eagerly the lobsters and the turtles all advance!
They are waiting on the shingle — will you come and join the dance?
Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, will you join the dance?
Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, won’t you join the dance?

“You can really have no notion how delightful it will be
When they take us up and throw us, with the lobsters, out to sea!”
But the snail replied “Too far, too far!” and gave a look askance —
Said he thanked the whiting kindly, but he would not join the dance.
Would not, could not, would not, could not, would not join the dance.
Would not, could not, would not, could not, could not join the dance.

“What matters it how far we go?” his scaly friend replied.
“There is another shore, you know, upon the other side.
The further off from England the nearer is to France —
Then turn not pale, beloved snail, but come and join the dance.
Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, will you join the dance?
Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, won’t you join the dance?

Date and Orange Spiral Biscuits

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Date and orange. The two flavour combinations had been stuck in my head and were not going anywhere. I wanted to play….

Date and Orange Icecream, Date and Orange Cake, Date and Orange Lamb Tagine, Date and Orange Sourdough…ok maybe not the last one…or mayyybbe…but certainly these little babies.

Date and Orange Spiral Biscuits

Date Mixture

300 gms Medjool Dates

1/2 grated orange rind

juice of 1 orange

In a pot slowly cook up mixture, until dates soften and mixture becomes like a thick paste. Cool.

Biscuit Dough

120gms softened butter

1/3 cup sugar

1/2 grated orange rind

1 beaten egg

1 cup plain flour

2/3 cup S/R flour

Cream the butter and sugar and then add the orange rind and beaten egg. Then add flours. KNead lightly and roll out on to a lightly floured surface. Roll to about 1cm thick.

Add date mixture to the dough, carefully spreading out mixture. Roll up and trim edges.

Gently pressing in the roll and turning as you go, to get any air spaces out. Cut to 1cm thickness, and line on a tray with baking paper. Bake at 180C for approx 30 minutes.

Iced VoVo’s

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The humble Iced VoVo I mentioned back here in this post. Since I mentioned it, I have been plagued by thoughts of these biscuits. I eyed them off in the supermarket, $1.90- bargain…but so full of ‘stuff’. Tickity Tock goes my brain... lets give them a crack. Not the most wonderful thing I have ever made… But they were fun, and I really did have a giggle while eating them.

Now I’ve made them, I can move on.

Iced VoVo’s

Biscuit Base

125gms softened butter

1/2 cup caster sugar

1 beaten egg

2 tps vanilla

1 1/2 cups plain flour

Cream butter, sugar, vanilla, egg and then add flour. KNead to a smooth dough. Roll out to an approximate square shape and then with a knife cut out squares the size you would like. Bake at 180C, until light golden and cool.

Coconut Icing

Equal parts icing sugar to desicated coconut, adding a little water as you go. Just enough to bind the two together.

Squish it together and lay them on the biscuits, add a dollop of jam in between (I used my Vanilla Plum Jam) and viola…Iced VoVo biscuits (of a sort.)

Sri Lankan Love Cake

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What do I think of when I think of Sri Lanka, little island in the Indian Ocean?

Beautiful white sandy beaches with swaying palm trees. Swinging in a hammock, being hypnotized by the sound of crashing waves.

Fish on your plate at dinner time. So fresh, you can still hear the whispered words of the fisherman I wonder how much I will get for this big one?

Wild majestic elephants being heard in the near by jungle as you sip your locally grown tea.

A selection of short eats (small entree sized finger food, Sri Lankan style tapas/yum cha to go- if you will) to choose from as you wonder around in search of the next ancient Buddhist temple to discover. Sri Lankan cuisine that is so full of flavours that your taste buds want to sing every time you eat.

Ancient rock fortress, Sigiriya. With so much history within its rocky walls, that you feel quite overwhelmed at the thought of how much this amazing rock had seen.

A kind of driving that can be only described as tiring. Honk when you are going to over take, honk when you are over taking, honk when you have over taken, honk when you would like to over take…and then begin again.

A country floored by the 2004 Tsunami.

Umbrella Lovers- if you wonder down to the beach, you will be sure to find some young couples sharing some ‘alone’ time, sitting under an umbrella. These umbrellas dot the surrounding areas, as couples shield themselves from prying eyes.

Buffalo yoghurt being made in earthen ware pots, lining the sides of the roads sitting in the sun. (similar to a Greek style yoghurt- thick and creamy, and oh sooo delicious.)

Love Cake, a cake with so many different recipes and variations. Usually made for celebrations. I hadn’t actually tasted this one before, but with the ingredients and the name…

Whats not to love?

Love Cake

150 gms crushed cashew nuts (cadjunuts)

125g semolina

3 eggs

150g sugar

125g softened butter

1 tbs rose water

1 1/2 tbs brandy

1/2 tps cinnamon

1/2 tps cardamom

1/2 tps nutmeg

Separate the eggs. Whisk together softened butter, 3 egg yolks, and sugar. Add semolina, cashews, rose water, brandy, spices.

Whisk the egg whites until stiff peaks appear and fold into mixture. Cook in a square tin, greased and lined with paper. Bake at 180C for approx 25 minutes or until golden.

(recipe taken from a local Sri Lankan cookbook and adapted.)

Travels with Sourdough

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Almond and Raisin Sourdough

The underside of the Almond and Raisin Sourdough. A toasted almond crunch to a slice.

Wholemeal sourdough.

Sunflower and Linseed Sourdough Panini.

Date and Pecan Sourdough

350gms starter

600gms flour

2/3 cup chopped medjool dates

1/2 cup chopped pecans

1 tbs raw sugar

good shake of cinnamon

1 1/2 tps salt

I made this sourdough on the warmest day so far that I have toyed with the sourdoughs. Consequence- a lighter sourdough then I would normally make as it rose so quickly. I did two lots of folds in between proves. Verdict- um yes please! (My mum liked this one too, and said that I could make some next time I came down to visit. Have starter…will travel.)