Tag Archives: recipes

Strawberry Vanilla Birthday Cake

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Birthday time and I wanted a simple cake, with not a crazy amount of sugar, no colours, kid friendly, easy to make, to be enjoyed by everyone and truly delicious…(small drum roll), please step up Strawberry Vanilla Cake.

Strawberry Vanilla Cake

cake part

150 gms butter softened

3/4 cup caster sugar

2 tps vanilla

1 1/2 cups s/r flour

3 eggs

Cream butter and sugar together. Add vanilla and eggs one at a time. Fold in flour. Bake cake at 180C for approx 1 hour (on 2nd shelf). Once out and cooled, cut carefully in half.

icing

300gms mascarpone

1/2 cup icing sugar

1 scraped vanilla pod

whip it all up in a mixer or with a hand held whisk and then layer half of the mixture between the cake with a layering of freshly sliced strawberries. Top layer of cake on and mascarpone mixture smoothed over and decorate with strawberries.

****

A really simple cake, that was thoroughly enjoyed, keeps well in the fridge for a few days and doesn’t lose any of its charm over time. (We ate this one on Little Monkeys’s birthday, now officially two.) I did catch Monkey Boy trying to get the “hair” out of his cake- he was trying to get the vanilla pod seeds out.

Honey Almond Nougat Gift ideas

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Gift ideas. Sometimes I can get completely stumped for ideas for gifts. I want to give something, but don’t want the present to be a token something. I want there to be some kind of thought behind it. A little present to say Happy Birthday, Merry Christmas or a simple I’m thinking of you.  Not something that screams… uh oh I forgot your birthday up until an hour ago, and this was the first thing I saw…Isn’t it pretty!

Here’s one idea for a gift. First stop, go to your local second hand store.

One Donna Hay tea cup and little white dish later. ($2 dollars spent, for perfect condition.) Add some recycled ribbons that I had got via a whole bundle from a LETS trade a while back. Now to fill them.

Kecap Manis Roasted Almonds

Your desired quantity of raw almonds, coat them lightly in Kecap Manis (Indonesian Soy Sauce). Then put them on a tray and slow roast them in the oven. Done when an almond is cut in half, and lightly browned through.

Honey Almond Nougat

2 cups caster sugar

1 cup glucose syrup

1/2 cup honey

1 cup toasted whole almonds

1 tps vanilla

2 egg whites

75grams softened butter

rice paper sheets

Mix sugar, glucose, honey, vanilla in a pan. Stirring until sugar dissolves. Boil uncovered until reaches small crack stage (a tps of mixture snaps when its dropped into cold water.) This usally takes about 6 minutes or until reaches approx 138C.

Beat egg whites until firm peaks form. With mixer running, slowly add hot mixture in a thin stream. Mix for 3 mins or until the mixture holds together, then add the butter. When combined add the nuts.

Quickly spread into greased and lined with rice paper tray. Smooth the top down and press the remaining rice paper. Wait until it gets to room temperature, and then cut into desired shapes.

Two easy hand made gifts that are made with love, using recycled dishes, and ready to be given to someone that needs a good present.

Sourdough Apple Rolls

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“Mama my taste buds can’t believe how good this is, they just want to keep eating and eating this” Monkey Boy

Right. Mental note to self, must make these again. And I did, then I did again.

Sourdough Apple Rolls

sourdough, into round parts- flatten a little

add some sliced cooked apple

a sprinkle of sugar

a sprinkle of cinnamon

some sultanas

Then pull the edges into the middle and slightly twist to make sure it binds.

Now turn it upside down so the smooth side is up, and let it rise for awhile. Cook as you would normal bread.

This picture was of a sultana free one, and the first batch that I did. Perfect for a breakfast on the run, snack, lunch etc. Easy to freeze, and delicious eaten slightly warm. Monkey Boy loves them in his pre-school lunch box. I love them as an instant breakfast, then I can keep doing other things.

Lemon Meringue Pie

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Lemon Meringue Pie was always my childhood favourite dessert. Mums recipe was a little cut out one from some out dated ’70’s magazine and I thought it was heaven in a pie dish.

Actually I still think its heaven in a pie dish.

There are so many sweet lemony concoctions that pass as lemon meringue pie. Pastry base vs biscuit base. Tangy vs sweet. Meringue that is sky high or just slapped on.

I get nervous ordering this if I am out somewhere as its such a let down when the taste isn’t up to scratch.

My mums lemon meringue pies have actually evolved a little over time, and depends on who is coming to visit on which type she will make. For me the original is still the best, with a few tweaks from me if I make it though. I’ve only made it a few times as,

1/ I’ll eat it all with no holding back and,

2/ When something is such a favourite, I actually get a little nervous cooking it. High expectations!

The original recipe calls for a biscuit crumb base, but I think the pastry does it more justice though.

Lemon Meringue Pie

Pastry

300gms (2 cups) plain flour

150gms butter

1 tsp vinegar

1/2 cup icing sugar

a little cold water

Knead dough lightly, cover in cling wrap and rest in fridge for about an hour. Roll dough out. Cutting to pie shape (I did individual sized ones), bake blind at 180C. Pastry does shrink a little, so allow room for that. Any left over pastry can be put in the freezer for another time.

Lemon Mixture

1 tin condensed milk

1/2 cup lemon juice

grated lemon rind of 2 lemons

3 egg yolks

Add all the ingredients together, combining well, and then carefully spoon into cooked pie shells.

Meringue

3 egg whites

1/2 cup caster sugar

In a mixer slowly add sugar to egg whites until forms stiff meringue peaks.

Dollop meringue on to lemon mixture in the pie shells, and bake at 180C until peaks start to colour (approx 15 mins).

I also had some left over lemon mixture and meringue, so rather than make up more pies I made a Lemon Meringue Cake. Just added a cup or so of S/R flour to the lemon mixture and then folded the meringue through. Whack it in the oven and bake until springs back and golden. Easy- peasy.

feeling mortal…I think we need to do some cooking

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Strangely enough I am not superhuman. This came as a bit of a shock. I thought as long as you put the fuel in, were kind to your body, mind and soul things would continue on even after major hiccups like hospital stays. Apparently it’s not true though.

Apparently even super heros get sick now and then.

Now I know I’m no super hero, and never try and pretend that I am, but getting blasted with a virus (with super evil powers) still was a bit of a shock. The kind of virus that lands Little Monkey in hospital for two days, Monkey Boy not to eat for 6 days and me to be a quivering mess in a darkened corner for far too long, (I have things to do damn it!)

So what does this have to do with cooking? It dawned on me as I pointed Mr Chocolate towards the fridge and told him “whatever” to feed our children for another consecutive night that all the cooking is central around me. The Monkeys are too little to really help out, and there is only so long the freezer meals will last. Mr Chocolate does long working hours so all the cooking pretty much I do. I have all these simple recipes in my head that mean the difference between screaming toddler at 4.30pm, who just needs a little something to tide him over until dinner, but all fairly useless if I’m not there to execute them.

If I was really sick for a really long time or really wanted a really long holiday…(oh!) Does that mean that’s the end of all the food that my family rely on and enjoy? Now don’t get me wrong, Mr Chocolate can cook a bit, and certainly wouldn’t let the boys starve but if he knew how to cook a few of the staples it would make me feel a little easier.

Even just to feed the sourdough starter.

So last weekend was spent with Mr Chocolate becoming Mr Sourdough and Mr Biscuit. The following weekend will be spent in a similar fashion, compulsory cooking classes.

Everyday Biscuits

* for use for snacks, cure for my belly is so hungry I may explode before dinner, or some after dinner dunking.

100gms softened butter

1/2 cup honey (125mls- a little more if you want them chewier)

1 tsp vanilla

1 1/2 cups plain flour (225g)

Cream the butter, honey, vanilla and then add flour. Lightly roll in a ball, then squish down a little. Bake at 180C until light golden.

Now how easy is that?

Vanilla Champagne Coconut Cupcakes

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You know when you ponder on something for awhile, thinking, I think it will work, I think it will, I think it will… Well this was one of those moments. Experimenting in the kitchen at its very best. Why? Not because I think my cooking is the bees knees, but because the cupcakes turned out even better than I had hoped they would.

These are my favourite thing I have cooked this month. Moist with a hint of champagne. Melt on your tongue, fantastic straight from the oven or just as good a few days later. These were a hit with The Monkeys, neighbours, family and Mr Chocolate.

Vanilla Champagne Coconut Cupcakes

125 grams softened butter

1/2 cup castor sugar

1 vanilla pod scraped (or two tsp of essence)

1 cup desiccated coconut

1 beaten egg

1 1/2 cups s/r flour

1 cup bubbly champagne (sparkling wine)

Cream the butter sugar and vanilla together. Then add the egg, coconut and champagne. It should look a little like soggy bread crumbs. Then fold in the flour. Cook at 180 until just cooked.

I have done batches in mini cup cakes, cupcakes and whole cakes, just adjust the time according to size. Should be just firm on top, not golden as they will be too dry then.

(20 mins for cupcakes as a guideline.)

Sourdough Flat bread

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Sometimes I don’t feel like thinking “what am I going to cook for dinner”.  I really love cooking, but sometimes I get tired of trying to hide vegetables, mixing tasty and healthy together, and generally being in the kitchen…. Sometimes the call of the outside is just too strong and the The Monkeys are just begging for rumbles in a park, rather than watching me cook another dinner in the kitchen.

Times like that I cook Bolognese. Whats so exciting about that? It will last 3 days and no one will ever realise that just ate the same meal that got upcycled…huh?

Follow if you will…

Day One– Cook up a lovely BIG batch of Bolognese Sauce. Finely dice those all those vegetables so the kids/partners don’t actually suspect there might be a whole garden in there.

DINNER- Spaghetti Bolognese… Buon Apettito!

Day Two- Now in another pot add oil, lots of lovely cumin, coriander, red kidney beans and perhaps a little chilli. Now add it to your bolognese. Bolognese just turned into Mexican flavours. Cook up some rice and spoon your mexican beans on top. A dollop of sourcream on the side, and a wedge of lime.

DINNER- Mexican Beans and Rice… Pass the Corona please.

Day Three– Now you still have a bit of the Bolognese/Mexican Beans in a pot but it surely isn’t enough to feed every one again. However if you add, a fried egg on top of the beans, some chopped up fresh tomato, spanish onion, coriander, a little avocado and a dollop of the sour cream, and serve with some lovely flat bread, your away.

DINNER- Huevos Rancheros… Would please any Mariachi band member.

I didn’t ‘pretty’ this one up at all. But you get the picture.

Sourdough Flatbreads

1 cup of sourdough starter

1 1/2 cups flour

1/2 tps salt

1/2 tps bicarb soda

1 1/2 tbs olive oil

water (I’m not sure how much I put in, go slowly until the right consistancy)

Let it rise in a lovely warm spot until double in size. A quick knead, and then divide into equal balls. Rolling dough out until quite flat, then cook under the grill and turning once. Should cook in just a couple of minutes. Serve straight away or freeze them for a rainy day.

Monkeys dance the Banana Tropicana

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Their eyes raise expectantly.

Looking at me, ready.

His toe starts wiggling. His brothers foot starts tapping.

The knees start bopping up and down. Their heads begin to nod along with the beat.

The music builds up and so do they.

An arm gets pushed to the side like a puppetier is controlling it. Each jab of the elbow is timed with the pounding beat. Feeling the rhythm from deep within, heads held back, the music takes them over.

The Monkeys dance.

Dance like their lives depend on it.

They dance for a slice of cake.

****

Banana cake has long been a staple in this household. What to do with a few manky bananas?… Banana smoothie, banana bread, banana muffins or banana cake. Now banana cake is usually a bit of slap and dash sort of affair. I cook with what I have at hand, and that depends on whether it is a healthy one or not (honey instead of sugar, substituting seeds for flours etc.) I thought it was about time I gave the old Banana Cake the respect it deserves.

Banana Tropicana Cake

4 mashed up bananas

125g softened butter

1 teaspoon vanilla

1/3 cup rum

3/4 cup coconut

2 1/2 cups s/r flour

Mix wet ingredients together, then fold in coconut and flour. Pour into greased and lined tin. Cook at 170C for approx 1 hour, or until skewer comes out clean.

This is a lovely moist cake with medium tones of rum. Actually The Monkeys didn’t get to sample this one, as I thought it was a bit too rummy for them. Plus I wanted it all for myself. Three days in and it was still a lovely moist cake that tasted just as good as the first day.

Orange and Cardamom Biscotti

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Some times you need something a little civilised. A little treat, a little daintiness perhaps…

This particular day something civilised was making some biscotti and having some dessert wine to dunk them in. Dunking…not so civilised. Dessert wine…very civilised!

Dessert wine is always sweet. I believe its supposed to be served sweeter than whatever your dessert is. You sip it in a civilised fashion, not guzzle…(note to self.)

To be enjoyed in restrained amounts- dunk a few biscotti in there however and I say drink what ever amount needs to be drunk.

The Monkeys helped me out with the cooking of the biscotti. Little Monkey had woken from a nap clingy and grizzly. Not wanting to leave my arms, it was raining heavily outside so that didn’t leave too many options of what to do with the boys. So with an eager Monkey Boy wanting to help and Little Monkey clinging to my hip like someone had super glued him on- cooking biscotti was locked in for the afternoon.

Now this was the that part wasn’t so civilised. With little thumbs stuck in egg shells, more than ample amounts of cardamom being flung in and flour being strewn on the floor- they were done. So easy, they can be done with one adult hand, two Monkey Boys hands, and two flaying Little Monkey hands while still clinging on to a hip.

Best eaten dunked into a little dessert wine or coffee after dinner, when its quiet and…civilised.

Orange and Cardamom Biscotti

3/4 cup raw sugar

2 eggs

2 tps grated orange rind

Beat together, and then add

1 1/3 cups of plain flour

2/3 cup of almond meal

1 tps ground cardamom (or what ever is left in the bottle!)

Mix it altogether to form a dough, and roll out to form a long log. Cook at 180 C for about 35 mins. Cut log on the diagonal and bake at 150C until dry and crisp- turning once in between.

(adapted from a Women’s Weekly Cookbook)

Gift idea– bag full of biscotti and a lovely bottle of dessert wine.

*The dessert wine we had was a Southern Highlands Wine. Located within my locavore area, it’s a stunning winery that has tastings and a gorgeous barrel room that can be hired out for functions- (…as it so happens we had our wedding reception there.)

Very civilised…

Making your own Ravioli

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I have a new toy…

A lovely new ravioli cutter.

Ravioli I love, but the frozen bought stuff hurts. My belly is never happy after I eat it, so I stopped years and years ago. It wasn’t worth the pain, and the taste was always such a disappointment. The kind of dinner that seemed like a good idea at the time, and then nothing but sore tummy and oh whose idea was this anyway?

After finding this new little toy and making our own though, oh happy belly… It’s light, it’s tasty, and it screams eat me now and perhaps a little glass of red on the side.

Pasta

550 gms Fine semolina flour

300 mls water (approx)

Knead dough until a lovely elastic consistency. It should be a smooth ball of dough.

Next, cut off small portions, and feed into the pasta machine. Flatten and thining out, (we went to level 4).

Ravioli Mixture

1 red capsicum (pepper) finely diced

1 small block of fetta crumbled

Lightly cook the capsicum in a little olive oil, just for a few minutes until soft. Add the fetta, mix well.

Placing one long strip on the bottom and then dropping small spoonfuls of mixture evenly spaced between. Another long strip of pasta over the top and with my new cutting toy… hey presto!

Serve with a simple sauce. Olive oil, garlic, canned tomatoes, ripped up fresh basil, a little salt and serve with grated parmesan.

As I have said with my other hand made pasta dishes, (orechiette and pici) keep the sauce simple. All the taste and love is in the pasta you have made. Don’t complicate it, and let the sauce be the accompaniment to the love you can taste in the pasta.

* If you don’t have a pasta machine, the same results can easily be done with a simple rolling pin…and if no rolling pin, a glass bottle will do the trick as well.

Vanilla Plum Trifle

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How did this Battenburg Cake over at Zeb Bakes become this Vanilla Plum Trifle?

Well as is happens, I had really strong intentions of giving the Batternburg a crack. I saw it, I had never heard of it, it, it looked tricky and I wanted to play. I thought the combination of vanilla and plum for the cakes would be nice. I also thought the vivid colour of my frozen summer plums would transcend in to the cake just a little more than it did. I also thought I had caster sugar.

Result?… A cake that had raw sugar sticking out in it, and a rather murky plum cake colour that did not contrast at all with the vanilla side. What to do?

Ditch it and eat the cake?… Or, as my mind went tickity tock. I thought Plum puree red and delicious…. vanilla mixed with a little mascarpone and dunk it all in cake…. Done. The deal was sealed and Mr Battenburg will have to wait until another day. This was given a 10/10 from Mr Chocolate, and he NEVVVERRR gives 10/10. It didn’t even have chocolate in it.

Vanilla Plum Trifle

chopped up pieces of plain vanilla cake

1 1/2 cup plum puree

250gms mascarpone

1 tps vanilla

1/2 cup icing sugar

strawberries

In bowl place chopped up pieces of cake, and then drizzle some of the plum puree over  the cake. Whisk together the mascarpone, icing sugar and vanilla. In between the cake and plum puree, dab spoonfuls of the mascarpone mixture. Keep laying the three componants until all used up and then place strawberries on top to fill in any gaps. Let sit in the fridge for a few hours to infuse the flavours.

Vanilla Cake

200gms softened butter

200 gms sugar

Cream these two together. Add

3 beaten eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla

When mixed well, add

200 gms s/r flour

cook in lined baking tray at 180 C until golden.

Then cut into small squares.

Embracing the Eastern goddess

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Labneh and Rose Apple Jelly.

I was given this cookbook (Crazy Water Pickled Lemons) awhile ago. It’s a tantilizing mix of Middle Eastern, Mediterranean and North African cooking. At the time I thought it was pretty but  thought a lot of the recipes were above me. All in the too hard basket, both with methods and ingredients. Then I revisited and woah mama! Of course I can cook out of this! Well I can at least hack a few recipes up and mama-fy them a bit.

First up Labneh. Labneh is a Lebanese Cream cheese, that has the taste of yoghurt but texture of cream cheese and couldn’t be easier to make. So easy you may just have to slap yourself  to believe, just how simple it really is.

First up make some yoghurt, or if you couldn’t be bothered…. buy it, a good natural one. Yoghurt is pretty easy to make though. Christine @ Slow Living Essentials has posted two great methods on making yoghurt. I do the quicker boil the kettle one. (and just a note, homemade yoghurt really is so much better than the bought stuff. No added ‘things’, it’s a LOT cheaper, its easy to make, and your cutting down on all those plastic tubs. Easy to flavour as you like.)

Back to the Labneh. Yoghurt made, and it’s time to to put it in a sieve and some muslin, and leave it for 12-24 hours. My book said for 24 hours, I did it for 12- depends on how quickly the liquid drains out of the yoghurt. Unwrap the muslin and voila! Labneh.

Next step in embracing my inner middle eastern goddess was Rose Apple Jelly. Sounding exquisite, and the colour divine, thursday night was jelly making night. (Naturally I was going to hack the recipe up and make it simpler.)

First roughly chop up your apples, seeds, core, skins and all. Cook it up until soft (approx 40 mins) then carefully drain off the liquid into another pot. Now the recipe did say to leave it for 12 hours in a jelly bag (or muslin) but I didn’t have that time so did it the quick way.

For every 600mls of liquid, add 375grams of sugar. Cook up along with juice of 1/2 lemon and 1 long strip of lemon peel. Cook until gels on small cold saucer. Add rose water to taste. (The original recipe asked for rose petals- with no access to lovely roses, I was going to have to skip that bit too. If by chance you would like to make your own rose water, Dana at  Fleur De Sel posted on making it.

Result? A really delicately flavoured, gorgeously coloured jelly. I hadn’t made jelly before and kept taking it up to the light and letting it sparkle.

Sparkle it did.