Meal Motivation

Little Girl's Castle Cake

Sat, 19 Jul 2008 00:00:00 +1200

Here's a pretty neat girl's castle cake recipe that will result in lots of oooohs and aaaahs. I managed to impress all the mums at our daughter's 3rd birthday party with my culinary skills on this creative little number - and the kids loved it too. Though I'll have to admit, very time consuming.

So what we have here is a fairy castle with a tower, covered in white chocolate bricks and surrounded by a moat made of blueberry jelly. Allow several hours to put this together - the time needed to bake the cake, a couple of hours creating the chocolate bricks, a couple of hours assembling the cake, and then about another hour on the day to put on the final decorations. Easily 6 hours total, though I was experimenting and having fun the whole way through.

Don't let that put you off - this is great fun, looks awesome, and will really impress the crowd.

Ingredients

3 cake tins - preferably all round or all square
A muffin tray for approx 4-6 small muffins
Double cake mixture - I used carrot cake, but choose something you like (must be a reasonably solid cake to hold everything up, so don't use a sponge)
3 King size bars of white chocolate, or about 700g of white cooking chocolate
500g bottle of white chocolate truffle - available from cake decorating shops
1 x cake board, to lay everything out on
2 packets of blue jelly - I used blueberry
A packet of ice cream wafers
3 long kebab sticks
Marshmallows of various shapes and sizes to line the outside
6 x candy sticks
Hearts, flowers etc for decoration

Chocolate bricks

The first task, and possibly the most time consuming is to create the white chocolate bricks for the walls of the castle. Maybe you can buy pre-made chocolate squares that you can use - but I couldn't, and the lady at the cake shop mentioned that they always make their own. Actually, I quite enjoyed making the bricks myself, it makes the thing look a bit more homemade.

Start by finely chopping the white chocolate - do only half a block at a time, at least for the first couple of runs. Any more than that it gets harder to manage.

Add the chocolate to a microwave-safe measuring cup, and into the microwave. The trick here is to cook for 15 seconds, then stir the chocolate - then repeat until the chocolate is fully melted.

Spread the chocolate onto a sheet of greaseproof paper, and use a spatula to get the chocolate to a consistent 4mm (approx) thickness.

The chocolate sheet goes into the fridge or freezer until it sets, minimum 15 minutes.

Remove the chocolate from the fridge and carefully cut into long strips. Builders say to measure twice, cut once; this certainly holds true here, so use a ruler or block to make sure the strips are a consistent width - this will make life easier later.

Cut the strips at random intervals to make rectangle bricks - I prefer some element of randomness to the wall, but you might prefer all bricks to be the same size.

The offcuts go back into the measuring cut, ready for the next batch.

You will need to multitask a little on this - half a bar of chocolate at a time, working on the next batch while the first is setting. Do some basic measurements of your cake tins and calculate how many chocolate bricks you need - I made about 160 of them, and had lots left over.

Once you have made enough chocolate squares, place them in a bowl and then into the freezer - they are much easier to work with when frozen.

Bake the cake

I chose a carrot cake because they aren't too sweet (the cake has enough sweetness on top), but also because carrot cakes are thick and substantial - which means the tower is less likely to fall over. I won't include the cake recipe here, as I'm sure you have a favourite chocolate / carrot / banana cake recipe that will work perfectly.

Make a double mixture, or more if you are planning on making a larger cake.

I opted for a round cake, but I would have made it square if I owned enough square cake tins. I had a square tin, a round tin, a round tin with a hole in the middle, and the muffin tins. Most combinations of square and round should work, given that you can cut the corners off square cakes and make them round.

So choose 3 cake tins, and fill them each about 3/4 of the way to the top - we want the cakes to come out as flat as possible, and filling to the top usually results in a rounded top. This is why I designed the cake around 3 layers rather than 2, but 2 layers would probably work just as well for a smaller cake.

With the remaining cake mix, fill in 5 or 6 muffins in a muffin pan. Again, don't overfill these as the shapes will be harder to work with.

Once the cakes come out of the oven, assemble the cake as pictured above. Use a knife to carefully cut a hole in the top layer so that the outer ring is about 3cm thick. Chop the battlements out of the top layer, being careful not to remove so much cake that the integrity of the structure is weakened. If you used square cake tins, chop off the corners and get them looking as flush as you can.
After doing all this, I found that some of the battlements were slumping, so I needed to pack some off-cuts between the layers to get everything sitting right.

Leave the muffins to one side for now, we will create the tower once the icing has gone on.

Icing

Working with chocolate truffle is an absolute treat after working with buttermilk icing. It melts easily, at which point it's easy to spread and easy to squeeze into holes. Or with less heat, it becomes thicker and easier to mold into shapes. It makes a perfect glue for sticking the chocoate to the cake, and it sets rock hard so that you can hold decorations in place easily. Hands down, a great material to work with.

Start by spreading a layer of truffle over the cake, then sticking the bricks on top. You may want to spread a little extra truffle on the back of each brick to make them fit into place better, I didn't need to do this for the walls but did for the intricate bits.

One of the reasons for laying down the truffle layer is to whiten the cake - helps where you miss a bit in the wall construction.

Tower

I decided to do an inner lining on my battlements for extra strength - see pictured below. This needs to be done before the tower goes in, which is why I left this till now. Once tha's done, you can insert the tower - I chose to create the tower then carry on with the icing.

The tower is essentially 5 or 6 muffins stacked on top of each other. Stick a kebab stick through the middle to keep them together, then run a knife down each edge to make the stack as square as you can (don't be too particular about this, the bricks will hide most mistakes).

Stick the tower on top of the cake structure, and drive the kebab stick into the cake. Add 2 or more kebab sticks at slight angles to give additional suport as required.

At this point, finish off adding the bricks to the cake and tower. I used 8 candy sticks for the 4 corners of the tower, and each tower face was only one brick wide (I used some bricks of a consistent size for this). Use plenty of thick truffle to fill in gaps and get the candy sticks to hold in place.

See image below in the 'moat' section.

Moat

The moat is a little tricky because the timing needs to be just right. The moat is 2 packets of blueberry jelly mixed to packet directions. Instead of cooling in a bowl, use a shallow tray - the jelly will set faster, and will be much more consistent, which you definitely need.

Put the jelly in the fridge and allow to partially set - this will take about an hour, but check regularly. It needs to be set, but still a bit sloppy so you can mold it into place. But not so runny that it spills over the edge of the flat board you are putting it on.

Once you think the mixture is the correct consistency, spoon it around the castle in blobs and arrange how you like. You can push the jelly right up against the castle wall, the chocolate offers good protection.

I did the jelly in 2 batches, this image shows the first batch completed. The 2nd batch was spooned over the top and thickened the moat - I suspect I was able to get my moat thicker than I otherwise would have by doing this in 2 stages.

Bedtime

If you are making this cake the day before, this is the right time to put the cake in the fridge and call it a day. Any decorations added at this stage are likely to spoil, so it's best to do these in the morning.

Decorations

Doing the decorating from the above photo, to the completed cake took less than an hour.
Firstly, add a door to the castle, which is simply an ice cream wafer. Cut window shapes out of more wafers and place as many windows on the castle and tower as you need - stick them on using the truffle mix.

The roof is a little more complicated to get right - it's 4 equal sized triangles stuck together using the white chocolate truffle. Use plenty of truffle, and make sure it's quite thick. Get it arranged right on a plate, then stick in the fridge for a few minutes to set in place.

I thought a little bridge would be a nice effect - another wafer with the candy sticks for supports, with chunks taken out to hold the wafer.

I found a little fairy that looked just like my daughter Lulu, so I put her in the moat for added effect. Marshmallows around the edge to make a nice border - the kids went crazy over these, and it kept the little fingers away from the jelly for at least a few minutes.
I used some candy flowers as lillies in the moat, and some candy hearts for decoration around the edge of the battlements - anything to add a girly touch to the creation and make it look a bit more interesting.

Let me know if you manage to recreate something like this - it's great fun, and the kids will love it.

Harvey.

Source: Little Girl's Castle Cake

Lamb Hamburger Patties

Tue, 08 Jan 2008 00:00:00 +1300

Here's a lamb hamburger patties recipe I use - not much different to the recipe for beef patties really. These hamburger patties come together in a nice malleable consistency which makes it easy to form patties that stay in one piece and don't fall to bits.

Ingredients

700g Lamb mince
1 onion
1 egg
half cup of breadcrumbs (approx)
fresh herbs - basil, coriander or parsley
1Tbsp Fennel seeds
1 tsp paprika
salt / pepper to season

Assembly

This isn't rocket science. Mix everything together in a bowl, except for the breadcrumbs. Adding the egg really moistens up the mixture, and adding the breadcrumbs is how I dry out the mixture again. Add the breadcrumbs until the mixture is somewhat dry, and is easy to shape into patties.
Shape the mixture into approx 8 patties, and grill or fry to cook.

Great with your favorite homemade burger. I find that homemade bread makes all the difference, but I have used a fresh kaiser bun in the photograph which was also pretty good.

Source: Lamb Hamburger Patties

Moroccan lamb skewers

Wed, 02 Jan 2008 00:00:00 +1300

I have just discovered lamb mince, and it has a few nice advantages over lamb pieces that I hadn't considered earlier.
This recipe for Moroccan lamb skewers doesn't require any marinating (which I usually do with all my skewers / kebabs) and threading the meat onto the stick is much less time consuming than regular lamb pieces.

Ingredients

700g lamb mince
half a cup of cashew nuts, roughly chopped
1 tsp cumin seeds
1 tsp paprika
1 handfull of fresh chopped coriander
Kebab skewers - 6-10 of them depending how big you make them
Salt & pepper to season
Fresh yoghurt to garnish

Mix it up

Mix everything together in a bowl, except for the yoghurt. Make sure there is a good dash of salt / pepper as these can taste a little bland without good seasoning.
Mix together with your hands, or a wooden spoon. The mix should be sticky enough to hold itself together in little balls.

On the stick

Roll the mince mixture into little sausage sized shapes, and then push a wooden skewer through the middle - much easier than threading individual pieces onto the skewer right?

Place the skewers onto a plate and place in the fridge for about an hour - this helps the meat stay on the stick.

Cooking

Grill, fry or barbecue the skewers until cooked through.

Garnish with yoghurt and fresh coriander, serve with couscous and salad.

Source: Moroccan lamb skewers

Dukkah recipe

Sat, 29 Dec 2007 00:00:00 +1300

Here's an easy recipe for Dukkah - a lovely mix of spices and nuts that you eat with fresh bread. Surprisingly, this dukkah recipe can be made with pretty ordinary ingredients - nothing expensive required, yet dukkah is very expensive to buy ready made from the deli.

This is my take on dukkah - there are plenty of ways to customize.

3 Tbsp pumpkin seeds
2 Tbsp sesame seeds
1 Tbsp cumin seeds
1 Tbsp fennel seeds
2 tsp rock salt (or regular table salt if that's what you have)
A dried chili or some chili flakes (optional)

Mix all ingredients in a blender on high speed for about 30 seconds. Done.

To serve

Serve with fresh bread and olive oil / balsamic vinegar. Dip the bread in the oil / vinegar, then in the dukkah to add a tasty crunch to the bread.

This recipe makes a good amount of Dukkah, which you will need. It's quite addictive.

Source: Dukkah recipe

Stuffed mushrooms with Falafel or Hummus

Mon, 17 Dec 2007 00:00:00 +1300

Following on from my last post about falafel, this nice stuffed mushroom recipe is easy to make after work, and because it's vegetarian you don't have to fluff around defrosting meat.

The concept is to take a large field mushroom - sprinkle some herbs and garlic over the top, and let it absorb some oil and vinegar. Then fill in the mushroom with some falafel or hummus mix. Either works well, though the falafel tends to be a thicker consistency and will stay in place better.

The recipe pictured uses Hummus.

Ingredients

Large flat field or portobello mushrooms. Actually, buttom mushrooms work fine too - if you pull out the stalk, the cavity is actually quite large inside and holds stuffing well. Great for "kid size" portions, and very cute too.
Fresh or dried herbs - thyme, basil, rosemary or sage all work well.
2 cloves of chopped garlic
A drizzle of olive oil
A drizzle of red wine vinegar
Falafel or hummus, homemade or from the supermarket
Cheddar cheese to top - Parmesan tastes great too, but doesn't melt as much.
Sale and pepper

Place the mushrooms on a baking tray, and sprinkle herbs and garlic on top of each mushroom.

Drizzle a little olive oil and red wine vinegar in the cavity. Go very sparingly with the vinegar, as it can taste quite bitter.

Cover the cavity with falafel or hummus, and sprinkle grated cheese on top.

Bake for 25 minutes at 180 degrees celsius.

Serve and enjoy - hopefully with more side dishes than I have pictured here!

Source: Stuffed mushrooms with Falafel or Hummus

Chili bean and Couscous Falafel Recipe

Mon, 17 Dec 2007 00:00:00 +1300

Not exactly authentic, but still delicious, this falafel recipe is based on chili beans and couscous. Chili beans can be as spicy or as mild as you like, and the half-cooked couscous gives the falafel a really nice amount of crunchyness.

Falafel is available in the supermarket, but can be quite expensive to buy - which is silly, because the ingredients are actually really cheap. This recipe is for the basic falafel mix, and it's up to you what you choose to do with it from here. Some of my favorites are...

Roll into little balls and fry in a pan (the standard way of cooking). Add the falafel to a salad with some homemade dressing, and serve as a main course.
As a replacement for beef or chicken on homemade burgers - falafel makes great burger patties.
As stuffing for rolled chicken breasts (see my recipe for stuffed chicken breast with cashews).
As stuffing for mushrooms - sprinkle some chopped herbs over some field mushrooms and then fill in the cavity with falafel. Sprinkle cheese on top and bake for 25 mins.
Sausage stuffing - split a sausage down the middle and fill in the gap with herbs and falafel.
In a pita pocket - add fried falafel to a pita bread pocket, and add minty yoghurt + fresh salad.
As the main event - nothing wrong with fried falafel balls on their own.

Ingredients

All quantities are up for discussion, feel free to experiment with this one.

1 can chili beans with sauce, as spicy as you like
1-2 medium onions
1/2 a cup of couscous
Juice of one lemon
2-4 cloves of garlic, according to taste
2 Tbsp olive oil
Chopped fresh parsley and mint
Salt and pepper
Optional - a few chopped fresh chilis or pickled Jalapenos

Chop the onions into large chunks before adding to the blender. Add all ingredients except the couscous to the blender, and mix until well blended but still fairly chunky, as shown. The consistency should be quite moist, but not a liquid. This may vary depending on how much sauce came with your chili beans, so adjust if required.

Half-cooked couscous

My first go at this recipe used uncooked couscous - it tasted nice, but the couscous was just a bit too crunchy and it spoiled the dish overall. My second attempt used cooked couscous, but that didn't work either - the recipe turned to paste, and there just wasn't any texture or anything to make it interesting.
So the answer is to partially cook the couscous, and you get the right amount of crunchiness.

Couscous is cooked by absorbing boiling water, so to half-cook, simply use half the recommended amount of water as per packet directions. Place the couscous in a bowl and slowly add boiling water, until the consistency seems about right - it should have absorbed the water, but not be light and fluffy like couscous normally is.

To finish off, mix the couscous with the other ingredients and stir well.

Cover, and leave in the fridge for at least 30 mins to become more solid.

Source: Chili bean and Couscous Falafel Recipe

Peanut satay marinade recipe

Tue, 18 Sep 2007 00:00:00 +1200

Who says marinade recipes need to be complicated? This 3 ingredient wonder makes for an easy satay sauce that's nice as marinade for chicken kebabs or breasts, or as a dipping sauce for parties. Satay sauce can be used for marinating meat, but also works well in stir frys or other dishes.

Satay sauce - 3 ingredients

1/4 cup of crunchy peanut butter
1 tin of coconut milk / cream
1/2 an onion, chopped very fine

Start by sauteeing the onions on a non-stick pan. I try to avoid adding additional oil as the peanut butter has plenty of oil. Add the peanut butter and coat the onions for a minute or so.

Then, slowly add the coconut milk to the pan, stirring constantly. The sauce will thicken up, and after a few minutes you are all done.

The sauce will thicken as it cools, so you can get away with a reasonably runny mixture, especially when you are making a dipping sauce.

Source: Peanut satay marinade recipe

Pizza recipes

Mon, 10 Sep 2007 00:00:00 +1200

Pizza recipes aren't complicated, but it never hurts to have a few more out in the open. I have some pretty strong opinions on how a pizza should be made, but that's largely a personal style.

I like pizzas with a thin but soft crust, and it has to be a homemade base - the supermarket pizza bases do the job if you don't have the time, but I'd rather do a special pizza on a special base and enjoy done properly.
I don't like to coat my pizzas with too much cheese, and I don't usually bother with mozzarella cheese as it's too expensive and overrated. Instead, use cheddar, use less of it, and compensate by having top quality toppings.

In terms of toppings, choose one or two ingredients and make them stand out. Break away from the norm by chopping up the ingredients nice and large, and complement your pizza with some nice sauce or fresh herbs.

I usually go with a mango chutney and tomato paste for my sauce, with some thyme or fresh herbs, this seems to work well.

Three pizza ideas

These three pizzas were made for a boys night in - an evening of pizza, beer and computer games. It doesn't get better than this really. Or check out my slow-cooked lamb pizza recipe.

Hot evil pizza

The challenge was to create a pizza using as many hot ingredients as I could find in the pantry. The overall effect wasn't too bad.

1 pizza base
Sauce - mango chutney, tomato paste, 2 Tbsp minced chili
1/2 cup of beef, cooked with chili powder and dried chilies
1/2 an onion, sliced coarsely
4 fresh red chilies
4 fresh green chilies
a good amount of pickled jalapenos
Kaitaia fire sauce (similar to tabasco)
Extra hot peri peri sauce

Overall, the general feeling was that this pizza was not as hot as the sum of it's ingredients. It seems that creating a super hot pizza is more about getting some unbelievably hot chilies than about throwing large quantities of averagely hot ingredients in there.
Aside from that, the taste was great, if you are into spicy food.

Souped up Hawaiian pizza

The Hawaiian pizza typically has 2 ingredients - ham and pineapple. All I could do to this to improve an already solid combination was to use fresh pineapple instead of tinned, and chop the ingredients up nice and chunky instead of stingy and small. I also added some onions, but this is just a personal preference.

It worked. A simple change to a favorite recipe makes it that little bit better.

Pepperoni pizza

The key to making this one a success is to buy good pepperoni. I didn't in this example, and you could taste the difference. Apart from that, it's a simple combination of ingredients that just works.

1 freshly made pizza base
Mango chutney, tomato paste, dried herbs for the sauce
Fried mince, cooked with a little mixed herbs and cardamom
Black pitted olives, sliced
capers
1/2 an onion sliced
Cheddar cheese

These pizzas were photographed uncooked, and without the cheese, so the ingredients are more visible.

Pizzas are all about experimentation, but do make sure you use good ingredients, and try to break outside the mold of what's available at the local pizza shop.

Source: Pizza recipes

Mango lassi recipe

Tue, 21 Aug 2007 00:00:00 +1200

When I visited India about 10 years ago, I was having a lassi every day - there was something about the cooling, sweet taste to go with your evil curry. Back in New Zealand, it's not something I make very often, though not sure why. The mango lassi is really tasty, and not complicated. The only part that you can get wrong is choosing a bad mango.
This mango lassi recipe is pretty standard, but tastes great.

Ingredients

1 ripe mango
1 cup of plain yoghurt
1/2 - 1 cup of milk, depending how thick you like it
2 - 4 tsp sugar, depending how sweet you like it
A few leaves of fresh mint
4 small ice cubes

Makes 2 large mango lassis.

Chop n' blend

Peel the mango and chop into chunks, without getting too close to the core which tends to be quite hard and stringy. Blend all ingredients on high speed. Be careful with the ice cubes as these can get stuck and make your blender splat lassi all over your walls!

Serve with a hot evil vindaloo, any tasty Indian cusine, or as a nice sweet dessert after any good meal.

Source: Mango lassi recipe

Stuffed chicken breast with falafel & cashews

Tue, 24 Jul 2007 00:00:00 +1200

A lovely stuffed chicken breast recipe - stuffed with falafel, sun-dried tomatoes, cashew nuts and basil wrapped in bacon and oven roasted.

While this recipe is going to involve getting your hands dirty, it's actually not that complicated. It looks impressive, doesn't involve anything too exotic and even tastes good.

Ingredients (serves 2)

2 chicken breasts (ie both sides of the breast)
6tbsp of falafel mix, or freshly made
1/4 cup sun-dried tomatoes, chopped
A small handful of cashew nuts
A small handful of cheese
A small handful of chopped fresh basil
4 rashers of bacon
6 lengths of oven-proof string, enough to wrap around your rolled chicken breast

Roll your own

Start by butterflying the chicken breast. This involves getting the largest possible surface area out of the chicken breast by placing on a board and slicing through the middle of the chicken breast, then folding out on a flat surface.

Along one edge, line up some falafel and chopped sun-dried tomatoes - this will form the center of the roll. Start rolling the chicken breast, as tight as you can.

As you start rolling, sprinkle basil, crushed cashews, any leftover sun-dried tomato and a little cheese inside the chicken breast. This is going to get extremely messy, but gives it all the flavor. There is no need to use too much cheese in this dish, so use sparingly.
Somehow, holding the roll of chicken tight, wrap 2 rashers of bacon around each chicken breast, and tie together with some string. If it's all holding together at this stage, you are doing well.

Cooking and serving

Once it's all rolled and tied down, place into an oven dish and cook in a preheated oven at 220 degrees Celsius for around 40 minutes. It's important to cook for a reasonable length of time so that the insides cook properly.

Source: Stuffed chicken breast with falafel & cashews

Baked salmon & veges

Mon, 23 Jul 2007 00:00:00 +1200

Easy to prepare and only 15 mins in the oven, this baked salmon recipe is full of flavor, and works well with the crispy carrots and celery included in the recipe.

Quick and tasty is the order of the day here, so you can pick up some fresh salmon from the shop after work and have the meal on the table within 30 mins.

Ingredients

2 salmon fillets or steaks
2 large carrots
4 sticks of celery
1 clove of garlic
2 tbsp fresh marjoram
1tsp rock salt
A dash of red wine vinegar
2 lemons
Olive oil
1 red onion
1 tbsp capers
1 fresh chili (optional)

the quick way

This recipe is pretty straightforward. Rather than reading the instructions, assemble the ingredients then follow the images below to get the idea.

Or the written way

Lay the salmon onto a large piece of tin foil. Sprinkle with salt and some about half of the fresh marjoram. Dill would also work well here, as dill and salmon always work well. Although not pictured, a sliced red onion will go great in this middle layer.

Slice up the carrots and celery into thin 6 inch strips. Lay these on top of the salmon. On top of the veges, sprinkle 1 clove of crushed garlic, the rest of the fresh marjoram, salt and pepper and capers. Put some holes in the chili and add the to the top, and then slices of one of the lemons.

Squeeze the other lemon over the top of the dish, and drizzle a splash of white wine vinegar. Pour olive oil over the top to finish.

Wrap the tin foil around the dish, and seal as best you can. Bake for 15mins in an oven preheated to 220 degrees Celsius.

Illustrated...

Enjoy with a nice glass of white wine.

Source: Baked salmon & veges

Cafe style Creamy Mushrooms

Sun, 22 Jul 2007 00:00:00 +1200

I call this recipe "Cafe-style creamy mushrooms" because they are every bit as good as what you get when you go out for breakfast on a Sunday. The cafes seem to be able to cook their mushrooms perfectly - just the right amount of Garlic and herbs, while the creamy sauce isn't too runny and not all thick and chunky either. Mmmmmmm.

This recipe does a pretty good job of capturing the flavor, making for a great Sunday breakfast.

We use portobello or field mushrooms for the main event, and then a number of button mushrooms (if you have them) for making the sauce - I like to keep the big mushrooms nice and big, it seems a waste to chop them up small.

Ingredients

A bag of large mushrooms
About 6 button mushrooms, brown or white
3 cloves of garlic
A dash of white wine vinegar
Olive oil + a good knob of butter
Fresh thyme
Grated fresh parmesan cheese
1/2 a cup of cream
A splash of white wine (optional)
Toast - fresh and homemade is best

The quantities here are all very approximate. There is no magic formula to work with, and the key to making this a success is to add the liquid slowly so it doesn't end up too runny.

The secret ingredient

The secret ingredient to this dish is to use chopped up button mushrooms as the base. This forms the base of the sauce, and thickens the sauce enough that it works nicely. Without this, the wine and cream has nothing to stick to, and the whole dish seems to fall apart.

Take a few button mushrooms and chop them finely. Add to a hot pan with olive oil, butter, 3 cloves of chopped garlic and some fresh thyme. At this stage, add a splash of white wine vinegar.

After about 30 seconds, add the portobello or field mushrooms to the pan. I find them easier to work with when chopped into halves or quarters.

Adding the sauce

The sauce is simply fresh cream and a little white wine, it will mix with the ingredients already in the pan and taste delicious. You can add half of your parmesan cheese as you add the cream, and this thickens the sauce and adds to the flavor. Reserve the rest of the cheese for sprinkling over the final product.

Add the wine very sparingly, and add the cream a little at a time, stirring constantly. Continue adding cream and stirring slowly over about 3 minutes, until you are happy with the consistency.

Serve on fresh toast and enjoy - I like a thick homemade multigrain toast.

Source: Cafe style Creamy Mushrooms

Slow-baked crumbed sausages & portobello mushrooms

Sat, 14 Jul 2007 00:00:00 +1200

A tasty mix of strong flavours goes into this sausage and portobello mushroom dish. Slow bake over 2 hours, or cook in 40 mins for a quick result, this recipe is sure to please.

I found myself tonight with a big bowl full of fresh homemade breadcrumbs that I didn't have a use for. I had planned on having crumbed fish, but the fish was a little too fishy for my liking.

No way those lovely breadcrumbs were going to waste though.

This recipe combines my favourite portobello mushrooms with sausages, herbs and tomato sauce, topped by crispy breadcrumbs.
Use the best sausages you can get - the butcher will have all kinds of nice home made sausages, so don't just use the standard cheap ones like I did.

Ingredients

6-8 sausages - the best ones you can get
6-8 medium-large portobello mushrooms
1 440ml can of chopped tomatoes
1 onion or red onion
3 cloves garlic
dash of red wine vinegar
dash of red or white wine
A large handful of chopped woody herbs - rosemary, thyme, sage or whatever you have available
Olive oil. Lots of it.
2-3 cups of home made breadcrumbs (made from bread, onion, egg and herbs)
1/4 cup of grated parmesan cheese

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Sauce

The goal for this recipe was to make it quickly with the minimum of preparation and fuss. To do this I used a can of chopped tomatoes, but your own brew of sauce would be better if you have time.
Pour a layer of sauce into a large baking dish.

On top of the sauce, put a layer of chopped or sliced onion, some chopped herbs and half the garlic. Add a few splashes of red wine vinegar.

The main event

The star of the show is the mushrooms, backed by the sausages. Place a layer of sausages and mushrooms, making sure you push the ingredients into the sauce.

The remaining ingredients now go on top of the mushrooms and sausages. As you add the ingredients, aim the liquids at the mushrooms so that they absorb the flavour and are nice and juicy.
At this stage, add the white wine, a little more red wine vinegar, and a good lot of the remaining herbs. Top with fresh cheese - some really old parmesan is perfect for this, but cheddar will do nicely too.

The breadcrumbs

Breadcrumbs aren't complicated to make. The secret is to use bread that is nearing the end of it's life, as fresh bread just sticks too much. Use about 6 slices of mixed grain or white bread, combined with an onion, some herbs and one egg. Mix em all together in a blender.

Put a good coating of breadcrumbs on top of the dish, then go to town with the olive oil. If you have a device that allows you to spray your oil, this would be best, otherwise thinly drissle the oil across as much of the surface as you can. The oil makes the breadcrumbs go nice and crunchy.

Add any leftover thyme or rosemary to the topping.

Cooking

If you have time, then slow cooking is the best way to cook this. Bake for 2 hours at a low heat, and it will cook perfectly. For a weeknight meal, cook at a medium heat for 40 minutes instead.

Serve and enjoy.

Source: Slow-baked crumbed sausages & portobello mushrooms

Fun things with Mushrooms

Fri, 29 Jun 2007 00:00:00 +1200

When I did a stint as a vegetarian a couple of years back, I made mushrooms my main meat replacement. I found mushrooms fitted in nicely as a replacement for all kinds of meats, and they go so well with garlic, olive oil, butter, spinach, thyme and all kinds of other flavors. It's worth noting that this is probably not a great idea as a dietary replacement, but it's fine from a "tastes good" point of view.

Last week I make a really good creamy mushrooms on toast - just like you get at the cafe. The star of the dish was the big portobello mushrooms, with the sauce made based on little button mushrooms nearing the end of their life. Add olive oil, butter, white wine vinegar, thyme, garlic and the right amount of cream and it's a perfect Sunday breakfast.

Mushroom Pasta

Taking the concept of the mushrooms on toast, with all those lovely ingredients that just play so nicely together, I turned this simple recipe into a pasta dish. Make a double batch so you have one for the table and one for the freezer.

Portobello mushrooms, halved
Button or brown mushrooms, chopped finely
4 cloves of garlic
1 medium onion
One glass of white wine
200ml fresh cream
A few sprigs of fresh thyme
Olive oil, and a good knob of butter
A medium bunch of spinach
(optional) 2 chicken thighs
250g penne pasta or macaroni
Salt + pepper
Grated Parmesan and cheddar cheese to top

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Cook the pasta to packet directions, and preheat the oven to 200 degrees Celsius.

Crush and chop the garlic. Slice or dice the onion. Chop the thyme. Chop the spinach. Dice the button mushrooms really small. Slice the portobello mushrooms in half or quarters if they are really big.

Add all these ingredients to a hot pan with some olive oil and a good knob of butter. Cook for 5 minutes, then take off the heat.

If you are adding chicken to this dish, cook the chicken in the same fry pan, without cleaning in between. There should be enough oil in the pan for the chicken, and plenty of leftover flavor in there. Once the chicken is browned, add the mushroom / spinach mix back to the pan, with a glass of white wine and 200ml cream.

Cook for a few minutes, it should be looking quite wet by this stage (which we want so it can soak into the pasta).

Pasta time

In shallow baking dishes, line the bottom with your cooked pasta. Put a layer of mushroom/chicken mix on top, and stir through if you like. Add a layer of cheese to top (to any thickness you like). A 50/50 mix of fresh Parmesan and tasty cheddar is especially nice.

Cook for about 30 minutes and serve.

Source: Fun things with Mushrooms

What's cooking?

Mon, 25 Jun 2007 00:00:00 +1200

Soft flour tortillas are actually quite simple things to make, but there are a lot of different soft flour tortilla recipes out there it's hard to know where to start.

I thought I'd create my own simple tortilla recipe seeing as I love them so much. Many recipes on the internet are based around vegetable shortening, which I do have in the cupboard but didn't see the point in using. As it turns out, you don't need it, and self-raising flour + milk + oil is all you need to get a great result.

Supermarket made tortillas are also pretty good, but nothing beats homemade and fresh.

Ingredients

3 cups of self raising flour
1 cup of milk
5 Tbsp olive oil
Extra flour for rolling

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Mixin'

I'm a cheat. Add all ingredients to a breadmaker, and mix using the dough setting. Most breadmakers will allow the dough time to rise, but this isn't going to happen here without any yeast. So feel free to stop the breadmaker as soon as the dough looks properly mixed.

Rollin'

Divide the dough into 12 small portions (smaller recipe pictured) and roll into balls.

Using a well-floured surface, roll the dough into a flat pancake, about 20cm diameter. The dough should be very thin, but still feel strong.

Cookin'

Use a non-stick fry pan and heat to a medium-hot temperature. I don't use any oil here as it just makes your food greasy, but the extra flour left on the tortilla plus the teflon surface of the fry pan should provide adequate lubrication.

Small bubbles will appear inside the tortilla, which will go brown on top. Flip after about 30 seconds and cook the other side.

Eatin'

Quesadillas are pretty hard to beat, but fresh burritos are also a nice way of eating your tortillas.

For the quesadillas, I added some marinated beef, fresh veges and cheese between 2 tortillas and heated on the fry pan until the cheese melted through.

Delicious.

Source: What's cooking?