Homemade Takeaway

Upfront apologies to any vegetarians out there.  You may not wish to read any further.  Mr Provincial and I were musing the other week about how we miss having the occasional takeaway.  It is not really since we left Sydney (three moves ago) that we have had takeaway on a semi-regular basis.  There, we were lucky to live near a really good pizza shop (mmm, greek lamb pizza), a mexican restaurant, indian takeaway and nice fish and chips shop.  Nowhere else have we found a pizza shop with a 'gourmet' pizza worth its $15-20 pricetag; we make our own now.

Anyway, in another pregnancy fog moment the other week I bought the wrong kind of mince (a half price markdown where I got carried away, and brought home four packets).  Generally, I buy the leanest of the minces - Heartsmart at Woolworths - but this time I bought premium which seems to be quite a bit fattier.  I used two packets up in bolognaise (four containers stowed in the freezer for post baby) and homemade taco mix.  But, I was a little distressed at seeing the fat rise to the surface once they were in the freezer, so I concluded the other packets should be used in something where the excess fat would cook off.  Homemade burgers seemed the order of the day, because we could cook them on the BBQ and the fat would drain.

So, homemade patties were made.  I just blitzed a couple of old bread crusts in the food processer with an onion.  Tipped that and an egg into my mince, mixed together and formed patties.

Yes, we have a lot of cooked patties in the freezer now!

Bread rolls were prepped in the breadmaker and finished in the oven.

Mr Provincial's homegrown and personally preserved beetroot was opened.  I still can't believe he took it upon himself to preserve them the night before we packed the house in Toowoomba!  It is very Australian to have beetroot on your burger.

I was planning to make oven fries but Mr Provincial requested smashed potatoes.  If you haven't tried The Pioneer Woman's recipe yet - you should.  Mr Provincial, who doesn't particularly like potatoes, loves this and has been requesting them about once a week.

Served with tomato, cheese, relish and lettuce we call this the miniature Provincial burger:) 

Unusual Market Vegetable 1: Pumpkin Greens

Mr Provincial and I had a discussion over the weekend, the conclusion of which being that since we arrived in Darwin we have not eaten nearly enough vegetables.  The cause we decided was not knowing what to do with three-quarters of the vegetables we encounter at our essentially Asian market (Rapid Creek for Posie Patchwork's info).  So we decided he would purchase one or two extra 'unusual' vegetables a week and we would research how to cook them once he had brought them home.

This week on of those vegetables was a $2 bunch of pumpkin greens which he asserts were selling like hotcakes to the Asian and African communities.  My research confirms they are widely eaten in South Asia and rural Africa.  They are a rich souce of Vitamin A.

I found some more complicated recipes on the web, but in the end decided to keep it simple.  After rinsing, I chopped the greens into large pieces, and stir-fryed them in a little olive oil and salt for about 5 minutes (until cooked down).  

Then I tossed through about four cloves of chopped garlic.

Can you say delicious?  Even ginger ate some of the stems - they sufficiently resemble beans for her to give them a go.

Homemade English Muffins

One of the doyens of the Australian cookery scene is Stephanie Alexander.  In her epic A-Z of ingredients recipe book The Kitchen Companion she gives her basic (and highly forgiving) recipe for American style muffins and writes "English-style muffins are flattish yeast buns intended to be split, toasted and buttered.  They are available everywhere one buys bread".

Shame on you Stephanie, they are also very easy to make at home.  I made our first batch using the breadmaker and this recipe on the weekend.  And they are in a class of their own - while you can clearly identify that they are English Muffins they have a much better flavour than the supermarket versions and, not all the added ingredients.  Is there anyone else that gets uneasy when they read ingredient lists on packets?  It doesn't always stop me buying a product but it certainly makes me uncomfortable.

Our breadmaker is proving its value day after day.  I have ummed and ahhed over making its purchase for so many years; and while I did  make bread by hand it was highly supplemented by bought loaves.   The breadmaker is making sure everything is happening at home.  By far the best price we could find was on Powerbuys.  I have to say their customer service was excellent.

And, Ginger is loving the boxes.  Here she is reading "Jack" in one of her boxes.

On a rainy sunday...

It is best to get plenty of rest while your people go to the market to get fresh fruit and vegetables.

Eat Cake. 

And get on with a current craft project.  192 squares finally cut and the quilt laid out.

Go to evening church service and have supper - which means you only need to take a plate to share and you don't have to cook when you get home.  Also, that Ginger is so worn out by keeping up with the bigger kids (and they are all bigger than her) that she just falls into bed leaving you to get on with the week's ironing and good TV watching (anyone else watch the great detective program Zen on ABC1?).

Where did last week go?  I had so many intentions of blogging much more regularly this year (I even instituted 5am wake-ups as a way of managing it) but last week just got away from me.  Mr Provincial ended up with a four day long weekend thanks to the Australia Day public holiday and a generous CO so we had sleep-ins (thank you Ginger!) and tackled some jobs around the house in the morning hours when I would normally blog.  Also had visits to the midwife and that delightful later pregnancy glucose tolerance test.  Baby boy is doing well, with a strong heartbeat and already seems to be head down - such a different pregnancy to his sister's:). 

Simplicity Sand Cake

This recipe was given to me by an older lady at our last church.  It falls into that delightful category of beat and bake cakes.  I make it pretty frequently.

1 cup Self-raising flour

1 heaped tablespoon cornflour

3/4 cup sugar

125g butter softened

2 eggs

1/2 cup milk

1/2 teaspoon vanilla essence

Place all the above ingredients in a bowl and beat for 6 minutes.  Bake in a ring tin at 175 degrees for about 30 minutes.

We like to eat our cake fresh and dusted with vanilla icing sugar.

Rosewater and Lemon Cheesecake

I made a cheesecake on Friday.

Everything that could go wrong went wrong with the making.  Not so the eating.  The eating was very good.

So, what happened?

1 kg of cream cheese turns out to be much more expensive than I had anticipated - about $16 for 1 kg.  I ended up buying homebrand for about $10.

The food processor blade broke on both sides trying to blend the semi-solid cream cheese.

The cake had to be baked in a water bath and it turns out that we don't have a baking tray big enough to contain our large round cake tin.  I found that out after I had already baked the cake base in said large round cake tin.

I thought I would be very clever and substitute our giant square cake tin (from Ginger's baptism) for the baking tray.  Turns out the cake tin leaks - a lot.  So there was boiling water all through the oven and all over the floor.

I persevered though, topping up the water with freshly boiled water every ten minutes for the 90 minute cooking time.  I hadn't accounted for what would happen when I had to take the whole thing out of the oven and that steady stream of boiling water became a torrent.  It may have involved some yelling at Ginger to "get out of the kitchen.  Mummy is not cross but it is not safe in here at the moment."  and a slightly scalded leg (nothing aloe vera wasn't able to fix).

And, the couple we went to dinner with, for whom I had baked the cake.  Well, it turns out she is a coeliac and couldn't eat it anyway.

On the plus side, it did taste good.  Very good.

Lemon and Rosewater Cheesecake

From We Love Food

200g gingernut biscuits
40g unsalted butter, melted
1kg cream cheese
240g caster sugar
3 tbsp lemon juice
grated zest of 1 lemon
1 tsp of vanilla extract
2 tsp rosewater (optional)
4 eggs, at room temperature

Preheat the oven to 170 degrees C.  Grease a round 23cm spring-form.  Place the tin on a large sheet of foil and press it up the outsides of the tin to seal.  Repeat the process so it is double-wrapped.

Place the biscuits and melted butter in a food processor and pulse until finely ground.  Spoon the biscuit mix into the base of the tin and press to form an even layer.  Bake for 8-10 minutes, or until golden and fragrant.  Set aside to cool.

Blend the cream cheese in a clean food processor until smooth.  Add the sugar, lemon juice and zest, vanilla and rosewater and blend until combined.  Add the eggs, one at a time, while the processor is still going.

Pour the mixture into the prepared tin.  Place the tin in a deep baking tray on top of a cake cooling rack and pour in enough hot water to come about 2.5cm up the side of the tin.  Bake for 1-11/2 hours, or until the top of the cake is golden brown and a skewer inserted comes out clean.  Remove from the oven and take the tin out of the water removing the tinfoil immediately.  Allow the cheesecake to cool completely in the tin.  This will stop the base from going soggy.  Carefully remove the cheesecake, lightly wrap in cling-wrap and refrigerate for at least 4 hours before serving.

Sunday Yumminess

Despite the heat up here we haven't really got away from our tradition of a little Sunday yumminess with afternoon tea (or in Mr Provincial's case coffee).

Yesterday I tweaked a friend's Date Loaf recipe and I must say I am pleased with the moist result.  And, it is practically healthy with no sugar in the recipe.  Spread a little butter on a slice for an extra ray of sunshine.

Date Loaf

Ingredients

250g dates, chopped in half

50g butter

1 tsp bi-carbonate of soda

1 1/2 cups hot water

1 3/4 cups self-raising flour

1 egg

Method

Boil first four ingredients for two minutes.  Cool and add flour and egg.  Pour into a loaf tin and bake at 170 degrees Celsius for 30 minutes.

Vegan Eating: 10 days in

These are just some of the meals we have enjoyed over the last ten days of Heather's Vegan Challenge.

Some observations:

• I am really missing tea. I drink my tea white so in the absence of milk I have no desire to drink it.  On the plus side I have discovered fresh mint tea.  I have always drunk peppermint tea - the dried teabag variety - but a fresh pot is an altogether different offering.
• Sweet potato cooked in coconut oil is our new go to for baked vegetables.
• Organisation is key.  I really have to plan my menu a couple of days out and remember to allow time to soak and then cook my legumes.  I have been using my slow cooker for the cooking part.
• Healthy sweet treats can be really, really good.
• Heather's curried chickpeas are hidden gold for a quick healthy snack.  Ginger loves them too.
• Breakfast is probably my biggest challenge to leave out dairy.  I have a confession - I am having proper old-fashioned porridge:)  I went a week without but I just really couldn't take almond milk.
• Neither my husband nor myself have been hungry while eating this way.  Admittedly, he hasn't exactly stuck to the rules as closely as I; but I think this is a real positive.  While we don't have plans to eat vegan long term - I think the whole food aspect of this exercise has been very valuable.

Recipe: Almond Friands

I made these on Friday and a lot of them got eaten over the weekend!

I used to always think I was virtuous when I ordered a friand rather than a piece of cake because it was so much smaller! I have had to rethink that supposition.  There is a lot of butter in these.

When we lived in Sydney there used to be a little cafe in The Rocks DH and I would go to which had a name something to do with a Gumnut - exactly what I can't recall - and I would always order one of their berry friands.  Come to think of it, I don't think I have actually eaten a friand since then:)

Anyway, I was attracted to this recipe because it calls for only egg whites.  We have a lot of egg whites sitting in our freezer because we always freeze spare egg whites when a recipe calls only for yolks and there is only so many pavlovas and merringues one family can eat.  Last year we made so many merringues that we could hardly stomach Eton mess anymore - if you were familiar with my husband's love of cream you would know how unlikely that was!

Anyway, the recipe...

Almond Friands from Country Style June 2010

Makes 12

1 1/2 cups pure icing sugar

1 cup almond meal

1/2 cup plain flour

6 egg whites

250g unsalted butter, melted

icing sugar, to dust

Preheat oven to 180C.  Grease a 12 cup muffin tray.  Combine icing sugar, almond meal and flour in a bowl.  Whisk egg whites in a bowl with a fork.  Add to flour mixture with butter.  Stir until well combined.  Stand for 20 minutes.

Spoon mixture into prepared moulds.  Bake for 15-20 minutes or until skewer inserted into centres comes out clean.

Set aside to cool in tray until cooled to room temperature.  Turn out onto a rack to cool further.  Dust generously with icing sugar and serve.

Recipe: Braised leek and cabbage salad with poached eggs and roasted kipflers

We have so many leeks in our vegetable patch at the moment, that to make an indent on them the other evening I made this take on a Australian Women's Weekly Recipe (Cook, p. 339 if you have access to witlof cabbages and want the original).  I would say however, that unless you have access to homegrown leeks you might find this a pricy meal!  Leeks retail around $2 each here.

Serves 2

500g kipfler potatoes, halved lengthways
1 tsp sea salt
1/2 tsp cracked black pepper
1 clove garlic, crushed
cooking oil spray
1/2 tbsp olive oil
10 baby leeks, trimmed to 15cm in length
300g white cabbage
1/3 cup dry white wine
1/2 cup vegetable stock
1/2 tsp white sugar
4 eggs

Creamy Chive Dressing
1 tbsp lemon juice
1/2 tbsp wholegrain mustard
1/3 cream
good handful of chives (the original recipe uses chervil)

1.  Preheat oven to moderately hot (180C fan forced)
2.  Make dressing by combining ingredients in a screw-top jar, shake well.
3.  Toss potato with salt, pepper and garlic in baking dish; coat lightly with spray.  Roast uncovered, about 50 minutes or until tender and crisp.
4.  Meanwhile, heat oil in a flameproof baking dish cook leeks and cabbage 1 minute.  Add wine, stock and sugar; bring to the boil.  Reduce heat, simmer, uncovered, 2 minutes.  Cover tightly, bake in oven for last 20 minutes of potato cooking time.
5.  Poach eggs using your favourite method.  Drain on absorbent paper when cooked.  We have a snazzy old-fashioned egg poacher which produces perfect eggs everytime.  I wouldn't dare advise how to poach eggs freehand:)
6.  Divide potato and cabbage between plates; top with leeks and two eggs each drizzle with dressing.

On My Mind: Chewy Health Slice

Joining Rhonda in sharing what has been on my mind.

Earlier in the week Katy of The Non-Consumer Advocate asked for a muslie bar recipe.  So, when I did the grocery shopping yesterday I grabbed the extra ingredients I needed to make up my favourite recipe - ALDI was out of dried apricots so I had to do an extra stop at Woolworths:)  Incidentally, ALDI has put up its price quite significantly on dried apricots - is this the same the world over?  There was even a sign explaining that a shortage of apricots meant regretably there had to be a price rise!

My recipe comes from my Mum's old copy of Mouthwatering Meatless Meals - a World Vision fundraiser. 

It is yummy!

Ingredients
1 cup wholemeal self raising flour
1/2 cup coconut
1/4 cup rolled oats
2 tbsp sunflower seeds
1 tbsp sesame seeds
1/2 cup chopped dried apricots
1/4 cup chopped dates
1/2 cup sultanas
1/2 cup chopped nuts
1/2 cup brown sugar
125g butter or margarine
2 dspn golden syrup ( I know this is hard to get in the US, perhaps molasses or maple syrup could be substituted)
vanilla essence or extract

Method
Melt butter and golden syrup.  Add to dry ingredients.  Mix thoroughly.  Press into flat tin.  Bake in moderate over for 20 minutes.

Unplugged Sunday

DH and I have noticed a phenomenon about ourselves - ultimately much of our time is spent in the pursuit of good food.  When we reminisce about our overseas adventures much of our focus is on meals eaten - that spicy goulash in Dresden, curries at the Civil Service Club in Singapore (incidentally my in-laws are moving back to Singapore so I forsee many Civil Service Club curries for us in the next couple of years), felafel in Egypt, and that really good hot chocolate in Munich (should you ever go - it was at a bakery next to the entrance to Nymphenburg Palace). 
When we look back on our previous postings and talk about where we would go back to, again the issue of where we would eat comes up.  Malaysian at Mamak in Sydney, lamb shanks at the Athenian restaurant (also Sydney), noodle soup at Noodle Kingdom and pasta at Pelligrini's in Melbourne.  We have hardly eaten out at all this posting because dining out with a toddler is just not worth the money or effort.

It is probably not surprising then that when we have time to cook on the weekend we go to town.  Unplugged sunday is allowing us this luxury.  Essentially slow food, lovingly prepared together.

This weekend we did The Hairy Bikers South American Chilli Con Carne (recipe here) - my changes: black eyed beans instead of kidney beans, 2 red capsicums (peppers) instead of one red, one green and I cut the chilli down so that Ginger could eat it.  It was really good fresh, reheated the next day and, yesterday for lunch on rolls with avocado.

Some meals just do not photograph well!

While I made dinner DH got on with shortbread - his second batch for the week; fortunately he took the first batch to work to share and I took half of this batch next door to our Laotian neighbour to say thank you for some freshly made spring rolls she had dropped round.

Also in the works was an apple and rhubarb pie.  Again, DH's handiwork.

All in all, a hearty winter feast.  Warming to body and soul. 

Another successful unplugged Sunday.

On My Mind: Baking Day

As per last week, I am joining in Rhonda's On My Mind series.

I had a baking day yesterday to restock the freezer.  In retrospect I think I bit off a bit more than I could chew as by mid afternoon I couldn't face going back into the kitchen to make tea and Ginger's patience had definitely run out!  Fortunately, I had some pizza bases I had prepared a few weeks earlier in the freezer so we didn't succumb to the lure of takeaway!  I think this is an important money saving tool - pre-prepared or partially made meals you can whip out at a moment's notice and have dinner on the table even if you can't face cooking.

My baking used up lots of the floaters in our cupboard - Gingercake (recipe here) used up some lurking glace ginger, the fruit cake some currants bought for Christmas (recipe here), lunchtime chapattis (not pictured, but recipe from the Hairy Biker's Cookbook) some wholemeal flour which I wasn't sure whether was plain or self-raising (must label, label, label....) and the custard cookies (recipe here) custard powder I bought 4 years ago!  Most satisfactory!  The white container is yoghurt being made

And, now there can be no further complaints from DH that there is nothing left in the freezer for him to take for morning tea.  He does like a daily sweet treat.  The bread will be put to work for lunch today - I am thinking cheese and tomato toasties.

Beauty that Moves Frugal Food Inspiration

Some of you may know that Heather of Beauty the Moves is starting a weekly post on thrifty kitchen ideas.

Inspired by her recent post on the quiche as a frugal food I whipped up a pumpkin quiche for lunch yesterday to clear out a few of the floaters in the fridge.  You know, those ingredients that you bought for one recipe but only needed a small amount of and so float in the fridge for weeks.

The additions  / changes I made to the recipe are as follow:

As per Heather's recipe I softened two cloves of garlic and one chopped onion.
To that I added:
2 cup pumpkin, chopped small and roasted with olive oil, salt and pepper and sage leave (from our herb garden) - I did it at 200C for about 40 mins.
a small piece of feta, crumbled

I lined a quiche dish with filo pastry - ours having suffered from a crumbling effect due to long freezer storage, meaning it is useless as normal filo wrapping pastry :)  I just put the flaky bits at the bottem of the quiche dish and add a spray of olive oil.
Placed the pumpkin mix in the quiche dish, covered with custard (as per Beauty that Moves with addition of 1/3 of a packet of sour cream).
I topped that with 1 cup grated cheddar.

Baked at 180C for 40 minutes and served.

Delicious!  Well, to DH and I.  Ginger took one nibble, screwed up her face and threw it on the floor - but then, there was her favourites of cucumber and tomato on offer - and all things are forsaken for those :) 

And, most importantly, my fridge is clear once more.

Happy Australia Day!

Happy Australia Day to my fellow Australians. 

We took advantage of the public holiday to get some jobs done around the house.  DH stripped and re-varnished our outdoor furniture, we sorted through tools and hardware items inherited from my Granddad (only took us 15 months to get around to it) and I baked and baked and baked. 

First, was molasses cookies using this recipe.

Then, a yummy boiled fruit cake.  A hit in our family and neither of us are big fruit cake fans.

Easy Boiled Fruit Cake

500g (1lb) mixed fruit
1 cup sugar
1 cup water
250g (8oz) butter
1 tbs golden syrup
1 tbs coconut
2 tsp cocoa
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda (baking soda)
1 tsp mixed spice
1 tsp instant coffee powder
2 eggs
1 cup self-raising flour
1 cup plain flour

Combine mixed fruit, sugar, water, butter, golden syrup, coconut, cocoa, soda, mixed spice and coffee in saucepan.  Stir over low heat until sugar dissolves, then brint to boil, boil 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.  Remove from heat; cool completely.  Stir in beaten eggs and sifted flours, mix thoroughly.  Spread evenly into greased and paper lined, deep 20cm (8in) square tin.  Bake in slow oven 1 1/2 hours or until cooked when tested.  Cool slightly in tin before turning out.

I'm not sure the exact origin of this recipe - but it was passed down by my Nanna.  Presumably it came from a women's magazine some years ago - it did win Mrs K Renfrey of Auckland a $10 first prize!

And finally, a couple of loaves of bread.  I tried out a new recipe that didn't seem to rise so well.  Still tasty but  a little squat.


Fortunately Ginger was entertained at the back door watching DH doing his work, and then conveniently took a long nap so I could work unhindered.  It is all cut up and frozen for DH's future morning teas and weekend breakfasts.

Flood induced food shortages have lead to a bit of impromptu meal planning here. 

Saturday's dinner was so simple but delicious.

Inspired by Jamie's Dinners (thats Jamie Oliver's Dinners - the cook book) it is a baked sweet potato stuffed with bocconcini and home grown basil, topped with a drizzle of lemon juice and olive oil.  Yummo.

Post Christmas Days

So much reading has been going on here.  DH has been absorbed in Nicholas Monserrat's The Cruel Sea, and Ginger has been positively devouring (in a literal sense) her board books.

Books Ginger pulled off the shelf.

5 minutes later different books off the shelf

For my part I have been tearing through my stash of Christmas books.  It has become a post-Christmas tradition for me to spend the lead up to the new year wallowing in Alexander McCall Smith's latest offerings. 

Such a gentle way to see out the old year.  Only The Double Comfort Safari Club to go and then another 12 month wait to spend time with his characters again.

I have also been digging into my other Christmas gifts, two of Annabel Langbein's cookbooks - The Free Range Cook and Eat Fresh: Cooking Through the Seasons.  I loved watching The Free Range Cook on ABC; set in beautiful New Zealand.  Good thing DH pays attention to these little (subtle?) hints!  So many meals from these books are featuring on my new year's menu plan.  Lucky they are all about fresh, unprocessed ingredients, as according to DH 2011 is the year of looking after his body!

On next fortnight's menu:

• Lamb, Rosemary and Apple Sausage Rolls
• Green Bean and Peanut Noodles
• Caramelised Onion and Feta Tart
• Baked Lemongrass and Chilli Chicken
• Chicken and Mint Salad rolls
• Couscous with Beetroot and Almonds
• Silverbeet, Feta and Pinenut Roll

Yum Yum!

Christmas and its immediate aftermath

Well, Christmas has come and gone - and I never got on here to blog in the leadup to it.  The leftover roast pork is gradually being eaten up, as is the pudding and remaining Christmas baking.  Had a lovely Christmas day with just the three of us.  Up early as Ginger rose at her usual 5am.  Awestruck by her presents!  Played with the wrapping paper rather than the toys but has spent the last two days giving them a thorough working over.

Ginger heads for the pile of presents (I hasten to add not all intended for her).

All for me!

Made it to church and then DH baked a lovely roast and made his final pudding and brandy custard preparations.  Lunched at 12 and the roast pork (free range, don’t you know) was a definite hit with Ginger! 

DH also did potatoes a la Jamie Oliver’s Christmas with butter, Clementine juice (in our case orange) and sage.  Yummy. 

Pudding was a success – despite it not being his Grandma’s official recipe.  We asked her for her recipe as we had so enjoyed a pudding she made a couple of years ago when we spent Christmas in England, she posted us one and the pudding was made; only for her then to tell us that she didn’t follow any particular recipe in making her puddings.

Pudding with garden variety Holly  – homegrown cherry tomatoes and rosemary

Grandma's Christmas Pudding

(makes a huge quantity – we made a third of this amount )

225g raisins

225g currants

225g  sultanas

200g mixed peel

225 shredded suet (we used copha )

500 demera or muscova sugar (we used brown sugar)

225 fresh bread crumbs

75g  plain flour

1 teaspoon nutmeg or cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon ground cloves

1/4 teaspoon salt

40 blanched chopped almonds

1 carrot grated

1 cooking apple, grated

2 lemons, grate the rind and squeeze the juice

3 eggs, whisk with the brandy

150 mls brandy

knob of butter

Add all to a large bowl.

Mix very, very well and leave to stand for a while.

Butter the pudding basin and line the base with paper.

Tip in mixture top with disc of paper and pleat foil to cover the top, tie on.

Cook in the top of a steamer or on a trivet for 5 hours.

Check regularly to make sure it doesn’t boil dry

Store for a month.

Cook for a further 2 hours before eating !!!

Wintery weather made it perfect for a hot midday meal.  The rest of the day, boxing day and today have been occupied with reading (Christmas loot), knitting, planning for the year ahead, playing with toys, bread baking, general pottering and watching the rain streaming down our window!   A delicious way to conclude the year.