I Confess I Like Katy Perry - Sticky Date Pudding

Cook Meter: Intermediate
Cost Meter: $ (unless you don't have the staples, flour, butter baking power and soda)

Last year I travelled to Brisbane to watch a Katy Perry concert with a friend of mine. It was one of the best concerts I have ever been too.  My usual musical tastes, are quite eclectic (mainly classic rock, indie, anything played on Triple J) but I must admit I told very few people I was going as I knew I would be ridiculed by most, to not only own both of her CDs but to be travelling to another city to see her concert.

What has this got to do with food, nothing really except that this recipe always make me think of her song "Hot and Cold". Hot and cold desserts, as I like to call them are, hot puddings, pies and the like, that are then slathered in ice-cream and/or cream. This melts into a decadent sauce that makes me drooooool...

Another recipe from Masterchef Kids be warned this recipe will serve an entire rugby team. When it came out of the oven I nearly had a heart attack and I had to freeze some and take it with me to Christmas dinner.

Sticky Date Pudding - adapted from the Masterchef Kids recipe

Ingredients:

340g dried dates, pitted, chopped (Save yourself some time and buy the chopped ones, it took ages to do myself as they were so sticky!)

2 tsp baking soda
500ml water
120g butter
340g brown sugar
4 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
340g self raising flour

Caramel Sauce
400g brown sugar
200ml cream
A stick of butter


Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 150 degrees Celsius. Grease a 26cm tin (should have been my first clue to the size of the mixture). The recipe calls for a spring form tin. But I used one of those silicon "tins" and it worked just the same.

2. Put the date, baking soda and water into a (large enough to hold your entire mixture) saucepan and bring to the boil.

3. Turn down to a low heat and cook for about 3 -5 mins or until the dates begin to break apart. Once this has happened take off the heat and cool for about 3 mins.

4. Add the butter and stir until it has melted into the mixture.

5. Add lightly whisked eggs, sugar and vanilla and mix well.

6. Fold in your sifted flour and when just mixed pour into your greased tin.

7. Cook for an hour or until a skewer inserted and pulled out clean.

8. Add all of the sauce ingredients together on a medium heat until they have melted and combined.

9. Serve with a giant scoop (or two) of icecream.

Merry Christmas and Happy 2012 from Bread And Sniff It

What did everyone do over the Christmas period??  These were a few of my favourite things

1. EATING  A FISTFUL OF GLAZED HAM. I tried a Nigella Lawson recipe, I trust her, she has that look, like one of your friend's Mums, who always convinces you to eat another pudding. You can tell she isn't one for counting calories.
2. Decorated my Christmas Tree. My Mum has sent me the most beautiful Christmas decoration of a little Maori girl. I love it, that and the golden fantails that peak their heads around from my fake tree branches.
3. Enjoyed a Summer Christmas. Yes I understand that a white Christmas may be amazing but to me nothing beats the summer, lounging by the pool, eating fresh seafood and day-time watching/playing the cricket.

4. Spending time with friends and family. Although I wasn't be in New Zealand for Christmas this year, I had my second family the Smith/Williams to hang out with. I couldn't think of a better alternate family to be with.  Plus it's always fun to hang out with people who are in love with food as much as I am.
   
   

   

   Image from winemakers.com.au

5. French Champagne.  Only a recent addition to my Christmas loves, but this is the only time of the year that I can convince Nick that buying a real French Champagne is worth it. That and it holds a special place in our hearts as we went on a trip to the Champagne region in France the day we got engaged.

So what did everyone else do this year?  I hope you surrounded yourselves with all the people and things that you love while also taking to the time to help those less fortunate.  Christmas after all is about giving.  So I hope you all had a very happy and safe Christmas and that everyone is getting geared up to jump into the year 2012.

P.S. My new years resolution is to beat the dismal amount 26 blog posts that I had last year.  I want to get closer to the 46 I had in 2010.  I'm pretty sure I can do that.

Seafood Chowder or is it Soup?

Cook Meter: Amateur
Cost Meter:  $

Nick and I have been on a massive health kick doing this workout system called P90X. What it has meant is that my usual meals have gone down the gurgler and have now been replaced with some form of protein, some carbs and vegies or salad. Although I have never been happier to eat steak, salmon and chicken all the time, meal time has been getting a little boring.

I needed to find a seafood recipe of some sort with a twist, when I thought of making seafood chowder. I know most people have their own seafood chowder recipe but if you're like me and have NEVER made it before what do you do?

I also needed it to be reasonably healthy (can you even say healthy and chowder in the same sentence). I don't think you can.  So here is my recipe I just made up, it's pretty good, although I put too much chilly in my version, so I have halved it for you here. If you like it hot and have a cold, double the chilli quantity.

Ingredients

500 grams of marinara mix (I got mine for coles for $5! Cheapest seafood I've ever bought)
1 brown onion
4 cloves garlic
1 large long red chilli
zest of one lemon
50g butter
2 tbsp white flour
1/2 cup white wine
2 cups of low fat milk
3 cups of low sodium chicken stock
5 stalks of celery
A handful of parsley finely chopped
Salt and pepper to taste

Method:

1. Add butter to a large pot, and brown the onions for a minute, add the garlic, chilli and lemon zest and fry for a further 3 min.

2. Add the flour and cook for about 4 mins. You may need to scrape up the bits off the bottom so that it won't burn.

3. Add the wine, it will pretty much evaporate but you will be left with that great wine smell.

4. Slowly add the milk until it creates a thick sauce like consistentcy. Now because I want to make it healthier, I've substituted all the rest of the milk or cream with stock. keep adding to you get the consistency that you like. I needed it to be thinner to reduce the calorie content per portion size.

5. Season with salt and pepper to taste and add celery. I wanted my celery crunchy so I left it in the soup for only 5 mins before adding the seafood.

6. I cut my marinara mix into smaller portions and then added to soup and cooked for 2 - 3 min max.

7. Chuck a couple of really nice buns in the oven and then serve. Delish. If you are not being so health conscious like me, smother your hot bread with butter. If you are get your butt on the treadmill for 30mins so you can add butter to your bread too!

Lame Jokes Make Me Smile - Mango Glazed Pork

Cook Meter: Amateur

Cost Meter:  $



I love the really lame jokes. The ones that are supposed to not be funny always break me into fits of giggles. I must say that I am an easily entertained person and it doesn't take much to keep me happy. So when the recent Get Some Pork on Your Fork ads came out, I loved them. I know everyone else hates them. The look of bewilderment on the boyfriend's face when the friends say that he should "Pork" his girlfriend makes me smile.

Whenever we have pork chops they are always crumbed, it's just a habit. So this week we thought maybe we should get a bit more adventurous with our chops.  I had a look through my Jamie Oliver cookbooks and found something fast and easy. Exactly what I needed.

Mango Glazed Pork Chops - adapted from Jamie Oliver's Ministry of Food

Ingredients

1 Pork Chop per person
1 tbsp Mango chutney
Salt and pepper to season
Olive Oil

Method

1. Using a sharp knife cut off the rind off the chops.  You could attempt to make crackling like the recipes said but I found that it took too long and wasn't worth it.

2. Cut slices through the fat every 1cm, this will help it render.

3. Coat in oil, salt and pepper and place in a hot frypan.

4. Cook for 5 to 6 minutes turning every minute.

5. Place your mango chutney on the pork chop and flip continously making sure the chutney covers the chop. 

6. Once it is properly coated, take out of the pan and rest for 5mins. 

I cut my chops into pieces, poured excess mango chutney from the pan on top and sprinkled with coriander.  I then served it with rice and a nice tomato and cucumber salad.

Lemon Meringue Cupcakes

Cook Meter: Intermediate
Cost Meter:  $

Masterchef Junior is back on again. And although I don't watch it I'm astounded by the culinary talent that these kids have. Seriously did they come out of the womb with a whisk in their hands.  So when I saw a contestant from the first year cook lemon meringue cupcakes and seeing I had a bag of lemons in my fridge and a full carton of eggs I thought I would give it a try.

The cupcakes recipe I took from my trusty Edmonds Cookbook. A kiwi kitchen staple, (for all you Aussies or Americans out there), the lemon curd and meringue recipe came from the Masterchef website. Something that looks quite intricate and fiddly for my clumsy hands was actually really simple to make. And yet they still have the power to make people who see them go oohhh and aahhhhh.

Give it a try and if you start to think that it's too hard, just tell yourself. If a 12 year old can do it. So can I!

Lemon Meringue Cupcakes (adapted from the Edmonds Cookbook and the Masterchef website)

Ingredients:

Cupcakes:
125 grams butter
3/4 cup caster sugar
1 tsp vanilla essense
2 eggs
1 cup plain flour
1/2 cup milk

Lemon Curd:
1/2 cup lemon juice
1/2 cup caster sugar
3 egg yolks
1 egg

Meringue:
3 egg whites
1/2 caster sugar

Method:

Preheat oven to 180 degrees celcius

1. Cream together butter, sugar and vanilla essence together.

2. Fold in the sifted flour.

3. Add the milk.

4. Split the batter into twelve patty cake tins.

5. Cook for 15mins or until the cakes spring back when you touch them.

6. Cool on a wire rack

Lemon Curd

1. Add lemon juice and sugar in a small saucepan and heat until the sugar has dissolved.

2. Add egg and yolks.

3. Stir continuously until the mixture thickens to the consistency of warm custard.

4. Place in a low baking tray and cool.

Meringue

1. Whisk your egg whites in a mixer until peaks begin to form.

2. Add sugar slowly, meringue is ready when you can tip the bowl and the mixture does not move.  You should also not feel any sugar crystals when you rub the mixture between your fingers.

Compiling the Meringues

1. Take your cup-cake and scope out a hole.

2. Spoon in the lemon curd.

3. Pipe on some meringue and place under a medium to high grill until they have nicely browned.

An Old Friend: Macaroni Cheese

Cook Meter: Intermediate
Cost Meter:  $

Lately I have been getting back to basics and cooking meals that I used to have quite frequently. The ones that you begged your mother not to make when you were little. With all the experimenting I have been doing of late, these kitchen staples have fallen by the wayside, like high school friends being replaced by your cool overly sophisticated uni buddies.

Sometimes the overly sophisticated can be a condescending pain in the butt and walking back into the welcoming arms of a long-time friends can feel like a hot water bottle in a New Zealand winter.

So today I convinced Nick to make Macaroni Cheese, it's my recipe I taught him to cook it and he made enough to feed a truckload of people. Why? I think it's a throw back from family meals, seriously does anyone know the proportions to make Mac'n'Cheese for two. Well I don't. So what will I be eating for the next few days? This, that's for sure.

Disclaimer: this pic isn't the finished result. I just couldn't find a way to make the sloppy mess of Mac'n'Cheese attractive and you know what. I like it that way. It's not trying to be pretty, just chilling, trying to be itself.

Ingredients:

250g Macaroni
6 rashers Bacon
4 spring Onion
200g Mushrooms

75g Butter
3 tbsp Plain Flour
3 cups Milk
1 cup Grated Cheese

Additional cheese and breadcrumbs for the top

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees celcius.

2. Slice the bacon, mushrooms and spring onions and saute in a pan until cooked. Put aside

3. Boil a pot of water and cook the macaroni, drain and put aside.

4. Put a saucepan on a medium heat and melt the butter.

5. Add the flour and stir, you want it to cook for about 3 - 4 minutes like this, if you don't it will taste floury.

6.  Now turn the heat down and slowly add the milk bit by bit. Do not stop stirring, if you do you are going to end up with lumpy sauce.

7.  Once you have used all the milk and the sauce has begun to thicken add the cheese and mix till it has all melted.

8. Stir everything together in a large dish, coat with grated cheese and breadcrumbs and place under the grill until it goes nice and golden brown.

My Favourite Things: Chicken Satay

Cook Meter: Amateur
Cost Meter:  $$

When I was in primary school, there was a song we used to sing about Peanut Butter. I felt like my teacher had snuck into my house and had been watching me (in a non scary way) and that I was her muse for this song.

"Peanut butter...yes please, Peanut butter....not cheese"

I was, and still am addicted to peanut butter. In fact, when we have a tub (I now have to resort to buying it ever so often so I don't get fat) it will be gone in a week. A week! And my partner only eats it if there is no marmite.

I like it in ice-cream, in chocolate bars, with jam, with honey, on crackers, in biscuits and with my chicken. I've been looking for a Satay recipe for a while, one that uses coconut milk. The luscious creamy type that makes you want to lick your bowl and I have finally found it, in the New Idea of all places.

Even Nick turned to me and said, "This is the best satay I have ever had, including all the restaurants I have been too."
Adapted from New Idea's Creamy Chicken Satay

Ingredients
1/2 cup chunky peanut butter
270ml can light coconut milk
2 tbsp Indonesian sweet soy sauce
1/2 cup chicken stock
8 chicken thigh fillets
2 tblsps peanut oil
1 onion
2 cloves garlic
1 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp ground coriander
1 tsp ground turmeric
1 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp chilli powder
1/2 cup of frozen peas
150g  of snow peas

Method:

1. Heat half of the peanut oil in a wok. Brown and cook the chicken.

2. Add the other half of the oil and fry the garlic and onion until soft, add the spices.

3. Mix together in a bowl the soy, peanut butter, coconut milk and stock.

4. Put the chicken and the peanut sauce mixture into the wok and cook for 5 mins.

5.  Add the vegetables and cook for a further 1 - 2 minutes. You want the vegies hot but not soft.

6. Serve with rice.