Category: Recipes P-Z

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Grey Cold Days

It’s so hard to get inspired on cold, misty cloudy days. The two males of the house – hubby and male puss are snuggled in the lounge in front of the heater with the playstation. Female puss is out in the dining room in direct line with the heat pump snoozing on top of a huge pile of cushions. I decided to warm up the house and our tummys with a cooking morning. First up were pikelets – different recipe this time to add to the recipe pile.

One egg, 3T sugar, 1T melted butter or canola oil, half cup milk. Beat with a fork and then add one cup of self-raising flour, mixing slightly only (like you do with muffins). Add an extra tablespoon butter/oil if using trim milk.

– Alison & Simon Holst

I’ve always known about not overmixing muffins but until I found this recipe I never knew about it for pikelets. It makes them rise really high and fluffy. I make them for my mum now as well and she puts them in the freezer. When you thaw them out pop them in a frying pan with butter (go lovely and crunchy) or put them on the sanwhich press to reheat. Gorgeous with maple syrup.  

Second up was banana cake with cream cheese icing. Makes the house smell beautiful.

Third was hummus. Fourth is lunch – BLTs. Might have to do some exercise this afternoon to burn off all the food! 

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46 days after my resignation

Not long now – I have five days of work left. I think I could be at the office for 24 hours a day and still not get everything completed by Friday. I have managed to find a short term contract for Dec/January while I think about what I want to do long term – I have an interview tomorrow with the recruiter. I did my 300 question aptitude test today on line today – I wonder what all my answers will tell them about me – that I should have stayed in my current job instead of resigning maybe?!! I hope not. My recipe for the month is homemade soft tortillas Flour tortillas . I made these last week and they were absolutely gorgeous. We had warm soft tortillas with chicken (not home grown!) and salad, mmm.

Texas Flour Tortillas (adapted from The Border Cookbook by Cheryl Alters Jamison and Bill Jamison)

Ingredients: Two cups of all-purpose flour (can make them whole wheat by substituting one cup of whole-wheat flour for white flour) , 1 1/2 teaspoons of baking powder, 1 teaspoon of salt, 2 teaspoons of vegetable oil, 3/4 cups of warm milk

Method: Mix together the flour, baking powder, salt and oil. Slowly add the warm milk. Stir until a loose, sticky ball is formed. Knead for two minutes on a floured surface. Dough should be firm and soft. Place dough in a bowl and cover with a damp cloth or plastic wrap for 20 minutes. After the dough has rested, break off eight sections, roll them into balls in your hands, place on a plate (make sure they aren’t touching) and then cover balls with damp cloth or plastic wrap for 10 minutes. (It’s very important to let the dough rest, otherwise it will be like elastic and won’t roll out to a proper thickness and shape.) After dough has rested, one at a time place a dough ball on a floured surface, pat it out into a four-inch circle, and then roll with a rolling pin from the center until it’s thin and about eight inches in diameter. (If you roll out pie crusts you’ll have no problem with this.) Don’t over work the dough, or it’ll be stiff. Keep rolled-out tortillas covered until ready to cook. In a dry iron skillet or comal heated on high, cook the tortilla about thirty seconds on each side. It should start to puff a bit when it’s done. Keep cooked tortillas covered wrapped in a napkin until ready to eat. Can be reheated in a dry iron skillet, over your gas-burner flame or in the oven wrapped in foil. While you probably won’t have any leftovers, you can store in the fridge tightly wrapped in foil or plastic for a day or so. Makes eight tortillas.

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Gorgeous Stewed Apple

Part of picking up food for cheap is making sure you use it. My 3kg of granny smith apples last week for 99c a kg were destined to become stewed apple which I normally make by putting the apples and a bit of sugar in the saucepan and cooking until they soften. For a change I thought I would try the recipe from the Saturday Dominion Post a few weeks ago. The apple comes out with a lovely buttery, lemon taste. I have just used some of the stewed apple to make an apple pie which is presently baking in the oven for dessert.

800 – 900g eating apples (I used a bit more), 40g butter (I used less), about 2Tbsp sugar, 1 lemon.

Peel the apples, core, cut into quarters, then chunks. Melt the butter in the saucepan over a medium heat.

Add the apple and sugar to saucepan, cover with lid and cook on a gentle heat for about 10 minutes. During that time, lift the lid a couple of times to stir the mixture.

When the apple is soft, remove from heat. Taste to see if it is sweet enough, if not stir in a little more sugar. Grate some lemon rind from about half the lemon and stir into the apple. Taste to see if lemony enough.

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Getting out of the Rut

I haven’t been writing lately. It has been a hectic time at work and I have been putting in 80 plus hours a week. I am constantly at a computer but not for blogging. Hubby and I were starting to go off track a little in that we had got bored with our meals and I was constantly tired by the time I got home so it was easier to pick up takeaways a coupe of times a week. Not a good way to be heading in to winter! So this weekend is mostly a weekend off from work and we are getting back on track. We found this recipe in the Dom Post – New World Recipe – a few weeks ago and it has become one of our new dishes.

Tuscan Lamb Chops

6 lamb loin chops , half a cup red or white wine ,1 teaspoon Tuscan seasoning mix , 1 lamb stock cube crumbled or 1 tsp lamb or beef stock powder and  quarter cup cranberry jelly.

 Preheat oven to 180 degrees . Place one or two lamb chops on a piece of foil large enough o completely enclose the chop. On to the lamb in each parcel pour over a little wine, some Tuscan seasoning mix and stock powder and place a tablespoon of cranberry jelly on top.

Fold up the foil to enclose the lamb and seal slightly.  Refrigerate for one to six hours to marinate.  Bake for 35 mins.  Stand for 5 minutes and serve with peas and mashed potatoes.

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Holiday Cooking

My mum just rang me to get a pikelet recipe. I tried this slightly different recipe one evening last week when hubby got cravings – worth adding it to the recipe file. I remember when growing up we used to have this rule in my household that on your pikelets you could have butter and jam or jam and cream but you couldn’t have butter, jam and cream. I think it was my mum’s way of making sure our pikelets were vaguely healthy! One of my favourite ways of having pikelets is re frying them up later in a bit of butter – they go sort of crunchy and golden.

Golden Syrup Pikelets

1 rounded Tbsp golden Syrup, 25g butter, 1 Tbsp sugar, ½ C milk, 1 large egg, 1C self-raising flour. Pour syrup in a bowl with the butter. Warm to soften both, mix in sugar, milk and egg. Sprinkle flour over top, then mix in with a whisk.

(Source unknown)

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Top Hats

Growing up birthdays in our household always involved the making of top hats. I have extended this to Christmas also and made the first Christmas batch a few nights ago for hubby. They are very easy to make with young children also.

Ingredients needed: Chocolate buttons (or a block of chocolate), marshmallows, pebbles, tiny little round paper cases.

Melt the chocolate (only need about half a pack of chocolate melts if you have a packet of Pascall’s marshmallows). Place about a teaspoon full of melted chocolate in a paper case – should be about half full. Place a marshmallow in the middle of the chocolate. Do this for all the paper cases. Then take a pebble and pop it on top of the marshmallow, attaching it with a little spot of chocolate. Place in the fridge to harden.

Traditionally we always made these with milk chocolate but hubby has been nagging me to make them with white chocolate so I gave it a try the other night. Definitely only to be tried if you have an incredibly sweet tooth!!DSC01339

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Food Challenge Update

We made it! Tomorrow we get to shop after not food shopping last week and instead living the week from what was already in the house. I have to confess we did cheat for the cats and buy them cat food because they kicked up a fuss over cheese on toast when the cat meat ran out. Male cat got a little grumpy and started boxing female cat’s ears so we realised that perhaps not every member of a household is able to live within the confines of a food challenge. Hubby also cheated by buying his lunch for work –he will only go so far with food challenges. If I was living alone I could probably go a few more days without shopping but I will give in as hubby is hanging out for his weekend bacon and eggs.

This morning I whipped up a batch of anzac biscuits (see recipes A-L) as we have nothing sweet in the house and then went through the cookbooks to see if there was anything I could make from the ingredients we had left. Found Alison Holst’s recipe for scone dough and whipped up my first ever batch of scones, adding cheese and home grown chives. (I have made scones years ago but always from a pack!). When I got home later hubby had already sampled the scones and was placing his order that the next batch should be cheese and onion so I’m guessing they passed the seal of approval. 

Basic Scone Dough

2C self – raising flour, 25g butter, ¾ C milk

Measure the flour into the food processor bowl. Add the butter cut into cubes and process until chopped into small pieces. Tip into a bowl and add the milk all at once. Cut and stir the liquid into the dry ingredients. Add a little more milk or flour if the mixture seems too dry or wet. The scones will rise better if the mixture has been lightly kneaded with your fingertips before it is rolled out. Pat or roll the scone mix into a 20cm square shape. Cut into 9 squares and place on a baking tray 1cm apart. Bake at 200 degrees C for 10-15 minutes.

Source:Alison Holst’s Meals Without Meat 1990

(I don’t use a food processor – when I was young my mum taught me the trick of grating cold butter into the flour and then rubbing the flour/butter between your hands. You get the same effect as a food processor and it only takes about a minute) .

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Pita Bread Crisps

Homemade pita bread crisps are my new thing the last few weeks. I had to go to the office today to work (Saturday) so just grabbed a container of pita bread crisps that I had made from the cupboard and some dip from the fridge for my lunch. Haven’t quite got around to making my own pita bread yet – just my own crisps. Split the pita bread so you get two circles and then cut them into small pieces. Dab/spray with olive oil. Can also put things on them like herbs etc. Cook at 180oC for about 8 minutes. Cool then store in a container in the cupboard. The National Heart Foundation has them on a romantic picnic menu they planned for Valentine’s Day but they put garlic on theirs, not sure how much luck you would have on Valentine’s Day! – http://www.nhf.org.nz/files/Heart%20Week%20Picnic%20Menu%20for%202.pdf

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Using up the pumpkin

Checking through the fridge last night I realized that the pumpkin was close to expiration so out came the recipe scrapbook. Last month I saw the Kiwi Chef make these on Good Morning (rather badly as he was talking too much and didn’t keep his mind on the job!) but I’ve tried these a few times now, mostly freezing them and taking them to work for lunch. I have dropped out the garlic from them as it’s not always a great idea at work unless everyone else also eats garlic J.  

 

Richard Till’s recipe – Pumpkin griddlecakes

1/4 pumpkin (approximately 2 cups of diced pumpkin)
1 medium onion
4 garlic cloves
2 small eggs
1/4 cup ground parmesan cheese
1/4 cup of flour
oil

Method:

1. Cube the pumpkin, roughly chop the onion and garlic and throw all of this into a roasting pan with a tablespoon of oil. Cook in the oven for about 20 to 30 minutes or until a little bit browned at 180 deg celsius.

2. Remove from the oven and allow to cool.

3. Put the roasted pumpkin, onion and garlic mixture into a bowl. Add the eggs to the bowl, ground parmesan, flour and season with salt and pepper and mash together.

4. Heat oil in a pan. Once the oil is hot, place large spoonfuls of then pumpkin into the oil, spreading slightly with the back of the spoon if needed. Turn the griddle cakes with a fish slice when the first side is cooked, cook the second side then put on a plate and set aside. Continue frying the pumpkin griddle cakes until all the batter is used.

 

Source : http://tvnz.co.nz/good-morning/richard-till-s-recipe-pumpkin-griddlecakes-17-april-2650399