Chocolate Crusted Lemon Tart

This weekend I wanted to make something sweet & I had a bit of a chocolate craving, so I flicked through all of my books for the perfect recipe that would not require a mix master (I still haven’t decided what to buy). I ended up with this tart from Green & Blacks Chocolate Recipes, I adore a good lemon tart & have never had one with a chocolate base before & thought it sounded even better than a plain crust, I wasn’t far wrong, I loved it & the two flavours were perfect together, it would be even better with some fresh berries alongside too I think. Yum!

Chocolate Crusted Lemon Tart

Pastry
175g plain flour
25g cocoa
pinch of salt
25g icing sugar
125g unsalted butter, chilled & diced
1 large egg yolk
2 tablespoons cold water

Filling
75g dark chocolate, grated
3 juicy unwaxed lemons
150g caster sugar
4 large eggs
150ml double cream
icing sugar to sprinkle

To make the pastry, sift together the flour, cocoa, salt & icing sugar. Rub in the cold butter using a food processor or your fingertips until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs.

Mix the egg yolk with the water, and add to the mixture to make a dough. You may need to a little more water. Gather the pastry into a ball, wrap it in greaseproof paper (or glad wrap as I did) & chill in the fridge for about 1 hour.

Roll out the pastry from the centre and away from you, then back to the centre & down towards you, using your weight to push down on it to avoid stretching it. Line a 23cm tart tin with a removable base with the pastry. Prick the pastry base with a fork in several places & chill for at least 2 hours or overnight.

Preheat the oven to 200c. Line the pastry case with foil & baking beans ad bake for 15 minutes, then remove the foil & beans & bake for another 5 minutes. Remove the tin from the oven & reduce the oven temperature to 170c. While the pastry is still hot, scatter the grated chocolate evenly over the base & then leave to cool.

To make the filling, finely grate the zest from the lemons into a mixing bowl. Squeeze and strain the lemon juice & add it to the zest with the sugar. Whisk until the sugar has dissolved, then whisk in the eggs & cream until the mixture is smooth.

Pour the filling into the cooled pastry case & carefully return it to the oven. Bake for 30-35 minutes until just set. Remove from the oven & leave on a wire rack to cool completely before removing from the tin. Dust with icing sugar before serving.

Sicilian Roasted Fish with lemon, anchovies, capers & rosemary

Last night we had this delicious fish from Jamie Oliver’s Happy Days. The recipe called for Brill, turbot or halibut steaks which I’m not sure if you can even get here in Australia, certainly not at my local fish shop anyway so I used some lovely Blue Eye fillets instead. All of the flavours give the fish a beautiful flavour & I found no additional lemon or seasoning was required at all, it was perfect the way it came out of the oven. Also for the fist time ever I actually really enjoyed the anchovies, these being one item I was never that fond of when whole & only coped with when incorporated into sauces, stews, etc, amazing how your taste buds change over time. I served it with a simple baked potato & some salad.

Sicilian Roasted Fish with lemon, anchovies, capers & rosemary

1 handful of fresh rosemary, leaves picked
extra virgin olive oil
4 x 200g brill, turbot, halibut or blue eye tranches/steaks
sea salt & freshly ground black pepper
2 large unwaxed lemons, finely sliced
1 large handful of salted capers, soaked
8 good anchovy fillers
a splash of white wine or prosecco

Preheat the oven to 200c. Bruise your rosemary in a pestle & mortar to bring out the flavour. Add 6 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil & scrunch together. Pat half of this flavoured oil round the fish, season well & put into an earthenware dish or roasting pan. Lay 4 or 5 thin slices of lemon over each steak, sprinkle over your capers & drape over the anchovies. Drizzle with remaining flavoured oil & bake for around 15 minutes off the bone or 25 minutes on the bone. Now you could splash the wine in if you like. Remove from the oven & allow to rest, like a steak for 5 minutes.

Iced Spice Fingers

Today Rach was coming over for a nice early (11am) visit with Ethan so I thought I would whip up a batch up bickies for morning tea, biscuits are my craze at the moment & there will be a few more coming up soon. I don’t think starting at 7.30am on baking is a good idea as I must have been half asleep, they were nearly a disaster but somehow managed to turn out very nice indeed in the end by some miracle. Do you like the nice fluorescent shade of pink I managed to attain? Firstly after stage one I ran upstairs to do my morning exercise, bike & some sit ups (still trying to regain pre pregnancy bod) & 5 minutes in remembered that I forgot to add the egg & vanilla so ran down, took the mix out of the fridge & added them in completely the wrong order, it was so tough to stir these in that I actually broke my wooden spoon in half. After my exercise session I then realized that I forgot to preheat my oven but went ahead without waiting as I only had so much of a window while the little Miss was asleep. Next I made the icing with 2 tablespoons instead of teaspoons of flour & was worried that this would lend a floury flavour but no taste of flour at all. I guess the lesson is that even when it looks like you might have to bin the mix all can still turn out & exact measurements or following of the recipe is not really necessary even in the more unforgiving world of baking where I thought that precision was always the key!

Iced Spice Fingers

180g butter
100g brown sugar
265g (3/4 cup) golden syrup
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
450g plain flour
75g self raising flour
½ teaspoon bicarb of soda
3 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon each of ground cinnamon & mixed spice
½ teaspoon ground cloves

Icing
240g (1 ½ cups) icing sugar
2 teaspoon plain flour
1 egg white
1 tablespoon lemon juice

Preheat oven to 170c. Combine butter, sugar & golden syrup in a saucepan and stir over low heat until sugar is dissolved and butter melted. Cool for 10 minutes, then stir through egg & vanilla.

Sift dry ingredients into a large bowl, pour over golden syrup mixture & stir to combine. Turn mixture out onto a lightly floured work surface & knead until combined. Wrap in plastic wrap & refrigerate for 30 minutes.

Using your hands, roll tablespoons of the mixture into 6cm lengths. Place onto baking paper lined oven trays & press lightly to flatten. Bake for 12 minutes or until browned. Cool on a wire rack.

For the icing, sift together sugar & flour. In a bowl lightly whisk egg white until foamy, gradually stir in icing sugar mixture, then add lemon juice & mix to combine. Halve icing, add a few drops of pink colouring to half & stir to combine. Spread icing over biscuits and stand until set.

Gingerlee, East Brunsiwck

Sunday morning Michael & I took Chloe for an early morning walk to check out Gingerlee, a new café on Lygon street in East Brunswick. The breakfast menu had a few items on it with quite a Middle Eastern feel, it was quite interesting offering dishes from toasted apricot & walnut bread, poached eggs with slow braised field mushrooms, Persian feta, avocado & lemon to the home made baked bean tagine that Michael had & the Syrian style French toast, orange blossom syrup, honey labne, stewed rhubarb & pistachios that I ordered. Mine was sensational, I could have eaten 2 plates full, the toast on first impressions could have been too sweet but as soon as you team it with the yoghurt it was perfect, as I said, absolutely luscious & nice to have something different to the usual suspects that appear on most breakfast menus. Michael enjoyed his beans though not as much as I did my dish, he said there was a flavour in there (couldn’t name it) that didn’t quite sit right with him, it did look good though especially when they brought it out in the tagine, lid & all before uncovering at the table. All in all another great addition to this strip. Also I would like to note that on the way home I stopped at Sugardough for some bread & noticed they now sell bomboloni too, custard, jam, apricot jam & chocolate flavoured & I’ pleased to say that after tasting the custard filled variety it is even better than Dench’s – in my opinion only of course – I love this bakery.

Gingerlee
Ph: +613 9380 4430
Fax: +613 9380 4436
117 Lygon Street
East Brunswick
Email: rebeccadietrich@gingerlee.com.au
www.gingerlee.com.au

Mushroom Pizzetta

Friday nights used to be take away night in our house until I turned into a stay at home mum, now I usually cook for 2 reasons, a) as you know I love it and b) – a bad pizza a couple of months ago put me off take away. As Michael used to love take away night & the most common food was pizza I decided to make my own using this unusual recipe from Delicious provided by Jamie Oliver. The pancetta is actually chopped up & forms part of the base which I haven’t seen before. You couldn’t really taste pancetta itself though I do think the dough definitely was improved by this, it was salty (not too much) and the overall flavour was enhanced, of course you could just put it in top! One tip, make sure the oven is really, really hot before you put the pizza in or the base will not crisp up, mine was a bit on the soft side but I know for next time to just pump the oven right up. In the end I would much rather eat this than a take away & it really wasn’t all that difficult or time consuming either.

Mushroom Pizzetta

1 garlic clove
A sprig of fresh thyme, leaves picked
Extra virgin olive oil
2 handfuls (200g) mixed mushrooms, wiped & sliced thinly
250g Taleggio cheese, thinly sliced
A few handfuls of rocket

Pizza Dough
100g sliced pancetta
500g plain flour
1 tsp sugar
2 tsp (10g) dried yeast

For the dough, pulse the pancetta in a food processor until finely chopped. Add the flour & pulse to combine. Add 350ml lukewarm water, sugar & yeast in that order & stand for 10-15 minutes until the yeast starts to foam. Pulse once again to mix, then cover the feed tube of the processor & leave the dough to prove for 20-30 minutes until doubled in size.

Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 220c. Line 2 baking trays with baking paper.

Bash the garlic, thyme and a pinch of salt in a pestle & mortar. Stir in 3 tablespoons of olive oil.

Pulse the dough gently in the food processor to break up a little. On a floured surface, knead the dough briefly until smooth. Cut the dough into 6 or 8 small lumps or 2 big ones, using a rolling pin, roll out into circles & place on the baking trays. Brush with the garlic & thyme oil, scatter with the sliced mushrooms & top with the cheese. Drizzle with more garlic oil, sprinkle with freshly ground black pepper & bake for 15-20 minutes until the bases are puffed & cooked through. Toss the rocket in a little olive oil & the lemon juice & scatter over the top of the pizza before serving.

Fresh Tomato Pasta

I picked up some fresh organic tomatoes from my local health food shop this week to make this fabulous pasta dish, Using the finest ingredients means the sauce doesn’t even need cooking, the hot spaghetti is enough to heat it through a little. The recipe comes from Bill Granger’s Sydney Food & is superb.

Fresh Tomato Pasta

1kg vine ripened tomatoes
1 tablespoon sea salt
½ cup extra virgin olive oil
2 tablespoon red wine vinegar
juice & zest of 1 lemon
2 cloves garlic, crushed
1 small red chilli, finely chopped
freshly ground black pepper
300g spaghetti
1 cup lightly packed basil leaves, torn

To serve
Parmigiano Reggiano

Score a cross in the base of each tomato. Place tomatoes in a large bowl & pour boiling water over them. Drain after 10 seconds, then peel the skin away from the cross. Halve the tomatoes, and press halves to squeeze out seeds & excess juice. Chop tomato flesh roughly, place in a sieve over a bowl & sprinkle with sea salt. Leave to drain for half an hour.

Place drained tomatoes, olive oil, vinegar, lemon juice & zest, garlic, chilli and pepper in a bowl & stir. Leave for 20 minutes, for flavours to combine.

Cook the spaghetti in rapidly boiling salted water according to packet instructions. Drain well. Toss through tomatoes with freshly torn basil leaves, and serve with freshly shaved Parmigiano Reggiano. Serves 4.

Salmon fillet wrapped in prosciutto with herby lentils, spinach & yoghurt

Here is a simple dinner for when you’ve been running around all day & don’t have much energy left, it comes from Jamie Oliver’s Return of the Naked Chef. The prosciutto gives the salmon a lovely salty kick.

Salmon fillet wrapped in prosciutto with herby lentils, spinach & yoghurt

255g lentils
4 x 225g salmon fillets, skinned & pin-boned
salt & freshly ground black pepper
8 slices of prosciutto
olive oil
juice of 1 lemon
2 good handfuls of mixed herbs (parsley, basil, mint), chopped
3 large handfuls of spinach, chopped
200ml natural yoghurt

Preheat the oven to 220c. Put the lentils into a pan, cover with water, bring to the boil & simmer until tender. Season the salmon fillets with a little pepper before wrapping them in the prosciutto slices. Leave some of the flesh exposed. Drizzle with olive oil & roast in the oven for around 10 minutes until the prosciutto is golden. Drain away most of the water away from the lentils & season carefully with salt, pepper, the lemon juice and 4 good lugs of olive oil. Just before serving, stir the herbs & spinach into the lentils on a high heat, until wilted. Place on to plates with the salmon & finish with a drizzle of lightly seasoned yoghurt.

Chicken Tagine with Green Olives & Preserved Lemon

Every week my mum comes over to my place for a day to spend time with Chloe & to help me out. To thank her for her help I cook up a big dinner for both my mum & my dad & I try to cook up dishes that they have never tried & would not try without my prodding. This week was the fancy sounding tagine which is really quite simple, I served it with couscous, another ingredient they have never tried. This recipe is from Gourmet Traveller & was a big hit, I loved it as I usually love all tagines & surprisingly my parents both loved it too, even the couscous which they thought they would hate. Next week polenta has been requested so I hope they love that just as much.

Chicken Tagine with Green Olives & Preserved Lemon

2 tablespoons Ghee
6 chicken marylands, thighs & drumsticks separated
2 large onions, coarsely grated
2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
¼ teaspoon (firmly packed) saffron threads
1 teaspoon ground ginger
4 black peppercorns
½ teaspoon sweet paprika
1 stick of cinnamon
2 cups chicken stock
50gm preserved lemon (about 3 pieces), flesh discarded & rind thinly sliced
150g queen green olives (about 12) pitted
2 tablespoons coarsely chopped flat leaf parsley
2 tablespoons coarsely chopped coriander
Couscous & crusty bread to serve

Heat ghee in a tagine or heavy based casserole, add chicken pieces & cook over high heat, turning, until golden. Then add onion, garlic & spices, and cook over medium heat, stirring to coat chicken pieces for 3 minutes or until fragrant. Add stock & 1 ½ cups water, turning chicken pieces once during cooking, for 40 minutes or until chicken is tender & meat almost falling off the bone.

Using a slotted spoon, transfer chicken to an oven tray & discard cinnamon. Bring sauce to a boil, and simmer for 12 minutes or until reduced by a quarter. Return chicken to pan, add preserved lemon, olives & herbs, and cook over a medium heat for 5 minutes or until chicken is heated through, then season to taste with sea salt & freshly ground black pepper. Serve with couscous & crusty flat bread.

Passionfruit Yo-Yo’s with White Chocolate Ganache

Here is a delicious recipe for Yo-Yo’s from a recent Gourmet Traveller, I think it was thier passionfruit special. Passionfruits are going for $1.50 a pop now so I used the tin of passionfruit pulp in syrup you can but from the supermarket instead, seemed to do the job without a problem & much less fiddly then pulping & processing too.

Passionfruit Yo-Yo’s with White Chocolate Ganache

Makes about 24 biscuits

180gm butter, softened
90g pure icing sugar
80ml (1/3 cup) passionfruit juice
225g (1 ½ cups) plain flour
100g (2/3 cup) cornflour

Ganache
90ml pouring cream
45ml passionfruit juice
2 pieces of lemon rind, removed with a peeler
180g white chocolate, finely chopped

For Ganache, combine, cream, juice & rind in a saucepan and bring just to the boil over medium-high heat. Place chocolate in a bowl, strain over hot cream mixture, whisk until smooth & refrigerate for 4 hours or until thick.

Beat butter & sugar in an electric mixer until light & fluffy, add juice & combine. Add flours & mix until just combined, then turn onto a floured surface, form into a disc, wrap in plastic wrap & refrigerate for 1 hour.

Preheat oven to 180c. Roll out pastry to 8mm thick & using a 3cm diameter cutter, cut rounds from pastry & place on baking paper lined oven trays. Bake for 8-10 minutes or until just golden, cool on trays for 5 minutes then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

Spread half the biscuits with a teaspoon of Ganache, sandwich with remaining biscuits & stand until set. Uniced yo-yo’s will keep for up to 1 week in an airtight container.

Note: To make your own passionfruit juice, blend passionfruit pulp in a food processor to crack seeds, then strain through a fine sieve. 12 passionfruits yield about 1 cup of juice.

Spring Minestrone with Pesto

This weeks soup is Jamie Oliver’s Spring Minestrone from Jamie’s Kitchen – I’m sure he would forgive me for making this in Autumn! The pesto on top is a nice touch which boosts the flavour wonderfully. As you can see from the photo it is not the most photogenic of soups but it is packed full of fresh healthy veggies & I think I can safely say I have now filled my fiber content for the week!

Spring Minestrone

6 heaped tablespoons fresh pesto (see recipe below)
1.5 litres chicken, ham or vegetable stock
1 bulb fennel
100g fine asparagus
2 Romanesco or 1 large cauliflower
6 baby courgettes
6 plum tomatoes
extra virgin olive oil
2 cloves garlic, finely sliced
1 bunch of spring onions, finely chopped
100g green beans, finely sliced
100g yellow beans, finely sliced
100g peas, podded
100g broad beans, podded
100g spaghetti, broken up (or other small soup pasta)
sea salt & freshly ground black pepper
1 small handful of green or purple basil
1 small handful chives

Bring a pot of stock to the boil. Then prepare all of the vegetables & put to the side. The fennel has to be halved, sliced & finely chopped, the asparagus needs to have the woody ends removed, the stalks finely sliced & the tips left whole, the cauliflowers need to be divided into small florets, the courgettes need to be quartered lengthways & finely chopped & finely the tomatoes need to be blanched. Cut them in half, remove the pips & finely slice.

In a casserole type pan (quite wide but not very deep) put 5 tablespoons of olive oil & heat the pan on medium heat. Add the garlic, spring onions & fennel & gently fry without coloring at all for about 15 minutes. Then add the rest of your prepared vegetables, the pasta & your boiling stock. Bring to the boil, simmer for about 10 minutes, season & serve in big bowls with a dollop of fresh pesto in the middle & a sprinkling of chopped basil & chives & a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil.

Pesto

¼ clove of garlic, chopped
3 good handfuls of fresh basil, leaves picked & chopped
1 handful of pinenuts, very lightly toasted
1 good handful of grated parmesan cheese
extra virgin olive oil
sea salt & freshly ground black pepper
optional: small squeeze of lemon juice

Pound the garlic with a little pinch of salt & the basil leaves in a pestle & mortar: or pulse in a food processor. Add a bit more garlic if you like. Add the pinenuts to them mixture & pound again. Turn out into a bowl & add half the parmesan. Stir gently & add olive oil – you need just enough to bind the sauce to get it to an oozy consistency.

Season to taste, then add the rest of the cheese. Pour in some more oil & taste again. Keep adding a bit more cheese or oil until you are happy with the taste & consistency. It may need a squeeze of lemon juice at the end but it’s not essential.

Roast Leg of Lamb with Rosemary & Garlic.

This is what happens when you need to feed your baby just as the roast needs carving & you forget to yell out ‘Take a photo!’, you end up with a photo of bones. Yes, for Michael’s birthday I had the family over for dinner which meant 10 people, so what is the easiest & most delicious thing to cook for those numbers, especially when you have a 10 week old baby not letting you spend much time in the kitchen? That’s right, the good old Aussie favourite, Roast Lamb. I used Jamie Oliver’s recipe from the original Naked Chef for a simple Rosemary & Garlic flavouring, I think this combination is probably the best you can do to a lamb roast. So easy too, bash it all together, whack it in the oven, follow with some veggies, whisk up a gravy at the end & walla, a magnificent birthday feast (at least I hope they all thought so).

Roast Leg of Lamb with Rosemary & Garlic.

1 leg of lamb (about 2kg)
½ lemon
1 handful of picked fresh rosemary
salt
1 clove of garlic
olive oil
some extra bunches of rosemary

Slice of small pieces of skin about the size of a 5 cent piece at random around the leg of lamb. Lightly rub with the lemon. With a knife, follow the bone down about 10-12 cm. Do this from the top end and the bottom end. Using a mortar & pestle, smash up a small handful of picked rosemary with 1 teaspoon salt. Add the garlic & ½ tablespoon olive oil and pound again. Rub this mixture on to the exposed flesh & push into the gaps you have made with the knife next to the bone. Season the skin with salt, and then sprinkle it with rosemary. Tie lots of branches of rosemary around the meat. Put a little oil in a hot roasting tray, add the lamb, & roast it in the oven at 225c, turning every 30 minutes.

Cooking times
Pink – 10 Minutes for every 450g plus 20 minutes
Medium – 13 minutes for every 450g plus 20 minutes
Well Done – 20 minutes for every 450g plus 20 minutes.

Always rest the meat for at least 10 minutes before carving.

Spaghetti con Gamberetti e Rucola (Spaghetti with Prawns & Rocket)

This is a lovely version of one of my favourite combinations, prawns, chilli, garlic & spaghetti. The addition of lemon juice & sun dried tomato puree gives it an extra nice tangy taste. The recipe comes from Jamie’s Italy.

Spaghetti con Gamberetti e Rucola (Spaghetti with Prawns & Rocket)

455g dried spaghetti
sea salt & freshly ground black peper
extra virgin olive oil
2 cloves of garlic, peeled & finely chopped
1-2 dried red chillies, crumbled
400g peeled raw prawns
1 small wineglass of white wine
2 heaped tablespoons of sun dried tomato puree or 6 sun dried tomatoes blitzed in a blender
zest & juice of 1 lemon
2 handfuls of rocket, roughly chopped

Cook your spaghetti in a large pan of salted boiling water according to packet instructions. Meanwhile, heat 3 good glugs of olive oil in a large frying pan & toss in the garlic & chilli. As the garlic begins to colour, add the prawns & sauté them for a minute. Add the white wine & tomato puree & simmer for a couple of minutes. When the pasta is ready, drain & reserve a little of the cooking water. Toss the spaghetti with the sauce, squeeze in the lemon juice, add half the chopped rocket, adding a little of the reserved water if the sauce needs loosening a bit. Correct the seasoning & serve sprinkled with lemon zest & remaining rocket.

Jam Roly Poly & a letter from the past

Yesterday my mum was over for the day to help out & hangout with Chloe. To amuse me she brought over some of my old school essays & other mementos that I hadn’t seen in years, in fact I can’t even remember writing any of them. They all had me in stitches, stories of running away from home, robbing the town snobs & setting up house in the Hilton Hotel to a plane crash in Columbia where I met Scott Carne (for those of you who remember he was the lead singer of Kids in The Kitchen & my first love!) & lived happily ever after with him. Amongst these treasures was this letter to my parents declaring what I wanted for Christmas, I found it hysterical & had to share it, I was in about grade 5 or 6 when I wrote it, I hope you find it amusing too.

Anyway all of this reminiscing reminded me of the Jam Roly Poly that I learned to make in home economics in Year 7 & which I used to cook up for dessert all of the time when I was a teen, I don’t think I’ve made it since I left home 15 or so years ago so of course it had to be done, with some adjustments – I added fresh strawberries which gave the syrup a berry flavour & changed it quite a bit, either way is great. And as you can see I did start my love of cooking early, in fact in one of the papers my mum brought over I declared cooking to be my favourite subject at School & she also had my old primary school black & white photography license & what do I do in my spare time now, funny how things end up isn’t it?

Jam Roly Poly

Scone Dough
1 cup self raising flour
pinch of salt
1 tablespoon of butter
½ cup milk

Syrup
1 Cup water
1 tablespoon of butter
1 tablespoon golden syrup
juice of half a lemon

Strawberry Jam
Strawberries, hulled & cut in half (optional)

Sift the flour & salt into a bowl & rub in the butter with your fingertips until mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. Add the milk to form a dough & roll into an oblong.

Meanwhile bring to the boil all of the syrup ingredients.

Spread jam on the dough & top with fresh strawberries if desired. Roll up lengthways & place roll into a cake tin. Pour over the syrup & bake in the oven at 200c for 35-40 minutes. Serve with custard.

Lemon-Raspberry Muffins

For Mothers Group this week I took along a treat, as you know I don’t need much of a reason to bake up a storm so as soon as it was suggested we bring something along I was ready for it. Being somewhere that children are always present the rule is nothing with nuts in it is to enter the premises, fine with me, just something to keep in mind for the future. I chose these delicious, packed full of fresh sweet raspberries with a lovely tang of lemon muffins. Muffins are great, they take about 5 minutes to whip up which is good for when you don’t know if you’re going to have a good or screaming baby on your hands when you need to prepare them, I had a pretty good one this morning though I did need to get a feed in while they were in the oven, lucky she is a fast drinker like her mum! The recipe is courtesy of Nigella, from How to be a Domestic Goddess.

Lemon-Raspberry Muffins

60g butter
200g plain flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
150g caster sugar
¼ teaspoon salt
juice & finely chopped zest of 1 lemon
approx 120ml milk
1 large egg
150g raspberries
12 bun muffin tray lined with paper cases

Preheat oven to 200c. Melt the butter & set aside to cool. Stir together in a large bowl, the flour, baking powder, bicarb, sugar, salt & zest. In a measuring jug, pour in the lemon juice, then enough milk to come up to the 200ml mark, then beat in the egg & butter. Pour into the dry ingredients & stir briefly, the batter should scarcely be combined. Fold in the raspberries, spoon the mixture into the muffin cases & bake for about 25 minutes. When cooked, the tops should spring back to your touch. Leave in the pan for 5 minutes to cool slightly, then sit them on a rack to cool for a further 10-15 minutes. Makes 12.

Garlic Prawns

One of my favourite ways to eat prawns is simply cooked with olive oil, garlic & a bit of chilli, nothing else needed, here is Bill Granger’s version from Bills Food.

Garlic Prawns

20 raw king prawns, peeled & deveined, tails left on
250ml (1 cup) olive oil
5 garlic cloves, finely chopped
3 fresh small red chillies, split lengthways but intact at top
1 teaspoon sea salt
freshly ground black pepper
2 tablespoons chopped fresh flat leaf parsley

To serve
Lemon wedges
Crusty bread
Green salad

Preheat oven to 250c. Cut a slit down the back of each prawn & place the prawns in an ovenproof dish that will hold them snugly in a single layer.

Heat the oil in a large frying pan over high heat. Add half the garlic and all the chillies & cook for 1 minute or until the garlic starts to change colour. Pour over the prawns, then sprinkle with the remaining garlic. Season with salt & pepper, cover with foil & bake for 10 minutes, or until the prawns are pink & cooked through. Don’t overcook – remember that the prawns will continue cooling after being removed from the oven. Sprinkle with parsley & serve with lemon wedges, crusty bread & a green salad. Serves 4.

Lynda’s Lemon-rub Steak with Charred Tomato Salsa

For my bbq on the weekend, as well as various snags, including some gorgeous kransky & some lamb chops I made some steaks with a gorgeous rub & salsa from Ainsley Harriott’s Ultimate Barbecue Bible. The rub was easy, just bash everything up in the mortar & pestle & it made the steaks lovely & tender & gave them a great flavour, they weren’t too hot either despite the extra hot cayenne pepper in the rub. The salsa went well alongside & the green chilly surprisingly packed quite a punch. I also made up some garlic bread to thrown on the Barbie after seeing a recipe for it in his book too, I know its daggy & old fashioned but what boy doesn’t like a bit of garlic bread & they all did, it was very well received indeed & the barbecue gave it a nice smoky flavour (and the house too, so much smoke came in that the smoke alarms even went crazy – Michael does it every time). We also had a few salads & as usual went way overboard with everything so guess what’s for dinner this week most nights?

Lynda’s Lemon-rub Steak with Charred Tomato Salsa

2 x 175g Sirloin Steaks ( I used Rump)
grated rind of 1 lemon
2 garlic cloves
½ teaspoon black peppercorns
½ teaspoon cumin seeds
1 teaspoon dried oregano
½ teaspoon cayenne pepper
½ teaspoon coarse sea salt

Salsa
3 plum tomatoes
1 small bunch fresh coriander
1 small bunch fresh mint
1 red onion, finely chopped
1 fresh green chilli, finely chopped
2 tablespoons olive oil
juice of half a lemon
rock salt & freshly ground black pepper

Using a mortar & pestle, grind the lemon rind, garlic, peppercorns & cumin seeds together until well blended. Add the oregano, cayenne & salt & grind again. Run the mixture into the meat & set aside for an hour or two.

Meanwhile, halve the tomatoes lengthways and place on the barbecue, cut side down, for 5-8 minutes until softened & a little charred. Slip off the skins & roughly chop the flesh. Finely chop the herbs & mix with the tomato, onion, chilli, olive oil & lemon juice. Season well to taste.

Barbecue the st4eaks for 3-4 minutes on each side for a nice medium to medium rare cooked steak. Serve with the salsa.

Traditional Garlic Butter Bread

1 long fat French stick
3 garlic cloves
75g slightly salted butter, softened
3 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley
salt & freshly ground black pepper

Cut the bread diagonally into 2.5cm thick slices without cutting right through. Peel the garlic& crush in a mortar & pestle with a little salt until you have a smooth paste. Mix the butter with the garlic, parsley & some pepper. Spread both sides of each slice of bread with the butter & place the loaf on some foil. Wrap well & place on the side of the barbecue for 1012 minutes, turning regularly until crisp & hot.

Not so Purple Potato Salad

Another potato salad from Jamie Oliver, this one from Jamie’s Kitchen. I made this for my Barbie on the weekend, it is supposed to use purple potatoes which of course I couldn’t find, if anyone has seen any in Melbourne please enlighten me & let me know where. The salad was nice though I have to say it wasn’t anything special, some of his others are much tastier. I think the trick is the purple potatoes, they would make it look great so next time I find some I will give them a go.

Purple Potato Salad

6 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
juice of 1-2 lemons, to taste
255g crème fraiche or fromage frais
500g baby new potatoes
500g purple potatoes
sea salt 7 freshly ground black pepper
1 bunch radishes, finely sliced
1 handful of fresh mint leaves, chopped
1 handful of chives, chopped

Make the dressing by mixing together the olive oil, lemon juice and crème fraiche. Cook the potatoes in plenty if boiling salted water for around 20 minutes until tender & drain well. When the potatoes are cool enough to handle rub off the skins with a knife and slice into bite size pieces. Mix with the dressing, then add the radishes and herbs & season well to taste.

Salmon with Horseradish & Beets

This recipe comes from Jamie Oliver’s Happy Days with the Naked Chef, under the chapter, Quick Fixes which is exactly what I needed last night being busy prepping some stuff for the bbq we’re having today. It was very quick apart from boiling the beets, I had giant ones as no babies in the shops & they took quite a while so you need to get them started pretty early on. The beets were fantastic, this was a lovely way to serve them & I loved the marinade, the marjoram really stood out & has a lovely & unusual (to me) flavour, I have some growing on my herb shelf so nice to find good uses for it. If I had known how nice they would turn out I would have bought heaps & made a bowl for the Barbie today! Also the horseradish cream brought it all together, going very well with both the salmon & the beets.

Salmon with Horseradish & Beets

2 x 225g Salmon fillets, pin boned & scored ½ cm deep
salt & freshly ground black pepper
6-8 baby beetroots, cooked until tender then sliced
1 small handful of marjoram, leaves picked
extra virgin olive oil
balsamic vinegar
2 tablespoons crème fraiche
2 tablespoons creamed horseradish
juice of 1 lemon
a handful of rocket or watercress

Add your salmon fillets, skin side down, to a hot non-stick pan. Lightly press them with a spatula so they don’t curl up. After a minute they should be lightly golden. Turn the salmon over, sprinkle with salt & then place under a grill for 10-15 minutes until just cooked. While cooking, marinate your beetroots with the marjoram, a little olive oil, balsamic vinegar & seasoning. Mix the crème fraiche with the horseradish & season to taste, carefully, with salt, pepper & lemon juice. Place the beets & salmon on your serving plate, sprinkle over the rocket & drizzle with the horseradish sauce.

Madeira Cake

Here is a recipe for Madeira cake, a nice change from my usual rich offerings, this cake is beautiful in its lemony, buttery goodness, try some. The recipe is from Nigella Lawson’s ‘How to be a Domestic Goddess’

Madeira Cake

240g unsalted butter, softened
200g caster sugar, plus extra for sprinkling
grated zest & juice of 1 lemon
3 large eggs
210g self raising flour
90g plain flour
23 x 13 x 7 cm loaf tin, buttered & lined

Preheat oven to 170c. Cream the butter & sugar, add the lemon zest. Add the eggs one at a time with a tablespoon of the flour for each. Then gently mix in the rest of the flour and, finally, the lemon juice. Sprinkle with caster sugar as it goes into the oven & bake for 1 hour or until a cake tester comes out clean. Remove to a wire rack & let cool in the tin before turning out.

Crispy Duck with Spiced Plum sauce

Duck is one of my favourite meats, some hate it, I can’t get enough of it & whenever it’s on a menu when I’m out I find it hard to go past & usually end up ordering it with no regrets. This recipe from Allan Campion & Michele Curtis ‘Food with Friends’ is a winner, the aroma of the spices while cooking is amazing & the plum sauce is really good with its combination of sweet & sour flavours. Quite easy to put together too though there are a few steps & pots to use!

Crispy Duck with Spiced Plum Sauce

Master Stock (below)
4 duck breast fillets
110g caster sugar
2 star anise
2-3 cinnamon sticks
4-6 plums, halves, stones discarded
80ml (1/3 cup) fish sauce
80-125ml (1/3-1/2 cup) lime or lemon juice
oil for cooking

Bring Master stock to the boil. Add duck, cover & cook for 10 minutes at a gentle simmer. Remove from heat & allow duck to cool in master stock. Once cool, remove duck from master stock & refrigerate.

Make sauce by putting 2 cups of the master stock in a saucepan over a medium heat. Bring to the boil, add sugar, stir to dissolve, then add star anise & cinnamon & cook for 10 minutes or so to infuse the flavours. Add plums and cook for 2-3 minutes. Remove saucepan from the heat.

Preheat oven to 180c. heat a large frying pan over a medium heat, add a splash of oil & cook duck filets for 3-4 minutes on each side until golden brown. Place on a tray, cook in preheated oven for 10 minutes. Remove, cover & rest for 5 minutes.

Reheat plum sauce, adding fish sauce & lemon or lime juice to taste, so the sauce is tart, sweet & sour. Carve each duck fillet into 6-7 slices. Arrange duck pieces on a platter and pour hot sauce & plums over.

Serve with steamed rice & garlic Stir Fried Greens (below)

Master Stock

1.5 litres (6 cups) water
250ml (1 cup) soy sauce
125ml (1/2 cup) Chinese rice wine
3-4 slices fresh ginger
1 lemongrass stem, sliced
2-3 pieces tangerine peel, optional
2 star anise
75g (1/3 cu) caster sugar

Put all ingredients in a large saucepan & bring to the boil.

Garlic Stir fried Greens

2 bunches gai laan (or bok choy, wonga bok, etc)
oil for cooking
4 garlic cloves, crushed
2 tablespoons grated ginger, optional
125ml (1/2 cup) chicken stock
1-2 tablespoons soy sauce

Wash greens well, discard big old leaves, thinly slice, chop up.

Heat a wok over high heat, add a splash of oil, the garlic & ginger and cook for 2-3 minutes, stirring often, making sure the garlic doesn’t burn. Add gai laan, toss for 1-2 minutes, add stock & cover with a lid. Cook for 3 – 4 minutes, tossing occasionally to ensure greens cook evenly. Remove lid & season with soy sauce.