Pumpkin scones

But no herb butter. I'm still grouchy about that *laughs*.

Ok, so to make pumpkin scones, I start with the green and gold cookbook, circa 1932. It's a little battered by now. Ok, I lie. It's so battered, I bought a new copy. But the theory remains. So my battered copy continues having pride of place on the shelf, but the new one gets used.

It's a lovely light recipe, and sweet, rather than savoury.

57g (2 oz) of butter
57g of sugar
1/2 teaspoon grated lemon rind
1C mashed cooked pumpkin (it's easier to mash after it's been cooked. I'm not sure why I bothered to say "mashed, cooked pumpkin")
1 beaten egg
2 1/2 cups self raising flour
pinch salt
1/2 teaspoon mixed spice
1/2C milk (possibly, I tend to use about 1/4C)

Preheat fan forced oven to 230C

Cream butter and sugar with lemon rind.

Add the pumpkin, and beat well. You can cheat here, if you had issues with creaming the sugar and butter together, if the pumpkin is still slightly warm it makes it really easy to mix in.

Add the egg, then fold in sifted flour, spice and salt. At this point you check to see what the consistency is like - if the pumpkin was quite dry, then you'll need all the milk. I've found that with well drained butternut pumpkin, I tend to use about 1/4C of milk to get it to the right consistency. You need it to be a soft dough.

Put it on to a floured board, and knead lightly to about 2cm thickness. Cut in to rounds (cut straight down, don't twist the cutter as you press down, or they won't rise evenly), and place on greased tray.

Brush some beaten egg or milk over the top of each scone, then place in oven.

Bake for about 15 minutes.

Serve hot with butter. Noms.

Sorry, still no pictures guys - the camera battery is STILL flat. I should do something about that.

Peanut Butter Choc Chip Cookies

I can't think of what to blog this week, so seeing as this was Friday night's project, here's the breakdown.

I originally stole the recipe from Smitten Kitchen (love her stuff!) but tweaked it by adding peanuts and peanut butter. She adapted it from one in all recipes, who probably got it somewhere else... When you find a good choc chip cookie recipe, it's good to keep and share it.

It's also got a mini ethics lesson in it! Gosh, cooking AND ethics in one post! No, you don't need to debate the ethics in the comments. Really, you don't.

Also, random factoids and links for the win this post.

I've Australianised (aka, metric!) the measurements.

270G of plain flour - which is just under 2 cups
1/2 teaspoon of bicarb soda
1/2 teaspoon salt (or a bit less depending on your peanut butter, we'll get to this shortly)
170g unsalted butter, melted
225g brown sugar (a cup, pressed down slightly)
112g white sugar (smidge less than 1/2 a cup)
3 teaspoons vanilla essence
1 egg yolk
1 egg
350g dark choc chips (if you're feeling lazy and/or decadent, just put in 2 packets of Cadbury's* choc chips. It's about 460g, but hey, you only live once, right?)
1/2 a jar of pure peanut butter**. 1/2 a jar is approximately 190g, but I just scoop.
if you like, you can also add some peanuts, which I did this time.

Preheat oven to 165C. I have a fan forced oven, you may need to adjust for yours if not.

While your butter is melting in the microwave*** (ok, you can melt it elsewhere, but seriously, who does that nowadays?), sift together the flour, salt and bicarb soda in to a small bowl. By sifting, it not only mixes them together, it gets rid of the lumps, and aerates the flour. You can skip sifting, but I don't offer any guarantees. I prefer using one of the old OLD fashioned sifters, that has the wheel in the middle. More work, but I feel I have the moral superiority edge. See next tip for further moral superiority.

Cream together melted butter (that will have cooled while you were basking in the glow of previous superiority), brown sugar, white sugar. I use a pump whisk (Avanti brand, but they don't seem to sell them any more) so again, moral superiority, because instead of using an electric blender, I'm at least burning SOME energy that I'm sure I'm going to replace by eating cookies... Ahem, back on track. The mixture should be fairly light at this point.

Add in your vanilla essence, egg yolk and egg. I add the egg yolk first, because if the first egg breaks the yolk, I can still add the egg yolk after that. Another thing I do: break the egg in to a small cup before adding to mix. That way if you have to pick out bits of shell because you're really unco when breaking eggs (aka, ME), you're not trying to pick it out of the mix, only the cup.

Stir in your morally sound peanut butter - I'm still using the whisk at this point to make sure I don't get just one huge lump of peanut butter in the mixture.

Fold in the flour mix. At this point I'm swapping to a normal wooden spoon. You don't want to over mix it at this point, or you lose all the air that you've beaten in previously. It should be just mixed.

Add in your choc chips, gently stir them through. If you're adding peanuts, add them now. (I used my trusty mortar and pestle to give a different consistency this time. Before I had a mortar and pestle, I used to wrap the peanuts up in a clean tea towel and hit them with the base of a pot. It's good for getting rid of any pent up aggression, too.)

I use a soup spoon to scoop out the batter. They do have a tendency to spread in the oven, so space them well apart. It usually takes me 2 cookie trays and 2 batches to get them all cooked. I tend to leave about 5cm between cookies.

Bake for 10-15 minutes. Get them out of the oven after the outsides start going brown. Let them cool on the tray for about 5 minutes (this is important if you don't want folded cookies, because they are VERY soft at this point) and then fully cool on racks.

Once cool, pack them up in to Anzac cookie tins, and take to work.



I've also made this recipe and swapped out peanut butter (no peanuts either) for 2 shots of espresso. They looked completely different. It worked, too, but wasn't as popular at work as the peanut butter batch.

*Nestle is the evil empire in my house. Just sayin'.

**You can get this in the health food aisle, Coles sells the Sanitarium one, or you can get it in a health food shop. By buying the 100% peanut butter, it means no salt/sugar, but also means no added oil, which is why I started buying it. What I wasn't aware of until my friend (who is passionate about improving the plight of animals everywhere) told me, is that peanut butter's added oil is usually palm oil, which not only horrifically bad for you, but also for the orangutan habitat. Won't someone think of the orangutans? The only issue for me is that it's not made in Australia, which is something I believe in. Health food store for the win.

*** I read this really cool article online about melting butter and the science behind it and why you use different types of butter (cold, softened, melted etc), and how each one affects the outcome of the dish. Needless to say, I can't find it again.

Gran's Spaghetti Sauce

Not my Gran, though I did feel adopted by her. I never had a Gran until I met Lincoln, I had Oma and Nanna (and later, after Nanna died, Betty). The first time before I met her, I asked Lincoln "what shall I call her?" "Gran" he says, without hesitation. And Gran she was, and always will be.

We went to Gran & Grandpas for lunch one day. Gran was making us spaghetti bolognaise, and apple crumble. I found out later (ok, in fact, the other night) that Lincoln used to get care packages of this when he was younger and his folks were away... And when he'd just moved out of home.

And the spaghetti bolognaise was GOOD. I'd never made anything with that kind of complexity of herbs and spices in the mix, and I'd been making it from scratch for years, trying to perfect it. Of course, I begged for the recipe from her.

So without further ado, I present to you:

Gran's Bolognaise Sauce.

500g Mince
1C sliced mushrooms
1 diced onion
dash of Worstershire sauce
dash of teriyaki marinade (we now use the hot teriyaki marinade)
2 jars of whatever tomato pasta sauce was on special this week.

Brown onions in a large frypan.
Add the mince, fry until cooked through.
Add the mushrooms, worstershire sauce, teriyaki marinade and tomato sauce.
Bring to a simmer, cover and let simmer for 10 minutes.
Serve with spaghetti or pasta of choice.

We've adapted the recipe a bit, we now add chilli and garlic to the mix, but every time we make this recipe, Gran lives on in our memories.

At Lincoln's request - Pepper Cottage Pie

I wasn't planning to blog this one, as it was an experiment, but Lincoln has requested I do. I think part of the reason why he made this request is because then he gets to find out all the vegetables I'm sneaking him.

When you live with someone who won't eat any vegetables aside from: mushrooms; onions; tomatoes; potatoes; and corn, you tend to be somewhat creative when cooking.

And a grater will be your best friend.

So, this recipe was originally going to be my version of shepherds/cottage pie, which involves lots of garlic and chilli (common theme in most of my savoury cooking), then 2 pots, one gets vegetables and the other doesn't, potato on top, in the oven.

But Lincoln wasn't home...

This probably makes enough for 4 - 6 people?

So, ingredients:
500G mince (Barossa Fine Foods organic mince)
2 onions, chopped
1 carrot, grated
1 zucchini, grated
2C sliced mushrooms (ish? I just kept slicing till I had what looked to be enough, then after they were in the pot realised not enough, so sliced more...)
1T whole mixed peppercorns
2 cloves of garlic
1/2C hot & spicy V8 juice
1 sachet McCormicks pepper gravy
5 large potatoes
butter/milk/garlic salt/onion salt to taste, for mashing the above
cheese to go on top
bacon/pancetta to go on top (this was new for me, as were pepper corns, but hey...)

Fry the onions & garlic in a large pan, till the onions are translucent.
Crush peppercorns with mortar & pestle until cracked but not powder (yes, you could use a pepper grinder for this, if you happened to have one spare. Mine is full of normal pepper).
Add mince & peppercorns, continue stirring until mince is brown.
Add grated vegetables, v8 juice and mushrooms. Place lid on pot & allow to simmer for approximately 10 minutes (this was the point I realised I needed more mushrooms).
Add pepper gravy sachet + 1C water, and continue simmering until you can no longer see that there's grated carrot & zucchini in there (about 15 minutes).

While that's simmering, cut up potatoes & boil them for about 5-10 minutes (I don't really know time frames, I just keep poking them until they fall apart).
Drain potatoes, return to heat so the last bit of water evaporates - no more than a couple of minutes.
Mash potatoes, then add some milk (or cream, but hey, milk) and butter. I hide the butter in the mashed potatoes, so it melts while I'm adding onion salt & garlic salt. Normally I'd add white pepper as well, but I was a little hesitant, considering the amount of pepper in meat dish.
Get out whisk & whisk potatoes until smooth. I'm a mashed potato addict, though I haven't found any meetings for it yet. If you don't like mashed potatoes, or haven't yet garnered an addiction to them, you can use less potatoes.

Pour meat mixture in to large dish, add the mashed potatoes on top of that, spreading it fairly evenly. If you're concerned about whether it will spread properly, I've found that leaving the meat mixture to cool for a bit generally gets it to thicken up, so potatoes don't fall in to the liquid. Sprinkle grated cheese & bacon or pancetta bits on top.

Put in oven @ 140 for 30 minutes (ok, all right, you could do a higher temperature for shorter, but I'd misjudged timeframes and it was going to be ready before Lincoln got home, if I cooked it at a higher temperature).

When cheese is melted, it's done.

Next time: I'd probably add a little bit of beef stock powder, and 1T(ish) of cornflour, as the mixture was a smidge runny/watery. I'd probably use more pepper, too, and a whole red chilli, but I understand that not everyone has the same pepper addiction I do.

If I were making it for just me, I'd have peas and green beans in there as well.

So, voila, hidden veges in a pepper cottage pie.

Lincoln will probably never forgive me *laughs*

My first post! Sunday morning spicy brunch

So, now I've set this up, I probably should use it, right?

Just made breakfast, thought I'd share, minus the pictures (hey, I was making MY breakfast, I didn't think of it until after I'd made it!)

It doesn't really have a name. And until I was thinking of writing it down, it didn't occur to me how much chilli there is in it. Relax, if you don't like chilli, you can always leave it out.

I think this recipe stems from not liking fried eggs, and then trying to cook them on top of the fried tomatoes that I do like, and so on. It keeps evolving.

So, it's eggs poached in tomato juice/tinned tomatoes, with hot pancetta and mushrooms. And toast.

Man, I so need a better name for it than that.

I know! It's a breakfast THING! Bugger. Michelle is probably the only person who would get that joke.

Onwards...

Ingredients:

Tinned crushed or diced tomatoes (I like the coles home brand organic ones)
Hot V8 juice
Mushrooms
Eggs
Hot Pancetta from Barossa Fine Foods (though I suppose you could use bacon or normal pancetta)
Piri piri seasoning (or you can use pepper steak seasoning, too)
Garlic (I used dried, I'm lazy, I admit it)
Spring onions
Parsley
Bread. For making of toast therein. Butter if you want it.

I like to use as few dishes/implements as possible. That, and I don't have a toaster.

So, to start with, slice your mushrooms (as many as you want to eat, I'm a mushroom addict, so this takes some time), and a couple of spring onions.

Heat up a small saucepan (for one person, I use a saucepan about 15cmish across). Make sure it's one with a lid. Put your mushrooms, a drop of oil if you want, the spring onions, some chopped parsley, some garlic and some piri piri seasoning in. Stir, put lid on, let it almost cook through. You can do some washing up now, or cleaning, while you're waiting. Or go post on facebook. Or, you know, take a photo of what you're doing so that when you think about posting it to a food blog, you have pictures.

Once your mushrooms are mostly done to your satisfaction, put them on some alfoil under the grill. Include the little bit of moisture at the bottom of the pan. It's pretty much a tip & pour movement. If you like your toast well done, put that under the grill as well, and turn on. If you don't like well done toast, don't turn the grill on (hey, I used logic!).

Pour 1/2 a tin of crushed or diced tomatoes, some hot & spicy v8 juice (I use about 1/4 of a cup? Ish? I don't tend to measure. It doesn't matter if you use too much, as you can just boil some of the liquid off), more piri piri, more garlic, more spring onions if you want in to the saucepan. Bring to boil until it's the consistency you like.

Turn grill on if you didn't earlier. Also now put your hot pancetta under grill. Which should now be keeping your mushrooms warm, grilling your pancetta and toasting your bread.

Crack 2 eggs in to the saucepan. They'll pretty much be swallowed up by the tomato mixture. Turn saucepan heat off, and cover with lid. (If you're making this for just 1 person, you end up with a bit too much sauce for 1 person. But you need the depth to make sure the eggs are poached).

Probably a wise idea to turn over your bread now, and have a go at the pancetta to make sure it's cooked on both sides. You can also give the mushrooms a quick stir.

By the time your toast & pancetta are done, your eggs should be poached to a slightly runny consistency (runnyish yolk, not runny whites).

Serve by trying not to splatter too much everywhere. If it lands on the plate, you have succeeded.