Quorn Pad Thai Noodles

This easy Quorn based Pad Thai dish was not quite as flavoursome as it could be, and the egg made it look a bit gluggy – not like the perfect bowl of rice noodles featured on the website! It is also not of the same WOW Factor quality as the yummy Salmon Pad Thai recipe that I absolutely adore making. It was satisfactory enough however. With the addition of some extra chilli or other sauces, maybe some chopped bok choy, and perhaps 1 egg instead of 2 next time, it is a great dish for after work when you just want to collapse in a chair with a bowl of something and a glass of wine.

Actually, the glass of wine goes without saying, no matter what the meal…..

I used cashews instead of peanuts, as I don’t like peanuts much. My local Coles supermarket has this great new thing called Scoop & Weigh, where you measure out your own nuts, fruits, seeds etc and weigh the little bag on a self-serve scales, then print out your own barcode sticker, just like the girls behind the deli! I’m having fun buying lots of bits & pieces, just cos’ I can! It’s so cool, just like playing shops when I was 6…..

Source: http://westender.com.au/coles-gets-a-market-style-facelift/

I added extra spring onion to the dish, and lots of coriander, for which a quantity wasn’t specified. I also added some lime zest, mainly because I paid $2 for one lime so I was determined to use every bit of it. Why do I not have any friends with a lime tree in their garden….

Happy Fooding!

Restaurant Review: Hyde Park Hotel

Lamb Pot Pie

Had a yummy lunch on the weekend at the Hyde Park Hotel in North Perth.

This pub is only 5 minutes drive from my house, yet I’ve never been there before in almost 4 years here. I was going to the Perth Mint (having a play-tourist moment!), so looked up the Entertainment Book to see what eating places were nearby, that I had a voucher for. I decided to try something new, and it turned out to be a great decision. The food was truly fabulous, in looks, portion size and taste. These mains were both about $25 each, standard pub prices, but as I had a voucher it was 25% off.

Baked Coriander & Pistachio Nut Crusted Chicken

Service was excellent and staff friendly – and the place was seriously renovated (apparently it used to be a bit of a dive – not so now, it is very upmarket) in 2011 and still looks brand new. It was my first time there, but it won’t be my last!

An added bonus is that there is a very large Dan Murphy’s bottle shop next door, so I made the most of that and stocked up on wine bargains while I was there.

Happy Fooding!

Balls That Once Were Burgers

I love to cook, but sometimes I am also pretty lazy. I also don’t eat “fried” food much – never deep-fried, and minimal oil in any other kind of frying. So when I saw this great looking Cashew & Lentil Patties recipe at Weekend Notes, I really wanted to make it. Loved the simplicity of it, ease of preparation, vegetarian-ness (I can’t quite do it fully, but I can’t cope with lots of meat either), health benefits (nuts! lentils!) and combination of flavours. But then I thought hmmm maybe I could bake this instead, then thought hmmmmmmmmm if I make it as a “burger” then I have to have a side, or make it into a proper burger…..so because I’m feeling lazy, what if I just roll it into balls instead and bake them?

So that’s what I did. I just scoffed myself stupid on these, for dinner, dipping them in sweet chilli sauce. So it was like a main course and I didn’t feel I needed to make any silly old side dishes to go with it!

It worked brilliantly – very impressed with this recipe. Chuck it all in the food processor and roll it into balls – what could be easier than that? And a lot of scope for experimentation – you could add grated zucchini, carrot, feta, haloumi, tahini…..the list goes on.

Makes 28-30 balls.

The only thing I changed was that I thought the mixture looked a bit dry so I added a splash of milk – which in fact made it very sticky – so I probabably didn’t need to do that.

Although I ate this as my dinner, of course it would be perfect finger food for an appetizer. Win-win all the way really.

Happy Fooding!

Green Bean Salad

I’m sorry there is no photo of this yummy salad – I DID take photos but they seem to have disappeared into cyberspace somewhere. Take my word for it, this does look great!

I’ve mentioned before that I got a great new cookbook for my birthday, and have shared with you a wonderful barley recipe from it. I’ve also tried a stuffed squid dish, which tasted quite good but to be honest wasn’t tasty enough to warrant the amount of effort that went into preparing it.

This vegie salad is a delight of vibrant colours and zesty fresh flavours. Although the book says it serves 4, it actually makes quite a large amount, so is a great salad to add to your Summer bbq side dish collection.

The recipe calls for flat beans, but hey use whatever fresh beans you like. Same goes for the parsley – curly-leafed would be fine, and you could use walnuts instead of hazelnuts.

Italian Flat Bean Salad

800 gms flat green beans, trimmed

2 lemons

1 orange

1 red onion, thinly sliced

2 bunches of flat-leaf parsley, roughly chopped

2 cloves garlic, crushed

80 gms hazelnuts, finely chopped

2 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil

sea salt & freshly ground black pepper, to taste

Blanch the beans in a large saucepan of rapidly boiling water for 3 minutes or until tender, then cool under running water.

Remove the zest from the lemons and orange with a zester or vegie peeler. Cover with a little boiling water and let stand for 1 minute; drain well.

Remove the remaining pith from the fruit and discard, then cut the flesh into segments.

Toss all ingredients together in a bowl. Refrigerate until serving.

Happy Fooding!

M&M Bars (Sort Of)

How about this for a slice so easy your kids could make it in a flash! This was in a magazine recently, promoting the 4 Ingredients Kids cookbook, and in fact only has 3 ingredients. It is quite sweet to taste, so for most of us one piece would be enough (I say MOST lol).

I prefer Smarties to M&Ms so I used those instead. You could use peanut M&Ms if you prefer, and I reckon you could easily add some chopped walnuts, almonds, raisins or coconut, or top the slice with melted chocolate. Using Malt-O-Milk biscuits would be good too.

Start with these basic 3 things and then experiment. You don’t have to be a kid to like quick and easy baking!

You can find this recipe and a heap of other 4 ingredient recipes here.

M&M Bars

250 gm pkt plain sweet biscuits (ie Marie, Arrowroot)

400 gm can condensed milk

1 cup M&Ms or Smarties

Preheat oven to 160C. Line a 16 x 26cm baking tray with baking paper.

Blend the biscuits to a fine crumb, in food processor. Add remaining ingredients and combine well.

Scrape the mixture into the baking pan and bake for 20 minutes.

Cool, then cut into bars to serve.

Happy Fooding!

Quick Apricot Couscous

I love couscous, quinoa, burghul – so healthy – I add anything I have lying around, a bit of lemon juice and lots of cracked pepper. Here is what I made on Sunday for a quick and easy dinner. I often make something like this to take to uni for my lunch as well.

Apricot Couscous

3/4 cup couscous

3/4 cup boiling water

1 tbsp lime juice

1 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil

grated zest of 1 lime

1/4 cup pine nuts

1/4 cup dried apricots, chopped

1/4 cup fresh parsley, chopped

1/4 cup fresh coriander, chopped

cracked pepper, to taste

Place couscous in a large bowl; pour over boiling water and set aside for 5 minutes until liquid has absorbed. Fluff up with a fork to separate grains.

Whisk lime juice and oil together. Add all ingredients to couscous and mix well.

Serves 2.

Easily doubles or make a huge quantity for a salad – you don’t really have to measure, just toss it all in. Use whatever nuts you like, and whatever juice you like – lime, lemon, orange. If you like things a bit salty, add a splash of soy sauce (not too much).

Happy Fooding!

Getting Stuffed!

Well today is moving day, for me. And all I’ve eaten over the last 3 days has been leftovers, sandwiches, muesli and oven-roasted bought trays of vegetables. So nothing exciting to report, and tonight when I am left alone with my still-packed boxes and am exhausted, my dinner will consist of a home-delivered Crust pizza and a bottle of champagne all to myself. I’m working tomorrow and the next day, and will have no Internet connection at home for a few more days, apart from my iphone, so my next posting might be a tad delayed due to technical difficulties and sheer exhaustion!

But in the interests of being well-organised with my blog, as they say on cooking shows, “here’s one I prepared earlier”…..

I LOVE stuffing! No one makes it like my ex-mother-in-law, who always used to have to make a whole extra batch when I was coming over, so that I could take it home. I love it sliced and eaten cold on sandwiches, and these days I don’t bother actually stuffing a chicken/turkey with it – I just make it separately – because why wait for a roast in order to make a batch, when you can just make and enjoy it any old time.

This is my ex-MIL’s recipe, with my addition of pine nuts, because pine nuts are one of life’s great joys and you should be eaten on or in as many dishes as possible!

Phyl’s Stuffing

1 medium onion, finely chopped

1 cup fresh white breadcrumbs (of course you can use any kind of bread, doesn’t have to be white)

1 box packaged stuffing mix (if you can’t find any, use 200 gms more breadcrumbs mixed with dried herbs of your choice)

2 springs fresh rosemary, finely chopped

1 cup fresh parsley, finely chopped

~ 1/2 cup pine nuts (optional)

1 egg, beaten

cracked pepper, to taste

milk

Boil the onion in a little water for 10 minutes or until soft; drain and add to breadcrumbs, stuffing mix, herbs, pine nuts, egg and pepper. Mix well, then add enough milk to make a quite moist (but not runny) consistency.

Use as desired: either stuff a chicken/turkey with it, OR form into a log and wrap in lightly greased piece of foil to bake (about 45 mins at 180C), OR spoon into greased patty pan tins and bake for about 30 mins at 180C.

Happy Fooding!

Not Quite a Sweet Success..

An almost-flop on the weekend….I recently borrowed the new “4 Ingredients: Christmas” cookbook from my library (which is also my casual job workplace – it is huge fun getting to see all the new release books coming across my path – I have enough books reserved to last me ’til the end of my days!). There are loads of simple, festive recipes in this book, a continuation of the 4 Ingredients series of books.

I decided to try the Rocky Road Bon Bons, only cut into squares rather than long rectangles wrapped in cellophane, for a bbq we went to. WELL, it didn’t quite turn out like it was supposed to – I had some milk cooking chocolate leftover from something else, so decided to use that. Not sure if it was a bit “old” or what, but it refused to melt properly in the microwave, and started to do that cooked/curdled thing that chocolate has a tendency to do if you’re not careful. It wouldn’t melt to a smooth liquid, so I threw in the other ingredients and hoped for the best – but it then wouldn’t mix together like it should……in desperation I added a 100g block of Lindt dark chocolate, put aside for my favourite chilli recipe (don’t think I’ve shared that with you yet) and a bit of butter, and threw the whole lot back in the microwave. I cooked it on Medium until the new lot of chocolate had melted; however, this meant of course that the marshmallows and turkish delight had also melted!

So what I ended up with was a sort of fudge/slice “thing”. Same flavours as the original, but the only lumpy bits were the macadamias. Also it was a bit skinny, so I should have used a smaller sized tin than the more lumpy version called for, to make it higher.

Oh well. Very rich tasting and chocolatey, so no problems with the flavours, but next time I will use fresher chocolate……

Here is the original, Christmas recipe anyway…..

Rocky Road Bon Bons

250 gms chocolate (dark, milk or white)

100 gms macadamia nuts, roughly chopped

1 cup marshmallows, cut in half

150 gms Turkish delight, roughly chopped

Break chocolate into pieces and melt in a microwave safe dish on Medium-High heat, stirring every 30 seconds. Allow to cool slightly before adding remaining ingredients. Mix until well combined. Line a 9cm x 13cm loaf tin with baking paper, pour the mixture into it, neaten edges and refrigerate until set.

Remove and cut into 8 rectangular slices. Cut in half again and wrap each in clear cellophane. These make a beautiful handmade Christmas gift tied at each end with a pretty ribbon.

Happy Fooding!

Still Sharing Christmas With You….

Although it is now January and I am fully expecting Easter eggs to arrive in the supermarkets any minute (!), I am still half in Christmas mode (why doesn’t it go for longer than 1 day??!!)……here is the microwave Christmas pudding recipe that I have been making for about 20 years – I was given the recipe by a nurse where I worked, many years ago. Actually I haven’t made one at all for the last few years, so I wondered if I still had the knack, but never fear it did turn out very well!

I make this on Christmas Eve, and then on the day itself just cut slices and reheat them individually.

The Parisian essence is included to make the pudding a lovely rich chocolatey-brown colour, like a baked one – you can get this where the vanilla essence etc is in the cake baking section of the supermarket. Failing that, you could actually leave it out altogether, as it won’t affect the flavour but the pudding will be paler in colour.

Microwave Christmas Pudding

4 slices of plain white bread, crusts removed

4 tbsp brandy, sherry or port

125 gms butter

125 gms brown sugar

pinch of salt

3 eggs, beaten

2 tbsp Parisian essence

375 gms mixed dried fruit

50 gms blanched almonds, chopped

1/4 tsp freshly ground nutmeg

1/4 tsp ground mixed spice

1/2 tsp ground ginger

1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda

1/2 cup plain flour

Finely chop or crumb the bread; soak in the brandy (or sherry or port) for a few minutes. Cream the butter with the sugar and salt; add the eggs and Parisian essence. Add the bread mixture, then fold in the dried fruit and almonds alternately with the sifted dry ingredients.

Spoon into a greased, 18cm microwaveable pudding-shaped basin (Starmaid used to have one in their range, and Pyrex make a glass one). Cover with plastic wrap.

Microwave on REHEAT for 7 minutes, then reduce to MEDIUM for a further 8 minutes. Turn out onto foil and completely enclose until cold.

Slice and reheat as needed, and serve with brandy sauce, cream or custard (or all 3!!).

Happy Post-Christmas Fooding!