Wednesday, August 12, 2009

Hamburgers

Tonight I made hamburgers with beef, onion, cheese, beetroot, tomato and baby spinach.
I had kwepie mayo and tomato sauce on mine. We also had some corn on the cob but it wasn't exiting enough to warrant a photo!

I also made a bacon, mushroom, spring onion and spinach frittata to have for lunches with some salad for the next few days.


Here is a closeup.
Thats all for now!

Tuesday, August 11, 2009

Veggie experiment part 2: celeriac

I forgot to take a photo of my lovely knobbly celeriac before I started to slice into it. I boiled it and some potatoes and made potato and celeriac mash to go with steak (Note the awesome grill marks!) The mash was sweet and nutty and had a lovely mild celery like flavour

Apparently it's important to put the celeriac into boiling water rather than cold; it will end up less bitter that way. Mine wasn't bitter at all and I put it into a saucepan with water at a rolling boil so I guess it worked!
Some steamed fresh green beans and mushroom sauce and dinner is done.
Last night I also made some cheesecake brownies (recipe from taste.com.au) which tasted delicious but looked a bit messy. It was very rich but yummmmmmm...



This is a closeup of the swirly top. I will make it again and try a bit harder to make it look nicer!
Bye for now!


Monday, August 10, 2009

Veggie experiment Part 1: Jerusalem artichokes

I bought some Jerusalem artichokes on the weekend and even though I had never cooked with them or even eaten them I thought I would give them a go. I roasted some chicken marylands over the jerusalem artichokes and some leeks. The white part of the leek was cut into longish chunks. I just washed the jerusalem artichokes and sliced them in half and put them in acidulated water until I was ready to cook them to prevent discolouration (I did my homework!)


They had a lovely flavour and texture. I made a lemon and herb spice rub for the chicken. I'm not entirely sure the leeks worked flavour or texture wise with this meal, but I do really like leeks... I will probably just do the jerusalem artichokes next time perhaps with some whole garlic cloves.

I served it with some steamed broccoli and made some "stuffing" which was really just my usual stuffing mix cooked in a parcel of baking paper (I use cubed bread, shallots, bacon, tomato, capsicum, herbs, eggs and a little worcestershire sauce; pretty much my Dad's recipe)



I also made a coconut tapioca pudding with mango. This was a total experiment as I had never used tapioca before and I didn't really use a recipe. I soaked the tapioca for about 5 hours in water (was only going to do 2 but I was out of the house) then microwaved it on realy low with coconut milk, caster sugar and vanilla extract until the pearls became transparent and took up the coconut milk. I served it cold the next evening with mango and a sprinkle of soft brown sugar. I would have used palm sugar but I had run out.



I also made marshmallows with toasted coconut and will split the batch with Mr Undomestic Goddess and we will each take some into work tomorrow.

Nighty-Night!

Saturday, August 8, 2009

Mexican madnes

So, the use of pantry items and meal planning kind of flopped when we went out for vietnamese then drinks on thursday night and I made savoury mince and mashed potato (bogan and old fashioned yet delicious) on friday before we went out for drinks. It was not pretty so no photos...

Tonight I made chicken enchiladas with proper corn tortillas, they have a much nicer taste and texture than the doughy white wheat ones. It doesn't look very photogenic more like something from the website http://thisiswhyyourefat.com/ which is disgusting yet hilarious and strangely compelling...

I also made a little salad with corn, tomato, avocado, red onion and coriander. I chargrilled the corn on the cob in my ridged cast iron pan which is also amazing for getting grill marks on chicken and steak. It is hideously heavy though!

Yum, will definitely make this salad again!

Wednesday, August 5, 2009

Pantry challenge 2

Made some moroccan chicken skewers: marinated chicken thighs overnight in a mix of greek yoghurt, garlic sauce and moroccan spice mix, then grilled.

Served it with chickpea puree (pantry) and a salad with tomato, cucumber, olives and red onion and a red wine vinegar and olive oil dressing. The chickpea puree was amazing; My stick blender made short work of it: I used tinned chickpeas and microwaved them in a little milk, chicken stock and this great garlic sauce from a local middle eastern grocer. The garlic sauce only contains raw garlic, olive oil and salt all kind of emulsified together, very yummy but potent!

(Close up of the yummy salad)
I decided I would make meringues as they are fairly healthy and I had all the ingredients in the house. So I printed off a recipe and got to work. The first time I didnt read the recipe and put the sugar in with the egg at the start. Needless to say the egg whites did not go fluffy. With two eggwhites remaining I did a half batch and piped some and put sprinkles on top and made to mini pavs out of the rest of the mix. The mini pavs are topped with rasberries and greek yoghurt with a little vanilla and icing sugar mixed in.

I need a bit of practice piping, these look like fairy dog poos. Cute, but still faintly turd-like.
I bought 2 piping bag sets a couple of weeks back and last week tried to make cupcakes with piped icing. It didn't work, it was a complete disaster! The thick buttercream icing wouldn;t squeeze through the nozzle. I had to smear it on instead...

Anyway, what do do with 4 eggwhites with 1 cup castor sugar mixed into it?
Find a cake mix that had similar ingredients and see what happens.

I used a recipe from taste.com.au but it had 4 egg whites and 6 yolks instead of 3 whole eggs and I added choc chips and made it into muffins instead of a cake. Recipe must be pretty foolproof as it still worked! The muffins were light and had a very crisp top, quite good!
That's all, tomorrow is shepherds pie, if all goes to plan!

Tuesday, August 4, 2009

Brief hiatus, no hernia

I have been a little lazy with both photographing and posting...


Here is a fruit tart we got from S&M bakery
And an eclair on the same day. Mr Undomestic Goddess and I had half each.


Tonight I made Chinese chicken and almonds and jasmine rice.
It was quite yummy, very old school cantonese-ish with sherry, soy sauce, ginger, chicken stock, chinese five spice, garlic , sesame oil and a smidge of chilli as the seasonings. I thickened the sauce with some cornflour.

This week I am trying to do a bit of a pantry challenge- each meal must use somethin in the pantry; I am very guilty of buying things and then forgetting about them or getting bored. Hopefully I will stay motivated!

Thursday, July 23, 2009

Beef Blur-guignon and kofta wraps

I made beef bourguignon on wednesday night but the photos were all awful as it was piping hot and it kept steaming! Served it on mash with steamed baby carrots. Though they do look like strange cadaver fingers in this photo...


It was delish, no leftovers as usual as the love of my life polished it all off!


Tonight I made beef kofta (supermarket ran out of lamb mince) in lebanese wraps with salad and a spiced yoghurt sauce. I didn't have any string to tie it together so I used a paper bag handle which looked a bit silly but kept it together for the photo.

Quick and easy, I used cumin, cardamon, coriander seeds, paprika, cinnamon (tiny bit), garlic, chili, onion and an egg and some polenta to bind. Same spices and salt and pepper mixed though greek yoghurt, cut up tomato and then throw it all together in the lebanese bread with some mesclun.

Thats all, I can't believe I have not eaten chicken all week, usually its all about chicken and fish and only beef once or twice a week. Chicken tomorrow, maybe something asian-y...
Night!