let them eat cake!!

There is a website called The Rhubarb Compendium. People have, since 1994, devoted time and energy to extolling the virtues of rhubarb.   Whilst I think that they probably ought to have better things to do, their waxing lyrical did help me stumble upon the following recipe.  Now what, you may ask, was I doing traipsing about the internet looking up rhubarb, especially given my recent comments about TRC's authors?  Well, simple really - our rhubarb plant was growing like the muscles of a Cold War-era olympian, and I needed to find a way to use some (other than stewed, which gets a bit boring).  So, without further ado, let them eat cake! 

Rhubarb Ginger Cake

180 g butter, at room temp

1 cup brown sugar, tightly packed

3 eggs

1 1/2 cups self-raising flour

1/2 cup plain flour

1 tbsp cinnamon

300 g sour cream

3 - 5 cups rhubarb, chopped into 1cm pieces

150 g crystallised ginger, roughly chopped

For the topping

1/3 cup self-raising flour

40 g butter, chilled

1 tbsp brown sugar

2 tbsp nuts (almonds, macadamias, pecans, whatever)

extra ginger, chopped

1. Preheat oven to 180ºC.  Grease and line 22 cm springform cake tin. 
2. Beat butter and sugar until light and creamy.  Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. 
3. Mix flours and cinnamon together.  Sift half over cake mixture.  Add half sour cream.  Sift remaining flour.  Add remaining sour cream.  Gently stir until combined. 
4. Fold through rhubarb and ginger.  Spoon into tin. 
5. Place topping flour in bowl.  Rub butter into flour with fingertips. 
6. Stir through remaining topping ingredients and sprinkle mixture over top of cake. 
7. Bake for about an hour and a half - check it after an hour or so, and just keep going until skewer or knife blade come out clean.  Stand for ten minutes before removing from tin and leaving on cake rack to cool. 
8. Serve with yoghurt or thick cream. 

NB: Apparantly Marie Antoinette actually said 'Let them eat brioche', rather than the infamous 'let them eat cake', but for my purposes I'm invoking some poetic license.  :) 

but don't you, step on my blue cheese shoes

We went to the Narrows Landing for dinner the other night.  Fantastic food and service, warm summer night, eating on the terrace.  Can't ask for much better than that eh?  Something on their menu caught my eye upon arrival, so naturally had to try it.  Blue cheese and honey bruschetta - blue cheese and honey!?  None of us were too sure how that combo was going to go down, but figured with blue cheese, how wrong can you go?  OMG - amazing!!  The two flavours complimented each other perfectly.  If I were to be poetical about it, I'd say it was like a gastronomic symphony, a veritable feast for the tastebuds. 

Last night I decided to recreate it at home, using my favourite blue - Kapiti Kikorangi.  You'll need:

4 turkish buns, ciabatta buns, or 1 ciabatta loaf
olive oil
blue cheese
honey (I used manuka)

1. Slice buns in half, as you would for burgers (if using loaf, slice nice thick slices, probably a cm thick).  Brush with olive oil. 
2. Grill soft, oiled side of buns until browned.  Turn and grill underside a little, but not as much as soft side. 
3. Spread liberally with blue cheese. 
4. Drizzle with honey (soften in microwave if needs be).  If using a strong honey, like manuka, be careful not to drown the cheese too much. 
5. Grill for a few minutes, until cheese is bubbling and honey has started to caramalise. 
6. Set on serving plate and allow to sit for a minute or two before serving. 

PS: Sorry I forgot to take a photo - next time! 

more zucchini goodness!

It's that time of year.  The zucchini plants are going crazy.  You go away for the weekend, come home and you have marrows.  Our two plants are producing zuccs faster than we can eat them, but at least it forces you to really think about what you can do with them.  We eat them a lot just sliced longways in half and then fried in butter (oh yes!!), or sliced and then layered in a lasagne (hmmm... potential for tonight...).  But recently I was given a whole new idea - zucchini fritters!

I know it may not be an earth-shattering idea, but it was novel to me.  I don't know why, seeing as I'm familiar with the concept of vege fritters - corn, potato etc.  But anyway...  Here's what we put in this time, but I reckon there are probably a million of different things you could put in.  Make sure you grate your veges early and set aside, 'cause a lot of liquid will come out of them, which you'll want to drain before frittering.  Buon appetito! 

2 zucchini, grated
1 each beetroot and kumara, grated
fresh herbs, chopped
capers
dash sweet chilli sauce
lemon zest
cumin seeds
2 eggs
flour, as necessary

1. Mix ingredients together and shallow fry in hot oil.  Yum!! 

Served with brown-sugared salmon and garden-fresh french beans.  Excuse the unappetising photo of fritter mix - one of those impossible-to-make-photogenic things. 

Berry Christmas everyone!

Wow. Technology is wicked. Well, sometimes. I've just discovered that there is a blog app on my phone. Love it! I loved my nokia, but these smartypants phones...

Anyhoo, it's only 4 days til Christmas, so get out there, buy up some berries, and feel the relaxation start to kick in. Berries are great like that, maybe its the antioxidants?

Berry Christmas!!

baa baa black sheep

It's been a long time since the last post.  Website kept crashing, so I thought it might be time to give it a wee holiday.  But all seems to be working again now, so here we go! 

It's been a busy few weeks since 02 November, the silly season's started and we're only a few days out from Christmas.  I'll not bore you with a detailed recitation of what's been cooking over the past 48 days, but will ease back into the world of bloggery with slightly more detailed rack of lamb details that was posted on Facebook. 

I'd never done a rack of lamb before, but I can tell you right now that I'll be doing it again, and very soon.  It was so tender and, if you shop around, pretty damn cheap.  It was $15/kg at the supy.  This will serve four peeps. 

2 x 7 chop lamb racks
2 tbsp harissa
6 tbsp breadcrumbs
2 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp fresh parsley, chopped
2 tbsp fresh mint, chopped

1. Smear the fat side of the lamb with harissa. 
2. Mix breadcrumbs, oil and herbs in bowl.  Press mixture onto harissa-smeared lamb. 
3. Roast in preheated oven (180-200 degrees) for 15 minutes. 
4. Remove from oven and allow to rest for 5 minutes before serving. 
5. Serve with new potatoes, asparagus and pan-fried zucchini, for the flavours of summer!

Nb: 15 minutes, our lamb was medium-rare after resting.  If you want yours less or more done, adjust the cooking time accordingly. 

when the moon hits your eye, like a big pizza pie...

I've made pizza bases before. I've blogged about making pizza bases before. Heck, I've already blogged the exact recipe for this pizza base before. But this weekend, the pizza-making took on a whole new dimension, so much so that re-bloggery was imperative. The yeast was spongey like sea foam, the dough more than doubled in size and had the elastic quality that every pizza maker strives for.

As I said, this recipe ain't new, but for the first time in my pizza-making career, the dough just seemed to do absolutely everything it was supposed to. All the pizzas in the past have been wicked, but this one was sublime. Nir-freaking-vana my friends. I'd like to think it was me and my general awesomeness that made the difference, but I think it was more the pizza-making partnership with my sous chef KB (said rather tongue and cheek, given it was he who prepared the frothy yeasty goodness which forms the foundation of a winning dough).

From the moment I set eyes (in complete astonishment, I'd never seen yeast activate like this before) on the mixing bowl, I knew this was the dough for visual documentation. So, without further bleeting on, here follows a pictorial guide to pizza greatness. Thanks to both KB and Mac, the dog who tried to help, by licking up the excess flour.

1 and 1/2 cups warm water
7 g active dry yeast
1 tsp sugar (or thereabouts)
500 g flour
1 tsp salt
3 tbsp olive oil
extra olive oil, for brushing crusts
parmesan, for crusts (optional)
tomato paste / satay paste (or others, such as BBQ sauce etc)
toppings


The step-by-step method can be found at the link at the beginning of this entry. What follows is a pictorial of how the pizza-making process is done. Oh, and to get your frothy yeast into super-risen dough - pour the yeast mix into the flour/salt/oil in a food processor. Mix until it forms a ball and pulls away from the sides. Return to well-oiled bowl, cover with damp teatowel and place somewhere warm for 45 minutes. I preheat the oven a little, then turn it off. No drafts, works well. Buon appetito!!!

 

 

NB: It's a good idea to get the toppings all ready to go while the dough is rising. Once you've got your dough flattened into bases, you want to top them asap, 'cause otherwise the dough will start to rise again and you could end up with fluffy, thick pizzas, instead of thin, pizzary goodness. Enjoy!!

me gusta mañana, me gustas tu, me gusta enchilada, me gustas tu - n◦ 2

I haven't really made a lot of enchiladas this year.  Plenty of burritos, a few batches of tasty tasty empandas, but not a lot on the baked goodness of the enchilada-front.  Time to get back on the horse.  Ordinarily I'm a chicken and kidney bean kind of girl, when it comes to enchiladas, but last night decided to make them with essentially a spag bol concoction.  Have mince, will travel. 

The thing I really love about enchiladas (and indeed the majority of tortilla-based foods) is that you can make the filling well before dinner time.  Heck, make it the day before.  Or a month before, then freeze it.  It doesn't matter, especcially for enchiladas, 'cause you're going to whack 'em in the oven anyway.  We had our mexican canneloni (it's what they remind me of) with a warm salad - cauli, red onion, garlic, ginger, beetroot, carrot and thinly-sliced kumara, stir-fried to perfection by KB with sesame oil. 

For 6 enchiladas (so 3-4 people, or 2 people, plus leftovers for lunch)

1 onion, diced

3 cloves garlic, finely chopped

1 chilli, chopped

cumin (powdered or seeds)

salt and pepper

500 g mince

capers, up to you how many

2 tbsp wholegrain mustard

2-3 tbsp sweet chilli sauce

dash balsamic vinegar

400g tin tomatoes

6 tortillas (c. 20cm ones)

cream cheese

cheese, grated

1. Sauté onions and garlic.  When softening, add chilli, cumin (as much as to your taste, I use a good 3-4 tablespoons), salt and pepper.  Stir.
2. Add mince and break up, stiring to brown all through. 
3. Add capers, mustard, sweet chilli and balsamic.  Mix through the mince.  Add the tomatoes, stir thoroughly and reduce temprature to low and allow to simmer for anything from a half hour to an hour or so.  Stir occasionally, to ensure the flavours are all through. 
4. When you're about 20 minutes away from being ready to eat, turn oven on to about 180 degrees celcius. 
5. Make up the enchiladas by spreading cream cheese onto the tortillas.  Spoon in a decent amount of mince and roll up (like a canneloni, or a crèpe), tucking the two sides together.  Place, seam down, into your baking dish.  Tuck all six alongside each other, so they stay put.  Grate cheese over the top. 
6. Bake for about 20 minutes, or until the cheese has melted and browned a little. 
7. Serve with a salad and you're done! 

PS:  Thanks, Manu Chao, for the title-inspiration, and you can add extra tomato on top of the enchiladas too, if you want, under the grated cheese.