Royal Gala Dinner Party

What?! You haven't been getting my posts since April? Maybe you should check up on your RSS feed reader ;) In all seriousness though, life has been hectic, what can I say? I just hope that you will all find it in your hearts to forgive me - It is my birthday after all!

Well, it was on Monday anyway. I turned the ripe old age of 25 and last weekend I held a purple themed dinner party to celebrate my quarter of a century of life. Why purple? Because it is my favourite colour of course! All my guests (14 of us in total) wore something purple and in true Tara fashion I had to take it that one step further and incorporate the colour purple into as much of the food as possible. I think I did pretty well considering purple isn't a predominant colour in food and I didn't want to resort to food colouring too much (it is only in the icing for the cupcakes and a tiny bit in the cocktails) and let's face it, it isn't the most appetising of colours. Eggplant and beetroot were my saviours, but I had some unlikely helpers - like lavender! Here is a copy of the menu, click on it to open it larger if you can't read it properly.

Appetisers & Drinks:

Eggplant & Goat's Cheese Stacks w/ Prosciutto Makes 50

I based these stacks on these ones that I found on Taste.com.au, but I used eggplant instead because I knew I was making beetroot dip and I didn't want the beetroot to dominate the appetisers! Just having one layer made them a little easier to handle as finger food and I topped them with prosciutto because it is delicious and pink, which is pretty close to purple. Lebanese eggplant is better to use for these as it is nice and slender and so makes smaller, bite-size rounds.

Cut 5 lebanese eggplants into 1cm slices and marinate in a mixture of 1/4C olive oil & 1/4C balsamic vinegar for 1 hour. In the meantime, mix together 3tsp chopped chives, 2Tbsp milk & 120g goat's cheese and set aside until needed.

Drain eggplant slices on paper towel and heat 1Tbsp olive oil in a frying pan. Fry eggplant slices for a few minutes each side, until golden. Drain on paper towel. Top with cheese mixture and 4 slices torn prosciutto.

Purple Potato Soup Shots Makes 20 shots (Double to serve 4 normally)

When I did my first search for purple food, this one came up and I knew I just had to make it. I didn't want a sit down entree though, so to make it more finger food friendly I served it in shot glasses. I made sure to top them with chopped chives and serve them with cheese twist biscuits though so that people didn't think they were alcoholic shots and get a strange surprise when they were savoury! Mine didn't turn out as purple as the photos in the article I got it from, but then I didn't have professional lighting (and I suspect theirs may have had some food dye in it to bring out the purple more). Despite my brother bagging me all night that my purple soup wasn't purple, it was a very pretty lavender colour and I was pretty happy with it.

Melt 1/2Tbsp butter with 1/2Tbsp olive oil in a stockpot over medium heat. Add 1/4C chopped red onion and saute for 10 minutes, until tender but not brown. Add 115g chopped purple cabbage & 1 diced medium purple potato and cook for 5 minutes, stirring. Add 1/2Tbsp flour and stir for 2 minutes. Mix in 355ml vegetable stock and bring to the boil, stirring frequently. Simmer for 20 minutes or until vegetables are tender. Cool slightly before pureeing. Pour into shot glasses (a funnel or squeeze bottle will make this a lot easier) and top with chopped chives to serve.

Beetroot Dip

I also got this recipe off Taste.com.au. The one change I would make would be to lower the dill a little next time, so this is reflected in the recipe below.

Drain a 425g can beetroot and process along with 1 tsp ground cumin, 1/2Tbsp dill & 1/3C natural yoghurt, until smooth. Store in an airtight container in the fridge until needed.

Fruit Tingle Cocktails

Sorry, no up close photo of this one, they all got downed too quickly! They were absolutely delicious and a real crowd pleaser. I did have a little trouble with getting them suitably purple as the blue curacao overpowered the strawberry liqueur, so I had to add a tiny bit of pink food colouring to make them stay purple. I say stay purple because in the bottle (I premixed it all together to make it easier when people arrived) it looked purple, but when it was poured into the glass it turned blue instead. It might have been because the strawberry liqueur I used wasn't very red to start with. I used quite small glasses, so I just put 1 large jigger measure (60ml) of the mixture into the bottom of the glasses and topped it with lemonade. In a regular glass you would probably need more like the 90ml total alcohol that is suggested. You could still premix it and just use 3 normal jigger measures to get the right amount.

Mix together equal parts of blue curacao, vodka & strawberry liqueur (some recipes use grenadine or raspberry cordial). If the mixture still looks blue, add a couple of drops of pink/red food colouring until it is purple, if desired. Put a few ice cubes in the bottom of a highball glass and add 90ml of the mixture. Top with lemonade and serve.

Purple Berry Punch

This was a very simple punch, just to add some more colour to the table and give people something to drink after their fruit tingle cocktail. The cocktails used a lot of expensive liqueur, so I just gave everyone one on arrival.

Pour a large bottle of Ribena into a punch bowl and add a bottle of bubbly (I used Passion Pop - classy, I know!). Top with some frozen berries to keep it cool.

Mains:

Beetroot Couscous Salad Serves 6

You might recognise this one from a little while ago. I loved this salad just as much the second time around, and it was perfect for the theme.

Caramelised Onion Potato Salad Serves 10

This is another recipe you may have seen on my blog before. It is my absolute go to recipe for potato salad - the most delicious one ever! This time I used purple skinned potatoes and made sure the red onions weren't cooked too long so that they kept their purple colour.

Roast Vegetables

Not really much of a recipe to share here, I just roasted some red onion, purple sweet potato, eggplant, zucchini & carrot in a bit of olive oil until tender. Just something to go with the roast beef.

Risotto Stuffed Eggplants Makes 8

I cheated a little bit here and got mum to make her risotto. She makes it well and it was one less time consuming thing that I had to do! I used about half of the batch that she made and she uses 2 cups of rice. So you could make a batch for dinner and use the leftovers to stuff eggplants for dinner the next night. Or, if you don't want leftovers, just make a batch using 1 cup of rice and that should be enough to fill the eggplants.

Make a risotto using 1C of rice, or use leftovers. I used a tomato based risotto, but you could really use any flavour you like. Preheat oven to 200C. Halve 4 small eggplants and scoop out most of the flesh (reserve for use in other meals), leaving a 1cm border inside the skin. This is best done with a knife to score the outline and a spoon to scoop it out. Arrange eggplants in a baking dish. Chop some Edam or Mozzarella (or your favourite cheese) into cubes and place one in each eggplant half. Fill with risotto and sprinkle with parmesan cheese. Cook in preheated oven for 30 minutes, or until golden and cooked through.

Poached Chicken w/ Blackberry Cabernet Sauce Serves 6

Red wine in a chicken dish? And blackberries!? Yes, it is a strange combination, but it works. Blackberries in a savoury dish was another of my unlikely purple helpers. I got the recipe from What's Cooking America. One of my best friends, Aleisha, can't stand sweet things with savoury, but she still gave this a go. What can I say? My friends really have faith in my cooking... suckers!

In a large pot over medium heat, combine the 2C water, 1C dry white wine, 1 bay leaf, 1 sliced onion, 1 diced carrot, 1 chopped celery stalk, 1/2tsp salt & 1/4tsp pepper. Bring to a boil and boil 5 minutes. Add 1kg halved skinless chicken breasts; bring back to a boil, cover, reduce the heat to low, and simmer 15 minutes. Turn off heat and let pot stand, covered, until cool. Lift chicken pieces from cooking stock with a slotted utensil. Slice thinly lengthwise, holding them in their original shape as you work. Arrange the sliced breast on a platter, cover with plastic wrap, and refrigerate. Strain the stock and reserve for use in other dishes.

For the sauce, puree and then strain enough blackberries to measure 1 cup pulp (about 2C). In a large frying pan, saute 1 small chopped onion in 3Tbsp extra virgin olive oil approximately 5 minutes or until onions are transparent. Add the blackberry pulp, 3Tbsp sugar & 1C Cabernet Sauvignon. Simmer sauce until reduced to approximately 1/2 the original quantity. Remove from heat and let cool. Refrigerate until ready to use. To serve, fan out chicken slices on individual plates (or a platter) and top with sauce.

Peppered Lavender Beef Serves 6-8

At this point you are probably thinking I have gone completely insane. This is, at most, only partly true. I can't comment on the taste of this dish personally, as I don't eat beef (except in mince form), but it was one of the first things to disappear, and it smelt DIVINE! I've heard of lavender being used in sweet dishes before - shortbread, honey, etc - but never in a savoury dish. I put the call out on the Taste.com.au forums for help in finding a suitably purple red meat main and this suggestion stuck out at me. The dish itself wasn't purple, but somehow the novelty of it having a purple ingredient was enough to satisfy me. Funnily enough, it was also from What's Cooking America, but somehow I didn't notice it on there when I found the chicken dish above. By the time I went to buy the beef I was already well and truly over my budget, so I just used a regular beef roast instead of the tenderloin, which was about 3 times the price. I had no complaints, so feel free to make this substitution yourselves.

For those of you in Melbourne who want to try this dish (or others using lavender), I got my culinary lavender from Warratina Lavender Farm in the Yarra Valley. I had to drive all the way out there to get it because I found this dish at the last minute, but if you are more organised than I am you can order it online and have it delivered. It was quite reasonably priced too, a 25g packet is plenty (you can barely tell I have opened mine) and is only $5.

Trim the fat and silverskin off a 1.5-2kg tenderloin beef roast. Pat the beef dry with paper towels. Lightly oil outside of roast with 1Tbsp olive oil. In a small spice or coffee grinder, coarsely grind the 1Tbsp black peppercorns, 1Tbsp white peppercorns, 2Tbsp fennel seeds, 1 1/2tsp thyme & 2Tbsp culinary lavender flowers; rub mixture all over the meat. Wrap tightly in plastic wrap and refrigerate at least 2 hours or overnight (preferably).

Preheat oven to 220C. Unwrap roast and place onto a rack in a shallow baking pan, tucking the thin end under to make it as thick as the rest of the roast. Roast for 15 minutes. Reduce oven temperature to 160C and continue to roast until the internal temperature reaches desired temperature on a meat thermometer, Rare - 49C, Medium Rare - 52C, Medium - 54C. Remove from oven and transfer onto a cutting board; let stand 15 minutes before carving (meat temperature will rise 5 to 10 degrees after it is removed from the oven). Transfer onto a serving platter and serve immediately with any accumulated juices.

Desserts:

Blackberry Chocolate Chip Ice Cream

I really only made this one so that I had a chance to use my new Tupperware Jel Ring. I started selling Tupperware a few months ago, but that is the subject of a whole other post. This one was so easy it barely needs a recipe, but here it is anyway! Use whatever flavour ice cream you like and mix in your favourite flavourings for the swirls - the possibilities are endless.

Soften a 2L tub of vanilla chocolate chip ice cream (I used Cadbury) and spoon into a Tupperware Jel Ring mould.Spoon through a few spoonfuls of blackberry puree (I used leftovers from the chicken dish), swirling it through the ice cream to make nice patterns (you can also spread a little bit on the mould before you add in the ice cream so that it is visible when it is unmoulded). Check for airbubbles and tap the mould on the counter a few times to get rid of them. Freeze for a few hours, until firm. Dip mould in warm water briefly to loosen, remove base seal of mould, invert onto a serving plate and remove top seal. If the ice cream seems stuck, gently run a blunt knife under the rim of the mould, or leave for a few minutes to allow gravity to do the job. Top with more blackberry puree and drizzle with Ice Magic. Serve quickly, before it melts!

Berry Bread & Butter Pudding Serves 4

This was a big hit, despite the fact that I burnt the bottom of it - A few too many glasses of punch by that stage I think! Or maybe it was because I skipped the water bath. I used this recipe, but substituted half of the raspberries for blueberries. Red + Blue = Purple, simple primary school art! I also used real sugar instead of sweetener, because I am a rebellious diabetic and I'm not a fan of sweeteners - except for in my soft drink. I am an odd one, aren't I? I doubled the recipe for the party, but I'll post the original size below because I am more likely to make it smaller next time.

Preheat oven to 180C. Whisk 3 eggs, 2Tbsp castor sugar, 1 1/2tsp vanilla essence, 1tsp ground cinnamon & 2C milk together in a bowl. Spread both sides of 6 fruit bread slices with low-fat spread. Cut slices in half diagonally to make triangles. Layer bread, in rows, in a 6cm-deep, 22cm x 13cm (base), 4 cup-capacity ovenproof dish. Sprinkle with 1/2C frozen raspberries & 1/2C frozen blueberries. Pour over egg mixture. Place dish in a large baking dish. Pour boiling water into baking dish until halfway up the side of smaller dish. Bake for 40 minutes or until golden and just set. Set aside to cool for 5 minutes. Sprinkle with 2Tbsp raw sugar. Serve with cream.

Chocolate Mud Cupcakes w/ Purple Ganache Frosting Makes 12

I am sitting here eating the final leftover cupcake as I type this - and boy is it delicious! Even a week after they were made, all they need is a zap in the microwave and they are almost as good as before. Originally I was going to put berries inside them for the purple theme, but I decided there was a bit of berry overkill going on elsewhere, so I just tinted a white chocolate ganache to use for the icing to fit in with the purple theme. I wanted to top them with edible silver foil or glitter, but these proved hard to find at the last minute, so I used some sparkly purple thingys (very technical name there!) that I managed to find at the cupcake factory down the road, and of course some silver cachous. This recipe is great as it can be made in the one bowl and doesn't use a mixer at all.

Preheat oven to 160C and line muffin tin with cupcake pans. For the cupcakes, place 200g butter, 250g chopped dark chocolate & 1/4C hot water in a microwave safe bowl and microwave on high for 2-3 minutes, stirring each minute, until smooth. Add 1/4C cocoa powder and stir until smooth. Stir in 1tsp vanilla extract, 1C castor sugar & 3 eggs. Sift in 3/4C self-raising flour and stir gently to combine. Pour into cupcake liners and bake for 20-30 minutes, until a skewer inserted into the middle has moist crumbs clinging. Allow cupcakes to cool completely in tins (I let mine cool in the oven).

For the ganache, melt together 250g good quality white chocolate & 1/3C cream in the microwave in 1 minute bursts, until smooth. Add a few drops of blue and pink food colouring, until desired colour is reached (I tried using red colouring and it wouldn't go the colour I wanted). Set aside at room temperature until the ganache is thick and spreadable. When cupcakes are cool, ice with ganache and sprinkle with cachous and sparkly purple thingys!

Purple Jelly Shots Makes 60

I followed the same recipe I usually do for these (again, skipping the worms), using 3 different packets of purple coloured jelly - Grape, Port Wine & Cherry. Sooo delicious - I think I ended up having 13 of them!?

Check out my apron! Everything just came together so well for this party, I wanted a fancy looking black apron that would look good with my cocktail dress and this one was just waiting for me when I went shopping one day. Even the dress didn't take too much effort to find and it is absolutely perfect (and was a bargain at only $50 when I was looking up to $200). The menu just came together and there were no major disasters in the cooking process. Even the plates were easy, Thanks to my friend Jess. I mean, who has 14 matching white dinner plates?! I would have had to buy 4 dinner sets if it weren't for the generosity of Jess! She was a life saver.

I'll leave you with some photos from the night, if you would like to see more, just click on any of the photos in this post and it will take you to my flickr page. Thanks to everyone who came along, I had a wonderful night. Also, a big thanks to Leish, Leanne, Jon & Jess for all your help. Love you guys! :)

Me & Leanne

Jon & Me

Phil & Leish

Leanne & Me

Leish, Caitlin & Jess

Two ways with polenta

I've been going well with my weight loss goals at the moment. I've lost 1.4kg so far since Good Friday and I am not only feeling and looking great, but I have dramatically decreased my insulin needs and also improved my blood sugar levels, which would make it all worthwhile even if the weight wasn't coming off just yet! But it is, so that is a bonus :)

It was only when I went to write my shopping list this week that I realised I had planned two meals that used polenta. Luckily I am a big fan of it and didn't really care! Besides, one was a soft, creamy baked polenta and the other one was used as a crunchy topping, so they weren't even all that similar.

I found the Mushroom rosemary polenta bake in the May issue of Super Food Ideas magazine and paired it up with a Honey balsamic chicken recipe that I found on sparkpeople.com (which is a wonderful FREE site that helps you to reach your fitness goals - If you are on there, add me as a friend, my username is TaraM84). The polenta was delicious and creamy without using any cream, milk or even oil, and the glaze on the chicken was a perfect match with the steamed vegetables as well.

The Chilli bean bake is out of a book I borrowed from the library called '200 Fat-free Recipes' and although my polenta topping didn't turn out quite as fluffy as their cornmeal one, it was still really tasty. I used about half as much chilli as the recipe called for and found it to be just enough to taste it without making me need to drink a litre of water along with my meal. I had to use canned beans because my supermarket didn't have dried ones, so I didn't need to cook mine as long. If you use canned beans use about 3 and 3/4C of beans (almost 3 cans) and halve all the simmering times. Dried beans are of course cheaper and better for the environment as there is less packaging.

Honey Balsamic Chicken w/ Mushroom Rosemary Polenta Bake Serves 4

Honey Balsamic Chicken

Cut 500g skinless chicken breast into 4 equal portions. Combine 1 1/2tsp dried thyme, 1/2tsp salt & 1/4tsp pepper and sprinkle over both sides of chicken. Heat 1tsp olive oil in a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Add chicken and cook 7 to 8 minutes on each side or until chicken is done. Transfer chicken to a platter and keep warm. Reduce heat to medium-low and add 2Tbsp balsamic vinegar and 2Tbsp honey to pan. Simmer 1 minute or until glaze thickens, stirring constantly. Pour glaze over chicken.

(Nutrition Info - taken from sparkpeople.com: Calories: 173.3, Total Fat: 2.6 g, Cholesterol: 65.7 mg, Sodium: 367.6 mg, Total Carbs: 10.1 g, Dietary Fiber: 0.3 g, Protein: 26.3 g)

Mushroom Rosemary Polenta Bake

Preheat oven to 200C. Place 1C beef stock, 2 crushed garlic cloves & 2C cold water in a saucepan. Cover and bring to the boil. Remove from heat and pour into a large ovenproof dish. Sprinkle over 1C polenta and top with 200g sliced mushrooms & 2tsp finely chopped fresh rosemary leaves. Cover dish tightly with foil and bake for 20 minutes, stirring after 10 minutes. Remove foil, sprinkle with 1/2C finely grated parmesan cheese and bake for another 5-7 minutes. Stand for 2 minutes and serve.

(Nutrition Info - taken from SFI: 760kj/180 calories, 4.4g fat inc. 2.4g sat. fat, 10g protein, 23.8g carbs, 2.6g fibre, 474mg sodium)

Chilli Bean Bake w/ Polenta Topping Serves 4

Soak 1 1/4C dried red kidney beans in cold water overnight. Drain and rinse well. Preheat the oven to 220C. Pour 4C water into a large saucepan, add the beans and 1 bay leaf and boil rapidly for 10 minutes. Lower the heat, cover, and simmer for 35-40 minutes or until the beans are tender. Add 1 large, finely chopped onion, 1 crushed garlic clove, 2 sliced celery sticks, 1tsp cumin, 1/2-1tsp chilli powder, 400g canned tomatoes, 1Tbsp tomato puree & 1tsp dried mixed herbs. Half cover the pan with a lid and simmer for a further 10 minutes. Stir in 1Tbsp lemon juice, 1 diced yellow capsicum, salt & pepper and simmer for another 8-10 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the vegetables are just tender.

Discard the bay leaf and spoon the mixture into a large baking or casserole dish. To make the topping, mix together 1 1/2C polenta, 1Tbsp wholemeal flour & 1tsp baking powder and whisk in 1 lightly beaten egg & 3/4C skim milk. Spread topping evenly over beans and bake for 20 minutes or until brown.

(Nutrition info - taken from 200 fat-free recipes: 399 calories/1675kj, 22.9g protein, 4.7g fat inc. 0.9g sat. fat, 11.6g fibre, 68g carbs)

Time to get healthy!

I've decided to get serious about getting fit & healthy. I know I have half heartedly attempted to do this several times in the life of this blog, but this time I am determined. I do not want to finish my degree at the end of this year and move into my profession overweight. I do not want to have to be a hypocrite on a daily basis when I am telling people how to eat better and promoting healthy lifestyles! So, starting on Good Friday (I know, crazy time to start eating healthy right?!), I started the process of turning my lifestyle around for the better. Over the past week I have been counting the calories I consume, striving to eat more fruit and vegetables, drinking more water and trying to get more exercise in the hopes that it will become a part of my regular routine.

A lot of people who I have told about my recent endeavours have commented that I don't look like I need to lose weight, that I look fine as I am, but the reality is that I am overweight. I am not ridiculously overweight and I do carry the extra weight well, but nonetheless, being overweight is not healthy, and being inactive is not good for my diabetic control. Surprisingly, when I jumped on my Wii Fit to weigh myself last Friday I found out that I have lost 3.8kg since the last time I was on it back in February, so I'm not as overweight as I was!

My BMI back then was 28.4, which is actually on the higher end of overweight (anything over 30 is considered obese) and my BMI at the beginning of the week was 26.9, which is getting closer to the healthy weight range (which is between 18.5 & 24.9). I am aiming for a BMI of 22 as this has the lowest health risks associated with it, so my goal weight is 55kg, which means I have 11.2kg to lose (4.9kg to get to the healthy weight range & another 6.3kg to get to a BMI of 22). I hope to get into the healthy weight range by the end of May and to my goal weight by my birthday at the beginning of August.

Over the past week I have been sticking fairly strictly to 1400 calories a day (~5850kj) and I have actually found that I am eating MORE now than I was before. I have always been a breakfast skipper (bad, I know). This stopped for a little while when I was first diagnosed with diabetes, but since I have had my insulin pump I have slipped back into my old ways, but this week I have eaten breakfast every day, which I am very proud of.

I have also been working to introduce exercise, which I have a lot of apprehension with, not only because of my poor fitness level, but also because of how badly it messes with my blood sugar readings. So I am trying to sort out my insulin doses and keep myself from going low after exercise, because aside from not being fun, I then also have to consume more calories to keep my sugar levels from going too low and putting me into a coma. The life of a diabetic is never simple, appreciate all the work that your body does to keep your sugar levels balanced! Trust me, you don't want to have to do that manually.

This week I got in one 30 minute walk (which was a feat in itself with the hills around here!) and three 45 minute Wii Fit sessions (with 13 minutes boxing, 10 minutes step aerobics, 11 minutes hula hoops & 11 minutes of strength exercises). Going from exercising 0 times a week to 4 times a week is pretty good if you ask me! I know that Wii Fit isn't the best exercise out there, but it gives me a good workout while giving me a chance to work out my insulin doses a little bit.

This week I lost 0.5kg, which I am fairly happy with, although it is a little short of the 0.7kg per week that I need to reach the healthy weight range by the end of May. Still, better than nothing, and also quite good when you consider that I managed to lose weight over the easter period! That is a pretty good accomplishment in itself.

Over the next few weeks you will notice a lot more healthier recipes on my blog. I hope that you all see this as good news and don't stop reading because of it. They will all still be very tasty, no rubbery, tasteless, rabbit food on my blog! Unfortunately, this does mean that I will not be participating in the Daring Bakers challenges anymore, I haven't been participating much lately anyway due to a distinct lack of time in my life, but I will be officially withdrawing from the group and I am very sad to do so. I will be living vicariously through other Daring Baker blogs from now on, so make me proud :)

Here is a pasta bake I made on Monday when Leanne came around for our weekly dinner and girly catch up. It isn't the lowest in fat or calories, but I had soup for lunch so that I could fit this into my calorie limit. It is quite high in fibre and contains around 1.5 of your 5 vegetable serves for the day as well. I got this one from the May issue of Super Food Ideas, although it was originally in their July 2006 issue. I was going to put some wholegrain honey mustard in there as well for some extra flavour, but I forgot about it until it was in the oven! Even without the mustard it was still delicious though.

Ham & Broccoli Pasta Bake Serves 4

Preheat oven to 180C. Cook 300g fusilli pasta according to packet directions, adding 380g trimmed broccoli florets to the pan for the last minute of cooking time.

Meanwhile, melt 1Tbsp reduced-fat dairy spread in a saucepan over medium heat and add 4 thinly sliced spring onions & 2 crushed garlic cloves. Cook for 1 minute, add 1Tbsp plain flour and cook, stirring, for 30 seconds. Remove from heat, add 1C skim milk, gradually, whisking until smooth. Return to hear and add 1tsp finely grated lemon rind. Cook, stirring, for 3 minutes or until sauce just comes to the boil. Reduce heat to low and simmer for 2 minutes, stirring occasionally, Remove from heat and add 1/2C reduced fat cream cheese & 1/2C grated reduced fat tasty cheese. Stir until melted and smooth. Season with salt & pepper.

Drain pasta and broccoli. Place in an 8C capacity baking dish. Top with 200g chopped 98% fat free ham. Pour cheese sauce over ham and stir to combine. Sprinkle with 1/2C fresh multigrain breadcrumbs and spray lightly with olive oil spray. Bake for 20 minutes or until golden.

Nutrition Information (from magazine) - 541 cal, 2266kj, 15.2g fat, 8.2g saturated fat, 33.6g protein, 63.1g carbohydrate, 7.3g fibre, 1307mg sodium

Late Valentines Dessert

I was meant to post this yesterday, but I have been sick (again) and it slipped my mind! I made this months Daring Bakers dessert for Valentines Day earlier in the month. I decided to go with mini versions as I found a heart shaped muffin form in my cupboard and thought it would be perfect... and then I found a heart shaped ice cube tray for the ice cream as well! It was delicious and pretty simple to make, with only 3 ingredients in the cake... and that is about all I can think of to write at the moment as my brain is a bit foggy from cold & flu tablets!

The February 2009 challenge is hosted by Wendy of WMPE's blog and Dharm of Dad ~ Baker & Chef. We have chosen a Chocolate Valentino cake by Chef Wan; a Vanilla Ice Cream recipe from Dharm and a Vanilla Ice Cream recipe from Wendy as the challenge.

Chocolate Valentino

I made two versions of this cake, a dark chocolate version and a white chocolate & macadamia nut version. I scaled down the recipe for both so that I didn't end up with too much cake. Since there are only 3 ingredients it is easy to scale down, just use the measurements below.

182g chocolate, 58g butter, 2 eggs

272g chocolate, 88g butter, 3 eggs

364g chocolate, 116g butter, 4 eggs

454g chocolate, 156g butter, 5 eggs

Put chocolate & butter in a heatproof bowl and set over a pan of simmering water (the bottom of the bowl should not touch the water) and melt, stirring often. While your chocolate butter mixture is cooling. Butter your pan and line with a parchment circle then butter the parchment. Separate the egg yolks from the egg whites and put into two medium/large bowls. Whip the egg whites in a medium/large grease free bowl until stiff peaks are formed (do not over-whip or the cake will be dry). With the same beater beat the egg yolks together. Add the egg yolks to the cooled chocolate. Fold in 1/3 of the egg whites into the chocolate mixture and follow with remaining 2/3rds. Fold until no white remains without deflating the batter. Pour batter into prepared pan, the batter should fill the pan 3/4 of the way full, and bake at 190C. Bake for 25 minutes or until an instant read thermometer reads 60C. Cool cake on a rack for 10 minutes then unmold.

Raspberry Vanilla Ice Cream

This was a bit of a problem for me as I don't have an ice cream maker and I also didn't leave myself much freezing time as I started cooking late! Freezing some of it in the ice cube mould did help it freeze quicker though. I added raspberries to my ice cream because I had some in my freezer and thought the pink would go nicely with the theme.

I made a raspberry syrup by heating 300g raspberries & 125g caster sugar in a saucepan until the sugar was dissolved, mashing the berries a bit as it heated. I then added half of this to the ice cream mixture and used the other half as a sauce over the whole dessert.

For the ice cream, slit 1 vanilla pod lengthways. Pour 300ml milk into a heavy based saucepan, add the vanilla pod and bring to the boil. Remove from heat and leave for 15 minutes to allow the flavours to infuse. Scrape the black seeds out of the pod with a small knife so that they fall back into the milk. Set the vanilla pod aside and bring the milk back to the boil.

Whisk 4 large egg yolks, 75g caster sugar & 1tsp corn-flour in a bowl until the mixture is thick and foamy. Gradually pour in the hot milk, whisking constantly. Return the mixture to the pan and cook over a gentle heat, stirring all the time. When the custard thickens and is smooth, pour it back into the bowl and add half of the raspberry mixture. Cool it then chill.

Whip 300ml heavy cream until it has thickened but still falls from a spoon. Fold it into the custard and pour into a plastic tub or similar freeze-proof container. Freeze for 6 hours or until firm enough to scoop, beating it twice (during the freezing process – to get smoother ice cream or else the ice cream will be icy and coarse)

I'm Back with a Stew

Finally feeling better both physically and emotionally, so I am back! Having the internet also helps, I have been stuck without it for almost 2 weeks... very sad... Anyway, I made this stew the other night after I saw it in a new book I bought and I couldn't go past it because it uses one of my favourite drinks, apple cider... Also, apples in mashed potato? You know I had to give something slightly off track like that a go! I used more shallots than it called for and next time I would make more sauce as I didn't find it saucy enough, so this is reflected below...

I know I have enough cookbooks and shouldn't be buying any more of them, but it was only 10 bucks and it is from a series that I already have 2 books out of which I love (BBQ Food & Cool Food), so I couldn't resist the temptation! Well, I bought 2 more of them, so now I have 4 out of the series and these 2 look like they may be just as good... This recipe is out of 'Fast Food' and the other book I bought was 'Small Food'...

Chicken & Cider Stew w/ Apple & Potato Mash Serves 4

Cut 1kg skinless chicken breast fillets (original called for thigh fillets) into 2cm cubes and season with salt, pepper & 2tsp fresh chopped thyme. Heat 1Tbsp olive oil in a large saucepan over medium heat and brown chicken in 2 batches. Remove from pan. Saute 5 thinly sliced french shallots & 1Tbsp fresh chopped thyme for 2 minutes. Pour in 600ml apple cider and bring to the boil. Scrape any sediment off the bottom and then return the chicken to the pan. Reduce heat to medium-low and cook for 35-40 minutes, or until the chicken is tender and the sauce has reduced.

Meanwhile, cube 1kg peeled potatoes and slice 2 large peeled green apples into eighths. Cook both in a pan of boiling water for 15-20 minutes or until tender. Drain and return to the heat until liquid has evaporated. Remove from the heat and mash until smooth. Add 2Tbsp light cream & 50g butter and season well with salt and pepper.

Stir 1C light cream into the stew and cook for 2-4 minutes or until the sauce has thickened. Serve immediately with potato and apple mash and a crisp green salad.

One Year On

It's been one year since you passed away. That year has numbed the pain slightly, but it is still there for all of us. It is still hard to believe that you are gone. I will love you & miss you always.

Sick...

For those of you who are wondering where I have disappeared to, I have been feeling sick. Sick in the way that cooking food, reading or writing about food and sometimes even thinking about food makes my stomach feel not so nice! The doctors don't really know what is going on, they thought I was pregnant (but I'm not!), and now I am having the joyous fun of seeing some specialists.

As soon as I feel well enough to cook, eat and blog like my regular self I will be back. Until then, keep blogging your hearts out (although I won't be reading until I feel better) and lets keep our fingers crossed that they figure out what is going on!