Fried Rice

A quick easy and yummy dinner. We had our rice with some honey soy chicken wings (thank you leonards) and some mini spring rolls (from a frozen packet, was not bothered to make real ones on a Thursday night)

• marinated chicken wings (one day I will put up a recipe for these but the ones from leonards are pretty tasty)
• Cooked rice
• 3 eggs
• 1 onion sliced
• 2 cloves of garlic finely chopped
• a little fresh ginger finely chopped
• chopped ham or bacon
• finely chopped carrot
• finely chopped capsicum (you can add in other vegies if you want, like peas)
• green onions chopped
• soy sauce
• powdered chicken stock
• spring rolls (again, will put up a recipe one day, the homemade ones are soooo much better)

1. If you dont have some already cooked rice, put this on now
2. Put the chicken wings in the oven at about 180 (I buy those foil BBQ trays as it makes cleaning much easier)
3. Mix the eggs well, then cook up in a frying pan (like an omelet, try not to mix it around and cook on a medium heat)
4. Remove omelet from pan and put in a bowl for now
5. In the same pan fry up the onion, garlic and ginger until the onions go soft
6. Add the ham, carrot, and capsicum and cook for about 2 mins (I try not to cook the vegies for too long so they are still have a nice crunch)
7. Chop up the omelet and return to pan with the green onions.
8. Add the rice to the pan with some soy sauce and some of the powdered chicken stock. Mix really well and add more soy sauce and chicken stock to taste
9. Leave on a low heat while you cook up your spring rolls
10. Serve rice with spring rolls, chicken wings and some sweet and sour sauce

Garlic and Rosemary Lamb Cutlets with Mash

• 6 lamb cutlets (enough for 2 people)
• 2-3 cloves of garlic
• a couple of sprigs of rosemary
• salt and pepper
• olive oil
• broccolini/broccoli (or any other veg for steaming)
• Potatoes, peeled and chopped
• Butter
• Milk
• Chives

1. In a mortar and pestle bash up the garlic, rosemary and salt and pepper.
2. Add about 3-4 tbspes of olive oil and mix
3. Put lamb chops on a plate and cover well with the marinade. Cover and put in the fridge for about 30mins
4. Cook the potatoes in salted boiling water.
5. Mash. See my method here (I added in some chives to add extra flavour as I didnt have much butter)
   
6. Steam Broccolini/broccoli while pan frying the lamb cutlets.
7. Eat!!

Smashing up the garlic, rosemary, salt and pepper

Adding in the oil

The finished product

 

Chilli Pork with Ginger

I got this recipe from the Masterchef Website… Well the inspiration for it anyway. It was one the the McCormick recipes so it asks you for dried this and granulated that…. but I used fresh of course!

• 500g Pork Fillet
• 2 small red chillies deseeded and sliced
• about 2 tbsps finely chopped fresh ginger
• 2-3 cloves of garlic finely chopped
• 2 tbsps soy sauce
• 1 tbsp of oil (I used peanut oil)
• 1 onion sliced
• vegies of your own choice – I used broccolini, snow peas, and green onions (was going with a bit of a green theme)
• 2 tbsps sweet chilli sauce and a little extra soy to taste
• rice

1. Finely slice the pork fillet and marinate it in the chillies, ginger, garlic, soy sauce and oil (leave for around an hour if you are patient, or less if impatient or hungry)
2. Put on your rice (once you start cooking this takes no time at all)
3. Stir fry and pork in batches and set aside
4. Stir fry onion, then add broccolini
5. When the broccolini is nearly cooked add the snow peas, green onions and pork
6. When all is cooked add a little extra soy (to taste) and the sweet chilli sauce
7. Serve on a bed of rice

Marinating the Pork

Slicing the onion

Chicken and Steamed Vegies with Satay Sauce

This is one of my favourite recipes! I originally got the satay recipe from my sister. It goes really well with chicken but it would also be yummy with beef or vegies or tofu. I normally steam my vegies because I just love the flavour and freshness of steamed vegies (not to mention it is better for me!)

• 1 chicken breast (is enough for 2 people)
• Vegies – I used carrot, broccoli, green beans and green onions – you can use anything thats good for steaming, i like snow peas too)
• jasmine rice
• red curry paste
• smooth peanut butter
• coconut milk (400ml can)
• soy sauce
• 1 lime

1. Prepare all your ingredients – peel and chop carrots, top and tail beans, cut up broccoli and green onions. I cut the 2 cheeks off the lime (for serving) then cut the middle piece in half for the satay sauce. Cut the chicken into large stirfry size pieces (or if you are feeling adventurous  thread the chicken onto skewers).
2. Put your rice on to cook. When I cook rice in the rice cooker I add a little bit of powdered chicken stock (about 1 tsp for 2 rice cooker cups). I find it creates a really nice texture to the rice.
3. Put the vegies on to steam (except for the green onions, they go in at the very last moment)
4. Mix the chicken with 2 tbsps of soy sauce. Fry in batches and put in a bowl until you serve (its ok if it gets a little cool because you will pour hot satay sauce over the top at the end).
5. For the sauce: In a small saucepan heat up about 2 tbsps of red curry paste until fragrant (the more you add the hotter it will be). Just put it on a low to medium heat. Then add about 1 cup of peanut butter and stir well to mix. The next ingredients I add to taste, so do it gradually and keep tasting to check, some soy sauce (probably about 2 tbsps), coconut milk (I rarely use a whole can), and some lime juice. The trick is to keep stirring, and add a little of each ingredient at a time and taste, and keep looking at it to see if it looks right. Also make sure the heat is quite low or the sauce might split.
6. When the steamed vegies seem like they are almost done add the green onions and turn the pot off (the residual heat will finish the cooking.
7. Serve with a mound of rice, some of the vegies and chicken then pour over plenty of the satay sauce.

Yummy lime!

Green onions

Getting everything ready

Frying up the chicken

Vegies ready to steam

Close up of yummy satay goodness

Mini Quiches and ORANGINA!!

Yesterday while shopping we got caught in the crazy rain storm!! We were at the Rocks Markets, so we decided to take shelter in a little French Patisserie to get some macaroons. But once we walked in I saw their drinks fridge and saw that they had Orangina!! I fell in love with Orangina about 10 years ago when I went to France, and have been searching to find a place in Aus that sells it ever since! Last year when we went to Japan we found some at Singapore airport which was pretty exciting, then earlier this year I found some at the lolly shop in Leura, but finally yesterday we found it in Sydney! And it was even in the proper French Bottles that need a bottle opener. They are the most amazing bottles! Its kind of like fizzy orange juice, its key selling point is that it has pulp in it.

Dinner last night was going to be a big quiche lorraine, but my quiche dish seems to have gone walkabouts… Not sure if I left it at someones house. Let me know if I left it at your house 😛 So instead I made my little mini quichies instead. Usually I do spinach ones, which are really really tasty! But my mini Quiche Lorraines were pretty tasty too!

• 1 onion finely chopped
• 2-3 cloves garlic finely chopped
• 2 rashers bacon chopped
• some baby spinach finely chopped
• about 2 tbsps chopped fresh parsley
• 2 green onions sliced
• Grated tasty cheese
• 2 eggs
• 1 cup milk
• 2 sheets puff pastry
• butter
• salt and pepper

1. Fry up the onion and garlic with a little olive oil and salt and pepper until caramelised.
2. Remove onion from pan and fry up bacon.
3. Grease a 12 hole patty pan try with butter (a muffin tray really doesnt work as well for this).
4. Cut pastry into rounds using a glass or mug.
5. Put pastry rounds into patty pan tray.
6. Put a little of the caramlised onion mix into the tarts.
7. Add a little of the chopped baby spinach, followed by the bacon.
8. Top with a little parsley and some of the green onions.
9. Season with salt and pepper.
10. Mix eggs and milk and pour into tarts (Be careful not to overfill as they will expand in the oven).
11. Top with the grated cheese and bake in a moderate oven (180) until golden brown.

These are yummy hot or cold. You can eat them as a snack, or for parties, or add some salad and vegies to make this a meal.

Yummy ingredients

Assembling the tarts

Ready to add the egg mix

Close up of the ingredients in the tarts

Herb Crusted Lamb Rack with Baked Potatoes and Asparagus

I kinda got the idea for this recipe from a meal on Junior Masterchef. I had some french shallots in my cupboard so I cooked them up and put them underneath the herb crust. Obviously you can vary your sides. It would be yummy with mash, I had some asparagus in my fridge that needed to be cooked 🙂

• 1 cup fresh bread crumbs (I used some tasty Ciabatta rolls and wizzed them up)
• about 1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley
• about 3/4 cup of grated parmesan
• about 2 tbsps finely chopped rosemary
• about 1/2 tsp minced garlic
• Olive oil
• 8 bone lamb rack (this does more than enough for 2, I had yummy lamb rack for lunch the next day)
• A couple of sprigs of rosemary
• about 3 cloves of garlic sliced
• about 8 french shallots
• 4 potatoes
• a bunch of asparagus

1. Wrap potatoes in foil and put in a hot oven for around 40 mins until soft inside (This is such an easy way to cook potatoes and I love how soft and fluffy they are in the inside)
2. If your lamb rack isn’t frenched remove the excess fat.
3. Put on a plate and top with sliced garlic, rosemary sprigs, salt, pepper and olive oil. Put some rosemary and garlic underneath as well.
4. Wizz up bread to make bread crumbs. Add Parsley, chopped rosemary, parmesan, minced garlic, salt and pepper and wizz until well mixed.
5. Drizzle in olive oil while wizzing until mixture is moist and comes together a little.
6. Slice the french shallots and fry with a little oil, salt and pepper until caramelised.
7. Sear lamb on all sides (leave the garlic and rosemary on it while frying). Remove garlic and rosemary after cooking.
8. Put lamb in a baking tray top with caramelised onions and crumbs.
9. Cook lamb in a moderate oven (180) for around 20 – 25 mins then allow to rest.
10. Steam or boil asparagus
11. Unwrap potatoes and top with some butter and a bit of salt and pepper
12. EAT!!

Before mixing up crumbs

Marinating the lamb

French Shallots

Look at that crust!!

Perfectly pink on the inside

Close up of crunchy crusty goodness

Pan Fried Trout with Sweet Potato Mash & Baby Spinach

So last week we were a tad lazy… not my finest week of cooking. There were a couple of take away nights, and we also went to the Night Noodle Markets twice! But the dinners I did cook were pretty tasty 🙂 Monday was one of those quick and lazy comfort meals in the form of Beef Goulash, recipe courtesy of Continental lol. Very tasty, but not really worthy of a blog post. Tuesday night we had some yummy yummy trout and sweet potato mash. I’ve never made sweet potato mash before but when we did our Coles order (we order online) somehow they accidentally gave us a bag full of sweet potato.

Pan Fried Trout with Sweet Potato Mash & Baby Spinach

• 2 trout fillets
• about 2 Tbsps fresh chopped parsley
• 2 spring onions
• 2 lemons
• about 2 tbsps olive oil
• 2 medium size sweet potatoes
• a dash of milk
• plenty of butter
• washed baby spinach

1. Peel the sweet potato and cut into even sized pieces
2. Cook in boiling salted water until tender
3. While waiting for the sweet potato to cook prepare the trout by putting on a plate and top with chopped parsley, spring onions, salt and pepper, sliced lemon, and olive oil
4. Drain well and mash – I used a potato ricer to mash mine and found that I had to be very careful as a lot of water was still coming out of my sweet potato. I put the sweet potato into the ricer, and carefully squeezed out the water before pushing the sweet potato through
5. Add a little milk (I heat it up a little in the pot by pushing the sweet potato to one side), then add butter and salt and pepper to taste. When its done I put it into a oven proof dish and pop in the oven while I cook the trout.
6. Brush off the spring onions, lemon, and parsley off the trout.
7. Fry in a non-stick pan, squeezing a little extra lemon over the top while cooking.
8. Remove trout from pan and turn off the heat. Add the baby spinach to the hot pan with a little butter and stir until just wilted.
9. Eat!! Yum!

Marinating the trout

Putting the sweet potato through the potato ricer

Mmmm Sweet Potato Mash!!

Dishing up

Close up of yummy trouty goodness

Banana Bread and Pizza Gnocchi

So I tried to write this post last night, but Firefox crashed and I lost almost my entire post. So here goes my second attempt!

On Thursday night we were feeling super lazy so we decided to go to Ichiros for dinner instead. We gorged ourselves on sushi and their special for the moment of chilli tempura squid. Very tasty!! But I did feel a little guilty for not cooking the Pork Larb as promised. So I decided to make my yummy banana bread instead (I also thought that the ladies at work would enjoy some banana bread for Friday morning tea). Last night I was home alone as my sous chef grump is away for the weekend. So it was 8.30 before I realised that neither I nor the bunnies had had dinner yet. At that point my stomach was getting ready to eat itself, so I needed super quick dinner. Enter Pizza Gnocchi (see recipe below).

Banana Bread

I found this recipe after googling “Cafe Style Banana Bread”. Don’t get me wrong, I love banana cake (I’m a little bit of a sucker for the Sara Lee Banana Cake) but there is something special about the banana bread you get in cafes. I have been trying to recreate it for some time now, and no recipe has turned out as good as this one. It actually tastes better the next day, despite my knowledge of this I always always have a piece when it is hot and steamy! It would taste nice with maybe walnuts or pecans through it also, I think I will do pecans next time.

• 1 1/2 cups SR flour
• 1/2 cup plain flour
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 1 tsp mixed spice (to be perfectly honest I dont actually own mixed spice, so I just add a little extra cinnamon and a dash of ginger)
• 1/2 tsp bicarb soda
• 1/2 cup dark brown sugar (firmly packed, and a little overflowing doesnt hurt)
• 1 cup mashed ripe bananas (3 bananas, if you cant find ripe ones just try asking – when I went to buy bananas I was devastated because they only had green bananas. After walking around the supermarket feeling a bit sad I decided to ask and after explaining that I needed really ripe bananas for cooking the very helpful man at the supermarket got me some that were out the back)
• 2 tbsps golden syrup
• 2 eggs (beaten)
• 1/2 cup melted butter
• 1/3 cup milk

This recipe is actually super easy! My kindergarten students could probably do it (with a little help from a grown  up for the hot bits) It involves no real skill whatsoever!!

1. Grease and line a loaf tin (I bought a deep dish loaf tin from Victorias Basement – it is the one you can see where it says Bakers Secret Bakeware, but they don’t seem to sell it online)
2. Sift flours, spices and bicarb into a bowl
3. Stir in sugar
4. Make a well in the middle and gradually stir in banana, golden syrup, eggs, butter and milk (be careful that your butter is not too hot or it might scramble the eggs)
5. Mix well to combine
6. Pour into loaf tin and bake for 45-50 mins at 180c
7. Try to wait until the next day to eat it
8. Fail miserably and eat as soon as it comes out of the oven because it smells so good!! lol

My sous chef grump went a little crazy with the photo taking 😛

 

Ingredients

 

 

My fabulous loaf tin

 

 

The wonderful measuring cups that my brother got me for my Birthday

 

 

I love the way you can see the flour falling in this picture

 

 

Adding in the golden syrup

 

 

Mixing mixing

 

 

Look at that mix, YUM!!

 

 

Must get every little bit!!

 

Pizza Gnocchi

So I needed a super quick meal for Friday night, so I created Pizza Gnocchi. I used some fantastic gnocchi that I buy from the South Sydney Markets and leftover pizza sauce that I had in the freezer from my pizza dinner party last Friday.

Pizza Sauce Recipe:

This comes from one of the MasterChef Magazines under a recipe for “Roasted Cherry Tomato and Buffalo Mozzarella Pizzas”

• 2 tbsps olive oil
• 1 onion finely chopped
• 1-2 cloves garlic crushed or finely chopped
• 2 tbsps tomato paste
• 2 tsps  finely chopped basil (never skimp on herbs, you can always add more than a recipe requests in my opinion)
• 2 tsps finely chopped oregano (also you really need fresh herbs, the taste is sooo much better!!)
• 400g can Italian chopped tomatoes

1. Heat oil in a saucepan and add onion and garlic and cook stirring occasionally for 5 mins or until onions are soft
2. Add remaining ingredients and simmer on a low heat until mixture thickens (I let mine simmer for ages as I think it makes the flavour even better)
3. This is optional but I then wizz up the mix in the food processor until it is a bit smoother

To create my dinner I simply cooked up the pre-made gnocchi (it tastes so good, why would I bother making my own?), Heated the sauce up in a frying pan with a little extra water. Added the cooked gnocchi to the heated sauce and mixed carefully (if you are too rough the gnocchi will break up). I served mine with lots of cracked pepper and grated parmesan. It tasted quite like pizza, but with deliciously soft gnocchi. Yum!!

 

Close up of melty cheesy gnocchi goodness

 

Teriyaki Beef Stir Fry

I think tonight was my least favourite dish… it was lacking slightly in flavour… however… it was still tasty enough to satisfy me! I think the problem is that a) I kinda suck at stirfries and b) I totally need to buy a wok! Maybe shopping this weekend while my sous chef grump is away 🙂

Teriyaki Beef Stir-Fry

• 2 tablespoons peanut oil
• 2 teaspoons sesame oil (I found that after cooking the beef I needed to clean out the pan and re-oil)
• 600g beef rump steak, sliced thinly
• Teriyaki sauce
• 1 brown onion sliced
• 2-3 cloves garlic
• 1 small red chilli finely sliced
• 230g can bamboo shoots, rinsed, drained
• Baby corn
• 230g can bean sprouts, rinsed, drained
• Snow peas
• 1/3 cup beef stock
• 450g hokkien noodles
• 4 green onions (shallots), sliced

Make sure you have all your ingredients chopped, sliced and ready to go. I also make sure that my noodles have been separated. I do this by putting them in a colander and running hot water over them to break them apart.

1. Put beef in a bowl and  cover with teriyaki sauce.
2. Heat oils in wok or large frypan and stirfry beef in batches. (put cooked beef on a plate or in a bowl for now)
3. Stirfry onion, bamboo shoots, garlic, and chilli for about 2 minutes.
4. Add baby corn, beef, snow peas, and bean sprouts. Stir in stock and about 1/4 cup of teriyaki sauce.
5. Stirfry until mixture boils
6. Mix through the noodles
7. Add the green onions just before serving

 

Beef after frying

 

 

Yummy ingredients

 

 

Noodles ready to go in

 

 

Ingredients in frypan prior to adding noodles

 

 

Noodle tossing action

 

 

Close up of noodley goodness

 

Testing

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