O is for Oh...so much baking

I spent most of the day in the kitchen baking Christmas treats, and my feet are feeling particularly sore. But I am happy with the results. All I have to do now is bag everything up and give it to our friends. I hope they enjoy eating them :).

Chocolate oat balls

Butter biscuits cut into Christmas shapes

Gingerbread men. I made over 90 of them!

Honey jumbles...yum.

The final product (sorry about the bad photography)

Thermomix adventure no. 1

So I did something recently that I never thought I would do. I spent an obscene amount of money on a kitchen appliance. But not just any kitchen appliance I might add... a Thermomix. And I must say, this is one of the best decisions I have made in a long time. I think it is fantastic. It saves time when cooking and motivates me try new food, and since it arrived on Tuesday I have been using it two to three times daily.

On Tuesday, after it was dropped off, at 3pm in the afternoon I used it 3 times. I made a carrot salad, cauliflower soup and quince paste, and the quince paste turned out amazingly.

I used some quinces I picked up from the side of the road, and I followed this quince paste recipe I found on the Thermomix community site. Unlike my attempts at making quince paste last year this was surprisingly easy because it avoided all the time wasted in straining the paste to make it fine and smooth. 

Here I am cutting everything up.

This is the core and peel after it had been blitzed, and before the water had been added.

Here it is after being cooked for 25mins, but before being strained to get the liquid out.

After cooking for a massive 50mins it is ready to be placed in the tray to cool and set.

Such a vibrant red colour.

The end product: so smooth and tasty :).

 I am looking forward to all the Thermomix adventures that are ahead of us.

Dehydrator!

If you know me, you will know how much I love fruit. I love baking with it, turning it into jam and chutney, eating it fresh, dreaming about it (this has been happening the last few days), and now I love dehydrating it. That's right folks, I finally splurged and bought myself a dehydrator for my birthday, and I love it. My birthday isn't until the end of the month, but having had it on layby for a while I couldn't go another month without having it in my life, especially because if I did it would be too late to dehydrate some of the fruit.

So, I have been experimenting. I made mango, and greengage fruit leather. I hadn't had fruit leather since I was a kid and had forgotten how great it tasted.  I also had a go a drying apricots, greengages, grapes and pears. All of which turned out quite well. I am also keen to dehydrate some vegetables, and herbs and spices in the next few months. 

Mango fruit leather before it went into the dehydrator.

I was blessed actually this summer with kilos of greengages from a friends tree. I didn't think I was going to taste any fresh greengages this year after my cousin sold her house, but thankfully this has not been the case. So last night Daniel and I stayed up stupidly late cutting greengages in half, as well as boiling, peeling and blending them together in order to make fruit leather.

I also had the opportunity to make some Greengage and Orange Jam which I have been adding into my porridge on a daily basis. I tried this first time last year and loved it, so I thought I would make it again.

This is what I did:

Greengage and Orange Jam
-2kgs of greengages
-2kgs of sugar
-juice and rind of 2 oranges
-juice and rind of a lemon.

After washing the greengages, I halved and pipped them and placed them in a large pot with the juice and rind of the oranges and lemon. I then let it heat up and continue to do so until the fruit was very soft and the skin had started falling off the plum. This only took about 10-15mins. I then add the sugar and stirred until it dissolved. After this I let it simmer until it reached setting point, and then put it in steralised jars.

I'm not sure if this is the correct way of making jam, but this is how I have been making it for the last few years and it seems to work so I just stick with it. Do you do it differently?

Nicholas was being super grumpy again as I made jam, so I carried him around with me as I prepared the jam. He doesn't really look like he is enjoying it. Oh well!

Apricot chutney!

Nicholas has been super clingy, whiny and awake this week. He is only having two 45min sleeps during the day and then will go to sleep for about an hour in the evening before waking up for an hour or two and then heading back to sleep. If we are lucky he might sleep for a few hours before waking up and needing one of us to go and resettle him. It's been doing my head in, and I am exhausted. I think he might be teething?

To help the situation, I decided that I would spend the day at my parents' place with my Mum and Aunt, so I didn't have to be left with Nicholas by myself all day... meaning that what could have been a really stressful day, because every time I left the room or even turned around Nicholas would cry, turned out to be surprising stress free. As a bonus, I was even able to have a quick nap in the afternoon to rejuvenate for the rest of the day.

Like I have mentioned previously, I love going to my parents' place to get away from it all. It is peaceful, quiet and beautiful, especially on sunny days like toady. 

And even though Nicholas was super clingy, he was happy enough to sit in his chair (in front of me), eating, just for long enough to prepare everything I needed in order to cook up some apricot chutney. 

 Here are the apricots - picked fresh off my parent's-in-laws tree.

Here is a the kilo of onions I cut up in halves and quarters, and then put in the food processor to cut up more finely. I refuse to spend ages cutting up onions. It is so time consuming. This is my Mum's food processor. A bit more advanced than my own, but I use mine for everything I can - cutting up onions, mixing banana cake muffins and dip, chopping up vegetables to make Nicholas puree - I love it.

Adding the sugar - sooooo much!

And the chutney before we spooned it into jars - YUM.

I am so glad the day turned out to be productive, and that I didn't stay at home and mope about!

Raspberries...YUM!

I had the opportunity to pick some raspberries this week from a friends bountiful patch, and gathered about 500gms. They are delicious, and there is nothing like fresh raspberries straight from the cane.   Instead of making just jam, which is a habit of mine when I have berries, I decided I should expand my berry cooking repertoire.

First I made what I am calling Raspberry Cheesecake Muffins. I used the tried and trusted Caramalised Strawberry Shortcake recipe. Only this time instead of using whole Granita biscuits as the base I used chocolate biscuits which I blended in the food processor and added to a bit of melted butter to it. I used enough to make a cup full. I then made the filling and mixed a cup of whole raspberries into it and stirred. I admit that despite the muffins not looking very pretty they tasted great, which I think is ultimately more important.

Secondly, I made a Raspeberry Roly-Poly from this Blueberry Rol-Poly Recipe. I have used this recipe with both blueberries and blackberries and each time it tastes great, so I thought I may as well give it a try with raspberries. Again it is not picture perfect, but I was super happy with the taste.

This is how it turned out...

But this how it is meant to look. This was made earlier in the year with blackberries.

And lastly, I gave in and made some jam. I threw in about 250 grams of strawberries, 150 grams of blueberries and 150 grams raspberries and made what I am calling Summer Berry Jam. I also used the juice from one lemon and about 550 grams of sugar. I should have taken a photo of it while it was on the stove as it was such a wonderful colour but I always forget about such things. So here is a photo of it in the jar. Not as stunning but at least it is something.

Christmas Break

Since Daniel has been home since last Friday, I have been living the life of luxury. I haven't had to dress Nicholas, feed him solids, give him a bath or even change his nappies. Daniel has really stepped up in into the position of being a stay-at-home father while he has been on holidays, and I am loving it! I am loving that Nicholas and Daniel are spending lots of time together. He is definitely 'Daddy's little boy'. The other when Nicholas woke, I went into his room to pick him up and give him his morning hug, and as soon as Daniel walked in the room he started pushing me away and put his arms out for Daniel. 

I have actually been enjoying having a little bit of freedom. I went into town the other day with Mum for a few hours and when I returned Nicholas was asleep and had been for about 2 hours! I was super impressed. This has also meant that in the last few days I have had the opportunity to spend some time in the kitchen preserving and baking.

I made some more mango chutney, as it was super delicious and I didn't make enough jars at Christmas time to leave any for us. We have already opened up a jar and used it on toasted sandwiches. I can't envisage it lasting the entire year.

I also made some Rhubarb and Strawberry cordial. I used strawberries from the garden and rhubarb that I bought from a small local market. I doubled the recipe (kind of). I used about 4 cups of strawberries instead of two, and I had 9 stalks of rhubarb so I just put them all in. I doubled the water and sugar content, but only used 3 lemons, as I thought four lemons might make the drink a bit sour. It made about 2 litres. I also sterilised the jars so it would last a bit longer. I have already given one bottle away to friends and plan the drink the other on New Years Eve.

It is delicious and tastes like summer.

I also gave this bottle of Blackberry and Apple cordial (and the card) to a friend yesterday to say thank you for lending me her baby bassinet when Nicholas was born. It was such a blessing not to have to buy one.

And here is a another decorated bottle of Blackberry and Apple cordial from earlier in the year.

Chutney

Along with cards this year, Daniel and I also made mango chutney to give to family and friends. We then covered them with paper and twine, and used some Stampin' Up bits and pieces to finish it off. I hope it tastes as nice as it looks :).

Caramelised Strawberry Shortcake...YUM

I found deciding what to do with my 2 kg of strawberries really difficult. There were just so many possibilities. After asking the question of what to do with the strawberries on FB and having a look at recipes online, I decided to make Caramelised Strawberry Shortcakes. I felt that they were a little out of my depth, seeing though I always seem to fail when it comes to cooking things in cupcake cases, but the picture made it look so delicious that I just couldn't resist. Plus, if a recipe states that kids can make them easily enough ("get the kids excited in the kitchen - with a little help on the stove and oven - they can assemble almost the entire recipe themselves"), then why couldn't I?

As I was making the shortcakes for bible study I needed a few more than 6, so I changed the recipe slightly.

Ingredients:

• Arnott's Granita biscuits (as many as you need).
• 700g strawberries, washed, hulled, halved
• 1 1/2 cup caster sugar
• 500g cream cheese
• 2 1/2 tbs plain flour
• 2 tsp vanilla essence
• 4 eggs

Method (copied from above website):

1. Preheat oven to 160°C. Line 6 large muffin pans with paper cases. Place biscuits, flat-side up, in the cases. Heat a non-stick frying pan over medium heat. Add the strawberries and 155g (3/4 cup) sugar and cook, stirring, for 2-3 minutes or until the sugar dissolves. Drain, reserving syrup. Set aside to cool.
2. Meanwhile, use an electric beater to beat the cream cheese and remaining sugar in a bowl until smooth. Beat in the flour and vanilla essence. Add the eggs, 1 at a time, beating until combined.
3. Spoon half the strawberries over the biscuits. Top with the cream cheese mixture. Bake for 20-25 minutes or until just set. Set aside to cool completely. Place in the fridge to chill. Transfer to a serving platter. Serve with the remaining strawberries and reserved syrup.

However, I think even if I had followed the recipe there would have been more than enough to go around. From the above version, I was able to make about 18, 12 of which I sent along to bible study with Daniel.

Even though the shortcakes didn't look exactly like the picture on the recipe sheet, I think mine turned out pretty great. The one thing I learnt though during the process making these was that I need be patient. If a recipe says to let it cool first and then set aside in the fridge BEFORE serving, than do just that, because allowing it to cool down means it is less likely to crumble when it comes out of the cupcake tin.

The finished product!

Here is a photo of Nicholas admiring its deliciousness :) No, he did not get to taste it.

Oh, and I put the rest of the strawberries in the freezer in little 100g and 200g lots for future use.

Here are some of the great suggestions I received on FB:

• "I'd freeze them... If you have those Tupperware ice block trays, I would purée them (may need a splash of lemon - not sure) & fill up the trays, whack the lid on & you always have a healthy smoothies option for winter - if it lasts that long :)" (This is a great idea, especially because my strawberries don't seem to keep well for very long.)
• "Strawberry Flan" (I really want to make this before summer is over.)
• "I made strawberry/watermelon sauce that was awesome and really easy. Just make strawberry jam with 1/3-1/2 watermelon instead of all strawberries, and add extra liquid so it's a sauce consistency. Puree it when it's cooled, then you can push it through a sieve if you want it really smooth. It's stored in bottles in the the fridge for over a year without going off, and the watermelon makes it taste like fresh strawberries. SO good on icecream." (This sounds so good. I think I am going to have to make this as well.)
• "I would probably just freeze 1kg in ziplock portioned bags for smoothies and other purposes. I often buy frozen fruit ( b/c I don't have plants!) just to make a crumble or have with cream. They are also nice for little people with sore gums and teeth :)" (I'm sure that when Nicholas has teeth he will love strawberries.)
• "strawberry and rose petal cordial....it is yummo!" (I just have to find someone with roses. I would love to try it.)