Tiramisu

Warning: this is a grown up dessert. It has uncooked alcohol and coffee. If you have kids present, I recommend making extra cream/cheese mix. Dunk some of the biscuits in some melted chocolate and sandwich two together with cream, for the kiddies, or making a separate dessert, like these caramel blondies (link to come)


Ingredients
3 cups strong black coffee, cooled. If you are fancier than me, you can use espresso or drip, but I just use instant.
3-4 tablespoons Tia Maria (Kahlua is also nice)
2 eggs, separated
250g mascarpone (Italian cream cheese)
1/4 cup caster sugar
250mL thickened cream
16 Saviardi (sponge finger) biscuits
1 tablespoon drinking chocolate (approx) or grated dark chocolate

Method
1. Mix together coffee and tia maria in a bowl. Set aside.

2. In a large mixing bowl, beat egg yolks and sugar until thick and pale

3. Add the mascarpone and beat well to combine.

4. In a separate bowl, whip cream.

5. Fold cream into cheese mix

6. In a separate bowl, beat egg whites to soft peaks.

7. Fold egg whites into cream/cheese mixture

8. Get your chosen serving dish/es. You can use one large dish, individual servings in any dish. Large red wine glasses, coffee cups, latte glasses. You can see some of the options at the end of this post.


9. Dip the biscuits into the coffee mix, and place in a single layer in the base of your serving dish. Don't soak the biscuits, just a quick dunk and straight out. If you leave the biscuits in the coffee for longer than a second or two, they will soak up way too much of the liquid (they are sponge fingers, after all) go soggy and fall apart.


10. Next, add a generous layer (1-2cm) of cream/cheese mixture and spread over evenly.


11. Continue alternating dipped biscuits and cream until you reach the top of your dish.


12. Finish with a layer of cream mixture and a sprinkle of chocolate

13. Refrigerate at least over night before serving.

Here is the finished result. I've used a variety of different vessels so you can see some of your serving options.

Celebration Food

This post is dedicated to food for celebrating. What do you think of when someone says "Party"?
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Chances are, most of you thought of some type of cake. Some of you may have thought of chicken wingets, party pies, mini sausage rolls or mini quiche. Others may have thought of elabourate meals, like the spread that may be laid out on a table at Christmas time, while others still may think of take away food or resturant food, because who needs to think about doing the dishes when you're celebrating?
Birthday cake, christmas cake, all kinds of cake are synonymous with celebrations. Finger foods are also pretty popular and enourmous meals like Christmas dinner also scream "Party time".
However, ANY food can be made appropriate for the right celebration. Take my last Tuesday night, for example. My family and I were celebrating my last university lecture. What did we have? Glazed Meat and Veg loaf with mashed potato and steamed vegetables for mains and lemon bars for dessert. The dense and flavourful loaf, fluffy mash and simple veges was followed wonderfully by the light and zesty lemon slice. Everyone thoroughly enjoyed it, even AJ scarfed 2 pieces of steamed carrot and a small chunk of meat loaf. And, importantly, if definitely felt celebratory.
My last birthday (26, but gosh, I'm feeling older than that this afternoon), I didn't feel like a traditional birthday cake, so my mum made me her deliciously cakey caramelly Pecan Pie. It was the most amazing birthday pie. My guests thought it was weird, at first, but when they took a bite with a big dollop of King Island Double cream, they understood.
Have you had a weird party food? What did you have? What did the guests think?

Moving on

For the last 4 months, I have been going to university for 2 hours every Tuesday afternoon to attend lectures for my final uni course. During this time, my amazing parents have stepped up to help us out. Tuesdays became rather busy. In the morning, I packed up 3 bags, KP got dropped off at daycare with her little pink backpack, AJ got dropped off at mums with a big black nappy bag and my aunty and I went and did laps at the swimming pool. When it got colder, AJ would get bundled up in her Boba baby carrier, and Aunty Trace and I would walk. Then, we'd go back to mums, pick up mum, go to the butcher, then home, to clean the house, do a load of laundry and get dinner sorted. Leave AJ with mum and head off to uni. Dad finished up work and picked up KP from daycare, I came home from uni and Aiden came home from work and all of us have dinner together.
But that is all over now. My last uni lecture was on this week. I have my last exam next Wednesday. After that, I should be graduating and I'll officially be done with university in October when the graduation ceremony takes place. No more uni, no more Tuesday dinners with my parents. Sigh. It is the end of an era, and I'm not sure whether I am happy with it. Change is inevitable, but that doesn't mean I have to like it.

Spicy pork Sausage rolls.

This recipe is adapted from Alive and Cooking. I liked the original recipe but thought they were a teeny bit bland, and I'm always looking for new ways to hide veges in my food (yes kiddies, mummy is a deceitful cook.) so some extra spice and grated vegetables have been added here. Hope you like them.

Ingredients:

850g minced pork
1 brown onion finely chopped

¼ cup finely grated carrot

¼ cup very finely shredded cabbage
1 long red chilli finely chopped

1 tbs. sweet chilli sauce
2 tsp. crushed garlic

¼ teaspoon finely grated ginger
1½ eggs, lightly beaten
1 cup breadcrumbs
5 sheets puff pastry
½ egg lightly beaten, for egg wash

Method:

1. In a mixing bowl combine the pork, onion, carrot, cabbage, chilli, sauce, garlic, 1.5 egg and breadcrumbs, then rub all ingredients together thoroughly.

2. On a sheet of defrosted puff pastry lay down a line of pork mix, roll the pastry over, crimp and seal the edges with egg wash

3. Brush the surface with egg wash and score with a sharp knife

4. Place on a lined tray with a decent space between each roll. Bake at 190 degrees for 25 minutes

Notes: I used panko bread crumbs, but I am sure you would be able to use fresh crumbs or normal packet crumbs. Make sure the Rolls are well spaced or they wont crisp up on the bottom and nobody likes soggy sausage rolls. These can be frozen before step 3. Just wrap each length of sausage roll in baking paper and place in a freezer bag or container. Defrost for 8-12hrs in the fridge before egg washing and baking as directed. Perfect easy dinner, or as finger food at a party. Don't forget the sauce - sweet chilli is nice, or tomato for the traditionalists among you.

Parmesan Pepper Twists.

Short one today. Pictures to come (when I find that damned cable again).

Ingredients:
1/4 cup fresh grated parmesan cheese
1 whole red capsicum
1 birdseye chilli, deseeded and very finely diced/minced
2 sheets of puff pastry
1 egg, lightly beaten.

Method:
1. Cut the capsicum into thirds, remove the white-ish "ribs", seeds and stalk.
2. Place skin side up on a piece of alfoil on a baking tray. Bake in a hot oven until the skin is mostly black and charred
3. Remove capsicum from the tray, but leave on the foil. Wrap the foil around the capsicum to enclose it. Like making a little parcel. Wrap the foil parcel in a wet tea towel and set aside to cool
4. When cooled, peel the black skin of the yummy sweet roasty flesh.
5. In a little food processer (or with a stick blender and cup) add the grated cheese, diced chilli and capsicum flesh and pulse with the blender until all the capsicum is smooshed up and the ingredients are combined.
6. Brush one square of pastry with egg and smear over half of the capsicum mix. Put the other square of puff pastry on top and crimp together with a fork down the top and bottom edges.
7. Slice into long thin strips, twist and place on a lined baking tray. Brush with more beaten egg.
8. Bake until golden and puffed.

Things I have Learnt (Part 1)

As a mum, I have learnt a whole lot - some interesting, some weird, some downright horrifying. Here is a list of some of the things I have learnt from being a mother of a new born and a toddler. If you don't have kids yet, there are things you can look forward to, if you do have kids, you may be able to relate.

• As long as there is a child about, your house will never be truly clean
• An infant can vomit more than a grown man, given the correct circumstances
• Some kids who will scream, spit and fight their way through every spoonful of a lovingly prepared gourmet meal will happily drink vast quantities of bathwater, including soap and their own urine.
• Kids can drink a surprising amount of aforementioned bathwater and suffer no ill effects.
• The best bath toys are empty shampoo bottles.
• Some days, you worry because your child has picked at this and nibbled at that but hardly eaten anything. Other days, you become genuinely concerned that he/she may explode if they were to consume another mouthful.
• Soggy nutrigrain cereal is almost indistinguishable from toddler poop.
• A large assortment of objects can pass through a toddler's digestive system without damaging the item or the child. These items include, but are not limited to: beach sand, glitter, coins (both real and play money), small toys, christmas beetles, tinsel and beads
• The first time your baby giggles will sound like angels singing
• You will never believe you could love anything or anyone as much as you love your baby, until you have another baby
• Leaving the house with children in tow often takes military level organisation.
• Your friends who don't have kids won’t understand your actions most of the time.
• A good night’s sleep is very very important.
• A mother's work is never done

Hoi Sin and sweet chili marinade

I made this up a few weeks ago in a search for something tasty to do with some chicken legs I had. And WOW! I must say, I was pretty impressed with the outcome. I didn't measure quanitites, but when I tried to reproduce it yesterday, it came out just as good. It was also quite tasty just brushed over some chicken thigh fillets while they grilled and as a stirfry sauce with some sliced pork loin and lots of veges.
Here it is: Just mix all the ingredients together in a bowl.
Approximately equal quantities of Sweet Chilli Sauce, Hoi sin and Kajup Manis.
Honey
A small sprinkle each of ginger powder and chinese five spice powder.
A little garlic oil.


That's it! So simple and delicious. Adjust the quantities to taste. I am sure there would be other ways to use this sauce. Pehaps with some nice calamari or king prawns. Or as a dipping sauce for vegetarian rice paper rolls. Oooh, the possibilities are nearly endless,

New Years Resolutions

Every year I say I'm going to make a New Years resolution and stick to it. Every year, without fail, I fail. Usually before Valentines day. I get a summer cold, or something else comes up and there goes my resolve. This time, I'm hoping it is different. My approach is different and hopefully my outcome will be different too. In the past, I have made all-sweeping statements such as "I'm going to exercise more" or "I want to lose weight". This time, I'm am making a plan. I want to lose some weight, which is nothing new, but how I am going to go about it is new. I have a plan and I am making myself accountable. I also have 2 beautiful little people as motivation. My daughters deserve a healthy and energetic mum to play with them, run around and jump and go swimming and bike riding with them. My plan is multifaceted. I will be exercising more - swimming at least once a week and doing wiifit for at least 10 minutes every evening at least 4 days a week, smaller portion sizes with meals, not buying chips, biscuits, chocolate, lollies when I go shopping, not shopping when I'm hungry, having little, achievable goals and drinking more water. If I feel hungry, the first thing I do is drink a glass of water and wait a few minutes. Why? I have realised that a lot of the time when I think I feel hungry, I'm actually just thirsty. My silly brain confuses my body. I have started my Resolution a few days early, just to give myself a kick on. I figure, with my multipronged approach is going to make me less likely to fail. If I have a naughty day, food wise, I still have my exercise. If I don't feel up to exercising one day, I will be sure to eat well. I won't let little problems turn into complete failure. I will get down to my pre-pregnancy weight. I would really like to be down to the weight I was in my last year of highschool, but that is a long way off. Little steps.
Here we go!

Oat Lactation Cookies

Adapted from original recipe by Noel Trujillo on www.food.com

This recipe is not only delicious, but useful. The oats, linseed and brewers yeast are galactogogues - substances than increases breast milk production. Oats need to be real rolled oats – not the instant kind. Linseed is also known as flaxseed. Brewers yeast is also known as “nutritional yeast”. You can use as little as 2 tablespoons or up to 4 tablespoons full of yeast – the more yeast, greater the effect on your milk production, but it also is rather strongly flavoured. When I first made this recipe, I started with just 2 tablespoons of yeast. I quite liked the yeasty flavour so the next batch I made I put the full 4 tablespoons of yeast. Both the linseed and yeast can be found at most health food stores.

Ingredients:

· 1 cup (about 125g) butter
· 3/4 cup caster sugar
· 3/4 cup firmly packed brown sugar
· 4 tablespoons water
· 2 tablespoons ground linseed
· 2 eggs, lightly beaten
· ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
· 2 cups plain flour
· 1 teaspoon baking soda
· ½ teaspoon salt
· 3 cups rolled oats
· 2-4 tablespoons brewer's yeast

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 180°C.
2. Mix the linseed and water and let sit for 3-5 minutes.
3. Beat butter, sugars well.
4. Add eggs and mix well.
5. Add linseed mix and vanilla, beat well.
6. Sift together flour, brewers yeast, baking soda, and salt.
7. Add dry ingredients to butter mix.
8. Stir in oats
9. Roll into balls and squash into circles onto baking sheet.
10. Bake for 12 minutes, or until golden brown and firm around the edges
11. Let set for a couple minutes then remove from tray

It is recommended that you eat one of these cookies a day to boost and maintain breastmilk supply. I found them a really convenient snack to munch on while feeding my baby girl. They are relatively easy to throw together and won't take too much time away from your new bub. Something I have been doing is baking these as a gift to bring when visiting a mum with a new baby. They have always been well received. They were also very popular at ABA meetings.

Revelation

I have come to a revelation. I am not a housewife. While my kids still live at home I will never be a housewife. Why, you may ask? Because I am a mother. A stay-at-home mum, to be precise. My kids come first. Always. The house can fall down around me, the laundry can pile sky high and the dishwasher can never get emptied. As long as my kids are happy, healthy and cared for, the rest is completely irrelevant.
Now, if you will excused me. I have to go. AJ just woke from her nap and sounds hungry.