so... i'm back. i'm on maternity leave after having twins in April so i have time to bake again.

I use stevia granulated sweetener/ but if you're not worried about sugar just use normal caster sugar

My first recipe back in the blogging saddle is an amazing banana bread with raspberries and dark chocolate.The best part, it's low fat and low in sugar. PERFECT.

Here is how it goes:

2 cups of plain flour
3/4 teaspoon of baking soda
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1 cup of artificial sweetener                             
4 tablespoons of canola oil or margarine        
2 large eggs

Do not use vanilla essence & don't bother with vanilla bean paste. In this recipe it would just get lost

1 1/2 cups of ripe mashed banana (approx 3 large bananas)                   
1/3 cup of low fat vanilla yoghurt
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract                            
                                                                       
1 cup of dark chocolate chips
1 cup of whole frozen raspberries, dusted with 1 tablespoon of plain flour.




TIP: Double the recipe, it will disappear so quickly.
Also, I have decided to make this recipe as muffins rather than a loaf to help with portion control. I need all the help I can get. Otherwise this will make a standard loaf  tin (approx 21 x 11cm) sized banana bread.

Preheat the oven to 180℃.

As a busy mum of twins it can take several sessions to get a recipe done. So I like to prepare all parts of the recipe in advance so that when I'm ready all I have to do is throw together my already measured, mashed and sifted ingredients.

1. Sift the plain flour, baking soda and salt into a bowl, set aside.
2. In another bowl blend or mash the bananas with the yoghurt and vanilla extract, set aside.
3. In the bowl of your standing mixer measure out the stevia and canola oil and beat until pale and fluffy
4. With the beater still running add the eggs one at a time until well combined
5. Add the banana, yoghurt, vanilla mixture until well combined.
6. Now you can add the flour and combine using the stand mixer or by hand until just combined. Do not over beat the mixture as this will make the bread very dense instead of light and fluffy.                            
7. Next you can fold through the chocolate chips and very carefully fold through the raspberries.
8. If you are making a loaf of banana bread pour the mixture into a greased loaf tin, or if you are making muffin banana breads use a greased ice-cream scoop to fill lined muffin molds 3/4 full. (When I doubled the recipe the yield was 3 dozen muffins) 
9. For a loaf bake the cake for 50-60 minutes.
10.  For muffins bake for 30 minutes. 

final installment of a simple life

What do you do when your uncle buys you a 1.5kg bag of Craisins for Christmas?
My solution, is adapting Jamie Oliver's 'rosemary rasin' bread.
refer to this recipe
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/jamie-oliver/rosemary-and-raisin-bread-recipe/index.html




The only problem/ concern I had was the cook time, so I just let it cool completely in the oven to do a little extra passive cooking.

My favourite combo for this was served with Saint Agur french cheese (not cheap at $90+ a kg).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Agur_Blue

the simple things in life part 2

Continuing on my Alain Ducasse adventure comes 'light pesto' pasta.
This is an astonishingly simple recipe, it takes no time at all.
All you need is 4 peeled cloves of garlic, 20g of freshly grated Parmesan cheese, 30g of pine nuts, 2 bunches of basil, 6 tbsp of water, 6 tbsp of extra virgin olive oil.
Cut the garlic cloves in half and remove the little green sprouty bit from the centre.

• Place 3 of the cloves (6 halves) into boiling water for 2 minutes.
• Put the remaining fresh garlic clove along with the blanched cloves, pine nuts, Parmesan and basil (I would recommend tearing the basil into pieces before bashing) into a mortar and pestle and combine to a traditional pesto consistency. (I cheated a little, I wasn't achieving the required consistency and so I abandoned the pestle and mortar in favour of my handy Cuisinart moulie).

• Add the water and olive oil, continuing to bash or blitz, as is your preference.
• season with salt and pepper, then put in a jar in the fridge to keep the flavours fresh. If you leave it on the bench the basil can loose it's 'ozone' (thanks Rick) freshness.

Meanwhile, put a pot of water on to boil, once boiling add plenty of salt then the pasta of choice (Alain uses pappardelle, but fettuccine or whatever) cooking according to the packet instructions.
While the pasta is boiling, toast 40g of pine nuts and then place on paper towel to cool.
Grate 20g of fresh Parmesan and set aside.
Drain the pasta and then put in in a large fry pan over medium heat and add a couple tbsp of the pest along with the extra Parmesan and pine nuts to heat the pesto through.
That's it, serve in the pan or on a platter.
yummo.

I served this pasta with a little salad of home grown mignonette lettuce, home grown cucumbers, and a little red onion, dressed with salt, pepper, lemon juice and a splash of olive oil.

the simple things in life

After Christmas and days of over indulgence, and more left overs than you can poke a stick at I'm yearning for some simple pleasures.

Thus we welcome Alain Ducasse, and his amazing cookbook 'Nature. Simple, Healthy and Good'.
From this philosophy I have made a Caprese salad from my home grown tomatoes, a mixture of heirlooms and cherry toms, a ball of buffalo mozzarella, basil from the garden and a balsamic glaze, with the obligatory swirl of extra virgin olive oil.
My tip for a sensational Caprese is texture.

This is the first of my heirlooms to ripen, not the prettiest, but she sure is tasty.

 

 

This is heirloom number 2.

Don't just dice your tomatoes into indenticate cubes, halve your cherry toms and chunky slice your larger toms.
This is a celebration of seasonal produce, home grown veggies and the scent of summer in the air.
perhaps the other important piece of advice, which should go without saying is seasoning.
Use salt and pepper. Salt and tomatoes are like potatoes and duck fat, an unbeatable combination.

Enjoy, because I certainly will.

LOW FAT, GUILT FREE TIRAMISU

INGREDIENTS:
1 & and, 1/2 cups of strong black coffee (I usually add a few tbsps of hot choc powder to the coffee)
2 tbsp of Frangelico
2 egg whites
1 cup of low fat (light/ diet/ reduced fat) custard
350g low-fat ricotta cheese
1/4 cup of icing sugar, sieved
250g savoiardi/ sponge finger biscuits
garnish with grated chocolate or 2 tbsp of cocoa powder

Questo è Come Noi Lo Facciamo (this is how we do it)....

1. Combine the coffee and Frangelico (+ hot choc mix) and set aside to cool.
2. Beat the egg whites to soft peaks using an electric beater.
3. In a separate bowl beat together the custard, icing sugar and ricotta until smooth and creamy.
4. Fold the egg whites into the custard mixture, be careful not to knock all the air out of the eggs, you want to keep the mixture light and fluffy.
5. To assemble the tiramisu, use a round or rectangle dish about 6cm deep and 18cm square or 18ch diameter.
6. My method is to place half the biscuits on the base of the dish and ladle over half of the coffee mixture 
7. Follow by pouring over half of the ricotta mixture.
8. Repeat the process, laying down the biscuits, ladle over the coffee and smooth over the remaining ricotta mixture.
9. Finish off the tiramisu by grating over some white or milk chocolate (just a smidgen, this is meant to be low fat) or cocoa powder.

Lei può mangiarlo tutto, well, I definitely could :)

SICHUAN PORK RIBS WITH EGGPLANT, GINGER AND BLACK VINEGAR

INGREDIENTS:

100 ml olive oil
1 brown onion, finely sliced
4 garlic cloves, smashed
2 eggplants, sliced into 2cm-thick disks
6 slices of pork belly, 2cm thick
1 daikon, peeled and sliced, 2cm thick (you know what: when you slow cook daikon, esp with pork, it goes all sweet and weirdly delicious, give it a go, smells a bit odd, but tasty)
6cm piece of ginger, peeled and thinly sliced
2tsp of ginger powder
1/2 tsp five-spice powder
2 tbsp pepper
3 small chillies, split
3 tbsp black vinegar
200ml oyster sauce
2 tbsp raw sugar
100ml light soy sauce'
250 ml chinese cooking wine (xiao xing)
200 ml water

HOW DO YOU MAKE THIS DELICIOUSNESS A REALITY?..

1. preheat the oven to 160 fan-forced
2. use a big, wide (shallow) pot or la chausseur (with a lid) and heat the olive oil over high heat and fry the onion, garlic stir frying for 1 minute, or until aromatic.
3. add the egglant and stir fry for 2 mins (I actually prefer, to cut the eggplant into 2cm sticks rather than rounds, but as always recipes are guides, not gospel).
4. add the pork, daikon, dried spices and all the other ingredients and bring to a simmer
5. place the lid on the pot and out in the oven for 2 1/2 - 3 hours. and the ribs will be amazingly fall-aparty and tender.
6. serve with steamed rice.

Recipe thanks to Karen Martini.

PARTY OF 5, PART 3

My first and enduring love will always be Rick Stein, and so it should come as no surprise that I would turn to Rick for a dessert selection. And he has yet to fail me, think ferrero-esque crisp meringue and a chocolaty cheesecake type filling.
Otherwise known as Hazelnut Chocolate Dacquoise.

I preheated the oven to 200 degrees, and roasted 50g of whole hazelnuts for about 6 minutes, removed them from the oven and tipped them into a tea towel, rubbing the hazelnuts to remove the skins, Then blitzed them to a medium/ fine chop. And dropped the oven temperature to 110 degrees.

In a glass bowl a whipped 5 egg whites to stiff peaks and whisked in 225g of cater sugar to create a glossy, stiff meringue. The next step is to fold in all but a tsp of the blitzed hazelnuts, the create an almost ferrero type taste and aroma. Top one meringue with the reserved hazelnut, this will be the top ;ayer of the cake.

To cook the meringue, divide the mixture into 3 equal portions, forming 3 20cm circles on baking paper (to do this use a 20cm round cake tin and trace the base on baking paper with a pencil to make a 20cm circle, repeat 3 times on 3 pieces of baking paper).
Bake the meringue disks for 2 hours and then turn off the oven, letting the meringues cool completely in the oven. (the disks keep really well, so you can make these several days in advance).

To make the filling melt 100g of good quality plain chocolate, with only 50% cocoa solids (I used valrhona). To melt the chocolate, simmer a pot of water and place a glass bowl with the chocolate, over the pot, but don't let the water touch the bowl. Let the chocolate melt and add 150mls of créme fraiche, and mix well.
In a separate bowl whip 150mls of double cream until just beginning to thicken and fold through the chocolate, créme fraiche mixture. (if the chocolate mix is very runny refrigerate briefly to thicken the filling to make the dessert construction easier)



To construct the daquoise top one of the meringue disks with half the chocolate mixture, place another meringue on top and spread with the remaining half of the chocolate and finally top with the top meringue that was dusted with the extra crushed hazelnuts.

the cake is now assembled and needs to be refrigerated before serving to soften the meringue slightly whilst firming up the chocolate filling.

Rick is quite adamant that you not assemble the cake more than 2 hours before you intend to serve the dessert. But I think that if it goes into the fridge as your guests are arriving, 2 hours or more doesn't really matter, as long as you don't forget about it.