Olive Oil Dough for Focaccia

I love focaccia. It's such a yummy bread. I came across the recipe for Olive Oil Dough in Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day and it says it works nicely in pizza or focaccia. Two very good things!

While the dough looked awesome while shaping, I think I needed to flatten it out more. I also needed to do something to secure the rosemary, because it all fell off during the baking.

Once it came out of the oven, it didn't look like any focaccia I've ever seen. It also didn't taste like a focaccia, it was more light and fluffy. I'm not sure what I did to make it do that. It was fun to try, but I don't think I'll try it again for a while.

100% Whole Wheat Sandwich Bread

I have been slightly obsessed with Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day. I had so much fun playing around with the recipes on their website that I felt that I had to do the right thing and buy their book and I was so glad I did. I took the book to work and was reading through it and a few of my co-workers made me promise to make them some bread.

I was flipping through and came across the recipe for 100% Whole Wheat Sandwich Bread and thought it would be absolutely perfect. The master loaf is slightly modified to replace white flour with whole wheat flour and there's the fabulous addition of honey which adds this beautiful hint of sweetness. The dough smelled amazing while it was rising and baking.

This dough is also the first loaf that actually looks like a loaf. I need much more practice judging how much dough goes in what sized pan, I think.

I shaped the loaf and let it rise as soon as I got up in the morning, although not quite as long as I should have, and then baked it for 50 minutes. The recipe said 50-60 minutes, but I had to go, so I was keeping my fingers crossed. I wrapped the loaf in a clean tea towel and tried to balance it in the car so it could cool. It made my car smell amazing.

In the end, the bread turned out perfectly. I brought some Gympie Farm salted butter to spread over it and the three of us managed to polish off the whole loaf (give or take a few pieces donated to our other curious co-workers who couldn't work out why I was bringing a freshly baked loaf of bread to work) over the course of the day.

This one has been my favourite recipe from the book so far.

Nigella's Pea and Pesto Soup

I'll never forget the episode of Nigella Express where Nigella makes this soup. She pops it in a thermos and then goes on an outing and drinks some in a taxi, another in a meeting... I remember thinking that taxi drivers on TV are much more understanding than those in real life, I don't think any of the taxi drivers I encounter would be too keen on someone drinking a lurid green soup in their car even if it wasn't staining.

I'm a funny eater, I'm not big on snacking because I find most snack foods to be quite unappetizing. If the food isn't sweets/desserts/cakes, I like food that is part of a meal and not part of a typical snack. Or bread. I wonder what the difference is between a snacker and a grazer? Am I more of a grazer? I don't know. Anyway, this recipe/episode stuck in my head and I thought I should give it a try as it was the dead of winter and everything was quite cold and I had just found my good food thermos and then I can have meal food whenever I wanted to.

It's terribly easy and looks so beautiful while cooking. The gorgeous green peas and spring onions floating in the water were so pretty. The blending was interesting, I have never used the blender to blend a soup before and I wasn't sure how much I could put in there at a time. In the end I erred on the side of caution but it took perhaps 6 refills to get 4 cups of soup. In hindsight, I should have used the immersion blender. I also took care to use a really good quality pesto, one I had to restrain myself from taste testing too much.

It turned out really really well. I'm not normally one who cares for peas, I don't think I would choose to eat them as they were (especially since D really doesn't like peas), however this didn't taste of peas. I couldn't pick out one defined flavour, it all blended together really well. It was nice and soothing and flavourful, although it did need quite a bit of seasoning.

The cooking was a success but unfortunately the using it as a snack didn't eventuate. I packed it in my thermos and took it to work a couple of times, but just never seemed to get around to eating it. I have this problem with drinking water at work too - while I'm working, it just never occurs to me to do these things. I'm having to really watch it with my water intake. Anyway, my soup, while lovely, didn't end up being used as I had intended.

I enjoyed it, especially with some little dinner rolls spread with a little Gympie Farm salted butter. I think I would make it again. Frozen peas last for ages in the freezer and the recipe could be scaled to just make a small amount rather than the huge jug that came out of preparing the recipe as written. It was a really good experiment.

Pea and Pesto Soup
from Nigella Express by Nigella Lawson
(can also be found here)

3 cups water
3 cups frozen peas
2 green/spring onions
1 teaspoon Maldon salt or kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon lime juice
4 tablespoons (1/4 cup) fresh pesto (not jarred)

Using a large saucepan, set the water on to boil. Add the peas, spring onions, salt and lime juice and boil for about 7 minutes.

Remove the spring onions and add the pesto. Blend the soup using an immersion blender or in small portions in a standard blender.

Donna Hay Chocolate Chunk Cookie Mix

I was a little disappointed with these, I have to say. They just didn't quite measure up to what I was hoping for. The cookies were dry but not crispy and they had a flavour that wasn't quite packet-mix but wasn't quite right. They were nice cookies, but something didn't quite work.

Despite this, D wanted to try the Triple Chocolate Chunk Cookie Mix so we gave that a whirl. When I was mixing everything together the mix was dry and crumbly, much like the chocolate chunk cookies. I didn't want the triple chocolate cookies to turn out like their less-chocolate brothers, so I added another egg. When that didn't give me the consistency I was looking for, I added some vegetable oil. That gave me a more scoopable cookie mixture and did increase the cooking time substantially, but the end product was so much better. Instead of a dry, crumbly cookie it was a cakey, fudgy chocolate present.

It's possible that a dry and crumbly cookie was what Donna was aiming for, but I found the chocolate chunk cookies to be messy and the flavour was off. The adapted triple chocolate cookies tasted fantastic and the texture was perfect for me. They were road tested on D and my co-workers and the triple chocolate cookies were the favourite by far. In fact, D liked them so much he bought me another packet and told me to make them again, but I had to leave a decent number of cookies at home (normally I take everything to work so we don't eat it all).

If we do decide to make $12 biscuits again, I might try substituting the vegetable oil with a little less melted butter and see what that does. Experimentation is fun (but in this case, quite expensive).

Kreatopetes

This is another of my attempts to try my hand at Greek cooking. This is my first proper attempt at working with filo, which was quite interesting. My natural urge is to be gentle with the amount of butter, I've been told that more butter = good when it comes to filo, so I may need to get over that.

The meat interior was very tasty and nicely spiced and tasted awesome in its little filo parcel. They were very very tasty. I took them to work, and even my Greek co-worker liked them, although she didn't comment on their authenticity!!!

I need to work on my parcel making skills for next time. I think my meat to pastry ratio was a little off. As nice as filo is, the parcel shouldn't be all pastry and little meat so I need to work on spreading it out more. I also think a smaller triangle with more layers would be nicer than my larger, only four layered ones. Lots of tips for next time!

Kreatopetes
as posted by mersaydees on Recipezaar

1 large onion, finely chopped
4 garlic cloves, pressed
2 tablespoons butter (regular salted butter is fine)
500g minced beef
400g tomato paste
1 cup water
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground allspice
1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
18 sheets phyllo pastry sheets
3/4 cup butter, melted, for brushing filo

In a large frying pan over medium heat, cook the onion and garlic in the 2 tablespoons butter until the onion is limp. Crumble in the beef; cook until it is browned. Drain and discard the drippings.

In a bowl, whisk together the tomato paste, water, salt, allspice, and pepper until smooth. Stir this mixture into the meat mixture. Cover the pan, and simmer for 30 minutes. Remove the cover, and cook the mixture briefly, until it is thick and the liquid has evaporated. Remove the pan from heat, and set the mixture aside to cool.

Tip: taste the filling before wrapping and add additional seasonings if necessary. If it tastes good in the bowl, you'll know it tastes good in the final product!

Using a rounded teaspoon of filling for each, fill, fold, and bake the triangles according to the following instructions:.

Lay a sheet of filo horizontally on a work surface. Brush lightly with melted butter, nor more than 2 teaspoons per sheet. Lay a second sheet of filo over the first, and brush it with butter.

Cut the filo crosswise into five equal strips about 3 inches wide and 12 inches long.

Place a rounded teaspoon of filling on one end of each strip. Fold over one corner to make a triangle. Fold the triangle over again on itself. Continue folding, from one side to the other, as if you were folding a flag. When you come to the end of this folding exercise, simply trim off with a knife, any extra filo too small to tuck under.

After folding five triangles, place them on an ungreased baking sheet and butter the tops. You can leave the tops plain if you use only one kind of filling, but if you wrap a variety of fillings, identify each kind with a topping such as poppy seeds or sesame seeds.

After folding the appetizers, cover and refrigerate for use in the next 24 hours; otherwise, freeze them solid on the baking sheet, then transfer them to containers with tight-fitting lids and return them to the freezer.

Bake the triangles, uncovered, in a preheated 180 degree oven for 15 minutes (20 to 25 minutes if frozen) or until they are golden brown.

I froze a few of mine with great success. They tasted just as good after freezing as they did fresh.

Gordon Ramsay's Scrambled Eggs

I was browsing through websites one day and I came across this post on infraredherring.com. It says that the best scrambled eggs come from a YouTube video (which has now been removed but another copy can be found here) and from the kitchen of Gordon Ramsay.

The video is apparently Gordon's perfect Saturday breakfast. Scrambled egg, sauteed mushrooms and tomatoes with sourdough toast.

Gordon uses three eggs and instructs us not to season them because the salt starts to break down the eggs and can turn them watery. He says to add a knob of butter right at the beginning because it starts giving the eggs a nice velvety finish right from the beginning. Never whisk your eggs beforehand because that's breaking them down - whisk them in the pan.

Apparently the secret (the main secret) is starting the eggs on a nice generous heat and then take them off the heat, then put them back on the heat and repeat (three or four times). He likens the scrambled eggs to a risotto, you need to keep working it. As you stir and put it off and on the heat, the eggs will come together and become quite creamy. At the end, add a tablespoon of creme fraiche to stop the cooking. After the cooking is done, then you can season and finish it off with some chopped chives.

I had just purchased a silicon whisk when I found this video and had to try the two out together. It takes a little bit of work but it is definately worth it. These are the best scrambled eggs I've ever had. I could have kept these on the heat for a little bit longer to thicken them up some more, but they were still delicious.

My old favourite scrambled egg recipe was one from Bill Granger, but it made you feel so guilty every time you ate it thanks to the addition of 1/3 of a cup of cream for every two eggs. Gordon's recipe manages to get the creaminess without the need for that much actual cream. I still like Bill's recipe, but I think next time I'll be cooking Gordon's.

Donna Hay Chocolate Cupcake Kit

We came across the Donna Hay range of packet mix cakes, cookies and brownies at our local Zone Fresh recently. I'd read about them in Donna's magazine and of course knew how they were made of all natural ingredients and it was just as if someone had measured out your dry ingredients and put them in a bag for you so all you had to do was add the wet ingredients to have cakes/cookies/brownies turn out just as good as if you'd done all the measuring yourself.


At $12 per box, you would hope that Donna would be onto something special and I did have a medium high hopes that the finished product would be of a decent quality so I decided to give it a try.


Very easy. Packet for cake, packet for icing and cute Donna Hay cupcake cases. I can't for the life of me remember what needed to be added, but I think it was eggs. Maybe some vegetable oil.

My mix ended up make ten cupcakes. Some cupcakes were harmed before this photo was taken.


These cupcakes, warm from the oven, are divine. Yum yum yum.

I had some trouble with the icing and I'm not sure if it was because I didn't add enough liquid to it. It just was not spreadable at all. It didn't get a creamy consistency and even though it tasted nice it was a little bit of disappointment after the amazing cupcakes.

All in all, the cupcake kit is very easy and the cupcakes themselves did not have any trace of packet-mix flavour. I was disappointed with the icing and I'm not sure if it was me but $12 is a bit much to spend just to try making the icing again. My cupcake inspiration tends to come at odd times and demand instant satisfaction. It's also pretty rare if I don't have the ingredients on hand to just make a batch (which is still pretty easy) so it's not likely that I'll make these again but the kits are quite impressive for a packet mix.

Max Brenner Hot Chocolate and Hug Mug

When D and I discovered that Max Brenner had opened a chocolate shop on the Gold Coast, we knew that we had to go and visit. Unfortunately, the opening hours never seemed to fit in with what was happening.

In the end, we went for a drive after work on a Friday night, arriving at the Robina cafe at around 8:30pm. The place was packed. It was so busy - there were no tables and the line was out the door. You almost couldn't move when you were inside.

I'm not a big fan of crowds, but I couldn't resist leaving D in the line to get some (takeaway) drinks so I could look at the chocolate goodies for sale. I fell in love with the hug mug when I had my first hot chocolate at a Max Brenner store in Sydney. It was such a cosy way to have a hot drink. I didn't buy one back then, but I thought about it fondly quite often. The Gold Coast store (well, maybe all stores now) had a hug mug and hot chocolate pack for sale and I couldn't control the ultimate consumer inside and wanted to buy it. Except, the store was so busy none of the staff were even looking at that part of the store, much less coming to help, so I just stood there for ten or fifteen minutes (D was still in the line). Luckily, a lovely girl who was just starting her shift saw me hovering and came to help me, and the hug mug was mine!!!

The next day I opened it up and tried to replicate the Max Brenner hot chocolate. I used my La Chocolatiere to froth the milk before pouring it over the chocolate powder. As you can see, my barista skills are a little lacking, but it tasted awesome! Everything taste better in a hug mug.

Experimenting with Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day

I had a big batch of the brioche dough rocking around in the fridge and I thought I'd have a little play with it and see what I could come up with.

So, I rolled the dough out flat, sprinkled it with cinnamon sugar and then rolled it up. I didn't get the swirl I was looking for, but I got a cool looking pattern.

It tasted quite good too.

The Schlow Burger

D loves burgers and enjoys experimenting with them, whether it be trying different burger restaurants or even making me experiment with the patties at home. I have to say, we do quite nicely in the burger stakes at home. D was browsing the internet and found Michael Schlow's award winning burger, the Schlow Burger and he wanted to try it.

The recipe as written includes a creamy horseradish sauce, crispy onions and good quality Vermont or English cheddar cheese, plus 80% lean ground beef for the patties. We cheated a little. We used some of the more expensive supermarket lean ground beef but I'm not sure of its fat percentage. We used Coon extra tasty cheese because that was what we had on hand and we omitted the horseradish sauce, because I didn't have any "prepared white horseradish", whatever that is.

500g of mince made three patties (although one ended up being quite misshapen, not sure how), we had one each for dinner on toasted Turkish rolls and I had one for lunch the next day using a bun made from my brioche dough. The brioche was perfect for the burger.

The patty was fabulously meaty. The mince is only lightly seasoned and there is nothing there that can mask the flavour of lower quality mince. Although we did buy the best the supermarket had, I think that next time I will get the mince from a butcher to take it to that next flavour level.


I did try making the crispy onions and they were an overwhelming success. They were so easy and added this awesome taste and texture to the burger.


Our version of the Schlow Burger was amazing. It was completely satisfying and was quite possibly a better burger than I've had from many a burger restaurant. It celebrated the flavour of the ingredients and everything really worked well together.

The Schlow Burger recipe can be found here.

Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day - Brioche

More Artisan Bread!

This time it's a brioche dough. This dough adds eggs and honey and smells divine while it rises. It was really rich and fantastic. I found that this dough needed a little longer in the oven to cook through.

I went looking for a brioche tin so my loaf would be the right shape but I couldn't find any. How strange. I didn't think that a brioche tin would be that elusive. I ended up using a small loaf pan so I could make smaller loaves.

We used the brioche dough to make burger buns and it was awesome. All burger buns should be made from brioche.

See this post on Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day for the brioche dough recipe.

Below is what happens when you can't decide on what artisan bread recipe you want to try and end up trying both. You end up with some massive containers about to fill up my tiny fridge!