Chicken Pot Pie

Adapted from Ina Garten's Chicken Pot Pie.

This one was excellent, I'm not going to write out the recipe as I didn't write down the quantities that I used, sorry, but you should be able to adapt it to how you like as it's pretty straight forward. If you click the link above it will take you straight to Ina's recipe.

Ina makes huge serves and uses a lot of salt and butter so I reduce these. (for instance approx 2 tblspns butter instead of 12)

I would use left over steamed, roast or BBQ chicken. I had steamed chicken breasts left over in the fridge, I used those instead of roasting them especially for this dish.

I cooked diced carrot for about 5 mins instead of 2, and I added corn kernels after approx 3 mins as I had some fresh corn cobs in the fridge. I didn't add the extra onions either.

I used ready rolled puff pastry sheets/squares instead of making my own. I'm lazy and I had some pastry in the freezer. Each sheet was big enough to cut two circles for the size ramekin I used. So two sheets was more than enough for 4 ramekins.  Next time I'll also cook the left over pieces of pastry, as every one wanted more!

I only used one chicken bouillon/stock cube and didn't add any extra salt. We are trying to reduce our sodium intake. So salt to taste if you like salt.

I din't add cream as I didn't have any,  I added a dash of milk and a large spoonful of sour cream.

I also found that it only needed to cook for 40 mins not 1 hour so check the pies after 35 mins to see how they are browning.

In a nutshell, it's a great recipe that you can adjust and play around with to cater for your family or friends.  It's easy and tastes fabulous, lots of flavour.

Thai Chicken Salad

I haven't posted a recipe in ages. This is adapted from a Weight Watchers recipe so it's pretty healthy and really tasty.  As usual feel free to play around with it. As it's a WW recipe the servings are small, you may want to increase the amounts.

Serves 4

1 tspn of macadamia oil

2 tspns of sesame oil

1 small red chilli, seeded and finely chopped

1 piece of lemongrass finely chopped

400g chicken breast very finely chopped (minced/ground is fine)

3 spring onions finely chopped

1 can water chestnuts chopped

2 tblspns fish sauce

2 tblspns lime juice

1 tblspn brown or palm sugar

2 tblspns finely chopped mint

2 tblspns choppped coriander

1 tblspn Thai Basil

4 well shaped iceberg lettuce leaves

1 large carrot peeled and grated

1 small Lebanese cucumber, peeled and finely diced

2 tbspns coriander leaves, extra.

Heat oil in a large non stick frypan or wok. Add the onion, chilli and lemongrass and stir fry over medium heat for 2-3 mins or until the onion is soft.

Add the chicken and stir fry until the chicken is cooked through. Add the spring onions, water chestnuts, fish sauce, lime juice, sugar, mint, coriander and Thai basil. Cook for 1 minute.

Place the lettuce leaves on 4 serving plates and divide the grated carrot between each plate and place on the lettuce leaves. Pile the chicken on top of the carrot, and top each serving with dice cucumber and coriander leaves.

Serve immediately.

My variation:

This time I used Rainbow Salad which is a prepackaged julienned mix of raw beetroot, carrot and broccoli stems, as I had it on hand and didn't have any cucumber. I also didn't have any Thai Basil so I just used the mint and coriander. I loathe cutting up chillies so I use Conimex Sambal Oelek in a jar, which is a south east Asian hot chilli paste. It looks more like minced chillies than paste.

P.S. If you don't like using sharp knives, you could use the Rainbow Salad, omit the water chestnuts and use chicken mince, then you could get away with only having to cut up the herbs, that might be safer for some people!

Favourite Things Friday

It's time for Favourite Things Friday so go and check out Mrs P at Quilting In My Pyjamas and take a look at all the interesting favourites that have been linked to FTF this week.

This week's favourite for me are cook books. I love cooking and I love cookbooks.  I have lots and lots of cookbooks.  My cookbooks cover cuisine from all around the world, including middle east, greek, italian, asian. Books from celebrity chefs, kids cookbooks,  Australian Women's Weekly cookbooks, lots of low fat and healthy cooking books.

 All these cupboards have some cookbooks in them.

 The books below are in my bookcase, not in the kitchen.

 The two stacks below are not all cookbooks but there are a couple in each of them.

 I am sure there are a few more lying around that I haven't included.

The thing is, I have so many cookbooks I can never remember which book a recipe is in, so lately if I want to find a recipe I go to the internet, and my website of choice is  taste.com.au. A website that has thousands of recipes from most good Australian food magazines.  I just have to type the main ingredients that I want to cook with, and up pop lots of recipes to choose from. I can save it into my online cookbook file or print it off and add it to the hundreds of recipes in my folder, (that I haven't shown you). 

I still love browsing though all my cookbooks when I have the time and  marking recipes for future use and I will keep on buying cookbooks, but maybe not quite as often, primarily as I am running out of places to put them!

Favourite Things Friday

It's Favourite Things Friday and I'm linking back to Mrs P at QIMP

In Mrs P's Slack Tea post yesterday, Mrs P said she didn't like two minute noodles.  I thought this was a perfect opportunity to post my all time favorite recipe. It uses two minute noodles and takes them to a whole new level.  It's a recipe that I have used ever since I moved from Singapore (a very very long time ago.)   I bought the book " Singapore Food" by Wendy Hutton when I lived there.  This dish is so simple, tastes very authentic and reminds me of Singapore hawker (street) food. It is a  really quick one that can be adapted to use what you have on hand, and it  can easily  be double or tripled to serve more.

Kon Loh Mee

Simple Noodle Dish

from Singapore Food by Wendy Hutton

Sufficient for 2

As usual I have adapted it but this is the original recipe.

2 pkts instant noodles (discard packaged seasoning) 

4 cups water

4 - 6 stalks Chinese greens, bok choy, choy sum etc

1 tspn peanut oil

2 tspns sesame oil

2 tspns black / dark soy sauce

2 tspns chilli sauce

any of the following, red BBQ pork sliced (the recipe follows), shredded cooked chicken, cooked prawns

Heat water and simmer the green vegetables until tender. Drain and reserve water. Cook noodles in the vegetable water for the time specified on the noodle packet, then drain.

Combine peanut and sesame oils, soy sauce and chilli sauce and toss in a large bowl with the noodles. Serve garnished with the vegetables and other ingredients. (In Singapore these noodles would normally be accompanied by a small bowl of light chicken soup and a side dish of pickled chillies.)

My variations include:

Soba noodles or any noodles I have on hand, as sometimes I don't have two minute noodles in the pantry.

I don't always use the peanut oil, sometimes I substitute it with macadamia oil, sometimes I leave it out altogether. Don't use olive oil.

Baby spinach leaves, in which case I don't cook them, just shred and toss into the bowl when adding the meat.

We use Thai sweet chilli sauce.

Char Siew ( Red BBQ Pork)

also from Singapore Food

500g (1lb) pork fillet

2 cloves garlic, crushed

1 tblspn liquid honey

1 tblspn soy sauce

2 tspns Chinese rice wine or dry sherry

1 tspn tomato sauce

1/2 tspn five spice

pinch powdered ginger

red food colouring (optional)

Cut pork lengthwise into strips about 4cm (1 1/2") thick. Combine all other ingredients. Marinate pork in this for at least 2 hours, turning from time to time. Put pork strips on a greased rack set over a pan of water and roast for 45 mins at 230C (450F), basting with the marinade every 15 mins. Allow to cool and cut into thin slices.

Meatballs in Mushroom Sauce

I haven't posted a recipe in forever, so here's one that's nice and easy you can cook in the microwave oven or in a regular oven BUT you have to like mushrooms if you are going to try this.

Meatballs In Mushroom Sauce

25g (1oz) butter
1 onion, finely chopped
675g (1.5lb) minced (ground) beef or lamb
50g (2oz) breadcumbs
1 tsp dried oregano
1 tsp worcestershire sauce - I always add a bit more
1 tsp tomato puree, tonight I added a tsp and a bit of some marinara sauce that I had left over in the fridge
pinch of dry mustard, or 1 tspn mustard
salt and pepper
1 egg, beaten
2 tblspn plain flour
2 tblspn oil
1 can condensed cream of mushroom soup
5 tblspn water
100g (4oz) button mushrooms, sliced

1. Melt the butter in a large bowl for 1min on 100% setting, add the onion, cover and cook for 2-3 mins or until tender.
2. Add the meat, breadcrumbs, oregano, worcestershire sauce, tomato puree, mustard and seasoning. Mix well together and then stir in the egg until combined.
3. Shape the mixture into 18 balls and toss in the flour. Place the oil in a large shallow dish and heat for 1 min on high.  Carefully add the meatballs in a single layer and turn in the hot oil. Cook uncovered on high for 4-5 mins until brown, turning half way through.
4. Place the meatballs into a casserole dish. Place soup, water and mushrooms into the first dish and mix together. Heat for 2-3 mins and stir well. Pour over the meatballs.
5. Reduce to 50% setting and cook for 35-40 mins. Stir or turn the meatballs half way through.

Serve with pasta or crusty bread.

Now if you want to cook it without the microwave.


Heat butter in pan, sweat onions.
Combine the ingredients as above.
Heat oil in frypan/skillet add meatballs and brown, turning to brown other side. I usually flatten mine slightly and just brown top and bottom.
Remove meatballs from the pan and add them to the casserole dish in one layer.
Add soup, water and mushrooms to the frypan, heat until simmering.
Pour over meatballs and cook uncovered in moderate oven for 35-40 mins.

Edited to add: Bitchypoo says the photo above looks like one of the cats crapped on the plate......nice and now I have put you off making it,  I love her so much.................

San Choy Bau

A really lovely meal, low fat and healthy. I just tried this for the first time this week. It was so quick and easy, once the mushrooms had been soaked and everything cut up.  A definite winner, nice fresh flavours. The following quantities will serve 4 but it would need to be served with something else, or would be great as an entree.




SAN CHOY BAU

serves 4

2 dried Chinese mushrooms
1tblpn oil
300g pork mince
2 cloves garlic, crushed
3cm piece fresh ginger, grated
50g green beans, chopped finely
1/4 red pepper, finely chopped
1/3 cup water chestnuts, finely chopped
handful of bean shoots, reserve some for garnish
3 spring onions, sliced, reserve some for garnish
2 tblspns oyster sauce
1 tblspn soy sauce
1 tspn sesame oil
1/4 tspn sugar
squeeze of lime juice
iceberg lettuce leaves carefully removed from the lettuce to form cups

Soak the mushrooms in hot water for 20 mins.
Drain and finely chop, discard the stems.
Heat oil in wok and stir fry the pork with the garlic and ginger, until the meat changes colour.
Add the beans, red pepper, mushrooms,  cook for 3 mins.

Add water chestnuts, bean shoots, spring onions, oyster and soy sauce, sugar and lime to taste. Stir for a minute or so until combined and heated through.

Serve heaped in lettuce cups.
Scatter reserved bean shoots and spring onions on top.
You can roll up the lettuce cups enclosing the filling and eat with your fingers.

P.S.  I did a Nigella and ate the left overs straight out of the fridge for lunch today. 

Corned Beef Hash Cakes

Another yummy recipe I found on  Taste.

Last week I bought a slow cooker and the very first thing I cooked was corned beef. After 8 1/2 hours of cooking that baby, it was still not even remotely tender.  Rather than waste it, I searched for a recipe that I could use it in.  Taste came to the rescue with a recipe for Corned Beef Hash Cakes. I am being lazy today, so if you would like the recipe you will need to click on the link. I reduced the recipe accordingly, as it apparently serves 10. I seriously doubt that it serves 10, more like it makes 10 cakes. I also didn't add the mustard as somebody doesn't like it!

These were seriously yummy and it didn't matter one bit that the corned beef was not meltingly tender. I only remembered to take a photo when there were only two left, these were the leftovers.  So no lovely photo of the hash cakes (a little chuckle at that name) served with steamed vegetables and an absolutely fabulous  D'vine Smokey Tomato Relish made locally  here on the Sunshine Coast.

I picked some up at the Eumundi Markets on Saturday.  Sue who owns D'vine is lovely and everyting she makes is top notch. You can also find her moorish feta with traditional basil pesto and other tasty things under the label Sue's Natural Cuisine.

Cashew Chicken

This is a fabulous recipe if you like stir fry chicken. I found it on Rasa Malaysia, a great food blog.  You marinate the chicken twice, and it completely changes the texture of the chicken, so that it is tender, just like you get in great Chinese restaurants.  It sounds weird, but bear with me, as the results are fabulous.  I have doubled the sauce ingredients from the original recipe, as I found there was not enough sauce. If you are using more chicken, double the sauce ingredients again. You can also use whatever vegetables you have on hand, eg. broccoli, choy sum, carrots, bean shoots etc

CASHEW CHICKEN

1 large boneless & skinless chicken breast, cubed
1/2 cup cashews
1 small green pepper cut into squares
grated green ginger, about 2 tspns
1/4 onion sliced

MARINADE
1 tspn baking soda
1 tspn cornstarch/ cornflour
1/2 tspn rice wine

SAUCE

1tblspn oyster sauce
1 1/2 tblspns soy sauce
6 tblspns water
6 dashes white pepper
1 tspn sugar
1 tspn rice wine
1/4 tspn sesame oil

METHOD

Marinate the chicken with the baking soda for 15-20 mins and then rinse thoroughly. (Make sure the chicken is properly rinsed and clean of baking soda.)

Pat chicken dry with paper towels and then marinate in the cornflour and rice wine for 15 mins.

While you are waiting, mix the sauce ingredients together and set aside.

Heat up a wok with 1 tblspn oil and stir  fry the chicken until the colour turns white and it is half cooked. Take out and set aside.

Add another 1 tblspn of oil into the wok and add the vegetables.  Stir fry until you smell the peppery aroma from the green peppers and add the chicken meat back in.

Add in the cashews and do a few quick stirs.

Add in the sauce and stir continuously until the chicken is cooked and well coated with the sauce.  Add salt to taste, (I don't,) dish out and serve hot with steamed rice.

I used choy sum and bean shoots this time.

You can find the original recipe here.

Weekend breakfast

Sometimes I feel like something a little different for breakfast, and I don't want to go to too much effort, and involve too many skills and ingredients. This fits the bill perfectly.  This is flexible and you can add more or less as you like.

Bacon and Egg Tortilla 

Ingredients for 1

2 rashers of short cut bacon, diced

1 egg, lightly beaten

1 tortilla

smidgin of butter.

I use 2 non stick fry pans. In a small fry pan cook bacon.  Heat a larger fry pan, I use one that just fits the tortilla, when hot add tortilla and heat. Warm both sides.

Remove tortilla, and place on plate.

Grease pan with butter and then add beaten egg. The aim is to make a basic omelette. If using only one egg, it is quite thin and delicate.  Cook egg. remove from pan and place on tortilla.

Add cooked bacon to tortilla and egg.

Roll up, and enjoy. 

Of course, you can always use 2 eggs, more bacon, make more than one.  

Ricotta and Spinach Cannelloni

We often have vegetarian meals here, and I always try to cook healthy options, regularly using Weight Watchers recipes. This one has been adapted from WW Family Faves Cook Book,  Ricotta and Spinach Pasta Shells.
Not the best photo, as I almost forgot, and once it is served on the plate it isn't photogenic.

This is a generous serve for 2 people

INGREDIENTS

cannelloni shells
1/3 cup shallots diced
1 clove garlic, minced
english spinach
225g ricotta, I use the brand, Pantalica, smooth light ( I highly recommend this particular one as it is really creamy and very smooth, and doesn't have that icky texture of some of the other ricottas)
1 cup bottled tomato pasta sauce
1/4 cup plus another 1/2 cup stock ( I use chicken stock, which technically isn't vegetarian)
provolone or mozzarella cheese thinly sliced

Preheat the oven to 200C.
Heat a pan and add 1/4 cup of stock, cook the shallots until soft, add the garlic and cook for 1 minute. Make sure most of the stock has evaporated. Chop spinach and add to onion and cook until just wilted. There should be very little, if any, liquid in the pan.
Combine spinach and onion mixture with ricotta in a bowl. Place it in a plastic bag and snip off the corner so that you can pipe into the cannelloni tubes. Fill the cannelloni with the mixture. This amount filled 8 tubes.
Place the cannelloni in a greased shallow ovenproof dish. In a pan combine the pasta sauce and stock. Bring to the boil. Pour the sauce over the cannelloni, cover and bake for 30 mins. Remove cover and place cheese over the cannelloni and cook for a further 5 minutes until melted and bubbling.

Prawn (Shrimp) Lime and Lemongrass Risotto

This is a huge favourite in our household and also with my friends. It is adapted from the Marie Claire style series - "Supper", by Jody Vassallo.



Prawn, Lime and Lemongrass Risotto

1kg (2lb) prawns (shrimps) ......(I use frozen raw prawns, which I defrost by placing in a bowl cover with cold water, add some salt and sit on the bench or in the microwave until they are defrosted, depending on how hot it is and whether the cats are prowling)
1.5 litres chicken stock (just over 3 pints)
30g butter
dash of olive oil
2 cloves garlic, crushed
1 small red chilli, finely chopped
2 tblspns finely chopped lemongrass
4 kaffir lime leaves, finely shredded
2 cups arborio rice
1 tblspn fish sauce

Peel and devein the prawns, if you are using frozen raw, you shouldn't need to do this step.
Chop prawns, you can leave some whole if you wish.
Heat butter and oil in a pan, add garlic, chili, lemongrass and kaffir lime leaves and cook over medium heat for 3 mins, or until lemongrass is fragrant.
Add rice and cook, stirring for a minute to coat the rice.
Add a ladleful of stock, stirring until the stock is almost all absorbed before adding another ladleful. Continue stirring and adding stock for approx 15 mins.
Add the prawns and cook for a further 5 mins.
Stir in the fish sauce.
Garnish.

PS You can omit the butter and oil at the beginning and just heat the herbs in some of the stock, before adding the rice, then it is super low fat.

PPS I usually only make it for the two of us so I reduce the quantities and wing it.

PPPS For the two of us I only use about 500mls of Campbells Chicken stock and top up with water.

PPPPS You can use fish stock instead of chicken stock, I just don't like fish stock (too fishy!!!!)

PPPPPS This looks quite soupy, I sometimes make it more wet than it theoretically should be. It is all about personal preference.

View from my window and a recipe

This is the view from my sewing machine, it is currently sitting next to the dining table, as I have nowhere else to put it.  At least I have a fabulous view to look out to when I look up. What looks like a couple of grotty patches on the window on the top photo to the left of the hill is actually bunches of leaves on the eucalyptus tree. The hammock is tempting sometimes!!

I made Gnocchi Florentine Bake for my girlfriend J for lunch last week. I found the recipe on Taste.com.au, it is here. I have a zillion cookbooks, and as I have so many I can't be bothered to search through them to find a recipe...go figure!!! I always end up looking on Taste.

I modified it a bit, as a number of people had commented that the yoghurt was too strong in it. I also halved the recipe which would have served 3 light eaters for lunch. So here is my version.

Gnocchi Florentine Bake       serves 8..........................  I think it would serve 6 

1 tblspn oil

1 large red onion, chopped

3 garlic cloves, crushed, ( I have taken to using Gourmet Garden garlic in a tube, as I am sick of getting crappy imported garlic from the supermarket, or the Russian garlic from the farmers market This seems to be pretty good to use when you are cooking as it doesn't have that yucky vinegary flavour that a lot of processed garlic has, and it's made locally here.)

200g (7oz) prosciutto, chopped

1 bunch spinach, (I used frozen and it was fine but normally I would use fresh)

1kg  (2.2lbs) potato gnocchi

1 1/2 cups greek yoghurt

1 1/2 cups smooth ricotta

125g  (4.5oz)  cheese ( it is supposed to have bocconcini but I didn't have any, either way it would be great)

50g (2oz) parmesan cheese, finely grated

Preheat oven to 220C (430F)

Heat oil in large non stick pan over medium heat. Add onion and cook for 5 mins or until tender. Add garlic and cook for 1 minute. Add prosciutto and cook for 3 mins. Remove from heat.

Place spinach in a freezer bag and twist top to seal, microwave on high for 1 to 2 mins or until just wilted, add to the prosciutto and onion mixture.  Or you could just chop finely and add to the pan after you have cooked the onion and prosciutto, and cook until wilted.  Combine yoghurt and ricotta in bowl.

Meanwhile, cook gnocchi in a large saucepan of boiling salted water for 3 minutes or until gnocchi floats to the surface. Drain. Spoon half the gnocchi into an 8 cup capacity baking dish. Top with half the spinach mixture and half the yoghurt and ricotta mixture. Repeat layers. Top with combined cheeses or bocconcini and then parmesan. Bake uncovered for 15 to 20 mins or until golden.  Serve with a salad.

Note: I had some left over and tried it the next day, the gnocchi had hardened and were like bullets, so I don't recommend saving it for later.

I made it again tonight.

Zucchini (Courgette) Chocolate Cake

Another crappy weather day in paradise.

I had some zucchini sitting in the fridge and I remembered a cake I used to make years ago. After searching through my cookbooks I found the recipe. I know you are all thinking eeeeeew that sounds pretty revolting, but if you think how yummy carrot cake is, this is just as good.  Yes, you can see the odd bit of green in amongst the chocolate cake, but you definitely can't taste it, so I'm not sure whether discerning children would eat it when they see the flecks of green, unless you can come up with a really good explanation of why it has green bits in it.  It is unusual, but a very moist and flavourful cake.

There are no decent photos of the cake, see the big hollow in the middle. I have been trying baking cakes using White Wings gluten free flour.  White Wings says that you can substitute this flour for normal flour in baking, sauces etc.  You can, but each time I have substituted it has changed the cake, and this time it was beautifully moist, tasted fabulous, but it sunk in the middle and fell apart when I tried to put it on a serving plate. I gave up trying to make the ganache look good, when the cake was disintegrating under it. See below, and this is after I had salvaged it.

I do recommend this recipe, but make it with normal wheat flour and it won't look like this when it is out of the oven.

I don't know why the cake looks a different colour in the above photo, I didn't notice it until I loaded it onto the post, and I am way too lazy too get out the camera again, take a photo, load it onto the computer etc.



Zucchini Chocolate Cake

125g butter
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
3 eggs
2 1/2 cups flour
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup yoghurt
1/4 cup cocoa
2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp mixed spice ( I didn't use this as I didn't have any)
1/2 tsp salt
3 cups grated zucchini (approx 350g - 12 oz)

Prepare a 25 cm square pan (10") by lining it with 2 cross wise strips of baking paper. Beat the butter with the sugars until light and creamy. Add eggs one at a time, with a spoonful of the measured flour to prevent the mixture curdling. Add the vanilla and yoghurt and mix well. (It curdled at this stage anyway!!!!)

Sift dry ingredients together. Stir in with the grated zucchini. Turn into prepared pan. Cook at 170C (340F) for 45 mins or until centre feels firm and a skewer comes out clean.

You can put 1/2 to 1 cup of chocolate pieces in the batter before cooking, if you want to up the chocolate, I didn't have enough as I wanted to use it for the icing, but I must admit it is fabulous with the extra chocolate. However, without the extra chocolate it is still very very nice.  I iced it with a dark chocolate ganache.


The recipe is from a New Zealand cookbook -  The Best of Home Cooking by Alison Holst.

Panang Pork Curry (Panang muu)

I have finally decided that buying hundreds of cookbooks and lovingly reading them from cover to cover, bookmarking fabulous recipes and cutting out hundreds of recipes from magazines has to have a purpose. So I am now.............ta dahhhh............................going to try and aim to cook at least one recipe from each cookbook I have, and also start using some of the recipes I have cut out or printed out and stashed in my recipe folder. It's the old 80/20 principle, 80% of the time I cook 20% of my recipes, or in my case it's more like 99% of the time I cook 1% of my recipes.

Tonight I just produced the most wonderful Penang Curry. I found the recipe, Panang Pork Curry on the Taste website you can find it here . It was amazing, now I never have to go to a restaurant to have Penang Curry again. The only change I made to the recipe, I substituted Valcom Penang Curry Paste, for the red curry paste. It was absolutely fabulous.

Once I get my camera working again, I hope I will be able to start taking photos, but in the meantime, at least you can see what it looks like on the Taste website