Recap: Aug-gassmmm 2011 - my month in food

"Home" Thai Restaurant with the family

Made some prawn linguine in garlic and chilli oil

Tried a new indonesian restaurant nearby

Made some more pancakes

Went back to the Winery a couple more times

Enjoyed some treats from the Cupcake Bakery

 Tried my hand at making some home-made pizzas

and a Tarte Bourdelou inspired by the Tour de France (Pear Tart)

Took my nephews to Galaxy World, and was amazed how good they were

Tried Churrasco Brasilian BBQ for the first time

Went back to Marrickville for some good old Viennese salad (Vietnamese!)

Made some more empanadas

Made longanisa (filipino port sausages) from scratch

Tried my hand at making fresh parpadelli with roasted garlic and capers

Inspired by Jamie Oliver - Crispy skin baked salmon

This is what a tart looks like when made using disposable bbq foil tin - fail!

Mark & LL @ Guzman - this one's for Tani!

Caught up with Jasmine and Don over Mussel Pot @ Belgian Bier Cafe

 Tried out the Burger Joint @ Darlinghurst with Leo

Celebrated Vy's birthday @ the Beresford

Merienda: waffles with chocolate and strawberries + warm walnut & date loaf with honey macadamia ice cream 

My specialty: Ribs ribs ribs 

Addicted to Hannah's pies and Powerhouse hotdogs

Experimenting with skewers for an upcoming BBQ I'm trying to plan

All in all, a great month in food, family and friends!

Read more >>

Recipe: French Almond Macaroons

Bored one Sunday afternoon, and wondering what to make with a bunch of leftover egg whites ( I made leche flan with the yolks), a quick google search led me to this recipe on taste.com.au. I've heard so many people say how difficult macaroons are to make - I think I did alright. Maybe it was just a fluke.


Here is my first attempt at making French Almond Macaroons, recipe from http://www.taste.com.au/recipes/14336/french+almond+macaroons

Ingredients
300g icing sugar
300g ground almonds
5 eggwhites (from 59g eggs)
Pinch of cream of tartar
1/3 cup (75g) caster sugar
food colouring


Fillings
250g unsalted butter, softened
150g icing sugar, sifted
2 tsp finely grated mandarin rind
1 tsp orange blossom water
1/2 cup raspberries


Method
Using a fine sieve, sift icing sugar and almonds, pushing through with a wooden spoon. Using an electric mixer, whisk eggwhites until foamy. Add cream of tartar and whisk until soft peaks form. Add sugar, 1 tbs at a time, and whisk until dissolved. Stir meringue into almond mixture (mixture will be stiff), then split the mixture into portions. Use the food colouring to tint the dough.

Spoon the mixture into a piping bag fitted with a 5mm piping nozzle. As I don't own a piping bag, I made by own makeshift piping bag using some baking paper rolled up into a cone. Pipe 1.5cm rounds on to baking paper-lined oven trays, then repeat with other mixture. Smooth over with a wet finger.

Preheat oven to 150°C and bake macaroons, 2 trays at a time, swapping trays halfway through cooking, for 20 minutes or until firm to the touch. Remove from oven and cool on trays. Slide a knife under each macaroon to release from paper, then store in an airtight container until ready to fill.

For fillings, using an electric mixer, beat butter until pale and fluffy, then gradually beat in icing sugar until combined. Transfer half the mixture from the bowl to another bowl and add mandarin rind and orange blossom water. Stir to combine. Add raspberries and rosewater to remaining mixture in mixing bowl and, using the electric mixer, beat until well combined. Sandwich pink macaroons with raspberry filling and orange. Bon appetit!

<< Back to homepage

Read more >>

Recipe: Chewy coconut macaroons

A quickie today - a simple but popular snack that is fun to make and a good one to get the kids to help with. I recently made a batch and brought a few of them to work, and it was well received - I made a second batch later in the week for those that missed out the first time. 

Also, for the longest time I thought I had lost this recipe for good. Luckily though, with the help of my siblings (and the wonders of the internet) we have it back . This is another one of our favourites - our mom would make batches and would make us wait until they had cooled.. back then I thought it was torture having to wait and stare at them on the benchtop as they cooled. But now I see why - waiting was so worth it. They are even better when they are more chewy a few hours after baking. I can't wait to teach my nieces and nephews how to make this.. that is if my sister's haven't already done so. Here it is, coconut macaroons.

Ingredients: 

• 2 tbsp butter
• 4 tbsp sugar
• 400g shredded or dessicated coconut
• 3 eggs
• 1 can condensed milk 
• 1 tsp vanilla essence
• Glacé cherries cut in half for decoration
• Cupcake patty paper

Instructions:

1. Cream butter and sugar together to form a smooth paste. 

2. Add the eggs,condensed milk and vanilla essence. 

3. Add coconut half a cup at a time and once all mixed together, take the mixture and form into small balls roughly the size of a ping pong ball.

4. Place the balls into cupcake pattys and decorate with glacé cherry on top of each macaroon.

5. Bake 180' Celsius for 20 mins or until just starting to be golden. 

Fluffy when warm or my preference let it cool and then store in an airtight container for a few hours and it becomes chewy. Additionally you can drizzle some white chocolate over the top once cooled for a Ferrero Rafaello experience. Bon appetit!

<< Back to homepage

Read more >>

Recipe: Ginataang Bilo-bilo (aka Alpahor in Chavacano / pidgin Spanish)

Ginataan is one of my all time favourite comfort foods, and is a dessert/snack that can be eaten at any time during the day. I have very fond memories of my mom and aunt cooking these on cold and rainy days - we would stay indoors all day and eat; the adults would chat while the kids watched movies and played board games. 

There are as many different variations of this recipe as there are number of regions in the Philippines. Remember, we have 7,107 islands at high tide and 7,147 at low tide (or so I was told). This recipe is the Batangueño version as it derives from my mom's hometown of Batangas.

The word ginataan (or guinataan) literally means "cooked in coconut milk. It is again very similar to the popularised taiwanese desserts (see here), and consists of sweetened/caramelised fruits and root vegetables accompanied by chewy glutinous rice balls and simmered in coconut milk. Our family usually has this warm, but I do know people who prefer this served cold and it's equally tasty. But I guess it just never lasts that long in our house as it is usually consumed the same day it is made. So here it is, ginataang bilo bilo.... 

Ingredients: 

• 1 cup of glutinous rice flour
• Food colouring/die (traditionally purple, but i used three colours)
• 1 litre of water
• 2/3 cup of brown sugar
• 1 can of coconut milk
• 1 small sweet potato, cut into cubes
• 1 small taro, cut into cubes
• 1 cup of jackfruit, cut into strips
• 2 small plantains (or lady finger bananas), cut into pieces

Instructions:

1. Add the water and sugar to a small pot and boil the taro and sweet potato cubes until cooked but firm. This should take no more than 10 minutes. 

2. While boiling the root vegetables, prepare the dough for the bilo bilo (chewy rice balls). In a mixing bowl place the glutinous rice flour, and slowly add water, one tablespoon at a time until you get a soft dough. Knead lightly for 30 seconds but do not overwork the dough. Add food colouring sparingly as it gets darker when cooked. Set aside.

3. Add the jackfruit and the plantains to the pot, and continue to simmer for another 5 minutes. Turn down the heat to a gentle simmer and add 1/4 of the coconut milk.

4. Grab small pieces of the purple dough and roll into small balls approximately the size of your thumbnail. After rolling each, drop it straight into the pot ensuring they are all fully submerged. Once cooked, all the balls will float to the top.

5. Turn off the heat and stir through the remainder of the coconut milk. Let the mixture cool down a little.

Serve warm making sure you get a little bit of each ingredient in each bowl to get the full flavour and texture. Bon appetit! 

<< Back to homepage

Read more >>