A Stuffed Kitchen plus Chilled Pea Soup With Mint Sorbet

Yesterday, I was reading Casual Kitchen, a cooking blog that does a great job of distilling a lot of other cooking blogs, as well as always providing interesting food for thought. Daniel was talking about what a relief it was to be in a kitchen that was 70-80% packed for a move because he did not have to contemplate which coffee mugs or wine glasses to use as all but the last two had been packed. The basics were to hand, but none of the peripheral stuff, which was inspiring him to cook more not less. Daniel challenged his readers to contemplate what could they get rid of and not miss.

So, would I be better off getting rid of 70% of my kitchen equipment? What do I have that I could get rid of and not miss? Certainly I have a lot of platters - we got married in the Year of the Platter - and I could probably get rid of half of them, and still have plenty, but I won't. Wear and tear is slowly taking its toll, and I suspect this cupboard will get emptied by natural attrition. Appliances? I use all my appliances regularly (toaster, blender, food processor, stick blender, toasted sandwich maker, and the hero, my Kitchenaid stand mixer), so nothing to ditch there. In another cupboard, I have a couple of salad bowls, about 10 mixing bowls of different sizes (some of which also double up as heat proof bowls for melting chocolate), about half a dozen baking dishes, a couple of souffle bowls (that also get used for salads, and serving from time to time) and a salad spinner. They all work hard for me all year.

Onto the less used items: I have two large colanders - and yes, I could probably get by with one - plus three tiny colanders that I use for jobs like rinsing salted capers, but are by no means essential. I have a mortar and pestle, that gets used maybe three or four times a year. More embarrassingly, I have two full drawers of baking equipment: a cupcake tin, a mini muffin tin, a friand tin, a madeleine silicone sheet, two springform tins, six cake tins, a swag of cookie cutters and a cookie press, a couple of square tins for brownies or slices, oven trays, a couple of loaf tins, a bundt tin and a mini-bundt tin. A lot of this was given to me, or came from my grandmothers' kitchen when she was packing up her house, and it all gets used, at least a few times a year. My least favourite drawer is the plasticware, which is in a symbiotic relationship with my freezer - when the freezer is full, the plastics drawer is half empty, when the freezer is empty, the plastics drawer won't shut. And the plastic drink bottles appear to be breeding with the takeaway box lids. I keep throwing them out and more and more turn up.

The entertaining-related items are probably the ones that don't really earn their living in my kitchen: the "good" dinner plates, the cake stand, the ham stand, the butter curler (inherited from my grandmother), a cherry pipper, tea cups, dessert forks. In a world, where there are people who don't know where their next meal will come from, it does seem wrong and indulgent to have so much, and I feel awkward about it now I am looking at it all. But would I ditch any of them? The simple answer is, not as long as I have the cupboards to hold them. I love to entertain and it really makes me happy to use the things that have come to me from other people, other times, other places. I feel a strong sense of continuity when I hold them. I also feel that the way you make a happy house is to fill it up with memories. If a fire took them from me, I probably would not replace any of these things, but while I have them, they are helping me build those memories. Sorry Daniel, but I don't agree. Two coffee cups just wouldn't do it for me.

Now onto some food for the very sticky weather we are having. Cold pea soup is a favourite of mine, and I already have one chilled pea soup on the blog. This recipe popped out at me from the Dec 90 / Jan 10 issue of Delicious (part of my We Made It Challenge with Melinda from Melbourne Larder), and I wanted to try it because of the mint gelato. The soup recipe is very plain - peas, potato, onion, lettuce and stock - so make sure you use really good (preferably homemade) stock, or else your soup won't taste as good as it should. The mint gelato is delicious, and when I make it again, I will make it in a deeper plastic box, as the large and shallow box the recipe called for meant it was impossible to get pretty balls of gelato. The taste was great, regardless of how shambolic my gelato balls looked. And make sure you do make the gelato: the soup without it is pretty bland, but together, they are light and refreshing, and completely perfect for this muggy weather.

Green Pea Soup with Mint Gelato
from Delicious, Dec 09 / Jan 10

Mint Gelato:
1/4 cup castor sugar
1/3 cup water
2 tsp grated lemon zest plus 1 tbsp lemon juice (or a little more)
1 cup plus 2 tbls slivered fresh mint plus extra leaves to garnish (forgot those for the photo!)
½ cup mascarpone cheese
1 egg white

Put sugar, water, lemon zest, juice and mint in a saucepan over low heat, stirring to dissolve the sugar. Increase heat to medium, and simmer for 2 mins. Cool syrup and strain, pushing down on solids to extract as much flavour as possible. Stir cooled mint syrup into mascarpone. Freeze in a plastic box (deep enough for you to use a melon baller to scoop the gelato) for at least 2 hours. Place frozen mixture in a food processor with egg white, and extra mint. Puree and refreeze for at least four hours.

Soup:
2 cups of green peas (frozen is fine),
1 large peeled potato, chopped
1 small onion, chopped
1 cup shredded lettuce (iceberg)
4 cups chicken or vegetable stock
¼ cup thickened cream

Combine potato, onion, lettuce and stock in pot over medium heat. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 10 minutes or until potatoes are tender. Add peas and simmer for 2 more mins. Puree soup in a blender until smooth. Add cream and season to taste. Chill for at least a couple of hours. Ladle soup into bowls and top each with a small scoop of gelato.

Baked Figs and Ricotta for Brunch

Figs are in season at the moment, and since the season seems to last for exactly ten minutes, you need to be quick to take advantage of it. I promise, I'll understand if you need to run to the shops now, just don't miss out. Last week, a couple of girlfriends were coming over for brunch, and I knew that I wanted to do something with figs. In the back of my mind, I remembered reading somewhere about a baked ricotta and fig dish. Google to the rescue, and I found this spectacularly easy recipe on the Guardian website from Yotam Ottolenghi.

While the name is not very familiar in Australia, Ottolenghi has been building a devoted following in the UK for several years. He has several food shops in London, and now a cookbook available in Australia. A friend who lived in London sent me the menu and some pictures from Ottolenghi a couple of years ago. Unlike many food stores, the shop is as beautiful as a painting, with riots of colour and texture coming from the abundant food. I think that is one of the most important things to have in a food shop - or for cooking generally - a sense of generosity and abundance. (A deli I know recently went out of business, which was not surprising given their counter displayed little more than a few slices of ham and a few slices of salmon on saucers under plastic. Incredibly depressing.) Even better when the generosity and abundance is matched with creativity and innovation. Now if only I had a ticket to London....

This dish was incredibly easy to make, and made for a really delicious and stress-free brunch. I served it with some toasted Turkish bread. The saltiness of the cheese plays off the musky fruit - I think figs and cheese belong together - with the olive oil and honey ratcheting it up even further. Incidentally, I skipped the lavender honey and used plain honey as I did not think the lavender flavour would sit well with the salmon that I was also serving.

Baked ricotta with figs and lavender honey
adapted from Yotam Ottolenghi on Guardian.com

500g good quality ricotta

½ tsp salt

Freshly ground black pepper

3 tbsp olive oil

1 tsp chopped rosemary, plus extra sprigs for garnish

4 fresh figs, cut into quarters or six

3 tbsp lavender honey, or less if figs are very sweet (I used plain honey)

Preheat the oven to 180C. Put the ricotta in the centre of a clean tea towel, squeeze to get rid of some of the liquid, then transfer the cheese to a bowl, season and mix well. Lightly oil four individual ramekins or one round ovenproof dish about 15cm in diameter. Spread the ricotta inside and level with a palette knife or a spoon - the cheese should come about 2.5cm up the sides.

Drizzle half the olive oil over the cheese, sprinkle with chopped rosemary and lay a small rosemary sprig on top. Bake for about 20 minutes for individual ramekins, 28 minutes for a large dish, then remove from the oven, top with the figs, drizzle over half the honey and bake again for eight minutes longer. At this point the figs should be semi-cooked but retain their shape.
Remove from the oven and allow to cool down slightly. You can serve the cheese slightly warm or at room temperature. Drizzle with remaining honey and oil.

Mixed Tomato Salad: We Made It

December is upon us. I have neglected my blog even more than my garden for the last couple of weeks, so apologies to any regular readers who thought I had fallen down the proverbial plug hole. Some low level renovations made me briefly computer-less, followed by the usual ups and downs of a household at this time of year, but I am planning to more than make up for lost time this month, so brace yourselves.

A few months ago, I saw a post from Melinda at Melbourne Larder about making good use of food magazines. In one month, she had made more than 10 recipes from a recent Gourmet Traveller. I was impressed because - brace yourselves - my name is Suzie and I am a food porn addict. I don't just enjoy them; I mainline food magazines. As well as filed and orderly collections of magazines I am keeping, there are piles of unsorted magazines hidden in various corners around the house. I have an enormous box of unsorted clippings from magazines that have been sent off to recycling, plus three largish scrapbooks of sorted recipes. Whenever I find myself out and about with some time to kill before collecting the kids, going to an appointment, or meeting a friend, I tend to dive into a newsagency and collect another hit. Which all wouldn't be nearly as wicked if I actually used them a bit more instead of just conjuring up hypothetical meals in my head.

So I dropped a note to Melinda suggesting some sort of monthly challenge, and after an exchange of emails, we have decided to play. Our plan is to pick a different magazine each month, try and cook and review and post as much as possible from it in the month. If anyone else decides to join in, they are more than welcome, just drop a comment in to either Melinda or me. No more rules or pressure than that. This month's choice is Australian Gourmet Traveller, December 2009. And tentatively, this project of ours is called "We Made It". Which, incidentally, is how I feel by the time I get to December.

So first recipe off the rank was a mixed tomato salad with sumac, herbs and flatbread. At this time of year, the available varieties of tomatoes spin out from the usual choices of Italian, vine-ripened or bog standard to a gorgeous palette of shapes and sizes and colours. And the recipe is not prescriptive as to what varieties you pick - take a look at what is available and what will look pretty in a bowl and work from there. Tomato salads are a great addition to any buffet or plate because of the shot of colour they give. They also last longer than your standard leaf salad - I enjoyed the remainders yesterday of a salad prepared the night before - so make sure you don't bin the leftovers. The tomato holds its shape and texture well, and if anything the flavour is enhanced. Incidentally, I prefer to blacken the capsicum skins under the griller than mess around with open flames - no need for yet another cooking scar on my hands!

If you would like to join in the fun of cooking from Gourmet Traveller this month, leave me a comment, and make sure you go and visit Melinda at Melbourne Larder and see what amazing things she is whipping up too.

Mixed tomato salad with sumac and herbs

Australian Gourmet Traveller December 2009
Serves 6

3 red capsicum
1.2 kg assorted tomatoes, such as vine-ripened, green, ox heart, grape, cherry, kumato
80 ml (1/3 cup) extra-virgin olive oil
3 golden shallots, thinly sliced
1 lemon, juice only
2 tsp sumac
1 garlic clove, finely chopped
1 bunch each coriander, parsley and mint, leaves torn
To serve:
grilled flatbread and crumbled feta (optional)

Grill capsicum over a low open flame until blackened, turning occasionally (20-30 minutes). Transfer to a heatproof bowl, cover with plastic wrap and stand until cooled (1 hour), then peel, coarsely chop and set aside.

Cut large tomatoes into wedges, halve smaller ones and combine in a bowl. Add olive oil, shallot, lemon juice, sumac and garlic, season to taste and toss to combine. Stir through capsicum and herbs and serve with grilled flatbread to the side and crumbled feta, if desired.

Pumpkin Time Part 2 - Perfect Pumpkin Salad

Having roasted my pumpkin yesterday, I was planning to make this salad last night but we decided to head out for dinner instead. So today I got to enjoy my salad, with all the components made ahead, meaning no work apart from the tossing. This made it such a thoroughly enjoyable Saturday lunch I am going to start trying to have a salad planned and ready to go every week. Our Saturday mornings are usually pretty frantic, racing from one end of the city to the other according to the season and the sport the kids are playing. It was so nice at the end of that racing around, to sit down to something lovely, instead of the usual scramble to find something for lunch.

This Nigella recipe is from a compendium of chefs' recipes, and fits perfectly into the I heart Cooking Clubs theme this week of an autumn meal by Nigella. As it is Spring here, I can vouch for the fact that the salad worked just as well on a warmish Spring Saturday as it would on an autumn day. Nigella says she drew her inspiration for this salad from her very popular summer salad of feta and watermelon, replacing the sweetness of watermelon with te sweetness of pumpkin.

Roast Pumpkin, Radicchio and Feta Salad

from Nigella Lawson in "Off Duty: The World's Greatest Chefs Cook At Home"

900g peeled and deseeded pumpkin

1 tbl vegetable oil

1/2 red onion cut into fine half moons

juice of 1-2 limes (60 ml)

1/2 cup toasted pine nuts

250g feta cheese, crumbled or cut into bite-sized pieces

1 radicchio headcut into bite-sized pieces

2 tbl oil

Cut the pumpkin into 6cm pieces and put them in a roasting tin with the vegtable oil. Roast at 200C for about 45 mins, until tender but not mushy. Allow to cool (this step can be done up to one day ahead). Steep the onion in the lime juice for 15 mins or longer (mine wound up steeping overnight and it was fine).

Put he pumpkin in a bowl with the feta and onions, radicchio and half the pine nuts. Gently mix it all (Nigella suggests using your hands for this). Mix the oil in the bowl the onions were steeping in, then dress the salad with this mixture. Sprinkle remaining pine nuts over the top.

Pumpkin Time Part 1 - Caramelized

"There are three things I have learned never to discuss with people: religion, politics, and the Great Pumpkin ― Linus Van Pelt in "It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown"

This quote landed in my in-box the same day I saw that roasted pumpkin* was one of the bonus recipes for this week, and it has been going round and round in my head for a week now. It has also brought back lots of Snoopy and Charlie Brown memories - surely we are well-overdue on a Snoopy revival? I used to love all the Peanuts characters but especially Snoopy (I had a stuffed Snoopy) and Lucy, who tried so hard to make Linus love her. I was prompted to do a bit of googling down memory lane. Here are a couple of gems I found on the net this morning:

Lucy: You think being average is enough, don't you? Well it isn't! What shape would the world be in today if everyone settled for being average?

Linus: What shape is the world in today?

OR

Lucy: This is our last game of the season. Let's win it!

Charlie Brown: Okay. Get out there and play your best.

Lucy: You always have to say something sarcastic, don't you?

So onto pumpkin. I don't get enough pumpkin, because I have sadly found myself to be living in a pumpkin unfriendly family. Largely thanks to my otherwise reasonable husband, the rest of the family treats its appearance at dinner as if it was the ebola virus, capable of contaminating everything else on the table. So I was thrilled to make it this week, and cunningly chose a night that darling husband would be MIA to serve it. Clever. I can now report that if you are trying to introduce unwilling / uninterested daughters to pumpkin, this recipe is a cracker. It gives the pumpkin a meltingly soft texture, and brings out its sweetness, which is surely a kid eatability criteria. Both conceded that it was pretty good. Husband's response? "Good luck to you all." Clearly I still have some work to do on that front.

PS: If you come back tomorrow, I'll show you how the leftovers work in a Nigella Autumn salad.

(NB to US readers, what you can butternut squash, we call butternut pumpkin)

Caramelized Butternut Squash

from The Barefoot Contessa Cookbook by Ina Garten

2 medium butternut squash (abt 2 kgs total)
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
1/4 cup light brown sugar, packed
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Preheat the oven to 200C. Cut off and discard the ends of each butternut pumpkin. Peel the pumpkin, cut them in half lengthwise, and remove the seeds. Cut into 4cm to 5cm cubes and place them on a baking sheet. Add the melted butter, brown sugar, salt, and pepper. With clean hands, toss all the ingredients together and spread in a single layer on the baking sheet. Roast for 45 to 55 minutes, until the pumpkin is tender and the glaze begins to caramelize. While roasting, turn the pumpkin a few times with a spatula, to be sure it browns evenly. Taste for seasonings and serve hot.

Blue Cheese Souffle

This week's Barefoot Challenge was a Blue Cheese Souffle, selected by Summer from (Sexy) Apartment. While souffle is a word that strikes fear into the hearts of many cooks, this was actually a pretty easy recipe. You start with a roux, beat in some egg yolks, blue cheese and parmesan, and finally fold the mixture into some stiff egg whites. The mixture is then tipped into a souffle dish and with a few hurried prayers, despatched to the oven for half an hour. And then, your souffle is (hopefully) risen and frothy and lovely.

How strong or mild the flavour of the souffle depends on the blue you use. I picked a King Island blue that was mid-range in intensity, and that suited us just fine. A few tips if you are tempted to give this a whirl: make sure you have your oven on the conventional oven setting not fan forced, as souffles don't like any air blowing around them. Do not open the oven door and peek at the blossoming loveliness of the souffle for fear of a collapse. Serve this immediately as it will slowly sink, and you will lose some of the airiness. However, curiously, I discovered that the leftovers are actually pretty good the next day. Certainly it tastes more like quiche at this point, but was still yummy with a rocket salad for lunch. I will definitely make this again for a light supper or lunch - maybe one day I will convince the kids to have a taste as well. Sadly at the moment they think that blue cheese is the work of the devil.

Blue Cheese Souffle

from "Barefoot in Paris" by Ina Garten

3 tablespoons unsalted butter, plus extra for greasing the dish (NB US tablespoons as used in this recipe are 15ml, not the Aus standard 20 ml)
1/4 cup finely grated Parmesan, plus extra for sprinkling
3 tablespoons plain flour
1 cup scalded milk
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
Pinch cayenne pepper
Pinch nutmeg
4 extra-large egg yolks, at room temperature
3 ounces good Roquefort cheese, chopped
5 extra-large egg whites, at room temperature
1/8 teaspoon cream of tartar

Preheat the oven to 200C. Butter the inside of an 8-cup souffle dish (7 1/2 inches in diameter and 3 1/4 inches deep) and sprinkle evenly with Parmesan.

Melt the butter in a small saucepan over low heat. With a wooden spoon, stir in the flour and cook, stirring constantly, for 2 minutes. Off the heat, whisk in the hot milk, 1/2 teaspoon salt, 1/4 teaspoon black pepper, the cayenne, and nutmeg. Cook over low heat, whisking constantly, for 1 minute, until smooth and thick. Off the heat, while still hot, whisk in the egg yolks, one at a time. Stir in the Roquefort and the 1/4 cup of Parmesan and transfer to a large mixing bowl.

Put the egg whites, cream of tartar, and a pinch of salt in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the whisk attachment. Beat on low speed for 1 minute, on medium speed for 1 minute, then finally on high speed until they form firm, glossy peaks. Whisk 1/4 of the egg whites into the cheese sauce to lighten and then fold in the rest. Pour into the souffle dish, then smooth the top. Draw a large circle on top with the spatula to help the souffle rise evenly, and place in the middle of the oven. Turn the temperature down to 375 degrees F. Bake for 30 to 35 minutes (don't peek!) until puffed and brown. Serve immediately.

Frittata for One

I am old enough to remember when eggs were the bad guys in the cholesterol wars, banished to the "once in a blue moon" category with

double cream and butter. But the pendulum has swung, and a friend has now been prescribed more eggs (if prescribed is what a nutritionist does) to help control his cholesterol. Apparently the good fats in eggs help fight cholesterol, plus they have a whole lot of nutrition and are very filling, so he won't nosh on something naughty mid-morning. So with that blessing in mind, here is a very very very easy frittata recipe from Nigella, that will get your day off to a good start.

Even if you are still half-asleep, you can manage this:

1. Scan fridge for any little bits and pieces of leftovers (vegies, maybe some ham or cheese or smoked salmon) that take your fancy, and grab two eggs.

2. Whisk eggs and chop whatever else you have grabbed finely, before combining them.

3. Tip the eggs into a hot pan, pause for two mins and then tip onto a plate. Too easy.

This was a perfect breakfast this morning with my fillings of choice - a little ham, a little capsicum and a little parmesan. Nigella also suggests using the frittatas as a filling in a sandwich with a smear of mayonnaise - something to do with your leftovers if there are any. Thanks to the ladies at I Heart Cooking Clubs for their theme this week: a Nigella One Pot (or pan) Wonder. I have no doubt that I will make this again and again and again.

Frittata

From "Nigella Express" by Nigella Lawson

For each frittata:

2 free-range eggs

knob of butter and a drop of oil, for frying

For a cheese frittata

25g/1oz Emmental, grated (or any other cheese of your liking)

For a chilli frittata

1 long red chilli, deseeded and sliced ¼ tsp ground ginger ¼ tsp ground coriander

For a green frittata

20g/¾oz watercress, baby spinach or rocket, finely chopped 1 spring onion, finely sliced

For a ham frittata

50g/2oz ham, chopped

1. Crack the eggs into a bowl, add your choice of flavouring and beat well to combine.

2. Heat the butter and oil in a heavy-based frying pan. Once the pan is hot, pour in the egg mixture, swirling quickly to coat the base of the pan in a thin layer.

3. Cook the frittata for 2-3 minutes over a medium heat, then lift the edge of the frittata with a spatula to check it is set and golden-brown underneath; the top of the frittata should be just set but still a little gooey.

4. To serve, slide the frittata out of the pan onto a plate and fold one half of the frittata over the other. Repeat the process with different flavourings to make more frittatas as needed.

Daring Dosas - Delicious Indian Stuffed Pancakes

This month's challenge for the Daring Kitchen was vegan Indian dosas. For those of you who have never tried dosas before, they are basically stuffed pancakes. At Indian restaurants, the pancakes are often incredibly fine and crisp and they usually come stuffed with potato, or possibly lamb. This month's host Debyi from http://www.healthyvegankitchen.com/ wanted us to make a vegan version, and her suggested filling was a tasty chickpea mix with a lovely coconut curry sauce over the top.

None of this was hard to make. The chickpea mixture and the sauce both took a little bit of simmering time, but if you are tight for time, they can be done in advance. Because chickpeas can be a bit dry, I saved some of the chickpea cooking liquid and mixed it back in to moisten everything up. The sauce was lovely and would be great over rice, possibly with a bit of leftover chicken tossed through it. But for me, the star of the show was the pancakes themselves, although not as thin and crisp as those in restaurants. The batter was quick and fast and tasty, and I will definitely use it again, possibly to make little blini sized pancakes that could be topped with a spicy dip.

Indian Dosas

This recipe comes in 3 parts, the dosas, the filling and the sauce. It does take awhile to make, but the filling and sauce can be made ahead and frozen if need be. You can serve them as a main course with rice and veggies, or as an appetizer. This does take a little planning ahead, so make sure you read the recipe through before starting.

Serves 4

Dosa Pancakes

1 cup spelt flour

½ tsp salt

½ tsp baking powder

½ tsp curry powder

½ cup (125ml/4oz) almond milk (or soy, or rice, etc.)

¾ cup (175ml/6oz) water

cooking spray, if needed

Dosa Filling

1 batch Curried Garbanzo Filling (see below), heated

Dosa Toppings

1 batch Coconut Curry Sauce (see below), heated

¼ cup (125gm) grated coconut

¼ cucumber, sliced

Dosa Pancakes

1.Combine the dry ingredients in a bowl, slowly adding the almond milk and water, whisking until smooth.

2.Heat a nonstick skillet over medium heat. Spray your pan with a thin layer of cooking spray, if needed.

3.Ladle 2 tablespoons of batter into the center of your pan in a circular motion until it is a thin, round pancake. When bubbles appear on the surface and it no longer looks wet, flip it over and cook for a few seconds. Remove from heat and repeat with remaining batter. Makes 8 pancakes.

Curried Garbanzo Filling

This filling works great as a rice bowl topping or as a wrap too, so don't be afraid to make a full batch.
5 cloves garlic

1 onion, peeled and finely diced

1 carrot, peeled and finely diced

1 green pepper, finely diced (red, yellow or orange are fine too)

2 medium hot banana chilies, minced

2 TBSP (16gm) cumin, ground

1 TBSP (8gm) oregano

1 TBSP (8gm) sea salt (coarse)

1 TBSP (8gm) turmeric

4 cups (850gm/30oz) cooked or canned chick peas (about 2 cans)

½ cup (125gm/4oz) tomato paste

1.Heat a large saucepan over medium to low heat. Add the garlic, veggies, and spices, cooking until soft, stirring occasionally.

2.Mash the chickpeas by hand, or in a food processor. Add the chickpeas and tomato paste to the saucepan, stirring until heated through.

Coconut Curry Sauce

This makes a great sauce to just pour over rice as well. This does freeze well, but the texture will be a little different. The flavor is still the same though.

1 onion, peeled and chopped

2 cloves garlic

½ tsp cumin, ground

¾ tsp sea salt (coarse)

3 TBSP curry powder

3 TBSP spelt flour (or all-purpose GF flour)

3 cups (750ml/24oz) vegetable broth

2 cups (500ml/24oz) coconut milk

3 large tomatoes, diced

1.Heat a saucepan over medium heat, add the onion and garlic, cooking for 5 minutes, or until soft.

2.Add the spices, cooking for 1 minutes more. Add the flour and cook for 1 additional minute.

3.Gradually stir in the vegetable broth to prevent lumps. Once the flour has been incorporated, add the coconut milk and tomatoes, stirring occasionally.

4.Let it simmer for half an hour.Happy eating!

Asparagus Hollandaise for A Taste of Yellow

When I first discovered the world of food blogs, one of the first that I started reading was Barbara at winosandfoodies.com. Barbara always has food that inspires, but it is her photos that I really love, particularly the photo essays she posts from time to time. Barbara was first diagnosed with cancer in 2004 and has had several rounds of treatment since then. To support the Lance Armstrong Foundation, Barbara holds an annual "Taste of Yellow" cooking event, challenging fellow bloggers to cook and post a yellow themed dish. (Yellow is of course the colour of Lance Armstrong's LIVESTRONG campaign).

Obviously cancer is a disease that impacts all of us directly or indirectly, sooner or later. I wanted to participate in this event firstly to thank Barbara for inspiring me to start blogging, and secondly to remember the people around me who have battled cancer. Some are now officially cancer-free, others have passed away. And for the rest of us, I see hope ahead. There is a constant trickle of scientific developments that promise to slowly crack the code of cancer. Vaccines against some forms of the disease are now available, and treatments are improving. I would love to think that in my daughters' lifetimes a cure is discovered. Donate if you can.

For my Taste of Yellow dish, I chose Asparagus Hollandaise. The new season asparagus seems to me a very hopeful vegetable. I was able to buy tiny spears that were incredibly tender to serve with a gorgeous hollandaise from my encyclopedic Stephanie Alexander. The recipe was easy and the emulsion seemed to hold without problem (unlike many other recipes). Perfect nibbles with drinks, or as a light entree.

Hollandaise Sauce

from "The Cook's Companion" by Stephanie Alexander

200g unsalted butter

3 tbsp white wine vinegar or verjuice

pinch of coarsely ground white pepper

2 tbsp water

3 egg yolks

juice of 1/2 lemon

Melt butter gently and allow to cool a little. Place vinegar, pepper and water in a small saucepan and reduce to 1 tablespoon liquid. Transfer liquid to a small bowl that fits comfortably over a stable small saucepan half-filled with hot water. Add egg yolks and whisk well over moderate heat until thick and foamy. Make sure that they do not get so hot as to become scrambled eggs! Whisk in butter a little at a time, still over heat. When all butter is incorporated you should have a bowl of thick creamy sauce. Add lemon juice to taste. Herbs can be added too , if you like.

White Pizza with Rocket

This week's Barefoot challenge was to make a white pizza with rocket (or arugula), and I am so glad that it was. Under normal circumstances, I never would have pulled this recipe out of the book, but it was great and loved by everyone from the oldest to the youngest in the household (and yes, you're right, she did pick most of the rocket off). It also showed me that making your own pizza dough is pretty easy. I should have remembered that from making the grilled California pizzas nearly a year ago to the day, but somehow because they were cooked on the grill rather than baked in the oven, I had imagined the dough might have been different. It's not. You just dump the ingredients in a stand mixer with a dough hook and return 10 minutes later for a lovely ball of dough. It's that easy. The recipe makes half a dozen pizzas, so I have kept several balls of the dough in the freezer, and will see how well they defrost in the next few days. I'll update this post once I know. Oh, and by the way, because I am an evil mother, I didn't mention to the kids that one of the cheeses was goats cheese. If they knew, I'm sure the pizza would have been given an "er yuck" rating. Instead they lapped it up. Is that wrong?

The Barefoot Bloggers are a group that are slowly working their way through the magnus opus of Ina Garten, The Barefoot Contessa. If you feel like popping on an apron every couple of weeks and trying out something new, feel free to join in. Thanks to Andrea from Nummy Kitchen for the great choice this week.

White Pizza With Arugula
from Back to Basics by Ina Garten

For the dough:
1 1/4 cups warm (100 to 110) water
2 packages dry yeast
1 tablespoon honey
Good olive oil
4 cups all-purpose flour, plus extra for kneading
Kosher salt
4 cloves garlic, sliced
5 sprigs fresh thyme
1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
For the topping:nocoupons
3 cups grated Italian fontina cheese (8 ounces)
1 1/2 cups grated fresh mozzarella cheese (7 ounces)
11 ounces creamy goat cheese, such as montrachet, crumbled
For the vinaigrette:nocoupons
1/2 cup good olive oil
1/4 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
Freshly ground black pepper
8 ounces baby arugula
1 lemon, sliced

Directions

Combine the water, yeast, honey and 3 tablespoons of olive oil in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a dough hook. When the yeast is dissolved, add 3 cups of flour, then 2 teaspoons salt, and mix on medium-low speed. While mixing, add up to 1 more cup of flour, or just enough to make a soft dough. Knead the dough for about 10 minutes until smooth, sprinkling it with the flour as necessary to keep it from sticking to the bowl. When the dough is ready, turn it out onto a floured board and knead it by hand a dozen times. It should be smooth and elastic. Place the dough in a well-oiled bowl and turn it to cover it lightly with oil. Cover the bowl with a kitchen towel and allow the dough to rise at room temperature for 30 minutes.

Place 1/2 cup of olive oil, the garlic, thyme and red pepper flakes in a small saucepan and bring to a simmer over low heat. Cook for 10 minutes, making sure the garlic doesn't burn. Set aside.
Preheat the oven to 500 degrees. (Be sure your oven is clean!)

Dump the dough onto a board and divide it into 6 equal pieces. Place the doughs on sheet pans lined with parchment paper and cover them with a damp towel. Allow the dough to rest for 10 minutes. Use immediately, or refrigerate for up to 4 hours. Press and stretch each ball into an 8-inch circle and place 2 circles on each sheet pan lined with parchment paper. (If you've chilled the dough, take it out of the refrigerator approximately 30 minutes ahead to let it come to room temperature.)

Brush the pizzas with the garlic oil, and sprinkle each one liberally with salt and pepper. Sprinkle the pizzas evenly with fontina, mozzarella and goat cheese. Drizzle each pizza with 1 tablespoon more of the garlic oil and bake for 10 to 15 minutes, until the crusts are crisp and the cheeses begin to brown.

Meanwhile, whisk together 1/2 cup of olive oil, the lemon juice, 1 teaspoon salt and 1/2 teaspoon pepper.

When the pizzas are done, place the arugula in a large bowl and toss with just enough lemon vinaigrette to moisten. Place a large bunch of arugula on each pizza and a slice of lemon and serve immediately.

TIP Make sure the bowl is warm before you put the water and yeast in; the water must be warm for the yeast to develop.
TIP Salt inhibits the growth of yeast; add half the flour, then the salt, and then the rest of the flour.
TIP To make sure yeast is still "alive," or active, put it in water and allow it to sit for a few minutes. If it becomes creamy or foamy, it's active.

Crashed Potatoes Crashed Potatoes

Do you have days when you should quit while you are behind? So far today, two batches of what should have been perfect pink macarons have failed on me. I have gone to the shops but forgotten to buy half of what I needed. I am trying to work out how to tie a sari on my daughter for a Bollywood party. She also wants to make a life size model of an emperor penguin for school, that incidentally will be taller than her. Red socks bled in the wash. Plus I have a BIG PILE of stuff to do like taxes, that make me want to beat myself with a garden fork because that would be more fun.

So here is a recipe for one of those days. I found it via some combination of Ree at The Pioneer Woman referencing Trish at Light Sweet Crude referencing Jill Dupleix. (How polite these blogging cooks are with everyone appropriately attributing recipes to each other.) But back to the potatoes: now that I think of it, this recipe is small and easy enough to be a haiku poem, which must be some sort of test for simple cooking.

Boil your spuds softish
Squash them flat, drizzle with oil
Hot oven roast then eat

I am happy now - what a concept: haiku recipes!

Crash Hot Potatoes
adapted from Jill Dupleix

16 small, round potatoes ( in an ideal world - mine were normal sized because that is what was in the vegie drawer, but little ones would look cuter)
1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1 tsp sea salt
freshly ground black pepper

Heat oven to 230 or 250C . Boil unpeeled potatoes in a pot of salted water, for around 15 minutes or until they are just slightly undercooked (ie soft enough to pierce with a knife tip but not mushy).

Drain, and arrange on a lightly oiled baking tray or sheet. Use a potato masher to squash each potato flat, until it is twice its original diameter. Brush the tops with olive oil, and scatter with sea salt, pepper, and any herbs or spices that flick your switch. Bake on the top shelf of the oven for 20 to 25 minutes until crisp and golden. Serve hot.

Zucchini Salad for Hay Hay It's Donna Day

I have decided to jump into a new cooking group on the web: Hay Hay It's Donna Day. Regular readers would know that I am already cooking and posting Donna's recipes regularly (so a new group is not really much more incremental work), and I like the idea of a monthly challenge. I have had an ongoing love affair with Donna Hay's recipes for years. I have collected every issue of her food magazines (slightly obsessively embarrassing), plus have most of her cookbooks. She is so prolific that it is becoming a problem for me to house my collection of her work, let alone the other squillion cookbooks I seem to have amassed. So why do I hang onto her magazines when I am happy to ditch others? There are a few reasons:

- I find her recipes work (as long as you follow them) and they are generally pretty quick to pull together and never require a trolley of ingredients.
- the magazines are beautiful to look at, and the food is styled so wonderfully that it is a pleasure using them.
- there is an outstanding index to the magazines, which used to be in hard copy but is now on the web. This means that if I am looking for a particular recipe, I can track it down without literally thumbing years of accumulated magazines. Yay!



So on to Hay Hay It's Donna Day #27. Denise from Chez Us has stepped in to facilitate the event after it was started by Barbara at Winos and Foodies and then nurtured by Bron Marshall. This month's challenge was chosen by host Priya from Akshayapaatram, and she nominated summer salads, preferably vegetarian as her theme. So off I went to my large pile of Donna magazines and found this Witlof with Zucchini, Mint and Fetta Salad in the Dec/Jan 07 issue. It was really good - so good in fact that I am planning to make it again as soon as I can get to the supermarket to get more zucchini. I have never been a zucchini fan, I think because I started eating zucchini as part of ratatouille (squishy and a bit of an underperformer). Served like this - sliced thinly and chargrilled - zucchini is a star. Throw in some fetta and mint and toss it through some lettuce (sadly no witlof to be found), and it is completely delicious. The dressing is nothing more than some white wine vinegar, olive oil and salt and pepper - all you need to show off this gorgeous produce.



Witlof With Zucchini, Mint and Fetta
from "Donna Hay Magazine" Dec/Jan 07
Serves 8, as a side dish

2 yellow zucchini, thinly sliced (I used a vegetable peeler for the slicing)
2 green zucchini, thinly sliced
1 tbl olive oil
150g fetta, chopped
1 cup mint leaves
1 tbl extra virgin olive oil
1 tbl white wine vinegar
1 witlof (I used oakleaf lettuce)

Heat a char grill pan over medium heat. Toss the zucchin with 1 tbl olive oil, and sea salt and pepper to taste in a bowl. Chargrill in batches for 1-2 mins or until golden and soft. Place zucchini, fetta, mint, extra oil and vinegar in a bowl ad toss gently to combine. Serve on a bed of lettuce.

Sensational Italian Mushroom Ragout

I grew up with a grandmother who believed that you should "never let anyone be as wise as yourself". In other words, never tell others everything that you know. But today I am disregarding that advice completely and giving you one of my favourite cooking secrets. This is a recipe that is as good and nearly as easy as the amazing Tetsuya avocado soup. Brace yourself for one of those recipes that is so unbelievably simple that it needs to be tasted to be believed. One that you will use again and again (unless your cardiologist is coming for dinner...). In my opinion it is a bit like a warm embrace, and this has been a week for warm embraces. But back to the mushrooms...

"Secret" may not be quite the right word for this mushroom ragout, since this recipe is on the ABC website, the Lifestyle Food website, and on various other sites. It comes from Kylie Kwong's book "Heart and Soul", and she attributes it to the Manfredi clan of Sydney restaurant fame. Kylie Kwong describes it as symbolic of the Manfredis : "down-to-earth, full of substance, elegant, vibrant and comforting". Kylie suggests serving with crusty bread, or as a side dish to accompany roasted poultry or meat. I also think it is beautiful tossed through pasta. And if you can't get all the varieties of mushrooms, feel free to experiment a little. Part of the joy of this recipe is the mixture.

I really like Kylie Kwong's "Heart and Soul" cookbook, and have very happily tried a lot of the recipes it contains. Unfortunately Kylie Kwong gets a hard time on some of the local blogs for not being "Asian" enough (and it really disgusts me that a whole lot of those commenting don't have the grace or the courage to post anything other than anonymous vitriol.) Lucky Kylie: she might not be Asian enough for some, but she is clearly Australian enough to be given a double serving of tall poppy syndrome. In my opinion, if the food tastes good, which these mushrooms undoubtedly do, then that should be enough.


Italian Mushroom Ragout
from "Heart and Soul" by Kylie Kwong

8 Garlic Cloves crushed
4 Onions trimmed & finely sliced
1 tablespoon sea salt
200 g fresh button mushrooms
100 g fresh oyster mushrooms
150 g shiitake mushrooms stems discarded
100 g swiss Mushrooms Brown
100 g fresh Mushrooms Enoki
100 g fresh black cloud ear fungus
125 g unsalted butter roughly chopped
½ cup Extra Virgin Olive Oil
cracked White pepper
½ cup Dry White Wine
½ cup roughly chopped Flat-leaf parsley

Place garlic, onions and salt in a heavy-based pan.

Cover with all the mushrooms except enoki and cloud ear fungus. Top with butter, olive oil and pepper and place over high heat for 5 minutes, without stirring, to allow the flavours of the onions and garlic to penetrate the mushrooms.

Add wine and remaining mushrooms, stirring to combine. Reduce heat and simmer, uncovered, for about 5 minutes, or until mushrooms are just tender.

Stir in parsley and serve.
Serve as part of a banquet for 4–6

Really Gorgeous Green Pea Risotto

Provided both are cooked well, where does the line lie between restaurant food and home food? I am talking about taste, not presentation, as obviously restaurants have the edge in presentation. If you were going to consider it as an equation, where D=Dinner, C=Cooking and P=Presentation, a meal at home is pretty much D = C, whereas in a restaurant, D = C + P. I have no problems with this - when I am cooking at home, I rarely have the time or inclination to make food look like it is athletically springing out of the plate (but a restaurant that didn't bother would irritate me).

So, looking purely at taste, where does the gap lie between home food and restaurant food? The scientific conclusion I have come to on the basis of this risotto is the number of ingredients and processes. The resulting dish was really good in a "oh my god, this tastes like something you would eat at Machiavelli" kind of way (or maybe at Fifteen if you are in Melbourne?). But you do need to devote a bit of love to it. There are spices to toast, then pound in a mortar and pestle, then make the risotto, stirring, stirring, stirring, then peas to cook and pound, before it all gets mixed together. Is it worth the effort? Absolutely, and it will definitely get served again at a winter dinner party. If I was serving it to the kids again, I would probably leave out the fennel seeds - they give a lovely background flavour but the kids found it a bit much. For a weeknight, however, I would still go to the Bill Granger oven-baked risotto, which does not have the finesse of this one, but is a lot less labour intensive.

Pea Risotto

adapted from Italian Local by Tobie Puttock

1 litre chicken stock (or vegetable stock)

2 tbl olive oil

1 onion finely chopped

2 sticks celery finely chopped

2 cloves garlic finely chopped

1/2 tsp fennel seeds

1/2 small dried red chilli

large pinch of white pepper

200g arborio rice

100ml white wine

50g butter

1 cup freshly podded peas (I cheated and used frozen peas)

1/4 cup parmesan

2 stalks mint

2 stalks continental parsley

8 slices crisped prosciutto (to serve if desired)

1/2 cup goats curd (to serve if desired)

Bring the stock to the boil in a small saucepan, then drop the heat and keep it at a low simmer. Heat the olive oil in a large saucepan over low heat. Add onion, celery and garlic, and saute until soft but not browned (about 10 mins). Pound the fennel seeds, chilli and pepper to a fine powder with a mortar and pestle, then add to the saucepan, and continue to saute for another 5 mins.

Add the rice and saute for 10 mins more, or until the grains are translucent. Once they are translucent, increase the heat to medium and add a glass of wine. Stir the rice until all the wine has been absorbed, then add the stock, one ladle at a time. Stir constantly and await for all the liquid to be absorbed before adding the next ladle. Meanwhile, bring a pot of salted water to the boil, and blanch the peas for 2 mins, then drain.

When all the stock has been added and the risotto is looking creamy, add the butter, remove from the heat and cover with a lid. Let the rice sit for 5 mins.

Pound the peas with a mortar and pestle until smooth. Stir the parmesan into the rice and season to taste. Stir in the crushed peas, mint and parsley, and spoon onto plates. Top with prosciutto or goats cheese if using.

Curried Couscous

The dramas of 09 continue with the discovery last week that a small part of our house has structural problems and basically needs re-building. How much work (and cost) is not clear until the builders start pulling off our walls next week. It makes me feel ill even writing that. Just my luck that the room in question is basically the repository for every piece of paper / book / file in the house. The next week will be spent boxing and clearing. Keep your fingers crossed for me - I am hoping that if things come in threes, this is the end of the three that began with chicken pox and followed with whooping cough. Then, just maybe, the second half of the year will be smooth sailing.

Luckily for me then, this week's Barefoot Challenge of curried couscous was a cinch. It was tasty, easy and I had nearly all the ingredients on hand. Couscous is always a winner with me because it is so fast and virtually impossible to stuff up. It also allows for any number of tweaks. My only changes to the recipe were to halve it, and I used stock instead of water for making the couscous, and left out the butter. The curry flavour was not overstated either, just a warm note in the salad. It worked well as a side when I served it with a lamb tagine, but I could also see it as a salad at a BBQ or maybe even as a girl's lunch with prawns or chicken breast tossed through it as well.

This month's first Barefoot Challenge is a recipe that I can see myself making again and again, so thank you to Ellyn from Recipe Collector and Tester for your choice. The Barefoot Bloggers are a cooking group that every month cooks something from the Barefoot Contessa, Ina Garten. Click here to see what others thought of the recipe.

Curried Couscous

from "The Barefoot Contessa Cookbook" by Ina Garten

1 1/2 cups couscous
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
1 1/2 cups boiling water
1/4 cup plain yogurt
1/4 cup good olive oil
1 teaspoon white wine vinegar
1 teaspoon curry powder
1/4 teaspoon ground turmeric
1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/2 cup small-diced carrots
1/2 cup minced fresh flat-leaf parsley
1/2 cup dried currants or raisins
1/4 cup blanched, sliced almonds
2 scallions, thinly sliced (white and green parts)
1/4 cup small-diced red onion

Directions
Place the couscous in a medium bowl. Melt the butter in the boiling water and pour over the couscous. Cover tightly and allow the couscous to soak for 5 minutes. Fluff with a fork.
Whisk together the yogurt, olive oil, vinegar, curry, turmeric, salt, and pepper. Pour over the fluffed couscous, and mix well with a fork. Add the carrots, parsley, currants, almonds, scallions, and red onions, mix well, and season to taste. Serve at room temperature.

Bruschetta with Capsicum and Blue Cheese

The GFC, (as I like to call the global financial crisis - makes me think more of Kentucky Fried than some nasty economic malaise) has forced some critical rethinking in most people's kitchens. Out with the pricey ingredients and imports, in with cheaper cuts of meat and more seasonal and local produce. The Barefoot Blogging crew has picked up on this and set a Barefoot on a Budget challenge in May to re-work an Ina Garten recipe to be a little more wallet friendly.

I took a few major cuts to this recipe: I substituted local blue cheese for the gorgonzola (about $8 for 250g vs $16). Because it has been one of those weeks, I forgot to buy the basil (saving $3). And then because it was still one of those weeks, I also forgot to include the capers even though they were sitting in my pantry (another inadvertent saving of a dollar or two). I did splurge on the yellow capsicum however (about $6 for two. Green would have been cheaper). And the end result was good, and looked great. I would definitely make this again but I must admit I would like to try the non-budget version next time. Maybe this is what I should be spending my stimulus money on?

Bruschetta with Sauteed Sweet Peppers and Creamy Gorgonzola
from Ina Garten

Good olive oil
2 yellow capsicums, seeded and sliced into thin strips
1/2 teaspoon sugar
1 tablespoon capers, drained
2 tablespoons julienned fresh basil leaves
Kosher salt
Freshly ground black pepper
Baguette
100g creamy Gorgonzola or other blue cheese, at room temperature

Preheat the oven to 185C.
Heat 2 tablespoons of olive oil in a medium saute pan over medium-high heat. Add the capsicums and cook until soft, about 12 to 15 minutes. Sprinkle with the sugar and continue cooking for 2 more minutes. Stir in the capers and basil, and season, to taste, with salt and pepper. Set aside.

Slice the baguette crosswise into 18 thin round slices. Brush the bread rounds lightly with olive oil on 1 side. Arrange them in rows, oil side up, on a sheet pan lined with parchment paper and toast in the oven until lightly browned, about 7 to 10 minutes.

Top each toast round with a teaspoonful of the capsicum mixture. Place 2 small pieces of Gorgonzola on top. Return the toast to the oven for 1 to 2 minutes and warm through. Serve immediately.

Chickpea, Beetroot and Nut Salad - Cooking to Combat Cancer

You don't need to look very far around here to find people impacted by cancer. And it is hard to know what to say about such a catastrophic topic in a post like this. Some of my close people have won their fight, others lost, some are currently fighting the battle. There doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason to who develops it - just a horrible random lottery. I am comforted by President Obama's pledge to find a cure in our time, and hope that philanthropic dollars continue to make their way to researchers despite the GFC. And a cure is coming. In a great recent development, my daughters will be immunised against cervical cancer thanks to the pioneering work of Dr Ian Frazer. More power to him and all the other scientists and doctors on the frontlines.

Chris at Mele Cotte is hosting her third annual Cooking to Combat Cancer, challenging bloggers to post recipes that feature ingredients believed to be anti-cancer. This salad strikes me as a great choice for the challenge. Filled with beetroot and carrot (both high in anti-oxidants), chickpeas (high in fibre), nuts and seeds (including brazil nuts and flax seeds linked to anti-cancer benefits), flavoured with turmeric, ginger and chilli (also linked to possible anti-cancer benefits), it is very good for you. Even better, it tastes sensational, and it keeps for several days as the tastes develop more and more. It comes from NZ's Cuisine magazine which I currently love, love, love! I found it in the pages at the back where they collect recipes requested by readers from helpful chefs. The reader after this recipe said it was so good she had to order a second serving. I can only agree.....

Chickpea, Beetroot & Nut Salad
Courtesy of Vilagrad Vineyard - Chef Kristian Nooyen

For the salad mix
¾ cup dried chickpeas, soaked then cooked until tender with 1/2 tsp turmeric
1 medium beetroot, cut into matchsticks, rinsed and set aside to dry off
1 large carrot, cut into matchsticks
4 spring onions, sliced
2 sticks celery, diced
1 thumb fresh ginger, very thinly sliced
½ cup coarsely chopped parsley
1 cup coriander leaves

For the nut mix
2 cups mixture of peanuts, cashews, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, sesame seeds
2 tablespoons brown sugar
½ teaspoon each salt, cumin and coriander powder
¼ teaspoon chilli powder
25g chilled butter

For the dressing and to serve
3 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
½ teaspoon brown sugar
salt and freshly ground black pepper
½ cup olive oil

For the salad mix

Toss together all the ingredients, setting aside half the coriander leaves for garnish.

For the nut mix

Bake the nuts and seeds for 5 minutes at 180°C then sprinkle with a mixture of the sugar, salt and spices. Grate the butter over. Bake for 10 minutes more, stirring often. Set aside to cool.

For the dressing and to serve

Mix all the ingredients together well. Toss the vinaigrette and 2⁄3 of the nut mixture with the salad mix. Garnish with the remaining nuts

Savoury Palmiers = Delicious Nibbles with Drinks

Easter is fast approaching, and so are the school holidays. It can't happen fast enough from my point of view. Our little family has had a fairly bumpy start to 09 so the thought that Easter and school holidays are just around the corner is wonderful. Books, sleep, crosswords, movies - all I am craving is some serious R n R. Throw in a friend or two for a meal and a coffee and it will all be perfect.

If Easter means getting together with family and friends for you, this is the perfect thing to nosh on with drinks. It was the Barefoot Bonus recipe in December, which I aspired to make but ran out of both time and puff. I am so happy I decided to try it out this week - if you are about to entertain, make these for your guests. You will blow them away with how truly scrumptious these palmiers are. Happy Easter!

Savory Palmiers
from Ina Garten in "Back to Basics"
2 sheets frozen puff pastry, defrosted
1/4 cup prepared pesto
1/2 cup crumbled goat cheese (I used goats fetta because that is what happened to be in the fridge)
1/4 cup finely chopped sun-dried tomatoes in oil, drained
1/4 cup toasted pine nuts

Spread the sheet of puff pastry with half the pesto, then sprinkle with half the goat cheese, half the sun-dried tomatoes, and half the pine nuts. Sprinkle with 1/4 tsp salt.

Working from the short ends (unless your sheets are square, in which case just start on one side), fold each end halfway to the center. Then fold each side again toward the center until the folded edges almost touch. Fold one side over the other and press lightly. Place on a sheet pan lined with parchment paper. Repeat for the second sheet of puff pastry using the remaining ingredients. Cover both rolls with plastic wrap and chill for at least 45 minutes.
Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

Cut the prepared rolls of puff pastry into 1/4-inch-thick slices and place them faceup 2 inches apart on sheet pans lined with parchment paper. Bake for 14 minutes, until golden brown. Serve warm.

Broccoli Soup With Grilled Haloumi

A week of feasting lies ahead with the brief trip home of my US-based brother, and the birthday of my ten year old. Between the two, I can count off at least five meals that I know could well be a little bit indulgent. Quite possibly a lot indulgent. So today's abstemious choice will start the week with restraint even if it does not finish that way. Broccoli is always my first pick as a vegetable when I want a solid dose of nutrition with next to no wickedness.

I found this recipe in an old Donna Hay magazine (Issue 14, Autumn). I subscribed to the magazine from launch, and now have a shelf groaning under the weight of Donna. Until a couple of years ago, it was worth hanging on to all the old copies because an index to each year's recipes was published. This made it easy to do a quick search for whatever I was looking for, and lay my hands on any recipe I needed. Infuriatingly, Donna doesn't publish indexes any more which apart from making me very cranky, makes my new mags a lot less valuable to me than the old ones. After all, no one has the time or inclination to go through 20 magazines to find a recipe that they think they remember. So what to do? Something for me to contemplate as I have a bowl of soup. The haloumi gives a lovely salty kick and a textural contrast to the smooth broccoli flavours.

Since this is Sunday, I will be sending this soup over to Deb at Kahakai Kitchen for her weekly Souper Sunday round-up. Go take a look at her offerings - thee is always something that will take your fancy on offer.

Broccoli Soup With Grilled Haloumi

adapted from Donna Hay

2 tsps olive oil

1 small onion

4 cups chicken stock

1 potato peeled and chopped

650g broccoli florets

100g haloumi, cut into slices and grilled in a non stick pan for 1 min

Heat a saucepan over medium heat. Add oil and onion and cook for about 5 mins or until the onion is translucent. Add stock, potato and broccoli and simmer until the potato is tender. Pour the mixture into a blender, and puree until it is smooth. Season to taste. Garnish with cubes of haloumi.

Tomato and Goats Cheese Tarts

It's nearly the end of March, and it's time for the last of our Barefoot Bloggers recipes. I love being part of this group because it is making me attempt things that I would not otherwise try, and I am discovering recipes that I will return to over and over again. Today's recipe, Tomato and Goat's Cheese Tarts (and last week's Brownie Pudding) will be among the few things about this month that I am keen to revisit. My elder darling daughter has been diagnosed with whooping cough / pertussis, so we are in quarantine again... (as an aside - it is starting to feel a little biblical around here with all the plagues visiting our house - I'll let you know if frogs or locusts appear). The up side of this is lots of time in the kitchen.

I halved the recipe as a lunch for the two of us. And luckily for me, this is my kind of recipe. It is the sort of thing that I always order when I am out at a cafe. Tasty, and big on flavour, the crunch of the pastry is offset by both the creaminess of the goats cheese and the slippery cooked tomato. It is also endlessly modifiable according to your tastes and preferences (mushrooms, smoked salmon, provencal vegetables, pesto, etc are all possible additions / substitutions). Next time, I make this combination, I will throw some pinenuts into the goats cheese mix for an extra bit of texture and nuttiness. This recipe would also be wonderful for entertaining because it looks and tastes great, and plates so easily. You could also make tiny bite-size tasrts as an hors d'oeuvre.

The Barefoot Bloggers are a group of blogging cooks who whip up a couple of recipes each month from Ina Garten, the Barefoot Contessa. This week's choice was from Anne Strawberry - who is clearly a woman with tastes similar to mine. Merci beaucoup chere Anne! If you want to see how the other Barefoot Bloggers found this recipe check out the blogroll here.

Tomato and Goat's Cheese Tarts
From Ina Garten: Back to Basics

2 sheets puff pastry, defrosted
Good olive oil
4 cups thinly sliced yellow onions (2 large onions)
3 large garlic cloves, cut into thin slivers
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
3 tablespoons dry white wine
2 teaspoons minced fresh thyme leaves
4 tablespoons freshly grated Parmesan, plus 50g shaved with a vegetable peeler
120g garlic-and-herb goat cheese (I could only get plain, so I mixed in an Italian spice mix)
1 large tomato (or 2 small), cut into thick slices
3 tablespoons julienned basil leaves

Using an 18cm saucer or other round object as a guide, cut 2 circles from the sheet of puff pastry, discarding the scraps. Repeat with the second pastry sheet to make 4 circles in all. Place the pastry circles on 2 sheet pans lined with parchment paper and refrigerate until ready to use.
Preheat the oven to 210F.

Heat 3 tablespoons of olive oil in a large skillet over medium to low heat and add the onions and garlic. Saute for 15 to 20 minutes, stirring frequently, until the onions are limp and there is almost no moisture remaining in the skillet. Add 1/2 teaspoon salt, 1/4 teaspoon pepper, the wine, and thyme and continue to cook for another 10 minutes, until the onions are lightly browned. Remove from the heat.

Using a sharp paring knife, score a 1/4-inch-wide border around each pastry circle. Prick the pastry inside the score lines with the tines of a fork and sprinkle a tablespoon of grated Parmesan on each round, staying inside the scored border.

Place 1/4 of the onion mixture on each circle, again staying within the scored edge. Crumble 1 ounce of goat cheese on top of the onions. Place a slice of tomato in the center of each tart. Brush the tomato lightly with olive oil and sprinkle with basil, salt, and pepper. Finally, scatter 4 or 5 shards of Parmesan on each tart.

Bake for 20 to 25 minutes, until the pastry is golden brown. The bottom sheet pan may need an extra few minutes in the oven. Serve hot or warm.