I really don’t think I’m a food snob – hey, I’m that person who has confessed to doing the KFC and Maccers drive through of shame. But I was brought up with food made from scratch and my mother ended up doing a great job of brain washing me because I never use store bought packet mixes or recipe bases. It just doesn’t taste right to me, it has an edge of artificial-ness, and usually they are too salty....
And… welcome to Thai week!! Welcome to Thai Week! Every now and then, I like to do a recipe theme week. This week it’s THAI week, with three classic recipes to make your very own Thai feast at home: Thai Yellow Curry There are many things to love about Thai food, but for me, the jewel in the crown are the curries. I adore that elusive combination of fresh aromatic herbs and spices with the complexity you get from using umami loaded seasonings such as fish sauce and shrimp paste....
Plus, my cheeky tip for how to darken gravy to make it a beautiful deep brown colour, as well as how to make gluten-free gravy. This turkey gravy recipe is for oven roasted turkey OR slow cooker turkey! Turkey gravy recipe When it comes to turkey, there are those in the Cranberry Sauce camp, and those in the gravy camp. Me – I’ve got a foot in both camps. There’s nothing quite like the combination of turkey with sweet-tart cranberry sauce....
What is Vegeta? Vegeta is a European vegetable based seasoning that’s used to add flavour into soups, sauces and stews, or to make liquid stock/broth by adding water. Think of it as salt – but with flavour! Nowadays, its widely available one very day grocery stores. It’s known by a few different names: vegetable stock powderall purpose or gourmet seasoninggranulated bouillon. Whatever the various labels on the cans and jars, the one thing that remains consistent is the distinct blue label!...
A Mushroom Sauce for everything! An omelette smothered in a creamy mushroom sauce. A mushroom sauce for steak. A baked sweet potato stuffed to the brim with mushrooms in a creamy sauce. I had all 3 of these on The List and no idea how I was going to share them all without a complete and utter creamy mushroom overload. Solution: Just share the sauce and a bunch of ways to use it!...
Use this Asian dressing for leafy green salads, Asian slaws, noodle salads and chopped salads. It’s also a terrific dressing to make steamed vegetables so much tastier. Finish with a sprinkle of fresh sesame seeds and sliced greens onions! Instant Asian Sesame Dressing This Asian Sesame Dressing is one of eight ready-to-use salad dressing recipes that I shared in this post: Ready To Use Salad Dressings. I’ve been wanting to share a bunch of long shelf life salad dressings for ages and was so glad to finally have an excuse to!...
Of the vast variety pastas in this big wide world, ragu is by far my favourite. Ragu is a meat based pasta sauce that is slow cooked so the meat is meltingly tender and the sauce is rich with a depth of flavour you can only get from cooking something long and slow. Something most people don’t have time to do midweek. But you can get your ragu fix midweek in just 15 minutes simply by using leftover Slow Cooked Beef Cheeks in Red Wine....
Broccoli Fritters “You will be amazed how little batter there is for the mound of broccoli used.” I’ve been posting a broccoli recipe every week for the last few weeks because it’s been insanely cheap lately! For those of you in Australia, it’s currently $1.00/kg (that’s $0.50 / lb) at Coles (usually it’s $4+/kg!). So me being me, who can never resist a good bargain, I stocked up big time which means I’ve had to get seriously creative to get through the ridiculous amount of broccoli stockpiled in my fridge....
Cheesy Jalapeno Bacon Stuffed Baguette This tastes like a cross between cheesy garlic bread and bacon dip. Well, that’s actually what it is. A cheesy bread STUFFED with bacon dip. Brushed with garlic butter and baked until toasty, crusty, golden brown. That moment, when you tear a piece off and the cheese stretches, you take a bite into the warm garlicky bread and the creamy, bacon dip fills your mouth…....
What is Chocolate Ganache? If you’re new to chocolate ganache and wondering what chocolate ganache actually is, this is going to be a life changing moment for you! Made with just cream and any chocolate you want (dark, milk or white), chocolate ganache is a rich chocolate concoction that can be used as a sauce, frosting, glaze, filling or for dipping. When it’s warm, it’s pourable. When it’s cool, it’s spreadable....
For a healthier version with no mayo, make this Cole slaw with a Creamy Yogurt Coleslaw Dressing (it’s so good!) OR try the RecipeTin No Mayo Coleslaw. A great Coleslaw doesn’t need a ton of ingredients. All you need is cabbage, carrot and a terrific Coleslaw dressing for this summertime classic. Along with Macaroni Salad and Caprese Salad, this is the salad we take to gatherings, that we lay out on buffets – because we know it’s a sure thing!...
Homemade Pumpkin Gnocchi The first gnocchi I ever made turned out black. Wait – not even black. If it was black, you might get away with claiming that it’s exotic, or coloured with squid ink. Mine were grey. I had slaved over them for hours. Made the classic way using mashed potato, I painstakingly followed every step in the lengthy recipe. I could envisage how impressed my family would be when I serenely placed the gnocchi in front of them, how they would praise me and exclaim how perfectly pillowy they were....
This is the first of a 3 part Spanish Feast Special series that I’m sharing this week – complete with Spanish Wine pairings! Hola! Who loves Spanish Food?? Me, me, me!! Spanish food is made for gatherings. Tables laden with rustic food for sharing – no fussy giant white plates with a tiny portion of fancy food with names I can’t pronounce, garnished with tiny herbs and assembled using tweezers....
Fettucine Alfredo I triple checked the nutrition analysis because I couldn’t believe my eyes when it came out with only 420 calories for a good size serving of this pasta. I have it in my head that Alfredo is so bad for you because it’s made with cream. Sure, there’s a high fat content. But the calories are a lot less than I expected. A LOT less. Maybe because this is a recipe that uses the classic Italian method of emulsifying the pasta (which is the magic that happens when you briefly cook the sauce with the pasta + some pasta water)....
Like Rosemary Garlic Lamb Chops, these lamb chops are marinated which tenderises the chops and infuses with flavour. It’s also ideal to pop the marinated meat into the freezer! I will shamelessly use any shortcut I can find – so long as it doesn’t compromise on flavour or mean store bought things like dressings. This plate of Greek deliciousness is pulled together using 2 nifty shortcuts: The cucumber and tomatoes are plated up in larger pieces so there’s less chopping....
If you’re feeling inspired, indulge in a Thai banquet with this Thai Chicken complete with Coconut Rice or Coconut Lime Rice, a starter of Thai Lettuce Wraps and how about a Thai Red Curry or Green Curry? Traditional Thai Chicken The marinade for this chicken is insane. It really is. The flavour is so good and I honestly think you’ll regret it if you don’t make a double batch. Because I promise, you will eat more than your fair share....
Hazelnut Olive Oil Cake This is actually the Lemon Olive Oil cake from a delightful cookbook called “Just Desserts” by Charlotte Ree. I’ve taken the liberty of renaming it because I enjoy the hazelnut flavour in it so much, I wanted to headline it – so I did! Usually with olive oil cakes, the olive oil is the dominant flavour. Recipes also typically encourage you to use very good olive oil (read: expensive!...
Simple to make, this recipe is sure to become a favourite you’ll make over and over again! Cream of Chicken Soup recipe Growing up, I was “deprived” of canned soup. And such is the case when you’re a kid that you always want what you can’t have. I got sent to school with bento boxes and eyed off my friends’ peanut butter sandwiches with jealousy. I looked forward to sleepovers, not only because of the excitement of staying at a friends’ place, but because I got to try food that my mother would never make....
Fresh eggs are also better for poaching because they have tighter whites so they poach neatly. But how can you tell how fresh your egg is before you even crack it? Here’s a quick tip: Simply put the egg in a glass of water and watch how it floats: Eggs start to degrade in quality the moment they are laid by chickens. This is because egg shells are porous and over time an egg will absorb air....
Bonus: I’m also sharing my fast biscuit icing method to cover the entire surface of a cookie quickly and easily, without piping! Icing for biscuits This is the icing recipe for the Christmas Cookies I just shared. The recipe got too lengthy so I decided to split it into two – and also, this is an all purpose icing recipe that is ideal to use for any cookies and biscuits, not just for the Christmas Cookies!...
