Family cooking - when there is not much in the house

We are having Pasta Bake tonight and both my kids are so excited.  It is the kind of meal that has just developed in our house and is the go to dinner when you don't have much of anything, but little bits of a number of veges.

Ingredients:
1 can of chopped or diced tomatoes (I usually mushy them up a bit more because I don't like the skin)
1 can of chilli beans
1 packet of spiral pasta just under cooked
Optional - 6 rashers of bacon cut into approx 1 inch square pieces lightly pan fried  

Then it is whatever is left in the garden or fridge in the way of veges - you can use carrots, silverbeet, spinach, corn, courgette, brocolli, beans, capsicum, mushrooms (anything really)  - the secret is that you don't need a lot of any one thing.  I lightly cook the veges - some I just pop in water and bring to the boil and drain off.  Mushrooms, capsicums and courgette I gently pan fry.

Put all of the above in an ovenproof dish mix around and top with grated cheese.  Pop in the oven for 15 to 20 minutes at about 160 degrees C and you are done.

And my kids LOVE it!  Easy Peasy.

Tomatoes -99 cents a kilo

So many of our meals start with homemade tomato sauce.  In a hurry - cook some pasta, stir fry some courgettes, beans and mushrooms and add tomato sauce and voila!  Use it as a base for spaghetti bolognese, chilli, or a casserole.

You need:
1/4 cup olive oil
25 g butter
2 medium onions - diced
2 red or green capsicums  (bell peppers)
4 cloves garlic, crushed
6 tablespoons tomato paste
2 kg peeled tomatoes
2 Tablespoons parsley
handful of basil - you can used dried if you have to - 2 tablespoons
1 Tablespoon salt
2 teaspoons brown sugar
1 teaspoon chilli paste
2 teaspoon freshly ground peppercorns

To make:
Heat the oil and butter in a large pot.  Add the onion, garlic and tomato paste and cook over a low heat, stirring occassionally until the onions are soft.  Add all the other ingredients and simmer slowly in a semi covered pot for 45 minutes, stirring occassionally to prevent sticking.  Remove the lid and continue cooking for a further 10-15 minutes until the sauce is quite think.  Store in fridge.

We tend to do 6 kilos of tomatoes at a time and we do freeze some of the sauce, but beware allow some space for expansion when you freeze it.

To peel the tomatoes we pop them into boiling water and then peel.

Guess what we are having for dinner tonight!

Me and Lois Part II - The NZ Christmas Mincemeat

For WandaFish :) if it is good enough for Lois (or her husband) it is surely good enough for me!

NZ Christmas Mincemeat
175g seeded raisins
150g sultanas
100g mixed peel
150g currants
30g almonds blanced, peeled and finely chopped
grated zest and juice of 1 lemon
grated zest and juice of 1 navel orange
1/4 cup brandy
1/4 cup medium sherry
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground allspice
1/2 tsp ground ginger
75g butter
150g dark brown sugar
2 large ripe bananas

Put the seeded raisins, sultanas and peel in a processor and pulse until roughly chopped.  Tip out into a large bowl and add the currants, almonds, zests and juices, brandy, sherry and spices.  Melt the butter in a large frying pan over a moderately low heat and use a wooden spoon to stir in the brown sugar.  Peel the bananas and slice finely.  Add to the butter and sugar and stir with a wooden spoon.  As the bananas soften crush them into the butter and sugar mixture.  Continue cooking for several minutes until the mixture is thick and smooth.  Add this mixture to the remaining ingredients.  Stir well and cover.  Leave at room temperature and stir again the next day before putting in a covered plastic container in the fridge.  If possible store for days or weeks before using.  (Not in my last minute house!) Makes enough for 3 dozen mince pies.

I also like the tradition that you can count on a happy month for every Christmas mince pie you eat in a different house (or cafe).  55,56,57..... just kidding! 

Happy eating

Me and Lois - Only in New Zealand

It has been crazy at my place recently as I am sure it is for most people at this time of year.

This morning I have been baking my Christmas Mince Pies and using the recipe by Lois Daish (a food writer) that appeared in The Listener several years ago.  I always use this recipe and every time I do it makes me smile because behind it is a story that I think might only happen in New Zealand. 

It was Christmas Eve in 2004 and I had been hanging onto The Listener magazine ready to follow the recipe that I saw for Christmas Mince Pies, but when I came to use the recipe - could I find the magazine? - NO!  Mr S had been busy tidying up and had put it out for recycling that day and it was gone. 

Not to be put off I turned to the internet to see whether they had the recipe on-line.  NO.  But there was the number for the Listener in Auckland, so not caring about the toll call, I rang. I wanted to make those Christmas Mince Pies.

NO, says the Listener they cannot give me the recipe, but would I like to ring Lois and ask for it?  WOW, you mean I can ring Lois?  So I rang Lois at home and spoke to her very understanding husband who without any fuss gave me the recipe I was after.  Only in New Zealand!  I wonder whether they would do it today?

The recipe is yummy - but beware do grease your patty pans!

Almond Pastry
 250g standard flour
50g almonds (I use 70 g as that is the size of the packet and I cannot bear the waste)
100g icing sugar
190g hard butter
1 egg yolk
1 tbsp very cold water (don't let your husband near it because mine tips it out when he is tidying up!)

Put the flour, ground almonds and icing sugar in a processor bowl.  Cut the butter into dice and add.  Pulse the processor until the mixture has an even crumb like texture.  Combine the yolk and water in a cup and add to the processor.  Pulse until the mixture starts to clump into larger crumbs.  Stop the machine, lift the lid and press a few of the crumbs together between thumb and forefinger.  If they do not readily hold togetehr, add a few more drops of cold water and pulse again.  Top the mixture into a bowl and press together with your hands.  Wrap in a plastic wrap and put in a cool place for 20 minutes before rolling out.

Makes about 24 small mince pies (I use mini muffin tins and I get about 36)

Lois also gives a recipe for the Christmas Mince which I must admit I do not use any more, being a last minute person I buy some good pre-made Christmas mince and use that instead.

I use mini muffin tins and bake the pies at about 190 degrees celsius in a fan forced oven for about 10 minutes. 

Also because my children do not like dried fruit I usually make some raspberry jam pies as well - just use raspberry jam instead of Christmas Mince.

Happy Baking

Holiday Joys

I really love my kids, I really do, but they are not at their best when the weather is bad, their friends are away and the netball holiday programme for one of them is cancelled. 

Today we have had the "sock incident" a major argument because one put their dirty sock in the hood of the other's hoodie while they were wearing it.  Crime of the century, which I did not apparently take seriously enough! (Bad mother)  Or another favourite line of the day was "MUM HE KEEPS LOOKING AT MEEEEE!"  Terrible, quelle horreur!

They also make me laugh.  Today Mr 15 was wrapped in his quilt on his bed reading and my phone goes off, with a text from him that reads

can u please bring me a biscuit im 2 warm to get it myself

Ah well let me think about that for a moment.... hmmmm..... ah... NO, but he did get points for cheekiness.

But all is quiet in our house, a quick trip to the library and hiring of the DVD Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief worked a treat.  Both my kids loved this book and judging by the hush, are both loving the movie.

Time enough to attend to dinner homemade Minestrone Soup and french bread rolls.

Recipe for French Bread

4 1/3 cups heavy duty flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon sugar
4 teaspoons Surebake Yeast (or another yeast powder of your choosing)
1 1/2 cups warm water

place all ingredients into bread maker select dough.  Form into rolls or french sticks when finished.

Let rise in a warm place (30 - 35 degrees celsius) for 30 minutes.
Bake 12 -20 minutes at 180 degrees celsius depending on whether you are doing rolls or a sticks.  EAT

If you are going stir crazy with all this bad weather and would like an outing this Saturday why not pop into the Frank Kitts Market undercover on the waterfront in Wellington, that's where I will will be.

Best Ever Scone Recipe

This is a bold statement I know, but as someone who has been a failed scone maker for many years I feel qualified to make this statement.

This recipe NEVER goes wrong, they are super easy to make and everyone likes them.

4 cups self raising flour
Pinch of salt
300 mls cream*
300 mls water

Pre heat oven to 200 degrees celsius. Sift flour and salt into a bowl, pour in cream and water together and mix.  Place dough on lightly floured flat surface and shape.  Cut out scones and place on tray with baking paper.  Bake for 10-12 minutes.

Serve with jam a nd cream - diet food!  YUM.

*  I know you can get different types of cream overseas - for any overseas readers this cream is liquid but can be whipped (I hope this makes sense).

sticky pages

I can always find my favourite baking recipes because they are the extra thick pages in my recipe book, where cake batter and everything else has splattered on the pages over years of use.  Often I have to gently pull the pages apart.

Lemon Cake/Loaf is one of these recipes and it is from our local school recipe book that was done several years ago as a fund raiser.  I like that these recipes are the contributions from local families of their tried and true recipes.

Melt 125 g butter
Add 2 beaten eggs
1/2 cup milk

Stir into that
1 cup sugar
1 1/2 cups self raising flour
1/4 tsp salt
Grated rind of one lemon

Pour into a greased loaf tin and cook for about 35 - 40 minutes at 170 - 180 degrees celsius

Topping:
Mix juice of lemon
1/4 cup sugar

Pour over cake while still hot after taking out of the oven. 

In our house the cake does not get a chance to cool, the first slices are eaten while it is still warm.

15 years ago

15 years ago today we had our first baby.  Our baby boy is 15!  Where did that time go. J is now 6 foot tall and gorgeous on the inside and out.  He is a fun, gentle, kind and loving person and for that I am very grateful.  He is still a work in progress when it comes to picking up after himself and doing it now not later, but I am sure in time these things will come and my nagging will pay off.  Most probably in time for someone else to reap the rewards!

This morning I baked a birthday cake.  Gone are the days of Thomas the Tank Engine and pirate ship cakes.  We have a special chocolate cake recipe which has become the birthday cake of choice in our house, we call it the Chocolate Fish Cake.  The first time I tried this cake I bought it at the local church cake stall and it was yummy.  Luckily a firend of mine knew the person who baked it and I was fortunate to get the recipe.  I am sorry I don't know the person's name because this cake is divine and easy to make.

WARNING this cake is not for the faint hearted or diet conscious!

Chocolate Fish Cake

125 g butter
3/4 cup caster sugar
2 eggs
1/2 cup homemade raspberry jam (if you don't have homemade try and get the next best thing in terms of store bought jam, here in NZ it is Anathoths for my money).
1 1/4 cups self raising flour
1/2 cup cocoa
1 tsp baking soda
1 cup warm milk
1/2 cup chocolate chips

Heat oven to 180 degrees celsius

Cream butter and sugar. Beat in eggs one at a time.  Add jam. Mix well.
Sift flour and cocoa together.
Dissolve baking soda in warm milk.
Add alternately to creamed mixture with flour etc
Fold in choc chips
Sppon into a prepared cake time - 22 cm round or square cake tin, lined with baking paper.
Bake for about 50 - 60 minutes depending on size of tin.
Cool on cake cooler.
Ice with your preferred chocolate icing.  Decorate with chocolate fish, marshmallows etc.

EAT

15 minutes after J and a friend came home from school.