What I did this weekend

It was DH's birthday this weekend. We went away to the South coast (2-1/2 hours from home) for a weekend with friends in my favourite holiday house we have ever rented. Wow. How much do you love the slide off the verandah? The colour of the ocean slid from olive green to turquoise to deep midnight blue. Bee-you-ta-full.

Peter and Linda's birthday cake

250 g butter
1 cup sugar
3 eggs
1/2 cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
50 g cocoa
70 g ground almonds
150 g self-raising flour

Preheat oven to 180C. Line 23 cm pan with baking paper. Beat butter and sugar. Add eggs/milk/vanilla. In separate bowl mix dry ingredients (cocoa/almonds/flour) and then stir into wet to combine. Bake 35-45 minutes.

Decadent icing: melt 150 ml cream and 200g dark chocolate in a saucepan over very low heat. Allow to cool until thick (I usually put in the freezer and stir every couple of minutes to check) then ice the cake.

Oh man oh man oh man. The icing hardens into pure essence of chocolate. So delicious as to be unphotographable.

Beautiful borscht

Sigh, the borscht didn't live up to its name. I've been cooking a lot out of the CSIRO Well-Being Diet Cookbook, and this is the first recipe which isn't drop-dead gorgeously delicious. It called for 1/2 cup lemon juice. Even as I squeezed, I thought 'no way'. I dutifully added it nonetheless - due to my deep need for order in the universe and in recipes - but regretted it upon tasting. Too tart. Only barely fixed by adding yogurt and extra virgin olive oil.

Mmmm pancakes

For breakfast: buttermilk pancakes topped with yogurt and canned peaches in mango juice. And a titch of maple syrup.

Lamb chops.

Boiled kipfler potatoes*.

Spinach and mushrooms**.

*I've always wanted to try these long skinny German potatoes, typically described as yellow and waxy. They were OK (but hey I'm not a potato person). Glad they weren't as expensive as they usually are.

**The star of the show. 500 g sliced mushrooms fried in olive oil with 2 thinly sliced garlic cloves. Right before serving, I added about 300 g English spinach and cooked briefly. Served with black pepper and extra virgin olive oil.

Bronte beach in Sydney

A couple of weekends ago we stayed at Bronte beach in Sydney. Very beautiful. And a fantastic choice of 6 or 7 non-touristy cafes for breakfast.

After slow cooking....

This is what the beans looked like after slow cooking. I added some sauteed fennel and red capsicum at the end.

Tuscan beans

I soaked 2-1/2 cups of white beans in plenty of water overnight. Into the slow cooker they go, along with (yes!) a whole head of garlic, an onion, a bay leaf, two chicken stock cubes, two rosemary sprigs and 10 cups boiling water (from the jug). Cook 4-6 hours on high.

I will serve these tonight, drizzled with lots of extra virgin olive oil. On the side: fresh bread and sauteed fennel and red capsicum.

Pear tartlets

Tartlets made from

• excess puff pastry (from meat pies)
• pears poached in the lonely last drops of a bottle of champagne. The pink blush is from a few raspberries added to the poaching liquid
• the dregs of vanilla yogurt

Turned out well except mascarpone cheese would have been better than the too-wet yogurt.

Meat pies

Meat pies (made of lamb mince and peas) in ramekins with puff pastry tops. Served with green beans and warm beets tossed with a butter and a slurp of orange juice. I am the sole warm-beet-eater in my family. DH finds the temperature shocking. He believes beetroot should only be cold on hamburgers. Did I mention he's Australian?

Pretty porridge

My morning porridge tarted up with leftover sour cherry and raspberry sauce from previous night's dinner.

Leftovers from Indian lunch

In the hustle and bustle of 12 people for lunch, I forgot to take a picture. Here are the leftovers from the next day. Clockwise, starting from the top, we have:

Peter Singer's dal
Salad of chopped tomatoes, red onions and coriander with cumin and a splash of lemon juice
Raita (yogurt with cucumber and mint)
Potatoes, carrots and spinach in a sauce made of spices, almonds and red capsicums whizzed in the food processor

On rice because that's nice.

Peter Singer's Dal Recipe

DH has added this dish to his repertoire. I think the secret is the Agra lamb and coconut curry powder which I bought from Mudgeeraba Spices and Curry Blends when they were in Canberra for Floriade. It's a large (300g) jar of dried spices which lasts a LONG time ... only 1-2 tablespoons per curry.

Ingredients:
1 tablespoon oil
2 cloves garlic, crushed
1 medium onion, diced
1-2 tablespoons curry powder
salt, to taste
1 cup small red lentils
3 cups water
2-3 bay leaves
1 cinnamon stick
400 g can of tomatoes
1/4 cup coconut cream or milk
2 tablespoons lemon juice

Method:
In a large saucepan, cook onions in oil. Add curry powder, garlic and salt and cook for a minute. Add lentils and stir for another minute before adding water, bay leaves and cinnamon. Bring to boil, then turn heat down very low and simmer for 20-45 minutes, stirring occasionally. When lentils have softened, add tomatoes and simmer for a further 10 minutes. Stir through lemon juice and coconut cream/milk.

Serve over rice with lime pickle and chutney.

Cooking beans in advance

Tomorrow we're having friends for lunch. Dear Husband (DH) wants to make a Peter Singer save-the-planet dal. I'm feeling adventurous so am making lots of Indian side dishes. This afternoon I made raita and green beans. I love this recipe for green beans because it calls for 10 cloves of garlic and even more ginger!

I don't usually add chili to my Indian food these days. My kids are fine with the other spices usually and then the adults can add chili later.

More pictures tomorrow as I cook. I'm hoping to make naan. The dough (made of yogurt, milk and flour) will be made in the bread machine. They will be baked in a very hot oven on a pizza stone.

Australian craft and food blogs

Check out these fantastic craft and food blogs written up in the recent Sunday Life.

Six and a Half Stitches
Poppalina
Nourish Me
Stone Soup
OneGirl Designworks
Cook (Almost) Anything At Least Once
Elegant Sufficiency