mushrooms on toast

Drunk. I caught the last 55 tram home to Union Square silently chanting for hot chips. Boo! No! Chastising myself I thought, I'm an industrious young lass, surely I can knock something greasy up, myself when I get home. Yes, bring on mushrooms on toast.

ingredients
olive oil
2x large mushys
2x cloves of garlijavascript:void(0)c thinly sliced
handful of sundried tomatoes or cherry tomatoes
tsp of dried thyme or fresh
fresh or dried chilli to taste
salt/pepper
handful of greens like spinach or rocket(arugula)

method
1. Fry up! I served on sourdough with a drizzle of olive oil and salt. I inhaled it so quickly I almost choked to death. Total. Win.

chocolate raspberry layer cake

I am a sucker for this packet mix, Clare and I call it 'not cake' as it doesn't seem to logically subsist of anything that makes a 'cake' haha. Deeply obsessed with making a layer cake, Clare and I concocted this plan.

Assembly:
We baked 2 sets of cake mix and left to cool.

raspberry jam
1/2 cup of frozen raspberries (or fresh obviously)
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup of water

1. Combine sugar and water, heat until the liquid becomes clear.

2. Add raspberries and reduce on medium heat until it resembles jam (maybe 20 minutes to half an hour).

chocolate cream frosting
1x packet of japanese tofu rinsed(firm or soft I cant tell the difference)
1/2 cup of cocoa
1 x block of lindt 70% dark chocolate (melted)
1x tsp vanilla
1/2 cup of sugar

1. Blend all the ingredients with a whizz stick or food processor (you can even get away with doing it by hand with a whisk), until well combined then pop in the fridge for half an hour while the cakes are cooling. My trick with rinsing the tofu is to cut the sides off then cut the top off and pinch out the sides a bit and just dribble water into one side for a few minutes to flush it out.

2. Assemble! The trick to assembling a heavily frosted cake without ruining the plate, frost on a piece of baking paper cut down the middle, when you're ready to transfer to a plate you can easily pull out both halves from underneath the cake. This cake mixture doesn't cut very well, but it was SOOOOOOO TASTY! The cake also becomes so moist its like mousse after a few days.

handful salad

I love this salad, its quick and easy, tasty and gets better the longer you have it in the fridge! I call it handful salad because I use a handful (or two) of whats lying around.

ingredients
1/2 cup cous cous
1/2 boiled water
1 tbsp of oil
handful of fresh flat leaf parsley (I just snip in with scissors)
handful of fresh mint (I just snip in with scissors)
handful or two of sultanas
handful or two of dried cranberries
handful or two of chopped almonds
handful or two of sliced sundried tomatoes

method
1. Put the cous cous, oil and boiling water into a bowl and let sit for a few minutes.

2. Fluff the cous cous then throw in all the ingredients and toss. Salad is better left overnight as the sultanas and the cranberries plump up with the moisture from the cous cous.

notes: I love the sultanas and cranberries, creating the perfect blend of sweet and tart. Also most of these items sit in jars in my cupboard so its a quick and easy meal if you cant be bothered going to the shops.

pizza dough and "anything goes" pizza

It was my new years resolution this year to master bread and yeast products. I haven't 'mastered' it yet, but I can make a mean sourdough ciabatta and yeasty things like pizza dough and cinnamon scrolls! (a LETHAL skill to have). Yeasty stuff is a bit difficult to grasp at first but eventually you will get it! I make this batch of pizza dough, roll them out into mini pizzas and keep them in the freezer in between pieces of baking paper, ready to go whenever I feel like it.

pizza dough: ingredients

2 tsp of yeast
1 tsbp sugar
1 1/2 cups water warm
3 cups of flour
Pinch of salt

method
1. Mix warm water, sugar and yeast together and leave for 10 minutes. The yeast should 'foam' and/or come to the top of the water like this:



2. Then add flour slowly until the dough is pliable and slightly sticky (you don't want it so sticky however that you cant knead it). All flour is different so you may need to add more flour, or less, so always mix bread products minus 1/2 cup of flour until you know how much you need (boom chic!). Dust your work surface and work that bread! About 6-8 minutes of kneading should get it elastic, you can feel the difference immensely, in the beginning it was kind of rough and un-uniform, by the time its ready it should be smooth, elastic, fully worked in almost exactly like "play-dough".



3. Lightly oil a bowl and put your dough baby in it. Turn the dough so it is covered in oil and cover with plastic wrap or a damp towel. Yeast is like mold (or is a mold I cant remember) it loves moisture and warmth. I usually turn my oven on to heat up for pizza time and let the bowl sit on top of the oven. Unless its hot hot summer you will need some heat help with making dough rise in Melbourne. It should take between 45-60 minutes to double in size. You can notice the difference, the dough basically becomes 'alive' and puffy (and be patient! if you have that warmth there the dough WILL rise, stop looking at it!). The marker on the bowl was where the top of my dough baby came to before it was left to rise:



4. Punch that dough! No I mean it! Punch in the centre to deflate all the air out of it and knead it for a minute. At this point in regular bread making you would shape it into a loaf and let rise again until doubled, but we don't need that for pizza bases.

5. Break off handfuls and roll out into pizza rounds (I'm rolling them out for single servings, use your noggin to cater to a larger bunch). I usually roll them out quite thin because the pizzas rise a fair bit and I like a thin crust. You will see when you're rolling it out that air bubbles will form in the dough constantly, its alive and burbling! so cool! Store in the freezer between pieces of baking paper.

6. Pizza is a great poor option. Next comes "anything goes" pizza, I had sun dried tomato tapenade, used that as a base, then used all the vegies I had in my fridge that were about to die, spanish onion, mushrooms, asparagus, sun dried tomatoes, and thin slices of garlic on top. Yum yum.

porridge with coconut cream, raspberries and almonds

I cycle to work, 12kms each way, so eating a low GI breakfast is important. Porridge makes me feel full until lunchtime. I try and eat fruit at breakfast as well, as usually I dont eat much fruit during the day (I'm a pussy like that).

ingredients
handful of raspberries, fresh or frozen
3/4 cup of porridge oats
1/2 cup of coconut milk or cream
1/2 cup of rice milk or soy
handful of shredded coconut
handful of almonds

method
1. Toast almonds and coconut under a grill whilst making the porridge.

2. Cook the oats in the coconut and rice milk until they are tender. Add raspberries and cook until they are heated. Serve with some brown sugar (especially if the raspberries are quite tart), the toasted coconut and almonds.

scrambled tofu with roti bread

This is one of my favourite easy meals to make. I work in batches like a stir fry to keep everything crisp and fresh. The best part is, is you can throw in whatever seasonal vegetables you like, mix up the seasoning, tofu takes on any flavour you wish to make.

ingredients
1 package of firm water packed tofu (honestly any kind of firm/soft chinese tofu would work)
3 stems of asparagus, thinly sliced
2 vegie sausages, sliced
2 mushrooms, diced
1 onion, diced
1 chili, thinly sliced
2 tbsp of pine nuts
2 tbsp fresh parsley
a handful of english spinach
2 tbsp sun dried tomatoes shredded
seasoning of your choice, I used a 1 tbsp of dukkah, some salt and some pepper

method
1. Working in batches I first dry roasted the pine nuts and set aside.

2. Fry up the chili and onion in some olive oil until the onion goes translucent. Add the sausages and saute for about 5 mins until the sausages go brown. Set aside with the pine nuts.

3. Fry up the mushrooms and mash the tofu into them. Let the tofu cook for about 5 minutes to release all of the water. Drain the water then throw all of the other cooked ingredients in and add the spinach, parsley, asparagus and sun dried tomatoes. Toss in the pan until spinach is wilted.

4. Serve with a drizzle of olive oil, salt and lemon juice (its pretty much how I finish everything these days) Voila!