My Kitchen Stories

Giant Skillet Cookie

Posted on June 17, 2013 by MyKitchenStories

Giant Chocolate cookie

“I’d just like a cookie that is so big it would take me all day to eat it”, said my friend Sally. I looked at her and realised that she really meant it. Sally can eat more cake, cookies and pastry than anybody I have ever met. Her house is the ideal place to deliver excess baking of any kind. That is where these giant cookies have found a home. Sally has been very down lately and I wanted to surprise her with these giant skillet cookies. “Skillet” or frypan baking has been quite the trend for a while, especially in the US, where cookies are an addiction. You’ll find all sorts of Giant Skillet Cookies are served in restaurants there.

Giant Chocolate cookie

There are no end of flavours you can make. Add fruit or any kind of nuts. Keep them as simple as the chocolate chip one above or have a little play like the chocolate hazelnut one.

Fudgy and warm

SABH is a monthly blog “get together ” where people cook along the same theme. This month it’s frypan cooking. I am sure there will be lots of interesting ideas , so why not take a little look at what others are whipping up.

The hop is brought to you by 84th & 3rd, The Hungry Australian, Dining With a Stud, and this months host The Capers of the Kitchen Crusader.

5.0 from 3 reviews

Giant Skillet Cookie

8 mins

20 mins

28 mins

This couldn’t be easier. One pot cookies you can make anytime.

My Kitchen Stories: My Kitchen Stories

: sweets

Serves: 6

Ingredients

1x oven proof skillet or frypan 10in or 24cm. Pre- heat the oven to 180C/ 350F
125gm ( 1 stick) of butter
½ cup of brown sugar
½ cup of caster sugar ( granulated sugar)
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
1½ cups of flour
1 teaspoon bi carbonate of soda
1 cup of chocolate chips ( or chopped chocolate)

Variation – chocolate hazelnut

substituted 1 cup of hazelnut FLOUR

¼ cup of flour ( or gluten free flour)

¼ cup of cocoa powder

Instructions

Put the skillet onto the stove top and add chopped butter. Leave over a medium heat till the butter has only just melted. Turn off the heat
Add the two sugars and vanilla to the frypan and stir well.
Crack the egg into a cup and break up with a fork and stir into the sugar butter mix
Mix the flour and bi carb together well and add ½ to the frypan stirring well.
Add the remaining flour and chocolate chips and stir. Flatten down the mixture and add nuts (if using)
Bake the cookie for 18-20minutes, or until just firm.
Serve the cookie in the skillet with icecream or wait till it is cool and release onto a plate

WordPress Recipe Plugin by EasyRecipe

Here it is in pictures

Grab these ingredients plus 1 egg

get a skillet

Melt the butter

till just done

Add the sugar

Stir the sugar into the butter

Until incorporated

Add the egg and stir

Add half the flour and stir

It will be incorporated and smooth

Add the rest of the dry ingredients and the chocolate chips

Mix well

Flatten out

Once it is completely mixed top with nuts or something else

Bake for 18-20 minutes

Serve warm with icecream

Warm chocolate cookie with icecream

Get cracking! Next post:

“Food and more food, George Clooney and my night with 6 Italian Men”

signiture

Posted in RECIPES | Tagged Australian macadamias, chocolate chip skillet cokies, cooking with hazelnut flour, giant skillet cookie, SABH Blog Hop, Skillet cooking | 11 Comments

Easy Hot Water Crust for Pies

Posted on June 13, 2013 by MyKitchenStories

Lamb and Porcini Pie with hot water crust

It’s cold in the Southern Hemisphere, forgive us if this recipe is not suitable for your current balmy summer evenings, somewhere else. It maybe one to keep for colder times.

Although there is no end of pasta at my house (Skaters choice/ teenager) a pie is always more than welcome. The two of us have a project in mind this week, and that is for me to teach him how to make a good Chicken and vegetable Pie. This is apparently what he would like to be able to master culinarily speaking, and I am more than happy to encourage such a lesson.

Lamb and Porcini hot crust pie

We have made the Quick Chicken Pie into an art, using both puff pastry and filo pastry in the past. This hot water crust is a little more interesting. It’s firm and chewy and really survives rough treatment more importantly it lives through a microwave blitz as a left over food. (As all food should in a house containing a teenage boy) We haven’t made the chicken version yet, but this one was welcomed warmly.

Wrap your hot water crust around any left over foods you might have. Try leftovers such as bolognese or ragu, maybe you have some roast vegetables or chicken, a stew that just isn’t quite enough to go around. All these are great ways to use this crust. Be inspired and make a chunky pork sausage filling instead of using left overs because this crust is perfect for pork pies. What ever you do with it, it’s easy to handle. I wanted to test this recipe to make sure it was easy enough for Skater. I had this in one of my recipe books so I filled my pie with left over lazagne filling of Slow Braised Lamb and Porcini. The filling is best if it isn’t too runny.

Hot water crust with lamb filling

5.0 from 2 reviews

Easy Hot Water Crust for Pies

10 mins

40 mins

50 mins

Use this crust for any pie. It is a great firm holding crust that is chewy and goes perfectly well with pureed vegetable or with white cheesy polenta, as we did. When you make a pie the filling must be cool or cold for the best results. Unlike other pastry crusts you can make this a fraction thicker.

My Kitchen Stories: My Kitchen Stories

: Dinner, Lunch, Maincourse

: Traditional

Serves: 6

Ingredients

I like to use a mixer for this recipe. You could use a food processor or simply mix with a wooden spoon. Preheat the over to 180C ( 325F)

150gm (5.29oz) butter (salted or unsalted)
200ml water (7 fl oz)
2 eggs (med)
450gm (15.9oz) plain flour
¼-1/2 teaspoon salt ( salt is important for browning and flavour here)
1 extra egg yolk and ⅛ teaspoon salt for glazing beaten together

Instructions

Put the butter and water into a small pot and put over a medium heat till the butter dissolves and the liquid reaches a rolling boil. Take off the heat.
Mix the flour and salt and pour into a mixer bowl. Mix the two eggs together in a cup breaking up with a fork. Pour the flour and egg into the mixer and add the water and butter mixture turning onto low immediately.( remember the liquid is warm and might cook the egg if it sits too long)
Mix till the dough forms a ball. Pour out onto a bench and push the dough into a disc. ( if using a wooden spoon stir till the liquid is all but mixed in and then knead lightly. Over kneading will give a tougher crust, so work it gently till it is nice and smooth. If your dough is very sticky and stays in clumps on your hands then sprinkle with more flour till it just comes together. ( some eggs are bigger and some flour is just not as absorbant). Cool the pastry a little and refrigerate till cold
Once the pastry is cool. Divide into x 2 . One disc should be about ¾ of the dough and ¼ left for a lid. Use a little flour to roll it out the dough and push into a greased pie plate. The pastry is plyable. Fill the base then brush the edges with egg and add the lid. Crimp around the top
Paint the top with egg yolk and pierce a couple of holes on the top.
Bake at 180 degrees for approximately 35-40 minutes or until golden

WordPress Recipe Plugin by EasyRecipe

Hot water crust

Pastry cooling

Ready to be rolled

This cake tin makes a great pie dish – non stick removable bottom

Rolling

rolling the pastry

Pie filling

Filling the case Egg washing

Simple hot water crust

Give it a try and let me know if it was easy for you

This picture was sent to me by a Sunshine coast reader, he made my Cauliflower, Lemon and Macadamia Soup. Hey Stefano, looks like you made a delicious version with added chilli.

Stefanos soup

signiture

Posted in RECIPES | Tagged Dinner., lunch, Maincourses, making pastry, Making pies, pies, using leftiovers | 14 Comments

Cauliflower, Lemon and Macadamia Soup and an exciting Night

Posted on June 9, 2013 by MyKitchenStories

Cauliflower and Macadamia soup

I have so much I want to tell you about Italy, but when I came home last week there were too many things going on and I got side tracked for a minute, so that will follow soon. My teen Skater, got his licence, the clever young thing did very well and passed first attempt. This now means no more driving lessons, a relief beyond measure. It really is true however that the good and the bad almost always arrive in tandem and this is one such time. “Can I borrow the car” is now on high rotation and my saying no, is even starting to irritate me. Still, this is a house with only 1 car and the excess for a driver of his experience is $2050, way out of my comfort zone. So, he will have to wait a little while for more practise.

Cauliflower, Lemon and Macadamia soup

Meanwhile, I’ve met some great people on twitter lately and one of them was “Australian- Macadamias.org” a group aligned to support, publicize and promote the Australian industry with news and recipes. Visit them on Facebook for recipes

They invited me, along with about 12 or so other bloggers to a fun cooking class and challenge with Colin Fassnidge from 4 fourteen restaurant, the Four in Hand ( Paddington), The Paddington Arms and of course My Kitchen Rules and Eamon Sullivan, who has been an Ambassador for Australian Macadamias for a couple of years. He has continued with his love of food and opened several cafe/restaurants in Perth if you want to check them out...Louis Baxters and The Bib and Tucker on the beach in Fremantle.

The night coincided with the new season of Macadamias and this quick recipe was inspired by Colin Fassnidge’s recipe for Jerusalem Artichoke Soup that he made at the event. Not everyone has access to Jerusalem artichokes or the sorrel ( a lemony leaf) that Colin used so I put together this recipe for Cauliflower, Lemon and Macadamia Soup. It just so happens that all of these things are in season at the moment.

Colin Fassnidge for Australian macadamias

After Eamon and Colin demonstrated their recipes we headed into the Sydney Seafood School Kitchen to try them out in a bit of a “pressure test” with Colin and Eamon as the judges. The trick was to make the two recipes in 30 minutes. Martyna from The Wholesome Cook .com and I had a great time and we did a fantastic job. We all sat down after to eat our soup for dinner.

Sydney Seafood School

Plating up our dishes

Tasting our food

5.0 from 3 reviews

Cauliflower, Lemon and Macadamia Soup and an exciting Night

5 mins

25 mins

30 mins

This easy delicious soup is based on a recipe that Colin Fassinage prepared

My Kitchen Stories: My Kitchen Stories

Serves: 4-6

Ingredients

1kg (2 lb) Cauliflower Flowerettes (1 large cauli)
1 large brown onion diced
2 cloves garlic crushed
3 tablespoons of Macadamia oil ( or butter if prefered)
1 cup cream – I used thickened cream
2 cups of chicken stock
150gm Macadamias chopped (3/4 cup)
¼ cup lemon juice
zest of 1 lemon
Salt and pepper

To Serve

Pancetta grilled till crisp, chopped chives and extra macadamias for finishing

Instructions

Using a medium large pot add the Macadamia oil and warm . Add the onion, garlic, lemon zest and soften. Add the cauliflower, Macadamias, stock and cream.
Bring the mixture to a boil, turn down and simmer till tender ( approx 20min). Add the lemon juice and puree with a stick blender ( I used my Vitamix for a very smooth finish).
Test the soup and add salt.
Chop up pancetta, nuts and chives and serve on top of the soup

WordPress Recipe Plugin by EasyRecipe

Cauliflower soup with lemon macadamias

Macadamias have been growing in Australia for 60 thousand years
New season Macadamias are available now
Approximately 11,500 tonnes of Macadamias will be produced this season
There are 800 Macadamia farmers in Australia, 500 of them in The Northern Rivers Region ( around Byron Bay)

Thanks Colin for the amusing story about your kids. When they visit the restaurant they make a b-line for the fridge where they like to pat the sheep and pigs hanging in there . I also loved Eamons story. He hated eating almost everything as a kid and constantly ran off to the bathroom during dinner to spit things out.

signiture

Posted in Interesting ingredients, RECIPES | Tagged 4 fourteen, 4 in hand, Australian macadamias, Cauliflower lemon and macadamia soup, Dinner., lunch dishes, Soup, winter food | 22 Comments

Bangkok Food Tour and one night in luxury!

Posted on June 5, 2013 by MyKitchenStories

The sweet corn guy

If you had one and half days in Bangkok what would you do to make the most of that time?

* I hope you have several minutes to flick through this rather long post full of photos*

I haven’t been to Bangkok in a long time and it has changed a lot, and so have I!. I arrived early on Saturday morning after flying 16 hours with 1 stopover. I was tired but nothing could keep me from hitting the streets before I collapsed. I suggest first check into a fabulous hotel, one night deserves the best. Then, hit the ground running with a Food Tour. I went on a walking tour called “Historic Bangrak Food & Culture Tour” with www.bangkokfoodtours.com Although they ask you to book ahead (best) I was unsure if my plane would be delayed, so I just turned up and was lucky my tour wasn’t booked out. There are a few choices but which ever you decide on it’s a great way to fast track seeing and learning as much as you can in a short time.

The new Bangkok

Lead the way Lunuchi

The tour is an easy walk stopping at up to 5 restaurants, revealing places nearby that you probably would not find yourself. As a bonus the guides buy samples of street food along the way, depending what is available on the day.

We met at a Saphan Taksin sky train station in Bangrak at 9.45 am. Luchi, our cute guide was there to meet “us,” and I say us because it is easy to find the meeting place, you will notice a group of hungry looking foreigners lurking at the modern, organised train station entrance. Hard to miss. (7 of us total today. The tours take up to 14 people hence the reason to pre-book) Warning! Don’t have breakfast……….

Charoen Wieng Pochana

Thai style Roast

First stop traditional Roast Duck “Thai style” on rice with pickled vegetables. The duck at this restaurant is “free range” coming from a family farm. It is less fatty and greasy than your average Chinese Roast Duck and has a nice clean sweetish soy flavour and more meat on the bones. Luchi also gets the cook to slice up some “Thai bacon”. A trotter of pork boned, stuffed and marinated in ginger garlic and lemongrass then roasted like the duck.

Preparing Thai style roast duck

Thai bacon

Roast Thai style Duck

Making Wonton

As we leave Grandfather is making wontons.

As we walk to our next stop we visit some fruit sellers and try “Salacca” originally from Indonesia.

salacca fruit

green mangoes rambutan man

An Indian Muslim restaurant run by the same family for 70 years is next. Here we sample spicy curry noodle soup, that resembles Laksa with rice vermicelli, boiled egg and crispy eschallots

Cooking curry noodles

Curry noodles

Spicy curry noodles above. The window where you can select food from the set menu, part of this restaurants popularity

The Indian Muslum restaurant

Takeaway fish cakes On our way to the next stop, PanLee Bakery, (who have now clocked up 60 years in the bakery business), we try fish cakes and buy some sweet coconut corn waffles to eat. Luchi buys BBQ steamed coconut bananas (in banana leaves), for us to try later.

Coconut banana

Coconut bananas in banana leaf

Masterchef

Don’t count on the coffee being “the usual”. Here it’s a charming combination of carnation evaporated and sweetened condensed milk frothed into a very unusual “capuccino”.

Pork bun

Pandan custard bun

Banana chips with chilli and lime leaves

After a Thai iced tea ( sweet) we walk for 10 minutes passing the Sweet Corn Guy. He’s happy to sell us an ear of corn each to chew on as we walk across a busy road under the free way fly over.

No Reservations

Special!!! We passed this restaurant while walking, we didn’t stop just in case we disturbed the dish washing

Kalaprapruek

We’ve walked at least 1 skytrain station away from where we started. This beautiful green space is the grounds of several restaurants. We are heading to Kalaprapruek inside here. It is owned by the Kings son, and Dad does not understand why his son would want to work. However this is a special place. Its’ a cafe, restaurant and produce store and it’s very popular. As you walk in the door there is fresh and dry produce for sale. The vegetables for sale are all organic and proudly bare the Kings seal. The money raised goes back to the Princes’ project, teaching the unemployed to grow and farm organically.

The Kings seal

Food for sale

The branding

And then there’s the cafe……………………..

The cafe

The Buffet at Kallaprapruek

Coconut cakes

Orange cake

We are ushered upstairs where there are some tables left and the sampling goes on. First a Roti that has been deep fried till crispy and served with a spicy incredibly flavourful green chicken curry

Fried roti with green curry

Pork, catfish salad, green papaya salad and bamboo salad

Crispy catfish salad

Almost finally, we all share a mixed dish. By this time a taste of each thing is quite enough. Som Tum (Green Papaya salad), Crispy catfish salad with green mango ( amazing), Bean shoot salad with chilli and Thai basil, Spicy shredded Goat and sticky rice follow by this red curry fish mousse steamed in banana leaf. We also ate the banana cooked in leaves we bought earlier and a choice of Coconut or Tamarind sorbet.

Unfortunately we got given the map and how to say all the Thai food words at the end of the tour. That aside the tour is amazing value packed full of information and fun at 1050 Thai baht ( approx $35 ). The tour ends here but Lushi will direct you back to the skytrain station or point you back in the right direction so you can practise your newly acquired street skills.

www.bangkokfoodtours.com

These are some of the interesting things I caught on the way back to my hotel (the FABULOUS one). This is Morning Glory, a green vegetable used in a lot of dishes. It makes great street food in an omelette.

Morning Glory and eggs

Sunday market sights.

Fresh Water Fried Fish

Durian fruit ??? I know!! restaurants Thai style

And my Hotel? The Lebua State Tower

1055 Silom Road, Bangrak, Bangkok, Thailand, 10500 Show Map

www.lebua.com/state-tower. Crazy luxury for $140 a night and the home of the sky bar on the 62nd floor with the highest alfresco out door restaurant in the world.

Sky bar

A fresh raspberry pineapple vodka cocktail sipped overlooking Bangkok by night was around $20

One night in Bangkok and I’m so very happy!

signiture

This is not a sponsored post.

Just wanted to add a picture sent in by one of my readers . She made my chocolate cookies for her sons playgroup. Cute. Thanks Amber

biscuits

Posted in reviews, Travel | Tagged Bangkok, Bangkok food tours, Bangkok Travel, Bangrak tours, Thailand, the Lebua Hotel, Walking around Bangkok | 15 Comments

Chocolate Biscuit people In My Kitchen June 2013

Posted on June 1, 2013 by MyKitchenStories

VIP’s Very Important Pastries

My kitchen is a bit neglected in the last couple of weeks my teenager, Skater has been in charge ( help!). I ‘ve just returned from a trip to Milan and Rome to visit food producers. I have all kinds of ideas and look forward to sharing some of these with you in the coming weeks along with lots of pictures. I joined an exotic food walking tour in Bangkok on my way back from Rome that I would love to take you on this week.

Vip biscuits

Meanwhile I have these cute VIP- Very Important Pastry cutters I bought while at Eataly in Rome.

Eataly have you heard of it? It is 4 floors of food and 18 restaurants. There is cheese making in fact a whole mozzarella section with glass walls so you can watch them make it fresh. There is gelato making & several gelato bars, seafood – all kinds of exotic stuff here, a butchery- aging/cutting, bread & pastry making, pizza and pasta making . Staggeringly, all processes can be watched via open kitchens and walls including a mini brewery. The vegetarian restaurant is situated next to the fresh vegetable sales. There are pizza bars with so many slabs of pizza you can’t tear your eyes away, foccacia made in thin elegant slabs topped with anything your heart desirers . Big rotisseries with meat roasting that can be bought whole or sliced or eaten there with sides of beautifully cooked beans and vegetables, or choose another restaurant and have meat grilled or as a ragu, may be with some fresh Caserecci pasta?. Fish can be grilled while you sit up at the bar or on a giant plate as Fritto Misto or why not a three tired mixed seafood platter? The mozzarella bar is busy while panini lure you with soft prosciutto and oozing condiments of artichoke and olive pastes. There is a coffee bar, the very Italian way to throw down a coffee while you are standing, as well as comfortable lounges where you can get a coffee or a coffee cocktail . There are gelaterias, beer and food matching, it goes on. Naturally there are books, wine, schools, kitchen equipment, even a travel agency. I think you get the idea…… the offering swings wildly between artisanal and industrial so you need to be aware that this is a style of supermarket/store. According to the publicity, Eataly is the 3rd biggest tourist attraction in New York, today. This is the chains 15th store. I hear it is an interesting trek by public transport. I arrived by car.

Baking People

You may be wondering why then, I would buy these cutters, and that’s a great question that I can not answer. There is however,a great crunchy biscuit recipe attached so you can make your own chocolate shapes even without these cute cutters for biscuits that hang on the side of your cup.

Mozzerella sales and production & smallgoods

Naturally fermented breads using Mulino Marino flours

Slabbets of Pizza style focaccia

www.australian-macadamias.org

I am very excited to have all of these Macadamias in my kitchen so I can create lots of recipes this winter. It can take up to 10 years for a Macadamia tree to reach maturity so I have a very precious cargo here. The Macadamia industry encourages native bees to help pollinate the crop, protecting bee populations with the extra bonus result of delicious Macadamia honey.

Le Tamerici. balsamic Amarene cherries

And finally, these Amarena cherries. Italian sour cherries are grown around Bolognia and Modena, they are prized for their texture, colour and the incredible sourness that works so well in cooking. Paola Calciolari is the owner, manager and tastebuds behind Le Tamerici artisan products. Her use of mustards in fruit (a regional speciality- Lombardy) and combinations of surprising tastes, flavours and textures are legendary. She has built her business around using almost entirely all local seasonal ingredients and supports the revival of heirloom fruit and vegetables from the Northern Italian region. The cherries are a subtle mixture of just poached deseeded cherries in a sugar syrup with just the right touch of local (IGP) balsamic (Modena is just down the road). All of her jars are a magical combination of the flavour and texture of the ingredient, even though it has been preserved. I met her at the cooking school in Mantova, Lombardy, a town 2 hours from Milan, it’s on the same property as the small production facility. The school is light and bright and it was here that she cooked lunch and matched a local ‘Mantovan’ risotto (this is a rice growing area) as well as cheese with her cutting edge products. The cherries were paired with a local creamy goat/sheep milk cheese and also stirred into a semi freddo with hazelnuts. A gorganzola was paired with mustard oranges and the risotto with lemon mustard fruit. What an experience for me! Thank you also to the gorgeous Alessandra Cazzaniga with her perfect English, who made sure I understood everything x

Mantovan Risotto perfect with lemon mustard fruit

Tasting Le Tamerici products

Semi Freddo using amarena cherries in balsamic

The building housing the Cooking School, shop and office

5.0 from 5 reviews

Chocolate Biscuit people

10 mins

20 mins

This recipe makes lovely crunchy biscuits cut into any shapes. They are ideal to decorate. If you would like to make vanilla or even lemon, replace the cocoa powder with flour and add lemon zest.

My Kitchen Stories: My Kitchen Stories

Serves: 12

Ingredients

Set the oven to 180 degrees ( 350F)

150gm butter (5.3oz) room temperature
100gm caster sugar (3.6oz) -granulated sugar
275gm plain flour (9.7oz)
1 egg ( small)
¼ teaspoon salt
25 gm cocoa ( .80 oz or just a bit under an oz)
chocolate chips optional ( 2Tablespoons)

Instructions

Put the softened butter in the bowl of a mixer and cream with the sugar. I used a food processor to cream my butter and sugar.
Add the egg to the processor or mixing bowl, and mix well. Add the sifted dry ingredients and the salt and process until the mixture comes together in a ball. Do not over mix
Add the chips if using
Flatten out into a disc and refrigerate till chilled.
When ready take out of the fridge and roll to between two pieces of baking paper to a thickness of 3mm. Rolling and cutting the dough will be a little like rolling pastry. The flour you use will stay on the baked biscuits if you use a lot. Brush off excess with a pastry brush. Using baking paper will make the dough nice and smooth and you wont have to use as much flour to stop it sticking ( you can use Icing or confectioners sugar to stop the sticking too) Use your cutter to cut out shapes. Put onto a lined tray and bake for 7-10 minutes or until firm.
As they cool they will become crunchy. decorate or sandwich with nutella and eat!

WordPress Recipe Plugin by EasyRecipe

Chocolate People from Rome

Just a word

I visited le Tamerici and Eataly as part of a work trip researching products. The macadamias are for writing recipes c/o www.australian-macadamias.org and www.crossmancommunications.com.au. If you are making a trip to Mantova and would like tastings of Le Tamerici products or would like to go to cooking classes . Contact: franco@letamericisrl.com

see what others are doing in there kitchen this month by visiting Celia www.figjamandlimecordial.com