Posted in Recipes

I finally got around to baking my Christmas Cake today.

It actually doesn't take long to put together, although it takes 3 hours to bake in the oven. The house smells of a delicious mix of fruit and spice right now as it cooks.

I think I am yet to meet an American who likes fruit cake, but it is very traditional here in New Zealand. We use it for wedding cakes, special anniversary cakes and the good old Christmas cake. It gets iced with Royal Icing, and in my family we like to top the royal icing with butter icing. I believe Christmas Cake can be made months ahead of Christmas and the longer it has to age, the better, but so far I have never been organized enough to do it well in advance.

This particular cake is the non-alcoholic version. Some recipes call for brandy in the cake, but this one doesn't. The recipe comes from Alison Holst - a famous-in-New-Zealand chef who is known for her good, practical, yummy and never fail recipes.  We housewives love her!

This photo shows the fruit ingredients before the flour and egg and spice mixture is added.

And here is the cake fresh out of the oven.

And this is a picture of a Christmas Cake all decked out in its finery.

Some people prefer Christmas Cake uniced with a fruit and nut glaze. They are just as yummy too, and look just as beautiful. This picture is from the BBC Good Food website.

If anyone wants the recipe, just leave me a message and I'll send it to you.

Posted in Recipes

Our own strawberries are not ready yet (though flowering well), so I was thrilled to find at the grocery store yesterday some of the first strawberries of the season for only .99c. I don't know why they were marked down as there was nothing wrong with them, and they smelled divine and tasted good too.

 I cut some up to put in our lettuce salad last night, and today I searched for a recipe online for a Strawberry Pie.

I found one at www.allrecipes.com and it turned out fantastic, so I thought I'd post it here. This one is a keeper!

1 (9 inch) pie crust, baked                               3 Tbsp cornstarch

1 quart fresh strawberries                               3/4 cup water

1 cup white sugar                                              1/2 cup whipped cream

Arrange half of the strawberries in baked pastry shell. Mash the remaining berries and combine with the sugar in a medium saucepan. Place saucepan over medium heat and bring to a boil, stirring frequently.

In a small bowl, whisk together cornstarch and water. Gradually stir cornstarch mixture into boiling strawberry mixture. Reduce heat and simmer mixture until thickened, about 10 minutes, stirring constantly. Pour mixture over berries in pastry shell. Chill for several hours before serving with a generous dollop of whipped cream.

We actually ate all of this pie in one sitting!

Posted in Recipes

As I write this, it is snowing outside. Definitely not summer here. And yet again, our neighbourhood bonfire had to be postponed - not due to flooding this week, but due to snow. I wonder what we'll get next Friday.

But I had a taste of summer in the kitchen yesterday when I realized that we had run out of jam. I pulled out the 1kg of raspberries I had stored in the freezer and made a batch of jam for the family. The fact that I can do anything at all in the kitchen is a miracle - and it means that the morning sickness is waning. It's still there, but it's not as intense. I started with 1 kg of raspberries - picked locally last summer.

I love the way that 'steam' comes off the fruit as it heats up underneath.

When the raspberries had lost their frosted look, I added 1 kg of sugar. It actually seems really wrong to add all this sugar to the fruit - but I don't know any other way of making raspberry jam.

Look at that rich, beautiful colour. Red is my favourite colour. I can't live without it.

I let it boil rapidly for 5 minutes exactly, then I turned off the heat and let it sit for 10 minutes, adding a knob of butter into the jam. Apparently, this allows the 'scum' from the fruit to come to the surface so you can scoop it out. My 3 year old woke from his afternoon nap while the jam was boiling and he came out saying, "mmmm what's that yummy smell?" There's something heavenly about the smell of raspberry jam cooking. It's a middle-of-summer, hot-day-outside smell - lovely. And I am so ready for summer to get here.

And then I poured the jam into the jars. I don't actually get too many jars of jam from 1 kg, but this should last us awhile as we usually alternate breakfasts with toast and weetbix. I love making raspberry jam because it's so quick, easy and foolproof. It never fails.

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Brownies are not the 'tradition' to New Zealanders that they are to Americans. We have ANZAC biscuits or Hokey Pokey biscuits (cookies) for that. But when I lived in America I fell in love with Brownies.

For this month I have taken on the responsibility of morning tea at church. The family who usually arrange this are busy taking care of their son who is still in hospital in critical care after his cycling accident (see my earlier posts), so I have told them I will take care of it until the crisis is over.

I've been trying to think of new things I can bake for our morning tea, which is a lovely time after the service to fellowship with the other people who come along (it's only a small, new church at the moment), and I was going through my recipe box this morning and re-discovered this old recipe that I was given when I was in America way back in 1991. It was quite a shock to see that it actually looks quite old - like an antique! The memory of it is so fresh in my mind. I can picture the kitchen, and the lady who gave it to me. At the time I was staying with a dear friend from YWAM days who lived in California. (Hi Danielle if you're reading this)! We were both young and single and pretty then. My beautiful friend used to have these two nice boys who were perpetual satelites around her. One of them took us home to his place one day and I got to meet his lovely mother who was such a warm, friendly person who welcomed me to her home like an old friend. She must have made these brownies for us and I loved them so much I asked for the recipe. It's amazing to think it was 17 years ago. That sounds so old!

I haven't made them in so long, so I decided to whip up a batch today for church tomorrow. They've turned out soooo good. I can't wait to try them, and they were so quick to make as well. I'll definitely be having these more often now I've found the recipe again.

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This first recipe is an old family favourite. My mother used to make them when we were kids and if you are careful it can do for 4 meals out of 1 kg mince which here in NZ is around $6 if on special.

MINCE BURGERS

CHEESE PASTRY

2 cups flour  

4 ounces butter

1 tsp salt

Grated cheese

Cut in butter and cheese. Dampen with about 1/2 cups milk and 1 tsp vinegar. Put in fridge for about 5 minutes to make rolling out easier.

MINCE MIXTURE:

1 pound mince (or 500 grams)

1/2 tsp salt

1 packet Brown Onion Gravy or Sauce (I use Maggi)

1/4 cup tomato sauce

2 Tablespoons flour

Roll pastry into 2 thin pieces. Dampen between each one. Take small spoonfuls of the mince mixture and dot all over the pastry leaving about 1 inch between each one. Place second pastry over the top and press down between mince. Prick with a fork and cut each one out individually and place on a baking sheet. Bake at 180 degC (400degF) for 25-30 minutes.

CHICKEN CASSEROLE

Boil 1 chicken, break in pieces and place in a casserole dish (I spread it between two dishes)

SAUCE:

Melt 2 TBSP butter. Stir in 2 TBSP flour. Gradually add 1 cup milk and 1 cup chicken stock. Add salt and pepper to taste. Cook until thick and pour over chicken.

TOPPING

Melt 2 TBSP butter. Add 1 small onion (finely chopped) and 3 rashers bacon* (chopped finely). Cook gently. Remove from heat. Add 1 cup breadcrumbs and a pinch mixed herbs. Sprinkle over chicken mixture. Bake 1 hour at 150 deg C (350degF)

*Can omit bacon

MUM'S LASAGNE SUPREME

300 gms lasagne

MEAT SAUCE:

2 TBSP butter

 1 clove garlic

1 medium onion, chopped

500gm mince (1 pound)

310 gram tin tomatoes

3 TBSP tomato concentrate

1/2 cup beef stock

1/2 tsp sugar

1/4 tsp oregano

Salt and Pepper

CHEESE SAUCE:

3 TBSP butter

3 1/4 TBSP flour

2 cups hot milk

1 1/2 cups grated cheese

Melt butter in saucepan, lightly cook garlic and onion for 4 minutes. Add beef, stirring, cook for 10 minutes. Add remainder of meat sauce ingredients. Cover and simmer on low for 1 hour or until all the liquid has evaporated. (I like to leave a little liquid, so it doesn't dry out too much). Cook lasagne in a saucepan with water.

SAUCE: Melt butter in saucepan, add flour, mix well. Gradually pour in hot milk, stirring well. Simmer 3 minutes. Stir in cheese. Season to taste.

Spread 1/3 meat sauce in ovenware dish, cover evenly with half of the lasagne. Cover with half of the cheese sauce. Repeat, finishing with a layer of meat sauce. Sprinkle with halt cup grated cheese. Bake in a preheated oven at 180 degC for 30 minutes.

* I have tried all sorts of lasagne recipes, but this is the yummiest!

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My five year old made this desert for us last night (under my supervision), and it is soooo yummy.

The recipe comes from a well-known NZ cook, Annabel Langbein, and was in a recent edition of a magazine, Growing Today. My children love looking through these magazines as they have lots of photos of animals and children and farms, and Meredith (5) found this recipe and asked if we could make it. It's a simplified version of a traditional souffle. I told her that a souffle is the hardest thing to make in the kitchen, so she felt very proud of herself.

Here it is:

Annabel Langbein's make-ahead souffle

3 cups fresh or frozen raspberries or blackberries

1/2 cup sugar

1/4 cup water

1 tsp vanilla essence

1 tsp lemon jice

1 Tablespoon cornflour mixed with 1 Tablespoon water

3 large egg whites at room temperature

1/2 cup caster sugar

Optional: 1/4 cup chopped pistachios

Combine berries, sugar, water, vanilla and lemon juice in a saucepan and bring ot a simmer over medium heat. Add cornflour paste and stir until lightly thickened. Simmer for 2-3 minutes. In a large, very clean mixing bowl beat egg whites and caster sugar until thick and glossy and the sugar has fully dissolved. Bring berry mixture back to the boil. Gently fold 3/4 cup of the boiling berry mixture into the meringue, swirling it into a marbled pattern. Divide remaining berry sauce between six 1/2 cup ramekins and top with meringue mixture. Sprinkle with nuts if using. In not cooking straight away, place souffles in the fridge for up to 4 hours. Preheat the oven to 190deg.C. Bake souffles until they are just beginninbg to brown, about 5-6 minutes. Do not overcook or they will shrink. Remove from oven andserve.

Posted in Recipes

We are moving into our house next week, but that is not stopping us from getting into the Christmas spirit. It is traditional here to have a Christmas cake which is a fruit cake. I think we must get it from our English ancestors. Alot of the cakes have alcohol in the recipe, but coming from a strict tee-totaller home, we'd rather not have it. My mother found this recipe years and years ago from a famous New Zealand cook, Alison Holst, and we've had it every year since I was a child. One year I tried to make a different type of cake, but it wasn't as good, so I always come back to the this one. I saw that Leanne over at TheGoodLife blogged the making of her Christmas cake, and I thought it would be fun to do that here too. Meredith (my 5 year old), and my son Hugh (7) had fun making it. I love the smell that fills the house while it's cooking.

So, if anyone wants to try a real traditional English Christmas cake, here is the best recipe I know - and with pictures too!

Pineapple Christmas Cake

8 ounces butter              6 eggs

1 cup white sugar           1 pound, 8 ounces sulatanas (725 gms)

1/2 tsp. vanilla essence    1 pound raisins (500 grams)

1/2 tsp. Almond essence   8 ounces currants (225 grams)

1/2 tsp. Lemon essence    2 ounces each of preserved ginger,

                              maraschino cherries (red or green),

                              and citrus peel (orange/lemon rind) (60 gms)

1 tsp. Cinnamon            2 ounces slivered Almonds

1 tsp. ground ginger       1 tsp. mixed spice

1/4 tsp nutmeg             1 cup drained crushed pineapple

3 cups plain flour

Method:

Line a 9 inch cake tin with 3 layers of newspaper on bottom and sides, and then baking paper on the top. Have sides higher than tin to prevent burning. (It can be a round or square tin - it doesn't matter so long as the sides are straight, so that the cake cooks evenly. Don't use an angel food cake tin)!

I cut the baking paper down to the same size as the newspaper.

Cream butter and sugar, add essences and spices. Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each one.

(You will need a large bowl for this part). In a large bowl mix chopped cherries, peel, chopped ginger, slivered almonds and well drained pineapple to cleaned fruit. (I drain pineapple through a sieve and squish juice through with a spoon).

To clean fruit, I do it the old fashioned way my Nana taught me and that is to lay each measurement of each individual fruit into a sieve and wash under the cold running tap, then place onto a clean teatowel and pat dry. After each 'drying' add fruit to the bowl.

Mix creamed mixture into fruit, and add 3 cups of flour and stir well, until everything looks all mixed in.

Then spoon into prepared cake tin, patting down firmly as you do it. There will be more mixture than you need, but I usually go a little bit over the edge of the cake tin. The newspaper will hold it in. Make it nice and smooth on top and press a little hollow in the middle as the cake tends to rise in the middle while baking.

Put in oven at 300°F for 2 hours, then 250°F for 1 1/2 hours. Leave in tin for about 10 minutes before removing papers and laying on a coolling rack.

Finished Result:

This is a long blog - I hope it's useful to someone.It's fun to make anyway. We ice it with a delicious icing. I'll post that recipe tomorrow.