Recipes: homemade pasta

A few birthdays ago, Hubby got given a pasta machine, an Italian cookbook and an assortment of pasts trays and cutters for his birthday (combined family present). While his Mum is visiting from the Sunshine Coast, we thought we'd make them some homemade pasta to show them how much we enjoy their present. They were so pleased with the results that they've decided to invest in one themselves!

Until last night, they thought it would be too much Hard Work but we've convinced them that it's easy enough and well worth the effort of NOT buying dried pasta off the shelf.

If you're flirting with the idea, we heartily support it as a good investment for your kitchen. I know purists will pooh-pooh the idea of a pasta machine, saying that their nonna only ever needed a marble slab benchtop, the mother of all rolling pins and some really good arm muscles...and pop-kiddies with a social engagements bursting at out of their iPhone calendars will say the San Remo fresh pasta stuff will do the trick...ah well! I say, if you enjoy eating pasta, try it out, you won't be disappointed! We've even experimented making soba noodles with it. Ahem. Abit of a disaster but quite fun nevertheless.

The latest Spice magazine has a section on fresh pasta, so check it out.

Fresh Pasta

Ingredients:

(Makes 700g of pasta...last night this served four adults plus two for lunch...or maybe will serve four hungry Italians or three hungry teenagers...anyway you get the idea...)

500g 00 / Tip00 / Doppio zero flour*

4 eggs

chilled water

polenta (for dusting your sheets / shapes)

Method:**

(If you're doing the pumpkin filling, roast it while you're making the pasta)

Mound the flour on a clean work surface or in a large bowl.

Break the eggs into the well and whisk with a fork, incorporating flour as you whisk.

Sometimes you need to add a smidgen of chilled water at a time to help the dough stick.

Turn the dough onto a floured surface. If you've done it properly, it will be play-dough soft and dry to touch. Just sift / sprinkle flour onto the mix if you've put too much water in!

Knead for about 10 minutes till your dough is smooth, elastic and slightly glossy.

Cover with a damp tea towel and rest for about 30 minutes before rolling out.

(I usually make my filling or sauce then, see below for more recipes)

ROLLIN' OUT WITH A MACHINE:

Divide the dough into two to four balls.

I usually go four to five because I'm short and I run out of arm length and height, which is useful when you have really long bits of dough. You'll see when you make it...

Keep the rest covered while you work the first ball.

Put your machine to the lowest setting and feed the dough through.

Fold in half lengthwise and then repeat.

Feed the dough through this setting about six times, till the dough holds together well. If the edges tear, mend with abit of water, but usually when you fold it back in it'll fix itself.

Then, roll it through once on the next setting up, fold, turn it up a number, roll through, fold...etc***

If you're going to fill the pasta, don't let it dry out, cover immediately.

Notes:

*You can use plain all-purpose flour and I'm sure there's alot of documentation of why or why not, but personally I think you need to sift it alot to get the same result AND it's harder to knead / roll out. In WA, Anchor makes a Tip00 floor and sells it in Woolies and Coles, so it's not a drama to purchase.

**You can do this in a food processor. As much as I love my food processor, I think it takes more effort to clean the dough out afterwards than it does to knead. About as good as a few push-ups, really!

***If we're making ravioli, we only roll to about 5 or 6, but if we're making spaghetti (it's a cross between that and angel hair...) we roll out to 8. Sometimes we make lasagna sheets as thin as 8 and it's lovely, a change from thick, doughy instant pasta sheets!

If you're cutting into shapes or fettuccine-ing, let it dry out, uncovered, while you roll the rest.
Sometimes we roll spaghetti out and stick it on coat hangers to dry.
We tried hanging lasagna sheets out one night and got a rude shock when sheets cracked and shattered in the middle of the night, onto the timber floor boards. Hehe, oops!

Pumpkin ravioli filling

Ingredients:

~1.2 kg pumpkin, half kent and half butternut

2-3 stalks of spring onion or one medium onion, chopped

sprinkle of dried chilli

sprinkle of nutmeg

few sage leaves, chopped

few rosemary needles, chopped

cheese (either 1/4 cup grated Parmesan and 1/3 cup ricotta, or equal amounts of leftover bits n pieces...I used Jarlsberg, pecorino and a mild Camembert...)

1 egg yolk, beaten (backup egg only, see below)

Method:

Pre-heat oven to 200 deg C.

Cut the pumpkin up and roast for about 45 minutes (rosemary, salt and olive oil to your taste).

Meanwhile, fry up the onion till soft in butter or olive oil, add your herbs and spices.

Remove from heat and mix into a big bowl with the cheese.

When your pumpkin is cooked, cool slightly, cut the skin off and mash into the bowl.

Sometimes the pumpkin is abit watery, either drain it or mix in the egg yolk to thicken it up.

If you're using ricotta this adds liquid but if you're sticking to dry cheese you'll be fine. You want to avoid soggying up your pasta sheets, that's all!

Lightly flour or polenta your chopping board (only do this directly on your benchtop if it's 1)yours and 2) robust to withstand being used as a cutting surface, with a knife or a fluted cutter).

See photo!

Don't overdo it, fill about 1 and abit teaspoon of filling, leaving yourself enough edges to seal.

I dip my finger in the chilled water and draw around the edges I'm going to seal, before laying a second sheet of pasta over. I start pressing and sealing the first long edge, then I do the perpendicular and short edges. Then I seal the middle long bit next, careful to expel as much air as possible, and then the other outer long edge last. I then use a fluted cutter to trip the ravioli apart.

Tortellini is also easy, you make little squares, fill the middle, fold over inna triangle, and pinch the edges together over the fat side.

Lay the pasta in a baking dish dusted with polenta and cover with a tea towel.

Cook in small batches in salted, boiling water for about 3 minutes till al dente.

I warm my bowls up in the oven (still warm from the pumpkin!) and then put the tortellini straight in.

Sage Butter Sauce

Melt some butter (2 to 3 tablespoons was enough for 4 people), put a sprig of rosemary in for flavour, remove when the butter is frothing up, add a handful of sage leaves, stir for about 1-2 minutes till crispy.

Remove from heat and drizzle over your tortellini.

OK you may be tired at this point but the first mouthful will be heaven. And the next, and the next. I forgot to make salad but nobody missed it!

Ok, another one, can you tell I have ironing to do?? Again??

Prawn and crab ravioli

Ingredients:

(serves 3 to 4 adults)

1 small onion, chopped finely

3 cloves garlic, crushed with salt

butter / olive oil to fry (equal amounts works well)

1 tin crabmeat, fresh if you have the patience

12 to 15 raw prawns, cleaned and tails removed*

splash of vermouth

1/2 tub (smallest on market in Perth...sorry I forget what size...let's call it 1/2 cup??)

herbs (thyme or sage)

1 bunch asparagus, blanched

chives, chopped

Method:

Fry the onion and garlic till soft.

Add prawns till pink, then stir crabmeat through to warm / cook.

Splash vermouth or white wine in.

Cool.

Mix with ricotta and season.

I made up half a batch of pasta only and made large seafood pillows; basically 2-3 prawns per pillow, 3 pillows per person, you get the idea.

Cook gently in boiling water, they took about 8-10 minutes each (1, blame the electric burner and 2, because they're huge!)

Make a burnt butter sauce with butter, sage / sundry herbs...thyme is good friends with seafood...and another splash of vermouth / white wine.

Lay the asparagus on the shallow bowl, top with 2-3 pillows each, drizzle sauce over and sprinkle with chives.

Notes:

*You can substitute also for equal amounts of scallop and lobster tail.

Fish or mussels don't seem to work, but you let me know if you have success!

Ahahahaa. Daylight savings has finished and my computer hasn't registered, even though I've got the "adjust for daylight..." thingy ticked. On ya, Microsoft :P

So I get a bonus hour to...iron? Watch CSIs? Blog moarz?

We'll see...buon appetito!

Recipe: Summer scone cake

Recently, some friends left Perth to live in Canada for a year, so we decided to host an all-Aussie farewell dinner party.

We made a mango and avocado salsa (it was a hit, a girlfriend took the recipe plus the bonus avocado and mango home, to try out on a dinner guest the next night), but I can't remember what the main course was. We tossed up roo but right now I can't imagine roo and mango being friends. Maybe we did macademia encrusted leg of lamb? And I'm sure there was beetroot. Argh.

I still daydream about the cake, though!

Courtesy of Ross Dobson again, and slightly manipulated on the night...

Scone Cake with summer fruit

Ingredients:
375g SR Flour
500ml whipped cream
250ml lemonade
100g jam (flavor to match fruit on hand or in season)
2 peaches, stoned and sliced
1 punnet fresh raspberries or strawberries
approximately 20cm loose bottomed tart tin, lightly greased (it's hard to think of anything polite to say to a loose bottomed tart...tin...)

The recipe says "serves 8" but it disappeared between five adults before I could photograph it whole!

Method:
Preheat oven to 180C / 350F.

I sifted the flour into a large bowl, made a well in the centre. Pour half the cream and all the lemonade in, mix well.

Spoon mixture into prepared tin, gently press down, bake 30-35 minutes, remove and let cool.

Spread your jam of choice over the top.

Whip remaining cream till soft peaks form, spoon on top of the jam, arrange fruit over and serve.

Notes:
We just had a discussion about whether people really need five veg and two fruit, or whether fruit loses its nutrients while being stored, and how people used to eat things in season more often than we do now.

The success of this cake depends on the quality of your fruit. I think that having a cute French jam also helps somewhat.

Other than that, no tricky bits, it's just soooo easy! Buy Ross' recipe books, they are such a treat.

(Ginger and Pepper's Mummy, if you're reading this, you know you're very loved, it is such a lovely present!)

I thought we'd had a remarkable summer of strawberries in Perth, donchathink? I did strawberry jam and had strawberries to top the cake but ate them all, so I followed the rozzleberry+peach suggestion.

He also says go blackberry+blackberry. Can't wait!

Porky postscript

P/s I forgot the secret ingredient bit!

Towards the last two-three minutes of porkchop cooking time, toss a few sticks of apple into the pan to cook. Remove the chops to rest, and deglaze the pan for same sauce. I didn't have any stock or wine on hand so I just grabbed a bottle of Berry Farm strawberry sauce and a splash of water. Waited till hubby asked before I got him to guess.

Anyway, strawberries are good friends with pork and apples, apparently!

P/p/s Posts from the other Jameliche-ites will follow soon, lots more restaurant reviews on the way :) Sigh, I really should gimp the photo abit shouldn't I...hehe...sorry...

xx

Recipe: Friday frenzy

Well, you guessed it, I'm procrastinating...hence the multiple posts. Funny enough, this Sunday, it's not ironing, it's cleaning! Yesterday consisted of a sleep-in, a shower, a change into more pyjamas and then a trip to Beverley for a pyjama party 21st. So apart from baking some birthday cupcakes, we didn't do much cleaning up. Hubby's parental units are coming to visit us and see our new home for the first time, we are eager to impress but yes I'd rather be sitting here talking about food than dusting and vacuuming up after my kitten.

Can I digress? They're not cat people, and Mingus isn't allowed on our bed, but he IS allowed to sleep on all the guest beds. Hee hee.

"Humans on my bed? I'm coming for a cuddle, shove up, incoming purr~purr furball...!"

Ahem. The cupcakes were the Nigella Lawson recipe and I did a basic orange-flavored buttercream frosting, and then tried a chocy version as well. There are a gazillion good cupcake blogs out there (start with cupcakeblog.com and work your way out from there if you're able) and it's the first time I've tried cupcake-ing since the phenomena took the world in a storm of fondant and silver teeth-breaking baubles. Hats off to all you cupcake goddesses out there, I'll leave it to you! It was easy but intricate work; I learned valuable lessons in the two batches baked, but I now vaguely understand why people will rely on Betty Crocker instead of whipping their own icing...seven cups of icing sugar so it's stiff enough to pipe? Eeek!

Back to my original intent: Friday night's dinner! I knew it was going to be a slightly frenetic weekend, so I set out to Farmer Jack's after work for two things...cupcake basics and an easy meal. It started out as a Chinese pork stir-fry, and ended up in the veggie aisle with fennel and apples. I'm self-distracting, I know...anyway, here's the recipe, partly inspired by the winter rosti recipe from Ross Dobson's Kitchen Seasons. Another birthday present from another beloved foodie friend, everything from this book is marvellously simple and showcases each ingredient to perfection.

Paprika pork chops, potato cake and apple fennel salad

Ingredients: (serves two hungry bunnies!)

2 pork chops

4 Ruby Lou potatoes ( 3 would've sufficed)

1 small sweet potato

some sage

2 Granny Smith apples

1 fennel bulb

olive oil (I used Dash tangerine infusion Agrumento style olive oil, purchased at the Araluen Chilli Festival)

balsamic vinegar (four leaf, buy the best you can, it really makes a difference!)

more olive oil to cook, about 3T

about 3T butter

Method:

Scrub and halve the spuds, peel the sweet potato, and cover the lot in a pot with cold water. Bring to boil, take off the heat, cover with a tight-fitting lid, and rest for 10 minutes.

Don't overcook, drain promptly, otherwise the result will be soggy.

Grate everything into a bowl, season and add shreds of sage leaf. Hooray for my food processor and its grating attachment!

Heat both your frying pans.

Heat half your butter and olive oil in frying pan 1 (I won't say non-stick because I've just said butter AND oil...!), swirl the pan to coat the sides too, then insert the potato mix and press down with a spatula / fish slice / ensuing friendly argument about correct name for said utensil.

Cook for 5 minutes on high heat, add oil round the edges and turn the heat down to medium. Cook for another 10 minutes, shaking often to avoid sticking.

Carefully upend onto a plate (helps if this is a larger diameter than your pan), re-oil and butter the pan and slide the potato back on, cooked side up, for another 10 minutes.

In frying pan 2 (or griddle plate), cook the chops about 10 minutes a side, dust with paprika towards the end. Start on a high heat for a few minutes and turn it down so avoid over-cooking.

In the meantime, also thinly slice the apples and fennel, and dress with olive oil and balsamic vinegar. Citrus, fennel and apple are good friends; if you can't get your mitts on the Dash stuff, make your vinaigrette with three parts part olive oil one part orange juice and season to taste). Or better still, you already have some homemade, orange-infused olive oil handy! Go you good thing!

(We were given one of those apple twirly-ma-jigs for Christmas, it's such a treat! Stick apple in, wind it out the other end, peeled and spirally thin, with a cute lil' core for the wormy farm.)

Layer apple and fennel and drizzle, dressing on, cut wedges of rosti and present the chop on top. I dusted more paprika on, and some dried thyme, for color and fragrance.

Ta-daa! Far cry from the intended bok choy stir fry and way more fun!

Ok, booting myself off the puter, going to...bake some welcome goodies...ahaha...dusting can wait till tomorrow night...!

Friday lunching munching @ Chapter One Brasserie

Friday 20^th March 20 2009: Chapter One Brasserie, which has just reverted to serving lunch. Hooray!

Don't miss out! So what if it's not on the main Subiaco drag? Make that reservation and walk up that end of Hay Street, I promise you will be rewarded with an exceptional dining experience!

My host and dining companion both chose calamari to start but I declined, leaving more room for dessert. I have fond memories of sidling into the then-Aalto's for angel hair followed by cassata; I say sidling because, on my minuscule graduate architect's salary, it was a guilty pleasure! I didn't want anything to distract me from the anticipation of my main course.

I eagerly tucked into my blue manna crab angel hair pasta with tomato sugo while the guys had the rabbit pie and roast chicken. I was in raptures! It was perfect. I can't do Jason Walker's work justice with words, go try for yourself. I talk more than my two dining companions combined and I still finished last (and they both mumbled appreciation of the succulent chicken and tender rabbit in between mouthfuls)! I had also been tempted by the tasting plate and the petit lunch menu...over the meal, I mentally mapped out reservations for three more visits over the next month, with various social excuses!

As I finished the last few mouthfuls, we overheard the next table having a friendly tussle over dessert; two patrons had ordered affogatto, and the ice cream is served simply in martini glasses, with the shots of Frangelico and espresso on the side. One diner was being teased that he had less ice cream, and Hayley Walker good-naturedly brought him a second scoop.

When it came to our turn, I was a quivering mass of indecision. I asked, and Hayley said her favourite was the raspberry and almond tart with licorice ice cream - they make it, that sold me, I loved it! My host told me to stop playing with my food and just damned well eat it. He caught me minutely inspecting the pastry folds and raspberry placement. Both dining companions have Dutch heritage and are big fans of triple salted licorice, so automatically gave props to the flavor. I'm occasionally subjected to licorice by my Dutch Mum-in-law and will normally leave it on the shelf at the candy store; I say, leave those reservations at home and go for it. It's sweet and is delicately flavored, a slightly interesting sage green but nevertheless an intriguing complement to the perfect pastry.

When the desserts were delivered, I trailed off mid-sentence to watch the chocolate fondant (served with their own pistachio ice cream) being prodded with some hesitation. The caution was warranted, as this beautiful, quivering fondant looked like it would explode in chocolate. I asked its owner if he wouldn't mind angling the plate towards me so I could appreciate when a cross section was cut. Oh joy, if only building sections oozed chocolate in AutoCAD...

The company was good fun and lunch was the perfect treat. Each dish was carefully had carefully paired flavors and were presented simply. Hayley's service was impeccable and although it felt like such a shame that there were only two tables that day, it was lovely not having to watch enviously while many plates were marched past us to other tables. I walked back to work in the sunshine, 1) in a mild attempt to appease my conscience and 2) feeling like we three had been party to a clever little Perth secret. I vowed to hop on the Wii Fit the next day to offset the first point. FAIL.

I highly recommend it...I think I've just found my new favorite restaurant...Jameliche, dear ones? Ready when you are!

Moon moods and Ellington excellence

Thursday 19^th March 2009: how about a break from a "school night" routine, with dinner at The Moon Café in Northbridge, followed by jazz and drinks at The Ellington?

The décor: dark, moody, quirky and laid-back. Its unpretentious-ness made me feel young and 20-something again, and I wished I was sporting less Gucci and more Converse. Still, wearing alot of black helped me blend right in.

The service: prompt and cheerful. I couldn't place our waitress' accent but was reluctant to ask, it was just delightful in its mystery. A young friend wistfully accounted how only backpackers seem to score jobs there, so we've conspired that she should dye her hair darker and only speak her second language (Spanish) in an effort to get on the staff list!

The cocktails: their pina colada really hits the spot, and so does their really fun peach schnapps and gin thing. Someone please go back and tell me what it's called...

The food: the menu was somewhat predictable. Although the burger selection was interesting and reputably good, our table ended up with nachos (argh, you're out of jalapeños?), the calamari (hot lil' popcorn morsels of fun with skinny chips and a tasty aioli), and two pastas. Hubby surprised me by ordering the vegetarian option, with lovely roast veggies and olive oil; I had fettuccine with Gorgonzola, thyme and pumpkin.

Thyme is my 'herb of the month', I love pumpkin, and have I mentioned what I think of cheese? But somehow, thrown together that night, the dish was flat. I added salt, ate half and then swapped for the roast veggies. But, my cocktail and stolen mouthfuls of calamari more than made up for my disappointment.

The cocktail list menu was quite intriguing, but unfortunately we couldn't stay to sample them all or enjoy the rousing jazz band (free, yippee!) in the back room. We'll be back for the jazz and I shall ponder this sudden disinterest in cheese.

The group dragged me away from the cocktail list and we wandered over to The Ellington to see the Don Gomes Trio, which turned out to be plus one saxophonist. We missed the introductions, I think Paul Pooley and Chris Tarr played; on top of scoring low marks for musician facial recognition, my glasses are two prescriptions back (new glasses eta 10 days huzzah).

I work with the lovely and creative Mrs Gomes, so I was quite excited to finally see Don in action. The sound lobby added a sense of underground, we were duly stamped and ushered through. The cozy room was unpretentious and looked like alot of effort had gone into the acoustics. I suppose you shouldn't really be arriving halfway through a set, but if you do come early to catch the next act (on nights when multiple bands are scheduled), this means you're trying to occupy the same space as punters lining up at the bar or obscuring the views of jazz fans crowded up the back. IMHO the standing room up the back would've been served better with a single, fixed dry bar and stools. We wandered upstairs and slouched on the banquettes (next to the slot light feature beautifully aligned with the hint of timber beam above) over Mount Gay rum and dry (extra lime in mine). A few more friends joined us, one had tapas from the bar (toasted Turkish bread with rosemary oil and smoked capsicum hummus, served with prosciutto, all consumed with relish), and I really look forward to menu additions of dessert.

I miss the Side-On Cafe (Annandale, Sydney). I don't know if has reopened since we returned to live in Perth; I won't Google it, I like the idea that someone bought it after its closure as a late surprise. They had the loveliest dessert menu...sticky date pudding and chocolate cake while listening to Elana Stone? Yes please!

I digress. The back lit acoustic panels made me grumpy but the shiny copper bar tops were a good material choice. The baton lights in the girls' loos were an unpleasant shock but I have to remember I don't go out just to look at finishes! There was a good selection both bars and the prices were pleasantly fair; we liked the fireplace room and the fact that the first floor transmission of the ground floor performance is in stereo.

Sorry, I did it again. Mr Gomes and friends put on a great show. He makes jazz piano look easy and effortless! One seriously considers volunteering to garden for Mrs G if it means one can linger outside their lounge room window listening to the practice sessions at home! When first introduced, I mused to myself that Don looks like he's sharing a musical, cosmic joke with his Maker; maybe he lets the rest of us in on it every so often, for example, when he played "Just One of Those Things" that night. We really enjoy it when musicians look like they love what they do!

Overall: good night out...hooray for The Ellington, it's been a long time coming! Come on Perth, support your local Jazz musos!

Picnic Baskets!

Dance me to the end of love...one hopes there are many more nights of picnic-ing and music in between! Hubby and I are both big Leonard Cohen fans, and quickly bought tickets to Sandalford when the gig was announced.

I'm sure that Perth fans have already blogged about how wonderfully everyone played and how talented the musicians were...so I'm just going to extol the virtues of our picnic basket (7th Feb 2009)!
Yes, there was cheese!

Another night not long after, we organized a Girls' Night Out at work, and went to the Burswood Outdoor Cinema to see Slumdog Millionaire (ahahah yes cheese also made an appearance).
It was brilliant! And we're happy that we went early to picnic and weren't still eating during the "movie star autograph" scene.

A few recipes to share: quick, make 'em and 'nom nom nom' before the end of summer!


Abby’s Picnic Quiche
(Adapted from Linda McCartney's Quiche Linda from World of Vegetarian Cooking. The book was a present from Sarvelicious at least ten years ago now...it has the loveliest recipes, many of which have distracted fervent meat-eaters from noticing the lack of meat till after they'd asked for seconds and thirds! Hee hee)

Ingredients: (For a 20cm quiche tin)

1 ½ to 2 sheets pastry (I used the Pampas frozen, low fat, ready rolled variety that day)

1 1 ½ cups / 200 g smoked turkey sandwich meat*
Handful of sundried tomatoes
About 175g of grated cheese, approx 40% Tilba Gold / Applebox Smoked, 40% straight Cheddar and 10% Grana Padano / Parmesan / Pecorino **

4 eggs, whisked till super frothy
150ml milk (I used full cream, but will use 1/2 quantity of cream if it’s hanging around the fridge)

Method:
Pre-heat oven to 200°C (fan).

While your pastry is blind baking for 10 minutes, prepare your filling.

Roughly chop filling and mix in a medium bowl.

I think a quiche works best if you only mix in the eggs and add the milk just before you fill the case.

Bake for about 25 minutes till cooked. I turned the oven down to 180°C for the last 15 minutes because the browning pastry was making me nervous, but would you know it, everyone enjoyed the browned bits the best!

Notes:
*This was my ‘halal’ ingredient for a few girlfriends, in lieu of 6 rashers of bacon – if using bacon, fry up 1 small onion and diced bacon in the SDT oil, cool slightly before adding to quiche mix. Even when I was a veggie, soy bacon = eww!!

**Of course, as you can already guess, I think you can never have too much cheese in a quiche…if you pour the mix into your tin and the liquid still manages to form a little ‘moat’ around the edges, your quiche will work no matter how much cheese you use…trust me...

T = tablespoon, t = teaspoon


Bonus recipe time!

Mini eggplant and tomato boreks (What else will you do with the other sheets of pastry??)

Ingredients:
1 small onion, diced
1 medium eggplant, cut into ½ cm cubes
½ t cumin, ½ t turmeric, ½ t salt
Handful coriander leaves

2 tomatoes, diced (Cross bottoms and plunge into boiling water to remove skins)
2 T tomato paste or a big shake of sweet chilli sauce

Pastry (Again, I cheated and used frozen Pampas…)
1 small egg, beaten

Method:
Fry spices and onion till brown, add eggplant and fry for another 10 minutes till soft.
Add tomatoes and paste of choice, stir for 2 minutes and remove from heat.
Add coriander laves and allow mixture to cool.

Thaw pastry sheets, cut 11cm circles.
(If you’re using 8cm circles, pulse the filling in a food processor, otherwise the eggplant cubes won’t squish into the pastry)

Drop ~2t of mixture into the middle of each pastry, fold over in half and expel air to avoid baking explosions, crimp edges with a fork to seal, and brush with egg.

Cook in the upper part of the oven (about 180 to 200 ish) for 20 minutes or till golden.
The recipe allegedly freezes well prior to baking, but I think I've already mentioned the expressly limited contents of our freezer!
Oh alright, occasionally we allow a tin of yeast and frozen fruit in ;)

Notes:
The recipe makes 30 pastries using an 8cm cutter, but I ran out of pastry; so I warmed the rest over couscous for hubby's meal, topped with chopped tomatoes and more coriander.

Both recipes together took about 1 ½ hours prep and baking time. I think the quiche alone would’ve taken 25 minutes prep time (includes thawing time) plus 25 minutes cooking time.

The quiche went really well with a fellow Jameliche-ite's Persian watermelon and fetta salad, hommus, a King Island Roaring 40s blue, the Sandalford sparkly wine, and some Ogran crackers (gluten free and still yum).

And sometimes when the night is slow, the wretched and the meek; we gather up our hearts and go, a thousand kisses deep...

Reverse Engineering: Smoked salmon salad

I’m curious about charcuterie!

I’ve collected a few interesting recipes for curing fish with sugar or salt, but haven’t been game to sit a big fat fish at the bottom of our fridge for a few days, only to result in fishy apples, fishy milk, and a booched dinner.

A few weeks ago, we wandered into The Inglewood, and I was beside myself when I saw their FoTD: beetroot-cured salmon.

Our meal was lovely, as always. It’s nice to have a local within walking distance that plates superb meals all nights of the week. The bistro staff provide excellent service and I thoroughly enjoyed my meal. Dessert was something simple, Frangelico syrup drizzled over vanilla ice cream. Hubby had a dessert that can only be described as a whipped cloud. Bliss!

I normally don’t order anything I know I can make at home (open bottle, pour over tub, insert spoon…) but in this case I figured the chef had put so much thought and effort into such a beautifully crafted salad, that the simple dessert selection was quite complementary.

Anyway, on a whim, I decided to “reverse engineer” the salad at home two days later. I hadn’t had the time to test my curing recipes, but made do with smoked salmon instead. Here’s the result, what do you think?

Ingredients and preparation (serves 2):

Buy a small (150 to 200g) packet of smoked salmon.

Blanch strips of one large zucchini, handful of yellow squash and one or two bunches of broccolini.

Use the slicing attachment on your food processer, a mandolin or a quick peeler to get thin strips.

Use stock to blanch your veggies; mine was chicken with a thumb of ginger and cloves of garlic thrown in. Remind me to post about poaching whole chickens. Being an ex-vegetarian, I’ve always been abit squeamish about carcasses, but it was just so easy!

Wash and halve your cherry / grape tomatoes. Use only half the punnet if your dining companion isn’t that fond of tomatoes.

Add thin slices of ‘fridge pack’ or tinned beetroot if using smoked salmon. Again, quick ‘n easy, nobody said they had to be fresh! If you have the time though, boil the fresh beetroot and then just steam your veggies over the top in the last five minutes. The beets will happily cook through 1.5 sitcoms. Peel it (ow ow hot hot), grate it, drain off excess water, squeeze in some lemon or lime, and finish off with a course grind of salt.

Croutons – thinly slice a French stick on an angle, sprinkle on some course sea salt and toast lightly under the grill.

Decide on the fat content by spreading on some butter, brushing on olive oil or using a low-fat spray; to me it’s about adding texture rather than flavor so I just did a mini spritz.

Make dressing by whipping mayonnaise with horseradish and/or whole grain mustard to taste.

(I think crème fraiche and herbs would work as well, or a really mild whipped feta dressing…)

Construction:

Layer the beetroot, smoked salmon, zucchini and squash. Scatter tomato halves, broccolini and croutons on top, drizzle dressing over and dust lightly with smoked paprika and cracked pepper.

Ta daa! Not bad for a laid-back Tuesday night dinner at home, eh? ;)

Wine & Cheese Nights: A History

I can't sleep! After thinking about all that fetta from my previous post, I've started thinking about a W&C Night for 2009. Jameliche, anyone? We can walk around the block and come back to my place in between courses so that we feel properly camel~like...

The very first Cheese Night was in 2007, inspired, strangely enough, by A Grand Day Out:
"Gromit, that's it! Cheese! We'll go somewhere where there's cheese!"
OK, Aardman provided a little push, we already liked cheese. Alot! And we wanted to find out abit more about matching wines to courses. How much cheese must you consume before it starts to make a difference? So, we found four cheese-minded friends and set to work. We pick the cheese, you bring the match, and let's see what happens!

The 2007 inaugural menu looked like this:
Entree - goats cheese souffle with baby leaf salad and fennel vinaigrette
Wine suggestions - champagne, grenache

Main Course - Seared kangaroo fillet on a roast vegetable stack with onion jam and haloumi
Wine suggestions - bordeaux, rioja, pinot noir, shiraz. I think we ended up with four bottles of various reds.

Dessert - "Chocolate Something". We ended up having a chocolate terrine with poached cherries. I forget if there was cheese...there was a heavenly botrytised semillon too...

And then some - soft white cheese with quince paste. From memory it was a lovely King Island scrubbed variety that had been sitting on the bench from about the main course...we had it with quince paste and Swan Valley Winery Tawny Port...just divine.

Dinner was fantastic, our friends brought us a cheesy Mixed Tape, which we played all afternoon the next day over the mountain of dishes. I didn't even know we owned that much stemware!! The only regret was that we hadn't recorded our wine matches and couldn't measure our successes and failures against the next meal!

So we thought we'd try again! The March 2008 menu looked something like:
Tapas - olives, almonds and goat's cheese
Wine match - Capel Vale Geographe Viognier '07

Entree - Gruyere souffles with spinach salad and shaved parmesan
Wine match - Jacob's Creek Brut Cuvee

Main Course - porterhouse steaks (we love Ralph's Meat at The Mezz, Mt Hawthorn) with basil butter and insalata caprese
Wine matches - Lenton Brae SSB '07, West Cape Howe SSB '07, De Bertoli 'Heathcote' Shiraz '04

Dessert - dark organic chocolate ganache & pistachio praline slice with Cointreau cream and fresh figs
Wine match - Lamonts '06 Methode Champenoise

And more cheese - fruit cheese with tea and coffee
Wine match - Haan Barossa Valley Viogner Ratafia with '01 and '02 grapes)

We enjoyed ourselves thoroughly, and repeated the occasion with the same table of friends in October 2008, to christen our new (and finally, our very own!) home:
This time, we introduced a wine and beer match.

To nibble - eggplant and chermoula spoons, drizzled with pomegranate molasses, served with a side of olives and sheep's milk fetta
Matches - Coopers Brewery Sparkling Ale, Cattier Chigny-les-roses Premier Cru Brut (NV)

Entree - "bacon and egg" souffle with an apple and celeriac salad (cheese: applebox smoked)
Matches - James Squire Original Amber Ale, Ashbrook SB '08

Main course - kangaroo fillets seared with baharat, on a polenta cake and roast veggies, with a dollop of chilli jam and pan-fried haloumi
Matches - Matilda Bay Brewing Co Redback Wheat Beer, Corte Ciara Pinot Grigio Della Venezie

Dessert - Belgian chocolate tart with vanilla bean mascarpone
Matches - Young's Luxury Double Chocolate Stout, Swan Valley Winery Chocolate Port

Cheeseboard - Bass Strait Blue Cheese (Danish style subtle blue with a creamy aftertaste) with a fig, chardonnay and apple chutney, Seal Bay Triple Cream Brie (French style rich and buttery triple cream cheese made from King Island milk and pure cream) with kiwi fruit, served with blue poppy and rye crispbread and Dutch pumpernickel bread
Matches - Talijancich Peters Old Port (Four Years, Swan Valley)

Ah. The dessert was a winner. Our non-beer-drinkers quaffed happily away at the chocolate stout in between nibbles of tart; our non-dessert-eating-friend finished his tart, asked for seconds, AND took a copy of the recipe home. Success!

Well, that's all the retro~posting I'll do tonight, I'm off to bed to dream up a new menu...

Surprise Chef: Cheekily Unseasonal Tagine

Aristos Papandroulakis certainly never jumped out at me in the veggie aisle at Coles or inspected the contents of my freezer (the poor man would be sorely tried, I keep nothing more than ice, ice cream and gin in it), but we've had many a night of fun and intrigue in the kitchen with our very own Surprise Chef meals.

You guessed it, Sarvelicious simply arrives on our doorstep with a bag of Mystery Veggies, which we upend on the counter amongst my purchases, and we decide "who's friends with what" over a cuppa.

After a series of Mystery Chef nights, we've arrived at a not-very-mysterious conclusion...our initial goal was to try new things, but our meals tend to end always take us out to Persia, Lebanon, Greece and Egypt!

The contents of our grocery expeditions are quite often: figs, dates, pistachios, shredded coconut, three types of cheese (usually at least one haloumi and one fetta), Greek yoghurt, cucumbers, eggplant, a leg of lamb, mograbieh, Persian candy floss and red capsicum.

Rummaging in our pantry often produces: pomegranate molasses, orange blossom water, couscous, more fetta, tinned tomatoes, chickpeas, preserved lemon and beetroot.

We were given a beautiful tagine with a stainless steel base for Christmas and decided it was quite appropriate to christen it over a Surprise Chef meal. The following recipe is our own, much inspired by the generations of good cooking handed down through the women in Sarvelicious' life, and the many Saturday mornings I've spent reading Saha by Greg and Lucy Malouf.

Cheekily Unseasonal Tagine
(December 30th in the southern hemisphere doesn't naturally feel like tagine weather!)

Ingredients:
1 onion, diced
1 bulb of garlic, sliced in half horizontally
750g leg of lamb, trimmed and diced to 1cm cubes
Pinch each of sumac, turmeric and cumin
1 to 2 Tbsp pomegranate molasses
1 tin tomatoes (or 4-6 fresh tomatoes, skinning is optional)
2 tins organic chickpeas (There really seems to be a difference! Rinse four times to remove tinny taste, or prepare dried chickpeas if you're planning ahead)
1 cup whole walnuts
1 cup stock (I can't extol the virtues of homemade enough, if you have the time)
1 cup gutsy red wine (or whatever you feel like drinking after)
1 cup couscous

Method:
Brown onion, garlic and lamb.
Throw in pinches of sumac, turmeric and cumin and drizzle molasses over.
Add tomatoes, chickpeas and walnuts.
Season, add the stock and wine, bring to boil.
Cover tagine, lower the heat and let it simmer for an hour while you enjoy the rest of the wine.
Stir couscous through and recover, allowing the grains to absorb moisture for about 10 minutes.
Remove from heat, leave to rest 10-15 minutes.

Serve with:
Salad - sliced raw snow peas, cherry tomatoes, parsley and pistachios, dressed with juice of preserved lemon, olive oil and hazelnut dukkah.
Raita - grate a cucumber into Greek yoghurt (optional: sprinkle with cumin)
Drizzles - tahini mixed with truffle honey (hooray for the Mundaring Truffle Festival!)
Dustings - chaat masala spice mix

The tagine produces lamb that pokes apart with a spoon, something we've only previously achieved after three hours of oven time. The chickpeas and walnuts are earthy, and the garlic presents beautifully as a perfect half, soft and sweetly complementary to the lamb. The molasses leave a delicious tang, fabulous friends with the crunchy salad and lush little sides.

I don't remember having space for dessert...and I know there was fetta, but I can't remember where it fit in...if you happen to have some on hand, just poke cubes into the couscous before you let the tagine sit for 10 minutes while you throw your salad together and whisk some honey into the tahini.

Next time: Leonard Cohen picnic hampers. Was there fetta? Indeed...

A tale of 3 cafes

The west end of the Perth CBD saw the opening of 3 very unusual cafes over the last couple of years. Alda's cafe, in wolf lane, Tiger Tiger in Murray Mews and Zekka in the plush quiet gold rush end of King Street near the corner of Wellington Street.

Alda's Panini Bar and Cafe - Wolf Lane, Perth
Coffee: TBA
Don't Miss: The Meat Ravioli, with a scoop of yoghurt
Alda's was the first and most vibrant of the three cafes. It was fun and exciting to enter the dark wood floored glass walled interior, not knowing if you'd be greeted by a hyper mischievous or gloomy Tim the ever present barista. Over his two years at the helm the cafe became a much loved haven for the early breakfasters, the lunch meeterers, after work drinkers, black clad architects, pin striped bankers and city peeps of all sorts congregating for a drink after work. It has since been sold and is a sorry and sadly quieted version of the once vibrant cafe that is open for business during a limited range of opening hours.

Early morning breakfast is a most especially saddening experience as the funflilled quietly chaotic early morning chatter of Tim and the banter of his cheers-like regulars has been replaced by highly irritating music (I'm a David Byrne fan but even I can't handle psycho killer at 7.30 in the morning!) and tiny breakfast rations at higher prices. The unexpectedly shambolic opening hours, which meant you could get a drink till 10pm on some Tuesdays if you were lucky, has been replaced by a no-nonsense list of opening hours. Closed Saturdays. The fun is gone kids, move elsewhere.
Bruncheroo Rating: 5/10

Tiger Tiger - burning semi-bright in the forests of Murray Mews, Perth
Coffee: TBA
Don't Miss: The gluten free slice
The best thing about Tiger Tiger is its location, in the old carriage house of Murray Mews. This eclectic little cafe serves dishes from a strict menu (don't try to mess around you get what you get!) in the old carriage right of way leading to Wolf Lane.

Free from the old rivalry with the dynamic duo formerly running Alda's, the doyenne of Tiger Tiger has inherited Alda's title of best after work drinking spot in the CBD.

The thing about Tiger Tiger is that you never know what you'll get. The moody manager is sometimes absent and in her absence the cafe runs beautifully. The food can be great, fresh and bursting with flavor. On an off day you might be served with undercooked legumes which will break your teeth if you're not careful.

But still, it is good to have Tiger Tiger around. Just make sure to chew slowly and be nice to the grumpy lady with curly hair!
Bruncheroo Rating: 6.5/10

Zekka - 74 King Street Perth
Coffee: Campos
Don't Miss: Mate tea
Zekka is a little cafe with a horde of fascinating magazines and little postcard courtyard open to the sun. I'm half convinced that Zekka was designed for Derek Zoolander. And it is definitely not for ants! A playfully elegant interior of concrete timber and glass greets you with a beautiful mural at the ramped entry into the cafe/men's fashion boutique. This cafe felt like the best little secret in town when it first opened up early last year.

The secret is out. The coffee here is absolutely lovely. As is the surprisingly delicate and aromatic Mate Tea. Breakfast is served all day and is slightly overpriced but fresh and tasty. Lunch is a limited range of salads, sandwiches, rolls and tarts but all are so well made with funny little gourmet touches that you don't notice the limited range.

The absolute best thing about Zekka, however, is that it is the best hiding spot in the city! You can lose yourself for hours in the corner of the courtyard with a pot of tea and one of their amazingly eclectic magazines to keep you company. A worthy successor to the sadly missed Alda's.
Bruncheroo Rating: 8/10