Enjoying ... a quick to bake bicki, a nice cup of tea and a good book.

  

Oat Cookies

1  1/2 cup plain flour

1/2 teasp bicarb soda

1  1/2 cup rolled oats

1/2 cup sultanas

1/4 cup chopped dried apricots
a handful of chopped almonds 

1/2 cup sugar

125gm melted butter

2 tabs golden syrup

1 egg

Sift flour and bi carb soda together.

Stir in oats, sultanas, apricots, almonds and sugar

than add combined melted butter, golden syrup and egg

Mix well

Drop teaspoonfuls onto a greased baking tray

Bake in moderate oven for approx 10 mins or until golden brown

Cool and serve with a nice cup of tea . . . and a good book.

I had the pleasure of meeting with Rhonda last week and finally got  my hands on her Down to Earth book. I've just managed to make myself some time to sit and have a flick through it...It's interesting, it's pretty, and it's full of the most useful information, it's a real Homemakers Bible. 

Good Old Fashion Jam Drops

with home made Plum Jam . . .

and a sneaky peak at my New Kitchen 

Plum Jam

2 kg Plums

250 ml water

1 tab lemon juice

1 1/2   kg sugar

Wash the plums then quarter and stone them.  Place plums, water and lemon juice in a large heavy based saucepan.  Bring it to the boil on a medium heat and cook until the fruit is soft, approximately 15 minutes.

Add the sugar and stir until dissolved. Continue boiling for approx 15 - 20 minute or until a little will set on a chilled saucer.

Remove from heat, allow to settle then bottle and seal.

Jam Drops 

½ cup Sugar

125 gm Butter

2  eggs

2 cups SR Flour

1 teasp Vanilla

pinch of salt

Jam (Plum, Apricot, Raspberry, Strawberry, Gooseberry etc…)

 Cream butter and sugar, add egg and vanilla.

Gradually add sifted flour and salt to make a stiff dough.

Roll into balls, place on greased oven tray.

Push thumb into center to make a small indent and fill with your chosen variety of Jam

Bake in moderate, quick oven until just brown.

If your too cool for Jam (like a certain teenage son of mine) this mixture is a good basic biscuit mixture. Just add a handful of choc chips, walnuts, peanuts or dried fruit, roll out, flatten and bake as above. 

 Quick and Easy to make, and great to freeze for Lunchboxes.

As for 'The Kitchen' well after a 4 month extension/renovation it is finally finished... (breathing a huge sigh of relief), before and after shots will be released soon,  just awaiting a few finishing touches and a dabble of clutter. 
It's so good to be back in the Kitchen baking again! 

Winter Wednesday - BAKING to Keep Warm

Oh the joys of a cold, rainy, miserable Winters day. . .

When your stuck inside . . . Crank up the Oven & BAKE

 

A rare treat for us here, a cold rainy day on the weekend meant a very productive day in the kitchen. Baking most of the day means the house is as warm as toast.

 

Most of our baking get sliced and packaged up into freezer bags and containers. I simply take a slice or two out of the freezer and pop them straight into lunchboxes for the children and Hubby everyday. When they stop for a lunch break they have home baked goodies as fresh as if it they were just baked that morning. 

Hope your keeping warm, and dry!

Pop on over to Hazel's Place to see what else you can enjoy about Winter.

Lemon Butter

Also known as Lemon Cheese or Lemon Curd or perhaps you know it as something else...   I call it Lemon butter because we like to spread it nice and thick on our bread.

Throw away the double boiler, here is a foolproof Quick and Easy method to make fresh Lemon Butter

Lemon Butter

4 large eggs (at room temperature)

1 egg yolk extra

3/4 cup caster sugar

3 large lemons, (approx 3/4 cup of juice)

125gm butter chopped into cubes

Whisk the eggs, extra yolk and sugar together in an 8 cup capacity microwave bowl until well combined.

Whisk in the lemon juice

Add the chopped butter 

Microwave on high for 3 - 5 minutes whisking every minute.  

It is ready when the curd comes to the boil.

Spoon into sterilised jars, seal and store in the fridge.

It will keep for about 2 weeks but it never usually lasts that long in our house!

and if you get sick of sandwiches then there is always

Lemon Tartlets!

This Lemon Butter also freezes well with no noticeable change to the consistency once thawed.

Whilst on the topic of Freezing, I froze my excess boiled peanuts before we went away on holidays and I am happy to report that they too will freeze very well. 

And for those of you wondering about the Oranges 

(from my last post). 

More than half of them have already been eaten. Taken straight from the fruit bowl, peeled and gobbled up.  Just as they should be!

Plain Cake

I had planned on naming a few more of my chooks today but it was way too cold to venture outside this morning taking photos. 

So, I decide to BAKE instead.

This recipe is anything other than plain (as the title suggests).  It is my base recipe for many a delight I have whipped up in the kitchen.

 

Cake

125gm butter

2/3 cup sugar

2 large eggs

1 teasp vanilla

1/2 cup milk

2  cups sr flour

Beat butter and Sugar until light and fluffy

Add eggs, one at a time, beating well in between

Add vanilla

Add flour and milk alternately and mix lightly 

Pour mixture into a greased cake tin

Bake in a moderate oven for approx 35 minutes

Spread with Icing - 

Today - Passionfruit Icing (because I have 2 ripe passionfruits,Yeh!)

Two passionfruits, approx 1 cup of icing sugar and a dash of water, mix to make a nice smooth icing.

Variations:  This is the exciting part!

Orange Cake (Hubby's favourite) 

Reduce milk to 1/4 cup and add 1/4 cup of orange juice and add grated rind from one orange

Ice with orange butter icing - 2 cups icing sugar, 2 tab butter, 1 - 2 tab orange juice, grated orange rind.  Beat Well

 Coffee Cake
Add 1 tab instant coffee dissolved in small amount of water
Ice with coffee butter icing - 2 cups icing sugar, 2 tab butter and small amount of dissolved instant coffee, depending on taste approx 1 - 2 teaspoons.  Sprinkle with chopped Walnuts.

Other Variations I have made:
Sultana Cake - Add 3/4 cup sultanas to cake mix. 
No need to ice.
Great easy recipe for Patty Cakes, just pour mixture into patty pan cases instead of a cake tin, you may have to reduce cooking time slightly though. I think it makes about 1 doz.
It can also be used to make a nice warm Pudding, just pour mixture on top of Stewed fruit (Apples, Apricots, Peaches, Rhubarb & Apple, Mulberries etc...) and bake.
Serve warm with cream or ice-cream
Icing Variations 

Chocolate icing sprinkled with coconut

Pink or plain icing sprinkled with sprinkles, 100's & 1000's

Topped with cherries, grated chocolate, the sky is the limit!

So you see, this Plain Cake is not really that Plain at all!

What would you do with this Cake? 

Choko - Is it a Fruit or a Vegetable?

Funny little thing this Choko, I remember my mum always feeding us Choko with dinner, sliced up, boiled and smothered in butter with a sprinkle of salt and pepper, sometimes she outdid herself and served it with white sauce, a bit like you would with cauliflower.  I LOVE IT, and I also serve it to my family regularly.

 The choko, technically speaking is actually a fruit as it has a seed, and it belongs to the  Gourd Family. However I believe it fits into the culinary term as a vegetable that can be cooked 
either savoury or sweet.....

I picked up a couple of green chokos from a stall on the side of the road last week and then I found a white variety at my local market on the weekend. I have never seen the white ones before, apparently they are exactly the same in taste
just a different colour... 

   A choko has quite a bland flavour and when cooked with sugar or syrup it can be disguised as apple or pear, quite popular in the old days when everyone had a choko vine in their backyards and fresh apples and pears were hard to get their hands on.  It is also commonly used in pickles and chutneys and can also substitute fruit to add extra pulp to Jam.  It is also rich in Pectin.
I decided I would try a sweet recipe with a couple of them, just to see what it was really like.  I've stewed up a couple of chokos with about 1/2 doz granny smith apples, a good handful of sugar and some cinnamon...

   APPLE & CHOKO PIE  MMmm smells delicious. . .

I have some special visitors coming over for dinner tonight, I wont tell them its a mix and we'll see if they'll be asking for seconds....

A couple of the leftover choko's have started shooting so I'm popping them straight into pots, Imagine how much fun I will have when I get my own loaded vine full of Chokos...There will be a bit of  Frugal cooking going on here,  thats for sure.

Lets hope these little babies grow for me now!  I'll leave them to shoot in the pots for a while and get their roots established then get them planted and see what happens....

Whose got a Sweet Tooth?

My dear dad popped in for a visit Yesterday and

 he left this for me at my front door. 

6250 teaspoonfuls !!!

Making IT - Not Faking IT

OLD FASHIONED SWEETS

No Artificial Flavours, Colours or Preservatives in this Lot, just good old SUGAR and WATER

 It was Big kids only in the kitchen this time:

Toffee

3 cups sugar

1 cup water

1/4 cup vinegar

Boil all ingredients for approx 10 - 12 minutes, or until a little hard ball can be formed when a little of the mixture is placed in cold water. At this time the mixture will starts to turn a light caramel colour. Take off the heat immediately and allow bubbles to settle (which I did not do) and pour into Patty Pans. Allow to harden.  If you like you may sprinkle them with hundreds and thousands or maybe try some crushed nuts before they set.

One taste of these toffees and I was taken straight back to the confectionery stall that stood outside the tuck shop at my old primary school fete.  I remember making these with Mum when I was younger and through my high school years I experimented with other sweets like, chocolate fudge, coconut ice, sugar coated peanuts, peanut brittle, caramel popcorn balls, homemade honeycomb and marshmallows...

It's been on my list to do for a while now, to make the kids some real homemade treats, my eldest two can't believe that these sweets  taste so good, I caught them sneaking some into their lunchboxes this morning to share with their friends.  It has been so much fun to get the old  recipe books out and make these once again

I know I sound like an old granny, but you just don't see them around anymore, recipes and trends have changed so much.

 I'm actually off to a local Country fete this weekend and I shall be keeping an eye out for any of these goodies on sale.

Marshmallows

1 1/2 tabs gelatine

100ml cold water

pinch salt

1 1/4  cups sugar

140ml hot water

Toasted coconut

Place gelatine, cold water and salt in a mixing bowl

Place sugar and hot water in a saucepan and bring to boiling point

Pour over gelatine mixture and stir until dissolved

Beat until thick and white (holds it's form when lifted) 

Add colouring and flavouring (if desired)

Pour into a greased tray

Cut into squares when set

Toss in toasted coconut

* To toast coconut, spread approx 1 cup of coconut on a large plate and place under the grill, keep tossing coconut until golden all over.

(alternatively you can cook in microwave, just tossing every 20 sec or so for approx 2 - 3 minutes) 



Chocolate Fudge

2 cups sugar

3/4 cup milk

1 1/2 tabs butter

2 tabs cocoa

1/8 teasp cream of tartar

Vanilla

Place sugar, milk, butter, cocoa and cream of tartar in a saucepan

Stir over low heat until dissolved

Allow to boil for approx 8 min or until a little soft ball can be formed when a little of the mixture is placed in cold water

Remove from heat, add vanilla and beat until stiff

Pour into greased tray

When partly set mark into squares

Allow to harden before removing from tin

*Be careful not to over boil as fudge will harden while beating and set brittle and sugary. (Like mine did - Still YUM though)

*To make Vanilla fudge, just omit the cocoa

ENJOY !!!

The Oven is On

With the big kids back at school and the new year well on it's way I've finally found some time to get  back into the kitchen.  When I bake, I BAKE...This week it was Date Loaf.  A favourite for everybody, and it doesn't last long around here. I like to think that it's a relatively healthy snack so it's great for lunchboxes. This recipe freezes very well, so I make a few at a time, freeze them and then slice them up fresh when needed!     

 

Date Loaf
1  cup chopped dates
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 tabs butter
1 teasp baking soda
1 cup boiling water
1 egg
3/4 cup sr flour
3/4 cup plain flour                      


Place dates, sugar, butter and baking soda in a bowl
Pour boiling water over and mix well together
Allow to stands until almost cold
Add the beaten egg
Sift dry ingredients together and add gradually, Mix well
Pour into greased and floured bar tin
bake in slow to moderate oven for approx 40 minutes
Serve sliced with butter

Kids in the Kitchen

We often do a big bake at our house at least once a fortnight so I have home baked treats for the kids lunchboxes, midnight snacks for dad and sweet indulgences for me and the little ones. 

Oh what fun, Annabel learned how to crack an egg, 

Elli taught teddy how to cook 

and Miss Madeline  discovered  how much fun it was to lick the bowl...

Today we made:

Walnut and date slice - for dad
1 1/4 cup sr flour
2/3 cup brown sugar
3/4 cup chopped dates                           
1/2 cup walnuts      
125 gm butter

1 egg

Place all ingredients in a bowl and mix well

Melt butter, beat egg well then add both to the dry ingredients
Mix well together and press into a greased slice tin
Bake in Moderate oven until golden brown
When cold cut into squares


Chocolate Slice - for  the kids
This is one of those old time favourite slices my mum used to make when I was little, it does not last very long in my house.
1 cup sr flour
2 heaped tabs cocoa
pinch salt
1/2 cup coconut
3/4 cup sugar
125gm butter
1 egg


Sift flour, salt and cocoa into bowl
Add sugar and coconut and mix well
Stir in melted butter and beaten egg
Mix together well
Press into greased slice tin
Bake in moderate oven for approx 25 mins
Cool completely and ice with chocolate icing
(2 tab cocoa, 1 cup icing sugar, 1 tab butter, 1 drop hot water - mix well together, spread over slice)
Sprinkle with coconut
Cut into squares


Sultana Scones - for mum

2 cups sr flour

pinch salt
2 tabs butter
1/2 cup sultanas
2 tabs sugar
3/4 cup milk
1 egg


Sift flour and salt into a bowl then add the sugar
Run in butter with finger tips
Add sultanas
Make a well in the centre and add beaten egg and milk

Mix into a moist dough

Turn onto floured bench. press out with hand and cut into scones

Place on greased and floured tray

Bake in Moderate Oven until brown about 15 mins

Serve cold with butter or jam and cream

*This recipe can also be used with kids cookie/playdough cutters for a FUN morning tea

*Dont forget to double all the recipes