SJ Foodfiles ...

This is just some of the food being cooked and eaten in Cafe la Joolz otherwise known as 'our house'. 

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 Bread rolls - this has become a weekly ritual at some time or another, making sure there are always some in the freezer.

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 Gus made this chicken dish and cannot for the life of me think what its called or where the recipe is ... I think it might be an Ainsley Harriot dish.

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Added:  No, it was a Women's Weekly recipe from their book Roast.  The recipe is here.
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... will hunt it down as it was yummy and a good one pot dish...

 A batch of cherry shortbreads as Brianna was home...

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 A date loaf, just because its yummy to have with a cuppa...

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This is the first time we have cooked Pork Belly.   Gus can take all the credit for this...

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 It was slow cooked for a couple of hours then put under the griller to crisp up the crackle...

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It was lovely and tender but the crackling is so naughty!

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 We had a friend coming to stay (for Angus' 50th) who is a coeliac.  I wondered what she might be able to eat.  Friday night we had 10 for dinner so I just bought hot chickens from the supermarket and broke them up into a big baking dish and kept them hot.  I carefully removed some breast meat with out skin (which has the seasoning on it) so Pauline could have that.  I made a potato salad using Kraft Potato Salad dressing which is gluten free.  I made a coleslaw using homemade boiled salad dressing which used White Wings Cornflour which is gluten free (Nurses brand is not).  We also had a lovely big tossed salad full of veggies so she could have that too.  Really no bother.  For dessert I made a big fruit salad using a can of fruit salad and added apple, orange, banana and passionfruit and had that with icecream.  After the party on Saturday night, a few people landed back at our place so we ordered pizzas.  I knew Pauline couldn't have pizza (our pizzeria is not gluten free) so I had made some mini quiches a few nights previous and froze them.  I used gluten free plain flour for the pastry and made sure other ingredients like my margarine, sour cream and stock powder were all GF too.  The filling was just egg, bacon, zucchini, fresh sweetcorn off the cob, parsley, sour cream and tomato.  She said they were delicious! I also bought GF bread for her to have for breakfast and she enjoyed having grilled cheese under the griller.  She bought her own cereal to have for breakfast also.  Before they left on Sunday, we had barbecue chops and gluten free sausages with the left over salads.

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 A very lazy smoko for the staff - packet carrot cake cupcakes for Angus' birthday.  The birthday person has to supply smoko for all.

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 This is another recipe I have seen on facebook.  Vegetable Tian - recipe here 
Saute an onion with garlic and line the baking dish...

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 Layer the vegetables - squash, potato, zucchini and tomato in the dish...

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 Sprinkle with mixed dry herbs...

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Sprinkle with grated cheese (mine was low fat so it didn't melt and bubble very nicely) ...

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 I served it with a chicken and mushroom parcel from Lenards.

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I never seem to have ginger on hand when I need it so I bought a big knob of it and portioned it up and bagged it and froze it.  Now when I need a bit, I can just get it out, peel it and grate it as usual.

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 I was given a big bag of lemons, fresh off the tree so I got to and used a few up straight away.  We had fish Saturday night for dinner so I made a lemon butter sauce and I also used one in my gin & tonic!   ;)

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 I love curried egg so while I had some of my homemade salad dressing on hand, I boiled up 2 eggs, added curry, salt and pepper and a bit of dressing...

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 This would be lovely in a sandwich but I just spread it on my toast for breakfast.  I have a cast iron stomach!

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 I made a batch of School Cookies, I have posted a recipe here on Simply Joolz.

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 These are yummy with fruit in them or you could sneak some choc chips in too.

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 Muffin pizzas - I couldn't find any pitta breads at the supermarket so English muffins had to do...

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 Very yummy on a Saturday night....

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 To get rid of a few more lemons, I made Julie Goodwin's Lemon Lime Tart - a video of Julie making the pie is here. and the recipe on her site is here.

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The pastry is really short so I roll mine out between baking paper then flip it into the pie dish.  If it cracks, just mend it with bits of pastry until it looks alright.

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 I blind baked the shell for 10 minutes...

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 Then filled it and baked for about 30 minutes until just firm.

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 Absolutely delicious, very tangy!

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 More bread rolls, this time bigger ones (8 instead of 12)...

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Last night I made a batch of vegetable soup - roughly chop pumpkin, carrot, onion, celery, potato, zucchini and I had a handful of sad looking cherry tomatoes so they went in too.  Add some chicken stock powder or liquid and some water to nearly cover the veggies and simmer away for 30-40 minutes until all tender.  Season with salt and pepper to your taste.   I blitz mine with a Bamix stab blender to make a smooth soup.  Serve with a dollop of sour cream and one of those bread rolls!

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That has me all up to date.  Not much happening here other than lots of office work, filing stuff away after the End of Financial Year...yuck!

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Enjoy your hump day!

Cheers - Joolz xx

Homemade crumpets ...

I have had this crumpet recipe in my folder for some time so I thought I'd give it a go this morning - I'm home alone so there was no pressure to get anything else done.

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The recipe came from Nature Witch's blog here but I see there hasn't been any activity for since July 2010.  Here we go ... and in hindsight, next time I will halve the mixture because 45 (!) crumpets is just a bit too many for this family of two!  They will freeze but that is still a lot to get through.

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Combine your warm water, yeast and sugar in a large bowl...

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Add in the flour, baking powder and salt gradually, making sure to get rid of lumps...

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This is the batter when all the flour has been incorporated.  I think it needed a bit more warm water added (1/4 cup) so the final batter is reasonable runny.

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Let the batter rest in a warm place for 20 minutes.  It should have bubbles rising to the surface.

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Spray egg rings with non-stick spray and place in your skillet (or like me, a griddle hotplate).  Fill each ring with good heaped tablespoon of batter.  It was trial and error with this quantity.  Less is better as it rises.

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These were my first attempts.  Not bad.  The recipe says to cover them for the last 2 minutes (to promote the holeyness) but I didn't have a big/high enough lid to do this on my skillet.  So I just flipped them over for a minute.

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See how the batter is getting more bubbly?

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Another batch ...

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Finally all cooked - yes, there are 45 crumpets!  Anyone know a hungry family of eight?

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I had mine with Golden Syrup and then one with Vegemite...

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So very good!

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I have frozen them in packs of 6 with kitchen paper between them.  Give them a try - if you can make pancakes, you can make these crumpets!

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Added: I got out a pack of frozen crumpets this morning and toasted them as normal and they were fantastic.  Missing the holey top so I stabbed it a few times with my knife so the margarine would go down into it a bit - naughty, I know!

Cheers - Joolz xx

Gus turns 50 !

 Last Saturday, we all piled on a bus and headed for Coonawarra to celebrate Gus' 50th Birthday.  His mum made this huge chocolate sponge cake.

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 He had his 40th Birthday at Upstairs and Hollick so thats what he wanted to do for his 50th also.  We had 64 guests.

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 Me and my beautiful girls!

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Family!

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 For lunch, there was a choice of crisp skinned local pork belly; cassoulet of upstairs pork, fennel & cider sausage, pancetta, tomato and cannellini beans...

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 or whole roasted scotch fillet of local beef; charred Kalangadoo onion; roasted field mushroom; green beans; horseradish butter and cabernet jus.  Salad of hillbilly farm lettuce, red onion, cucumber, cherry tomatoes and local olives.

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 Dessert was a fantastic vanilla bean panna cotta; raspberry sorbet; poached local rhubarb; rose geranium syrup; freeze dried raspberries.  Everyone raved about this!

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Soft centred dark chocolate pudding, house-made butterscotch icecream; hazelnut and almond praline; vanilla cream.

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It was a very long lunch and just what Gus wanted.

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Cheers - Joolz