Christmas 2011

Round 2 Christmas was at our house so that means another 3 recipes to share with you.


First is a very easy trifle recipe. Forget baking the sponge! Or cooking up the custard! Time is of the essence and I had turkey, stuffing, salad, roast pork and potato bake to worry about as well. I really didn't need to add more to my list to do. So yeah, I went with the bought sponge and custard. Come to think of it, I never make custard. The carton stuff I find is always better...hmmmmm could just be my cooking.....anyway, onto the recipe, like this post isn't long-winded enough.....

Easy Peasy Trifle

Ingredients

Packet sponge fingers (or a jam roll would be really yummy too)

2 packets of straweberry jelly

Carton of custard

1 or 2 cans of diced peaches and pears (get whatever fruit you prefer)

600ml cream

Half a block of chocolate

Method

1. Place a single layer of the sponge at the bottom of the bowl

2. Make jelly as per instructions on the box and pour the cooled jelly over the sponge fingers. Place in the fridge to set (around 4 hours or overnight just to get some of it out of the way)
3. After the jelly has set, squirt the custard over it

4. Next goes the fruit
5. Followed by the whipped cream (forgot to photograph both these steps)

6. To finish off, shave/grate chocolate on the top
(We ended up using 2 bars of flake and crumpled them)
Seriously with this dessert, anything goes!

The second recipe is another dessert. Yeah one wasn't enough....(however, the trifle was so easy it doesn't really count)
We decided to make creme caramel because it's one that can be made the day before and it can set in the fridge, again it's all about managing your time on Christmas day isn't it?

I went with this recipe.

Dissolving the sugar and water in saucepan

Getting thicker

After about....13mins boiling you get the caramel.
It's not really a caramel though is it? More a toffee no?

First goes the caramel into your tin (in my case I used a quiche dish)
If you have a flan dish, go with that. And MAKE SURE you check that it fits into one of the trays in the baine marie water bath thingy, not like me. I ended up trying to fit it into a paella pan in the oven. And then found out the paella pan was too large for my oven. All this after I'd put the boiling water in and everything....grrr

Cooking the milk and vanilla

Beat eggs and sugar

Pour the milk mixture into the egg mixture

Strain it into the dish

Bake in a water bath for around 45mins at 160 degrees.
NB: make sure it's only the 45mins because I tested it at that time and it seemed too wobbly so left it in for another 10 or so minutes and found it a little too firm. Especially if you leave it in the fridge to set overnight, 45mins cooking time is best.

The next day.
You can see the custard has shrunk in size and the caramel now comes up over it. YUM!
Although I think I took the caramel (toffee) a little too far this time. Shame on me!

Recipe number 3 is ricotta wrapped with chargrilled vegetables.
I got this recipe from one of the Woolworths magazines.

Ingredients
250g fresh ricotta
1/4 cup finely grated parmesan
1/3 cup grated mozzarella
1 tablespoon finely chopped chives (or basil)
2 tespoons finely grated lemon rind
Salt & pepper
Chargrilled red capsicum
Chargrilled eggplant

Method
1. Combine ricotta, cheeses, chives, lemon, salt and pepper in a bowl.
2. Cut chargrilled capsicum and eggplant into 4cm wide strips.
3. Place 2 teaspoon of cheese mixture onto one end and roll enclosing cheese mixture.
4. Secure with a toothpick and place onto serving platter.

Chargrilling the vegies was the hard part. Suppose you could buy the already chargrilled vegies in the jar.

I ended up marinating mine in extra virgin olive oil and 4 cloves of garlic for a couple of hours

The stuffing mixture

These went down a treat!

So what else did we have for Christmas?

Second hor d'oeurve -
Smoked salmon, mayo and dill on crakers

Roasted sweet potato and pine nut salad

Roast turkey, roast pork (because not everyone in the family likes turkey), ham, potato bake, traditional irish pork stuffing and of course some gravy to help it all down.

Mmm pork crackling, how I love you

That concludes our Christmas celebration lunches for 2011 :)
And by now it is 2012 so happy belated new year! May you be blessed with love, laughter and happiness!!!
xoxoxo

Caramelised Onion, Asparagus and Feta Salad

There was 2 Christmas lunches this year, one at my bros the week before and another at my house on actual Christmas Day. So it was almost a full week of celebrating (for the kids anyway with all their new toys).

My contribution this time was a caramelised onion salad (recipe here) and a black forest cake.

Butter, onion, brown sugar and red wine vinegar

After cooking for 5mins, it didn't look thick enough yet

Cooked a further 5mins made sure it was thick and caramelly

Next is the asparagus

There was a red capsicum chopped and thrown in there as well. Don't think you can make much out with all that feta I crumbled on top

And the black forest cake

Roast lamb (best roast lamb ever!)

Spinach and cream cheese dip

Fried rice

Cooked prawns with lime dipping sauce

Chicken, Leek and Smoked Bacon Pie

I always keep a frozen package of pies in the freezer. You never know when you get a craving for a pie with peas and mash ;) And I'm just like a kid, a total sucker for the mini pies and sausage rolls....mmmmmm. I'd be one of those adults that hover over the kids food at the birthday party. Think fairy bread, mini pies, mini sausage rolls and baby frankfurts and of course loads and loads of tomato sauce! Do they still make that for kids parties? Not the ones I've been to anyway, I think it was just my era...........

Meat pies are a tick for me, but I detest the frozen chicken and vegetable pies. Even the so called "gourmet" ones. Sargents make a particularly bad one.

So yeah, if I want a chicken and veg pie, I'll have to make my own one.

Found this sweetly hickory smoked bacon at Woolies I wanted to try out. Loved it in the pie. But of course regular bacon will do the job, this was a little more fancy.

Chicken, Leek and Smoked Bacon Pie

Ingredients
1 Tablespoon oil
700g chicken thighs, chopped
6 slices of smoked bacon (shortcut, rindless)
1 carrot, diced
1 leek, thinly sliced (white part)
6-8 mushrooms, sliced
2 Tablespoons plain flour
1 teaspoon of preferred herbs (I used oregano)
1/2 cup cream
1 cup frozen peas and corn
1-2 sheets puff pastry

Method:

1. Heat oil in pan and cook the diced chicken, transfer to a bowl.

2. Now cook the bacon (2mins)

3. Add carrot and leek, stir well

4. Add the mushrooms

5. Throw in the flour and cook for a further 3mins

6. Add the chicken and herbs. Cook for another 5mins or so

7. Pour in the cream

8. Add the frozen veg and stir it through

9. Scoop them out evenly into 4-6 ramekins (depending how big your ramekins are).
You could line the base and edge with shortcrust pastry and blind bake it first, but I didn't.

10. Top it with puff pastry and maybe brush an eggwash over it.

11. Bake at 180 degrees for around 20mins