cheese biscuits

i needed to take something to a party last night and was at a loss as to what to bring...everyone had already made it known what their contribution was going to be and all the things i could have brought were being brought by someone else...then, i thought about these...they're yummy, and everyone asked for the recipe, so here it is...

200 grams sharp cheedar cheese
50 grams parmesan cheese
250 grams butter
500 grams strong bakers' flour
1/2 teaspoon sugar
1/4 teaspoon ground pepper
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
paprika


preheat the oven to 170C.

line baking trays with baking paper.

place the cheddar cheese in the thermomix bowl and grate for 2-3 seconds on speed 8. set aside.

place the parmesan cheese in the thermomix bowl and grate for 8 seconds on speed 8. set aside.

place the flour, sugar, peppers and butter in the thermomix bowl and mix for 10 seconds on speed 5 or until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs.

add the cheeses to the flour mixture in the bowl. place the dial on closed lid position and use interval speed to knead for 2 minutes.

portion the dough as desired. i used a mini icecream scoop.

sprinkle with paprika.

bake for 15-20 minutes or until golden.

whisks' pasties

one of my friends, miss cathryn, recently made some pasties, and inspired me to do the same. this is what i did with what i had. what i made was by no means authentic cornish pasties, but i don't think i heard a single complaint. i didn't have any lard, so i used the 2 cartons of sour cream i had in the fridge to make the pastry. i didn't have turnips or swedes and wasn't going to the shops just to get for that either, so i did the sacrilegious and used carrots(!!!).

i really did go out of my way to not be authentic, didn't i? but they were delicious, and with that, i rest my case.

makes 16 big pasties

pastry

2x300ml cartons sour cream
4 cups strong bakers' flour

combine together in the thermomix or food processor until the flour and cream come together. tip the mixture onto a lightly floured board and knead lightly into a ball and place into a plastic bag. seal and place in the refrigerator to rest.

filling

1 large onion
3 large carrots (or turnips/swedes, if you want to get it right)
30 grams olive oil
1 kilo skirt steak
3 large potatoes
salt and pepper to taste
1 or 2 eggs

line 3 baking trays with baking paper.

place the onion and carrots/swedes/turnips in the thermomix bowl and chop on speed 5 until just chopped - you can hear when this is done and this takes about 3 or 4 seconds. add the olive oil and saute for 8 minutes at 100C on speed 1.
i like my steak and potatoes cubed by hand, but this can be chopped up with the thermomix, if desired. if you want to chop the steak with your thermomix, cut the meat into 4 centimetre cubes and chill in the freezer for about 30 minutes before chopping. turbo once or twice to get the consistency you like. peel the potatoes and quarter, and place into the thermomix bowl. chop the potatoes using the turbo function pressing the turbo button once or twice to get the size you like. combine the carrots, onions, potatoes and meat together and season generously.

preheat the oven to 200C.

retrieve the pastry and divide it into 16 portions and roll each portion into a thin disc. you will be surprised at how thin this pastry can be rolled and even more surprised at how strong it is...at least i was - it holds the filling admirably. once all the discs have been rolled, divide the filling amongst them. fold the pastry over and press to seal, then crimp however you wish. if you don't do the crimping thing, just press the tines of a fork around the pastry - not only does it add a decorative feature, it helps to seal the pasty. place the pasties on the prepared baking trays. place the egg(s) into a bowl and whisk lightly. brush the pasties with the egg generously and bake the pasties for 25 minutes or until golden.

vanilla custard, just like grandma's

on saturday, i got together with a few friends who were longing for some old fashioned comfort...old fashioned comfort food. so after having a nice comforting risotto, i made vanilla custard from scratch. no custard powder, and the yellow in the custard came from the eggs. yolks to be specific.

the verdict? one of the guys sighed and proclaimed it to be just like gran's and breathed in all the vanilla-iness. and everyone nodded in agreement and continued eating their custard. lol.

2 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons maize cornflour
3 egg yolks
1/2 litre milk
vanilla bean paste to taste

pop it all into the thermomix bowl and set the thermomix to cook at 80 degrees for 7 minutes on speed 4. so good. so easy. no comparison could be made with the bought stuff.

dorothy floate's secret of success cookery book

i actually have three copies of the dorothy floate's secret of success cookbook - one for me and one for each miss c and miss k, but have realised i really only need 2 because they will only need one each when i'm dead and gone. i guess the spare will be up for grabs.

that aside, it is an excellent read and dot takes her cooking very seriously, explaining everything so very carefully.

dot was never shy in letting her readers know which of her recipes won prizes, and good on her. and good on her for sharing her tips on achieving the finest results from each recipe. after all, why waste good ingredients with a bad recipe?

i was looking at an article about old or new recipes and decided that i, too, should share one of dot's gems - in fact, her (prize) gem scones, no less. i'm copying her recipe just as she wrote it - i think there's a certain charm about it. ask me if you need help with conversions - can't have anyone wasting good ingredients.

(prize) gem scones

1/2 lb s.r. flour
2 eggs
3 ozs butter
4 level tablespoons castor sugar
9 tablespoons milk

cream butter and sugar, add eggs and beat a litte, then add a little sifted flour and beat well. then a little milk and flour alternatively until all milk and flour has been used. add a few drops of essence of lemon. bake in gem irons. put irons into oven and get them very hot while you are mixing the scones. gem irons should be so hot that when greased the butter will sizzle. it is a good idea to have butter melted and use a glazing brush for greasing irons. have your mixture ready before taking irons out of oven, grease and put about a teaspoon of the mixture into
each iron, bake in moderate oven 10 to 15 mins.

melting moments

i love these biscuits because they are delicate and delicious, filled with a lovely lemony icing. they are supposed to keep very well in an air-tight container, but they are so easy to eat, it doesn't matter if they don't keep well. i don't know anyone who doesn't love these biscuits because everyone asks for them.

2 cups of plain flour
1/2 cup custard powder
250g. butter, softened
1/2 cup icing sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla essence

icing:
3/4 cup icing sugar
60 grams butter
1-2 lemon juice
lemon rind

preheat the oven to 170 degrees celcius.
line a baking tray with baking paper.
beat the butter, vanilla and icing sugar until light and creamy.
sift the flour and custard powder together then add to the creamed mixture, mixing until everything is well combined.
divide the dough into 30 pieces and roll each piece into a small ball.
place the balls on the lined tray, and press each ball with a fork to flatten slightly.
bake for 15-20 minutes until pale golden but not brown.
make the icing by creaming together the second portion of icing and butter, with the lemon juice and rind.
place a little icing on half of the biscuits and sandwich together with the remaining biscuits.

apple crumble

i like my crumble quite plain, not oaty, not coconutty, not nutty ....... i like it made just with flour, brown sugar and butter. and i like lots of it and lumpy. very often, i've seen it dry and not at all generous. if you're going to have crumble, have it.

160 grams butter
1 cup plain flour
3/4 cups brown sugar

a quantity cooked apples

preheat the oven to 180 degrees celcius.
for the crumble, place the butter, flour and sugar in a medium sized basin and use a hand mixer to combine them (you could use your fingers to rub the butter throught the flour, but i don't like to dirty my hands).
place the cooked apples in an oven safe dish and sprinkle the crumble mixture on top.
bake the apple crumble in the oven for 20 minutes or until golden.
serve with cream and/or icecream.

sponge cake

the first time i remembered having a freshly made sponge cake was back in september 1971 and i think it was a sunday. if it wasn't, then it was a saturday, but in my mind it was a sunday. my parents and i were at echo point park and we bumped into one of dad's architect friends, tony, and his wife, megan.
from echo point park, you could see this piece of land we had in castle cove. all we ever did when we first bought the land was just look at it. then the years passed and the novelty of looking at it wained. but i digress....
one thing led to another and we ended up at tony and megan's place and we had afternoon tea there. megan (who is jeff wiggle's sister....i know, small world...i also know jeff wiggle's mother) whipped up a sponge cake and dressed it with strawberries and cream.....can't remember if there was jam, but there definitely were strawberries.
i remember being so impressed that someone could just whip up a cake just like that while guests were there. i knew then and there i wanted to be as clever as that when i grew up. i thought i wanted to be able to just whip anything up at short notice. more recently, i did bump into megan, and she's still the very beautiful, tall, stylish and slender lady she was then. amazing how she hasn't changed. i did tell her about how inspirational she was; she didn't remember the occasion, but i'm glad i did.
this isn't megan's recipe, it's actually a recipe for a sponge roll which i use, and it's very quick and easy. the thiness of the cake really speeds things up so it's quick to bake, quick to cool and fill and ultimately quick to get onto the table.

3 eggs separated
1/2 cup caster sugar
1/2 cup self raising flour
1/4 cup wheaten cornflour
2 tablespoons hot milk
1/2 cup jam
300 millitres thickened cream
fresh berries


preheat oven to 180°C. line a 20 x 30cm swiss roll pan with baking paper.
using an electric mixer, beat eggs and sugar until pale and thick.
sift self raising flour and cornflour over egg mixture.
drizzle boiling water around edge of bowl.
use a large metal spoon to gently fold ingredients together (don't over-mix).
pour mixture into prepared pan.
bake for 10 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into centre comes out clean.
sprinkle an extra 1/4 cup of sugar onto a sheet of baking paper.
turn sponge straight from oven onto baking paper.
gently roll up sponge in paper. wrap in a tea towel.
set aside to cool.
whip the cream.
unroll sponge and remove paper.
spread jam, cream and berries on sponge.
reroll and slice to serve.

alternatively, slice the sponge in half lengthways and fill with berries, cream and jam and sprinkle with icing sugar. this is my favourite way of serving this cake - since you don't have to roll it, there can be lots of filling with not too thick layers of cake. yum.

pound cake revisited

pound cake again? yes, pound cake again. this time it's a blast from the past. back to 1977, in fact.
in 1977, i was still in high school and every school holiday, i would always make an effort to get myself down to the city and make my way down to the sydney county council building on george street and collect recipe sheets. i actually remember that on this particular occasion, i was with julia and anna and one stephen o'leary and we were on our way to see star wars. my friends were good, weren't they? allowing me to detour and get my recipes sheets. well, they were eventually rewarded by a piece of cake, so there was really not too much to complain about. they did have to wait until the following year, i think, before i actually made it for them to try, because i remember taking it to musical rehearsal - we were doing bye bye birdie and i remember bringing it along and offering it around. i still remember my costume, and i have a scary feeling that it may still be somewhere hanging in someone's wardrobe.....it was a very bright yellow, so it shouldn't be too hard to find if i wanted to find it. but i digress....
barbara lynch and doreen andrews presented switched on living monday to friday at 10am on channel ten, and these recipes would be the ones they demonstrated. i loved them. and i loved this cake. it was a cake that worked and tasted good.
this is from the issue week commencing 5th december 1977, "gifts from the kitchen" part I. i hope there are still many of these treasures tucked away in someone's files or drawers or massive piles of things - i find this so comforting and relaxing....can a recipe be relaxing? well, it gives me a warm sort of fuzziness...or something.... i hope i continue to discover other pound cake recipes.

2 2/3 cups flour
1/4 level teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
1/2 level teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 level teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups butter, softened
2 1/4 sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla essence
8x50 grams eggs
1-2 teaspoons grated lemon rind

sift first 4 ingredients.
cream butter and sugar very well, add vanilla essence.
add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.
add flour mixture all at once and mix at low speed till smooth and well blended, add rind.
place into a well greased, lined and floured 23 cm (9") tube pan.
bake in moderate oven 180 degress celcius for 1 hour and 40 minutes or till cooked. cool in tin for 5 minutes before turning out.

lemonade, like at the easter show, but probably healthier

do you ever buy those big lemonade drinks they sell at the easter show? you know, the ones which are in a big tank with the lemon rinds floating in them and lots of ice? we do, and we buy the really big one because we like to share it (between the three of us, and no one else). it's always so refreshing and the acidity's just right to cut the greasiness of all the junk we eat when we're at the show. doesn't this sound bad? so much junky food...and drink.... i reason that it comes once a year, and the show's the only place where we get this kinda stuff. i'm sure it's available all year round at markets and the like, but for us, that's the only time we see it.
this lemonade is my imitation of the one at the show, but i'm sure it's better because it's home made, and as such, we would take extra love and care when we make it. like washing the lemons before we use them and not adding any preservatives or anything unnatural.....and since this is so wholesome sounding and all, one of these days, i'm going to post something to "balance" it, like the recipe for corn dogs (yum) and cheese on a stick (yum yum).
we didn't make it to the easter show this year, so i think miss k might be entitled to her annual quota of junky easter show food, albeit my version of it.

1 cup fresh-squeezed lemon juice (about 6 washed lemons, and retain the rinds for the garnish)
7 cups water
1 cup granulated sugar

combine the lemon juice with the water and sugar in an 2 litre jug and stir to disslove the sugar. if you like, you can stir, go away and do something and come back to it and give it another stir, and before you know, it would have dissloved.
place the jug in the fridge until ready to serve.
to serve, fill a large glass with ice and fill the glass with the lemon concoction. to give it the full easter show effect, put half a lemon rind in the glass, as they do. me? i like to slice the rind into slivers before adding it to the drink, so they release lots of lemon flavour.

pound cake by whisks

does this title sound boring? i guess it does, but a good pound cake has been one of those elusive things in my life. it's a simple cake, but it isn't....a good one that is. then, there's always this thing called "personal preference" - for me, i want a pound cake to be fragrant, comforting and have a mouth feel that's...that's...velvety, smooth....i don't know, it's hard to explain exactly....i must lack the eloquence, especially in between mouthfuls.
i've tried making this cake in lots of different ways - i've tried it where i don't beat until the sugar's dissolved, i've tried it where i beat it until the sugar's dissolved....i've even tried baking it with half plain flour and half self raising flour (no, i didn't run short of either - i just wanted to experiment) and permutations of these and other methods. all methods were delicious, but perhaps the one where i used half self raising flour and half plain flour and dissolved the sugar was my favourite. that said, this is a favourite cake in all its permutations.....maybe because it's so deliciously buttery and fragrant....something old fashioned and comforting....bliss.... go ahead and try making it - it's almost foolproof, and wonderful to eat.


125g butter
3/4 cup sugar
3 eggs
1 cup self raising flour
2 tablespoon powdered milk
1 tablespoon corn syrup
juice of half a small lemon
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg


cream sugar and butter together until light and fluffy.
add eggs one at a time and mix well.
add in flour, powdered milk, and corn syrup.
beat each in well.
add the lemon juice, salt, vanilla, nutmeg, and mace.
make sure everything is well combined, and pour into a greased loaf pan.
bake 180 degrees celcius for 45 minutes, checking for doneness by inserting a toothpick and seeing if it comes out clean. try not to over bake this - it's much nicer when its just done.

cinnamon scrolls by whisks

these are essentially a glorified scone which i like to make when we need something comforting for afternoon tea and we just don't have the time or patience for a scroll made with yeasted dough.
these are really quick and easy to make. when making these, remember that the less you handle the dough the better they will turn out. once you get the hang of making them, you will find that making them is really no effort at all.

2 cups self raising flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
60 grams butter, melted
3/4 cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
60 grams very soft butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon

glaze:
1 cup icing sugar
2 tablespoons milk
1/4 teaspoon vanilla

line a 20cm square tin with baking paper and preheat the oven to 200 degrees celcius.
combine flour and salt in a medium sized bowl.
mix melted butter, milk and vanilla together.
pour the liquid into the bowl with the flour and stir quickly and gently with knife just until dough leaves sides of bowl.
tip the dough out of the bowl onto a lightly floured surface.
sprinkle a little flour onto the top of the dough and roll the dough into a 1 cm thick rectangle about 30 centimetres long and 20 centimetres wide.
spread the dough with the very soft butter.
combine cinnamon and sugar and sprinkle it over dough.
roll up, starting on long side.
cut into 16 rounds and place rounds, with sides just touching, in the prepared pan.
bake for 18-20 minutes or until golden brown.
remove from oven and drizzle with glaze.
serve warm.

for glaze:

combine the milk icing sugar and vanilla and stir until smooth.

cinnamon streusel cake by whisks

this smells so good whilst baking in the oven and tastes so good when it comes out, warm or at room temperature. what more could a person want?
i made this in little loaf tins and miss k took slices of this to school and shared it with her friends and all they could think about was cinnamon loaf....don't you love it?

cake ingredients:

125 grams butter
2 eggs
1 cup sour cream
1/2 cup cream
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 cup white sugar
2 cups self raising flour
1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
pinch salt

cinnamon mix:

3 tablespoons brown sugar
1 tablespoon cinnamon
1 dash allspice

streusel mix:

60 grams butter
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup plain flour

preheat the oven to 180 degrees celcius.

put all the cake ingredients in a medium sized bowl and beat all cake ingredients together with a electric mixer (i like to use a hand held mixer) and spread half of the mixture in a deep 28 centimetre round pan lined with baking paper. i like using a springform tin to bake this cake because it makes the cake easier to remove from the tin. just make sure your springform tin holds the base of the tin securely - you don't want the bottom of the cake tin to fall out when you're transfering the tin to and from the oven. something like that would make me want to cry. i know this happened to my friend janet and she said that's how she felt.

mix together the cinnamon mixture in a small bowl and sprinkle over first layer.

dollop on remaining cake batter as evenly as you can (it doesn't have to be perfect) and use a knife to swirl the cinnamon through the batter. as fun as this is, try not to overdo it - just a quick zig zag through the batter is all that's needed - it's nice having the distinct cinnamony lines going throught the cake when it's finished baking.

roughly mix the struesel mixture together (it's fine if it's lumpy) and sprinkle it over the cake mixture.

bake the cake at for 45-50 minutes or until done. to check for doneness, insert a toothpick in the centre of the cake and when you take it out, if there's a wet batter on it, leave the cake in the oven for another 15 minutes, then check again. if there's a moist batter on it, leave it in the oven another 5 minutes, then check again. if the toothpick comes out without any batter stuck to it, the cake's ready.

if the cake's ready, take it out of the oven and put it on a cake rack to cool a little. if you try to take it out of the tin when it comes straight out of the oven, it might just fall apart because it hasn't had a chance to stabilise. this cake is quite moist, that's why it needs a bit of time. just be patient and leave the cake to settle down for a little bit - give it at least 15 minutes - it will still be warm even after 30 minutes or longer. i know...and it smells so good. if you don't mind what your cake looks like, then go for it.