Greetings friends! Today is a quick post on a variation to the Rosemary Bellini I posted a few weeks ago. The Basil Bellini came about as I had a few peaches leftover from making the Rosemary Bellini. Rather than letting them go to waste, I thought I would make some of Kylee Newton’s Peach and Basil Lemonade with them. Kylee’s recipe is delicious peachy basil-y lemonade that is so refreshing on hot days! However, in her recipe (below) you need to strain out and discard the solids after blitzing. But, those same solids are actually a delicious puree of peach and basil! In my opinion, it was far too tasty to go to waste…y. (Sorry)
And so I made it into a hasty Basil Bellini!
I added a spoonful of that peach and basil mix into a glass of sparkling and voila…a Basil Bellini!
A side advantage of the basil bellini is that you can have the kudos of making your kids homemade peach and basil lemonade and also have quiet mummy (or daddy) juice on the side! You could also add some of the strained mixture into your sparkling wine but then you would miss that little frisson of smug of also being zero waste!
Peach and Basil Lemonade Recipe
This comes from Kylee Newton’s book The Modern Preserver which I cannot recommend highly enough!
Hello, retro food lovers and Season’s Greetings from 2003! This month I am using Delicious Magazine from December 2003 to prepare a menu where…well let’s see if you can guess…Hint..there’s a big clue in the title.
The whole time I was cooking this month I also kept thinking back to my early twenties when we used to play a drinking game called “I’m going to the moon”. The person who starts says “I’m going to the moon and I’m taking (for example) an apple”. Then the next person says “I’m going to the moon and I’m taking a pear”. The first person who is the game controller tells them if they can come to the moon or not. If they can’t go, they need to stay on earth and have a drink. There are many variations on this game but my personal favourite was based on the same theme as this month. Let’s move away from my sozzled past to see what was happening in December 2003. Although come to think about it, that was probably the same time as I was playing the game!
The Lord of The Rings: Return of the King was the big movie of December 2003. The Last Samurai was the next biggest. And, quelle surprise, The Da Vinci Code was still the best-selling book. Which all kind of explains why I was playing drinking games instead of partaking in pop culture. Although the soundtrack to those drinking games would have been good with Here Without You and Hey Ya! being the number one songs that month!
The Menu – December 2003
Moorish Champagne Cocktail
I am always very happy to be able to start these menus with a cocktail. The Moorish Champagne Cocktail was both easy to make and also very more-ish!
Moorish Champagne Tart Recipe
Salad of Dried Pears, Proscuitto, Blue Cheese and Walnuts
AKA a salad of a few of my favourite things! If this hadn’t fit the theme, it would have surely been my Nigella item for this month! And it was divine!
Salad of Dried Pears, Proscuitto, Blue Cheese and Walnuts Recipe
Grilled Salmon with Thai Green Risotto
I apologise for the photo of this which is not great. Having said this, the photo from the mag (which follows the recipe) is also not great. Neither photo does this dish, which was amazing any justice! But, trust me, it is worth taking a punt on as it was delicious!
Grilled Salmon with Thai Green Risotto Recipe
Mulled Wine Sorbet With Clove Biscuits
This was so nice and refreshing. It is summer in Australia so this is a nice nod to wintry flavours but adapted for summer. The sorbet mixture was very soft, for me it was more like a slushie than a sorbet so my recommendation is either not to serve it on a very hot day or to eat it quickly as it melts in moments. Speaking of melting, the clove biscuits just melt in your mouth! I am usually a bit wary of cloves – I’ve bit into them accidentally when eating things like curries and find the flavour a bit too much! So, for the first few biscuits, I ate, I picked the cloves off. Since then, I have eaten them with the clove in and the flavour of them seems to be less powerful in the biscuits than in say a curry. So, even if you don’t love cloves, give these a try with them!
Mulled Wine Sorbet with Clove Biscuits Recipe
My Nigella Moment – Crispy Herbed Potatoes
For first-time readers, this refers to the moment at the end of Nigella Lawson’s cooking shows when she sneaks back to the fridge to have another bite of something delicious. In these Twenty Years Ago posts, it is something contained in the magazine that does not fit with the overall menu theme but I’m sneaking it in because it is too good not to share.
You had me at crispy potatoes! And then when I saw how pretty these were, I knew they would be my Nigella item for this month. If I hadn’t already bought what I needed to make Katrina Meynink’s Roasted Taters with Horseradish and Tapenade for Christmas Day, the Crispy Herbed Potatoes would have been on the menu. (As an aside, I have just bought the aforementioned book From Salt to Jam and am absolutely loving it).
Crispy Seared Potatoes Recipe
Overall a great month from Delicious December 2003. If you have not yet guessed the theme, no going to the moon for you! But in the interest of your liver, it was to find recipes with double letters. Until I did this, I had never really thought about how many food items had these. I was absolutely spoiled for choice with options:
(Update 6/1/24 – I had originally included links to items below that are still on the Delicious.com.au website. Those links have been blocked but anything I have asterisked is available should you want to check them out.)
Starters
Baked eggs
Bruschetta with grilled artichokes and roasted garlic
B’stilla*
Cheese Crock
Chilled pea soup with lobster and risoni salad*
Goat’s curd in grappa*
Prawn and fattoush salad
Schiacciata*
Spanner crab chowder
Peppered Beef Salad
Smoked Salmon with clementines and cress
Terrine with microwave cranberry chutney
Mains and Sides
Beef fillet with spicy potatoes and horseradish
Butternut pumpkin with tasty stuffing
Cheeky Christmas turkey with braised leeks and the best wine gravy
Chicken noodle salad
Chicken with pepperoncini
Cinnamon and sultana couscous
Cold turkey salad with mango and honey dressing
Country chicken and mushroom pies
Chicken coconut curry pie
Crispy skin coral trout with roasted pineapple, coconut salad and rosti potato
Fillets of John Dory with olives, capers and rosemary
Flame grilled tuna with wasbi cake, bok choy and lime ponzu
Fricassee of chicken with mustard and grapes
Grilled coral trout with asparagus, red capsicum and sugar snap peas
Rice paper rolls with turkey
Seared barramundi with garlic skordalia, asparagus and creole salsa
Traditional Barossa ham in verjuice jelly
Turkey with saffron butter and preserved lemon and olive stuffing
Baked zucchini tarts with stuffed vegetables
Frisee, watercress and witlof salad
Goat’s cheese tarts with roast peaches and vincotto
Moroccan carrot salad
Open lasagne of asparagus with rocket tortellini
Roasted eggplant and tomato salad
Savoury Summer puddings
Sweet potato briks
Truffled potato mash
Sweets
Baked lime cheesecake
Boozy puddings with cheat’s custard*
Cherry clafoutis*
Choc-mint raspberry sundae
Chocolate and strawberry tartines*
Chocolate and brandied prune terrine*
Christmas morning muffins*
Christmas pudding ice cream with sweet cranberry sauce
Cinnamon ice cream with red wine poached figs*
Chocolate cake with plum pudding vodka*
Coconut and passionfruit slice
Eggnog custards*
Flourless Hazelnut roulade
Free-form berry trifles
Middle Eastern fruit cake*
Pannettone with berries and brandy sauce
Passionfruit panna cotta*
Raspberry ice cream sundae
Snowballs*
Starry night tarts*
Star-topped mince pies
Strawberry sundae*
Tutti Frutti ice cream*
Vanilla sponge with raspberries
White Chocolate and chilli ice cream with tropical fruit
Other
Hettie Potter’s suet-free mince meat
Easy cranberry sauce
Peanut Butter sauce
Raspberry sauce
Strawberry sauce
Irish coffee with orange rind and vanilla
Sorry for the massive laundry list but I really wanted to show how many items had double letters! I was honestly astounded!
So, my question to you lovely readers is – if you were making your own double-letter dinner, what would you choose? Either from the extensive list above or things that have not been mentioned – baguettes, beetroot, jelly, waffles, green beans, toffee, frittata, dill, mayonnaise, cabbage, spaghetti, mozzarella…the list goes on!
Couscous which is in the list above is the only thing I could think of with the same series of letters twice. Can you think of any others?
And one last thing. Thank you all for reading and commenting through the year! Best wishes for an amazing 2024!
Hello crime readers and food lovers! This month our menu is a tribute to the late Rosemary Barton, one of the characters in Agatha Christie’s Sparkling Cyanide. We are remembering Rosemary with a Rosemary Bellini. We’ll get to her in a moment but first let’s take a moment to ponder the US title which was Remembered Death. Now, why on earth when you have an AMAZING title like Sparkling Cyanide, would you change it to something as humdrum as Remembered Death?
Sparkling Cyanide – The Plot
“Six people were thinking of Rosemary Barton who had died nearly a year ago…”
Agatha Christie – Sparkling Cyanide
A year before the novel is set the lovely Rosemary Barton and six of her family and friends gathered for dinner at the swanky Luxembourg Hotel. Rosemary collapsed and died during the dinner. The coroner’s verdict was that she committed suicide due to depression after a bout of flu. (I was quite surprised to hear that depression from the flu was considered a thing back in the day. I guess now with long covid, we are seeing much the same thing but under a different name).
Six months before the novel is set, Rosemary’s husband, George gets a series of anonymous letters saying that Rosemary was murdered. George hatches a plot to find her killer by having another dinner at The Luxembourg exactly one year after Rosemary’s death with the same people attending.
Dumb idea? Totally. Because George dies of cyanide poisoning on the night.
Making one of the dinner guests the murderer of both people. If George was killed because he was getting too close to the truth, who, at the table wanted Rosemary dead? Turns out, everyone has a motive!
We have:
Iris Marle, Rosemary’s sister. She stood to inherit her sister’s considerable fortune
George himself may have killed Roseary as he had discovered she was having an affair. Did he do himself in out of guilt?
The enigmatic Anthony Browne threatened Rosemary with death. Did he poison her to keep her quiet about his shady past?
Stephen Farraday, a politician whose career was on the up was having an affair with Rosemary. Did he kill her to avoid a public scandal if she revealed their dalliance?
Lady Alexandra (Sandra) Farraday, Stephen’s wife had a great reason for wanting Rosemary dead. She wanted to keep her husband.
Ruth Lessing George’s secretary who has a crush on George and hates Rosemary
Good thing we have Co lonel Race on hand to bring the killer to justice!
The Moving Finger – The Covers
Sparkling Cyanide collage
I was so happy to find a load of covers for Sparkling Cyanide and so many non-English covers! However…Portugal and France both seem to have confused champagne for martinis as covers from both countries feature glasses containing olives.
Hello Food Lovers, Who doesn’t love a homemade gourmet gift? And you know who has time to home-make gourmet gifts? Posh people that’s who! And, as we know posh people like to eat flowers, this is not just plain old homemade mustard, this is sparkling wine and lavender mustard! Very posh indeed. And so easy to make! The recipe for this comes from the xxx edition of that bastion of posh food, xxxxxx. So why not get your retro gifting on and make some for your friends this year? T
As well as lavender buds and sparkling wine, this mustard has a heap of herbs in it which makes it quite green. The lavender is not overbearing, in fact the mustard packs quite a strong mustardy punch rather than some old fusty thing you would find in your nana’s cupboard. It goes perfectly with ham or other meats on your Christmas table or in sandwiches with leftovers. I have also stirred a spoonful of it into mayonnaise and then used this mix as the dressing for a potato salad. It would also be great in a Beef with Lavender Mustard or in an Elsa Greer Roast Beef Sandwich. You could even put some of your leftover Beef in Lavender Mustard into your Elsa Greer Sandwich! 🤯
Sparkling Lavender Mustard – The Recipe
Variations
You could also experiment with the herbs used in this – a handful of tarragon would be lovely. Or, if you are not a lover of sparkling wine you could use white wine as suggested by the actual recipe.
For me though, a little glass of sparkling as I made this was a perfect way to kick off the Christmas vibe!
A quick note on making the mustard. I found that my little food processor shown above, did not process the mustard seeds as much as I wanted them to be processed, so I took the mixture out and bashed it about a bit in a mortar and pestle until I got it to the consistency I wanted. This likely would have been easier to do before putting the seeds into the food processor. Also, bear in mind that the more you bash the seeds about, the more pungent your resulting mustard will be. The photo below shows the difference in texture between the two.
Gifting your Sparkling Lavender Mustard
The mustard will keep for at least 6 months if kept in the fridge after opening. I would suggest making it about a month before you want to gift it to allow the flavours to all settle down and meld together. If you want to decorate the jar as I have done, you need to cut some circles of cloth about 2.5cm larger in diameter than your jar. I tend to save little jars during the year so I have a ready supply of these. Make sure that you sterilise your jars – I do mine in the dishwasher. I then popped a little dab of glue onto the jar lid and place the cloth circle over the lid.
Fill your jar with mustard and close the jar. Wrap with some kitchen twine or raffia. Add a sticker if you wish, telling people what is inside. If you have fresh lavender flowers, your can also add a few of these. I just tucked mine under the string.
And voila, a perfect little gourmet treat as a hostess or other gift!
“That’s great, it starts with an earthquake, birds and snakes, an aeroplane”…so begins the fabulous REM song, “It’s The End of The World As We Know It”. And for me, this year actually began with a 7.6 magnitude earthquake when we were holidaying in Darwin. Last month we celebrated my birthday in absolute chaos (more on that later) whilst on holiday in Port Douglas. And when I say chaos, I mean a total f*cking nightmare. So when the random number generator chose “Birthday Party, Cheesecake, Jelly Bean, Boom! I thought it might be a good chance to reset and have a little party to make up for the day that was ruined! The vehicle of choice for this month is Super Food Ideas, from September 2003 and I went in search of party food.
But first, let’s take a little wander down the memory lane to the heady days of September 2003. R Kelly’s Ignition (Remix) was #1. Less said about that the better I think. Finding Nemo was top of the box office and The Da Vinci Code was still the most popular book!
The Menu – September 2003
Margarita
Now, I can’t think of a much better way to kick of any birthday celebration than with a classic Margarita! And this one was perfection!!!!! I
The cocktail napkin you see in the above photo was one of a set of napkins I bought in Port Douglas. They are all super cute and also an inspiration to make the rest of the cocktails featured on them!
And as with the margarita, the first four days of our holiday were wonderful. Port Douglas is such an amazing place. Rainforest, reef and beach – great restaurants, perfect weather….the only downside is the crocodiles…and the murder birds!
Margarita Recipe
Seafood Pizza
As you may have noticed, I love my seafood! This nicely leads me to where our holiday turned paradise into a nightmare. Day 5 of our holiday, which was my actual birthday we had planned to move from our PD central apartment to a house around 10km out of Port Douglas. It was also the night of The Matildas v England final of the Women’s World Cup. We had been out for a lovely dinner the night before so the plan for my birthday was to grab a seafood platter from Port Douglas when we left and then enjoy the evening in our house. Dip in our private pool, , bit of football on the telly, champagne on ice, and our gourmet seafood platter…could life get any better?
Better? No. What we hadn’t figured was that it was about to get a whole lot worse!
We turned up at the house, for which we had a confirmed booking from one of the largest, if not the largest booking agencies in the world. The Fussiest Eater sends a text to the owner asking for the keypad number as the gate is locked. We are there for about 5 minutes when a woman comes out of the house. “Can I help you?” she asks. “Oh, yes, you probably just got our text. We’re here for our holiday”
Apparently we weren’t.
In the time that we had made our booking and our actual holiday, the house had been sold. It was no longer holiday accommodation.
It was now 3:00pm on a Saturday, we had no place to stay for the next four nights and we had a rapidly warming seafood platter on the back seat of the hire car.
Seafood Pizza Recipe
Party Pies
You know this is an Aussie Meat Pie because the secret ingredient is a spoonful of Vegemite! I made mini versions of this pie – in Australian we call these Party Pies so they were perfect for my Birthday Party Menu!
Now back to Port Douglas. The Fussiest Eater began calling the owner of the house. He confirmed that he had sold the house and had told the booking agency to cancel all future bookings. I started trying to find us accommodation. The first place I found wanted $15,000 for the four nights. The second $6000. Finally, we were able to find a studio room back in Port Douglas for the four nights for a price that we could actually afford. And that had a fridge in which we could put the seafood platter! From there we called the booking agency who offered to not only refund the cost of the house but also to pay for the emergency accommodation.
The following day we were also able to move into a one-bedroom apartment in the same complex which was a lot better than the studio but still how we had wanted to spend the last few days of our holiday.
As of today though, the booking company have yet to refund us the money for the second Port Douglas Apartment. We are idiots who did not get their OG offer in writing and they are now saying that as the second apartment was cheaper than the housetechnically we are not out of pocket.
Technically they ruined my birthday and did not deliver on the holiday we paid for and expected.
TechnicallyI could have chosen the house that cost $15000 instead of that studio apartment as our alternative accommodation and technically they would have had to refund us the difference.
I didn’t want to be an arsehole.
I’ll leave that up to them.
Meat Pie Recipe
Chewy Almond Crescents
We now turn to the sweet part of our birthday party menu. These were great! Really tasty and not overly sweet. You couldn’t really taste the apricot jam which was a shame. When I make these again, I will maybe add some chopped-up dried apricots into the mix. Or maybe add a glaze with the jam. They were delicious regardless. These would be great with a cup of tea or coffee or equally with a little glass of Baileys! This was probably my favourite thing on the menu. I also loved the butterfly cakes but they were similar to cakes I had made before. These were all new and I was so happy to discover them!
Accomodation saga continued….As of today though, the booking company have yet to refund us the money for the second Port Douglas Apartment. We are idiots who did not get their OG offer in writing and they are now saying that as the second apartment was cheaper than the housetechnically we are not out of pocket.
Technically they ruined my birthday and did not deliver on the holiday we paid for and expected.
TechnicallyI could have chosen the house that cost $15000 instead of that studio apartment as our alternative accommodation and technically they would have had to refund us the difference.
I didn’t want to be an arsehole.
I’ll leave that up to them.
Chewy Almond Crescents Recipe
Lemon Curd Butterfly Cakes
These were so pretty and also delish. I loved the tanginess of the lemon curd with the sweetness of the cupcake!
The one-bedroom apartment was great. However, on the first night, I was woken at around 2 a.m. by the sound of what sounded like a woman screaming. Channelling my inner Nancy Drew, I got out of bed and looked out the window but the side street the room looked out on was deserted. I was just getting back into bed when I heard it again. This time I went to the main room to look out of the front windows but the main street which we overlooked was also quiet. I went back to bed. I heard the same noise once again at around 5 a.m. This time I wondered if maybe someone in the neighbouring rooms was having an argument as again there was no movement on either street.
There was no mention of any attack on the news the following day so I went about my business. As we were walking back to the apartment from dinner I heard the same noise. This time though I was able to see that it was coming from a bird that we had just walked past. A quick Google Search identified these murder birds as Bush Stone Curlews. Thankfully no Nancy Drewing needed for me on the second night. Or thereafter.
Lemon Curd Butterfly Cakes Recipe
My Nigella Moment – Passionfruit Glazed Shortbread
For first-time readers, this refers to the moment at the end of Nigella Lawson’s cooking shows when she sneaks back to the fridge to have another bite of something delicious. In the context of these Twenty Years Ago posts, it is something contained in the magazine that does not fit with the overall menu theme but I’m sneaking it in either because I made it and it was really good, or I just didn’t have time to make it but it was one of the most appetising things in the mag!
I love shortbread and passionfruit so these were high on my list of things to make. They would have also fit in nicely with my birthday party theme but I ran out of time and had to choose between the Almond Crescents and these. In the end, I have eaten Passionfruit Shortbreads before whilst the Almond Crescents were something new to me so I chose them. These though? High on my list of things to make! And believe me, when I do…I will definitely be popping back to the biscuit tin, Nigella Style, for just one more!
Super Food Ideas really came through for my birthday-themed menu! As did Port Douglas for my birthday holiday. Despite the…ahem…hiccup with the accomodation, PD remains one of my favourite holiday destinations!!!!
Kylee’s recipe is delicious peachy basil-y lemonade that is so refreshing on hot days! However, in her recipe (below) you need to strain out and discard the solids after blitzing. But, those same solids are actually a delicious puree of peach and basil! In my opinion, it was far too tasty to go to waste…y. (Sorry)
