Category: Fruit

REPOST – Future Classics – Australian Table – August 2001

Remember how I said I had a fab idea for a whole new series of blog posts whilst on holiday?  Here’s the thing, along with hundreds of cookbooks, I also have a huge collection of food magazines, most of which sit on shelves in my back room doing nothing.  Once a year, I grab a handful of the oldest, take them on holiday and cut out the recipes I want, throw away the magazines, and cook the recipes over the next 12 months.

Vodka With Crushed Limes2

Crispy Duck with Green Pancakes2jpg

Currently I have a few mags from the late 1990’s but they are most from the early noughties onwards.  So they are not quite but well on their way to becoming formally vintage.  My thought on holiday was….”These are the things that will shortly become the vintage recipes of the future.  So, instead of ripping them up, I’m going to start cooking from them.  Once a month, I’ll revisit one of these magazines, cook a thing or two and decide if these are future vintage classics – or just junk taking up space in my backroom.  Here are the early years to 2013:

Magazines1And here are 2014 to the present day:

Magazines2so, to start, we are stepping back in time 15 years to the August 2001 edition of Australian Table:

Australian Table August 2001 I also thought it might be fun to revisit some of the content of these magazine as well as the recipes, so without further ado, here are the:

Flavours of The Month – August 2001

This section spoke about what was in season.  I thought I might give it a little Retro Food For Modern Times Twist!

Sweet Potatoes

Huh….my plan was to insert a recipe or two from the blog.  However, apparently I have made nothing with sweet potatoes. I’ll link to some recipes  below.

Baby Bok Choy

Or anything with Bok choky.  What have I been cooking in for the last four years?

Cumquats

Hooray – Finally!

Click here for my Four Kumquat Canapés For Four Food Heroes recipes

Pineapples

Melbourne Cup Crab and Pineapple Appetizer and MC Cocktail

Pineapple soufflé

Movies of The Month

Oh man.  August 2001 was a GOOD month for movies!  I would quite happily watch Bridget Jones’s Diary or Along Came a Spider today.  I don’t recall ever seeing Evolution but I am definitely putting that to rights, pronto.  I know it’s probably a little late with the picky picky however, Australian Table, I would like to point out that the chocolate-voiced, sloe-eyed maverick investigator is actually called Alex Cross.  The ACTOR is Morgan Freeman.  And what a difference a letter makes.  Slow-eyed which I typed at least a dozen times in the above paragraph makes you sound like you should be taking special classes.  Sloe-eyed…hello sexy!

Movies - August 2001

Music Of The Month

Well, I guess you can’t have it all.  I listened to none of these at the time nor do i have any real desire to seek out any of these.  Maybe the Elvis Costello.

Music August 2001

The Food

I chose two recipes from an article on fool proof party food starting with:

Vodka with Crushed Limes

Australian Table August 2001These are my flavours…this was so good!  Tangy, sweet delicious!

Crispy Duck with Green Scallion Pancakes

Crispy Duck with Green PancakesNo, these are my flavours!  Spicy, seductive!

Australian Table August 20012

Berry and Rhubarb Crumble

This recipe came from an advertisement for a 3 in one hand blender.  Crumble is pretty much already a classic but the addition of rhubarb instead of the more traditional apple?  Genius!

Rhubarb and Berry CrumbleRhubarb and Berry Crumble Recipe

Everything I made from this mag was SUPER! My view is that this is a definite future vintage classic!

I hope you’ve enjoyed this little walk down memory lane!  I’ll be back in a couple of weeks with a mag from September 2001.  I hope it’s as good as this one!

Have a great week!

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Political Partini

Well, the Brits have Brexited; here in Australia we go to the polls this weekend (Lord only knows why – every time we actually elect a Prime Minister internal party political infighting deposes them and puts someone else in the top job!) I’m sure my friends in the U.S. are sick to the back teeth with Trump and Hilary and there’s still a long way to go on that one….

Political Partini

Most of these campaigns are being run on scare tactics and fear mongering  so why not kill the bad vibes with a super tasty cocktail.  I’m in…how about you?

And oh boy do I have an absolutely beauty for you!  The Political Partini!  It’s not only delicious but punny which means I love it even more!!!!  And what’s not to love?  It’s pear infused vodka, traditionally Grey Goose La Poire but I made my own, Amaretto which I absolutely adore, simple syrup and lemon juice. So, it’s filled with fruit and nuts kind of healthy…in a boozy sort of way!

Polical Partini2This is so, so good.  I only wish I had made more pear-infused vodka so I could make it my election night tipple! Do people in other countries have election night parties?  It’s kind of a thing here.  My parents used to always have / or go to one.  If I had not just started a new job I may have thought more about it and organised something for the weekend but that’s totally not happening…maybe I’ll tag along to my parents’ party….oh Lord really?  Is this what my life has come to?

Well, here’s an ode to something I most likely will not be this Saturday from one of my favourite singers Dan Kelly.  It does contain some of the naughty words  so, if you are at work or there are kiddies about, you might want to delay playing it.

The Political Partini was created for the US 2008 election campaign but is delicious enough to celebrate or commiserate any election wins or losses.  Or indeed anything.

OMG…it’s so good!!!!  And that’s coming from someone who is not overly fond of pears.

Political Partini3

Politcal Partini: The Recipe

Print

Political Partini

A super delicious cocktail made from pear infused vodka, amaretto and lemon – how could it be bad?

Ingredients

Scale

For the pear infused vodka

  • 1 pear
  • 250 ml vodka

For the cocktail

  • 2 parts pear infused vodka
  • ¼ parts Amaretto
  • ¼ parts simple syrup
  • ½ part lemon juice
  • Pear slice for garnish

Instructions

For the pear infused vodka

  1. Wash and chop up the pear.
  2. Place in mason jar.
  3. Cover with vodka. Close the jar and keep in a dark place for a week or so, shaking daily.
  4. Before use, strain through cheesecloth to remove all the pear particles.

For the Cocktail

  1. Place all ingredients, except the pear slice in a cocktail shaker filled with ice.
  2. Shake, baby, shake until the outside of the shaker is frosted.
  3. Strain into martini glass and garnish with a pear slice.

Have a great week!

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This Goose is Loose – Goose in Spring Cocktail

Happy hump day people of the internet!

This goose is loose! 

For the next five days, I am a lady of leisure!  And what better way to celebrate than with a cocktail (or two)!  And this Goose in Spring Cocktail fits the bill perfectly!

Goose In Spring 1After three years, I am leaving the amazing team at Protiviti in Melbourne for pastures new.  It was so hard to say goodbye; I have made so many friends there and worked for three amazing bosses.  But new challenges beckoned and I am moving on. 

But not until  Monday.

Goose In Spring 2

So, in the meantime, while I am unofficially unemployed, I am as free as this little bird.

Goose In Spring3If being free means:

  • Cleaning out my pantry
  • Clearing out my wardrobe
  • Clearing out my bookshelves
  • Putting my car in for a service
  • A visit to the dentist
  • A visit to the hairdresser
  • Catching up with a girlfriend for lunch
  • A visit to the beauty salon for a mani & pedi
  • Getting the broken strap on my favourite handbag fixed
  • Trying to cook as many recipes from Persiana as possible
  • Vintage Shopping with my mum
  • Writing at least three blog posts to schedule for when I am on holiday next month
  • Writing that novel I’ve been thinking about for years
  • Scaling Everest

Yep, totally absolutely free!

Goose Is Loose 5The Goose in Spring cocktail was the winner of the May 2012 Vodka Cocktail Contest, where it was created by Elijah Venanzi.

[yumprint-recipe id=’68’]The Goose In Spring combines all the delicious floral flavours I love – lavender and elderflower with some fruity deliciousness from raspberries and lime!  The original recipe used lemon instead of lime but I didn’t have any – and you know, when life doesn’t give you lemons, a girl’s gotta improvise!  My lavender vodka was also VERY lavendery so I needed to adjust the other ingredients around it.  The original ratios are per the link in the recipe.

Have a lovely week!  I’ll be thinking of you while I’m doing all that nothing!

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Pieathalon 3 – Lemon Potato Pie

It will come as no surprise to you, wise people of the internet that this, in all it’s earthy glory, is a potato:

PotatoAnd this, is a can of beans.

They don’t call me Captain Obvious for nothing!

Lemon Potato Pie Beans

What is probably not so obvious is that you can turn these into this:

Lemon Potato Pie4

That’s right,  lemon meringue pie made from spuds and beans.

How?

Well, it’s Pieathalon – the foodie equivalent of Mouseketeer Surprise Day; anything can happen and it usually does!

Starting with a brand new logo (thanks Greg, it looks super!)

PieathalonPieathalon is that time of year when bloggers from all over the world swap recipes and rejoice in the kooky baked goods of yesterday.  The full list of participants and what they made is at the bottom of the post.  Why not go visit them all?  Maybe start with Battenberg Belle who is making my pie of choice, Fatty Arbuckle’s Delight, then pop over to Ruth at Mid Century Menu  who sent me lemon potato pie!

Lemon Potato Pie 2

Lemon Potato Pie – The Pie

The recipe for Lemon Potato Pie comes from 250 Superb Pies and Pastries, a book from 1941. The use of the humble spud instead of the more luxurious ingredient of butter to create lemon curd had a feel of wartime austerity about it.  Butter was rationed right?  Otherwise….why?   No, seriously, WHY?

Let’s not delve too deeply into the minds of 1941 and get stuck right in to the pie.  Starting with some grated potato.Lemon Potato Pie 3This was then parboiled for a spell and quickly became a kind of gloopy liquid.

Lemon Potato Pie5

After the rest of the ingredients were added and it cooked some more, the potato broke down even further.  However, at the end of the cooking there were still some small flakes of potato which were odd and a bit off putting when you tasted the….sludge.  So, even though this was not in the recipe I blended the lemon mixture to make it smooth.  Bear, in mind I have the fussiest eater in the world as my chief taste tester!

Lemon Potato Pie6

Lemon Potato Pie  – The Meringue

So, then to the meringue. And here disaster struck.  I had put the separated whites into a bowl and left them on the far side of the kitchen bench while I made the filling. When it came time to make the meringue I looked around to where I had left the egg whites and they had vanished.

“Did you take my egg whites?” I asked The Fussiest Eater in The World.

“I gave them to the dogs.  I thought that’s what you left them for”.

We had no more eggs.  And we had been to a rather boozy lunch that day so there was no option of getting into the car to go buy more eggs.

“Crap…guess, I’ll have to finish it tomorrow”.

Lemon Potato Pie7

A bit later, I was making our dinner which was the Argentine Beef Stew from The A-Z of Cooking (1971). I will definitely blog about that one soon, it was DELICIOUS and I remembered something about making meringues from bean water.  A quick visit to Google confirmed that you could make meringue from the water that surrounds tinned chickpeas or white beans.  Why not give it a whirl?  It’s in the same spirit of “make do and mend” as the potato based filling.

Lemon Potato Pie8I drained the can of beans, the beans went into the stew and the bean water went into the mixer.

I was incredibly surprised to see that it meringued up a treat!

Lemon Potato Pie9Ooops!  I’d over filled my pie!

Lemon Potato PieIn homage to Ruth, I thought I would let the Fussiest Eater in The World have the final say on the Lemon Potato Pie.

Lemon Potato Pie: The Verdict

Mixed.

Lemon Potato Pie10So, what do you think?

“The filling is gorgeous.  It’s really delicious”.

And the meringue?

“Tastes like the worst marshmallow in the world”.

Well done cooks of 1941!  And thanks Ruth for a  super recipe!   Your lemon potato pie is delicious!

Sadly, vegans and egg intolerants, the aqua fava meringue was not. It was much more marshmallow-y than meringue-y. It was very gooey and a bit stringy – think mozzarella cheese on a pizza.

 

Lemon Potato Pie11

Here is the recipe for the pie:

Lemon Potato Pie recipeGiven the bean meringue was a failure, here is the proper recipe for the meringue from Ruth.

“The recipe for Meringue 1 is 2 egg whites, 4 tbsp sugar, 1/2 tsp vanilla.  Beat eggs until frothy, add sugar gradually, and continue beating until stiff.  Add flavoring.  Pile on pie and bake in 325 degree oven for 15-18 minutes”

Pieathalon 3 – The Bloggers

Here is the full list of the wonderful crazy people who participated in Pieathalon this year.  I’m heading off to see  their creations!  Why not join me?

Thanks as ever to the wonderful Yinzerella for making it all happen!

Have a wonderful week.  Now go eat some pie!

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REPOST – The Dishiest Dish – Rhubarb, Rose and Passionfruit Sorbet

We are having a lovely spurt of late summer…OMG, it’s autumn now….warm weather, just perfect for enjoying this delicious rhubarb, rose and passionfruit sorbet.

Rhubarb, Rose and Passionfruit SorbetLet’s talk about it shall we?

  • It’s fruity, tangy and not too sweet so incredibly refreshing on a hot day.
  • It is the most glorious shade of pink.
  • The passionfruit and rose water make it smell like a summer garden.
  • It has a  Rhubarb Almond Shard
  • And is sprinkled with Rhubarb Crumble Dust
  • And for the cherry on the top, it’s got…well…a cherry on the top.

I based this recipe on the Rhubarb and Rose Sorbet in Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall’s River Cottage, Light and Easy which was my selection when we did a stint on Celebrity Chefs for Tasty Reads. I usually find Hugh very engaging, hence choosing the book, however I admit I have struggled with it a bit.  I’m all for dairy and wheat free however it just seemed like a bit of a chore, not to mention expense to have to buy new ingredients for just about every dish – this one has buckwheat flour, that one had chestnut flour, the other had chickpea flour.  Never even mind the expense.  Who has the space?

But I pretty much had everything for the sorbet, except the rhubarb already.  I also had a little passionfruit left over from the Valentine’s Day Soufflé so I popped that in as well.

Rhubarb, Rose and Passionfruit Sorbet26 Week Challenges

These have been a bit of a disaster.  I downloaded an update to my phone weekend before last. And it killed it.  #epicfailnexus5  The phone would no longer read the sim card.  So after spending the weekend trying every fix available on Google on Monday I got a new sim card, even though I kind of already knew it wasn’t the sim card.  On Tuesday the phone went in for a service.  Then there was a WEEK of daily calls of “Is it fixed?  “Is it fixed? Is it fixed?”  Then after seven days they said “Oh, we now know it’s not hardware, it’s software” and they got a “I KNOW IT’S NOT HARDWARE I TOLD YOU IT WASN’T HARDWARE ONE WEEK AGO.  YOU HAVE SPENT A WEEK WASTING MY TIME AND YOUR TIME. JUST PUT IT BACK TO WHAT IT WAS BEFORE THE UPDATE” And an hour later it was fixed.  Seriously I hate being such a bitch to service people.  But really.  A week.

A week where, I was without my meditation app and my flexibility app.  So they fell by the wayside.  I downloaded some mediation podcasts to my ipod.  Which promptly broke.

Oh and my car wouldn’t start this morning.

Technology hates me.

On the more positive side, my March resolution of 6 weeks without Candy Crush is going amazingly well!

Silver linings!

I’m starting a new challenge today:

The Persiana Project

As of now, I have 32 dishes left to cook from the very many I marked as “Want To Cook” in Persiana.  Sabrina Ghayour’s new book comes out in 50 days.  Technically, I can cook them all between now and then.  Realistically, it is unlikely however, to raise the stakes, I have made a deal with myself not to by Sirocco until I have cooked the 32.  And I REALLY want that new book.

We’re going to be eating a LOT of Middle Eastern Food over the next few weeks.   I can’t wait!

Reading

The Shut Eye – Belinda Bauer

Loved it – a great thriller about a missing child and a suspect psychic.

When We Were Invincible – Jonathan Harnisch

I feel really bad about saying that I am not enjoying this because it seems quite ungrateful seeing as I got it for free off Net Galley.  But I am half way through and I ‘m really struggling.  The plot…what there is of it….revolves around a teenager who suffers from Tourette’s and his life at an elite prep school.  I’m finding it all bit too stream of consciousness-y; with not nearly enough context for me to be able to enjoy the story.

Ummmm….let me think of some positives….

  • It’s very likely a very real description of being in the head of someone who is mentally ill.
  • It’s short.
  • I love the cover.

Watching

I watched the movie Compliance and it totally ooked me out.  Seriously, watching it made me feel dirty.  Several times I wanted to turn it off  because it was painful to watch. Having said that I would actually recommend it.  But be warned it is TOUGH going.  It will also make you question every person who ever calls you on the phone.  Not a bad thing really seeing as it is based on true.

Then I watched The Breakfast Club.  Damn, I love that movie!  And it made everything all right with the world again.   And I spent about three days walking around singing “Hey, hey, hey, hey….”

I’m still not trusting anyone who calls me who is not on my speed dial though.

Cooking

I haven’t been cooking much as I have been working all the hours!  I have been living on toast or things from the freezer.  Hopefully things will slow down soon because next week I have marked out to cook:

  • Margaret Fulton’s Quail in Vine Leaves with Muscat Grapes
  • Sabrina Ghayour’s Safavid style beef pastries
  • Laurie Colwin’s Broccoli Salad

Ok, here’s the recipe for the Sorbet:

Print

Rhubarb, Rose and Passionfruit Sorbet

A lovely light, refreshing sorbet, not too sweet with a glorious pink colour.

Ingredients

Scale
  • 750g rhubarb
  • 75ml orange juice
  • 75g passionfruit pulp
  • 100g caster sugar
  • up to 50g icing sugar
  • up to 2 tsp rose water
  • 100g passionfruit pulp

Rhubarb Crumble Dust & Almond Shard

  • 18 Rhubarb Crumble boiled lollies (or any fruit flavoured boiled lollies)
  • 100g flaked almonds
  • Oil

To Serve

  • Ice Cream Cones
  • Maraschino Cherries

Instructions

  1. Trim the rhubarb and cut into 3-4cm lengths. Place in a large saucepan with the caster sugar and the orange juice.
  2. Bring to a simmer and cook gently until the rhubarb is completely soft. Puree in the pan until smooth.
  3. When cool, stir in the passionfruit.
  4. Taste and add the icing sugar as required.
  5. Stir in the rosewater. Start at about 1/4 teaspoon and add it gradually until you get your desired level of rosiness.
  6. Chill until cold and churn in an ice cream maker until soft set, then transfer to a freezer container and freeze until cold. Alternatively, pour the mixture into a freezer container and freeze for an hour. Then remove from the freezer and break up the frozen sides, pushing them into the softer centre. Return to the freezer and repeat every hour until the mixture is soft-set.
  7. Then let it freeze solid.

Rhubarb Crumble Dust

  1. Place the boiled lollies in your blender and grind into a powder.
  2. Remove a third of the mixture to sprinkle over the top of your sorbet as your dust.

Almond Shard

  1. Heat your oven to 180C
  2. Line a baking tray with baking paper and lightly grease. I used coconut oil.
  3. Sprinkle the paper with the almonds, then with the remaining crushed lolly powder.
  4. Place in the oven until the lollies melt.
  5. Remove from the oven and all to cool.
  6. Break into shards

To Serve

  1. Place two scoops of sorbet into an ice cream cone.
  2. Sprinkle a teaspoon over the Rhubarb Crumble Dust over the icecream, stab with an Almond Shard and top with a cherry.
  3. Enjoy!

Have a great week!  And let me know what you’ve been cooking, reading, watching!

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