Chilli Rosemary Oven Fondue

I have been meaning to try this for a while. Straight forward, painless and really great. The flavours can swing as wildly as you like here by using different herbs and spices, citrus rind or inserting something smoky like fried bacon pieces. It is important though that you find a cheese wheel that has a wooden container and is wrapped in foil or grease proof paper or you may find melted plastic which aint cool.

1 small cheese wheel
Garlic slivers
Chilli slices
Rosemary sprigs

Peel back the wrapping from the top of the cheese. Use a small sharp knife to make incisions all over the cheese and insert your flavourings. Re-wrap with the foil and place the wooden lid back on. Place into a 120C preheated oven for 20 minutes or so. Remove and tuck in with biscuits, bread or vegetables.

Thyme and Start Anise Potted Prawn

Wow. Ticks all of the boxes - simple, cheap, quick, stupidly tasty. Some chilli would have been good too.

200 gms cooked prawn, peeled

200 gms unsalted butter
1 clove garlic sliced
2 pieces lemon rind
Small handful of thyme leaves
2 star anise
1/2 tbs mayonnaise
Rind of 1/2 a lemon
1 spring onion minced finely
Salt and pepper
1 baguette thinly sliced
Extra virgin olive oil


Melt the butter over a low heat and throw in the garlic, star anise, lemon rind and thyme. Infuse for 10 or 15 minutes but don't allow to colour. While the happens, mince the prawn with a knife then combine with the remaining ingredients, then spoon into a ramekin. When the butter is ready carefully pour half into the ramekin and gently fold through with a teaspoon. Squish the prawn down flat lightly. Place some of the thyme on top and then 1 star anise before pouring in the remaining butter. If necessary squish down the star anise to submerge. Refrigerate to solidify. Take out of the fridge 10 minutes before you wish to use it. To serve drizzle some extra virgin olive oil over the baguette slices and grill on one side until crunchy. Tuck in.

Mushroom and Prawn Bruschetta

Easy as. I made this taste even more mushroom like by using some porcini oil I made by soaking some porcini mushrooms in some extra virgin olive oil - an inexpensive little trick. I bought my bread from the Dayboro Bakery, they not only make the best pie and peas in the world, they also bake amazing bread - if you get the chance, check them out.



300 gms prawns shelled
Some great bread sliced
4 or 5 big mushrooms sliced
2 cloves garlic sliced
3 tbs extra virgin olive oil
1 handful parsley chopped
Salt and pepper
1 tbs marinated feta


Drizzle some oil over the bread. Heat 2 tbs of the oil to medium high, bung in the garlic and fry until fragrant, throw in the mushroom, some salt and pepper and cook until coloured. Remove and mix through the parsley and feta, set aside. Grill the bread. Heat the remain oil to medium high then flash fry the prawns until tender and just cooked through. Bread, shroom, prawns on top, drink some wine.

Socca

Listening to mates is a great idea. They know things; great bands, cool books, sweet movies and sooper nice food. Thanks Helen. This is a bastardized version of the recipe I was told (apparently my local major supermarket food chain don't stock chickpea flour) but it worked anywho. I grabbed a packet of gluten free flour (read here: rice flour) and hoped for the best. Whilst I am sure the texture is different it did the job. This was made for the Kindy kids when I made Cherry Tomato Jam.

500 gms rice flour
An equal portion of water
1 tbs fresh chopped herbs
Salt flakes
Olive oil for frying

Combine flour, herbs, water and a little salt until it forms a thickish batter. Heat some olive oil in a large non stick pan to medium high, ladle in some batter and fry on one side. Carefully flip and sprinkle with some sea salt flakes. Fry some more, flip, sprinkle with sea salt flakes. Repeat once more then remove. Do this until your batter is gone. More oil will be prepared throughout the process. Eat with anything really.

Prawn, Sweet Potato and Mushroom Pizza

So good.
If you like this recipe, try these.

300gm green prawns shelled

4 cloves garlic minced
1/2 bunch parsley minced
1/4 of a sweet potato
300 gms mushroom minced
Basil leaves
1 onion finely sliced
Mozzerella
4 pizza bases
1 tbs extra virgin olive oil
Juice of half a lemon
Salt and pepper
Tomato passatta

Preheat an oven to 220C. Chop the green prawns into thumb nail size pieces and combine with the extra virgin, salt and pepper, half of the garlic and the lemon juice. Hack at the sweet potato with a vegetable peeler making a pile of very thin slices. Spread 1 or 2 tbs of passatta over each base, sprinkle over the garlic, tear on the basil leaves, divide out mushrooms and a light sprinkling of mozarella. Top with the sweet potato slices and prawn followed by as much cheese as you like. Bake for 10 or 15 minutes.
I like to serve mine with chilli slices and dressed rocket on top.

Lamb Cutlets with Minted Pesto Crust

Holy moly, this was good. The only difficult part was getting the pesto right - which is as simple as tasting it and adjusting it with more of whatever you need. Here I used a 1:1 ratio of basil and mint but I think that it would be better at 1:2 ratio basil to mint. Experimenting with other herbs or sauces like romesco or chimichurri would be brilliant too, just make sure there is enough oil to moisten the crumb and then crisp it. This would only have been about 5 minutes work and 10 minutes cooking. When you make the pesto substitue 2/3 of the basil for mint and make a smaller batch. Alternatively try my Mint and Parmessan Crusted Lamb Cutlets or Lamb Cutlets with Plum, Red Wine and Mushroom Sauce recipes.

3 tbs pesto, minted

8 lamb cutlets (or more)

4 tbs Panko (bread crumbs)
Salt and pepper
Extra virgin olive oil
1/4 lemon
2 tsp store bought balsamic reduction


Season the lamb with some olive oil, pepper and the juice of the lemon and allow to come to room temperature. Heat a barbecue to very hot. Season the lamb with salt and sear both sides well on the barbecue, remove to a clean plate and allow to rest for a couple of minutes. In the meantime, combine the minted pesto and the bread crumbs and spoon to the top of each cutlet. Heat a grill to very hot and place the cutlets under to crisp up. When they have nice colour remove to serving plates and add some balsamic glaze to the plate for dipping/dragging through.
I served this with some barbecued sweet potato, butter wilted spinach and some rosemary garlic potatoes. Unreal.

Homemade Bagels

Not my recipe but I have made it lots of times and would like to share it. This gear is tasty as, not difficult but a little fiddly. Heaps worth it though. The actual bread making part is simple, as is forming the bagels but there are a few steps. In total it was about 30 mins to mix and form, in the fridge overnight, simmer for 1 minute and bake for 15 minutes. Awesomeness in bread form.

500+ gms plain flour

375 ml warm water

1 packet dried yeast (7 gms)

1 tsp sugar

2 tsp salt

1 tbs honey

Polenta for dusting

Mix the yeast, sugar and water and stand until it is foamy, about 5 minutes. When foamy mix in the honey. Stir the water into the flour and salt and mix with a wooden spoon until it forms a stiff dough. Turn out onto a floured surface and knead until elastic and firm, about ten minutes, more flour may be needed. When ready divide into 8, roll into balls and cover with a clean tea towel for 10 minutes. Roll each out into a 25 - 30cm rope of even thickness. Moisten one end of a rope and attach it to the other end, squashing and kind of rolling it, trying to keep the thickness even. Place onto a tray well floured with polenta, repeat with remaining 'ropes'. Refrigerate overnight, covered in cling wrap.
Take the bagels out of the fridge 20 mins before cooking. Boil a large sauce of water and preheat an oven to 240C.
Simmer each bagel in the water 1 or 2 at a time for 1 minute including a turn then remove to a wire rack until all are done. Sprinkle each bagel with poppy seeds, sesame seeds or pepper if you want. Place on baking paper lined trays and bake for 15 minutes or until golden. Remove and cool, fill with tasty gear - I used cream cheese, avocado, salmon, basil leaves, oven roasted cherry tomatoes.

Seafood Risotto Cakes

Tasty as and it were left overs. I'm not going to go through the process for making risotto here, the process is the same as making any risotto but feel free to check out some of my previous risotto recipes (Mushroom and Silverbeet Risotto, Asparagus Pea and Mint Risotto, Cacciatore Basil'd Chicken and Blue Cheese Risotto etc). The only difference I made to the basic was that I flavoured the stock with bashed garlic, parsley stems, prawn heads and shells then removed them with a slotted spoon. When the risotto was almost done (about 5 minutes from the very end I added in diced fish, thinly sliced squid, scallops and green prawns and some lemon juice. Very nice. My favourite part about the risotto cakes were the whole prawns trapped inside the cake - unreal. We ate this by itself with a squeeze of lemon but it would be very nice with aioli and a simple salad.

Left over seafood risotto

2 eggs

3 cups Panko bread crumbs (or other)

2 cups seasoned flour

Oil for frying

Salt flakes
Lemon wedges

Beat one egg with a fork and fold through the risotto. Form the risotto into cakes with your hands or by using a chefs mould. Heat the oil 1 or 2 cm deep in a heavy based frying pan to medium high. Beat the remaining egg in a bowl. Carefully flour the cakes, coat in egg and cover with crumbs. Fry on each side until golden taking care not to break. Alternatively deep fry them until golden. Remove to absorbent paper, season with salt, squeeze over some lemon and serve straight away.

Tomato Bread

Super super simple. This is great as an accompaniment to a meal, on its own, as the base for bruschetta or with an antipasto platter or tapas selection. Use the nicest bread you can get your hands on eg, sour dough, ciabatta, bruschetta bread, baguettes. Also, I find that toasting only one side gives a much more interesting result - crunchy on top but soft everywhere else. This is about as simple as a tapas dish gets.


Version 1 (Traditional)
Slices of nice bread
Ripe tomatoes sliced in half
Garlic cloves whole
Salt
Extra virgin olive oil

Grill one side of the bread until just toasted. Rub the cooked side first with the garlic followed by the cut side of the ripe tomato. Season with salt and drizzle with a little extra virgin.


Version 2 (my interpretation)
Slices of nice bread
Oven roasted cherry tomatoes and their oil

Works 2 ways.

1. Smear some oil on each piece of bread, place under a hot grill. When toasted remove and smear 1 roasted tomato on each. Sweet.
2. Smear some oil and a roasted tomato on each piece of bread and toast under a grill until cooked. Darker flavour.

Crumbs for Fish/Chicken

Use anything you find tasty really but all I would suggest is make your own bread crumbs, its simple. I have made bread crumbs with Chinese five spice in, onion and garlic powder, onion, oregano, just salt and pepper and, a combination of the following and various other herbs. For the bread mix I just use what is at hand, tonight it was left over sourdough bread and 2 slices of bruschetta bread, both I found in the freezer. Sliced white also works. Bought stuff is OK and functional but lacks depth as it is too fine and quite flavourless. Having said that the Japanese version of store bought bread crumbs, Panko, is wicked. If I can get it in western Queensland, you can get it anywhere. Whatever you think you won't use (before you taint it with raw egg etc), put in a freezer bag and into the freezer for another time.


6 slices of bread (ish)
3 or 4 slices of parmessan
1 handful of parsley
A few sprigs of thyme
Salt and pepper
Zest of 1 lemon
Polenta or semolina
2 or 3 eggs whisked


If the bread you wish to use is not stale, stick it under the grill at a medium heat for a couple of minutes either side but don't toast it as such. Combine the bread (torn), parmessan, parsley, thyme, zest, salt and pepper in a blender/whizz thing and pulverize until you have a both a fine and chunky texture. In order have bowls/plates filled with polenta, egg and bread crumb. Dip your meat product into the previous in the written order, pressing in the crumbs and shallow fry.
Serve with slices of lemon and whatever else.