Muesli Cookies

We all love muesli bars at my house, perhaps a little too much. A batch rarely lasts more than a day, and so I've been looking for a slightly healthier alternative that we can all enjoy with a little less guilt and a little less exercise required to counteract the over-indulgence. I often scan Teresa Cutter's website in search for healthy ideas, and last week gave her Oatmeal Honey Scones a go. They were a big hit! They are egg-free and dairy free which doesn't bother our household specifically, but I have a few friends whose children have allergies so another recipe up my sleeve is a bonus. They are also super quick to whip up. As always, I added a bit of lib with the recipe, using what I had on hand, so here is my version:

2 1/2 cups rolled oats
1 tablespoon linseed, soy & almond (LSA) mix
1/2 teaspoon bicarb soda
1/4 cup honey
1/4 cup sunflower oil
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 ripe banana
120g chopped fresh dates (pitted)

1. Preheat fan forced oven to 160C. Line a baking tray with baking paper.
2. Place everything minus the dates in a food processor and whiz for 20ish seconds until everything is combined and the oats are mostly chopped.
3. Add dates and whiz to combine.
4. Spoon about a teaspoon worth of mixture for each cookie onto the baking paper and flatten slightly.
5. Bake for 10-12 minutes or until slightly brown and just starting to crack on top.

I made these into 22 little Muesli Cookies, whereas Teresa Cutter made 8 large "scones" out of the same size batch. That way the kids could have a couple and feel like they were being spoiled (and without any sugar or butter, I could have a few and not fear for my arterial health). They are really yummy. I think they might actually taste better than our muesli bars, and of course the recipe is open for experimentation. I've made 3 batches of these since discovering the recipe, but I think I'll try playing with the ingredients next time, maybe changing the fruit and adding some other seeds. FYI, they don't set hard like a biscuit, they are quite soft, I guess given there is no flour.

On another note, I have just been introduced to The Book Depository. How I didn't know about this before is beyond me, but they do free shipping world wide, and their prices are amazing! Needless to say I have a few Nigel Slater gems headed my way.

And on yet another note, we found out today that Chicky and Poppet will be getting a sister in January.

Flocks and Friands

The complete lack of egg production from our chickens over the last 8 months made us reconsider the flock. The cochins, very attractive birds, had grown quite large. Two were clearly roosters and we aren't allowed to keep roosters where we live. The two females hadn't started laying yet (I've read it's quite normal for them to take 10 months to start, but then egg production isn't consistent or reliable). They were also fairly unsociable and the girls couldn't handle them like the Isa Browns. Unfortunately we lost two of our original Isa Browns at various times this year and the only remaining hen had never laid. Given all of the above, we decided to re-home our flock and start again. Approximately 3 minutes after I posted a "free" ad on Gumtree, the phone calls began and by the end of the week the chickens had gone to 3 different homes.

On Saturday afternoon we picked up four new Isa Brown pullets. They quickly made themselves at home and started fossicking through the self-sewn tomato plants.

My girls were very excited to meet the new girls of the garden, and Chicky has taken on the responsibility of taming them with lots of "pats and cuddles".

And we are already being rewarded. Since arriving on Saturday afternoon, they have laid 10 eggs. I'm excited just thinking about all the baking I'll be able to do!

Speaking of baking, I got straight on the job tonight and baked some Raspberry and Dark Choc Friands. I don't think I've ever eaten a friand before, let alone made any, and I wasn't really sure what to expect. I was pleasantly surprised by the finished product (yes, I've eaten 2 already).

The only change I made to Celia's recipe, was using Callebaut 54% dark chocolate callets in place of 70%. In the absence of a friand pan, what else could I use but bright blue patty pans? These made the friands a little smaller than in the original recipe so I stretched the batter out to make 9. How good are raspberries? I must have eaten a handful of frozen raspberries in the process. Friands will definitely be going on my list of "morning tea possibilities" when I have visitors.

Back to Basics

I've started running again. It's weird, very different but oh so therapeutic.

I stopped running when I was 6 weeks pregnant and contracted giardia, which rendered me weak, tired and void of enthusiasm. Given the complications of morning sickness and the fact that we were travelling the country, the giardia went undiagnosed until we got home 4 weeks later. I then had to wait until I was in the second trimester to take antibiotics for it, so after 6 weeks of gastro-like symptoms I had lost a lot of weight, almost all muscle mass and all my stamina. All the efforts I'd made to ensure I was in tip-top shape pre-pregnancy were moot. Perhaps being in prime physical condition helped the recovery, but it certainly felt like I was left with nothing.

So at 13 weeks pregnant, with the visitors evicted from my digestive tract and breakfast only occasionally revisiting, I began the journey to regain some of the muscle and stamina that I'd lost. At first I could walk little more than a kilometer to the local supermarket without having to nap when I got home. I slowly built this up to a 4km walk and had started cycling regularly on an indoor trainer (both my arms and legs looked like the arms of a Schleck brother!) when our household got hit with a nasty head cold. We somehow managed to back this up with the flu. Now at almost 17 weeks I am finally getting back into some regular exercise. I'm back at step aerobics (which I did up to 28 weeks when I was pregnant with Poppet), I started swimming again this week (oh my lord my shoulders hate me), I'm cycling on the trainer a couple of times a week and this weekend I started running again. Re-reading that sentence, it sounds like an awful lot for a preggo to take on, but compared to pre-pregnancy where I was running 50kms each week plus aerobics, plus swimming, plus cycling, I really am "taking it easy", I promise.

So pregnant Pam runs quite differently to pre-pregnant Pam. If you've been pregnant, you'll know that some of the hormones involved in nurturing your bundle of joy (primarily relaxin), cause your ligaments to loosen. The biggest offenders are the ligaments of the sacro-illiac joint in your pelvis. This has to happen, otherwise the thing the size of a watermelon won't fit out the exit the size of a golf ball, it's not rocket science. To an athlete, "loose ligaments" sounds like an injury, and this is one reason why you should be careful exercising during pregnancy. Pushing those relaxed ligaments too far will result in injury, so pregnancy is not the time to push your body to its limits. Being sick and effectively starting from scratch has helped me here. Running like a granny isn't such a bad thing for bubs and I!

So my leisurely 6km jog this afternoon consisted of a 200m walk break half way through (mostly to have a drink and to give my heart rate a chance to recover - too much blood moving away from the uterus for too long isn't good for bubs, so little breaks are great for us both). Can you tell I studied reproductive biology at uni? Education is great, but maybe if I were more ignorant I'd be sitting in a beanbag, watching Oprah with a donut in one hand and a coke in the other. I like to think my baby and my body will thank me for being an active mumma, and maybe I still ate the donut when I got back from my run.

Where was I? A mid-way break for recovery. The break also provided an opportunity pee-stop. The kid is the size of an avocado and my bladder is already compromised! I could feel my pelvis moving while I ran which was a little unnerving, but completely normal. I could also feel the milk jugs shudder with each step. Don't get me wrong, I have a good sports bra, but the puppies have just realised that we're pregnant and have shot up from non-quite-an-A-cup to something more like you might see on a Canberra-bought video. Keep in mind they were feeding Poppet up until a couple of months ago, so I'm not sure why they seem so shocked by all this, but needless to say it adds another interesting element to running.

I can see how all these changes might put even a runner off running during pregnancy, but the endorphins that were bouncing through my body this afternoon made me ignore the pain in my hip flexors and start planning the next run. I doubt I'll run much more than 6kms at a time until the wee-un is out, and pace is something set by my body and not my watch, but being active again is what's important, not just for me physically, but for my mental state. I was sick for a while, but now I'm not sick, I'm just pregnant, and while my doctor is happy and I'm happy, that's not going to stop me from being me.

Banana and Date Scones

Legend has it that this week is International Scone Week. With two very ripe bananas in the freezer, what better opportunity than to give my mother-in-law's Banana and Date Scone recipe a go? I haven't had much success in the past making scones, and find the lemonade version much more foolproof than the traditional recipe, but think I may have gotten a bit of technique sorted in my last couple of attempts, with help from my food processor.

Here's the recipe, as my mother-in-law defines it, with not quite exact measurements. I think it takes a bit of experience and observation to gague just how much of the flour and milk to add. I replaced plain SR flour with wholemeal and found it worked just as well.

• 40g butter, cubed
• 2 cups plus a bit of wholemeal SR flour
• 1 large or 2 small mashed bananas
• 1/2 cup chopped dates
• pinch ground cinnamon
• 3/4 cup milk (or as much as you need to bring dough together)

1. Preheat a fan forced oven to 220C. Lightly grease the holes of a 12-hole muffin tray.
2. Mix butter and flour on low speed in a food processor until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. Alternatively rub the butter into the flour with your fingertips.
3. Transfer the mixture to a large mixing bowl. Add the mashed banana, dates, cinnamon and almost all of the milk. Slice through the mixture with a butter knife until just combined, adding more milk if necessary to bring dough together.
4. With floured hands, turn dough onto a smooth surface and break gently into 12 even pieces. Place one piece into each hole of the muffin tray. I prefer this technique over cutting the dough into rounds as I find it removes some of the handling which can toughen the dough.
5.  Bake for 10-15 minutes or until slightly browned. 

These are a tasty, healthy snack that are best eaten warm, with or without a little butter. As with all scones, they are best eaten the day they are baked, but if you find you have leftovers at the end of the day, they freeze well. Thirty seconds each in the microwave is all they need to defrost. Happy International Scone Week!

In My Kitchen - August 2012

I've been spending a bit of time in my kitchen lately, since nausea seems to be giving me a break and my appetite has returned to normal (if anything I'm a little more ravenous than usual!). I've even been getting a bit more creative with dinners, cooking spinach & ricotta cannelloni, tuna mornay and spinach & egg pie this week, none of which have appeared in my kitchen for many months. Unfortunately I don't have any new toys in my kitchen this month, but I do have a few other things of interest.

In my kitchen are some whole macadamia nuts, in their shells. My sister-in-law recently went "down south" and brought these back for me, amongst a few other little goodies. For the non-West Aussie readers, "down south" refers to the south west region of Western Australia. These macadamias are the hardest nuts I've ever tried to crack. We broke our nut crackers on the first one and have since resorted to a vice and hammer. They kind of make you burn the calories before consuming them.

 

In my kitchen is a batch of (slightly overcooked thanks to baby brain) Breakfast Muffins, ready to share with a local community group I go to. There are often lots of evil tasty treats brought for morning tea, so I thought I'd be the healthy contingent this month. Next time I might take some decadent Mocha Bars to even things out.

In my kitchen (in my freezer to be precise) is a batch of Nigel Slater's Apple Icecream. I watched him make caramelised apples with this icecream on the TV a few days ago, and while I've never made icecream and don't own an icecream maker, this looked too easy not to try. And it was incredibly easy, using ready-made pouring custard. The end result basically tastes like frozen custard with apples (which it is). It's a pleasant change from the shop-bought chocolate icecream that normally resides in my freezer.I might have to make some sort of pudding tonight to go with it.

In my kitchen is a copy of The Edible Balcony by Indira Naidoo. This was a birthday present from hubby. I turned 30 while we were on the road (What was that? I don't look a day over 25? You are too kind!), and he managed to sneak the girls off shopping, buy me this together with a book about running, and hide them in the camper trailer until my birthday. Needless to say the books got a little scratched and stained by red dirt, but I was none the less impressed with his efforts. Naidoo has some great tips and ideas about gardening in small spaces, and the book is packed with lots of fun recipes too.

Other than being a mess from my renewed interest in cooking and baking, nothing else noteworthy can be found in my kitchen this month. I have grand ideas about baking bread and flavoured scrolls this afternoon, but I suspect sleepiness and dinner preparation may stand in my way. Maybe tomorrow...

Check out what's happening in some other kitchens this month by following the links at Fig Jam and Lime Cordial. 

A Mocha Bar Variation

Yesterday, Celia from Fig Jam and Lime Cordial posted a recipe for Mocha Bars. These little pieces of heaven are what I would call a brownie-biscotti hybrid. The shape and crisp outer gives the illusion of biscotti, but the decadent, soft interior reminds me of a good brownie. Needless to say, the recipe was so inviting I gave it a go as soon as I'd read it. Here's my adapted recipe, utilising ingredients I had on hand.

• 125g (½ cup) unsalted butter
• 55g (½ cup) raw (natural) cocoa powder
• 3 large eggs
• 150g (¾ cup) raw sugar
• 100g (½ cup) soft brown sugar
• 20ml (4 teaspoons) vanilla extract
• 40ml (8 teaspoons) strongly brewed black instant coffee
• 375g (2½ cups) plain flour
• 1½ teaspoons baking powder, sifted
• pinch of salt
• 180g milk chocolate chips (I used Callebaut 34%)
• 180g dark chocolate chips (I used Callebaut 54%)
• 100g slivered almonds

The original recipe called for Tia Maria, but I didn't have any, nor a desire to buy any so I used coffee. I really could have percolated some but I was lazy so went with instant. I also replaced some of the chocolate chips for almonds, so remove a little of the guilt.

I followed Celia's baking procedure, and the one log that I baked barely cooled before being devoured. Thank goodness I froze the other 3!

Tangerine Custard Cake

"Hey remember that month when I only ate boxes of tangerines. So cheap and juicy!" - Regina Spektor

Good friends of ours, Craig and Kristen, have a very fruitful tangerine tree in their back yard. Their recent harvest saw in excess of 300 edible fruit, about 30 of which made it to my kitchen on the weekend. So what do you do when life throws you tangerines? Drink copious amounts of tangerine juice to ward of the winter cold demons, and then make a Tangerine Custard Cake.

I adapted this recipe from the Orange Custard Cake recipe in my ever-faithful Golden Circle copy of Cooking: a common sense guide. I used my food processor because....well why not? The original recipe called for more traditional techniques like rubbing butter into flour with fingertips, but with my barely-used new food processor sitting there staring at me, I had to give it a go.Here's the recipe as I made it this morning.

2 cups (250g) self-raising flour
1/3 cup (40g) custard powder
80g butter, chopped
1 cup (255g) caster sugar
3 eggs
2 tsp finely grated tangerine rind
1 cup (250ml) tangerine juice

Cream Cheese Icing
125g cream cheese, softened
3 tbsp icing sugar
2 tbsp tangerine juice

1. Preheat fan forced oven to 180C. Line a cake tin with baking paper (I used a 20cm x 20cm square tin but if I owned a bundt tin I definitely would have used that.
2. Sift flour and custard powder into the large bucket of a food processor. Add chopped butter and process until the mixture resembles fine bread crumbs.
3. Add the eggs, tangerine juice and rind and process on low speed until smooth.
4. Pour/scrape batter into cake tin and bake for 35 mins or until a skewer comes out just clean (keep an eye on it in the last 10 minutes to avoid over-cooking).
5. When the cake is completely cook, mix together the cream cheese, icing sugar and 2 tbsp of tangerine juice. The quantities may be a bit out, I just kept adding a bit more icing sugar and a bit more juice until I liked the taste. Spread icing over the top of the cake.

The tangerine juice makes this cake lovely and moist (providing you don't over-cook it), and the custard powder seems to give it a silky texture. 

If anyone has any tried and tested tangerine recipes, please pass them on. Now that I'm starting to feel a little more human as I bid the first trimester farewell, my appetite is encompassing things other than hot chips and Ribena. Hopefully my kitchen will start getting a bit more love and attention, and my family a more interesting range of dishes.