There are a lot of things out there that are purely for our convenience, that can easily be made at a much lower cost and in a much larger quantity, see the Dukkah recipe for a great example of this. Until recently I thought that spice mixes were a waste of time and money, if […]

All pumpkin soups are very easy and every one can taste different depending on what is added to it, either in spices or other vegetables. Sweet potato or potatoes make great additions to change the flavour slightly, and curry spices or simply a rich stock can make the soup different. Roasting the pumpkin changes the flavour […]

Every year, for Christmas, I buy the best ham that I can and glaze and cook it. This makes the ham moist and flavoursome. The glaze is pretty much whatever you feel like putting in the mixture.I have put together a list of what I used in each year’s glaze. Cooking instructions are pretty much […]

Ingredients Head of cauliflower, cut into large florets 3 garlic cloves, or 3 tsp minced garlic 2 tbs vegetta Freshly ground black pepper 2 tbs chopped chives or other herb Instructions In a microwave dish, combine cauliflower, garlic, and Vegetta, cover with plastic wrap and cook in the microwave until tender. Transfer cauliflower and garlic to […]

This has become a real go-to dish, simple and made quickly. We grow our own sweet potatoes in season and when not we still have them in the cupboard as the preferred carbohydrate. Ingredients Quantities in the ingredients are not listed, make as much as is needed for the number of people being served Sweet […]

These are so much quicker and easier than standard chocolate crackles, taste better and look great, and can be modified to suit the season, red and green smarties for Christmas, green coloured white chocolate amd mini eggs for Easter. Can be made with bigger patty pans and pushed into a dish shape, filled with melted […]

I have reached the age at which I should make a Christmas cake – generally I buy a good quality, expensive Christmas cake, and then forget to serve it on Christmas Day. I then cut it into pieces and freeze them, eating it in small portions for most of the year. Christmas cake isn’t really […]

Why buy dukkah in tiny containers when it is so easy to make? The ingredients are fairly flexible and can be adjusted, particularly by adding more of something, right to the end. I use it as an opportunity to use up all the small quantities of nuts I have around. Ingredients Keep the 2 batches of […]

We’ve had a bit of a healthy eating fad going on at our house for a couple of weeks – no tea, coffee alcohol, refined/processed carbohydrates, starchy foods, low GI everything, lots of water, exercise and vegetables. I’m calling it a low carb, anti inflammatory, liver cleansing diet.  This morning, looking for a bit of […]

My first experience with marmalade – I spent ages researching this and eventually found some recipes that I thought sounded like the way that I cook. TANGELO MARMALADE So good and so easy – I think I have got it down to something easy to manage that suits my method of cooking. Ingredients About 8 […]

I never liked the cheese cakes that I have bought in cafés – the baked variety. They are just too dry compared to the unbaked variety which still remains a home cooked option. I have no idea why the unbaked one is not available in cafes, maybe because it would be hard to transport from […]

This recipe is from Julian, guaranteed great chilli crabs – made and eaten while travelling across the north of Australia – I would go back to Karumba just to eat their crabs. Method Clean crab and cut into quarters. With a hammer crack nippers and big claws, then chuck in pot with vegetable oil and […]

This is far easier and more flexible than most recipes would have you believe. Basically season the meat,  dredge it in flour, fry off, cook the vegetabels in the same pan, deglaze with wine. Put the vegetables, tomatoes, stock, herbs and meat into a pressure cooker and cook till tender. Ingredients 8 osso buco pieces […]

Yesterday I got out the pasta machine to make flat bread. It hadn’t been out of the cupboard in several years and I had forgotten how easy it was to use and how well it kneaded dough. Today I heard Italian food being discussed on the radio and the recipe for pasta was given. Last time […]

There are 2 recipes here, one made with milk and the second with oil. Tbe second is great for camping. FLAT BREAD with Yoghurt / Kefir I saw Matt Preston make flat bread with yoghurt on Master Chef the other night. It looked so easy that I had to give it a go using kefir […]

I needed to come up with something to go with soup, we don’t buy bread any more because we are reducing our Carb intake, so when I need a bread I need to make it. This is so good and easy, and tastes a bit like a damper. So good in fact that we ate […]

This year I have grown my first ever sweet potato patch. Because the weather this Autumn has been so warm the plants haven’t begun to die back so we are going to have a bumper crop and are harvesting as we need them. The sweet potatoes need to harden for about 10 days before using […]

Home made mayonnaise is so easy and tastes so much better than the store bought stuff that it is worth making no matter how much you actually need. You do need a good mixer – I have used a food processor and a blender but the best is my new, super-fast Bamix. The food processor […]

We are still picking mushrooms from our spent mushroom compost. They are coming up in the garden under the spinach leaves. The last thing we now feel like eating is mushrooms but I came up with this mushroom sauce recipe and it is really good. I can eat it even though I have difficulty looking […]

Our wood fired pizza oven has been used many times for pizzas, and has made the best paella, only possible because of the even high temperature on the base of the oven. I have just made the best roast pork I have ever made, with fantastic crackling so I am writing down what I did […]

I have finally ventured into growing my own milk kefir. These are my first “grains”, bought on e-bay. The 2 scoops of grains came packed in a zip-lock bag in a little powdered milk with a full set of instructions. This is enough to kefir about 1/2 litre of milk over 24 hours. I followed […]

This is awesome – totally to die for. Don’t make too many because it is so rich that you can only eat a small amount but most decided that we could skip the pizzas and go straight to the desert pizza next time. BANANA AND CHOCOLATE DESERT PIZZA Ingredients Be totally creative here. This is […]

  PIZZA DOUGH We bought a wood fired pizza oven and then discovered that there is a lot more to pizza than we had ever imagined. The main thing that I learned is that there is an art to the dough and that all doughs are not created equal. To this end we have spent […]

One more thing to do with all of my mushrooms. This one used 1 kg of mushrooms and made a fair amount of soup. It was lovely. Excess can be frozen before the cream/ricotta is added. This quantity would seem to serve about 12. The three of us will eat it over a few days, […]