I myself am a complete chilli wuss. But this may interest some people.

Drilled chilli beef

I was just given a buttload of Deer Hamburger. I love the stuff, but what can I do with it other than the normal hamburgery type stuff?

Any ideas.?

I asked a question about rice the other day, and mentioned that as part of the rest of the meal I was giving this soup a go. Well, it turned out very succesfully, so here are the results!



The soup was actually quite delicious, if I do say so myself. Just the right amount of sweetness and spice, and it got several compliments. A lovely bright colour too!

I took hints from some of the comments left as to what to do with my rice, and ended up adding fried over red onions and the middle sections of the marrow. The stuffed marrows also turned out very well, the meat was very flavoursome and the vegetable also soaked up a lot of flavour.

The only minor drawback was the salad i'd bought to go alongside, which turned out to be herb salad containing coriander... everyone else enjoyed it, but i'm not a fan of the stuff so had to pick it out!

For dessert we had ice cream, rhubarb pie (not homemade, this time) and chopped fruit.

( recipes, and a picture of the main course below )

Every year I throw a Chinese New Year dinner for my friends. There's always too much food, but very little of it makes it to the ice box for leftovers. I've posted the recipes for most of these dishes before so I won't bore you again, but the recipe for the Shiny Chicken is a new doctored recipe I threw together.( Pics and Chicken Recipe )

So last night was my boyfriend's birthday, and I had promised to cook a roast chicken with all the trimmings. Come midday yesterday, however, and we were both languishing in the heat of a southern hemisphere summer, to the point where the last thing I wanted to do was hover over a stove basting roast vegetables. So I suggested that I still make the chicken, but instead of having hot vegetables, substituting a cool orzo salad. This made his eyes light up, because orzo is one of our favourite foods which we eat far less often than we should.
No photos, unfortunately, because the camera batteries weren't charged enough, but imagine tender slices of lemon and basil basted roast chicken, laid out over a heaping serve of chilled, perfectly al dente rice-shaped pasta stirred through with a generous amount of basil, cashew and parmesan pesto, chopped red peppers, homegrown cherry tomatoes, red onion and roasted chopped cashews, with the added tang of whole, roasted and caramelized garlic cloves and salty feta. Mmmn. Served with a fresh leaf salad tossed with balsamic vinaigrette which seeped into the edges of the orzo and imparted extra flavour, this meal was a definite hit, and I think I'll reprise it again sans the chicken as an easy and delicious house-warming party meal.
We finished our meal with another favourite, dark chocolate mousse topped with lightly whipped cream and blueberries. Even though this is a recipe I've made many times, I managed to screw it up a bit by putting in about four times the amount of butter and twice the amount of chocolate the recipe called for (yup, when I glanced at my recipe, I managed to mix up the amount of chocolate and the amount of butter, and my conversions from oz to grams). This meant that the texture of the mousse was much more solid than normal, almost like a cross betweeen a mousse and a cake. It wasn't bad - in fact my boyfriend and flatmate proclaimed it as better than the original- but I prefer the light fluffiness of the original mousse recipe.
( Recipes under cut... )

It all started in August 2005. I was working up north (Broome) at the bird observatory there. Now there are only 6 staff up here (2 are volunteers), we all lived at the observatory where we worked so it became more like family than workmates. My boss had come from Sydney where she lived across from a Hindu temple. She'd also had the luck of having Korma teach her how to cook Indian food. She is also vegan.

On this night in August she decided to cook us up a vegan Indian feast. I was surprised by the end of the night. I had never imagined vegan food could be so yummy and filling. She taught me a thing or two about vegan cooking. :) (I'm not vegan myself, but I'll eat anything that tastes good).

So, what did she cook us?

( Many photos )
I never imagined vegan food could be so tasty and filling. My gosh that was a delicious meal. Those pakoras... *bliss*

I bought a box of papadums a while ago because they were in the bargain bin. Last week I made mango chutney to use up the mangoes I couldn't eat in time. From there I figured we needed an Indian night, and all of a sudden I decided last night should be it.

I was extremely impressed with myself, I usually end up in a flustered panic in the kitchen because some stuff is cooked way before something else or I don't have what I need or I can't tend to everything at once. I'm actually getting more organised now, and I can enlist the help of my b/f for some things.

Yesterday I made...
Dahl - We didn't eat this, this is for my lunches at work.
Naan bread - These tasted good, but more like scones than naan. I followed the recipe but these didn't turn out how I'd hoped.
Tamarind chutney - the last batch was almost out.
Rogan Josh - The centerpiece.
Vegetable pakoras - The entree, served with the mango and tamarind chutneys. Cauliflower, zuchinni and yellow capsicum.
Pappadums - well, we only had to briefly fry these to prepare them.

( Photos! )

I'll need to learn how to make some Indian desserts now. The only problem is the b/f and I can't eat so much food in one sitting!

i have a bag of organic shiitake mushrooms.  what should i do with them? 

I had some left over cabbage from a catering gig and decided to make kimchee.....



( Salt and Chili Sauce after the jump... )

I catered a cocktail party for 20 hungry men last night. I grabbed my camera during a lull in the prep.



( More after the jump )

Today we had lots of cold and ice and to combat it we built a fire and made a stew. It occurred to me that some fire roasted jalapeños would be the perfect addition to what I had in mind. It turned out to be a huge hit! I only wish I had some marshmallows to roast for dessert!



Recipe & Picture!

So my friend hates cake (I know, it's nuts).

I'm helping plan a party for him that has a junior-high theme. I'm making a special dessert for him... but I want to have a cake for everyone else that's one of those cakes that's created/built out of trashy pre-made desserts (twinkies, ho-ho's, ding dongs).

I have the basic building blocks, but does anyone have advice for me about how to make the whole thing stick together? Or a website where they could point me that tells how to build a "cake" out of little Debbies/Hostess treats/the like?