Rhubarb and the 'burbs

On Saturday we had dinner with friends out at their place in the suburbs. In Adelaide, the 'burbs are around a 15 minute drive from the city centre. When Paul and I moved to the North East suburbs, my friends thought it was soooooo far away. It was a 10 minute drive from Adelaide or 15 in rush hour. A taxi ride home cost $20. Gosh, Adelaide is TINY compared to Melbourne.

We drove for an hour on the Monash freeway to get to our friend's house. And this is still suburban Melbourne. On our way home at night, we got caught in a traffic jam. It was totally bizarre. Traffic was practically stationary. If it was Adelaide, you would have only seen 2 cars on your way home. I think it's going to take a while getting used to driving here.

We had a great dinner with Jess, Matt and Kristina. I continued the ingredient of the month challenge and made a Rhubarb Yeast Cake, which was essentially a big sticky bun filled with rhubarb, walnuts and dried cranberries. I modified a Stephanie Alexander recipe.

It was very tasty and I have loads left over for morning tea at work for the week.

Jess and Kristina posed nicely for the camera, but Matt and Paul decided to do a funny pose. Matt looks normal at any rate.

A Weekend Of Firsts

This weekend I made two things for the first time.

The first one of those things is sausages. I made Pork, Apple and Sage sausages. I minced the pork myself, so I know that they're nice and lean. I added finely chopped apple, sage and onion to the mix as well as bread crumbs, egg and salt. I then fed them into casings using the sausage making attachment for the mincer. I used the ratios from the book that came with the mincer/sausage maker. Turns out there's slightly too much salt, but that can be fixed next time.

This is the finished product.

My next first was icecream. Well, I don't have an icecream machine, so it was semifreddo. I used a gourmet traveller recipe for vanilla icecream and then swirled some stewed rhubarb through it before I froze it, so it could be part of my ingredient of the month creations. I put some in icypole moulds and some in ramekins. Here are a couple fresh out of the moulds.

The were extremely tasty!

Toast and Lasagne

On Tuesday night we took the newly acquired car out for a spin to Ali and Carter's house for dinner. We brought with us a fresh supply of lasagne - one for dinner that night and 4 others for the freezer.

Jenson went to bed just before dinner, but Ali and Carter had to take turns settling him over dinner, while Paul and I ate and conversed with whoever was not on Jenson duty at the time. After Jenson had settled, it was very much like old times. Drinking, eating, laughing and just generally having fun. Well, designated driver Paul skipped out on the drinking part because he was driving, but I'm pretty sure he still had fun. We've got the next dinner lined up and we're looking forward to it!

Paul made rhubarb bread last night. We used this recipe for rhubarb bread in the bread machine. I made the rhubarb puree and Paul did the rest.

We had it for breakfast this morning. It's not particularly sweet and you can taste the tartness of the rhubarb. It goes really well with honey. We made the smaller loaf and discovered that it's too small for the bread machine, so next time we'll probably make the larger loaf, and take the dough out to bake in the oven. I might add a touch more sugar next time too.

Rhubarb Cinnamon Cake

This is my first recipe for my ingredient of the month in January. It's the rhubarb and cinnamon cake from Stephanie Alexander's Kitchen Companion.

This is a really great, moist and fruity cake and I highly recommend it. It's been too hot to have it with a morning tea or coffee, but it's been great with a bit of ice cream for dessert.

Ingredient of the Month #3: Rhubarb

I love rhubarb. Paul loves rhubarb. So I thought I'd start the year off with an ingredient that we'd love to experiment with. I've even found a recipe for rhubarb bread that Paul might be able to try.

Watch this space for some interesting rhubarb creations.

I know I was slack in December and didn't have an ingredient. It's not that I fell off the wagon as such, but because of all the Christmas baking and preparations I was doing, I decided not to give myself any more kitchen challenges.

Beetroot Coleslaw

I made beetroot coleslaw last night to go with our bbq lamb. It was really tasty and I'll definitely be making it again for bbq's in the future.

I peeled and then grated 3 small beetroot (raw) and finely chopped 1/2 a red onion and 1/2 a savoy cabbage.

For the dressing I combined 3 heaped tablespoons of whole egg mayonnaise, 2 heaped tablespoons of plain yoghurt and 2 teaspoons of horseradish.

I then mixed everything together in a bowl.

Don't forget to wear gloves when you're preparing the beetroot and mixing the coleslaw or you'll end up with purple hands!!

Here's the finished product


And with bbq'ed lamb leg chop

Roasted Balsamic Beetroots

Last night I continued with my ingredient of the month theme and I cooked roasted balsamic beetroots. I peeled and cubed the beetroot and some red onion. Then coated them in oil and salt and sprinkled fresh thyme over the top. I roasted them in the oven for about an hour - until they were soft and then splashed some balsamic vinegar over the top.

The photos aren't really the most attractive, but at least the colour's vibrant.

I served the beetroot with roast pork, roast potato and gravy.

Beetroot Salad

It's been really warm lately, so we've been eating lots of salads. I thought I'd combine salad with the ingredient of the month and make a beetroot salad.

I boiled cubes of beetroot for the salad and the water went bright magenta. I thought it looked pretty cool, so I took a pic.

The salad consisted of beetroot, orange, baby spinach, beetroot leaves and topped with crumbled goats cheese.

I served the salad with a BBQ'ed porterhouse steak (cooked by Paul).

Ingredient of the Month #2: Beetroot

I've only just remembered that it's a new month and thus time to change my ingredient of the month. I'll try and pace myself with this one, unlike last month. This one's also a little healthier!!

So this month my ingredient is beetroot (or beets if you come from the US). Both the leaves and the bulb/root are edible, so I'll try and think of recipes for both. I've already bought my veggies for this week, though, so I won't be able to start the challenge until Saturday at the earliest.

Let me know if you're going to join in and feel free to link to your recipes in the comments :)

Ingredient of the Month #1: Pastry

Here's my first weekend of cooking with pastry. I may have gone too hard, too fast and I think I may be pastried out for the month. Here's what I made this weekend...

A chicken roll for lunch during the week. I made the chicken filling from scratch (including mincing the chicken) but I used ready-made puff pastry.

I made Puff Borek with a feta/mozarella and parsley filling. I made the puff pastry from scratch for this one. I was pretty nervous about how it would turn out, but it worked so well. I fried these and then froze them, so I can reheat them in the oven for my birthday party.

Proof that I made the pastry

Finally I made Sigara Boregi, which are spinach and feta filos that I've also frozen so I can reheat them for my birthday party.