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Archive for August, 2009

Caponatina

Posted in Recipes, tagged , , , , , on August 20, 2009| 5 Comments »

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At the markets last Friday, Jimmy the Tomato Man made me buy a box of yellow capsicums.  The conversation went like this..

“How much are the capsicums, Jimmy?”

“$14 a box, but for you, $10..”

“Hmmm….”

“No, you’re such a lovely customer, for you, $8. Now you have to buy it, or I’ll be insulted, no-one else gets such a good price from me..” (as he puts the box in our trolley and I meekly hand over the money).

After making a roasted pepper hot sauce, I wanted to use the remaining capsicums to make caponatina – a dish our elderly Italian neighbour used to prepare.  It’s basically a combination of chopped vegetables – in this case, capsicums, eggplants, tomatoes and onions – pan-fried in olive oil and seasoned with garlic, chillies and anchovies.  I grilled (broiled)  the fingers of eggplant before adding them to the pan, to reduce their sponginess and the amount of oil they absorbed.  The caponatina was then finished with a generous amount of white wine vinegar, a splash of Moo’s aged balsamic vinegar and salt and pepper to taste.

Caponatina is usually served cold as an antipasto dish, and giving it time to rest in the fridge allows the flavours to meld.  Traditional recipes have far more liquid, including tomato sauce and lots of oil, but this lighter version is a nice accompaniment to hot and cold meats – we had ours with sausages!

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Festive Butter Cookies

Posted in Recipes, tagged , , , , , on August 18, 2009| 6 Comments »

Isn’t it wonderful how…

…a disposable piping bag…

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…and a little tempered chocolate…

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…..and a sprinkle of icing sugar…

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…can turn a boring butter cookie into a festive treat?

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(I caught Big Boy with one of these in each hand yesterday, taking alternate bites from each cookie…)

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Weekend Photos

Posted in Food & Friends, tagged , , , on August 17, 2009| 4 Comments »

We were treated to a wonderful feast at Tracey and David’s yesterday, including Tracey’s delicious apple and berry crumble.

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Their friend and neighbour Bruce baked a gramma pie – something new to me, but apparently a traditional Australian dish.  Gramma is a form of squash akin to pumpkin, but I have no idea what one looks like. I’ve tried the search engines, but typing “Gramma” into Google Images just produces photos of  little old ladies.  If anyone knows of a photo online, could you please let me know?

Bruce’s pie was delicious – puff pastry around a sweet filling of mashed gramma, raisins and a secret ingredient or two that he wasn’t divulging (hmmm…dried peel? ginger?).

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Bruce and Kathleen also provided rocket (arugula) for the salad bowl from their prized no-dig garden, which was absolutely packed with produce, and surrounded by netting to keep out delinquent possums.  In just the small section you can see below, they had garlic, rhubarb, bok choy and beets bursting out of the ground.  Astonishing when you consider that it’s the final few weeks of winter here in Australia!

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Tracey and David’s sons have some amazing stick insects, hatched from seeds they’d been given by the CSIRO.  These fascinating creatures looked exactly like leaves – they’d be almost impossible to find in the bush. Here’s a young male, pretending to be leaf litter…

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and a discarded skin, shed as the insect grew too large for it.

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Tracey and David live on the Central Coast – a gorgeous part of the world at any time, but particularly so on an unseasonably warm and sunny winter’s day.  It was an easy two hour drive out of Sydney and we passed some stunning water views of Lake Macquarie on the way.  Definitely worth a trip if you haven’t been before!

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Cumquat Jelly

Posted in Recipes, tagged , , , , , on August 16, 2009| 1 Comment »

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And now for something completely different…

We’ve never been big marmalade fans, so when Annick gave us a bag of cumquats from her tree, we weren’t sure what to do with them.  Pete eventually decided to make cumquat jelly.  It’s delicious – sweet with a hint of bitterness , and an interesting, complex flavour that’s reminiscent of Grand Marnier.  I’m sure we’ll find a myriad of sweet and savoury applications for this – if there’s any left over to play with.  So far, everyone who’s tasted it has asked for a jar…

Here is Pete’s original recipe.  It makes quite a lot of jelly, so make sure you have plenty of sterilised jars ready to go (we pop ours into the dishwasher to clean them before we start).

  • 1 kg cumquats, washed well in warm water, halved
  • 1 lemon cut in 16ths
  • 1 x 300ml jar homemade pectin
  • 2 kg sugar

Note: when cutting the fruit, use a sharp knife and be careful not to lose too much juice.  This recipe makes about 8 x 300ml jars.

1. Place the cumquats and lemon (including all the seeds and peel) in a large stock pot.  Add approximately 1.75 litres of filtered water and the jar of pectin.  Gently simmer the fruit (covered) for 1 – 2 hours.

2. Half way through the cooking time, break up the fruit with a potato masher.  Continue to stew until the fruit turns into liquid mush.

3. Line a colander with a clean, open-weave cloth and pour boiling water over it to sterilise.  Place the colander over a large bowl and pour the cooked fruit and all the liquid in to drain.  Allow the pulp to drain until quite dry – several hours or overnight.  Don’t press the fruit in any way, or you’ll get cloudy jelly.

4. Measure the drained liquid.  You need a total of 2 litres.  This might vary a little depending on how juicy your cumquats are – if necessary, adjust the sugar accordingly.  Pete used two kilos of sugar to two litres of strained liquid.

5. Pour the liquid into a large stock pot.  It has to boil right up in the pot in order to set, so make sure it’s big enough. Add the sugar to the warm liquid, stir and then heat gently to dissolve.

6. Bring to a gentle boil then skim well – there should be a lot of white foam to remove.

7. Once the jelly has been well skimmed (be patient and do a good job, to ensure you get a clear, jewel-like end product), turn the heat up and boil vigorously until the jelly rises up in the pan to around five times its original volume.

8. Turn off the heat and check if further skimming is required. Test for set by putting a spoonful on a cold plate.  Allow to rest until cool, then push it with your finger.  If it wrinkles, it’s set.  Also, if left undisturbed for a couple of minutes, the hot jelly should start to form a very thin, delicate skin on the top of the liquid – a good indication that it will set well.

9. Once the jelly is setting up, pour it into sterilised jars, seal tightly, and hot water process by boiling them for at least 10 minutes in a large saucepan of water, with the liquid covering the lids by at least 1″ (2.5cm).  Make sure you don’t pour cold water onto the hot jars, or they’ll crack – have the water already boiling and gently lower the sealed jars in.

. . . . .

See our Jam Making Primer for more tips on making jam.

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Tagine

Posted in Food & Friends, tagged , on August 14, 2009| 3 Comments »

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Sadly, Tagine is now closed.

We had a great meal last night with our old friends PK and Robyn at Tagine in Rozelle.  This charming Egyptian restaurant is a wonderful dining experience.  The food is interesting and delicious, but it’s the  service which brings me back – Ramy and his team are gentle, welcoming and accommodating, without ever being intrusive.  It’s just such a nice place to eat.

Pete and I decided this year that we would only pay for restaurant meals that we couldn’t make ourselves.  It’s a good rule, because it means that we always feel like we’re getting value for money (there’s no sense of “this is so simple, I could have made it at home”) and it forces us to try out different cultural cuisines.  The flavours at Tagine are indeed different – wonderfully so – with lots of distinctive cumin, coriander and baharat.

Of course, I had to whip out my pocket camera and take some photos.  The restaurant was quite dark, so I set the Lumix on its high sensitivity setting – hence the slight graininess of some of the shots.  All taken without flash or tripod though!  Ok, I’ll stop going on about my camera now…

Chicken livers, slow cooked with sundried tomatoes and mixed-nuts rice – one of the two entrees we had. Rob and I demolished this, while the boys turned their noses up at the offal.  They had spicy beef sausage cooked in capsicum, tomato and chillies, served with flatbread.

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Quails stuffed with rice, beef mince, pinenuts, raisins and caramelised onions served with creamy mushroom sauce – my favourite dish of the night. The flavours were rich and layered, and the combination of the sauce and stuffing were divine.

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Mixed chargrill of king prawns, chicken, and lamb – I was too busy eating quail with my fingers to try much of this, but everyone else enjoyed it.

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Om Ali – A North African delicacy of pastry, honey, nuts & raisins baked in double fresh cream – rich, luscious, moreish.  Like a really good custard pudding, only much better.  I loved this.

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Feteer meshaltet – an Egyptian delicacy of home made layers of pastry, covered in butter and served with honey, double cream & molasses – this was Pete’s favourite.  You break off pieces of pastry, swipe them over the molasses smeared on the plate, then dip them in the honeyed cream.  It’s very nice, but if you eat too much, you don’t have enough room for the Om Ali, and that would never do…

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Traditional fresh mint tea – a great after dinner drink, made from fresh spearmint and green tea, then poured from a height to aerate it.  Traditionally served in these delicate little glasses.

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Tagine has a great mid-week special – $39/head for two courses plus a glass of wine (or free corkage).  We were able to share two entrees, four mains and two desserts on that basis, and left feeling comfortably full.

I’m feeling very mellow and cheerful this morning – perhaps that’s what a truly fine dining experience does for you.  We felt like we’d been welcomed into someone’s home, and spent the night with friends. I’m trying to think of an excuse to justify another meal there  in the near future!

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