Gluten-free Lemon Myrtle Friands

Now I know most you will be thinking 'oh yeah... lemon myrtle spice... got a big bucket of THAT... not.' but read on.  I'm not expecting you to go out and buy some - but it's delicious if you have some OR you could just substitute with some lemon zest.

How I came to have a truckload of lemon myrtle spice?

We picked up some on our trip to my Aunt's place last year.  She lives on a property with a macadamia orchard and lemon myrtle grove.   We went to Lennox Head markets and picked up some spice and upon returning home realised our error.  The spice jar was just ground up dried lemon myrtle leaves.  Leaves we could see as far as the eye could gaze.  D'oh!   

My aunt on our departure offered us some more leaves to make our own spice, just walked over to a branch with about 200 leaves and pulled it off and put it in the back of the car.   It's all we could smell all the way home.  Delicious.

Ingredients:
180g butter, melted
200g icing sugar, sifted (CSR's is gluten free)
60g gluten free flour,sifted
120g almond meal
5 egg whites
1 teaspoon lemon myrtle spice*

*substitute this with zest of one lemon if you don't have :)



Method:
Preheat oven to 200°C.

Grease a friand tray with some of the melted butter (use a cupcake tray if you do not have one).

Place icing sugar and flour in a mixing bowl, add almond meal and stir through with a fork.

In a separate small bowl, beat egg whites with a fork, then add the dry ingredients in the other bowl to the mix. Combine using a fork and then add the lemon myrtle spice (or lemon zest). Mix well.

Spoon the mixture into the tin until each mould is 3/4 full.

Place in the oven on the middle shelf and bake for 10 minutes. Rotate the tray 180 degrees (so the part of the tin that faced the front of the oven now faces the back) and bake for a futher 5-10 minutes until golden on top.

Cool, and dust with icing sugar to serve.

I also love these with lime and raspberries.  Use lime zest and drop two frozen raspeberries in each mould before placing in oven.

Zucchini and bacon cake

A few of you may be familiar with this one - it's commonly served as 'Zucchini slice' but I kinda prefer it like this.  I put a little extra bacon in it and some cayenne and serve it in wedges - feels more like a meal to me.

The secret to getting this to turn out perfectly is how well to drain your zucchini. Don't drain the excess moisture out, you end up with slop.  I learned this the hard way, let me save you the pain.

I generally will make a few of these at a time and freeze one, this time I didn't.  I have cut the wedges up and frozen a few of those, for lunches for both hubby and Eloise - a great alternative to a sandwich and if needs be a quick dinner for the frills.

It's yummy hot or cold, promise - it might be how you get greens into your kids!  They can help too - grating zucchini pouring ingredients into the bowl..


Ingredients
5 shortcut rashers bacon, finely diced
1 onion, finely diced
5 eggs
1 cup grated tasty cheese
pinch salt
pinch black pepper
pinch cayenne pepper
3/4 cup self raising flour
500g zucchini, grated

Method:
Preheat oven to 180 degrees c

In a pan over medium heat, add a little oil and fry your bacon and onion.   Continue to fry until the onion becomes transparent.  Turn down the heat and set aside.

Grate your zucchini.  Place in a teatowel or muslin and roll it up and squeeze it over the sink to extract all excess moisture.  Set aside.

In a bowl mix your eggs, flour, salt, black pepper, cayenne pepper and cheese.  Mix well.  Add zucchini, bacon and onion and mix until all well combined.

Grease your tray and pour ingredients in, moving mixture to sides and smoothing surface with spoon or spatula.

Bake in oven for 40-45 minutes.   Cool in tin, then transfer onto plate/container.

Can be stored in fridge for up to 5 days, freeze for up to 2 months.

I've been busy you see...

I don't have a recipe for you this afternoon my friends - I have SIX including the 'Whacky cake' pictured above.

Last week Kidspot asked me to road-test and review six of Moira Gillard's -(Julia's Mum) recipes.  Click here to see six of the recipes our Prime Minister grew up on.

I found all the recipes extremely easy and particularly enjoyed making and eating the apricot balls .
Which one/s do you think you'd try?

1,000th post giveaway this week!

Wow.  I can't work out if I should be embarrassed or proud - hehe I rabbit on a lot I guess.. thanks for indulging me!  This Sunday I will publish my 1,000th post on Frills in the Hills - of that 285 posts have contained recipes, a good many thoughts on raising my three frills, our adventures and of course my miscellaneous ramblings.

To to celebrate or compensate - I'm giving away three mini-chef sets ! 


This includes:

• A gorgeous replica retro mixing bowl (holds about 600ml)
• Twin set of spatula
• Set of ice-block moulds (8 in each)
• Hamlyn's 200 recipes for kids cookbook

I will be road-testing a few recipes from this during the week too!

PLUS: Mini Gourmets will be offering all Frills in the Hills readers 10% off all purchases until midnight Saturday!

Discount code: frillsinthehills

It's a gorgeous little store with lots of goodies - I purchased the apple peeler and some cookie cutters last week myself!

To enter:

• Tell me which section you love and why (from the title bar up the top) in either a comment here, facebook or a tweet.  (see below for more detail)
• You can enter once on every method each day.
• On Facebook, make sure you write it on our wall  - I need to see it or I can't count it!
• On Twitter - include me on your tweet so I can see it :) @frillyhills
• If entering here - if I can't track you through your blog, please leave your email address or email it to me
• Competition ends Saturday midnight - I'll announce Sunday afternoon!
• Only open to those with Australian postal addresses.
• Good luck!!

Sunday Baking Project: The quickie muffins - sugar and dairy free - get CREATIVE!

Now these are terribly basic, but don't let the ingredients fool you - they are not by any means bland or boring.   I made these quickly BEFORE school shortly before the school holidays as I ran out of my pick and mix a little earlier than I expected.  They are truly so simple you'll be trying them and experimenting with your own variations!

Some variations I try instead of currants:

• Frozen raspberries
• Cut up pear or apple
• Mashed banana

Alternatives to honey:

• Golden syrup
• Maple syrup

You can also make them with gluten free flour, sometimes I substitute a few tablespoons of bran or crushed wheat-bix for the flour.

So my friends, if you haven't had enough cooking for school lunches/snacks already after yesterday's 30 recipes I gave you - have a go at these!


Ingredients
(makes 20)
2 cups self-raising flour
1/2 cup honey
2 eggs
1/2 cup rice milk (use regular if no dairy allergies/intolerances)
1/4 cup currants


Method:
Preheat oven to 190 degrees c

Mix all in in a bowl with electric beaters/mixer mix until smooth (2-3 minutes tops)
Pour into cupcake/muffin papers or greased muffin pan about 3/4 full.

Bake for 12-15 minutes until golden on top and baked through.

Have a lovely Sunday!  Hop over to Facebook  to see my adventures at the Good Food and Wine Show yesterday!  I won something for you'll never guess knowing WHAT...!

and tomorrow is the launch of new competition for the 'little chefs' out there. to celebrate the upcoming 1,000th post!

Revving up to go back to school - 30 lunchbox recipe ideas and links!

Aaaah the weekend.   What more can I say?

Today I'm going to give you a quick mc-linky style round-up of our favourite school lunchbox treats because tomorrow and Monday I'll be making, baking, freezing a few.   I love to pick and mix school lunches because I mean it's a very rare occasion that I have time to bake/make stuff before we head off to school each day.

I reserve that time to nag, repeat myself 4,000 times and have a small nervous breakdown... only to get to school to find we're missing a hat, folder, library bag or that it's mufti day or it's not.  (OK, not every day, but it happens...)

Banana butterscotch pudding with pecan crumble

This one is not for the faint-hearted or full-bellied.  It's gorgeously rich so you really only do need a little.  I was inspired to make this by Delicious this month - a magazine that has been failing to do so for a while so I'm hoping Delicious has got its groove back!

I made a few modifications, nothing huge.  A lovely dessert to have on a cold wintry night, alone or with friends... serve with ice-cream..

Ingredients:
Pudding
80g butter, split into 60/20g portions
125g brown sugar
1/2 cup golden syrup
1/2 cup skim evaporated milk (original recipe calls for cream)
5 extra large bananas (or 8 medium/10 small) peeled and sliced into thirds lengthwise
2 tb caster sugar.

Crumble
3/4 cup self raising flour
75g cold butter, cut into cubes
2 tbsp brown sugar
2 tbsp caster sugar
1/2 cup pecans, roughly chopped (original recipe adds chopped hazelnuts also)


Method:
Preheat oven to 200 degrees c

Melt 60g of butter in a deep frypan over low heat.  Add brown sugar and golden syrup and simmer for 1-2 minutes until sugar has dissolved.  Leave to cool in a jug, then add and stir through evaporated milk.

In a clean frypan, add other 20g of butter and melt.  Add the sliced bananas and sprinkle with caster sugar. Fry for about 40 seconds on each side, then transfer to baking dish.

Pour the butterscotch sauce over the top and prepare to make the crumble.

To make the crumble place the sugars, flour and sugar in a bowl.  Rub the butter into the dry ingredients with the tips of your fingers until they resemble breadcrumbs.  Add the pecans and then scatter over the baking dish.

Bake in oven for 15-20 minutes until golden brown on top.

Enjoy your weekend everyone..!

Season Savvy Challenge Week 7 - Leeks

Hello again!

Hope you've had a fabulous week and are pumped for the weekend!  I'm off to the Good Food & Wine Show and I think on Sunday we'll be off farmgating... just for fruit and vegetables.  School holidays my kids seem to eat four times as much fruit, don't ask me why!  I plan on getting busy with some apple recipes from last week too!

This week we're all about leeks.  My house growing up there were never any leeks.  I discovered leeks in London when I was 21 - I was served for dinner one night fettucine with leek, bacon and cream and parmesan.  I wondered what I had been missing out on...!

So these days we grow leeks, there are always leeks in the garden and in our fridge.  Yum.

What is Season Savvy?

I'm all about using seasonal produce. When it's good. When it's plentiful, when it's cheap.

Each week I'm challenging you to use a particular piece of produce that is SEASONAL. Now if you're in a different season to me, don't panic. Maybe you have cooked something before with this ingredient, add it and play along....

Hopefully this way, we can use this as a bit of inspiration/education and show off what you can cook, and save some moulah!



So what do you need to do?
1. Find a recipe you love or a way you love to eat leek - it doesn't need to be the main ingredient, but it needs to be in the dish.. and it doesn't need to be fancy either!
2. Make it or find the link
3. Photograph it and/or share the recipe
(it doesn't need to be-step-by-step photos!)
4. Post your link down there with the Linkytool down below
5. Get visited, and visit other people's recipes!

Slowcooker Recipe: Chicken Noodle Soup

I must have known.
Or I jinxed myself.

Last Saturday I asked you all what you craved when you were ill, and many people like me, said chicken soup.  Well come Tuesday night I had the beginnings of a cold - so lucky I had made a batch on Monday eh?

It's a 'bung-it-together-and-let-the-slow-cooker-do-the-work' jobby.  Just what the doctor ordered don't you think?  The secret to making this an 'okay' soup to a 'brilliant' soup is the seasoning.  Get the right amount of pepper and salt and it's a bowl of recuperation.  Otherwise it would be a bit bland.  I add it to the pot but also taste it in the bowl.


Ingredients:
1 whole 1.4 kg chicken
2.5 litres water (or 10 cups)
3 stalks celery, chopped
2 stalks parsley, finely chopped
2 large carrots, peeled and chopped
200g thin spaghetti (dried)
Salt
Pepper


Method:
Place chicken, water, celery, parsley, carrots and 1tsp of pepper and 1 tsp salt in the slowcooker.  Cook on low for 7 hours.

Take out the chicken carcass and you will easily be able to peel off the chicken meat.  Return that to the cooker and discard bones/skin etc. Then add raw spaghetti for last hour.  Check for seasoning before serving.

Serve with bread (ours served with french baguette)

Happy Bastille Day - voila! Here is your brioche!

Oh la la....

You might have noticed I have a little button there on the right saying the 10 food things I want to do in 2010 - well my friends, THIS is one of them.  I love brioche but always had a feeling it was full of butter because it was so rich and well... buttery (bit of a giveaway huh?) but that doesn't stop me from wanting it, smothered with... yes more butter.

To my delight there wasn't as much butter as I expected, so not as guilty-a-pleasure as I first thought.   Like the good old french baguette reminds me of my first time in Paris, brioche reminds me of my time in Brittany and seeing Mont St Michel for the first time.  Breath-taking, and a must-see on anyone's itinerary to France.  I stopped into a little bakery on Mont St Michel and grabbed myself a whole brioche to myself - I had not had breakfast and was starving.. it was an experience I will never forget.  Amazing place with an amazing discovery.

This takes a little while to make, but the outcome is worth it, but if you need instant french gratification today on Bastille day try the french baguettes - I've made two batches already this week!  Have with Navarin of lamb or Le Pork Roast?

Ingredients

1 1/2 cups plain flour

1/2 teaspoon salt
6 tbsp butter, at room temperature
2 tbsp caster sugar
2 large eggs, at room temperature
1 1/2 tsp yeast


Method:
In a mixing bowl add 1 cup of the flour, yeast, sugar and salt.

 Start your machine kneading or by hand in your butter a little at a time, and eggs. (In the kitchen aid this takes about 2-3 minutes)  Gradually add in the last of the flour and knead until soft and smooth (about a further 1-2 minutes)

Cover your bowl with clingfilm and allow to rise for about 2 hours, until it doubles in size.

Then take your dough out of the bowl, and wrap in the cling film.  Put in the refrigerator overnight or at least 2 hours.

Preheat oven to 190 degrees c

Take out of the film and knead into 3 even-ish logs about 30cm long. 

Plait your dough and then place in a greased loaf tin.  Cover with film and allow to rise for another 2 hours.

Brush with egg glaze - (1 egg yolk + 1tbsp milk)

Place in oven and after 8 minutes, turn oven down to 150 degrees.  Bake for further 15 minutes until golden brown on top.

School holiday recipe suggestion: Peanut Butter choc chip cookies

Our school quite understandably has a peanut/nut free policy so on the weekends my girls tend to overdose on peanut butter sometimes - it comes and goes.  My hubby is a big peanut butter fan too so I thought I could make these to last the school holidays (yeah.. sure!) and give them their peanut fix for morning teas..


They have a lovely texture, chewy on the inside and a little bit crunchy on the outside, perfect for me.  Unfortunately I only had a few before they were all nabbed by our resident cookie-monsters.


Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups plain flour

1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp bicarb soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup smooth or chunky peanut butter
125g butter or margarine, softened
1/2cup firmly packed light brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 large egg
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/3 cup dark chocolate chips


Method:
Preheat oven to 190 degrees c

In a bowl, cream your butter, sugars and peanut butter together.

Add egg, vanilla extract and whip until fluffy.

Add flour, salt, baking powder and bicarb soda, and continue to mix until well combined. 

Lastly, add choc chips.

With a tablespoon, take chunks of mixture out and roll into a ball about 50c coin diameter.  Place on baking tray and squish down a little (like pic below)

Bake for 10-12 minutes until lightly golden brown on top.  Allow to cool on trays then transfer to plate.

Impossible NOT to share this!

My very clever friend, Nisha came over yesterday with her adorables Nicholas and Alexander and arrived with a birthday gift for me.

Look at the decoration detail she's put in the wrapping!

It's got the little kitchen thingies on the bottom - how cute is the cake with an 'L' on it and the kitchen aid!? I just adore it!

She is SO clever, it was such a shame to unwrap!  You can see other clever things Nisha does here or visit her blog here.

Gorgeous right?

See you later on today with something you can cook with the kids!

Princess and the Frog Themed party/playdate!

When Disney DVD offered us an opportunity to review Princess and the Frog how could we refuse?  This was the first film we ever took the frills to see at the cinema and they adored it.  I knew they were busting to see it on DVD!

So this school holidays we invited some friends over and made a day of it!

I made some cookies - frog and tiara shapes using this recipe and dotted with currants.  The cookie cutters were a bargain at $2.50 each from Inspired by Chocolate.

And I cut out frogs from cheese and placed them on apple and orange 'lilypads'.  Kids loved them!  I also made mini cupcakes with frogs on top.

We also coloured, cut and attached paddle-pop sticks to frog masks, long term play possibilities there.  And also made some home-made colouring books from pages from here and here.

And the movie?  Fantastic!  I love this movie because it does really have some positive themes for girls in particular.  They don't need to be rescued by a prince, they can be the rescue-r and hard work pays dividends - we love that! The music is gorgeous too, set in Louisiana's bayous it's Jazz all the way, it's infectious!



You can buy it NOW on DVD and Blu-Ray