Tutti-Frutti Flapover Pie

Sam refers to this as a "Tutti-Frutti Flapover Pie", I think this is a cute name! So I'm gonna keep it.

His pie is filled with nectarines, blueberries, blackberries, banana and apple. Mine had apples and blackberries - take away from this that any old fruit/ combination there of will do!

I make my pastry with wholemeal flour and brown sugar, both of which contribute to a more nutty tasting, brown effect. The brown sugar helps to counter the slightly drying effect of the bran in the flour.

I chuck a little ground almonds in through my fruit, partially because I like the taste, but mostly to soak up any extraneous fruit juices!

This is a deceptively simple, but impressive dessert - I encourage you to give it a go!

Rich, Roasted Ratatouille

I like my ratatouille like I like my men: dark, strong, rich, a little bit sweet and tall with blue eyes. Wait. What?

Rat-Stew, as we lovingly refer to this dish in my family is a fabulous dish! Especially useful for using up those potentially slightly dodgy veggies left over from last week's veggie market... The tomatoes, and aromatics are kinda necessary - but the bulking vegetables can be anything that's not too starchy, really.

Funny story, apparently when I was little I would eat courgette but not zucchini. The theory behind this being that my Grandfather referred to

This version, which is oven roasted, comes from my darling Sam Stern's Student Cookbook... I love that book! I have confused many a Boyfriend and flatmate by asking, broken heartedly "Where's Sam? Have you seen him? I've lost him!"... And then predictably locating the book under my bed from when I was reading it before bed...

The roasting causes it to be much richer than the, more usual to me, stove top version... I've never looked back!!

Olive Parcels

 I think the original recipe for these, such as it is, came from and Allyson Gofton cookbook... But I am not certain!

Parmesan, pastry and olive these little parcels come together in moments! My Mummy used to make them to take as nibbles (Ladies, a Plate! NZ Style) to Adult Dinners - and I used to try to scoff as many as I could before she noticed... It was a good deal. I usually got in trouble, but it was worth it!

Now that I'm an adult (kinda-sorta) I can make them as and when I please/ have leftover pastry... The olives might make them a little less popular that my other leftover Pastry Snacks - but that just means more for meee!!!

"Leftover pastry" is possibly a slight misnomer here - because the easiest way to make these is to use pre-rolled puff or savoury short crust pastry cut into squares... But you can use any puff or savoury short crust, really - the pre-rolled stuff just saves you time!

Aside from "pitted" the olives can be any of your choice! Kalamata is my favourite - but stuffed, green olives are fun too...

Taste & Create: Thali - Black Sesame Chutney

This is the final Taste & Create Thali recipe from Seduce Your Taste Buds... and it's the visually stunning Black Sesame Seed Chutney...

It's such a gorgeous, glossy, black colour!

PJ's chutney is very creamy looking... I'm not sure how I caused mine to look so different...? I wonder if it's because I used dried, desiccated coconut rather than fresh grated?

The seasonings are very similar to the ones used for the tomato riata and the two accompaniments complemented each other beautifully!

One factor that most excited me about this dish was that I got to make my own chutney with speed and ease rather than my usual (but fantastic) shop-bought mango chutney... :)

This one is well worth knocking up!

Taste & Create: Broccoli Soup

Did you know that in Sweden it is traditional to have soup on Thursdays? Specifically; yellow split pea soup because yellow split peas are associated with Thor and Thursday is, after all Thor's Day!

This recipe is not for yellow spilt pea soup. This recipe is for Broccoli Soup. This is because we had approximately a million (AKA 2) broccolis and no spilt peas (I used them making soup for last Thursday!)...

This soup that I made for Taste & Create this month is simple, tasty, vegan (if you let it be, I didn't) and requires very few ingredients. It's fantastic for Students and Real People alike! It also came out the most fantastic shade of green:

See?

I fried the cumin seeds and garlic in butter as PJ of Seduce Your Tastebuds recommended in butter because I like butter. And I think garlic tastes better fried in butter, over oil... But, as oil is such an easy substitute; I still think it's fair to store this recipe as a vegan option.

The potato gives the blended soup a creamy texture without the addition of milk or cream. PJ pressure cooks her potatoes and broccoli; but I don't have a pressure cooker in my student kitchen so I boiled my potato and steamed the broccoli over it... Feel free, however to boil your broccoli and potato together; bearing in mind that the broccoli won't need quite so long to cook as the potato and over-cooked broccoli is a kinda funky colour...

I really enjoyed this soup, and hope you do too!

Taste & Create: Thali - Tomato Riata

This is my penultimate Taste & Create Thali recipe from Seduce Your Taste Buds... :)

It's a year, one month and 23 days since I posted my original review of 6 of PJ's delicious recipes... and today I will tell you, in greater detail about the 6th: Tomato Riata...

I really loved all the colour matching going on with the riata in this particular bowl...

Now, you may be like me, and of the belied that riata always contains cucumber. And cumin. And mint. Yes? No? Well; it turns out - we're wrong. Shocking, I know!

If you check out PJ's Menu page and scroll half way down (ish) she has a whole HOST of riata dishes! Only one of which contains "cucumber" in the title... So there. You learn something new every day.

This riata is a little more acidic tasting than its more conventional contemporary - but tasty none the less! I recommend giving it a go even if only to say that you have...

Taste & Create: Thali - Sambar

Taste & Create Thali recipe from Seduce Your Taste Buds #4!!

For today's Sambar recipe, you will need 3 teaspoons of yesterday's Sambar Spice powder recipe...

Hand ground Sambar Spice

Sambar, as a general rule is not my favourite way to serve lentils. I chose to make this recipe in the hopes that making my own Sambar, completely from scratch, would teach me otherwise.

It didn't.

Don't get me wrong! This Sambar is lovely! My friends and family think it fantastic! It's just not to my taste...

The original recipe called for "drumstick" which is not something I'd encountered before... PJ offers a variety of alternatives at the end of her post; I used peas because that's what I happened to have at the time.

So today, I will provide you with the recipe and encourage you to come to your own conclusions...

Clockwise from top left: Garlicky Spinach Rice, Aloo Fry and Sambar

Taste & Create: Tahli - Sambar Powder

Taste & Create Thali recipe from Seduce Your Taste Buds #3!!

You're going to need today's Sambar Spice recipe for tomorrow's Sambar Curry Recipe... It's pretty simple, really - just the ingredients together and away you go!

The quantities listed here will make more than you need for the Sambar; but the spice powder will keep will in an airtight container for future use...

I had a great time blending these all together by hand with a mortar and pestle! But use a spice blender, if you have one... or whatever else you have available to you. :)

You'll need:

1/2 cup coriander seeds

1 Tbsp gram dhal

1/2 Tbsp fenugreek seeds

Red chillies, to taste (I used 1)

1/4 tsp Asafoetida (hing) - this is an anti-flatulence herb and won't affect the taste of the Sambar Powder if you can't find any to use.

1-2 tsp oil

Dry roast the coriander seeds until fragrant.

Add the oil and the rest of the ingredients and fry briefly until all oil is absorbed.

All to cool before grinding into a fine paste.

Store in an airtight container until needed.

Taste & Create: Thali - Garlicky Spinach Rice

Further catch up on my rather delayed Thali collection today... and this instalment is Garlicky Spinach Rice!

This rice comes out the most extreme, green colour - it's fantastic!! As I have mentioned before spinach is my favourite food; so this dish was always going to be a winner!

The three chillies ground into a paste (with more garlic, fresh ginger and water) give it a bit of a bite... So either label it as not for the faint of heart, or use fewer chillies to dial it down a bit...

This recipe is fairly similar to a Greek one I've presented previously; only with extra garlic and chilli and ginger added... Puréeing the spinach also make this final dish much greener than the previous one! I'd be hard pressed to pick a favourite out of the two; the Greek dish being much richer and this being more punchy - you should try them both out and see which you like better!

Taste & Create: Thali - Aloo Fry

Hej, hej!

Remember my Thali from Taste & Create way back? Well... I've been paired with PJ of Seduce Your Tastebuds once again and I feel this is the optimum opportunity for me to finally get around to posting the full recipes I made last time... thus reminding both you and me how awesome they are! (It's a sign from the Gods, I tell you!)

Top: Tomato Riata, Aloo Fry, Garlicky Spinach Rice
Centre: Black Sesame Chutney
Bottom: Sambar made with home-made Sambar Powder

Although I really liked (most) of the dishes I made... Far and away my favourite (and the one I've made most often since) was PJ's Aloo Fry...

The crunch provided by the whole spices and slightly crispy fried potatoes in this dish really blew me away. Think; pan roasted, Indian spiced roast potatoes!

*drool*

Most of the spices required here (mustard seed, cumin seed, coriander seed) are not all that "unusual" and if, as a student, you were to go out and buy a packet - I'm sure you'd find many reasons to use them again and again. (Packet curries very rarely stand up to their homemade counterparts). The fenugreek (kasuri methi) leaves are a liiitle bit more unusual... and although they definitely add an enjoyable extra dimension to the dish; I hope I'll be forgiven for suggesting that you can probably get away without them if it's beyond your means.

Do try this dish out! I'm sure you'll enjoy it!

Kitchen Sink Quiche

 This is one of those dishes that is so easy and such a part of my everyday life that it never even occurs to me to photograph and post it...

Not the prettiest thing ever, but still pretty damn tasty!

I call it "Kitchen Sink Quiche" but it could just as well be "Fridge Scraping Quiche"... Kitchen Sink just sounds... nicer ... to me, y'know? And Kitchen Sink or Fridge Scraping it's a great way to use up any left over bits and pieces you don't know what else to do with!

The recipe it technically "self-crusting" which means you don't need to worry about a pastry case and the batter is made with both wholemeal flour and bran flakes (although you can leave out the bran flakes or substitute for plain, all-purpose flour if that's more your jam...) so it's full of fibre!

I'll attach the recipe (almost) as I found it in the (old) Edmond's Junior Cookbook... but this is just the humble beginnings of what could be a great dish! The original is vegetarian, but the photographed one here had bacon in it as well...

Or; sub out the cheddar cheese and mushrooms and chuck in smoked chicken, brie and apricot for a rather more up-scale quiche!

The only things limiting you are your imagination and the contents of your fridge!

Younger Brother was hungry and couldn't wait for me to snap a posed photograph...

So what are you waiting for?! Dig in!!

Nigella's Mexican Scrambled Eggs

I'm starting to detect a theme here...

I feel that I have yet to learn how best to photograph scrambled eggs...

These scrambled eggs are pretty fantastic Nigella totes these as the ultimate hangover cure; even going so far as to suggest that they're worth deliberately hanging yourself over for... I'm not convinced anything is "worth" a hang over... but they're still pretty dang good!

There's something about eggs and chilli that just works for me! The kind of remind me of "Parsi Eggs" which are a spicy, Indian style of scrambled eggs my whole family enjoys... at some point I shall have to make and photograph 'em for y'all!

Now, Nigella calls for corn tortillas in her recipe; to the best of my knowledge you can't get corn tortillas in New Zealand... In fact, I've never seen a corn tortilla in the flesh my whole life! (Sheltered much?) I used the easily available flour tortilla to provide the crunch for my eggs... and to that end they worked fine! :) You could use the bottom few chips from a bag of corn chips, or even toast to the same effect, I would imagine...

A word on scrambling eggs: when I was first "taught" how to scramble eggs (ie; sans microwave) at school we were told to cook them reeeally slowly over a very low heat, stirring all the time 'else they'd go rubbery. This leads to very soft, but slightly grainy eggs, in my experience, not a texture I particularly enjoy. What I like to do is to crank the heat right up on a non-stick pan, melt a knob of butter and whip the eggs into a bubbly frenzy. Then I pour the eggs into the hot pan and allow them to set on the bottom before slowly pushing them 'round (wrinkling them, really) with a silicone spatula. Once you've wrinkled the first layer of egg, stop and let the next layer set on the hot pan before wrinkling again. Continue until all the eggs are neeearly cooked. Then turn off the heat and tip out onto a plate/piece of marmited toast... smother with HP Sauce and you're away (although I'd skip the marmite/HP sauce for Mexican eggs...)!

You don't want to cook the eggs all the way in the pan because they'll continue to cook in their own heat off the pan... over cooking eggs WILL make them rubbery!

The point of all this, I think, is scramble your eggs in the way that makes you most happy!

Click on for the ingredients...

Red Lentil and Tomato Soup

So guys, guess what? I'm still around!! Can I get a woop, woop?! :)

This is a recipe inspired by the delicious soup my cousin, Vicky served me while I was staying with her in England... It requires very few, very cheap ingredients but with the lentils providing protein and the tomatoes providing their fantastic anti-cancer qualities it's an excellent soup to keep away the Winter (or the it-really-ought-to-be-spring-by-now?!) Blues...

Gorgeous, terracotta soup garnished with crumbled feta and a drizzle of olive oil!

If you use vegetable stock (and skip the feta I sprinkled on my serving!) this soup is easily vegan/vegetarian... but because I'm perfectly happy to have animal in my diet - I made my soup with powdered chicken stock!

The recipe I used is based on this one from About.com's Low Fat Cooking Section... Because I was in Sweden for only 6 months - I was unwilling to buy all the spices I might ordinarily have in my kitchen - so I chose ground cumin over ground coriander - but use what you've got! Cooking should be a fluid action...

This was quick, easy, hearty and delicious... and it lasted for AGES (you can decide whether that last point is a pro or a con...)... I really encourage you to try it!!

Gado Gad-ish

Gado-Gado is an Indonesian dish which consists of veggies and a peanut sauce. Essentially. This is my interpretation...

So many colours!

 Okay, so basically I providing you with a "recipe" for my style satay sauce... and a serving suggestion. But! It's an excellent serving suggestion! And Gado-Gado sounds like a much more legitimate meal than peanut-butter scooped out of the jar an onto a carrot stick... and there's only a *little* bit more effort required!

Veggies? Check! Peanut sauce? Check! Extra protein kick? Check!!!

We have here stir fried pepper, carrot strips and bean sprouts on greens with a soft-set boiled egg. Probably 10 minutes effort start to finish (not counting dishes) and the peanut sauce! Oh! The peanut sauce!

Wanna see?

Guilty Taste & Create: Drunk French Toast

Almost a month to the day... I made this delicious French Toast found on my May Taste and Create partner, Min's blog: The Bad Girl's Kitchen... Since then Life has spectacularly got in way with a variety of colourful excuses/reasons anywhere from the photo's were taken on my Daddy's camera and thus I was at his mercy to have access to them to my usual "lazy" excuse to Holy Hell! I head for London (and ultimately, Sweden) in a little over a month!!!

Still, it's very rude on my part - I didn't even send Min an apology e-mail yet. But fear not! If you were to sign up for Taste and Create for July (e-mail Min before the 8th of the Month) you won't be paired with me, and so your partner will, in fact, be reliable... I'm taking a break... Did I mention Sweden yet? ALL BY MYSELF!!! London for a week with family first... MEEP!!!

Now, French Toast... or, more to the point, Drunk French Toast... The drunk-ness makes it all the more studenty! In fact, if I were flatting right now, I'd have been able to follow the recipe exactly as all my favourite people in Wellington drink Bourbon! My parents however, do not... my French Toast wants to be a pirate when it grows up... I used rum!

In future I'd use more rum... but otherwise the recipe is fantastic as Min writes it... I'm currently working 2-3 shifts/day and haven't the energy for more than a basic update right now... but I will be back! Perhaps typing from Sweden!

Watch this space...

xoxox ~ Kat

Taste & Create: Seduce Your Taste Buds Thali

Eugh. I feel like a Zombie. I've gone from unemployed to over-employed in no time flat! (Not that I'm complaining per se - I'm grateful for the opportunity to be earning some savings!)But I've got a looong week of 3 shifts/day for the next 7 days so this is gonna be a brief post to get the important things out there... :)

After next week I will fill y'all in on all the details!

I had fun with Taste and Create this month! I was paired with Padmajha of Seduce Your Tastebuds and my taste buds were most certainly seduced! PJ offers a lot of tasty looking vegetarian, Indian food. Rather than selecting just one recipe to try out - I decided to chose five, and make a Thali.

'Thali' refers to the plate used to serve this meal, and is basically either a metal tray with little dishes for many curries/chutneys or a single plate with indentations. The thalis we have are of the indentation variety.

Clockwise from top left: Tomato Raita, Aloo Fry, Garlicky Spinach
Rice, Sambar. Centre: Black Sesame Seed Chutney.

The recipes I chose were:

• Aloo (potato) Fry which was amazing my favourite dish of the five! Spicy, slightly crispy and the most beautiful shade of yellow. Yum yum.
• Sambar which is a sort of runny lentil dish that I'm not a huge fan of. And, although tasty, this particular recipe didn't make a convert out of me... my guests really enjoyed it though! I really enjoyed getting out the mortar and pestle to grind my own sambar powder though!
• Garlicky Spinach Rice does what it says on the package - it's the most lurid green colour! Just brilliant!
• Tomato Raita which is a little different for the cucumber/minty raita I'd usually make. It was fun and will no doubt feature on my table again!

and finally...

• Black Sesame Seed Chutney mine looked nothing like the photo - but it was super yummy!

Now, as students, some of the spices called for may be a little odd... but, if you can buy them in only the quantities you require, can be sourced quite cheaply! I especially recommend the Aloo Fry as a good flatting meal!

Final conclusion? This was fun! And with the exception of the Sambar (which is more a reflection on me, than on the recipe itself) I'll be making these recipes in the future! The Aloo Fry was the absolute star!

Marmite Spaghetti

... or, in my case, Vegemite Spaghetti. Because that's what I had. Also, Australian Vegemite is closer (in flavour, but not texture) to English Marmite than New Zealand Marmite is... Make sense? No? Good.

This is another Nigella recipe, and a absolute, bottom-of-the-barrel cupboard scratching recipe. Tasty though! Well worth making even when you do have sufficient ingredients to make something else.

do you think the pasta looks tastier from this angle...

The result is a salty, savoury pasta which is tasty when served under cheese. In much the same way that toast can be made tasty and savoury by being served beneath marmite (or vegemite) and cheese.

The sauce is simple enough to make... and if you want to feel as if you're eating a balanced meal - add some peas at the last second to the pasta water for a splash of green!

...or this angle?

I won't get into the vegemite vs marmite debate... you can suit yourself! Either will work just fine... :)

Egg Flop Omelette

Super healthy, super tasty breakfast...

Omelettes and I get along in kinda the same way that stir-fry and I get along... I like to eat 'em... but I kinda suck a cooking them.

My current theory is that this is because I like to fry my "fillings" and then pour the egg over them and cook it all together unlike a normal person - who either doesn't cook the fillings at all or cooks them separately from the egg part and actually using them to fill the omelette...

My may is easier - and requires less mess. But only when "mess" refers to the number of plates and pans required. The finished result invariably looks a mess... kinda like someone else already tried it and didn't think much of it...

But that's beside the point! Kat Omelettes are tasty and healthy. And that's what matters here. They involve egg, which is good for protein. Spinach (whenever possible) which is good for iron. Tomatoes, which I cook a bit to help prevent prostate cancer ( ;] ). And cheese which is good on everything. Oh! And they're cheap. And easy. Student-able. Yeah.

See how I managed to get the daisies in the background in perfect
focus? Yeah! Mad photography skills...

I dunno... Let's just read the instruction now.

Taste & Create: Rawa Dosai

Dosa are something I first tried in India last year... to an untrained, Western eye they're basically delicious, savoury pancake. When Taste & Create, which is my favourite monthly blog event, paired me with Jayasri Ravi of Samayal Arai this month I was super excited to see her Dosa Section, and I immediately hopped on over to have a look.

Most dosa recipe than Jayasri has listed require several hours fermentation which put me off in this instance - simply because I decided, about two hours before teatime that I wanted to make dosa to serve alongside. Here, it should be noted that dosa are primarily a breakfast food, I think, so usually you'd make them the night before and let 'em sit over night.

The recipe I chose to try out was for Rawa Dosai - I think 'rawa' is the term used to describe grains once ground into a flour-like consistency... but I'm totally unsure about that! We had most of the ingredients already, because we do eat a lot of Indian (or, more accurately, Indian-style) food at home - but if you don't, and I don't expect many students would... it'd be well worth going to your supermarket or local Indian market and trying to source them - these dosa are divine!

Rawa Dosai, served with a Goan-Style fish curry.

I did learn, after my very, very pale first several that it's vitally important to get the pan really, really hot before you try to cook these. Leave your impatience at the door when you enter the kitchen to cook dosa!

I was excited because I was able to cook these on our tawa - a flat, side-less frying pan, which meant I was the first to use it for it's intended purpose, but any frying pan will do - just as long as you can pick it up and swirl it! :)

A real, live, tawa... :)

These were great, and we'll definitely make them again... and, one day when I'm a bit more organised, I'll try out some of the other varieties too!

Don't-Ask-Don't-Tell Pasta Puttanesca

Why don't ask, don't tell? Because puttanesca sauce contains three things people commonly believe they don't like: olives, capers and anchovies.

WAIT!!!

Before you give up on this recipe in disgust - know this, I loathe anchovies and am only just learning to tolerate capers (olives and I on the other hand... well put it this way - for much of my childhood I preferred olives to chocolate) but "a la" puttanesca is one of my favourite ways to eat pasta! Even when I've made it myself and I know what's in there!

See? Looks pretty harmless, really...

If you really, really can't stomach the idea of anchovies, you can substitute them for bacon or salami, I suppose. And the capers for gherkins. The olives? Pick 'em out you lazy so and so's...

Thus, if you're feeling brave, read on for the recipe: