food glorious food

parcels of hammy goodness (oh and salad)

Posted on June 29, 2011July 6, 2011 by bekswhoknits

The continuing adventures of my salad sistema container

My sistema container has had a lot of use since i bought it. It’s also half price at Coles at the moment, which i’m not too pleased about. But murphy’s law does dictate as soon as you buy something it will be on sale for cheaper.

Today i have a chopped salad. Which is really just a whole heap of fruit and vegies chopped up for picking at.
There’s mandarin, mushrooms, celery, tomato, snow peas, carrot, and lettuce.
All of which taste good with Australian mustard, which is what’s in the dressing container.

With some left over store bought potato salad (which has some tinned corn added because last night we added half a tin of corn to the stew and i didn’t know what else to do with half a tin of corn).
And some ham. Because ham is also good with mustard and wrapped in lettuce, to make a tiny parcels of hammy goodness.

On a wintery evening

Posted on June 29, 2011June 29, 2011 by bekswhoknits

A stew was in order.
It was a blustery day in perth.
The sort of day where you want to curl up with a good book, but had to be at work instead.

So at about 10 o clock i decided that a stew was in order. Something nice and hearty; a reason to have the oven on.

It wasn’t the greatest stew i’ve ever made. My head wasn’t quite in the game and i forgot to add flavour.
And when i did it was a bit too late.

Onion and chuck steak went in a fry pan to brown.
Then some flour went over that, as a thickening agent.
I imagine it like a roux sauce where your flour and butter stick together and then thicken milk, except for a casserole i use beer. And in this case Fosters.
My boy and I are two Australians who actually drink Fosters, but it is hard to find.

While that was bubbling away i chopped some potatoes, carrots, capsicum, and mushrooms.

They went in the bottom of my little casserole dish and then the meat on top.
That went in the oven for half an hour.
I checked on it at half an hour, the potatoes still weren’t cooked, and it was very bland.
So i added some salt and pepper, Worcestershire sauce, and HP barbeque sauce (seriously what was i thinking not adding any of this earlier??) and stirred that through the best i could.
Another half an hour and it was still looking a bit runny, so i put it back in the oven for another 10 minutes.

It still wasn’t really thick (i don’t know why i can’t get a nice thick stew – to the research-mobile!), but i was hungry.

It definitely hit the spot, but i’m going to have to practice some more to make it good.

Saturday lunch @ Chapels on Whatley

Posted on June 27, 2011August 9, 2011 by bekswhoknits

Maylands is evolving.
Slightly biased because I live here, but I keep discovering new places.
Well mostly I stick to the same places but every now and again we venture out to some where new.

Chapels on Whatley has been a shop that I’ve walked past on the way to the train countless time. But it never really appealed to me aesthetically. It’s just not the kind of furniture that I like.

But as a coffee shop I was willing to give it a shot. And I was pleasantly surprised.

Feeling ever so delicate from a night at the Inglewood previously, the ham bagel went down a treat.
But the highlight was the scone and jam that was fresh and hot out of the oven, and the best cup of tea I have had in a very long time.

They actually sell the tea as well which I have to buy, as soon as I buy a teapot that I can use. I have my Royal Albert teapot which I got for my 21st, but I’ve never used it.

Now I’m on the hunt for a teapot.

Chicken!

Posted on June 27, 2011June 27, 2011 by bekswhoknits

Monday. The start of the week.
I’m always a little bit more enthusiastic on a monday – well as ado an as i get home from work.
Mondays at work are never productive but Monday afternoons seem to be.

So full of gusto, I cleaned the bathroom, started cleaning the kitchen, and decided to tackle a nice veggie filled dinner.

The veggies were boiled.
The carrots went in first, then the cauliflower. The bok choy and snow peas went in at the very end just to blanch.

The chicken was grilled in a little bit of butter (mmm butter). Then once that was cooked some sauvignon blanc (I’m getting better with my wines) went in to deglaze the pan. After that had boiled off, some chicken stock and cream went in to make a sauce. Some fresh parsley and chives topped off the sauce and that was it.

And the best thing was, after eating it I don’t feel bloated and stuffed.
Great way to start the week.

Pork sauce fail

Posted on June 23, 2011 by bekswhoknits

I wasn’t sure I wanted to post this one. It was a bit of a fail.
Well the pork was cooked perfectly (thanks babe) and the cauliflower mash just hit the spot (thanks me) but the sauce was something else. Something else.

We were still at the hotel so we were making do. I didn’t have flour or cream or any of the usual components of a good sauce.

So the sauce was comprised of onion sautéed in butter, then white wine was added.
Instead of cream, we added milk (which immediately split and looked terrible). Then in an attempt to save it, grated cheese was added.

The end result was a really thin sauce, with clumps of melted cheese.
Not good.
But my boy still insisted that it tasted good even if it wasn’t the desired result.
But here it is…
Pork sauce fail.

I heart wooshter sauce

Posted on June 18, 2011August 2, 2011 by bekswhoknits

It may not have been the prettiest dish, but after not keeping anything down for two days it was just what I needed.

Steamed rice with shaved carrot and celery.
A dash of vegemite in the water which the rice was cooked, and finished off with some worcestershire sauce.

Hotel food

Posted on June 14, 2011 by bekswhoknits

We’ve eaten out so much in the last week, it gets pretty expensive. But with everything that’s been going on, cooking dinner without all my usual staples has just seemed really exhausting.

Fortunately things are starting to get back to normal so i cooked dinner last night.

Chorizo, snow pea, and spinach tomato sauce with pasta or rice.

Done.

steak – nigella style

Posted on May 24, 2011May 24, 2011 by bekswhoknits

last night loml (love of my life) came home from work and told me that there was half a nigella episode that i had to watch.
He wanted me to watch her mussel linguine recipe but we ended up drawing inspiration from her bbq steak. The essence of the recipe is that the steak is charred on the outside but still bloodied in the middle.

And to go with it was potato. Well mashed potato, with carrots, bacon, cheese, spinach, mushrooms, and fresh parsley and chives.

simple. and delicious.

what to do with chorizo

Posted on May 19, 2011 by bekswhoknits

this

so so easy.
cook pasta
cook chopped onion, chopped chorizo, and chopped mushrooms in fry pan
break to help boyfriend put up shelves in spare room
add tinned tomatoes (to chorizo, not pasta)
add cooked pasta to chorizo

serve with chives, cheese, and olives (on the one for me – my boy doesn’t like olives)

om nom nom

straight out of the taste.com recipe book

Posted on May 18, 2011January 9, 2014 by bekswhoknits

last week loml (love of my life) unexpectedly had to get his wisdom teeth out.

in the many times that he spent sleeping rather than awake (and in pain) i researched what i could make him that would be easy to eat, but with ingrediants that i already had in my cupboard so i wouldn’t have to go to the shops and possibly not be there when he woke up.

after a bit of searching i found cauliflower soup and it’s associated recipe carrot, zucchini, and dill muffins

all had ingrediants that i had in the cupboard/fridge already. i figured that it would be a good, vegie filled meals which would be easy on the teeth.

Now my boy didn’t like the cauliflower soup, although i was rather partial to it. But he devoured the zucchini muffins, which is surprising as he only eats my zucchini slice because it has bacon in it.
Although he did comment that the muffins could have used bacon.

Fast forward 5 days and you have what i grabbed out of my fridge this morning as i was (as always) running late.

And an update on the wisdom teeth? All ok, stiches removed and my little chipmunk is a chipmunk no longer.