Let's play pretend

Today's game of pretend is "Let's pretend it is the 14th of June, and I'm not months late with this Daring Cooks challenge." Exciting, isn't it?

OK, I'll hand it to you. This reveal is hardly earth shattering. One can even go as far as saying it is SO two months ago! I'm sure everybody has already ooh'ed and aah'ed over everybody else's Tricolor Vegetable Pate's, but what can you do? Sometimes life gets in the way, and you need to be a few months late with your Challenge.

I could've just skipped it. You are allowed to skip two challenges a year, but I really liked the look of this one. Ideally I would have made one of the carnivore versions, but some people in my family (I promised to never name any names again) doesn't like liver. So, vegetables it is. Only, this vegetable version doesn't feel like a compromise at all. It was so easy to make, and so very delicious, it was just as good as any meaty version I've ever tasted. And it looks fabulous, much more difficult than the chopping and layering of vegetables it essentially is. Perfect party food.

The bread recipe is one I found in a South African magazine years ago, and have been making ever since. It's made of Nutty Wheat, a wholegrain flour made in South African consisting of 20% wheat bran (a useful fact I learned from Cooksister), so if you don't have it, make your own. Easy peasy. It also requires some sunflower and sesame seeds, but you can either skip them all together, or substitute with your favourite ones. This bread is easy and delicious, you'll see. Except maybe if you're young and male, like my brother, who calls this parrot food. This boy doesn't pull any pushes, let me tell you.

Our hostesses this month, Evelyne of Cheap Ethnic Eatz, and Valerie of a The Chocolate Bunny, chose delicious pate with freshly baked bread as their June Daring Cook’s challenge! They’ve provided us with 4 different pate recipes to choose from and are allowing us to go wild with our homemade bread choice.

Tricolor Vegetable Pâté
Makes enough for 4 one cup capacity ramekins
Line your ramekins with plastic wrap, overlapping sides.

White Bean Layer

2 cans cannellini (white kidney beans), rinsed, drained thoroughly
1 tbsp / 15 ml fresh lemon juice
1 tbsp / 15 ml olive oil
1 tbsp / 15 ml minced fresh oregano or 1 teaspoon dried
2 garlic cloves, pressed

Mash beans in large bowl. Add lemon juice, olive oil, oregano and garlic and blend until smooth. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Spread bean mixture evenly on bottom of prepared ramekins.

Red Pepper Layer

210 ml jar roasted red bell peppers, drained, chopped
3/4 cup / 180 ml crumbled feta cheese

Combine peppers and feta in processor and blend until smooth. Spread pepper mixture evenly over bean layer in prepared dish.

Pesto Layer

2 garlic cloves
1 cup / 240 ml fresh basil leaves
1 cup / 240 ml fresh Italian parsley leaves
1/4 cup / 60 ml toasted pine nuts
3 tbsp / 45 ml olive oil
1/2 cup / 120 ml low-fat ricotta cheese

Mince garlic in processor. Add basil, parsley and pine nuts and mince. With machine running, gradually add oil through feed tube and process until smooth. Mix in ricotta. Spread pesto evenly over red pepper layer.

Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate overnight.

To unmold, invert pâté onto serving platter. Peel off plastic.

Fair Lady Bread
Makes one loaf

3 cups Nutty Wheat (or 150ml wheat bran mixed with 600ml all purpose flour)
1/2 cup sunflower seeds
1/4 cup sesame seeds
2 cups yoghurt
5ml honey
1/2 cup milk
7.5ml baking soda

Preheat your oven to 180°C.

Prepare a loaf tin with some butter.
Mix all the ingredients together, and spread into the tin. Smooth the top of the dough.
Press some extra seeds into the top of the dough if you want.
Bake for one hour.
Cool out of the tin on a wire rack.

Enjoy with a cup of tea.

Anna's Banana Bread

I was one of the very lucky girls who had more than one woman looking after me while growing up. My mum, of course, who also soldiered on all alone when my dad died, my grandmother, who kept us stocked up on the most delicious homemade fudge, and, for a while, Anna.

For a few years, Anna was our housekeeper, and we all loved and adored her. She looked after us during the day while Mum was away at work, gave us lunch, and kept the house neat as a pin. Lunch was always something cooked, usually some sort of meat with loads of vegetables, sometimes some pasta. Run of the mill healthy stuff. I do remember Anna's puddings though. Looking back, I'm sure we couldn't have had pudding every day, but it felt like it. Custard pudding, vinegar pudding, baked chocolate pudding, bread and butter pudding. They were delicious. When I think of Anna I think of pudding. Hopefully one day somebody will associate me with something as nice.

Somewhere along the way a bought a lovely little cookbook on a whim (not the first or the last time this happened, mind you), called Winnie-the-Pooh's Teatime Cookbook. It is filled with lovely recipes like Warm Milk with Honey and Vanilla, Chocolate Tea Bread, Strawberry Butter and Cucumber Sandwiches.

It also has the loveliest quotes in between the recipes. I am a bit of a Winnie-the-Pooh fan, so please allow me to repeat my favourites:

"By-and-by Pooh and Piglet went on again. Christopher Robin was at home by this time, because it was the afternoon, and he was so glad to see them that they stayed there until very nearly teatime, and then they had a Very Nearly tea, which is one you forget about afterwards, and hurried on to Pooh Corner, so as to see Eeyore before it was too late to have a Proper Tea with Owl." The House at Pooh Corner

"Pooh always like a little something at eleven o'clock in the morning, and he was very glad to see Rabbit getting out the plates and mugs; and when Rabbit said, 'Honey or condensed milk with your bread?' he was so excited that he said, 'Both', and then, so as not to seem greedy, he added, 'but don't bother about the bread, please'." Winnie-the-Pooh

" ' Pooh', Owl said, 'Christopher Robin is giving a party'. 'Oh!' said Pooh. And then seeing that Owl expected him to say something else, he said, 'Will there be those little cake things with pink sugar icing?' Owl felt it was rather beneath him to talk about little cake things with pink sugar icing." Winnie-the-Pooh

One of my favourite recipes from this lovely little book is one for Banana Bread. Whenever we had some bananas starting to get too ripe, Anna would make Banana Bread for us. When I left the house and moved to the big bad city, Anna came to my apartment once a week, and I always made sure there were enough too-ripe bananas for two banana breads: one for me and one for her to take home. They were good times, and she was a good friend, and whenever I make this bread, I think of her.

Banana Bread

225g plain flour
1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
1/2 teaspoon salk
100g butter
225g sugar
2 eggs
2 ripe bananas, mashed
2 teaspoons lemon juice
100ml milk
100g chopped dark chocolate, optional (not part of the original recipe, but I had some extra, and these days I can have as much chocolate as I want)

Preheat oven to 180°C.

Sift together flour, bicarbonate of soda and salt. In another bowl, cream butter and sugar, then add eggs and bananas. Add lemon juice to milk. Add flour mixture and milk mixture to banana mixture alternately, ending with flour mixture. Stir in the chopped chocolate if using.

Pour into a greased 1kg loaf tin and bake for 50 minutes to an hour. Allow to cool in tin under a clean tea towel.

Hot Cross Bunny (with chocolate in her tummy)

Dear readers. This was going to be my most beautiful post ever. I've been thinking about it for ages. The idea was to make hot cross buns, but in bunny shapes. I thought I'll make them look like the Lindt easter bunnies, complete with ribbon and bell. And to reproduce the photo, the one with the one bunny in front in focus, and all the others faded in the background (except I don't know how to do that with my camera).

Anyway, let's just say I had problems. I never got round to making them in South Africa, and back home we're in full recovering from jet-lag/getting ready for camping-mode. And working with yeast in between all this didn't work out at all. I can't blaim the recipe. It's Australian Women's Weekly's, and we all know they never make mistakes. It must have something to do with leaving the dough for several hours before getting round to it again. The buns tasted very yeasty and not sweet enough without the added chocolate.

I also had trouble with the different shapes. They had flat sides where they touched each other while baking. In the end I only had one body shape that was actually round, except the chocolate I hid inside beforehand had leaked out during baking. The glaze turned out one big mess, so I'll defenitely use another recipe next time.

I really want to have another go at this, as I think they can be ultra cute. Unfortunately I won't have time before leaving for the weekend tomorrow, so I'll give you the recipe and ideas of how I will do it next time, based on what I learned making this batch. This post is for Bread Baking day #28, this month hosted by Tangerine's Kitchen. The theme is Buns, and I don't think anything says Easter like hot cross buns. I hope you have some nice ones.

Hot Cross Bunnies
Should make about 8, depending on the size

4 teaspoons (14g) dry yeast
1/3 cup (75g) caster sugar
1 cup (250ml) warm milk
4 cups (600g) plain flour
1 teaspoon mixed spice
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
80g butter, chopped
1 egg, beaten lightly
1/3 cup warm water
100g milk chocolate

Combine the yeast with one tablespoon of the sugar and all of the milk in a small bowl, whisk until the yeast is dissolved. Cover the bowl and stand in a warm place for about 10 minutes or until the mixture is frothy.

Sift the flour, spices and salt into a large bowl. Rub in the butter, and stir in the remaining sugar, yeast mixture, egg and enough water to make a soft dough. Cover the bowl and stand in a warm place for about one hour, or until the mixture has doubled in size.

Turn the dough onto a lightly floured surface, and knead for about 10 minutes or until the dough is smooth and elastic.

To form the bunnies:
Make 6 rounds of about golf ball size, wrapped around a couple of blocks of chocolate. (start with 6 to make sure you have enough dough, you can always make some more later). Make 6 more rounds of about big marble size for the heads, 6 balls slightly larger than peas for the tails, and about 2cm long log shapes with tapered ends for the ears. Keep in mind that the dough will still rise, so make it smaller than your desired outcome. Keep all shapes on oiled baking trays, but don't let them touch each other, as you will lose the nice round shape. Keep in a warm place for 20 minutes or until the dough has almost doubled in size.

Preheat the oven to 220C.  Bake the buns until they sound hollow when tapped. Keep in mind that the smaller shapes will bake quicker. For the bodies, check between 10 and 15 minutes, and for the tails and ears just over 5 minutes. The heads should be done somewhere in between. Brush with glaze (I didn't like the AWW one, and can't really comment on any others), and cool on wire racks.

To assemble:
Melt the rest of the chocolate and spoon it into a sandwich bag with a small corner snipped off (or whatever you use). Stick the head and tail to the body, and the ears to the head, with the chocolate. I had a tough time getting the ears to stick, and ended up using toothhpicks to anchor them. Maybe it will help to cut off the bottoms of the ears to make a flat surface. Pipe on little faces on the heads, and crosses on the body (otherwise it will only be hot bunny, and is it just me, or does that sound more like a Valentine's day treat?).

Some extra tips:

• If you want fruity bunnies, add 1 cup sultanas and 2 tablespoons chpped mixed peel to the mixture.
• Make sure the dough is comnpletely wrapped around the chocolate, so that it doesn't leak out.
• Leave plenty of space around each shape on the baking sheet, otherwise the end result is out of shape.
• I love cardamom, and added some to the mixture. Of course you can use whatever spice you want.

I'll try this again next year, and will do another post then on the outcome. Hope everybody has a lovely Easter!

Lovely sounding watermelon muffins with white chocolate, rosewater and lemon zest

I had high hopes for these muffins. We had some watermelon left in the fridge which needed using up, and what do I find paging through the new Good Food? Watermelon and white chocolate chip muffins. Doesn't that sound lovely? I love recipes using what you have in the fridge, and turn out to be fabulous too. So out came the flour and my cute new babuschka measuring cups, and I started baking.

Of course I had to make them special. I had some Green and Blacks white chocolate in the pantry which I thought I'll use. When I opened the packet I saw the chocolate flecked with tiny pieces of black, and lo and behold, another look at the packet revealed that the chocolate contained Madagascar vanilla. This was so beautiful, I thought long and hard about not putting it in at all, and saving it for something a bit more special than muffins, like sharing with the Fabulous Man. But as I had no other chocolate, and the watermelon was starting to look at me reproachfully from the fridge, I started chopping.

I also added some lemon zest and rosewater for a romantic twist, and it looked wonderful, the pink dough studded with little black-speckled pieces of white chocolate, and some swirls of lemon in between.

To top it all off, I used my ultra gorgeous cupcake liners. Aren't these just the the prettiest little things you've ever seen?

Into the oven they went, and I rubbed my hands in gleeful anticipation. Boy, was I disappointed. Out came muffins that can only be described as a very synthetic looking orange, and my heart broke. Where were the pretty pink rose-scented muffins I pictured having with my afternoon cup of Earl Grey?

Then there was the taste. Do you know what watermelon muffins taste like? Nothing. It was just this bland piece of dough, apart from the absolutely wonderful pockets of melted white chocolate and vanilla (defenitely using these again!).

I turned to my trusted old friend when things go wrong, the internet. Turns out that the recipes that contained real watermelon were very much like the one I used, and not getting rave reviews either. Most recipes ask for watermelon flavouring to be added, or are just pink coloured muffins with raisins or dark chocolate chips to resemble seeds.

I'll give you the recipe I used anyway, in case you have more success than I had. If anybody has a recipe they know and love, please pass it on. In the meantime I'll have my watermelon as nature intended: straight from the fridge, infused with some vodka (once the Little Girl has grown up a bit).

Watermelon and white chocolate muffins
Makes 12

400g watermelon, peeled and chopped
5ml rosewater or to taste
1 1/2 cup (225g) self-raising flour
2 tbsp caster sugar
1 tsp baking powder
50g butter, melted
1 egg, lightly beaten
zest of one lemon
3/4 cup white chocolate chips
icing sugar, to dust

Preheat the oven to 180°C. Line a 12-hole muffin pan with paper cases.

Place watermelon in a blender and puree until smooth. Strain into a jug, discarding any seeds and pulp. Flavour with rose water.

Sift flour, sugar and baking powder into a bowl. Add melted butter, egg, watermelon juice and lemon zest, and stir until just combined. Fold through the chocolate.

Spoon into paper cases, and bake for 20-25 min until done. Transfer to wire rack to cool.

Chocolate Pizza Pockets

This lady is one of the main reasons I started my own blog. Not only does Meeta have beautiful photo's and delicious recipes, she also hosts the very popular Monthly Mingle. I used to look at the round-ups longing to join in the fun, and am so excited that I can now venture into the world of food blogging events myself. And I couldn't have picked a nicer theme to take the plunge: Bread and Chocolate, hosted by Jamie from Life's a Feast. Wow! The very thought makes my mouth water. And that was even before I'd started having a look around the net for inspiration!

You'd think it an easy choice to make. I love bread. I love chocolate. Combine the two and you have heaven on your plate. Forget the carbs, forget the fat, think about all those anti-oxidants and serotonin, and realise that this is health food. Nay, medicine! You will be downright irresponsible if you don't have bread and chocolate at least once a day! Seriously, I'm all for being healthy and mindful of what you eat, but I do think a big part of that is having whatever your body tells you it needs, have it in moderation, and enjoy eating it. All this guilt about the food we eat cannot possibly be good for our health!

Anyway, back to recipes. My, oh my, what a selection. Chocolate on bread with a sprinkle of sea salt, chocolate bread and butter pudding in any conceivable variation, chocolate chip bread, good old Nutella on toast, and chocolate hot cross buns, (yes, I know it's only February, but why we restrict ourselves to these fabulous buns only at Easter is beyond me). Where to start?

After lots of hmming and aahming, I decided to go back to my current philosophy, which is to love my money. I know it sounds strange, but I'm reckoning that if you love your money, you will only exchange it for something really really worthwhile, which in my case means I don't go to the shops all the time and spend it on crap. It also means only one grocery trip a week, based on a carefully planned menu, and some lateral thinking when it comes to using what you have first. And what I try to have around these days is either a batch of my favourite new pizza dough, or the ingredients to whip some up. I love this pizza dough - it can be used for so much more than just pizza, (which is great by itself, let's face it), and I am working on few ideas which I'll tell you all about later.

What I also have in my cupboard at all times is some good chocolate. Green & Black's to be exact. Please allow me to digress for a minute. I have a wonderful, lovely girlfriend who lives in Johannesburg, called Anelle. Not only is she smart and funny and generally great company, she is also the best giver of gifts I know. She always has something to give, and it's always chosen with care and fabulous taste. One of the gifts I've received from her was a block of this wonderful chocolate, and I've been eating it ever since. (Not that particular block, mind you, that was gone in a matter of minutes). The dark chocolate is rich and smooth, the milk chocolate is not too sweet, and the white chocolate has vanilla in it! Hence, always a special place in my cupboard for this trio.

 

I wanted to do something different than just your average chocolate pizza, and decided to make little pizza pockets, one half of the batch filled with a spicy dark chocolate and hazelnut mix (thank you Cooksister for the great idea!), and the other half with white chocolate and macadamia nuts.

I started off with little pockets more or less the size of ravioli, but there wasn't enough filling to stand up to the amount of dough. For the next round I cut rounds of about 10cm diameter, placed the filling on one side, then folded them over and squeezed the edges together. This worked much better. I also added a little splash of cream to the white chocolate mix, as it was a tad dry with only the chocolate and the nuts. Next time I will use some white chocolate spread instead of the cream for a nice smooth filling, and I will also add some cardamom for some extra oomph.

These little chocolate pockets turned out really delicious, and I'm really proud of them. I hope you like them too if you decide to make them, or use them as inspiration for your own recipe.

And of course, I hope your Valentine's day is full of love, friendship, and some chocolate.

Chocolate Pizza Pockets

One quantity of my pizza dough, or use your own favourite recipe

For the white chocolate filling

about 1/2 cup of white chocolate spread
100g white chocolate, chopped
50g macadamia nuts
1/2 teaspoon ground cardamom

For the dark chocolate filling

100g dark chocolate, chopped
about 1/2 cup of Nutella
50g hazelnuts, chopped
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground chilli (if your tastebuds agree)



Preheat oven to 200°C/400°F

Roll out your pizza dough as thin as you can. Cut out circles of around 10cm diameter.

For the white chocolate pockets: place a dollop of white chocolate spread towards one side of the circle, top with some white chocolate, macadamia nuts and a pinch of cardamom. Fold over the other half of the dough and pinch edges closed.

For the dark chocolate pockets: place a dollop of Nutella towards one side of the circle, top with dark chocolate, hazelnuts, a pinch of cinnamon and a pinch of chilli. Fold over the other half of the dough and pinch the edges closed.

Brush the tops of the pockets with some egg for some colour.

Bake for 12-15 minutes until golden brown.

This ain't no no-knead pizza

I first heard about Jim Lahey's no-knead bread recipe through the lovely Luisa from Wednesday Chef, and was intrigued by the whole business: fermenting water, shaggy dough, crackling bread! I read as much as I could, and it seemed as if every blogger worth his/her salt made this with showstopping success and loved every minute of it. The recipe was copied and saved and added to my to-bake list.

And that's where it still is. You know why? It's the waiting bit. First it's 12 hours (but preferably 18). Then wait another 2 hours. Then bake for 30 minutes at a temperature which will probably ruin your fabulous new castiron pot's handle. And it's 3 days later before you get to enjoy this wonderful bread. Now, I think it's time for me to play the baby card. Just reading about all this waiting around, and thinking about how I'm going to fit it in between feeding a baby, playing with a baby, trying to get a baby to go to sleep, changing a baby, and have I mentioned feeding a baby?, and I'm exhausted enough to abandon the recipe for some unforseen future date, probably when Little Girl is in her teens.

Also, and probably more importantly, there's the no-kneading bit, which I realise is necessary as it's part of the name and everything, but the more I think about it, the more I have to admit that I actually like kneading. I like how the dough is all gooey and sticky and messes up your rings (and I ALWAYS forget to take off my rings), but the more you push and fold and push and fold, the silkier it gets, until you're left with a smooth mound of soft white springy dough. I find it therapeutic, much the same as stirring risotto.

Then, to top it all, I found a recipe that doesn't include waiting. That's right. You turn on the oven, mix you dough, knead it for about 10 blissfull minutes, by which time your oven and pizza stone is nice and hot, and you can do a quick assembly and ta-da! Pizza in the oven. Also, if you don't want two huge pizzas, which this recipe makes, you can freeze half of it, ready for those evenings when you're tired and hungry and couldn't be bothered to make something fancier. Oh, be still my fluttering heart!

Not that I have abandoned all hope of ever making Mr. Lahey's masterpiece. It's still on the to-bake list, and it still sounds intriguing. One day I'll get around to it, and see what all the fuss is about. I might even ignore the fact that thousands of bloggers before me has done the same, and write and tell you all about it.

Pizza
makes 2 large pizzas

2 cups flour (this is where all bloggers start to discuss the virtues of different types of flour. I'm still new and stupid, so let's say plain)
8g sachet instant yeast
pinch of caster sugar
2 tablespoons olive oil
3/4 cup warm water

Preheat the oven to 200°C.

Sift flour into a bowl. Add the rest of the ingredients, and a pinch of salt, and mix until the dough comes together.

On a floured benchtop, knead the dough until elastic and springy, about 10 minutes. Divide into halves, roll out.

Add your toppings, and bake for 15-20 minutes, or until the crust is golden brown.

                                                              oOo

You might notice the absence of a photo of the finished pizza. That is because the  Little Girl demanded a drink the moment the pizza went into the oven, and I lost track of time. Fabulous Man was on the phone, so nobody was looking out for dinner. In short, it burnt. Not a lot. It was very delicious after we cut off the burnt edges, but still not good enough to take a photo of. Instead, please accept a photo of an original piece of artwork of mine, called Flower. I know it will make up for it.