Chocolate and Cherry Meringue Stack

There are a few times when you decide to prepare a meal or course where you may end up with a leftover ingredient. Deciding what to do with that ingredient, without wasting it, sometimes becomes a bigger choice than the original planning of a meal.

Eggs! Where a recipe only requires egg yolks or egg whites, you no doubt will need to make a decision as to what to do with whichever is the leftover without wasting them. There are several choices you can make for either but your decision will be based on whether you are actually going to indulged in this "by-product" and whether you do need it. 

For a meal next weekend we have decided, for dessert, to make a Hazelnut (Nutella) with Ferrero Rocher Ice Cream to accompany a Chocolate Souffle. Only needing the yolks of 5 eggs for the ice cream, I had the whites of 5 eggs at my mercy. Fortunately for me, I've had a dessert recipe that required only the whites of 5 eggs on my have to do list for the past month or so.

Egg whites used to make 4 meringue discs

Berry Ripple Cream, Mixed Berry Coulis,

 Melted Chocolate

Finished Stack (Recipe)

Note: Went overboard with the chocolate. No such thing I hear most of you say. There are cherries in there somewhere. As cherries are out of season at the moment, I had to settle for canned cherries.

Warm Chocolate Orange

Once again, a challenge presented itself when I first viewed this dessert as a pressure test for current contestants on the popular "reality" cooking show Masterchef Australia. 

"Celebrity" Chef Shannon Bennett's Bistro Vue's Warm Chocolate Orange became part of a menu this weekend. The return of my son Joel and his girlfriend Amanda from their two and bit year life experience of living and travelling the UK and Europe gave me due reason to attempt this multi element dessert.







It was a big day in the kitchen getting everything prepared. Along with the dessert, a Braii had also been planned to welcome the well travelled back home. So I could dedicate most of the kitchen time to the Warm Chocolate Orange, I prepared the marinade and relish for the BBQ last week.
As with most recipes, especially desserts, that have several components to them, I start off with plenty of enthusiasm. Several elements, and hours later, I question my sanity in taking on such tasks. Then all I need to do is remind myself of, with fingers crossed, the end result, thinking of the enjoyment and culinary experience our guest may have.

Then there is that one element that is fun and enjoyable to prepare. In this case, the orange jelly pearls were that element.













Using a syringe, single drops of warm orange jelly, made from freshly squeezed orange juice, sugar and agar agar are slowly added to grapeseed oil that has been chilled in the freezer.

The first (bottom) layer - 

Orange segments in orange jelly

Assembly time.

As for the end result, I was very pleased and relieved that it all came together.

 A special dessert for a special occasion.  

Pumpkin Soup

After seeing some "cute" Asian Pumpkins in our local fruit and veg shop last week, coupled with the experience of some rather nippy temperatures the past few evenings, it was on the cards that Pumpkin Soup would be on the menu this weekend. 
Jen is unable to have onion but is okay to have the "green" part of leeks. So leeks it was as the substitute for the onions. I actually like the taste of leeks and have used them on many occasions in some recipes.
I decided to roast the pumpkin to give the soup a touch of added flavour.

When having croutons with a meal, I prefer to make my own using a really nice sourdough. Method is just to toss cubed pieces of the bread in a bowl with garlic infused olive oil, salt and a generous sprinkle of dried herbs such as thyme. rosemary and marjoram. Then bake in a 200C oven on a tray for 10-15 minutes.

Mothers Day 2015

I have been wanting to make curried sausages since an old school friend, Loretta Ryan, mentioned them in a Facebook post a few weeks back.
Being Mother's Day, having the memories of mum's curried snags and having mum with us now, today was the day to make it. 

Along with the Curried Sausages, a Lemon Tart was whipped up for dessert.
Why a Lemon Tart? Just because.

Oyster Mushrooms

For the second week in a row, I have been given a substantial amount of mushrooms. This time they were oyster mushrooms. Thank you Cathy Cox.
As we now have, as of this weekend, my mum living with us and my son and daughter in law visiting, I knew it would not be too hard to make use of them. 

For breakfast yesterday it just had to be pan-fried on toast with chives

Dinner last night was an Omelette with Shallots and Spinach.

Since observing how omelettes were made by some of the chefs while on our honeymoon in South East Asia, I now use their method. 

It is much quicker than any technique I've followed 

and presents much better.

Finally, for today's lunch, we had Leek and Mushroom Frittata served with a Spicy Tomato Relish (minus the chorizo) and Salad

Risotto and Mushrooms

The "Death Dish" as it is known on some reality cooking shows, especially Masterchef Australia, is really not that hard to make. Risotto is like any meal you create. If you follow the directions correctly, it is pretty hard to get it wrong. Yes it does require a bit more attention while making it but if you want a perfect risotto, you do what you gotta do.
One thing I'd like to mention is that, like other methods of cooking certain dishes, there are strong preferences by chefs as to the correct way to stir the rice while the stock absorbs. Some will keep stirring to a minimum. Some will only stir in one direction while others refuse to stir at all. The non-stirrers will shake with each addition of stock. The shake method is used when making the risotto in a frying pan.

Roast Pumpkin Risotto - from a few years back

We were given a large bag of mushrooms by a friend who owns and operates a horse riding centre in our local area. With the recent wet weather and an abundance of "fertiliser", the paddocks are full of the "field" variety. 

Field mushrooms bring back childhood memories of going out for a drive with our dad, after a few days of constant rain, to the rural property's near home and collecting our own. These rural property's are now the well developed residential and business areas of Kings Langley, Glenwood and Bella Vista. 

Mushroom Menu for the Weekend

Pan fried with garlic and thyme on toast
(Breakfast Saturday)

With Rocket and Parmesan (Breakfast Sunday) 

Mushroom Stock for the Risotto




Chose to use a mushroom stock made from rehydrated mixed forest mushrooms

Mushroom and Spinach Risotto (Lunch Sunday)

Mushrooms with Roasted Garlic, English Spinach and Trio Quinoa (Dinner Saturday)