Best Ever Orange Cake!

I wanted to bake something for school, and the tart was a little hard to pack in a lunchbox, so I asked my auntie to take it to my Oma who I am sure will appreciate it. This recipe is kind of our house's fall-back recipe, and whenever we want to bake something, but can't decide, we all agree on this. It is an amazingly easy recipe, and tastes great. It's also really good for lunch boxes. It is from the Women's Weekly Everyday Cakes & Cookies. It is the moist orange cake.

Ingredients:

- 150g of butter (softened)

- the zest and juice of 2 large oranges

- 2/3 of a cup of caster sugar

- 3 eggs

- 1 1/4 cups of self-raising flour

- 1/4 of a cup of milk

How To Make It:

1. Preheat oven to 160˚C, fan forced

2. Grease and line the base of a 20cm round cake pan (make sure it is quite a deep pan)

3. Add all the ingredients together in a large bowl

4. Use an electric mixer, and beat on low speed until combined

5. Increase speed to medium-high and beat for about 3 minutes or until the mixture is changed in colour and smooth

6. Spread into prepared pan and bake for about 45 minutes, or until the top is browning and a skewer inserted comes out clean

7. Leave the cake in the pan for about 2 minutes to cool, and then turn onto a wire rack to cool

Icing (it's a bit makeshift, but tastes good)

1. Put about 2 tablespoons of butter into a medium bowl (add more if you like your icing buttery, like me)

2.Put about 4 tablespoons of icing sugar into the bowl, and mash it up (using a fork) until it is a really rough paste

3. Add in the juice from 1 orange, and stir (add more of each ingredient until it is the right consistency)

4. Spread onto cold cake, and add sprinkles or writing icing, or leave it plain :)

I added those yummy little silver balls on top!

(Also, just so you know, this was supposed to go up last week, but I accidentally saved it as a draft instead of publishing it so sorry about that!)

Choc-Chip Cookies!

I was really craving choc-chip cookies and fudge today, but Mum said I had to make a choice. I chose the cookies (well, technically she said 'I hate fudge and cookies, but cookies are better!). This recipe is off of my favourite food website, taste.com. Almost all of the comments were good, except a few said that the dough was a bit sticky, so I chose to add only a little bit more flour. Anyway, these are the Gooey Chocolate Chip Cookies.

Ingredients:
- 185g of butter, softened
- 1 cup of brown sugar
- 1/2 of a cup of caster sugar
- 1 egg
- 1 egg yolk
- 2 cups of plain flour (I added about a tablespoon more)
- 1/2 a teaspoon of baking powder
- 200g of dark chocolate, roughly chopped

How To Make It:
1. Preheat your oven to 180˚C
2. Line 2 baking trays with baking paper
3. Put both sugars and butter into a medium bowl
4. Beat with an electric mixer until smooth, creamy and pale in colour
5. Add in the egg and egg yolk and beat until well combined
6. Add the flour and baking powder, and stir with a wooden spoon until well combined (I used a spatula, but it's nearly the same thing)
7. Add the chocolate and stir until combined (make sure the choc-chips are evenly dispersed throughout the mixture)
8. Roll balls about 5cm's wide, place on tray with spaces between, and press down slightly (when they are cooked, they pretty much double in size)
9. Put in oven for 12 minutes or an extra 5 minutes if you want them crispier (Mine were in the oven for almost 20 minutes and they were still quite soft, but keep checking them whilst they are in there)
10. Take out of oven, and leave on tray for about 3 minutes to firm up, and then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

Turned out really yummy!

Another Tart...Lemon!

My auntie is visiting from Melbourne, and I told her I loved to bake. She asked me to bake something for her, specifically a lemon tart. So we spent some time looking for a recipe and found this one in Stephanie Alexander's The Cook's Companion. There were a few difficulties, mainly with the pastry, and a small issue with putting in the filling. Anyway, this is the Lemon Tart recipe.

Ingredients:

Pastry- (you can buy some, or make your own like I did)

- 180g of unsalted butter

- 240g of plain flour (I didn't put enough in at first)

- a pinch of salt

- 3 tablespoons of water

- 24cm loose-based deep flan tin

Filling

- 3 large lemons

- 6 eggs

- 250g of caster sugar

- 200ml of cream

- icing sugar (to dust)

How To Make It:

Pastry

1. Remove butter from fridge at least 30 minutes before making the pastry

2. Sieve flour and salt onto a marble pastry slab or workbench (I was a bit unsure about this, but I used my kitchen bench, just cleaned it really well)

3. Chop butter into quite small pieces and, a few pieces at a time, toss through the flour

4. Lightly rub the butter pieces between your fingers, and keep tossing the flour through them

5. Bring all the mixture together, and make a well

6. Add the water into the well, and, using a pastry scraper, or a hard spatula, continually fold mixture to a rough heap

7. Using the heel of your hand, quickly push the mixture away across the bench from you (don't overwork it, but make sure it is combined)

8. Gather together in a small ball or a roll and cover in glad-wrap

9. Put in the fridge for 20 - 30 minutes to firm up a bit

10. Meanwhile, preheat oven to 200˚C

11. Take pastry out, and dust your bench top, rolling pin and hands with flour

12. Roll out the pastry until it is about 5mm thick

13. Gently lay the pastry onto the tin, and lift up the sides so that they fold into the corners.

14. Cut off the edges, but leave about a centimetre of lee-way so that the pastry has room to shrink

15. Before putting the pastry into the oven, cover with baking paper, and use pie weights (or, in my case, I just covered it in rice) to weigh down the pastry

16. Put into the oven for about 20 minutes

Filling

17. Meanwhile, zest and juice lemons in a small bowl

18. In another, large, bowl mix together the eggs and sugar until well combined

19. Add the zest and juice and stir well

20. Add the cream and whisk well (make sure you use an actual whisk!)

21. Open the oven, and check the tart (don't take it out, make sure the middle is cooked as well),but leave the tart on the shelf to cool a little

22. Pull out the shelf, and ladle the mixture into the tart.

23. Bake for 35-45 minutes or until almost set.

24. Take out of oven, and cool in tin for at least 30 minutes before serving

25. Dust with icing sugar, and serve with thick cream

Very lemony, but very nice!

Chocolate Tart & Tandoori Kebabs!

I know I haven't posted anything for a while, but it's the holidays and all my routines are stuffed up because im too busy sleeping in and eating junk. Oh well! My Mum decided to invite my uncle over for dinner, and  used it as an excuse to do a lot of cooking. She asked me to help make a desert and some kebabs she chose, so for the desert I found a lovely-looking chocolate tart. Both of these recipes are from Coles magazines, the August issue (tart) and the September/October issue (kebabs). The kebabs are dead easy, but the tart is a little more challenging (well, for me anyway)

CHOCOLATE STRAWBERRY TART
Ingredients
- 250g packet of Arnott's Choc Ripple Biscuits
- 125g of butter, melted
- 250g of dark eating chocolate, chopped
- 1/3 of a cup of thickened cream
- 125g butter, extra, chopped
- 2 eggs (all of the inside of the egg, obviously)
- 3 egg yolks (the orange bits, in case you forget!)
- 1/3 of a cup of caster sugar
- 2 tablespoons of strawberry jam (try to make sure it doesn't have too many chunks in it)
- 250g of strawberries, hulled and thinly sliced

How To Make It
1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius or 160 degrees Celsius for fan-forced ovens
2. Grease a 24cm (base measurement) loose-based fluted tart tin, and then place on a baking tray (Mum gave me a flan tin and said 'it's the same thing!)
3.Process biscuits in a food processor until finely crushed (be careful with those food processors, I cut my finger on the blades!)
4. Add melted butter and process to combine
5. Transfer to prepared tin and use a spatula to spread and press over the base and side (it said to use a spatula, but I just used the back of a spoon)
6. Chill for 30 minutes (which should be enough time to do everything else)
7. Place chocolate, cream and extra butter in a medium saucepan
8. Stir over low heat for 2 minutes, or until the chocolate melts (keep stirring the chocolate or it will stick to the bottom of the saucepan)
9. Cool for 5 minutes
10. Meanwhile, use an electric mixer to beat the eggs, egg yolks and sugar in a large bowl for 3 minutes or until thick and creamy
11. Gradually beat the chocolate mixture into the egg mixture
12. Pour into the biscuit base
13. Bake for 15 minutes, or until filling is just set (even though that part seemed the easiest, it was the part that I stuffed up the most. My tart was in the oven for 40 minutes, instead of 15. But that may have been because it was on the bottom shelf and was sharing the oven with a big pot of curry)
14. Cool for 15 minutes, and then chill for 2 hours or until firm.
15. Place jam in a small heatproof jug/bowl with 2 teaspoons of water (this step can be done just before you take the tart out of the fridge, or whilst it is in the fridge. If you do it while the tart is in the fridge, make sure you reheat the jam to make it liquidy again)
16. Microwave in high for 20 seconds or until jam melts(i just realised that i didn't add any water. Whoops!)
17. Strain and cool for 2 minutes
18. Arrange strawberry slices on tart, and brush with jam

Ended up better than I expected!!!!

So the tart wasn't as hard as i thought it would be, and there were quite a few mistakes, along with some blood loss, but it ended up really well, and everyone enjoyed it, I think!

TANDOORI CHICKEN SKEWERS WITH HERB DIP & PICKLED ONIONS

Ingredients

- 1 small red onion, very thinly sliced

- 1 1/2 tablespoons of lime juice

- 1 1/3 cups of light Greek yoghurt

- 2 tablespoons of Tandoori Paste

- 1 kg of chicken thigh, trimmed and cut into 3cm pieces (3cm? does it matter? probably)

- 1 cup of coriander sprigs

- 1/4 of a cup of mint leaves

- 2 garlic cloves, crushed

- 1 long green chilli, chopped

How To Make It

1. Place onion and 2 teaspoons of lime juice in a glass bowl (make sure it is glass, otherwise it is bad for the pickling process)

2. Season with salt and then cover and stand for an hour

3. Meanwhile, combine 1 cup of the yoghurt and all the Tandoori paste in a large bowl

4. Add chicken and toss to coat (I really enjoyed 'tossing' the chicken)

5. Thread onto skewers, and place in the fridge to marinate for at least 15 minutes

6. Process the coriander, mint, garlic, chilli and remaining lime juice in s food processor until smooth ( mum did this part because i was trying not to bleed into the food)

7. Heat a barbecue or chargrill on medium

8. Cook chicken, turning, for 10 minutes or until cooked and lightly charred 

9. Serve with dip and onion

The skewers were beautiful and were my favourite bit of dinner, if I say so myself :)

Enjoy!

Easy Chocolate Cake

This morning I did the City 2 Surf, 12km walk, and although it was only a walk, it was tiring! Anyway, I felt like making a chocolate cake today, so I flipped through my massive cookbook, and found an easy-looking chocolate cake. This recipe is super easy, and has ingredients that you don't need to go out and buy. The only problem is that it is in the oven for 1 hour! Oh well. This is from the cookbook I got for xmas, and it is the 'Country Women's Association Classics' cookbook. It is Kim's chocolate cake.

Ingredients:
- 2 cups of self-raising flour
- 2 tablespoons of cocoa
- 1 1/2 cups of sugar
- 1 1/2 cups milk
- 2 eggs
- 2 tablespoons of butter, melted

How To Make It:
1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius. Grease and line a 23cm round cake tin.
2. Sift the flour and cocoa into a bowl (preferably a large one as this recipe makes quite a large mix)
3. Add the sugar, milk and eggs.
4. Beat with an electric mixer for 2 minutes
5. Add in the melted butter, and beat for a further 2 minutes.
6. Pour into prepared tin and bake for about 1 hour (although it took my cake about 1hr and 10 mins)

This recipe didn't include instructions for an icing, so this is what I did. It isn't accurate at all, and you have to make it by taste and texture, but it's something.

Ingredients:
- Icing sugar
- Cocoa powder
- Soft butter (not melted)
- Milk

How To Make It:
1. Put about 3 tablespoons of icing sugar into a medium bowl
2. Add in a tablespoon or two of cocoa powder.
3. Add in about 2 tablespoons of butter, and if needed, a splash of milk
4. Squish the butter into the icing, and keep adding either milk or icing sugar if the mix is not the texture you want.
5. In the end, the mixture should stay in the bowl if you tip it upside down, and make sure you put the icing onto a cool cake, otherwise it will melt.

Crepes for Dinner!?!?!?!?!

It's a bit random, but I decided to make crepes for dinner. My mum sometimes did this for me and my brother when we were little and on special occasions, like birthdays and on Pancake Tuesday. But I had a sudden onset of cravings for crepes. So I begged mum to make them, but she said to make them yourself, so I did. This recipe is titled pancakes, but are more of a crepe consistency. They are from my mum's cookbook; ' Stephanie Alexander, The Cook's Companion'.
In our family (there are 4 of us), we have 3 or 4 big crepes each, so my mum usually doubles the recipe as it does not make nearly enough. I will put the original recipe on here, and if you make them and want quite a few, just double all the quantities.

Ingredients:
- 250g of plain flour
- 60g of butter
- a pinch of salt
- 1 1/2 cups of milk
- 3 eggs

How To Make Them:
1. Put flour into a large bowl, and make a well
2. Heat butter, milk and salt in a saucepan over medium-high heat until butter has fully melted
3. Break eggs into the well, and stir into the flour (it's going to get really thick and sticky, but when you add the milk it gets better)
4. Gradually add the warm milk mixture and whisk until smooth (you can use an actual whisk if you want a really good workout, but I just used an electric mixture to make sure there are no lumps)
5. The mixture should be like thin cream, and if it's not, then add more milk ( it doesn't have to be warm)
6. Cover and refrigerate for at least 2 hours before cooking.
Cooking
7. Heat a frying pan on medium heat (preferably a non-stick frying pan, and use one that is the size that you want your pancakes to be)
8. For the first pancake, and after you've cooked a few, grease the frying pan with butter, oil, etc.
9. Lift the pan away from heat, and ladle in the pancake mixture, tilting the pan to spread it evenly and then put it back on the heat
10. After about a minute, lift the outer edge of the pancake, to see if it's cooked ('cooked' is when the underside starts to brown)
11. If it's not cooked, then set back down, but if it's cooked, slide a spatula underneath and flip the pancake over onto it's other side (flipping is hard, but it gets easier with practice!)
12. Cook for a little bit less time on that side, until the base is also browning, and then serve
13. Enjoy!

I like my pancakes with lemon juice and butter, or Nutella, or maple syrup. You can also have savoury ones like smoked salmon, cream cheese and spring onions (that's what my mum usually has), but really you can put on whatever you want! These are pretty easy to make and turn out really well!

ANZAC Biscuits :)

So, as usual I am cooking on a Sunday arvo. Today I decided to make ANZAC biscuits. I used a recipe from one of my mum's cookbooks, called 'Lady Flo Bjelke-Petersen's Classic Country Collection'. It's a really old but well-used book in our house. The recipe is the ANZAC biscuits.
Here's  how I made them...

Ingredients:
- 125g butter
- 1 desert spoon of golden syrup
- 1 heaped teaspoon of baking soda
- 1 1/2 cups of rolled oats
- 1 cup of self-raising flour
- 1 cup of sugar
- 1 cup of desiccated coconut
- Pinch of salt
- 1 egg
- 1/2 cup chopped nuts (optional, I chose not to add these)


How To Make It:
1. Preheat oven to about 180 degrees Celsius (fan-forced)
2. Line a baking tray with baking paper, or grease it
3. Put butter, golden syrup and baking soda into a small saucepan, and, over medium-high heat, stir until butter has melted. Set aside
4. In a large bowl, mix oats, self-raising flour, sugar, coconut, nuts, and salt.
5. Add in the melted ingredients to the dry ones, and mix well until fully combined
6. Mix in unbeaten egg
7. Knead mixture for about 5 minutes (make sure your hands are clean!)
8. Roll into small balls, and evenly space the balls apart on the tray (these really spread so be careful!)
9. Put into the oven and bake for about 15 minutes, or until the cookies are golden-brown and not super-squishy.

 Of course little chicken nugget helped me.....

Fresh out of the oven!

YUM!!!!!