TUBULAR TASTES

TUBULAR TASTES

Deliciously succulent pasta tubes filled with aubergine, ricotta, spinach, parmesan and smoked Fior di Latte, topped and bottomed with home made tomato sauce ….. salivating yet? This week’s recipe is a home-cook’s dream as it can be prepared well ahead of time and gently reheated to serve topped with fresh basil leaves. It can be made in very large quantities for parties and freezes well ....

YOU SAY SHISO, I SAY PERILLA

YOU SAY SHISO, I SAY PERILLA

Some years ago I found an interesting herb garnish on my salad in a Vietnamese restaurant.  I didn’t recognise it but my mother, the green thumb in our family who couldn’t identify it either, suggested that I take it home and stick it in a glass of water. I did and roots sprouted. Now, I have a garden that is verdant with perilla ....

LUXE SOUP

LUXE SOUP

Dinner for a very dear friend’s birthday required a bit of thought. I wanted to cook her favourites but with a twist. She loves a corn curry I’ve been making for years but I didn’t want to serve a curry meal and so decided to convert the curry idea into a soup for entrée and make it a bit luxe for the celebration by garnishing with crayfish tails ....

INDIAN INSPIRATION

INDIAN INSPIRATION

Here are two simple dishes to offer with drinks when you have a crowd of people. Recently I served them instead of a first course before an Indian meal. The radish and cucumber raita can be made well ahead of time and, if all the ingredients are prepared beforehand, the prawn and coriander pakoras can be cooked in just a few minutes ....

GRAB A CRAB

GRAB A CRAB

Are you ready to kick back for a casual but impressive meal? This dish of crabs cooked in beer has its origins in Southeast Asia but it easily slips into Australian cuisine when you use some local, vibrantly fresh blue swimmer crustaceans and a Victorian brewed gluten-free pale ale ....

BACKYARD ABUNDANCE

BACKYARD ABUNDANCE

This one ticks all the boxes. Gluten-free, organic, sustainable, low food miles, seasonal, community-minded, delicious and free. I’m referring to a bag of limes and avocados given to me by Rosie. The avocados came from a tree overhanging her backyard and the limes from one of her green-fingered friends ....

JENNY'S FROZEN LEMON MERINGUE CAKE

JENNY'S FROZEN LEMON MERINGUE CAKE

My beautiful grandmother, Dot, had a lovely tradition of always noting the name of the person who passed a recipe on to her. I still have her old hand written recipe book with its solid wooden cover. It is full of recipes with lovely names like Chocolate Cake Rene and Aunty Nellie Lambert’s Rock Cakes, Muriel’s Caramel Marlow and Elsie T’s Coffee Crystal Biscuits as well as many of Dot’s own recipes ....

ORANGE AND LEMON POLENTA CAKE

ORANGE AND LEMON POLENTA CAKE

Over the years Rosie, Caren and I, between us, have accumulated lots of wonderful gluten-free cake recipes, many of which are already included in the Sweet Baking category here on our blog. A chance conversation we had recently highlighted the fact that it’s often nut flours that make the best substitute for wheat flour in cake-baking. But what if you want to avoid gluten and nuts? Well, this one’s for you. Or anyone else who doesn’t mind a moist, citrusy cake with a nice texture and a moreish flavour. Anyone? ....