After pineapples--why not peanuts!

After the New England pineapple, here comes the New England peanut..

first of a crop, perhaps! This one was very immature inside though the shell was the right sort of crackly texture.

Perfectly simple, delicious and colourful starter

A starter we had the other day, simple, delicious and beautiful, with all those gorgeous summer hang-ons:
mellow yellow tomatoes, herbs, Moroccan-style eggplant cooked with garlic and cumin, roasted capsicums, and olives to garnish. Worthy of being painted!

Postscript: I've been asked how we prepared the eggplant, so here goes: using a vegetable peeler, remove 1 cm wide strips of skin along the length of each eggplant. Cut the eggplant into 1 cm slices. With our home-grown eggplants, we didn't need to do the next step(in italics) but with shop-bought ones you will have to. Sprinkle with salt and layer the slices in a colander. Leave for around 20 mins, then wash under cold water, drain, then pat dry with paper towels.
Heat olive oil in a frying pan and fry the eggplant slices in batches until browned on each side and set aside on a plate. Add more oil to the pan as needed. After all eggplants are browned, cook 2 garlic cloves, finely chopped, over low heat for a few seconds. Add paprika, cumin, and pepper--or a little fresh chilli--then add the eggplant slices back to the pan and cook, mashing them gently with a fork(but not too mashed!)Continue to cook until most of the liquid has evaporated. Add some chopped coriander and lemon juice--and serve! Can be served hot, warm or cold.

Captured sunlight in a meal inspired by Provence

Things are running a little late in the garden this year, due to some unseasonally cold weather we had back in spring, so it's only now really that the classic summer vegetables--tomatoes, capsicums, eggplants/aubergines, the zucchini/courgette family, butter and green beans--are really getting into their stride. These vegetables with their distinctive fragrances, colours and flavours that feel like captured sunlight, are brilliant to cook with and create meals with all kinds of influences, from Turkish to Georgian to Greek to Provençal. That's the influence I was channeling in this simple and delicious dinner menu.
First course: 'Verrine de Provence' : A 'verrine' just means something presented in a small individual glass dish, usually a first course. In this case, the verrine consisted of a layer of small roast tomatoes, followed by a layer of eggplant salad:char-grilled eggplant, cut up and mixed with garlic, olive oil, vinegar and salt; followed then by a layer of roast chopped capsicum, two anchovy fillets, a dab of home-made mayonnaise and chopped basil leaves. Put it together at least an hour or so before eating and keep it in the fridge till you are ready to serve.
Main course: 'Poulet à la provençale' : cut up a chiocken(or use ready-cut chicken pieces). Marinade for about an hour in some olive oil, juice of a lemon, salt, pepper and garlic. Fry some chopped onion in olive oil, take chicken out of marinade, fry till beginning to be golden, then add the marinade juice, some chopped flat leaf parsley, tarragon, salt, pepper, more garlic, and a dash of white wine. Cover and let simmer. Meanwhile prepare some tomatoes by scalding them to get rid of their skins, chop coarsely, and add to the dish. Simmer till chicken is thoroughly cooked and sauce has thickened, about 45--60 mins. When serving, add extra chopped parsley and tarragon.
Vegetables to accompany: courgettes/zucchini, coarsely chopped and sauteed with olive oil and onions, and butter beans, simply cooked for a short time in just a little water mixed with a dash of oil.
For dessert, we had fruit and home-made icecream.

Pineapple harvest

Well it's been a long time coming but the pineapple that David planted and which has been very slowly coming to fruit in our greenhouse was finally ready to pick! Looks and tastes and smells gorgeous and we're pretty chuffed!

Sweet Summer 10: A different kind of sweet delight--honey and pepper vodka liqueur!

I'm republishing here a post I originally wrote in 2011, as I thought it made a rather nice and usual contribution to a sweet summer. So here's to home-made honey and pepper vodka liqueur!

When we were in Russia, we tasted a whole lot of different vodkas, including some lovely flavoured ones. My favourite was a delicious honey pepper vodka(actually from Ukraine) which had a wonderful piquant sweetness that warmed the throat. But we couldn't find any to bring home and certainly you can't buy it here. So I decided to try making it and by dint of looking up in various Russian cookery books we have, found a sort of recipe--I say sort of because actually it just talked of pepper vodka, and I had to experiment myself with the honey. Anyway I made it and it turned out just wonderfully, and very reminiscent of that Ukrainian tipple!
I used Russian Standard vodka(by far the best vodka you can buy in Australia, in my opinion--it's from St Petersburg and made with the pure cold waters from massive Lake Ladoga)as a base, then added 10 whole black peppercorns, let it steep for 10 days, then after 10 days, strained the vodka, which had now turned a pale brown colour, and added one large tablespoon of Manuka honey(which happens to be my favourite honey), stirred it, and let it steep for another 3 days before drinking it. Great as an after dinner liqueur, though it can also be drunk as an aperitif. (In both cases in shot glasses).

Sweet Summer 9: Swedish cinammon cake

Another lovely Swedish recipe from Stephanie Smee: cinammon cake.


 This one's a bit of a favourite in our house. My mother has been making a version of this for us for years, but I recently started using a recipe out of a gorgeous little traditional Swedish cake cookbook called Sju Sorters Kakor, (2005, Ica Bokförlag, Forma Publishing Group AB). Even though it is a recent publication, the book contains all my favourite Swedish baked goods recipes from way back. The title means "Seven Sorts of Cakes" as traditionally, if you invite somebody over for coffee and cake in Sweden, it was customary to offer seven different sorts of cakes or biscuits. I have a cousin who still keeps things in the freezer for just such an occasion, although she is my mother's age and I doubt my generation would have the time or energy to keep up the tradition! Still, it's a lovely idea!

So here's the recipe: Kanelkaka (Cinnamon cake)

(The cookbook notes that it was a "prizewinner" (!) in 1965!!

NB, Swedish cake recipes tend to measure dry and wet  ingredients in decilitres … 1 decilitre is 100ml. I find it very handy as it means you don't have to mess with scales. Most stainless steel measuring jugs from IKEA you'll find are marked with decilitres as well as the other metric/US measurements …

Set oven at 175 deg C.

Butter and line a springform cake tin

Ingredients

3 eggs

2 declitres (200ml) caster sugar

2.5 dl (250ml) plain flour

2.5 tsp baking powder

1 tbsp ground cinnamon

75g butter

1 dl (100ml) water.

Decoration (optional) flaked almonds

You can also add a teaspoon of ground cardamon which adds a lovely flavour. (my addition …)

Melt butter and water together over low heat and set aside.

Beat eggs and sugar until light and fluffy.

Blend flour, baking poweder and cinnamon and add to egg mixture.

Add melted butter and water.

Pour into cake tin. If using, sprinkle flaked almonds over the top.

Bake in oven for about 40 minutes or until an inserted skewer emerges dry.

I tend not to ice these sorts of cakes … my children are not fond of icing. But I do like to sprinkle either with caster sugar or icing sugar.

Sweet Summer 8: Gâteau Basque à la David

On my mother's side, I have Basque ancestors--and this is the classic cake from their region, masterfully interpreted by my (non-Basque!)husband David Leach.

(serves 4-6 people)

Ingredients for pastry: 200g plain flour, 1 whole egg plus 1 egg yolk, 130 g castor sugar, 130 g unsalted butter, pinch salt, lemon rind. Ingredients for custard: 200 ml milk, 1 egg yolk, 50 g castor sugar, 20 g plain flour, a little cherry brandy(optional), some stoned Morello cherries(he used our own homegrown ones which had been preserved in armagnac but tinned Morellos could conceivably be used). First make the pastry: put the flour in a bowl, make a well in it and into it put the egg yolk, the lightly beaten whole egg , the sugar, pinch salt, and the softened butter. Mix carefully till well combined and forming a good smooth and not sticky pastry. Put it in the fridge to rest while you prepare the custard. Dilute the flour with a little of the milk. Warm the rest of the milk gently. Beat the egg yolk with the sugar, then add to warmed milk, and then add the flour mixture, stir over stove till nice and thick(and do not let it boil.) Off the stove, add a little cherry brandy, and then the cherries. If you want to make the classic custard-filled Gateau Basque, omit both the cherries and cherry brandy. You can also flavour your custard with rum if you like.

Grease a cake or tart tin, roll out the pastry, make a base and sides out of most of it, then pour the custard mixture into it. Make a lid with rest of the pastry, crimp the edges well together, then glaze the top with a pastry brush dipped into some egg yolk. Score the pastry with a knife to form a pattern. Bake in a moderate oven for about half an hour. The cake is delicious both warm and cold.

Etorri mahaira! (Come to the table!)