I adjusted the ratios somewhat for this one. We had twice as much chicken as the recipe called for, so I doubled the marinade and bumped up the rice slightly¹. However, we were a bit light on mushrooms, so they were scaled back a bit. And we'd just harvested a bunch of silverbeet (chard) out of the garden a couple of days ago, so I didn't want to try to take any more yet. This left me trying to swap in frozen chopped spinach. Which was fine, but I didn't want to overdo it, so I just put in a relatively small amount.

The final result was tasty, but I do think that it would have been better with more mushrooms and greens (and a bit more salt). All of these changes are reflected in the write-up below.

Ginger Rice with Chicken and Mushrooms

Slightly adapted from Dish of the Day by Kate McMillan

Ingredients

• 4 skinless boneless chicken thighs, cut into bite-sized pieces
• 1 Tbsp. ginger paste
• 2 Tbsp. oyster sauce
• 2 Tbsp. dark soy sauce²
• 2 Tbsp. Shaoxing wine (绍兴酒)
• 2 tsp. sesame oil
• 1/4 tsp. Chinese five-spice powder
• 1 Tbsp. oil (optional)
• 1 onion, chopped (optional)
• 1-2 cloves garlic, minced (optional)
• 2 c. jasmine rice
• 4 c. water
• 400-500g Swiss chard (silverbeet) and/or kale, chopped
• 250g mushrooms (preferably a mix of shiitake and cremini), sliced
• 2-3 green onions, sliced

Directions

1. Combine chicken, ginger, oyster sauce, soy sauce, wine, sesame oil, and five-spice powder and mix well. Set aside for 10-20 minutes.
2. If using onion and garlic, heat the oil over medium heat and sauté until softened (3-5 minutes).³
3. Add the rice, water, greens, mushrooms, and chicken (along with all of its marinade) to the pot and bring to a boil over medium-high heat.
4. Reduce heat to medium-low, cover, and cook until rice is tender (15-20 minutes).
5. Remove from heat, fluff rice, and allow to stand, covered, for 10 minutes.
6. Sprinkle with green onions and serve.

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¹ Not double. I just nudged the rice up by 1/3. But, honestly, for the amount of everything else that I had in the pot, it might've been better not to scale the rice up after all. It was tasty this way, but definitely could've used more mushrooms and greens. Which the recipe write-up reflects. ^Back
2 I used light soy here because the recipe didn't specify and it was what I had easily to hand but, having tasted it, I think that dark soy (or a blend of dark and light) would work better than light alone. ^Back
3 The original recipe didn't call for any onion or garlic and I didn't use any this time. But, having tasted it, I think some more aromatics would go nicely, so I've added them to the recipe as an optional extra. ^Back

I had to fudge this one slightly. It was meant to be done with bananas, blueberries, soft tofu, and orange juice concentrate. We didn't have any orange juice concentrate, but we did have some nice honey Greek yogurt that needed to be used up. So I swapped that in instead. Obviously it's a very different flavour, but it still gives a bit of acidity and a bit of sweetness. Not in the same proportions and not with the same flavours, but it got the job done. And, honestly, I suspect the yogurt version is probably a bit healthier as well.

This worked out quite well. It provided something to round out the breakfast this morning, since we didn't have enough pancakes left to feed everybody. It used up some of the ridiculous pile of tofu from the fridge. And it let me easily say "sure, no problem!" when the Kidlet requested a smoothie with her pancakes this morning. And, even more importantly, Reiver and the Kidlet both seemed to enjoy them.

Banana-Blueberry Smoothie

Slightly adapted from The Big Book of Breakfast by Maryana Vollstedt

Ingredients

• 150g soft tofu
• 3/4 c. honey or vanilla Greek yogurt
• 1/2 c. frozen blueberries
• 2 frozen bananas
• 1 c. milk

Directions

1. Combine all ingredients and purée until smooth.
2. Pour into glasses and serve.

I was planning on doing carrot-zucchini latkes for breakfast this morning. But the zucchini wasn't a great price this week, so I decided to save it for another time. Which is all well and good, except it left me with a hole in my meal plan.

After some frantic rifling through cookbooks, I eventually settled on this pancake recipe. It's not super substantial, but it was tasty and we had all the bits readily to hand. And that was the important bit this morning!

I ended up using some horopito-infused honey as the honey component of this recipe and I think it worked quite nicely. That said, regular honey will work just fine too. I just used the horopito honey because we had it and I thought it would complement the other spices well. (Which it did.) The slight peppery taste worked well with the coriander and cinnamon in the batter.

Spiced Whole Wheat Pancakes with Nuts

Slightly adapted from The Big Book of Breakfast by Maryana Vollstedt

Ingredients

Pancakes

• 300g whole wheat flour
• 1 Tbsp. baking powder
• 1 tsp. ground cinnamon
• 1 tsp. coriander seeds, ground
• 1/4 tsp. ground nutmeg
• 1/4 tsp. coarse sea salt, ground
• 2 c. milk
• 3 large eggs
• 1/4 c. oil
• 3 Tbsp. honey
• 1/2 c. chopped walnuts, divided

Cinnamon Honey

• 1/4 c. honey
• 1/8 tsp. ground cinnamon
• 1 Tbsp. butter

Directions

1. Combine the flour, baking powder, cinnamon, coriander, nutmeg, and salt and mix well.
2. In a separate bowl, beat the eggs with the milk and mix in the oil and honey.
3. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and stir to combine.
4. Mix in half of the walnuts.
5. Heat the pan over medium-low heat.
6. Add a little butter if necessary.
7. Scoop a few portions of batter into the pan, using ~1/4 c. for each pancake.
8. Cook until bubbles form and edges look dry.
9. Flip and continue cooking until browned on both sides and cooked through.
10. Transfer cooked pancakes to a plate and repeat with remaining batter.
11. Meanwhile, gently heat the remaining honey and mix in the cinnamon and butter. Stir to combine.
12. Serve pancakes topped with cinnamon honey and reserved walnuts.

Beans are in season! And corn. And all sorts of other lovely stuff. But today I'm talking about the beans.

When they're lovely and fresh like this, they really don't need much done to them. They're great enjoyed raw (maybe with a little dip or dressing on the side). Or just quickly steamed or sautéed.

This recipe actually only called for a bit of salt and oil, but I really love garlicky green beans, so I added just a touch of garlic paste to them as well.

I also cooked them for way less time than the recipe called for. It suggested blanching them in salted water for 5 minutes before sautéing them with an alarming amount of salt. I cut the boiling time down to ~90 seconds, used only a small amount of salt, and, as noted, added a bit of garlic to them mix as well. They came out great! I mean, they weren't the star of the show or anything, but they were very nice and everyone seemed to enjoy them. So that's a success in my books!

Sautéed Green Beans

Slightly adapted from Vegetable of the Day by Kate McMillan

Ingredients

• 250g fresh green beans, ends trimmed
• 1 tsp. olive oil
• 1/2 tsp. garlic paste
• 1/4 tsp. coarse sea salt

Directions

1. Bring a pot of salted water to a boil and add the beans.
2. Boil for 1-2 minutes, then drain and shock under cold water.
3. Heat the oil over medium heat.
4. Add the beans, garlic, and salt and sautée until beans begin to brown slightly (3-5 minutes).

I went slightly off-script for this one. The recipe calls for banana, pineapple, and mango for the fruit and then vanilla yogurt and orange juice as the liquid. I found a bag of frozen "tropical fruit blend" at the grocery store yesterday. It did contain pineapple and mango, but it also had a lot of strawberry and honeydew in the mix. I figured that sounded tasty and let me buy only one bag of frozen fruit rather than two, so I just rolled with it. As for the liquids... We already had a bunch of really nice honey yogurt, so I opted to use that with a little vanilla extract mixed in. And for the orange juice... I did juice the orange that we had, but it didn't produce quite enough, so I just rounded it out with a bit of milk and called it a day. So, not quite the smoothie of the recipe, but good nonetheless.

Tropical Smoothie

Slightly adapted from The Breakfast Bible by Kate McMillan

Ingredients

• 1 banana
• 2 c. frozen fruit (preferably a 3:1 mix of mango and pineapple)¹
• 1/2 c. honey yogurt
• 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1/2-3/4 c. orange juice and/or milk

Directions

1. Combine ingredients in blender and purée until smooth.
2. Add more liquid as needed to achieve desired consistency.
3. Pour into glasses and serve.

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¹ I think mine was more like 8:6:3:3 strawberries to honeydew to mango to pineapple. ^Back

I was dead tired yesterday. Luckily we still had some leftovers for dinner. So all I needed to do was whip up some sort of vegetable side to go with it. I had a big bag of minced spinach in the freezer and I'd just restocked on cream, so that made this an easy choice.

It wasn't a phenomenal dish, but it wasn't bad either. And it did the job of putting some green on our plates. And I cut the cream with a bit of milk, so I didn't even feel too guilty about eating it!

The original recipe was written for fresh baby spinach, but I didn't really want to commit half a kilo of baby spinach to it. As far as I'm concerned, this is what frozen spinach was made for: being used in large quantities on short notice.

Creamed Spinach with Lemon

Slightly adapted from Vegetable of the Day by Kate McMillan

Ingredients

• 1 lemon
• 1/2 c. heavy (35%) cream or half-and-half (10% MF)
• 450g frozen chopped spinach
• 1 tsp. sugar
• salt and pepper, to taste

Directions

1. Use a vegetable peeler to cut a 5cm long strip of lemon zest off of the lemon and add it to the cream.
2. Bring the cream to a simmer over medium-low heat.
3. Simmer, uncovered, until reduced by half.
4. Meanwhile, heat the spinach over medium-low heat until thawed.
5. Sprinkle in the sugar and season to taste with salt and pepper.
6. Continue cooking the spinach until any excess liquid has evaporated.
7. Grate the lemon zest from half of the remaining lemon and add it to the spinach. (Reserve the remaining lemon for another use.)
8. Once the cream has thickened, add the spinach to it and stir to mix.
9. Cook until heated through (2-3 minutes).

We all wanted dessert the other day. I was thinking of doing up some grilled bananas with chocolate and chopped nuts. But then Reiver mentioned that he could really go for some bananas and custard. Except... we were all out of custard.

We did have milk, sugar, and eggs though. So I reasoned that it wouldn't be that much trouble to make some custard.

But then I got to flipping through my cookbooks and found this banana butterscotch pudding recipe. And we had (almost) all the bits. And it sounded fun. And Reiver and I are both butterscotch fans. So... wins all 'round!

I say almost all of the ingredients, because we didn't actually have any vanilla wafers. What we did have though, was Gingernuts! And I reasoned that a) using butterscotch pudding rather than vanilla was already a deviation from the "traditional" combination and b) ginger would go quite nicely with both the banana and the butterscotch flavours. And they did, indeed, go very well together!

Banana Butterscotch Pudding

Slightly adapted from Dessert of the Day by Kim Laidlaw

Ingredients

• 6 large egg yolks¹
• 40g cornstarch (cornflour)
• 3 c. milk, divided
• 70g butter
• 250g sugar
• 1/4 c. water
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 3-4 bananas, peeled and sliced
• 4-6 Gingernuts, crumbled
• whipped cream, to serve

Directions

1. Mix the egg yolks with the cornstarch and 1/2 c. of the milk and set aside.
2. Heat the remaining 2 1/2 c. of milk with the butter until steaming. Cover and keep warm.
3. Meanwhile, combine the sugar and water over high heat.
4. Stir constantly until sugar has just melted.
5. From this point on, DO NOT STIR the sugar!
6. Reduce heat to medium-high and cook, swirling often, until caramel turns golden.
7. Remove from heat immediately and carefully pour in the milk mixture. It will bubble and steam vigorously, so just do a little at a time initially.
8. Whisk until bubbling subsides and mixture is thoroughly combined.
9. Whisk the egg mixture to make sure the cornstarch hasn't settled out.
10. Slowly pour the hot milk mixture into the egg mixture while whisking to temper the eggs.
11. Return the custard to medium-low heat and cook, stirring constantly, until thickened.
12. Remove from heat and stir in vanilla.
13. Spoon layers of pudding, banana slices, and crumbled biscuits either into one large dish or several smaller ones.
14. Once pudding has cooled, add a generous dollop of whipped cream on top and serve.

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¹ I actually went with 4 egg yolks and 1 whole egg for mine. I still found the finished pudding lovely and rich, so I'm not sad about saving a few eggs by doing it that way. ^Back

Reiver picked up some lovely fresh corn the other day. I didn't quite get to it on Friday, so I figured I should make sure to add it to my dinner plans for Saturday so that we could enjoy it while it was still at its best.

The recipe I picked called for grilling the corn. And we did try doing one cob in the air fryer to get some of that roastiness on it. But I have to say, I think I liked the microwave steamed corn even better! And the maple butter went great with both.

Corn with Maple Butter

Slightly adapted from Vegetable of the Day by Kate McMillan

Ingredients

• 1/4 c. butter, softened
• 1 Tbsp. maple syrup
• grated zest of 1/2 a lemon
• ~1 Tbsp. lemon juice
• pinch of ground cayenne and/or smoked paprika
• salt and pepper, to taste
• 4 ears of corn, unshucked

Directions

1. Combine the butter, maple syrup, lemon zest, lemon juice, cayenne/paprika, salt, and pepper and mix well. Set aside.
2. Trim the silk end off the corn. Wet the ears of corn all over.
3. Microwave on high until done (3 1/2 minutes for one ear, probably ~5 if doing all four at once).
4. Trim the wide end off of the corn cobs and squeeze the narrow/silk end to push the corn out of its husk like a tube of toothpaste.
5. Slather the corn with the compound butter and enjoy.

Reiver's family gifted us a bunch of lovely beets out of the garden the other day, so I've been looking for a nice way to use them up. I was initially eyeing a nice roasted beet salad recipe, but it required goat cheese and I didn't want to have to go out and get yet another kind of cheese for it.

This one technically called for fontina, but I figured that I could probably get away with a mix of cheddar and mozzarella for that. And that combination does, indeed, seem to have worked out quite nicely!

The beets came out great. Reiver and I were both big fans. They tasted wonderful. The cheese was lovely. And the walnuts added just a bit of crunch on top.
The Kidlet was less of a fan, but I was kind of expecting that. She's never really cared for beets in the first place. She was a trooper and tried them anyway, but this preparation didn't jive with her any more than any of the previous beet recipes that I've tried. That's alright though. More for the rest of us!

Beet Gratin with Walnuts

Slightly adapted from Vegetable of the Day by Kate McMillan

Ingredients

• 6 large beets, peeled and sliced
• 1-2 Tbsp. olive oil
• pepper, to taste
• 75g Cheddar cheese, grated
• 75g mozzarella cheese, grated
• 1 tsp. dried thyme (or 2 tsp. fresh)
• 3 Tbsp. heavy (35%) cream
• 1/4 c. walnuts, chopped

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 190°C (375°F) and grease a 20cm (8") square baking dish.
2. Toss the beets with the olive oil.
3. Place ~1/4 of the beet slices in the bottom of the prepared dish, overlapping them slightly.
4. Season with a bit of pepper.
5. Combine the cheeses and the thyme and sprinkle ~1/4 of the cheese mixture over the beets.
6. Repeat the layers of beets and cheese until you run out.
7. Drizzle the cream over the last layer of cheese.
8. Sprinkle with walnuts.
9. Bake at 190°C (375°F) for 45 minutes.
10. Let cool slightly before serving.

Apparently these are also known as "strawberry Napoleons", but I've only ever heard them called "mille-feuilles" (lit. "1000 leaves/sheets) which is a reference to the layers of puff pastry used to sandwich the filling.

You can do them with all sorts of different flavours, but I had a recipe for this strawberry and whipped cream version and we had all the ingredients on hand already, so that made it an easy choice. And they were a big hit all 'round! A bit messy to eat, maybe, but nobody seemed to mind that terribly much. They were all devoured in very short order.

I was worried about being short of filling, so I whipped a full cup of cream (even though we didn't have the full 450g of pastry that the recipe called for). In retrospect, I think that 3/4 c. probably would have been sufficient. But no one seemed to mind the extra cream. I also didn't worry too much about making them neat and tidy. And I skipped the dusting of icing sugar. I'm sure it would have been a nice finishing touch on a neatly made set of mille-feuilles, but I wasn't too worried about it for these ones. We just wanted to tuck in and enjoy!

Strawberry Mille-Feuilles

Slightly adapted from Dessert of the Day by Kim Laidlaw

Ingredients

• 375g puff pastry
• 250g strawberries, hulled and sliced
• 1 Tbsp. sugar
• 1 Tbsp. lemon juice
• 3/4 c. heavy (35%) cream

Directions

1. If the pastry is frozen, thaw it out.
2. Preheat oven to 200°C (400°F) and line two baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone baking mats.
3. Roll to a thickness of ~3mm trying to keep it as rectangular as possible. Aim for a shape that is ~20x30cm (or slightly smaller).
4. Trim off any uneven edges and cut the rectangle in half lengthwise (to form two rectangles each a bit under 10cm wide).
5. Cut each piece of dough crosswise into pieces 4-5cm wide.
6. Place the small rectangles of dough onto the prepared baking sheets and prick each one 3-4 times with a fork.
7. Bake at 200°C (400°F) for 20 minutes, rotating halfway through.
8. Meanwhile, toss the strawberries with the sugar and lemon juice and set aside.
9. Once the pastry is puffed and crisp, remove from oven and allow to cool.
10. Meanwhile, beat the cream until soft peaks form.
11. Carefully fold the strawberries and any accumulated juices into the whipped cream.
12. Once the pastry is cool, spoon a generous portion onto half of the pieces, then top with the remaining pieces of pastry.
13. Dust with icing sugar if desired and serve.

This salad worked out particularly. Reiver's family gifted us some lovely butter lettuce and beets the other day. And then mushrooms went on sale for half price at the grocery store. And, at that point, all you really need to add to complete the dish is a light vinaigrette, so this recipe dovetailed quite nicely with our available ingredients this week.

I think cremini mushrooms (and/or a mix of oyster and shiitake) would be idea for this, but the sale was only on the white button mushrooms this week, so I just went with those. Use whatever tickles your fancy though. You can't really go wrong with mushrooms cooked in butter!

Spring Greens with Sautéed Mushrooms

Slightly adapted from Vegetable of the Day by Kate McMillan

Ingredients

• 1 Tbsp. butter
• 250g mushrooms, trimmed and cut into bite-sized pieces
• 1 tsp. garlic paste¹ (optional)
• salt and pepper, to taste
• 1 Tbsp. red wine or apple cider vinegar
• 1 tsp. balsamic vinegar
• 1-2 Tbsp. olive oil
• 1 Tbsp. minced shallot²
• 1 Tbsp. minced fresh chives
• 150-175g mixed greens

Directions

1. Melt the butter over medium heat.
2. Add the mushrooms and cook until they release their liquid.
3. Add the garlic, season to taste with salt and pepper, and continue cooking until most of the liquid has evaporated.
4. Meanwhile, combine the vinegars and whisk in the olive oil.
5. Mix in the shallot and chives (or green onion) and toss with the greens.
6. Top salad with the mushrooms and serve.

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¹ The recipe didn't call for any garlic and I didn't use any this time, but, in retrospect, I think some garlic with the mushrooms would have been nice. I would definitely add some if I were doing this again. ^Back
2 I didn't want to go out and get shallots and chives just for this recipe, so I used a minced green onion in place of both. I'm sure the shallot and chives would have been nice, but not so nice that it was worth getting two extra ingredients for and then trying to figure out how to use up the excess. The green onion got the job done just fine. ^Back

This is a fairly standard shortcrust pastry with the addition of a bit of cornmeal and an egg. (The original recipe actually called for two egg yolks, but I nicked the yolk of my first egg with a piece of shell and decided to just toss the whole egg in and it seemed to work fine, so I think I'll just do it that way on purpose in the future.)

Cornmeal Shortcrust Pastry

Slightly adapted from The Breakfast Bible by Kate McMillan

Ingredients

• 250g soft (plain/standard/cake) flour
• 75g cornmeal
• 1/2 tsp. baking powder
• 1/4 tsp. coarse sea salt, ground
• 170g unsalted butter
• 1 large egg
• 3-4 tsp. cold water

Directions

1. Combine the flour, cornmeal, baking powder, and salt and mix well.
2. Cut in the butter until crumbly.
3. Mix in the egg with a fork.
4. Drizzle in the water, a little at a time, just until the pastry comes together.
5. Press into a ball, flatten into a thick disc, wrap in plastic wrap, and chill for at least 30 minutes or until ready to use.

This made for a phenomenal brunch! The flavours were great and it looked very nice too. The only slightly hiccough (and I do mean slight) was that, in order to get the egg whites to fully set, I had to cook it until the yolks were also hard. They were still delicious. It just wasn't the set white, runny yolk result that I'd been hoping for. But, given how this one went, I think you'd need to cook the whites and yolks separately for that. That said, it was good enough like this that I probably wouldn't be inclined to bother most of the time. And, I will admit: having the yolks fully set did make it easier to serve.

I've given ranges for a lot of the ingredients here because I do feel that you have a fair bit of flexibility. Our green onions were large, so I only ended up using three. But with smaller ones, I think that the full six called for in the recipe would have been more appropriate. The recipe also called for just over 100g of each kind of cheese. I used 100 and felt that was very generous. I think that I probably could've gotten away with half that amount and still been quite happy. That said, maximum cheese was delicious! And I followed a similar logic with the asparagus, bacon, and garlic. For the eggs, the original recipe actually called for 4-6. But I had a very large pie plate and, even with six eggs, it still looked a bit sparse, so I tossed in an extra two and that seemed just about right.

Asparagus, Corn, and Egg Tart

Slightly adapted from The Breakfast Bible by Kate McMillan

Ingredients

• 1 recipe cornmeal shortcrust pastry
• 100-150g asparagus, trimmed
• 100-150g pancetta or bacon, chopped
• 3-6 green onions, chopped
• 3-4 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 c. frozen corn kernels
• 50-100g mozzarella cheese, grated
• 50-100g cheddar cheese, grated
• 1/3 c. half-and-half (10% MF)
• salt and pepper, to taste
• 6-8 large eggs
• 1/2 c. sunflower or similar sprouts (optional)

Directions

1. Roll out the pastry and use it to line a 23cm (9") deep-dish pie plate or 25cm (10") tart tin. Chill for 20-30 minutes.
2. Preheat oven to 190°C (375°F).
3. Line the pie shell with baking paper, fill with pie weights, and blind bake for 12 minutes.
4. Meanwhile, blanch the asparagus for 1-2 minutes and then drain and shock in cold water.
5. Cook the pancetta/bacon over medium heat for a few minutes, then add the green onion and garlic and cook until softened (5 minutes + 3-5 minutes).
6. Add the corn and cook for another minute or so.
7. Remove the paper and pie weights from the pastry shell and spread the bacon mixture in an even layer in the bottom of the pie shell.
8. Place the asparagus on top and sprinkle with the cheese.
9. Drizzle with the half-and-half and season to taste with pepper.
10. Return to oven and bake for 10 minutes.
11. Crack the eggs into the tart, doing your best to space them evenly. If it's important to you to have set whites and runny yolks, then separate the yolks from the whites and pour the whites on first. Set the yolks aside for now.
12. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
13. Bake at 190°C (375°F) for 15 minutes.
14. If you reserved the yolks, add them now, doing your best to space them evenly atop the tart.
15. Return to oven, turn off heat, and allow to sit in hot oven for 10 minutes to finish setting whites and thicken yolks.
16. Remove from oven and allow to stand for 5-10 minutes before slicing.
17. Garnish with sprouts (if using), cut into wedges, and serve.

I wanted to make everyone cog for breakfast this morning. I figured it would be an easy, tasty way to start the day and a good use of the fresh strawberries and blackberries that we had in the fridge.

Unfortunately, neither Reiver nor I had realized that there was no sweetened condensed milk in the pantry. This left me a little flummoxed. I didn't really want to go out to the shops to try to get some at 7am, but I also didn't really have any good alternatives for breakfast. Luckily, we did have lots of sugar in the pantry. And milk in the fridge. So I figured that maybe I'd just try my hand at making the sweetened condensed milk from scratch. And, honestly, it worked out pretty well!

Mine didn't come out quite as thick and syrupy as the stuff you get in the can. I suspect largely due to the fact that I was using low-fat rather than full-fat milk. It still did a nice job of sweetening the cog though and the exact consistency is not important for that, so I'm happy.

Sweetened Condensed Milk

From Bigger Bolder Baking

Ingredients

• 2 c. milk
• 2/3 c. sugar

Directions

1. Combine the milk and sugar and cook, stirring, over medium-low heat until sugar has dissolved.
2. From this point on, do not stir. Continue to simmer gently (adjusting temperature as necessary) until mixture is reduced to ~1 c. and darkened slightly.
3. Transfer to a jar and store in the fridge until ready to use.

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Variants

Non-Dairy Sweetened Condensed Milk

• 2 c. oat milk (or other non-dairy milk of your choice)
• 2/3 c. sugar

This is billed as "Asian-style chicken soup" in the cookbook. But, looking at it, it's basically a simplified pho. You start with chicken stock and enrich it with green onions, ginger, fish sauce, cloves, star anise, and chile and then poach a couple of chicken breasts and some bok choy in it. The chicken then gets sliced and placed in a bowl with some rice noodles which the broth then gets ladeled over. Cilantro, green onions, basil, bean sprouts, chopped peanuts, sliced chilies¹, hoisin sauce, and lime wedges are passed at the table for people to adjust their soup to their taste.

I had a chicken carcass on hand, so I just made my chicken stock from scratch. I didn't measure my stock. I just added enough water to cover the carcass and added some carrots, onion, garlic, bay leaf, peppercorns, dried mushrooms, a dried chile, and a splash of soy sauce. I would have put some celery if we'd had any, but we didn't so I just rolled without it. Because I was making my own stock from scratch and without any added salt (except what was in the soy sauce) I didn't add the water called for in the recipe. (Besides, I think I probably had more than the requisite 8 c. of stock anyway.) If you're using commercial stock though, you'll probably want to add the water to avoid an excessively salty final broth.

Chicken Pho

Slightly adapted from Dish of the Day by Kate McMillan

Ingredients

• 8 c. chicken stock
• 2 c. water
• 1 bunch green onions, divided
• 5cm fresh ginger (or 1 Tbsp. ginger paste)
• 2 Tbsp. fish sauce
• 1 Tbsp. sugar
• 6 whole cloves
• 2 whole star anise
• ~500g skinless boneless chicken breasts
• 4 heads baby bok choy, chopped
• ~200g dry rice noodles
• fresh Thai chilies, thinly sliced
• fresh cilantro
• Thai basil
• bean sprouts
• peanuts, toasted and chopped
• lime wedges
• hoisin sauce

Directions

1. Combine the stock and water and bring to a boil over medium heat.
2. Reserve one of the green onions and set aside for later. Cut the remaining green onions into thirds and add them to the pot.
3. Add the ginger, fish sauce, sugar, cloves, and star anise to the pot as well.
4. Add the chicken, reduce to medium-low, and simmer until chicken is cooked through.
5. Strain the broth and return to the pot.
6. Return to a simmer, add the bok choy, and cook until tender.
7. Meanwhile, slice the chicken breasts and cook the rice noodles according to package directions.
8. Place some noodles in each bowl and put a few slices of chicken breast on top.
9. Ladel some broth and bok choy over the noodles.
10. Chop the reserved green onion.
11. Put the chilies, cilantro, basil, bean sprouts, peanuts, and lime wedges on a plate and pass at the table for people to dress their soup as they see fit.
12. Drizzle with hoisin if desired.

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¹ Omitted this time since Reiver can't eat them. ^Back

We've had some surplus egg whites sitting in the fridge for a few days now. Initially I'd been hoping to use them for a sugar-free pavlova. But I hadn't had a chance to get back to the grocery store to get the sweetener and I was worried about them going off before I had a chance, so I opted to use them up in these macaroons instead. They were, ostensibly, meant to be chocolate-dipped macaroons, but we liked them so much as-is that we didn't bother with the chocolate.

The original recipe called for making these with sweetened coconut. This was clearly insane. I found them plenty sweet with just unsweetened coconut and the recommended amount of sugar. I think they would have been cloying and bordering on inedible with sweetened coconut!

Coconut Macaroons

Adapted from Dessert of the Day by Kim Laidlaw

Ingredients

• 250g unsweetened shredded dried coconut
• 1/2 c. sugar
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 4 medium egg whites

Directions

1. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone baking mats.
2. Combine all ingredients and mix well.
3. Spread the mixture out on one of the baking sheets and chill for 30 minutes.
4. Preheat oven to 150°C (300°F).
5. Scoop up a generous tablespoon of the coconut mixture, form it into a ball, and place it on the other prepared baking sheet.
6. Repeat with remaining mixture.
7. Bake at 150°C (300°F) for 30 minutes.

I've been doing a lot of cooked breakfasts lately, but we got off to a slow start today so I took a slightly different tack and went with these smoothie bowls instead. The original recipe was for a banana-date smoothie, but I just added some extra banana and dates and a bit of yogurt to make a somewhat thicker smoothie and then topped them with almonds, coconut, and granola for an easy, no-cook breakfast.

Chocolate-Banana Smoothie Bowls

Slightly adapted from The Breakfast Bible by Kate McMillan

Ingredients

• 3 bananas, frozen
• 12 pitted dates
• 1/4 c. almond butter
• 1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
• 1/2 c. milk or almond milk
• 1/3 c. plain Greek yogurt
• 1 tsp. honey
• 1 Tbsp. Dutched (alkalized) cocoa
• 3-4 Tbsp. toasted almonds, chopped
• 3-4 Tbsp. shredded coconut
• 3-4 Tbsp. granola

Directions

1. Combine bananas, dates, almone butter, cinnamon, milk, yogurt, honey, and cocoa in a blender and purée until smooth.
2. Divide the smooth among two or three bowls.
3. Top with almonds, coconut, and granola. Sliced bananas, dried cherries, and/or chopped dark chocolate would also make excellent toppings.

This was meant to be a mapo tofu variant, but the author had already taken a few liberties with the recipe and then I took a few more, so it's not quite mapo tofu anymore. It is, however, completely delicious! Strong recommend.

Braised Tofu with Ground Beef

Adapted from Dish of the Day by Kate McMillan

Ingredients

• 1/4 c. soy sauce (pref. mix of light and dark)
• 1 Tbsp. shaoxing wine (绍兴酒)
• 1 Tbsp. sesame oil, divided
• 250g ground beef
• 300g tofu
• 1/2 c. chicken stock
• 1 Tbsp. Laoganma (老干妈)
• 1 tsp. sugar
• 1/2 tsp. cornstarch (cornflour)
• 1/8 tsp. white peppercorns, ground
• 1 Tbsp. oil
• 3 Tbsp. minced green onion, divided
• 1 Tbsp. ginger paste
• 3 cloves garlic, minced

Directions

1. Combine the soy sauce, wine, and 2 tsp. of the sesame oil and mix well.
2. Add the beef and stir to combine. Set aside.
3. If using soft tofu, boil it in lightly salted water for 5 minutes, then drain, pat dry, and press between paper towels for at least 30 minutes.
4. Cut the tofu into 1cm (~1/2") cubes. Set aside.
5. Combine the chicken stock, Laoganma, sugar, cornstarch, white pepper, and the remaining 1 tsp. of sesame oil and mix well.
6. Heat a wok over medium-high heat.
7. Drizzle in the oil and swirl to coat.
8. Add the beef with its marinade and stir-fry until just cooked through.
9. Add 2 Tbsp. of the green onion, the garlic, and the ginger and stir-fry for another minute or two.
10. Add the sauce to the wok and cook for a minute or two until slightly thickened.
11. Add the tofu and gently stir to coat.
12. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer for ~10 minutes.
13. Sprinkle with remaining 1 Tbsp. green onion and serve with rice and veggies of your choice.

Reiver and Orthia have a lemon tree growing in their front yard! Apparently that is pretty normal here, but it's still a huge novelty for me. So I've been making the most of it. I went out this morning, picked a couple of lemons off the tree, and made some fresh lemon curd. It was delicious!

Lemon Curd

From The Breakfast Bible by Kate McMillan

Ingredients

• 1 large egg
• 4 large egg yolks
• 1/2 c. sugar
• 1/3 c. lemon juice
• 2 Tbsp. butter

Directions

1. Combine the egg, egg yolks, sugar, and lemon juice over low heat.
2. Cook, stirring constantly, for five minutes.
3. If lemon curd has not thickened at the end of five minutes, nudge the heat up slightly and cook until thickened.
4. Remove from heat and stir in butter.
5. Curd may be enjoyed immediately or chilled for up to a week.

I've been doing a lot of sweet breakfasts lately. Which is fine to a point. They've certainly been tasty. But they aren't exactly the healthiest. (Not that every savoury breakfast is an exemplar of healthy eating, but I feel like it's easier to do a healthy savoury breakfast than a healthy sweet one on average.)

Anyway... I finally got out to do a proper grocery shop yesterday and restocked on eggs and greens, so I decided to give this simple baked egg recipe a try. It's nothing fancy, but it's a solid and reasonably healthy meal to start the day.

Baked Eggs with Greens and Cream

Slightly adapted from Vegetable of the Day by Kate McMillan

Ingredients

• ~400g greens of your choice¹
• 2 tsp. butter, divided
• 4 large eggs
• salt and pepper, to taste
• 4 tsp. heavy (35%) cream, divided

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 180°C (350°F) and grease four ramekins or an oven-safe frying pan.
2. Rinse the greens and chop into bite-sized pieces.
3. Blanch the greens in lightly salted water until wilted.
4. Drain the greens and divide amongst the ramekins or spread in the bottom of the pan.
5. Make a well in the greens for each egg.
6. Place 1/2 tsp. of butter in the bottom of each well.
7. Break an egg into each well and season with salt and pepper.
8. Pour 1 tsp. of cream over each egg.
9. Bake at 180°C (350°F) until whites are set and yolks have reached desired doneness (12-18 minutes).
10. Serve with toast and your choice of condiments. Mayonnaise and/or ketchup (tomato sauce) go well.

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¹ Spinach, kale, chard (silverbeet) or a mix of some combination of those all work well. ^Back

I still haven't had a chance to do a proper grocery shop yet, so I'm more-or-less running on whatever ingredients were in stock when I got here. I knew we had eggs and Reiver had put together a sourdough starter the week before I arrived, so I decided to give some sourdough crêpes a go. I had initially made some lemon curd to go in them, but then realized that we had ham, cheese, and an avocado that desperately needed to be used, so I changed tack and did some lovely savoury crêpes instead. (We still had some of the sweet ones afterward, but it was nice to be able to start with something savoury and a bit more substantial for breakfast.

Ham & Egg Crêpes

Ingredients

• 1 recipe sourdough crêpes (without any spices or sweeteners)
• 1 slice gouda or emmental per crêpe
• 2 slices black forest ham per crêpe
• 1 egg per crêpe
• 1 Tbsp. milk per egg
• salt and pepper, to taste
• 1-2 avocadoes, sliced
• drizzle of Kewpie mayo

Directions

1. Cook your crêpes.
2. Place a slice of cheese in the centre of each crêpe.
3. Place two slices of ham on top of the cheese.
4. Beat the eggs with the milk and season to taste with salt and pepper.
5. Cook over medium low heat, stirring occasionally, until just set.
6. Scoop a portion of eggs onto the ham, then fold the crêpe over to cover the eggs (first one side, then the other; like a letter).
7. Top with a few slices of avocado and a drizzle of Kewpie mayo and serve.