Breakfast Club - Puffed Peach Pancake

How many of us take a cook book to bed to read?  Or is it just me?  The other night I pulled Bill Granger's 'Holiday' off the book shelf and trotted off to bed, its been a while since Bill and I caught up!  Flicking through the book I came to the recipe for the Puffed Apple Pancake which I make regularly for breakfast

throughout Autumn, when I noticed Bill's footnote "... It's also fabulous with peaches ..."

This was a bit of a light bulb moment for me!  Why have I not thought of this seasonal improvement myself!?!?!?! 

I stand by my original comments though, swapping the apples for peaches has not made it any prettier to photograph with my little point and shoot!  Clearly the ugly duckling of the breakfast world because it is a very tasty way to start the day.  If I had to choose though I think I probably prefer the apples to the peaches ~ it's a texture thing!

Puffed Peach Pancake
50g butter (I use frylite nowadays)
4-5 medium sized ripe peaches, cut into quarters
3 tbsp brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla bean paste
1 tbsp lemon juice
90g plain flour
A pinch of salt
1 tsp finely grated lemon zest
1 tbsp vanilla caster sugar
4 eggs
185ml milk

Preheat the oven to 200C (220C for conventional ovens). Melt the butter in a 25cm frying pan with an ovenproof handle. Add the apples and cook for 5 mins over medium heat. Add the brown sugar, vanilla and lemon juice and cook, shaking the pan occasionally, until the butter has dissolved.

Mix the flour, salt, lemon zest and sugar together in a large bowl, make a well in the centre and slowly add the eggs and milk, whisking lightly to combine (don't worry too much about the lumps). Pour the batter evenly over the apples (it's fine if the apples show through). Put the pan in the oven and cook for 15 mins until puffed and golden. If your pan is shallow, place a baking tray underneath to catch any drips. Serve absolutely immediately with either yogurt, honey or maple syrup.

Serves 4
Bill Granger's 'Holiday'

CBC 14 - Apricot Slice ...

... and an announcement!

The party last night was lots of fun, Miss KH had no idea and was completely surprised.  And Miss KH is soon to be Mrs KS!!!!!!!!  So pleased ;0)

Before leaving for the party yesterday I had time to make this Apricot Slice which comes from Bill Granger's book 'Bill's Open Kitchen'.

Apricot Slice
185g plain flour
170g caster sugar (I used vanilla)
1 tsp baking powder
A pinch of salt
3 eggs
60ml milk
2 tsp natural vanilla extract
180g butter, softened
14 apricots, pitted and halved (this may vary depending on the size of the apricots)
2 tbsp caster sugar, extra

Preheat the oven to 160C.  Sift the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt into a large bowl and make a well in the centre.  Place the eggs, milk and vanilla in another bowl and mix to combine.  pour the egg mixture and butter into the well in the dry ingredients and beat for 2 mins until smooth.  Spread the mixture evenly into a greased or non stick 20 x 30cm lamington tin.

Push the apricot halves, cut side up, evenly into the cake mixture in four rows of seven (my tin couldn't quite fit this, I'm guessing next time I need to bunch them up a bit closer!).  Place in the oven and bake for 20 mins, sprinkle over extra sugar and cook for another 20 mins, or until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean.

Cut into fingers with two apricots halves per slice.

Makes 14 slices
Bills Open Kitchen

Bill also says that if fresh apricots are out of season you can use bottle or canned ones instead.

We couldn't wait to tuck into this slice and had to wait a whole 10 mins for the apricots to cool down enough not to burn our mouths!  When it was still warm it had a really overpowering 'eggy' taste to it, I put this down to stupidly using three large eggs where I am guessing Bill used medium in his recipe.  However, now the slice is cold the eggy taste has disappeared and the mixture of the vanilla cake batter and the jammy fresh apricots blends for a wonderful summer treat.

Christmas Day Feast - Part Two - Cocktails and Christmas Lunch

The main event! I've had to put it in a new post as there were starting to be too many labels!

A Passionate Affair

15ml passionfruit liqueur

10ml passionfruit in syrup

120ml chilled brut champagne

Combine passionfruit liqueur and passionfruit in a flute; top with chilled champagne.

Serve in a 150ml glass champagne flute.

Serves 1

The Australian Women's Weekly Cocktails Book

Yum - this was just the tonic to help me get Christmas lunch ready ;0)

Christmas Lunch

We're not ones for a whole roast turkey or a ham joint that lasts for days and days afterwards. And there are more than one or two fussy eaters in this family so trying to find something that suits everyone is pretty much impossible! I settled on pan fried duck breasts (remember the great Duck Hunt?) for all of us apart from Hubby. He won't eat duck so instead he had a barbie with sausages and burgers. I was going to make him the chicken with chorizo and mozzarella that I've blogged about before but the chicken we bought just two days before Christmas was already off!!! He was very happy with his barbie all the same though.

Duck with Madeira and Blueberry Sauce
4 duck breasts (skin left on)

4 garlic cloves, chopped

Grated rind and juice of 1 orange

1 tbsp chopped fresh parsley

Salt and pepper

Madeira and Blueberry Sauce

150g blueberries

250ml Madeira

1 tbsp redcurrant jelly

Use a sharp knife to make several shallow diagonal cuts in each duck breast. Put the duck in a glass bowl with the garlic, orange rind and juice and the parsley. Season to taste with salt and pepper and stir well. Turn the duck in the mixture until thoroughly coated. Cover the bowl with clingfilm and leave in the refrigerator to marinate for at least 1 hour.

Heat a dry, non stick frying pan over a medium heat. Add the duck breasts an d cook for 4 mins, then turn them over and cook for a further 4 mins, or according to taste. Remove from the heat, cover the frying pan and leave to stand for 5 mins.

Halfway through the cooking time, put the blueberries, Madeira and redcurrant jelly into a separate saucepan. Bring to the boil. Reduce the heat and simmer for 10 mins, then remove from the heat.

Slice the duck breasts and transfer to warmed serving plates. Serve with the sauced poured over and accompanied by new potatoes and a selection of green veg.

Serves 4

Ultimate Christmas Book

This duck was amazing! I think they must have been raised by Arnold Schwarzenegger though, they were massive and ended up taking twice as long to cook them, they were lovely and moist and pink inside still, even if the skin side of the breast was a little darker [ahem: black] than I would have really liked it to be. Oh well!

Of course, being Christmas, I didn't serve it with plain old boiled potatoes and a selection of green veg!

Bill's Mini Potato Gratins

600g potatoes, peeled and very thinly sliced

185ml cream

1 garlic clove

Sea salt

Freshly ground black pepper

Preheat the oven to 200C. Cut a piece of baking paper into 16 strips 15 x 2cm. Line 6 x 125ml muffin tins with the strips, in a criss cross pattern with strips overlapping on each side. This will create little handles to remove your gratins with.

Place all ingredients in a bowl and toss to combine. Layer the potatoes in the muffin tins and pour over any remaining liquid. Place in the oven and cook for 40 mins.

Serves 6

Bill's Open Kitchen Book

I've had this recipe ear marked to make for a long time but never got the chance to actually make it. Very yummy indeed and went really well with the duck and other veg. I must have smaller muffin pans though as I doubled the recipe and ended up getting 2 whole muffin tins out of it (that's 24 mini gratins!)

Honeyed Winter Salad

1 butternut squash, cut into thin wedges

2 red onions, halved and cut into wedges

4 parsnips, cut into wedges

3 tbsp olive oil (try garlic or basil infused)

1-2 tbsp clear honey

1 small ciabatta,roughly torn into pieces (tomato and olive ciabatta works well)

1 tbsp sunflower seeds, optional

225g bag leaf spinach

2 tbsp white wine vinegar

1 tsp Dijon mustard

Heat oven to 220C / fan 200C. Put the vegetables into a large roasting tin, drizzle with half the olive oil and season to taste. Roast for 20 mins, turning once in a while until softened. Drizzle with the honey. Scatter torn ciabatta and sunflower seeds over the top and return to the oven for a further 5 mins or until toasted.

Put the spinach into a large bowl and tip in the vegetables and ciabatta. Whisk the vinegar, mustard and remaining oil together, season to taste and toss into the salad until the spinach wilts slightly. Serve immediately.

Serves 4

Good Food Vegetarian Christmas - Christmas 09

This salad seemed like such a good idea at the time! Although the veg was cooked it never turned an appetising 'golden' colour and the ciabatta was decidedly soggy. I would probably try this again but not on Christmas day when there a whole host of other dishes timed to be ready at the same time as this needed much longer than the stated time to cook properly. Aside from that it would have been lovely. I also added a bag of chantenay carrots.

Simple Braised Peas

50g butter

2 bunches of spring onions, trimmed and thinly sliced

900g frozen peas

125ml fresh veg stock, hot

1 bunch of fresh chives, optional (I forgot to add this!!!)

Melt the butter in a large pan over a medium - low heat. Add the spring onions and cook gently for 1 min, until soft. Increase the heat and add the peas and stock. Season, cover and cook for 4 mins. Sprinkle with the chives, if using, to serve.

Serves 8 (baby elephants! This recipe makes a lot!)

Can't remember where this one came from but it gets made quite a bit cause its so yummy and lets face it, peas need all the help they can get to be more appealing!

So now it has taken me almost the same amount of time to get these posts done I'm off to have myself another Passionate Affair (oh ah missus!), some leftovers and a leisurely afternoon reading all my new cook books that Santa bought me ;0)

Have a relaxing Boxing Day!

PS - Can't believe I forgot to add dessert to the post!!! We had raspberry and White Chocolate trifles, I blogged about them not long ago so if you would liek to see the recipe please click here.

Breakfast Club - Puffed Apple Pancake (and setting the record straight!)

Hubby bought me Bill Granger's book 'Holiday' for Christmas last year and I am ashamed to say that I have never made anything from it. To further add to this shame when the series to accompany the book was on TV not that long ago I never watched it. I did record it though and with a spare few minutes to myself on Friday night (before going to see Julie and Julia!) I manged to watch some of them.

This recipe appeared on the show when Bill went to Tassie (Tasmania), which is my home state. Firstly I would like to correct the misrepresentation that seems to always occur when you get 'Mainlanders' (people from the rest of Australia) visiting our small island and I'm afraid to say that Bill was no different, shame on you Bill! Contrary to popular belief it is not always winter in Tasmania. We get 4 very distinct season's, Autumn, Winter, Spring AND Summer. It just so happens that our winter's are a tad on the cooler side because we are further south and therefore closer to Antarctica but Summer temperatures can push the mercury through the roof too, for some reason Mainlanders never want to advertise that bit though.

I was feeling a wee bit miffed with Bill by the time he actually got around to making this recipe and I wanted to pay very little interest to it. Unfortunately it used two of my favourite things - apples and pancakes - but its not the recipes fault so I decided to bury the hatchet and make this for breakfast. It's not the prettiest looking breakfast in the world, and I was pleased to note that it isn't just down to my photography skills. The TV show and Bill's book haven't really done it any justice either but it needs to be tried to be believed - totally scrummy!

Bill's Puffed Apple Pancake

50g butter

4 tart green apples, such as Granny Smith's, peeled, cored and cut into eighths

3 tbsp brown sugar

1 tsp vanilla bean paste

1 tbsp lemon juice

90g plain flour

A pinch of salt

1 tsp finely grated lemon zest

1 tbsp vanilla caster sugar

4 eggs

185ml milk

Preheat the oven to 200C (220C for conventional ovens). Melt the butter in a 25cm frying pan with an ovenproof handle. Add the apples and cook for 5 mins over medium heat. Add the brown sugar, vanilla and lemon juice and cook, shaking the pan occasionally, until the butter has dissolved.

Mix the flour, salt, lemon zest and sugar together in a large bowl, make a well in the centre and slowly add the eggs and milk, whisking lightly to combine (don't worry too much about the lumps). Pour the batter evenly over the apples (it's fine if the apples show through). Put the pan in the oven and cook for 15 mins until puffed and golden. If your pan is shallow, place a baking tray underneath to catch any drips. Serve absolutely immediately with either yogurt, honey or maple syrup.

Serves 4

Bill Granger's 'Holiday'

Hubby has asked for this one again when we have visitors over, when making it the next time I will cut back on the butter and the sugar as it was quite sweet. The lemon gave it a really nice zesty hit too. I didn't have any Granny Smith's in the fruit bowl so I used one bramley in their place, just remember to cut the wedges on the thick side or they disintegrate before the batter is even added. I'd also serve it with the yogurt rather than the maple syrup, just to cut back on the sweetness.

Bill Granger's Peach and Raspberry Slice

I've been meaning to make this recipe for quite some years time now.  I first saw Bill make it on one of his TV shows and went out to buy the book, especially for the recipe.  The book then ended up on the book shelf, occasionally removed from its perch so I can leaf through the pages.  I've even made one or two of the recipes, but I never quite got around to making the Peach and Raspberry Slice.  That was until last weekend ;0)

Bill Granger's Peach and Raspberry Slice
185g plain flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder, plus 1/2 tsp extra
125g butter, chilled and diced
115g soft brown sugar
115g caster sugar
3 ripe peaches, peeled and sliced into wedges
90g raspberries, fresh or frozen
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 egg, lightly beaten
185ml milk

Preheat the oven to 180C.  Grease and line the base of a 20cm x 30cm baking tray.  Sift the flour and baking powder into a large bowl and then rub in the butter with your fingertips.  Stir in both the sugars.  Press half the mixture over the base of the tin.  Lay the peaches over the top and sprinkle with raspberries.

Add the vanilla extract, extra baking powder, egg and milk to the rest of the base mixture and stir well - don't worry too much about lumps.  Pour evenly over the top of the peaches and raspberries and bake for 1 hour.  Cool in the tray, then cut into squares to serve.

Makes 20 pieces
Bill Granger - Everyday

* To peel the peaches, score a cross in the skin with a sharp knife, then blanch the peaches in boiling water for 30 seconds, refresh in cold water and peel the skin away from the cross.

I was expecting this slice to be worth the wait, and in hindsight there were maybe one or two things I could have done differently to enhance the final product.  I could have made the slice when peaches were in season and slightly riper than the rock like beasts I ended up using.  I believe using the right sized tin may have also helped the cause a little!  This is not to say that the slice was a complete disaster, its still pretty yummy and goes down very well with some ice cream, it just didn't quite live up to my expectations.  Guess I'll just need to wait till 'next summer' (!!!!) when the peaches are at their peak!