Sprouting.

I'm doing more sprouts.  I have done a couple of lots since daughter gave me the lentils but thought I'd tell you all how I do them.  It's not hard, they are good for you and yummy to eat.

You don't need anything special so if you haven't tried it before why not give it a go.

This week I am doing Lentils and Chickpeas.  I haven't sprouted chickpeas before so I'm hopping they'll be nice.

You need a jar.  I'm using a different jar for each seed.  Something to cover the jar, you need to be able to strain the water out so stocking, cheesecloth, muslin...

*I put 2 soupspoons of seed in each jar.  The seeds swell up and take up room as they sprout so the amount you use will depend on the size of your jar.  I like to do smaller amounts more often..
*Cover with water and soak.  I usually soak overnight but this lot is being started in the morning so will be soaked until this evening.  I use a spoon handle to push down on the stocking as I pour the water in.  It lets the water through easier and there is less mess.
*After soaking strain water, into a bowl or jug.   Don't pour it down the sink, use it on the garden or potplants.
*Each morning/evening cover seeds with water again, swoosh around and strain.  I turn the jar upside down and prop it up a bit so all the water drains away.  I also use a spoon handle or something similar to press up on the stocking.  It allows the water to drain better.
* When the sprouts are the size you like, 3-7 days, put them in the fridge to keep them fresh.  I like to use them within a few days but have left them for a week and they were OK.

I have them with salad, in sandwiches, by themselves, add to stirfries...However you want.  Try them with everything or by themselves as a snack.

Day 1.

Day 3

Day 5.

  Ready to eat.

Use clean water for soaking and rinsing.  I use rainwater because that is what we have but would use tap water if we were in town and connected to scheme water.  Our house water is not potable so I wont use that.

I made Pasta. And Pickled Beetroot.

Yep...I made pasta.  With egg and flour on the kitchen table...you know, real pasta.

Hippy/Hippie, as in wild and free not big at the hips, Daughter was here on Friday and she always inspires me to try something new and this week it was pasta making.

Four year old Grandaughter was here so made some too.  First we plonked 3 lots of a cup of flour on the

table, 1 for each of us, 

 

GD broke the egg into a cup then poured that into a well we made in the flour. 

A smidge of salt a bit of oil then squish it all together.

Make it into a ball, ready to roll out. 

Notice one ball is pink?  That is mine.  I added a couple of spoons of liquid that I used for the beetroot.
Roll out, using a small bottle for small person, a bigger bottle for bigger person and  whatever you can find in husbands shed for third person.

Cut into different thickness strips and shapes and call them what you want.

 

We also made some with tomatoey beetroot mush in them, a bit like ravioli.   

Daughter had this pasta machine that she gave me ages ago that we brought out to try.  It was hard going but they did get some *penne* and some other thing.   It looked like hard work and not something I could use so I will stick to the handmaking stuff.    

We had some for our tea and Hubby says it was very nice but maybe slightly undercooked.

So there you go.  Another thing that I have been wanting to do has been done.

I must say it is a lot more work than going to the shop and buying a packet and as I always buy quite a bit when it is on special so always have some here it wont be an every week thing.  I will do it again as it is much nicer than the bought stuff.

If you have never tried making your own pasta give it a go, it's well worth it even if just for the fun factor.

If you have, how'd it go?

  Blogger is being a pain, again, so Beetrrot writup is coming later.

I Made Bread.

I used daughter L's recipe and even though it is a white loaf it was alright.
The bread was crusty on the outside but light and soft inside.  It wasn't very high but I *may* have put it in the oven too soon.


But it was made from scratch, no bread machine here.
Next time I will use wholemeal flour and add stuff but this, with some Choko Pickle and cheese, made a nice lunch. 

We had it with Tomato soup, shhh, out of a can!  But Hubby like it.   Next time I will  take some soup out of the freezer so it will be better.
I am going to try the *Five Minute* bread but this one was quick and easy to put together so I'll see if one is better than the other.

I'll ask L if she minds me putting the recipe here and if she doesn't I'll add it

Choko Mustard Pickle

This afternoon I made the "Easy Choko Mustard Pickle" from the Year In A Bottle by Sally Wise book.  Hmmm.  It's OK but I must have done something wrong.  I did double the recipe because the kg of Choko it needed was only 3 and as I had a bucketful to use I thought doubling the recipe would be the way to go. 

Maybe it wasn't.  I think there was too much liquid for the amount of choko and the cornflour didn't seem to thicken it so I added more but it still didn't thicken.  I was going to let it simmer away but it was getting too soft so I took it off the stove and bottled it. 

 The recipe said the Choko should be finely chopped but I think next I won't make it as small as I did today.

Sometime over the next week I will make up a different batch but I will use my mothers Cauliflower Pickle recipe, if I can find it.  Not sure why I didn't use that today as I know that is really nice when she makes it so I would know if I had the taste right or not.  'Cept I couldn't find it...
With this one, maybe it's suposed to taste like it does... I just had another spoonful and the 5 jars will be eaten as it's not awful and I'll see what other people think of it before I decide if it's worth trying again or not.  

The whole process would have been easier, and safer, if I didn't have to keep kicking the cat out of the way  so I could get to the stove.

Bread and Butter Choko.

Hubby wasn't too keen on me making these so asked that I half the recipe first so as not to waste too much stuff. 
I did, well I tried to.  Apparently I don't know what half of 1.8litres is but lucky I had a taste test and the too sweet mix told me I must have had it wrong.  Add in the extra 300ml vinegar and all is fine.


Below is my original recipe but this time I halved it and used Choko instead of Cucumbers. 

Bread & Butter Pickles 

8 large chokos, sliced
3 large onions, sliced
4 large capsicums
1 cup of salt
9 plus cups of cold water
1.8 litres  white.  The original recipe calls for malt vinegar but I don't like that so never have any.
1.5 kilo sugar
1 Tbs turmeric
1 tsp mustard seed

Wash and slice the cucumbers, slice the onions and capsicums. Combine the vegetables in one or two very large bowls, sprinkle with the salt (do this in layers as you are adding the veggies) and add the cold water (you will need more than nine cups!) Let stand for 3 hours then drain without rinsing.

In a large saucepan combine the remaining ingredients. Heat to boiling, then add the vegetables. Bring back to the boiling point but do not boil.
Pack into hot sterilized jars and seal Chill before serving.

Very good on bread and butter, but serve with cheese and cold meats, too.

It tastes good but is a bit darker, more cloudy than the cucumber one I did last year.  I possibly (pretty sure) used more than a 1/2 Tbs Turmeric...HoHum, still good though.  

We now have 4 jars in the cupboard and 1 open in the fridge.  And I have Hubbies permission to make more.
I will add some red banana shaped capsicum/chilli to the next lot, for a bit of colour.

Cold Cure.

Maybe not a *cure* as such but something that kicks any cold I start to get out the door quick smart is a mix I make up and sip on throughout the day.

We've been away for a few days, it was great but wet and windy and I started sneezing and had a few other symptoms so on getting home I made up my *medicine*

It's just a mixture of white vinegar, honey and lemon juice.  I mix the same amount of each, give or take, and drink it down.

It doesn't always taste great but it isn't horrible and it works better than any cough medicine.
I have also made the mixture with added grated lemon zest and extra juice.  Much nicer as the vinegar taste is not as strong.

Passionfruit Spread.

Hubby came in with another bag of of Passionfruit so I had 2 big bowls sitting on the counter.  What to do what to do...
I was having a visitor for morning tea so decided to serve pikelets and passionfruit spread.
Hmmm, how do you make passionfruit spread?  Dunno but probably like lemon spread...
So I checked out how I made that and had a thought and came up with this.
Morning tea was postponed but 2 came for lunch and this was still served and proclaimed a keeper.

It only took a couple of minutes in the microwave.  The most time was spent scooping out the pulp.

Passionfruit Spread.
125ml Passionfruit pulp.
1/2cup sugar.
2Dsp cornflour.
1cup water.
Mix together in glass bowl.  Nuke for a bit maybe 1and1/2 min, stir, nuke again 1min, stir.  Again maybe...Watch it as it boils up, you don't want it going over the top.  A few minutes all up is all it needs.  Be careful when you taste it as it is hot!  Could be done on stovetop.

This didn't make too much, a couple of small jars and a small dish but is easy and quick enough for me to make as needed.

Passionfruit .

It's that time of the year when the area outside the backdoor is covered in fallen Passionfruit.
We have a wonderful vine out there, the best producer of  the 5 vines we have.  Though the fruit are smaller than the vine over the pigpen we get more of them.

I think the flowers are so pretty.

Grandaughter was out here a couple of days ago and she helped pick up a couple of bags worth.   They are nice fresh but there is only so many we can eat plain.  The son sometimes has a few but never enough.  I do freeze them and give some away but still have heaps.

I am going to make up some cordial but we don't drink a lot of cordial here.
I'm a water drinker and Hubby drinks Coke.  

I have been experimenting with making a pudding out of them.  I am onto my third try and it is good.  Hubby thinks it could be a bit sweeter but he's a Coke drinker so what would he know.      
He could be right though, I usually add way less sugar than recipes call for and think the stuff still tastes OK.

I have modified my chocolate pudding recipe which was modified from a Yogo recipe from the SimpleSavings site.

This time I used 200ml of Passionfruit pulp, 2Tbs cornfour, 3Tbs sugar, just under 1/2cup skim milk powder, and 300ml.of water   
Heat in micowave, stir, heat etc until it starts to thicken.. 
It gets a bit thicker as it cools.  Cool then gobble.
Use more or less pulp depending on the intensity of flavour you like.  I like it strong.  As in everything I cook/make it is all experimenting, no set recipes.




I serve mine in a cup, that holds 3/4 cup but if you had big Passionfruit you could use the shell of them.





 I liked it.  DD said it tasted too much like Passionfuit but kept eating it out of the bowl.  Grandaughter wanted more then more again.

Tomotoes Are Done.

I have enough jars/bottles of Tomato Relish to last around 5 months.   I ended up pureeing most of it and I will use it instead of Barbecue sauce.  We don't eat a lot of pasta but I would use it with that as well though my SiL says it's not really a pasta sauce. 

Today I had some with savory pikelets for lunch, Hubby had some over his spuds that he had with his tea.
I did modify the recipe I used, I added zucchini and capsicum to one lot, I just can't seem to follow a recipe as it is written.  Tastes good though.

I tried drying some in the oven.  I knew that I should have put the timer on or not gone on the computer but hey, you get that.  And as a result you get burnt dried tomato.  Some of it was OK. lol.  The second lot I put in the oven when I was finished with the fire and it was going to be going out. I forgot about that lot too and when I remembered them the following day they were dried but stuck hard to the tray.  Still tasted OK but there were bits that had to be soaked off.  Gee I'm good!

We have more outside ready to be picked and a few manky ones inside that I will curry and freeze for Hubby.

All in all it was a successful saucy afternoon and something that I will be more inclined to do  now that I know I can.

Tomatoes.

We are picking lots of tomatoes, too many to eat fresh so I have been freezing a few bags to use over winter but thinking that I should save some to make chutney or sauce with.

Son brought a crate of food for the pig out yesterday so I shoved him out of the way had a peek to see if there was anything good for us.  There usually is and we're not too proud to eat pig-food.
The crate looked like it was full of bags of tomatoes.  A closer look showed that they were in pretty good condition, not sure what was wrong with them really.  So I told him to leave the crate and I would *feed the pig* later.  Yeah right.  But I now have over 20 kilo of tomatoes to cook up and do something with.
Under the bags of tomatoes was a pile of carrots, still firm and clean so I baggsed them as well.   Tried out my *new* juicer and made some juice with some of them and some other stuff.  'Twas nice.

I'll have to light the woodstove tomorrow, we don't have a gas stove, so I hope it's not going to be too hot.  I'll have to find a recipe to use so might do that tonight.
Last year Daughter L. made tomato chips, dried them in a car, and they were so nice. I could try that.

What would you do with 20kilo of tomatoes?

Lemon Spread...Taste Testing.

I wrote about how I used all lemon juice instead of water for my latest batch of LS so over the last few days I have been getting different family members to taste it. 

Husband. "Ummm, very lemony"
Son.  "Taste like lemons".
Daughter T.  "gasp gasp, splutter, splutter, where's the water".
Granddaughter J. 3 years old.  "Water, discusding"

So, results were not promising...but I like it, it is lemony, that's the point People!

Daughter L. might like it, she eats the lemons and drinks the juice straight. 

I eat it from the jar.  I do use a spoon, I'm not a total feral.

Heston's Feast

Heston's Feast  is a *cooking* show on at 8.30 on SBS, Thursday nights and is one of the few shows that I enjoy and watch.  he has a different theme each week.  Tonights was *Fairy Tales*
He cooked up a stuffed boars head...yumyumyum....Maybe we should try this next time we do a pig.
Or lets not but say we did.

This guy is amazing and nothing that he cooks up and serves to people is expected.

The big house from the Hansel and Gretal story that he made for the dessert was pretty cool.  I would eat that.
This house was all edible but big enough for a person to fit inside...so cool.

I think I'm clever when I make real lemon jelly...I have so much to learn...

Lemon Spread.

Tonight I did a comparison cook off on lemon spread using cornflour only or cornflour and custard powder.
I stopped buying custard powder when I started making custard the real way, using eggs but as I had been given a couple of packets I thought that I'd try both and see if one was better or not.

I used a different recipe than the last lot and this one is way more lemony.  I like it but I don't think that Hubby will.

Lemon Spread.
1cup lemon juice.  Instead of water.
3/4cup sugar.
1/3cup lemon juice. 
1Dsp cornflour.  2 if not using the custard powder.
1Dsp custard powder.
Heat sugar and cup LJ.  Dissolve powders in the 1/3 cup LJ then stir into the heated mix.
I didn't add grated rind this time as I used all juice and didn't think it would need any.

The spreads taste very similar, not sure if I can pick a difference.  There *may* be a slight difference but not to say one is better.  The mix with the added custard powder is more yellow but that is not a good enough reason for me to start buying it again. 

Lemons

Our lemon tree is so full of lemons, I don't think we will ever get through them all.  Hubby picked another bucket of them on Sat so I have spent the weekend trying to use them up.  He juiced them and we ended up with 2 litres of straight juice.   

I made Lemon Cordial.  I rarely drink anything except water (and coffee) but Hubby does when it is hot.
Or there is no Coke left!

This is such a simple recipe and it was so nice that I wont  buy lemon cordial again.  The first lot was made from following a few recipes that I had, they were all more or less the same and I said to Hubby that I wanted to use less sugar.  He talked me into following the recipe but I was right, it was way too sweet even for him.  I just added more juice to get a taste we both liked.  I halved the recipe to start with , to see how it tasted but will make heaps more and preserve it in a way that I have read about.
The recipe we used is below.

Lemon Cordial.
600ml straight lemon juice.
600gm sugar.
Put in pot and heat, while stirring, until the sugar dissolves.
It is now ready to use.  Add water to taste.  Ice if that is what you like.  How simple is that?
 Not very expensive to make, it has nothing *fake* in it and the people that I used as testers all said that it was very nice.  I did ask them to be honest in the remarks but as they all had more than one glass and there were other drinks on offer I'm taking it to be a keeper.  I added homegrown passionfruit, made into  iceblocks to the jug of made up cordial and that added a nice taste as well.

So that is a cheap recipe but I wanted cheaper.  I had a thought and made this.

Lemon Honey Cordial.
400gm Honey  or 1 cup. (I used Powder Bark as I had a bucket in the kitchen)
500ml Lemon juice.
Heat, stiring until honey has disolved.
Bottle and add water to taste.

The taste of the honey comes through so will vary with the type of honey I use.  Probably wouldn't be cheaper if you had to buy the honey.

So what to do with all the skins instead of throwing them to the chooks?
Yep...Candied Lemon Peel.  I really like that stuff.

Candied Lemon Peel.
Boil lemon peel in water for 5-10 minutes.
Strain, and repeat with fresh water 3 or 4 times.  This removes the bitterness from the pith part of the skins.
For 1 cup of peel use 1cup sugar to 1/2 cup water.  Bring sugar and water to the boil, add peel and boil over low heat until the syrup is reduced.
Spread out to dry.

Boiling in the syrup.

I spread it out on some kitchen paper that I had here from the last lot I made and I will save it and use it again.







So what else could I make with this stuff...thinking, thinking, thinking...Jelly!  Using the cordial as the base.
I have never made *real* jelly but have always meant to so this was the time.
My research showed that you use 1Tbs of gelatin to 500ml of liquid so I halved it, again I wanted to taste test before making lots and made it up.

Lemon Jelly.

250ml or 1 cup of made up cordial.
1/2 Tbs gelatin
I heated 1/4 cup of the cordial and whisked in the gelatin, added rest of cordial and poured into dishes.
Let set in fridge for a few hours.

This is the end result, after maybe 4 hours in the fridge.
It has set firm but is not rubbery at all and the taste is divine.
Hubby was impressed and the sugar filled jellies from the shop are now a thing of the past.
I will experiment with different flavours of these.





I also made some Lemon Spread.  I call it lemon spread, it could be curd, butter, some other name...

It has  no eggs and is quick and easy so stays in the recipe bag.  Did do it a tad differently this time but it still passes my taste test but *may* not be as nice as I usually do it.  I will make another batch and compare the two, next week some time.
It didn't make too much, that's a shooter glass there to give you some idea on the size of the jar.  There was a few spoonfulls that didn't fit in either container but that's how I managed a decent taste test.

Lemon Spread.
1cup water
3/4cup sugar
1/3cup lemon juice
2Dsp cornflour.  Or 1Tbs CF and 1 of custard powder.  This makes it nore yellow.
grated lemon zest ! or 2 depending on taste.  I like adding more than 1.

Heat water, disolve sugar, I disolved the CF in the juice then added that to the boiling water/sugar mix, stirring all the time.

Because it has no eggs this is great for making when the chooks go off the lay.

I keep it in the fridge but I don't know how long it would keep for.  I make it up as I need it. 
I will keep the juice in the freezer.

You can have it on bread, toast, use it in tarts or baking or eat it out of the jar, using a spoon!

The original recipe called for a cup of sugar but that was too sweet for us so play around with it and tweek it to meet your taste.  Original recipe also had 1oz of butter but I don't *do* butter so I leave that out.

Lentil Patties For Tea.

In between cleaning up a bit I have made some yummy Lentil Patties for my tea.

I had some leftover lentils in a pot that I wanted to wash so I added some sauce and oatmix to them and  mixed it all together
Doesn't that look good?






I then plopped them in a frypan and cooked them on the stove. 






And this is what I ended up with with.

A plate of yummy patties.  More than enough for tea so snacking throughout the day is sorted but I will freeze some so I don't eat them all.  Afterall, I'm sure Hubby will want some....

Fixing A Non-Stick Pan That Does.

A few years ago a spend what I thought was a lot of money on a non stick frypan.  It worked OK for a while but then everything started sticking and it became a pain to use.
I don't like throwing away things, even crappy things, so kept using it and whinging every time I did as it was a bugger to clean.
This morning I *fixed* it.
We had bought a *Hot Sheet* for using when camping on barbecues and it was great so when we saw something similar for half the price at Bunnings we bought one to try in this pan.  It works brilliantly, the egg cooked quickly and just slid out of the pan.  A quick wipe over with a damp cloth and it's ready for next time.

See, I didn't need to throw the crappy frypan away and buy another one.  I am a hero.

Candied Lemon Peel. Update.

The general consensus of this is that it tastes pretty good.

I had dried some and put some in a jar in the fridge but the fridge one didn't seem as nice so I reboiled it and dried it out as well.  Just in time too as there was none of the dried lot left.

It is sitting on the bench and I know that if I don't hurry up and put it away then I won't have to!

Candied Lemon Peel.

I have a cold and so am dosing up on hot lemon and honey drinks and was wondering if there was anything that I could use the lemon skins for.

This morning I was over on the Simple Savings website and found a thread that mentioned Candied Lemon Peel so I am going to give it a go this afternoon. 

Well the afternoon is half over and I have made a batch of this.  It tastes quite nice but I'm not sure what I will do with it now. Some suggestions were to have it on ice cream or add it to cakes and puddings but as I don't have any ice cream here and I don't bake I will need to find other uses.  Or I could just eat it plain, it is nice enough for that.

It wasn't hard to do, a bit fiddly but as I was inside watching a movie and had the fire going anyway it was no drama.

I hope that *Linda (Sydney)* from SS doesn't mind me putting it here.  I did do a web search and found recipes the same or very similar and I will try a few of those over the next few weeks.
Candied Peel

1 cup of lemon peel, cut into strips
1/2 cup of sugar
1/4 cup of water

The recipe said to boil the peel a few times in fresh water and I think this was to remove any bitterness from the peel.
.
I put the sugar in the water and brought it to the boil and then added the peel.
I let it simmer until there wasn't much liquid left and then took it off the fire. 

I will dry some overnight on a cake rack and put the rest in a jar in the fridge.

The recipe says to store in airtight container.  If done *properly* it should last a few months.

I have just had a thought and now wonder what the peel would taste like if simmered in honey.  I will report back if I get around to trying that.
 

Oat Slice.

Wet and cool outside here today so I am inside with the fire going and not nuch bothered to do anything so I thought I'd make *the men* something to munch on.

You need to do this,                                                this,                                                then this.


Bung it in here for 20 min.

Plate up then present to judge for verdict.

                                                     Thumbs up.  Was there ever any doubt!

Oh, you want a recipe?   I don't really *do* recipes but try this?

I call this *Oat Slice* but it may have started out as something else.

1cup oats.  Mine usually have other stuff added to them. 
1cup mixed fruit.  Was sultanas but I have 3 year old MF that needs to be used up.
1/2cup SR Flour
1/2 cup sugar.  I used less and will use less again next time. Maybe 1/4cup next time.
1/2cup coconut.. 
150gm butter.  I used 100gm margerine.
1Tablespoon  honey.  I used 2 heaped Tb spoons of PowderBark honey.  Maybe that was why it was sweet.
Mix all dry stuff together.  Add to melted butter/honey mix.  Mix 'til all combined.  Press into slab tin and bake in oven 'til golden. 
I had it in a wood fire oven at 200 for around 20 min. 

Not sure where the original recipe came from but I know I changed that and am still changing it slightly each time.  Next time I may add wheatgerm with the oats, will use less sugar.    Once I added a muesli mix that I had made up.  Could use all the crumbs that you save from different cereals.
Add what you like, omit what you don't.