NUTELLA STRAWBERRY CREAM PUFFS


6 sheets frozen puff pastry, thawed
1 jar nutella
1 punnet stawberries
600 mils thickened cream, whipped
icing sugar


preheat oven to 200c.  line a baking tray with baking paper.

cut each sheet of pastry in to 8 pieces.

place on trays and cook till golden brown and puffed.

cool.

split each piece of pastry in half lengthways.

cut strawberries into slices.

spread bottom piece with nutella and place about 4 pieces of strawberry onto nutella.

spoon or pipe cream over top of strawberries.

place top piece of pastry on cream.

dust with icing sugar.

PINEAPPLE BOILED FRUIT CAKE

1 cup sugar
450 gram tin crushed pineapple
375 gram packet mixed dried fruit
1 small packet chopped walnuts
1 teaspoon bi-carb soda
1 teaspoon mixed spice
125 grams soft butter
1 cup self raising flour
1 cup plain flour
2 eggs, beaten

preheat oven to 160 c. grease and line bottom of 20 cm round cake tin.

place sugar, pineapple, mixed fruit, butter, walnuts, bicarb soda and mixed spice into a medium sized saucepan.

place over medium heat and bring to boil. simmer for 3 minutes, stirring occasionally.

cool.

stir in flour and eggs.

pour into tin.

cook for 40 - 50 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean.

cool in tin for five minutes then tip out onto wire rack. cool completely.

  TOBLERONE ICE CREAM
     


2 x 600 mils thickened cream

2 cans condensed milk

400 grams toblerone chocolate

thick chocolate topping

strawberries


grease and line a large pudding steamer tin with 2 layers of cling wrap.

crush or blitz the toblerone chocolate (no big chunks, they will sink to bottom of tin).

with an electric mixer, beat the cream and condensed together until thickens.

stir in toblerone.

pour into tin and cover with lid.

pour remainder (if any) into another container.

freeze overnight  or until set.

tip ice cream out onto serving plate and pour topping over top and down sides.

decorate with strawberries.

NOTE..if ice cream wont come out of container, quickly run sides of container under hot water.

Saturday. Thank God you are over.  I am so tired, sitting here yawning my head off.  Too early a start to my day, couldn't sleep so up early.

 All things considered, I had a pretty easy day. Had the grandkids but they were good, had decided on a stir fry for tea so I didn't have to panic about that and number one son and the man were out so I didn't have to feed them. So I played with the kids, tidied up the yard, fed them some lunch and had the urge to make icecream.  The man went down the shop for me to get some toblerone chocolate while I got the bits and pieces together, basically cream and condensed milk. So I've tried to blitz,  cut, pounded and blitzed (again) the toblerone, apparently it was a bit too hard for the machine but the pounding did it. Then whipped and stirred and plonked in the freezer.  That's a leave and forget for the time being.

Last week I had frozen some pumpkin biscuit dough, which I thawed out today and cooked up. The last four dozen disappeared very quickly. The kids love them.

Anyway the rest of my arvo disappeared at a fast rate of knots and it was suddenly tea time.  We are having chicken and mushrooms in a white wine sauce.

Dunk the chicken in some seasoned flour, cook,  remove from pan, cook some mushrooms and garlic in same pan, add some white wine and stock, bit of thickening, add the chicken back, add some noodles and parmesan cheese and dinners served.

While we were eating,  miss Tash casually announced that I hadn't made dessert, number five almost fell off his chair.  Its ok, I'm making scones" says I.  "You're lucky" says he as he sits himself back down.   They all really only come for dessert.  So off to the kitchen to make the scones. My way. Flour, sugar, salt, butter, milk and egg. Most cooks would say no egg, but I like them with, turn out nice and light. Just don't over work the dough or they go tough and don't what ever you do, cut them with a glass, like my mum used to, (the old vegemite glass was used for that), sucks the air right out of the dough.. Cook in a hot oven and eat them hot with jam and cream, or nutella if you're miss Tash.

While they were eating I went to check on the icecream. Unfortunately it wasn't frozen yet, so the rest of that story will be here next time.

Must be the night for tired, all the kids are grumpy and crying at the drop of a hat, so by 9.15 everyone's gone home and I'm just left with the mess,


So short and sweet tonight, beds calling and tomorrow's another day of grandkids. Then of course it's almost Christmas and I have a heap of cooking for that. Even though we all go to my mums place, I get to take a pineapple boiled fruit cake (that's a given, every year) and what ever else I decide to make. Probably tim tam balls and mint slice balls and maybe some cupcakes, depends on my time frame. Then I have to do it all over again for a second Christmas lunch at Lizzy Lou's place next Saturday for the other side of the family.

So to each and all of You, Merry Christmas. Hope you have as much fun with your family as I will with mine.

......SHAZZIE'S SCONES................

4 cups self raising flour
2 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon salt
2 slightly heaped tablespoons butter, softened
1 egg
2 cups milk

preheat oven to 200 c.  line a baking tray with baking paper.

In a large bowl, mix flour, sugar and salt.

with two knives, cut butter through flour until you can no longer see the butter.

add egg to 1 cup of milk and beat well.

add milk and egg mix to flour, add more of the milk as needed until mix just comes together. (if you add too much milk, just mix in more flour).

tip onto a  floured board, knead lightly . DO NOT OVER KNEAD  or scones will be tough.

using hand  lightly flatten into a round shape about 2 cm thick.   cut into rounds with a scone/biscuit cutter (not a glass).

place rounds on tray and brush with left over milk.

cook until nicely brown. about  12 - 15 minutes.

serve with jam and whipped cream.

CHICKEN AND MUSHROOMS IN WHITE WINE SAUCE


1 kilo chicken breast fillets, diced
500 grams mushrooms, sliced
800 grams (2 packets) precooked egg noodles
2 tablespoons minced garlic
1 cup dry white wine
1 cup chicken stock
4 tablespoons cornflour
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground black pepper
1/2 cup parmesan cheese
2 tablespoons canola oil
extra salt and pepper to taste


prepare egg noodles according to directions on packet, set aside.

in a large bowl, mix the 1 teaspoon of salt and pepper and 2 tablespoons of the cornflour together.

toss chicken through the flour mix until well coated.

in a large wok or pan, heat 1 tablespoon of oil and saute chicken till cooked.  remove chicken from pan.

using same pan, add the other table spoon of oil and cook the garlic and mushrooms till mushrooms have changed colour.

add wine and cook for 1 minute. then mix the rest of the cornflour into the cold stock  and add stock mix to pan, stirring till thickened (if too thick, thin out with more stock)

add chicken back to pan and heat through.

add noodles, parmesan cheese and salt and pepper to taste.

serve.

Well, it's Saturday once more. Another week gone and another week closer to Christmas.

Another easy day for me. Only my kids, a barbecue tea, and only dessert to really think about.

After a leisurely cup of coffee, I wandered up to the kitchen to start. Of course I had found a recipe through the week and of course I changed it. But, Banana cream cheese cake pie, here we come. This consists of a chocolate ripple biscuit base, cream cheese, condensed milk, vanilla instant pudding  whipped cream and banana filling then more whipped cream, bananas and toasted coconut on top. Made in a springform tin. You need a few different dishes to use but overall quite an easy dessert. The biscuits are  crushed, mixed with melted butter and pressed into the tin then  placed in the fridge. You then beat softened cream cheese till smooth, quickly mix the instant pudding with some milk, tip the instant pudding and the condensed milk into the cream cheese and beat till smooth. Fold in some whipped cream, the place bananas and the filling mix into the base, cover with whipped cream and place in fridge till ready to serve. When ready you add more banana and some toasted coconut. Looks really good. Hope it tastes yum.
Miss Tash doesn't like custard type desserts so I pressed some chocolate ripple biscuits into the 1/2 round patty tins and I'll put some nutella, banana and cream in them when we are ready to have dessert.

I don't even know where the rest of my day went, miss Tash, number five and the chunky one arrived for a while, so we chatted and drank frozen coke they bought with them and they left. It's 32 c in the shade outside so not terribly motivated to do anything much at all today.

I prepared all the bits for the barbecue, toasted the coconut under the griller and cleaned up. I then just waited for everyone to arrive, sitting in the breeze from the air conditioner.

The man of the house was out for the day so number one and number five are the chefs tonight. I must say they did a good job on the barbie.
We eat, clear the table and I head back to the kitchen to put the finishing touches on the banana cream cheese cake pie and the nutella tarty things.
I slice up some bananas, spoon some nutella into the biscuits add some banana  then whipped cream and top with chocolate sprinkles. That's miss Tash's dessert done.

I slice more banana and cover the top of the banana cream cheese cake pie, sprinkle that with toasted coconut and that's done too.

Now for the moment of truth, I carefully slice the pie and send it out to number one son for the taste test.
Success. He tells me it's the best dessert I've made in ages..thanks for that..I think.

We all try it, except miss Tash of course, It is totally excellent. Not quite cheese cake but definitely not custard, but oh so yummmmmm. The chocolate biscuits give it just that subtle chocolate taste and colour that it needs.
The nutella banana tarts are really good too. Especially for something that takes five minutes to throw together.  You could even by pass the pressing of the biscuits and just place everything on to the biscuit straight out of the pack. Not as pretty but same taste.

So thats my day and night yet again, Somehow it's 12.23 am and I reckon it's bed time.

Number five and family were here for tea on Thursday night as well, so I made a quick pasta with penne, chicken, tomato pesto, cream, garlic and spinach. It should have had some sun dried tomatoes in it as well but I forgot to buy them. Didn't really need them,would have given it a bit more colour I think, but add them if you have them. Tasty.