I love an easy, no churn ice cream recipe! Even if you are living in a part of the world currently covered in snow and frost, I promise you that your guests would be thrilled to be served a bowl of home made chocolate, rum and raising ice cream. Continue reading
Summer in Sydney is just too hot. Balmy days. Hot nights with no drop in temperature. Cooking is just too hard and dinner is often salad or something equally refreshing.
While I won’t go near the stove for make a meal I will happily prepare something sweet. Continue reading
These are the cutest incarnations of lamingtons I ever did see! For non-Aussies, a lamington is a sponge cake coated in chocolate icing then drizzled in coconut. Super yum. Continue reading
As I’ve mentioned before, summer and I are not friends. I don’t like heat, humidity, flies, insects, sweating. Obviously I shouldn’t be living in steamy Sydney but here I am. And as much as I adore baking it is sometimes just too damn hot to turn the oven.
That’s where this beauty of a dessert comes in. I found the recipe in a back issue of the wonderful delicious magazine and had, serendipitously, made meringues a few days earlier. Continue reading
A recent excursion to Bilpin in NSW introduced me to the exquisiteness of fresh apples. When I say fresh, I mean picked from the tree moments before eating. I am guilty of popping into the supermarket on my lunchbreak to stock up on apples for my daughters’ lunchboxes but after trying these amazingly fresh apples I won’t be doing that again.
I was lucky enough to be invited recently on an ‘apple adventure’ day in Bilpin, a pretty little hamlet outside of Sydney, by the lovely Belly Rumbles. Check out her blog here: http://bellyrumbles.com/
Isn’t it great?
Anyway a group of food bloggers did a tour of an orchard, where it was all systems go in the packing sheds.
Then we visited a pick your own orchard, which was so much fun. We were given delightful little straw baskets to fill with produce, and I felt quite relaxed and happy as I chose the most wonderful apples from the tree.
The difference between freshly picked Australian apples and the often floury, picked-months-ago-and-kept-in-cold-storage numbers from the supermarket couldn’t be more stark.
Greengrocer 1, big chains 0.
I used some of these beauties to create an easy apple ice-cream by the fabulous Donna Hay. The Hungry Dad declared it one of the best he’s ever had, which is strong praise indeed.
The best thing is, you don’t even need an ice cream maker – pretty cool, huh?
GATHER:
2 cups grated apples [Donna specified Granny Smiths but I used red delicious]
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 tablespoon finely grated lemon zest
3 eggs
2 egg yolks, extra
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
¾ cup caster sugar [I reduced Donna’s quantity of 1 cup]
2 cups pouring cream
crumble
½ cup slow cooking rolled oats
1 cup plain flour
1/2 cup brown sugar
100g chilled butter, chopped
2 generous shakes of cinnamon and allspice
LET’S GET TO IT:
Place apple, cinnamon, lemon zest and juice in a non-metallic bowl, toss and set aside.
In a large ceramic or glass bowl put eggs, extra yolks, vanilla and sugar and place over a pan of simmering water.
Using hand-held electric beaters whip for six to eight minutes, until pale and thick.
Remove from heat and cool slightly.
Place cream in bowl of electric mixer and whip until stiff peaks form. Using a big silver spoon gently fold in the egg mixture, stirring until incorporated.
Gently fold in apple.
Pour into two litre metal cake tine, cover with foil and freeze overnight.
Serve, then top with crumble.
crumble:
Place flour, sugar and oats in a bowl and rub in butter until it is the texture of lumpy sand. Sprinkle over a dash of cinnamon and allspice.
Tip onto baking pan & bake for around 15 minutes at 150C or until golden. Cool before using.
Firstly let me apologise for the [lack] of photos. I made this obscenely rich passionfruit semi-freddo to serve to some friends who came over yesterday. Between setting up all the desserts and ensuring everyone had a plate and making sure things didn’t melt the photo thing pretty much didn’t happen.
Use your imagination – cool, rich ice cream studded with swirls of passionfruit, itself sunshine in a mouthful. Don’t you just want some right now? Continue reading
Firstly – an apology for the lack of photos with this post. I’ve been baking like a mad woman in the last few weeks for various Christmas-related events and even though I intend to photograph as I go for my blog it hasn’t turned out this way.
Sigh.
First up, a super easy Christmas ice cream pudding that I’ve been making for many, many years. I have no idea where the original recipe comes from but it is embarrassingly easy.
This is so simple and a perfect dessert for Christmas Day in Sydney, which is, without fail, a squillion degrees. I made nine desserts for my mother-in-law’s Christmas lunch on the weekend and this was the first thing to vanish.
GATHER:
2 litres best quality vanilla ice cream, softened
1 cup mixture of sultanas, currants and raisins
Good splash of rum
¼ cup glace cherries, chopped
2 tablespoons cinnamon
LET’S GET TO IT:
Soak the dried fruit [but not the glace cherries] in rum and leave overnight.
Line a 2-litre pudding basin with cling wrap, leaving overhang.
Working quickly tip the softened ice cream into a large bowl and stir in rum-soaked fruit, cinnamon and cherries.
If desired place some home-made chocolates [see below] in the base of the pudding basin, then add ice cream. Smooth the top then fold over the overhanging cling wrap. Wrap in foil and freeze overnight.
Home made Christmas chocolates
I found a similar idea for these little chocs online and Christmas-afied them using red and green Christmas sprinkles from a baking store. Simply line two mini muffin pans with mini liners. Place 150g your choice of chocolate with a splash of canola oil in a bowl over a pan of simmering water. Stir until melted and glossy. Pour chocolate into mini pans until bottom is covered and then a bit more. Sprinkle over Christmas sprinkles and place in fridge for a few hours until firm. Remove and discard wrappers.
Miss 7 and I made these for her to hand out to her class. We bundled a few up in cellophane bags for all of her classmates. I should have taken a photo…
the hungry mum 