Breakfast Archives - Page 5 of 17

lucycorry July 8, 2014

The perfect chocolate smoothie

I don’t want to jinx things, but we are having the best winter ever. There are tomatoes growing in my garden, despite heavy frosts and gusts of wind that feel like they’ve blown straight from Antarctica. A work colleague whose house is hooked up to solar panels says they have more battery power now than they did in mid-summer. It’s not exactly t-shirt and jandals weather, but the sun is out and the days are crisp and clear.

The weather is so good that on Monday, to celebrate the start of the school holidays, we had chocolate smoothies for breakfast. On Friday, to celebrate the last day of term, we had chocolate porridge. I’m a strong contender for Mum Of The Year, don’t you think?

The perfect chocolate smoothie

The ingredients for these smoothies came from The Big Fair Bake, a Fairtrade initiative designed to showcase the many wonderful ways you can a) support Fairtrade and b) use Fairtrade ingredients. Supporting Fairtrade seems like a no-brainer to me – it’s getting easier all the time to find fairly traded and produced things all the time and I like the idea that I am (in a tiny way, admittedly) helping other families while doing something nice for my own. While The Big Fair Bake is, as the name suggests, all about baking, this is a so-hot-right-now option that doesn’t require you to turn on the oven or even the elements. Now that’s what I call the perfect holiday breakfast.

400ml coconut milk (the Trade Aid one is delicious!)

3 Tbsp good quality cocoa powder

1 Tbsp honey (or more to taste, if you like things really sweet)

3 very ripe bananas, peeled, cut into chunks and frozen

Put everything in a blender and blitz to form a smooth and frothy mixture. Divide between two tall glasses and serve. Pink straws optional, unless you live in my house.

lucycorry June 28, 2014

Treat me: Brown bread icecream

“Unlike Justice, hospitality should not be seen to be done!”

So begins ‘Dining In And Dining Out In New Zealand’, an absolute treasure in my cookbook library. This book, gifted by a friend with a strong sense of the absurd, has survived many cookbook culls and house moves. Written in 1973, it has stayed a strong favourite. I’m unsure if the author, Patricia Harris, is still alive, but I’d love to meet her. I imagine her as one part Margot Leadbetter, one part Fanny Craddock and two parts Delia Smith.

Like the title suggests, the book is part-dedicated to catering at home and part-dedicated to New Zealand’s 1970s restaurant scene. While none of the restaurants she recommends are still in existence, many of her recipes remain in vogue. I’m not sure I agree with her dictum that vichyssoise (first take your homemade chicken stock) is the answer to the busy hostess’s woes, but the intention is well meant.

My fondness for Mrs Harris’ means her book has never been relegated to my office (the staging post for cookbooks that need new homes), so it’s getting a moment in the sun this month for Belleau Kitchen’s June Random Recipe challenge. We were supposed to pick the recipe on page 40, but since I couldn’t see myself acquiring ‘five dozen rock oysters or four dozen Stewart Island monsters’ for the seafood starter, I went for page 41 instead.

Brown Bread Icecream

This comes from the ‘Dinner At Home’ chapter, which is full of helpful suggestions. My favourite refers to the carving of the loin of lamb: “persuade your husband to carve it as neatly as possible (if your husband is one of those “joint wreckers” I advise you to invite an experienced surgeon among your guests)”. Mrs Harris suggests serving this unusual, but delectable, icecream with caramel sauce and praline, but I reckon it’s fine by itself or served between two very thin slices of toasted baguette in a kind of literal icecream sandwich. No husband or surgeon required.

170g brown sugar

60g butter

125ml water

4 egg yolks, beaten

60ml milk

700ml cream

1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1 1/2 cups wholemeal bread crumbs, lightly toasted

Put the egg yolks in a bowl that will fit over a medium saucepan in a double-boiler arrangement. Put a couple of cms of water in the saucepan and set over medium heat.

Put the sugar, butter and water in a small saucepan and cook over medium heat until it reaches boiling point.

Pour this syrup over the eggs and beat well, then add the milk. Set the egg mixture bowl over the water in the saucepan and stir well until it thickens (about five minutes).

Remove the bowl from the saucepan and put in the freezer to chill (about 20 minutes should do it).

When the egg mixture is cold, whip the cream and vanilla together until it is just before the soft peak stage. Fold in the egg mixture and the toasted breadcrumbs, then scrape into a plastic container. Cover and freeze for at least four hours.

Let ripen at room temperature for 10 minutes before serving. Makes about 1.3 litres.

Have a great weekend, everyone x

lucycorry June 12, 2014

How to make sunflower seed butter

The advent of school lunches means that we’re now going through our favourite peanut butter at an alarming rate. We already ate it a lot – anyone who tells you they don’t eat it by the spoonful occasionally is either a person of no consequence or a liar – but now it’s disappearing like there’s no tomorrow.

We are lucky in that nuts are not a banned substance at ‘our’ school (dogs are also banned, but they’re not as good in sandwiches so it’s not such a big deal), but I do feel the need to diversify our reliance on the humble peanut. And so, while scrabbling around in the pantry last weekend I found a small sack of sunflower seeds and decided to have a bit of an experiment, based on my 2011 adventures in making my own tahini.
Half an hour later and I’d made two jars of fragrant sunflower seed butter for the princely sum of $2.50. Here’s how you can make it too.

How to make your own sunflower seed butter
This is really easy – all you need is a bag of sunflower seeds, a splash of neutral-flavoured oil, a pinch of salt and a food processor or blender. A fancy high speed blender would do the trick in seconds, but a regular food processor does a pretty good job in about five minutes.

500g sunflower seeds
3-4 Tbsp neutral flavoured oil (sunflower oil, if you really want to be cute about it)
a good pinch of salt (optional)

Line a large oven tray with baking paper and heat the oven to 180C. Scatter the seeds over the prepared tray in an even layer.
Toast them in the oven, watching carefully and stirring every 5-10 minutes, until they are turning golden. Don’t wander off, they burn easily.
Remove them from the oven and let cool for five minutes, then tip into your food processor (carefully, so you don’t lose the lot on the floor).
Add the salt, 2 Tbsp oil and whiz – it will be very noisy but will settle down and form a paste. Add the remaining oil until the paste slackens to a peanut butter-style consistency.
Scrape into jars and store in a cool, dark place. Makes about 500g.

lucycorry May 22, 2014

Treat me: Banana granola

Has it ever occurred to you that bananas are like buses? There’s never any when you want one (or at least, one in the right state of ripeness or heading to the right destination), then a whole bunch turn up (or turn from green to extra-ripe) at once.

I know that’s a bit of a stretch, but come on, it’s Friday. And while I am well aware of the joys of freezing overripe bananas, not least because they’re great in smoothies like this apple crumble one, there’s only so many containers of frozen bananas that our tiny freezer can take. And there’s only so much banana cake a small family can eat in a week too (really, there is!)

So it is with great pride I present to you my latest way to use up all the bananas that are no longer fit for eating in their natural state: banana granola. It’s genius, even if I do say so myself.

Banana Granola
This makes the house smell like banana cake, but it’s much more virtuous. The buckwheat gives it an extra crunch, but if you can’t lay your hands on any try quinoa or another cup of seeds.

4 cups whole or jumbo oats
1 cup seeds – sesame, sunflower, pumpkin, linseed – or a mixture of all of them
1 cup desiccated coconut
1 cup buckwheat or quinoa
1 Tbsp cinnamon
2 Tbsp neutral, flavourless oil
2 Tbsp honey
3 very ripe bananas
1 1/2 cups dried fruit, optional

Heat the oven to 160C and line a large baking dish with baking paper. Put the oats, seeds, coconut, buckwheat or quinoa and cinnamon in a large bowl and stir well to mix.
In a separate bowl, mash the bananas to a smooth puree with the oil and honey. Stir this mixture through the dry ingredients – don’t be afraid to use your hands to really mix it in.
Spread in an even layer on the prepared tray and bake for 35-40 minutes, stirring every 10 minutes. If it starts to look a little dark towards the end of the cooking time, just switch the oven off and leave the door slightly ajar, but leave the granola tray in the oven until it has cooled down. This will ensure it dries thoroughly.
Stir through some dried fruit if you like – I reckon sultanas and banana chips are a good combo – and store in an airtight container.

Have a great weekend, everyone x

lucycorry May 18, 2014

Treat me: Spanish Hot Chocolate

Winter is coming, I can feel it in my bones. There’s only a month until the Shortest Day (after which winter really starts in this part of the world) and even though it’s been bright and sunny, there’s no mistaking that chill in the air.

That means porridge is back on the breakfast menu and so – occasionally – are delicate demi-tasses of my very own homemade Spanish hot chocolate. It’s thick, velvety and just the thing to cheer you up on a grey morning. Want some?

Spanish Hot Chocolate
Spanish hot chocolate is like nothing else on earth. It’s rich, thick and has a chocolate hit strong enough to sustain you until aperitivo hour. I’ve finally clocked how to make it at home – not quite as much fun as drinking it in Spain, but infinitely more achievable at the moment.
For best results, use the best cocoa powder and chocolate you can find. This makes enough for a good-sized jar – instructions follow on how to take it from powder to liquid heaven.

1 cup cocoa powder
1/3 cup caster sugar – increase this to 1/2 a cup if you like things very sweet
6 Tbsp cornflour
200g dark chocolate, smashed into little bits

Put all ingredients into a food processor and whiz until it forms a fine powder. Alternatively, sift the cocoa, caster sugar and cornflour into a small bowl, then stir in the finely chopped chocolate. Transfer to a screwtop jar.

To make two small servings: Mix 1/3 cup (6 Tbsp) of the chocolate mixture with 1/2 cup milk of your choice (not low fat milk, ok?) in a small saucepan. Heat, stirring all the time, until it thickens, then add 1 1/2 cups milk and stir frantically. Keep cooking over low heat, stirring all the time, until the mixture is thick and velvety. Divide between two cups. Follow with a brandy and a cigar, then go to work.

Have a great week, everyone x