Cauliflower & Prosciutto Pasta

I found this recipe in the Canvas magazine that came the NZ Herald on 2nd June 2012. We had just discovered the wonder of brussel sprouts, so I took the recipe home and tried it. Unfortunately I lost those photos when I lost the hard drive, but I still had the recipe. Today I made it again, and it was just as delicious as I had remembered.

Boil 400g pasta and set aside. Cook 6 slices of prosciutto (we use bacon instead) in a little olive oil, then set aside. Using the same pan, fry 400g of cauliflower and 200g sliced brussel sprouts with 3 cloves of garlic. In a bowl, combine 1 cup cream, 3 egg yolks, 1/2 cup finely grated parmesan cheese, salt and pepper. Add the cream mixture to the pan of cauliflower and brussel sprouts. At this point, I add the chopped bacon, although the recipe says to put it on last when serving. Add the pasta to the frypan and stir until the cream sauce thickens. Serve with a little extra parmesan grated on top.


Sooooo good!

Orange & Cardamom Cupcakes, with Orange & Whiskey Icing

Today Caitie and I made Orange and Cardamom Cupcakes, using a recipe from the Wild About Cupcakes book by Rachel Lane, published 2009.
The recipe calls for combining 1 cup flour, 1/3 cup ground almonds, 1 teaspoon baking powder, 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger and 1/8 teaspoon salt in a bowl. Separately, beat 90g butter, 1/2 cup sugar, 2 teaspoons orange zest and 5 cardamom pods, ground.

Caitie had fun opening the cardamom pods, and then using Steve's mortar and pestle to grind the cardamom.






The beaten mixture didn't seem to be turning creamy, but with perseverance (and a lot of beating), we got it there.




Then we added the dry ingredients to the wet ones, along with 2 eggs, 3 tablespoons orange juice and 2 tablespoons of plain yogurt. We actually used sour cream instead of yogurt. They were baked for 25 minutes at 180 degrees Celsius.

While the cupcakes were cooling, we made Geoff Scott's Orange & Whiskey Icing - 1 cup icing sugar, 50g butter, 1 teaspoon orange juice, 2 teaspoons whiskey. So yum.


We took the cupcakes around to Sue & Jim's house. Everyone enjoyed one, and Uncle Jon and Steve had two each! I call that a success!

Apple Snow

Jim's Aioli

Sticky Lemon Chicken

Steve made Gordon Ramsay's Sticky Lemon Chicken for dinner tonight. I originally had photos of this from when I made it, ready for the recipe book, but I lost those photos when the hard drive failed. I took photos of Steve's final dish, but because he tweaked the recipe a bit as he made it, it looked darker and thicker, and it had quite a different flavour.

American Brownie

Steve made American Brownie this morning, using one of his old Eves Pantry recipes.
The original recipe called for:
875g butter
1.3kg chocolate
1.75kg sugar
25g vanilla essence
700g egg
10g baking powder
900g flour
185g cocoa
490g pecans

I think Steve ended up using a quarter measure of everything. It was a bit too rich for me, but Steve and the kids really liked it.

Carrot Cake

I made some carrot cake yesterday, using Jim's recipe. I haven't scrapped the recipe yet, but I needed a cake for my birthday morning tea shout at work that wasn't overly sweet.



It was very moist and quite tasty. I didn't ice it, because it was moist enough that it didn't need it, and the guys at work aren't really into sweet things. It makes two cakes, and I took one into work. The whole thing was eaten! Success! :) We'll use the remaining cake for school lunches, etc this week.