Citrus cake with marmalade

Some days just call for cake. I don't even eat a lot of cake but I needed to make some anyway. Especially when I see a recipe where I already have everything I need! This was the case with Rachel Khoo's Quatre-quarts aux agrumes, or citrus fruit cake. I had everything except the orange zest. In place of that I had a jar of Maggies Place thick cut 4 fruits marmalade, that I got from my Urban Locavore box. 

This can become something. I think.

It totally did.

A buttery, sweet cake, covered in the contrasting marmalade, which has a touch of sweetness finished off with a kick of bitter orange and a citrus tang! This is a very adult bake, as it is not completely sweet, but sweet enough to know it's cake. To keep it sweet, make a sugar syrup with lemon and rosemary and drown the cake in that instead of the marmalade. Heaven.

I took this to Carolanne's Kitchens 2nd birthday celebrations (I kinda cake crashed! Who brings cake to a birthday party!?) and was happy to see most of it gone! 

Recipe inspired by Rachel Khoo's Quatre-quarts aux agrumes.

Ingredients
4 eggs
250g golden caster sugar
250g plain flour
a pinch of salt
finely grated zest of a lemon + juice
1 tsp baking powder
250g butter, melted and cooled
1 jar of Maggies Place thick cut 4 fruit marmalade (or any brand that is your fave!)

Method
1) Preheat oven to 180C, and prepare your baking tin (original recipe calls for a loaf tin but I used a bundt).

2) Seperate the eggs and in one bowl beat the whites with half the sugar to form soft peaks, in the other bowl, beat the egg yolks with the other half of the sugar, until thick and pale.

3) Gently combine the flour, salt, zest, juice and baking powder with the egg yolk mix and then slowly add the melted butter.

4) Add the egg whites carefully, folding them into the mix until combined.
5) Pour the batter into the prepared tin and bake for 50-60 minutes, or until a skewer comes out clean.

6) Leave the cake to cool in the tin, when it has cooled enough to take it out of the tin, heat your marmalade gently on the stove until it has become pouring consistency. 

7) Prick holes all over the top of your cake, then pour over the marmalade. 

NB The original recipe says the cake cooks in 35-40 minutes, however mine was not NEARLY done by then, and it needed an additional 25-30 minutes. You'll have to use your judgement here, and just keep checking your cake after its been in the oven 40 minutes.

Savoury cake - Rachel Khoo

My darling bf recently returned from a 2 week trip to England for some family weddings, and tucked away in his bag was a couple of bits and pieces for me! England is SO MUCH cheaper than Australia, and so I managed to snag some great workout clothes, an awesome union jack cushion for the couch and most importantly, Little Paris Kitchen, by Rachel Khoo. What a man! How is this... he knew I didn't have many French cookbooks and so he thought it would make my collection more complete - he also remembered me watching her episodes on YouTube, and knew I liked her. I have found a keeper here ladies!!

Flicking through the book, I loved it. Bookmarking recipes, well, there are A LOT I plan on making. In fact this week is pretty much only recipes from her book - some are involved and fiddly, for a Sunday bake up when you have the time (and will) to potter in the kitchen. Others are so easy they're perfect for a week night meal, which are the ones I'll use this week. Will write more about this book as I use it, as I'm sure I'll use it a fair bit!

So the recipe that popped out for me was the cured sausage, pistachio and prune cake. It's a really unique combination of flavours and it sounded delicious - however I don't have prunes or pistachios in the house, but I do have a jumbo smoked chorizo sausage from Mondos that I got in my Urban Locavore box. Perfect. Rachel mentions that the combo that goes into these savoury cakes can be whatever takes your fancy, or whatever is in your fridge! Serve them with a lightly dressed salad or take them on a picnic. Super versatile.

Heres the recipe - adapted from Rachel Khoo's Little Paris Kitchen.

Smoked chorizo, fetta, and spring onion cake

Ingredients

2 cups plain flour 
15g baking powder
1 smoked chorizo (Mondos was delicious!), diced into rounds and quartered
2 or 3 fat spring onions,  chopped roughly
100g fetta (about half the block, I used danish fetta)
4 eggs
100ml milk
150ml olive oil
3 tbsp plain yoghurt
pinch of salt to taste 
pepper

Method

1) Preheat the oven to 180C and line a square brownie tray with baking paper (a few drops of oil will help the paper stick).

2) In a bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder, sausage, and spring onions.

3) In a seperate bowl, whisk the eggs until they are thick and pale in colour.

4) Gradually whisk in the oil, milk, and yoghurt, then add the salt and pepper.

5) Add the crumbled fetta, and fold the mixture together gently, bit by bit. Don't over mix, better to undermix it (you don't want to develop the gluten like you would in a bread recipe, you want a light cake, not a tough one!).

6) Pour the batter into the prepared tin and cook for 25-30minutes or until a skewer inserted into the middle comes out clean. Leave in the tin to cool.

NB; If you'd rather use a loaf tin (as Rachael's recipe calls for), then bake for 30-40 minutes.

Check out Eating Those Words for another delicious looking take on this recipe!

Sweet n Savoury Scrolls

Upon looking at the ridiculous collection of jars in my fridge, I decided today that I was going to use some of them up, somehow. I had been reading a breadmaking book earlier, and so I thought that making some scrolls with a variety of different fillings with bits and pieces from the fridge! I recently bought a whole box of seconds strawberries from a local berry farm (Berry Sweet), and because I had so many I made strawberry compote earlier in the week, I figured this would be a great way to use some of it up! I also decided that the Homestay Organic Plantation mango chutney and Margaret River Organics "Cowaramup Crumble" cheese (both from the Urban Locavore box!) would be great together... So I split the dough in half and made both!

I used Nigella Lawsons dough from her Norwegian Cinnamon Scroll recipe, and just changed the filling! It was a beautiful dough to work with, in saying that, it was my KitchenAid that did most of the work! It was originally very sticky, but with a dusting of flour it became very managable! It was soft, supple and elastic - I needed my bakers spatula though!

Heres the recipe for the dough, what you will it with is up to you though!

Ingredients
600 g flour (plus a bit extra for dusting)
100 g sugar
½ teaspoon salt
21 g (3 sachets-yes, really) easy blend yeast or 45 g fresh yeast
100 g butter
400 ml milk
2 eggs

Fillings

Margaret River Organic Creameries "Cowaramup Crumble" (use as much or as little as you like, I used about 1/3 of the block)

Homestay Organic Plantation mango chutney ( I used about 1/3 jar, but you can use more if you like, but I wouldn't recommend using less as you'll get all dough with too little filling!)


Thyme, for sprinkling

4-5 tbsp berry compote or other stewed fruit (if using other stewed fruit you'll need closer to 1 cup to cover the dough)


Sugar, for sprinkling

Method

1) Combine the flour, sugar, salt, and yeast in a large bowl. Melt the butter and whisk it into milk and eggs, then stir it into the flour mixture. Mix to combine and then knead the dough either by hand or using the dough hook of a food mixer until its smooth and springy-add extra flour until the dough becomes a good rolling consistency. Form into a ball, place in an oiled bowl, cover with clingfilm and leave it to rise for about 25 minutes.

2) Take one-third of the dough and roll it or stretch it to fit your tin; this will form the bottom of each bun when it has cooked. The tin should be wider rather than tall, otherwise the middle takes far too long to cook, drying the edges out. Roll out the rest of the dough on a lightly floured surface, aiming to get a rectangle of roughly 50x25cm, roughly 1cm thick.

3) I cut the dough in half and spread one half with about 1/3 jar of mango chutney and grated a generous amount of cheese over the top. On the other side I spread about 4 tablespoons of strawberry compote over the dough.

4) Roll it up from the longest side until you have a giant sausage. Cut the roll into 2 cm slices which should make about 20 rounds. Sit the rounds in lines on top of the dough in the tin, swirly cut-side up - half savoury on one side, half sweet on the other. Don’t worry if they don’t fit snugly together as they will swell and become puffy when they prove. If you have some left over then pop them in a muffin tray for individual serves! Brush them with egg, sprinkle the savoury side with thyme and the sweet side with sugar, and let them rise again for about 15 minutes to let them get duly puffy.

5) Put in the hot oven and cook for 20-25 minutes, by which time the buns will have risen and will be golden brown in colour. Don’t worry it they catch in places. Remove them from the tin and leave to cool slightly on a rack - it’s easy just to pick up the whole sheet of parchment and transfer them like that - before letting people tear them off, to eat warm.

Tapas for Life round up!

On the 24th of March my sister Jenni and I held a tapas event for her Relay for Life team, and we were both blown away by the generosity of the local businesses who donated their wares so we could run the event and earn as much profit as we could to donate to the Cancer Council. We ended up making over $800 from the night which was such a great success, we have some fabulously generous friends!

The Organic Collective donated a gorgeous box of tomatoes, onions, potatoes, lemons, oranges and capsicums which could not have tasted any better - they were fresh, local and unbelievably tasty. You NEED to try one of their boxes, the quality is amazing.



I used the onions, capsicums, tomatoes and oranges to make orange scented albondigas, which went down a treat, they were a little bit different, but really moreish!

Photo c/o Carolanne Rushe

The same organic onions were caramalised, and paired with some gorgeous Ringwould goats milk fetta from a previous Urban Locavore box I had received to make a tasty frittata, that I cooked gently in a pan first, and then transferred into a shallow baking dish and finished off in the oven. This was gone - fast! I also used the caperberries from a previous box on the platters - there were none left at the end of the night!

I also had a smoked trout that I had frozen from the very first box, that I wasn't sure how to use. I ended up making some savoury pancakes with them, which were nice, but I used too much of the trout! Very nice if you love smoked fish ;) It was full of paprika, spinach and bites of trout. Unlike the pancakes I made at the Breakfast with Benefits, these were SO easy to make, and flipped like a dream!



Speaking of Urban Locavore, Paul, the brains behind the operation, was really generous and donated a box to the raffle. Rhianna Clarke was the lucky winner of the straw packed box of local goods, and was pretty stoked!

I had gone to The Tasting Plate at the Mezz shopping centre in Mt Hawthorn looking for some stuff of my own, and got talking to the manager Janine, about food, Relay for Life and her chilli company, Habaneros for Gringos. I realised I had tried some of her products at the Araluen Chilli Festival in Freo and had really enjoyed the curried onion dip! I told her what I was doing and she generously donated some of her products, as well as plenty of great items from the shop. We ended up having tasting plates of their DELICIOUS Habaneros 4 Gringos chilli fetta (Seriously. Find this stuff, its awesome), curried onion dip, and chilli olive tapanade, with marinated octopus, olives and manchego cheese from The Tasting Plate. There were loads of comments about the chilli products - everyone loved them, especially the curried onion dip!

Photos c/o Habaneros 4 Gringos

These went down so well with the Casalinga sourdough baguettes that New Norcia Bakery donated. Seriously good bread, as soon as you crack it open, you just want to take a bite. Just walk in there and TRY to walk out with nothing. I never do. Their coffee is great too.

Gorgeous bread from New Norcia Bakery, Mt Hawthorn.

I may have tried a portugese tart when I picked up the bread... for research of course! They are GORGEOUS!

One of the highlights of the meal was probably the amazing meat provided by El Asador. This business run by couple Emily and Max specialise in Argentine products and if you've been to any food markets in the last 6 months you would have seen their stall, or smelled their amazing giant bbq cooking up chorizo and asado! We were lucky to get loads of meat from them - beef asado, chorizo and morcillas! The beef asado is an Argentine cut of beef that is super tasty, slow roasted with their herb and salt rub (AMAZING! I always have this in the house) and then grilled to crispy deliciousness. This meat... Is genius. I couldn't cook on the bbq that night, so cooked them in a pan (after slow roasting them for 2 hours the night before). They are quite fatty, but a lot of the fat melts away when you bbq them - I cut a lot of the fat off (not all - fat is flavour!), took it off the bone and sliced it into sharing sized pieces, with chimmichurri on the side. That meat was gone in 5 minutes. It was so tasty and tender... If you see the El Asador bbq stall ANYWHERE, buy the asado. It is gorgeous.

Beef asado from El Asador - YUM! (Photo c/o http://elasador.myshopify.com/)

Their chorizo is fresh not cured, and really juicy. Served with chimmichurri again, these were super moreish bites that everyone loved. Look for the Choripan at their stall!

The morcilla is the Argentine version of black pudding. This is not something I've tried before, and that wasn't breaking my heart. Carolanne cooked it up, as the Irish love their black pudding and so I figured she would do it justice! It was quite crumbly, but had a great flavour - pretty much everyone tried some, even though the thought of it grossed some people out. Thing is though, everyone loved it!

Morcillas from El Asador (Photo c/o Carolanne Rushe)

El Asador also donated a fantastic hamper with a bunch of their products which was won by Jemma Edwards (I'm not jealous at all!).

El Asador hamper, full of goodies! (photo c/o Carolanne Rushe)

There I also made a huge batch of spicy paprika nuts, which were REALLY easy to make, and cheap. I went to Kakulas in Northbridge and bought about 2kg of blanched raw almonds and peanuts and it set me back about $15 - not a bad price for a MASSIVE bag of nuts!

Just in case there were still people who could eat, I bought out some flatbreads with tomato, herbs, roasted peppers and rock salt, just to fill any savoury holes people might have had in their tummies!

There had to be dessert... well there didn't really, there was so much food eaten! But I had made it anyway and so people were gonna eat it! Some pseudo Portugese tarts, made with yoghurt and orange instead of cream. Some had orange caramel on top, some were naked. They went down a treat and there were none left! Not too sweet, only a few bites, it was all we really needed after feasting all night.

Crust Mt Lawley were also awesome and contributed 2 $25 vouchers to the raffle - it wasn't hard to talk these up, have you tried the peri peri chicken, or veggie supreme pizza? Do it, they're SO nice.

Red Hot Spatula donated a voucher for 30% off one of their cooking classes, which is an awesome deal because Yvonnes classes are brilliant. I've been to one and we all loved it! They have just released a new line of spice pastes and rubs, which I can't wait to get my hands on!

Jenni's bath was FULL of donated booze for everyone to drink, including a carton of Custard Cider from the Real River Company - needless to say, people were merry!!

Cider for all! (photo c/o Carolanne Rushe)

The night was great fun - and most importantly, we raised a bunch of money for the Relay for Life in Katanning. All up the event raised over $70000 which is amazing considering its a town of about 4000 people. It just goes to show that everyone is touched by cancer in some way or another, and are willing to give generously if its going to help combat such a terrible disease. Its worth remembering though, that a cancer diagnosis is not always a death sentence. For some its an incredibly trying time which tests every limit they have, but eventually they come out of it with a greater zest for life than ever. Its these people who offer hope to others, who need to have their stories listened to and learned from. They deliver a message of appreciating what you have right in front of you every day, and taking nothing for granted.


Eat, drink and be merry, and savour every bite, every moment.

Relay for Life - Tapas evening!

After the success of the Breakfast with Benefits event I held in November, my little sister asked me if I wanted to help her out with another event, this time for her Relay for Life team. Obviously I said yes, but I wanted to do something a bit different - so I've gone for a tapas evening! There will be all manner of delicious things, from Chorizo, Jamon, and Manchego cheese, to Sangria, and Rioja! The food and drink will be as local as possible, and where we will be using imported products (Spanish wine etc) then I will be using Australian, preferably Western Australian, companies.

It will be held on the 25th March, and will be capped at about 25 guests. 


So far we have a carton of delicious Custard Cider and 2 bottles of apple port, donated by the very generous and talented brewers at The Real River Company, so already on day 1 of looking for sponsors for the event - we have a carton of the best cider in WA to keep the punters happy! 
Red Hot Spatula, caterer extraordinaire will be donating a voucher for 30% off a cooking class for 6 - which is awesome, I've been to a class of hers and they're FAB, and the food was amazing! 
El Asador, makers of fine Argentinian produce, have also jumped on board again to donate some of their delicious goods - including their delicious chorizo!
The Organic Collective have agreed to be on board again, supplying us with some gorgeous organic potatoes for our patatas bravas and Spanish tortillas!
Urban Locavore are an awesome new business in Perth who gather a collection of Western Australian products and delivers a tasting box full of goodies right to your door! We'll be getting one of these boxes to raffle off!
Crust Gourmet Pizza Bar Mt Lawley is on board again too, with vouchers for their delicious pizzas!



There will be more details to come, and this post will be updated when we get more donations/sponsors. Having prizes and products for the evening donated means that we can spend less on running costs, and make more of a profit to donate to the Cancer Council - so please give generously! Jenni has set up a webpage for her team, and if you'd like to donate you can do so HERE, either directly to the Cancer Council, or you can donate straight into a PayPal account to help cover costs for the fundraising events. ALL PROFITS will be donated directly back to the Cancer Council, and we are trying to get as much donated as we can so our profits are higher!


The relay itself will be held in Katanning (we raised $100 000 last time! Not bad for a small town!), however all fundraising events will be held in Perth.

At the moment we are half booked out already - so if you're interested get in quick! Just send me an email/comment and I'll put your name on the list! Breakfast with Benefits had a waiting list, so get your name down!!

Use Twitter? Look out for the hashtag #tapasforlife!

Urban Locavore Box

There aren't often moments in your week where you experience a random act of generosity and kindness. People are usually caught up in their own happenings to worry much about anyone else, at least never more than in passing. However I was lucky to experience an act of generosity recently from someone who I'd never even met yet.

One evening on Twitter, I was noticing everyone posting about how they were stoked about their Urban Locavore goodie box, and I mentioned that I was jealous and I wanted one! I'm a bit broke at the moment due to being a relief teacher and it being school holidays (so no pay) and my summer holiday job being so delayed that by the time I start working there, Ill be only 2 or 3 weeks away from working again. Anyway, I couldn't really afford one this month, due to Christmas among other things! Everyone had one a box but me, so I pouted. Urban Locavore posted on my behalf, asking who was going to play Santa?! Who was going to gift me a box full of WA foodie goodness?! I thought nothing of it and ended up watching a movie and going to bed, but before I went to bed I checked Twitter and it turned out that the lovely Strawberrythief had gifted me a box! She said that it was because of my fundraising efforts for the Breakfast with Benefits that I had done. Such a nice thing to do! So the next day, I got my personally delivered box! It was so generous of her to do that for someone she'd never met. Go and read her lovely blog!

But what is this Urban Locavore box anyway!? Who started it? This is taken from their website...


Each month, Urban Locavore hand picks 6 to 10 of Western Australia’s best products and delivers them directly to your door in the Perth metropolitan area. Some products you may have seen before, some will be unknown but we are sure you will love each one.
We are a team of passionate WA food lovers. We are not affiliated with any producer or company, the only bias we have is towards local. There is a great article in the Subiaco Post by Jona Turle which gives a background on the motivations behind Urban Locavore.
We are small part of a bigger movement which aims to reduce food miles and associated emissions, embrace seasonality and local produce and support smaller growers and producers who use organic or biodynamic methods in their production.


Small changes in buying habits can make big differences.


Our Mission:
To discover & share great food made by talented and passionate producers in Western Australia.
To promote & support producers who source most (or all) of their ingredients locally.
To encourage consumers to think about and question where their food comes from and how it is produced.


What is a Locavore?
Locavore is a word which was coined in San Francisco in 2005 during the World Environment Conference and has since been embraced as part of a movement towards championing a focus on reducing food miles and associated emissions, embracing seasonality and local produce and supporting smaller growers and producers who use organic or biodynamic methods in their production.


This was their first box, and it contained some really great West Australian stuff! Paul is the brains behind the operation, and we had a chat when he came round with the box and he's a cool guy. He got the idea from living in San Francisco and has bought it back here with a more local emphasis. The awesome local products that were included are as follows;


Rochelle Adonis - Rosepetal Barberry Pistachio

Now, I'm not a fan of nougat, its just too sweet. So I wasn't planning on being able to eat this on my own! Thank you Christmas parties! I got this out when we had friends over, and went to cut it into pieces - it was pretty crumbly rather than sticky. I was a bit concerned the rose petals would remind me of eating pot pourri and get stuck in my teeth. When I ate a little chunk I was pleased to see the rose flavour wasn't overpowering and the petals didn't feel I was chewing a dead flower. It was pretty nice, chewy (but not stuck in your teeth, pull your fillings out kinda chewy!), with a nice mild flavour. I'd definitely give this to someone as a gift!


Eden Gate - Blueberry Velvet

Not yet tried this one - but I want to! Ill put it in morning smoothies and on ice cream I think! When I start working again (which means I'll be making more of an effort to have a decent breakfast) Ill likely put this on yoghurt and museli for breakfast!

This is what I want for breakfast...

Holy Smoke! - Smoked Trout

Not tried this yet either, and not sure what to use it for! Ill be happy to take any recipe suggestions! Im thinking perhaps some potato cakes?


Vesuvio Pasta - Ravioli Ricotta & Spinach

This was something I knew wouldn't last long in the house! I served this with some homemade almond pesto with basil from my garden - it was delicious! The pasta is filling, and would serve 2 of us for a main course, and 3 or 4 for a starter. The pasta came frozen and takes about 10mins to cook which is really convenient and fast for families, busy workers, everyone! I would buy these again.

The cheese was mild but creamy, and would carry so many flavours really well. A discussion with The Food Pornographer had us both agreeing that this pasta would be fab with burnt butter and sage! A big winner!


Purely Mexican - Salsa Mexicana

My bfs eyes lit up at this one. He's a chilli fiend and was happy to see this one! We've used this as a dip to take on picnics, and I stirred some into smashed up avo to make a cheats guacamole. This is a really fresh, flavoursome sauce that is really versatile - if you don't mind the heat! The chilli comes and smacks you in the face but then the freshness of the other ingredients comes through. To use it in other things such as chilli con carne or beans would be really nice. We still have some left, so will see how we use it!

This is the kinda label you wanna see..

Turban Chopsticks - Thai Green Curry
I had this for dinner last night. When you look into the jar you can see the chunks and bits n pieces of all the fresh ingredients that go into this mix. Open the lid and it smells GREAT!

I cooked off the whole jar in a wok, added some diced free range turkey meat, then poured in a can of coconut milk. I added some homemade chicken stock as well that I had lurking in the freezer, just to add some flavour! I added baby corn, broccolini, and rice noodles to make a soupy bowl full of delicious! This made 4 good portions, and was tasty. Gluten/dairy free and totally vegetarian, this is certainly a crowd pleaser! I don't know how much these retail for but I'd consider buying another one to keep in the cupboard for times where you need a quick green curry fix!

Gluten Free Cookie Company - Quinzacs
Hm this one, I'll admit, I wasn't a fan of. The cookie was HARD, I couldnt bite into it with just my teeth, and I wasn't a fan of the flavour. Might have been the quinoa, not sure as I've never had it before so I cant say accurately! But I would use these cookies, blitzed up for a gluten/wheat/soy/lactose/egg free cheesecake base, or as a crumble topping, just not as a cookie.. I just realised I dont have a photo for this! Ooops!


I love this concept and have every intention of supporting it in the future!I cant wait to find out what the next box will bring! I would love to get one each month, it's a great surprise and gives you some variety each month. It also goes without saying that supporting local businesses is a fantastic and sustainable thing to do!


Others who have gotten one of these boxes and blogged about it are;
The Food Pornographer
Foodie Cravings (who freaks out at whole fish and got Paul to hide it from her!)


Next month - BUY ONE! They're awesome.