I found this recipe on the internet before getting my TM, and have wanted to cook it ever since the TM arrived. The link to the recipe is:
http://www.recipecommunity.com.au/recipes/10893/red-curry-chicken-risotto.html
This was another lesson in preparing all the ingredients first, so that they could easily be added at the required times. I didn't do so well with this, as I was a bit distracted, and had to keep referring to the recipe. SJ and my cousin EM came around to try muy cooking this time, as CJ was doing something else. SJ saved the day by going to buy some arborio rice, as Mum had got basmati rice by mistake.
At one point, when I was measuring out the coconut milk (I wanted to weigh it on my talking scales to see whether 400 g was equal to 400 ml), I accidentally tipped some of the milk into the TM jug instead of the jug on the scales. I pannicked a bit, but EM assured me that I had not ruined everything, and tipped the milk back into the jug for me. Everything seemed to take me ages to do, and we ate about 45 minutes later than I had planned. I think I'm just going to have to get all the ingredients prepared before my friends come over, rather than when they arrive.
I wasn't sure whether I had to use a particular type of curry paste, so just bought some red thai curry paste. 3 tablespoons sounded like a lot, but i followed the recipe exactly. I think I might use a touch less curry paste next time though, as it was really rather hot! I'm glad I didn't add the extra chilli as the recipe suggested.
I let the risotto sit in my thermoserver while I made more lemon custard. EM hadn't tried it yet. It amazed me just as much this time as it did in the demo, just how much difference the resting of the risotto made. It was quite liquidy when I took it out of the TM, but after resting, it was perfect!
Apart from being a bit hotter than I expected (not too hot though), the risotto was absolutely delicious! The texture and flavour were perfect. This is definitely a recipe I'll make again.
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Dip and Pizza
I had a great cooking week last week.
I was rostered on for morning tea, so decided to make the Capsicum and Sundried Tomato Dip from the EDC. It was really quite straightforward.
I was worried about how much to bring, as some people bring heaps of food to morning tea, and sometimes there is quite a large turnout. So, I made a double quantity. Quite a lot of dip!
It was a success, and quite a lot of the dip was eaten. Everyone said nice things about it (probably because I was a bit overenthusiastic about it, and sat in front of the bowl, inviting everyone to try the dip saying "I made it myself!"). It did taste really good though.
I wasn't sure what to do with the leftovers, as I knew I probably wouldn't heat it, and didn't want it to go bad in the fridge. Then, I remembered the leftover pizza dough that was still in my freezer from the Varoma demo.
After some thought, and a couple of phone calls to Mum to ask her opinion on some things, I decided to make a pizza with the dough and the dip.
I invited SJ and CJ over to try it out, and give me some encouragement while I made it. These were the same friends who had tried the fettuccini the previous week. They said that it wasn't fare that E was the only one who was named in my blog, so I've named them!
I had asked Mum to drop over and get the pizza dough out of the freezer, and it was nicely thawed by the time I got home. It smelled just the same as it had when E made it - lovely and yeasty. I had frozen it in Tupperware, so it had retained all its moisture and was slightly sticky.
after some deliberation, I decided to cook the dough on my only pizza tray, even though it was smaller than the one that E had used. I don't have a thermo mat yet, so put some baking paper on the tray, and placed the dough in the middle. I tried, unsuccessfully, to flatten it out into a perfect circle. After much flattening and stretching the dough covered all but a small bit of the tray, and CJ reminded me that it didn't have to be perfect.
Then I spread the dip over the base, and covered this with 100 g of salami I found in the fridge. CJ wanted cheese, so I put some Cheddar slices over the salami. It was quite fun arranging the salami and the slices so they were all overlapping, and all the dip was covered.
I wasn't sure how long to cook it, and CJ suggested that I should try 20 minutes at 200 degrees. Of course, we couldn't remember how long E had cooked the pizza for during the demo. It came out perfectly! the base all rose up, and the topping was a really delicious combination. The lovely pizza smell went all through the house!
The only problem was that when I picked up a slice to eat it (I always eat pizza in my fingers), the topping fell off. CJ and SJ explained that what I needed was pizza cheese under and over the rest of the filling to bind everything together. I'll have to try that next time.
CJ said that she wanted lemon custard instead of chocolate to finish the meal. I decided that this would be a good challenge for me, as I had never used a peeler to peel the rind from a lemon before. I'm not entirely sure whether I included any pith in the custard, but it tasted really good, so I assume I didn't. It was easy to feel when I had peeled too deeply, as some juice would come through onto my finger. I just love the smell of the lemon and sugar mixture after it is ground up! It reminded me of E's first demo in my pre-thermomix life.
I was rostered on for morning tea, so decided to make the Capsicum and Sundried Tomato Dip from the EDC. It was really quite straightforward.
I was worried about how much to bring, as some people bring heaps of food to morning tea, and sometimes there is quite a large turnout. So, I made a double quantity. Quite a lot of dip!
It was a success, and quite a lot of the dip was eaten. Everyone said nice things about it (probably because I was a bit overenthusiastic about it, and sat in front of the bowl, inviting everyone to try the dip saying "I made it myself!"). It did taste really good though.
I wasn't sure what to do with the leftovers, as I knew I probably wouldn't heat it, and didn't want it to go bad in the fridge. Then, I remembered the leftover pizza dough that was still in my freezer from the Varoma demo.
After some thought, and a couple of phone calls to Mum to ask her opinion on some things, I decided to make a pizza with the dough and the dip.
I invited SJ and CJ over to try it out, and give me some encouragement while I made it. These were the same friends who had tried the fettuccini the previous week. They said that it wasn't fare that E was the only one who was named in my blog, so I've named them!
I had asked Mum to drop over and get the pizza dough out of the freezer, and it was nicely thawed by the time I got home. It smelled just the same as it had when E made it - lovely and yeasty. I had frozen it in Tupperware, so it had retained all its moisture and was slightly sticky.
after some deliberation, I decided to cook the dough on my only pizza tray, even though it was smaller than the one that E had used. I don't have a thermo mat yet, so put some baking paper on the tray, and placed the dough in the middle. I tried, unsuccessfully, to flatten it out into a perfect circle. After much flattening and stretching the dough covered all but a small bit of the tray, and CJ reminded me that it didn't have to be perfect.
Then I spread the dip over the base, and covered this with 100 g of salami I found in the fridge. CJ wanted cheese, so I put some Cheddar slices over the salami. It was quite fun arranging the salami and the slices so they were all overlapping, and all the dip was covered.
I wasn't sure how long to cook it, and CJ suggested that I should try 20 minutes at 200 degrees. Of course, we couldn't remember how long E had cooked the pizza for during the demo. It came out perfectly! the base all rose up, and the topping was a really delicious combination. The lovely pizza smell went all through the house!
The only problem was that when I picked up a slice to eat it (I always eat pizza in my fingers), the topping fell off. CJ and SJ explained that what I needed was pizza cheese under and over the rest of the filling to bind everything together. I'll have to try that next time.
CJ said that she wanted lemon custard instead of chocolate to finish the meal. I decided that this would be a good challenge for me, as I had never used a peeler to peel the rind from a lemon before. I'm not entirely sure whether I included any pith in the custard, but it tasted really good, so I assume I didn't. It was easy to feel when I had peeled too deeply, as some juice would come through onto my finger. I just love the smell of the lemon and sugar mixture after it is ground up! It reminded me of E's first demo in my pre-thermomix life.
Monday, March 7, 2011
Creamy Tomato and Salami Fettuccini
It has been a while between posts. The weekend before last, I was in Sydney seeing the Boy from Aus, and last weekend, I spent celebrating my birthday.
Last night though, I decided to cook dinner for my friends. I liked the sound of the Creamy Tomato and Salami Fettuccini, so decided to give that a go. I also decided to make chocolate custard again for dessert, as it was so nice last time.
I learned from my last cooking lesson that it was important to get out all the ingredients, so I measured everything and put it into dishes.
The EDC was vague about how much I should chop up the vegies for the fettuccini sauce, so I diced some and julienned others. This was probably a bit of overkill, as the TM chopped them anyway. I'll chop them less next time and see what happens.
I had an initial panic, as I discovered that I had run out of olive oil (another advantage of laying out the ingredients first). Then I remembered that I had some butter in the fridge, so decided to use that. Conveniently, I had 50 g , which was just what I needed. I buy my butter in packets of 100 g blocks, and I have a real thing about anyone breaking my blocks. E was teasing me the other day when we were making the cupcakes, as she had to break into one of my 100 g blocks. It's a good thing she did! Some day, I'lll make my own butter.
I've decided to convert recipes as I go from weights to measures. In doing this, I discovered that 100 g of zuccini is about half a zuccini, and that 200 g of cream is the same as 200 ml, which is very convenient. When weighing out the ingredients for the custard, I discovered that 70 g of sugar is about 4 metric tablespoons, 40 g of flour is 3 tablespoons and 20 g of cocoa is 2 heaped tablespoons.
Everything went smoothly. I just quietly followed the recipe step by step and it worked! weighing the fettuccini was interesting though, as it kept rolling off the scales! Then I had the bright idea of breaking it in half and putting it in the TM basket - much easier.
The fettuccini was absolutely delicious! The custard was even nicer than the last lot, as I used sugar this time. My friends were really impressed. One commented how I would have never thought of doing this a couple of months ago, and mentioned how happy and in control I seemed. It was true.
Last night though, I decided to cook dinner for my friends. I liked the sound of the Creamy Tomato and Salami Fettuccini, so decided to give that a go. I also decided to make chocolate custard again for dessert, as it was so nice last time.
I learned from my last cooking lesson that it was important to get out all the ingredients, so I measured everything and put it into dishes.
The EDC was vague about how much I should chop up the vegies for the fettuccini sauce, so I diced some and julienned others. This was probably a bit of overkill, as the TM chopped them anyway. I'll chop them less next time and see what happens.
I had an initial panic, as I discovered that I had run out of olive oil (another advantage of laying out the ingredients first). Then I remembered that I had some butter in the fridge, so decided to use that. Conveniently, I had 50 g , which was just what I needed. I buy my butter in packets of 100 g blocks, and I have a real thing about anyone breaking my blocks. E was teasing me the other day when we were making the cupcakes, as she had to break into one of my 100 g blocks. It's a good thing she did! Some day, I'lll make my own butter.
I've decided to convert recipes as I go from weights to measures. In doing this, I discovered that 100 g of zuccini is about half a zuccini, and that 200 g of cream is the same as 200 ml, which is very convenient. When weighing out the ingredients for the custard, I discovered that 70 g of sugar is about 4 metric tablespoons, 40 g of flour is 3 tablespoons and 20 g of cocoa is 2 heaped tablespoons.
Everything went smoothly. I just quietly followed the recipe step by step and it worked! weighing the fettuccini was interesting though, as it kept rolling off the scales! Then I had the bright idea of breaking it in half and putting it in the TM basket - much easier.
The fettuccini was absolutely delicious! The custard was even nicer than the last lot, as I used sugar this time. My friends were really impressed. One commented how I would have never thought of doing this a couple of months ago, and mentioned how happy and in control I seemed. It was true.
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