Chuck in the Cheese Muffins

Due to the amazing weather in Perth yesterday a picnic was called for and with my group of uni girlfriends, aka Team Awesome, we headed off to Burswood to enjoy the sun. (Sadly a massive group of people with annoying party whistles had the same idea and if any of the food had been bad I'm pretty sure we would've thrown it at them!)

I volunteered myself for savouries as Miss S & Miss B are the baking goddesses of our group. We had a wonderful array of home made goodies ranging from quiches made by Miss K (the picnic planner) to old English scones (Miss S) with jam & cream of course and finally to-die-for macaroons made by Miss B. I truly to hope that S&B open up a little shop one day because the rest of the world is missing out, plus I'd gladly put my hand up to work there!

So because I usually bake I was at a bit of a loss as to what I should cook. I was contemplating going with fritters but I just couldn't find a recipe that jumped out at me :( So instead I thought I'd try my hand at savoury muffins. Enter 'Super Easy Cheese Muffins' courtesy of ChocolateSuze. I've posted my recipe below (and renamed them) with a few variations.

Ingredients

•  2 cups Plain Flour (all-purpose flour)
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 4tsp baking powder
• 1/4 cup oil
• 1 egg (lightly beaten)
• 1 1/4 cup milk + extra if required (which I needed after mixing it)
• 1 cup grated cheese (I used Mersey Valley flavoured with basil & garlic)
• 1/2 cup grated parmesan
• 1/2 cup sundried tomatoes (chopped)
• 1tbsp black pepper
• 1tsp cayenne seasoning

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 180C and line a muffin tray with patty cases. I used a large 12x muffin tray and had enough left over to also make a small loaf in a loaf tin.

2. Chuck all your ingredients into a bowl (or you're KitchenAid & set it on 2/4 for a little bit but not too long) stir all ingredients together. If it gets to dry, like mine, add extra milk. Make sure you don't excessively stir it or the muffins won't be very nice at the end.

3. Spoon them out into the patty cases (if you're lucky enough to own more than 1 muffin tray I'd suggest using 2) and then put it in the oven. If you're making large muffins I'd suggest 20mins, I think I did mine for about 25mins but just keep an eye on them and when they're golden brown take them out.

4. Slather them with butter and gobble them up! Or you can eat them cold but I reckon warm with butter would be yummiest.

 

Triple C Soup

If you have never heard of the Pioneer Woman you are missing out. Her recipes are literally to die for (I mean that and you'll see why when I list the ingredients!). This has become the staple meal in our house and I always try and make sure I have the ingredients in the kitchen. I have made a few adaptations though and if you're looking for it on her website it's Chicken Rice Soup. It does take awhile to whip up but it's definitely worth it and once you've cooked it enough that prep time will go down. This is also the only thing I've cooked that Hubby has ever been ok with eating for leftovers.

Ingredients

• 1 packet of chicken thighs (or more depending on how many people you're feeding)
• 1 packet of Pearl CousCous
• 5 chicken stock cubes
• 1.5 cups chicken stock
• 8 cups water
• 1 small onion (finely diced)
• 1 large green capsicum (a green pepper) again finely chopped/diced
• Half a bunch of celery stalks diced into small pieces
• 6tbsp butter
• 4tbsp plain flour (all-purpose flour)

Method

1. Put chicken in large saucepan and cover with water and liquid stock. Add stock cubes and bring to boil. Reduce to medium heat and cook for 20 minutes (or until chicken is cooked through).
2. Take the chicken out and leave them to cool, then cut/shread into bite size pieces.
3. Chop the vegetables.
4. Melt 4 tbsp of butter in a pan and then add the flour. Stir with a wooden spoon until thickened and then add to broth. Stir the heck out of that thing and just keep going so you don't wind up with lumpy yucky flour stuff throughout.
5. Add couscous to liquid and stir. Meanwhile clean the pan and melt 3tbsp butter then add your veggies. Stir it all together and then add the chicken. Cook the chicken and veggies for 2 minutes and then add to broth.
6. Make sure the couscous is cooked (at least 8 minutes) and then serve it up in big bowls.

Lemon Coconut Slice

Ingredients

• 1/4 cup lemon juice
• 3tsp lemon rind
• 4 eggs
• 2 cups Caster Sugar
• 250g butter
• 1 cup dessicated coconut
• 1 1/2 cup plain flour (all purpose flour) 

Method

1. Preheat your oven to 180C and line (& grease) a 20x30cm cake tin (mine was 30x30cm and they were pretty thick).
2. Melt butter in a medium/large saucepan over medium heat. Once butter is melted remove from heat. Stir in the sugar (it'll be pretty thick!).
3. Add eggs, one at a time and stir until thick and glossy.
4. Sift flour over the mixture and stir until well combined. Then stir in the coconut, lemon rind and lemon juice (ps I added an extra 1/2tsp of rind). Spread the mixture over the tin.
5. Cook for 30 minutes or until an inserted skewer comes out clean. Take out of the oven and cool in the pan. Once cooled flick onto a wire rack (let it cool more) and then cut into pieces.

I took this to work and everyone gobbled it up. I guess I shouldn't have made a diabetes joke because low and behold I got called in by my midwives to do a follow up glucose test later this week!

*courtesy of www.taste.com.au*

Welcome

AKA the Introduction.

After being unable to cook for the majority of my pregnancy, I'm finally feeling ready to get back in there. Following my little sister's foray into the world of blogging (check her out - Beauty Down Under) I've decided to keep a virtual record of my cooking triumphs and tragedies (with a bit of baby baking thrown into the mix as well).

Before I get started with any recipes I figured I'd give a little bit of background on myself.

1. I work fulltime in internal recruitment to keep my Hubby in the lap of luxury (at least until October!).

2. My husband is Danish which inspired the blog title and we've been together for over 6 years.

3. We're expecting our first child in November whose womb nickname is Pecan (don't worry we're not sticking our child with that moniker).

4. My red Kitchen-Aid, known as Betty, was a wedding gift from my in-laws.

5. I'm a quarter of a century old and still suck at riding a bike but thankfully this blog has nothing to do with that!