I'm not going to post the method, as this is more a record of ingredients for me :) This recipe is in the new "A Taste of Vegetarian" cookbook from Thermomix. it is vegan and a perfect recipe to use up leftover veg in your fridge ;) here is the gluten free version i made tonight which was YUM!!!! 5/5!

it's a funny recipe though - you swear there's no way it's enough batter for that amount of veg but it's perfect!

600g roughly chopped veg - i used 1 onion, 1 small yellow capsicum (though something red would have been great ;)) half a small cauliflower, some beans and 3 small potatoes, plus half a bunch of finely chopped coriander
3 corn cobs, kernels removed
2 cloves garlic
110g gluten free plain flour (i used white wings)
80g besan / chickpea flour
1 tspn garam masala (made in tmx ;))
1 tspn curry powder
210g water
oil for frying

** see the recipe book for the method!

as i didn't have any avocado to make the salsa the book suggests and dh doesn't like it, i just mixed natural yoghurt and sweet chilli sauce, though i'd thought a spiced yoghurt (with cumin, coriander, S&P and fresh mint) would have been great, but couldn't be bothered to do it lol

i think that these made in teaspoonfuls rather than large spoonfuls would make fantastic finger food for a cocktail party

this was good but not good enough! recipe is for me so i can tweak it ;) the numbers in brackets are what i did this time.

1L skim milk
2 teabags, strings & tags cut off
2 cinnamon sticks
6 whole cloves (4)
8 cardmom pods, squeezed til they just crack slightly (5)
1/4 tspn ground ginger, rounded, or one slice fresh ginger, peeled and cut into chunks
1 tablespoon (tspn) raw sugar or honey or to taste

put the milk in the bowl of the thermomix
place the other ingredients in the basket and place it into the thermomix
cook 20mins (12) at 100'c, speed 3
remove the basket, pour and serve

it was delicious!

the kids enjoyed theirs and ryan had seconds.

we had ours in a lasagne which i layered with Thermomix bechamel sauce (the thermomix stirs and cooks it all for you ;)) and dried GF lasagne. it was sooo good though quite rich.

thanks again to Lana and i definitely recommend giving her recipe a try!

I also had a go at making gluten free pasta last night! i was going to use it as the Lasagne noodles but didn't realise it had to rest in the fridge for an hour first. i used this recipe and it worked well. i made my own chia meal in the thermomix, and also milled polenta to make the grittier corn flour it called for.

so i left it over night and then had a go at making it with my new (replacement) pasta maker. which worked perfectly at first and then was nearly totally unusable by the time i was not even half way through the batch of pasta (the roller that rolls it into a sheet just seems to stick and is nearly impossible to turn, this is the exact same thing that went wrong with the first one - DON'T buy a Benzer brand pasta maker!!!!)

this dough is very different to work with compared to regular gluten pasta dough. it breaks quite easily, though i found adding a little extra oil helped. it then would stick into a huge lump as it 'fell' below the pasta maker, so i had to make very small amounts and literally toss them in GF flour (i just used a commercial plain blend) and then they would be fine.

they took minutes to cook and they were very yummy! unfortunately because of the SNAFU with the pasta maker i didn't make enough for a meal so geoff and i had it as a side dish (with pesto) with our dinner. i am keen to try again but not sure what to do with the stoopid pasta maker :( the fettucine cutter / roller works perfectly but the sheet roller won't work at all now. i'm wondering how frustrating it would be to just use a rolling pin (i was just squashing with my hand in the end lol)

oh and i forgot to say i made the dough in the thermomix of course ;)

1. you get what you pay for with pasta makers and I think my replacement pasta maker (used for the first time tonight) is broken too :(

2. gluten free pasta is bloody hard work!

Thank you to my good friend Lana who agreed to be a guest blogger here on my blog! yippee!! even better she made the recipe and brought some over for us to sample! (stay tuned) * it smells divine and the kids are loving theirs :)

Bolognese Meat Sauce

This great meat sauce is a specialty of Bologna. It is delicious with tagliatelle or short pasta such as penne or conchiglie as well as spaghetti. The oil/fat content makes it ideal for making lasagna, particularly homemade pasta. I will post more about this later! It keeps well in the refrigerator for several days and can be frozen for several months.

Ingredients
25g/ 1oz/ 2T butter
60mL/ 4T olive oil
1 medium onion, finely chopped
25g/ 1oz/ 2T pancetta or unsmoked bacon, finely chopped (optional)
1 carrot, finely sliced or diced
1 stick celery, finely sliced
1 clove garlic, finely chopped
350g/ 12oz lean minced beef/lamb/chicken or kangaroo
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
150mL/ ¼ pt/ 2/3cup red wine (I have used merlot, cab sav, shiraz and grenache)
125mL/ 4fl oz/ ½ cup full milk
1 x 400g/ 14oz can plum tomatoes, chopped with their juice, or 450g fresh tomatoes
1 bay leaf
¼ t fresh thyme leaves

1. Heat the butter and oil over moderate heat in a heavy saucepan. Add the onion, and cook for 3-4 minutes. Add the pancetta (if using), and cook until the onion is translucent. Stir in the carrot, celery and garlic. Cook 3-4 minutes more.

2. Add the meat and crumble it into the vegetables with a fork or spoon. Stir until the meat loses its red colour. Season with salt and pepper.

3. Pour in the wine, raise the temperature slightly, and cook until the liquid evaporates. Add the milk, and cook until it evaporates.

4. Stir in the tomatoes with their juice, and the herbs. Bring the sauce to the boil. Reduce the heat to low, and simmer, uncovered, for 1 ½ - 2 hours, stirring occasionally. Correct the seasoning before serving.

Taken from The Italian Cook, A definitive guide to Italian ingredients and an inspirational collection of recipes by Capalbo, Whiteman, Wright and Boggiano.

For a no fuss preparation, you can chop the vegetables in a blender. For a more sophisticated finish, it is better to hand chop them. Or you can hand chop some and put the rest in the blender . I’ve used Black Russian tomatoes, which I have grown in my own garden (they are awesome croppers over the whole season, so far this season, from 2 plants which cost me $2 each, I have harvested 20.75kg!). They are chocolate brown, and give the sauce a rich dark colour. This is such a versatile recipe, I always make 2 or 3 times as much as I need, and either freeze, or make up a lasagna to freeze. It does lend itself well to increasing the quantities, just keep in mind that the wine and milk will take longer to evaporate.

* if you have a recipe you'd like to share on here please email me - you don't HAVE to cook for me ;) but thanks lana!

we were heading out to a Coeliac Society afternoon tea and needed to take something to share but i don't have much in my pantry or fridge at the moment! (shopping trip is due but am waiting til after school holidays end ;))

i didn't have everything i needed to make the herb dip in the Every day thermomix book so i ended up with this:

2-4 cloves garlic, peeled
handful rocket
125g cream cheese
125g natural or greek yoghurt *

chop the garlic & rocket on speed 6 for 10 seconds
add the cream cheese and yoghurt & mix on speed 4 for 10 seconds, stop, scrape down and repeat.


* this makes quite a runny dip - if you have time try straining your yoghurt for a few hours to thicken

well OK, no fishes here!

but today i wasn't feeling so good because I had my gastroscopy yesterday (results in a week). i didn't feel like doing any housework (when do i ever? lol) so i decided to cook up the bananas i had instead of wasting them again. I also had heaps of pumpkin because i'd bought a 6kg pumpkin at Choku Bai Jo last weekend. so I jumped onto Taste and found 2 recipes to try.

Pumpkin Loaf
and
Banana Bread

the Pumpkin Loaf was a hit with all of us, despite me stuffing up the recipe due to my inability to think today LOL (i transferred ingredients from the banana bread recipe to the pumpkin loaf recipe). The banana bread on the other hand was not a hit with anyone. which is not to say it's bad (it also got 5* on Taste) but i am really fussy about banana bread and am still looking for my perfect recipe. this was not it.

Here are the ingredients *I* put in the pumpkin loaf (as opposed to what was meant to go in it lol). of course i did it all in the thermomix but was not in the state of mind to actually write a conversion.


* 650g butternut pumpkin, peeled, deseeded (i cut up this much of kent pumpkin but only used about half of it to get one cup)
* 100g butter, softened
* 1 1/2 cups brown sugar (could get away with less)
* 2 eggs
* 1 cup Gluten free self-raising flour (I used a brand which contained soy)
* 1 cup buckwheat flour
* 1 cup gluten free plain flour
* 1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
* 2 teaspoons baking powder
* 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
* 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
* 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
* 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves (didn't have any, forgot to grind them before starting the cake)
* plus i had to add maybe 1/4 cup milk to make up for adding the extra cup of flour!

Orgran Wheat Free - Gluten Free Spaghetti in Tomato Sauce
even though Orgran seems to be a great brand in general this is one product i suggest you avoid. Rora HATES it and won't touch more than the first spoonful. i wish i'd taken a photo of it tbh as it looked NOTHING like the picture on the front - the spaghetti was so soft and swollen that it was broken into small pieces of only a few mm. luckily tinned spaghetti was only an occasional (few times a year) treat that she won't miss!


Lowan Cocoa Bombs
On the other hand she had never had sugar-cereal before (neither had the other kids) and when these were on special recently i got some for her to try. she loves them! (weekends only ;)) she will eat bowlful after bowlful.

story about an American celebrity's gluten free kitchen

we haven't been there often, but Rama's is one of the few gluten free restaurants in Canberra. On Sunday night we were looking for somewhere to go out with Geoff's family and decided on Rama's. it's a Fiji-Indian restaurant located in Pearce, just south of woden, next to Ethiopia Down under (also GF recommended), 2 doors from Deeks GF cafe and next to the foodworks where you can buy deeks products when deeks is closed. a real little GF hub!

Luckily we were able to squeeze in on an early table and it proved to be a great place to take kids as it is noisy enough to cover their noise (but we could still hear) and all the staff seemed very patient of the children.

the owner of Rama's is really lovely and my memory of her from our other (pre-kids) visits was that she likes to personally visit each table for a quick chat at some stage in the evening.

we opted for the cheaper banquet on the menu and it was quite delicious and very popular with us all - there was none left! despite us carefully picking a largely GF restaurant the kids only ate pappadums and rice LOL rora did try some of the lamb and wanted more but unfortunately by the time she realised it was all gone :(

not everything at rama's is gluten free but the menu clearly sets out which items are and which aren't. in our banquet only the samosas and roti were gluten foods.

"Rama's Delight"

Entree:
Pappadums
Samosas
Bhajia

Main Meals:
Lamb Rogenjosh
Beef Vindaloo
Chicken Korma
Vegetable Bombay
Rice

Side Dishes:
Roti (Bread)

Dinner: $29.00 per person
Lunch: $25.00 per person (cash only) or
$29.00 per person (Credit Card payment)
Inc. GST

i highly recommend Rama's for a GF meal, eat in or takeaway - if you want to eat in you WILL need to book, it is VERY popular!

Gluten free bread is one of the things that it's nearly impossible to make like regular gluten bread. Rora seems happy to have most kinds of bread that i make for her - i make almost all the bread we have because of the price of the bought loaves - generally around $6-8 for a small loaf of maybe 12 slices of bread!!! for the most part gluten free bread is not suitable for sandwiches (certainly not packed sandwiches) but is ok as toasted or toasted / grilled sandwiches.

We all like Cyndi's recipe, and i've used it to make little dinner rolls for us all, as well as to make regular bread for Rora. The recipe is in the Thermomix Gluten Free Wheat Free cookbook as well as Cyndi's Changing Habits Changing Lives book (i think it might be the accompanying recipe book).

it's a dense bread and i usually put in double the amount of seeds cyndi suggests - i usually use about 80-90g combined of sesame, linseed, sunflower, pepita and / or chia seeds. the chia seeds are high in protein and very good for you!

as you can see even though Rora was very wary of bread for the first few months - she knew it hurt her tummy to eat bread - she quite likes this bread occasionally :)

See also:
Gluten Free Rice Bread

this is not so much a recipe as it is a reminder for me of what i did tonight :) it needs some refinement ;)

wontons:
500g veal mince (or use pork or mix of pork & veal, pork & prawn)
1 small onion
4 garlic cloves
2 small carrots
1" ginger
1 egg
2-3 shallots, cut into 1" lengths
coriander

chop on speed 6 & mix well

soak rice paper wrappers in hot water, fold four sides into the centre, put tspnful in centre and bring in as for wontons. place in base of varoma (don't line with baking paper or if you do poke holes in bottom - mine stewed in the collected steam :()

no need to wash out tmx bowl, any leftover mince adds flavour to broth

broth:
in basket place:
some celery leaves
1 small carrot, chopped diagonally
star anise (i used 3, was not enough)
4 garlic cloves
1" ginger sliced
black peppercorns if desired

in bowl of tmx place 800g water, splash of tamari and good splosh of sesame oil. i also added some chicken stock powder as i was out of homemade stock concentrate.

place basket in

cook for 10 minutes on varoma speed 3/4

asian veg:
use any leafy green veg, slice very finely and place in top of varoma

put varoma on top for 10 minutes on varoma speed 3

** i'm not really sure about cooking times ATM as i totally overcooked the wontons.

serve with rice noodles (soaked) and some of the broth, wontons and greens.

would be lovely with some chilli in it too

~*Rae*~'s failsafe version

sloppy joes
pasta with vegetable & bean sauce
pasta with broccoli & bacon
chicken cacciatore
asian soup with rice noodles and rice paper wontons
fritatta


garlic
2 carrots
6 zucchinis
2 green capsicums
celery half
1 red capsicum
shallots
brown onions
few mushrooms
tomatoes - 10-12
broccoli, big bunch
asian green veg of some sort
sweet potato

Ok, this was not a success but was nearly a complete success! plus rora likes it and it's very simple (once i get the formula right ;)) so i want to note this to know where to start next time...

if you want to experiment yourself please remember all ingredients are VERY approximate!

100g parmesan cheese, cut into chunks
200-300g tasty cheese, cut into chunks
25g butter, cut into cubes
1 tab GF plain flour
350g low fat milk
350g water
1 packet (250g) San Remo GF pasta

put cheeses in TM bowl and chop for ummm 10 seconds until in smaller pieces (i didn't do this and should have!) place in another bowl.

place all other ingredients in TM bowl. cook for 16 minutes on 90' reverse speed 1

scrape sides down and mix with spatula. add cheese and cook for a further 5 minutes on 90' reverse speed 1

mix with spatula and serve.

(not an April fool's joke lol)

i missed it! this morning i was wondering how long i'd been blogging now, not thinking it would be a year but thinking it must be getting close - i started on 26/3/08! i can't believe it's been a year already!! i wish i had added my counter when i first set it up but i really didn't expect to get anyone but me and a few friends occasionally here :)

if i was a good blogger i would have baked a birthday cake to photograph LOL instead of forgetting ;) hehehe ah well...