2009 August - The Klutzy Cook

Menu Plan #3

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Another successful week of menu planning is now under my belt. They say it takes 21 days to form a a habit, so I’m just another week, and I’m there!

Last week’s menu plan went very smoothly and the family managed to fend for themselves fantastically. But I do think they were all glad I was back on cooking duties last night.

This week we’re back to a full menu, with Sunday being Father’s Day, so the kids can help me make Dad’s favourite dinner.

Monday – Chicken and Corn Chowder (Slow Cooker)
Tuesday – Tuna, Mushroom and Pine Nut Pasta (New Recipe)
Wednesday – Impossible Quiche and Salad
Thursday – Beef Satay Stir Fry with Rice
Friday – Homemade Pizza using Easy Pizza Dough
Saturday – Barbecue – Steak, Sausages, Corn with salads
Sunday – Lasagne, Chips and Salad
Extras – Choc Mint Slice (New Recipe), Strawberry Muffins

I have a lot of fresh corn to use up from the markets last week – it will be going into the corn chowder (that’s a bit obvious), the quiche and some cobs onto the barbecue.

Have a great week!

Feel free to add your menu plan for the week below.

Pea and Ham Soup

Of all soups, Pea and Ham Soup is undoubtedly my favourite and has been all my life. My Dad has always made a mean version of this soup and nowadays, I still use his recipe with a few of my own tweaks. Also, I make it in the slow cooker, but it is just as good done on the stove top.

Every Christmas I freeze the bone leftover from the Christmas ham so that at the first signs of winter, I’m ready to make a batch of Pea and Ham Soup. I leave a bit of the meat on the bone so there are some chunky bits for the soup. Obviously, this only allows for one batch, so as winter progresses, I buy some ham hocks and use those.

This winter, my local supermarket had a fantastic supply of really meaty ham hocks (see pictures) that delivered huge amounts of ham chunks for the soup. My family was in soup heaven – thick, chunky Pea and Ham Soup mopped up with big wads of bread.

Since our winter has come to an abrupt halt this year (temperatures have escalated this last week of winter to +30C), this will probably be my last soup post for a while. It is therefore only fitting that I finish the season, as I started, with Pea and Ham Soup.

Pea and Ham Soup

Ingredients

1 Ham Hock or Bone, preferably with some meat on it
2 medium onions, finely chopped
2 large carrots, finely chopped
2 celery stalks, finely chopped
440g packet (2 cups) of split green peas, rinsed and drained
4 cups (1 litre) reduced salt chicken stock
4 cups (1 litre) water
2 bay leaves

Method

Trim any excess fat from the ham hock or bone. Put everything into the slow cooker. Cook on low for 8 hours. Remove the ham bone and once cooled, remove meat from the bone. Cut the meat into chunks and return to the soup. Serve with fresh bread.

Pea and Ham Soup Ingredients

Ingredients into the slow cooker

The Klutzy Cook Notes

The Pea and Ham soup can also be cooked on the stove top. Place all the ingredients in a large saucepan or stockpot. Bring to the boil (skim any scum off the surface) then reduce to low and simmer for 1-1 ½ hours. Remove bone and meat as above.
My Dad used to serve this with some sliced pieces of Frankfurt on top. This is ideal if you don’t have much ham meat to return to the dish.
If you prefer a smoother soup, blend the soup in batches after the bone is removed and don’t return the meat to the dish.
Seasoning can be added at the end, but check for saltiness first. The ham bone can make the soup fairly salty.
If there is extra, freeze it in an airtight container for another night.

Enjoy this recipe and if you have any comments about the soup, please leave them below.

Slow Cooker Beef Curry

Whether it’s beef or lamb, these days I really do prefer my curries done in the slow cooker. That long, slow cooking process makes a great curry dish and this Beef Curry is no exception.

Every time I’m cooking this recipe, it seems I have people over during the cooking process, and this time was no exception. While we were sitting down to morning tea and chatting, the aromas filled the house and everyone left with the recipe in their hands.

Slow Cooker Beef Curry

Ingredients

1kg diced chuck steak
½ cup flour
2 tablespoons oil
1 large onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, crushed
1/3 cup Massaman curry paste
4 medium potatoes, cut into quarters
2 large carrots, cut into 3cm lengths
1 cup beef stock

Method

Heat 1 tablespoon of oil in a frying pan. Dust the chuck steak in flour. Shake off excess flour and cook one third of the beef until browned. Remove and place in the slow cooker. Repeat with remaining beef using a little extra oil if required.

Heat the remaining oil and sauté the onion and garlic until softened. Add the curry paste and cook until fragrant. Transfer mix to the slow cooker. Add remaining ingredients.

Cover and cook on High setting for 3-4 hours or Low setting for 6-8 hours.

Serve with cooked rice.

The Klutzy Cook Notes

Any favourite curry paste can be used – Massaman is a type of Thai curry that includes potatoes and goes perfectly with this dish.
I have actually sacrificed some meat for extra vegetables in this dish, you can add more meat if you wish.

Please feel free to leave a comment below about this recipe or ingredients.

Pasta with Broccoli and Tomatoes

Broccoli is one of the few vegetables all of my family eat, even my eldest son who is ‘allergic’ to many others. Every time he eats a vegetable he doesn’t like, he gets this look on his face like there is a bad smell under his nose and he’s in some acute pain. It’s hilarious and very transparent so I always know immediately if he does or doesn’t like something (even if he tries to tell me otherwise).

So based on a motherly desire to miminise my son’s pain, I was keen to try this Pasta with Broccoli and Tomatoes recipe. Not only was I thinking I would be onto a winner, there was also an abundance of broccoli in my fridge from the markets last week that I was keen to use up.

This recipe is courtesy of a great pasta book (The Top 100 Pasta Saucesby Dianne Seed) I bought over 20 years ago. If find it amazing how you can have a cookbook for so long and still find something new every time you look in it.

What a delight! It turned out even better than I had anticipated and was well received by all (even my ‘allergic’ son). The recipe requires you to make a simple tomato sauce while cooking the pasta and broccoli. The two parts then come together with a great clump of cheese and voila!

Pasta with Broccoli and Tomatoes

Adapted from The Top 100 Pasta Saucesby Dianne Seed

Ingredients

2 tablespoons olive oil
1 medium onion, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 x 400g cans Italian tomatoes
1 teaspoon sugar
600g broccoli
500g short pasta (I used penne)
1 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese

Method

First make the tomato sauce. Heat the oil in a saucepan and sauté the onion and garlic until soft. Add the tomatoes, all their juice and the sugar. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Cook the tomato mixture uncovered on a medium to high flame for about 20 minutes stirring occasionally.

Tomato Sauce Cooking

Once the sauce is reduced and thick, blend the mixture with an immersion mixer, blender or food processor.

Blending the Tomato Sauce

While the sauce is cooking, heat a large pan of water. Wash the broccoli and divide it up into florets, removing any thick stalks. Slice the stalks in half to allow faster cooking.

Once the water is boiling, plunge the broccoli into the water bring the water back to the boil, then remove the broccoli but keep the water.

Broccoli Cooking

Bring the water back to the boil again and add the pasta. Cook according to the packet directions and add the broccoli back to the pasta for the last few minutes of cooking.

Broccoli & Pasta Cooking

Drain the pasta and broccoli well and return to the pan. Add the hot tomato sauce and combine well. Finally, stir through the parmesan cheese and serve at once.

The Klutzy Cook Notes

If you have a deep pot with colander insert, this is ideal for cooking the broccoli and pasta. Simply lift the colander out when the broccoli is done and allow it to drain leaving the water in the pan for the pasta.
The traditional way to make the tomato sauce is to pass it through a food mill or mouli. However, a blender or processor works just as well and is faster.
This tomato sauce is a great base for many other pasta dishes so make a double quantity and freeze it for another time.

Do you have any other broccoli recipes to share? Please comment below.

Menu Plan #2

Well what a triumph last week was. I managed to make everything in my menu plan (Menu Plans – Back on the Agenda), was super organised with the family cooking and we had a great dinner every night!

As expected there were some highs and lows. The highs (for me anyway, the family may disagree) were the Pasta with Broccoli and Tomatoes and Salt and Pepper Squid. The low was the Cinnamon Tea Cake which just didn’t seem to work so I’ll be tweaking that one.

So following on from this success, menu planning is now well and truly on the agenda. Here’s my plan for this week, which is a bit of an unusual week as I’m going out of town (visiting my sister) for a couple of nights. There are plenty of frozen leftovers to fill the gaps while I’m gone, and I’m sure a ‘Daddy’s treat’ of some description will make its way onto the table. We’re also moving into warmer weather so salads are starting to find their way back onto the menu.

Menu Plan #2

Monday – Tuna Patties and Salad
Tuesday – Kangaroo Soft Tacos
Wednesday – Hoisin Pork & Noodle Stir Fry
Thursday – Baked fish with Fennel, Tomato and Olives
Friday – Family fending for themselves
Saturday – Family fending for themselves
Sunday – Barbecue

I’d love to know what your planning this week so please feel free to share your menu plans in the comments section below.

Lemon Delicious

An abundance of beautiful lemons left me pondering how best to use them up. I know I’ll squeeze some and freeze the juice in ice blocks for future recipes, but what else could I do? Lemon Delicious was the first thing that sprang to mind. Out came the cookbooks and with several recipes in hand, I created my own version of Lemon Delicious.

This is one of those magical desserts that while baking separates into two layers. Out of the oven it is a light sponge sitting on top of a delicious tangy lemon sauce. It is like a self saucing pudding, but of a citrus kind.

The recipe is another to add to the easy baking repertoire as it uses ingredients that are always on hand. At most, you might have to pick up a couple of lemons, or even better, grab them off your tree.

Here is a video outlining the steps to making the Lemon Delicious. There are a few ‘klutzy’ moments along the way, but they didn’t affect the final result.

Lemon Delicious

Ingredients

2 eggs, separated
¾ cup caster sugar
40g butter, melted
½ cup self raising flour
1/3 cup lemon juice
2 teaspoons lemon rind, grated
1 cup milk

Method

Preheat oven to 180C (350F). Lightly grease a pie dish or other suitable ovenproof dish (approximately 6 cup capacity).

Beat the egg whites until soft peaks form.

In a separate bowl, beat the egg yolks and sugar with an electric mixer until thick and creamy. Add the butter, flour, lemon juice, rind and milk and mix until smooth.

Fold the beaten egg whites into the mixture. Pour mixture into prepared dish and place in a baking dish. Pour warm/hot water into the baking dish until it is about halfway up the sides of the pie dish.

Bake in the oven for about 45 minutes, or until pudding is set. Serve with ice cream or cream (or both!).

The Klutzy Cook Notes

This is also great as a ‘Lime Delicious’, simply replace the lemon juice and rind with that of lime.

What’s your favourite lemon pudding?

Some other easy baking recipes you might enjoy:

Nanna’s Ginger Biscuits

Strawberry Muffins

Slow Cooker Lamb Shanks with Red Wine & Honey

Slow Cooker Lamb Shanks are the ultimate in comfort food. The meat just falls of the bone and tastes sooooo good. It’s sometimes hard to believe that something that is relatively inexpensive in the meat department, and looks pretty unappetizing, can taste this good. Ah, the beauty of the slow cooker.

What I love about this recipe is that there is no need to brown the shanks first. So this is literally one of those recipes that you throw on in the morning and when you come home at night, dinner is ready. Just cook up some potato mash or other accompaniment and your done. Not only that, the smell of the lamb, red wine and honey is absolutely divine.

Slow Cooker Lamb Shanks

Ingredients

4 large lamb shanks, or 8 smaller ones
1 large onion, sliced
2 cloves garlic, sliced
1 tablespoon fresh oregano, chopped
2 cups tomato pureed tomatoes
250ml chicken stock
250ml red wine
¼ cup honey

Method

As I said, this one is easy – put everything into the slow cooker, ensure the lamb shanks are coated in mixture. Cook on low for 8 hours. Serve with rice, vegetables or mashed potato.

The Klutzy Cook Notes

Any type of lamb shank can be used. French trimmed lamb shanks are less fatty, but you can also buy the normal shanks (usually cheaper) and trim any excess fat and sinew off.
Dried oregano can be used instead of fresh.
For the pureed tomatoes use tomato passata or puree up a couple of tins of tomatoes.

Enjoy

Italian Sausage Pasta

As I wrote last time (Menu Plans – Back on the Agenda), my menu organization has not been all it should be lately (but now remedied). In this disorganized mode I went to the supermarket last week with no idea of what to get for dinner. As I walked in, there was a rack of menu cards screaming “Feed Your Family For Under $10”, so I grabbed them all and promptly decided on the Italian Sausage Pasta.

Italian Sausage Pasta appealed because it was a combination of flavours I haven’t really put together on pasta before. Also, the idea of using whole cherry tomatoes (of which I had heaps in the fridge) was appealing. That settled, I purchased all the other necessary ingredients and the dinner dilemma was solved.

The recipe is adapted via Curtis Stone who has been doing work with Coles Supermarkets, and I must say, the other recipes he’s put together look good too. I added a few extra tomatoes and olives than the original recipe called for – less is not always more! Italian-Sausage-Pasta

Italian Sausage Pasta

Ingredients

15 cherry tomatoes
2 teaspoons + 1 tablespoon olive oil
8 Italian style pork sausages
2 garlic cloves, crushed
1/3 cup pitted kalamata olives
¼ cup coarsely chopped flat-leaf (Italian) parsley
500g pasta (penne, rigatoni or other short pasta)

Method

Preheat oven to 190C (375F). Place the tomatoes on a suitable baking tray. Drizzle with 2 teaspoons of oil and season with salt and pepper. Roast the tomatoes for about 8 minutes, or until the skin begins to split. Remove them from the oven .

Cook pasta in large pot of boiling water. While it is cooking, heat tablespoon of oil in a frying pan and cook the sausages. Allow to cool then slice into 3cm disks. Saute garlic in the pan for 1 minute, then add the tomatoes and sausages. Heat through for 3 minutes then add olives and toss through. Bring the whole mixture to a simmer and add the parsley.

Drain cooked pasta and add to the pan. Toss well to combine with the sauce. Serve.

The Klutzy Cook Notes

- While the recipe calls for Italian sausages, any herb or garlic flavoured sausages would be just as nice.

Hope you enjoy the flavor of this Italian Sausage Pasta as much as we did.

Please share any comments or suggestions about this recipe below.

Menu Plans – Back on the Agenda

Right, I’ve decided to get my cooking life organised (the rest can stay a mess for the moment) and get my weekly Menu Plans going again. I used to do this religiously and it was fantastic for organising the family cooking. I’ve regressed to usually having a vague idea of what’s on the upcoming menu, but lately it’s worsened. Sometimes I’ve been finding myself still wondering what’s for dinner at 5 pm. The kids keep asking one of their favourite questions – “What’s for dinner” and my response has been a blank stare, shoulder shrug and feeble “I don’t know yet”.

The thing with Menu Plans is, when they are functioning in my life, everything seems to run smoother. I don’t have the constant backwards and forwards going on in my mind about what to cook. For me, the mental conversation is usually along the lines of “I’ll do pasta, there’s some tuna in the pantry and…oh no, I don’t have the mushrooms for that recipe. OK, I’ll stop and buy some…I don’t really feel like tuna pasta…What else have I got…I guess I could do a chicken stir fry, I’ll just need to grab some greens…but I don’t have any chicken defrosted and I’m not buying any more because I have heaps in the freezer to use first…wish I’d taken some chicken out of the freezer…there is some bolognaise sauce in the freezer, I think we’ll just defrost that and have spaghetti bolognaise (again)”.

So, there is actually a double objective with writing a menu plans post. Firstly, if I make a public commitment to do something resembling a menu plan each week, I will do it. This is a huge benefit to me and my family. Not to mention, it lets me pore through my recipe books and magazines looking for new things to try.

Secondly, I’m hoping there is something my readers can glean from my menu plans. Perhaps you might join in and write your own (feel free to share them with us – just write a comment) or just use mine as a starting point, even if it’s just a couple of ideas to take on board.

Anyway, with all that said, here is my menu plan for this week. I believe there should be some flexibility as not everything will go according to plan, but it gives a great starting point.

Menu Plan #1

Monday – Lamb Shanks with Tomato and Honey (Slow Cooker)
Tuesday – Pasta with Broccoli and Tomatoes (New Recipe)
Wednesday – Pea and Ham Soup (Slow Cooker)
Thursday – Beef Curry
Friday – Homemade Pizza using Easy Pizza Dough
Saturday – Salt and Pepper Squid (New Recipe)
Sunday – Barbecue
Extras – Kiwifruit Microwave Jam, Cinnamon Tea Cake (New Recipes)

This week I have an abundance of broccoli and kiwifruit in the fridge from the markets last week, so I’m trying a couple of new recipes to use these up.

So, I’m a woman on a mission. Feel free to take the journey with me and post your menu plans below.

Cheese Muffin Recipe

Muffins have been a bit of a feature in our kitchen lately (see Strawberry Muffins) including this savoury Cheese Muffin version being added to the repertoire.

There is a good reason they’re such a staple as muffins are really the ultimate in family cooking – easy to make, eaten by all and extremely versatile. The latter is because you can take a basic muffin mix and using whatever ingredients are on hand, turn them into a dozen yummy muffins that won’t last a day (in my house anyway). The other great thing about muffins is that they freeze well and can always be on hand to pop into lunchboxes, picnic baskets or for a quick morning tea treat.

This Cheese Muffin recipe with a hint of herbs is fantastic for dunking in soups or soaking up stew juices. They offer an alternative to bread for serving with meals and add a bit of variety.

Cheese Muffin

Cheese Muffin Recipe

Ingredients

2 cups self-raising flour
1 egg, lightly beaten
1 cup milk
4 tablespoons melted butter
1 cup grated tasty cheese
1 teaspoon dried mixed herbs (optional)

Method

Preheat oven to 200C (390F) and lightly grease a 12 hole muffin pan. Alternatively place muffin cases into the pan holes.

Add the flour to a mixing bowl and make a well. Add the remaining ingredients and mix together. Stir until the ingredients are just combined. The mixture should still be pretty lumpy.

Cheese-muffin-mix-2

Divide the mixture evenly among the muffin holes filling each to about 1/2 full.

Cheese-muffin-tray

Bake for 20-25 minutes. Test the muffins are cooked by inserting a skewer into the centre of a muffin. When cooked, it will come out clean.

The Klutzy Cook Notes

Use whatever herbs or spices are on hand to create a different flavor each time.
Store in an airtight container for 1-2 days or freeze immediately.
Next time your serving soup, try these cheese muffins as a delicious alternative to bread.

Do you have any savoury muffins you’d like to share?

Other easy baking recipes you might like:

Strawberry Muffins

Vanilla Birthday Cake

Nanna’s Ginger Biscuits

Family cooking capers from an accident prone Aussie home cook

Feel free to add your menu plan for the week below.

Pea and Ham Soup

Ingredients

Method

Ingredients into the slow cooker The Klutzy Cook Notes

Enjoy this recipe and if you have any comments about the soup, please leave them below.

Slow Cooker Beef Curry

Ingredients

Method

The Klutzy Cook Notes

Please feel free to leave a comment below about this recipe or ingredients.

Pasta with Broccoli and Tomatoes

Ingredients

Method

The Klutzy Cook Notes

Do you have any other broccoli recipes to share? Please comment below.

Menu Plan #2

Lemon Delicious

Ingredients

Method

The Klutzy Cook Notes

Slow Cooker Lamb Shanks

Ingredients

Method

The Klutzy Cook Notes

Italian Sausage Pasta

Ingredients

Method

The Klutzy Cook Notes

Menu Plan #1

Cheese Muffin Recipe

Ingredients

Method

The Klutzy Cook Notes

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Ingredients into the slow cooker

The Klutzy Cook Notes