Homegrown Pumpkin Soup and Homemade Bread

One of the best things we ever did for our house is to keep a compost. Its great to not have anything wet in the trash, all the left over food goes in the compost, especially seeing as we are vegetarians. From our compost has sprouted a huge pumpkin vine, and like last year, we have grown several large organic pumpkins! We cut open the 1st one the other day, and my husband made most of it into a pumpkin soup, and I want to remember how beautiful and sweet it is! As an accompaniment, I made some more homemade bread, this time without oats but just flour instead. A lovely lunch to remember!

homegrown pumpkin soup and homemade bread

this homegrown pumpkin is very sweet and delicious!

a self-sown pumpkin growing in our backyard

Today's Small Win - Baking Oat Bread

I had another low-mood day yesterday after waking from dreaming about my lost teaching career, so today I decided on a small win - having a go at baking bread! My husband assured me it was easy! I saw this video by Nikki Beal on youtube the other day and was thinking maybe the oatbread she makes in it would be doable! So with my husband's encouragement I had a go, and low and behold, it actually worked out well! Huzzah! (Yeast, 2 cups of flour, 1 cup of oats, 1.5cups of water, 2 hours rest, roll in flour, 30 minutes more rest, then 30 minutes in the a 220 oven, turn, then another 15 minutes in the oven)

today's small win - baking oat bread

New AI biscuits!

I've been fooling around with the new chat AI I got yesterday, mainly I've been asking it to help me with meal planning. I told it the dietary requirements of my family of three, mainly that we are dairy-free and meat-free. Then I asked it for a simple cookie recipe using some of the ingredients I have in the back of my pantry that need using up. I told the AI that I had cacao nibs, wholemeal self-raising flour, coconut flour, powdered psyllium husk and sunflower kernels. This was the recipe it came up with, which we tried and it turned out great!

ingredients for the AI cookies

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup sunflower kernels
• 1 cup whole meal self-raising flour
• 1/4 cup cacao nibs
• 1/4 cup coconut flour
• 2 tsp powdered psyllium husk
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 cup honey/golden syrup
• 1/3 cup coconut oil, melted
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

Instructions:

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F) and line a baking tray with parchment paper.
2. In a large bowl, mix together the sunflower kernels, whole meal self-raising flour, cacao nibs, coconut flour, psyllium husk powder, baking powder, and salt.
3. In a separate bowl, whisk together the maple syrup, melted coconut oil, and vanilla extract.
4. Pour the wet mixture into the dry mixture and stir until well combined.
5. Using a spoon or cookie scoop, drop balls of dough onto the lined baking tray and flatten them slightly with the back of a spoon.
6. Bake for 10-12 minutes, or until the edges are lightly browned.
7. Let cool on the baking tray for a few minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.

Enjoy your delicious vegan cookies!

the new AI cookies before they went in the oven

how the AI cookies looked coming out of the oven

Vegetarian Bolognaise Pies

 David just made these pies from scratch! He just made up some shortcrust pastry and filled them with left over lentil bologanise! Yummmm!

2 ripe bananas muffins

I did an internet search for a recipe that would use 2 ripe bananas as that's what I had and I found this recipe for banana cinnamon muffins. Its an American site so I had to translate the oven temperature to 190 degrees, and I used plain flour and bi-carb of soda. And I didn't do the butter and sugar topping, they are fine just as they are. They turned out deliciously! Nom nom nom!

this recipe for muffins uses 2 ripe bananas

Gluten-free Diabetic Friendly Trifle

Well today was my birthday and we had a lovely day, we even made a trifle to celebrate! We made a gluten free sponge cake yesterday, I would use smart sugar, or stevia sugar, to make this diabetic friendly. We made half the sponge cake from this recipe of a prize winning gluten-free sponge cake. One sponge cut up is enough to cover the bottom of my trifle bowl. Then I used a low-joule jelly, one packet made about 700ml of jelly and that was enough to go on top of the cake. Then I used a tin of Australian peaches, next time I will use two. Then 3 cups of custard made with lactose free milk and a little more smart sugar, or stevia sugar. Next time, I think I will make 4 cups of custard. I finished off with strawberries and Australian blueberries, which made the final result quite pretty, if I do say so myself! Thomas had fun helping put the trifle together, it's quite straight forward and he couldn't wait to taste it!

this trifle is gluten-free, lactose-free and diabetic friendly

assembling a trifle is a fun activity for a young cook

Easy Jam Drops

I found this easy jam drop biscuit recipe on taste.com.au. The hardest part to making them was getting the electric mixer out of the cupboard! I rolled the teaspoon sized balls a bit big and they spread out quite a lot, so next time I must remember to make smaller balls. The biscuit recipe is really yummy, and with a bit of my favourite strawberry jam these jam drops were delicious! To make them dairy-free I just used nuttelex instead of butter!

these jam drops were easy to make

Gingernut Cookies

My husband and I just made these gingernut cookies and they turned out real nice! Not too sweet and a nice level of spice. The batter turned out a bit sticky so my husband put a bit more flour in it until it was right to roll into balls. We searched through lots of recipes for ginger snap and ginger nut biscuits, and finally found a recipe to try at bestrecipes.com.au

thsee gingernut biscuits turned out nicely and were very yummy!

4 Ingredient 10 minute Cookies

These 4 ingredient 10 minute cookies were easy enough for me to make and they turned out alright! I should have just made the balls smaller as the cookies ran into each other. I squeezed them all onto one cookie tray when they should have been more spread out on two. Thomas helped me make the balls and mix it all up, he even helped crack the egg. Well done!

these cookies are really easy to make

Dairy-free Choc-chip Cookies

We made these chocolate chip cookies, using nuttelex instead of butter. We also used Sweet William chocolate chips so these are dairy-free. We found the choc-chip cookie recipe on the Cadbury website, and they turned out deliciously!

these cookies are dairy-free and delicious!

Caramel Meringue Tartletts

We just made these yummy caramel meringue tartlets! We found the caramel tart recipe on food.com. My husband loves caramel but had to recently turn some caramel tarts down at work due to his lactose intolerance. It made him sad so I said why not make our own with some nuttelex? And here are the results, they taste as good as they look!

these dairy-free caramel tartlets were made with nuttelex

Australia Day Lamingtons

We just made some lamingtons, I believe they are an Australian dish, so what better way to celebrate Australia Day? My husband has the day off work as its a public holiday here in Australia, so we've been baking. We even had a special lunch of rissoles and salads. The recipe we used for the lamingtons was from taste.com.au Enjoy!

we made these lamingtons to celebrate Australia Day

My First Attempt at Trifle

Apologies for being absent for a couple of months, I've been playing World of Warcraft! But yesterday I took some time out to have a go at making trifle. I was inspired by my father-in-law who made a trifle for Christmas! But our trifle has to be dairy free due to my husband's lactose intolerance. We also practiced making gluten free sponge cake, as we are hoping to make a trifle next time the family come to visit so it will need to be gluten free because my brother is coeliac. 

this was my first attempt at making trifle

The sponge cake worked out well I think, it was a bit like meringue, we found the recipe on food.com. We only did half a batch as we only wanted to make a small trifle, but next time we will put it in a bigger bowl we bought, I think the half batch will fit better in that. We made the jelly separately, with raspberries in it which worked really well. Canned peaches were also very nice, they looked good on top of the squares of jelly facing outwards. Then a layer of custard on top of the peaches, it was a bit thick, maybe 4 cups will be enough for the big bowl. I think we should use lactose free milk instead of soy milk for the custard. Then I decorated the top of the trifle with fresh strawberries and kiwi fruit, the strawberries were especially yummy! I'm wondering if I can make a healthy trifle, we usually serve fruit salad, but I'm thinking trifle would be good instead of that.

Rice and Egg Cakes

We found the recipe for these rice cakes on taste.com, we made them without the chicken. We're trialling the low FODMAP diet at the moment to see if that will help with our symptoms, apparently its good but we have to be on it for a few weeks. Already its proving to be very difficult to find things we can eat especially if I'm to go vegetarian, as you can't eat legumes! Hopefully we won't have to be on this diet for very long!

these rice cakes were suitable for a low FODMAP diet

the recipe made 12 tasty rice and egg cakes

Dairy-free Lemon and Coconut Muffins

Based on a simple recipe for muffins, I added my own lemon and coconut flavour. I also skipped the milk so my husband could try these as he has a lactose intolerance, I used lemon juice and coconut milk instead. They turned out well, with a subtle coconut and lemon flavour, you could really smell it as they baked. So to the basic recipe I added 1 tablespoon of lemon rind and 2 tablespoons of desiccated coconut, and instead of the cup of milk, I used the juice of one lemon and coconut milk to make up one cup. Yummo!

these lemon and coconut muffins have coconut milk and lemon juice in them instead of milk

they have a lovely subtle flavour

Lemon Polenta Biscuits

These biscuits are dairy free, as well as egg free, and don't require an electric mixer. I found the recipe for passionfruit and lemon polenta biscuits on taste.com.au and they turned out fine. I just used normal plain flour instead of the gluten free flour suggested as that's what I had in my pantry. I baked them for a few extra minutes which maybe I shouldn't have done as the biscuits turned out a bit chewy, but I'm not sure if they're meant to be like that. The passionfruit icing is nice, I never knew you could make passionfruit icing by just adding the fruit to the icing sugar like that! It was easy enough for me to pull off!

these lemon polenta biscuits are dairy and egg free

the passionfruit icing was really easy to make

Dairy-free Peanut Butter Cookies

I'm not sure if these peanut butter cookies are fit for adult consumption, but they might be ok as they're very sweet! There are many recipes for these 3 ingredients cookies, I followed the recipe on allrecipes.com. There are just 3 simple ingredients, peanut butter, sugar and an egg, so not only are they dairy-free but they're also gluten free. This was easy enough for me to do with my son! He helped mix the batter and roll out some cookies on the tray. This is a great activity to do with a young child! The cookies came out of the oven very soft and they had flattened out a bit, but they hardened when cool. I might do this activity with Thomas again when he feels like baking!

these peanut butter cookies were very easy to make

there are just 3 simple ingredients for these cookies, peanut butter, sugar and an egg

3 year old Thomas helped with the mixing

Thomas also helped roll out a few cookies, here they are before they went in the oven

here are the cookies straight out of the oven, they had flattened out a bit and were very soft but hardened when cool

Classic Blueberry Muffins

When I put them in the oven, I thought these blueberry muffins would be an epic fail! But they turned out ok! I followed the recipe for classic blueberry muffins on taste.com.au, it was a challenge because I had my 3 year old son at home with me so I had trouble concentrating on getting the ingredient quantities right. I got him to help by mixing the flour, and putting patty pans in the muffin tray, but he quickly lost interest and went off to play. I was sure I had screwed it up when I added the liquid, it was very floury and sticky. I had a lot of trouble spooning the mixture into the patty pans, it was so sticky it wouldn't come off the spoon. But the muffins turned out fine after 20 minutes in the oven, and they were yummy as well!


these blueberry muffins could have been an epic fail but weren't

Baked Rice Pudding

I found a website that explains the basic rice pudding recipe that you can bake in the oven, along with some suggestions for spicing up the flavour. I had a go at making it myself, it wasn't too hard, with only 4 simple ingredients, plus I added cinnamon for flavour (I used soy milk because of my husband's dairy intolerance). The recipe says to bake it for 2 hours at 300f, which I converted to 150c, but it wasn't ready after 2 hours, so I turned it up to 160c and baked it for an extra 30 minutes then it was ready. I thought it was yummy but my husband didn't like the texture of it which is a shame, otherwise I would make this again. Maybe I will for myself when I'm alone at home with nothing to do but eat some yummy rice pudding!

you mix the ingredients straight into the baking dish, so mess is at a minimum!

4 simple ingredients, sugar, rice, salt and milk, plus cinnamon for optional flavour

rice pudding for one because my husband didn't like it!

Chicken with Risoni and Eggplant

This is a meal I could cook again, it turned out quite well and was easy enough for me to do on my own. I found the recipe for chicken drumsticks with ratatouille risoni on taste.com.au and I followed it except it needed 3 times more risoni than stated in the recipe. I used a cup of risoni instead of just one third and it turned out how I expected. Yummo! I am well on my way to over coming these silly anxieties I have around cooking!


this was an easy dish to cook and was delicious