Month: June 2018

Solstice festival on Scotland Island

Solstice Festical

This weekend, the local kindy organised their annual solstice festival.  This year it was really quite large and started at 10 am with breakfast food till night fall at 5 pm with a lantern parade made by children during the day.   There were many local bands playing all day and  a number of stalls to browse through by local creative people and other community members.

Scotland Island

My first stall

I had a stall where I intended to sell a number of the ceramics pots I have in boxes (I have more than we need at home).  Thinking that ceramics was not on its own representative of who I am, I completed the stall with a good baking of bread, biscuits, croissants and cakes.

In the end, I sold a few ceramic pieces (plenty left if you are local and want to go through for a gift or for yourself) and all breads and cakes!

Cakes , biscuits and recipes

Chocolate chip cookies

This chocolate chip cookies are a family favourite, can’t go wrong. This time, Ambrine made them and opted for milk chocolate instead of dark chocolate.

solstice

Madeleines

At home, this is another classic. Madeleines are quick to make, simple and small in size.  A little zest of lemon adds a little zing!

solstice

I called it the “chocolate brownie cake”, this is the Gateau de Suzy

The Gateau de Suzy is another simple recipe. The only step that must be done carefully is beating the eggs and sugar until very fluffy, with a food processor this is simple, by hand this is just a little more tiring !

brownie cake

brownie cake
Almost gone!

The hazelnut chocolate torte

This is a new one in my collection. I have now uploaded the recipe. Yummy! It is a more technical, no denying it but not so hard that you should not try. Follow the recipe to the letter!  By the way, it is gluten free.

gluten free chocolate hazelnut

The croissants

Only a photo, no recipe at this stage, I am still in the learning stage.

croissants

croissantsThe sourdough baguettes

They found a new home reasonably quick. One was bought by a child who ate most of it straight away!  Their recipe is HERE.

And what else?

Moss balls! With local plants. Bringing the rainforest to your house.

Cooking for sharing

Cooking for sharing

One of the reason I like cooking is to place the dish in the middle of the table for everyone to share.  Of course when you go to a restaurant, you get the dish you selected from the menu.  At home, at friends, I love when the dish is put on the table.  This may sound obvious to some of you if you haven’t been in countries where plates are plated in the kitchen and brough to the guests.

Our family lives on a small island in the northern part of Sydney. As our children and their friends from next door were all day coming back and forth between the two house, we decided to have a common dinner. Each family brought their dish and, …wahoo, what a feast we had: soup, salmon, flat bread, curry, dal and chocolate cake for dessert!

table to share
Dishes to share served with flat bread (fresh from the pan!)

The soup of the day

The soup of the day was a vegetable soup, a French classic: the potato leek soup.  Here you go: one big potato (or 2 small), 1 small leek, 2 carrots, rock salt and water just covering the vegetables. Simmer until cooked then blend.

You can use other vegetables and add a little complexity, this is a base recipe.

The soup can be served on its own or with a teaspoon of creme fraiche.  Add an egg or a little fried Haloumi and here is a meal!

Baked Salmon with capers, red onion and chestnuts

I have already posted about that simple method of preparing fish. I enjoy it because it is simple, full of flavours, looks good and results in a very light dish.  You will find the recipe HERE.

pot de saumon

And for breakfast we had fresh croissants

And for breakfast we had fresh croissants, so did two other families nearby. I hadn’t made croissants for a long long time. It had something to do with not being satisfied of how the flakiness had been.  The idea of baking viennoiseries had been in my mind for a few weeks, I had a good ides what I had to improve.  I had been making sure to have the right butter available at home just in case I felt like taking the dive. Somehow, my youngest daughter asked for some Saturday morning. Here was  the excuse I needed.

When making croissants, it is difficult to make a small quantity because you need a minimum volume of dough for the lamination process (the process that makes those flaky buttery layers).  I used a recipe based on dry yeast, this at least was not to be left to good luck.  I had been quite unlucky with fresh yeast recently, and anyway, I did not have any.

From 500 g of flour, I got 15 pieces, mostly croissants , a few pains au chocolat and a few  torsades (think braids) I made using long strips cut from the sides of the dough when first rolled.   I am quite pleased with the result.

The recipe needs a fair documenting with photos which I do not yet have, it is not on my blog for now.

 

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Baked salmon fillet

Find a nice piece of salmon fillet for the number of people you want to feed (ask your fishmonger) for this baked salmon fillet dish and prepare it in a gratin ceramic dish. This recipe is very easy.

Serve this with a green salad or blanched french beans. If you would like a meal a little more consistent add couscous semolina or rice.

Ingredients:

For 4 people.

  • 1 large piece of salmon fillet (bones out if possible)
  • 1 tbsp of capers
  • 1/2 red onion
  • fresh thyme,  fresh rosemary or fresh sage (your choice, if you don’t know choose what you have at home or some thyme – my favourite)
  • 1 punnet of cherry tomatoes (10-15 cherry tomatoes, if you only have normal size tomato, go for two of them but in eight pieces each.
  • Olive oil
  • Rock salt (1 tsp)
  • Cracked pepper
  • in the photo above I had some chestnuts to use.  If you want to use some, incise each of them, place them one minute in boiling water, then peel and put in the bake.
Method:
  1. Heat Up the oven to 180ºC.
  2. Place a dash of oil at the bottom of your gratin ceramic dish.
  3. Place your piece of salon in the middle, the tomatoes on the side, the apers and oinion scatred all over.
  4. Put a fillet of olive oil over the dish, add the salt and cracked pepper, then herbs.
  5. Cook for about 20 minutes. The time will vary depending on the thickness of your piece and your oven. To check for doneness, use a small pointy knife and pull apart the flesh of the fish. If it pulls apart, it is ready. Salmon is beautiful when just done, that is when there is still a little pinkness in the flesh (just cooked).
  6. Remove from the oven and serve with blanches greens or a salad. Add some couscous or jasmine rice if you want something a bit more nutricious.

salmon fish cappers red onion