Sisterly love

Ben 10 power!

Well, Sophia Lush AND her mum are appalling at keeping the blog posts rolling. But watching Sophia calm Samuel down by cooking up a batch of biscuits with him was too sweet not to quickly post! She caught his vision with the promise of light sabre and Ben 10 watch shaped biscuits...a little tricky for a soft dough. However, no trickiness with the flavour! - So good that they all disappeared before photos of their clever shapes.

 The chocolate chip biscuits from the EDC were modified with nuttlex and rice milk and oats for choc chips, (no nuts) to make them "failsafe", that is, low chemical



I have to say that Sophia's version of the Creamy Fettucine Salami was sensational. I love my 8 year old cooking our dinner. She just

• replaced the veggies to ones that were in our fridge (broccoli and mushrooms), 
• changed the cream, tomatoes and water to a tin of tomatoes and a tin of evaporated milk plus a little water, and 
• changed the salami for bacon. I think it was a tiny bit lower fat - which makes up for my seconds and thirds...I think.

Leave your favourite recipe tweeks in the comments :)

Mayonnaise meets it's Maker

Hi it's SOPHIA from LITTLE LUSH COOKS. 

Tonight  I made  really, really creamy, yummy  mayonnaise.

I will give you the recipe later.

When you make  mayonnaise you need to separate the egg yolk from the white. When I was doing this I accidentally let the egg yolk fall in to the bowl but luckily dad came to the rescue. Then it was all good..

* from mum - seems lots of folks have a whoops with mayonnaise once or twice! So I have included a trouble shooting guide, which includes advice from lots of forum users. It's down the bottom if you want to scroll down.

I promised  you the  recipe so here it is.

 1 . Ingredients .

1 clove roasted garlic (optional)

1 egg' room temperature  and separated

salt and pepper to taste + a little Dukkah

1 tsp Mustard we used Dijon

 1 tsp rice wine vinegar or lemon juice.

250 g Grape seed or safflower oil (though we just used sunflower)

                                             

Put the clove of garlic in first - I just chop for 3 seconds speed 7.
Separate your egg and put the white in a dish and the yolk in the bowl.
Put the special butterfly in.
Add the mustard and vinegar and salt and pepper. Set to speed 4 for 1 minute, we cook at 37 degrees here to make sure everything is the right termperature.
Scrape everything down the sides, (and mum quickly scrapes around the blades).
Put the lid back on and weigh your oil in a jug. Press 4 1/2 minutes. Turn to speed 4.

For the first minute just do little pours on the lid. Then you can get more lazy and pour lots on and let the special lid do the drip, drip, drip.

I use a spatula to wipe down the measuring cup and lid towards the end.

When the timer gets to 12 seconds, tip the egg white in to mix til the end. Then you have yummy creamy mayonnaise.

 

A TM Mayonnaise trouble-shooting guide
*Firstly, I have to share this amazing tip from Alice Flanagan. It is the fastest, most trouble free way to make mayo: Put the butterfly in, and throw all ingredients into the TM bowl (except oil), including the egg white. Set for 1.5 minutes, 37 degrees speed 4. Then remove the butterfly, put the MC in place and set the TM to 3 minutes speed 4-5. Pour a little of the oil onto your MC, wait a few seconds, then pour the whole lot on. Never takes me more than 2 minutes now :)

For the traditional way - heres the TM australia You Tube video: 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tb_13IHiMuk 

Problem	Possible Causes	Suggestions
Mayo is split (runny mess)	1.    The yolk or other ingredients were too cold to allow the oil to emulsify into the yolk mix 2.    The oil was added too quickly 3.    The type of oil was too heavy, such as olive oil 4.    The acidity of the lemon was lower or higher than normal due to seasonal fluctuation	1.        Put the split mix in a jug. Clean out your TM bowl and butterfly. Re-whisk an egg yolk or two for 1 minute on speed 4, then add your split mix slowly instead of oil. 2.        Next time, try heating your yolk mix on 37 degrees for the first minute. 3.        Make sure you use a light oil with a light flavour, e.g. sunflower or vegetable oil. Only pour some of the oil on for the first minute. You can tip the rest on the lid after the first minute 4.        Use a white wine vinegar instead of lemon juice if you have had splitting problems
Mayo tastes gross	1.    Too strong a flavour of your oil 2.    The fresh garlic is too sharp for your taste	1.    Use a light oil! E.g. sunflower or safflower or light vegetable oil 2.    Use roasted garlic or ½ tsp of garlic powder
Mayo going off too quickly	1.    Too small a family to get through the quantity of mayo in time 2.    Jars not sterilized or using unclean knives in the open bottle	1.    Do a half quantity of oil – it will have an even yummier taste! 2.    Ensure your jars are clean and only clean knives go into the opened mayonnaise

Mayonnaise recipe or flavour suggestions:

Grapeseed, Sunflower, Rice Bran or Macadamia oils, (or very light olive oil).

Mustard: you can choose a flavour you like!

Tips: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YqJckz5zSY

Queen of Tarts meets Queen of Hearts

Mum's turn to blog as we reached inspiration overload! What's a girl to do when a lovely neighbour whisks you to the ballet to watch Alice in Wonderland? It was a delight from the dramatic installation in the foyer to the turkish delight powdering our noses between acts. Vivid costumes, comic timing and fabulous choreography were saluted by a rainbow at our exit.

Then another neighbour dropped over the most quaint packet of rosebud tea...and our creative juices flowed. Raspberry Frangipane Tart and Rosebud Tea jellies emerged with thanks to Fiona Hoskins' real fruit jellies recipe from "Devil of a Cookbook"and Steph Berg's sweet shortcrust pastry recipe.

The frangipane is so simple and delicious - and I once prepared and cooked mini frangipane's before my brother's rancilio Sylvio had finished warming up and extracting our perfect coffees.
Sophia's favourite part was the simple jelly making and cutting. And the result is fit for any Tea Party down the Rabbit Hole!

Berry Frangipane:

Oven - moderate (180) and prepare a tart or friand tin

Grind 200g almonds for 10 seconds speed 10 - set aside
Pulverise 200g raw sugar and zest of 2 lemons for 20-25seconds on speed 9-10
Add 200g butter (roughly chopped) and mix for 30secs speed 5.
Add 2 eggs and mix 10 seconds speed 5, scrape down. Add 2 more eggs and repeat.
Add 30g cornstarch and the almond meal and mix for 10-15secs on speed 5.
Pour into the tin(s) and dot with berries.
Bake for 15-25 minutes depending on pan size. The tart should be golden brown and just firm. Don't dry it out.
For the tart, we blind baked the shortcrust pastry for 10 minutes first - and then we should have let it cool.

The result was a fabulously quirky tart with jellies, but unless you like unusual fibre - we discovered that the rosebuds are most certainly ornamental!

Until next time...Sophia Lush and mum would love your comments.

Birthday Cooking

Hello, it's Sophia again in Little Lush Cooks land. You must be wondering about my apple pie for my birthday...it tasted perfect with my lemon custard but every one was so fixed on eating it that they forgot to take photos!

My birthday was busy and exciting. My little brother, Isaac, cooked me teddy bear birthday cakes - I will include the recipe later. He made a dairy free, low salicylate vanilla cake so that my other brother and sister could eat it. I made teddy bear biscuits, and baking powder!

The best thing about turning 8, is that now there is only 10 years until I can become a thermomix consultant like my mum - but that didn't stop me from doing my own demonstration for my friends.

First I made fresh strawberry sorbet - using the spicy apple water I froze in the ice trays - I think everyone loved it but they probably ate it too quickly as they got brain freeze.

 

Next up was my buckwheat and grain bread rolls. My friend and I loved shaping them

I made low salicylate chicken risotto for the dinner and finished with the lemon custard and my apple pie. I had lots of fun and hope everyone else did as well.

I promised the cake recipe - it's just changed a tiny bit from the Every Day Cookbook, and as you saw, my 6 year old brother can make it:

Dairy Free Vanilla Cake:

Ingredients

120g Nuttelex
2 Eggs
100g Rice Milk (home made- but bought is ok)
1tsp vanilla sugar or pure essence
130g sugar
160g self raising flour
1tsp baking powder

Method:

Pre-heat oven to 180 degrees celcius. Grease a ring tin, or muffin tins or bear tins :)
Put nuttelex into the TM, and blend 30 seconds, 50degrees, speed 2
Add everything else. Mix 30 seconds speed 5.
Get mum to pour it into the tins.
Bake in the middle of the oven for 15-35 minutes depending on the tin you use.

We sprinkle with citric icing sugar for the low salicylate people at our house, but cinnamon sugar tastes yummier - mum calls this a tea cake.

I'll be making more biscuits with my birthday biscuit cutters - stay tuned!

Oh So Spicy Apple Pie

What's the best way to turn 8? Yep - make your own apple pie! Mum had too many sad apples in the fridge and I was ready to burst with needing to cook.

The Apple twirly got whirly and the thermomix started cooking. We saved the yummy spicy water to use in the pastry and freeze for making sorbet. I'll post that later. We also swapped the blanched almonds for some macadamias that needed using. We did things in the wrong order. But mum has helped me write out the right order. I had to go play dress ups for a while.

It turns out I'm pretty good with pastry - and next time we'll use the home-made pastry on top instead of grandma's puff pastry that needed using up. I just have to make some fresh custard to go with it...YAY

Ingredients:

Filling:

5 apples twirled in an apple slinkee and then quartered
60g raw sugar mixed with
1tsp cinnamon
2/3tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp cloves
(you'll only use half of this)
600g water

Pastry

The remaining 30g sugar with spices
pinch of garam masala
30-40g blanched almonds or macadamias
210g plain flour
130g cold butter cut up into dice size pieces
pinch of salt
1 medium egg yolk
3-4 tsp cooled spicy water from steaming the apples, (or orange juice)

Method:

Make the pastry by whizzing up half the sugar and spices for 3 seconds, speed 9.
Put it on your pastry mat for now. Then put in your nuts for a few seconds on speed 8.
Put the sugar back in, plus flour, garam masala and salt, and butter. Mix for 7-10 seconds on speed 10. Mum said STOP when she heard the noise change and it looked like lumpy breadcrumbs.
Add the egg yolk and water. Turn the dial to the picture of the thermomix with it's lid closed. Press the wheat symbol and stop it after 10-20 seconds.
Tip it onto the pastry mat and knead it a little bit so any sticky bits mix in. I did eat some bits because it was too yummy. Wrap it up in cling wrap and let it sit in the fridge for 15 minutes.

Put the water in the bowl of the thermomix. Place apple pieces into the steamer part, (called the varoma). I split them between the two layers. Sprinkle the rest of your spice mix over the apples. Put the lid on the thermomix and the steamer on top. Press the timer to 30 minutes, then press the 'varoma' temperature and then turn the dial to speed 3. Mum stirred the apples a couple of times.

While the apple steams, you can get the pastry ready. The oven needs to go really hot - fan bake 220 degrees. Rub your butter paper over your pie tin and then get your rolling pin. Mum helped me to roll up the pastry on the pin and then she laid it gently out over the tin. It was still pretty messy so we just patched it all up. Then my favourite part was trimming the edges. I had to eat all the bits I cut off.

I put the pastry in the freezer for 10 minutes and then the oven for 12. We should have pricked it with a fork first. Then we filled it up with the apple and put strips of puff pastry over the top. We brushed it with a bit of honey and butter melted together. Mum put it back in the oven for another 25 minutes. I can't wait to eat it.