Bread Pudding

So nice. Saturday morning, leftover bread, transformed into delicious rich breakfast, called by some "not necessary". I dis-agree.

You want some nice chewy day old white bread. Baguette works well or an artisan style sourdough.

Chop the bread into cubes and dry it out in a low oven.

Basically you are soaking the bread in a custard mix and baking it. The drier the bread is the more custard mix it will soak up.

Use 100ml of milk or cream for each egg. Whisk together in a bowl.

One baguette, 5 eggs, 500ml cream serves two,   or one.

Flavour with cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg.

Fold in anything you like, grated apple, pear, banana, peaches, plums, nectarines, raisins, nuts and chocolated all work wonders.

Sprinkle the top with a coarse unrefined sugar and orange zest.

Bake in a water bath at 325F for about 45 minutes, it is done when the custard is just set in the center.

Babylicious

Baby food is a crazy market saturated with way over-priced or poor quality products I would not feed to my dog, let alone my child. Organic foods are important for adults but essential for babies. I believe it is completely unnecessary to expose a new biological system to the vast cocktail of antibiotics, hormones, pesticides and genetically altered foods most of us ingest regularly.
And real baby food is super simple to make!
You will want a blender on a stick and a ricer (a hand food press, with all the little holes) is handy.

Foods to choose. At first you need foods that are easy on the digestive system and also puree well.
Brown rice is easily digested; simply cook in a rice cooker, (don't have one? Go get one. They are cheap and no other technique can compete with its ease or consistency) and puree with water. Use a glass jar with a mouth wide enough for your stick blender. Mix this with puree vegetable and wow! You made baby food! 

Some good vegetables to start with are steamed (better than boiling because it leaves more nutrients) carrots or peas. Set up your steamer and cook carrots just until tender all the way through, don't leave them there to die for an hour. Frozen peas take two minutes. Slow roasted yams, squashes and sweet potato are great. Roast in skins in 300F oven for about 2 hours or until super soft all the way through. Cut squash in half, remove seeds and bake cut side down with a cup of water in the pan to prevent burning. Use a baking sheet for yams and sweet potato so they don't leak sugars all over your oven. Roasting at the low temperature of 300F give the starches enough time to caramelize, becoming deliciously sweet before the outside burns.
Taro root is one of the most easily digested starches but very tricky to find organic.

Peel and core some apples. Put them in a pot with juice of an orange or splash of water. Put a lid on the pot. Put the pot on the stove and turn it to low. Come back in an hour. Apple sauce.

Nightshades are a large group of plants containing, among many others,  potatoes, tomatoes, eggplant and peppers. These are all relatively new additions to our diet and were considered poisonous for many years. They are rich in alkaloids, especially when green, that can be harmful to the body. In the '70s pregnant women were urged to wear gloves when peeling potatoes out of concern for the high levels of solanine, a steroid alkaloid with paralytic effects, found in green potato skin! This is no longer such a concern but it is recommended to avoid nightshades for at least a year, if not much longer, especially in larger portions. If your kid does not want to eat tomatoes and eggplant that is fine! They could be one of the many people who cannot properly process nightshades!
Other nightshades include tobacco, mandrake and balladonna, also known as deadly nightshade

Cruciferous vegetables can cause bloating and should be moderated. These include cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli, brussel sprouts, kale, kohlrabi and turnip. As a portion of the meal they are fine, but even some breast feeding mothers need to avoid these. Test and see, some are more sensitive than others.

Smoothies are great too but don't use juice unless you made it yourself. Most juice has loads of sugar added to it, even ones that say no added sugar. What they do is reduce the juice to a super sweet powder, basically fructose, and add that. Not what your baby needs if they plan on napping.
Try banana, blueberry, pear, a touch of kale and coconut water. Delicious.

Roasting

Roasting means putting something in a fairly hot oven (400F - 500F). It is quite easy, but also because your food is hiding in the oven it is the most common place for burning.. What you need to balance is the time and temperature with the size of your food. If the outside of your food is colouring too much before it is cooked through, you need to lower the temperature.
ALWAYS HEAT UP THE OVEN BEFORE STICKING ANYTHING IN IT
Roasting is a great way to cook larger cuts of meat, carrot, parsnip, potato, yams, eggplant, capsicum, mushroom, pumpkin, all sorts of things.
The easiest way is to wash your vegetables, peel if you like, cut them up not too big not too small. What you want is to have the outside of your product golden and crispy while the inside is soft. Coat your food with oil and salt maybe add a little herb or spice and spread evenly ONE LAYER THICK in a large roasting pan. Don't have your product stacked up on each other or your final result will look like mash and won't have a delicious crispy exterior.
Using parchment (baking) paper is nice for whoever has to wash the pan after..

ROAST POTATOES

Potatoes, olive oil, salt pepper toss.
Spread evenly, roast. Turn once 3/4 through cooking. Done.

ROAST CHICKEN WITH ROOT VEGETABLES

Cut all vegetables large. Add broccoli final 8 min if desired. Season chicken liberally with salt pepper and fresh herbs. Roast until done. To check if a chicken is done shake his leg. He should feel loose and relaxed in the joints. You can also stick a skewer (or knife) in the thickest part of the thigh, juices should run clear.

Quinoa Salad

 

Quinoa (Keen-Wah) is a grain originating from South America. It has a very high protein content and no gluten. It is also very delicious.

Cook quinoa using absorption method, similar to rice. Always wash quinoa before cooking, you never know what your farmer has been doing before he used some grubby hands to harvest your delicious grain. Put about half a cup per person in a pot and run cold water over it. Fill the pot with running water, whisk, pour off any grains that won’t sink and repeat. Repeat. Pour off excess water, you want about equal parts quinoa and water, the water should be about a centimeter above the quinoa. (You can drain completely and measure if needed, but just do it a few times and you’ll get the feeling).

Bring to a boil and immediately cover tightly and reduce heat to as low as you can. Leave for about ten minutes and your grains should be cooked and all the water gone. The grains should looked cooked and not have a visible white center (not quite done). Do not add salt until cooking is finished, “salt inhibits the absorption of moisture.” Remember that, it goes for any grains you are trying to re-hydrate..

Remove from heat and flip into a large bowl.

Now for flavour. What you want is to pretty much saturate the grains with a vinaigrette, add some texture, season and enjoy. Any of these ingredients can be substituted with similar of your choice.

For texture add chopped tomatoes and cucumber and toasted nuts (add the nuts very last move so they do not become soggy).

For your vinaigrette peel as much garlic as you can (or get your wife to do it). Like lots and lots of garlic, put it in a pot and cover with extra virgin olive oil, turn to low and cook until garlic is soft golden sticky and delicious. Cool. We call this garlic confit (confit = cooked in fat (see it on a menu, order it, you love it, consciously or otherwise)). Remove the garlic pieces and add to you bowl, put them all in, you probably didn’t do enough.

Add the cooled garlic oil to a blender with a third as much lemon juice and a solid shot of maple syrup, agave nectar or honey and enough salt. Blend. Add a bunch of basil, parsley and tarragon. Bend. There’s your herb vinaigrette.

Pour the dressing into the bowl, use lots.

Add super finely chopped (no, that’s not fine enough, chop more) preserved lemon.

Gently fold using a wooden paddle is best. Adjust seasoning (with salt). Add your toasted nuts. Eat.

Vinaigrette, aka Salad Dressing

Don't ever buy salad dressing.

1 part vinegar : 3 parts oil                     Shake.          Thats it.


Now you can get interesting. You can use any vinegar with any oil plus any flavouring you can think of, that's a lot of options.

Often add 1/2 part sweetener.

To make a nice thick dressing, add everything but the oil and then using a hand blender slowly drizzle in oil. You could even add an egg at the beginning, and have a mayonaisse based dressing, like caesar.

Add salt. Most people don't season their leaf enough if at all.

Squeeze two lemons into a mason jar. Add a spoon of honey and a spoon of mustard. Slowly add grapeseed oil while blending with hand blender. Keep adding oil slowly until dressing thickens. Add a chunk of chevre goats cheese and fresh picked thyme. Taste all the time, at the beginning with no oil it's very sour, when finished the flavour should be balanced and delicious.

Or think of something yourself..

Try adding herbs, spices, raw, dried or cooked fruits and vegetables, nuts, seeds......

Confit

Confit. If you see this on a menu, order it. Don't question it and don't be silly. Order. Confit means love.
Actually it means cooked in fat, preferably it's own, but that's not always possible. Food is usually cured with salt and or sugar and aromats before being submerged in fat and cooked very slowly until tender. What more do you want?
Because confit foods are covered with fat, they are not in contact with oxygen and are therefore preserved. This style of cooking was a necessity before refrigeration. Originally referring to fruits cooked and preserved in sugar, the French perfected the art with meats like duck and goose.
Making Duck confit is easy and amazingly delicious. You would be really cool if you actually tried this.

Liberally cover the skin of your duck legs (thighs attached) with cure. 2 part rock sea salt : 1 part sugar + aromats, (traditionally bay leaves, garlic, thyme, black pepper, juniper berries, I like a whack of herbs too and pulsing in the food processor before adding the salt and sugar) leave in fridge loosely covered 24- 48 hours. Wipe off cure and submerge duck in fat. ( If you can't find duck fat you can use oil, but you should really go find duck fat). Put in oven below 300F. Duck is done when thigh bone can be pulled out with ease, 3-5 hours ish. Cool. Back in the day they'd sort of just keep this downstairs for months but I suggest the fridge. When you want to eat it, which is pretty much always, when you're actually ready to eat, make a pan hot. Gently (always gently (hands of a lesbian, tender yet firm)) remove duck from fat, and place duck skin down in hot pan. Don't move it. (Hot means when the duck hit the pan it goes spttzzzzzzz instantly but not so hot your pan is about to melt and everything goes black). Put pan in 350F oven for 10 min or so. You want the skin all super crispy. That's when it's done.. Put a little salad on a plate, put the duck down, drizzle with a gastrique. Wow.

Oil

All oils have a set temperatures at which they will begin to smoke, flash and burst into flame. When oil smokes the healthy molecules break down becomes carcinogenic.  FYI

You need extra virgin olive oil. It's health benefits have been promoted for centuries and it is used for most western based cooking and dressings EXCEPT when you DON'T WANT TO TASTE OLIVES, or you need HIGH HEAT. Olive oil has a very low smoke point, so don't use it for searing.It is good for sauteing but is the healthiest unheated.

Grapeseed oil. This stuff is great. It has pretty much no flavour and a high smoke point, so it's great for searing. Use anytime you don't want to taste olives. Anything Asian and olives is almost always weird and not so pleasant. (So don't use olive oil to make Asian food).. Grapeseed oil makes wicked salad dressing because you only taste the other ingredients.

Sesame oil. There are two types, made from roasted or raw seeds. By far the most common is the roasted, usually used for flavour rather than cooking. Be careful, a little goes a long way.

Some nuts make great salad and baking oils like walnut and hazelnut, but what you need is nice extra virgin and grapeseed for pretty much all your cooking.

Polenta

Polenta is quick, easy, cheap and ya, Delicious and Nutritious..
Polenta is cooked cornmeal. It's made delicious with butter and cheese. I love cheese.

Shop  cornmeal, (optional( right)) cheese, (whatever you like, parmesan, piave, mascarpone, gorgonzola), butter and the preserved lemon in your fridge...

1 part cornmeal 4 parts water. Boil 1 litre of water with a teaspoon of salt. 'Make it rain polenta,' (250mls) gently shake it into the water while whisking, like so..

Once you have whisked in all the cornmeal switch to a wooden spoon and turn heat to low. Cook stirring often for about 20minutes. You can tell it is done by putting it in your mouth, the bits of cornmeal should not be hard and when stirred vigorously it pulls away from the sides of the pot (somewhat).. Add a whack of butter ( I like a lot of butter on my corn, 1/4 Cup is coool..) hand-fulls of cheese, finely chopped preserved lemon, juice from one lemon. Taste it, add more salt and lemon probably... Now you are at one of the natural cross-roads of life. You can either eat your polenta as it is or you can pour it into a BUTTERED dish of a size that your polenta will be an inch and a half or so thick, let it cool, cut it and fry until crispy in a medium hot pan with oil.
That's it.

Preserved Lemon

Preserved Lemons are a staple of North African food. All you have to do is heavily salt lemons and leave it on your counter for a month. I like to use 1 part sugar to 2 parts salt. Classic aromatic flavourings are cinnamon, star anise, black pepper, bay leaf, chili. Leave spices whole.
Usually lemons are quartered lengthwise with the cuts not going through so the lemon is held together at the bottom. Cover each lemon with your cure (salt, sugar, spices) and pack into a jar. Agitate daily and the lemons will release juice that mixes with the cure to form the brine that not only keeps lemons edible for months in hot African sun, but makes them absolutely lemony delicious. You can use them anytime but they are really ready after a month or so, when they should be refrigerated. What you're really after on these little suckers is the yellow part of the skin. The white pith is really bitter. To use remove a lemon from the brine and give it a quick rinse. 'Filet' a quarter with a sharp knife so you have just yellow skin. This can be tricky. So here's a better way...

Wash lemons. Peel them with a vegetable peeler into a jar. Try to get just yellow, no white. Cut in half and juice lemons that now have no skins through a sieve into the jar. Add a Tablespoon of unrefined sugar and 2 Tablespoons of sea salt PER LEMON! (about). Add any aromats you like. Shake it. Leave it. For at least a week. Chop it up really small and mix into grain salads, put on vegetables, use with meats or to finish stews*...

*Citrus peel becomes very bitter when cooked too long, it's a finisher..

Happy Birthdaiye!!

Here's the menu from a birthday I did for a friend. We started with started with four little bites and then had some snacks..

 Asparagus, Proscuitto, Thyme Goat Cheese

Smoked Duck Breast, Cider Gel

Smoked Salmon, Pickled Beets, Lemon Dill Fraiche

Mushroom Crustini

Chicken Sticks, Peanut Sauce

Root Beer Beef, Polenta

Lamb Chop, Black Fennel

Garlic Prawns, Sweet Chili

Veggie Cakes, Rouille, Red Onion Jam

Scalloped Potatoes

Green Bean, Broccoli, Sesame, Onion

Farro 

It was Nutritious and oh so Delicious.. I'll post some recipes, if you want more just ask!