Easy cheaty cheesy nachos

Our microwave is still not back from repair yet though the stove and oven are now working. I'm still not cooking much because we just don't have anything to warm up the leftovers - yes, I know, I can use the stove or the oven to warm up the food, but ...

Tonight, I'm having a couple of friends over - the Best Bud and his wife. I decided that I wanted to make nachos and The Boy said, why don't we invite the Best Bud and his wife? So yes, the Best Bud and his wife are coming over for nachos. That's it ... just nachos. It's something simple I throw together and I'm not making a big fuss. Something yummy and hanging out with my chummies. :-)

Please bear in mind, as the title suggests, these are easy, cheaty, cheesy nachos. Focus here is on the easy and the cheaty.

Here's what I do:

Guacamole

Ingredients:

• 2 avocados of the appropriate ripeness
• 1/2 onion, finely diced
• 1/2 juice of lemon
• Pinch of salt

Instructions:

• Scoop avocado out of the skin and remove seed.
• Mash up with a fork in a bowl.
• Squeeze in lemon juice and mix.
• Mix through diced onion.
• Mix through salt - adjust to taste. 

• Refrigerate until you are ready to use. 

The Easy Cheaty Cheesy Nachos

Ingredients:

• 2 large bags of Doritos chips (I use the Cheese Supreme flavor)
• 2 cups of shredded tasty cheese
• 3 large cans of Stagg® Dynamite Hot® chili with bean
• 1 tub (or 2) of sour cream (you can use light if you prefer)

Instructions:

• Heat up the cans of Stagg® Dynamite Hot® chili with bean in a large pot.
• On large, flat dinner plates, lay out one layer of the Doritos chips, slightly overlapping (you can layer it more if you like).
• Put a layer of the shredded cheese (be generous) all over the layer of Doritos chips.
• Once the Stagg® Dynamite Hot® chili with bean is hot, scoop it up layer them over your plate on top of the cheese and Doritos chips - make sure you divide the chili evenly between all the plates (and the number of people you are serving).
• Then put a large scoop of the guacamole in the middle of the plate on top of the chili.
• Add a large dollop of sour cream on top of the guacamole.
• Serve and enjoy.

This recipe will serve 4 adults generously.

What makes this recipe so incredibly tasty is that instead of using plain Doritos or corn chips, which is what most people or restaurants use, I use the Cheese Supreme (or you can use the Nacho Cheese) flavor chips. This adds to the extra cheesiness of the taste, that and gobs and gobs of shredded cheese.

See what I mean about the recipe being easy and cheaty? If I was not cheating, I'd make the chili from scratch but seriously, that Stagg stuff is really tasty and I really like it. I'm not diligent enough to want to make the chili from scratch in this instance. I will, however, make the chili from scratch when I do Chili Con Carne and I've got a fabulous recipe for that from the Mother-In-Law. The Boy loves Chili Con Carne in the Winter with fresh bread, so if I do that this Winter, I'll write about it.



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Red chicken curry

Once again, this is a post written a very long time ago but never got round to posting. Since the stove and oven (now repaired!) were of the fritz, I didn't do any cooking the past few days and the microwave is in the shop for repair (they couldn't repair it on the spot and had to take it away!). I hope to do some cooking over the weekend but that might depend on whether the microwave comes back or not cos I'm quite dependent on it for warming up leftovers. :-)

I'd recently posted about the gadgets in my kitchen with one of them being a Thermomix.

On the first night that I received it, I decided to give it a shot with cooking even though I had not bought it for that purpose (though it's sold and marketed for that reason!). I looked through their community website and found a chicken curry recipe that was fairly simple and it looked like I had all the ingredients on hand. (I didn't want to be out buying ingredients as I was trying to clear the fridge before a trip away).

The chicken curry turned out very tasty although the cooking experience with the Thermomix left much to be desired (I've since become much more of a fan of the Thermomix, which is a great machine if used for the right purpose). That said, I've decided to include the recipe here by converting it from a Thermomix recipe to a regular recipe that anyone can use.

Here's the RECIPE for a simple red chicken curry:

Ingredients:

• 500g chicken thighs cut into bite size pieces
• 1 tomato quartered
• 1 can 400ml coconut milk
• 1 tablespoon dark sugar
• 5 tablespoons oil
• Salt to taste

Ingredients for spices:

• 1/2 teaspoon fresh ginger minced
• 2 brown onions finely chopped
• 2 teaspoons tumeric
• 2 teaspoons ground coriander
• 2 tablespoons chili paste (sambal olek)
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cumin

Instructions:

• Add onion, ginger, oil and spices into a pot and cook for 5 - 7 minutes on a moderately high heat until the everything starts to brown
• Put in half the can of coconut milk and bring to boil, then simmer for 5 minutes
• Add remaining coconut milk, tomato, chicken, sugar. Bring to boil and simmer for 30 minutes covered
• Add salt to season and adjust to taste. Then bring back to boil and simmer for another 30 minutes covered

Note: this will cook the curry fairly quickly but still give it some deeper flavor from the simmering. If you want to really let the flavors catch, I would suggest using a cast iron pot and on the last simmer, put the pot into the oven at 90 degrees C for 1 or 2 hours, depending on your timing and when you want to eat.

When I was cooking this in the Thermomix, it being my first time cooking with the machine and needing to clear out my fridge, I got quite creative with my ingredients. To say that I did not follow the recipe exactly would have been putting it mildly.

Here's what went down:

• I used less chicken because there were only the 2 of us eating - so it was only 4 chicken thigh pieces that I used. I didn't weigh them, but I'm guessing it's less than 500g
• I had about 2/3 a punnet of grape tomatoes in the fridge that needed to be eaten (no regular tomatoes) so I used all of those instead, which is a lot more than just 1 tomato
• There was a large lump of ginger that needed to be used up as well, so instead of 1/2 teaspoon of ginger, I think I ended up with maybe 1 1/2 tablespoons of ginger
• I didn't have tumeric, so I used curry powder instead
• I didn't have ground coriander (who knew there were so many spices I didn't have?) and I chiffonaded (is that even a word?) a handful of fresh coriander instead and used that
• I was generous with the chili paste and used 2 generous heaped tablespoons and then for a little extra zing, I added a 1/2 teaspoon of my special blend of chili powder. Don't do this if you do not like a lot of heat in your curry
• Oh yeah, since I was doing it in the Thermomix, I skipped a step and forgot to fry off the spices. Totally stuffed that up and I think it would have tasted even better than it did, if I had done that step properly

I served it with some brown rice and steamed broccoli (done the old fashioned way *grin*) and it turned into a very nice dinner.

Are you a fan of curries? Do you like them mild, medium or hot? Ever tried one that's super hot? Red, green or yellow curries for you? Any particular ethnicity of curries you are specially fond of? Indian? Thai? Malaysian?



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Honey soy chicken with rice ... in the Thermomix

I'm making an effort to cook more often now that we are settling down into the new apartment (soon to be known as The Apartment once I get comfortable enough with it and think of it as such ... might take a few months yet!). It's just more economical to have more meals cooked and eaten at home. I've talked about how expensive it is to eat out here and about eating out economically here.

The challenge with working full time and cooking meals is ... well ... time ... and planning, and energy!!

I usually get home between 6:30pm and 7pm, some days a little later and I'm also usually knackered. I just don't have the energy to do any heavy duty cooking.

I'm on the hunt for recipes that are quick, easy, tasty and do not require a lot of ingredients.

Note to self: This just reminded me that I have recipe book that has all the recipes with only 4 ingredients. Must dig that out and study it.

Tonight's recipe has a few more than 4 ingredients but it's done in the Thermomix.

The Thermomix for me is like cheat cooking.

Just throw it all into the machine and start pressing buttons. :-)

The reason I ended up with this recipe is because I did a search on the Thermomix community and entered in the stuff that I had on hand, which was chicken, onion and capsicum. It spat out a few options and this was what I decided to go with. I had most everything except the ginger (I'm substituting with ground ginger powder instead), the broccoli (which I picked up after lunch today) and the baby corn (which I've decided to go without and substitute with corn kernels instead because I have that). Oh, I also don't have any toasted sesame seeds, so I'm going to go without that - not a big fan of sesame seeds anyway.

So, here's the RECIPE for those of you who have a Thermomix and want to try it:

Ingredients:

• 1 cm ginger
• 2 clove garlic
• 1 onion - Peeled & Halved
• 30 g olive oil
• 650 g chicken breast - Cubed
• 140 g soy sauce
• 200 g water
• 160 g honey
• 1 tsp paprika
• 150 g broccoli - Cut into Florets
• 100 g carrots - sliced
• 100 g Capsicum - diced
• 100 g baby corn
• 1 tsp cornflour
• Steamed Rice To Serve
• Toasted Sesame Seeds (optional)

Instructions:

• Chop ginger and garlic for 5 sec/Speed 7
• Add Onion and chop for 3 sec/Speed 7
• Add oil and saute 2 mins/100 deg/Speed 1
• Add chicken and cook 2 mins/100 deg/ Reverse / Soft speed
• Add remaining ingredients and cook 15 mins/100 deg/ Reverse / Soft speed and use the spatula a few times to help mix everything in
• Replace MC with steamer basket and cook 5 mins/100 deg/ Reverse / Soft speed
• Serve on rice sprinkled with toasted sesame seeds

My microwave is dead and waiting to be either repaired or replaced by the rental agent, so I had to cook the rice first (also in the Thermomix) and kept it warm so that I could serve it with the chicken. I used a doodat that came with the Thermomix called a ThermoServer which is basically a thermos but shaped like a bowl with the lid to keep food warm. If the microwave was working, I'd have cooked the rice and then not worried about keeping it warm, 'cos I would have been able to just warm it back up in the microwave.

For the record, I have 3 MAJOR appliances not working properly in my kitchen right now - the stove, the oven and the microwave. Basically, if not for the Thermomix, I would not be able to cook in the dang kitchen because without those three items, it's basically not a functioning kitchen.

People who have followed me on Facebook and Twitter will know that I have had the rental agents from hell and Miss Lazy Pants rental agent didn't bother to check that all the appliances were working prior to us moving in. There are other things that she didn't do too but that's a whole other story and a long one at that. I won't bore you with the details.

Anyhow, the verdict ...

The sauce was very liquidy (watery?) in the Thermomix when the time was done based on the cooking instructions, so after it was cooked, I put it into a big pan and brought it back to a simmer and tossed in a tablespoon of corn flour mixed in some water to thicken it back up. After I put in the corn flour, I let it simmer for about a minute or two just to thicken up. That seemed to work very well. Of course, after the dish cooled completely the sauce was quite thick but that can be fixed with just a little water while reheating the leftovers (if there are any!).

I had no idea how it was going to taste but the kitchen smelled wonderful while it was cooking. When I was putting in the soy sauce and honey, I had thought it was a lot of soy sauce and honey, but it turned into a very tasty dish. The Boy had seconds and there's still a little left for the next day or so as leftovers (we like our leftovers in this household!). I asked The Boy if he wanted the dish cooked again another time for dinner and he said that he was happy to eat it again, so I guess I'll be cooking it again at some point.

This one's a keeper!



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Chocolate covered peanut butter balls

Continuing on the theme of peanut butter and chocolate, this is something that I have been wanting to do for a while.

I first tried these chocolate covered peanut butter balls when we hosted a wine tasting evening at our apartment and the winery brought along a chef that served some delicious food that went along very well with the wine.

These little chocolatey delights were part of dessert that was served. You should have heard some of the noises people were making when they ate them. Heh!

Of course, many of us begged for the recipe and I, in turn, bugged and bugged and bugged them until the published the recipe in their newsletter. The winery have recently opened a cafe and they serve this delicious dessert there.

Here's the RECIPE for the balls:

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup unsalted butter
• 2 cups rice bubbles cereal
• 2 cups crunchy peanut butter (do not use old-fashioned style or freshly ground)
• 2 cups dry milk powder
• 2 cups icing sugar
• A pinch of chilli powder (optional)
• 425 grams dark chocolate, chopped

Instructions:

• Line cookie sheet with foil. Melt butter in heavy small saucepan over low heat.  
• Combine cereal, peanut butter, dry milk and powdered sugar in large bowl. Mix in butter. Moisten hands and roll tablespoon mixture into ball. Place on prepared cookie sheet. Repeat with remaining mixture. Chill overnight. 
• Line cookie sheets with foil. Melt chocolate in double boiler over low heat, stirring occasionally. Remove chocolate from over water. 
• Using fork, dip peanut butter balls at a time into chocolate and transfer to prepared cookie sheets. Refrigerate until chocolate is firm. (Can be prepared week ahead. Refrigerate in airtight container.) 

The only thing that I did differently to the recipe (because I always do) is that I added the chili (and quite a lot of it - I used about a teaspoon) into the melted chocolate that coated the peanut butter balls so that could get that hint (kick!) of chili when I bit into the little chocolatey peanut buttery delight. :-)

If you keep them in an airtight container in the fridge, it will keep for up to a week, possibly a little more, if you have a really good fridge. 

ps. Can you tell I have Internet and my blogging mojo back??

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Afternoon snack ... chocolate

Friends who know me will know that I am rather fond of chocolate.

This is my latest discovery  - the Reese's Dark Chocolate Peanut Butter Cups.

NOT the milk chocolate ones but the DARK chocolate ones, because I like dark chocolate.

The bittersweet taste of dark chocolate along with the slightly salty flavor of the peanut butter is just delightful.

Each pack comes with two cups, which is just the best amount for an afternoon snack. Yum!


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Best Gyoza ever!! ... and this is a test

This is not really a real post. For those of you who use Blogger, you’ll know that Blogger has recently switched to a new user interface.

It reeks!

For some unknown reason, the HTML section for writing a post now will no longer capture line breaks when text is copied into it. It’s rather sad ... for me, that is. My nicely formatted paragraphs of text looks like someone vomited up a whole bunch of words onto the page. I’m sure there’s some uber technical reason why it now no longer supports line breaks when it used to before but I just don’t know what it is.

Sometimes “new” is not “better”, Google!!

Anyhow, I’m testing out to see what would happen to my formatting were I to email myself this post. If it’s awful, I might just delete it, if it’s passable, I’ll leave it up.

So yes, this is a test.

That said, I’ve discovered the best gyoza that I’ve ever eaten. It’s quite possible that there is better gyoza out there, but this gyoza is pretty darn good.

I get the gyoza at a restaurant close to where I work. The place is called Hokkaido and I might have talked about it previously (trying to think when) – possibly when I first discovered it … ah yes, here.

Anyhow, their gyozas are just the right amount of chewy and crunchy, and extremely tasty. Best eaten while still warm.

I definitely recommend trying them out.

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Spicy chorizo spaghetti

We now have Internet at the apartment after a long and painful month of having no Internet at home. It has been difficult and not very productive. I’ve learned to manage without it but really, it’s so much better with.

Tonight is the first time that I have cooked – really cooked in the new apartment.

The kitchen sucked.

I was terribly uncomfortable in it and it’s much smaller. I feel cramped and closed in. I’m also moving around very awkwardly and there’s not a lot of room to manoeuvre. I keep thinking I’m going to crash into something, plus there’s just so little counter space for me to actually put stuff.

Well, aside from that little rant, I made one of The Boy’s favourite dishes – Spicy Chorizo Spaghetti. Not quite Italian, considering the chorizo but very tasty.

Here’s the RECIPE:

Ingredients:

• ½ lb beef mince
• 1 chorizo sausage sliced
• 1 brown onion roughly chopped
• 1 tomato cut into 8 or 12 pieces
• Small handful of green olives sliced
• 1 teaspoon Italian herbs (I tend to be quite generous with the herbs ‘cos I like the flavour)
• 1 teaspoon minced garlic
• ½ teaspoon chilli powder (depends on how spicy you want it – adjust to taste)
• Salt
• Garlic infused olive oil (regular olive oil would work too, I prefer garlic for the flavour)
• 1 jar of tomato pasta sauce of your choice
• Pasta of your choice (I use spaghetti)
• Serves 4

Instructions:

• Put olive oil in a pan and heat
• Put mince garlic and onions into heated pan and cook until onions are semi-transparent
• Add in tomatoes and cook until onions are transparent, remove onion and tomato mix from pan
• Add more olive oil in pan, put in chorizo sausages and cook until crispy brown on outside, remove from pan
• Add more olive oil in pan, put mince into pan and cook. Add Italian herbs into the mince and continue cooking.  When cooked, remove from pan.
• Pour pasta sauce into a medium to large size saucepan.  Add onions, chorizo, mince into pasta sauce. Add sliced up olives into sauce. Bring to boil, then simmer.
• While sauce is simmering add chilli powder (as much as you like depending on how spicy you want it) and salt to taste. Remember that you need a bit more salt that usual because the pasta will soak up the flavour and take out some of the salt. If you don’t like salt, don’t add.
• Cover the saucepan. Let the sauce simmer with everything in it for about 30 minutes (at least), more if you want a bit more flavour. Stir occasionally so it doesn’t stick to the bottom.
• Cook pasta
• When sauce is ready, drain pasta and put back into saucepan. Pour sauce over pasta and serve on individual plates. Alternatively, you can pour the pasta into a large serving dish and pour the sauce over it and serve at the table too.
• Enjoy!

In spite of my grousing about the kitchen not being what I want it to be, the meal turned out well and The Boy was generous in his compliments. :-)

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Duck liver pâté ... and a quick update

 

We're up in The House and we've got internet!!!! Howz about that??? So exciting.

Since there's internet, I'm taking the opportunity to do a quick post.

In case you're wondering, there has not been much cooking ... okay *any* cooking at all in our household because of the move. Ever since the move, we've hardly been home to eat and I've been living on bananas and other assorted fruit for dinner.

For the first week, we were just madly trying to juggle work and unpacking and would drop into bed exhausted each night. For the second week, which is this week just past, we've had an assorted number of things going on in the evening which meant that we have not been home. The Boy's been interstate for work too so I've missed him for one night. 

But .... here we are, up at The House with MORE unpacking because we've moved a bunch of stuff from The *new* Apartment to The House since the new place is HALF the size of the previous place. *sigh* ... it's called "downsizing" and it ain't fun!

So ... we had lunch today at our favorite French restaurant today and as usual it was fantastic. It's called Bistro Molines and it's always, always a delightful and decadent experience that leaves us tired and satiated and in need of an afternoon nap. :-)

I had the duck liver pâté for a starter which Robert makes himself. It's very rich and very creamy. As you can see from the scrumptious picture, it comes with an assortment of bits and pieces which accompany it very well. It took me forever to eat it all because I'm slow and I have a tiny tummy. In fact, I found it quite filling, served with the housemade Melba toast slices topped with sea salt. Scrumdily-icious!

Of course, I don't have a recipe for you for this 'cos I've never made pâté before and I didn't ask them for the recipe. 

All I'm saying if, if you're ever in the vicinity, stop in for a meal. The food is worth making the trip for and Sally the owner is just delightful and will take fabulous care of you.

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Créme Brûlée ... in the Thermomix

I'm still without Internet at home but this is a post I wrote a while back and never posted. Plus, I've got someone asking me for the recipe, so I thought I'd better post it.

For those of you who have been following me on Facebook or on Twitter, you will know that I've been churning out creme brulees like there is no tomorrow. The reason for this? The Mother decided that she wanted creme brulee for Christmas Day lunch. Argh! Having never made creme brulee before, I hunted down recipes and practiced. Between starting to learn how to make creme brulees and Christmas Day, I have made 38 servings of creme brulee. If I never see another creme brulee again, it will be too soon. Seriously, I have made so many of them, I'm a little over them - even though they are one of my favorite desserts.

Speaking of desserts, those who know me will know, I'm no good with desserts ... or baking. The sweet department is not one of my strong points. When I have a dinner party, if I can, I'll ask someone to bring dessert, though admittedly, there is a sense of satisfaction of knowing how to make desserts and cooking an entire 3 course meal on my own. I am getting better at making desserts too. I make a mean chocolate mousse and I've also learned how to make a berry delight that is amazing. I will post recipes for those later. Someone remind me!

Anyhow, creme brulee is one dessert that I found quite daunting, what with the whole baking in a baking tray of hot water. For some reason, that part intimidated me - I do not know why. For that reason, I decided to turn to my trusty Thermomix. I wouldn't use it for everything and not often for cooking, but I decided that it works well for baking and desserts (and crushing rock salt, but that's another story!).

This RECIPE that I used for the creme brulee is for the Thermomix. If you don't have a Thermomix, try this recipe instead (I've tested it and it does work, plus it's not that different from my Thermomix recipe). I've just stuck with the Thermomix recipe for myself cos it was just easy and I had to churn out 38 of those things, and easy works in that instance.

Ingredients:

• 400 g whipping cream
• 70 g granulated sugar
• 1 tsp real Vanilla extract (or seeds from 1 or 2 Vanilla pod)
• 275 g eggs (approx. 5 large eggs)
• Brown sugar for the topping

Instructions:

• Place all ingredients except brown sugar into mixing bowl and mix for 1 minute/speed 3.
• Cook for 15 minutes/90d C/speed 3. Note: If using cold eggs or cream, you may need to cook a little longer to thicken the mixture, taking into consideration that the mixture will continue to thicken whilst left standing to cool.
• Check that the créme looks perfectly smooth and is not grainy at all. If it has gone grainy or become scrambled, it can be easily rescued. Just add 30g cold milk or cream and blend for 30 seconds/speed 8.
• Repeat if necessary until desired smooth texture is achieved.
• Pour out mixture immediately into individual ramekins or a large dish.
• Leave to cool to room temperature and then chill in fridge.
• Once chilled, and set, sprinkle a thick layer of brown sugar on top, then caramelise by heating under a hot grill or with a kitchen blowtorch.

Tip: When measuring the eggs it's important to get 250 - 300g of egg (approx. 5 large eggs). This will affect the thickening of the brulee and the overall end product.

I did do some things differently, even though with the Thermomix and desserts, exactness is a good trait. I just can't help myself.

• I used 2 vanilla bean pods, and at one time, I even used 3. The Boy really, really likes vanilla bean.
• I used raw sugar because I was not sure what they meant by granulated sugar. There are many types of granulated sugar.
• I did not use the brown sugar to caramelize. I found (with Batch #1) that the brown sugar does not caramelize well. I used raw sugar which worked quite well, but I was also recommended demerara sugar, and that worked well too. 
• The blow torch needs to be quite strong so don't bother with those dinky ones in the restaurant store. Rather, go to eBay and search for "blow torch" and look at the ones that come up. You want something that will throw a nice big flame.

• I also ended up usually with 300g of eggs, which is about 6 large eggs. With the size of the eggs I was buying, it was just closer to 6 eggs than 5 eggs. As long as you don't exceed the 300g, you'll be okay, so I would suggest cracking your eggs into a bowl and weighing them.
• And ... last but not least, at least for me - in the Thermomix, the optional step of going an extra 30 seconds on speed 8 with another 30g of cream make the creme brulee much smoother. I found that when I did the step, I got a much better result. Of course, this does not apply if you do not have a Thermomix. However, if you do have a Thermomix, I strongly recommend that you do not skip this step. 

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