Strawberries and Cream Tart

Posted on April 4, 2012 by Sydney

Gavin and I had another couple over for dinner the other weekend and as it was a low-key sort of deal, I wasn’t planning on making a dessert. When I told him that, however, he gave me a sharp look and declared that German’s expect dessert so I better figure something out. Luckily, with some sweet pastry dough in the freezer leftover from making Smitten Kitchen’s Apple Pie Cookies and Julia Child’s Kitchen Wisdom at hand, I decided upon a strawberry and cream tart. Make ahead, serve at room temp*, doesn’t need a lot of ingredients: perfect.

I won’t lie to you, I cheated a bit.. I didn’t actually make an apricot glaze – I just used apricot jam. I also didn’t use a tart pan (obviously) or glaze the strawberries. What I did was create something tasty and satisfying without feeling too heavy. It’s easy as pie. Easier actually.

What you need:
a punnet (or 2) of strawberries
pastry dough, storebought or homemade
thick double cream (Julia used Pastry Creme or Creme Patissere – too much work for me)
apricot jam or glaze

What to do:

1. Roll out pastry dough on a floured board/counter in a rectangular shape until about a quarter inch thick. Place onto a parchment/greaseproof paper covered baking sheet. Spread apricot jam over dough, keeping about 2 inches or so free on all sides. Follow with cream.. I was pretty heavy handed, although Julia says to use up to 1/4 inch! Arrange hulled strawberries in an appealing pattern. I didn’t have enough strawberries so I cut them in half. Not as pretty but just as tasty. If you have enough strawberries to put them in whole, glaze them with the apricot jam.

2. Bake in a on oven pre-heated to 190C/375F for about 30-45 minutes or until strawberries are softened, crust is toasty brown, and cream is bubbling.

3. Eat. You can either serve it warm, letting it sit for a moment to allow the cream to firm up a bit, or, like me, bake it ahead of time and serve it at room temp. Ice cream? Fabulous. Pouring cream? Divine.

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Slow-cooker Mexican Chicken

Posted on March 5, 2012 by Sydney

A slow-cooker is a funny thing, something I never thought I would want/need. Just another unitasker that takes up precious counter space. Boy was I wrong, I’ll be the first to admit it! This thing is great! I use it to cook stews and lovely braises while I’m at work. While it is hard to find recipes that a.) can be cooked for 10+ hours, and b.) don’t inlcude “cream of whatever” soups, I have found some recipes that are amazing. This is one of them. It’s even one of the kind that doesn’t require anything other than dumping and mixing. My favorite. It does include taco seasoning (fajita in the UK) though.. So my homemade credentials are blown!

I pinned this from my friend who got it here. I’m actually making things I’m pinning so go me! Pinterest Challenge success all the way!

So without further ado, the recipe.

Slow-cooker Chilli Lime Mexican Chicken
adapted from Pip and Ebby

You’ll need:
chicken (breasts or thighs, I uses boneless, skinless breasts)
jar of salsa
packet of taco/fajita seasoning
chillies
coriander/cilantro
2 limes
rice
garlic
tortillas (I prefer soft corn, but whatever you prefer)

Step one: Put 4 chicken breasts or 6 thighs (defrosted) in slow cooker. Dump in a taco seasoning packet or if you aren’t lazy like me, mexican spices like cumin and coriander, etc. I added that anyways… Then dump in a jar of salsa (mine was small). Mix that all up til it’s all coated. Then chop up some garlic, a chilli (or 2 depending on how hot you like it!), a big handful of coriander/cilantro and add that along with the juice of a lime. Cook for 10 hours on low (or less, it’s not crucial)

Step two: When you get in, make some chilli garlic lime rice. Yeah buddy, this stuff is good! Make rice as usual but add a chopped chilli, garlic cloves and the zest of a lime. Once cooked, fluff up and add the juice of the lime. Prepare the tortillas by either microwaving in a damp towel or (like microwave-free me) put it on the burner and move it a lot til it’s hot.

Step three: Assemble! Put the tortilla on a plate and add rice and a chicken breast – careful, they fall apart! Top with scallions/spring onions, tomatoes and a dollop of sour cream (or plain greek yogurt, like me!). I also served some red cabbage cole slaw with it which was sooo tasty! To eat the leftovers at work, I put the extra rice, chicken and sauce in a container, cabbage, tomatoes and yogurt in another and ate it more like a saucy rice dish. Mmmm…

Overall, this bad boy is going to be a keeper and a regular in our household. If this sounds like a lot of work, it totally isn’t. Easy peasy. And super delicious. And healthy! No added oils or fats (other than the sour cream/yogurt).

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Garlic Parmesan Monkey Bread

Posted on February 8, 2012 by Sydney

Success! I actually completed my first ever Pinterest Challenge! I joined a bit late, so I only had a weekend to make it so I made food. Garlic Parmesan Monkey Bread.. Tasty. I actually ate some for breakfast. It’s pull-apart so I couldn’t eat too big of a piece ;)

It was pretty simple to make, I’m not sure if I’ll make it again though.. I bit too white-bread-y and dry for me.. Maybe I just didn’t have enough garlic or butter! If I do make it again, I’m going to at least double those.. If I’m to splurge on fat calories, I’m going to splurge on the fat calories – you know? The Pastry Affair version that I pinned, used a bundt pan, which I don’t have, so I used a baking dish. Worked fine. We dipped in oil and balsamic.. yummy :)

PS… Do you want to join in the Pay it Forward fun?

The Pinterest Challenge

Posted on February 2, 2012 by Sydney

I love Pinterest. Like most people who have succumbed to it’s charms, I can literally spend hours browsing through cool things that people have found via the world wide web. I have a “Make This” board which has all the crafty/sewing-related things that I want to make. Or use as inspiration to make. There is also an “Eat This” board, which, you guessed it, I want to eat. Actually, make and then eat.

I pin all these things with the best of intentions.. I really do plan on making these things. The problem is, I never do! That where the Lovebumps Pinterest Challenge comes in! Lovebumps blog, along with other bloggers aptly called the PinAddicts, has decided to challenge bloggers around the world to actually make things from their boards and then post it on the first Monday of the month. Since that is only 4 days away, I thought I would make something edible. It’s Gavin’s birthday tomorrow as well, so if I make him something off my board that’s two birds with one pin-shaped stone!

Since I have been fairly obsessed with the no-knead bread that hit the web about two years ago, I am going with bread. Monkey bread. Garlic Parmesan Monkey Bread to be specific. And this is the very specific Garlic Parmesan Monkey Bread:

Mmmm… It’s from The Pastry Affair and damn.. I could eat that whole thing myself. Right now.

So come on! Join in!

What I’m working on

Posted on November 18, 2011 by Sydney

This is the beginning of my advent calendar for Alfie and Kitty.. So far I have the numbers on six of the envelopes and this much stitching of the pockets. I have a lot of work ahead of me! It doesn’t help that the disappearing pen seems to just be absorbed into the felt rather than staying until it gets wet… annoying.

Tomorrow I am cooking our Thanksgiving dinner. Since the British clearly don’t celebrate it, we don’t have a holiday next week. We would do it next weekend but, alas, we are at a wedding were Gavin is the best man. Should be fun as we are having people total! I have already brined the turkey and I’m totally cheating and roasting the turkey and making the gravy tonight! That way tomorrow I just have to worry about reheating it – 20 minutes! Woohoo! So I won’t have the Norman Rockwell moment of setting the whole turkey on the table, but as no one really knows how to carve the turkey properly anyways, I figured no one would care. I’ll just make sure everyone has enough to drink!

Dinner Party

Posted on October 22, 2011 by Sydney

Tonight Gavin and I are having 2 friends over for dinner tonight so sorry for the lack of content… I decided to make my very easy dinner (slow cooked beef) much more complicated by making Apple Pie Cookies from Smitten Kitchen. It was my first time making pie dough from scratch, by hand, but I tasted the “mistake” cookie and it was good! Let’s see what the others think… If it passes the test, I might make them for Thanksgiving! Woohoo!

Thanksgiving 2011 planning

Posted on October 19, 2011 by Sydney

Gavin and I are hosting Thanksgiving at our house again this year. Last year I cooked it for a total of 10 people and this year there are 12! It was funny to celebrate with all the Brits as they definitely don’t acknowledge, let alone celebrate Thanksgiving, as a holiday and they only eat turkey for Christmas. I cooked turkey and all the trimmings, very (for my family) traditional. We started (of course) with cosmos and then moved on to wine and beer. Gavin’s cousin and his (then) fiancee brought a cheese platter, a friend and her flatmate brought mashed potatoes and another friend and his girlfriend brought pumpkin and pecan pie! It was amazing. The food went off without a hitch, everyone had a good time, and we never ran out of anything to drink. Lovely.

This year I am thinking that I might make it a little less “Wilson-family-traditional” and branch out a bit and try some new variations. Maybe a chestnut stuffing? Maybe some bacon in the roast brussels sprouts? Maybe these salads!

I saw these salads in an apple cup from Yummy Mummy over on the Kitchn… Oh the stuff you can find on the internet at work when you aren’t busy (and btw, aren’t her food photos lovely?!). I’m not sure if they are going to be time consuming to make – 12 apple cups? I can make them ahead of time though… Just rub lemon juice so they don’t turn brown? The salad itself sounds good as well – apple, blue cheese, avocado (and pomegranites but they are far too expensive here!). I think I would add bacon crumbles and some candied nuts and serve with some dressed greens on the side. We do everything buffet style since we don’t have a big enough table but I think they would look so nice on the side board!

Aren’t the colors just beautiful? It just screams fall and British apples are the best apples I have ever eaten in my life. No joke. I’m also not joking when I say that they have a super popular type called Cox. Seriously? The Brits just love cocks/cox. But that’s a whole different post ;)

Homemade ground chilies

Posted on October 3, 2011 by Sydney

When I was up in Stoke for Suzanne’s shower, Gavin’s mom gave me a chili plant that she had. It had a pretty good amount of chilies on it and when I commented on it, she gave it to me. She wasn’t going to eat the chilies so I didn’t feel too bad. In fact, I was pretty excited. I was going to make my own dried chilies! I had found a tutorial over on Bev Cooks for dehydrated jalepeno peppers. Immediately, my interest was piqued and I knew what my next cooking activity would be.

When I got home with the chili plant, I clipped all the red peppers off and put them on our grill pan and into the oven at the lowest it would go. I left them there until I went to bed which wasn’t much later so I wasn’t surprised that they were still soft the next day. I did this again the next day and they still needed some more drying time. We had baked potatoes for dinner a night and I decided to put them in the (turned off) oven after the potatoes were cooked. Bad call Sydney. The next morning when I took them out they were black. Like midnight black. Black Beauty black. I mean look at how sad that is. I almost cried.

Not to be dissuaded that easily, however, I thought I would just try one and see it was really burned beyond rescue. I tossed 2 into my mortar and pestle and had a go. They actually didn’t smell burned at all! Just smoked. And HOT! Seriously, my nose was burning while grinding away! I did a little taste test with Gavin and these babies are GOOD! So I then ground them all up and they are now good to go! Gavin and I call them the “smoked chilies” and they have now seasoned the spaghetti sauce I made last night, the marinade for the chicken kebabs on Saturday as well as the salad dressing we had last night! I have a feeling they won’t last too long! Good thing there are more green chilies on the plant!

And P.S. Can I just give a little shout-out of love to my Joseph and Joseph mortar and pestle? It’s awesome!

An ode to late summer, food style

Posted on September 8, 2011 by Sydney

As summer never really materialized in the UK this year (it was the coldest and rainiest ‘summer’ since 1993) I decided to take matters into my own hands and at least taste summer. My mom makes a mean tomato cheddar pie. Honestly, that thing is one of the best things I have ever eaten. Unfortunately, it is super time consuming (hello pie crust) and not the most healthy thing in the world (mayo and cheddar cheese) so I decided to go a different route. Enter the tomato tart.

I was inspired by David Lebovitz’s French Tomato Tart but being me (and my mother’s daughter) I altered it a bit. I didn’t make my own pastry crust as I had some leftover puff pastry that I had to use so that decided that mine would be a free-form tart – that and the fact that I don’t own a tart pan. I had also roasted a boat load of peppers and had a bunch left in the fridge. I also had some zucchini that were threatening to go off so they got thrown in the mix as well.

I was kinda shocked at how good it was. It was totally better than the sum of it’s parts. It screamed of sunshine and warmth even though it was chucking down buckets outside. Gavin, the meat lover even went back for seconds!

So here’s what I did:

Free-form tomato tart
One sheet of puff pastry, or a smallish block, rolled out real thin (1/4″)
Dijon or whole grain mustard (I used whole grain)
2-3 ripe tomatoes, sliced
2 small zucchini, thinly sliced
2 roasted peppers, sliced in biggish chunks
olive oil
fresh thyme
soft goat cheese

1. Preheat oven to about 400F/200C
2. Roll out pastry and start spread with mustard. Let dry for a few minutes
3. Layer the veggies on top. I alternated tomatoes, zucchini, tomatoes, peppers, tomatoes, etc. until the whole pastry is covered, leaving room around the edges (about 1″).
4. Sprinkle with thyme and drizzle with olive oil, salt and pepper.
5. Slice goat cheese and lay over top.
6. Fold the edges up and pinch the corners to seal.
7. Bake that bad boy until the pastry is cooked and golden and the cheese is browned, about 30 minutes.

Here is mine, just after I layered the veg and sprinkled with thyme. I thought it was just so pretty I had to take a photo!

And after baking.. excuse me while I wipe the drool off my keyboard!

“Clean-out-the-fridge” pasta dinner

Posted on June 23, 2011 by Sydney

This week I have just been so tired, I can’t even be bothered to cook.. Plus I have taken up embroidering (yeah, I’m cool). Tonight, I was wondering what on earth I was going to cook, when I decided that I was going to: a) use up the massive bag of baby spinach as well as the lone zucchini in the fridge, and b.) not buy anything as I can’t afford to (payday is tomorrow, thank goodness). I settled on spinach and zucchini pesto. It was super easy and it is pretty tasty to boot! The color was phenomenal! Like totally neon green. I mean look at that!

The pesto is more of a paste as I don’t have a food processor… I know, but they are ridiculously expensive here and I have no disposable income..

And this is it mixed with spaghetti… mmmm…

So good… I can’t wait for lunch tomorrow to eat it again!

Syd the Wyd

Living my life the way I know best

Category Archives: Food