Macaroon Madness

Hello all.. meet my new friends... Bounty Macaroon (who's a chocolate macaroon with coconut ganache) and Pandan Macaroon (Pandan macaroon with coconut ganache).

Then I took it one step further and made Nasi Lemak Macaroon .. which is a Pandan Maroon with a schmear of Sambal Balachan. Nom Nom Nom... Yes... I think I've finally lost it.

Chocolate Macaroons

Yay! My macaroons popped! This is the recipe from the Women's Weekly Biscuit book. They weren't actually that hard to make and I had a chance to try piping for the first time. If there's any left by tomorrow I'll be bringing them to E's 3rd birthday party.

Tonight's Dinner

Roast pork with roast potatoes and vegetables. Followed by white wine and cinnamon poached pear with ice cream

Chocolate Banana Muffins

Otherwise known as Chocana Muffins. Recipe inspired by Nigella Lawson.

3 over-ripe bananas

1/2 cup vegetable oil

2 eggs

1/2 cup caster sugar

1.5 cup of self raising flour

3 tablespoons of cocoa powder

Mash bananas then add oil, eggs and sugar. Mix until smooth. Sift in flour and cocoa and stir for 2 minutes with a wooden spoon . Bake at 180 degrees fan forced for 15-20 minutes.

Date and Walnut Scones

I feel quite blessed for the friends I have at work. Besides being incredibly generous with hard work, knowledge and patience; we also love to eat and and we've shared many morning teas together.

These are the scones I made for G's Bon Voyage morning tea. We also had sausage rolls, party pies, cheese scones, ginger biscuits, biscotti, mudcake and pizza. A lovely tribute to our Queen Domestic Goddess who is departing on her big European Adventure.

Butter Chicken with Paratha

I used a bottled sauce for the butter chicken and made the paratha from this recipe. Easy peasy!

Paratha

1.5 cup plain flour

20g butter

100ml milk

1/4 tsp salt

Melt the butter than add flour and salt. Add most of the milk to form a dough and knead for 3 minutes. Rest for 30 to 120 minutes under cling film. Cut the dough into quarters and roll each quarter to 2-3 mm thickness with a rolling pin. Fry in a non-stick frypan with peanut oil for 2-3 miinutes each side. Serve with curry

Easy Banana Cake

This is a much loved recipe from my dear friend D. Not only is it a good simple recipe, it makes really good use of over-ripe bananas that are frankly too expensive to waste.

3 oz sugar

3 oz unsalted butter

1 egg

2 tbsp milk

1 tsp vanilla essence

2-3 mashed bananas

4 oz self-raising flour

Cream together butter and sugar. Beat in egg, milk and essence. Add 2-3 mashed bananas then sift and fold in flour. Bake at 170 degrees C for 30-35 minutes in a small bread tin. Serves 4.