It's been a looooong, long, long tiiiime!

Hello everyone!

I can't believe almost a whole year has passed since I lasted posted here. It has certainly been a whirl wind of a year.

My family welcomed a new healthy baby boy, born 13/10/2014 and thankfully he's been pretty good so far! I also had my in laws stay with me from Jordan for a few months, I can't thank them enough for all the help they gave me.

Seeing as I have a newborn and have chosen to breastfeed I found it vital that I try anything to keep my milk supply as high possible. So far I have tried eating and drinking fenugreek. Although it's great since it's all natural, on consumption you may find that your skin will start to smell like this seed. I didn't feel as though it has done a great deal to increase my milk supply so I ditched that and when onto lactation cookies!

I have searched for some recipes and have found that the main ingredients to make the cookies "work" are brewer's yeast, oats and flaxseed meal (linseed).

So far so good! I have noticed a slight increase in my milk and I get fuller faster and never really feel 'empty'.

You will find that the brewer's yeast will give it a bitter taste, which is what you want, as it is the component that has the most health benefits.

Ingredients

1/2 Cup butter ( low fat is best)
3/4 Brown sugar
1 egg
1 Tsp Vanilla
2-3 Tbsp Linseed meal
2-3 Tbsp water (depending on how moist you want it)
1 Cup wholemeal self-raising flour
1 1/2 Cups oats
 Your own additional ingredients e.g. choc chips, coconut, nuts etc

Method

Pre- heat oven to 180 gas or 160 electric. Line biscuit try with baking paper.

1.Using a hand mixer or table top mixer cream butter and sugar then add the egg and vanilla. Mix well.
2. Place Linseed meal and water into a cup and allow to sit for a few minutes.
3. Place dry ingredients into the butter and sugar mixture along with water and linseed. Combine well.
4. Mix in oats and added extras to taste.
5. Using a teaspoon, scoop out mixture and place onto prepared baking tray. Wet the back of the spoon to slightly press down on the dough.
6. Allow to bake for 10 min.
Cool on baking rack.

In addition you could use a linseed (flaxseed) mixture which includes carob and berries.

Note: Using whole seeds is better than using crushed. The nutrients slightly deplete in the cooking process.

I hope you enjoyed my come back post! I hope this will help any mummas out there who deed a boob boost!

Battered fish

Hi all!

I haven't been in the cooking mood for a while now. With the heat that is the Australian Spring and Summer, I find it draining and by the end of the day I'm not bothered to move let alone cook.

However the other day I had a craving for fish and chips so managed to try something else with my frozen Basa fish fillets.

Who doesn't love a good battered fish?! I love thick crispy batter and this recipe is just perfect! But remember that this is a sometimes recipe the oil and the deep frying is tres artery clogging ;-p

Ingredients

1 cup self raising flour and extra flour for dusting
1 cup cold water
1-2 tsp baking powder
Corn oil for cooking
pinch of salt

Depending on how thick you want the batter to be add more or less water. Whisk it around until all the lumps are gone and the mixture is smooth.

Method

*If using frozen fish make sure that the fish is fully defrosted before cooking.*
-Heat oil in a large wok or a deep frying pan
-Dust each fish on the both sides with the flour.
-Place the fish one by one into the batter
-When taking the fish out of the batter remove excess batter by scraping the fish on the sides of the bowl.
-Gently slide fish into the oil
-Cook until golden

Serve with chips of your choice and a wedge of lemon. ENJOY!

Herbs Crusted Fish

Hi all!

For quite sometime now I've come to realise I cannot cook seafood. SHOCK, HORROR, GASP!

With this terrible realization I had to find a way to nail cooking seafood. For those who know know me well, they'll know I could do without chicken or meat, give me prawns (shrimp), octopus, calamari, fish, muscles and all the other glorious things you find under the sea!

For starters I thought I'd experiment with some frozen fish that I get from my local Aldi store. This way if things don't turn out well, at least I didn't pay too much for ruined fish.

Here is one of my best tries at fish. It is a herb crusted fish and it tasted AMAZBALLS!
And the best part it was so simple, its ridiculous.

Ingredients:

Basa fillet skinned and boned
1-2 cup of flour (I used wholmeal)
2-4 tablespoons of mixed herbs
Salt
Pepper
Oil

Firstly defrost the amount of fish you want to cook (skip this step if using freshly bought fish). Using a paper towel dry the fish so the flour doesn't go pasty.
On a large flat plate mix the flour, herbs, salt and pepper together onto the plate. Place each fish onto this flour mixture coat the fish generously.
Heat up a large fry pan with some oil (as much as you like ;-p) and gently place each fish into the oil. Cook on both sides for 5 mins.
Serve with salad or rice.

Happy eating!

Product review: Asian at Home

Hiya all!

My first product review in a very long time! Yay for me!

Today's review is on Aldi's Asia at home, Pad Thai meal kit.

I took a quick snap of the box, forgetting to snap the contents...great job I know. It came with a packet of rice noodles, two sachets of peanuts and one sachet of the stir in Pad Thai sauce.

Let me tell you, it tasted nothing like any Pad Thai I've ever eaten. It was very disappointing. Once the sauce is mixed in to the chicken and veggies, there wasn't that distinct flavour that you want in your Pad Thai. It wasn't unpleasant by any means, it is eatable but disappointing.

I picked up this product from my local Aldi for around $3.50 which I though was a bit much for this product. Sadly I will not be buying this product again, I will however try the Maggie Pad Thai T home kit which I saw at my local woolworths.

I hope this was product review was helpful for those who crave Thai at home and aren't bothered to make it from scratch :-p

I'm back!...with a recipe!

Hello! Hello!

Although it has been quite sometime since I last posted some pictures of eating habits, I have now finally finished (I hope) with studying and can focus mostly on baking and my blog.

Since last time I had posted, I managed to bake a sticky date pudding with a lush butterscotch sauce and a whopper of a chocolate fudge cake. That's it. Sad, I know.

The whole family has also been doing quite a bit of "clean eating" for over 6 months now. My interpretation of clean eating generally consists of eating wholemeal, protein of any sort and veg. The family including my little munchkin have treats on occasion, which explains my cake baking shortage.

A few weeks ago I had made two wholemeal pizzas with bbq chicken on one and steak on the other.

For my dough I used the same recipe as the Zaatar Pizza and instead of using plain white flour I substituted it for wholemeal flour.

BBQ Chicken Topping:

- Barbecued chicken, roast or fried chicken breast
-Thinly slices Spanish (red) onion
- Sliced Capsicum
-Sauteed mushrooms

Once the dough is rolled out to your preferred thickness I smothered the base with bbq sauce I then add cooked barbecued or roast chicken (fried up chicken breast is just as good).
Add the onions capsicum and mushrooms, then mozzarella cheese.

Steak Topping:

-500g beef strips
-Carmalised onion
-Sauteed garlic
-handful of roasted pine nuts or almonds

Once again once the dough is rolled out, throw on a few tablespoons of tomato paste onto the base.
Generously lather on the onions and garlic (these can be cooked together).
Add the beef and nuts.
Finally add the mozzarella cheese.

Presto! Easy and healthy.

Happy eating!

New look and a few pictures

Hi everyone!

It has been a very long time since I've last posted anything. I have finally changed the look of my blog, I hope you all like it as it reflects exactly what the majority of posts will be about!

As it the month of Ramadan where Muslims fast from dawn 'til dusk, I've been preparing some yummy stuff lately. Not all are new recipes but for the mean time until fasting is over, here are some pictures of dishes I've been dishing up before and during the fasting month!

Until the next post

Enjoy!

Zaatar Pizza (Manoush Zaatar)

Hello one and all!

I'm back with a very quick and easy pizza recipe and the dough used for this particular recipe is extremely versatile and can be used for almost anything!

I came across this 10 min. dough recipe a few years ago on an Arabic forum (can't remember the name for the life of me) and I found this amazing recipe! It comes in two parts and only takes 10 mins.

Part one:

1/4 cup sugar

2 Tbs fast acting yeast

2 cups warm water

2 cups plain flour

Whisk to combine, cover with cling film and a tea towel and allow to sit for 10 mins.

Part two:

1/2 cup olive oil

3 cups plan flour

Mix in part two with part one, once the 10 mins. is over. At this point you can either use your hands to mix or use a mixer with the dough attachment to combine everything together.

You will find that the dough will keep rising and this recipe is good for at least 3 large pizzas.

For the Zaatar you can purchase the zaatar mix from a middle eastern grocer or dry your own oregano and add sesame seeds to it.

Zaatar mixture

In a bowl mix in 5 tbs of the zaatar mix with enough olive oil to cover the dry zaatar. Stir with a spoon.

Take a hand full of dough you like and press it down on a pizza tray or you can free handed-ly shape your dough. Spoon a few table spoons of the zaatar and oil mixture on to the dough and spread around to cover the surface. Place in the oven until golden*. Add a pinch of sumac on top of the pizza for added taste.

For a healthier option you can substitute plain flour for wholemeal flour, which is what I did!

*You may find that the zaatar has dried up you can simply add more mixture while its cooking to keep it moist.