Gran’s Milk tart

We had a “Pik & Proe” at our church recently. Basically everyone makes their favourite recipe, it could be bread, pasta, veggies, salad, dessert, whatever you feel like basically. You then bring this dish to the church and everyone can try your dish.

I love it, you get so many ideas and new recipes. I decided to make my Gran’s Milk tart. Okay, okay I might have changed a few things to make it leaner, but it still tastes great!

Gran’s Milk tart

Ingredients:

1 pack short crust pastry (yes, I cheat)

1 litre low fat milk

150g Sugar

½ Vanilla pod

½t Cinnamon

70g Cake flour

50g Corn starch

2t Custard powder

½t Salt

3 Large Eggs (separated)

6T Water

60g Butter

1t Vanilla essence

Method:

1. Roll out the pastry and place it in a prepared 25cm pan. Bake blind at 180 degrees Celsius for 10 minutes. Remove the beans and bake for another 5 – 10 minutes, until golden brown.
2.  In a pot add the milk, 50g sugar, cinnamon and vanilla (scrape out the vanilla seeds). Heat it until warm and keep it on a low heat.
3. Mix the egg yolk, water and 100g of sugar until it is light yellow.
4. Sift all the remaining dry ingredients into the egg mixture and mix well.
5. Take a cup of the warm milk and add it slowly to the egg mixture, mix well. This will warm the mixture before you add it to the pot. Slowly add the egg mixture to the warm milk on the stove. Stir continuously.
6. Keep the mixture on a low heat and stir continuously until it thickens. This will take some time, be patient. Add the butter and vanilla essence. Remove the mixture from the heat and remove the vanilla pod.
7. Use an electric mixer to beat the egg whites until it makes soft peaks.
8. Gently fold the egg whites into the warm milk mixture, make sure it is well combined.
9. Pour the mixture into the pan with the baked pastry. Dust with a bit of Cinnamon and bake for 20 minutes in a 180 degrees Celsius oven.
10. Let the milk tart cool completely before removing it from the pan.

There you have it, my Gran’s milk tart recipe. Be warned the first time you make this you will feel overwhelmed and uncertain. By the third time, you will feel like a professional! Don’t give up, it’s worth the effort!

Have a fantastic day!

The Ginger Wonder!

Hey everyone!

Oh my gosh, I haven’t blogged in ages. Loads of things have been happening, but I guess the biggest news is that my husband and I are expecting our first child. This is also why I haven’t been blogging new recipes, cause I couldn’t eat much for such a long time! Only now in the last part of my second trimester I have been able to eat everything again (excluding a few things like tomatoes, balsamic vinegar, chicken etc.)

Let’s look back... Trimester one I basically just wanted to eat starch, red meat and citrus fruit. My poor husband had pasta almost every night! (Morning sickness, is not only in the mornings…) Trimester two I could start eating salads again! I could slowly start adding veggies again. Now on trimester three I feel much better. This means… recipe time again!!

We are so excited about our little baby, and I’m sure there’ll be loads of adventures! Who knows, maybe even a post or two on baby food. I’m pretty sure I’m going to try making my own baby food, rather than buying the bottled mass produced stuff. I’m sure I won’t be the only new mommy trying to figure out what babies should start eating when…

So here’s my first new “recipe” of 2013. Guess what it’s on safe natural medicine you can use while you’re pregnant. :)

I hate the taste of ginger, but I promise you, when you feel nauseous you’ll try just about anything to relieve the feeling. Ginger helps with nausea, heartburn and it is a natural cold medicine. Added benefits are: Ginger improves the body’s absorption of essential nutrients in the body. It helps to keep your sinuses clear. It helps to reduce flatulence, and reduces stomach cramps. It is even a natural anti-inflammatory, this is why I call it the wonder root!

You can use it in different ways, fresh ginger in honey to chew on, you could throw it in your bath water and bathe in it. Or you can do what I did, and make a “ginger tea”.

The Ginger Wonder!

Take fresh ginger and cut 3 or 4 thin slices off a fresh root.

Boil water and add it to the ginger slices.

Let it stand for 5 minutes. 

You can remove the ginger and add some lemon juice and honey.

I was feeling like I was getting a cold, and had one cup, once a day for 5 days. I never got sick! It was the cheapest medicine I’ve ever used, and I shall definitely use it for the rest of my life.

Have a great day!

Beetroot, Butternut & Chicken Salad

May I just say I’m a butternut freak, you’ve probably noticed. I post butternut recipes regularly. I guess I love it, because it looks like sunshine on your plate. Part of enjoying food is how it looks, if it’s pretty I enjoy it a whole lot more.

   

Ingredients:

300g cooked beetroot (you could buy it cooked or steam it for 15 minutes)

250g Steamed Butternut

300g baby leaf Spinach

2 Chicken Breasts cut into strips

1 tablespoon Honey

1 teaspoon Chicken Spice

Method:

Firstly coat the chicken in chicken spice and seal it into a hot frying pan. No need for oil, the honey will help the chicken to get golden brown.

Seal the flesh of the chicken and add the honey.

Fry for about 5 minutes and take off the heat. It should be cooked without being dry, nothing like dry chicken.

Now you could be creative, compile the salad in layers.

First layer will be spinach, followed by butternut and beetroot. Lastly add the chicken.

Drizzle the left over honey juice from the pan over your salad and viola; you have a tasty summer dish.

You could add pumpkin seeds, even some parmesan. I added almonds to my dish. Hope you enjoy it as much as I do!

Warm Lettuce Salad

I saw an idea for this dish on the television, and thought is this woman insane? How on earth does fried lettuce taste. The answer? Delicious!

It sounds weird, but try it. I am a firm believer in trying everything at least once. When you fry the lettuce it gets a sweet taste. The trick is not to cook it for too long, you want your lettuce to still be a bit crisp. This is what I did:

Ingredients:

1 medium onion chopped

½ Iceberg Lettuce chopped

½ cup Frozen Peas

5ml Butter

Salt and Pepper to taste

Method:

First soften the onion in a bit of boiling water in a pan.

When the water is cooked away add the butter and lettuce, stir-fry the lettuce and onion, for about 2 minutes on high heat.

Add the peas, salt and pepper.

Stir for another 2 minutes.

Take of the heat and serve warm.

Let me know what you think.

Tuna Cakes

We all know we need to eat more fish, but it gets boring. The same old fish and chips every week. So I decided to try something new. I call it, Tuna Cakes. I decided to use tuna, because it is high in omega 3 fatty acids. 

Omega 3 is such a wonderful supplement with great health benefits. It could lower cholesterol, reduce high blood pressure, ease joint pains, fight wrinkles, improve memory and could even boost your mood.

Ingredients:

200g mashed potatoes

2 tins of Tuna

1 egg

1 teaspoon parsley

1 teaspoon lemon juice

Pinch of Paprika (You could add more if you like hot food)

Salt to taste.

Method:

Add all the ingredients together, mix well.

Add about 5ml of olive oil in a very hot pan.

Scoop a tablespoon of the mixture into the pan and press down to flatten it slightly.

Leave it for about 3 minutes per side, or until it’s golden brown.

This mixture will make about 8 fish cakes.

I served these Tuna cakes with some sweet chilli sauce. You could serve this hot or cold, next time I might add a bit of spring onion to the mixture. Overall this is a healthy fun recipe, I hope you enjoy it!

My First Risotto

You have to try something new every now and then. You know, just to keep it interesting. I decided to make my first Risotto. This is a high in starch meal, so try not to overdo it :)

 

Mushroom Risotto

250g Mushrooms thinly sliced

1 large onion thinly sliced

1l of vegetable stock

1 Pack of mushroom soup powder

400ml Low fat Milk

250ml Pasta Rice

Firstly gently sweat the onion and mushroom until the onion is soft.

Add the rice and some of the stock; keep adding the stock little bit at a time waiting for the rice to absorb the liquid. Do this until all the stock is absorbed or the rice is nice and soft.

Lastly add the soup powder to the milk and add to the risotto, stir until it thickens.

Let it gently cook for about 10 minutes.

You could serve this with a bit of parmesan cheese if you like.

Honey Peach Chicken Skewers

It’s summer time again, well almost. This time of year South-African’s love to braai (barbeque). Sometimes I get tired of the same old thing over and over again. So we tried something new for the grill. It’s quick and easy to make, and tastes real good. Hope you enjoy it.

   

Honey Peach Chicken Skewers

Makes 4 skewers

Ingredients:

4 chicken breasts cubed

250g Dried peaches

60ml Honey slightly warmed in the microwave to make it runny

Chicken spice

You will also need skewers.

Method:

Stack the chicken and peaches on the skewer.

Baste the chicken with Honey and lightly spice it with the chicken spice.

Braai until cooked, it will take about 10 – 15 minutes.

Enjoy with summer salads.