Carob truffles

December 29, 2011

The end of 2011 brings with it the end of one where's the beef? tradition. This here is our final calendar recipe! Michael's mum gave us some beautiful Japanese-style crockery for Christmas in lieu of material for a "Robyn's Recipe Calendar 2012" tag.

I'll confess to some trepidation ahead of making this recipe. I haven't eaten carob in about 15 years - back then carob buds were 40 cents a packet at the school tuckshop and thus one of the more popular sweets. Now with more disposable income and a weakness for dark chocolate, I've not sought out carob in a long time. It seems fewer and fewer other people are seeking it out either: the sales assistant at Brunswick's Organic Wholefoods drew a blank and theorised that with dark chocolate now sold as an antioxidant-rich health food, there mightn't be much market for carob. Michael had more luck in Smith St's sister store.

That's if you ever want to consider sugar-free soya carob lucky. It's a pretty joyless product, earthy and floury and nearly 30% palm oil. I was not feeling any more optimistic after my test nibble at the corner. But determined to see this tradition through to the bitter, chocolate-free end, I persevered with the recipe. The carob melted to a silky puddle and combined smoothly with the other more truffle-like ingredients. I added an extra dash of maple syrup to ensure a bit of sweetness, rolled them out, popped them in the fridge and... they were alright. Not chocolate, of course, but pretty good. As if my carob anxieties weren't enough, I'd been sceptical about mixing sultanas and peppermint but that totally worked. You could even increase the quantities of each, I reckon!

I ate several of these at my desk the following afternoon and they sustained me through a few hectic hours. I really, actively enjoyed them; I did not expect that. I'm still not sure that I want to buy sugar-free carob again, though. Are there any carob fanciers out there? Do you have any serving suggestions for us uncreative chocolate lovers?


Carob truffles

2/3 cup hazelnuts
1 1/2 tablespoons cream or 1 tablespoon soy milk
2 tablespoons sultanas
1 tablespoon maple syrup
100g milk or soy carob
peppermint essence

Grind one-third of the hazelnuts to a coarse meal, and roughly chop the remainder. In a bowl, stir together the ground hazelnuts, cream/milk, sultanas and maple syrup. Gently melt the carob and add that to the sultana mixture. Add peppermint essence to taste, and mix well. Refrigerate the mixture for 30 minutes.

Roll the mixture into balls with your hands, and press in the chopped hazelnuts to coat the balls. Refrigerate the balls further before eating.

Mushroom, lemon & tarragon tagliatelle

November 10, 2011

November's calendar recipe had a fairly wintry feel which was a bit out of place on a humid November evening. Still, it was simple to throw together (20 minutes from start to finish I reckon) and a fairly tasty kind of comfort food. It's heavy on the butter and cheese, giving the whole dish a nice creamy feel, offset by the chunky mushroom pieces throughout. The tarragon and wine gave it all a subtle flavour, although sadly the lemon got a bit lost.

We used fresh pasta from Donnini's, which gives any pasta-based meal a helping hand, although I reckon this would still come out okay using supermarket stuff. The recipe makes more than enough for four people and gave us some delicious leftovers at work on Friday.

Mushroom, lemon & tarragon tagliatelle
(a recipe available from Delicious magazine here)

2 tablespoons olive oil
50g butter
4 cloves garlic, sliced
8 flat mushrooms, sliced
1/2 cup white wine
2 tablespoons chopped tarragon leaves (plus a few in reserve for garnishing)
500g fresh tagliatelle
Zest and juice of 1 lemon
50g grated parmesan cheese
salt and pepper

Heat half the butter and the olive oil in a frying pan.

When it's heated up, add the garlic and stir-fry for a minute or so until it has softened.

Add in the wine, tarragon and mushrooms along with generous sprinkles of salt and pepper. Stir thoroughly and simmer for a couple of minutes, until the wine has reduced a bit.

Cover the pan and keep simmering for another 10 minutes or so, until the mushrooms are nice and soft.

While the mushrooms are simmering, cook your pasta (our fresh tagliatelle took about five minutes in a pot of boiling water to be perfect).

Drain the pasta and combine with the mushroom mix in whichever container will fit the whole mix in. Stir in the lemon juice and zest along with what's left of the butter. Fold through the parmesan cheese and serve, garnished with the spare tarragon leaves.

Fried noodles

October 24, 2011

October's calendar recipe was simply titled 'fried noodles'. It was a fairly quick and easy dinner to throw together and provided plenty of leftovers - a winning combination for working week cooking. It's not the most exciting recipe, although the sesame seed sprinkles add something a bit interesting to a fairly standard stir-fry. It's a filling and relatively healthy meal, and a good way to use up some vegie box bits, but I'm not sure we'll make it again in a hurry.


Fried noodles

1/4 cup sesame seeds
2 tablespoons sunflower oil
3 teaspoons sesame oil
4 spring onions, chopped finely
3 cloves garlic, minced
3 red chillies, chopped finely
200g firm tofu, cubed
150g button mushrooms, sliced
4 small carrots, cut into sticks
2 tablespoons water
3 tablespoons shoshoyu (Japanese soy sauce)
2 teaspoons sugar
350g packet of hokkien noodles

Toast the sesame seeds in a dry frying pan until they're just golden (be careful they don't get away from you and burn!). Take them off the heat and leave to cool for a few minutes before whizzing them in a spice grinder or food processor to make powdery sesame sprinkles.

Combine the sesame and sunflower oil in a small bowl and stir together.

Heat half of the oil mixture in a wok and stir-fry the spring onion, garlic and chilli over a medium-high heat for a couple of minutes. Remove the fried mix from the wok and set aside.

Now stir-fry the tofu for 5-6 minutes, until it's gone nice and golden. Once it's ready, remove it and set it aside for later.

Pour the remaining oil into the wok and, once it has warmed up, stir-fry the carrots and mushrooms for a couple of minutes. Add the water, shoshoyu, sugar and noodles to the wok, making sure you've separated the noodles and stirred them through the sauce as much as possible. Cover the wok and leave to cook for 4 minutes.

Add back the tofu and the onion mix to the wok, stir everything together and serve with a generous sprinkle of the sesame seeds on top.

Florentines

September 24-25, 2011

After weeks of taking my recipe cues from VegMel, I reverted back to my calendar recipes. September's feature is gluten-free florentines. I was looking forward to trying these - my mum would occasionally bake florentines when I was a tween and teen (mostly likely having sourced her recipe from a Women's Weekly cookbook). Hers were very thin and crisp, with a deep brown sugar flavour and chocolate on the back. 

This recipe was a bit different, chocolate-less, and baked into cupcake papers. Though they browned up a little, they didn't have the same depth of flavour. They reminded me more of toffee, a little chewy and inclined to stick to the teeth (happily remedied with a glass of milk on the side).

In the same sitting I attempted a vegan batch with a couple of straight-forward swaps - margarine for butter and maple syrup for honey. While it seemed ridiculously easy, this did affect the results substantially. My vegan florentines (in the pastel pink cases) leaked much more oil while simultaneously gluing themselves firmly to their cases. I don't think anyone trying these escaped without ingesting some paper. They didn't brown up in the oven in quite the same way either. There was still some sticky sweetness to be enjoyed, but I've got to work on my way with vegan fat.

This recipe is very quick and easy to make, and uses the kind of ingredients I have on hand (or can easily substitute). These are all good reasons for me to try again and get this just right.

Florentines
(a recipe already available online here)

75g butter or margarine
100g castor sugar
50mL coconut cream
1 tablespoon honey or maple syrup
75g flaked almonds
30g glacé cherries, chopped
30g dried currants

Line a muffin tin with 12 cupcake cases and preheat an oven to 180°C.

In a small saucepan over medium heat, melt the butter/margarine. Stir in the sugar and coconut cream, bring the mixture to the boil, and then allow it to simmer for 5 minutes. Mix in the remaining ingredients.

Spoon the mixture into the cupcake cases, gentle level them off a little, and bake them for 15 minutes. Allow them to cool to room temperature before eating - they'll firm up quite a bit.

July 30-31, 2011: Spiced yoghurt eggplant & naan

July and August's calendar recipes were designed to be cooked together, and we found plenty of time to do this on the last weekend in July. I started out with the naan on Saturday - my dry yeast was a bit old and I couldn't work as much flour into the dough as the recipe listed, but they still puffed up nicely in the frypan. The test naan we nibbled was lovely, light and buttery though a little sweet for our taste.

On Sunday Michael took responsibility for the spiced yoghurt eggplant. The eggplant rounds soaked up staggering amounts of oil as we fried them - we'll use a much lighter touch next time. The sauce is a cinch to stir together but a little more care is needed to cook the eggplant in it, if you want to retain their shape. While they weren't exactly pretty they were very, very tasty. The naan was perfect for mopping up the extra turmeric-stained oil on our plates. Leftovers microwaved magnificently, stretching the meal into August as intended.

Spiced yoghurt eggplant
(a recipe that seems to be online here, here and here)

2 large eggplants
1 tablespoon oil
2 green cardamom pods
1/4 teaspoon asafoetida powder
1 cup yoghurt
2 teaspoons fennel seed powder
1/4 teaspoon turmeric powder
1 teaspoon chilli powder
1 teaspoon ground ginger
salt
more oil to fry

Slice the eggplant into thick rounds and fry them in oil until golden brown. You can deep-fry, shallow-fry or alternatively recipes say you can brush the eggplant in oil and grill it - though they may mean American grilling, which I'd call barbecuing or dry-frying. Drain the eggplant on absorbent paper once cooked.

Heat the tablespoon of oil over medium heat in a large pot. Add the cardamom pods and asafoetida, tossing them around, then stir in the yoghurt. Add the fennel, turmeric, chilli and ginger powders, stirring to combine and cooking for about 4 minutes. Add the fried eggplant, gently layering them up and slathering them in the yoghurt as you go. Turn down the heat, cover the saucepan, and cook gently for a further 4 minutes. Season to taste and serve with naan and fresh greens.

Naan
(looks like it's sourced from allrecipes.com)

1 x 7g packet active dry yeast
1 cup warm water
1/4 cup castor sugar (I would use less next time)
3 tablespoons milk
1 egg, lightly beaten
2 teaspoons salt
3 1/2 cups bread flour, plus extra for dusting
1/4 cup butter, melted

In a large bowl, stir together the yeast and warm water until the yeast is completely dissolved. Let the mixture rest for 10 minutes, after which it should be a bit frothy. Stir in the sugar, milk, egg, and salt, then gradually add flour to make a soft dough (the original recipe had 4 1/2 cups flour, but I couldn't work that much into it). Knead the dough for 6-8 minutes, until smooth. Transfer the dough to a lightly oiled bowl, cover it with a damp cloth and set it aside to rise for about an hour.

By this time the dough should have doubled in volume (mine hadn't, but I persevered anyway). Pinch off golf ball-sized portions of dough, roll them into balls and place them on a baking tray. Cover the tray with a towel and allow the dough to rise for a further 30 minutes. They should double in volume again (mine didn't).

Heat up and lightly grease a frypan. Roll out a dough-ball at a time into a thin circle or oval (mine were about 4mm thick) and lie them out in the frypan, cooking for 2-3 minutes on the first side. When it's lightly browned and a bit puffy, brush the top side with melted butter and flip the naan over to cook on the other side for 2-4 minutes. Transfer the finished naan to a plate and continue with the remaining dough. Serve warm with your favourite curry.

June 19, 2011: Winter vegetable tagine

This month it was my turn to tackle the calendar recipe - a task I was happy to take on given that it required only 1 tiny tweak to turn into a vegan and gluten-free delight. It's a pretty impressive meal, with a nice combo of winter root vegetables and warming spices. I probably went overboard with the stock, which meant that we ended up with something more soup than stew. Maybe if we'd used a tagine as specified rather than just a big pot things would have worked out better. Still, with a pile of quinoa on the side and some of this harissa drizzled on top, this was one of the most hearty and warming meals of the season.

Winter vegetable tagine

2 tablespoons olive oil
2 onions, sliced thinly
2 large carrots, cut into chunks
2 parsnips, cut into chunks
300g sweet potato, cut into small cubes
1 small butternut pumpkin, peeled and cut into small cubes
4 tablespoons tomato paste
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground turmeric
2 cinnamon sticks
Veggie stock
Can chickpeas, drained
2/3 cup dried apricots, halved
10 pitted dates, halved
2 tablespoons honey (swap for maple or agave syrup to make this entirely vegan)
2 tablespoons chopped parsley
1/2 flaked almonds, toasted

Heat the oil in a big saucepan and cook the onion until it softens up nicely.

Add the vegetables, the tomato paste and all the spices.

Cover the veggies with stock (don't be heavy-handed here!) and bring it to a simmer. Pop a lid on it and cook gently for 45 minutes.

Add the chickpeas, apricots, dates and honey and simmer for another 20 minutes.

Scatter with herbs and almonds and season to taste when everything is tender and delicious.

May 30, 2011: Gleegan crepe bake

After surprising myself with some bloody good crepes, I dared to experiment with a vegan, gluten-free version... on a weeknight. I figured it was worth a shot: after all, I knew that French galettes used buckwheat flour and I've plenty of experience making 'cheesy' vegan sauces.

Actually most of the buckwheat crepe recipes that the internet turned up used at least as much plain wheat flour as buckwheat so there was still some substituting required. My strike rate wasn't quite as impressive as last time (now 2 duds of 9 crepes) but I was still satisfied - these crepes were tasty and pliable. I just found that they needed more oil than their gluteny counterparts for fail-safe flipping.

For the ricotta filling, tofu was always going to feature - I took inspiration from Veganomicon's cashew ricotta to dress it up. It ended up just a smidge astringent; next time I'd reduce the quantity of lemon juice. We had leftover filling, and it was delish on toasted sandwiches with just a drop of agave nectar to balance the flavour.

The white sauce was a cinch with substitutes, the parmesan-breadcrumb topping less so. I found rice and cornflake crumbs in the cupboard (be warned that Kellogg's cornflakes are not strictly gluten-free!) and they did well enough, though I'd be open to alternatives. This was finally my chance to try wanting kneading's parmesan recipe and I was left wanting more (next time: half the crumbs to this full quantity of parmesan flavour).

All pulled together this was passable, promising. Not as pretty, with sauce overflowing and too many powdery crumbs, but with enough flavour that we forgave it. Again, cannelloni would be easier but the crepes are pretty great - I would make them again and smother them less.

Gleegan crepe bake
(a gluten-free, vegan adaptation of this recipe)

crepe batter (inspired by David Lebovitz)
1/3 cup buckwheat flour
1/3 cup gluten-free plain flour
1 cup soy milk
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
spray oil for frying

crunchy topping (inspired by wanting kneading)
2 tablespoons raw cashews
2 tablespoons nutritional yeast
a modest shake of garlic powder
a shake of salt
1 cup gluten-free crumbs - rice, polenta, gf cornflake... (I'd recommend halving this)

filling (inspired by Veganomicon)
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 clove garlic, crushed
1 bunch spinach, chopped
1/2 cup raw cashews
juice of 1 lemon (I'd recommend halving this)
300g medium-firm tofu
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon salt

sauce
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 tablespoon cornflour
1 1/4 cups soy milk

Start by making the crepes. Sift together the flours into a medium-large bowl. Gradually pour the milk and oil over the flours, whisking as you go, until it makes a smooth batter. Cover the bowl and allow the batter to stand for 1-2 hours.

Heat up a fry-pan and give it a spraying of oil. Pour a 1/4 cup of crepe batter into the centre of the pan, using the back of a spoon to gently spread it out into a circle of just a couple of millimetres thickness. When the crepe's visibly dried out around the edges, carefully flip it over. After roughly another minute it should be cooked; transfer the crepe to a plate and repeat the process with the rest of the batter.

Use a food processor for the crunchy topping. Grind the cashews to a coarse powder, then add the remaining ingredients and blend until well combined.

Next, prepare the filling. Heat the oil in the fry-pan and sauté the garlic and spinach until the spinach has wilted - this will only take a few minutes. Take them off the heat and allow them to cool a little. In a food processor, grind the raw cashews to a coarse powder. Add the spinach and remaining filling ingredients and whiz everything together until it's nicely combined.

This is probably a good time to start preheating the oven - 180°C. Then get rolling! Place just a tablespoon or two of filling along the centre of each crepe, roll them up and place them in a baking dish.

In a small-medium saucepan, make the sauce. Start by heating the oil, then mix in the cornflour to make a smooth paste. After it's been cooking a minute, gradually whisk in the milk, doing your best to avoid lumps (I added the milk in very small batches to begin with). Bring the sauce to the boil and, once it's thickened, take it off the heat and pour it over the crepes.

Sprinkle the crunchy topping over the sauce-slathered crepes. Bake them for about 30 minutes, or until the top is crisp and golden.

May 21, 2011: Cheesy spinach-stuffed crepes

I was tempting fate when I decided to cook this month's calendar recipe after a long day shopping.  This wasn't just a new recipe - it involved crepes.

I'm not sure that I've ever even attempted crepes before but frying'n'flipping is the bog-standard cooking technique that challenges me the most. Burgers, fritters, (soy bombs!), pancakes, omelettes, dosai (shudder)... cooking them through and getting them to the plate in one piece is frequently more than me and my spatula can handle.  Crepes would surely rank second behind dosai in delicacy, and perhaps deliciousness too.

Foolishly I forged ahead, and inexplicably I was rewarded with crepe after slim golden crepe.  I used just a little oil spray in a hot non-stick pan, gently spreading the batter with the back of a spoon to a conservative diameter of about 15cm.  They were beautiful.

This was just the start, though.  I blended together a filling of spinach and ricotta and rolled it into the crepes...

... then covered the lot with a white sauce, bread crumbs and cheese.

Once out of the oven, it was the perfect winter dish - warming and cheesy, a little gooey but not too sloppy (as I feared it might be with all that white sauce).  I think some ready-made cannelloni tubes would do just as well - and be far more convenient - in this dish, but I really am glad that it prodded me to try my hand at crepes.  I didn't know I had 'em in me.

Cheesy spinach-stuffed crepes

crepe batter
1/2 cup wholemeal flour
1/2 cup plain flour
3 eggs, lightly beaten
1 1/4 cups milk
15g butter, melted
spray oil for frying

filling
30g butter
1 clove garlic, crushed
1 bunch spinach, chopped
250g ricotta
1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese
1/4 teaspoon ground cumin

sauce
30g butter
2 tablespoons wholemeal flour
1 1/4 cups skim milk

1 cup stale wholemeal breadcrumbs
1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese

Start by making the crepes. Sift together the flours into a medium-large bowl. In a separate bowl, whisk together the eggs, milk and melted butter.  Gradually pour the liquid over the flours, whisking as you go, until it makes a smooth batter. Cover the bowl and allow the batter to stand for at least 30 minutes.

Heat up a fry-pan and give it a light spraying of oil.  Pour a 1/4 cup of crepe batter into the centre of the pan, using the back of a spoon to gently spread it out into a circle of just a couple of millimetres thickness. When the crepe's visibly dried out around the edges, carefully flip it over.  After roughly another minute it should be cooked; transfer the crepe to a plate and repeat the process with the rest of the batter.

Next, prepare the filling.  Melt the butter in the fry-pan and sauté the garlic and spinach until the spinach has wilted - this will only take a few minutes.  Take them off the heat and allow them to cool a little before placing them in a food processor.  Add the ricotta, parmesan and cumin to the processor and whiz everything together until it's nicely combined.

This is probably a good time to start preheating the oven - 180°C. Then get rolling! Place just a tablespoon or two of filling along the centre of each crepe, roll them up and place them in a baking dish.

In a small-medium saucepan (I used the same one that I melted the crepe batter butter in), make the sauce. Start by melting the butter, then mix in the flour to make a smooth paste. After it's been cooking a minute, gradually whisk in the milk, doing your best to avoid lumps (I added the milk in very small batches to begin with). Bring the sauce to the boil and, once it's thickened, take it off the heat and pour it over the crepes.

Combine the remaining breadcrumbs and parmesan, then sprinkle them over the sauce-slathered crepes.  Bake them for about 30 minutes, or until the top is crisp and golden.

April 11, 2011: Cheese & tomato quiche

It wasn't too long before I was making pastry again, this time with my recipe calendar as an excuse.  It's a straight-up quiche arrangement; full of tomato, lined with a little mustard and topped with extra cheese in the form of brie slices.  Actually the brie centre melted right into the quiche filling within the first few minutes that it spent in the oven, the rind sticking around in lazy stripes on top.

It was lovely fresh out of the oven and nearly as good when gently reheated for lunch later.  I reckon home-made shortcrust is the one pastry that still holds up convincingly as leftovers.

Cheese and tomato quiche
(recipe slightly adapted from Quick Vegetarian Recipes)

175g plain flour
salt and pepper
75g butter, diced
2 tablespoons cold water
1 tablespoon wholegrain mustard
50g mature cheddar, grated
4 tomatoes, sliced
125g brie, thinly sliced
1 cup milk
2 egg yolks
1 clove garlic, crushed

In a food processor, pulse together the flour, salt and pepper. Add the butter and blend until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs.  Pour in the cold water and blend the mixture until it comes together as a dough.  Bring it together into a balls, wrap it in plastic wrap, and refrigerate for at least 20 minutes.

Roll out the dough between two sheets of plastic wrap and ease it into a pie dish.  Refrigerate the pie crust for another 10 minutes or so.  Preheat the oven to 180°C.

Blind bake the pie crust for 10 minutes, then remove any weights and paper and bake it for a further 5 minutes.  Spread the base with the mustard and sprinkle over the grated cheddar.  Layer the tomato and brie slices on top.

Whisk together the milk, egg yolks and garlic, then pour them over the tomatoes and cheese.  Bake the quiche for at least 30 minutes, until the eggs have set and the top is golden.

March 5, 2011: Little lemon cheesecakes

Michael, Mike and I enjoyed our first Simpsons night so much that we soon arranged another.  This time Michael picked up dinner at Trippy Taco and with an eye on my calendar, I volunteered to make dessert.  

The March feature recipe is for individual cheesecakes and with its reliance on pre-made ingredients, I couldn't help thinking of Sandra Lee as I whipped these up.  Actually a little googling has revealed that this recipe comes from Australia's answer to Sandra Lee, the 4 Ingredients crew.

While it's not my usual food-prep style, I can't deny that these were simple and very popular.  (They also used up some Arnott's biscuits that may have been sitting in my cupboard for a year.)  I'd recommend eating them semi-frozen.

Little lemon cheesecakes
(this looks to come from the 4 Ingredients website)

8 butternut snap biscuits
250g cream cheese, softened
280g jar lemon butter
berries to garnish

Line 8 holes of a muffin pan with cupcake papers.  Place one of the biscuits in the base of each paper.

In a small mixing bowl, beat the cream cheese until fluffy.  Add the lemon butter and beat until smooth and completely combined.  Spoon the mixture into the cupcake papers and smooth over the tops; freeze the cheesecakes until firm, 2-3 hours.

To serve, give the little cheesecakes 5 minutes to thaw, and garnish them with berries.

February 9, 2011: Bean curd rolls with mango sauce

I was really looking forward to trying my February calendar recipe - bean curd rolls!  I barely even knew such a thing existed but it could only be six kinds of right, right?  A vegan and gluten-free alternative to spring rolls, deep-fried golden and crispy.

Little did I know that the bean curd sheet in my cupboard was... weird.  It was actually a single sheet, which had been folded up into a rectangle in a previous, more flexible lifetime before drying out to crumbly rigidity.  I figured it probably just needed a light dunking in warm water to restore it to a fold-friendly state, like a rice paper wrap, but this didn't quite work out. The outside of the sheet dissolved quickly into sloppiness while the inside remained brittle.  Worse, the outer layer was not of even thickness at all, looking like a sloppy mesh.  I found it very difficult to roll it round the filling.

The deep-frying was not without its worries, either.  I struggled to cook the rolls evenly (they have a powerful centre of gravity!), some threatened to unravel and they never quite attained the crunchiness I had fantasised about.  Oh well.  I have to admit they tasted pretty good, for all that.  Michael heartily enjoyed them, and was particularly enthusiastic about the sauce.  This gave me a chuckle since it's made of no more than a blended can of mango.

I'm still a bean curd roll believer - I'm convinced there are better ones out there.  Does anyone have any hints on choosing and using bean curd sheets?

Bean curd rolls with mango sauce
(ingredient quantities adapted, original recipe also found online here)

1 carrot
3 mushrooms
half a bunch of coriander, finely chopped
400g tofu
1 x 50g bean curd sheet
cornflour
vegetable oil, for deep-frying
200g canned mango
more coriander leaves + chopped fresh red chilli, to garnish

Reserve a little of the coriander as a garnish.  Chop the carrot, mushrooms, and the rest of the coriander finely and place them in a medium-large bowl.  Crumble or mash the tofu into the bowl and combine the ingredients thoroughly.

Soften the bean curd sheet by brushing it with warm water.  Separate the layers.  Place a tablespoon or so of filling onto a sheet segment and roll it up.  Dust the roll lightly with cornflour.  Continue rolling the tofu filling into the bean curd sheets, dusting them with cornflour.

Heat the oil in a saucepan.  While it's heating, puree the mango in a food processor until smooth.  Line a plate with absorbent paper.

Deep-fry the rolls, just two or three at a time, until they're golden brown.  Drain them on the absorbent paper.

To serve, arrange the rolls on a plate, cover them with pureed mango and sprinkle over the reserved coriander and red chilli.

January 4, 2011: Muhammara II

Mum came through with another recipe calendar for Cindy's birthday this year and I mixed things up by taking charge of making January's dish. First up for the year was muhammara, something we've made from a different recipe and enjoyed before (the other version is also gluten-free). This turned out fairly similarly - it's a hearty and enjoyable dip.  We happily ate this for dinner with a bunch of chopped up vegies and some guacamole. If anything, it could have used a bit of an extra chilli kick to overcome the sweetness of the pomegranate - I'll know for next time.


Muhammara

1/3 cup breadcrumbs, lightly toasted
3 red capsicums, quartered and seeded
1 red chilli, seeded and chopped finely (maybe go to 2 next time)
1 clove garlic, crushed
2-3 tablespoons pomegranate molasses
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
1/3 cup finely chopped walnuts
2 tablespoons olive oil
salt

Grill the capsicum quarters until they blacken up nicely, and then cover them and leave to cool. Peel the blackened skin off.

Whizz the breadcrumbs, capsicum, chilli, garlic, pomegranate syrup, lemon juice and 2/3 of the walnuts in a food processor, and then pour in the oil with the motor running and season with salt.

Transfer to a bowl to serve and garnish with the remaining walnuts.