Pork and beans

Growing up a few decades ago compared to today, there were so few choices when it came to food.  The cereal variety was maybe about less than ten.  There were no gluten free pasta or bread, no dairy free butter, no sugar free muffins.   Coffee was coffee, no soy, light, chai, etc.  A steak was usually T-bone, no varieties such as Wagyu, Angus, or labels such as corn fed, grass fed, aged, dry aged, etc.  Food was food.  There were no unnecessary labels.  Whether it was fresh - from the ground, from a tree/plant or packed - cans, boxes, plastic packaging.   Today, it's an entirely different story.  Whatever happened to simple food?  

In his 2009 book Food Matters, Mark Bittman mentioned modern agriculture, global warming, sustainability and the change towards conscious eating. These days, we don't look at calories anymore. Consumers are conscious about where their food comes from, the carbon footprint, whether its organic, grown locally or imported from half way around the globe.  This kind of mentality creates a good set of consumers. Smart consumers.  But then we also create a lot of waste.  In Australia alone, consumers waste an estimate of 4 million tons of food each year!  Because what happens is we tend to shop more than what we can actually consume.  (How not to waste food shall be for another post!)

I'm not a fan of food fads but I do believe in simple good food. Seasonal cooking is always how we plan our menu at home.   Simple food prepared at home. With love.  For family and friends.

Now growing up, we were fed with lots of food I wouldn't normally buy these days. Our parents back then fed us with what they knew best.   Powdered orange juice (Tang), canned vienna sausages... including a favorite breakfast fare a million years ago.  Canned pork and beans.  A mixture of beans covered with sweet tomato sauce and about 1 to 2 pieces of pork.  We used to eat it on toasted white bread and loved it for breakfast and even after school snack. And sometimes ate it with rice too.  It's a Filipino thing (rice with everything).

Now this is my take on the canned pork and beans I grew up eating.   A simple dish made of 2 basic ingredients:  pork and beans! 

Ingredients

200 grams pork belly, cubed

300 grams French beans, cut into 2 inch pieces

2-3 cloves garlic, minced

salt and pepper to taste

vegetable oil 

chilli flakes (optional)

Method

Heat a shallow pan and add cooking oil.

Fry the pork pieces until crispy.  Set aside.

Using the same pan, add the garlic and cook until soft and fragrant. Do not overcook or burn.

Add the beans, and stir to cook the beans until bright green, about 2 minutes.

Add the cooked pork and stir to mix through.

Add the chilli flakes (if using) and stir.  Turn off heat.

Serve with steamed rice.

Salmon rissoles

As Lent is upon us, we like to eat more fish or seafood dishes this season.   As a Filipino parent, we try to instill in our kids traditions that we grew up with.  And as born Filipino Catholics, there's a lot of these traditions that come during Lent - from Ash Wednesday to Maundy Thursday to witness washing of the feet, to Good Friday to do the Stations of the Cross to Easter Sunday.   While we can't always do all these traditions because of timing and schedule, we do keep to our lenten sacrifice.

From Ash Wednesday, it's customary that we avoid eating meats on Fridays for the whole season of Lent.  In the past years, I have personally sacrificed eating meat for 40 days and it was a welcome change.   

Every year, each of the girls have their own fave food or habit which they sacrifice for the whole Lenten period.  Usually they give up chips, lollies, chocolates, soda, etc.  It's a good exercise of discipline as sometimes I forget and pack some in their lunch box, and then I get told off.  "Please don't add chips in my lunch box as I'm sacrificing that for lent, mum."  It's good for discipline and for the health too!

Now this is a fantastic option to our weekday or weekend menu.  Salmon rissoles.  They're easy and so inexpensive to make.  The recipe is adapted from Coles recipes.

Ingredients:

4 medium sized potatoes
 

30g unsalted butter

395g tin red salmon, drained and flaked

3-4 spring onions, chopped

1 cup breadcrumbs

zest and juice of 1 lemon

1 egg

1 cup corn flour


vegetable oil or light olive oil for frying



Method

Boil the potatoes until tender, 20-25 minutes.

Drain.  In a large bowl, mash the potatoes with 30g unsalted butter.

Add the flaked tinned salmon, bread crumbs, spring onions, egg, zest and juice of the lemon.

Mix and shape into patties.

Roll in corn flour and shake off excess.

Continue wth the rest of the patties.

Heat a pan on medium heat with enough oil for frying.

Pan fry the rissoles in batches, for 5-6 minutes or until golden.

Drain on paper towels.

Serve with garlic aoili (simply add crushed garlic into a cup of store bought mayonnaise) and a lemon wedge.

Tips and tricks:

*Variations on this rissoles, would be using tinned tuna or flaked smoked salmon;

* When shaping the patties/rissoles, make sure they are uniform in size to make cooking easy

* You can add other greens into the rissoles.  Chopped basil or chives will work great too.

Peanut butter cookies with coconut oil (made with homemade peanut butter)

Peanut butter cookies is one of the two things I remember we baked at home, while growing up.  We were not a baking family.  We were more grilling and stove top people.  The other thing we baked at home were pound cakes.  Yes!  And I remember we used Blue Bonnet butter.  US imports into the PI back then which were aplenty.  And pound cakes and peanut butter cookies were a staple in our kitchen.    The most fun out of making the peanut butter cookies were the criss cross patterns which me and my siblings would fight over who should do it.    

These days, with peanut butter overtaken by Nutella in recent years, the girls were not a bit interested with these.  So I had these to myself and my siblings when they came over.

I'd like to say these are healthy because butter is substituted with coconut oil, and we also made our own peanut butter.  So pretty much, we knew what went into these cookies. 

The cookies came out soft and chewy (as we wanted), but you can always make it crunchy.

If you want to make this with your own peanut butter, The Kitchn has the step by step-step easy procedure to make them.  Of you can simly use store-bought peanut butter.

First you will need peanuts.

For our version of this peanut butter, I used salted peanuts because I didn't want to add any more salt while making them.  I also roasted them in the oven first then cooled before making the nut butter.

Then they go into your food processor.  The first pulse gives you a grainy texture of milled or pounded nuts.

 

The next process gives you a smoother nut butter and almost ready to use.  I just added 2 tablespoons of vegetable oil and it was ready!  Poured into a jar and kept at room temperature.  It lasted for more than two weeks.   But of course, we ate them with warm Filipino pandesal bought from our local Asian grocer immediately.  Taste test for quality, as you do. 

To make the peanut butter, I adapted the recipe from Elise at Simply Recipes.

 

Ingredients:

100 grams caster sugar

125 grams light brown sugar, packed

 1/2 cup creamy peanut butter (store bought or home made)

1/2 cup coconut oil

1 egg

325 grams plain flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/2  teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

Method

In a medium sized bowl, combine the dry ingredients and mix with a whisk.

In the bowl of your stand mixer, beat the coconut oil and sugar until creamy, 2 or more minutes.

Add the peanut butter and eggs and continue beating until light and fluffy.

Add the dry ingredients in 3 batches, continuing to mix with every addition, and until the dough comes off the sides of the bowl. 

Wrap the dough in cling film and refrigerate for 3 hours.

Preheat oven to 175*C.  Prepare a cookie sheet with baking paper or silicone mat.

Shape the dough into rounds, golf ball size.  Place on the prepared pan/cookie sheet 2-3 inches apart.

Flatten the cookies using a fork with a criss cross pattern.

Bake in the oven for 15 minutes for chewy cookies, or until golden.

For crispy cookies, bake in a preheated 180*C oven for 10-12 minutes.

These cookies are not sweet, as I lessened the sugar a little bit, and they were surprisingly good.  There were no coconut flavour or odour which some people dislike when using coconut oil.

Tips and tricks:

* To use coconut oil, it helps when the oil is a little bit solid.  Usually, coconut oil solidifies when the weather is cooler.  If you use liquid coconut oil, it will take longer to beat it until light and fluffy.  To solidify your coconut oil, measure what you need and place it in the fridge overnight, and just take it out an  hour or more before using.  

* The cookies lasts longer than when butter is used.  I tested a few of these, and they kept for two weeks in an air tight container room temperature.

Oreo brownies for the school lunch box

Aah. The school lunch box.  What's in it today?   The school lunch box is a tricky thing you see, especially when schools are "nut-free" and all my girls just really want for is anything with Nutella.  Either that, or they'd rather have rice with anything (even hotdogs) than a ham and cheese sandwich.  Yes, I have raised them well into the Filipino food culture.


The new school year has started and we are back again into routine.  Morning lunch box prep, homework, assessments, piano lessons, cello, sports, etc etc etc.  Although we have minimised the girls out-of-school activities, I find that the start of the new school year always brings unnecessary anxiety.  Are the lunch boxes packed, water bottles, snacks, fruits.... do you have your library bag?, did I sign that permission note?, did we check head for lice? (yes - the most important of them all!).  Did we?  Did I?  .....


Sometimes I get organised and prep the lunches in the evenings and then get that extra few minutes of sleep in the mornings.  Most of the time, I open the fridge door in the morning and prep what's on offer.  Sometimes its a jam sandwich, or a cup of rice with what's left over from dinner, at odd times the girls will have some onigiri because I felt like I had superpowers for the day.


I drool at lunch box bento boxes prepared by other mums who I follow on IG like Nami from Just One Cookbook.  I want to, but at the same time, I don't.  Hahaha!  With 4 girls going back to school, I don't think I have enough superpowers to do them all equally attractive and bento-box like.


While I don't prepare bento-box like lunchboxes, I do love going back to their favourites and adapting them to the school's nut-free policy. This is a favourite brownie recipe with the nuts replaced with Oreos.  Now who doesn't love Oreos?

Ingredients

200g dark chocolate, chopped

125g butter, chopped into cubes

1 1/4 cups or 280g caster sugar

3/4 cup or 115g plain flour

1/4 cup or 30g unsweetened cocoa powder

150g Oreos (1 foil pack from the double-pack box), roughly chopped

3 eggs, slightly beaten

 3-4 packs mini Oreos for topping

Method

Pre-heat over to 180 degrees C. Line a 28cm X 18cm brownie pan with non stick baking paper.

Put the chocolate and butter into a heatproof bowl and place over a saucepan of simmering water, stirring occasionally until smooth. 

Remove the bowl from the heat and set aside to cool slightly, 5-10 minutes. 

Combine the sugar, flour, cocoa powder and Oreos in a large bowl. 

Using a wooden spoon, stir in the eggs and chocolate mixture until just combined.

Pour into the prepared pan, and top with the mini Oreos (as many or as little as you want) slightly pushing them into the batter.

Bake for 30-45 minutes, or until moist crumbs cling to a skewer when inserted into the centre.

 




Tips and tricks:

* Brownies are very versatile.  You can add any kind of nuts or leave them plain. 

*  Instead of Oreos, you can also top them with salted pretzels, Ferrero Rochers, Reese's cups - which I've seen from IG feeds.

* Here's another tip I learned from TAFE when lining square pans.  Cut the edges diagonally, and then slid them side by side to fit the pan.  No need to cut a square and line the sides. 

And so 7 weeks more before the next school holiday, but I'm not counting.  While I surrender back to the chaos and regularity that is our life, I also love sitting back and enjoying the peace and quiet when I'm not working and have the day to myself - which days have been filled with physical activity: walking and badminton and yes, more time in the kitchen to cook and bake.

Now, what's for the lunch box tomorrow?

Pork and chorizo sliders with jalapeno mayo

"Life is full of surprises and serendipity. Being open to unexpected turns in the road is an important part of success. If you try to plan every step, you may miss those wonderful twists and turns. Just find your next adventure - do it well, enjoy it and then, not now, think about what comes next." - Condoleezza Rice

Do you believe in fate?  Serendipity?  I do in most instances.  I mean there are small miracles that happen every day, I believe that.  I've experienced that. But serendipity are those little sometimes big, pleasant surprises that just happen.  Because of fate?  Maybe.  Luck?  Who knows.  But I do believe this.  That if you think something or visualise something so bad and pray for it, the forces of the universe will make it happen.  

Now maybe I'm a little naive about these things and believe too much in this crap, but truly I am amazed at how things turned out for someone I've connected with in IG.  We don't know each other personally, but she's contacted me a few weeks ago.  We had two things in common.  We're both Filipinos and into Instagram.  That's about it.  In the course of our email exchange, she mentions about looking for a job which I thought maybe, somehow I could help however way I can.  Working a few days at at government office and with limited connections myself I casually forwarded a job posting email which circulates around the office when positions fall vacant.  And from there,  a few weeks after that email exchange, it all turned quite magical.  Serendipty. A happy pleasant surprise!  She got the job which involves a project working closely with our branch!  I am amazed at how this all turned out.  Social networking does work!  And soon, I will get to meet her!

Not to mention through social networking, my eating and cooking adventures (and my family included) have evolved.    

Just looking at my Instagram feed, Pinterest, FB and reading other food bloggers' posts is always inspiring.  Recently though, I had some nostalgic kick craving and remembering a particular burger we loved to eat while hubby and me were still dating.  This was served at a small kiosk at the Greenbelt Plaza just outside the cinema.  This was during the early 90s but they disappeared later on during that decade. From what I've learned, they are now back with the same famous recipe for choriburger but with an entirely new look and logo.  

So here's a recipe inspired by an old favourite from back in Manila (Burger on the Run's Choriburger).  I was looking for Bun on the Run online and found a Pork and Chorizo burger by Emeril Lagasse's from the Food Network's Backyard Eats - which I found too complicated with so many spices so I made my own version.  We served this "for adults only" at that weekend birthday party.   The smell of the patties while cooking was so inviting, some of the kids kept coming into the kitchen and asking what's cooking.  "Sorry kids, this is for adults only."

Ingredients:

500g pork mince

3 fresh chorizo sausages, removed from casings

2 cloves garlic, finely chopped

1 onion, finely chopped

1/4 teaspoon paprika

1/4 teaspoon cajun pepper/seasoning

1 tablespoon corn flour (for binding)

salt and pepper for seasoning

 

Mix all the above ingredients by hand in a large bowl.  Shape into patties.  Set aside.

Using a pan griddle, or a simple pan, fry the patties in a little oil and cook until done.

To serve: thinly spread some jalapeno mayonnaise* on the rolls/buns, top with a pork-chorizo burger, some lettuce (add tomato slices and cucumbers if you prefer), and top with a good dollop of the jalapeno mayo*.  

*I wanted to make Emeril's green chilli mayonnaise but can't get poblano peppers at the time, so I made a simple Jalapeno mayonnaise.  Which was a mixture of 2 jalapeno peppers finely diced, mixed with a cup of mayonnaise. 

Tips:

•  Buy your chorizo fresh from the butcher or deli.  The supermarket variety will work but will not be the same because they are slightly cooked.  You will need to remove the chorizo from the casings which will be difficult to do with the commercial variety;

• You can make this as big as burgers or small as in for sliders (like this version);

 

Sometimes I think the fear of being vulnerable and taking a risk stops us from connecting with people.  Opening doors, in more ways than none, actually helps.  We create friendships and build little communities!   I love how blogging and social networks has helped me do this.  And taken my thirst for cooking and eating into new heights.

Oatmeal and raisin cookies

"All I really need to know, I learned in kindergarten..." - Robert Fulghum

Do you know this guy?  Robert Fulghum is a story teller.  An American non fiction writer who's writings of common things and life in general are as funny and interesting, as they are inspiring.  He is one of my favourite book authors.  And this -   All I really need to know I learned in kindergarten... is one of my fave from his books.  It has, since first publication sold more than 7 million as of its 15th anniversary edition in 2003.  I had my first copy of this book in 1998.  And I never stop going back to it.  Again and again and again.  Why?  Well because of the simplicity of the message.  And here's an excerpt from the book via Amazon:

"All I really need to know about how to live and what to do and how to be I learned in kindergarten. Wisdom was not at the top of the graduate-school mountain, but there in the sandpile at Sunday School. These are the things I learned:

Share everything.

Play fair.

Don't hit people.

Put things back where you found them.

Clean up your own mess.

Don't take things that aren't yours.

Say you're sorry when you hurt somebody.

Wash your hands before you eat.

Flush.

Warm cookies and cold milk are good for you.

Live a balanced life - learn some and think some and draw and paint and sing and dance and play and work every day some.

Take a nap every afternoon.

When you go out into the world, watch out for traffic, hold hands, and stick together.

Wonder. Remember the little seed in the Styrofoam cup: The roots go down and the plant goes up and nobody really knows how or why, but we are all like that.

Goldfish and hamsters and white mice and even the little seed in the Styrofoam cup - they all die. So do we.

And then remember the Dick-and-Jane books and the first word you learned - the biggest word of all - LOOK.

Everything you need to know is in there somewhere. The Golden Rule and love and basic sanitation. Ecology and politics and equality and sane living.

Take any one of those items and extrapolate it into sophisticated adult terms and apply it to your family life or your work or your government or your world and it holds true and clear and firm. Think what a better world it would be if we all - the whole world - had cookies and milk about three o'clock every afternoon and then lay down with our blankies for a nap. Or if all governments had as a basic policy to always put things back where they found them and to clean up their own mess.

And it is still true, no matter how old you are - when you go out into the world, it is best to hold hands and stick together."

- Robert Fulghm  

Print this Recipe

This recipe is adapted from Margaret Fulton's cookbook Baking - The Ultimate Sweet and Savoury Baking Collection.  

To make these chewy and healthy cookies:

250g unsalted butter, softened at room temperature

1 cup firmly packed, brown sugar

55g caster sugar

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

60ml milk

2 large eggs, lightly beaten

300g plain flour

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon bi-carbonate of soda

3 cups rolled oats

1 cup raisins or sultanas

 Sift the flour, cinnamon, salt, baking powder and bicarb soda in a bowl and set aside.

Using an electric mixer, cream the butter and sugar together untli light and fluffy.

Add the vanilla, milk and eggs and beat until mixed through.

Add in the dry ingredients and continue to beat until just combined.

Take off bowl from your stand mixer, and using a wooden spoon, stir in the rolled oats and raisins.  You will have a lumpy slightly wet dough.

Place the bowl in the refrigerator to chill until firm - several hours or overnight.

Preheat your oven to 180*C.  Grease and line trays or cookie sheets with baking paper.

Using an ice cream scoop or tablespoon, scoop out dough and form into balls.

Arrange on baking tray/s and press down slightly with a fork.

Bake for 15-20 minutes or until golden.  Do not overbake.  At this point, the cookies should be slightly soft in the centre.

Remove from oven and transfer to a wire rack to cook

These cookies are great and healthy - they are chewy which is the kind that we like at home.  They kept for 2 weeks in an airtight container in the kitchen.  Two or three went into lunch boxes, some nibbled while waiting for dinner, some taken with milk (and coffee) and they're just all-around simple cookies.  No fancy schmancy pants here.

I think sometimes we need to be reminded that life can be simple.  That its okay to slow down.  That its okay to be late.  And that mess and dishes in the kitchen can wait.  That we should count our blessings (and be grateful for what we have). That prayers are answered.  And that cookies and milk, do make you feel good. 

And here's another quote from American politician Barbara Jordan - " Think what a better world it would be if we all, the whole world, had cookies and milk about three o'clock every afternoon and then lay down for a nap."

Enough said. 

Cookies and milk please.

Sugar-free blueberry buttermilk muffins

Blueberries are a favourite at our home.  Fresh or frozen, these small round blue fruits are always in our fridge/freezer.  When they're on sale at the supermarket, we get heaps and freeze them.  They're the gold nuggets of fruits.  Full of antioxidants and Vitamin C.   Add that to a sugar-free muffin batter and you've got something that's a real treat - in taste and in nutrients.


Don't get me wrong, we love our sweets and desserts and cupcakes at home, but there are times when healthy is the best route and best way to exercise restraint.  Of course, I'm talking about the adults in our home.    These are  muffins are moist but has that slight crunch on top thanks to buttermilk and just smells divine coming out of the oven.

To make this guilt-free muffins, I've substituted Natvia 100% Natural Sweetener for the same amount of sugar called for in the recipe,  inspired by the Australian Women's Weekly Best Food Cookbook.

 (Print the recipe here)

325g plain flour

150g Natvia 100% Natural Sweetener

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

Zest and juice of one orange

1 large egg

250ml buttermilk

120ml vegetable oil

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 cups frozen blueberries

Slowly stir the dry ingredients with the blueberries to avoid too much bleeding of the fruits into the batter.

Preheat oven to 190*C.  Line 2  muffin trays (12 half-cup capacity) with liners or simply spray with canola oil.  Or you can also use just one 1-cup capacity 12-cup tray.)

In a jug or large measuring cup, mix together buttermilk, oil, egg and vanilla.

In a large mixing bowl, combine all dry ingredients and zest and stir to combine.  

Add the frozen blueberries and gently stir.  

Add the wet ingredients and the orange juice into the dry ingredients and stir slowly using a wooden spoon to incorporate the ingredients together.  Do no over stir.

Scoop the batter using an ice cream scoop or a tablespoon into the lined muffin tray, two thirds full.

Place in the oven and bake for 25-30  minutes or until the tops are golden.  A skewer should also come out clean when you test for doneness.

Leave to cool in the trays for 5-10 minutes then transfer to a wire rack.

A healthy treat in lunch boxes and take-to-the-office morning tea.  These are guilt-free muffins.  So really, there's no need for restraint.  But if you need to, just keep them in airtight containers in the fridge and warm in the microwave when you need one.  Or two.  

Oreo chunk double chocolate cookies

"C is for cookie, that's good enough for me.  C is for cookie, that's good enough for me.  ..... Oh cookie, cookie, cookie starts with C." - Cookie Monster, Sesame Street

Let me just say that these cookies are damn good.  They are.  And no doubt when you try and make one batch of this, it'll be gone faster than the time you actually spent making them.  I first saw these cookies from Instagram and then discovered the lady who made them - Lauren from Lauren's Latest.  

I take off my hat to Lauren for creating this simple cookie recipe which makes my girls really happy every single time they're on the kitchen bench.  And when they're not... well, we then have to make it.  Really quick.

To make these heavenly-OMG-they're-really-good cookies, I've tweaked Lauren's recipe a bit to suit our cookie preference.  Cookies with a little bit more height (I've added baking powder) and more chocolatey (I've increased the cocoa a tiny bit.)

120g butter, softened to room temperature

1 cup caster sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 egg

1 cup plain flour

1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa 

(we've made these using different brands - Nestle, Cadbury, Hersheys -  and the quality stays the same)

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup dark chocolate bits (or roughly chopped dark chocolate blocks)

7 pieces Oreo cookies, roughly chopped

Preheat oven to 175* C.  Line baking trays/cookie sheets with baking paper.

In a medium sized bowl, add the dry ingredients and mix with a wire whisk.  Set aside.

In a large bowl (if using a hand held beater or the bowl of your stand mixer), cream together soft butter and sugar until creamy and pale.  Scrape down the sides of the bowl every now and then to make sure butter and sugar are coming together.

Add the vanilla and eggs, and lightly beat until mixed through.  Scrape down the sides of the bowl and continue mixing until you have a pale batter.

Add the dry ingredients gradually mix until you get a soft dough.

Add the Oreo chunks and chocolate bits and stir with a wooden spoon.  

Chill in the refrigerator for 30 minutes until firm.

Using an ice cream scoop or a tablespoon, scoop out cookie dough and shape into balls.

Place on cookie sheet/s.   Lightly press each cookie with your fingers to flatten.  

Bake in the preheated oven for 8 minutes or until the cookies have a matte/flat colour (It will be shiny during the first few minutes of baking).

Slide off the baking paper/sheets with the cookies onto a cooling rack and cool until firm.

Enjoy!

So tell me.  Are you a fan of networking sites like Instagram or Pinterest or Tumbler?  Do you get inspired by the photos from these sites?   Well, you already know I do.  How about you?

Beef and burgundy pies, calzone / empanada

Half way through to Term1 and the girls have settled in calmly at school. B who is now in Year 9 has taken electives in school that somehow (as a mum, I hope) would imbibe a new kind of interest, away from social networking and other non mind stimulating endeavours. Let’s see how and where Commerce and Visual Arts will take her this year. And for the first time, the NOW big girls will sit in separate Year 3 classes. Well somewhat. As two (A and S) are together in one class and (J) is the one separated. And half way thru, we can already see slight changes in their confidence and maturity.

And on the home front, we’ve done the most exciting step! We moved house! Not at all that grand in terms of distance (a few short blocks away), but still as crazy and overwhelming. Clearly not your ordinary kind of start to the year. But we’re just as glad and feel blessed that we found the perfect place. So we have been busy for what seemed like forever – from searching for the rental house, to inspections, to packing, cleaning, packing, cleaning, packing, cleaning, and now, cleaning, unpacking, cleaning unpacking, cleaning, unpacking. No complaints here. Just feelings of relief. Exhausting and crazy, but relieved. And so, for weeks now, with the start of the school year and the moving thing going on, writing/blogging has taken a back seat. Not that anyone actually notices, I know! Cooking never stops though. It’s a daily routine and taking photos of what we eat at home takes centre stage online – getting addicted with instagram much. Photos to upload and drafts to edit are patiently waiting for attention.

But before all these excitement was a meat pie attempt at home. For the new school year, we made some home made meat pies to pack in those lunch boxes. This recipe is inspired by the doyenne of the Australian culinary scene, Margaret Fulton - beef and burgundy pie recipe from the Margaret Fulton’s Encyclopaedia of Food and Cookery. We’ve managed to ruin our pastry from scratch and used store bought puff pastry, so this version became one easy recipe to follow.

1k beef chuck steak, cut into cubes

60g or 1/2 cup flour

Cayenne pepper
1 onion, diced
3-4 pieces of bacon with rind, diced

250g mushrooms

Half a bunch of thyme

125ml merlot

125ml vegetable or beef stock

2 tbsp olive oil
25g butter

Salt and pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 150*C.

In a large bowl, mix together the flour and cayenne pepper.  Dip the beef cubes into the flour mixture and turn to coat.  (This eliminates the process of patting dry the meat pieces in order to brown them properly.  The flour coating also acts as a thickener in the dish during the finishing stages).

Using a large heavy-based saucepan or cast iron pot on medium heat, add oil and butter.  

Stir in the diced bacon and cook until golden and crisp.  Remove from pan and set aside.

In the same pan, brown the coated beef cubes a few pieces at a time, making sure all sides are browned, then aside.

Add the onions into the pan/pot and cook until soft, then add the mushroom.

Add back the browned beef cubes and bacon and continue cooking.  

Add the thyme, wine and stock to deglaze the pot/pan. 

Cover and place in the preheated oven and cook for 1-2hours or until meat is tender.

Cool completely. 

We prepared the filling a day early to let it cool down. Using a fork, the meat was coarsely shredded and set aside while the pastry thaws from the freezer section of the supermarket. Half cup muffin tins were used to prepare the meat pie versions, but we opted the easier route after one tray and wrapped the fillings in ala calzone-empanada versions. The pies are finished off with some egg wash, baked in a 160°degrees pre-heated oven until crisp and golden. About 30-40minutes.

These pies were wrapped with love and into the girls lunch boxes on their first day of school. Even hubby enjoyed and endorsed these at work. These are an absolute delight to eat! Seriously good melt in the mouth flavours wrapped in flaky savoury pastry. The little empanada varieties looked so great and bite sized, we’re making them for the next call-out for school morning tea!

Yield? Not quite sure.. but let me see. We made 12 pieces using the half-cup muffin tins, about 5 large calzone types, and about 24 cocktail sized empanadas. The filling plus 20 sheets of store-bought puff pastry could yield an approximate 36 using standard ½-cup muffin tins. Approximately.

PS – as I haven’t written for like weeks now, there was a kind of anxiety logging in to blogger. You know that kind when you know you have to face something, but you’re dreading it because of the enormity of the task? Well, it felt was like that. And to think this is just a personal. Ay-ay-ay!