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This wasn’t worthy of a title because I didn’t get the roasted barbecue corn to use in my salad. But otherwise:

Reasonable sized Denver steak cut. Get to room temperature and carry out any other tenderising procedures if so bothered. 

Marinade:

3 tbsp honey bourbon, 1 tbsp golden sesame oil, white pepper, sweet paprika, and red chilli flakes to taste. Little pineapple juice could be nice, too. 

Done rare. To taste the denver. 

[sulla-slays-cronulla]

Mutton Pesto Pasta

Less about the recipe than showing off my giant shells. AT LAST! Cost 8.50 per half kg but worth it. 

Baked (230C) sweet potato and some chickpeas at the bottom. Time it nicely as 20 mins for potatoes and meat sauce. 

250g mutton - quick stir fry, no need oil due to fat content. 

1-2 tbsp each of black pepper and paprika. 

1 tbsp red wine vinegar

1/2 cup beef stock with 1/4 cup full fat milk

2 tablespoons sundried tomato pesto

Stir then add in rough chopped 200g red spinach. Leave on low heat for fifteen or so minutes, final few minutes to reduce the sauce on higher heat if necessary

Leisurely chop and add two pickles and 1/2 a teaspoon of capers near the end for saltiness. 

[sulla-slays-cronulla]

Baden-Arabian Yoghurt-cake?

Saudi-inspired coffee dessert with German honey & dates.

Don’t you just hate it when you splurge on cherries and have left over cream cheese, then you plan to make hotcakes to eat them with but instead find black forest honey shipped from Saudi Arabia and crave a spicy coffee Middle Eastern-style cheesecake you aren’t prepared for instead? Yeah, me too. Plus side, either way you get to purchase then eat vanilla-macadamia ice cream to have with it.

Get cream cheese to room temperature first.

 Base (8” baking dish)

-          60g plain flour

-          64g rough blitzed walnuts and black oats. Was about half-half.

-          34g salted spreadable butter

Mix the butter in by hand, roll into breadcrumby texture.

-          Add around or sightly under well-beaten half of a mixture of 1 egg, 2 tbsp very cold milk, 1tsp vanilla. Set rest aside for later.

-          1 tbsp strong instant espresso powder and 3 tablespoon golden raisins: Blitz into a delicious and fragrant paste.

Mix into the rest of dough. Roll out and press into smaller circular baking dish. It should go about an inch up the sides

-          Blink bake at 170C for ten minutes.

Body

5 apricots, 6 (Seeberger, very mild flavour) dates

1 small orange of zest

2.5 tbsp Langnese Black Forest Honey *******

3 Star anise (strong, giant Indian), 2 cloves (very strong), 3 tbsp cinnamon (brand not strong), 1 tsp nutmeg

2 squares 100% dark chocolate, handful raisins

115g Cream cheese, 60g yogurt

¼ cup wholemeal flour, bak-pow-sod, 40g blitzed coated almonds

½ egg (from earlier with milk n vanilla) + 1 yolk

 5 fresh and ideally slightly over-ripe apricots with 6 German (really?) dates. Chop roughly. Chernobyl in a microwaveable mug for 3+ mins until reduced and gooey. Stir quickly to cool and be rid of humidity, add finely or even a bit roughly ground spice mix of:

-          2 cloves, 2-3 large star anise, cinnamon and nutmeg to taste, leftover or additional raisin-coffee paste. It’ll be in the blender anyway.

½ pack Philadelphia cream cheese, ~115g

Quick hand-blend the room temp. cheese then add:

40g in ‘shell’ rough blitzed almonds

Around a quarter cup of superfine whole(grain?) flour. Might I add here, this idiot forgot baking soda and powder in the flour and added in at the very last step, which explains the surface texture. I don’t know what measurements to actually use but let us approximate: ½ tsp powder, 1 tsp soda.

2.5 tbsp or more if you cannot resist because it is utterly incredible, Langnese Black Forest honey

Blend lightly again

Add 60g sugar free and fat free yogurt. Mix lightly

Add the orange zest, spiced date & apricot goo – hopefully it has cooled a bit

Lastly add to the residual egg mix from earlier 1 more yolk, beat properly. Pour half at a time into the mixture and incorporate quickly at each.

Final touch as you pre-heat oven t 180C:

Some rough chopped golden raisins (small handful?) and 2 squares of 100% dark chocolate. It will melt slightly so stir in juuust as you’re about to pour the batter into the cake tin.

Bake for around 35 minutes at 180C.

Not any longer because the cookie base will burn.

Cool then chill in fridge over night.

So for mine, the sides rose fast and cracked, then steadily the centre, then a slow return to flatness. Could therefore reduce raising agents but I kind of liked it. very visual. However less would mean a smoother rise, which is not necessary because the yogurt makes it a lovely light, moist cake.

Here, the specimen has been opened to obtain clear view of flesh. 

Overall, the quality of ingredients matters most here: The honey, anise, apricots, and especially type of date used. Would need to make a few adjustments to flavour if the dates for example were Ajwa or even Chinese red. Then the strong spices and black honey would not work well.

Why do we even use sugar when all of this tastes and is better…

Had with Stemilt sweet cherries and Farggi Vainilla con nueces de macadamia ice cream – of course this is with sugar, oopsie.

   Reminder to try making these another time:

https://nadiashealthykitchen.com/kleicha-date-cookies/

[sulla-slays-cronulla]

Pomegranate-Pistachio Van Houten Cake

Very rich, heavy chocolate cake. It was improv first time round, based on the Hershey’s choc cake basic recipe, next time I think more liquids. Just unsure what or how that will affect baking, which took 84 minutes. Crazy. Baked in two trays covered with foil, stacked atop each other, at 160C. So the temp and time would change as well. I switched the tiers every 18 or so minutes. 

Requires two water-tight baking dishes - just used wax paper, no need to butter up. 

Measured the mixing bowl first, then measured final batter. Subtracted bowl weight and divided by two to get the even weight for each tier. 

Dry - largest bowl

1 cup wholemeal and 3/4 cup plain flour

100 g blitzed pistachio

3/4 cup cocoa powder, unsweetened. 1.5 tsp baking soda and baking powder, hefty pinch salt. I have literally no idea what I’m doing with raising agents and the recipe was too complicated to figure it out from chemical-math-scratch. 

Wet - bowl. ‘Whisk’ wet into dry once mixed. 

(you cannot actually whisk, way too thick)

1 egg + 1 yolk

1/2 cup olive oil 

vanilla

200g warm sour cream (this should be 240g but the packet was only 200g. So.)

4-5tbsp jam - pomegranate and raspberry

6-8 tbsp pomegranate molasses

Prepare in mugs aside to pour into main batter while oven is preheating:

250g fresh pomegranate, melt in saucepan or microwave ~mins. Add 1.5 tbsp honey. Option to strain the liquid but this depends on your health & texture preferences. Felt more authentic with the full fruit. - hot

2tbsp coffee powder in 250ml of pistachio milk - hot

(Using the milk instead of boiling water makes a much thicker batter. One option is to increase the pomegranate juice proportion, as opposed to a) adding an egg white or b) adding sour cream

Next Day! Because I finished angrily checking baked-ness until 1 in the krupping morning. 

Decor: Powerberry Fig Cream Cheese Filling and Pomegranate Ganche

Get your chilled tiers out. 

Make your syrup. 

This is 3/4 of a tiny bottle of powerberry juice reduced with 3 large, chopped dry figs. It takes around half an hour, transfer it to a glass and chill for a few minutes in freezer immediately after. There shouldn’t be any ‘liquidity’ surviving, this is the appearance: 

Get half a pack of philly cream cheese (I think that’s approx 115g)  to room temperature with 2-3 tablespoons of very cold full cream milk. Whip well, until fairly soft and fluffy but eh, who cares, cakes will squish it anyway. Mix 2 tbsp of the berry-fig syrup into the cheese, quick whip with hand mixer to even out. Spread across cake with dollops of more syrup atop. 

I am the miracle worker that manages to choose the smaller of the baked cake halves to be on the bottom. Sigh. 

Anyway, the next step is ganache which should be left to personal style. I wanted chonky. 

Melted 4 tiny Green & Blacks 85% choco bars in some coconut oil, adding 1 tsp pomegranate molasses (or half? don’t know), honey (1/2 tbsp), jam (1.5tbsp), more cocoa powder (tbsp) to even out the icky sharp commercial sugar taste, and finally high quality butter 1.5 lady thumb chunk for the very best sheen and edge of flavour. 

Used microwave (low) to melt it, stirring consistently in between blasts because apparently it’s more convenient to risk radiated food than to clean a pot and glass dish. Pour over cake. Jiggle to even out. This is a thick one so it wont be shiny or waterfall down the edges. 

See ganache and filling width. 

The cream cheese core is particularly good, so next time, if fancy enough to pipe, I would use some to decorate the top as well. 

[sulla-slays-cronulla]

Fruity Houjicha Lattea Tart

Starting with CRUST 

                        Dry

- 57g wholemeal flour

- 63g ground almonds

- salt as preferred, 2-3 tbsp Allspice mix (because I was lazy and didn’t want to decide carefully what to use)

32g unsalted butter

Mix together by rolling gently between fingers, should resemble fine breadcrumbs. 

                        Wet

1 egg (Chew’s king-sized)

1 tbsp molasses

1/2 or 1tbsp pecan oil, didn’t really measure

1 tsp vanilla essence

Pour into the dry and quickly mix together by hand. It was an obscenely perfect result first try although every measurement was random convenience and feel. I wonder if that’ll ever happen again...

(was a weensy bit of the molasses in the bottom of the egg-wet bowl that I used later)

Roll out thin on baking paper if going to plop into a wider tart dish that’s salted butter lined. 

Blind baked this at 170C for 7 minutes because I wasn’t sure if it would burn, but after taste test it can deffo handle a longer pre-bake. The aroma is unreal. 

Moving onto to central body & fruit toppers

- 1 tbsp apple cider vinegar into chopped fruit bowl (prevent browning)

(in here are the apple, sun plums, nectarines, 1/2 strawberries, jam)

- 1 massive Pacific Rose apple sliced

- 2 white nectarines sliced

- 2 sun plums sliced

- 1 blue plum / soury dark red/black one [topper, thin slice]

- 5 strawberries rough chopped + 5 strawberries [topper, thin slice]

- 60g mixed cashew and macadamia nuts, rough blended or chopped

- 10 chopped dried cherries (sugar free)

- 9 g unsalted butter

- 1 tbsp natural brown sugar -> put into teeny remainder of egg-bowl molasses, stir to dissolve

- 2-3 tbsp sugar free peach jam (+ / or flower honey if you have it)

- 1 tbsp Cointreau

And, a portion according to your taste of a ‘Coconut Lattea’

       - 2 ground tablespoons of genmai houjicha (for baking)

       - 5-6 tbsp light coconut milk

       - 1 tsp cinnamon

       - 1 tbsp peach jam or flower honey as sweetener. Fine if less or none

1. On not-so-high heat, toast (9g) butter for a couple of minutes in a non-stick pan. 

Add (2-3tbsp) peach jam to the sliced fruits & vinegar, but keep the thin sliced toppers off to the side and the chopped dried cherries for a bit later. 

2. Once it starts to have a slightly milk-caramelly aroma, pour in the main body fruit bowl. 

Stir a little to get it all nice coated in butter, add the brown sugar, allow to cook and reduce a bit. Takes about 6-12 minutes? Didn’t pay attention to total time. 

Add the chopped cherries approx. 2-3 minutes in so they spread their deliciousness to the rest.

3. Once the liquid in the pan is starting to make kind of a crackling sound (that’s the fruit sugars), or you’re satisfied with the apple condition, add the nuts and coconut lattea: Half, or full amount, or half + more coconut milk to the pan. Whatever flavour profile and texture you’re in the mood for. This version is around half of the coconut lattea mixture to experience more of the fruit medley.  

Within a minute of adding nuts and ‘milk’ it will be thickening, add the Cointreau mini shot to give it a citrus rounding and bodily punch, stir, and you can turn the heat off and move pan to side.

4. Herd into tart dish, decorate with toppers, and pre-heat oven to 180C. 

Arrange the slices as you please, I chose central strawberries because concentrated strawberry sugar-syrup is awesome. 

This was ~30 minutes baking and could have done more but I was worried about the tart base burning. Didn’t need to be. 

yes, this is a very superfluous pre-bake photo but whatever. Would be great with ice cream. Is a very, very light dessert. 

[sulla-slays-cronulla]

Atomic Okonomiyaki - Sweet Chilli Tuna Frittata

Thought this was a mistake to attempt for a little while there, but glad I did. 

Ingredients

1 can sunflower oil tuna

1 can chilli tuna - 3star inferno Ayam Brand (Optional to use two of these instead of mixing with 1 plain tuna, but... it is quite spicy)

3/4 mug of chopped (sweet) Malaysian pumpkin. Microwave until easily mash-able with spoon or fork, you should keep the skin too. 

3/4 cup of drained corn (canned type)

1 egg

1 ladle of flour / thickener

2 whole sprigs (I think this was about 8-12 stalks) of coriander, finely chopped

1-2 tbsp black pepper, 1 tbsp coriander seeds/ ground 

[next time will maybe include some type of strong and salty sauce but for now wanted to experiment clean, and it was already on the verge of too watery]

Method

After beating the egg and spices, basically toss everything else in. If you want to include the chillis from the tuna can would be better blended or finely chopped before mixing in. Flour is last. 

The batter is quite liquid, not least because of the oil from both tuna serves. So one option is to drain a little of it out over time, or add more thickener / pumpkin and chill for a bit before frying. 

These were difficult and tedious to fry (but so yum). Even on medium-high heat each side of a significantly flattened piece is 3-5 minutes. 

I got ONE properly shaped omucake but then destroyed it. My flipping skills are lame. 

Soba noodle salad was with chopped red daikon, cucumber, baby cai xin, and forgetting how gravity works so basically carpet bombing with roasted sesame seeds. And yes, my tablecloth is bubble wrap. 

Made a beef version as well. with... pumpkin and sundried tomato pesto. Don’t remember what else went in but pretty enjoyable. Very moist. 

[sulla-slays-cronulla]

Cashew-Chestnut Pancakes

Basic Pocketcake Recipe:

Dry

120g boiled chestnuts - Roughly blended

60g roasted cashews (used ones have cane sugar) - Roughly blended

40g wholemeal flour

1tsp salt; 1/2 tsp baking soda; 1/2 tsp baking powder (did not measure, do not know proper proportions)

Mixed spices (Cinnamon, Allspice, Nutmeg) 1.5 tbsp

(next time could try adding chopped golden raisins for sweetness if no cane sugared cashews)

Keep aside - Two 99% dark chocolate squares rough chopped

Wet

1 egg - beaten

1/2 cup unsweetened oat milk; 1/3 cup full cream milk. Warmed, add just under a tablespoon of red wine vinegar. Allow five minutes for a small buttermilk conversion. 

Procedure:

Combine all the dry

Combine all the wet - do not accidentally cook the egg in hot milk. 

Poured the wet into the dry. Whatevs. Mix with whisk or fork or anything until reasonably well incorporated. This is a chunky batter. 

(Taste test here would be a good idea)

Add the chocolate chips, final light stir. 

Fry either on non-stick pan or with some butter of choice. 

Butter gives the nice edge rings, no butter produces smooth surface. Did both. 

Finished with a covered gentle heating in the toaster, around 4 minutes. Stacked 3, wrapped in foil. Didn’t want the inside to be raw and didn’t want to squish them too much in the pan. 

Makes 9. 

Minor disaster with the second round pan temperature but overall very edible. 

First eating: Lazy version.

Too hungry and tired to do a proper sauce, had with a juicy orange and some bourbon infused cheddar. Extra choco sprinkles and golden raisins. 

Second Eating: Premium ZOMG

I made the sauce. Woah. We are truly blessed with what supermarkets offer. 

Mandarin Date Sauce (Alcoholic)

4 Jeju Mandarins - These were a bit fridge-spoiled so a good use of them. Leave some of the pith so there’s a slightly bitter marmalade-y flavour. 

Squish and heat for ~30 minutes

Add 1.5 tablespoons 100% date sauce

Reduce further, another 20 minutes or until you’re satisfied with the thickness.

Transfer into container, add a full tablespoon of Cointreau liqueur. Stir. 

Topping Combination

- 1 chopped dark chocolate square

- Handful of delicious (sugar free) jumbo red raisins

So utterly delicious. Much wow. Had with the last two pancakes. 

Literally cannot even.

*Celestial choir* 

Edit:

These were requested again. This time used some chopped pecans and 20 or 30g extra of cashews with pretty much the same proportions for everything else. Result is much sweeter and oddly fluffier? Perhaps I added more baking powder this time as well. 

[sulla-slays-cronulla]

Red Pepper Chicken

Ingredients:

~900g Chicken Drumsticks

For the sauce:

2-4 red chillis (blended)

1/2 large red bell pepper (blended)

4 tbsp olive oil

2 tbsp sugar free mustard

1/2 tbsp honey

Hot red cayenne pepper (to personal taste, but 1 tbsp for me)

Black pepper (1tbsp) Thyme (a pinch) 1 tsp salt

Accompanying Grilled Morsels:

Other half red bell pepper (sliced)

4 chonky garlic cloves (whole)

1 small/medium sweet potato (cubed)

1 small fennel bulb (rough sliced)

Tasmanian bush pepper cheese

Out of this packet I was least interested in the bush pepper cheese but it was DELICIOUS. Ate more than half the rectangle instead of using it for ingredients. 

Procedure: Grill at 220C / 240C for over an hour.

Since I combined several recipes, there was a compromise between ones that recommended 240C and others 200C. I think the lower only works for browning if you have a high sugar coating for the chicken and veggies. 

After around 55minutes I gave up on the 220C and cranked it up all the way to brown. Reheating leftovers also used the mega toasty to roast the vegetables proper. I wonder if the chicken was so juicy and tender because of the lower temperature start, though. 

[sulla-slays-cronulla]

Blue Cheese Burger

This was fun. Found some blue cheese soaked in Raboso wine at the store, and bought sesame bread to confect a beef burger with it. 

Beef Patties

300g beef - fatty

finger length of chopped leek ; 1 chopped green chilli, 2 sliced garlic choves

               To start with, fry the leeks then the chillis in salted butter

               After those are done, toast the garlic so its browned and sweet. Chop

              Add to small mixing bowl with desired amount of salt ~1 tsp

erm... no measurements taken henceforth, here goes:

Handful of coriander, roughly shredded

1-2 tbsp worreshestakewwada whatever sauce 

1-2 tbsp ground paprika, <2 tbsp ground fennel & cumin, 1-2tbsp garam masala

Fry burgers in high temperature grape seed oil. It was around 3 minutes per side but to be perfectly honest, I do not recall and did not record. I’m sure by eye and instinct is good enough. 

Then bread, and salad, and cheese. The wine flavour of the cheese is quite overwhelming without a very salty-flavour-punchy burger to balance it out. I did take slightly too much cheese. 

For the second round I melted the cheese on. Quite shiok. 

Now the bread was of course toasted, and then, because the burgers are somewhat chonky and I did not wish to squish, they went into the oven after for less than 4 minutes. Did not want to risk eating this beef raw buuut it was in for slightly too long and some juiciness was vanquished. 

[sulla-slays-cronulla]

Tom Yam Toman

Sides

Angel hair ‘sketti with a final stir fry in tom yam sauce and oil. 

Quick boil: Some random slightly bitter leafy greens and Fish roe fish balls

I sliced up a hand-sized chunk of pumpkin and 1 Vietnamese beetroot. About 2 tablespoons of cold coconut oil, and other stuff I have forgotten, and a whole lime, all roasted at 220C for a little over an hour. 

The fish

was a packet of Toman, maybe 180g. Marinated in 3tbsp vegetarian oyster sauce, <1 tbsp sesame oil, some dried basil (fresh would be better), coarse black pepper, optional chilli powder, chunk of sliced and crushed ginger. The basil immediately mellowed out the other flavours. 

Fish slices cooked on fairly hot pan, takes about 1 minute each side. Option to snare what’s left of the gravy after, pour into pan and roll the green veggies around in it, for example. 

[sulla-slays-cronulla]

Shambles: Green Tea cookies

Did not measure properly, it was simply a snack I wanted and the major challenge was getting the texture workable. 

130g salted cashews and macadamia mix plus 1 cup of baked cashews. Blitzed unto powder.

30g self-raising flour

2 tbsp green tea powder.

1 tsp salt.

1-2 tbsp cinnamon

2 tbsp desiccated coconut

3tbsp molasses and 3tbsp honey

3 tbsp coconut oil - extra virgin

they went in at 180C but I think next time I’ll try 160C so the edges don’t burn. In total it was 12minutes at 180C, a cookie turn away from edges, and a further 5 at 160C. 

If i had a pomegranate jam I would make a dark chocolate ganache to line them, and add those adorable little salted sakura flowers...

[sulla-slays-cronulla]

Undecided Anpans - Matcha Red Bean

They weren’t bad, but I can’t say I loved them? Based on recipe by Okonomi Kitchen (here: https://www.okonomikitchen.com/redbeanfilledmatchabuns/ ) but with a lot of flour, liquid, and oven related improvisations and perhaps inadvisable folding. 

Instead of 200g bread flour:

40g plain, 80g wholemeal, 80g self-raising flour and 11g ground pistachio

Should have been 3g of yeast but the scale broke, sooooo.... no idea

20g butter (melted), salt optional

Instead of 20g sugar --> 1.5 tbsp maple syrup, 5g brown sugar

9g matcha powder

Instead of soy milk --> 160ml total of plain low fat yogurt and pistachio milk. I melted the butter in a cup with this.

* mix all together and rest for an hour or until doubled in size. I left the bowl balanced on top of the just-boiled kettle, so it was quick.

Then, you need 176g of red bean paste (my proportions were 240g redbean : 100g attap : 60g coconut flesh) , home made, mixed flavours, whichever you please, and some plain cooked red beans (~50g). 

Start separating the dough with a digital scale - if it works - each bun is 70g. 

Rest, covered, warm for 15-30 minutes to rise. 

Tried two different roll out techniques, the square and bao. Um. I don’t know, I think the shaping didn’t take full advantage of fluffiness and ability to rise. 

Did not cut the sides

Once folded and rested once more for half an hour to double again:

They were in the convection oven at 180C for 20minutes plus a flipped final 5 minutes. There’s a problem with heat distribution in this one, otherwise I doubt baking time would be above 18 minutes. 

(The leftover of my red bean pot, with the coconut, attap and all, was then combined with a small can of washed lychees and light-ish coconut milk for 5-6 red bean ice cream sticks)

[sulla-slays-cronulla]

Pan Sun-Fried Cod and Squid Ink Aglio Olio

Everything honestly tastes better with chopsticks. 

Clearance Fish – it was a 180g chunk. Defrost gently. 

1 tbsp sundried tomato oil, 3.5 mins each side, glass cover on. was in heated toaster for a few minutes, sides covered to not dry out. Lots of oil spitting. 

* Next time will do 4 mins each side

* Luckily did not salt the fish, it’s already quite potent. 

Aglio olio 3-4 chopsticks squid ink pasta, cooked 1 min less than required, cooled in water. 2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil 2 finely sliced garlic cloves 1 tbsp chilli flakes 7 capers Caper-pinch of salt Cold crispy salad

[sulla-slays-cronulla]

Red-Bellied Pandan Mini Cheesecakes

Fancy red-bean insides, low sugar. Also, this is a bottomless version, feel free to make your own adaptations.

Makes 10 of them. Took around 25 minutes, baked at 170C. 

- 50-100g red bean, pressure cook for 1 hour after an overnight soak and proper wash.

- 45g total of dry chopped red dates and wolfberries. 

- marinate in choice of liquid sweeteners, e.g. tbsp each of coconut water, maple syrup, red wine, whatever suits best. 

- Combine with red beans after around an hour of warm, gentle soaking and cook a little to reduce liquid

- Mix later with red bean, 10 attap seeds, and 3+ tbsp fresh coconut. Total amount is approximately 1 cup. 

- Optional: Some gula melaka or brown sugar

A portion of it (above) is blended with the sticky fresh attap chee and coconut flesh. 

Cheesecake Body

Step 1:

5 pandan leaves and a whole fresh coconut advised

1/3 cup coconut water (fresh if you can)

1/3 cup light coconut milk

2/3 cup naturally sweetened pistachio milk

big chunk salted butter

* Cook together in saucepan, add according to sweetness preference after it has a cooled a bit 2 tbsp of normal honey, 2 tbsp flower honey, 1-2 tbsp gula melaka

Place in a cup after 30-45 minutes on low heat. 

Step 2:

140g cream cheese

1/4 cup wholemeal flour

2 egg yolks

Optional to do separately: Fluff-meringue up some egg whites for a lighter mixture. Only used a bit of it. 

* Add 1/2 of the pandan liquid glass before the egg white component. This helps judge how liquid it will end up. 

Mix well. 

Pre-heat oven to 170C.

Butter line the muffin cups or line the base/make a base. Pour around half the mixture into 10 tiny tins. 

Then dole a portion of the sweet red bean paste + some general bean-date-berry chunks mixed into each.

Cover with last of mixture. 

You may have to squish the paste down a bit, which is why it sticks to the bottom. Could also try shaping it into flat, wide discs? 

Finished appearance: 

[sulla-slays-cronulla]

Cherry-Matcha Pistachio Cheesecake

*This tasted much sweeter prior to baking. Remember next time. Means it could work even better as a non-baked version. 

Low carbohydrate, low sugar 

Base 

Baked at 180C for 11 minutes

80g total of ground almonds and a handful of rough crushed pistachios

55g wholemeal flour, 1 teaspoon (or to taste) of salt

50g butter, heat until soft in a cup with 1-2 tablespoons of gula melaka

- mix most (~4/5ths) of the butter into the dry mixture, until it is just wet enough to form a sort of dough. Press into bottom of baking dish, helps to seal edges

- Also take this time to properly line the baking dish with salted butter, so the sides don’t stick later 

Body

Baked at 180C for 45 minutes

250g ricotta and 110g Philadelphia cream cheese at room temperature

1 egg + 1 yolk

1-5 tbsp maple syrup, 1 tsp vanilla extract and 3 drops pandan essence

2 tbsp Matcha powder and 2-3 tbsp self-raising flour

Pistachio milk with coconut nectar - 1/6 cup or more if you can deal with a wetter batter and used the lower bound amount of maple syrup

Handful of pistachios and 3 squares 100% dark chocolate 

Glass of seed-removed dark semi-sour cherries with optional butter sauce

Steps

- If you don’t have the patience to intensify flavour by partially drying and baking the cherries:

- Pan fry half the cherries in the leftover butter and gula melaka to remove some moisture. 

- Once cool, add them to other cherry halves and mix with some crushed pistachios. Also suggest a strong cherry jam, but not too much, ~1 tbsp

- Cheese into a large mixing bowl

Add the matcha powder to the not-cold cheese and hand mix a bit.

- Prepare egg mixture: Add the maple syrup, vanilla, and pandan (this mellows out the flavour and matches the pistachio better)

Add half, mix, add the flour to thicken slightly, mix, add the rest

Next goes the pistachio milk

This is one of the silkiest cheesecake batters I have ever seen. Was tempted to overmix. 

Stir in the pistachios and chocolate chips.

Pour around half into the baking dish before adding the layer of cherries. Try best to cover them before baking, in oven at 180C for around 45 minutes. Mine was not that liquid so no risk of leaks.

Also: Did not use water bath, did not have a smaller diameter dish which would have looked slightly better for the volume. 

It very helpfully curls in on itself for easier removal once it cools. Place in fridge after it cools down slowly, chill overnight. 

Personally, I like the clumsy rise and crack but it isn’t necessary. Can use something else to thicken the mix besides the self-raising flour, and adding more liquid ingredients (e.g. sweets or milk) will also avoid a dramatic surface. 

[sulla-slays-cronulla]

Georgian Things

Variation of walnut salad and crispy, salty, pan-fried chicken with garlic sauce. 

Salad sauce:

2 garlic cloves

1-2 (my handwriting looks like “7″ but maybe don’t do that) green chillis

1 cup walnuts, hold a few back

salt to preference

Blend the above together, can add a LITTLE water if you want to make it thinner. The authentic recipes add 1/3 cup of water. 

Salad body

2 tbsp red wine vinegar

250g half peeled Japanese cucumber, rough chop

1 hot purple onion - small finely sliced

Grilled green grapes, keep the caramelising sugar water (220C++, 20 mins)

1 red bell pepper small chopped, 1-2 cups chopped cilantro 

(authentic adds tomatoes, has no grilled grapes. But phooey to that.)

Chicken Tabaka is pretty straightforward. 

Smash the little chicken body so all it’s ickle bones are squish-splat. 

Add salt, pepper, any other spices you may like but it can be quite plain. 

Oil and butter into a pan but the type you can compress, or, add a very heavy pot on top to keep the chicken pressed down as it cooks. 

Each side is 10 minutes, a whole chicken is around 20minutes each side depending on your apparatus. 

[sulla-slays-cronulla]

Tropical Beef Skewers

Ate ‘em too fast. 

This was for either 500 or 700g of beef cubes, which are blunt end smashed around a bit before marinade immersion, 2 hours. Best to use skillet or grill. 

2-5 minutes each on super hot surface, undisturbed. May choose to baste 

Used some coconut oil, but not really necessary. 

Next time will halve the sauce amount. 

2 small/medium slightly dehydrated bananas (you could microwave or pan fry)

2 slices of kiwi, 2 pineapple chunks, finely chopped

Used 12 slice-chunks of papaya, can reduce if the salty is also reduced

50ml fruit juice of choice

25-50ml Wostershire sauce

50ml light soya sauce

2 heaped teaspoons Dijon mustard

3 tsp each white pepper, mild chili powder, pink peppercorns (if you can crush them would be better)