April Wrap-Up

In a much quieter month than usual of course, due to the current pandemic, the month started with me baking a Walnut cake to take to the clinic to farewell one of our Doctors, on Wednesday 2nd.
I saw the recipe on Catarina's blog (who reblogged from another blogger) and thought it looked easy and delicious. Recipe at the bottom of post.

The pink moon - when the full moon was exactly opposite the Sun and closest to Earth, was visible just after sunset on Wednesday 8th.

My street and the pink moon in the distance

The Easter long weekend from Friday 10th to Monday 13th, was spent doing a bit of gardening enjoying the warm weather, and finishing off some furniture painting projects.

This sideboard will most probably take new door knobs as I'm not too fond of the original ones that I painted

This little rocking elephant was on the verge just two houses down from me, awaiting Verge Collection by our local council. I went to get it, glued its trunk, sanded and painted it. It's now ready for my grandkids to enjoy. They haven't seen it yet, I  hope they like it :)

Jose has taken over the cooking and shopping, but I made Rice Pudding for Easter lunch to go with the meat stew Jose cooked.
I've also found a great and quick recipe for Artisan bread and I've been baking it once a week.
This week I baked 3 loaves - 1 sourdough, and 2 artisan breads and dropped a Sourdough and 1/2 of one Artisan bread to friends of ours who live in a Retirement village.
In exchange I was given a bag of persimmons from their garden.

Preparing the bread

The 3 loaves I baked - 2 artisan and 1 sourdough

Bag of Persimmons given to me by our friends

Our passion fruit vine is full of fruit and just a few flowers still in bloom. They are so pretty aren't they?

At work a couple of the patients presented us with their home made Anzac biscuits, delicious Raspberry cup-cakes, Lemon cup-cakes and one gave us a $40 voucher from a nearby coffee shop. Some were accompanied by Thank you notes, which touched my heart.

The kind gestures didn't stop there, as one day when I arrived home from work I found a beautiful card in the post box written by a young mother of 2 who I met through the "Buy Nothing" facebook group, thanking me for the friendship, which left me quite emotional. 

She was the one who made my birthday cupcakes. I had sent her a photo of them on my table, which she now displayed in her postcard.  
One of these days I'll bake her a home-made bread to thank her for the beautiful gesture.

Anzac day was celebrated on Saturday 25th. Sadly this year the usual parade and festivities were cancelled, but a lot of people chose to stand on their driveways or balconies at 6am and light a candle while listening to "The last post".

Crown of poppies in my street, and flags and poppies at the Retirement village where my friends live

Because we had a long weekend, on Monday 27th, Jose and I picked olives from our small tree by the driveway in the front garden. We managed to pick 7kgs! Jose is now in charge of changing the water daily for 1 month, before they get prepared.

The new neighbours moved to their new house at the beginning of April, but with social distancing I haven't seen them.

Our olive tree by the driveway and you can see house next door.

When we were picking olives the magpies that live in the trees in the park across the road, came to our driveway to get some olives. They love walnuts, so I got a few and they would come close to me and eat them.

The friendly magpies eating walnuts

On Wednesday's I'm the one that closes the clinic, and as I came out into the car-park last week, I was greeted with this beautiful purple sky, the sun having just set.

Our cats, either because they are getting old, or maybe because we are spending more time at home have become quite clingy. Fluffy, our ginger cat, just wants to have his paws over Jose when he sits next to him, or if he decides to sit on my desk he will put his paws over the mouse or the keyboard and type away, or he decides to sleep on my hand.

Fluffy lying on my keyboard

Fluffy, Twiggy and Shelley

WALNUT CAKE

1 juicy orange (zest, juice and pulp)

1 measure plain yogurt 

1 measure of grated coconut

3 measures of flour

3 sugar measures (I used only 1 1/2 measures)

1/2 measure of oil

4 eggs

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 tot of Port wine

2 teaspoons spoon cinnamon 

1/2 measure coarsely chopped walnuts

1. Turn the oven on to 180 C°, when preparation begins. 

2. Mix all the ingredients with a wooden spoon. It is not advisable to use an electric mixer.

3. Bake in a greased pan sprinkled with flour, and covered with parchment paper, during  30/40 minutes, depending of the oven.

4.  Test with a toothpick and if necessary, let it cook a little longer. 

Note: I used a cup as a measure for all ingredients. I only used 1 1/2 cups of sugar, and found it was sweet enough.
Enjoy 😃

Octopus and Cheesecake

My husband and I have been trying to eat a low-carb and grain free diet, mainly so he loses weight and keeps his blood sugar and cholesterol under control.
So no potatoes or his much beloved rice is on the menu, but once in a while I have to relent.
On Friday we went past a fish shop that had an amazing choice of frozen fish and we bought 2kg of octopus, something I don't easily find in my shopping area.

It would be for Saturday's dinner, and my husband suggested I make an Octopus salad, but that's very much a summer dish for me, so I suggested "Polvo a Lagareiro" - Grilled Octopus and potatoes in olive oil - just the right recipe for the colder nights we're having.

Since it would be a special dinner I invited our son and daughter in law to dinner, and they were surprised that we were having real potatoes and not a "potato substitute" like cauliflower.

Try it out, I'm sure you will love it, even though you might think octopus is weird.

Polvo à Lagareiro

Ingredients:

• 2 kgs frozen octopus (mine were just the long tentacles, all cleaned)
• 2 onions
• 2 bay leaves
• salt
• 1 kg small potatoes 
• 5 or 6 garlic cloves
• Parsley or coriander
• olive oil (plenty)

Preparation:
Boil the frozen octopus in a pot with one peeled onion. No water needed, as the octopus will shed water). I used the pressure cooker and as soon as it started whistling I removed it from the stove.

Let cool and then cut up into small pieces.

(If not using a pressure cooker, cook in an uncovered pot with water and the onion until the octopus is tender). Octopus shrinks a lot after cooking.

Warm the oven to 180C. 

Wash the potatoes (I used normal potatoes suitable for roasting as I couldn't find small ones), put them in an oven tray, prick with a fork and add salt. Cook them in the oven for 30 minutes.

Remove tray from oven, and if potatoes are soft give them a punch with your fist. I used a wooden spoon over the potatoes to punch them so as not to burn my hands. (These are called "Batatas a Murro" or Punched potatoes).

Next, put the octopus pieces with the potatoes, a bit of salt over the octopus, add a chopped onion, and minced garlic. Drizzle with olive oil. Put back in the oven for another 10 to 15 minutes.

Remove from the oven and serve. You can sprinkle the tray with chopped parsley or coriander if you wish. Serves 6 to 8 people. I accompanied with boiled broccoli.

PS - "Lagareiro" is the man who produces olive oil.

Octopus tentacles already boiled

Polvo a Lagareiro

We couldn't finish the meal without a dessert of course - but this one was a low carb one!
No bake Cheesecake with a berry syrup. Yummi!!

Here is the link for the recipe - I made my syrup with raspberries instead of blueberries.
Note - I used powdered stevia as a sweetener and used less quantity in both the cheesecake and the syrup.

http://alldayidreamaboutfood.com/2015/04/low-carb-no-bake-blueberry-cheesecake-pie.html

No bake cheesecake with raspberry syrup

Fig Jam with Port wine Recipe

Our wonderful fig tree is packed with figs this year. They ripened quite early too, probably due to the very hot weather.
Every other day I pick them and apart from taking some to work, giving to family and friends and eating a few, my bounty is far too big to be consumed at home.

So I have made Fig Jam, and for the first time I also made Fig Chutney and Preserved Figs.
They all taste wonderful, and now I can have a taste of a beautiful summer fruit well into winter.

Our fig tree, small but productive

Fig Jam Recipe

Ingredients:

1,800kg figs, washed and quartered.

2 cups sugar

1/2 cup Lemon juice

1 cup Port Wine

2 Cinnamon sticks

You could add a little bag of fresh rosemary as well.

Preparation:

Put the figs in a pot with the sugar and let absorb for about 15 minutes stirring occasionally until the sugar dissolves.

Add the lemon juice, Port wine, cinnamon sticks and rosemary, and let the mixture boil until the sugar is totally dissolved. Reduce the temperature and let simmer until the fruit is soft and the liquid is thick - about 20 minutes. Remove the cinnamon stick and pour into sterilized jars. When cool refrigerate.

                                                    

                                              

I filled quite a lot of small jars that I'm taking to family overseas.

And yes, I'm off in less than 24 hours!! Can't wait for our well deserved break!

Hopefully I'll be able to blog a bit and give you a glimpse of what I'm up to in Amsterdam or Lisbon.

See you soon.

Cauliflower and Parmesan Mash

Happy Spring day everyone!
It was a gray day in Perth, no rain though, which was great as I managed to do a cleanup in the garden - there were loads of lemons, mandarins and passion-fruit all over the garden in various stages of decomposition due to the heavy winds and rain of the last few days. 
I'm glad I managed to save over 20 passion-fruit that will be given to friends on the weekend.
In the afternoon I painted a bedroom wall with stripes, and finished decorating a small coffee table that I picked up in the "verge collection" last week, which will be given to my son and daughter in law for their house.  But that will be another post...

As per a previous post entitled "Changing our way of eating" to the Paleo way, here is one of the recipes I have used quite a few times.

This recipe was adapted from the recipe originally posted by Gourmet girl, who has an amazing collection of wheat free recipes. Check her blog for some Paleo inspiration.

Rich and Thick Parmesan Cauliflower Mash

1 medium head of fresh cauliflower, broken into florets
2 carrots, sliced
1 cup of chicken broth or Gluten free stock
60gr brick style cream chese (I have used cream cheese and cottage cheese)
3 to 4 tablespoons heavy cream
3 to 4 tablespoons Parmesan cheese
Sea Salt,
Freshly ground pepper
Nutmeg to taste
3 cloves garlic

In a medium saucepan, place cauliflower, carrots and chicken broth/stock.
Bring to a boil and then cover pan; turn heat down to low and simmer until cauliflower is very soft and tender and chicken broth has completely cooked into the cauliflower (about 20 to 30 minutes). Make sure there is no liquid left at all in the bottom of the pan (remove the cover if necessary and cook until any remaining liquid is gone and the cauliflower is no longer wet looking).  

Remove pan from heat and add garlic cloves, cream cheese and heavy cream.  
Using an immersion blender stick, or a food processor, blend or puree the cauliflower until the cheese and cream are fully incorporated and the mixture is smooth. 




Add grated Parmesan cheese, nutmeg, salt and pepper, to taste.  Blend another minute.  Adjust seasoning and add additional cream, if necessary, to thin out a little bit or add additional Parmesan to thicken. 
The cauliflower mash should be thick and not runny at all.

Before going under the grill

And ready to serve....

This makes a good side dish for meats, fish, or as a base for a Tuna casserole...

*** You can serve it this way, or sprinkle extra Parmesan cheese on top, spread the mash into a pirex
dish and put it under the grill for about 15 minutes until the cheese melts and the top has turned golden brown.

*** You can vary this mash, by omitting the carrots, or adding other vegetables instead of the carrots, maybe making it a green mash by adding broccoli...

Recipes with dairy, are not Paleo, but if you are like me and love cheese, then why not treat yourself once in a while? 
I am lactose intolerant and only drink Almond milk, but cheese doesn't seem to bother me.

Enjoy it!

Banana Ice Cream

I remember a while ago reading somewhere that you could make a super quick ice-cream using just one ingredient - ripe bananas!

So, instead of making banana bread, which would just add some grams to my body, I decided to use the four over ripe bananas in my fruit bowl to make an healthy ice-cream instead.

Peel and slice the bananas and put in a container in the freezer during a couple of hours.


When frozen, put in the food processor and mix for a while, using a spatula to scrape the sides of the bowl until it all becomes a smooth paste.
I added a tablespoon of honey and just to make it a little wicked I added 2 teaspoons of Baileys (Irish Cream Liqueur) as well.



When the mix was smooth, I  scraped every last bit from the mixer bowl, put in a serving dish and into the freezer again, to be served after dinner.





Before serving I poured another tot of Baileys (Irish Cream liqueur) just for good measure.
This was enough for 3 servings.

Yummy and super quick too!!
I might add one or two figs next time, as it's fig season and my tree is full of beautiful sweet figs.
What else would go well with bananas? A couple of diced walnuts might be nice too.
Anything else you could suggest?

Pasteis de Bacalhau - Codfish Fritters

Pasteis de Bacalhau (Codfish Fritters) are traditionally made the whole year around, but are ideal to use up Codfish leftovers from the Christmas dinner.They are lovely as starters at a party, and I just made them today to take to the New Year's eve dinner tomorrow at the Portuguese club, as we have to take our own food for the night. They are easy to make and you could also use any white fish to make these and they would be ideal to feed children who don't like fish. They wouldn't have the same taste though.In Portugal you find them in every Coffee shop and can be bought to eat as a snack, and in restaurants they would be accompanied by Tomato rice or a green salad. Can be served hot or cold. 

Ingredients:300gr codfish (already desalted by soaking in water for 2 days, changing the water 2 or 3 times a day)300gr boiled potatoes2 or 3 eggs1 onion, chopped 2 cloves garlic, crushedParsley, salt and pepperOil to fryBoil the codfish in water for about 15 or 20 min. if not using the Christmas leftovers. Remove skin and bones and put in a food processor until it is shredded. If doing by hand, make sure the pieces are quite small.Boil the potatoes in their skins. Drain them, peel and puree them. Add potatoes to the fish, add the chopped onion and crushed garlic and chopped parsley.Add the eggs, one a time and stir well and adjust the seasoning. The mixture should be stiff.Using 2 tablespoons, shape the mixture into oval shaped cakes. Fry in very hot oil until golden brown.Drain on absorbent paper, plate them and decorate with some parsley.Enjoy them!

Ready to eat!

Variations:You can fry the onion in a tablespoon of olive oil instead of adding it raw to the mixture.Instead of whole eggs, you can also add just the yolks and beat the whites until stiff, then add them.If you use a larger quantity of potatoes than fish, the fritters will be lighter. 

 PS: I used very large eggs and the mixture was slightly runny, so I had to add 2 or 3 tablespoons of flour
        to thicken it before frying.

Portuguese Christmas Recipes

These will be the traditional dishes I will be cooking this Christmas Eve.

Oven baked Codfish

800gr salted codfish
1 teaspoon mustard
6 soup spoons Olive oil
2 garlic cloves, sliced
1kg small potatoes, peeled
500gr onions
1 teaspoon paprika
150ml Port wine
125gr Ham, Bacon or chourizo, sliced
parsley, black pepper

Slice the codfish into small pieces and let it soak for 12 to 24 hours, changing the water 2 or 3 times a day. The fish will swell and loose its saltiness too.
After drying the fish slices, smear each of them with the mustard. In a deep oven proof dish with lid, pour half the olive oil and the sliced garlic. Arrange the fish pieces, and around them put the small potatoes and quartered onions. Sprinkle with the paprika and pepper. Drizzle the rest of the olive oil and half the Port wine. Cover the dish and bake in the oven, at 180ºC for 25 minutes. Uncover the dish, add the bacon and the rest of the Port wine.
Return to the oven for another 10 minutes, testing if the potatoes and fish are cooked through.
Sprinkle with chopped parsley and serve.

Rabanadas (Tipsy slices)

1 French loaf (day old bread is best)
2 eggs
125 ml milk
5ml grated lemon rind
oil for frying

Syrup:
300gr sugar
250ml water
1 stick cinnamon
50ml Port wine

Cut the bread into 2cm thick slices. Beat the eggs and place in a soup plate.
Mix the milk and lemon rind and place in another soup plate-
Dip the bread slices into the milk and then into the beaten egg. Fry in hot oil and drain well.
Put into a shallow serving dish.

To make the syrup, boil the sugar, water and cinnamon stick for 3 minutes. Add the Port wine and bring to the boil again and pour over the slices of fried bread.

Variation:
If you prefer you can omit the syrup and instead sprinkle the fried bread with a mix of sugar and cinnamon. They will be dryer but not as sweet and syrupy.

Tipsy slices - in the front with the sugar and cinnamon, at the back with the syrup

Enjoy!
Hope you like my suggestions.

Fig Jam with walnuts

My wonderful fig tree´s produce is coming to an end, so I picked all the ripe figs and made the last batch of fig jam of the year. Right now the tree was left with 3 or 4 figs still to mature which I will pick and eat in a few days.

Not a very big tree, but very fruitful!

When we bought the house 5 years ago, the tree was already here, in the front garden by the driveway and every year since we have been here it has produced kilos of fruit, without so much as a bucket of water once in a while (just rain water when it sporadically pours), or any fertilizers either. As we can't eat it all I do give some away to friends, and during this fruiting season that started at the end of January until now, I have made 4 batches of jam, giving some jars away too, baked a fig cake and a fig tart.

Fig cake (before baking)

Last year the leaves of the fig tree were heavily affected with scale and we had to spray with white oil.

There were always lots of ants feeding off the sweet honeydew produced by the scale, and this weakens the tree eventually.

This year I examined the leaves closely every couple of days and managed to pick a few leaves with scale and just cut them out and threw them in the rubbish. Apart from that a couple of times I saw some sort of beetle eating the ripe figs that were opened. Those figs would go straight into the rubbish bin by the driveway, although some of the beetles managed to fly away!

A beetle on a fig

Well, enough about the nasty bugs, let me give you the recipe for the fig jam.
This time I added rosemary to the original jam recipe and it was the best ever (so said my husband)!

Ingredients

1000kg figs
700gr sugar
1/4 cup lemon juice
1/4 cup Port wine or Muscat wine (sweet wine)
1 cinnamon stick or 1 tablespoon cinnamon powder
1 stick or two of rosemary (optional)
A handful of walnuts, toasted and sliced (optional)

Slice the tops of the figs and cut them into small pieces, add lemon juice, cinnamon, rosemary and cover with the sugar and let sit until the sugar dissolves.
Slowly bring the mixture to a boil in a moderate setting, stirring occasionally, during about 20 minutes until the fruit is soft and the liquid is thick. Let it cook for 1 hour in very low heat. Remove the cinnamon stick and rosemary. Add the toasted walnuts
Let cool and pour into sterilized glass jars and refrigerate. Consume within 3 months.

                                                    

As I used a sprig of Rosemary from our old woody bush, all the leaves broke away and at the end of the cooking when I tasted the jam the rosemary leaves were still woody, so I had to pick all of them out of the pot with a pair of tweezers! What a job that was!
Still the taste is great, so if want to use rosemary put it in a muslin or calico cooking bag, it won't break away and you won't have to pick out the leaves with tweezers.

If you are lucky enough to have figs in your garden or can buy them cheap, try this out, you won't regret it.
I'm now looking forward to baking some lovely things with passion-fruit,  yesterday I picked the first two that had fallen from the climber that was planted last year and the vine is packed with fruit.

Passion fruit

Christmas Eve - Portuguese style

This is my first Christmas post on my blog, hopefully there will be many more Christmas to blog about.
The traditional Portuguese Christmas Eve was celebrated at my house with 15 friends.
Hubby made his delicious Garlic prawns for starters, I had cooked Bacalhau com Natas (Cod fish in cream sauce) and Algarve style carrots for the main meal, and Arroz Doce (Rice Pudding) and Panacota for dessert.
My friends brought a plate of various nuts and dried fruit, biscuits and dips, a delectable Tuna Roulade (I must get this recipe!), Pudim Flan (Creme Caramel), a green salad, Mango Mousse and more Rice pudding.

Cod fish in cream sauce

Algarve style carrots

The tablets outside (forgot the flash!)

The tables were set outside in the backyard, with some cane sofas under the gazebo. Later as the wind was picking up we took the sofas out and put the two tables and chairs under the gazebo, so we would be more protected. We had a wonderful night of sharing beautiful food with lots of talk and laughter.
When the guests started to leave around midnight we exchanged our gifts, to be opened later, and the last guests left at 1am.

My home-made gift baskets

The goodies I made - spicy nuts, soap, cherries with rose wine and vanilla, laundry liquid and tomato jam

I put another load of dishes in the dishwasher, we stacked the garden chairs and put the cane furniture back under the gazebo. It was past 2am when we went to sleep, after still having a short chat on skype with my parents and my sister in Portugal.

This morning under the gazebo

This morning, a Pudim flan (creme caramel) has been done and we are almost ready to go and join another Portuguese family who live 60km away.
Tomorrow, Boxing day will once again be celebrated with friends at their house and I will be making a Chocolate Mousse to take with. Luckily we still have another public holiday on the 27th, to enable us to recover from all these parties of overindulgence.
We do seem to eat far too much, an overload of sugar for me at least!!

Hope you are all having a Wonderful Christmas with your family and friends.