My Hot Buns

As soon as I walked into the supermarket, I noticed (through clever use of product placement) the hot cross buns. Apparently these goodies arrived in stores the week after Christmas but I only just noticed. Proof of my virtuousness in baking my own bread, thus never needing to venture into the bread section!

There were all shapes, sizes and colours: mini buns, mega buns, traditional buns, fruit buns, fruitless buns, peel free buns and then there’s the totally left of centre choc chip buns! As far as I’m concerned, they’re not hot cross buns and you wont find me eating them at Easter!

While we’re on the topic of things I wont eat, I have become very obsessed with eating only home made preservative and additive free food since Theo arrived. So I finally decided to have a go at making my own hot cross buns. The recipe says to let them prove for an hour and a half, which I did, but in warm weather it may not take that long. So aside from the fact that the proving takes a while, this is a very quick recipe. It took me two and a half hours from start to finish but actual hands on time was probably 15 mins tops!

Unbaked, doughy, aromatic, squishy goodness!

The recipe is from the Every Day Cookbook (EDC), and fresh out of the oven complete with crosses and sugary glaze, topped with meltingly delicious buttery goodness, they were irresistible. My DH and I ate one each and when I questioned whether it was acceptable for us to have another, he saw nothing wrong with idea. However, I exercised restraint and we shared one more! I promptly froze the rest before we ate every one of them!

Glossy, sugary, deliciousness!

I’ll be in hot bun baking mode the week before Easter this year as I plan to make them to give to my nearest and dearest. Let’s face it, everyone loves baked goods and what better than freshly baked bread with a whole lot of luscious dried fruit and spices thrown in!

ThermoDipping!

On Sunday I took advantage of the fact that I could cook whatever I wanted and not the standard demo recipes. We had friends coming for dinner and one is a 'recovering vegetarian' (her words not mine) meaning she is slowly trying out meats, mainly chicken and seafood. Anyway, I thought it would be a great opportunity to try out more recipes from the 'Taste of Vegetarian' cookbook. So I selected a very vegetarian Harvest Nut Roast, and Zucchini Moussaka. I was disappointed. The nut roast tasted good, although it was a little overbrowned due to my temperamental oven! The moussaka was a bit disappointing. Next time, I'll use less onion and chop it rather than puree it. The onion flavour was very overpowering. I took the leftovers to mum and dad's house for them to 'enjoy'! I'm still waiting for feedback...

The absolute highlight of the meal was a dip I threw together in the afternoon. I hadn't had the foresight to organise nibblies and on investigation, found a packet of cream cheese in the fridge. I had no parsley to make herb and garlic dip, I had no sundried tomatoes to make sundried tomato dip. Disaster loomed! Then I spotted it! One red capsicum! I blitzed the capsicum on speed 7 til it was finely chopped and then then threw in my cream cheese and processed it for a few seconds on speed 4  until it was combined. I'll do it for a bit longer next time as there were still some white bits of cream cheese in the dip. But it was deeeelicious!

OM NOM NOM NOM ...NOM NOM NOM...

The moral of the story: Always keep a packet of cream cheese in the fridge and add whatever you feel like, or whatever you've got! eg. tuna, salmon, capsicum, sundried tomatoes, avocado...and make sure you let me know what you tried and how it turned out :)

Frozen Bananas + Nuts + Chocolate...

I knew one could make some kind of quick banana ice cream using frozen bananas so when I had a few sad looking bananas in my fridge the other day I threw them into the freezer and forgot about them. Unfortunately (or fortunately for me once I tasted the ice cream) we have an upside down fridge freezer and the little person who lives with us can open the freezer. So this morning he proudly presented me with one of said frozen bananas and proudly proclaimed "mamama" (little person speak for 'banana'). Realising I wasn't going to get away with returning it surreptitiously to the freezer, I pulled out my A Taste of Vegetarian cookbook,  found the Instant Banana Ice Cream recipe and quickly set about recreating it!

The recipe called for four bananas, 80g roasted salted macadamias and 80g of carob or choc bits. I had one solitary banana so adjusted the recipe accordingly, raided the pantry and fridge, and came up with the following:

1 frozen banana (chopped)
20g roasted salted peanuts
20g of 70% dark chocolate

Mill nuts for 5 seconds on speed 8

Add chocolate and mill for a further 5 seconds on speed 8

 It should resemble finely chopped nuts and chocolate!

Add bananas and process for about 30 seconds on speed 8.

Mine needed scraping down a few times as I quartered the recipe and it flew straight to the sides of the TM bowl, but with the full recipe it should be fine.

Behold! Instant banana choc nut ice cream. Mmmmmm!

By this stage, my little person had forgotten all about the 'mamama', so I popped the bowl in the freezer for later. When later arrived, a very happy mummy, fed it to (and shared it with) a very happy little person.

For a super healthy version, try this Chocolate Banana Nut Ice Cream

Yum!