Cinnamon scrolls

Cinnamon scrolls

This isn't a recipe from the Basic Cook Book, but it is an amalgamation of a few different recipes into one. I decided to make mini cinnamon scrolls for my son to take to school today for his class's end of term party. He was asked to bring something sweet, so rather than make cupcakes or slice, I figured scrolls was something a bit different that probably wouldn't be a double up of something that was already there.

Rolled dough with butter, sugar and cinnamon topping

I used Lailah's 900g jumbo white loaf recipe for the bread base. I considered using the sweet dough recipe, but since the scrolls were going to be loaded with sugar, butter, cinnamon and then drizzled with icing sugar, they would be sweet enough! So I made up a batch of the dough, allowed it to rest for the first 15 minute prove in a bowl over a thermoserver filled with hot tap water. I then split the dough into two, and rolled them out into a rectangle, with the dough being about 4mm thick. Once I had got a nice rectangular shape, I spread over 30g of soft butter over each, sprinkled each with 50g of brown sugar, then sprinkled over approximately 1.5 teaspoons of cinnamon over it. I rubbed it all in with my hand to incorporate it, then rolled them tightly into a sausage.

Cutting scrolls with string

I find a great way to cut scrolls so they end up with a nice flat top and stay in a rounded shape is to use some sort of string. You could use nylon kitchen string, fishing line or in my case dental floss! I actually used mint flavoured because that was what I had, but I promise you the flavour of the mint isn't detectable on the finished product! I really should buy some plain floss though to keep for such occasions!

Nice flat cuts

I placed the mini scrolls quite closely in the tray so when they rose they would butt up against each other and form a sort of pull-apart. I put the scrolls into a warmed oven (on the lowest setting - or if you have a defrost/dough rising setting that is perfect). Once they had doubled in size (approximately one hour depending on the warmth of the lowest setting of the oven) I removed them, heated the oven up for 10 minutes to 180℃ and cooked them for 20 minutes. Once they were nicely browned and hollow sounding when tapped, I removed them from the oven and put them straight onto a cooling rack. I always remove my bread products as soon as they come out of the oven or they continue to make steam and it will make the bread go soggy.

Once they were cooled, I made up a quick icing mixture - just using pure icing sugar and a splash of milk. I didn't bother using the thermomix for this, since I only wanted a small amount. I drizzled it over the scrolls with a spoon and they were good to go! Luckily there wasn't enough space on the plates so I got to keep a few for us at home!

Happy thermomixing!

Baked scrolls

Chilli mussels

Chilli mussels

I have actually had this on my meal plan for the last 2 weeks and only tonight did I get around to trying it. I wish I had tried it sooner because its fabulous! The only reason I hadn't is because I can never seem to get mussels on our online grocery order, and they are something I would rather buy just before I am going to use them. So this afternoon when I finished work I popped to the supermarket and got some mussels.

The hardest thing about the entire dish was giving the mussels a scrub and debearding them. Hardest as in time consuming - but it really only took me about 10 minutes, probably even less. I had just over a kilo of mussels, so I spread them in the varoma, using both the dish and the tray so they would cook evenly. I added all the ingredients to the bowl, put the varoma in position and left it to do its thing. A mere 12 minutes later I checked and they were done!

Chilli mussels ready for steaming in the varoma

I don't like super hot chillies, so I used 2 long red chillies and removed most of the seeds and membranes, but left a few in so there was a little heat. I didn't have any white wine, so I added a little extra water, but it could probably do without that since the sauce is quite runny in the end.

The mussels were lovely with a few slices of tiger loaf to mop up the sauce at the end. We actually ate the mussels between 2 of us, so we were left with quite a bit of sauce. I'm not sure if you could really use it for much, maybe if you wanted to do more mussels the next day, or it might be nice to reduce it and serve it with some other seafood or even use it as a pasta sauce for marinara.

Happy thermomixing!

Beef rendang

I made this dish a few weeks ago but it ended up being a disaster - not due to anything to do with the thermomix, but because I bought some really awful meat! I did love the taste of the sauce though, so I wanted to give it another go with some meat that wasn't so much like leather!

The flavours in this dish are really good. The coconut gives it a really nice texture too. I love toasting the coconut first so the lovely aroma of coconut fills the kitchen. Then toasting the spices before milling, so all the smells mingle together. Yum!

I didn't have any peanut oil, so I used ghee. I'm not sure if this is what caused it, but at the end of cooking my coconut milk seemed to split, and there was what looked like a lot of oil floating on top. But mixing it together again seemed to fix it a little. You can see the thinner separation of the oil in the picture.

The sauce was a little runny, I am wondering if it could have done with cooking for slightly longer to reduce the sauce a bit. Aside from that it was a great curry, with just enough heat for my liking.

Happy thermomixing!

Lemon butter

Lemon butter

I had a few lemons to use, so I thought I would make some lemon butter. I love anything lemon flavoured, so I didn't mind that my lemon was extra juicy and produced more than suggested in the recipe!

This was really simple to make, one of those "add everything in and start" recipes. Once it had cooked for the minimum time suggested, it coated the back of the spoon nicely, so I didn't need to cook it any longer. I just put it into the empty jam jar and left it to cool.

Lemon butter

The texture is lovely and it was really lemony. I haven't actually decided what to do with it yet. It would be great on toast, or as a filling for some tart cases made with short crust pastry. It would also be great to make up some meringue and making a cheats version of lemon meringue pie!

I might try doing that at some stage this week.

Happy thermomixing!

Butter and buttermilk

Finished butter

I haven't made butter very often in my thermomix. Main reason being is I don't very often see cream on sale, so most of the time it is cheaper to just buy blocks of butter. To make butter, I use pure whipping cream, which was $3.89 for 600ml. Usually you get around 250g of butter from a 600ml container. Butter is usually around $2.40 for a 250g block. Despite this, for the purposes of the blog, I thought I should do it again!

The length of time it takes to churn the butter depends on the freshness of the cream. The expiry date on my carton was July 30th (not a typo - a whole month way), so this batch took about 4 minutes to churn into butter. Last time I made it, it took 40 seconds. So don't give up, it will get there eventually.

Butter solids and buttermilk

The best way to know that the butter is done, is that the measuring cup starts to dance in the thermomix lid as it is churning. At that stage, the butter solids have separated from the buttermilk. As you can see in the photo, the butter ends up looking crumbly, and the buttermilk is separated. Using the tm spatula, I give the butter a good press and push it around the bowl to help squeeze more butter milk out, then put the simmering basket in and drain out the buttermilk. Once i have done that I repeat that process, just to make sure I get the most buttermilk out of it as I can.

Butter about to be washed

Next add the cold water and follow the directions to wash the butter. This helps remove any more buttermilk that is still in the butter, as this is what will go sour first. Its important that the water is really cold so it makes the butter firm and you don't end up with a big sloppy mess. Repeating the straining process again leaves you with lovely butter. If you want to you can do the water cleaning process a second time, but I didn't bother doing that this time.

Spreadable butter

Once I had the butter, I added some grapeseed oil to the bowl and gave it another whizz until it formed a lighter, creamy consistency. I used 50g this time, however I might add a bit more next time just to make it a little bit softer. The addition of the oil means you can put it in the fridge and it will remain soft enough to spread. I prefer to do this with home made butter, just in case there is still a little bit of buttermilk left behind. I usually keep butter on the bench in smaller quantities, but with butter I have made I prefer to keep it in the fridge.

Buttermilk

I ended up with 250g of butter and 300ml of buttermilk. Now I just have to decide what to use the buttermilk for! If you don't need to use it straight away, you can freeze it until you need it.

Happy thermomixing!

Home made burgers

Burger buns with American style burger patties

I am going through the main meals quite quickly in the Basic Cook Book, so I have included a few non-BCB meals in my meal plan this week. Tonight we had burgers - I made the buns using Lailah's 900g jumbo loaf recipe, and the burgers were from Skinnymixer's American Style Burger Patties recipe.

Before proving dough

To make the buns, I made up a batch of the dough, and using 4 of my mini round baking pans that I picked up at Kmart last week, I measure out 120g of dough for each of them. I then rolled them into bun shapes and dipped the top of the bun into the sesame seeds. The remaining dough I put into a small loaf tin. I covered them all in plastic wrap and put them in the oven on the lowest temperature setting to help them rise. Once they were doubled in size, I took them out of the oven and pre-heated it to 180℃, and baked the buns for 20 minutes and the loaf for about 25 minutes.

After proving

The burgers I made earlier this afternoon, just after making the bread dough. I left them in the fridge to rest for a while. Then once the bread buns were cooked and cooled slightly I started cooking the burgers on the stove. They would be lovely cooked on the bbq too, but tonight I decided to try them on the stove.

I used the tomato ketchup from when I made the meat pies on the buns (recipe from the BCB). I haven't got around to making mayonnaise yet, so I used some shop bought mayo I already had in the fridge. Next time I make these I will also make some mayonnaise from scratch.

Cooked burger buns

The kids both finished all their burgers off. The seven year old even said "If there was a magic genie, all I would ask him for is more of these burgers!". I'm guessing that means these were a big hit!

The burger meat tasted great, considering it only has the 3 ingredients. I am so used to adding herbs, pepper, eggs to bind, breadcrumbs and so on. But they worked out great without all this! If you haven't tried them, give them a go!

Happy thermomixing!

Pumpkin soup and soft butter rolls

I had a bit of a migraine today, so I had spent some of the afternoon in bed. It had gone when I woke up at 4pm, but I didn't feel like doing anything too fiddly for dinner, so I decided to make a soup. I had a gigantic butternut pumpkin, so pumpkin soup it was!

I usually make the famous Lailah's 900g jumbo loaf recipe into bread rolls, but it occurred to me that I hadn't yet made any breads from the Basic Cook Book for the blog! So I thought I would try out the soft butter rolls.

I had a funny feeling with this recipe, with the quantity of flour it requires. It seemed like an awful lot of flour to not that much liquid. I did add in some bread improver, as I find that it tends to make bread softer and also makes it last longer. Just 2 teaspoons though, so this wouldn't have made any difference to the end texture. Once all the ingredients were added, I did the initial mix to combine it. It didn't really combine much at all, so I gave it another quick mix around with my spatula. I then started the kneading. I looked through the lid and nothing was moving even though the blades were going. So I took the lid off and loosened it up a bit then tried again. Nothing much happening. Loosened it again and then when I tried to knead it made a funny squealing noise and sounded like the blades were stuck. I ended up tipping the whole lot onto the pastry mat, discovering that it had formed a solid pile of dough on the bottom. I broke it all up and tried again. It got to the end of the 2 minute knead and wasn't brought together at all. It was a big dry mess! I kneaded it as best as I could and put it in a metal bowl, covered in wrap and then in the warmed oven to prove (I prove on the keep warm setting on my oven, which is what I usually do with bread dough).

After one hour I checked it. It hadn't risen very much at all, but the texture of it was a little better. It wasn't as stretchy as my usual bread dough though. I had serious doubts about the end product, but perservered with it! I rolled them into 80g balls and put them into a high sided baking tray, then left them to rise again for 15 minutes while I started on the soup.

I love making this pumpkin soup! I like putting the raw pumpkin and carrot in and obliterating it in seconds! It really shows the power the thermomix has. This also helps the soup to cook a lot faster. I hadn't opened my carton of cream yet, but I had some creme fraiche left over from the chicken veloute meal, so I used that instead of adding cream to the soup. The finished product is so silky and smooth. I found it was already seasoned well enough with salt from the vegetable stock that is in it, so I just ground some pepper over it. Yum!

Obliterated raw pumpkin and carrot in 15 seconds!

The rolls...they don't look the best. They definitely didn't turn out much like the picture in the book. They were quite heavy and doughy, almost as if they hadn't proved enough. They tasted more like damper than anything. And they definitely weren't soft. The texture of the bread was uneven and dry. I wasn't a big fan of these at all, and don't think I will make them again unfortunately. Still, this far through the book, and its really the first fail I have had. Onwards and upwards!

Soft butter rolls

Happy thermomixing!

Chicken cacciatore

Chicken cacciatore

We had the chicken cacciatore for dinner last night, and it was pretty good! I have made this one before. I usually cut the chicken thighs in half (unfold it and cut along one of the bends if that makes sense). I just find it stirs a lot easier if you do it this way. 

I didn't have any wine, so I skipped that ingredient. I was going to add some extra water, but I didn't bother. It was probably a good idea, because I find the end result of this dish is quite runny. 

The chicken was nice and tender and not at all dry, which is the great thing about using thighs. I know a lot of people don't like chicken thighs, but they just have so much more flavour and don't dry out as easily as chicken breasts.

The olives give the dish a nice hint of saltiness. Surprisingly, my 7 year old loves olives, so I added a few extras to the dish for him! I did think it could have done with a few more mushrooms, since they do collapse a bit during the cooking. I added slightly more chicken than I was supposed to, so I didn't have much room to add more mushrooms anyway. Next time I might do less chicken and more mushies!

I served the cacciatore with mashed potato that I cooked on the stove and mashed by hand. It wasn't as nice as thermie mashed potato but I was running short on time. I did plan on having some extra steamed vegetables as well, but got distracted and forgot! I did cook some corn in the microwave but it turned an odd colour and the kernels shrivelled up a bit so I binned them. They had been in the fridge from last week so they were probably a bit past it anyway!

Happy thermomixing!

Thick yoghurt

Thick yoghurt

I like to experiment with different yoghurt recipes. I had forgotten to save some of my last batch of yoghurt for my next starter, so I ended up buying a small 170g tub of "5am" organic vanilla bean yoghurt to use as my starter. I had found a recipe for a double batch of yoghurt on the recipe community, and this was the brand they suggested, so I thought I would give it a go.

I didn't actually want to make a double batch of yoghurt, purely because I like to store my yoghurt in the easiyo container in the fridge so it doesn't take up too much space. I made half the amount of the recipe, but this was still too much to use the easiyo to set it in. I used my thermoserver instead, and prewarmed it, then wrapped it in a blanket overnight.

Another change I made was adding some milk powder. I added half a cup, as this usually helps to make it even thicker. I love really thick yoghurt.

For the cooling down of the milk, I poured the heated milk into my thermoserver and left the lid off, then put it in the fridge. After an hour I took it out of the fridge, scooped off the skin that had formed and poured it back into my tm bowl. The temperature was pretty much perfect for adding my starter (5am yoghurt). I added the entire tub (170g) then poured it back into the thermoserver and wrapped it up and left it overnight. It would have been in there for around 11 hours.

This morning the yoghurt was nicely set, so I popped the thermoserver into the fridge to cool down. This afternoon we tried it out, and it was delicious! Beautiful, thick and creamy yoghurt, with just the right amount of sweetness. Not tart at all. I'm looking forward to using it tomorrow for topping my CADA for breakfast!

Happy thermomixing!

Basil pesto

Basil pesto

I had a bit of a busy day on Thursday, which is usually my day off. I did an extra shift at work, then went to pick my son up, so I didn't have my lunch until 2pm. Leftover Aussie meat pie and tomato ketchup! Gotta love leftovers! Then it was school pick up time, we went to visit my sister and nephews, and on the way home I had to collect my shopping order from woolies. I got stuck on the freeway in traffic (going towards the city? go figure...) so it was already 5pm by the time I got to the supermarket. I collected the shopping, got it all the way out to the car, and realised they had given me some incorrect items. So I had to go all the way back and swap them to save me going back to the shops again. So by the time I got home it was almost 5.30pm. I unpacked the shopping while I reheated the kids' dinner then had to think about making something for me and hubby....

I had some basil leftover from last week and also some new basil I had just picked up. I get the living basil they sell in woolies now, so it lasts me the whole week. I have tried growing herbs myself, but I forget to water them and they die haha!!!

I hadn't made the pesto before so I wasn't sure how much it would make. I was just planning on using it for spaghetti. I grated the amount of cheese that the recipe listed. Then when i picked off the basil leaves I realised I didn't have enough for the whole recipe. I had already added the pine nuts though, so I just used what I had. I only added 100g of the oil because I didn't have enough basil leaves.

Spaghetti pesto

It turned out pretty good. It was a bit runnier that the picture in the Basic Cook Book, but this worked out okay in the end, making it easier to mix through the cooked spaghetti. All up, the dinner took me 10 minutes to cook. Brilliant!

Happy thermomixing!

Hot chocolate

It's been pretty cold in Perth the last week or so, so I thought it would be a good opportunity to try the hot chocolate. This is pretty rich, as it uses dark chocolate in the recipe. I have actually tried it using milk chocolate, but it wasn't that great. I probably needed to increase the amount of chocolate I was using when I did it with milk chocolate.

I used Lindt 70% dark chocolate for this batch. I used the entire 100g pack. Since it serves 2, that is 50g of chocolate per serve. It ends up being very similar to the spanish version of hot chocolate they serve at San Churro. Very, very thick. It was actually a little bit too strong for my liking.

Next time I might just use 50g of chocolate for the 2 serves and see how that goes. It would be quite nice to flavour it, or even experiment with the Lindt flavoured varieties of chocolates. Chilli, orange, mint or berry.

Last time I made this (with the milk chocolate) I gave it a quick whizz at the end so it ended up with a bit of froth on top too. I didn't do it this time because the kids had just gone to sleep, so I didn't want to wake them up.

Happy thermomixing!

Aussie meat pies and tomato ketchup

I had left this meal for the last one of the week on my meal plan, since I had to make a special trip to Kmart to get the individual pie tins. They are such a bargain, for a pack of four only $3.50. They also are a good way to prove bread dough to get perfectly shaped hamburger buns.

I started off making the tomato ketchup, as it requires quite a long cooking time. It thickens up nicely during the second cook, after adding the spices to it.

Ketchup at adding spices stage

It is quite a vinegary tasting sauce, but when having a little bit with something (such as a pie!) it tastes quite nice. It can be a little strong when you just have a taste of it on the spoon! It isn't really exactly like a store bough ketchup (like Heinz for example, which is what we usually have), but it is nice for something a little different. I popped the hot ketchup into some jam jars, and turned them upside down to form a vacuum seal. They do have a bit of sugar in them, so they will probably last in the fridge for a while.

Finished ketchup in jar

The pies...these babies took quite a long time and fiddling about to make! To be honest, next time I make them I would probably make one big pie in a cake tin. There are two types of icing - regular short crust pastry for the bases and iced butter puff pastry for the tops.

Short crust cases

Tomato ketchup

I have made the short crust pastry before and it works brilliantly. It is easy enough to roll out and cover the tins. They then have to go into the freezer to cool down again after handling them. This worked out okay though, since I also had the meat mixture that I had cooked cooling in the other freezer.

The iced butter puff pastry was another story. I didn't read beforehand that the butter needed to be frozen. So I diced it and put it in the freezer for 15 minutes, then made the pastry as instructed. It didn't really come together on its own, it was a big pile of breadcrumb-like mess when i poured it onto the pastry mat. Once it had been in the fridge for half an hour (while I made then cooled the beef mixture), I took it out and rolled it out. It was quite hard at first, but it soften up really quickly, and I had to put the discs I had cut out into the fridge to firm up again. By the time I got to the 5th disc, it was way too soft to roll and was getting stuck to everything. I put them all into the freezer while I filled the pies.

Meat filled pie cases

Iced butter puff pastry topped pies

I also found there wasn't quite enough pastry to make 6 pies, although I guess that would be because my tins may be slightly larger than the "texas muffin tin" suggested in the recipe book. I used a fork to crimp the edges of the pastry.

Once the pies came out of the oven, they looked great! They came out of the tins really easily, and had browned up nicely on the bottom. I did cook them on a metal baking tray so they would have even heat on the bases as well. The pies were really good with the tomato ketchup. I am pretty happy I have a spare left over for lunch tomorrow! I will keep it in the baking tin, and reheat it in the oven tomorrow so the pastry remains crisp.

Happy thermomixing!

Mongolian lamb hot pot

Mongolian lamb hot pot

This is one of those meals I tried when I first got my thermomix, loved it, and then forgot about it because there were so many other meals I wanted to try. I think I had looked at it a few times since in the recipe book, but because I usually look at the total recipe time, the 3 hours 25 minutes put me off. It is always a good idea to actually have a quick read through the recipe though, because most of that time is just marinating the meat in the fridge, and the actual cooking time is very minimal. Overall the active time is quite short at the end.

I marinated my meat for an hour. I found this plenty of time for the flavours to infuse and the vinegar to tenderise the meat. I used lean lamb that was already diced, so I skipped the step of freezing it first and then slicing into strips. Since it doesn't require much cooking time, it doesn't fall apart much at all, so you still end up with chunks of meat at the end.

I added the sauces in the quantities suggested, even the sambal oelek, so I was a little worried it would be too hot for the kids, but on tasting it, it wasn't too spicy for them at all. I just gave them mainly meat and not too much sauce so they wouldn't get too much chilli at once. If I was cooking this meal just for the adults, I would probably add an extra half tablespoon of sambal oelek to it.

The lamb was lovely and tender. I was trying to get the meal cooked quite quickly, so I did cook the rice in the microwave so I didn't have to wait for the thermomix to be free. Although I have just read of a way the rice can be cooked in the thermoserver, so I might give this a go next time we have rice.

I also steamed my broccoli over water on the stove because the mongolian lamb hot pot isn't really on long enough or high enough heat to give off enough steam to cook the broccoli.

Happy thermomixing!

Chicken veloute meal

Chicken veloute meal

If you have ever been to a thermomix demo, or had one, then chances are you have probably tried the chicken veloute meal. What is great with this meal, is that it uses the thermomix's ability to its full potential, with layered cooking, and easily provides you with a 2 course meal!

While the base of the soup is cooking in the bowl (with the vegetables being steamed in the steaming basket), the chicken is cooking in the varoma tray, and then later on the vegetables are added.

Now I have to admit - I really didn't like the chicken veloute meal when I had it originally. I have trouble eating chicken breast and steamed vegetables. And I really don't like steamed zucchini at all! So I did make a few adjustments to this meal.

Steamed chicken using baking paper

I left the soup part of it as the recipe instructs. When I added the chicken breast to the varoma tray, I put it onto a piece of scrunched up, wet baking paper, making sure to leave space at the sides for the steam to circulate through. I do this for a couple of reasons - so when I put the vegetable in, they don't end up with chicken drippings cooked onto them (yuck!!! yes I know its cooked but it just looks awfully unappetising to me!). I also use the baking paper to make cleaning the varoma a lot easier afterwards. It can be a bit time consuming poking bits of cooked chicken out of those tiny holes!

I also used fresh thyme leaves instead of tarragon. This was simply because I had a bunch of them I hadn't used up from last week, so rather than spend $3 on a bunch of tarragon, I just replaced it with the thyme. You could use whatever herbs you like or have on hand.

Steamed mixed vegetables

For the vegetables, I didn't cut them up into the tagliatelle sized strips. I prefer to cut the vegetables up chunkily, and just add them sooner so they cook through to how I like them. I cooked the chicken for 20 minutes since some of the tenderloins were quite thick, and added the carrots and cauliflower to the varoma dish at the 17 minute mark. At the 20 minute mark I added the broccoli to the varoma dish and continued with the recipe.

Delicious potato and leek soup!

I really love the potato and leek soup that this recipe makes. It is just so beautiful and silky! I then prepared the sauce for the main dish, and I must have left too much of the soup in the bowl, because I had quite a bit left over. I added the leftovers to our soup and stirred it through. The addidtion of the creme fraiche and mustard made the soup even better! Next time I make potato and leek soup on its own I am going to add those ingredients anyway. Yum!

Happy thermomixing!

P.S. I almost had a thermo-fail with this recipe! I weighed my potatoes in the bowl before I started, then got distracted. I got all the other ingredients out and prepared them. Then I put the garlic and onion in and turned it to the speed required for three seconds. It sounded really loud! Then the bowl was so much heavier than I expected when I lifted it out to scrape the onion and garlic down the sides...well that might have something to do with the potatoes I had obliterated along with them!!!! OOOOOPPPSSSS!!!!

Crepes with chocolate sauce (and strawberries!)

Crepes with chocolate sauce

Sundays are great for having fiddly breakfasts, knowing I don't need to rush around with the kids to get them to where they need to be for the day. So most weeks I like to make something special for breakfast on a Sunday. I decided to give the crepes a whirl. And since I hadn't really planned it through, I didn't have any syrup left to pour on them so I thought I would make up a half batch of the chocolate sauce too!

The crepe batter is really quick to make. Put everything in and give it a few quick 10 second blends and its ready to rest in the fridge for half an hour. I wanted to make the sauce in the thermomix, so I poured the crepe batter into a bowl and left it to rest while I made the sauce.

Crepe mixture after resting

I didn't really need a huge amount of sauce and there wasn't anything else I was planning on using it for, so rather than wasting half of it, I made up half of the recipe. One thing I will do differently next time, I would probably stir the cocoa through the sugar syrup a little before mixing it in the thermomix, just because some of it got stuck against the side of the bowl, and I had to give the sauce a second mix to combine it all. This probably wouldn't be too much of an issue if the full recipe was made though, as it would be covering the blades more.

Chocolate sauce

I found the sauce was also a little too thick in the end, so I did add a little bit more water and gave it another quick mix. One important tip! When you scrape the sauce into another container and you end up with a really chocolatey spatula...don't lick it! It is chocolate, and very tempting, but that stuff is cooked at 120℃ and it burns the tongue quite a lot! I know this from experience!!! Ouch...I am still suffering today with a sore tongue. I just wasn't thinking at the time, well I learnt my lesson the hard way!

Sugar syrup and cocoa powder

The crepes worked really well in my new Tefal non stick frying pan I bought a few weeks ago. I buttered the pan for the first couple of crepes, but then tried without buttering it and they still came off the pan just as easily.

Crepes are very time consuming to make since if you only use one frying pan, and it takes 3-4 minutes to cook each one, and I ended up getting 8 out of the mixture. So the whole process of making the batter, then resting it while making the sauce, then cooking the crepes, took me around an hour. So definitely something for a lazy Sunday when nothing else is calling you!

Next time I make them I want to try using a little less batter for each crepe to aim for the 10 crepes suggested in the recipe. I used a little over a ladle full for each crepe, because my pan was quite big, but because of the 4 eggs in the recipe, they do puff up a little bit. I think they would have been a little bit lighter and fluffier if I hadn't used quite as much batter for each one.

The kids ate every single morsel of theirs, and they really enjoyed the chocolate sauce as a bit of a treat! Well, who wouldn't!

I still do have a little bit of sauce left, so I am thinking it might be good to use for making hot chocolate drinks. I may just experiment with that later tonight and report back on the result!


Happy thermomixing!

Spaghetti carbonara

Spaghetti carbonara

I can't believe I have waited so long to try this recipe! Its so easy to make, and the sauce is delicious. It tastes so creamy, it is hard to believe that there isn't any cream in it.

I used diced short cut bacon, which was quite nice. Pancetta would be lovely too. The bacon goes into the thermoserver while the pasta water is coming to the boil. The water goes on for ten minutes to boil, so if you wanted to save time, you could add boiling water from the kettle so it doesn't take as long.

If you haven't tried cooking spaghetti in the thermomix yet, try it! Its quite funny to watch it spinning around and gradually going down into the bowl. My pasta packet instructions stated 9 minutes to cook, so I added an extra minute to allow for the time it took the pasta to fall down completely into the water.

Once the pasta is drained and placed in the thermoserver with the bacon and shallots, the sauce mixture needs to be added as quickly as possible and stirred. This cooks the egg and melts the cheese, so it forms a lovely creamy sauce. Since there isn't actually any cream in the dish, it isn't too heavy. Both the kids enjoyed this meal. I will definitely make this a regular addition to my meal plan!

Happy thermomixing!

PIzza Margherita

Pizza Margherita

Some nights it is nice just to have something quick and easy for dinner, and this is perfect. The recipe specifies it makes 4 pizzas, but I ended up making 2 from the dough, on my large round pizza trays.







The dough recipe is just the regular pizza dough from the book, so that is easy enough. I left this dough for about 40 minutes, as I didn't have a lot of time before the night time showering the kids routine began. We prefer the thinner crust pizzas anyway, but if it is left longer it just ends up getting a bit of a thicker crust.

I also added some tomato paste to the pizza bases, mainly because I felt a little bit odd not adding sauce to it! I also sprinkled a little bit of dried mixed herbs over the paste (also a habit!). I used a block of firm mozzarella, so I used a hand grater to grate it, I just prefer it that way for sprinkling over the pizza. I usually buy pre-grated mozzarella to be honest, and store it in the freezer to keep it fresh.

The end result was quite tasty, and they kids enjoyed it. They prefer basic pizzas with few toppings, so it was great for them.

Happy thermomixing!