Baking basics: The classic tea cake

Ingredients 

60g butter (room temperature)
1/2 cup castor sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
1 cup self-raising flour
1/3 cup milk
15g butter extra (melted) to brush on top
1 tablespoon castor sugar, extra
1 teaspoon cinnamon

This is a great recipe, so simple and something that I have easily put together when I have had people over. 

Always a hit, I have even brought it into work before and been asked if it was a ' Donut cake ' 

Method:

Preheat over to 180deg (fan forced) grease and line a 20cm round cake tin. Only use a round tin, as it will sink in the middle if you use a loaf tin...trust me!)


This was a little trick my Mum taught me to cut the perfect circle to line the bottom of the pan.

Cream butter, sugar, I like to use an electric beater, or mixer if you have one, works just as well with a wooden spoon and some elbow grease!

Add egg and vanilla, mix until light and creamy. 

Fold in sifted flour and milk, add this alternately until smooth.

Spread mixture into cake tin, bake for 25min or until golden 

Allow cake to cool in the tin for 5mins before turning onto wire rack, brush with butter and sprinkle with combined sugar and cinnamon.

This cake is best served warm from the oven and with a nice cuppa!!

Enjoy!

Much love,

Coffee lovin' - Zigfrids

It has been on my mind to do a Coffee lovin' series for some time now. The concept being that through my love for coffee I continually find myself on the quest for the best brew. 

Now I am by no means an expert when it comes to coffee, this series will merely be based on my own personal tastes and experiences and will be spaced out over the course of the warmer months. So enough waffling let's get into it!

Location: Zigfrids

Address: 66 Pakington Street, Geelong West VIC 3218

Price per coffee: $3.80 

Coffee Beans: Coffee Surpreme 

Hours: Open 7 days, 8am til late

The first thing that strikes you when you walk in is simply the large size of the building that was once an old mechanic's workshop. 

And the second is the beautiful decor, the perfect mix of industrial styling and rustic warmth. 

There are only a few simple things that I believe factor into a good coffee. The main being temperature. When I want a coffee I would prefer to drink it right away not 30 min after I order it. I also don't want scolding third deg burns when I attempt to sip it.

In saying that, I am going to narrow down these posts to a few categories when comparing the coffee experience.   

Coffee: Great temperature, nice balance between coffee and milk 

Atmosphere: Relaxed and comfortable, family friendly

Service: A bit slow, however there was only one staff member on the floor. Still friendly service.

Well that was my first attempt, I will just try to keep these posts short and simple and just see where this series of Coffee lovin' takes me!

Much love,

Healthy Salad Sunday

I thought I would post this 'go to' salad recipe, the ingredients seem to vary depending on what I have on hand in my fridge. But that is one of the appealing things about this kind of salad I think!

Ingredients

- 1 cup diced sweet potato

- 1 cup diced red capsicum

- 1 cup diced carrot

- 1 cup broccoli florets

- 1 cup diced zucchini

- 1 cup shredded red cabbage

- 1 cup cooked quinoa

- 2 cups of veg stock

- Chili infused olive oil

- 2 cloves of garlic (minced)

- 1 tbsp grated ginger

- 1 Lemon

The first thing you need to do is cook up your quinoa. When cooking quinoa the most important thing to do is rinse it thoroughly, easiest way to do this is to place the quinoa in a sieve and rinse under running water. 

Once it is well drained place the 1 cup of quinoa and 2 cups of veg stock ( or any kind of stock will do) into a pot and bring to the boil until all the stock is absorbed. This should take about 8-10 mins. Once the stock is absorbed, remove from heat and fluff up the quinoa with a fork and place aside.

The process is very much the same as cooking rice. You can use water to cook your quinoa, but I find using stock brings a lot more flavour to the quinoa.

 

Next you want to stir fry your veg!

Place a generous splash of Chili infused olive oil into a wok and fry up your minced garlic and grated ginger until them become fragrant. Then throw in your sweet potato and let this soften for a few minutes, then throw the remaining veg into the wok and stir fry until they have softened slightly. You still want a nice crisp crunch when you bite into your salad!

Now for the fun bit! grab a large bowl and mix the cooked quinoa and the stir fried veg together. 

And it is that simple!  

I always find it great to squeeze some lemon over the top to freshen it up and give it a nice zing.

This would be the prefect thing to bring to a bbq or what I like to do is cook this up on a Sunday night and then you have a great salad to bring to work or school for lunch the next few days, I find this salad keeps from around 2-3 days. 

Much love,

Winter warmer; the perfect slow cooked lamb roast

Today is the last day of winter and also a Sunday, so I thought it was fitting to do a post on the perfect winter warmer! This is my go to recipe for slow cooked lamb roast and also beautiful crispy roast potato's.

Ingredients
- Half leg of lamb ( I used 1.2 kg half lamb leg, however you can double this recipe depending on the size of the lamb)
- 2-3 cloves of garlic
- 2-3 sprigs of rosemary
- Olive oil
- 1/2 Cup of your favourite red wine
- 1/4 Cup Soy sauce

Method
- Crush garlic, rosemary (remove leaves from stem)and a splash of olive oil in a mortar and pestle. I generally eyeball the amount and add enough until I am happy with the consistency. If you do not have a mortar and pestle, you can either finely chop up the rosemary and garlic or a blender would be just as good.

-Brown off the lamb in a fry pan with a splash of olive oil on a high heat, this will seal the lamb and stop it from drying out when it is slow cooking. I generally leave it for a approx 1 min on each side.

- Once browned, transfer into slow cooker and rub the rosemary and garlic paste all over the lamb and pour the soy sauce and red wine over the top.

- Slow cook on low for 7-9 hours depending on the size of the lamb, as a guide the smaller leg such as the one I am cooking (just over 1kg, takes about 7hrs and larger leg 1.5kg plus will take around the 8-9 hour mark)

- Once the meat is falling off the bone, remove from the slow cooker and pull the meat apart and remove the bones. I like to return the meat to the juices in the slow cooker so it will soak up all the goodness!! You can leave the meat in the cooker on a 'keep warm' setting until you are ready to serve up your roast.


Now onto the potato's!!

All you will need for the potato's are;
-A nice roasting potato, I prefer desiree
-Olive oil
-Ground sea salt and black pepper
-Whatever herbs you have on hand, I am using dried oregano


Method
-Peel and cut potato's
-Place in pot and just cover with water

-Bring to the boil and then simmer for 8mins
-Drain water and shake the potato's in the pot with the lid on until the are fluffed up around the outside

-Place in roasting tray and drizzle with olive oil, season with sea salt and pepper, sprinkle your herbs over and roast for about 40mins on 200deg (fan forced) making sure to turn potato's about 20mins in.

Much love,

Nanna Gloria's ribbon sandwiches

Never know what to bring to gathering? Then keep on reading! Best thing is that they are cheaper than your standard box of chocolates and you are guaranteed to come home with an empty plate!

Ingredients

300gm Ham
Half a bunch of spring onions, roughly chopped
1 loaf of wholemeal bread
1 loaf of white bread
1 jar of Cream cheese spread
*All ingredients are just rough guides, depending on how many sandwiches you want to make

-Grab three slides of bread, I like to grab two slices from one loaf and one from the other
-Layer some ham on one slice
-Spread a generous layer of cream cheese spread on another
-Sprinkle some spring onions over the slice with the cream cheese
-Then stack the layers; Ham slice, cream cheese slice and top with the remaining slice of bread
-Gently cut off all the crusts and slice into three 'ribbons'

It's as simple as that!

Nana's top tips
- If you have an electric knife it will make it a lot easier to cut off the crusts
- Be careful not to push down on the sandwiches too much when cutting them as you will end up with flat sandwiches

Much love,

Banana cake//

Ingredients
160g Butter, room temp
3/4 Cup Firmly packed brown sugar
2 eggs
1 1/2 cups Mashed banana (over ripe)
2 Tbs Hot milk
1 tsp Bicarbonate of soda
1 Cup Plain flour
2/3 Cup self raising flour

- Preheat oven to 180 deg (fan forced) line and grease a cake pan, I prefer to use a loaf tin
- Beat butter and sugar together until pale and fluffy

-Beat in eggs one at a time

- Stir in mashed banana, the recipe called for 1 1/2 cups, but I just use whatever I have on hand, normally anywhere between 3-5 bananas will do perfectly
- Warm up the milk in the microwave for about 20sec then mix in the bicarb soda and pour into banana mixture and stir
- Stir in sifted flours in two batches

- Spread into pan
- Bake for around 40mins, or until cooked through

- Allow to cool in pan for 5mins, before removing and placing on a wire rack to cool completly

- I have used a basic cream cheese icing which I will link here. But the cake tastes great just on it's own as well
- It is really important to crumb coat your cake when icing, which is simply spreading a thin layer of the icing over the cake and allowing it to set and form a kind of 'crust' which will allow all the crumbs to set in. This way you will not pull up crumbs when icing your cake!

- Then you can spread the remaining icing over the cake

Tips
- Always allow cake to rest 5mins before removing from pan
- Crumb coating a cake will always give it a nicer finish

Much love,