Tag Archives: food pics

Meringues

I’ve been doing a lot of running around on errands so I haven’t posted recently. My blood sugar dropped a lot so I found myself craving sweet things.

So I decided to take the plunge and made meringues for the first time.

Sounds silly I know, but I’ve had this thing about being afraid of screwing up the egg whites. I had a box of egg whites in my fridge that I bought and felt, if I never take the risk, I’ll never do it!

So I made this batch of brain food and boy, am I glad I did! (here’s a BBC Food’s recipe for meringue, it’s slightly different.)

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Leche Flan

One of the easiest Filipino desserts for me to make here in Australia is Leche Flan. The kids love this recipe, but as you can see in the image, the caramel isn’t very dark. That’s because of my family’s preference, so you may need to experiment with the caramel to get it as dark as you like.

I hope you enjoy making this! This is a busy mom version; traditional Leche Flan  uses carefully separated egg yolks, careful hand beating with a whisk, and strains the mixture through cheesecloth several times, resulting in a silky creamy flan. I’m rather lazy and want my delicious treat with minimal effort; my answer to this is to tap the bubbles out and use either a blender or mixer.

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Homemade Wontons


As part of their holiday ‘fun thing’ I taught my eldest how to make chicken wonton filling / chicken meatballs. Eldest boy helped wrap up a few, but I had to take over or else we wouldn’t have dinner on time! Happily my little budding hearth witch mastered the wrapping of wontons quickly. We still have meat so we’ll make a packet of wontons to freeze, and make meatballs out of the rest.

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Yummy Hospital Food!

Yeah I know, there’re are people out there going O_o wtf at that title. It’s like saying “OMG YUMMY AIRPLANE FOOD.” (Which I have had. Emirates and Philippine Airlines international flights have delicious food, and I hear Singapore Airlines and JAL have also good inflight menus. So…yeah. ^^;;; )

So, hospital food here in Townsville Hospital? Is yum. I’m not saying that because “I don’t have a choice and hafta eat it because I’m admitted for baby-observation” but because I really do find the options delicious. Lunch was a meltingly soft beef curry with steamed green beans (that was my choice, since I get jabbed for blood tests as part of the monitoring) and I have a coffee. I chat up the lunch ladies here and they now know I ABSOLUTELY ADORE the hospital’s egg sandwiches. If someone rejects them please give them to me while I’m here. cute puppy eyes And well, extra protein for bubs! (I have some sealed fruit juices and fruit cups that were rejected and I’ve set aside to increase my vitamin C intake to help me absorb the goodness for the baby too.)

Hospital food is yummy here.

Anyway. It so happened someone rejected their egg and ham sandwiches, and the food cart lady asked if I wanted them. DO I EVER?! I love the boiled egg salad sandwiches here, but egg sandwiches in the hospital are om nom nom weakness for me. The egg sandwiches might not seem special to anyone but they’re light and creamy and flavorful eggs of perfection without being overwhelmingly eggy. Maybe next time I’ll remember to take a picture of them before snaffling them down. They’re so yummy… They have plenty of other sandwiches too, but the egg ones and the chicken ones are my faves.

There’s always a good meal too. You have the main dish (one of the meals scheduled that I picked will be chicken schnitzel with sides, and the dessert for that will be a fudge cake. OM NOM NOM, must remember to take photo). The tray will have a fruit cup, coffee or tea (I pick coffee) and often a slice of bread and options of jelly or Veeeeeeeegimite (I… prefer the jelly) and there’s often a fruit cup of diced fruit. I found out that people often turn up their noses on these things and sometimes, if lucky the fruit cups, extra sandwiches and such end up in the lounge fridge for anyone to have. If unlucky they get thrown away. Thrown. Away. HORRORS.

Now, the food served are also balanced diets. A serve of meat, carbs and steamed veg is the usual. The carbs can be mashed potatoes, rice, steamed and mashed pumpkin, or roasted potatoes or pumpkin/squash. They’re not overly salty, but also not bland. And they do serve a small packet of salt and pepper that if used, is just the right amount. Breakfast is typically cereal options, (I pick boiled oatmeal porridge), fruit cup, yogurt, fruit piece, coffee or tea, slice of bread with butter and jam option. It’s very filling, and usually afterward I walk around the ward to stretch my muscles and ensure I don’t encourage blood clots.

Milo, Chocolate Chip Cookies and ANZAC biscuits. Yum!!!!!!

Mid morning, mid afternoon and about 8 pm, there’s a coffee trolley that goes around too. I look forward to these because they have the option of hot Milo with the usual coffee and tea (and yes, I can ask for a milo-coffee!) and this is where I get the chance for little saltine crackers and cheese, or a packet or two of Arnott’s bikkies or cookies. =9 The cheese and cracker option it pure delight when eaten with the supply of cherries or grapes I have here with me for extra vitamin C snackies.

Milo coffee, saltines and a nibble of cheese - healthy snackie!

Healthy little nibbles

And I’ve taken so long writing this that they’ve come up with the tea / bikkie break. I asked for a Milo-coffee / mocha, and they gave me the saltines and cheese =9

Staying hydrated isn’t a problem either. The water bottles they give out have a sweet water that reminds me of Evian (which we used to drink when I lived back in Germany.) I often find myself surprised when I empty a bottle from idly sipping while writing. I also have my half-cup juice stash of apple juice, and there’s the tea trolley, and if I want more I can just meander down to the lounge and make myself a coffee, then toddle back to my room. I can also make myself a chamomille or Lady Grey tea since I brought some teabags from the house (because I do try to cut back on the coffee to just twice a day.)

I’m quite well fed and cared for here, and I really appreciate the efforts on that. So I thought I’d write about it.

And now that I have, I’m going to eat the food.

 

==

 

update: dinner option:; shepherds pie, steamed veg, pea and ham soup.

shepherds pie, ham and pea soup, veg and all good and delicious!

shepherds pie, ham and pea soup, veg and all good and delicious!

=9

 

Starting the year 2015 with Soba

Kitsune Soba

So, I’m back from the hospital with some blood pressure meds I need to take every eight hours. Egh. They really mess with me though, so I have to be careful with how long I stay upright.

Normally at this stage of my pregnancy, I’ll be feeding the baby with the aim of brain and muscle development. However, in the wake of no less than 5 failed cannula attempts (my veins just kept going NOPE!) I have the grip of a three year old. So, while I was planning delicious foods like piroshky and maina to prep and freeze and store for easy reheating and eating, they have to take an unfortunate back-burner for now. Fortunately, the children can be pressed into kitchen service (it’s also good training for them; a seven year old boy is quite capable of peeling potatoes and carrots, and the eldest daughter is capable of chopping that up into little chunks, and with the aid of a food processor slicing up onions is easy – she just has to cut them into quarters and feed through.) I’ll have to have them brown up minced meat with carrots, onions and potatoes and freeze to use as bases for future meals.

My children will grow up to be capable in the kitchen.

I found some enoki mushrooms at the local grocery though! They were on sale too, yay, so I snapped up a packet. I knew I had some aburaage in the pantry, and either soba or udon, so I decided to make something noodle-based for our first dinner of the year. Yeah, I’m not steady enough to do the whole thing proper but fusiony dishes let me get away with this. There were frozen shrimp har gows in the freezer, and to my delight I’m not allergic to this set. I’m going to have to remember that, and buy more in the future.  I had both soba and udon, but decided on the soba because the udon felt like too much to deal with right now, plus it’s more traditional for the Year End Soba” (though I’m making it for the start of the year, since I was too ill yesterday to cook. We went with a different Japanese-holiday-appropriation instead.)

 

Shadowdancer’s Super Lazy Toshikoshi Kitsune Soba with Shrimp Har Gow

 

1 packet aburaage (there were ten pieces in this one) or inari-zushi no moto (they’re the same thing.)

1 liter Campbell’s Chicken Stock

2 Maggi Chicken bouillon cubes

1 small punnet of enoki mushrooms, pulled into strips

1 frozen package of Shrimp Har Gow (feel free to substitute any other dim sum of choice)

Half the packet of this brand of soba” This makes enough for four or five people

(not used this time) Asian greens, such as Chinese cabbage (wom bok), chopped into strips, leeks, spring onions chopped fine, bok choy, as desired

Note: If you have narutomaki fish cakes” , other kamaboko” kamaboko, or anything else you want to add to this, feel free.

1 medium sized pot

In a medium sized pot, pour the chicken stock. Add bouillon cubes and enough water to fill  up to 2/3 of the pot. Add the aburaage with the accompanying liquid. Put in the enoki mushrooms, and bring to a boil at medium heat. Add  the har gow adn cook for another 10-15 minutes. Add the soba, (and greens and naruto) and cook for another 4-5 minutes.

Serve in bowls, with chopsticks. Enjoy!

I am, however, having a slice of fruit cake for dessert.  With Lady Grey tea.

“>coles_darkfruitcake

Sticky, yummy, packed with fruit. It’s not boozy, but my time-tested method of improving on store bought fruitcakes is to simply soak them in the brandy or rum of one’s choice in a plastic container for a week. Store bought fruitcakes are also a delight when you’re making boozy fruitcake truffles – just ball up boozed up fruitcake, dip into white glaze, decorate with candied cherries … yum~