Thoughts

I don't know why but I need a vent today. This will be entirely random thoughts that I have been having of late.

1- How could anyone hurt a child, any child but specifically your own child. I look at my babies and I can't imagine ever getting to the point where I am that angry or unhappy at them or otherwise that I would think hurting them would fix the problem. I want to hurt those people... a little counter productive I guess.

2- Discipline is love. I am not talking smacking but discipline your children people. Kids need rule, kids need guidelines. You are doing them a favour teaching them these rules and you are doing yourself a favour. When kids know the rules it doesn't mean they wont misbehave or try and bend the rules but it will reduce those incidents just be consistent.

3- I want the rain because we are only on tank water but we have water now so can you go away now.

4- I love exercising.  I get a little unmotivated  sometimes but if a make myself get out and do it I feel amazing. I would recommend for mums with young kids there is great kids yoga video that I do with Hastings on you tube I think it is Yogatic. Also for just anyone working out at home there are great print outs and full length videos on fitnessblender.com they have heaps of videos that will suit all fitness levels.

5- I love cooking. I love making pretty dishes but even more I love making delicious dinners. Cooking is cathartic for me.

Thanks for letting me think on screen.

Yumo Apple Cider Cakes with Apple Bark

This was meant to be a donut recipe but I didn't have a donut pan so we made patty cakes. I also dont know where to get cider so I had to make my own so I will add that recipe as well. 
This recipe is care of Alanabread 
http://www.alanabread.com/2011/10/apple-cider-baked-goods-apple-cider-glaze-apple-bark/

APPLE CIDER BAKED GOODS + CIDER GLAZE + APPLE BARK

Apple cider baked goods (from Diana’s Desserts)

2 cups plain flour

2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

2 tsp cinnamon

1 egg

2/3 cup packed brown sugar

1/2 cup apple sauce

1/3 cup maple syrup (or maple flavoured syrup)

1/3 cup good quality apple cider

1/3 cup vanilla yoghurt

3 tbsp vegetable oil

Apple cider glaze

1 cup icing sugar mixture

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/4 cup good quality apple cider

Apple bark

1 apple

sprinkling of cinnamon

For the apple cider baked goods

1. Preheat oven 180°C.

2. In a large bowl combine flour, baking powder, salt and cinnamon.

3. In another bowl combine wet ingredients; beaten egg, brown sugar, apple sauce, maple syrup, apple cider, yoghurt and vegetable oil. Give them a quick whisk then add your bowl of dry ingredients. Whisk until just combined.

4. Divide your mixture between pans/tins of your choosing. For a donut pan bake for 10 minutes, for mini donuts and baby cupcakes bake for 5-7 minutes or until the tops spring back when touched.

5. After 5 minutes transfer to a wire rack and allow to cool completely.

For the apple glaze

1. Combine icing sugar, cinnamon and cider in a small bowl and stir well to remove any lumps.

For the apple bark (do this the morning before)

1. With a sharp vegetable peeler peel thin strips of apple, including the skins, and place on a baking tray. Sprinkle with cinnamon.

2. Bake in a cool oven (around 80-100°C) until completely dried, between 2 -3 hours. (If you are doing this day before you may need to re-crisp your apple bark for half an hour before assembling). Once dried, the apple skins will shrink and curl like little twigs. The apple strips will look like leaves.

For the assembly

1. Hold your baked good up-side-down and dip into the glaze. Shake of any excess and place back on the wire rack. Take a piece of apple bark and place on baked good while the glaze is still wet so it stays in place once dried. Continue with the rest of your donuts and baby cupcakes.

The Apple cider Recipe

8 -10 apples
1/2-1 cup sugar
2 cinnamon sticks
2 star anise 

4 whole nutmeg

Directions:

1
Quarter your apples (no need to remove peel or seeds).
2
In a large stock pot add your apples and fill with water--just enough to cover the apples.
3
Add your sugar.
4
Wrap your cinnamon and allspice in a doubled up cheese cloth and tie, and add this to the apples and water.
5
Boil on high for one hour (uncovered) checking on it frequently.
6
Turn down heat and let simmer for two hours (covered).
7
Take off the heat after two hours of simmering and let cool.
8
Remove spices and mash up the apples to a pulp like consistency (a potato masher works well for this).
9
Once cool pour into a strainer over a large bowl. When most of the juice has drained away, put the remainder of the pulp into a doubled up cheese cloth and squeeze over the bowl until no more juice comes out.
10
(At this point you can either restrain the juice to get out the little bits of pulp that remain with a cheese cloth draped inside the strainer to catch them or just leave it like I do).
11
You can store in an air tight container in your refrigerator for up to a week or you can freeze it for later use if you like.

Another Great Recipe

Ingredients

• 2 skin-on bone-in chicken breasts
• 2 slices bacon (finely chopped)
• 3 tbsp (about a handful) finely chopped mushrooms
• 2 tbsp roasted pine nuts
• 2 tbsp panko bread crumbs
• 1½ tbsp cream cheese
• 2 garlic cloves (minced)
• 2 tbsp green onion
• ⅛ tsp salt
• ¼ tsp thyme
• ¼ tsp parsley
• olive oil/butter

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 400°F.
2. Remove chicken from fridge.
3. In a pan on medium heat, fry bacon until cooked, but still soft. If cooking potatoes with the chicken, save the bacon fat for them!
4. Roast pine nuts in pan on medium heat until browned.
5. Finely chop your bacon, mushrooms, pine nuts & green onion (or combine in food processor).
6. In a bowl mix all your ingredients together (minus the chicken!).
7. Run your finger under the chicken skin to loosen it for the stuffing. You should be able to loosen it from each end, while it stays connected on the sides.
8. If you’re cooking potatoes with the meal, combine all ingredients in a baking dish and put them in the oven 10 minutes before the chicken (refer to recipe below).
9. Use a spoon and your finger to stuff the filling under the chicken skin. Spread it evenly as you stuff.
10. Once stuffed, rub the chicken skin with olive oil or butter, and rub entire chicken breast with salt & pepper.
11. Place chicken in a baking dish (or on top of potatoes), cook for about 25-30 minutes (will depend on size of chicken breast), or until chicken reaches internal temperature of 160°F (will continue to cook while resting). I would highly recommend using a meat thermometer (linked below) for the best results.
12. Serve chicken garnished with parsley.

To a Special Lady

This is over a week old but my Mother had a birthday and I love treating her on her special day because she treats everyone else every other day of the year. So I snuck over to her house at the crack of dawn and put up decorations she was awake but I had eyes on the inside keeping her clueless and I had breakfast all prepared.
Happy Birthday Mum.

Blueberries, home made yoghurt and Muesli 

Yoghurt Recipe

2 litres non-homogenized milk

3 tbsp live natural yoghurt

1 vanilla bean

½ cup sugar (optional)

Preparation

Heat treatment 

This is required to destroy any spoilage bacteria, thus allowing the desirable bacteria no competition to produce enough lactic acid to preserve the yoghurt. It also denatures the proteins a little, giving the yoghurt more viscosity.

Firstly, heat the milk, sugar and vanilla bean with seeds scraped out in a sterile pan to 92°C – you can use a double boiler or put it straight on the heat (be very careful not to burn the milk as this will taint the product – keep stirring!). You will need to use a thermometer to check this temperature and keep stirring to ensure an even temperature throughout. Once the 92°C is attained, remove the pan from the heat.

Reduce heat quickly from 92°C to 35°-40°C. Place the pan in a cold-water bath – use a double boiler system and replace the cold water, or put the pan straight into a sink if deep enough. Check the temperature frequently.

Adding the starter

Once the milk reaches 38°C, add the yoghurt and stir. Pour the milk into sterilised jars and fill right to the top, leaving no gap. 

Never add the starter if the milk is higher than 45°C.

Afterwards, your own yoghurt can be used as the “mother” to make the next batch. However, over a few batches, the nature of the bacterial content may change slightly and, with it, the texture and flavour of the yoghurt may begin to change. If this is the case, start again with commercial yoghurt.

Incubation

It is very important to get this right – if the temperature is too warm, then one bacteria will grow faster than the others and this will result in imbalanced flavour and texture. In Australia, most commercial yoghurts are incubated at 42-43°C for 4-6 hours (the longer the incubation the stronger the yoghurt), while European yoghurts are incubated for 12-16 hours at 33-35°C.

Keep the sealed jars in a warm place for 12-18 hours. An easy way of doing this is to place the jars in a small eski, with water surrounding the jars at the correct temperature. You can check every few hours and adjust the water temperature as required by replacing with warmer water. During the incubation, the bacteria will convert the lactose into lactic acid and the pH will decrease to the point where coagulation occurs.

After coagulation occurs, do not place the yoghurt in the fridge for at least 1 hour – it is this time after coagulation has occurred that will determine the flavour intensity of the yoghurt; the longer it is left, the stronger the flavour.

Keep in a tightly sealed jar and use within a week of making it. 

Fruit Loaf 

Recipe by Teresa Cutter, The Healthy Chef

200 g  (2 cups) almond meal

1 tablespoon ground linseed (flaxseed )

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon bi carb soda ( baking soda )

4 free range / organic eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla bean paste or extract

1 large red apple, chopped with the skin into chunks

80 g dried apricots (sulphur free )

60 g dried cranberries

30 g walnuts, chopped (optional but really good )

1 tablespoon honey

Preheat your oven to 180 C. (160 C FAN FORCED)

Mix almond meal, cinnamon, bi carb and linseed (flaxseed ).

Add eggs, honey and vanilla and mix through.

Add apple, dried fruit and walnuts.

Mix well – it will be very chunky, full of fruit.

Spoon into a loaf tin that you have lightly oiled and dusted with almond meal or coconut.

Smooth out the batter with the back of a spoon, making sure it’s all even.

Bake for about 40 minutes or until golden and cooked through and your kitchen smells wonderful.

Remove from the oven and allow to cool in the tin for about 1 hour before turning out.

Serve alone or with a little ricotta or cottage cheese  + honey.

Store in the fridge in an airtight container for up to 4 days.

Banana Bread

265g (1 3/4 cups) self-raising flour

40g (1/4 cup) plain flour

1 tsp ground cinnamon

140g (2/3 cup, firmly packed) brown sugar

125ml (1/2 cup) skim milk

2 eggs, lightly whisked

50g butter, melted, cooled

2 overripe medium bananas, mashed

Preheat oven to 180°C. Brush an 11 x 21cm (base measurement) loaf pan with melted dairy spread to lightly grease. Line the base and 2 opposite sides with non-stick baking paper, allowing it to overhang.

Sift the combined flours and cinnamon into a large bowl. Stir in the sugar and make a well in the centre. Place the milk, eggs, melted butter and banana in a medium bowl, and stir until well combined. Add the banana mixture to the flour mixture and stir until just combined. Spoon the mixture into the prepared pan and smooth the surface.

Bake in preheated oven for 45-50 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. Remove from oven and set aside in the pan for 5 minutes. Turn onto a wire rack to cool completely. Cut into slices to serve.

Practical or Lazy

Ok so when I was a bit larger just after I had the baby boy I used the excuse that I was fat and didn't look good in anything but now I am 20kg lighter and I am still wearing the same clothes. Black crop tights and wide strap singlets and very comfortable bras. I know that seems strange to add but I wore a normal bra the other day that all the other women in the world wear and I was SO uncomfortable.

I keep making excuses for my wardrobe, it is practical because I am the mum of 2 young boys to moves with me and is can get messy, I go to the gym so I am just wearing my gym clothes before hand and oh whoops I got changed into clean gym clothes after my shower.

When I really think it through I am just being lazy I am comfortable and I look ok not good not great but not bad. I am being very lazy.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Years

A belated Merry Christmas and Happy New Years. It was my littlest Calloways First Christmas and he had a lovely time. Hastings enjoyed opening his presents but really just wanted to open one and then just play with it rather then open another one. We also spent a lovely  day with family. I got to spend some lovely play time with my only Nephew who is about 5 months younger with Hastings. It was great to have a big family Christmas. 

New Years involved us in bed by ten and then off to the gym. A perfect evening and morning for me. 

I hope everyone had a lovely time with family and friends. 

Love

Tarryn