True of false? It's not the size that matters, its the way you use it.

It's 5:55am by my mac clock. In other words there is no sane reason why the fuck I am awake right now. And do you want to know the worst reason of all?? All I can think about when I try and get back to sleep is the Chocolate Swirl Croquembouche from Masterchef. Crazy??! mmm I think I am on my way if not already there. 


Anyway, apart from the dreams of toffee and caramel and sinking my teeth into crunchy puff balls with silky custard all night (sounds a little erotic and I assure you it was!) But since I am up nice and early (why do people call it 'nice and early'?? its NOT NICE!!) I thought I'd make the most of my time at home since my work computer has every site that is remotely useful blocked.


Blog note: I cooked this roast dinner one Sunday night a few weeks back before the blog was started but for goodness knows why my mission had. 


Recipes 13, 14, 15, & 16: Perfect roast pork with Roast potatoes, parsnips and carrots, Yorkshire puddings and a consistently good gravy.  (I have been reading Julie Powell's "The Julie/Julia Project" and having all the recipes in French sounds so much more exotic and grand then anything sounds in English).


Firstly the pork goes into the small oven, resting on a bed of veggies and herbs. After this was done I started my roast potatoes, parsnip and carrots. These needed to be part cooked by boiling them first. Low and behold the water took 15 min to boil but I had already peeled them which could have been done while the water was boiling but I didn’t read the recipe all the way through or plan the tiny oven disaster that is my mothers kitchen to a T. 


While I was suppose to put the vegies in the oven 20 min after the meat has gone in, the veggies went in about 50 min after the meat was cooking which meant that everything in the tiny oven was running late. 


Next was getting the Yorkshire pudding batter ready as it has to sit for 30min. This I could do as the veggies still had an hour left to cook and the meat would be done in half an hour. And I still needed to make the gravy and cook to the Yorkshire puddings and carve the meat and make sure that the crackling was crackly. 


The pork was overcooking the veggies weren’t browning and it was about 8pm now. At this point I don't know how you can make a Jamie roast dinner with all the trimmings in one oven. Oh thats right!.... if you have a normal size oven your fine!!!


After a glass of cold water and a lot of goooss-fra-baa I was ready to get back in the game. 


The meat came out and crackly crackling was removed, covered in foil and then the pan which had the meat juices and bed of veggies was put on the hok where flour, wine and stock was added. Everything was mushed with a potato masher and left to simmer. Next the muffin tin was put in the oven to heat, then oil was added in the muffin sections and put back in the oven to heat up further. 


By now I have complaints from mum and Tristan that they're hungry and its getting too late to eat dinner. I had suddenly found men's skill of selective hearing.


The gravy was sieved and put into a jug, the batter poured out into the muffin tin and back in the oven. It is about 8.30pm now and the Yorkshires need to bake for 15min with no disturbing allowed. I carved the meat, served it and the Yorkshires started burning. Shit! By now mum and Tristan were sitting at the table waiting patiently (patiently my arse!). Dad was getting in trouble putting butter on the dinner table in case any one wanted any.

So after disturbed the puddings I got out the veggies and served them with the now cold pork. When the puddings were done everything was sent to the table and dinner was served. 

Cold pork with luke warm gravy and hot veggies with slightly oily Yorkshire puddings. Dinner was eaten at 9pm but apart from late night indigestion I think it was mostly a success. Everyone was v polite and said they enjoyed it.  I think if i had given them dog food they would have said it was nice they were so hungry.

Confession

Fear not my fellow followers, I am still alive! While coming down with a tummy bug and then Australia Day there has been not much chance to cook until now. All I felt like eating was plain pasta with butter on it... I can hear you all saying mmm yum right now. SO for dinner tonight I thought i'd cook again as I have been having a slight freak out. 154 days left in my mission for "Jamie's Ministry of Food" and 148 to go. I know one per day and i'll get it done but that won't happen I know myself. I need to get crackin'!


If you have just been trying to add up the recipes in my blog and the amount left to cook it doesn't make any sense. Thats because I have to admit something... I have cooked more recipes then what is written on my blog. They will be posted but I started cooking before I started writing.


Recipe #12- Classic Tomato Spaghetti. (With added peas and baby spinach)- Cook garlic, basil stalks in olive oil add a can of tomatoes. Add chopped basil leaves (& frozen peas), bring to the boil, add cooked spaghetti and baby spinach. Serve.


It needed a lot more salt but then it could have been just me. I have this mouth ulcer that makes everything taste metallic. fun.

Snot, Slime and Friends

Recipe #11- Chicken Chow Mein last night. Wondering what the snot, slime and friends means? let me explain. I chopped the garlic, spring onions, ginger and chilli as Jamie asks. The chicken was defrosting and the noodles were sitting their packet ready to go. Next step was to pick the leaves of the coriander and chop the stalks. Out came the fresh coriander from the fridge... 'Mmmuuummmm!!!' Lets just say it did not like sitting in the fridge over the past couple days. It was half snot and half coriander.


While mum sorted the snotty coriander I got the mushrooms out of the fridge to start chopping. When I pulled one out of its box I not only had a mushroom in my hand but also a little creepy crawly friend too. 'Mmmuuuuuummmm!!' So mum sorted the slimy mushrooms and my little friend went straight into the compost. After the Snot, slime and friends catastrophe everything was ready to go for some wok action. Except the fact that the only bit of sauce used in Jamie's Chicken Chow Mein is soy sauce it was the only sauce we didn't have at home. So off Dad went -as he so often does when I am half way through a recipe and realise I don't have everything to make it- to the shops to get some soy sauce. He came back after failing at the local Shell to then be successful at the Asian grocers across the road.


Dinner was served and eaten within 15 min of getting the soy sauce in the door.
 

A tribute to offal free books

 While reading "My Year of Cooking Dangerously" by Julie Powell on the bus I was not sure if I gave myself bus sickness or if what she wrote made me queazy. 

"These kidneys...were large and messy and many-lobed, striated with white fat filaments"

Need I elaborate? If I do I think I'll be leaving you feeling bus sick too. Although the positive thing is, that she admits that they don't taste like piss when she eats them which is what her mother thinks kidneys taste like. I am thanking Jamie and the heavens that there is no offal in 'Jamie's Ministry of Food'!!


Recipe #9 & #10- On Saturday morning I put two recipes together and made the perfect omelette. Bacon, tomato and cheese. Need I say more?? Mmmm I could do an omelette for dinner tonight thinking about it... don't think mum would approve of omelette for dinner though.


Recipe #11-Saturday night was our Terminator marathon. So the only thing better then a Terminator marathon is a Terminator marathon with cheesecake. I made Jamie's 'Vanilla Cheesecake with a Raspberry topping' for dessert. I thought of my growing bum and used light philly instead of full fat. I also didn't read the recipe right so I used pure cream instead of double cream. It was a non-bake cheese cake so I don't think it made much difference as all it had to do was set in the fridge after everything was mixed together. I've never made a non-bake cheese cake before, I've only ever done the New York Cheesecake from Nigella Lawson's 'How to be a domestic goddess' and you know what?? You will definitely feel like your a domestic goddess if you try that recipe, it is AMAZING! Jamie's cheesecake was also amazing but didn't quite earn the caps yet... maybe more lemon next time and it will be on par.

Saving my ABC's for another day

Recipe # 7 & 8- Korma Chicken (with Jamie style homemade curry paste). I had no alphabet songs going through my head staring at the spice section in Coles yesterday.

I made my own ground almonds for the curry which worked well and we added dried coriander leaves in stead of coriander stalks and half a red chilli instead of a green one. I avoided putting my fingers in my mouth this time while chopping the chilli but we did have our mouths burning within the 2nd mouthful!

Hmm there is still Vindaloo to cook.... haha we might have more then our mouths burning with that one :)

Soggy salad

Recipe #5 & 6- Steak, carrots and salad. Strange combination I have to admit. It started with thoughts like 'I can't be bothered to cook' but also 'I'm not going to get this done unless I keep cooking' so I was tied. Mum didn't feel like curry, or rice, or noodles, or pasta so the option I was left with was potatoes. And the only problem with potatoes was that we didn't have the right ones for the 'best new potatoes' and the 'baked French potatoes' took too long to cook as I had to be at basketball in an hour.

Carrots it was. Baked in a foil bag with garlic, bacon, butter, honey (was meant to use marmalade but...yuk) and rosemary. Assumption stabbed me in the back again. I didn’t read the recipe and thought carrots are quick cooking vegetable. No no no. Bake for 50 min... so that left me 10 min the eat, digest and drive to basketball. Fail!

The 'Everyday chopped green salad' was chopped, dressed and ready to go. The carrots were in the oven and I was out the door.

Home from basketball and ravenous. Mum warned me that the 'Everyday chopped green salad' was a soggy mush. The only thing that kept its crunch in the salad was the celery. It tasted nice enough …as good as soggy salad tastes. The carrots however were delicious! I award my self 5 stars for the carrots and -5 for the salad. Just thinking of it makes me feels ill.

Ew I have to stop there on that note.

24 Balls

I’ve been lazy over the weekend. I won’t get all the recipes finished if I keep cooking this slow. But Thai take-out was just calling me! How can anyone resist the call of Thai take-out???

Recipe #4- Spaghetti and Meatballs. No drama's last night except having sayo crumbs everywhere and trying to keep my cat away from the meatballs. She sat on the kitchen stool while Jamie asked me to scrunch all the ingredients together with my hands then roll them into 4 large balls and split the 4 large balls into 6 small balls (There was a lot of balls) and tried to get on the kitchen bench. When I stopped her she would try to just get her head on the bench with no paws... sneaky cat.

Bring a Salad

Recipe #2 (& #3)- Rice Salad. BBQ at Chloe's house sitting house last Friday and it was a 'Bring a Salad' do. I'm a sucker for them! Last time I made a couscous salad that had too much chilli and not enough of anything else but couscous. Plus I have this problem of over catering so there was a lot of this too much chilli too much couscous salad. I have dissed that recipe as a bad day and will never make it again. This time I felt confident with my salad choice. Jamie's Rice Salad.

First things first was to cook the rice so it could cool. The rice for the salad is a mixture of long grain and wild rice. I mixed the both of the rice together assuming that it all takes the same amount of time to cook. Wrong. The wild rice takes longer as Mum came in and told me about 30 seconds too late. (At this point I could hear Tris's voice in my head saying "Assumption is the mother of all fuck ups") Two words to describe how my rice turned out trying to cook it Jamie's way instead of in the trusty rice cooker. Burnt Pan.

The rest of the goodies for the rice were chopped and ready to go, this included fresh chilli's. Tip #1: Never think that you've washed your hands enough after chopping chilli. I learnt this the hard way last Friday. How you ask? I kept burning my fingers while cooking the rice and would put them straight in my mouth. It felt like I’d transferred the heat burn from the rice pan to my fingers and then into my mouth. I felt like I could have breathed fire!

The salad was then dressed (with Jamie's Lemon jar dressing) but I was still not. After I threw on a pair of shorts and top, packed my bag and got out the door mum had me back inside cleaning the stove top that to my eyes was clean but to hers it was not.

Finally at the party an hour late with a glass of bubbly in my hand.... couldn't get any better! -ok maybe if I had a pina colada in a coconut :)

Curry, Curry, Curry!

I have already cooked all the curry's in Jamie's Ministry of Food about 100 times. The night before last all I did was dream about curry's, Cooking curry, eating curry, serving curry... curry, curry, curry! It was curry mania if someone tapped into my dream waves.

Recipe #1: Vegetable Jalfrezi. Sounds exotic, don't you think? This exotic curry started off with Erin and I going to Coles on our lunch break to find fenugreek seeds, brown mustard seeds (no not ordinary mustard seeds. Brown mustard seeds) green chilli's, red chilli's, groundnut oil and whole coriander seeds. We stood in front of the spice wall in Coles which is in alphabetical order and tried to find the spices in F, B, S and C. After going through the alphabet about 3 times in our heads singing the song we were taught in school we still had no fenugreek seeds or brown mustard seeds. I gave up on fenugreek seeds and got plain mustard seeds instead. Next was groundnut oil. We stood in front of the oil section found peanut oil, vegetable oil, canola oil, virgin olive oil, extra virgin olive oil, sesame oil... Wtf is groundnut oil? well let me tell you... Its actual the same thing as peanut oil. Only they call it groundnut in stead of peanut in the UK. (I didn't find this tiny piece of information out until I was back at my desk after the shopping experience).

Back at the office I had a slight stress out that I couldn't do my exotic Jalfrezi, so I called mum. Mum's always know best. I have learnt this over the years that if Mum says take an umbrella you do anyway because for some reason or another her sixth sense knew that the hot day would turn rainy and you would be left walking home from the bus stop looking like a drowned rat. She found the damn groundnut oil and fenugreek seeds... It was her sixth sense I have yet to inherit.

After feeling sightly travel sick from reading on the bus I started cooking my exotic dinner, beginning with the home made curry paste.

Firstly, the spices needed to be toasted then crushed to a powder in a pestle and mortar. I thought this was easy having only ever watched Jamie do it on his shows. I put all the whole toasted spices in Mum's small pestle & mortar and began. They started flying everywhere! The mortar was too small and the pestle was too small... Everything was just too small! I have come to the conclusion that my Mum likes tiny appliances. Every appliance in our kitchen is small. Small oven, small sandwich press, 1 cup processor and now I have discovered the small pestle & mortar. However, I overcame the obstacle of small and did manage to smash, crush and powder the herbs.

Next was add the other ingredients and process. Now this is where Mum's tiny processor called Oscar came out of the cupboard. Small Oscar was perfect for the job!

Everything was added to the pot and cooked for 45min. To reveal a delicious looking and exotic tasting Vegetable Jalfrezi which was served with Poppadums and yoghurt. Now, you think I'm being cocky saying it was exotic tasting but the fool proof test is... Mum had seconds!

Day 1- Danielle's Beginning of the End

After sitting on my bed feeling slightly hungover and sorry for myself as 2010 is finally here I realised I had no New Years resolutions... for once. Yes there are always the ones like loose weight, stay healthy and find love. This year I am leaving the first two in 2009 as they never made it through the year finished and the later of the three I have already done. SO back to feeling slightly hungover and no resolutions I looked aimlessly at my full bookshelf and saw all the cookbooks that I have only cooked maybe one or two recipes out. It was a bit depressing. Hundreds of dollars spent on recipes and only a handful cooked. I needed to show my bookshelf and books some respect... I need something to keep me sane going into 2010. A goal… a mission.

Yes i am sure that everyone (don't think anyone except Erin at work is reading this but hey.. Her idea was the blog mine was to just cook) is thinking that this has already been done by the famous Julie Powel but hey?! It got her through her a year so why not let her idea help me through 2010. And no I am not going to cook my way through Julia Childs Mastering the Art of French Cooking, I do own a copy but I think aspic has me leaving that book off my book shelf for this mission. Plus i don't think i could convince anyone to eat it, the bf loves meat but jellied meat.... not so sure.

The question is: what book? After a minute or so staring at my bookshelf that had an overflowing shelf of cookbooks that were starting to be stacked in the romance section (shock horror!) except one book stood out.

Jamie's Ministry of Food.

I think it was the words on the inside of the book sleeve that enticed me...

"I have written this book to empower you..."

Yes I just blushed too :)

There are 173 recipes in Jamie's Ministry of Food. Julie gave her self 365 days for 524 recipes. I have 173 recipes in my mission so to make it fair I have 120.5 days to complete my mission. Which gives me 17 weeks, approximately about 4.3 months. Is it doable? I mean Julie did live only with her hubby and didn't have to share a kitchen with her mother whereas I do. So I think 6 months give me time to let mum have her space in the kitchen and let me have a life outside this ridiculous mission I've decided to do.

Did that last bit even make sense? ok so my time ends on the 30th of June 2010. 173 recipes to cook in 6 months...Wish me luck!