Congrats Veronica and Shadi!

Recipe # 33: Cracking Burgers.
Hamburgers for dinner last night, obviously not made with ham... why do they get the name hamburgers?? If anyone out there in the endless void who actually reads this knows, please share this bit of trivia.
Cracking Burgers starts with Jamie asking you to bash 12 Jacob cream crackers in a tea towel and add them to 500g's of beef mince in a mixing bowl. We didn't have any crackers like Jamie uses (Auzzie version is sayo's) so I used store bought bread crumbs. My opinion is if your going to use store bought crackers you may as well use store bought crumbs. If your using fresh breadcrumbs on the other hand that is completely different.
Next went in 2 heaped teaspoons of Dijon mustard. Mmm I love the colour of Dijon mustard when it’s heaped out on a spoon. It almost looks gold.


Pepper and salt was next, along with fresh chopped parsley. You’re meant to add an egg next but I did a typical Danielle and read the recipe once over and thought I new better then Jamie and forgot to add the egg. I think this was why they were a little dry and didn't stick together well.

I shaped the mince into 4 patties and put them in the fridge while I watched my backed up TV of MKR. (p.s. SO pumped that Shadi and Veronica won!!!)


We had salad fillers such as avo, baby spinach, truss tomatoes, cucumber and gherkins to go with the burgers which were being served with hot Tommy mustard, tomato sauce and focaccia bread instead of burger buns as that was all we had at home.
I oiled the patties with Mum's trusty garlic spray oil (Love it!) and placed them on a hot griddle pan. No idea how long I cooked them for but I cooked them until they were cooked through and the cheese was melted on top. We had frozen wedges with our burgers -left over’s from my 21st that were still in the freezer :) probably not the healthiest choice but it was easy and quick since the grand finale of MKR was on TV last night and nothing was getting in the way of me watching that :)


A delicious meal in all.

Mum's is better by far!

Receipe #25: So last night we had Jamie's Chilli Con Carne. It was well… lets just say I cannot look at chickpeas again. I LOVE(d) chickpeas but this dish made everything go mushy, watery but also if possible dry. The flavours of chilli, cumin and cinnamon were delicious but the texture was all wrong and I did not need to add the extra can of water which Jamie says to do.


Jamie instructs: Chop garlic, onion, carrot and celery and fry with spices for about 7min. Add a can of chickpeas, kidney beans, 2 cans of tomatoes and then your mince.
When do you brown the meat???...I guess never.
If your reading the recipe in front of you now you’ll notice that I did not include the capsicum. We didn’t have any and as it was raining outside no one was willing enough to go to the shops and buy one.
Next to use a can from the tomatoes and fill it with water. Add it to the mixture. Then chop coriander stalks and add them to the watering uncooked mince stew looking thing on the stove. The only coriander stalks we had were frozen ones… I think they loose their flavour when frozen. Believe it or not you couldn’t taste them at all and there was quite a lot in there.


It takes and hour to cook so thank goodness netball was cancelled from wet weather.
Serve it with rice and sour cream (Jamie says yougart but we have our traditions still).


While everything was cooking I made lumpy guacamole with a hard avocado. I would say it was the highlight of dinner (not being sarcastic).


Fish for dinner tonight but all I can think about is Duck Ragout from MKR. Could I get any more opposite?

Weird and Wonderful

I made just as much mess making Jamie's Chicken Fajitas as eating them. 


Recipe #17- Tonights dinner had to be a quick one as netball season is back on. The worst feeling is being full and then having to run around for two twenty minute halves. Ew.


So I flicked through JMOF and went for one of his 'Twenty-minute Meals'. He quotes 19min for Chicken Fajitas. Don't even ask how I started it cooking 5:30pm and we were eating at 6:30pm. Thank goodness I underestimated myself and allowed enough time. If I had taken Jamie's 19min advice I would still be trying to eat fajitas.


I chopped the chicken, capsicum and onions and put them in a bowl with smoked paprika, cumin, lime juice and olive oil. Next was to start the salsa. I needed 15 cherry tomatoes, a bunch of fresh coriander and one fresh chilli. We had the fresh chilli... normal tomatoes and dried coriander leaves. That will have to do. 


Now Jamie says serve it with a tub of bought guacamole but I thought no. We have fresh avocados at home and i've made guacamole before it will be easy peasy. Yes well its easy peasy when you have more then half an avocado to use. The other one was so hard I could have knocked someone out with it. I attempted to cut through it with a sharp knife to nearly only cut my hand off and not even make the avocado budge. And yes i was using an avocado not some other mysterious fruit.


So in with the half of an avo went some onions, yoghurt, vinegar (weird but wonderful!) and tomato. I made half an avo go round enough! 


The chicken and capsicum mixture then had to be put on a griddle pan and cooked. The smell of the smoked paprika is still hanging around the house. Feeling slightly ill right about now.


I chopped lettuce and cucumber to go with everything even though Jamie doesn't say so. It was served on the balcony with mozzies having just a big of a feast as we were. With no cheese. Yes no cheese Erin!! For some reason it slipped my mind and eyes when reading the recipe.


Maybe I do need to go back to the judgmental optometrist and get new glasses.

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.