Rum Balls

Ok, it's Christmas. So here are the start of the festive recipes.

Rum balls have a great tradition in our family. There was always a big bowl of them on every Christmas morning breakfast table or at Christmas parties during December. I really love them, especially the condensed milk, which I have a slight addiction to. I am rather proud to say that I've passed the addiction onto my kids!

We have always made run balls with crushed Weetbix being the main ingredient. I now see rum ball recipes made with crumbled Christmas cake or chocolate cake. Sorry folks, but it's not the same. Weetbix versions are way better in my opinion.

You can make rum-free versions for the little ones if you like, but I feel that there is such a small amount of alcohol in each rum ball that it is really not necessary. And the rum flavour is really what makes these special. But it is up to you.

I like to make several batches of rum balls and then package them up in glass jars to give as gifts. Best to get them all out of the house otherwise they all get eaten up! 

Merry Christmas. 

What you'll need

Makes 20 - 30 small rum balls

9 Weetbix, finely crushed

1/2 cup desiccated coconut, plus 1 cup extra coconut to roll at the end

1 cup sultanas, roughly chopped

2 heaped tablespoons cocoa powder

395g tin Nestle condensed milk

1 tablespoon rum

What to do

Place the finely crushed Weetbix in a large bowl with the coconut, cocoa powder and sultanas.

Make a well in the centre of the ingredients and pour in the condensed milk, making sure to scrape out the tin and not waste any. pour in the rum.

Mix very well with a wooden spoon. You should have a sticky mixture that comes together when pressed.

Take heaped teaspoon-sized balls of mixture. Using damp clean hands, roll the mixture into balls. Set aside on a tray.

Place the extra reserved coconut into a large plastic container. Place a few rum balls at a time into the container and roll them around to coat well in coconut. Repeat until all rum balls are coated.

Store in air-tight containers or in jars decorated with Christmas paper.

Enjoy in moderation. These are addictive.

Anzac Biscuits

Here's a quick bikkie recipe. These biscuits are great and although they are usually made in Australia around Anzac day in April, we made ours in December for an international cuisine day at school. I was lucky enough to be invited into the second grade class and give the children the story behind the creation of these biscuits back in the early 1900s. The children liked the biscuits and hopefully learnt something in the process.  If you want to learnt something about the story of Anzac Biscuits, visit here.

There's been a bit of debate in our house whether these biscuits are better 'chewy' or crunchy'.

It's crunchy all the way for me, so you'll get crunchy bikkies if you use this recipe.

What you'll need

Makes approximately 20 biscuits

1 1/4 cups plain flower
1 cup rolled oats (porridge oats)
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 1/2 tablespoons golden syrup
150g butter
3/4 cups desiccated coconut
1/2 teaspoon bicarb soda

What to do

Preheat your oven to 170 degrees. In a large bowl add the flour, oats, sugar and coconut and stir well to combine.

In a small saucepan add the golden syrup and the butter and heat over a low heat until melted together.
Remove from the heat and mix in the bicarb soda. Then also add 2 tablespoons water.

Pour the golden syrup into the dry ingredients and mix well until combined. The mixture should stick together a little, not be dry and crumbly. If dry, add a little more water.

Using a teaspoons full of mixture, roll into balls with slightly wet hands. Place on a lined baking tray. Flatten the balls slightly with your fingers.

Bake for 12 - 15 minutes until golden brown.

Once cooked, remove from the oven and cool completely before placing in an air-tight container for storage.

Creamy prawn and avocado pasta

I think I should have made a very large pot of this dish. It was so, so tasty that the man of the house and I polished it all off and were looking for more.

My inspiration was a packet of frozen green prawns. The rest of the ingredients were already in the fridge.

The creamy sauce and big, plump prawns stuck nicely to the flat ribbons of papardelle. And the hint of fresh chilli and basil lifted the sauce so it was not to heavy.

I'll be making this one again, for sure.

What you'll need

Served two, with no leftovers!

200g packet frozen, peeled, green prawns
1 brown onion, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 fresh red chillis, finely chopped
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
1 cup pouring cream
1 medium avocado, peeled and sliced
2 teaspoon vegetable oil
Handful fresh basil, torn into small pieces
Handful of fresh Parmesan cheese, finely grated

Fresh cooked pasta to serve.

What to do

Heat one teaspoon of the oil in a large frying pan. Once hot, add the onion and garlic. Reduce the heat to medium, stirring constantly. You don't want the onion and garlic to colour, just soften. Once soft, remove from the pan to a bowl and set aside.

Increase the heat to high. Add a little more oil to the pan. Add the prawns and saute over high heat, until pink. This should take about 5 minutes. Reduce the heat to low. Once much of the heat has gone out of the pan, add the onion mix back into the prawns. Stir in the mustard and chillis. Remove the pan from the heat. Now add the cream and stir well into the other ingredients. 

While the sauce is still hot, mix through or spoon over cooked pasta. I used parpardelle. Top with sliced avocado, torn basil leaves and cheese. Simply delicious!

Banana cake with coconut and lime icing

'Can you bake a cake for an open day at the school?' I was asked. 'No problem,' I said. 'One slab of banana cake with coconut and lime icing, coming up!'


What you'll need

For the cake
2 large, overripe bananas, mashed
125g butter at room temperature (or slightly melted)
1 1/2 cups caster sugar
2 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract (or seeds from 1/2 vanilla pod)
100ml milk
1 1/2 cups (225g) self-raising flour
1/2 teaspoon bicarb soda

For the icing
1/2 cup shredded coconut
Juice and zest of one lime
1 1/2 cups icing sugar

Butter to grease the cake tin

What to do

Preheat your oven to 180 degrees Celsius. Grease the cake tin and line it with non-stick baking paper. I used a 20 x 20cm cake tin.

Place the butter, sugar, mashed banana, eggs and vanilla in a bowl and mix well. You can do this by hand or with electric beaters. Add the milk and mix to combine.

Add the flour and bicarb soda. Mix until combined. Pour the batter into a prepared tin and use a wooden spoon to smooth the batter and move it into all the corners of the pan. Bake for 40 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean.

Cool in the tin for 15 minutes, then remove the cake to a wire rack to completely cool it.

Once cool, make the icing.  Pour the icing sugar into a bowl, squeeze the lime juice into the icing sugar, mixing as you go with a spoon. The consistency is right when the icing is the consistency of softened butter. It should not drip off the spoon, otherwise it will run off the cake. Add more icing sugar if the icing is too wet. If the icing is too dry, add warm water, a few drops at a time until you have the right consistency.

Spread icing over the cake, using a knife that has been heated under running, hot water. Once spread all over the cake (to the edges and down the sides if you want to), sprinkle over the coconut and the lime zest. Let the icing set for 10 minutes, then slice with a sharp knife. It will be easier to cut cleanly if you heat the knife under hot, running water before each slice.

This cake will store in an airtight container for three or four days. Alternatively you could slice the cake and then freeze to use in lunchboxes etc. Layering the individual cake slices between pieces of baking paper will make it easy to remove from the freezer, ensuring it won't stick to the other cake slices.

Corn and zucchini muffins

Continuing on with the zucchini theme of this week, I made a batch of these savoury muffins. They were super tasty and full of yummy vegetables.

Here's a funny story. I packed some off to school in the little people's lunchboxes. While they enjoyed the muffins, they reported that the other children in the class laughed because the muffins had corn in them. Apparently these children have never seen a savoury muffin, and thought I'd made sweet muffins with corn in them!  Gross is all I can say to that......

If you have trouble getting your children to eat their vegetables, I think foods like these muffins are a great idea. You can include lots of different vegetables, such as zucchini, corn, grated carrots, peas, chickpeas, tomatoes, sweet potato or pumpkin in the mix, flavour with some herbs and cheeses and you have a yummy and nutritious snack that easily fits in the lunchbox or can be served for lunch or as a party snack.

In addition to lunch boxes for school, we had these warmed up for lunch served with some salads. And I left a plate of these muffins on the kitchen bench for afternoon tea snacking also. They didn't last long!

I think these muffins would also freeze well, so you could make a double batch for eating later on. I mention freezing foods as I've been seeing a bit online lately about new Mums struggling to cook/eat nutritious meals. Foods like these muffins can be defrosted easily with a quick zap in the microwave and importantly, can be eaten with one hand while nursing, rocking, feeding babies. Thinking of all you new Mums out there.

What you'll need

Made 16 medium-sized muffins

1 large zucchini, grated and extra juice removed
1 medium onion, grated
300g tin corn cornels
1 cup self-raising flour
1 cup instant polenta
2 eggs
1 1/2 cups milk
1 cup grated cheese, I used gouda
8 cherry tomatoes, sliced in half
1/2 cup shredded ham
1 table dried thyme
Salt and pepper

What to do

Preheat your oven to 180 degrees.

Mix all ingredients in a large bowl, excluding the tomato, ham and thyme. Season well. You should have a thick mixture, but it should be wet. If not, add a little more milk or water to the mixture. If very runny, add a but more flour until the consistency is right.

Spoon the mixture into well-greased muffin cases. Sprinkle over a little bit of ham, press a half cherry tomato into the top of the muffin and sprinkle with a little of the dried thyme.

Bake in the oven for approximately 30 minutes. Insert a wooden skewer into some of the muffins, and if it comes out clean, the muffins are ready. If the skewer comes out with wet batter on it, bake for at least another 10 minutes and test again.  Once ready, remove the muffins from the oven and let cool
on a wire rack. Serve warm or let cool completely for lunchboxes or freezing. If freezing, store in an air-tight container.

Zucchini and cottage cheese cakes

Here are some delightful little 'cakes' that we had for brunch last weekend. I had a large bag of zucchinis (courgettes) in the fridge and I wanted to use them up, but in a way that our guests and the little people would enjoy. The result was zucchini and cottage cheese cakes. The zucchini gave these cakes a lovely lightness and the cottage cheese provided a wonderful tang. I served them warm with bacon, grilled tomatoes, chopped avocado and toast along with some other brunchy things. It was yummy and worth skipping breakfast for.

What you'll need

Makes 30 medium-sized cakes

2 x medium zucchinis, grated and drained of 'juice'
4 eggs, separated
1/2 cup self-raising flour
1/2 cup milk
1 3/4 cups cottage cheese
1 cup grated cheese (I used gouda)
2 tablespoons chopped chives or eschallots
Salt and pepper
Butter for frying

What to do

Place egg yolks, flour and milk in a bowl and mix until smooth.

Add the zucchini, cottage cheese, grated cheese, chives/eschallots and season well with salt and pepper. Stir well to combine.

Place the eggwhites in a large bowl and beat with electric beaters until they are stiff. Gently fold through the zucchini mixture.

Heat a frying pan (I used two at the same time) over medium heat. Add a teaspoon of butter and melt until it is foamy. Dallop in tablespoons of the mixture. Cook until you see bubbles rising on one side of the cakes, then flip and cook the other side. Both sides should be golden brown. Cook in batches, keeping the cakes in a warm oven.

Serve warm with bacon, roasted tomatoes and some chopped avocado. Delicious!