Brendon’s Giant Chocolate Chip Cookie

August 13, 2015January 16, 2019 amcarmen1 Comment

Hi Everyone! It’s Brendon from Brendon The Smiling Chef again with my second delicious dessert post as part of Amcarmen’s Kitchen’s Auguest series. It’s been a pleasure to be able to share my recipes with you, and next week you can visit my website to check out Ally’s mouthwatering recipes for Adobo and Sinigang.

Here in Australia we often take for granted just how lucky we are to have an abundance of fresh, delicious food whenever we want it. On my travels to developing parts of India or Peru I saw firsthand the immense poverty and malnutrition that many people experience in their daily life. With populations on the rise, food is becoming an increasingly scarce and precious commodity. Back home in Sydney I’ve volunteered for a number of years with St. Vincent De Paul Society in their Vinnies Van appeal, providing fresh meals to people less fortunate. I’ve seen their struggle and this is why find it extremely difficult to hear that in the state of New South Wales alone (where I live) we throw away over 1.1 million tonnes of food each year! It’s a ridiculous amount and we really need to be more careful with our food consumption habits if we are to create a sustainable future for the generations to come.

The recipe I’d like to share with you today is part of a collection of recipes I like to call “Up-cycled Food”. The idea is simple – take your leftovers or parts of ingredients you would commonly throw away (such as parsley stalks or vegetable stems to name a few) and turn them into a delicious meal. At the end of my Cookies and Cream recipe from Tuesday’s post, I promised to show you what you can do with your leftover chocolate chip cookie dough. Sometimes I genuinely cannot be bothered to roll out a million tiny balls for individual cookies. Instead I press the dough into a cake tin or slice pan and bake it as one giant choice chip cookie. It still tastes absolutely delicious and much faster to make. You can either use your leftover cookie dough from Tuesday’s recipe (and simply skip straight to step 3) or make some more dough using the recipe below.

PREP TIME 10 MINS | COOKING TIME 20-30 MINS | MAKES 2 GIANT COOKIES

INGREDIENTS

250g unsalted butter, softened
200g dark chocolate, chopped
200g milk chocolate, chopped
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup plain flour
1/4 cup baking powder
1 free range egg
1 tbsp vanilla bean paste (or extract)

METHOD

Pre-heat the oven to 170C (325F or gas mark 3). Grease two 20cm spring form cake tins with butter and line with a disc of baking paper. Place each onto a baking tray and set aside.
Place the butter and sugar and vanilla into the bowl of an electric mixer and beat until fluffy. Alternatively use electric hand beaters. Add the egg and beat until combined. Add the flour, baking powder and salt and stir to form a smooth dough. Add the chopped chocolate stir to combine.
Divide the dough in half and press into each cake tin using your fingertips.
Place the baking tray on the middle shelf of the oven and bake for 20-25 minutes until for a soft, fudgy cookie. Increase cooking time to between 25-30 minutes for a firmer, biscuit-y texture. Remove from the oven and allow to cool.
Cut into wedges and serve. Any leftover ganache from Tuesday’s recipe tastes delicious with these gooey cookies. Simply warm it up then drizzle for a full-on chocolate hit!

That wraps up things for me here at Amcarmen’s Kitchen. It’s been a pleasure to be a part of this Auguest series. You can check out all my cooking and food blogging adventures at Brendon The Smiling Chef. While you’re there check out my Instagram page @brendonthesmilingchef.

Happy cooking and keep smiling,

Brendon D’Souza 🙂

Brendon’s Cookies & Cream

August 11, 2015January 16, 2019 amcarmen3 Comments

Hi Everyone! Hope you’re all having a lovely day wherever you are. My name is Brendon D’Souza and I am a writer and food blogger from Sydney. I’m very honoured to be a part of this Auguest series and have some exciting dessert creations to share with you over the next two posts.

I launched my website Brendon The Smiling Chef in 2012, posting simple recipes that I had cooked for dinner. I developed skills in food styling and photography through internships and writing and editing roles at Green Lifestyle, Grapeshot, Australian Catholics and Youth Food Movement Australia and started to apply these skills to my recipe posts. This year I plan to make a few exciting changes with the website and include a restaurant review section called “Smiling & Dining @” which features reviews that I publish at Zomato While you’re there feel free to check out all my foodie adventures in Instagram at @brendonthesmilingchef.

I met Ally a few months ago at a food blogging seminar held in Sydney and she told me all about her passion for exploring cultures through food, which is something that I too love! We caught up a few weeks ago for a fabulous cooking day where she showed me how to make some delicious Filipino recipes (Which you can check out at Brendon The Smiling Chef next week). The recipe that I’m going to share with you today is a bit of an invention that I have drawn from my experiences of growing up here in Australia. Like Ally, I too am a bit of a third-culture foodie. My family are Indian and are originally from the state of Goa which sits on the West Coast of India. Goa is largely influenced by the Portuguese, who colonised the region in around the 16th Century, so our culture, customs and cuisine are surprisingly similar to Europe. I was born in Bahrain and lived there for two years before we migrated to Australia in the mid-nineties.

Growing up in Western Sydney, I was surrounded by a wealth of multicultural diversity and from a young age I was introduced to the cultures and cuisines of the Philippines, Southern America, Malta and Vietnam to name a few. Despite all this I have to admit that as a child I was very embarrassed about being Indian. It’s one of side-effects of growing up in Anglo-Saxon society. I saw myself as different from all the other kids at school. I had black hair, brown skin and brown eyes rather than blonde hair and blue eyes. Now that we’ve all grown up, a lot of my friends have said that they experienced these feelings too! I would cringe when I opened my lunchbox to find the beautiful Goan prawn curry and rice that mum had packed for me. What would the other kids think? We never really ate much Indian food at home when we were younger because my sister and I, being True Blue Aussies, didn’t like the pungent spices used in most of our cooking. They were too hot for our tiny tastebuds to handle. In these instances, six-year-old Brendon would drag a chair to the kitchen and reach for a jar of tomato paste sauce to put together my version of Spaghetti Bolognese; 1 kilogram of beef mince with 1 jar of tomato paste, yes paste (#IcantbelieveIdidthat), stirred through.

The 2000’s came along we noticed a number of American food products appearing on the supermarket shelves including Pop Tarts, Oreos, and Krispy Kreme Donuts. My favourite was Hershey’s Cookies ’n’ Creme bar, (or the Mars® counterpart Dove), a dreamy combination of white chocolate with tiny chocolate cookie pieces. It was ever popular among my Filipino friends. They had experienced this delight for years because it was sold in all the Filipino grocery stores. We saw it as a luxury because it was so new! It became one of my favourite flavour combos and, to nine-year-old Brendon’s delight, even started appearing in ice creams and cheesecakes!

I was playing around with the idea of reinventing Cookies and Cream and turning it into a sophisticated dessert. Chocolate chip cookies would definitely feature because who doesn’t love a good chocolate chip cookie? A white chocolate and vanilla bean ganache could represent the Cream and a 70% dark chocolate ganache would balance the sweetness. It had been a while since I’d tried to make macarons from scratch but I thought it would be nice to have some chocolate almond cigars to add another texture and flavour to the dessert. We made up the recipe for these while referring to the Master Adriano Zumbo’s for rough measurements. They weren’t as smooth on top but they made delicious chewy cookies.

PREP TIME 30 MINS | COOKING TIME 15 MINS | SERVES 2-3

INGREDIENTS

For the white chocolate and vanilla bean ganache

100ml pure cream
200g white chooclate, chopped
1 tbsp vanilla bean paste
1 tsp glucose syrup

For the bitter dark chocolate ganache

100ml pure cream
150g dark chocolate (min. 70% cocoa solids)
1 tsp glucose syrup

For the chocolate almond cigars

1 free range egg white
250g caster sugar
150g almond meal
2 tbsp Dutch process cocoa powder

For the chocolate chip cookies

250g unsalted butter, softened
200g dark chocolate, chopped
200g milk chocolate, chopped
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup plain flour
1/4 cup baking powder
1 free range egg
1 tbsp vanilla bean paste (or extract)

METHOD

Preparation

White chocolate and vanilla bean ganache: Place the cream and white chocolate into a microwave-safe bowl and stir to combine. Heat for 30 seconds on medium then give the bowl a stir with a spatula. Continue to heat and stir the ganache in this way until smooth. Alternatively you can place the chocolate and cream into a heatproof glass bowl set over a pan of simmering water and stir until melted. When smooth, add the vanilla bean paste and the glucose syrup and stir until smooth. Allow to cool completely. Transfer the ganache to a disposable piping bag, seal the end with a rubber band and place in the fridge until cold but pliable.
Bitter chocolate ganache. Place the cream and dark chocolate into a microwave-safe bowl and stir to combine. Heat for 30 seconds on medium then give the bowl a stir with a spatula. Continue to heat and stir the ganache in this way until smooth. Alternatively you can place the chocolate and cream into a heatproof glass bowl set over a pan of simmering water and stir until melted. When smooth, add the glucose syrup and stir until smooth. Allow to cool completely. Transfer the ganache to a disposable piping bag, seal the end with a rubber band and place in the fridge until cold but pliable.

Chocolate Almond Cigars

Pre-heat the oven to 150C (300F or gas mark 2). Line a baking tray with baking paper and set aside.
Place the egg white into a clean stainless steel or glass bowl free from grease or dirt. Whip to soft peaks using clean electric beaters. Add 1 tbsp of castor sugar to the egg whites and beat for 20-30 seconds or until the sugar has dissolved. Continue to add the sugar in this way until you have a glossy meringue. Sprinkle the almond meal and cocoa powder over and fold using a spatula to form a smooth batter.
Transfer the batter to a disposable piping bag, twist the opening to enclose the filling and carefully cut off the tip of the bag to create a hole 2cm in diameter.
Pipe 5cm cigars onto the baking sheet. You will need about 8 for this recipe. Allow them to rest for 10 minutes.
Place the tray on the middle shelf of the oven and bake for 10-15 minutes or until the cigars have risen. Remove the tray from the oven and allow them to cool. When cool, take your piping bag with the white chocolate ganache and pipe a line down half the cigars. Sandwich with another cigar on top.

Chocolate Chip Cookies

Place the butter and sugar and vanilla into the bowl of an electric mixer and beat until fluffy. Alternatively use electric hand beaters. Add the egg and beat until combined. Add the flour, baking powder and salt and stir to form a smooth dough. Add the chopped chocolate stir to combine.
Roll out 12 cookies using 2 tsp cookie dough for each. Place them onto the prepared baking tray leaving about 3cm between each cookie for spreading. You will only need a small amount of the dough for the recipe but I’ll show you what you can do with your leftovers in my next recipe. Wrap the leftover dough tightly with cling wrap and place in the fridge.
Place the baking tray on the middle shelf of the oven and bake for 10-15 minutes until the cookies have spread. Remove from the oven and allow to cool.
Crumble 4 of the cookies to form cookie crumbs.

Plate up the dessert

This is where the fun begins. Feel free to let your imagination run wild. Sprinkle the cookie crumbs across 4 serving plates. Pipe some white chocolate ganache onto each of the serving plates. Then rest a cigar along the ganache. Divide the chocolate chip cookies among the plates. Make a 1cm hole in the piping bag with the biter chocolate ganache and pipe them around the plate. Serve.

Ally and I had lots of fun with the plating. Check out our attempts.

Happy cooking and keep smiling,

Brendon D’Souza 🙂

Chicken Pastel Mini Pot Pies

August 4, 2015January 16, 2019 amcarmen3 Comments

Hello Everyone, I’m Jialing, and I’ll be taking over Amcarmen’s Kitchen for this week, so watch this space for my experimental Filipino fusion recipes! Like Allison, I come from a Filipino background, but didn’t really start doing a lot of cooking until my university years. My cooking style is… hazardous… I may set off the occasional fire alarm, or forget a key ingredient or two, but don’t worry! My recipes for this week have been Amcarmen-approved. Today’s recipe features one of my favourites, Chicken Pastel, which is a cream-based chicken and vegetable dish, typically eaten with rice, as typical with most Filipino cuisine.

Today’s recipe came into existence after I made a batch of chicken pastel using 1kg of meat, then realising too late that I only had 2 cups of rice left in the pantry, and wasn’t due for a Coles-run for another week 😦 I decided to make use of recently purchased ramekin sets by turning the pastel into pot pies, which proved to be a big success with my boyfriend (or so I surmised, after returning to a mountain of empty ramekins). The pastel is adapted from my mother’s recipe, using chicken thighs, which she claims is tastier (and she’s right, of course), but be warned that this recipe makes several servings of pastel, simply because there are a lot of components, but feel free to play around with the ratios.

So apparently, after doing a bit of research, Filipinos adapted this dish from the Spanish Pastel de Pollo – essentially the same thing – which is actually eaten with a pastry crust. Not rice. So… this recipe isn’t so much fusion food as accidentally recreating the recipe in its original state… But… anyway.

PREP TIME 2 HOURS | COOKING TIME 1 HOUR 35 MINS | MAKES 6 MINI POT PIES

INGREDIENTS

For the marinated chicken

500g chicken thigh fillets, cubed
3 tbsp light soy sauce
1 & 1/2 tbsp flour
Juice of 1/2 a lemon

For the pastry

2 & 1/2 cups plain flour
2/3 cup ice water
250g unsalted butter, chilled and cut into 1 cm cubes
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp white sugar

For the chicken pastel filling

Prepared marinated chicken
1 can (420g) cream of mushroom soup
1 can (230g) vienna sausage*, cut into 1/2cm pieces, reserve the liquid
1/2 cup grated tasty cheese
6 large cup mushrooms, diced
3 garlic cloves, minced
2 medium-sized carrots, peeled and cubed
1 large potato, peeled and cubed
1 large red Spanish onion, diced
1 medium-sized capsicum, diced
1 chicken bouillon cube

*Alternatively you can use cocktail sausages or pre-cooked chorizo sausages

METHOD

Preparation

Marinate the chicken: Toss the chicken thigh fillet with lemon juice and soy sauce, and marinate in a large covered bowl for at least an hour (or refrigerate overnight for juicer chicken).
Once you are ready to prepare the chicken pastel (after you have made the pastry), add the flour to the chicken marinade, making sure to mix evenly.
Prepare the pastry dough: Combine the flour, white sugar, and salt in a large mixing bowl. Using a pastry cutter (or a blunt knife, in my case), cut the butter into the flour until it resembles a coarse, pebbly mixture. Be careful not to overwork the mixture as this will cause the butter to melt before baking and reduce the pastry’s flakiness!
Slowly add the iced water, one tablespoon at a time, gently stirring it into the flour until the mixture just holds when pinched (it should still look crumbly, but not doughy).
Carefully shape mixture into two round disks (if the dough does not hold, add another tablespoon of iced water), then cover each with plastic wrap and refrigerate them for at least one hour. While the pastry is chilling, prepare the filling.

Chicken Pastel Filling

Heat a large frying pan over medium-high. When the oil is hot, add the garlic stirring until fragrant and golden brown, followed by the onions. While onion is cooking, add the chicken bouillon cube.
Once the onions are soft and translucent, add the chicken together with the marinade liquids. Stir continuously until the marinade thickens slightly and the chicken is almost cooked through.
Add the carrots and potato, cooking them until softened for about 3-5 minutes. Then add in the capsicum and mushroom, cooking them further for another 3-5 minutes.
Once all vegetables are cooked through, add cream of mushroom soup, plus half the can of water or milk if you prefer, stirring well (if you are using cocktail sausages or chorizo, use one full can of water/milk). Reduce the heat to low and allow the mixture to simmer on the stove for about 15 minutes.
Add the vienna sausage pieces and the reserved liquid to the chicken mixture, and stir, allowing to simmer for another 5-10 minutes until the sauce is thickened.
Remove from stove, and allow the chicken pastel to cool down a bit while preparing the pastry.

Prepare the pastry for the pies

Preheat oven to 200C (200F or gas mark 6). Spray 12 ceramic ramekins with cooking oil (or grease with butter) and set aside.
Sprinkle some flour onto a clean tabletop or surface. Remove one disk of pastry dough from fridge (leave the other in the fridge while you work, to make sure the butter in the mixture remains chilled), and gently work into a ball. Cut into 6 equal portions.
Working with one portion at a time, divide into two pieces – one piece should be approximately 1/3 of the portion (this will be the top) and the remaining 2/3 of the portion will be used to line the inside of the ramekin.
Roll out the larger portion into a circle large enough to fit inside the ramekin. Gently drape the pastry into the ramekin, pressing it onto the bottom and sides. Smooth out the folds of pastry so that the entire interior of the ramekin is covered, with a slight border of pastry going over the lip of the ramekin.
Spoon enough chicken pastel filling into the pastry-lined ramekin, ensuring that it does not spill over the edge.
Roll out the remaining 1/3 portion of pastry into a circle, and gently place on top of the filled ramekin. Join edges to pastry lining the lip of the ramekin, pinching the pastry securely.
Using a small paring knife, cut slits into the top (this will allow the heat to escape, so the pie tops do not explode in your oven).
Repeat with remaining 5 portions (to make process quicker, first divide all the portions into 1/3 and 2/3 pieces, and then roll them out and line the six ramekins. Fill the ramekins, then pinch the tops into place and cut slits).
Arrange the ramekins on a baking tray, lined with baking paper (this will catch any drips from the filling). Bake in preheated oven for 45-60 minutes (may or may not take longer depending on your oven), or until tops are golden and pastry is flaky.
Once the first batch of pot pies are in the oven, repeat steps 13-19 with the remaining pastry dough from the fridge.
Once cool, the pies should come out of the ramekins quite easily, with gentle help from a breakfast knife.
Serve hot and enjoy with a side of a green leafy salad of your choice.

Baked pies can be refrigerated for up to one week, or frozen for up to 3 months. Place frozen pies in refrigerator overnight to thaw. To heat refrigerated pies, place in an oven preheated to 200 C for 15-20 minutes.

Unfortunately, the recipe for the chicken pastel filling and pastry don’t quite match up in terms of quantity, so there WILL be leftover chicken pastel. But never fear! It is quite delicious eaten with a bowl of steaming white rice, in true Filipino fashion #pastelfordays

ENJOY YOUR MEAL!

Jialing.

Bacon, Beer & Potato Soup

July 31, 2015January 14, 2019 amcarmenLeave a comment

Hello Everyone! Today is the last day for Winter Warmer Month *sad face* and I’ve got something that the men may like: Bacon, Beer, and ‘Tater Soup (aka “Man Soup”). Towards the end of June, when I was planning Winter Warmer Month, I came across this recipe in my research and decided to give it a go for one reason, and one reason only – it was just because it was called Man Soup, which I’m guessing comes from the bacon and beer.

If you are, or have been following my Instagram through my blog, you may have noticed that I have been posting a few photographs that show somewhat symmetry (asymmetry) breakfast/brunch/lunch/super late lunch photographs that have been inspired by the symmetrybreakfast guys that have been trending last weekend. I showed them to Jialing and we then decided to have our own symmetry breakfast this past week and it’s actually quite fun! Today, as you can see above, we had bacon, beer, and potato soup, well, we were supposed to have a different brekky this morning but since I was already preparing this for the blog, we decided to have soup instead.

The original recipe can be found on Food.com – I pretty much followed the recipe, but adjusted the quantities, probably not very accurately since I kind of just winged it to make two servings.

PREP TIME 10 MINS | COOKING TIME 1 HOUR 10 MINS | SERVES 2-4

INGREDIENTS

330ml (1 bottle) beer
250g maple-glazed bacon, cut into bits
50g vintage cheddar cheese, crumbed or grated
1 cup chicken broth
2 large potatoes, peeled
1 celery stick, sliced
1/2 brown onion, halved and sliced thinly
1/4 cup plain flour
2 tbsp unsalted butter
2 tbsp light sour cream, plus more for topping
Ground salt and black pepper to taste
Olive oil

METHOD

Preheat oven to 200C (400F or gas mark 6). Line a baking tray with foil or parchment paper and rub the potatoes with a bit of salt and some olive oil. Bake in the oven for about 45 minutes, adjusting the cooking time if needed to make sure that they pierce easily with a fork.
As the potatoes cook, heat a medium-sized pan over medium-high and add the bacon bits. Fry until crispy. Once done, use a slotted spoon to remove the bacon bits and transfer to a plate lined with a paper towel.
Next, add in the onion and celery slices to the pot with the bacon grease and sauté until soft and translucent, about 5 minutes. Then add in the butter and continue stirring until it melts.
Sprinkle the plain flour over the onion/celery mix, stirring continuously until it starts to form a paste-like texture, and the flour and fats are combined smoothly. Keep stirring it for a further 5 minutes until it becomes a blonde roux (a light tan colour).
Slowly pour the chicken broth into the roux, adding more and more at a time to get the roux into a creamy texture. Once all the broth has been added, pour the beer into the soup slowly, a little at a time and continue to stir.
When the potatoes are done, cut them into small chunks and add them to the pot, stirring to incorporate into the soup.
Using a handheld stick blender, mix the entire mixture into a thick stew. Add water to thin if necessary, however don’t add too much liquid until the blending is done. Then, add the sour cream and cheddar cheese, and let the soup continue cooking for a further 15-20 minutes on medium-low.
Turn the heat off, and divide equally into serving bowls (2 large bowls, or 3-4 small bowls) and top with the crispy bacon bits and a dollop of sour cream. Enjoy!

BON APPÉTIT

– Ally xx

Minestrone Soup

July 29, 2015January 14, 2019 amcarmenLeave a comment

Hello Everyone! Winter Warmer Month is coming to an end this week *sad face* but surely we won’t be saying goodbye to soups forever. I’ll keep today’s post short only because I am actually just writing this now (maybe 30 minutes before this goes up) and I didn’t prepare it in advance or during the day. I’m keeping it short because I’m really tired, but I didn’t want to skip out on posting.

Basically I woke up at 6:30am today, yes that’s actually quite early for me especially since I didn’t sleep well last night, don’t know why. I got up earlier than usual to get ready and head over about an hour out West on the train, to Brendon’s (brendonthesmilingchef) place for a cooking collaboration that had been planning for just about over a month now. We spent the whole morning until late afternoon shopping, cooking, styling, eating, and talking – and overall it was a successful day. I won’t say what we made today because that will be coming up for the month of August!

Okay (again I always do this), I said I’d keep it short but I’m already 200 words in and I haven’t actually talked about today’s recipe – Minestrone Soup. is a thick soup of Italian origin made with vegetables, often with the addition of pasta or rice. Common ingredients include beans, onions, celery, carrots, stock, and tomatoes. There is no set recipe for minestrone, since it is usually made out of whatever vegetables are in season. It can be vegetarian, contain meat, or contain a meat-based broth. I’ve made this soup a couple of times in the past and I used risoni pasta and added bacon chunks to it before. Today, I’m keeping it quite traditional, and used left over angel hair pasta hair that I cut into about 2cm long pieces.

PREP TIME 10 MINS | COOKING TIME 65 MINS | SERVES 4-6

INGREDIENTS

375g McKenzie’s Italian Style Soup Mix, washed and drained
150g maple-glazed bacon, cut into bits
1 can (400g) canned diced tomatoes
1 cup angel hair pasta, cut into 2cm long strands
2-3 garlic cloves, minced
2 small carrots, peeled and sliced
1 celery stalk, sliced
1 medium-sized onion, diced
1 large potato, peeled and cut into small chunks
Ground salt and black pepper to taste
Shaved parmesan cheese
Bread of choice

METHOD

Preparing the Beans:
- Quick method: Put required quantity into a saucepan and cover with water – approximately 3 cups of water for every cup of soup mix. Bring to the boil and simmer for approximately 45 minutes or until cooked, skimming if necessary.
- Traditional method: Soak soup mix for approximately 6-8 hours (overnight if convenient) before cooking.
Minestrone Soup: Heat oil in a large pot over medium-high. Fry the bacon bits until browned, then sauté the garlic together with the bacon until fragrant and golden brown. The add in the onions and cooking until soft.
Add in the carrots, celery, and potatoes, and season with salt and pepper to taste. Give it a good mix and leave to cooking for about 5 minutes before adding the canned diced tomatoes in. Cook for a further 5 minutes.
Add in the chicken stock and bring to a boil. Once boiling, add in the prepared beans and further simmer for about 10-15 minutes, in the last 4 minutes, add in the angel hair pasta.
Turn the heat off, and divide equally into serving bowls (4 large bowls, or 5-6 small bowls) and top with some shaved parmesan cheese. Serve immediately with some stone-baked Pane di Casa bread.

BON APPÉTIT

– Ally xx

Minty Pea & Ham Soup

July 23, 2015January 14, 2019 amcarmen4 Comments

Hello Everyone! I’ll keep today’s story short today just because I don’t have much to tell or write about for this recipe. However, I do just want to say that this was supposed to be a recipe for Pea and Watercress Soup, but for some reason I could not find watercress anywhere even if I did see them on the shelves two/three weeks ago when I didn’t need them. I had all the ingredients ready from grocery shopping two days ago, except the watercress. Maybe they’re not in season hence the lack of? Well I just did a Google search after writing that sentence and it appears that watercress is a late spring, early summer vegetable in Australia, available from October to December. Oh well. Anyway, so when I went to the shops yesterday morning as a last resort and could not find watercress, I decided to change my soup menu for today and bought a pack of ham for a pea and ham soup instead! I guess no harm done, but such hassles to find what could not be found.

I completely forgot that I had mint leaves in the fridge hence why not pictured in the ingredients shots. I think I wanted to use the mint leaves for the recipe with the watercress soup, but it completely slipped my mind when I had to change the menu. Also, at that time I couldn’t find my bottle of thickened cream when I rummaged the fridge; I found it in the end though, at the very back of the fridge…

PREP TIME 10 MINS | COOKING TIME 30 MINS | SERVES 3-5

INGREDIENTS

2 cups frozen green peas
2 cups chicken broth
1 pack (300g) shredded ham
2-3 garlic cloves, minced
1 large potato, peeled and cut into chunks
1 small red onion, diced
1 small carrot, peeled and cut into chunks
1/2 bunch mint leaves
Ground salt and black pepper to taste
Thickened cream

METHOD

Heat a little bit of cooking oil in a large pot over medium-high. Add the shredded ham and fry until browned (about 5 minutes). Remove from the pot and set aside.
Add a little bit more cooking oil and sauté the garlic until golden brown and fragrant. Then add in the onions and cook until soft. Add in the carrots and potatoes, and season with a bit of salt and black pepper. Leave to cook for about 5 minutes.
Add in the chicken broth and bring to a boil. Once boiling, let it cook for a further 5 minutes before adding the green peas in together with half of the fried shredded ham. Bring the heat down to low and let it simmer for a further 10 minutes or until the vegetables are tender.
Turn the heat off, and throw in the mint leaves. Then, using a stick blender, blend the ham and vegetables together with the liquid in the cooking pot until smooth.
Divide the soup equally into serving bowls (3 large bowls, or 4-5 small bowls) and top with the remain shredded ham, a dollop of thickened cream, and mint leaves. Serve immediately with some toasted bread.

BON APPÉTIT

– Ally xx

Hearty Chicken Chipotle Soup

July 21, 2015January 14, 2019 amcarmenLeave a comment

Hello Everyone! Another week, another soup on the blog today! Just three more soupy recipes to go until the end of Winter Warmer Month, and gosh until the end of July as well! I can’t believe time has flown by that fast! It’s making me said because that basically means that I have about 2 weeks left in this beautiful city that I have called home for the past 4 and a half years. It’ll be heartbreaking to leave, but it’s time that I get my career life together and make that transition from uni life to a professional working life.

Anyway, enough about how my life is and will be for the next few weeks/months/years, let’s get onto today’s recipe shall we? If you’ve read my previous blog post on my Moroccan Pumpkin Soup, you might remember me going on about how I can’t believe that they don’t sell chipotle peppers in any of the big grocery stores here in Sydney. Well, when I was out doing a quick shopping run at a with my friend Marissa (basically just buying extra ingredients to go with our dinner for that day), I tried my luck to see if the Asian store that we went to sold chipotle peppers. To my surprise, they did, canned and in adobo sauce as well! My reaction was sort of like a what the *bleep* is this for real kind of reaction. I even said to myself that I should’ve popped by this store before I went all Moroccan on my pumpkin soup, and this was honestly like 2 day after I had posted my pumpkin soup recipe. Since they had them in store, and only 4 cans remaining, I decided to buy a can and figure out ow I can use them for another recipe seeing as I practically went cuckoo trying to find these peppers.

Today I had actually scheduled a recipe for Cauliflower and Stilton Soup, but instead, seeing as I had the chipotle peppers, I decided to do a Hearty Chipotle Chicken Soup. The soup that I made is the exact definition of a Winter Warmer Soup; it had a nice kick to it from the chipotle peppers, and a lovely sweetness to it from the corn, while the beans and the chicken meat bulked the soup up. You can find the original recipe on Taste of Home. I’ve tweaked the method a bit as well as some of the ingredients for my recipe.

For the chicken broth, I bought 2 chicken carcasses from the butcher and boiled it together with some bay leaves, sea salt, black peppercorns, and ginger for about 45 minutes to an hour to get the flavour into the broth. I then shredded the meat from the carcasses and used them to bulk my soup up instead of using chicken breasts as the original recipe used. I also used fresh field grown gourmet tomatoes and roasted them over the gas stove to give it that flame-roasted flavour to them for my soup. Yes I probably picked the most time consuming way to make this soup, but it was all worth it in the end I believe. I completely forgot to deseed the chipotle peppers, as the original recipe stated, before adding them to the soup, but I’m glad I didn’t because, though it gave the soup a good kick, it wasn’t as spicy as I thought it be. If I had deseeded them, I don’t think they give the heat that I had with this dish.

PREP TIME 10 MINS | COOKING TIME 1 HOUR 20 MINS | SERVES 3-4

INGREDIENTS

3 cups chicken broth
3 small field grown gourmet tomatoes, flame-roasted and cut into chunks
2-3 dried bay leaves
2 large chicken carcasses, washed and cleaned thoroughly
2 chipotle peppers in adobo sauce, sliced or minced
2 ears of corn, cut from the cob
2-3 garlic cloves, minced
1 small red onion, diced
1 can (400g) cannellini beans, drained
2 tsp adobo sauce (from the chipotle peppers)
Fresh cilantro or coriander
Ground salt and black pepper to taste
Thickened cream or sour cream
Thumb-sized ginger, sliced
Whole black peppercorns

METHOD

Add the chicken carcasses together with the bay leaves, ginger, salt, and whole black peppercorns, to a large pot with enough water to cover the chicken. Boil for about 45 minutes to an hour over medium-high heat. Remove the chicken carcasses from the broth and set aside to cool. Strain the broth into a bowl and discard the bay leaves, ginger, and peppercorns. Set aside for later.
Once the chicken carcasses have cooled down, pull the meat from the chicken carcasses and shred to small pieces. Set aside.
Heat the same pot over medium-high with a little bit of cooking oil. Sauté the garlic until golden brown and fragrant. Then add in the onions and cook until soft. Add in the shredded chicken pieces and season with a bit of salt and pepper. Give it a good mix and follow with the adobo sauce, chipotle peppers, cannellini beans, sweet corn, and tomatoes to the chicken mixture. Give it a good mix and let it cook further for about 5-6 minutes before adding the chicken broth in.
Bring to a boil. Once boiling, bring the heat down to medium-low and let the soup simmer away for a further 10-15 minutes to ensure all the flavours blend together.
Divide the soup equally into serving bowls (3 large bowls, or 4 small bowls) and top with a dollop of whipped thickened cream and fresh cilantro. Serve immediately and enjoy!

Anyway, before I end this post, I would just like to share my experiences of how I’ve heard other people try to pronounce chipotle (chee-poat-lay). The very best, and even I still remember until now even if it’s been just about 2 years ago, I’ve heard chip-poh-lah-tay from Jack Harries (jacksgap) on YouTube when he was doing a chilli challenge with Jamie Oliver, also note the way they say jalapeño, jah-lah-pee-nose instead of HAH-lah-pen-yose.

BON APPÉTIT

– Ally xx

Cayenne Crab & Corn Bisque

July 16, 2015January 14, 2019 amcarmenLeave a comment

Hello Everyone! We’ve made it halfway through Winter Warmer Month and today I’ve got something for spicy and seafood lovers out there. Well, I mean maybe not all seafood lovers will fancy this just because I know some people who do love seafood, but can’t do crabs because of its taste/texture, or even prawns because of the way it looks. Anyway, if you like spicy, crab, and sweet corn in a nice creamy soup, then this recipe is for you!

A bisque is basically a soup of French origin from a crustacean-based broth (either from lobster, crab, shrimp, or crayfish) that is smooth, creamy, and highly seasoned. Traditionally, you would extract the flavour from imperfect crustaceans that are not good enough to sell at markets. In an authentic bisque, the shells are ground to a fine paste and added to thicken the soup. Seafood bisques are traditionally served in a low two-handled cup on a saucer or in a mug. However, not all bisques contain seafood. Bisque is also sometimes used to refer to cream-based soups in which pre-cooked ingredients such as squash, tomato, mushroom, and red pepper are puréed or processed in a food processor.

Anyway, two days ago I went to the Sydney Fish Markets with my roommate Marissa (from Maiyummy) and her friend Rachel to indulge in delectable seafood plates from the barbecue and grill place, as well as purchasing some fresh seafood for our own cooking. I bought some live flame clams and blue swimmer crabs for this particular recipe. Actually, I hadn’t planned on making a seafood bisque for Winter Warmer Month, but as soon as I knew that I was going to make a trip to the fish market, I had to do a seafood soup of some sort! Anyway, enough talk and let get to the menu shall we? You can find the original recipe over on All Recipes; I changed the order of the method and the seasonings but it still worked out fine.

PREP TIME 10 MINS | COOKING TIME 45 MINS | SERVES 4-6

INGREDIENTS

450g fresh crabmeat (I got mine from blue swimmer crabs)
2 ears of corn, cut from the cob
2-3 garlic cloves, minced
2 dried bay leaves
1 small-sized onion, diced
1 cup chicken broth*
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup thickened cream
2 tbsp unsalted butter
1 tbsp plain flour
1 & 1/2 tsp cayenne pepper powder
Ground salt and black pepper to taste

*I made my own by combining chicken carcasses, salt, pepper, bay leaves, and a bit of ginger in a pot of water and boiled it for about 45 minutes to an hour, otherwise store bought broth, or a chicken cube/powder with water will do the trick as well.

METHOD

Wash and clean the crabs thoroughly and place in a steamer and steam for about 20 minutes. Once done, remove from the steamer and set aside to cool. If you’ve purchased crab flesh in a jar, then you can skip this step altogether.
Melt the butter in a large pot over medium-high heat, be careful as to not brown/burn the butter. Add the garlic and sauté for about a minute or two before adding the the onions and cooking them until soft.
Add in the corn kernels followed by the bay leaves, cayenne pepper, salt, and black pepper. Mix around and cook for about a minute or two before adding the chicken broth in with the mixture.
Bring the broth to a boil and leave to simmer for about 10 minutes. Remove 1 cup of the soup and set aside.
Reduce the heat to medium-low and pour in the thickened cream. Using a stick blender, blend the corn together with the liquid in the cooking pot until smooth. Turn the heat up to medium-high once again and return the unblended soup to the cooking pot and mix well.
In a small bowl, stir together the flour and milk. Slowly and constantly stir the mixture into the simmering soup. Stir in crabmeat (leaving a few pieces behind to decorate with) and cook until warmed through, about 5 minutes.
Divide the soup equally into serving bowls (4 large bowls, or 6 small bowls) and top with some crabmeat, corn, cayenne pepper, and fresh afro parsley.

BON APPÉTIT

– Ally xx

Classic Cream of Mushroom Soup

July 14, 2015January 14, 2019 amcarmenLeave a comment

Hello Everyone! I know, this recipe may not be as exciting as the three Winter Warmer soup recipes that have gone up on the blog for this month, but everybody loves an easy creamy mushroom soup. Well, at least I know without a doubt that I love me a nice bowl of mushroom soup. Even at buffets that I have been to, I always dive into a nice bowl of mushroom soup over whatever was the other choice of soup.

Anyway, I’ve made this recipe a couple of times before and I remember the last time I made this soup was last year during my meat free week which was the week before Easter Sunday. That whole week was difficult indeed because I would always be so hungry after 2 hours of having my meal which then made me sad and upset. What did I learn from this experience? I can’t live without meat in my diet, and therefore I will never be able to convert to a vegetarian. I can have a no meat day, but a week let alone forever? Nope!

You may notice that there are some ingredients missing in the picture from the list, and that’s only because I remembered when everything was chopped up already that I was missing the butter and flour. The dash of worcestershire sauce was actually unplanned, I just came across the sauce in the pantry as I was searching for the pepper mill.

PREP TIME 10 MINS | COOKING TIME 25 MINS | SERVES 2-3

INGREDIENTS

300g cup mushrooms, sliced
2 pcs portobello mushrooms, cut into small chunks
2 cups pork stock*, or vegetable stock
2-3 garlic cloves, minced
1/2 brown onion, sliced
3 tbsp unsalted butter
1 tbsp plain flour
Dash of worcestershire sauce
Ground salt and black pepper to taste
Pinch of dried thyme
Thickened cream

*I had about 2 cups of rich pork broth that I didn’t want to throw away from tenderising a piece of pork shoulder to teach my friend how to make roast pork cracking, so I reserved it and decided to use it for this recipe. Otherwise, plain vegetable stock is fine for a vegetarian option.

METHOD

Melt the butter in a large pot over medium-high heat, be careful as to not brown/burn the butter. Add the garlic and sauté for about a minute or two before adding the the onions and cooking them until soft. Then add in the mushrooms, seasoning with a bit of black pepper, salt, and thyme. Cook until the mushrooms are tender.
Add the pork stock in and a dash of worcestershire sauce. Bring to a boil. Once boiling, let it cook for a further 10 minutes. Scoop out about a tablespoon of the stock and place into a small bowl together with the flour. Mix until there are no more lumps and the mixture becomes a thick paste. Return to the pot and incorporate well into the soup. Continue cooking the soup until it starts to thicken, about a further 5 minutes.
Turn the heat off, and scoop out about a heaped ladle of the soup and mushrooms. Set aside.
Then, using a stick blender, blend the mushrooms together with the liquid in the cooking pot until smooth. Return the unblended soup to he cooking pot and mix well.
Divide the soup equally into serving bowls (2 large bowls, or 3 small bowls) and top with a dollop of thickened cream and fresh afro parsley. Serve immediately with some toasted bread.

BON APPÉTIT

– Ally xx

Moroccan Pumpkin Soup with Crispy Chorizo

July 10, 2015January 14, 2019 amcarmen2 Comments

Hello Everyone! Oh what a hectic recipe this has been. First of all, it wasn’t supposed to be Moroccan-flavoured pumpkin soup; I wanted to do a spicy chipotle pumpkin soup. I looked everywhere I could for chipotle peppers, but could only find chipotle salsa in the grocery stores that contained like 5% chipotle and 95% others. There were two other stores that sold chipotle peppers, but one I had to order online (with a minimum price of $20.00 to be able to ship), and the other I had to wait up to 10 days. So I scratched the chipotle and decided to use fresh jalapeño peppers along with Mexican chilli powder.Those flavours didn’t even shine through because of the very flavourful Moroccan soup base that I used for the soup. I was going to make my own vegetable stock for this dish, until I saw this base in store. I’ve never seen them before (well duh it says ‘new’) and I wanted to give it a try – thus Moroccan Pumpkin Soup on the menu tonight. Even though I didn’t achieve what I wanted to in the first place, the soup was delicious, especially with the crispy chorizo bits on top!

Peeling pumpkin can be quite difficult, I guess, well not for me. I only said that because I remembered my former housemate Lydia struggling to peel pumpkin; it would take her close to an hour to peel and cut them into chunks. I also remembered how she would place them in the pot and cook them as she went to save time, and but of course the first batch of pumpkin would already be tender. I jokingly said to her, “did you have pumpkin mash for dinner?” Ah bless her; Lydia if you’re reading this, please comment below (also you Vidhya because I know you are reading this and remembering this too :P).

PREP TIME 20 MINS | COOKING TIME 40 MINS | SERVES 3-5

INGREDIENTS

1 medium-sized pumpkin, peeled, deseeded, and cut into chunks
1 chorizo, sliced and then cut into small chunks
300ml thickened cream
2 cups Campbell’s Moroccan soup base
2 jalapeño peppers, deseeded
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 medium-sized onion, diced
1 tsp Mexican chilli powder
Afro parsley
Feta cheese
Ground salt and pepper to taste
Olive oil

METHOD

Preheat oven to 180C (350F or gas mark 4). In a large bowl, combine the pumpkin chunks and jalapeño peppers with olive oil, salt, and pepper. Toss around until well coated with the oil and seasoning. Line a baking tray with foil and place the pumpkin chunks and jalapeño peppers on it. Roast in the oven for about 20 minutes or until tender.
Heat a large pot with a bit of olive oil over medium-high. Add the chorizo chunks in and fry until crispy. Set aside, leaving behind the oil in the pot.
Sauté the garlic until fragrant and golden brown. Add the onions and continue cooking until soft.
Add the pumpkin and jalapeño peppers to the pot and mash the pumpkin, mixing it together with the sautéed garlic and onions. Season with a bit more salt, pepper, and Mexican chilli powder, then add in the Moroccan soup base. Bring to a boil. Once boiling, continue cooking for a further 10 minutes.
Remove from the heat and let it sit too cool down slightly for about 10 minutes. Using a stick blender, blend the vegetables together with the liquid in the cooking pot until smooth. Add in the cream and give it a good mix.
Divide the soup equally into serving bowls (3 large bowls, or 4-5 small bowls), and top each with a bit of crispy chorizo and feta cheese. Garnish with afro parsley leaves and serve immediately with some toasted bread.

Honestly, why buy canned soup when you can easily make your own! Much more healthy in a sense that there are far way less preservatives in your soup and you can go nuts with the flavours that you fancy!

BON APPÉTIT

– Ally xx

AMCARMEN'S KITCHEN

A Third Culture Foodie

Tag: Home-cooked

Brendon’s Cookies & Cream

PREP TIME 30 MINS | COOKING TIME 15 MINS | SERVES 2-3

Chicken Pastel Mini Pot Pies

PREP TIME 2 HOURS | COOKING TIME 1 HOUR 35 MINS | MAKES 6 MINI POT PIES

Bacon, Beer & Potato Soup

PREP TIME 10 MINS | COOKING TIME 1 HOUR 10 MINS | SERVES 2-4

Minestrone Soup

PREP TIME 10 MINS | COOKING TIME 65 MINS | SERVES 4-6

Minty Pea & Ham Soup

PREP TIME 10 MINS | COOKING TIME 30 MINS | SERVES 3-5

Hearty Chicken Chipotle Soup

PREP TIME 10 MINS | COOKING TIME 1 HOUR 20 MINS | SERVES 3-4

Cayenne Crab & Corn Bisque

PREP TIME 10 MINS | COOKING TIME 45 MINS | SERVES 4-6

Classic Cream of Mushroom Soup

PREP TIME 10 MINS | COOKING TIME 25 MINS | SERVES 2-3

Moroccan Pumpkin Soup with Crispy Chorizo

PREP TIME 20 MINS | COOKING TIME 40 MINS | SERVES 3-5