GET ON THE COOK
DISCLAIMER: You might notice that measurements are sketchy here. Don’t freak out. Cooking is all about practice, f*** ups and using your intuition. I’ve not added perfect amounts because I have made these recipes up in my brain and I do it from memory usually. If you’re really after more precise measurements or I have just generally destroyed an entire recipe and it didn’t work, swing me an email and I’ll try and be more precise. Otherwise, go nuts. If you screw it up, you won’t do it again next time.
Also, taste your food when cooking at different stages through the process. This is so important in ensuring your plate of eats doesn’t end up on the table as a bland blob of a thing or something that could salt burn your tastebuds off.
ENJOY!
Lize xx
A CLASSIC. SCRAMBLED EGGS.
Okay. So a contentious topic. Scrambled eggs. There’s hundreds of ways people do them and thousands of claims to the best scrambie. This is the way we do it and we reckon it’s pretty delicious. The most important thing is the quality of the eggs. I (Eliza) have turned into a huge egg snob and for bloody good reason. Not going to go into how hideous industrial egg production is here. I reckon there’s a whole lot more awareness now about caged chooks and eggs. Which is great. All I can say is, support egg producers who are doing the right thing. Do ya research a bit. Just because it says ‘Free Range’ on the carton, doesn’t necessarily mean those chooks have the most humane life. Try your best to find pastured eggs where the chickens are free to roam and scratch around. Not only is the flavour of eggs a hundred times better, but you’re supporting ethical farming practices and generally small and local business.
Eggs are miraculous. Their versatility will never cease to amaze me. This is a really simple recipe that only asks for eggs, salt + a rude amount of butter.
What’s In iT
Serves 2
4 eggs
a big knob of butter
drizzle of olive oil (to stop the butter from burning)
salt
pepper (after you cook the eggs)
2 big slices of sourdough bread
seasonal herbs to throw on top
What You Do
Whisk your eggs in a bowl with a decent pinch of salt. I do this with a fork and am careful not to over whisk it. In my experience, once there’s too many egg bubbles from being over whisked the end result isn’t as fluffy.
2. Heat up your best non-stick pan so it gets hot.
3. Whack your butter and olive oil in and wait until the butter is sizzling and starts to smell nutty.
4. Put your sourdough in the toaster.
4. When the pan is hot, pour in the eggs.
5. This is the crucial part. Don’t touch the eggs. wait until you can see them slightly cooking around the edges. Then with a spatula, slowly and gently fold the eggs. The idea is to not overly move them around. You want clouds. It should only take 2 minutes at the most. Cook them to your liking, some like longer and some like really gooey eggs.
6. Butter your toast.
7. Divide eggs onto buttered toast.
8. Grind some black pepper and top with herbs. Parsley is my fave. If you happen to have some chilli oil on hand, it’s amazing. Oh and parmesan if you got it, but that’s indulgent.
Roast Pumpkin + Garlic Strozzapreti With Spinach + Goats Cheese
A.K.A An Autumnal Delight
Excuse the crappy photo, but I was too busy stuffing my face to get a good one. This combo will make ya simultaneously wanna snug up by a fire + do a little dance ‘cause it’s comforting, easy and delicious. You can use any pasta for this one really. Rigatoni would be epic or just your humble fettuccine. Whatever you have in your pantry will work. I find the chewiness of the strozzapreti is amazing with the texture of the roast pumpkin, that in the end really acts as a thick sauce for the whole thing. Butternut or Jap pumpkins are good for this one. You want it to be sweet to contrast with the tartiness of the goats cheese. Now with the goats cheese, this is the thing I’m most fussy about. Get your hands on some good Chèvre. Meredith Dairy goats cheese is hands down the best in my opinion and you can find it at most supermarkets or whole food stores. You can substitute the goats cheese with parmesan, or add both if you’re feeling frisky. Tuck in and enjoy this one!
What’s In It
Serves 2
400g strozzapreti or pasta of your choice (this should give you some leftovers depending on how hungry you are)
1/4 of a Jap pumpkin OR 1/2 a butternut (skin off and diced)
1/2 bulb of garlic (cloves separated + skin on)
rosemary (chopped finely)
2 big handfuls of spinach (washed and roughly chopped)
Meredith Dairy goats cheese (Chèvre)
2 brown onions (sliced)
olive oil
1 tbsp salted butter
parsley to garnish
salt + peps
What You Do
Pre-heat oven to 180 degrees.
2. Skin + dice pumpkin into chunks and coat with olive oil, salt + finely chopped rosemary. Add garlic cloves to pan and toss all together. Whack in the oven until soft and caramelised on edges. Take out garlic after 20 mins as it’ll burn if in any longer than that.
3. Meanwhile, slowly cook onions in butter and a generous glug of olive oil until they are sticky and translucent.
4. Put water on to boil in a large pot. You want the pasta to have a lot of room to bubble around in. When it’s boiling add salt until the water tastes like the sea. Very important.
5. Once the onions are cooked peel the garlic, roughly chop and add to the pan. Then, when the pumpkin is soft, add that to the pan too and combine it all.
6. Add pasta to the boiling water. Cook for a minute or so less than what the packet says so it’s al dente and chewy.
7. Spoon some of the pasta water to the pumpkin pan to loosen up all the sticky bits.
8. When the pasta is a minute away from being done, add the chopped spinach to the sauce and let it wilt whilst stirring.
9. Drain the pasta and coat with olive oil. Immediately add it to the pumpkin pan and toss around so it gets dressed with all the goodness.
10. Break apart a decent amount of goats cheese into the pasta and continue to toss.
11. Salt + pepper + chopped parsley + bowl + wine + eat.
Fried Eggplant + Shishitos + Soba noodles
You can pretty much put anything with soba noodles. Maybe not chocolate (but who are we to knock it before we’ve tried). Any veg that is in season, roast it up make a soy and vinegar based dressing, whack it onto some sesame oil dressed soba and Bob’s your Uncle. Roast pumpkin and corn fried in butter and miso go tremendously.
This version is fried eggplant and shishito peppers. The tastiest little pepper morsels you ever did see. 1 in 10 are spicy apparently, so it’s like Russian roulette without the danger.
What’s In It
Serves 4
1 pack of of organic soba noodles (Hakubaku brand is good)
2 large eggplants (diced into cubes sized to your liking)
2 large handfuls of shishitos
half a bulb of garlic (Australian, organic if you can)
1 bunch of spring onions
chilli to your liking
any herbs in season for cooking + garnish (coriander, chives, Thai basil or sweet basil)
1/3 cup of soy sauce
tablespoon of honey
dash of red wine vinegar
decent olive oil
sesame oil
What You Do
Dice up your eggplant and soak it in a bowl of cold, salty water for 30 mins. This halves the cooking time and stops it from oxidising.
Chop your herbs + chilli + garlic + roughly slice your spring onions. Use the whole spring onion from white to green tips.
Combine in a bowl, soy sauce + honey + red wine vinegar + chilli + garlic + half of spring onions
Put water on the boil for soba noodles.
Drain eggplant and heat olive oil in a large pan or work. Get the oil really hot. Fry eggplant in batches until its brown all over and slightly soft. Add oil to pan at the beginning of each batch. Set aside on a plate.
After the eggplant is done, fry shishitos in batches of hot oil. You want these to be sizzling and to char up on the skin. Remove when done and set aside.
7. Add into the hot pan eggplant + shishitos. Once these have been tossed around a bit, add the soy sauce mix and let that shit sizzle away.
Cook soba noodles as per instructions from the pack. Only takes a few minutes.
Now, the eggplant and shishito fry up should be looking sticky and delicious. Turn off the heat and add your fresh herbs and the rest of the spring onions.
Drain the soba noodles and coat them in a generous drizzle of sesame oil.
Whack noodles in bowls. Put the soy-y fried up mix on top and add some more fresh herbs.
Eat with chopsticks + a cold beer.
CHIMMICHURRI / PESTO THING
This is honestly the best mother of a sauce thing ever. Perfect for when you have real sad looking herbs at the end of the week or you just feel like zesting up your life on any occasion. I’ve only ever made these concoctions with leafy annual herbs like coriander, basil and parsley but you could get experimental and add some perennial numbers like chives and thyme into it too.
Great on spuds. Great on fish. Great on sandwiches. Just great on everything really.
WHAT’S IN IT
1 huge bunch of parsley + stalks (chopped roughly)
1 huge bunch of basil leaves
3 cloves of garlic (finely grated or chopped)
juice of 1 lemon (add more or less if you want)
3 tsps whole coriander seeds
1 1/3 cup of good quality olive oil
salt + pepper
What You Do
Heat 1/3 cup of olive oil in a pan and add coriander seeds. Fry them up for a little bit until they start to sizzle and smell good. Don’t burn them.
Then literally chuck everything else into a food processor or blender + the oily coriander seeds and blend away.
Consistency should be a little bit runnier than a pesto. But then again it’s up to you and what you like. Add more oil, lemon or salt after giving it a taste.
Whack it into a clean jar and put in the fridge. It’ll last a week.