Ever watched cartoon characters eat a burger? You know that perfect bite when they chomp into it and you wish all food was cartoon food. I'm not saying these are cartoon burgers but they're pretty close! Different elements make up this awesome burger which I'll outline in this blog. However what makes a good burger a great burger is the quality of ingredients. You don't need to be all organic and "granola" about it, but be mindful of the ingredients you're putting together and seek out the best you can.

Starting with the bun. It should be soft, not sugary and has some integrity so it doesn't just fall apart when sandwiching a bit of meat.

Moving onto the bacon, if you're using it. It must be smoked bacon. Remember, not all bacon is smoked. Some are cured by other means. Those you should avoid. In Australia, you'll find what they call "streaky bacon". This is the ideal bacon cut for burgers. Take your time with cooking this. Don't add oil to the pan when you're frying this as enough fat will come out of the bacon. Use medium heat and let is crisp up good.

Last but not least the beef. In the past we'd always use store bought mince. Those days are over. We now buy rump steaks and hand mince them. This way, you know what meat is actually in your mince (not offal, bones and cardboard). Remember to include a good ratio of fat to meat (20/80 is ideal). I find rump is a great cut, well priced with good fat ratio. And I hear you asking, "how do you hand mince meat". You don't need a meat grinder. You simply cut the meat fine. I also suggest separating the meat with the fat and cut those up separately then mix it together afterwards. Be sure not to overwork the meat, as in handle it too much. I truly believe home, hand minced beef is the secret to a great burger.

Other ingredients to consider include slowly sauteed onions and mushrooms. Opt for cos lettuce if you can. It has more of a crunch and less water content. Pick a melty cheese. Jack, colby or cheddar are good options.

I'm not going to outline every single step in assembling a burger as everyone has their own "style". Below is a recipe to flavouring of the patty and a few tips we've learnt. Note, the quantities are rough and largely "free pour". So trial and error with your flavours. Add more if you like more flavour, add less if you want to keep it simple.

Patty mix Ingredients
~500g Hand mince beef
1 egg
1/4 to 1/3 cup breadcrumbs
~ 2 Tbpsn tomato sauce/ketchup
~ 2 Tbpsn worcestershire sauce
~ 2 tspn dried (or fresh) parsley, (sometimes I put oregano and minced garlic too).
~ 1 tspn salt
pepper to desired quantities


Patty method
Mix all the above mentioned ingredients together in a large bowl until just combined. Allow to rest and flavours mature. Cover and leave overnight in the fridge or set aside for a few hours.

Portion patties appropriate size to the buns. Roll in balls then flatten. Following my visit to the twin cities of Minneapolis and St Paul, I "juicy lucy" -'ed these patties. I put a little piece of cheese in the middle of the patty before frying it.

Fry in a well greased, pan on medium to medium high heat. Tip here is to only flip once. When you flip, you can melt a slice of cheese while the patty is frying on the other side. Another tip: lately we've been frying the bacon first, then cooking the patties in the bacon fat. This definitely adds extra flavour. You could also BBQ the patties for that nice char-grilled flavour.

Construct burger, eat and enjoy!

I came up with this recipe last year during my ambassadorship with Bulla Cream. I was asked to re-create George Calombaris' Olive Oil Chocolate Mousse with Spiced Red Wine Poached Pears with my own twist. I tried making this with olive oil and it tasted TERRIBLE!! Definitely had to put my own spin on this one. I didn't have any fancy servingware for these. I figured any glass, ramekin or bowl will do fine.

This is a light dessert. Great for those who are gluten free too!

Once upon a time I had a shellfish allergy. During the winter months, the thought of a nice creamy seafood chowder was so delectable! Feeling disappointed every time, OG made me this chowder minus the seafood. Mmm it was delicious! I'm glad that now I can have it with clams, but I wouldn't hesitate to recreate this soup. 

Ingredients
150 g streaky bacon, diced
4 cups stock (chicken or vegetable)
1/2 onion, diced
1 medium clove garlic, minced
1 large stick of celery, chopped
2 medium potatoes, cubed
1 tblspn parsley
1 tsp dill
5 average sized mushrooms
3 tsp corn starch, dissolved in about 1/4 cup water
100 ml milk (as desired)

Salt & pepper to taste
100ml cooking cream (regular cream that doesn't split when cooking)

Method
1. On high heat, fry bacon and set aside leaving residual fat in pan. 

2. Return pan to heat and fry onions until translucent, add celery and garlic, stir to combine. Add dried herbs and potatoes. Stir. 

3. Add stock, and bring to a rolling boil, then reduce heat to medium. Simmer until potatoes are soft (the longer you leave cooking the more the potatoes break down and the thicker your soup gets). This usually takes about 10 to 15 minutes (time dependant on how big your potato cubes are). Add mushrooms when potatoes are partly cooked. 

4. Stir in prepared corn starch and water. This will help to thicken the broth.

5. Reduce heat to low. Add bacon, cream and milk, and stir to combine. Season to taste (add more milk to reduce to salt level). Serve with crispy toast.

Growing up, if someone offered me "mac n’ cheese", I would get a highly processed, neon orange dish that came out of a blue packet. The smell of that instantly turned me off. 

Hi readers, I sincerely apologise for being so absent with my posts. I have been busy in the kitchen but also busy in my life, to find the time to blog, which is no excuse I know! It's been since August! Wow! I'm terrible! hopefully I will make it up with a series of quick posts. 

1/3 cup cocoa (35g)

One of the best things about Australia is the lamington. It's one of my all time favourite desserts, ever since I was a kid. Because it's so easy to find and relatively cheap, I've actually never made lamingtons before. According to SBS food, recently it was national lamington day. They put together a lamington recipe collection that has a slight twist on the ol' fav. One in particular caught my fancy - the Chocolate and Raspberry lamington. Mmm sounded delicious! It really wasn't such a stretch as lamingtons sometimes comes with jam and cream. This recipe just used raspberry jam and chocolate sponge (instead of regular vanilla). 

One evening when I was home alone, I made this recipe. Well... I started making it. I did it in stages. 1) Bake the sponge 2) whipped the cream and stir in the jam 3) prepared the ganache 4) construct the lamingtons. Verdict? Yes they were delicious and ridiculously big as I sandwiched together two pieces of sponge. The cake was pretty dense so eating it was a staged process too. 

This is my first attempt at making lamingtons

I chose not to blog it though as I think I could make it better. "How so?" I hear you ask. Well this is why I'm blogging this particular recipe. This is my take on the Chocolate Raspberry Lamington - I made it into a swiss roll. I decided to change the sponge cake recipe and used the "Chocolate Roulade with Coffee Cream" recipe from Australia's Sweet Baking Favourites (ISBN: 9780646580050) (Published by Nestle and Pacific Magazines). This cake is definitely for the sweet tooth folks out there. Enjoy!

Ingredients
Sponge
6 egg whites
1/2 cup (110g) caster sugar (I reduced to about 90g)
1/4 cup (25g) cocoa powder
2 Tblspn plain flour
2 Tblspn boiling water

Chocolate ganache
200g good quality dark chocolate, chopped
300ml thickened cream
Filling and construction
100 ml thickened cream 
1/4 cup (85g) raspberry jam (1 reduced to about 70g)
1/2 to 1 cup shredded coconut

Method
Sponge
1. Reheat oven to 170C. Grease a swiss roll pan or shallow baking tray (~35 x 25 cm). Line pan with baking paper.

2. Using an electric mixer, beat egg whites until they form soft peaks. Gradually add sugar, beating well after each addition to ensure the sugar dissolves. Sift cocoa and flour over egg mixture then pour in hot water. Fold gently. 

3. Spread mixture into prepared pan evenly. Try get this as levelled as possible. Bake for about 15 minutes or until cooked through and springy to touch.

4. Meanwhile, lay a clean tea towel on the table and cut a sheet of baking paper the same size as your baking pan, and lay the paper over the towel. When cake is cooked, remove from oven and turn the hot sponge onto the paper and peel away the lining paper. This maybe tricky, I used a chopping board to help me flip out the sponge. Working quickly and using the tea towel as a guide, roll the sponge into a swiss roll and allow to cool on a cooling rack.

Filling
5. Place cream in a medium bowl and whip til soft to medium peaks form. Stir in raspberry jam. 

6. When cake is cooled, gently unroll it and spread the cream evenly along the inner side of the roll. Gently re-roll the cake, this time using the baking paper as a guide. Place on serving dish, cover and place in fridge for about 15 to 30 minutes.

Ganache
Construction
8. Remove roll from fridge and pour ganache over roll to cover. Sprinkle with shredded coconut. Keep in fridge until ready to serve. Serve with fresh fruits.

Walking past cafes with lovely jumbo muffins, it takes me back to winter in high school. I used to love getting a jumbo choc chip muffin that's been over heated in the microwave with choc chips melting between your scorching fingers as you juggle muffin between your hands and mouth. 

This week I dropped into a kitchen outlet store and picked up my first jumbo muffin tin. Being super excited, I couldn't wait to use it. I had a bunch of leftover pizza ingredients in the fridge so I decided to make these jumbo pizza muffins. The recipe was inspired by Leonie's instagram post and based on Donna Hay's recipe with some ingredient changes - (seriously guys - pineapple belongs in a pina colada! Yes! I'm one of those people). 

The other dilemma I encountered was how do I line these muffin hole! Online - everyone seems to just use baking paper cut into squares and folded. Here is a good video on how to do it yourself. I literally cut a big square and shoved the paper into the hole and used a little ramekin to hold it down as I didn't have a tumbler that fit as per the video.

Of course, you can make this recipe vegetarian by omitting the meat. You can make this carnivorous by adding more meat (bacon, chicken, mince beef...). It's really how you like your pizza, but the basis is pretty simple - mix dry ingredients together, mix wet ingredients together then combine, fill muffin cases and bake.

A couple of learnings. 1) best put the mushrooms on top of the muffin before baking as they get soggy (unless you like it like that). 2) Cut up most of the ingredients small but not too small.

Makes approximately a dozen jumbo muffins or more smaller ones.

Ingredients
3 cups self-raising flour
1 tspn baking powder
2/3 cup oil (I just used olive oil and a little less)
2 eggs
2 Tblspn tomato paste (or pizza sauce)
1 cup milk
1 1/2 cups grated cheese (I used a pizza mix, however, Cheddar and mozzarella are best)
1 tblspn dried oregano
1 clove garlic, minced

Filling (use what ever you like from this list - this is just what I used)
chopped pepperoni
fresh basil, chopped
mushroom, diced
sun dried tomatoes, roughly chopped
80g chopped spinach (I defrosted some frozen ones)
red onion, diced

Other filling suggestions
Capsicum, diced
olives, sliced
ham or bacon, diced
anchovies (you crazy kid)
artichoke hearts
prosciutto, small pieces
bocconcini, small pieces

Method
1. Preheat oven to 180C (moderate). Line muffin tin with cases or baking paper.

2. In a large bowl, combine flour, baking powder, oregano, 1 cup of cheese, garlic and your filling (perhaps leave out the mushrooms if you intend to have it). Mix to combine. Set aside.

3. In a medium bowl, add eggs, tomato paste, oil and milk. Whisk to combine. 

4. Pour egg mixture into flour mixture. Stir to combine. Fill prepared muffin tin. Add mushrooms on top and distribute remain grated cheese on top of each unbaked muffin.

5. Place muffins in preheated oven and bake for 20 to 30 minutes (less if using smaller muffin tins) or until cooked and golden brown. When pricked with a toothpick or skewer it should come out clean.

6. Remove from oven. Allow to stand for 5 to 10 minutes and remove from tin onto a wire rack to cool further. Serve warm - perhaps top with some aioli or pesto for that little bit extra. 


  

After wondering the streets of Istanbul, we discovered a local restaurant near our hotel, in the old town of Sultanahmet. I don't even remember the name of the place. Upon discovery, we frequented the restaurant daily and even multiple times a day. It was a little family run place with brick design linoleum lining their walls and a simple menu. This cheap and cheerful place was always busy! 


So what's was the big deal? Their red lentil soup - AKA Mercimek Çorbasi. Oh my! So damn tasty! We tried a couple of other places' Mercimek Çorbasi, but it just didn't compare.

This is THE SOUP!

After return from our big trip, I was determined to replicate this soup. I didn't want to wait for another trip to Istanbul to get this soup. So I scoured the web and various family members' recipe books. I had a relatively long shortlist of recipes and I studied each one carefully. Their methods, their ingredients, their quantities. I then started experimenting. I've been through about 7 pots of soup now... and I think this is as close I can get it... so hence I've titled this "Turkish Inspired" as I don't think it's 100%, but hey, it's pretty close and it is definitely damn tasty. So to settle my cravings, and enjoy a warm hearty soup for the winter - here is my version of Mercimek Çorbasi. This should serve about 6 entree size bowls, 4 main size dishes or 2 super hungry hippos!

***Please note these herbs and spices amounts are approximate. I'll leave it to your best judgement to figure out the right ratios.

Ingredients
1 cup red split lentils, well washed (soaked for a few hours or overnight)
1/4 to 1/3 cup of Bulgur (either fine or coarse)
1 big knob of butter (this makes it, so don't skimp or use margarine), if butter isn't your thing, just leave it out.
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 brown onion, finely diced
2 cloves of garlic, minced
1 large carrot, finely diced or grated
2 tablespoons tomato paste
Approximately 4 to 6 cups of stock (vegetable or chicken)
hot water to top up
salt/pepper to taste
Marash pepper to serve (optional)
Lemon to serve (optional)

The list of herbs and spices***
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon ground coriander seeds
3/4 teaspoon ground turmeric
1 teaspoon sumak
2 teaspoons dried parsley
3 to 4 medium size bay leaves
1/2 teaspoon powdered ginger
1 teaspoon paprika powder
1/3 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 teaspoon dried mint leaves
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon powder

Method
1. Wash the lentil and bulgur well  in a medium pot. Cover with about an inch of water and over medium heat bring to a boil and simmer for 5 to 10 minutes. Remove from heat and set aside, it should look pale and mushy.

2. To a large pot over medium heat, melt butter and add oil. When butter has melted, add onions. Saute until translucent.




3. Add garlic and the herbs and spices list above. Stir to mix.  Add carrot. Stir to mix. Allow carrots to cook slightly - about 1 to 2 minutes. Add lentil and Bulgur mixture. Stir to mix. Add stock. Stir to mix. Add tomato paste. Stir to mix. Turn heat up to bring to a boil and then turn it down to low to simmer.






4. Stir every 10 minutes. Simmer for about 30 to 45 minutes. The longer the better. Top up with water if it's starting to get a bit dry and thick. Taste to season. If you're in a rush, the carrots should be soft, take out the bay leaves and using a stick blender, blend until smooth (optional).




5. Serve with some fresh bread, lemon and some Marash pepper^. 




^What is Marash Pepper: This is a red pepper/capsicum that is grown in Turkey with a complex flavour and moderate heat. It comes as flakes and maybe difficult to find. You can substitute with Aleppo Pepper which is similar or any moderate heat pepper flakes.

8.     Drizzle glaze over warm cooked rolls. 

For the longest time, whenever we'd go over to our Filipino friend's family's place for parties we'd gorge ourselves on mainly two dishes. One of them being spring rolls. I don't know what it was about these spring rolls that were a million times nicer than any restaurant's. We could eat an entire bowl full and be completely stuffed yet they still kept coming! And we'd just keep eating. Magical spring rolls!

A few years ago, our friend's mum showed me how she makes them. They were very simple. We tried to make them ourselves, soon after being shown, but it just didn't turn out. So we left that alone.

After a few years of not having these magical spring rolls, recently our friend's wife told us about her version. And after trying hers, we got so excited and re-energised about making them. They were similar, except our friend's wife added more pepper and some prawns.

We decided to trying a small batch and they turned out beautifully! It was super tasty as if they had MSG in them but they didn't! It was fantastic! I combined our friend's mum's and wife's recipes and below is our version of these magical spring rolls!

Ingredients
300g mince pork
100g fresh prawns, minced/chopped finely
1 carrot, finely grated
1 egg
1 clove garlic, minced
1 small onion, finely chopped
~1/2 Tblspn oyster sauce
~1 Tblspn soy sauce
Salt and pepper to taste
~2 to 4 Tblspn finely chopped fresh coriander and/or chives (optional)
1 x 50pkt frozen spring roll pastry (with egg)
Vegetable oil for deep frying or shallow fry with slightly more oil

Method
1. In a bowl combine all the ingredients mentioned above minus the spring roll pastry. Mix until all ingredients are evenly distributed throughout the mixture. Set aside.




2. Remove frozen spring roll pastry from freezer and allow to defrost, for most brands, it takes about 50 minutes.

3. Take defrosted pastry out of the packet and wrap with a clean damp tea towel.

4. Place a sheet of pastry on a plate so it sits like a diamond. Place about 1 to 1 1/2 tspn of mince mixture across, on the side slightly closest to you. Fold the corner closest to you over the mixture to form a tight/snug roll and roll away from you. Fold in the left and right corners and continue to roll. Secure with a dab of water at the top tip. Repeat with remaining spring roll sheets.

My funky rolling instructions

Note: If you’re confused about my instructions here is a good guide.




5. Heat oil in fry pan (or deep fryer). You know when the oil is hot enough when you stick something wooden (I use a chopstick) in the oil, it starts to bubble around the wooden item.


6. Slowly lower the spring rolls in, if you’re kind of shallow frying, turn spring rolls after they’re brown on one side (about 1 to 2 minutes per side). depending how big your fry pan is, I usually do about 5 to 6 at one time. Once browned remove from oil, allow excess oil to drip back into pan and place on clean paper towels to further drain away excess oil. Repeat for remaining spring rolls.




7. Serve hot to warm with some chilli sauce on the side.