Creme Brulee Choc Chip Cookies

The best thing about working in a tea shop is constantly playing around, blending different teas together and finding the perfect garnishes for iced teas. Lately, however, I've been playing around with the teas at home, and incorporating the different flavours into different types of food. Here's a recipe I came up with for choc chips cookies, using creme brulee (a flavoured black) tea.

INGREDIENTS:

- 250g butter

- 5 - 10 tablespoons of T2 creme brulee tea

- 1/3 cup caster sugar

- 125mL sweetened condensed milk

- 1 1/2 cups self-raising flour

- 200g choc chips

METHOD:

Melt the butter in a saucepan on the stove, then add the tea and steep for 5 minutes. Turn off the heat, and continue to steep for 5 more minutes. Drain through a sieve into a separate bowl, taking care to press down on the leaves to release as much butter as possible, and then set aside until it has hardened at room temperature

Preheat oven to 180 degrees. 

Beat the butter and sugar together until light and creamy, and then beat in the condensed milk. Add the flour and mix. Once the mixture is smooth, mix in the choc chips.

Roll into balls and place on baking trays, taking care to leave room for the biscuits to spread. Cook for 12-15mins or until golden, and transfer onto a wire rack to cool.

3 things

Having a mother who is a cooking teacher has been useful for many reasons, some of which include having the best lunches in the classroom and the most impressive birthday cakes at parties. It's only just occurred to me, however, just how many little tips and tricks I have learnt from her. It seems I spent my childhood assuming that everyone knew the difference between caster sugar and A1 sugar, or that unsalted butter is best for baking.

After having a little think about all the tricks she has taught me, I decided that the following three are my favourite and most used:
1 - Zap any citrus fruit in the microwave for around 15 seconds before juicing it (it helps to get the most juice out of the fruit)
2 - Spray a measuring cup or spoon with a non-stick cooking spray before measuring out golden syrup (prevents the syrup from sticking and therefore gives you an accurate measure)
3 - Cook books can be read like novels

Thanks mum! xx

Dinner Party!

On Saturday night my wonderful friend Emily and I hosted what was no doubt the dinner party of the century (modest, eh?) in an (extremely early!) celebration of our friend Kirby's birthday.
We spent all of Saturday cooking and ended up with enough food for about twenty, despite the fact that we'd only invited eight of our friends! A big thank you to all our lovely friends who attended for making it such a fun and entertaining night (and to Kirby, for the photos that follow)
xx

the table.

like I said, there was enough food for twenty!

the feature of the main meal - the edible garden! We were all surprised when the 'soil' actually tasted nice!

the feature of the dessert - hamburger cupcakes! 100% cupcake

group shot!

Wow.

Today I fell in love.

I found an amazing website which pairs foods together, but based on their scientific properties. I have a flavour thesaurus which I adore, but that pairs things on taste alone. Foodpairing scientifically analyses the flavour components of ingredients and matches them up with ingredients with similar components. After 5 years of research, they launched their website which allows subscribers to enter ingredients and see what its perfect match is. I had a play around, and it told me that tomato sauce and strawberry and banana is a perfect match! I might have to have a play around in the kitchen and see what recipe I can create that includes all 3 ingredients ... This could get interesting!
It turns out heaps of cocktail makers and chefs use it - including Burch and Purchese of the Sweet Studio in South Yarra, which I just adore.

Check it out: www.foodpairing.com

Cook Book Crushes.

My two latest:

 

I think I'll spend all night tucked up in bed reading them from cover to cover!

Excitement!

One of my favourites, Donna Hay, has finally launched an iPad app! I've always admired the way Donna presents everything, and her magazines never fail to inspire me and set my stomach rumbling! The app features beautiful photos, little animations, recipes and a special mode which takes you through the recipe step by step while you're cooking. Love.

I originally got my iPad to become more productive at uni, but thanks to Jamie Oliver and now Donna Hay's apps (plus a little fruit ninja - guilty!), it's only encouraged procrastination!

http://www.donnahay.com.au/ipad

fresh produce ...

... what could be better? Yum!

Cheat's Pizza

Tonight I made Jamie Oliver's 'Cheat's Pizza' - self raising flour and water thrown into a food processor, lightly kneaded and then cooked on the stove top, followed by a short burst in the oven. Tasted great, and was so much better than waiting around for yeast to rise!

Pizza goes into the fry pan - note the Bickford's Cordial which doubled as a rolling pin in the background!

Toppings include caramelised onion and roasted capsicum

Pizza ready for the oven, topped off with homegrown rosemary

And now, the finished product! (drum roll please)

(if only that glass of Pepsi was a red wine!)

Cook Book Bonanza!

Today, delivered to me at work by my beautiful friend, was a brand spanking new copy of Adriano Zumbo's cook book, 'Zumbo'! I thought the book was to be released next month, so the literal jump of joy which I did in the middle of the store was entirely justified. 

I'm also waiting on Heston Blumenthal's 'Heston Blumenthal at Home' to be delivered (hopefully next week!) Plus I got a macaron AND a high tea book from work last week, which fast became regulars on my nightstand. 

Eek! I don't think I'll be able to pay rent next month ..