Pasta is always a great comfort food.  Just don’t use chicken!

The world is experiencing a very difficult time right now.  I hope you are all safe, well, and staying out of public areas.  In the meantime, it seems that a lot of us are cooking up a storm.  Everyone is on the prowl for new recipes as we are having to cook far more than we did before when we were footloose and fancy-free.  This eggplant, speck, and fresh tomato sauce is very comforting to eat, and also very easy to make.  It is also very adaptable.  If you don’t have fresh tomatoes, used canned, or pureed tomatoes.  If you don’t have eggplant, try it with zucchini.  If you don’t have walnuts, just leave them out or add some other kind of nut in their place. If you don’t have speck, use bacon, or ham.  Just don’t use chicken.  Most Italians hate it when you use chicken in a pasta sauce.  I still haven’t worked out why it’s so horrendous to join chicken and pasta, but as I have an Italian living in my house, I can’t even make it behind closed doors to figure out the reason for this mysterious food rule.

To salt or not to salt

I used to always cut up my eggplant, put it in a colander with salt, then let it sit for an hour or two before using it so that all the bitterness would seep out.  It turned out that many times that I wanted to use eggplant (aubergine), I would have forgotten to do this step and then was at a loss as to what to make for the upcoming meal.  One fateful day when I felt like taking enormous risks, I just used it anyway (yes, my life is pretty low-risk, as you can see).  Do you know what?  For my taste-buds, it didn’t make one iota of difference.  From that time on, I have never salted another eggplant. It certainly made cooking life a lot simpler.  My risk-taking capacity hasn’t risen much from that moment though.  I’m still not planning to try parachuting or base-jumping any time in the near future.

Spice the sauce up!

If you like to feel the burn when you eat pasta, go ahead and sprinkle in some chili flakes.  Now, this is actually another Italian food rule that’s a no-no:  chili and cheese should never be mentioned in the same sentence.  I’m waiting for the lightning to come and strike me for that one.  Sometimes, I manage to get away with it when I’m cooking, and nobody gets their knickers in a knot about it.  In fact, I make pizza every week in my outdoor wood oven and my favourite pizza topping recently has become spicy Chorizo and Gorgonzola cheese.  I don’t make anyone else in the family eat it though.  Don’t tell anyone I told you about this….they may take my Italian passport off me.  It is really delicious though!

Travel photo of the week

The only type of travel we can do right now is virtual, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t look at beautiful places, does it! The photo below was taking last Spring in Urbino in the region of Italy to the east called Le Marche.  We went there to visit friends.  I wasn’t expecting anything much as I knew very little about this area.  I was blown away with how beautiful it was!  This is a secret that Italy has kept under its hat for way too long.  Even though it was Easter and prime tourist season, there were only Italians around, which doesn’t often happen in Italy.  Go there……when you are able to again!

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Pasta with Eggplant, Speck, Walnuts, and Fresh Tomato

This eggplant, bacon, walnut, and fresh tomato sauce is an easy one to throw together while the pasta is cooking.

Course entree, first course, Main Course

Cuisine Italian

Prep Time 10 minutes minutes

Cook Time 20 minutes minutes

Total Time 30 minutes minutes

Servings 2 people

Ingredients

• 200 g short pasta (penne, fusilli)
• 1/2 onion
• 1 eggplant medium-sized
• 75 g speck or bacon
• 2 tomatoes medium-sized
• 6 walnut kernels
• 60 ml olive oil 1/4 cup
• 20 g Grated Parmesan Cheese

Notes

1.  Chop the onion finely.  Chop the eggplant into small cubes. Chop the tomato into small pieces. If needed, cut the speck or bacon into thin strips. Crumble the walnut halves.
2. Put a large pot of water on to boil.
3. Heat a 4 Tbsp olive oil in a frying pan.  Add the onion and eggplant cubes. Stir frequently until they start to brown slightly.
4. Add the speck or bacon.  Stir frequently while it is cooking.
5. Once the water in the big pot boils, add salt, then cook the pasta as per the instructions on the packet.
6. Add the chopped tomatoes to the frying pan mix.  Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Cook for 5 minutes until the eggplant is cooked through.  Add the crumbed walnuts. Note: if the pasta hasn't finished cooking yet, turn the heat under the frying pan down to low to keep the sauce warm.
7. Drain the pasta when it is at it's al dente stage. Add 1/4 cup olive oil to the big pot.  Tip the pasta back in.  Scrape the eggplant sauce over the pasta and mix well.  
8. Sprinkle the grated Parmesan Cheese over the pasta and mix in.
9.  Eat immediately.

A Savoury pie for Pi Day

Pi Day is coming up in on March 14th (Get it?  3/14 for those of you who live in countries where they put the month before the date).  A physicist called Larry Shaw came up with this idea in the late 80’s as a kind of geeky way to celebrate this mathematical constant. Coincidentally, this date was apparently Albert Einstein’s birthday as well.  This is a festivity I can get completely behind: it reminds us of an important math concept, and we can make and eat lots of pie. What’s there not to like? Last year for the super DIY site Instructables   I came up with this savoury pie for a Pi Day contest they were running.  I tried to use flavours from Greek cuisine.  The end result tasted wonderful, so whether it is very Greek or not is beside the point.

What is so great about Pi anyway?

Pi is a pretty cool math constant.  No matter how big or small a circle is, the ratio between the circumference of the circle and the diameter of that same circle is always 3.14 followed by an infinite amount of digits. A woman called Emma Haruka Iwao has recently calculated Pi to 31 trillion digits.  Luckily we don’t have to put all of those digits into our calculators to work out the area of a circle, otherwise it would take us our whole life-time to do one math problem (can you imagine a teacher setting THAT test?).  The constant has been used for about 4000 years; first by the Babylonians  and then the Egyptians.  It wasn’t until Archimedes of Syracuse came along in the heady days of the 200’s BC that pi was calculated a little more precisely. The symbol for pi, which I can’t write here due to the limitations of the WordPress keyboard, was taken up by mathematicians in the 1700’s, and has become today the symbol much loved by math teachers and hated by the majority of schoolchildren all over the world.

Pi is all around us

So, the other freaky but tremendously cool thing about pi is that it’s everywhere in nature.  Apparently, it’s a constant that comes up , well, constantly, in pretty much every aspect of the natural world from the way stripes on a zebra are set out, to the timing of division of cells in growth, to breathing cycles, to the way a pine-cone or a seashell grows.  We cannot escape it, even if we want to.  That’s the attraction of it for scientists and mathematicians.  If they can uncover patterns of sequences of digits in pi, or why the digits are as they are, maybe they can unlock the secrets of the universe.

The pie made for pi

The best thing about Pi Day is that you can eat lots of pie!  I used ingredients for this pie inspired from Greek cuisine.  You may notice that the ingredients are in 3, 1, and 4 quantities.  that wasn’t so easy to pull off, but somehow I managed!  I used filo pastry to match the pie theme, but you could happily use puff pastry instead and get a great result.  Actually, it may be even better to use a sturdier pastry base than filo so that the filling sits in the pie better.  Let me know if you try it!

Travel photo of the week

I have been to Greece a couple of times, but unfortunately I don’t have any digital photos as it was way too many years ago.  The next best thing I can show you is the town of Syracuse (Siracusa) in Sicily where Archimedes hung out and did all his world-shaking and moving.  The old town is on an island called Ortigia, which connected to the mainland by two bridges.  There are Greek ruins scattered all over the place, so it’s fairly easy to imagine the daily life that Archimedes and the inhabitants of Syracuse must have had way back then. Some of the same streets and squares that you wander on in Syracuse will be the same places where Archimedes put his feet centuries ago (maybe with a little refurbishment to the stone work since that time).  Now, that’s something pretty cool to think about!

By Lisa Watson

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Greek Inspired Savoury Tart for Pi Day

This savoury tart is filled with delicious zucchini, spinach, mint, Greek yogurt, and feta cheese. Make a pie for Pi day!

Course entree, Main Course

Cuisine Mediterranean

Prep Time 30 minutes minutes

Cook Time 45 minutes minutes

Total Time 1 hour hour 15 minutes minutes

Servings 4 people

Ingredients

• 3 zucchini (courgettes) small
• 1 clove garlic
• 4 tomatoes medium-sized
• 3 eggs
• 100 g baby spinach
• 4 sprigs mint
• 3 eggs
• 1 lemon for zest
• 4 turns of a pepper mill
• 300 g Greek yogurt
• 1 tsp salt
• 4 Tbsp olive oil
• 3 Tbsp milk
• 1 packet feta cheese
• 4 sheets filo pastry

Instructions

• Mince the garlic. Chop the zucchini in cubes. Chop the tomato in cubes.
• Zest the lemon.  Roughly chop the mint leaves. Crumble the feta cheese.
• Put the oil in a large frying pan. Add the zucchini cubes, garlic, and the salt. Sauté for 4 minutes, stirring often.
• Add the spinach and lemon zest. Sauté for 3 minutes.
• Add the tomato chunks and chopped mint.  Cook for 1 further minute, stirring carefully.
• Leave to cool for at least 10 minutes.
• Oil a quiche dish and place a round of baking paper on the bottom of it.
• Layer the sheets of filo pastry one on top of the other in the quiche dish.
• In a medium-size bowl, whisk the eggs and yogurt together. Sprinkle with 1/2 tsp salt.
• Add the cooked vegetables to the pie and spread them out over the filo pastry.
• Sprinkle the crumbled feta over the top.
• Pour the egg mixture over the other ingredients.
• Bake at  180 degrees C (350 degrees F) for 40 - 45 minutes, until the custard is set.

This is a revamp of a post I wrote a few years ago.  My boys are teenagers now and way taller than me.  Don’t let that put you off!  It’s still valid!  I think they would still like doing quite of few of the things to do in Amsterdam listed below.  When they were under 10 years old, they tried out all the experiences on the list and adored them!

1. Take A Boat

Go on a canal tour.  There are a range of companies, all fairly similar, so there is no need to shop around (and drag your kids around after you!). The 1 hour tour gives you a good view of the city and is short enough that the kids don’t get bored. Be warned: there were no toilets on the boat we went on!

2. Park yourself in Tranquility

Take tram 4 to RAI, then cross the road and enter into Amstelpark. This sward of green is a paradise for children! The playground is large, with different structures for different ages. There is also a mini-golf course, which is a little expensive, but very well-kept. For children who like animals, you can find wallabies and alpacas, and for the treasure-hunters in your family, there are egg sculptures hidden throughout the park. There is also a miniature train that you can go for rides on.

3. Feed Yourself and the Ducks

In Amstelpark, go to eat some Amsterdamsche bitterballen (a delicious kind of croquette) with mustard at Parkcafé Zomers. Sit outside on the terrace near the lake and enjoy the peace while the kids feed/chase the ducks. The staff are very friendly and there is lots of room for the kids to run around.

4. Find Nemo

The Nemo Science Mueseum is located near the Station Centraal. It is a hands-on experiment mecca for kids. Be warned, it will be difficult to get them out of here!  The beautiful building has an oasis of sanity in the form of a roof-top garden, which has a beautiful view of Amsterdam. Important note: if you want to see one of the demonstrations that happen at the museum during the day, get your place at least 15 minutes before it starts or the kids won’t be able to see anything and you will have crying fits on your hands (learnt from hard experience!).

5. Talk a Walk

Take a tram to Dam Platz, then go for a walk in the West of the centre along canals and down tiny streets. The bonus is that if the kids are getting hungry or tired, there are plenty of cafés to choose from.  Just don’t go into a place that calls itself a “coffee shop”, as they deal in another kind of “pick-me-up”! Note: In the weekends there are many groups celebrating stag and hen parties.  With children, it is better to walk around this area in the morning or early afternoon. Avoid walking into the Northern part of Amsterdam from the Square as that is where the Red Light District is situated.

6. Eat in a Merry-Go-Round:

Near the Museumplatz there is a fantastic restaurant called De Carrousel Pannenkoeken that serves Dutch pancakes.  It has been set up in a converted carousel building.  Some of the horses are still in place. The service is fast, and the food is delicious. Even better, you can relax with an end of lunch coffee while the kids can go to a small area where there are comfy chairs a TV playing cartoons, and a blackboard on the wall for them to draw on.

7. Feel the Wind in Your Hair

Take bus number 391 from just outside the Central Station in Amsterdam to the unpronounceable Zaanse Schans and see fabulously restored windmills in a beautiful setting.  The bus takes 40 minutes, but drops you right at the gate of the park. You can enter the park for free, but if you want to go inside any of the windmills it costs you a small amount.  I think it’s worth it to go inside one of them to see the vanes and mechanisms from close up. You can catch a little passenger ferry across the river Zaans to the quaint little village, or just walk across the bridge. Don’t eat in the actually park if you can avoid it.  The food is really not that good. A perfect place for lunch is a restaurant called De Vijf Broers, just across the bridge from the park.  It has fantastic outdoor seating next to the river, a wonderful view of the windmills, and best of all, a giant sand-pit with toys in it, walled in on three sides so children can’t flee to the water! You can also catch a train from the tiny station of Zaanse Schans, which only takes 15 minutes to get to Amsterdam.  We caught it only on our way back to Amsterdam, as we didn’t want to have to drag the kids around the enormous Central Station looking for a train.

8. Soak Up Some Culture

There is, of course, the famous Van Gogh museum.  We didn’t even try to go in as there was a two hour wait outside, whether you had already bought ticket or not. The museum is small and fills up very quickly. If you can’t get to see the museum (or even if you do) you can find out more about Van Gogh and his paintings on a wonderful website called Artsy,  We did go to the Rijksmuseum, which was excellent.  To avoid any queues, buy the tickets for the adults in the family online before you go, and then go to the reception desk in the middle of the beautiful entry atrium (NOT the ticket windows) to pick up free tickets for any children in the family under 18. Start on the fourth floor and snatch glimpses of the masterpieces as the children pull you past.  Our boys loved a room on that floor where there is a huge replica of a battle galleon, and paintings on the walls of ships.  Just after that, there is a room full of enormous dollhouses, which I’m sure girls would love!  The museum provides a brochure for kids with a kind of treasure-hunt for them to follow.  They need to look for particular parts of paintings in different rooms. I suggest you limit your visit to an hour to avoid the worst of the “museum fatigue” that sets in quickly when children are present.

9. Go Farming

Visit the farm/petting park that is situated right in the middle of Amsterdam.  The farm is called De Dieren Cappel and is within walking distance of the Central Station.  They have all sorts of farm animals, such as goats, pigs, sheep and rabbits that the kids can pet.

10. Sail The Seven Seas

Well, the boat doesn’t actually set sail, but you can get the sea experience by going to the Het Scheepvaartmuseum (my kids think the name is hilarious!). This Maritime Museum is next to the Central Station. You can explore a real-life replica of a sailing ship which sunk in the 1700’s, plus inside the museum there are lots of hands-on activities for kids, plus different tours you can take around the museum.  Check out their website for details.

If you are planning to hit more than three museums or more, look into getting some kind of museum pass like the Amsterdam and Holland Pass or a museum card, at least for the adults.  The children often get in free up to a certain age, so it’s less interesting to get one for them.

By Lisa Watson

How to learn to like blue cheese

This recipe comes from the mother of a good friend of ours who originates from Florence in Tuscany.  When we all lived in California, Simone used to make us Pasta with zucchini and Gorgonzola cheese whenever we went to dinner at his place, which I was always very happy about!  I am a big fan of Gorgonzola.  Well, it wasn’t always this way.  Once, way back in the mists of time, when I had just left the familiarity of the country I grew up in, and when the only cheese I really knew about was mild Cheddar, I tasted Gorgonzola and thought it was horrible.   Over the years, mainly thinks to the pasta sauce, I have become almost addicted to this blue cheese and devour it scooped onto hunks of baguette without even hesitating.  Actually, I think I was initially scared of the whole blue cheese family by a story my mother told me when I was little. She used to tell us that when she was young, her uncle would often tell them the story about how he’d seen a cheese crawl off the table when he visited Europe because it was so blue.  I actually remember believing this story when I was a kid, which must’ve delighted my Great-Uncle as he LOVED to play jokes on people.  Now you can see how myths are created from one piece of fake news……

Where is Gorgonzola Cheese made?

Gorgonzola cheese, made of pasteurized milk from cows, can be almost hard and crumbly in consistency to soft and gooey. My favourite kind is the meltingly-soft and squishy Gorgonzola dolce, but if I’m presented with it’s aged cousin, the harder, crumbly Gorgonzola piccante, I won’t say no. It comes from a town to the North-East of Milan in the North of Italy called, you guessed it: Gorgonzola. I haven’t been there yet, but given what good cheese they make there, I figure that it must be a lovely place! The town of Gorgonzola is just a bit east of Milan, so if you are in the city of fashion, you can take a trip to the epicentre of where it is said that Gorgonzola cheese was first produced back in 879.  There are other towns in the area that dispute that claim, but since this town got the cheese named after it, I think they have won the battle of ownership without much of a fight.

Travel photo of the week

Ok, so the travel photo of the week has nothing to do with Gorgonzola or the area around it.  It is only about 100 km away though, so it almost counts. The photo you see below is of The Langhe in Piedmont, Italy, just south of Turin.  It is a fabulous wine region where they make some of the best wines in the world (in my humble opinion).  The vineyard-clad hills roll this way at that, and at the top of many of the highest hills are small villages with views that are out of this world.  The one you can see on the top of the hill here is called La Morra.  If the panorama and good wine is not enough for you, The Langhe is also very well-known for its food.  This is the kind of place that lunch takes at least 2 to 3 hours.  It’s not just a meal, it’s an experience!

To find out how to cook pasta like an Italian does, check out my handy guide.

By Lisa Watson

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Pasta with zucchini and Gorgonzola Cheese

How to make pasta with zucchini (courgette) and Gorgonzola cheese

Course entree, first course, Main Course

Cuisine Italian

Prep Time 15 minutes minutes

Cook Time 10 minutes minutes

Total Time 25 minutes minutes

Servings 4 people

Ingredients

• 400 g Fusilli
• 2 Zucchini medium sized
• 200 g Gorgonzola 7 oz - or more or less depending on how much you like it!
• ½ cube Beef bouillon cube or ½ a vegetable bouillon cube
• 80 -100 ml Cream approximately ⅓ cup
• 40 g Walnuts 1 ½oz
• Parmesan cheese to taste

Instructions

• Cook at the pasta as per the packet instructions.
• While the pasta is cooking, slice the zucchini thinly and saute it in olive oil until it's cooked through and browned a little.
• Take the pan off the heat.  Add the cream, the bouillion cube and the Gorgonzola.  Stir until the cheese is melted.  If you have very soft gorgonzola dolce, you can mix it in a bowl with the cream until it becomes a uniform mixture, and then add it to the zucchini .
• Chop the walnuts and add them in to the sauce.
• Drain the pasta then add to the sauce.
• Grate Parmesan cheese over the finished dish.
• Sprinkle with cracked black pepper

Just a few short hours before, I was calmly seated on a long-haul flight from the other side of the globe.  Now, I am holding on for dear life to the back of my Dad’s quad while he careens up and down hills, swerving between trees and splashing through boggy creeks while chasing a herd of bulls. I’m sharing the wooden platform tacked over the back wheels with one of the sheepdogs.  As I turn my head to search for the escaping bulls, the dog catches me full in the face with the broad side of her very long tongue. I’m definitely home on the farm in New Zealand.

The dogs adore taunting the bulls and look very proud of themselves when they get the huge beasts into the cattle-yards.  They’re being checked out before being sold tomorrow. When they are let out, I prudently stand up on the elevated ramp that you can see in the photo above.  These big guys are pretty wild and very intimidating when you are standing on their level.  Actually, they’re still very intimidating when you stand up on the ramp, but they have less chance of being able to charge you when you are up there!

The farm in New Zealand where I grew up lies at the end of a very long and windy gravel road. A grader comes from the town of Whangarei, about an hour’s drive away once or twice a year and trundles along the road to fill in all the potholes and redistribute the gravel. A vehicle coming along the road is an event and we all go out to look at it to see who it could be.  A couple of times over the years, very bewildered tourists in camper-vans have ended up out here when they took a very wrong turn. It is possible that somewhere on the back-roads of Northland, they are still driving around aimlessly, looking for a way out.

There’s a grass airstrip on the farm, which you can see in the photo below beside the road. Yes, you are right.  It’s not quite like the runways at the airport, but small planes can land and take off from there with no problems.  This is where the pilots who spread fertilizer on the fields fly from.  I remember once when I was young, being allowed to go for a ride with one of them.  The pilot took me on an acrobatic ride that was better than any roller-coaster!  He flew straight up so that I was pushed into the seat, and then stalled the plane so we dropped like a stone and I floated.  Only my lap-belt kept me in.  It was fabulous!  I’m sure that he wouldn’t be allowed to do it nowadays, especially with a kid in the plane with him, which is a pity.

Life is very good out here for animals and people alike.  Fresh air, oodles of space to roam in, and views people around the world pay millions to have on their back door-step.  I feel very privileged to have grown up here.

By Lisa Watson

It’s not a party if there’s no honeycrunch!

When I was growing up in the seventies in New Zealand, Rice Krispies seemed to be one foodstuff that every family had in their kitchen.  Whenever a kid had a birthday party, along with little red “cheerio” sausages on sticks and Bluebird chips, there would always be a Rice Krispie offering on the table in the form of honeycrunch bars or chocolate crackles . They fulfilled every desire of the parent and children at that time.  For the parents, they were cheap, quick to make, and could easily be whipped up in large quantities. For the kids, they were sweet, sweet, sweet; which is all a small child needs from a party really.  The hyperactive sugar rush they get from these treats can power them through hours of running around madly and shrieking excitedly. Kids who are served carrot sticks and hummus at parties don’t realize what they’re missing!

A very forgiving recipe

Aside from the non-politically-correct sugar rush honeycrunch gives, they are fun to make with kids as there is not much to making it.  The recipe is very forgiving.  The butter, sugar, and honey mixture should theoretically be boiled until it it changes to an amber colour as you see in the photos below.  If you don’t boil it for long enough, the taste will be a little less caramel-like, and the honeycrunch bars will be a little softer rather than crunchier. No matter how they come out, they will taste good.

The one thing not to do when making honeycrunch

The only thing you should not do is boil the mixture for too long, as it can get a burnt taste, which is the one time when honeycrunch doesn’t actually taste very nice. Oh, there’s one other thing that you should not do: do not eat it all at once, otherwise you’ll turn into an over-excited 5 year old at a birthday party.

And honeycrunch is not just a party food

Actually, it’s not true that we only ate it at parties.  My mother made it often so that it could be popped into our school lunch-boxes as a treat after we’d finished our Marmite sandwiches.  It’s amazing how many kids suddenly want to be your friend when you pull a couple of bars of home-made honeycrunch out of your lunchbox!

Travel photo of the week

This photo is taken on my father’s farm in New Zealand.  The trees on the right are the beginning of a large area of preserved forest (or “bush” as it’s called in NZ). Dad has put up fences all around it to stop cattle and sheep from straying in there, in order to keep it as pristine as possible.  It’s so dense that we were forbidden completely from setting foot in it.  When I was little I imagined that witches and goblins had houses hiding in these trees. In fact, Dad got lost in there himself many years ago.  He ordered his dogs to “Go home” so that he could follow them, and they just slunk around behind him and stayed at his heels.  Mum had all the neighbours out searching for him to no avail, but he found his way out after a night of stumbling around.  Take that as a cautionary tale:  the New Zealand bush is VERY easy to become lost in.  Even people like my Dad, who have a good idea of what they’re doing can lose their way very quickly!

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Honeycrunch from New Zealand

Honeycrunch bars are a sweet treat from New Zealand that can be made quickly with only 4 ingredients!

Course cake, Dessert, party food

Cuisine New Zealand

Prep Time 5 minutes minutes

Cook Time 5 minutes minutes

Resting time 1 hour hour

Total Time 1 hour hour 10 minutes minutes

Servings 16 bars

Ingredients

• 100 g Rice Krispies 4 cups
• 100 g Butter 1/2 cup
• 85 g honey 4 Tbsp
• 50 g sugar 4 Tbsp

Instructions

• Grease a baking tin with sides. I used a 20 x 20 cm tin for this recipe. (That's 8 in x 8 in)
• Heat the butter, sugar, and honey in a medium-sized pot on a medium heat. Let the mixture boil gently, and stir frequently for 5 minutes, until the colour begins to darken slightly.
• Take off the heat and stir in the Rice Krispies.
• Scrape into the prepared tin. Gently spread the mixture out with a spatula or spoon. Do not press down hard.
• Cut into slices while still warm. Leave to set for at least one hour.

By Lisa Watson

The recipe that was used around the world

This cookie recipe was given to me years ago by a well-traveled friend of mine who, at some time in the past, had met a woman called Pam when she was visiting Borneo. Pam gave her this cookie recipe. My friend carried on with her travels and lost touch with Pam.  Eventually, after a few years of wandering the globe, she ended up living in France for a while, which is where I met her. At that point, she passed Pam’s cookie recipe on to me.  I never got to meet Pam, or find out anything about her, but I often make her cookies and think about who she might be and where she could be in the world. Her cookie recipe has been carried like an Olympic torch all over the world, and now I am passing it on to you.

Who knows, maybe if it keeps being shared, one day it will end up back in the hands of Pam!

I love Pam’s cookie recipe as it is

1. very easy to throw together,
2. there are no waiting times (except for waiting for the cookies to cool off so that you can eat one without burning your fingers),
3. and it is very versatile. You can substitute vegetable shortening for butter (in fact the original recipe doesn’t use butter), and you can add different combinations of chocolate, nuts or raisins, depending what is in your cupboard.

What Pam’s cookie dough should look like

The above photo shows what the cookie dough consistency should look like at the end.  If it is a bit dry, add water, one teaspoon at a time until the dough sticks together.  I find that using your hands to mix in the chocolate chips or nuts works best for getting them to spread evenly through the dough. For this batch, I chopped a couple of chocolate bars into pieces as I had forgotten to buy chocolate chips.  It tastes just as good!  It just means that you have more work to cut the chocolate into bits.  The advantage is that you get to eat all the scraps that fall off the chocolate pieces.

Ideas for different combinations to change your cookies

In the recipe I have written to add 1 cup of chocolate chips, but if you want to mix things up a little, here are some ideas of combinations you could add:

• ​dark and white chocolate chunks or chips
• chocolate pieces and chopped pecans
• chocolate and chopped almonds
• dark chocolate and chopped hazelnuts
• white chocolate and dried cranberries
• raisins and chopped walnuts
• two types of chopped nuts
• chopped dried apricots and chopped unsalted pistachios

Your imagination is your only limit!  Just make sure that the fruits, nuts, and/or chocolate pieces are all roughly the same size.

Travel photo of the week

Since the friend who gave me the recipe spend a couple of years living on Vancouver Island, I thought that I would show you one of my favourite beaches in the world (aside from the New Zealand ones of course!).  This is Long Beach on the west coast of Vancouver Island. You can see where it got it’s not very imaginative name from. The beach is enormous and wild, and if you’re lucky, or unlucky depending on your opinion, you can come across one of the many of black bears who live on the island.  They regularly scour the beach for food.

By Lisa Watson

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Pam's Biscuits

Course cookies, sweet

Cuisine American

Prep Time 20 minutes minutes

Cook Time 10 minutes minutes

Total Time 30 minutes minutes

Servings 30 cookies

Ingredients

• 120 g butter or shortening 1/2 cup
• 25 g white granulated sugar 1/4 cup
• 100 g dark brown sugar 1/2 cup
• 1 egg
• 1 tsp vanilla essence
• 240 g flour 2 cups
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 150 g chocolate chips 1 cup

Instructions

• Heat the oven to 180 degrees C (350 degrees F).

  With either a standing mixer, or a handheld mixer, cream the butter and sugar together until the mixture becomes pale and fluffy.

  If you don't have a mixer, use your very strong arm to beat them with a wooden spoon.

  
  
  
• Sift the flour, baking powder, and salt into the bowl with the creamed butter-sugar mixture.
  
  Use a wooden spoon or a silicone spatula to mix everything together until you get a homogeneous mixture.
• Add the chocolate chunks, and chopped nuts if using. Mix them in gently. I find that it is better to use your hands at this stage to mix the chocolate chunks in uniformly.
  
  
  
  
  
• Line a cookie sheet with baking paper.

  Use a teaspoon, or your hands, to take walnut-sized pieces off the dough.

  Roll each lump into a ball and place it on the cookie sheet.

  Squash each ball with a fork to flatten it out.

  
  
  
  
• Bake the cookies for 10 -  12 minutes until they start to turn a slightly golden-brown color. 

  Take the cookie tray out of the oven and leave the cookies to cool on it for 10 minutes.

  Take the cookies off the tray and leave them on a wire cooling-rack to cool completely.

  
  
  
  

Notes

Pam's cookies will keep well in a sealed container for up to 5 days (though they have never lasted that long at our house.  They often get eaten hot off the cookie tray!).

The joy of kites at the Rimini Kite Festival

In April we drove over to Rimini on the East coast of Italy to visit some friends.  We were incredibly lucky to hit town on the weekend that the once a year kite festival was on; and not only that, there was a perfect strong and steady wind blowing off the sea that lifted all the enormous kites high into the sky. Rain showers keep passing over, and the sun umbrellas and lounge chairs were still locked away so we walkers, and many very excited dogs, could enjoy the entire beach.

How do they make their kites fly so well?

Most of the kites were not the traditional diamond-type that I used to make as a kid, but were almost like balloons made in all sorts of fantastical shapes. What makes these crabs, pink dragons, telephones, and caterpillars into  kites is that they fill with air and lift off the ground purely using the force of the wind. My kites never flew as well as these, even in the wind we sometimes get on the farm that is so strong you can lie back in it and not fall over.

It was very difficult to choose which photos to put up as there were so many weird and wonderful kite shapes. The pink dragon above didn’t seem to really want to lift off.  He seemed more interested in keeping his feet on the ground and watching how the others did it.

Kite flying always whisks me back in time

There’s something very soothing about the rustling and swooping noise the kites make when they’re flying. It always takes me back to my childhood: running along as fast as I could with a kite trailing behind me, and the magical feeling I got when it stopped bumping along the ground and suddenly lifted high into the sky. I can understand why people are so passionate about making and flying kites!  At the Rimini festival this year, there were around 200 “kiters” from over 30 different countries that gathered for the long weekend of wind-hustling.  How do they check these kites in on the plane?  Some of them would definitely rate as over-sized luggage!

It’s worth going to Rimini to see the old town too!

Although I am not showing you photos of Rimini’s old town in this post (the kites are just too spectacular!), it is definitely worth tearing yourself away from the beach to go wandering around the old town.  I had no idea that it was so pretty!  It’s easy to spend a day exploring the town, and stopping every now and then for a delicious piadina, a delectable coffee, or a creamy gelato.  I’ll be telling you all about the specialty of Rimini, the piadina, in a post coming your way very soon!

Kites galore!

There was a kite to suit every taste, and every preference that a person could have.  You like squid?  Here they were in quantity, fluttering their tentacles around;

You are more into space (or starfish?)?  Here, were startled-looking stars rotating and whipping around as though they were trying to escape their tethers and take off into space;

Or are you more into ghosts, or even old telephones?  Well, here were the kites for you to admire!

Hats off to the kite masterminds!

In the photo below, you can see the ballast that is needed to keep these giants from flying away. It seems to be a lot of work to set one of these kites up and make it fly.  I can’t even imagine the work that goes into making these huge kites, and getting them to a point that they fly perfectly.  No wonder the kiters want to show off their creations!  I did feel a little sorry for the wife of one of these men (they all seemed to be men, which was another puzzle for me. why do you think that is?).  She was sitting in a deckchair with her Yorkshire terrier on her lap for the whole windy afternoon, while her husband flew a number of these large animals.  I bet that’s what she spends most of her weekends doing.

Almost like being there!

You can get a real feel for how cool the festival was in the video below.  Watch out for the pointy-headed man.  I have so many questions that I’d like to ask him, the first being, “Why?”.

By Lisa Watson

Chocolate Crackles: essential New Zealand party food

When I was growing up in New Zealand in the Seventies, every single birthday party I went to would have a plate of chocolate crackles sitting proudly on the party food table, just waiting to be gobbled by sugar-frenzied, over-excited herds of children. The Seventies seem to be coming back into fashion (to the fashion powers that be, please don’t bring back lamé jumpsuits…..), so I decided to resurrect this old childhood favourite.

And why is the coconut there?

Chocolate Crackles are incredibly easy to make and do not need any cooking, except for melting the butter, so could happily be made with just the use of a microwave. They also have very few ingredients in them, which is probably how some beleaguered parent who had to make some sweet treat in a hurry for their child’s birthday party came up with the idea in the first place: by looking in their kitchen cupboard and throwing what was in there into a pot.  It seems that even a Century ago in New Zealand, most kitchens had a steady supply of dried coconut in them, although coconut palms do not actually grow in the country itself.  I’m still not sure why coconut is such a ubiquitous ingredient in cake and cookie recipes in New Zealand.  My guess is that it was something that kept for months without refrigeration back before aeroplanes existed, so it was an easy ingredient to store.

The origin of chocolate crackles

The first known recipe was actually printed in the Australian Women’s Weekly back in 1937, so this is one Antipodean recipe that I will have to let the Australians own (unlike pavlova). Apparently it was used as a marketing tool to sell a product called Copha; a solid fat made of hydrogenated coconut oil. Kellogg’s jumped on the candy-train in the Fifties, as a main ingredient in the recipe for chocolate crackles was one of their cereals, and took ownership of the name “chocolate crackles”.  They tripped and fell flat on their cereal-covered face when they attempted to trademark the recipe a few decades later. Since recipes can’t be owned by any one person or company, their bid failed completely.

You can use butter

As I don’t like the idea of using a vegetable shortening with trans-fats in it, I replaced the Copha with butter.  The crackles came out just fine and the Rice Krispies stuck together nicely, just like I remember them doing with the vegetable shortening that was used in the past.

Travel photo of the week

As I have sadly confessed that this recipe for chocolate crackles is not an original New Zealand recipe, I have decided that Australia should be featured in this week’s travel photo section.  This is a bustling beach in Queensland, Australia called Mission Beach.  We were there in August, which is Winter, but it was warm enough to go swimming, and there were no jellyfish, no cyclones, and no people to be seen anywhere.

Print Pin

Chocolate Crackles

Easy to make crunchy Chocolate Crackles will be a hit at any child's party and are fun to prepare with kids as well. Find the Antipodean recipe here on Italian Kiwi.

Course Dessert, party food

Cuisine New Zealand

Prep Time 5 minutes minutes

Cook Time 2 minutes minutes

Fridge time 2 hours hours

Total Time 7 minutes minutes

Servings 12 crackles

Ingredients

• 125 g butter 4.4 oz
• 30 g cocoa 1/4 cup
• 70 g icing sugar (powdered sugar) 1/2 cup
• 40 g dried shredded coconut 1/2 cup
• 60 g Rice bubbles (rice crispies) 2 cups

Instructions

• Put paper muffin cases into a muffin pan.
• Melt the butter in a medium-sized pot.
• Turn off the heat.  Add the cocoa and stir until dissolved.
• Add the icing sugar and stir in.
• Add the coconut and mix in.
• Add the rice bubbles and mix gently until they are all coated with the chocolate mixture.
• Spoon the rice bubbles into the paper cases.  Put the muffin pan in the fridge for at least two hours before eating the crackles.

By Lisa Watson

On being introduced to fennel bulbs

This isn’t so much a recipe as such, as it is an introduction to a vegetable I never knew you could eat before I set foot in Italy.  In New Zealand, where I grew up, fennel was known as a herb that you sprinkled over a fish while cooking it if you were feeling particularly risqué that day. Actually, back in those days, even having fish that wasn’t battered and deep-fried within an inch of its life was pretty damn risqué, let alone sprinkling some freaky herb on it. I’m glad to announce that things have changed drastically in Kiwi-land since then in regards to the way food is prepared! Though I have to say that a fresh piece of deep-fried snapper and chips is one of the first things I want to eat when I touch down at Auckland airport (and that’s even when the plane arrives at 5:30 in the morning!), Well, it’s a competition between good fish and chips (“fush ‘n’ chups” in the kiwi lingo) or a mince pie.  I’m salivating now just thinking about it.  OK, at this point, it gives me a great excuse to throw in a photo of where I spent my formative years.  The colours are real! That’s me, my Dad and one of my sons on a joy-ride. 🙂

Back to thoughts on fennel

Got….to….get….my….mind….back…..to…..salad…….OK, with a force of will I didn’t know I had, I’m starting to think about fennel again, rather than greasy, insanely delicious comfort food……I do love the crunch of fennel when it’s raw in a salad.  It’s a vegetable that my kids also love to play with. They snap off one of the “layers”, hold it by the stalk so that it looks like an ice-cream and crunch and munch it just like that.  It’s also great cooked, if you like an aniseed-y flavour.  The aniseed flavour is much milder when it’s raw.  I like it braised with stock in the oven. OK, now I’m starting to salivate over that too, which makes we feel a little better about the Pavlovian drooling going on inside me.  It’s not just for grease then!

If you want to get really risqué, you can add a handful of chopped walnuts to the mix when you make the salad.  They go really well with the crunchy fennel and sweet oranges.

Another way with fennel

I have a great friend, Gina, who lives in the mythical town of San Francisco (yes, it really is as cool as everyone says it is!).  She used to be a REAL cook (unlike me!) at one of the better restaurants there and introduced me to making salad with thinly sliced fennel and Portobello mushrooms. Fabulous!!  Unfortunately, where I live now, I have never seen Portobello mushrooms.  It’s OK with champignons de Paris, but it’s not the same.  Luckily, fennel is holds up extremely well as a salad all on its own with just a little lemon juice, salt and olive oil.  This is the way my mother-in-law first showed me how to make it.  When I told my husband’s parents that in NZ we use the leaves and not the bulb, they couldn’t believe it as they had never used the leaves for anything.  Funny world we live in, isn’t it!

By Lisa Watson

Print Pin

Fennel bulb and orange salad

Easy salad made with fennel bulb and orange pieces

Course Salad

Cuisine Italian

Prep Time 5 minutes minutes

Total Time 5 minutes minutes

Servings 3 -4 people

Ingredients

• 2 Fennel bulbs medium sized
• 2 oranges
• 2 Tbsp Olive oil
• Lemon juice from 1 lemon
• Salt to taste

Instructions

• Slice the fennel bulb - the thickness depends on how you like your "crunch factor".  I like to slice it thickly so that it is very crunchy.
• Chop the ends of the oranges, then cut all the skin and pith off.  Cut the oranges into chunks and add it to the fennel.
• Put it in a bowl and sprinkle the other ingredients over the top.
• Mix and eat immediately.