Curried Tuna Slice

Ingredients:
1 sheet shortcrust pastry
425g tuna (drained and flaked)
1 tbsp butter
1 onion, finely diced
1 stalk celery, finely diced
2 tbsp butter, extra
2 tbsp plain flour
2 tsp curry powder
½ cup water
½ cup milk
2 eggs lightly beaten
2 tbsp grated cheddar cheese

Topping
Ingredients:
125g grated cheddar cheese
1-2 tsp curry powder
½ tsp paprika

Combine ingredients, and sprinkle over base before cooking.

Method:
Pre-heat oven 200 degrees Celsius. Line the base of a greased, foil lined lamington tray with the pastry. Spread drained and flaked tuna evenly over pastry.

In a small saucepan melt butter and sauté onion and celery for 1-2 minutes. Spread over tuna. Melt extra butter, add flour, and curry powder. Stir until combined. Gradually add water, milk and eggs, stirring constantly and bring to the boil. Remove from heat and fold in 2 tablespoons grated cheese. Pour sauce over vegetables. 

Sprinkle topping over slice.

Bake at 200 degrees for 10 minutes. Reduce to 180 degrees for 25-30 minutes or until cooked.

Filling will be set and top is golden brown. Serve hot or cold as a main meal or cut into 3cm squares to use as finger food.

(Sharing this recipe from the Cheapskates Club Newsletter.)

I'm not really liking 2013 a lot at this point in time. Money seems to be very tight everywhere, jobs are scarce, and changes are being forced upon us whether we like it or not. Damian's paid employment finished up on Monday which leaves both of us not currently in paid employment. We have been trying to re-establish our own business again since moving here, and we will be pushing that fairly heavily now. He has a few jobs in the pipeline which should come to fruition, but I think things will be a bit tough over the next little while. The positive though is that he has so much to do here at the farm, that he may now have the time to do them, and I am well and truly over being a single parent for the last 3 years while he has been working away. I have been busy in the kitchen today so far. I still have a lot of lemons to use up, so this morning I made a batch of lemon cordial, I drink way too much coke zero, so I want to change over to something else. There is a lot of sugar in cordial though, but it is very refreshing.

I have also made up a batch of anzac style meusli bars for lunchboxes, much cheaper and better for you than the bought ones. The recipe had a lot of sugar in it, so I cut back on that by about 1/2 and they are still quite sweet, so will cut it back a bit more next time.

And I also finished off a big jar of nutella on Kasey's sandwich this morning, and I have had recipes in my files for ages on how to make it, so I finally bit the bullet and made some....oh my goodness....YUM!! I used this recipe.

It is so decadent, and just delicious. It cost about $10 to make about 1.2 kilos of nutella, but I think if I can source the hazelnuts at a better price, I could do it much cheaper, as I had to buy them in small packets at the local supa IGA. I only used home brand dark cooking chocolate, but I find if I add a tablespoon of good quality cocoa to this, that it improves the taste of the cheaper chocolate into something really yummy. I will definitely make it again. I also used home made condensed milk, I don't buy that anymore either, and I use this recipe.
I purchased a cheap little greenhouse at the Reject shop a couple of weeks back, so I am going to put that together and get some seedlings up and running and get my vegie garden going a bit more seriously to save some more money. We are heading down to Brisbane tomorrow for an 80th birthday celebration for Damian's dad on the weekend, so I am hoping to pick up some point of lay hens while I am down there, so that my egg supplies don't dwindle too much with no layers left. Damian and I have been discussing ways to ensure that a fox does not get in the pen again, so we are going to secure their current pen even more and we will look at a more professional setup for my different breeds over the coming months, once I start to get them re-established again, but that will take time.Anyway, got some work to do, so I had better go and do it.

Creamy Mushroom Chicken

This is a quick and easy dinner meal, that is delicious. The combination of the chicken, mushrooms, bacon and cream makes this a creamy, hearty dish. Yum.

Ingredients
1/2 kilo chicken - diced or sliced
3 rashers short cut bacon, diced
1 onion
250g mushrooms sliced
1 clove garlic
1 tbspn wholegrain mustard
3 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
300ml cream
Butter and olive oil for frying
Cornflour and water to thicken

Put chicken and bacon in a hot pan with a tablespoon butter and olive oil, and fry until golden. Add onion and garlic and mustard and fry for 2 minutes, add worcestershire sauce and fry for a further 2 minutes. Add mushrooms and  2/3 cream, and stir over a medium heat for 2 minutes, add a teaspoon cornflour in 1/4 cup water to thicken, turn down heat and simmer gently for 15-20 minutes. Add remaining cream, and serve.

It's been a quiet couple of days here, I have become a little temporarily addicted to Pinterest, while I find my way around it and look at lots of inspiration for around the house. I have nearly finished the dimensional artwork piece I have been working on for our bedroom, and I have also started a block of the month project for another piece of artwork for the walls, which will be stunning when finished (hopefully). I have the choice to either make tomorrow very full on with running around, or very quiet plodding around here, will just depend how I feel in the morning....the plodding is winning out at the moment, hopefully I feel a bit more energetic when I get up in the morning.

A new recipe

I made up a new recipe tonight. I was at a loss to what to make for dinner, I had some home grown potatoes, beans, carrots and cabbage, and not much meat in the freezer, so I just started with the chicken and made it up as I went along. It was really yummy, and I will definitely make it again, no photos as it was all gone before I thought of it, will take some next time I make it.


Creamy Thai Curry

Indgredients:

2 chicken breast fillets sliced
1 onion chopped
2 tspns crushed garlic
3 tbpns thai curry paste
1 cups beans chopped
1/2 cup cream

Method:

Fry chicken until slightly seared, add onion and garlic, and fry for a few minutes. Add thai curry paste and beans and fry for a further 5 minuites or so. Add cream (you can add more cream for more sauce, I only had 1/2 cup left tonight) and stir, reheat but don't boil. Serve with boiled potatoes, cabbage, carrots and peas, with a dob of butter on vegies, and season to taste with salt and pepper.


Serves 4

A bit of room organisation...

Yesterday morning I went to an overlocker inspiration session at the sewing centre, they had a husqvarna rep there showing us all the different ways you can use your overlocker and the different feet you can use, I didn't realise how much extra you can do with the overlocker other than neatening edges, it was quite worthwhile, even though the focus did seem to be on that particular overlocker and a bit of a sales pitch, but if I can transfer the information to my overlocker and play with the settings a bit, then I should get quite a bit out of it. I caught up on a bit of paperwork last night, and finished another bouquet preservation, so that is now ready to go to the framer.

Today I have had a sleep in, thought I would take advantage of school holidays....I am in such a positive mood today, I think it's because I haven't really got too much on this week, and I have time to breathe...

Today I would like to give the office a bit of a cleanup and transfer some of my craft things into the spare room and tidy that up a bit, with Damian and I both working out of our office now, it really seems very cramped in here, and has become a bit frustrating, so I am going to see if I can sort it out a bit. I also have some more washing to catch up on....I had piles of it after our time away...but should get through it today, and I want to get all the sheets washed as well. I have also made a start on my recipe blog, I have been collecting recipes over the years and have been keeping them in a word document, and I made a start on trying to index it all out, but it will take me months, and as I keep adding to it, it alters all the page numbers and index etc....arghhh...just too hard...so I thought I would keep a separate blog for this, and add all of my recipes into that and use separate labels to index them. I would like to eventually do it up into a recipe book for my children to have with their favourite recipes. I have only put 1 recipe in there so far, but will add to it over the next few months so that it becomes quite comprehensive.

I have to remember to ring my sister Kerrie, it's her birthday today.  Okay, off to do some organising. :)

Meusli Bars

I have made a batch of meusli bars this afternoon, and am currently waiting for them to cool and firm up before cutting them up into bars.  It should make about 16 good size bars, and cost probably $4 to make this batch. Much cheaper than buying good quality meusli bars at the supermarket, which are about $5 for 6 bars!, and I know exactly what has gone in them, my meusli bars don't have numbers as ingredients!   I have made them to this recipe.

Ingredients:

200g butter

1 cup sugar

2 cups toasted meusli

2 cups ricebubbles

1/2 cup coconut

2 tablespoons golden syrup

1/2 cup choc chips
1 tin homemade condensed milk

I melted the butter in a saucepan on the stove, then added the sugar, and left it to boil gently without stirring until a pale golden colour, I then added all other ingredients, and stirred up and pressed into tins and baked at 180 deg for 20 - 25 minutes until goldenl. It only took about 10 minutes to make them, they were really easy. 

I took the 2 girls out this morning, and we all had our swine flu shots at the local high school. Kasey was pretty brave really, and cried a little when the needle was given, but was fine within about 10 seconds.  Honestly, it was the least painful needle I think I have ever had, the nurse who gave us the shots is very good at what she does. Damian is out finishing off the back tray on his landcruiser, so I can't wait to seen how that looks when he gets home.  Not sure what we will have for dinner tonight yet, but I will try to use up some more food from the freezer.  I found the microwave chicken that I purchased about a month ago sitting right in front of me in the fridge last night, I thought I had put it in the freezer, so I will have to throw that away, so much for buying it on special, it has ended up being wasted, I was wondering where it had got to and kept searching in the freezer for it! Must have been having a boy look for it!