From the category archives:

homemade kitchen gifts

rocky road with shortbread

May 23, 2010

Thought I’d do a little update on my previous rocky road post that I did around Christmas.  This time, I made it with shortbread biscuits (eet sum more) vs. tea biscuits (aka marie) and it works out so much better.
I make this for gifts to take to dinner parties and use whatever I have available in my kitchen:
Melt [...]

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spicy pickled carrots

March 20, 2010

very easy way to pickle and preserve a few carrots

I have never pickled anything before but am wild about the concept of preserving.  I also really love the idea of eating the same food and experiencing its character in  many different ways. A friend sent me the link to this recipe on this great site dedicated [...]

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salt with rosemary and coriander

January 20, 2010

Anyone who knows me knows that I am a total salt-aholic.  I love the stuff. I need it and put it on everything. Salt gives you high blood pressure, blah blah blah blah.  I have perfect blood pressure and cannot enjoy my food unless it is adequately salted.  finished.
I love this salt flavour mix, the rosemary and coriander seeds [...]

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rocky road

December 23, 2009

This is inspired by Nigella’s Christmas TV show and I have a LOT of chocolate.  Kind of just did my own recipe as I needed to make a lot for two more xmas parties (its relentless).
You could halve the recipe and make a smaller batch etc…..
recipe:

450 – 500 gms milk chocolate (can use dark or [...]

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peanut butter shortbread

December 15, 2009

I have recently fallen in love with peanut butter, I was kind of neither here nor there about it, now its very much a part of my life.  I took this classic shortbread recipe and peanutbutterified it. 

recipe:

200gms butter (original recipe is for  250 gms if you want to leave the peanut butter out and keep it classic)…..plus [...]

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white chocolate, cranberry and pecan nut cookies

December 10, 2009

I had some dried cranberries lying around and always have white chocolate so thought these would be quite nice. The recipe was with macadamia nuts, but couldn’t find one mac nut in the Waterfront yesterday (dont get me started on this topic…)
I have however got tons of pecan nuts — so substituted.
I find American cookies [...]

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quick apricot jam

December 3, 2009

My paternal grandmother Betty used to make the most incredible apricot jam and I remember the delight as a child finding a more or less whole apricot within the jam and then squishing this on my toast. 
I started making apricot jam about 10 years ago and bottled these  under the  brand name: ’sams jams’.  The friends and [...]

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