Summer in Australia is hot, don’t let anybody tell you differently.  It’s also the time that we Aussies love to entertain.  Long BBQ’s at home, accompanied with cooling beverages, lasting until the heat of the day is put to bed by the arrival of evening.  Our hot Summer days do cry out for BBQs, but cooling dishes for entertaining are also an essential requisite for any serious home cooks’ repertoire.

Another recipe that I am not 100% sure when I nabbed it from, maybe Delicious?  I made these for Christmas Day 2012, but they are perfect for any entertaining occasion.  I made them as shots, but you could prepare larger versions as a cool entree to start a Summer dinner party.

Not sure if you like chilled soup?  Quite a few people are put off by the idea.  This is a great recipe to make and see if chilled soup is for you.  This recipe is full of flavour and the crab gives you the required texture to add some interest for your palate. Read more →

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Prawn toast is a favourite of mine.  The crunch of biting through the crisp fried bread base and savouring the juicy prawn topping, truly scruptious.  Usually eaten just out of the wok, steam escaping from the prawn topping, usually up my nose as I take that first bite.

As much as I adore prawn toast, it really isn’t an everyday food, is it?.  Being fried in oil, the bread does do it’s fair share of soaking a bit of that oil up, no matter how well you drain it.  Healthy for you, this dish is not.

On the weekend once in a while I will make this as a treat for the boys, and of course as a treat for myself.  Simple finger food served with some sweet chilli sauce on the side.

I never order them these days when we eat out at Chinese restaurants.  I have often wondered if they are of those ‘Anglo’ dishes that are just there for those of us from non Chinese backgrounds.  They were a staple item I would always want to order as a child, but these days I always tend to order items a lot more interesting and unusual.  Read more →

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Oh yes, the first Christmas entertaining recipe for the season.  I am being proactive this year and will be sharing a few Christmas recipes with you.  Unlike the last couple of years where I have been unorganised and lazy.

I love oysters and I especially adore Sydney Rock Oysters.  What better way to celebrate Christmas than with some oysters and a glass of your favourite bubbly?  Oysters are perfect for pre-Christmas cocktail parties, and no I haven’t got a gig with an oyster association, I just love them! Read more →

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Kathlyn of Bake Like a Ninja was our Daring Cooks’ March 2011 hostess. Kathlyn challenges us to make two classic Peruvian dishes: Ceviche de Pescado from “Peruvian Cooking – Basic Recipes” by Annik Franco Barreau. And Papas Rellenas adapted from a home recipe by Kathlyn’s Spanish teacher, Mayra.

Wow I am a lazy girl and took the easy but also low fat free road on this challenge.  Trying to be really good about what goes in my mouth at the moment and as delicious as the papas rellenas looked in all their deep fried goodness I went for the fresh and healthy ceviche.

Ceviche is believed to have originated in Peru nearly 500 years ago.  It is believed that the original dish used the fermented juice of the banana passionfruit and then during the Inca period they started using chicha.  It was with the arrival of the Spanish that the locals switched to using citrus juice.

In the past I have only ever identified and eaten this style of dish with various Islands in the Pacific.  In Hawaii it is called poke and in Fiji it is called kokoda, but there are so many versions around the region. Read more →

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Our October 2010 hostess, Lori of Lori’s Lipsmacking Goodness, has challenged The Daring Cooks to stuff grape leaves. Lori chose a recipe from Aromas of Aleppo and a recipe from The New Book of Middle Eastern Food.

I had bought a jar of vine leaves a couple of months prior to the challenge. They sat there on top of the deli counter pleading for me to buy them. They knew I had never played with their type before and they beckoned for me to take them home and get all experimental on their grape leaf behinds.

So I did. I took them home and in the cupboard they sat, and sat, and then sat some more. I am hopeless with impulse deli purchases, I just can’t help myself most of the time. That jar of vine leaves would still be sitting there if it wasn’t for Lori and her great challenge. Talk about the perfect challenge, thanks Lori.

As there are only the three of us and the jar contained ample leaves, I decided to give two recipes a go.
I made grape leaves stuffed with ground meat and rice with apricot tamarind sauce. This recipe was the one that was provided by Lori which was adapted from Aromas of Aleppo by Poopa Sweck and Michael Cohen. Read more →

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