Waste not, want not: The Thrifty Kitchen

Many people who would baulk at the idea of shredding a $50 note at the end of each week don’t think twice about throwing out the equivalent amount in unused, soggy vegetables each week.

Wasted food is just one side-effect of a society that is becoming increasingly disconnected from the idea of seasonal food and thrifty kitchen practices, such as using up leftovers rather than throwing them out.

Lack of time and lack of cooking knowledge are often blamed for the increased reliance on packaged or takeaway food. But a new cookbook, The Thrifty Kitchen, by Suzanne Gibbs and Kate Gibbs, aims to inspire people to eat more healthily and cheaply at home.

Kate says the global financial crisis has helped focus people’s minds on their expenditure and be more careful with their money, and this was part of the inspiration for the cookbook.

“This is a book that needed to be done,” she says. “An enormous amount of money is being wasted by people not being strategic and planning their meals. People need to think about their food as if it’s similar to a business and not buy food if they’re not going to use it.”

The Thrifty Kitchen contains plenty of useful tips on how to shop thriftily, including how to get the best value at the supermarket, how to get your money’s worth when buying meat, and essential items to keep in the pantry.

As well as chapters on work lunches and weeknight meals that are cheaper, healthier and more delicious than takeaway, sections of the book are devoted to meals that can be made from leftovers and weekend meals to cook and keep, allowing even the busiest people to plan ahead.

“A lot of us know how to do this but we can all improve in the way we do it,” says Kate. “Be forward thinking in terms of the meals you and your family want to eat. Make a double quantity of spaghetti bolognaise and freeze some so you don’t need to get takeaway. If you cook a roast chicken for two people, you can put the leftovers in sandwiches or make a lovely pasta dish with some cream.”

While cooking your own food gives you ultimate control over what you put in your body, it is also much cheaper to cook for yourself, and using up leftovers helps reduce waste and lessens the impact on the environment. But Kate says it is important that cooking is realistically integrated into people’s day-to-day lives and the book shows people ways that they can best use their time to fit cooking into their life.

“We’ve given lots of useful advice along with the recipes, including some clever ways to be thrifty in the kitchen. We believe cooking is connecting with food. It’s about knowing what you eat and knowing how to develop and incorporate variety into your diet.”

Kate comes from a fine food pedigree: her grandmother is the doyenne of Australian cooking, Margaret Fulton OAM, and her mother, Suzanne Gibbs, is a Cordon Bleu-trained chef who published her first cookbook at 24.

Food was integral to Kate’s childhood. She and her sister would often awake to delicious cooking smells wafting from the kitchen. Over breakfast , they would plan meals for the weekend and Kate says she always wanted to be involved in the cooking.

“We’d have family days where we would go to the fish market, buy mussels and come home and make Provencal soup. It was a lovely family event. You don’t need to spend a lot of money going out somewhere – you can just all get together and cook.”

Talking to Kate, recipes flow freely throughout the conversation. While pondering the answer to a question about her favourite recipe in the book, she digresses into a quick list of ingredients to make ricotta pancakes for breakfast.

“Food plays a massive part in my life. I choose my friends around how much they like cooking!” she laughs. “I’m lucky with my food background but, even if someone doesn’t grow up like that, you can still becoming engaged with food.

“When you love food, you’re not prepared to settle for second best.”

The Thrifty Kitchen is published by Lantern, Penguin Books, $49.95

We made it: Speculaas

Suzie from Munch+Nibble and I are taking part in the "We made it" project, where we choose a food magazine each month and cook as much as we can from it. It's an attempt to actually use the magazines we subscribe to, rather than just bookmarking them.

This month's magazine is Gourmet Traveller and the first dish I made was from the "Classic Dish" section: speculaas. This is a thin and crispy spiced biscuit from Europe. According to GT writer Emma Knowles, the Dutch and German versions of speculaas are heavily spiced, with cardamom and ground white pepper added to the mix. Emma also added star anise and mace to her interpretation.

I have a simplified speculaas recipe from Miranda Sharp that appeared in Epicure a few years ago and it makes a very moreish biscuit. But the spice mix in this GT version sounded more robust and interesting, with cardamom, cloves, star anise, white peppercorns, mace, cinnamon, ginger and nutmeg all featuring. Rather than using ground spices, you grind up the cardamom, cloves, star anise, peppercorns and mace yourself. I made it the old-fashioned way, using a mortar and pestle, and it does produce an intense spice mix with an almost medicinal smell. However, letting the dough rest overnight softens the harsh edges of the strong spices and mellows them into an aromatic biscuit. The aroma while baking is heavenly. As Emma notes, it's a good thing that the recipe makes a lot of biscuits, as it is almost impossible to stop at just one.

The verdict: An intense, addictive biscuit that would find favour at any time of year but is particularly welcome at this time of year; aromatic spices feature heavily in Christmas baking. While this is an easy biscuit to make, it does involve some labour and you need to allow time for the dough to rest (at least eight hours, but preferably overnight), as well as chilling the cut biscuits before making them. So while I thoroughly enjoyed this biscuit, it is not something you can whip up in a hurry. My simplified speculaas recipe is better if you're in a hurry; but the intense spices in this version make it a winner.

Speculaas

Recipe by Emma Knowles, p 38, Gourmet Traveller, December 2009

500g plain flour, sieved

2 tsp baking powder

220g butter, softened

250g dark brown sugar

2 Tb milk

Speculaas spice

8 green cardamom pods

8 cloves

5 star anise

1 tsp white peppercorns

1 piece of mace

2 Tb ground cinnamon

2 tsp ground ginger

1/2 tsp finely grated nutmeg

1. For speculaas spice, finely grind cardamom, cloves, star anise, peppercorns and mace in a spice grinder or mortar and pestle. Transfer to a large bowl, add cinnamon, ginger and nutmeg, stir, add to flour and baking powder and set aside.

2. Beat butter, sugar and a pinch of salt in an electric mixer until creamy (3-4 minutes). Add milk, beat to combine, then add flour mixture and mix until just combined. Form mixture into a dough with your hands on a word surface (add extra milk if the mixture is too dry), shape into a disc and wrap in plastic wrap. Refrigerate to rest (eight hours to overnight).

3. Preheat oven to 170 degrees Celsius. Roll pastry on a lightly floured surface to 5mm thick, then refrigerate until firm (30 minutes). Cut into desired shapes and place on trays lined with baking paper. Chill until firm (20 minutes), then bake in batches until light brown and crisp (10-12 minutes). Cool for 5 minutes on trays, then transfer to wire racks and cool completely. Speculaas will keep, stored in an airtight container, for 1 week.

We made it: Gourmet Traveller

Addict: devote, apply habitually or compulsively (to a practice); person addicted to a habit.

My name is Melinda and I'm addicted to food porn. My books are pushed aside to make way for more glossy cookbooks, out-of-season food magazines are stored in boxes in the cupboard until their seasonal time arrives, and I have storage boxes stuffed full of recipes clipped from magazines and newspapers. I want to organise them and file them but every time I pull out the box to do so, I get side-tracked by hypothetically conjuring up the dishes until I've run out of time. The clippings are piled back into the box and put away until the next time.

Thankfully, I'm not alone in my addiction. My friend and fellow blogger Suzie from Munch+Nibble is a fellow food porn addict - and possibly even more addicted than me! Whenever Suzie has spare time on her hands, she dives into a newsagent for another hit.

Several months ago, I surprised myself by cooking at least 10 dishes out of that month's issue of Gourmet Traveller. Suzie was suitably impressed, as we both tend to drool over each issue, bookmark dozens of recipes, and then file away the magazine without actually making anything. We have now set ourselves the challenge of picking a different magazine each month and try to cook, review and post as much as possible from that magazine in that month. Hopefully our pristine copies will soon be covered with the splotches and splatters of use in the kitchen.

If anyone else would like to join in with our "We made it" project, you are more than welcome - just drop a comment to either Suzie or me.

So, for our inaugural "We made it", we have chosen the December 2009 issue of Gourmet Traveller. This magazine is a favourite of mine: it is beautifully written, photographed and edited. I believe that Australian food magazines are among the best in the world, especially in the way the food is photographed and presented.

Gourmet Traveller has several regular columns that I really enjoy: Fare Exchange, where readers can write in and seek recipes of favourite dishes from chefs around Australia; Classic Dish, where a classic dish is featured, including its history and a recipe to try; Perfect Match, a wine and food match dish, and In Season.

A stunning trifle, glossy dark berries perched on top of a custard and sponge base, is the enticing cover photo of this month's issue. Inside is lots of inspiration for Christmas, with some old favourites given a modern twist, and Sydney star pastry chef Adrian Zumbo providing some zany Christmas dishes to make.

If you would like to join in the fun of cooking from Gourmet Traveller this month, leave me a comment, and make sure you go and visit Suzie at Munch+Nibble to see what amazing dishes she is whipping up. Check back regularly this month, as we plan to post throughout December about the different dishes we're trying.

If you are unable to buy Gourmet Traveller, you will find many of the recipes from each month's issue featured on its excellent website: http://www.gourmettraveller.com.au/

Snowy drifts of sugar

So many of the traditional Christmas baking dishes that we favour seem wrong for our climate: hot roast dishes, rich puddings and dense spicy treats are perfect for a snowy, northern hemisphere Yuletide but seem inappropriate when we're more likely to be heading to the beach.

Yet the tradition persists. To me, the aroma of spices such as cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger and cloves are the essence of Christmas and conjure up images of sweet treats that we can eat with a reckless abandon that doesn't exist during the rest of the year (or why else are the January magazines full of post-Christmas diets?)

It is a time of excess, particularly in relation to baking. A slice of panforte here, a wedge of fruit cake there, here a mince tart, there a spiced biscuit ... there's plenty of excuses to indulge.

Despite my mounting pile of recipes, it's nice to return to some old favourites. I adore spiced biscuits and cakes - put the word "spiced" into the title of a recipe and you have my attention immediately. These cute little spiced biscuits by Donna Hay, finished off with a dusting of snowy icing sugar, are a perfect way to offer season's greetings.

Sugar-dusted spice biscuits

125g (4 0z) butter, softened
3/4 cup (150g/5 oz) brown sugar
1/4 cup (95g/3 oz) golden syrup
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 egg
1 3/4 cups (235g/7 oz) plain flour, sifted
1/2 cup (55g/ 1 3/4 oz) hazelnut meal
3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon allspice
1/4 teaspoon grated nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1/4 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
icing sugar, for dusting

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius (350 degrees Fahrenheit). Beat butter, brown sugar, golden syrup and vanilla extract with an electric mixer until pale. Add the egg and beat well. Add the flour, hazelnut meal, spices and soda and beat until just combined.

Roll two teaspoonfuls of mixture into balls and place on baking-paper-lined baking trays, allowing room for spreading. Bake in batches for 8 minutes, or until light golden. Cool, then dust with icing sugar.

Recipe from Donna Hay Magazine, issue 12

Restaurant review: The Station Hotel, Footscray

Gentrification and renovation has swept much of the previously overlooked inner-western suburbs over the past few years, with many a fine old Edwardian or Federation house with lovely bones finding itself modernised. Along with the influx of artistes and yummy mummies has come a passion for good coffee and decent cafes, which has been largely catered for in Yarraville and Seddon.

Now Footscray has joined the throng, with the stately old Station Hotel, built in 1864, being brought into the modern era by highly regarded chef Sean Donovan. Footscray has long been the place to go for Asian and African food but diners west of the CBD now have a more upmarket option.


Donovan, who has worked at Michelin-starred restaurants in both London and France and formerly weaved his magic south of the river at The Botanical, has waved his wand over the Station Hotel and turned it into the area’s first gastro-pub. While the surrounding area may seem less amenable to fine dining than South Yarra, London or France, his chef’s eye for detail and use of excellent produce has transformed the pub into a thriving local where it’s difficult to snare a table if you don’t book ahead.

The focus here is firmly on the food. The dining room interior is pleasantly neutral, with one wall papered in a subtle grey paisley pattern. The wooden tables, adorned with cloth napkins and heavy cutlery, are positioned quite closely together, although the noise levels never rise unacceptably and it’s possible to conduct a conversation without shouting.

When the Station first reopened, diners ordered and paid at the bar but this has been sensibly replaced by table service. The waitstaff are friendly and helpful, eager to answer any questions about the menu and not shy about complimenting patrons on their dining choices.

While the menu does reflect Donovan’s training, there are still some traditional pub favourites, albeit with a cheffy twist, such as beer-battered fish and chips or a burger with onion fries. There is a choice of eight different steaks, either Black Angus or wagyu, grain or grass-fed. Then there are the gastro-pub offerings: blinis, farro risotto and terrine de campagne. There is also evident pride in the produce used, with names such as Fratelli Galloni Prosciutto di Parma, Coffin Bay scallops, Smoky Bay oysters and the provenance of each steak detailed on the menu.

Seafood makes up the bulk of the short entree list. Marinated ocean trout is folded delicately atop four pancake-sized buckwheat blinis. The blinis are crispy and a little oily but saved by the accompanying sauces, one zinging with piquant horseradish and the other full of little salmon roe that pop sensuously in the mouth.

The Cashel blue cheese and leek tart is an upmarket, but well made, quiche. The pastry holds the firm eggy filling without sogginess but still has a flaky lightness to it. The blue cheese adds a subtle bite and the tart’s richness is offset by a salad of radicchio and thinly sliced apple.

The relative simplicity of the entrees disappears with the more elaborate mains. On paper, the spicy wagyu beef sausages with Gorgonzola, soft polenta, candied walnuts and sage – essentially a glamorous bangers and mash – sounds messy and complicated, with too many ingredients competing for attention. But there is a harmony in the dish, with the different flavours complementing each other and the smoky sweetness of the candied walnuts adding an extra sizzle of flavour. The waitress rated the sausages as “7 out of 10” in the heat stakes but our palates clearly differ, as I found the sausages to have nothing more than a pleasing warmth to them. They are coiled on a pillow of soft and creamy polenta, flecked with herbs and Gorgonzola. Radicchio and shaved parmesan add some lightness to the pure comfort food element of the dish.

Just as detailed on paper is the black pudding dish, which features Donovan’s gelatinous, slightly spicy black pudding. When the crispy, pan-fried skin is cut, the black pudding spills out over its accompaniments of caramelised onion, a brie and duck egg omelette and a mound of lentils and bacon. A slice of walnut and fruit toast adds a firm-textured dimension. Despite the many ingredients, this dish works, and the interesting juxtaposition of sweet and sour tastes makes it memorable. Black pudding is not to everyone’s taste, but if you are a fan, this is an excellent version.

The serves here are generous and desserts are no exception. A hot Valrhona chocolate cake, about the size of an entree plate, has surprise packages of poached quince pieces hidden inside. The fruit, and the bitter notes of good-quality dark chocolate, save the cake from being cloying or overly sweet, and it is finished off with a scoop of Jock’s vanilla ice-cream. The Station’s version of ubiquitous sticky date pudding is excellent: a large wedge of pudding is studded with walnuts and doused with a thick butterscotch sauce.

The Station Hotel has been embraced by locals and it’s easy to see why. While simple dishes are executed well and will not scare off those who are after a pub meal, there is enough innovation, passion and pride in the food here to attract those who want something a little more adventurous.


The Station Hotel
59 Napier St, Footscray
(03) 9687 2913

Melbourne Larder Christmas cake

When I started planning to make my Christmas cake, I didn't factor in the weather. I imagine that it would wonderfully comforting at this time of year in cold England to have an oven emitting warmth and a kitchen filled with spicy aromas as a fruit cake gently cooks in the oven, but it is definitely the wrong thing to be doing in a hot Australian kitchen when the temperature is already 30 degrees at 7am.

But the dried fruit had been macerating in Irish whisky for three days and I couldn't put off the baking any longer. It was time to whisk up the cake batter and turn on the air-conditioner and let my cake bake slowly for three hours.

Fruit cakes seem to have fallen out of favour over recent years. I know very few people who still bake a Christmas cake every year. Fruit cake is certainly not glamorous or showy like a chocolate or celebration cake but it does have a certain richness and comfort factor. A rich cake densely studded with plump fruit and nuts and laced with alcohol is a delicious afternoon treat with a cup of tea, especially in winter. And, although it is not ideally suited for a hot Australian summer, fruit cake has a Christmassy air about it to me. I confess that my favourite Christmas treat is now a slice of spicy, chocolatey panforte but I still have a soft spot for a good old-fashioned Christmas cake.

In Christmas 2007, after reading through my collection of fruit cake recipes, I came up with my own version, which was a hit with the family. Most fruit cakes are quite similar - it's a matter of choosing your preferred dried fruit and then working out the proportions of butter, sugar, eggs, flour and spices for the cake batter.

People often think they need to set aside a large portion of time to make a Christmas cake. However, the cake is actually very easy to make and just requires preparation and forward planning in order to allow time to macerate the fruit and then to bake the cake. Long, slow baking is the key that turns the thick batter into a rich, dense cake. The other secret is to line the cake tin with brown paper to help protect the cake from drying out through its long cooking time.

Melbourne Larder Christmas cake

250g sultanas

250g currants

250g raisins

60g prunes

100g dates

100g dried apricots

100g glace cherries

300g plain flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

250g butter

250g brown sugar

4 eggs

150ml brandy (or sherry, port or whisky)

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 teaspoon nutmeg

1 teaspoon mixed spice

1 teaspoon ginger

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1 tablespoon golden syrup

zest of 1 lemon

Soak dried fruit in 100ml brandy overnight. (This year I soaked the fruit in 150ml Irish whisky for three days in the fridge and this gave a deeper, mellower flavour. If you have time, I recommend this; but the cake will still taste fine if you only macerate the fruit overnight.)

The next day, pre-heat the oven to 150 degrees and sift together the flour, baking powder and spices.

Cream the butter and brown sugar with an electric mixer until light and fluffy. Add the eggs and flour mix alternately. Lastly mix in the vanilla extract, soaked fruit, golden syrup and lemon zest.

Turn into a lined 20cm square cake tin.* Scoop centre into a light hollow to allow for rising. Place whole blanched almonds in a pattern around the edges of the cake. I sometimes make a little flower pattern in the centre as well.

Bake for 2 to 3 hours (cover with foil if the top is browning too much). Remove from oven and drizzle over the extra 50ml brandy. Cool completely in the tin and then turn out. Wrap the cake in several layers of greaseproof paper and then in foil and store in an airtight tin in a cool place until Christmas.

* The base and sides of the cake tin are lined twice - with brown paper and greaseproof paper. Lay two sheets of brown paper onto the bench, making sure it is larger than the tin. Trace around the base of the tin and then cut diagonally in from the sides to the base-line. This will allow the paper to fold neatly into the tin with no cracks for the cake to leak through. Repeat with a sheet of greaseproof paper.

Preparing for the festive season

Christmas-time is my baking highlight of the year. I stress the word "baking" because savoury dishes such as turkey and ham don't really come into the equation, although I do enjoy planning the main meal as well. I love baking Christmas treats: gingerbread, panforte, panettone, lebkuchen, shortbread, mince tarts, Christmas cake ... the list is long.

It's time to load up my shopping trolley with bags of dried and glace fruit, different types of nuts, spices such as ginger, cinnamon and mixed spice, and plenty of flour, sugar, butter and eggs. The kitchen fills with the heady, mouth-watering aroma of cakes and biscuits as they cook - a spicy smell that I always associate with Christmas and its delicious traditional dishes.

There are many cliches associated with Christmas and it can be a difficult time of year for people who feel forced to try and live up to the ideal of "festive cheer". But I'm fortunate in that Christmas was always a fun and social time of the year for my family. With relatives spread around the state, it was a good chance for everyone to get together and indulge themselves with good food.

The Christmassy treats that we served up for morning and afternoon tea were just as much a part of our celebrations as the turkey, ham and plum pudding. Everyone had a specialty and we eagerly looked forward to the chance to savour delicacies only available at that time of year.

I love learning about the different traditional dishes and adding them to my repertoire. To my Anglo traditions of shortbread and mince tarts, made to my grandmother's recipes, I've added a decadent chocolate panforte and my auntie's lebkuchen biscuits. Other dishes I've tried included buche de Noel (France), stollen (Germany) and panpepato (Italy).

But each year the list grows longer, as I find more books and recipes to add to the pile. Murdoch Books has recently released Cooking for Christmas, a sumptuously photographed book that has recipes for soups, entrees such as potted prawns, main dishes with all the trimmings, puddings and edible gifts. I'm trying to resist buying another cookbook but there are some excellent recipes in there...

I have the delicious magazine Christmas special from last year, to which I've added a Women's Weekly version that I bought last week. I'm eagerly awaiting the December issues of delicious, Gourmet Traveller and Donna Hay Magazine to find out what goodies are on offer this year, and I've been busily combing through past issues of Donna Hay Magazine to gain inspiration.

What dishes will make it onto my baking list this year? Chocolate and Grand Marnier buche de Noel from Gourmet Traveller? Stefano de Pieri's panettone? Gourmet Traveller's recipe for panpepato? Or old favourites, such as my chocolate panforte or a panforte that matches perfectly with Rutherglen muscat? It's time to write out the shopping list and fire up the oven ...