Bread Roll French Toast

Recipe By: Pippa
Serving Size: 4

Who doesn't love an indulgent breakfast on a lazy long weekend? And you can feel virtuous about using your leftover bread rolls from the other nights' barbecue :)

Use your imagination (or whatever is is your fridge, freezer or pantry) for toppings. I also had strawberries that were a few days old so I sliced them up, and mixed together with a little splash of balsamic vinegar (yes vinegar!) and a teaspoon of sugar. You could use any frozen berries, choc chips, jam, anything really!

Ingredients:
4-6 bread rolls, day old
4 egg
2 tablespoons cream
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
20 grams unsalted butter
Welly Boot Extra Virgin Olive Oil
maple syrup, to serve
fresh fruit, to serve
ground cinnamon, to serve

Directions:
1. Lightly beat together the eggs, cream and vanilla in a large shallow bowl or dish

2. Slice the buns lengthways into thirds (so that you have three thick slices of "bread") an place cut side down into the dish of eggy mix. Flip the bread over after a minute or two to cover the other side of the bread.

3. Heat the butter and Welly Boot Extra Virgin Olive Oil in a frying pan over a medium/low heat. Cook the eggy bread in batches until golden brown on each side. Keep warm while all batches are cooking.

4. Repeat steps 2 & 3 until all slices are cooked.

5. Serve with maple syrup, fruit and cinnamon and a lovely hot coffee!

Breadmaker Hot Cross Buns

Easter weekend is the perfect time to enjoy a lazy couple of hours in the kitchen. These beautiful fresh hot cross buns contain no preservatives like their supermarket counterparts so they don't keep. But that's not usually a problem as they get snaffled up pretty quickly!

Recipe By: Sunbeam
Serving Size: 12
Yield: 12 Buns

Summary:
Fill your kitchen with the aroma of sweet, spicy bread. Although the recipe takes about 2 and a half hours to complete, really there are only mere minutes of actual work. The hardest part is waiting!

Ingredients:
Dough

• 1 Egg, 60g
• 150 ml Water, warm
• 2 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
• 280 g baker’s flour
• 2 tablespoons brown sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon allspice
• 1 cup mixed dried fruit
• 2 teaspoons dry yeast

Crosses

• 2 tablespoons plain (all-purpose) flour
• 2 tablespoons water
• 1 teaspoon caster sugar

Glaze

• 2 tablespoons water
• 2 tablespoons caster sugar
• 1 teaspoon powdered gelatine

Directions:
1. Beat egg and water together and put into bread pan (the "mixing bowl" of the breadmaker). Add butter

2. Combine flour with brown sugar, salt and Allspice. Stir in dried fruit. Add to bread pan. Make a small pocket in the top and fill with the yeast. Wipe any spills from the outside of the pan.

3. Place the pan in the bread maker and close the lid. Set to "Dough" program and start. In my bread machine this is 1hr and 15min.

4. When the bread maker indicates that the program has finished, remove the dough from the bread pan and knead lightly on a floured surface. Divide the dough into 12 pieces (I like to weigh mine to ensure even sizes) and shape each piece into small buns. Place close together in a lightly greased baking tray (a 26cmx16.5cm lamington tray works well). Cover with lightly oiled cling wrap and then a tea towel. Leave to rise in a warm place for 30 minutes.

TIP: Spray a piece of plastic wrap with Olive Oil Spray before covering your dough. This keeps the environment inside nice and moist, but the oil stops the plastic from sticking to the dough when it is removed.

5. CROSSES: Combine plain flour with water and sugar to form a smooth paste. Pipe paste to make crosses on each risen bun. Bake at 200℃ for 25 minutes. Turn the tray about half way through the cooking time to achieve a nice even colour.

 TIP: You don't need a piping bag to make your crosses. Just place the paste into a zip lock bag, push into the corner and snip off the end!

6. GLAZE: Place water, sugar and gelatine in a small bowl and stir until dissolved. Brush over buns whilst hot.

 Enjoy with a slathering of butter and a great coffee while still piping hot.

Beef & Black Bean Stir Fry

{image from Junior MasterChef Series 2 Cookbook}

Recipe By: Junior Masterchef
Serving Size: 4 serves

Ingredients:
1 tablespoon soy sauce, light
2 teaspoons caster sugar
2 teaspoons cornflour
400 grams rump steak, trimmed of fat, thinly sliced
1 bunch gai lan*, (Chinese Broccoli)
80 milliliters vegetable oil
1 red onion, small, chopped
3 centermetres fresh ginger, finely chopped
1 red capsicum, seeded and thinly sliced
100 g oyster mushrooms**, roughly torn if large
1 tablespoon salted black beans
2 tablespoons chinese rice wine, (shaoxing)
2 tablespoons oyster sauce

Directions:
1. Combine the soy sauce, sugar and cornflour in a bowl, add beef and toss to combine. Cover and marinate in the fridge for 30 minutes

2. Cut gai lan leaves from stems and trim base of stems. Slice remaining stems lengthways if thick, then cut leaves into 5cm lengths. Set aside separately.

3. Heat a wok over a high heat and add 1½ tablespoons of oil. When very hot (shimmering) add half the beef and stir fry for 2 minutes or until the beef is browned. Transfer beef to a bowl and repeat with another 1½ tablespoons of oil and remaining beef. Wipe wok clean.

4. Place wok over a medium heat. When hot, add remaining 1 tablespoon of oil then onion, garlic and ginger. Stir fry for 1 minute. Increaseheat to high, add gai lan stems, capsicum and mushrooms and stir fry for 2 minutes. Add gai lan leaves, black beans and rice wine and stir fry for 30 seconds. Return beef to wok, add oyster sauce and 60ml water and stir fry for a further 30 seconds. Serve immediately.

Notes:

*If Gai Lan is unavailable, substitute with broccolini or green beans.

**If oyster mushrooms are unavailable, substitute with swiss brown or shitake

TIPS for Stir Frying: This is a technique where you need to be really organised beforehand, as cooking should be done quickly. Make sure you prepare all of the ingredients beforehand - this is kown as "mise en place" (MEEZ-ON-PLASS), literally "put in place". Cut all the ingredients into pieces about the same size so they cook evenly. The dish will look and taste much better.

Working Mum's Time Saver Tip

Ask your butcher to slice your beef into strips for you! Most supermarkets also have this option in their pre-packaged meat department.

 

Meal Plan Monday

Monday

{image & recipe credit}

Creamy Coconut Fish Curry with Steamed Rice

Tuesday

Nachos Supreme

Wednesday

Tuna Mornay with Creamy Mash

Thursday

Steak Bearnaise with steamed greans

Friday

Chicken Ceasar Salad

Saturday

Lamb Korma with Steamed Basmati Rice

Sunday

Chicken Parmegana, chips & Salad

Lunchbox

 {image & recipe credit}

Chocolate Coconut Slice

Nasi Goreng

 {image credit-AGT Magazine via Zinio}

A real snatch and grab recipe that can be made at a minute's notice straight from the pantry. Also a great way to use up leftover rice.

Ingredients:

• For Serving
• 1 brown onion, thinly sliced
• 4 eggs
• For the Fried Rice
• 1 tablespoon peanut oil
• 1 brown onion, finely chopped
• 1 red chilies, finely chopped
• 2 cloves garlic, crushed
• 1 teaspoon shrimp paste
• 500 g rice, steamed, cooled
• 2 tablespoons kecap manis
• 1 tablespoon light soy sauce
• 1 tablespoon sweet chilli sauce
• 4 spring onion, sliced
• 1 cucumber, sliced
• ¼ bunches coriander, roughly chopped
• prawn crackers

Directions:

1. Fry onion until brown & crispy. Use the same frying pan to fry eggs to desired "doneness". Set aside for serving.

2. Heat peanut oil in a wok over a medium-high heat. Stir fry brown onion, chilli, garlic and shrimp paste for 5 minutes.

3. Add rice, kecap manis, soy sauce, sweet chilli sauce and spring onions. Stir-fry for 3-5 minutes.

4. Serve with 1 fried egg per person, fried onion, sliced cucumber, coriander and prawn crackers.

(Serves 4)

Working Mum's Time Saver Tip: Cooking rice from scratch can take up to 25 minutes and I don't always have leftover rice. Microwavable rice sachets are quick and easy solution.  They can be kept in the pantry and only take about 2 minutes to cook in the microwave. There are a variety of brands available at most supermarkets.

{images via Woolworths}