Thermomix for a big family?

Have I mentioned my Thermomix love before?

Um , yep, here, here and here, oh and here too.

And a few other places too, on both blogs, if you're reeeaaallly interested.

But, a question I've seen asked here and there is....

Is the thermomix good for a big family?

Well, my unequivocal answer is YES. Y.E.S. Uh huh, yep it definitely is.

How do I know this, with my family of 2 adults and 2 young kids? Which I consider a small family, by the way.

Well, I've very recently spent 10 days house/kid/dog wrangling sitting.

Which amounted to a family of 2 young kids (one of whom eats as much as an adult, and it's NOT the 5 year old), a nearly 10 year old and an 11 1/2 year old - girls, a 14 year old boy, myself, and sometimes my husband.

So, as far as the amount of food being consumed, I cooked enough for 5 or 6 adults and one 5 year old.

I would NOT have wanted to be without my thermomix, actually.

I used it for chopping onions (no tears and so fast), making coleslaw (in an instant), making white sauce for lasagne (no standing and stirring for ages), making meat sauce for lasagne, mixing crepes, boiling eggs, cooking rice, making smoothies, grating cheese, making tahini balls (which require everything chopped or ground, sooo fast!), mixing meatballs, making bread dough, making breadcrumbs, making a beef nacho topping, making the spice paste for butter chicken curry, making sorbet.....

and there's probably a few other things I'm forgetting.

Phew.

I actually used it a lot more than I do at my house, with our 2 adult, 2 kid family.

The fact that I could set it and let it do it's thing was really a lifesaver, as I simultaneously helped the 11 year old with homework, policed 'net and mobile ph usage by the 14 year old, chased down the 9 year old to feed the dogs and dig out her lunchbox, dealt with 2 hungry, over-stimulated youngsters, fielded ph calls from telemarketers and put a healthy, from scratch dinner on the table.

I made each breakfast and dinner from scratch and school lunches were often left-overs from the night before.

So, YES!

Thermomix is GREAT for larger families.


Read this post here written by Jo over at Quirky Cooking
if you want her thoughts on using a thermomix to cook for large groups.

How to make a snow cake

If you're after a quick, cheap but entertaining activity, this one's for you.

My little fellas and I tried this out one morning after reading a kid's book entitled The Lemon Sisters.

Straight after breakfast, actually, as can be evidenced by the stack of bowls in the sink and the washcloths lined up in front of the sink. If I'd got the 'lil fella in a picture you'd see him in his footy pjs and if I got me in a photo, you'd see me in all my morning glory. So be thankful I didn't.

I think the author actually called it lemon ice, but somewhere in the book they talked about a snow cake and that's what stuck in our heads, so snow cake it was.

Now, in our hemisphere there actually IS snow around at the moment, though not close to where we live.

If you had real, clean snow you could certainly use it or you could do as we did and crush some ice instead.

If you happen to be living in the OTHER hemisphere though, this is a great little cool treat for a hot day.

Just sayin', ya know, in case anyone's HOT over there.

OK.

First up, gather some snow, or, crush some ice in a high powered blender.

Or in your thermomix, as I did.

Scoop some snow into a bowl and squeeze over some lemon juice.

Now sprinkle over some sugar.

Using white sugar obviously keeps it all white, but you could use brown sugar or rapadura instead.

Layer more juice and sugar and snow, as many layers as you like.

Scoop into bowls and enjoy.

Now chase the 'lil fella round the house to get him out of his thoroughly sticky, damp, lemony pjs and wipe down all kitchen surfaces that have lemon juice, sugar and melted snow drips on them.

Mmm mmm, ' twas tasty though...

Chocolate milkshake in the thermomix, mmmm

Ok, you can actually make this in any old blender, but because my thermomix is my (other) baby, that's what I use.

The how to is pretty simple....

Throw the following things into your thermomix (or blender)

• milk

• rapadura to taste or a pinch of stevia or a little of both (rapadura gives a bit of a flavour that stevia does not) I try to steer away from refined sugar.

• cocoa powder - make sure you get one with no fillers

• A blob of avocado

• A raw egg yolk, free range

• Whiz it all up.

• Add a couple of ice cubes before you whiz it if you so desire

This is a great healthy treat for kids, and others, (especially if you can find organic raw milk), without having to resort to the store bought variety that costs more money and is full of icky ingredients to boot.

Adding the avocado makes it more like a thickshake,beautifully thick and creamy, but it adds no flavour.

Yum yum yum yum yum!

Edit: I also put in a wee bit of kefir. Good probiotics, and the cocoa disguises any sour taste.

Home made sausage rolls - sort of

I made my own sausage rolls today....well, sort of. What I actually did was squeeze the sausage meat out of the grass finished beef sausages I get from the farmers market and made my own pastry. Now, I wouldn't do that with regular old supermarket or corner butcher sausages, but I've spoken to this farmer and his family and know where the meat is coming from and how it's raised.

If you happen to live in Victoria, Family Farmed Meats turn up at farmers markets to the South and East of Melbourne and you can actually place an order online and pick it up at your nominated market. Love it.

And I just noticed on their website they will home deliver in Metro Melbourne and regional areas too. Get together with a friend or two and do yourselves a favour by ordering some healthy meat.

Once I'd finished squeezing out my saussies I had a duh thought and rang this farmer up. I asked if they could prepare an un-sausaged pack of sausage meat for me to pick up at my local market. Of course they can, no problem at all.
Did I say I love it?!

Ok, back to my sausage rolls.
I pulled my pre-rolled pastry sheets out of the freezer (yes, I do still have the odd instant, ready-made indulgence) and then had a thought to check the ingredient list. Oh yuck. Darn, there goes that time saving ploy.

Next time saving idea: can I make pastry in my Thermomix?
Yes!

This is how:

120grams butter
80grams lard
100gms chilled water
250grams plain flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons lemon juice

Put flour in TM bowl and turbo for a few seconds to sift.
Cut butter and lard into walnut sized pieces, add to bowl along with salt, lemon juice, and most of the water.
Knead for 10-20 secs on interval unitl it forms a rough dough. You may need to add the rest of the water.
Turn onto lightly floured board and pat gently into a log shape.
Roll out to a long thin strip, approx 40cm x 12 cm.
Fold into 3 by folding the bottom third up and the top third down over that.
Turn so that folds are at the sides. Roll out again.
Repeat this 3 more times.
Cover and leave in fridge till ready to use, at least 30 mins.

Sooo easy!
I didn't have lard so used all butter (although I'm finding out lard is not as bad as we've all been led to believe so may ask my farmer about it) and it was easy to work with and tasted delicious.

Here it is ready to be fridged:


And here's what was left of the finished product after the men in my house had been at them:

I'm sure you could adapt the above method to a food processor with probably no adaption needed at all and I'll experiment with freezing next time. These would be great to have on hand for just about any occasion, so a stash in the freezer would work well.

Delicious, and I love knowing exactly what's in them.


(I can't believe this is the first time I've made my own puff (sort of) pastry. Shakes head at self....)

Homemade bagels - by thermomix or hand

Ever made your own bagels? Bagels are not that big here in Australia, at least not round my area anyway. You can get them here and there but if you want them, what better way to have them fresh than to make 'em yourself?

Here's how...

Homemade whole wheat bagels.

Now of course I couldn't just follow the recipe to the letter, so I used spelt flour instead of wheat and I used my thermomix to do the hard work for me. And the spelt flour was white, as that's all I had to hand.

If you have a TM and want to mix these bagels in it, just measure everything in as per the recipe, mix on about 6 until it holds together (about 10-15 secs), then knead for 3 minutes.

Now, the only slightly awkward part of this process was the instruction to shape them to 'resemble a bagel'...



But they turned out very well, slightly wonky shapes not-withstanding, with that chewy and dense texture bagels are known for. Although I think I could have baked them for slightly longer than the 15 minutes set out in the recipe, maybe 20 would do it, just to give them a little more colour on the outside.



Yum, I'll make these again, now I need to find if they freeze well. They were so easy to make and cook, they'd be easy to make in bulk for use later.

I'll let you know what I find out...

Homemade spelt bread, thermomix or by hand

There's nothing much better than the smell of fresh bread and that's what we've been smelling round here lately as I've taken to making my own on a regular basis.

And it's soooo good! My mum used to make all the bread for a family of eight, so I don't know what's taken me so long to get round to the idea of making my own. I do have a bread machine, but I haven't used that in a long while, partly due to now having a thermomix. The thermomix doesn't actually cook the bread for you, but it certainly does all the rest of hard work. That said, it is pretty easy to make this bread by hand, but seeing as I have a thermomix, I'm gonna use it!

Actually, the reason I now like to make my own is because I have become so much more aware of exactly what is put into our food. And why spelt? I use spelt instead of wheat for it's nutritious benefits, as well as it's flavour and texture. Spelt can sometimes be found in supermarkets, however I buy it in 5kg bags over the net and it gets delivered, just what I like.

Spelt bread by hand

1 tablespoon dry yeast
2 cups warm water
3 tablespoons honey
3 tablespoons melted butter
2 teaspoons salt
5-6 cups spelt flour (any combo of brown or white)

• Mix yeast, water and honey in a large bowl and let it stand for 5-10 minutes.
• Stir in the butter, salt and 3 cups of flour.
• Add the remainng flour in small amounts until the dough becomes too stiff to stir, then turn out onto floured bench.
• Knead for about 6 minutes, but do not overwork the dough. Stop when it is smooth and elastic.
• Place in a bowl, cover and let it rise until doubled in size.
• Punch down the dough, and divide it between 2 smallish loaf pans.
• Cover and let it rise again.
• Heat oven to 175c (350f)
• Bake for 20 minutes or so, until it is brown on the top and smelling done. Mmm mmm!

Spelt bread in the thermomix
10 grams dry yeast
2 cups warm water
85 grams honey
75 grams butter
2 teaspoons salt
5-6 cups spelt flour (any combo of brown or white)

• Place chopped butter in TM bowl and melt on 90c, speed 3 for about 1 1/2 minutes.
• Add honey, warm water and yeast. Mix on speed 4 for 2 seconds then leave to sit for 5-10 minutes.
• Add salt and 3 cups of flour. Mix on speed 5 for 10 seconds.
• Add 2 more cups of flour, mixing on speed 5 for 10 seconds after each addition.
• Knead in TM for 2 minutes
• Place in a bowl, cover and let it rise until doubled in size.
• Punch down the dough, and divide it between 2 smallish loaf pans.
• Cover and let it rise again.
• Heat oven to 175c (350f)
• Bake for 20 minutes or so, until it is brown on the top and smelling done.

See? Couldn't be easier.

Home made tortillas, by hand or thermomix

Tortillas are one of those things I used to buy and keep in the cupboard until needed. That should have been warning enough, and after reading the ingredients list I can see why they keep so well.......they are barely a food at all. Well, slight exaggeration perhaps but here is what is in the ones I used to buy:

Wheat flour

Water

Vegetable oil

Humectant

Salt

Emulsifiers

Raising agents

Dextrose

Preservatives

Colour

Food acid

Flour treatment agent

Antioxidants

And this is what is in the ones I made last night:


Tortillas

320grams plain flour
1 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon baking powder
180 grams/mls warm water

Much better for you surely, without all the extras in the list above.
And they taste sooooo good, they are well worth the little bit of fiddle it takes to roll them out.

Ok, here's how to:

Mix all ingredients in a bowl, turn out and knead for 10 minutes.

Thermomixers: throw it all in the TM bowl, mix for 10 secs to combine, then knead for 3 minutes.

Rest the dough for 5 - 10 minutes.

Enlist a helper (not strictly necessary)

Divide dough into 12 pieces

Roll each piece flat into rounds, or any odd shape, as long as it's as thin as you can get it.

Fry in a hot frypan until the upper surface starts to pucker and puff a bit.

Flip over, cook briefly on other side.

You'll be able to tell when they're done by sight, and they should cook pretty fast.
If not, turn your pan up a wee bit.
I use a scanpan, which is non-stick, so I oil it up at the start and that's it.

Once cooked, I put a teatowel inside a large ziplock type bag and lay each tortilla as it is cooked onto the teatowel in a pile. I then seal the bag while the next one's cooking. This method keeps them soft and flexible.

Do try these, you won't regret it, the taste is fantastic, there is no throw-away plastic packaging, they're cheaper than store bought and my recurring theme, you know exactly what's in them.

Homemade chocolate spread........aka Nutella

Well the Nutella turned out pretty well, if not as thick as I remember the shop bought product being. If I make it again, I would probably reduce the amount of milk somewhat to make it a little thicker.

This recipe is actually from my thermomix book, but if you have a decent blender or food processor for grinding the hazelnuts, I'm sure it can be made the conventional way. I'll convert it to how I think it will best be made without a thermomix.


Hazelnut chocolate spread

90 grams of caster sugar
(can be reduced to 50 grams, I used 60 and that seemed plenty to me)

60 grams of hazelnuts

100 grams plain chocolate, in pieces

70 grams butter

100 mls milk
(Next time I'll try about 70 mls)

• Pulverize the nuts till they are as finely ground as you can get them.
  

• Place butter, sugar and milk in a pot. Heat gently while stirring, until butter melts.

• Add chocolate. Stir until chocolate melts.

• Add hazelnuts. Cook on a low heat for about 6 minutes, stirring until mixture is a smooth consistency.

• Store in a jar in the fridge. Keeps for 14-21 days.

Tasty on toast, bread, gingerbread cookies or just on a spoon.
Those are the ways we've eaten it so far, the kids are loving it.



Just found another version of this I'd like to try, this recipe being specifically trialled by someone without a thermomix. I like the idea that the writer was able to mix it to a thick creamy texture, unlike mine which had to set in the fidge. Hmmmmm....

Maybe I'll make these with mine, Nutella Cheescake Brownies, at Alpineberry

because how good do they look??

And use that as an excuse to try another batch of nutella....shhh, don't tell!

Make your own peanut butter

In my ongoing attempt to green up my family's life and leave behind as many preservatives and additives as possible, I thought I would try making my own peanut butter. I love peanut butter by the spoonful and the kids eat it on their sammys.....not their daycare ones though, of course. But I find commercial peanut butter far too sweet and depending on what brand you buy it has various things added to it apart from the basics.

Now if you ask Master Chef Google how to do this you will come up with many similar answers.

Peanuts, oil, no oil, salt, sugar, honey........hmmmm.


Well, I did it this way:

I used my Thermomix, though I presume any half decent food processor would the job.
Into that I added 500 grams roasted, un-salted peanuts.
I blitzed these until I they were very very finely ground. At this point some of my searches had said my peanuts should turn to a paste and bind together. Well, mine didn't.
So I added a splash of olive oil - peanut is recommended but I didn't have any, and blitzed again. Better.
Another dribble of oil and blitz again.
Ok, looks good now, paler than commercial peanut butter but the correct consistency.
Taste. Hmmm, a bit.....bland?
Add some salt. Mix. Better.
Add a bit more salt. (Confession, I like my food salty, great for my health I know) Mix.
Just right.
Store in recycled glass jar in fridge, where it should keep for 2-3 weeks.

Only I'm not sure even I can eat that much p/b in 2-3 weeks.

On the left is home made nutella, which I also made today, much to my 4 year old's delight. Nutella is not something I buy, ever, but I had a recipe and wanted to try it. Preliminary tastings were promising, though it had to go into the fridge to set, so I haven't tried it out since then.

I'll keep you posted on that one....




Ha, you can now tell exactly how lazy I am, my peanut butter is labeled Archibald's honey and my nutella is some sort of mayo. I just cannot be bothered soaking labels off jars. Laaazzzy, yay me!

How to make your own chicken stock

Chicken stock is an ingredient in many dishes and and is readily available in stores. But, it is really easy to make your own and you'll have the satisfaction of knowing exactly what's in it. You'll get a flavour you won't find in a packet or carton and it will cost you less, as you're using bones which are usually just thrown away. And boiling the bones gets you some extra minerals too.

How do you do it?

• Pile chicken bones in a largish pot.
• Add a peeled onion, a chopped carrot, and a stick of celery. (You can also add any odds and ends of veges you have around.)
  
• Add enough water to completely cover the chicken bones.
• Bring to the boil.
• Keep it at a slow boil/simmer for two or more hours, adding more water if the level gets too low.
• Drain the solids out and refrigerate or freeze.
  

I like to freeze the stock in muffin pans, so I have convenient amounts for adding to dishes. Once they are frozen, just pop them out and store them in a ziplock bag in the freezer.



This lot was actually made in my thermomix, and the reason it's pale is the thermomix recipe only calls for 60 minutes of cooking. So if you want a darker, richer flavour, cook for longer on the stovetop.

I use the chicken bones from the roast chickens that we buy once in a while. I now buy La Ionica chickens as I've found out pastured/free range chicken is healthier and this particular brand is hormone free and not chemically processed. Not terribly thrifty I know, but I feel better if I know I'm using every bit of it in this way.

You won't want to go back to using store bought stock, this tastes too good.

Thermomix for a thriftier kitchen

Have you heard of thermomix? I made a brief reference to it in this post and you can check it out on my squidoo lens or just google it.



One of the benefits of having a thermomix is it is a time saving and money saving device. Now, I was given mine and I'm mighty glad I was as it is an expensive wee beastie.....nearly $2000 Australian.


But let me tell you a few benefits.

• It saves me loads of time when I cook or bake. It has built in scales for weighing and a built in element for cooking, so everything happens in the one unit, thus saving on dish washing, too.

• It cooks everything perfectly. Seriously, you CANNOT burn or otherwise wreck your cooking. Especially when cooking from the supplied recipe book.

• It is supremely easy to use. I can cook dinner one-handed with a cranky baby on my hip. I don't burn pots on the stove by not paying attention, I don't have to chop, stir or puree and it has a built in timer, so switches itself off when finished.

Those are the time saving factors.

If you count time as money, then you're already saving. But it does have distinct money saving attributes too.


You can...

• Make bread dough, very quickly. So buy your ingredients in bulk (cheaper) and make your own bread. Mmmmm, yummy!

• Make sorbet in 3 minutes. Hot day, the kids want to go out for an icypole/popsicle/flavoured ice? Stay home (save petrol and money) and make your own, any flavour you like, and know what's in it.

• Make your own sauces. Thermomix has failsafe recipes for bechamel, hollandaise and the like, so no more running to the store to buy the pre-packaged variety.

• Make your own custards and mayos. Fresh when you need them, no more expired containers lurking in the depths of the fridge, and, you know what's in them. (Meaning no artificial colours, flavours, thickeners or preservatives).

• Are you a juice drinker? Thermomix does that too, the healthy way. It completely pulverizes your fruits and veggies to an extremely smooth consistency, so you get the skin, the pulp, everything. No waste.

There are more things this wonder machine can do but you've probably heard about enough for now.

Want a demo?

Where to get one?

They are only available through tupperware style parties, you go to a demo and can order one from there. Very occasionally you see a current model on ebay, although they fetch nearly the same price as buying a new one. And you will sometimes see an older model thermomix on ebay. The older ones are cheaper, largely the same as the current model and parts are still available worldwide.


Ooh, I just found this budget busters section on the Thermomix Australia blog.


Bottom line, if you can get one of these, it's well worth it!

Do you Squidoo?

Have you discovered Squidoo? Squidoo is a publishing platform and community, within which you can write and publish 'lenses' (pages) about any topic that interests you. Once you get sucked in, there is information on any topic you may think to search for and it's so easy to spend hours there, hopping from lens to lens to lens.



What is the purpose of it? Well, information sharing of course and you can also earn money off your lenses. You can add ebay and amazon links and you can use your lenses to drive traffic to your own or an affiliates site. You can write as many as you like, so the earning potential is unlimited, supposedly.

I'm having fun creating pages, I've done two so far, and it's quite a challenge to make them good ones, as far as looks and content go. Wanna see? Topics close to my heart of course...


Understanding unilateral hearing loss

and

Thermomix - Now you're cooking!

If you're wondering what a thermomix is, it is explained on the above 'lens' or check this post on my other blog. It's only the BEST EVER KITCHEN GADGET around!

Anyway, hop on over to squidoo, sign up, share your interests, look me up and give my pages a rating. Be kind! :0)