out of the frying pan

Has been a horror week in NZ- tradgedy on epic scale as a loved historic city crumbles under the forces of nature, indicriminately robbing us forever of treasured people and places. For those who are left the losses this week are incalculable,mind numbing and energy sapping. When grief is at its most acute even mundane tasks seem monumental. Hunger is no respecter of grief though, nor will go away simply because you have no kitchen or water. So how do you feed the family or the neighbours or even just yourself with no running water, no power and little or no equipment? One pan on the barbecue if neccesary will do - in fact if you have no frying pan available a foil roasting pan from the supermarket will suffice.

Tin Pan Tucker- Chicken with Couscous

Couscous is light, filling and trebles in volume when cooked which takes only a few minutes so its ideal camping tucker.
This dish is easy to do in an Aluminium roasting pan on the barbecue or campfire, you can also of course do it in the oven at home in a roasting pan.

Serves 4 – 6
1 disposable foil roasting pan – available in supermarkets
1 sheet of aluminium foil to cover the pan
8-10 chicken drumsticks with the skin removed or skinless thighs
2 cloves garlic crushed
2 rashers of bacon with the fat removed chopped
4 carrots peeled and sliced
1 head broccoli or other green vegetable chopped
1 tsp thyme
2 cups sterilised hot water
4 teaspoons chicken stock
2 cups couscous
Cooking spray

Pre heat the barbecue grill to a medium flame Spray the pan with cooking spray or rub lightly with oil and add all the ingredients except the couscous.
Cover the pan with the foil crimping it tightly around the edges and place on the prepared grill. Cook for 40 minutes giving it a gentle shake half way through the cooking time.
Remove the pan from the heat and take off the foil cover. Stir in the cous cous and cover with the foil for 3-4 minutes until the liquid is absorbed and the couscous fluffy. Serve immediately.

Cooks Tip: Aluminium foil pans weigh next to nothing and are reasonably inexpensive however if you want you can re use the pan and the foil covering over and over. Just wash them carefully as you don’t want punctures.
Frozen meat will stay frozen in a well packed chilly bin for two days, gradually defrosting during day two.

Tin pan tucker - Hoi sin Chicken and rice

This cooking method is so easy, just throw the ingredients in the pan and cover with foil. Sling onto the Barbie then no pans to wash as you can crush the pan up and put it in the rubbish.
I allow two drumsticks per adult or 1 for littlies, adjust the amounts according to what you need.

Serves 4 or more
1 disposable aluminium Foil roasting pan, – available from supermarkets
a sheet of foil large enough to cover the pan.
8 Chicken drumsticks with the skin removed or skinless thighs
4 carrots peeled and sliced
2 cloves garlic crushed
1 head or broccoli broken into pieces or other veg
¾ cup long grain rice per person – I use basmati (45 g per person)
1 1/3 cups sterilised water allow 1/3 cup per person, hot if possible
2 tsp chicken stock powder
3 tbsp Hoi sin sauce
1 heaped teaspoon grated ginger
Big pinch of Chinese 5 spice
Cooking spray

Heat the barbecue grill or set a grill. Spray the pan with cooking spray or rub with oil. Place the chicken and vegetables and the rice into the greased pan.
Add the ginger, Hoi sin sauce and stock powder to the water to help distribute them and pour into the pan. Sprinkle in the 5 spice and give it all a little mix.
Cover the pan with the sheet of foil, crimping it tightly around the edges to ensure the heat doesn’t escape.
Place over a medium heat on the barbecue grill.
Cook for 40 minutes. The pan will need a gentle shake after 20 minutes to mix it a little. Serve piping hot.

boy food

Was talking to Pete about his boy who is doing Farming Internship. Up at 4.30 am, solid day of hard physical stuff, sports all evening, and fed large mountains of good plain food throughout day. Boy, not surprisingly, completely knackered but also content.

Is strong similarity between farming college and military training. Strategy appears simple - keep em busy and exhausted, so no energy for fighting, shagging or arguing. Is excellent plan to my mind, as by some miraculous feat, boys also suddenly able to make own beds and fold clothes instead of sleeping in squalor and dumping on "floordrobe".

Strategy succeeds or fails on food. Hungry tired boys are dangerous species, capable of great evil. So food is stuff my mum refered to as "Boy Food", meat and spuds, meat and pastry, meat and gravy...As was only my sister and myself , boy food was reserved for boyfriends, builders and brothers in law. But we also loved simple filling Old School type meals.
Meat and eggs are great muscle building protien, with high satiety factor - protein makes us feel full. Starchy carbs are all about energy, also comforting and cheap!Unless you are v. active boy, keep serving to size of fist.

As we are not on farm and don't have military budget, but have high energy boys to feed, is necessary to choose carefully, or teenager taming comes at great financial cost. One of cheapest and leanest meat cuts is brisket or Corned Beef. Is great boy food, wonderful with mashed spuds. Also good in sandwiches with relish or chutney it is underrated "old school" food, easy inexpensive and simple.

Slow cooker corned beef

The slow cooker is invaluable when you are out all day, corned beef is tasty however you cook it so is less likely to be bland than many other slow cooked meat meals.

1 piece of corned silverside- whatever size best suits your household, adjust cooking time according to the weight
1 onion, sliced
2 carrots, sliced lengthways- can include other veg if you wish but may get a bit soft
1 bay leaf
1 cup ginger ale
zest and juice of an orange
6 whole cloves
1 teaspoon black peppercorns

Place the meat into the crock pot, add the spices and vegetables, juice and ginger ale. Cover and cook on low 7-9 hours or according to the manufacturer’s recommendations for meat by weight.
Remove the meat from the liquid and allow to rest for 10 minutes before slicing.
Serve with mashed spuds, green veg and a good chutney or relish.

Classic Corned beef

Corned beef, silverside or corned brisket – whatever you call it this is a lean cut of meat with a salty flavour. Serve hot with veg or cold in slices. Make sure you allow plenty of time as it needs to simmer for an hour or more.
I piece of corned beef – whatever size best suits your household, adjust cooking time according to the weight
1 onion peeled but left whole
a few 3-4 whole cloves
6 peppercorns
1 tbsp brown sugar or golden syrup
1 tbsp malt vinegar
Cold water to cover
Place the meat into a large saucepan, add the spices and cover with water. Stir in the sugar or syrup and the vinegar and bring to the boil. Simmer the meat allowing 25 minutes per 500g.
Remove the meat from the water and allow to rest for 10 minutes before slicing.
Serve with mashed spuds, green veg and a good chutney or relish.

our daily bread

My nephew El once ate his toast into shape of lion, roared at himself with it, then was too frightened to eat it. He is funny boy, but I am thinking is not bad idea to give toast a miss for a while as is getting scarily expensive to have bread from shops.

Have watched price of basic wholegrain sliced loaf increase from $1.99 to over $3.00 over last couple of years and set to rise higher after disastrous year in Queensland.

Bought some extra flour before price goes up, but as loaded cupboard with 5 kg bags felt like crazy US apocalypse fanatic from mountain compound. Type who hoard food, have eleven wives, most of them cousins, big beards (even the wives) and large cache of semi automatic weapons! Had to apply copious lip gloss and mascara to counteract effect of hoarding as felt self slipping into serious checked shirt territory.

When kids were little I made all our bread by hand as were too poor to buy nice bread and am bread snob - cant abide pappy bread even if very cheap. As never owned bread making thingy have done this always by hand. Bread repertoire now increased to include many treat type breads and scrolls, loaves and buns, but standout breakfast fave these days is toasted homemade English muffins.
Was camping a week or so back at annual Parachute music festival, no cooking facilities except camping burner and 4-5 teenagers to feed. Toasted English muffins were ideal brekkie for all of us. 2 batches made roughly 26+ muffins for less than $5 bucks.

Since developing recipe, price of milk also soared, so if wanting to make without using pricey fresh milk either substitute with milk from powder, or I used 1/4 cup condensed milk. Made up balance with water, didn't need to add sugar as condensed milk V. sweet.
Left me with 3/4 can condensed milk - perfect amount for chocolate caramellow brownie which also went down well with young-uns. Saving on basics means treats still possible too.


English muffins

My family all like English muffins as a quick breakfast or snack, but boy they’re expensive to buy for such a simple thing! These homemade ones are lovely and easy enough for a novice baker.

4 ¼ cups plain flour
1 sachet instant yeast
½ tsp sugar
1 tsp salt
2 cups warm milk or milk from powder or 1/4 condensed milk + 1 1/4 cups water-omit sugar
1 egg beaten
50 g butter

Dust 2 oven trays with flour
In a large bowl combine the instant yeast, sugar, flour and salt.
In a small pan, melt the butter then add the milk and heat gently. The liquid should be warm but not hot. If you are not sure, hold your little finger in it and count to 10. If it’s uncomfortably hot by the time you get to 10 allow it to cool a little, if it doesn’t feel warm at all, heat it up.
Make a well in the centre of the flour and pour in the egg and the butter and milk mixture. Use a large metal spoon to mix to a soft dough.
Knead lightly for 2 minutes then place into a large greased bowl and allow to rise. Either by z9i setting aside in a warm place until doubled or by using the microwave method.
Pre heat the oven to 190°
When the dough has doubled in size knead it lightly and roll on a floured bench to 1 cm thickness. Cut into circles using a large cutter (I use my favourite “tuna tin” cutter to make 10cm circles). Re roll the trimmings and you should end up with 15 muffins. Place on floured trays and rest for 10 minutes.
Bake them for 7 minutes then turn them over and bake a further 7 minutes, until lightly golden.
To serve split muffins in half and toast lightly, top with jam, honey, ham or whatever else you fancy.

Cook’s Tip: If you are planning on freezing the muffins, split them first, they’ll defrost quicker.

For spicy fruit muffins

Add to the dry ingredients
2 tsp allspice
2 tsp cinnamon
¼ tsp ground cloves
½ tsp mixed spice
½ cup sultanas soaked in boiling water for a few minutes to plump them up

Or develop your own spicy fruit blend

Am in the horrors as seem to have haemorrhaged money for the last 5 or so weeks. If result was lovely tan from lying beside infinity edge pool in 5 star resort and sipping expensive cocktails with little umbrellas out of a coconut, wouldn't be so bad. But reality was modest family Christmas then 7 days camping in tent by beach!

Camp kitchen well equipped with fridges, freezers and great big stoves. Most campers are longtime regulars, A result is certain routines evolve in kitchen as campers begin to prepare evening repast. cheeses are opened and sampled, one day blue cheeses, another goat cheeses, another creamy rind cheeses... wine is uncorked, serious cooking takes place.
Young people armed with dried noodles and canned stew have new foods and flavours thrust upon them and hush falls as "the engineers" 3 regulars, prepare for camp kitchen annual Master chef challenge - this year is curry competition.
Big mike is going for South African Vibe (big Mike also brought block of fresh yeast - kindly shared with me, a deep fat fryer - yup took it camping, he is BIG for a reason, and blender- for making cocktails naturally) other guys are doing Thai and North Indian curries. Smells are amazing - no premixes here - fresh ginger, chilli's, coriander and cumin seeds...Self makes fresh berry tart (went berry picking), my pudding looks so show stoppingly gorgeous cannot avoid being drawn into discussions, tastings etc. Berry tart was a hit with our lot, all curries were a sensation and budget took a hammering. We ate in one week 3 times normal grocery budget.
This type of free form tart is easy to assemble and works with all manner of sweet fruit fillings.


1 quantity of sweet shortcrust pastry, same one as I use for mince pies etc - a pile of berries and a few good handfuls of sugar. Roll out the dough on greased baking sheet, pile berries on - thin layer for big tart or in a heap for smallish one like mine. Sprinkle liberally with sugar (to sweeten and form a syrup with juices while cooking) press sides up around tart, brush crust with egg white and sprinkle on some more sugar. Bake @180 till golden. Mmmmm

spoiled for choice

One of my biggest challenges after over a decade as food writer, developing hundreds (and hundreds) of recipes, is what to make when people come for dinner.
Am worried people expect impressive Michelin star restaurant type stuff -"flambe of organic baby unicorn in honeysuckle souffle, with truffled rhino horn jus and an oxygen foam"- or some such fancy schmancey stuff.
But fact is I only do "family food". I made my name stretching one chicken breast and 1/2 can of beans into 4 course dinner for 6 - while knocking out a batch of scones and recycling the recycling. Am very happy to eat anything I didn't have to make myself - invite me around for cheese on toast and I'm thrilled! but I suffer from serious performance anxiety at home.
Earlier in year to solve problem I developed my own Help menu. I chose a couple of recipes that were interesting and tasty and made same dishes for each lot of visitors -worked really well until last week when realised we had friends coming who had already had that menu!
Horrors- practically had night sweats trying to decide what to make! Feel very silly as actually really like having a house full of people, enjoy cooking for them, just hate making decisions (also not wild about cleaning but is another story).
Finally after far too much deliberation decided to do leg of lamb, as is a treat for us (anything not mince is treat for us actually). Marinated the lamb in yoghurt and herbs and slow roasted it. Served with crispy garlic roast spuds and a couple of salads. Dessert was old fave Hazelnut meringue roulade.
Was all really tasty, and had an enjoyable and convivial evening. Best of all though- have now sorted out next years help menu! Yay - just cant invite same people for dinner for another 12 months so sorry to those two couples- will be happy to have you to dinner again in 2012.

Here is my recipe for slow roasted leg of lamb - Mmmm - great winter or summer.

Yoghurt Baked lamb with Rosemary, mint and lemon

I love lamb and prefer to team it with seasonings that enhance rather than mask the delicate flavour of the lamb. This yoghurt marinade ensures the meat is tender and juicy and forms a tangy crust, I marinate it for a minimum of 5 hours or up to 24 hours.

Serves 6 -8 adults

1x 2.5 leg of lamb on the bone
1 cup natural unsweetened yoghurt
1 tbsp finely chopped rosemary – a couple of big sprigs
1 tbsp finely chopped mint
zest and juice of ½ a lemon
1 tbsp olive oil
½ tsp salt

Cut several slashes into the plump side of the joint. Combine the yoghurt rosemary, mint, lemon juice, zest, oil and salt and mix well.
Coat the lamb with the yoghurt mixture working it gently into the slashes. Place the lamb in a plastic bag and wrap it so the yoghurt marinade cant slide off the meat. Place in the fridge and allow to marinate for 5 hours or up to 24 hours. Give it a bit of a massage from time to time.
Pre heat the oven to 180, place the lamb into a roasting pan, salvage as much of the yoghurt marinade as you can from the bag and spread over the meat. Bake the lamb at 180 for 20 minutes then reduce the temperature to 170 and bake allowing 20 minutes per 500g so roughly 2 ½ hours.
Allow the lamb to rest for 10 -15 minutes before carving.

food of love

I always encourage people to teach their kids to cook, as is essential life skill and frankly am terrified that one day I may depend on them to feed me when I am old and infirm and if they cant cook I'll die of malnutrition or worse food poisoning! But is not only kids who need to learn.
Anne and Bill have been married 60 years. They have strict division of labour, common to their generation. Anne cooks and runs house, Bill looks after finances and plays golf.
They raised 4 boys, and enjoy a quiet and comfortable retirement. That was until a fortnight ago. Anne fell while watering garden, savagely breaking several of her 84yr old bones, 4 surgeries later she was finally on the road to recovery and Bill was tired of toast. Survival instinct kicked in and he found himself in the unfamiliar territory called kitchen. Never having attempted to cook anything other than eggs or toast he decided to roast a chicken.
With great pride he regaled Anne during visiting hours of his achievement. He'd successfully cooked a chook. Anne was amazed, how did he do it ?
Apparently there were instructions printed on the pack and Bill had simply followed them. In all the years she's cooked for him she'd never needed to look and he'd never needed to cook.

Don't you wish you'd married Anne? I'd even wear the ugly golf trousers if it meant coming home to a cooked meal everyday - sigh. anyway heres how I cook a chook

To Roast a Chicken

A roast chicken is one of the simplest and most satisfying dishes, the house will smell wonderful while it cooks, and once you’ve mastered the basic technique you can try all sorts of variations.

Pre heat the oven to 180º
Allow 20 minutes per 450g plus an extra 20 minutes at the end.
Make sure the chicken is fully defrosted, pat it dry with a piece of kitchen paper and place it in a roasting pan. Sprinkle the bird with a little salt and pepper and put it into the pre-heated oven.
During the cooking time baste the chicken with the juices in the pan, use a large spoon and carefully spoon the hot pan juices over the whole chicken, this helps it to brown evenly and keep it moist.

When the cooking time is completed pierce the plumpest part of the chickens thigh with a sharp knife and press the flesh firmly, have a look at any juice that comes out, it should be clear. If there is any pink juice at all cook the chicken for another 20 minutes then check it again. If you have allowed 20 minutes per 450 g plus another 20 it should be fine.

Remove the chicken from the oven; cover with foil to keep it warm then let it rest for 10 minutes before you cut it up. This will allow the meat to relax and will be more moist and tender to eat.

Roast chicken is delicious hot or cold, serve with gravy or chutney, hot roast vegetables, mashed spuds or salad.

Hints and tips: Rubbing the skin with butter before it cooks will make it extra golden and crispy but does add extra unnecessary fat.
Adding lemon or orange segments to the cavity inside the bird will help keep a big bird moist as it cooks, herbs and garlic will infuse flavour and bacon strips placed over the breast of the bird will keep it moist and flavoursome.
Marinades and barbecue style sauces will all add variety to a roasted bird as will dry spice rubs or some liquid in the pan while the bird cooks, you could use stock, wine, or a combination.

Was totally inspired by one of our FB followers losing 65kg. Asked her if she would allow us to share her story and she generously agreed. I love that she is making good "lifestyle choices" rather than dieting. Simple substitutions, and moderation rather than deprivation seem to have been the keys to Michelles sucess - as well as her own determination of course.
This approach gets the big thumbs up from me and it clearly works - just look at the pictures. Thanks Michelle.

Hi Sophie,
I am emailing you in response to your post on facebook.
This Christmas will mark 4 years since I was 150kg. I was a size 28 and could not do up my shoes. It wasn't until I saw the christmas photos that I realised just how bad things had become. I started on Weight Watchers, by having to count my points I learnt to totally change the way I cooked - I discovered that I don't need oil to make crisp roast potato. I also learnt to make wise changes - I love food,and I love to cook and entertain, and I don't like to miss out, so I have had to adapt many recipes.
Instead of cream in a sauce I use reduced cream, coconut flavoured reduced cream instead of coconut cream. Instead of oil I use a little red wine vinegar on my roast vegetables, and there are plenty more changes I have made.
I still have treats but when I do, I will have a vegetable stirfry for dinner. I have also learnt that breakfast is important - when I was at my biggest I didn't eat all day, but as soon as the kids went to bed I would eat a full days worth of food in 1 hour.
I used to eat a packet of chippies a day (a large pack) but I have discovered poppadoms, which I cook in the microwave for 30 seconds each - done this way there is no oil and they are great with some salsa. As a sweet treat I will have a few marshmallows but I will always put them into a bowl and then put the packet away so I am not tempted!!
As of this morning, I now weigh 83.9kg and am a size 10 - 12.

Thank you and kind regards

Michelle