Serves 6

The New Apricot Chicken

Serves 4

8 chicken cutlets on bone, or 4 marylands

olive oil

21/2 tbs Moroccan spice mix

2 brown onions, thinly sliced

2 garlic cloves, crushed

1cm fresh ginger, finely grated

2 tsp plain flour

2 cups apricot nectar

1 cup dried apricots

¼ cup toasted flaked almonds

Steamed rice to serve

1 Preheat oven 200C. Brush chicken with olive oil then rub the spice mix evenly over the chicken. Place into a greased roasting pan or baking dish skin side up, just large enough so sits flat in a single layer, and roast 15 minutes.

2 Meanwhile, heat a little oil in a large frying pan over low heat. Add the onions, ginger and garlic, and cook, stirring occasionally, for 5-10 minutes until softens. Sprinkle over the flour and cook 2-3 minutes. Stir in the apricot nectar. Simmer for 10 minutes or until the sauce thickens slightly. Add the apricots then carefully pour the mixture over the chicken.

3 Cover tightly with foil. Reduce oven to 180C and bake further 30-40 minutes or until chicken is cooked through and dried apricots nice and plump. Sprinkle with toasted almonds & serve over steamed rice.

Tips

1 Best to use cuts of chicken on the bone, develops much better flavour.

2 The chicken should fit snuggly into pan in a single layer- if dish too big sauce evaporates off leaving, not enough sauce to go around.

3 The chicken should be golden before you add the sauce.

4 Cover tightly once sauce has been added to trap in steam & prevent sauce evaporating.

Pea & Ham soup

Serves 6

500g dried green split peas

4 cups chicken stock

8 cups water

1kg ham hock or bacon bones

1 brown onion, diced

1 stick celery, diced

1 carrot, peeled, diced

2 bay leaves

4 black peppercorns

2 sprigs parsley

crusty bread, to serve

Place split peas in a sieve and run under cold water until water turns clear. Set aside.

Place stock, water, ham hock, vegetables and split peas in a large saucepan. Combine bay leaves, peppercorns & parsley in a piece muslin & tie up to secure, drop into the pan.

Bring to gentle simmer over medium-low heat and cook, partially covered for 3 hours, skimming the surface occasionally to remove any foam. Remove from heat. Remove ham hock from the soup and set aside for 5 minutes.

Meanwhile blend the soup with a hand-held blender to desired consistency.

Remove skin and fat from ham hock and discard then shred meat and return to the soup, if necessary warm over medium heat. Taste, season with salt and freshly ground black pepper and serve with crusty bread.

Serves 20

4 cups self raising flour, sifted

1/2 tsp salt

300ml pouring cream

325ml-350ml lemonade, milk or soda water

double cream & strawberry jam, to serve

1 Preheat oven 250°C no fan. Lightly grease large flat oven tray.

2 Combine flour and salt in large bowl. Add cream and 325ml milk. Use a flat bladed knife to stir to a soft dough adding more milk if necessary. Turn onto a lightly floured surface and knead gently until dough comes together.

3 Press dough out to 2cm-thick. Use a 51/2cm round scone cutter to cut as many scones from dough as possible. Press dough together gently, rolling it a 21/2cm-thick, cut more scones, repeat to get 20 scones. Place onto tray just touching each other.

4 Bake 12-15 minutes until golden and well risen. Serve hot with jam and cream.

Recipe by janelle Bloom from Fast Fresh & Fabulous

Top Tips

1 make sure the self raising flour you use is fresh.

2 Dont overmix the dough or you will get tough chewy scones

3 Press dough out & cut as many scones from the first lot dough

4 when press un-used dough together and press out again make it a little thicker as scones from second & third cut never rise as high

5 Never eat a cold scone must be hot out of the oven.

STRAWBERRY JAM

1 punnet of strawberries

3/4 cup of sugar

Juice of a whole lemon

Blend together and cook in microwave on high for 15-18 minutes

Serves 1

A little butter or olive oil

125g button mushrooms, thinly sliced

2 tsp Worcestershire sauce

2 large fresh eggs, at room temperature

2 teaspoons butter

1 tbs chopped fresh herbs (like chives, parsley)

salt & freshly ground black pepper

1 Heat a 20cm base non-stick frying pan over medium-high heat until hot, preferably non-stick with shallow sides so omelette will slide out easily. Add butter or oil then mushrooms and cook 4 minutes until light golden. Add Worcestershire sauce, toss to combine then tip mushrooms into bowl, cover to keep warm. Wipe the pan clean.

2 Crack eggs into a jug. Use a fork to beat the eggs until when you lift the fork the egg runs in a thin steady stream. Dont season with salt before cooking as salt with toughen the egg.

3 Heat the frying pan again over medium-high heat until just warm. Add butter and tilt pan back and forth until butter sizzling. Don't add butter too early or it will burn before pan hot enough to cook.

4 Beat eggs again and pour into the pan, tilting until base is covered. Use a wooden spoon to drag cooked egg from outer edge into centre. Tilt pan to allow uncooked egg to come in contact with pan.

5 Sprinkle the herbs over the omelette and season with salt and pepper. Spoon mushrooms over one half of the omelette. Cook for further 30 seconds or until the underside is golden and top only just set. Fold the un-topped half over. Slide onto hot buttered toast and serve immediately.

Top tips

1 Cook your eggs from room temperature.

2 choose the right size pan, non-stick and shallow sides make easy to slide omelette out of the pan without it breaking.

3 Don't over-beat the eggs, use a fork or a small whisk.

4 Don't season eggs until after omelette is cooked, salt will toughen the egg and cause it to weep.

Serves 6

1/3 cup medium-grain rice, well rinsed

1/3 cup raisins

2 cups milk

300ml thickened cream

1 vanilla bean, split

1/3 cup caster sugar

4 free range organic eggs

Pinch of ground cinnamon

½ cup regular whit sugar

1 Preheat oven to 170°C fan forced. Cook the rice in a saucepan of boiling water following packet directions or until tender, alternately microwave for 4 minutes on High/100% followed by 6 minutes on Medium/50%. Refresh in cold water to prevent rice over cooking, drain well then transfer to the base lightly greased 1.5 litre (6 cup capacity) baking dish. Scatter over the raisins.

2 Combine milk, cream, vanilla seeds and pods in saucepan over medium heat for 10 minutes. Strain, reserving pods (see tip below).

3 Whisk sugar, eggs, and cinnamon in a bowl. Pour in the luke warm milk mixture. Strain the egg mixture through a fine sieve over the rice and sultanas and stir gently to combine.

4 Line the base of a roasting pan with a tea towel (see tip), folded to fit, and place custard in the pan. Pour enough boiling water into the pan to reach halfway up the side of the dish. Bake, uncovered for 40-45 minutes or until the tip of a small knife inserted into the centre comes out clean. Remove the dish from the roasting pan and set aside for 1 hour to cool slightly.

5 Sprinkle top of the rice custard with sugar then use a kitchen blow torch to brulee the top. Serve as is or with roasted strawberries.

Top tips

1 Rinsing excess starch off the rice is key to beautiful textured non gluggy dish

2 never add salt to the water as this prevents the absorption of the custard, rice ends up like hard little pellets.

3 Splitting the bean crossways you get better result. Don't waste the pods after boiled them, rinse them in cold water then place onto a wire rack to dry then pop into a jar caster sugar, secure leave for 1 month and you have own vanilla sugar- far better & cheaper than anything you will buy- can just keep adding beans & sugar to top up.

4 Don't want to over whisk eggs, if you get to much air custard turns out like soufflé, rises, drops then forms very thick crust.

5 Tea towel in base of the pan neutralizes the heat from the base of pan, stops it over cooking.