One of the absolute delights of my childhood was discovering the Anne of Green Gables set of books by Lucy Maud Montgomery. They were my favourite books for years! And to be honest, although I haven’t read one in forever, I still have the entire series and it wouldn’t take much for me to be again drawn into the world of Matthew and Marilla, Diana Barry and Gilbert Blythe and the adorable red-haired, high-spirited feisty girl known as Anne of Green Gables. And that’s Anne with an E and don’t you forget it!
These books taught me so much about the world – about love, about friendship and family, about how it’s okay to be different (and how to embrace that difference). Oh, and how I wasn’t the only person in the world who constantly had to spell their name to people to ensure that they got it right!
So I was overjoyed to find out that there is an Anne of Green Gables Cookbook. And beside myself to be given a free ARC from NetGalley and Race Point Publishing to review! Thank you so much!
First up, this book is gorgeous! The illustrations and the photos are beautiful. And all of the recipes are referenced to the exact place in the books where they occurred..which a pedant like me totally loves!
I choose to make Anne’s Poetical Egg Salad sandwiches. And they were delicious.
OMG…these were so good!
I think sometimes it’s hard when blogging to present something as simple as these sandwiches because…..well…it’s egg salad right and everyone knows how to make that. so why bother? But this is also real food, the kind of food I want to make. Eat. Repeat.
And you can also fancy these up. The version you are looking at has some chives in the mix. It’s great with lettuce in the sandwich. To make it really fancy, a slice of smoked salmon is divine!
I adored this book almost as much as the novels that inspired it!
And as we head into the new year, some rules for living from Miss Anne Shirley:
ON FRIENDS
ON MAKING MISTAKES
ON MAKING AN EFFORT
ON ATTITUDE
ON LOVE
THE FUTURE
And on that note sweet people, I’m going to bid you adieu for 2017.
Thank you for reading, commenting, liking, sharing. You’re the best and most wonderful kindred spirits ever!
And for all of you, all my very, very best for a joyful 2018! May it bring it everything you wish for!
For for those of you who are already totally confused, let me explain. A Jaffle is an Australian term for a toasted sandwich. And it is a much loved food for breakfast, brunch, lunch, afternoon tea, dinner, supper, a midnight snack or any of the times inbetween.
And I made one based on Vincent Price’s Buckingham Eggs. And it was very good!
Like I guess many of my generation, the first real inkling I had of Vincent Price was as the voice in Thriller….
I had no idea he could not only cook, but cook like a boss, until I started blogging. It’s one of the reasons why I am so excited that the 50th edition of Vincent and Mary Price’s A Treasury of Great Recipes is about to be released. And I am reliably informed by Jenny of Silver Screen Suppers that, in her view, it is the best cookbook ever written! And Jenny knows her stuff!!!
Only a few more sleeps ’til that happens but first, Jenny invited her blogging pals to take part in a cookalong with some of Vincent and Mary’s recipes.
I hadn’t really intended on making the Buckingham Eggs for the cookalong . I was totally primed to make Vincent Price’s Champagne Chicken but, it was only 10:00am. Possibly a little too early for a roast dinner. But I was hungry and a jaffle seemed like the perfect thing to tide me over til dinner time. A quick glance at the fridge revealed eggs, cheese and anchovies. I had a thought process that went something like this:
You could make the Buckingham Eggs
But I want a jaffle
The Buckingham Eggs sound really good.
So does a jaffle.
Anchovy and Mustard butter…-
Egg and Cheese Jaffle
Hmm…what if we…
I like where you are going with this
And thus the Buckingham Eggs Jaffle was born. I’m sure neither Jenny or Vincent would disapprove of my tweaking the recipe slightly to satisfy both the devil and the angel on my shoulder! For the purists, here is a link to the original recipe as cooked by Jenny:
For my version make an English mustard and anchovy butter. I could not find any anchovy paste so I mushed up an anchovy. The mustard adds some heat and makes it a beautiful colour!I could just eat this on toast forever and be totally content!
But, wait, there’s more!
Eggs and cream and cheese and onions. I meant to add some Worchestershire Sauce but I totally forgot! Oh well, all the more reason to make it again next Sunday!
Now, add the onions to the egg mixture and scramble them really lightly. You need them to thicken up but still be quite moist as they will continue to cook once they are in the jaffle iron.
Now, butter both sides of the bread (if you’re feeling decadent ) or the one side if not. Place the buttered sides on the surface of the jaffle iron. This is important otherwise your bread will stick like crazy. Place the cheese on one side and the thickened egg mixture on the other side.
Fold The Iron over. Trim any bits of bread hanging out of the iron and place over a low heat.
The only tricky bit is that once the iron is closed you have no way of telling how much the inside has cooked unless you open it up and have a little peek. Make sure you turn it over at least once so both sides get toasty. As a general rule, once the outside is a dark golden colour, the inside will be perfect. This is the colour you are aiming for:
At the risk of sounding a bit hippy dippy, when cooked like this, the egg and cream mixture and the cheese become one in a gorgeous creamy melange. This is surrounded by crispy, salty, slightly spicy bread…..OMGZ delicious.
This made a super brunch, but if darkness is falling across the land and the midnight hour is close at hand, this would also make a super late night snack!
A massive thanks to Jenny for including me and to Vincent and Mary Price for the recipe.
For all the deets on the cookbook launch and activities around it, click any (ALL) of the links below:
They say you should do one thing every day that scares you. Well, this week we are jumping ahead to the letter H in the A-Z of cooking and I am doing something that terrifies me. The reason for the leap from E to H and the sudden boldness on my part will become apparent in the next post….Huh…instead of a cliff hanger ending I think I just gave you a cliff hanger starting! Anyway, want to know what scares me? That third episode of Limetown still makes me shiver but cooking wise, one of the things that frightens me is bread.
And not only did I made bread this week but ooh la la, I made French Bread! Brioches to be exact. And they were very good! They looked kinda like brioches, they smelled like brioches, and they tasted like brioches! I cannot tell you how pleasantly surprised I was because the manner of making seemed odd.
I have never made brioche before but maybe, possibly this is how it is done. It seemed to work!
You made your bread dough then divided it into 12 pieces which you rolled into balls. Then you pinched off a small ball of dough from each of those so you then had 24 balls, 12 small and 12 larger. The recipe then called to make a hole in the large ball and stick the small ball inside. I found it easier to flatten the large ball and wrap it around the small ball.
Then into the baking pan for a rest and rise:
Add a glaze, pop in the oven and a short while later:
BRIOCHE!!!!
If I’d known brioche was going to be this easy I would have been making it for years! I love that high shine glaze! And to copy a phrase I learned from the Great British Bake Off, the bread also has “good crumb”.
Even though I had specifically made these for another purpose, I couldn’t resist having a little taste. Brioche and apricot jam for afternoon tea? Yes please!
As for the rest of them? Stay tuned. You’ll see in a couple of days! And it’s worth the wait! Meantime, get your brioches ready!
Dissolve 1/2 tsp of sugar in the water. Sprinkle over the yeast and whisk it in with a fork. Leave in a warm place for 10-15 minutes or until the mixture is frothy.
Sift the flour and salt into a bowl. Mix in the rest of the sugar, the yeast mixture, the eggs and butter.
Mix by hand until the mixture leaves the side of the bowl.
Knead on a lightly floured board for 5 minutes.
Put the dough in a warm place and leave to rise for about 1.5 hours or until it has doubled in size and springs back when lightly pressed.
Preheat your oven to 230C.
Divide the dough into 12 portions. Break off a small bit of each portion and roll into 12 small balls.
Roll the remainder of the portions into 12 larger balls.
Poke a hole in each of the larger balls with your finger and place the small ball inside. Close the hole by pressing the dough together.
Place the balls in your baking tin and leave to rise for about an hour or until light and puffy.
Mix the ingredients for the egg glaze together and brush over the brioches.
If we are at home on a Friday, we don’t usually eat a big meal, just usually have a couple of snacky things here and there.
Tonight’s snack plate had a distinctly retro feel so I thought I would share it with you!
Cheese and Date Bread
First up, we have some Cheese and Date Bread, courtesy of The A-Z of Cooking. We have jumped somewhat forward here in that this recipe appears under G – Good Health, when technically we are only up to D – Drinks and Dips. And whilst Drinks and Dips are usually good Friday fare, tonight it was something different.
I was intrigued by the idea of Cheese and Date Bread. I really wasn’t sure how the sweetness of the dates would go with the rest of the ingredients. These fears were completely unfounded. And my bread looked just like real proper bread!
Cheese and Date Bread2
If somewhat lopsided…
Cheese and Date Bread3
The bread is pretty good plain but if you want to take it to a whole new level? Toast it up.
Cheese and Date Bread4
Cheese and Date Balls
Like I said, initially I was hesitant to make the Cheese and Date Bread. What changed my mind was finding this recipe for Cheese and Date Balls:
Of course I made mini balls – because that’s how I roll. Also, I swapped out the lemon in the recipe above for a teeny splash of vermouth.
Mmmmm…blue cheese, walnuts and dates spread on toasted Date and Cheese Bread. Life is good!
Cheese and Date Balls2
But wait…there’s more.
But first a little bit of disclosure. I am actually trying something new tonight which is to cook (ok, assemble, I had actually cooked everything beforehand), photo, write, review and post all in the one night. Normally this process can take WEEKS. I am also doing it whilst drinking a rather large martini which we will get to in due course. So, if the end of this devolves into absolute gibberish, you know why and apologies in advance.
Those olives you see on the plate? Aren’t just any olives. They are:
Martini Drenched Olives
Normally, you put your olive into a martini. In this recipe, you put some martini into your olives! This is so simple and really adds a new and different flavour to some otherwise ordinary olives.
2 cups green olives (I used stuffed olives because I had them)
3 tbsp vodka
1 1/2 tbsp dry vermouth
1 tbsp lemon juice
1 tsp shredded lemon zest
8–10 cracked peppercorns
Instructions
Rinse the olives under cold water and drain.
Combine all the other ingredients.
Place the olives in a bowl.
Pour the other ingredients over.
Refrigerate for at least an hour. (I kept mine in the fridge for nearly a week).
But you know what? If your going to have some martini drenched olives, why not make also make a Drenched Dirty Martini. It is Friday after all!
Drenched Dirty Martini2
The Drenched Dirty Martini is a dirty martini made with Drenched Martini Olives.
[yumprint-recipe id=’32’]
Drenched Dirty Martini
Have a great weekend!
PS – Love to hear your thoughts on the quick and dirty post. I live in awe of the bloggers who manage to do something daily and would love to be able to increase my output. Your feedback on me just banging something out like tonight v agonising over every comma is most appreciated! Thanks as always. xx
One of the best things about 2014 was connecting with other cooks and bloggers and cooking from the same books. I love doing it in person at the Tasty Reads bookclub but it was also so much fun doing the Joan Crawford inspired dinner for Jenny’s book launch.
Which is pretty much all cook-a-longs. They choose a new book every two months and anyone can cook from the book and post on their own site. Then, Leah shares what everyone posts on The Cookbook Guru. What a great idea!!!
The book for January and February is Jane Grigson’s Vegetable Book. First published in 1978, this has become a classic. And very auspicious that I get to start with a book full of retro recipes.
I was even more excited that there were a whole heap of artichoke recipes because the local continental deli had been having a sale and I bought about a ton of artichokes because they were something insane like 50 cents a can.
Then I read Jane’s advice on
How to choose canned artichokes.
“Don’t”
Huh….Jane apparently doesn’t mince words. I like her already. But anyway I hightailed it out of artichokes and landed at the very other end of the book at watercress and found this lovely recipe for a very fancy grilled cheese called Locket’s Savoury.
Locket’s Savoury 2
I did have a little giggle when I read the name of this dish. Back in the day, we used to have a footballer by the name of Lockett nicknamed Plugger because….I have no idea why and have sufficient lack of interest in football to be arsed to Google it. Anyway, some time before the Grand Final one year (the equiv of the Super Bowl or the FA Cup Final), Plugger hurt his groin. And I swear for an inordinately long amount of time, it seemed like if you picked up a newspaper, turned on the radio or the tv, all you heard about, all people seemed to care about was Plugger’s Groin. Strangers would approach you on the street and say “So, do you think it will be good for the Granny?”
“What?”
“Plugger’s groin.”
Not since David Beckham made those underwear ads has an entire nation been so obsessed by the state of a football player’s nether regions. And yes, by the way…we do nickname our Super Bowl/FA Cup etc The Granny. As in a little old lady. That’s Australia for you.
So, all that was Lockett’s Unsavoury, let’s turn to the matter at hand – Locket’s Savoury
So simple. So delicious, and just 4 ingredients.
Bread
The original recipe called for white bread. I used this beautiful seeded ciabatta. Jane’s recipe called for the crusts to be cut off. I left mine on because I love the taste of the toasted seeds!
Locket’s Savoury – Bread
Watercress
One of my favourite greens. I love the peppery taste of it!
Locket’s Savoury – Watercress
Pears
Are probably my least favourite fruit. Will this recipe redeem them in my mind?
Locket’s Savoury – Pear
Stilton.
Mmmmmm…blue cheese. Happy days….
Locket’s Savoury – Stilton
Stilton is apparently the king of cheeses. Who knew cheese had a royalty. Who’s the queen? And more importantly who is the red headed reprobate prince flashing it’s arse and donning a swastika for high jinks?
I’m betting it’s goats cheese.
Locket’s Savoury3
This was awesome. It actually made me like pears. And that’s saying something!
There’s a few more totally awesome watercress recipes in this same book and I have a ton of it left so you may get a few more o’ these before the month is through. There is definitely one more I have to do.
Locket’s Savoury 4
Here is Jane Grigson’s recipe:
This was really good. Super tasty, super easy and I wouldn’t change a thing in Jane’s recipe.
Or would I?
The more I thought about it, the more it seemed very unfair that my gluten-free friends missed out on this delight.
So without further ado, meet the pimped up, gluten-free Locket’s Savoury
Pimped Up Locket’s Savoury
Basically, scrap the bread, use a slice of pear as the base. Add your watercress and Stilton. Throw in some chopped walnuts. Once done, sprinkle with some chives.
In some ways this was almost better. Those pears got all caramelised and…dare I say it, delicious!!!
I’m so looking forward to doing the Cookbook Guru Cook-a-longs. And you know what would be even better? If you all did it too…
If you did want to, you already know the book for the rest of Feb. March and April is The Food of Morocco by Paula Wolfert. My local library has a copy of this. Yours probably does too. I also got the Jane Grigson book from the library.
But PS..The Locket’s Savoury is the gift that keeps on giving. Those little bits of blue cheese that slide off as you grill the cheese and go kind of crunchy. So good to eat later!!!
Have a fabulous week!
And I would love to know your royal family of cheese!!!
OMG…these were so good!
