Tag: Gluten free

Chinese peanut and celery salad

Bunch of cut celeryPeanut and celery salad with boiled pork dumplings

The Hungry Girls had a guest blog on The Design Files in January 2012. We included a recipe from each of our books accompanied by photographs by Leah and and illustrations by Katherine. Follow these links:

Monday – the story of the Hungry Girls

Tuesday – Cherry tomato, herb and chilli fish (Volume 1)

Wednesday – Chinese peanut and celery salad

Thursday – Quick Spanish dinner (Volume 2)

Friday – Yoghurt and white chocolate pannacotta (Volume 3)

The Wednesday recipe was a new one, so I’m including it here too … Continue reading Chinese peanut and celery salad

Annual mushroom soup

Pine mushrooms and wood blewitts

I thought we’d well and truly missed mushroom season this year. For pine mushrooms (saffron milk caps) it’s autumn, and now it’s July and we’ve only just managed to rustle ourselves out the door and in the car and down to my dad’s place in South-West Victoria, where we have a secret mushroom spot nearby. We found it about five years ago and going back has been a highlight every year since. I jump out of the car and skip around like a schoolkid, way too excited. My husband is the stealth hunter and gets straight to business, finding and cutting the best and most beautiful specimens over the hills. Continue reading Annual mushroom soup

Tomato kasoundi

Jars of red and green tomato kasoundi

Last weekend was the final hurrah for our old kitchen and bathroom. Now our weatherboard worker’s cottage has been stripped of its lean-to addition and reduced to four very cosy rooms, each one really having to pull its weight. We have a study/kitchen, two bedrooms/storage, and a living room/everything else. We’ll be spending the next few months building a new kitchen, bathroom and larger living space, and I’m aiming to be very calm and graceful and to take our chaos in my stride! (A wry smile from my husband.) Continue reading Tomato kasoundi

Green bean, coconut and yoghurt salad

Green bean, yoghurt and coconut salad

Tonight at dinner our 18-month-old daughter finally decided that beans are pretty good. We didn’t have to cut them up into little pieces and ask her to ‘go quick’, which is a silly game that involves her stuffing as much into her mouth as fast as possible, and sometimes ends with the food dribbling back out (we resort to it only if we’re getting a bit desperate). We also didn’t have to scatter tinned tuna on top like I did the other day at lunch, or sneak bean pieces in on chopsticks hiding behind something else more appealing. Instead she sat there with a half-eaten bean wobbling in her hand as if to say, you know what, Mum and Dad, these aren’t bad. ‘Maw’ she said after she’d eaten that one, and I thought, hurray! Continue reading Green bean, coconut and yoghurt salad

Broad bean stir-fry

Broad bean stir-fry (with pickled mustard greens), and tofu tomato stir-fry

About three weeks ago, spring officially ended in our vegie patch. I pulled out the lettuces that were all of a sudden full and large, the parsley that had gone to seed, and a small, proud patch of my first ever beetroots and carrots. Saddest of all, I picked the last of the broad beans, then chopped off the stalks a few centimetres above the dirt. Instead of a lush green view out the kitchen window, we were left with rather desolate beds scrappily covered with last season’s mulch. And it was suddenly a very different feeling gazing out the window while doing the dishes. Continue reading Broad bean stir-fry

Italian chickpea bread

Italian chickpea bread and salads

A few years ago, while searching in an op shop, I found a small hardback cookbook that’s become a favourite. Believe it or not, good cookbooks are so hard to find in op shops that I’ve almost given up looking. You sift through a gazillion microwave and diet cookbooks and mostly come up with nothing. Continue reading Italian chickpea bread

Brown-rice nori rolls

Brown rice nori rolls

We’ve been eating lots of sandwiches of late. When I can, they involve homemade sourdough, and we toast them up in a frying pan with a splash of olive oil to make them extra delicious. But still, it equals bread for lunch, and I don’t think it’s clever if we’ve also had bread for breakfast. Continue reading Brown-rice nori rolls