foodie.tv

Recipe courtesy of a Chinese whisper (from Wendy who got it from someone in her mother's group).

1 cup self-raising flour
1 cup plain flour
1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
125g butter
1 1/2 cups brown sugar, lightly packed
1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
3/4 cup milk
1 egg
1/2 cup chopped walnuts or pecans

Grease pan, sift flours and nutmeg into bowl, rub in butter, mix in sugar. Press 1 1/2 cups of the mixture into pan. Stir combined soda and milk into remaining dry ingredients with egg and nuts, mix well, pour into pan. Bake 190C for 35mins. A good cake for freezing, picnics and lunchboxes.

We went to Sydney on the weekend, basically so James could see the Brumbies lose to the Ta's. Apparently he got a little 'tipsy' during the match.

On Sunday we managed to navigate our way to the Royal Sydney Easter Show at the newish Homebush Park venue. The kids loved the bits they weren't too tired to see, the mock high five performers, the Holden stunt driving team - Jontes favourite, the petting enclosures, ice cream treats and the cows.

Georgia was a volunteer for the Sydney Olympic Games and her name is on one of the hundreds of poles at the entry of the park.

Today was Pau Pau's Birthday she is looking really happy and healthy, both Dad and Mum have lost quite a few kilo's due to their low GI diet. They have said that they haven't had to change the way they eat too much so its been easier to diet this way then others. Mum said she had a lovely afternoon with Jade and they were off to the Lobby for dinner, we are trying to organise a birthday breakfast for her on Saturday. So hope you had a great day - we love you.

A couple of shots with the zoom lens. I think some colours were a bit washed out - need a different ISO setting I expect, the day was very bright.

My camera broke last week - I have had sleepless nights worrying about what to do. After much research and discussion I finally bought a Canon SLR 350D. I am really happy with it, still so much to experiment with. As you can see James and the kids didn't have much success fixing the old one.

I am still using the kit lens as I am saving for a macro but it seems to work ok.

Its that time of year, the cusp between autumn and winter, crisp bracing mornings with the scent of frost and to warm up the evenings, steaming bowls of soup. We had leek, potato and chickpea soup - easy to make just cook some chopped leeks, potatoes, chickpeas in some stock for 20 mins and puree.

Last weekend we traveled to Austinmer (small coastal town close to Wollongong) to stay with the Tregurtha's. Trog's mum and aunt have built an amazing beach house on an old family plot. Bec and Trog had invited all the old gang from Baxter for lunch and a beach visit on the Sunday. The Coffee/Bradleys, the Cox/Fulliloves, Laybutts, Simingtons, Cranes and the Millers. All our closest Baxter friends have now had children, the ages ranging from just under 1 to around 7.

Bec said she enjoyed herself so much that she might even make the lunch an annual event - the clever layout of the house allowed the kids to have plenty of playing space inside while the adults could relax on the deck overlooking the beach and cliffs beyond.

This is our favourite recipe for this type of cookie.

1/2 cup butter
3/4 cup white sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/4 cups plain flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
250g white chocolate bar chopped or broken into pieces
100g macadamia nuts, chopped

Preheat oven to 190C
Cream butter and sugar, stir in egg, vanilla and then fold in flour, baking powder and salt, stir into the creamed mixture. Finally stir in the nuts and white chocolate. Drop teaspoons onto a cookie sheet and bake for 10 mins or till lightly browned.

I think everyone gets this problem with home gardens, lots of one vegetable or fruit in abundance all at one time. You end up juggling boxes of overflowing ripe fruit and peddling free produce to the dazzled looks of the neighbour's or work colleagues. Most don't mind or are too polite to say anything. Last year we had plum's and zucchini's, this year it's strawberries, cucumbers and cherry tomatoes (and still more tomatoes). My favourite way of eating these over ripe, warm sunbaked morsels is on top of creamy marinated feta and snap crisp crackers.