It’s just past tomato season; I made this relish back at the end of February when tomatoes were at the peak of their harvest. This tomato relish has lots of flavour and is great with vegetable fritters, on steak sandwiches or as an accompaniment to meat.

The sweet / acidic flavours will depend on the tomatoes and apple, so add just a little of the sugar and vinegar to start with, ‘reduce’ the relish and then add a little more to taste as necessary. You can always add more, but you can’t take it out if it’s too sweet or acidic.

This relish stores well in the fridge for a few days or you can double or triple the recipe and bottle it for later. Makes approximately 1 cup.

Method

1. In a saucepan, sauté the onions in a little oil over medium heat until soft. Add the apple and garlic and continue to cook for a further couple of minutes.
2. Add the tomatoes, mustard, allspice, sugar and vinegar, stirring.
3. Bring to the boil and then reduce the heat to a simmer. Simmer until reduced to a consistency that you like (I reduced mine for about 20 minutes).
4. Serve warm, bottle in a sterilised jar and process or let cool and refrigerate until use.

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This potato salad is always a hit at BBQs and functions, is easy to make and can serve a lot of people on a very small budget. I’ve included prosciutto, four thin slices cost less than a dollar and add a gourmet touch, but for a vegetarian version, leave out the prosciutto altogether.

I took this salad to our Christmas celebrations and so used a kilo or so of potatoes, I usually allow for a potato or so per person (depending on the size of the spuds) and adjust the rest of the ingredients to suit.

Above I used garlic chives, which we have growing in our garden. I love being able to go out and snip a few chives for the salad – for free!

I’m surprised I haven’t shared this recipe before – it’s one that I learned from my mum and that I often take when I’m asked to ‘bring a salad’.

Method

1. Boil potatoes in salted water until tender and drain.
2. Place eggs in cold water and bring to the boil. Boil for 12 minutes then drain and rinse under cold water. When cool enough to handle, peel eggs and roughly chop.
3. Fry prosciutto over medium heat until browned, roughly chop and set aside.
4. Combine mayonnaise and sour cream. Taste and adjust ratio according to preference. In a large bowl, toss the potatoes, eggs, prosciutto and mayonnaise mixture until well combined. Add half of the mayo mixture and increase until you have the spud to sauce ratio you prefer.
5. Using a pair of kitchen scissors, snip the chives over the potato salad, lightly tossing to distribute. For presentation, sprinkle a little prosciutto and chives over the top.

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Homemade chips aren’t that much more difficult to cook than the frozen, store bought variety but the do taste light-years better and are much healthier.

Use an oil that heats well at high temperature like rice bran oil. We use macadamia nut oil and it gives the chips a lovely flavour.

You only want to use as much flour as will give the chips a very light coating. Too much will leave your chips floury once cooked. So add a little and toss, adding a little more if you need to. They don’t need to be completely coated in flour.

For homemade wedges, make exactly the same, but add some Cajun spice mix with the flour and paprika. Or for a different flavoured chip, add a little rosemary or garlic with the flour.

Method

1. Preheat oven to 220°C. Pour a little oil onto a baking tray and heat the tray in the last few minutes of pre-heating the oven.
2. Leaving the skins on the potatoes, cut into wedges and par-boil for a couple of minutes (you want them under cooked). Drain and put back on the heat for a few seconds to let any excess moisture to steam off.
3. Sprinkle the flour, paprika, salt and pepper over the chips. Put the lid on and give the pot a good shake to coat the chips and rough them up a little.
4. Spread chips onto the hot tray and cook for 30 minutes, turning once half-way through. Nice served with sour cream and chilli sauce.

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I recently read a wonderful Australian book called Healthy Family, Happy Family. Not only does it have some great ideas for ensuring children are eating healthy meals, and tips for encouraging fussy eaters, it also has many excellent recipes (like mango French toast, strawberry, honey muffins and parsley and cashew pesto). The salad dressing below (the best I’ve ever tasted) is from the book. The recipe makes a large batch, but keeps well in the fridge for a few weeks, if it lasts that long.

Method

1. Add all ingredients to a screw top jar and shake until combined. Leave on the bench for a few minutes after refrigeration and before serving to let the oil liquefy again at room temperature. Shake just before serving.

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This is a guest post from my husband Colin.

I’m the guy who used to pick the capsicum off his pizza.

When Mel’s talking food and makes comments about ‘fussy partners’ it’s me she’s talking about. My wife is a good cook who uses ingredients well. A quick search through the recipe section will show that. To my knowledge she has only ever tried to kill me with once with food. We were staying the night in a caravan park at Lennox or Brunswick Heads partway through the 1300 km drive to Sydney. Had she been successful the CSI investigators would, after removing their sunglasses, point out the murder weapon; a half empty bowl of Indian Curry. Motive would be difficult to establish if it weren’t for the fact we were staying the night in a caravan park at either Lennox or Brunswick Heads partway through the 1300 km drive to Sydney.

[Melissa’s note: it wasn’t that hot. ]

There’s a saying ‘there’s no such thing as bad weather, only inappropriate clothing’. I’ve heard it twice in the past week and both times it was from a Scotsman which speaks volumes of the Scottish climate. Anyway, the same can be said about food. There are no bad ingredients only bad recipes, if recipes are being used at all. Boil a Brussels sprout and tell me I’m lying. Sauté a Brussels sprout in garlic butter and and do the same.

If there’s something that you don’t like to eat find the best sounding recipe and try it. Don’t like mushrooms, try Stroganoff. Not fussed with zucchini, try Ratatouille and if capsicum is not your thing try this…

Steak with Capsicum Salsa

1. Cook the steak how you like it
2. Quarter the capsicum and clean out the seeds.
3. Place the capsicum under the grill skin up.
4. When the skin blackens remove and peel (covering in tin foil after grilling makes this easier).
5. Place the capsicum on a chopping board add a good splash of olive oil and chop it down to a salsa.
6. Add chopped parsley and steak juices if you pan fried the steak.
7. Mix it up and serve on the steak.

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Meat and veg. Easy. Healthy. And really tasty with this simple recipe. Cook all the vegetables together in one pot to save on washing up. If you use pumpkin and overcook it a little it goes mushy and spreads over the other vegies. Yum. A favourite I had forgotten about for a while.

Method

1. Boil or steam vegetables until tender. If you are using dense vegetables like potatoes, you may need to cook these for a couple of minutes first before adding the other vegetables.
2. Drain well and add the remaining ingredients. Put the lid on and give the whole lot a good toss and shake to distribute the dressing. Reheat gently if necessary before serving.

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I admit that the photo doesn’t look all that appetising, but this recipe is actually quite tasty. And as a bonus it is healthy and quick to make. I would say it is also quite inexpensive, but as someone has poisoned the winter crops up north, tomatoes and eggplants are going to get a little pricey for a while.

Use this as a dip with some toasted Turkish bread or as a sandwich spread. In the photo above, I have spread it on toast with some cream cheese, a nice combo. The recipe makes about 2 cups.

Method

1. Preheat oven to 200°C (390°F).
2. Cut all vegetables into chunks. Place in a large baking dish, drizzle with oil, sprinkle with salt and bake for 45 minutes or until soft (the time will depend on the size of the vegetable chunks. If they are really small, it may take less than 45 minutes).
3. Cool and process in a blender or use a stick blender until just smooth. Add lemon juice and extra salt to taste. I used about 3 Tbsp. Just keep tasting and adding until it tastes good.
4. Store in the fridge, but this pate tastes better at room temperature.

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This onion jam is simple to make and can be made while the rest of the meal is being prepared and cooked.

While the recipe calls for red onion, I usually just use the brown onions from the pantry and it tastes just as good. You could also vary the type of vinegar you use. I generally don’t measure the sauce or vinegar, so taste and adjust the sauce quantities to your liking.

Method

1. Cook onion in some oil over very low heat until softened and starting to caramelise (about 20 minutes) stirring occasionally. Don’t let the onion brown.
2. Add the rest of the ingredients and cook for a few extra minutes giving it a stir every now and then.
3. Serve over sausages (or anything else you fancy).

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I’m not a salad fan, so when I’m asked to bring a salad to a function, I try to make it as tasty for me as possible. Eating a bunch of greens just doesn’t do it for me.

This is the salad that I came up with for Christmas day with my favourite ingredients, feta and pumpkin. I love the salty-sweet combo. We actually didn’t use pine nuts in the end as they were way too expensive and we were coming close to blowing our budget, so I substituted toasted slivered almonds instead. I think pine nuts would have been better. Also, the only rocket I could find was pre-packaged rubbish, so I skipped that too, but the peppery taste of the rocket would be a nice balance to the sweetness of the pumpkin and dressing.

The salad dressing was a honey balsamic dressing.

I made this the day before, so the pumpkin was cold. I just put everything in separate containers and built the salad just before serving, in order to keep the flavours separate. Don’t dress the salad until the last minute as it will make the salad soggy.

The only downside: putting the oven on to make a salad. The pumpkin roasted: we roasted.

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 220°C (430°F). Toss the pumpkin in some olive oil and salt and pepper. Bake for around 30 minutes or until browned and cooked through, tossing once during cooking.
2. Lightly toast pine nuts in a dry pan over medium heat and set aside.
3. Wash and prepare salad leaves, drying them well. I never thought I would say this, but a salad spinner is so worth it here!
4. Build your salad by tossing a little dressing with the greens. Taste and add more but don’t overdo the dressing – you don’t want to clothe your summer salad in heavy dressing . Add the pumpkin and feta tossing slightly. Sprinkle with the pine nuts.
5. Drizzle with a little more dressing and serve immediately.

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When it comes to comfort food we often think of mashed potato or pasta, but soft polenta would definitely have to be my favourite comfort food. I love its soft, carby, creamy, buttery goodness.

You can get instant polenta which cooks in only a few minutes, or regular polenta that takes about 40 minutes to cook. I’ve only used regular polenta so I can’t compare, but I’m told that it is better than instant.

When making polenta a skin kind of cooks to the bottom of the pot. To clean, soak in water overnight and this skin just peels right off.

Of course, it’s the real cream, the real butter and the real parmesan that make this dish so good.

Method

1. Bring the stock or salted water to the boil
2. Pour in the polenta, stirring as you pour. Bring to boil then reduce to low heat and simmer until done, stirring regularly. ‘Done’ can take a few minutes if you’re using instant polenta or approximately 40 minutes with regular polenta. If the polenta gets too firm, then add some extra water as it cooks. If you want firm polenta, use less water.
3. When soft, stir in the butter, cheese and cream and serve.
4. For firm polenta leave out the cream and spread across the base of a slice tin. Refrigerate until cool then cut into slices to pan fry or grill.

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