In My Kitchen, June 2024

 Dear friends, Welcome to this newsy post about what I've been up to In My Kitchen this past month. And now as the weather cools down beautifully for the short Northern Queensland Winter, I'll share with you a little about what is happening in my garden, as the edibles we grow end up in my kitchen. We are still dressed in t-shirts and shorts during the day when on yard duty, and this morning Mr. HRK and I spent the whole morning in the garden, planting new seedlings, pruning, reminiscing, and enjoying the Winter sunshine. What bliss. 

Juicy limes are in season, and when I was given a few by a friend from Pickleball, to celebrate I made this Coconut Lime Syrup cake.  This is one of those faithful cakes that is never a flop, always turns out and is always fresh and delicious. It's just made in one large bowl, and can be prepared early in the morning ready to be served warm for morning tea. The quintessential lime syrup can be simmering on the stove while the cake is cooking. This is one of my favourite cakes and brings back nice memories which are included in the post I wrote about the cake.

During this past month, we were away for 3 wonderful weeks in balmy Cairns, in Tropical Far North Queensland, playing in a Pickleball tournament at the North Queensland Games for one weekend, and enjoying visiting our daughter. Remember the Spice Girls, and what a hit they were? Well in Cairns, the Spice Girls Herb company is making some wonderful sachets of various herbal combinations. I bought the Chai Spice Tea and used it to make a delicious Chai spiced pear cake when we came home. This cake is a recipe in Emelia Jackson's new book "First, cream the butter and the sugar." Please check out the recipe here at this link, you will be so glad you did.

Chai Spiced Pear Cake

With the few limes that were left after cake baking, I made a batch of lime curd in the microwave, using exactly the same method as I use to make the lemon curd. Delicious.

My daughter loves the Mingle seasoning products, which the company promotes as containing no nasties. I made a Chicken satay for dinner in her kitchen with the Satay spice blend and it was delicious. No photos of that dish though, I cooked it in her kitchen, and forgot to take any photos. She loved it. I know they sell Mingle at Woolworths, not sure where else though.

There was a Tandoori Chicken Traybake which we really enjoyed over two nights.

Easy and healthy Chicken Pilau was one of the first recipes I ever posted on Happy Retiree's Kitchen, way back in February 4, 2014. It's still a recipe that I enjoy to cook and eat. This is an old photo, because guess what, I made this dish a couple of weeks ago and it was gone before I had time to take a photo.

A curried Beef Chow Mein with a medley of vegetables including cabbage, is always a delicious mid-week meal. I made it for dinner a few nights ago, and then we ate the leftovers for lunch. It's another easy and low cost  mid-week meal on rotation in my kitchen. I like to serve it with rice or noodles.

I've discovered this range of healthy spiral pastas by San Remo, which have enough fibre and nutrition to be even eaten just with cheese without feeling guilty. There are quite a few flavours including chick peas in the range. I cooked up the recipe on the back of the packet, and substituted zucchini for eggplant because that is what I had on hand, and included chorizo, tomatoes and Italian herbs, and it was delicious.

We had a real cold snap come through a couple of weeks ago, it must have plummeted to 10 degrees Celsius one night,  and these Slow cooked Italian Lamb Shanks warmed us up beautifully.

Even though sadly we don't have our beehive anymore, I was thrilled this morning to see lots of bees in the pink Cuphea, and the Butterfly bushes.

There are bees in there.

 Can you see the bee in the lower red circle? I was sure I saw one in the top one as well, but it's difficult to make out now. Flowering bushes and shrubs can be full of bees, but it is so difficult to catch a photo of them with a mobile phone camera. 

We bought a large pot of parsley from Bunnings this morning for $9.00, and I broke it up into 11 plants. Given that a sachet of fresh parsley from the market or the supermarket costs around $4.00 each, I think this is the economical way to do it. I'll grow a couple of plants in a pot, and the rest in the garden. Can you really have too much fresh parsley on hand to cook with? 

This is a tomato bush against Mr. HRK's shed, which I am hoping will be loaded with lots of those small tomatoes, perfect for salads. It has grown so quickly.

Now that it is officially Winter, my mint patch has decided to grow. I'm quite excited. Mint hates the Summer heat.

I planted some spinach seedlings.

My beautiful tropical orchid is taking centre stage on the patio.

This one is happy to strutt her stuff in the orchid house.

A friend gave me this new pot for smaller plants, I love the colour. The painted rocks were a gift from a friend at Easter.

This beautiful red coleus brightens up our front garden. She is very happy in Winter. Many thanks to Marj for thinking to take this photo.

 I am sending this post to Sherry of Sherry's Pickings for the In My Kitchen event. If you would like to join in, send your post to Sherry by the 13th of the month. Or just head over to her blog to visit more kitchens and see some of her lovely art work.

Warm wishes

Pauline