Creamy White Wine Garlic Prawns in the Tropics

 

Eating fresh prawns and seafood are synonymous with Christmas and living in Tropical North Queensland. The further North you travel the more seafood becomes the preferred option for a delicious Christmas meal. When it comes to eating seafood, often freshly cooked, chilled, and unadorned is what I prefer, however a plate of home cooked garlic prawns is always a delicious way to enjoy them. 

Portuguese Custard Tarts cooked in my Pie Maker amid Cyclone Jasper

Why  travel to Lisbon or anywhere else in Portugal to enjoy their famous Portuguese Custard tarts, when you can make them in your own kitchen at a fraction of the cost, and honestly they are just as delicious. We holidayed in Lisbon about 15 years ago, and we really did enjoy their custard tarts, note the plural, every morning with our espresso coffee along with the locals, but now I am just happy to cook and eat them in my own kitchen. It's cyclone season here in Far North Queensland, and Cyclone Jasper has been and gone.

In My Kitchen, December 2023

 

I'm in the mood for Christmas now, which is great, because it's nearly here and the stunning colours of Christmas are naturally occurring in our garden. Bring it on. It's been a big morning today. The fruits for my Christmas Cake and my Christmas Plum Pudding are now macerating, and the Rum Ball mixture is chilling in the refrigerator. I'll roll these traditional little festive balls in coconut tonight. I needed to start all of these preparations early at 6.30 am this morning, before the heat of the day set in, and I am so relieved that I have made a start. Hopefully the cake will be baked and the puddings made by the end of this week. I am usually earlier than this making the Christmas cake, but I've been fairly casual about it all this year, and they will still taste great and make it feel like Christmas, even if lunch is fairly simple. 

Sourdough Focaccia with Rosemary, Avocado, Goat's Cheese and Balsamic Dressing

 

Whenever I bake Sourdough Rosemary Focaccia and then eat it, enjoying its crunchy crust, and savouring its unique sourdough and rosemary flavours all over again, I wonder why I don't make it more often. It really is the easiest bread to bake, faster to rise than most loaves, and with so much potential to be served in so many interesting ways. The target rise required for Focaccia bread isn't as great as for normal bread, so it's going to be faster to make which is perfect during our Summer. I've also used a very small amount of baker's yeast in this recipe to ensure the dough requires minimal kneading and will conveniently rise and bake on the same day, unlike most sourdough loaves which require overnight fermentation.  Fresh in season avocado, delicious soft goat's cheese, and a Balsamic Vinegar Gourmet Glaze was the perfect lunchtime topping for my latest loaf. 

Prawn Taglierini

The ratio of prawns to pasta in a dish like this one can be a personal choice for the cook. I originally cooked this dish using a kilo of prawns and about 300 g of pasta because I love prawns and I think one of the saddest things when eating is when a prawn pasta only has a scant number of prawns in the dish.

Classic Slow Cooker Tomato Pasta Sauce

This is a classic homemade tomato pasta sauce recipe for the home cook which I find is one of the best sauces to have on standby in my kitchen for a quick and simple meal. Everyone needs quick dinners in their recipe repertoire, and with this sauce most of the work is already done. 

Spiced Pumpkin, Orange and Prune Cake

 
This cake is full of golden pumpkin, aromatic spices, orange juice and half a cup of our home produced honey. Whilst we don't really celebrate Thanksgiving here in Queensland, we are planning for Christmas already, and we know that it will be Thanksgiving in the Northern Hemisphere very soon. This cake will be nice and comforting to bake and have on hand as part of the Thanksgiving celebrations. The aromatic spices combined with orange juice and honey are wonderful flavour enhancers in this cake, and nobody will even guess that the cake contains pumpkin, well perhaps at Thanksgiving the adults will, but the children won't. Pumpkin is such a versatile vegetable.