Leek and Spinach Tart

This is one of my favourite "light meals" recipe. I spoke about Teresa Cutter before but honestly, this woman creates the best healthy clean recipes that are so nourishing for your body. I have made this tart a few times and even had it at my baby shower.

One of the reasons why I made this various times is because I have trouble removing tarts from tins. This version was one of the semi successful ones- but you can see it suffered some trauma. The filling is beautiful and the crust is so yummy though.

Some mistakes I made included
- Not oiling the tin enough
- Pressing the pastry too hard into the tin. Gentle pressing is sufficient.
-Not rolling the pastry evenly.
- Underbaking the crust.
- Using the wrong type of tart tin. I used the high wall type but found out that NOT all tins are created equal. Too thick a tin actually made it harder for the tart to be removed.

There was one week, that I was so frustrated, I made 3 tarts to prove that I can do it :x

Leek and Spinach Tart (Serves 10-12)
Crust
300 grams of Almond Meal
1 Cup of desiccated coconut or around 100grams
3 tablespoons of linseed
pinch salt
3 eggs

Filling
2 leeks
500 grams of spinach
500 grams of ricotta cheese
seasoning

Preheat Oven to 180C. Oil your tart tin VERY well. Blitz crust ingredients in the food processor. Roll pastry in between two pieces of baking paper and gently press it to the tin.

To make the filling, cook the leek with a little oil till soft. Add spinach till it wilts. Mix vegetables with ricotta and seasoning. Spoon into tart. Bake for 30 minutes. Serve with rocket and balsamic vinegar.

Turkish Gozleme

I'm starting to appreciate other cuisines. Growing up in Singapore, I had the luxury to try Indian, Chinese (mostly!), Japanese.. but never as extensive as growing up in Perth. Lebanese? checked. Indonesian? Checked. Thai? Checked. Fusion al carte Australian? checked.

It's weird. Seriously. I'm taking cooking Chinese tips from an Australian cookbook (I swear, granny, you are still the first I go to!). Or like in this case, Turkish Gozleme from the AUSTRALIAN Women's Weekly!

I loved it regardless. It means there are no boundaries in creating cuisine. Flipping through a few "Australian" cookbooks, it made me realised how much food bring different cultures together. Perhaps by printing a different culture recipe from a known writer, it gives me the guts to try something new. It means it can be done.

I had a go at making Turkish Gozleme at home one weekend, and boy oh boy, never did pounding dough feels so good. Is there such a therapy call Dough Therapy? Maybe that is how Turkish ladies get their tough arms from.  Perhaps that also explains why I never got a gozleme from an angry lady.

So I served this to my husband. And watch him smile.

Turkish Gozleme (Adapted from Australian Women's Weekly Eating Together)
4 cups of plain flour
1 tsp cooking salt-I used my sea salt
1 2/3 cups of warm water
2 tablespoons oil. I used olive

Lamb filling
3-4 tsp cumin
1 tsp paprika
pepper
1 tsp garlic minced
500 grams lamb mince
1 can of diced tomatoes
1/2 cup chopped parsley

Spinach and Cheese Filling
300 grams baby spinach
1 small red onion chopped
1 tsp mixed spice
150 grams feta cheese
1 cup of cheddar or mozzarella cheese

Make Dough
Combine flour, salt and gradually stir in water. Sprinkle flour on work surface. Don't forget to flour your hands. Knead dough. Hit it, punch it, just keep working on it till it is smooth. Return to bowl. Cover.

Make lamb filling
Cook garlic. Fry lamb till done. Add tomatoes and spices. Simmer. Cool.

Make spinach and feta filling
Combine all ingredients. I blanched the spinach first quickly and squeezed some water out.

Diver dough into 2 pieces. Flour work surface and rolling pin. Roll each piece into a square. Roll as thin as you can. Sprinkle spinach and cheese filling first, then topped it with lamb filling. Fold each edge over.

Using a well oiled grill pan, cook gozleme on each side till browned slightly. Serve with lemon/lime wedges.

Tom Yum Sausage Rolls

I love the versatility of Tom Yum paste. My granny loves it more as she brought TWO big jars over from Singapore. One and a half jar still remains in our pantry. This means creative ways of cooking up Tom Yum!

While preparing for morning tea for my colleagues, I thought of a different twist to the usual sausage rolls. Adding tom yum to the mince mix! The result was a moist and tasty sausage rolls. Thankfully, my colleagues loved it as well as there were NONE left by the next day. It's abit of a change as well, from bring sweets to savory to morning tea.

The roasted sesame seeds added an aroma and texture. Certainly goes well with tom yum!

Speaking of which, I would certainly appreciate more ideas for Tom Yum paste. Anything other than noodles, fried rice or sausage rolls! ;)

Tom Yum Sausage Rolls (makes around 20 mini rolls)

2 pieces of puff pastry defrosted
300 grams of chicken mince
2 tablespoon of Tom Yum paste
2-3 pieces of kaffir lime leaves chopped
1 cup of bead crumbs- I used dried but if you have stale bread to make into breadcrumbs, even better!
1 egg
2 tablespoon of corn flour
1 tsp of fish sauce
1 tsp of sugar
 2 tsp of toasted sesame seeds
Egg wash 

Marinate chicken with all seasoning for around 20 mins.
Preheat Oven 200C. 
Meanwhile, preheat oven and line baking tray with baking paper.Cut puff pastry into halves (lengthwise). Place sausage mixture in the middle. Egg wash all sides. Roll to seal. Cut into bite sizes. repeat for 3 other halves of puff pastries. Egg wash the top of the mini pastries and sprinkle sesame seeds. Bake for 25 minutes till golden brown.

Lemon Tart

I usually shy away from making pastry because I perceived them to be difficult, tricky, time consuming and unpredictable. The last thing I want is to make a tart and for pastry to fall off, or a base that is hard enough to break a person's tooth. Ah... the power of my imagination.

It turns out that to make a sweet shortcrust pastry isn't that hard. A few blitz in the food processing, resting in the fridge and tadah, ready to be rolled into the pastry tin. I used Donna Hay-because that is my "if this is new, look at Donnay Hay Classics" mantra. I think the pastry turned out slightly crisp but I would have preferred it to be slightly more crumbly. I might give Women's Weekly a go next time as their ratios of butter and flour seems slightly different to me (more butter I think).

I do like the filling! Nothing like a good citrus refreshing kick. The original recipe does not call for lemon zest, but since I have this lemon that I have squeezed, why waste the zest? I reduced the sugar slightly and even used a new product by Philadelphia- a low fat cream!!

My colleagues polished most of the tart off and I took 2 slices for AR. I did bring some fruits to go along with the tart, and cream of course. Since I was bringing it for office morning tea, I didn't cut a slice before packing it...and now I think the photo of it looks too plain! Definitely did not justify now lovely this tart was.

Lemon Tart

Short Crust Pastry
2 cups plain flour
3 tablespoons caster sugar
150 cold butter chopped
2-3 tablespoons iced water

Process flour, sugar and butter in food processor till it resembles breadcrumbs. While motor is running, add iced water till dough is formed. Turn dough out. Knead lightly. Wrap in pastry wrap and refrigerate for 30 mins.

Once dough is ready. Roll out between 2 sheets of baking paper, till around 2-3mm thick. Line the tart tin. Blind bake it (by placing baking paper, filling it with rice or baking beads) in preheated 180C oven for 10 mins. Remove beads and bake for another 10 mins till golden. Spoon filling in and bake again.


Lemon Tart Filling
3/4 cup of lemon juice (I used 1 and 1/2 lemons) and zest of it
1/2 cup of caster sugar (Was 3/4)
3/4 of pouring cream- I used Philadelphia low fat cream
3 eggs lightly beaten

Place lemon juice and sugar in heatproof bowl over simmering water. Stir till sugar dissolved. Add cream and eggs. Stir continously for 5 mins or so. Pour into tart shell through strainner. Bake tart for further 20-25 (mine took 25 mins) till filling is set. Cool and serve with cream or ice-cream.

Satay Chicken Triangles

Back in Singapore and Malaysia, Satays are a treat! Skewers of tender tasting meat, marinated for hours...cooked on a flamed grilled bbq and served with spicy nutty sauce. ooo.. just thinking about it makes me drool!

The version of Satay appears to be different in Australia. When I first saw satay on the menu, I was mortified to see "Satay chicken", "Satay lamb"..etc. And they are pretty much just meat simmer in a nut sauce. Not the tender tasting skewers of meat that I was used to!

Still, the casserole version tastes fairly decent. It's pretty much just peanut butter chicken casserole! (That sounds sooo mid western!). I wrapped the mixture in some puff pastry and viola! A pie is formed!

Satay Chicken Triangles  

Filling
1 chicken breast sliced thinnly
1 cup of peanut butter (i used the chunky kind)
1 red onion chopped finely
1/2 cup of chicken stock
1 carrot diced
1 cup of frozen corn
2-3 tsp of chili flakes
seasoning

3 puff pastries-defrosted
1 egg yolk

Saute onion till soft. Cook chicken till nearly done. Add chili flakes, stock and veges. Simmer for around 10 minutes. Add peanut butter. Stir till it melts and the casserole turns creamy. Do a taste test and season accordingly. Cool

Cut each pastry up to 3 squares. Spoon mixture into each square and fold across. Seal with egg yolk. Brush each pastry with some egg yolk. Bake in a 180C pre heated oven.

Spinach, Feta and Chicken Triangles

And so I am a fan of taking a few short cuts here and there. Having a few friends over for lunch, we decided to have a variety of dishes-the previous dish, honey pumpkin pecan salad was one of them. The plan for this one was to mix up some spinach, feta and chicken, wrap it in filo pastry, bake it and viola! lunch is served!

Two days before the lunch, I realised that in between coming home from church and preparing lunch in 45 minutes means time is tight! Not to mention, I am still a novice in handling filo pastry! I picture torn pastries, with spillage from the filling to the tray from my incomplete mess of trying to handle filo. So I chickened out and used spring roll pastry instead!

Surprise surprise, it was better than expected. Still with the crunch factor but not as flaky as filo of course. I think it was a tad dry and should have less chicken and more feta. Instead of shallow frying, I sprayed the parcels with some oil and baked it for 20 minutes. Lunch was served just in time!

Spinach, Feta and Chicken Triangles (makes around 12) 

1/4 of roast chicken shredded
50 grams of feta cheese crumbed
150 grams of slightly wilted baby spinach leaves
1 tsp of garlic
squeeze of lemon juice
cracked pepper and sea salt
2-3 tsp of poppy seeds

6 spring roll wraps cut in halves.

Mix mixture together. Spoon it on to spring roll wrappers and wrapped it from corner to corner to create triangles. Place them on trays. Spray with some oil and sprinkle poppy seeds over them. Bake in pre heated oven of 180 C for 20 minutes or till golden brown. .

Fruit Tarts

There are some food that you associate with breakups (i.e. chocolates), some that you associate with weddings (i.e. beautifully crafted cakes) and some that you associate with relationships. Well, I associate fruit tarts with time spent with my mother.

Growing up, I was never strong in my academic subjects. My parents enrolled me in numerous tuition class and never gave up encouraging me to do just slightly better. Every Sunday after church, my mother would encourage me to attend my English tuition by promising a nice lunch with her after tuition (plus window shopping of course). We would nearly always end up at Delifrance for some mother-daughter time and a fruit tart for me. Because mum works full time, those precious moments spent together were highly cherish by me, and I'm sure by my mum as well.

I love the custard that filled the sweet crust. The slight tang from the strawberries + kiwi fruit goes so well with the sweetness of the crust and custard. I remembered savoring every bite while mum and I chatted about tuition, school and shopping.

Well, so many years have past but my love for fruit tarts remain. I spotted Mrs Kwok's recipe and was impressed by how easy it seems to be...and so I thought! I underestimated the time and skill required to make these little beauties though and screwed up big time with the custard the first time round. Obviously, I did not heat the custard long enough and it was still watery. The 2nd time was better-but there wasn't enough custard to fill the tart shells! I quickly whipped up another batch of custard and that seem to be sufficient.

See how wet the custard was?

These babies aren't as pretty as the ones at Delifrance but bitting into one sure bring backs memories. Mum- fruit tart and lunch at Delifrance when I get back next year! =)



Fruit Tarts (4 large size tarts and 10 mini ones)

Custard Cream 4 tablespoon of corn flour
2 egg yolks
4 tbsp of sugar
200 ml of milk

Tart Shells
500 grams of cake flour
150 grams icing sugar
250 grams butter
2 large whole eggs

1) Custard- Combine egg ylk and corn flour. Whisk till ingredients combined. Add sugar into the yolk mixture and mix well. Warm milk on stove. Stir warmed milk gently into the egg yolk. Put the mixture back on low heat and keep stirring till it gets thicken (expect 10-15 minutes of stirring if not more). Chill.

2) Tart Shells- Cream butter and icing sugar. Add eggs. Fold in 2/3 flour by batches. Gather up dough and knead it genthly. Add remaining flour to make into a smooth dough. Roll dough in longular shape and cut into equal portion. (I cut 4 into big portions and 10 tiny ones). Shape dough into tart mould. Bake for 250 C in 180C preheated oven.

3) Assemble- Spoon custard cream into shell and top it with fruits. If you like, heat up some jam and glace the tarts.

Oven Baked Curry Puffs

I have been eying this recipe for ages. Curry puffs are one of my favorite snacks as a kid-in fact, my favorite part is the egg and the crisp edges. These treats are usually deep fried and are probably not the most healthy snack around, but arguably one that is the hardest to deny.

The first time I read the recipe, I thought it was waaaay too much work and procrastinated attempting them. The "one day I will make these" eventually turned into 3 years.


Because these curry puffs weren't deep fried, the texture of the pastry wasn't the same. Nevertheless, it had a slight melt in your mouth texture which I found surprising. The pastry was rather thin as well and you get a generous mouthful of filling. I did not follow the recipe for the filling as the original recipe required coconut milk which I was reluctant to use since I froze some of the remaining puffs.



Oven Baked Curry Puffs (makes 25)

Pastry
500 grams of plain flour
1 egg
150 grams of butter
50 ml iced water
pinch of salt
1 tsp of vanilla essence

Filling
3 potatoes chopped finely
1 onion chopped finely
3-4 tablespoon of your favourite curry paste
2-3 tsp of curry powder
1 tsp of minced ginger and garlic
pinch of salt

Egg wash
1 beaten egg

Pastry
1) Whisk egg till smooth. Add vanilla essence and salt.
2) Rub butter to flour till it resembles breadcrumbs.
3) Add egg mixture and iced water and mixed with both hands to form dough. Cover with damp cloth and chill for 1 hr.

Filling
4) Meanwhile cook potatoes in a pot of salted boiling water till just done. Drain.
5)Heat some oil in a seperate pan and saute the onion, ginger and garlic. Fry curry paste as well. Add potatoes and curry powder and cook throughly. Season if needed.
6) Set aside and cool.

Wrap
7) Preheat oven to 150C
8) Dust board with flour. Flatten a piece of dough to a thin disk. Place 1tbsp of filling at the centre and seal edges. Either use your fingers to fold wavy fringe or a fork.
9) Place puffs on baking tray. Brush with egg wash. Bake for 20-25 minutes till golden brown. Cool and serve.



I was lazy and used a fork to do the edges rather than pleating them. I wouldn't say they looked perfect but I'm glad I finally attempted them after 3 years!! And so, I have the privilege of bringing this dish to Dhanggit's perfect party dishes blog event. Happy first birthday Mayumi!!

Spinach and Fetta Pie

Spinach and Feta is another classic combination. The saltness of feta goes so well with the texture and taste of spinach. I have been wanting to experiment with filo pastry for a while now. The last time I used it was about 4-5 years ago. I remembered that experience to be tedious. The brushing of butter on each piece of filo. My clumsy hands tore several sheets of filo along the way and I was tired after making 24 spinach feta triangles! I decided to be less ambitious and tackle a pie dish this time round rather than individual tiny triangles that required more attention.

This time round, I tore a few sheets of filo again and was tired of brushing the pastry after the first 4 sheets. Then I grew lazy and decided to pile the sheets on the pyrex, praying that it will work. I figured out it will be more successful if I could stop tearing the pastry! Thankfully, the pastry still came out crisp and lovely despite not having butter brushed on individually. I'm pretty sure I have around 8-10 sheets on the pyrex.



Spinach and Fetta Pie (adapted from Donna Hay 1, pg. 170).
8-10 sheets of filo pastry
50 grams of butter melted

Filling
1 bunch of english spinach trimmed, soaked and washed.
150 grams of fetta crumbed
4 eggs
1/4 teaspoon of mixed spice
1 cup of light and easy evaporated milk
sea salt and cracked black pepper

Preheat oven to 200C. Tear spinach.

Prepare filo pastyr by brushing each sheet with butter and layering it with another piece of filo. Repeat. Place pastry in pyrex or square baking tray (around 8 1/2 inch pan), letting some of the pastry hang out.

Combine egg, milk, fetta, mixed spice and seasoning in a jug. Place spinach onto the pan first. Pour egg mixture next. Bake for 20-25 minutes till the filo turns golden.



ps: coincidentally, Singairishgirl made spinach puffs too!