Pumpkin Quandry

I got this pumpkin on holiday - yes, stopping at the roadside stall was the most exciting bit! There were lots of exciting bits I just love this stuff.

Anyway, anyway, anyway, it turns out that this pumpkin is not as nice as it looks.

I baked some thinking it would be sweeter that way and I could make pies, pasties, soup and just eat it. Nope, no joy... blurgh!
I made some soup, onions, sweet potato, baked blurgh, chicken stock, curry spice mix and cinnamon. Then added coconut milk and a heck load of chopped coriander. It was so nice that DH took it to work!!! SHOCK!

My second try was a bit of a long shot. I'd seen a recipe for a brownie with a cheesecake swirl (I made pumpkin cheesecake swirl).. Anyway anyway, one was runnier than the other, didn't work out and I ended up just mixing them together and baking it. I topped it with the BROWNING SECRET RECIPE CHOCOLATE SAUCE.
It was chocolate overload (heaven for some of my friends) with secret vege ingredient.

Bad bad picture, but this was all that was left after a day or so. Sooo fudging good!

DS1 loves smooshing his hand in the remains and feeling all those slimy seeds. I think these will definately be toasted and eaten, not sown and grown!

Any more suggestions welcome!

Now I'm off to bake the rest and think of what to do with this whopper ham I have in the fridge. Reduced from $60 to $40! Slice it and freeze it?

Anyway, anyway, anyway, lemons are calling. Tree is ripening and I am loving it!! I'm dedicated to make lemon butter this year, already made lemon surprise pudding..

Bits and bobs

Best shortcut in the world... frozen cookie logs. These are made with coconut and left over Easter egg chocolate. Yummo


The banana mousse made out of those left over bananas that I stuck in the freezer. I think I overdid the cream as it took more gelatine than the recipe. yuuuumo.

Baby Yohghu-brow smearing yoghurt all over another cross pollinated zucchini from bro and co. (xx!)

Ba-naa!

Ok so here's my banana toasted muesli (the original recipe was el blando so I added a cup of honey and some cinnamon DS1 loves it :o)

And here's the caramel banana "tart". I didn't have puff pastry so I just used a short crust pastry recipe and it was diviiiiiine! Went a bit crazy with the caramel.. didn't need as much but it was still way delish.

My spring roll pastry had cracked while it was frozen so it was useless.So no banana rolls.

I was going to make a banana mousse (with gelatine, cream and pureed bananas). I reeeally hate making jelly from a packet as it's just sugar+colour crap+flavour crap. I don't have agar agar flakes so it's good old stinky gelatin powder..anyway I ran out of time so I stuffed the rest in the freezer. I'll stick a pic on when I get moussing :o)

Easter = not about bunnies

He Lives

Banana Bonanza

Some very lovely people from up the road dropped in a WHOLE bag of ripe bananas from the market this morning.

So here's what I'm going to make:  Caramel Banana Tart

Banana Sprill Rolls with the  left over (family recipe) chocolate fudge sauce

Banana baked muesli

and ofcourse the simplest and most delish..

ofcourse all of this is if I can be bothered.. been up a few times with teething baby - urgh!

Thanks Bro!

My brother lives down and inland (quite) a bit. Mum and Dad returned from visiting him and his lovely girls. They came back with what I thought was a little pumpkin but it's a zucchini! Mum took the top and I have the bottom all scooped out and ready to stuff.. haven't decided with what yet.

AND they brought back a bag of peaches they'd scrumped from a road side tree :o) hehe
Organic o'course being abandoned like that, so grubs here and there but OH MY!! What TASTE!
I had just recently decided that I didn't like peaches as the supermarket ones were revolting. I'd totally forgotten what REAL FOOD tasted like. Ahhh! THANKS!

Also dearest brother, you'll be happy to know that it's finally in and doing well. Only a few months late mind :o) Not expecting a huge crop this year ofcourse.

Lemonade

Here's a lovely pic of DH with the boys (and some orange tulips - aren't they divine!!) Everyone is juicing up the early lemons from the tree in the garden to make lemonade.

Here's the overgrown pumpkin vine (well the bit you can see, it goes down the whole side of the house and a bit over the neighbour's side) that has yet to produce any females THIS side of the fence - grr!

It's sad when hope rides on flower that's been a snail's dinner. Fingers, toes, eye all crossed.
This is the vine covering the old potato patch. These seeds came from a cucumber packet (I'm sure) and so I was a bit miffed when I realised it wasn't a cucumber plant.