inner pickle

A slice of Wednesday

One of my long-time favourite blogs closed down recently and it really got me thinking.

About how much time we spend recording and revisiting, about what we're not doing while we're busy blogging, about what the motivation behind blogging is. You know. Light and easy stuff. 

It strikes me that blogging, particularly at high frequency, is something people do for a specific period of time, but is something pretty hard to sustain long term.

Some people do it - I seriously don't know how Soulemama manages fresh and crafty posts day after day while homeschooling and mothering five children. I love The Pioneer Woman but there is so much going on over there now I find it hard to know where to look. Loobylu is one of the best long-term bloggers around and she had a huge hiatus a couple of years back (and earlier this year too.) 

It feel weird when a favourite blog closes down, like a breakup you kind of weren't involved in. 

My very good (real life) friend Estelle had a blog that I loved. I was very sad when she abandoned ship and I live in hope that because she hasn't cancelled her typepad subscription therefore she might make a comeback. Estelle is involved in my very favourite custard recipe (we put together her mother's recipe and my mother's recipe and got nirvana.)

She's a marvellous foodie. 

And she sent me a slice recipe, before I started this slice thing here. I thought it sounded WEIRD. 

She admitted it sounded nuts too, but urged me to try it. 

So today I did.

She called it the most amazing nutty, brownie like cakey slicey thing EVA. (Direct quote).

We might call it "Estelle's Insane Slice".

And FAR OUT it's really good. And if you thought the Easy Slice was easy, try this. 

 

Estelle's Insane Slice

Ingredients:

1 cup crunchy peanut butter

¼ cup honey

1 egg lightly beaten

1 tblsp cocoa

Method:

Mix all ingredients together and pour into a greased and lined loaf tin (mine was 22cm by 11cm) and bake for 20 mins on 180degC.

Estelle: "I'm not joking, that's it." (Direct quote.)

Four ingredients. It takes approximately two minutes to make.

Next time I'll double it and put it into a slice tin. 

Insanely good.

(Did I say we'd do a healthy meusli bar slice this week? Er, how 'bout next week?)

So do we think there's a future in blogging? This uniquely public record of private worlds? Or is it a strange and short-lived snapshot of all these domestic lives all over the globe that people will um over in a hundred years time. They're going to look at this slice and go, peanut butter, honey, egg and cocoa? Those pre-apocalyptic Australians, they were insane. And far out they ate a lot of slices. 

xxx

the clean-out-the-fridge brownie recipe

Hi! So there's a lot of rain going on over here, and by here, I mean south-east Australia.

Our wide brown land is less droughts and all about flooding rains today. Adam and I are part-way through selling a house in south Brisbane which we are very much hoping will not slide down the hill before settlement. (And, obviously, that the tenant and her children are safe.)

Friends all over Twitter and Facebook are talking about the chaos in the supermarkets and the composure of the Premier. You have to love a woman in charge in crisis. I always loved Anna Bligh. But then I was a heart-felt Queenslander for the three years I was there. It sticks with you, that place. 

So if you're reading this in the not-so Sunshine State, I hope your carpets are dry and your cats and dogs are indoors. 

Makes me feel petty, whinging about not being able to get my washing dry. 

In other news: we are officially on the home stretch in this Sydney adventure. As I drove around looking for a parking spot after a late-night grocery shop tonight, and parked a mile away up the street, lugging my bags in the gate I thought: won't miss this. 

We move on Monday next week. 

I should clarify - I'm not packing up the house. I've mentioned boxes in reference to all the sorting out and getting rid of we're doing. I'm not actually packing the whole place up. I thought I was, then Adam booked the packing service option with our removalists, and I didn't argue. (I may have high-fived him.) Three small children. No family in Sydney. It's money very very well spent, I think. 

It may also take a little while to get our internet up and running in our new place and so posting next week may be a tad haphazard. I'll be here till this Sunday though.

Anyway, I was all organised. I did an inventory of the pantry, the fridge and the freezer and managed to write a dinners-list which used stuff up. The last few moves have seen me madly dropping over to friends' houses with bags full of fridge and freezer stuff on the last day. I swore I was going to be better organised this time. 

So we were a few days into my menu plan when I came home and there's a big fruit and vegie delivery on my doorstep. 

I am an idiot.

Before Ivy was born, yep, that was June, I put my weekly delivery on hold until 31st December, and promptly forgot about it. I called up the service and thanked them, and permanently cancelled my order and she reminded me I had an uncancellable dairy order arriving the next morning. I am such an idiot. I was scared to ask how much milk was coming - back in June Tilly was still drinking milk like a young calf. She's slowed down now. 8 litres. 8 litres of milk on my doorstep.

So I abandoned my list and wrote another one. Which included yoghurt and custard.

What does this, sitting on the bench, inspire you to make?

Not pumpkin soup, there's already a butternut in the fridge earmarked for that. 

Baked pumpkin risotto? Roast pumpkin and haloumi salad? Nigella's pumpkin and goat's cheese lasagne?

This is my favourite game: here's your ingredients, whatcha gonna make?

(My crisper. The unexpected vegies.)

Ratatouille? Stir fry? 

Meanwhile, there's some cocoa and peanuts which really totally must be used up. Sometime this century. Why move them as raw ingredients? Much better to enjoy them as brownies, right?

No chocolate in the cupboard, so can't resort to my all-time favourite. This is a very good substitute though, I'm happy with this attempt. A bit of chew. A nice crumb. Nicely fudgey.

And if you don't like nuts, you can leave them out. 

Clean-out-the-fridge Brownie.

INGREDIENTS

250g butter

1.5 cups sugar

1.5 cups cocoa

1 tsp salt

1 tsp instant coffee

4 eggs

1 tsp vanilla

1.5 cups plain flour

METHOD

Melt the butter in a saucepan on a low heat, then stir in the cocoa, the coffee and the sugar and stir until smooth (just a minute, don't let it get too hot). Take off heat. Beat in the eggs, then add the vanilla, the salt and the flour. Stir up well and add nuts if you like. 

Bake for 30 minutes on 180 degrees. (I use a square 20cm cake tin.)

Only one saucepan and the baking tin to wash up. Awesome. 

There's time to think up a use for the kilogram of cheese that was delivered too.

xxx

Lazy lady

Some people cook with a recipe most of the time. Some people never use recipes and just wing it. 

I have to admit to supreme dorkdom: I memorize recipes. Always have.

I carry quite a lot around in my noggin, most of them very basic, Country Women's Association-type recipes.

This one, it is actually called Lazy Lady, I used to make when I was a kid. 

This recipe is in Mum's recipe book, but when the idea of Lazy Lady struck me this afternoon, Mum was not at home. So I made it from memory. I got to about the end and it didn't look right with one cup of flour so I added another cup of flour and the milk and it looked perfect. And tastes exactly like I remember it. 

It's just a good old chocolate slice really. It's quick to make and not too fudgy or brownie-like, it's just a bit crumbly and delicious with a cup of afternoon tea. 

Here it is.

Lazy Lady. Recipe provenance unknown - from a friend of my Mum's, I think. 

125g butter, melted

1 cup brown sugar

1 egg

2/3 cup cocoa

2 cups self-raising flour (or plain flour + 4 tsp baking powder)

1/2 cup dessicated coconut

1/2 cup milk

 

Melt the butter and mix in the brown sugar. Add the egg and mix well. Add the cocoa and the flour and the coconut and stir. Add the milk and stir. 

That's it. 

Pop it into a 20cm square tin and bake on 170°C for approx 15 mins or until springy in the centre. 

Ice it in the pan, while still hot.

ICING: 

1 cup icing sugar (or CSRs Icing Mixture which is sugar + tapioca starch)

1/2 cup cocoa

1 tbsp soft butter or margerine

3 tbsp milk

coconut for sprinkling

Mix all your icing ingredients together and slather on.

Oh, and if you lick the bowl at all, make sure you wipe your face before you answer the door or it might be only after the organic vegies delivery dude has left that you notice the chocolate streak from mouth to ear.

Dorkdom. On so many levels. 

xxx

 

Always room for a brownie...

What do you do with a jar of Nutella in the cupboard after Christmas that you've had there to make chocolate truffles with that you didn't get around to making?

You eat it by the spoonful, of course.

Until better sense gets the better of you and you frantically google "recipes with Nutella" to save you from yourself.

Nutella brownies, recipe from here, they kindly provide the calorie, cholesterol and saturated fat content per bar: I suggest you carefully don't read this. 

An excellent way to use up the Nutella, a lovely treat for my sweet-deprived children, but honestly, if you're into brownies in any way, not a patch on these.

The Best Brownie. Ever.

I think I found it.

And I tell you, it was a long delicious road from here...

... to the final fabulous non cakey Brownie.

I freely admit I did not create the Recipe of Awesomeness.

I've mentioned it before, a blog I love, Lemonpi. She gave me the recipe but didn't actually create it either.

The original recipe is from Baked which is now officially on my Christmas wish list. 

In fact when Lemonpi does Brownies she does them with bacon. How cool is THAT? 

I'm not brave enough to do bacon when I've only just met this Brownie, maybe someday soon.

Just to demonstrate my commitment to this challenge (best Brownie evah) I think I'm up to 5 recipes. This one being the sixth. And I've made it twice. The first time is the photograph at the top, and I added white choc chips which you can see in the middle. 

They don't need them.

The white choc chips added crunch and texture variation but tip the balance on the sweet stakes. This Brownie, with its teaspoon of salt, is a perfect perfect balance of killingly sweet and rich and not too much so. 

So I've made them again without the rogue chocolate and they're cooling in the kitchen as I type, making the house smell amazing. 

Before I give you the recipe, allow me to give you the photographic back-story to the photo at the top of this post.

Trying to take photos of cake-related items without small hands in the frame can be hard.

Dum-de-dum, I'll just clean up this crumb, then?

Oh. You can see me?

I'm just going to see if these Brownies fit into my bag, OK?

No? Just a little poke?

Well then, I'll just keep my eye on them and check they don't run away while you're taking their photo.

BROWNIES

(Makes 24. Original recipe from Baked by Matt Lewis and Renato Poliafito. This one from Lemonpi.)

1 1/4 cups plain flour
1 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons dark unsweetened cocoa powder
311g dark chocolate (60 – 72% cacao), coarsely chopped [I used Lindt 70%]
226g unsalted butter, cut into 1-inch pieces
1 teaspoon instant espresso powder
1 1/2 cups caster sugar
1/2 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
5 large eggs, at room temperature
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

Preheat the oven to 176′C. Butter the sides and bottom of a 9-by-13-inch glass or light-colored metal baking pan.

In a medium bowl, whisk the flour, salt and cocoa powder together.

Put the chocolate, butter, and instant espresso powder in a large bowl and set it over a saucepan of simmering water, stirring occasionally, until the chocolate and butter are completely melted and smooth. Turn off the heat, but keep the bowl over the water and add the sugars. Whisk until completely combined, then remove the bowl from the pan. The mixture should be room temperature.

Add 3 eggs to the chocolate mixture and whisk until combined. Add the remaining eggs and whisk until combined. Add the vanilla and stir until combined. Do not overbeat the batter at this stage or your brownies will be cakey.

Sprinkle the flour mixture over the chocolate mixture. Using a spatula (not a whisk), fold the flour mixture into the chocolate until just a bit of the flour mixture is visible.

Pour the batter into the prepared pan and smooth the top. Bake in the center of the oven for 30 minutes, rotating the pan halfway through the baking time, until a toothpick inserted into the center of the brownies comes out with a few moist crumbs sticking to it. Let the brownies cool completely, then cut them into squares and serve.

Tightly covered with plastic wrap, the brownies keep at room temperature for up to 3 days.

As if they'll last that long.

xxx