I love a road trip. Wind in your hair (or airconditioning in your hair), music strumming, a gorgeous destination and a boot packed with chilled nibbles for the route. It was this idea that inspired the latest The Perfect column in Sunday Life magazine. My New Zealand grandmother Marion used to pack homemade sausage rolls for my parents in their twenties as they headed off on some road trip to the South Island, or up to the Bay of Islands. My parents still remember these morsels, and I’ve always wanted to do them myself. Using shortcrust pastry instead of puff pastry is important – they hold together better, and taste so much better cold. The meat is chopped rather than minced, which I much prefer – there’s a real texture instead of the spongy sort. Soft chicken sandwiches, sliced almonds giving a pleasing crunch, are perfect palm-sized snacks for the road.
Preheat oven to 200C. Line a baking tray with baking paper. Combine meats in a bowl, add nutmeg, zest and thyme, season with pepper and mix well. Place pastry on a floured bench top, cut each sheet each in half. Divide and shape meat mixture into 4 sausages, each as long as a pastry sheet, then roll each in parsley. Place 1 sausage along the edge of a pastry sheet, brush pastry edges with water. Fold pastry over filling to form a long roll, open at the ends. Repeat. Cut each roll into three, place rolls on baking tray, brush with milk and sprinkle with poppy seeds. Bake for 25 minutes, until golden.
Chicken, almond and caper tramezzini
Soft Italian chicken sandwiches for the perfect pit stop.
Cover 1 x 320g chicken breast fillet with water in a saucepan, season with sea salt and peppercorns, simmer 10 minutes. Turn off heat and leave in water for 10 minutes, then remove and let cool. Use hands to finely shred chicken, then combine in bowl with 3 tbsp mayonnaise, 2 tbsp almond slivers, 2 tsp capers, rinsed, and ¼ cup chopped parsley. Season to taste. Pile mixture on 6 thick slices white bread, crusts removed, top with 6 slices. Cut into square quarters, wrap and pack.
Did you see The Perfect… column in Sunday Life magazine on the weekend? It was one of my favourites so far. Cooking for the in-laws can be fraught with too-much-effort and disappointment. Instead, showcase domestic know-how and culinary spark when the in-laws are in town. It’s about being relaxed and remarkable. How to impress with minimal fuss. I made this three times to test the recipe, and while it’s hard to keep thinking something is delicious even though you’ve eaten it for three meals in seven days, this one was. The pomegranates give a bursty tart crunch, and the spatchcock are not fiddly and are gorgeous wrapped in these spices. Just serve with couscous and a simple do-ahead eggplant salad.
Pomegranate roasted spatchcock
Tart and sweet roasted spatchcock, infused with Middle Eastern spices and scattered with jewel-like pomegranate seeds and almonds.
6 tbsp extra virgin olive oil, plus extra
1 garlic clove, sliced
4 tbsp pomegranate molasses
1 tbsp cumin
1 tbsp ground ginger
2 tsp ground cinnamon
3 spatchcock, butterflied
¼ cup sliced almonds, toasted
seeds from 1 pomegranate
To make marinade, place all ingredients except spatchcock, almonds and pomegranate in a bowl, mix well and season. Add spatchcock to marinade and turn to coat well. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 2 hours or overnight. Preheat oven to 200C. Heat a little oil in a roasting pan over medium-high heat, add spatchcock (reserving marinade) skin-side down to lightly brown. Baste spatchcock with marinade and cook in oven skin-side up, until tender and juices run clear (15-20 minutes). Serve halved on a large platter, with cous cous if liked, sprinkled with almonds and pomegranate seeds. Serves 4-6.
Spiced eggplant salad
A do-ahead, fragrant and soft eggplant salad with punches of mint.
Heat ¼ cup olive oil in a large frying pan and fry 3 eggplant cut into 2cm thick slices in batches, until very soft and golden brown on both sides. Add more oil as needed. Drain on paper towel and season well, sprinkle with 1 tsp ground cumin. Arrange warm eggplant on serving plate, scattered with 1 large tomato, finely chopped, and 1 cup mint leaves. Drizzle with dressing made with 2 tbsp yoghurt, 1 tbsp tahini, juice of ½ lemon. Sprinkle with pomegranate seeds if liked.
Photograph by Katie Quinn Davies.
{THE PLAYLIST}
The gritty blues of Ruth Brown in Miss Rhythm makes for a dreamy backdrop, to suit all tastes. How can you not love this?
Drink in one hand, crunchy spiced bite in the other, and a bunch of friends to clink glasses with. The perfect celebration drinks are intimate, elegant, and supremely fun. These recipes appeared in my Sunday Life column, The Perfect… Check out the next one on Sunday, or see it at Daily Life here.
Oyster po’boys
A New Orleans palm-sized sandwich, piled high with glorious fried oysters.
1 egg
2/3 cup milk
1/3 cup plain flour
2 tsp smoked paprika
½ cup panko crumbs
20 oysters, shucked
2 cups rice bran oil
4 small soft white rolls
1 baby cos lettuce
4 cherry tomatoes, halved
spiced mayonnaise (see below)
Whisk together egg and milk, season and set aside. Combine flour and paprika on one plate, panko crumbs on another. Dust oysters in flour mixture, then dip in egg mixture, then panko crumbs. Heat oil in deep heavy-based frypan. Use tongs to drop oysters, in batches of 5, into hot oil. Deep-fry oysters until golden, 30 seconds each batch. Be careful, oil may spit. Drain on absorbent paper. Fill rolls with lettuce leaves, tomato, mayonnaise and oysters. Add a few sprigs coriander if liked. Serve while oysters are still hot. Makes 4.
Chilli fried school prawns
Heads on or off, these fun crunchy are perfect with bubbles or beer.
Take the heads off 500g raw school prawns (optional). Dust prawns in seasoned tapioca flour. Heat half of 750ml rice bran oil in a wok or large, deep heavy-based frypan. Cook one-quarter of the prawns in very hot oil, until crispy and golden. Transfer to absorbent paper. Repeat with remaining prawns, adding more oil as needed. Season well with salt flakes and dried chilli flakes. To make spiced mayonnaise for dipping, combine ¼ cup Japanese mayonnaise with juice from ½ lime and ½ tsp smoked paprika.
Food photograph by Katie Quinn Davies.
PLAYLIST: Bright, happy, cheers-worthy tunes for celebration drinks with Awkward, an EP by San Cisco.
A feast of colourful foil-wrapped eggs and golden bilbies were the chocolate prizes of excited garden hunts on the weekend. Now it’s the adult’s turn, try this chocolate tart with Italian coffee icecream. These two recipes were published in my new column in Sunday Life magazine on Sunday, did you catch it? This tart is totally simple to make, and the coffee icecream is a perfect pairing. The Perfect column in Sunday Life is all about situational perfect occasions. We match the perfect wine with the perfect meal and the perfect playlist for the perfect occasion. Check out the next column this weekend.
Chocolate tart
Why should kids have all the fun at Easter? Rich chocolate in a most decadent form, light and oozing on a biscuit pastry base.
450g sweet shortcrust pastry
150g dark chocolate
125g unsalted butter
5 eggs
1 cup caster sugar
½ cup plain flour, sifted
Blind bake shortcrust pastry in a 23cm diameter round tin according to packet instructions. Preheat oven to 180C. Combine chocolate and butter in a bowl over saucepan of simmering water, stir gently until melted. Set aside. Combine eggs and sugar in a bowl over saucepan of simmering water and whisk until thick, about 10 minutes. Ribbons should form when whisk is lifted. Whisk chocolate mixture into egg mixture, then whisk in flour. Pour mixture into tart case and bake for 15-20 minutes, until just set and still wobbly. Serve at room temperature with coffee ice cream. Serves 8-10.
Italian coffee ice cream
Spoonfuls of velvet melting coffee give an adult note to the indulgent feast.
Whisk 6 egg yolks and 3 cups cream in a heat-proof bowl. Add ¾ cup roasted coffee beans and place over saucepan of simmering water for 10 minutes, stirring until thick enough to coat back of a spoon. Remove from heat, add 1 cup caster sugar, stir until dissolved. Cover, refrigerate for 2-3 hours to infuse. Turn freezer to coldest setting. Use ice cream maker and follow instructions or strain custard into 10x20cm loaf tin, cover and partially freeze. Transfer to bowl, beat well, then return to loaf pan and freeze overnight.
THE PERFECT.. playlist: Ethereal and boppy in one, with a twinkling Australian accent, Holly Throsby’s record Team.
Finally, I hear you sigh, an explanation. Yep this is why I’ve been so hopeless at the blog. I’ve been working. It’s a funny thing this blogging thing. We start because we are dying so hardly to write about food and take pictures and visit excellent places and then say all there is to say about all the things we’ve done. And then somebody comes along and and asks you to write something for them. So you do. And then another person does. And next thing you know you’re not a blogger but a nine-to-fiver (as a term of phrase clearly, not actual hours). And you’ve neglected the very source of all the goodness, the work and the real-life pay: the blog. So that is where I am right now, and I’m completely thankful for everything.
One of the miraculous things that has happened work wise is my new column for Sunday Life (yay!), called The Perfect … Did you see it launch on the weekend? The column is situational, so The Perfect… Picnic and so on. Each week I’ll do two recipes to help inspire the perfect culinary scenario. So do get A Sunday Life on the weekend to see the next one. So far we’ve done The Perfect.. Picnic, and here are the recipes for those who missed it. May as well have a lovely day out on the sprawling lawn before summery months completely disappear. Hope you like!
Rustic onion tarts
A sweet and salty savoury tart that can be sliced to order after swims, casual cricket, hide and seek. “Beware of crumbs” warning doesn’t apply today.
166g ready-rolled puff pastry (1 sheet)
3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil, plus extra
5 large onions, finely sliced
2 sprigs thyme
2 garlic cloves, chopped
8 cherry tomatoes, halved
120g goat’s curd
1 handful basil leaves or baby herbs and flowers
Prepare pastry bases. Cut pastry sheet in half to create two rectangles. Use a knife to draw a line 1cm inside each base, without cutting through. Use a fork to prick inside each rectangle 8-10 times. Place bases on a greased baking tray.
To make caramelised onions, heat oil and cook onions in a medium saucepan over low heat for 40 minutes, stirring to prevent burning. Add more oil if needed. Add thyme and garlic, season, then cook for another 10-15 minutes. Set aside.
Preheat oven to 200C. Top bases with onions, leaving edges bare. Dot with cherry tomatoes. Bake for 12-15 minutes, until golden. Once cool, dollop with goats’ curd, then scatter with leaves or flowers. Serves 4-6
Berry trifle jars
Portable and completely pretty, little layered desserts in jars add another sweet note to the day.
In a food processor, roughly chop 1/4 cup toasted hazelnuts and 8 amaretti biscuits, then divide half the mixture between 4-6 small glass jars with lids.
In a bowl, mix together 250g mascarponecheese with 2 tbsp milk, ½ tbsp brown sugar and 1 tsp vanilla essence. Fold in 1 cup lightly crushed frozen blueberries or blackberries, divide between jars. Layer with remaining nut mixture. Top with fresh berries, place lids on and store in esky with iceblock and spoons.
Loved interviewing six women – Yumi Stynes, Sandra Sully, Margaret Pomeranz, Fleur Wood, Margaret Fulton and Nicole Trunfio – for the Sunday Lifecover story on the weekend.
Having fun in your 20s, rearing a family in your 30s or getting wise in your 60s – at what age do women feel most fulfilled? Kate Gibbs talks to Yumi Stynes and others about the best years of their lives.
Yumi Stynes, 35, refuses to dye her hair. She confesses she’s lied about her age in the past, “partly a female thing and partly a vanity thing”, but will not budge on the tell-tale long grey streak running through her almost black hair. “This shows I am a warrior! This is an indication of the life I have lived, of the scars I have acquired. Why would I deny myself those symbols? I am proud of who I am and what I have done.”
Favourite weekend ever probably, thanks to the Sydney Writers Festival, and the rain, and the lovely friends to spend it with. Two of the three talks I saw were down in Walsh Bay, where festival goers packed the streets, or hid from the incessant rain in the newly opened Fratelli Fresh, the tapas bar Firefly and a massive warehouse-style bookstore set up just for duration of the festival. Both Fratelli and Firefly are worth visiting, by the way. In the former we had linguini with parsley and lemon breadcrumbs and a bistecca with anchovy butter. And wine. There must be wine at lunch on such a literary-based and rainy day. At Firefly, the fabulous Jeremy Hyman and David Bushby and I shared grilled haloumi, and a massive never-ending pot of olives after the Alan Ramsey and Senator John Faulkner talk and before the Christopher Hitchens talk in the evening.
More on the actual festival, anyway. On Sunday Annabel Crabb, the political journalist, talked to Tony Abbott on the difficulty of truth, amusingly, and the thinking behind his recent memoir Battlelines. He talked about his disappointment after the Liberal’s loss at the last federal election and why he’s so addicted to athleticism – be it physical, religious, or political.
Meanwhile, Christopher Hitchen’s talk covered mainly his life and work, and there was little on his atheist beliefs. He was amusing and incredibly intelligent, albeit damning and impatient with the (admitedly horribly phrased and pretty stupid) questions coming from the audience. I’ll get his new book Hitch-22 anyway.
The Kitchen Inc. blog is written and edited by Kate Gibbs - a journalist, author and cook.
Food, travel, design >> How, when entwined together, these things inspire our daily culinary experience >> The Kitchen Inc. covers food, kitchen-based inspiration, and workable design as it impacts our dining, eating, cooking lives.
Kate Gibbs writes a weekly column for Sunday Life in The Sun Herald called The Perfect... She is a regular contributor to the SMH on food and travel. She writes food features for The Wall Street Journal.
Kate writes for The Foodies Guide to Sydney, The SMH Good Cafe Guide and SMH Everyday Eats. Kate has 11 years' journalism experience and has written for Russh, Australian Gourmet Traveller, Frankie and others. The interest in journalism began at London's The Evening Standard newspaper. Her first cookbook, The Thrifty Kitchen, was published by Penguin in 2009. Kate's grandmother Margaret Fulton is also in the food business.
In The Kitchen Inc, Kate writes restaurant, bar and cafe reviews, and shows the most interesting and inspiring places to eat and gastro-explore. Kate reviews new food-relevant design and books, she writes about new trends in cooking, how different ingredients are being used by our top chefs and cooks, and how to use these ideas at home.
