Wholemeal Raisin Buns

These are really very tasty, and if made with either less sugar or a sugar substitute, could be a rather 'sort of healthy' breakfast snack.  

Wholemeal Raisin Buns

2⅓ cup wholemeal self-raising flour

pinch salt

115g butter

⅔ cup sugar

⅔ cup raisins

⅔ cup chopped nuts

2 eggs

⅓ cup milk

Pre-heat oven to 180°C

Sift flour and salt, tipping the meal from the sieve into the mixture once done. Rub butter into flour until crumbly. Add the sugar, raisins and nuts. Beat the eggs with the milk, and add to flour mixture. You may need to add a little more milk if mixture seems dry, a little sticky is OK. Take a portion of dough, around the size of a large egg, and roll it until ‘bun-shaped’, then place onto lightly greased, cold baking tray. 

Cook for 15-20 minutes. 

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For those of you who are not in Australia, please find here a selection of Measurement & Temperature Conversion Charts which should help with the accuracy of your own cooking. 

Iced VoVo

Cooking these Iced VoVo (VoVos? VoVoes?) was an exercise in bafflement. I was following a recipe that kept talking about cooking macaroons — not macarons, that’s a whole other technical cooking horror story waiting to happen. To someone else. I felt I was cooking something other than what was written. I had a vague thought that perhaps macaroons didn’t have pastry bases, but it wasn’t until I had spoken with a friend about it, that she told me I was in fact describing an Iced VoVo. Well, of course I was.

As an aside, what sort of name is VoVo? It sounds like something Eartha Kitt might lengthily purr while having her afternoon tea. Work with me, just close your eyes and you too can hear her ask for an Icedddd VoVoooooo with her unmistakeable voice.

Anyway, after some Googling, and remembrances to the foodstuffs of my childhood, I think my Nannas before me may have mixed up the recipe a bit and what we have here is what I’ll call an Iced (Macaroon) VoVo. 

Iced VoVo

½ cup plain flour

½ cup self raising flour

½ cup corn flour

115g butter

1 egg yolk

1 tbsp. sugar

pinch salt

3 tbsp. water

½ cup jam (the flavour of your choosing)

Preheat oven to 150°C

Sift flours, sugar and salt together. Rub butter into flour until crumbly.  Beat the egg and water together, then mix into flour mixture, making a stiff paste.

On a floured surface, knead the dough lightly, then roll out until thin. Cut into circles and place into greased patty tins (enough as needed to cover the bottom of the patty tin).

Onto the uncooked dough, place a ¼ tsp. blob of jam, then set aside while you prepare the topping.

Coconut Topping

30g butter, melted

1 egg

½ cup sugar

1 cup coconut

Mix all ingredients together, then place about 1 tbsp. onto the prepared VoVo bases. Cook for about 15-18 minutes, then remove to cool.

A word of advice… it may be best to allow the Iced VoVo to cool properly prior to tasting it. The jam will get exceedingly hot, and WILL scald the hell out of your tongue and bottom lip. Or so I’ve heard. 

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For those of you who are not in Australia, please find here a selection of Measurement & Temperature Conversion Charts which should help with the accuracy of your own cooking. 

Coffee Biscuits

I don't like the taste of coffee, and can only drink a very small Turkish/Greek coffee very occasionally. I do love how good coffee smells though. Bad coffee can just be sent to the bottom of the ocean for all I care, it's so olfactorily offensive I can hardly bring myself to imagine how it would taste. 

My Nanna's coffee biscuits smell amazing though, better than any coffee. Ever. I made these and could hardly stop myself walking into the kitchen to sniff the biscuits over and over. I make a bold statement, and say that these are the best biscuits I've ever eaten in my life. These biscuits could bring about world peace* because of their deliciousness. 

This recipe has made up for the 'Scones of Horror' by far, and I'm glad I decided to keep going. I have had many offers of help with the scones — thank you everyone! — and will be giving them another go next week. Maybe.

Coffee Biscuits

1½ cups wholemeal self-raising flour

115g butter or margarine, room temperature

½ cup sugar

1 egg

1 tbsp. coffee essence

Preheat oven to 170°C

Using an electric beater, cream the butter and sugar. Add the egg and coffee essence, then work the flour into the mixture to form a (sticky) dough.

At this point, pop the biscuit dough into the fridge for about 10-15 minutes, as the next stage is a little easier when the mixture is cool.

Turn the biscuit dough out onto a well floured surface, lightly knead then roll out thinly (3-5mm), using a floured rolling pin.

Cut into biscuit shapes then place onto a greased baking tray (or use baking paper).

Bake for 9 to 12 minutes. Remove the tray from oven and place the biscuits onto cooling racks after about 5 minutes or so. 

For this recipe I used store-bought coffee essence, however if you want to make your own, I've included a recipe for it below. 

Coffee Essence

4 cups of water

½ tsp. salt

250g coffee grounds

2 cups sugar

Bring water, salt and coffee to the boil, reduce heat and simmer for 2 hours.  Into a heat-proof container, strain the coffee (use muslin cloth or clean thin cotton cloth), discarding the leftover grounds.

Return the coffee mixture to the stove, adding the sugar and simmer for another 30 minutes.

This makes quite a lot, so you may want to halve the recipe. It will keep in your fridge for some time. Simmering coffee for 2 hours also makes your house smell tasty. Like a giant macchiato.

*I know that's not possible, but still...


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For those of you who are not in Australia, please find here a selection of Measurement & Temperature Conversion Charts which should help with the accuracy of your own cooking. 

Scones of Horror

I thought scones were easy to cook. I was wrong. Well, maybe they are easy to cook. I don't know. What I do know so far, is that I can't cook them.

I didn't photograph my first effort — I wish I had because the scones were really not beautiful, and it's hard to describe how indescribably ugly they were. I followed the recipe as best I could, however being asked to add 'enough milk as needed' is a little vague. My scones looked a lot like crumbly misshapen eggs, with measles. I have no idea what happened to make small brown spots appear all over the scones. They looked diseased. 

Second effort? Scone pancakes. Yes.

For my third effort, I'm just going to kidnap someone from my local branch of the Country Women's Association and make her cook my scones for me.  

Edit: I just took a photo of my second effort, it seems they also took on the horribly diseased appearance of their predecessors.

Peanut Biscuits

Lots of cooking happened this weekend, surprisingly! I was quite busy, in a very good and relaxing way. Friends, art, exercise, dinners, brunches, a movie, and community deeds filled my weekend. But of course I managed to cook a couple of biscuit recipes. 

Today's recipe is of a biscuit that just cries out to be dunked in a cup of coffee or hot chocolate, neither of which I really drink so I imagine you'll have to try it and let me know if my imagination at all aligns with reality! I cooked my biscuits for a tiny bit longer than the recipe asked for, so they were quite crispy — hence my dunking recommendation. What I'd actually recommend is that you cook them for 9 minutes, when they're still a bit chewy and yummy. 

Peanut Biscuits

1 cup self-raising flour

115g butter

⅓ cup brown sugar

⅓ cup white sugar

½ cup roasted & unsalted peanuts, chopped roughly

1 egg, beaten

Pinch of salt

Preheat oven to 180°C

Using an electric beater, cream the butter and sugar until smooth. Add the egg, peanuts and salt, then sifted flour, mixing until a sticky dough forms.  

Dollop tablespoon sized portions onto a greased baking tray, and cook for 8-10 minutes. Check the biscuits at 8 minutes if cooking in a fan-forced oven as overcooking can occur quickly. 

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For those of you who are not in Australia, please find here a selection of Measurement & Temperature Conversion Charts which should help with the accuracy of your own cooking. 

Granny’s Potato Cake

Granny’s Potato Cake is not what I would call a potato cake, it’s not deep-fried, and isn’t on any fish and chip shop chalkboard menu. It’s a cake you can make with left over mashed potato! I’m not sure that my ancestors had someone like me in mind, there’d hardly ever be left over mashed potato from a meal I’d prepare. Because mashed potato. Mashed. Potato.

Anyway, I visited Adelaide recently to see my brother and his wife’s newly born triplets (that’s a whole OTHER exciting story!), and in between hospital visits and helping my mum serve drinks at the local bowls club (a warm and caring bartender I am not) we looked at some of the recipes to prod me into making this project a bit more real. We sorted and grouped items by type; cakes, biscuits, sweets, etc. There is going to be a whole section on Christmas cookery, which I am looking forward to. The recipe we thought we would cook with the minimum of fuss first up was the one below — Granny’s Potato Cake. We cooked it twice. The first effort was somewhat hideous — brown sugar really shouldn't be used if white sugar is in short supply — but this version below surprised us at how light and tasty it was.

Granny’s Potato Cake

¾ cup of mashed potatoes. Mix with butter & milk [as for dinner]

¾ cup sugar

1 cup milk

1 cup sultanas

2 cups self-raising flour

A few drops vanilla essence

Preheat oven to 180°C.

Mix potato and sugar, making sure of no potato lumps, then add the sultanas and milk. Mix throughly. 

Sift the flour into the mixture, combine all ingredients well. 

Place into greased and papered flat baking tin, such as a lamington tray.

Topping

2 tablespoons butter

2/3 cup sugar

1 tablespoon desiccated coconut

Nutmeg, to sprinkle

Rub butter, sugar and coconut together. Spread as evenly as possible over cake mixture, then lightly dust with nutmeg.

Bake for 45-55 minutes.

Serve with tea and enjoy!


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For those of you who are not in Australia, please find here a selection of Measurement & Temperature Conversion Charts which should help with the accuracy of your own cooking.