Saturday, July 26, 2014

Mango Lassi With Help From My Noosa

Here is another easy recipe using my favourite yoghurt.  The Noosa flavour this time is mango, and what better to do with mango yoghurt than to make Lassi. I have a few surprise ingredients for my Mango Lassi, look below....With fast food this healthy, why wait?


2 tubs of Mango yoghurt


1 cup Mango Kombucha


Half of a pod of vanilla beans.


Whiz it up in a blender, and Bob's your uncle!


Enjoy for Brekkie, or with a proper Indian (homemade, or take-away).  This recipe is probably enough for 2 people.

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Here is a few garden pics for Summer 2014.






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Tuesday, July 8, 2014

Noosa Going To Like This

     Honey Yoghurt Panna Cotta w/ Cookie Crumbs

An easy dessert, served cold and no oven needed, making it great for a summertime treat.

            

                                           

Noosa yoghurt is made in Fort Collins, Colorado using a secret recipe from Noosa, Australia.  A quote from their website:

"We Aussies are famous for embracing other cultures, then adding our own little twist to make them our own. (It’s not “stealing,” it’s “being inspired.” There’s a difference!)
That’s exactly what we did with our Noosa Finest Yoghurt. We took a page from the Greeks (Ta, Greeks!) with their famously rich yoghurt. Ours is made in small batches, set, and infused with honey to give it that delicious sweet-tart tang, and smooth, velvety texture that sets us apart from the throng. We add just the right amount of fruit purees, made from the best the seasonal market has to offer, and pack it in clear tubs so you can see for yourself the lusciousness of what you’re about to enjoy."

I would like to start acknowledging local products.  Let us start with Noosa Yoghurt.

All the yoghurt cultures and a mild, creamy mouth feel.  They use local milk and honey in their products, which is great, right? It seems to me that this yoghurt is pretty popular here in Fort Collins. This recipe can be adapted using any of the flavours available, the sky is the limit!

 

For my recipe, and it can't be more simple....You will need 4 tubs of honey yoghurt. You don't need and added sweeteners, the yoghurt has just the right balance of sweetness.  Pour these out in a large bowl.


I grated in some tonka bean, or you can use vanilla/lemon zest.


Bloom then melt 4 small gelatin sheets and add to the yoghurt mixture.  Blend well.


Place in your moulds and set for several hours in the refrigerator.  I needed 6 moulds.


While they set, make some cookie crumbs.


When your dessert is set, turn out on a plate and baste the cookie crumbs over it.  I don't think anyone would mind if you drizzle a bit more honey.



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Friday, July 4, 2014

Toying with Tonka Beans

I guess I should break my silence and blog again.

While in the UK, I got to cook with and taste unpasteurised cheese.  Tartiflette

Here is more on the artisan cheese front:


....Anyway, I also got to discover:


Tonka beans are illegal in the United States (Horray freedom!) 

The ingredient in Tonka beans that make the FDA verklempt is coumarin.  Coumarin is feared as a nasty anti-coagulant .  It appears that it isn't that simple.  Wait, before you develop shpilkis in your genechtagazoink.  

"Humans would need to eat an unreasonably bovine amount of tonka bean to fall ill. The shavings of a single bean is enough for 80 plates. At least 30 entire tonka beans (250 servings, or 1 gram of coumarin total) would need to be eaten to approach levels reported as toxic—about the same volume at which nutmeg and other everyday spices are toxic."

Read more:





On to dessert!
Creme Caramel/Flan is wonderful, right?  Well, add some cream cheese and tonka beans 


Viola, we now have Flan de Queso w/ Tonka Bean.

1 cup sugar
1 (12 ounce) can evaporated milk
1 (14 ounce) can condensed milk
1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese
6 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 grated tonka bean

Caramelize sugar on stove top over low heat. Once caramelized pour into 8 ramekins. Let cool. Mix all other ingredients in blender. Once the caramel has cooled, pour this mixture over caramelized sugar in ramekins.
Place ramekins in 1 inch of water and bake in oven at 325 degrees for 30 minutes to 1 hour until only the very middle jiggles.  Let cool then refrigerate.  Like most baked custards let set for at least 4 hours, but these taste even better overnight.

Be even more defiant by finely grating a tad more of the bean over the top of the finished, plated dessert.



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In other news:

The garden WAS doing really well this season, in spite of; delayed planting, bunnies, bugs, etc.  Plenty of dedicated elbow grease for two months.....And this:





Gets hit with this:


....And becomes this:

                                      

Tomato plants become sticks.



 We may eek out a garden yet.  Some of the garden centres offered BOGO deals on vegetable plants.

Here is what I am phasing in for a solution to a multitude of gardening woes.  The rails to put hail/frost cover on are recycled old trampoline legs.  I even padded the edge with split pool noodles.  It is a work in progress, however.

                                               

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