Salt and Pepper Squid with an asian salad

For me, salt and pepper squid is always a 'go to' meal on a menu that I know will always have good seasoning and flavours. I quite often see it on menus in the entrees section so it is always good if you don't want to have that "  I've eaten too much - bloated feeling" not good!  Why do we order so much food and feel like you have to eat it all since you paid your good hard working money for it? Even if that means your gonna suffer afterwards. About 90% of the restaurants where I live have main meals that are way way over sized and honestly just shouldn't be able to fit in one persons stomach. Apparently our stomachs are roughly the size of our fists, but can actually stretch about 10 times larger than this! I dunno about you but the thought of my stomach expanding that much freaks me out a little!

What do you think?

Back the Squid!

This recipe has so many great flavours in it that complement each other perfectly!
From the spices in the salt and pepper mix to the chilli in the dressing!
This recipe is also gluten free as it uses rice flour.

The recipe is open to changes and is not strict at all! If you don't have ingredients- don't worry :)

Just swap and change thing around -Get creative! The dressing is quite hot so you can take out the amount of chillies if you wish :)

Recipe

Salt and pepper mix:

2 t Szechwan Pepper

2 star anise

1 cinnamon stick

2 t coriander seeds

2 t dried red chilli powder

100 g sea salt flakes

300 g rice flour

Asian Salad

1 cucumber, peeled into ribbons

1 red pepper (capsicum) deseeded and sliced

1 red onion, peeled and sliced

1 spring onion

1/2 cup fresh coriander

1/2 cup fresh mint sprigs

1/4 cup fresh Vietnamese mint

1 cup mung beans

Nahm Jim Dressing

4 birds eye chillies

4 cloved garlic, peeled

4 coriander roots

75 ml lime juice

3 1/2 T fish sauce

Squid

12 squid tubes

oil for frying

sweet chilli sauce, Asian plum sauce or aioli for serving.

What to do

 Salt and pepper mix-  put all ingredients except rice flour into a frying pan and fry gently for about 5 minutes or until fragrant.

 Then grind this with a pestle and mortar. Place in a bowl and add rice flour.

Salad - mix together all salad ingredients in a bowl.

Dressing -  Grind chillies, garlic, and coriander root in a pestle and mortar into a paste.

Then mix with lime juice and fish sauce in a bowl.

Toss through the salad.

Squid -  Clean tubes and remove membrane (if not already done)

Score the squid with a knife (not cutting it right through)

Then roughly chop into desired size. Or into rings if you prefer.

Dust with salt and pepper mix.

Deep fry in fryer or in a wok in oil.

Fry until golden. 

Serve with your chosen sauce.

Enjoy!

Let me know what you think! 

Brit xx

Kiwi Fruit Jam Recipe - Easy

I recently put a photo on Instagram of Kiwifruit Jam I made a while back. I was taught how to make this in chef training while we were making bread.

Lets talk a wee bit about kiwi fruit.

In New Zealand we call them "kiwi fruit" but from my understanding the rest of the world seems to call it a "kiwi" ?? So just to clarify I am making a "kiwi Jam" for everyone outside of NZ! :D

We usually refer ourselves as 'kiwis' over here because one of our main national icons is a bird called a Kiwi. I hope that wasn't too confusing!

Back to the Jam!

Recipe

1 kg Kiwi fruit

1 Cup water

Juice of half a lemon

900 g white sugar

What to do

→Peel the kiwi fruit and wash.

→Chop the fruit into a pan then add the water and lemon juice.

→Simmer until the fruit is tender, then mash it ans stir in the sugar.

→Bring to the boil and boil fast until it sets.

→Bottle in jars

You can enjoy this Jam on your morning toast, sandwiches, or serve on scones with jam for a bit of a change!

Enjoy 

Brit xx

Easter Holidays + Graduation!

Over the weekend the Easter holidays were celebrated!
What a great time of year to spend time with family and friends!
I was fortunate enough to spend time in Central Otago NZ, and what a lovely place it is there. Especially at this time of year, lovely colours of autumn leaves and such a calm atmosphere.  ☁ ☼ ❁

Easter friday was a day to relax for me and reflect back on what a crazy couple of years it has been studying to be a chef! My graduation was on Thursday! woohoo! chapter of my life complete ✔
Now bring on full time working!

Anywhooo.. I wanted to share a wee sample of the MANY pictures ( I have a new phone that I am addicted to taking waaay to many pictures on... clogs up everything but o well) that I took during my easter break.

I am very fortunate that my family loves to get outdoors and be active. This was a great way to clear my head from books, studying and work.

I had some old bread leftover in the freezer that I don't eat and no one in my house ever really eats so I took them with me cause there is this lovely wee duck pond not too far from where we stay. 

Over on my side if the world it is autumn! (Thumbs up for southern hemisphere!) ✌So the leaves were all over the ground, nice and crunchy ones too!

To your left are some pinot noir grapes. Central Otago is very well known for producing grapes for pinot noir wines. I'm not a big wine drinker but I can definitely appreciate these sweet grapes :)

Easter Friday lunch was Nana's Homemade vegetable soup with homemade wholegrain bread, Delish! You can check that out on my Instagram here Brits Instagram

I also made some hot cross buns! But that will be for another blog :)

I hope you all had a lovely Easter! Let me know what you got up to in the comments below 

Brit xx

Fresh Cream Torte - Sponge cake Recipe!

This has to be my favourite sponge recipe!

It has such a light fluffy texture and tastes great. Even better... It is super easy!!

Ingredients

5 eggs
100g sugar
100g flour plain

whisk eggs in cake mixer.
gradually add sugar.
whisk on high for 10mins
 while it is whisking prepare a lined tin with baking paper.

IMPORTANT:Be gentle when handling and taking  the mixture out of the bowl to ensure you do not break any air created during whisking!

 Sprinkle flour over whisk beater and fold through using whisk beater. Get rid of any obvious patches of flour. Cut and fold with spatula.
put in your lined greased tin.
 bake at 205degrees for 5min then 190degrees for 15-20mins

I Hope you enjoy this recipe as much as I do!

If you have any questions feel free to ask :)

Brit xx