I was walking past a butcher’s window the other day, when a pile of “Beef Soup Bones” caught my eye.

I stood there with my mouth watering, dreaming about a hot, thick beefy soup, salty and creamy with soft vegetables and the smell of stewed herbs. Mmmmm.

I know this sounds silly, but, I searched the web for a simple beef soup recipe that was similar to the imaginary soup in my head. And I couldn’t find one! So I made this one up, and it worked! It was absolutely divine!

Simple Beef and Vegetable Soup

1kg of beef soup bones
1 large brown onion, chopped
I stalk of celery, chopped
2 carrots
1 small turnip, chopped
1 medium potato, chopped
fresh rosemary
2 bay leaves
½ teaspoon of peppercorns
½ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon soy sauce
Salt to taste

1) Throw everything into a large pot.

2) Cover the pot contents with boiling water. Boil on high heat for 5 minutes, then simmer on low heat for 3 - 3.5 hours. Taste, add more seasoning, or top up with more hot water, if required.

3) I like to remove the meat from the bone. Serve hot with crusty bread!

My husband is trying to eat less cheese and dairy. So with homemade vegetarian pizzas for dinner, I decided to make him a cheese-less version.

Pita bread with tomato paste, chopped tomatoes, capsicums, green beans, olives, mushrooms.

I cracked an egg in the centre and sprinkled some dukkah (an Egyptian blend of spices and crushed nuts), salt, and cracked pepper all over. Into a 180C oven for 20 minutes.

The smell of the roasted dukkah was INCREDIBLE. My goodness, I could hardly contain myself.

And then I noticed that I had accidentally crumbled feta onto it… CHEESE! OOPS. Silly me. So I decided to eat it myself.

(I made him another one! I’m not that mean!)

Every time my mother cooks her beef rendang, both my husband and myself tremble with childlike excitement.

We love beef rendang. I will always swear that one day I will learn how to make it from scratch, to embrace my mother’s recipe and to pass it on to future generations.

The only problem is that my mother doesn’t have the recipe written down. It’s all in her head. And her measurements and instructions are all in Chinese Aunty Language:

“it should be the size of two small fingers.”
“sprinkle a bit, but not too much”
“fry it until it smells nice”

It’s like that for all my mother’s recipes and unfortunately I still haven’t learnt a single one of them!!

So it took my husband’s initiative to get me started. He decided to learn how to cook rendang by himself – bypassing both my procrastination and all the Sacred Chinese Mother Rules. He found an excellent Goat Rendang recipe from ABC TV’s “The Cook and The Chef”. Probably a far cry from an authentic Malay recipe, but DAMN it was so good. My husband did so well. I completely recommend it!

I gave it a try the other day, and of course I changed a few things. For example I excluded the sugar, I used less coconut at the end, and I used chuck beef instead of goat.

As I pounded the lemon grass, garlic and ginger, then fried everything up… goodness me, the smells that filled my kitchen was ABSOLUTELY DIVINE. I FELT LIKE A KITCHEN GODDESS.

Thankfully I managed to take a nice picture of it. Rendang smells incredible, but it doesn’t photograph very well!

Here’s my version of it:

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A few weeks ago I started playing netball for the first time in 8 years. I discovered – although, it wasn’t much of a surprise – that I was pretty unfit.

The only regular exercise I have done in the last 5 years, was taking a daily walk in the park. And the occasional swim and jog.

I guess, since I don’t have any major health or weight issues, and because I have a healthy diet and lifestyle, I’ve never had much motivation to do any regular exercise. Which is a pretty pathetic excuse if you ask me.

Last week it hit me. What am I waiting for? Is there a better time to start?

So here I am. I’ve been running!

I ran 4 times last week! I feel great!!!!

Truth be told, I don’t really know what I’m doing. I know how to do warm ups, I start walking, I ease myself into a steady jog, pick up the pace a bit, when I start to puff, I push myself a teensy bit more, then ease back, and keep doing it until I’ve had enough.

I don’t know how far I’ve jogged. Or for how long. I’m not thinking about my strides or footing or anything technical. I don’t even know if I’m getting better, or pushing myself too hard.

I found a cool little site powered by Google Maps, that lets you plot your running path and calculate the distance and calories burned (pictured). That’s been really helpful so far!

Anyone got any quick running tips?

In my efforts to make the kids eat more calcium, I’ve been trying out all kinds of yogurty desserts. We make my own natural yogurt with a yogurt maker. We eat about 2kgs a week!

Anyway, this is the absolute hands-down favourite of the lot. I call it a dessert, but really I make this for the kids after school, as a bit of a treat.

Yogurt, Fruit and Cookie Dessert Recipe

Crumble 2 or 3 cookies into a glass cup. I use ANY kind I have in my cupboard – shortbread, wheat or oat cookies.

Dollop 4 tablespoons of natural yogurt.

Top with any kind of fruit compote or canned berries with syrup. I like canned blueberries.

There’s something very magical about slightly mushy cookies with fruity yogurt.

My oldest boy is turning 5 this weekend. At his request, he wants a Spiderman themed party, with all his friends, balloons, streamers, games and a Spiderman cake.

I said yes to everything, except the cake.

I’m quite ANTI-FOOD-COLOURING when it comes to children’s birthday cakes.

I’m happy to let my kids eat a small slice of other people’s coloured cakes. But there’s no way I’m going to tip 3 bottles of RED E129 to make a bright red Spiderman cake for my son!

How am I going to make a SPIDERMAN CAKE WITH NO FOOD COLOURING???

A friend of mine passed me a list of Natural Food Colouring Alternatives and how to make them. They sound great!!

Apparently the colours don’t turn out as vibrant as the chemical stuff. Which means I’m still stuck, because I don’t think my son wants a PINK Spiderman mask.

……………………………………………………………………

Yellow – mix powdered turmeric with a little hot water to form a paste. Suitable to colour frosting and icing.

Pink – The liquid of canned beetroot will give a pale pink to frosting and icing.

Red – cook fresh or frozen raspberries over a gentle heat, stirring often, until very thick. Sieve mixture to remove pulp. Allow to cool. The colour will be reddish pink. Suitable to colour frosting.

Not suitable for kneading into ready-made soft icing. You may use a pastry brush to paint raspberry colouring onto finished icing.

Violet – cook fresh or frozen blueberries over a gentle heat, stirring often, until very thick. Sieve mixture to remove pulp. Allow to cool. Suitable to colour frosting.

Not suitable for kneading into ready-made soft icing. You may use a pastry brush to paint blueberry colouring onto finished icing.

Green – Usea combination of freshly juiced spinach (remove stalks before juicing) and tumeric paste (see above). Suitable to colour frosting and icing.

Brown – Use a Parisian essence which is made from natural caramel, or use sifted cocoa or carob powder. Carob powder and cocoa are suitable to colour frosting, but not for colouring ready-made soft icing.

Notes
These colours will be much less intense than commercial food colourings.

Do not add large amounts of these liquids to the frosting or it will curdle. Excessive liquid added to soft icing will make it sticky.

(Apologies. This information was photocopied from a book, and I don’t know what the book is called.)

I have written about how I have weekly meal plans. But there are just some days that I just can’t be bothered to cook.

I might have forgotten to defrost the meat, or I might have appointments all afternoon, or I’ve had a really bad day and can’t control the kids… whatever the reason, there comes a point in the afternoon where I DON’T WANT TO MAKE ANYTHING TOO COMPLICATED.

However “instant meals” don’t have to be highly processed, unhealthy food with lots of additives - eg. frozen pizzas, tv dinners, instant noodles, instant macaroni and cheese.

So one of my favourite, most laziest, simplest and healthy meals is Tuna Rice Salad. I make it once a week, because I’m lazy, very often. And because my boys love it.

Recipe for Tuna Rice Salad

Just cook 1 cup of rice.
While it’s still warm, tip in a whole can 185g of Tuna in Oil (undrained).
Throw in whatever vegetables you have, chopped.
Dash of soy sauce.

DONE in 15 minutes.

Tips :

Vegetables I like to use: canned corn, canned mixed beans, chopped tomatoes, capsicum, spinach and snow pea sprouts.

Sometimes I use brown rice instead (pictured).

Cooking is definitely one of my passions. I love cooking simple, healthy, delicious, everyday meals, that are quick and easy to make, using fresh ingredients.

I thought I would share some of the concepts behind my weekly meal planning and collect some of my daily recipes.

This is what I made last week -

Mon – Pan fried salmon with soy sauce, mixed vegetables and rice.
Tue – Pasta salad, with sun dried tomato pesto, spinach, feta, tomatoes, capsicum and a sprinkle of pine nuts.
Wed – Eggplant and potato Thai red curry with rice.
Thu – Left over curry and rice
Fri – Tuna and brown rice salad, with assorted chopped vegetables.
Sat – Meatballs and pasta with homemade tomato sauce.
Sun – Dinner with my parents.

(More examples of my meal plans at the end of this post)

When I create a weekly meal plan, I always try to consider the following things:

Fresh and Natural
I like to use fresh ingredients that are preferably organic, no msg, no additives, colours or artificial flavours. I stay away from instant powders, mixes, sauces, soups and dressings. I’d say the only instant stuff I use are Indian curry pastes and the occasional stock cube (but even then I’m really picky with my brands).

Healthy
I try to use less oil, salt, butter, cream, and sugar where possible.

It doesn’t mean I use more lo-fat / lo-sugar stuff, because manufacturers usually put in other stuff to compensate. I just go without.

Lots of Vegetables
I always try to keep vegetables raw. If not, I steam, or boil, or bake, or lastly fry. In that order of preference.

I always try to have vegetables at the table at every meal. I like my dark green and red vegetables.

Time and Convenience
I am really short on time. Each meal has to take me 30 minutes to actually cook and put together. 45 minutes at the most. I very rarely make a meal that requires time during the day to prepare (eg. prepping and baking a lasagne, folding dumplings, skewering kebabs.)

Cost Concern
I go shopping once a week. I buy lots of things in bulk. I grow my own herbs and some vegetables.

When I buy a “feature” ingredient for one meal, I create other meals in the week that can also use it. Eg. If I buy a tub of bocconcini, I’ll use it on pizza, a side salad, and in a pasta. So there’s no waste.

The “feature” ingredient is usually more expensive, so I tend to only buy 2-3 per week.

“Staple” ingredients are the things I usually buy every week – eg. tomatoes, potatoes, broccoli, lettuce, spinach, carrots, fresh fish and meat.

“On-going” ingredients are stuff I buy in bulk – rice, lentils, canned vegetables, olive oil.

Eat Out Once a Week
I believe in breaking the routine once in a while. Hanging out as a family and doing something a little special. We usually go to my parent’s place for dinner, or we go to the beach and eat fish and chips. Sometimes I pack a picnic dinner and we’ll sit by the river.

We very rarely go out to a restaurant and eat out as a family. Mostly because of cost. Partly because I can’t bring myself to eat crappy, mass-produced, badly-made, over-processed food.
So fast food places, cheap pizzas, and local Chinese takeaway is out of the question.

More Fish. Less Meat.
Each week I try to make 3 vegetarian meals + 3 fish meals + 1 red meat meal. I don’t believe there’s much nutritional benefit from pork or chicken. But I think I need a boost of iron from red meat.

Fish meals – one meal with an oily fish (salmon, cod), one tuna, one white flesh fish (snapper, barramundi).

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This was the first time I slow cooked lamb for 2 hours. The meat was incredible - sweet, soft, buttery, and flaked off the bone. The sauce was a rich, creamy mixture of sweet caramel onion and tangy tomato sauce with a hint of spiciness. It was divine.

Lamb Shanks in Spicy Tomato Sauce

2-3 lamb shanks, cut into pieces
¼ cup of plain flour
salt and pepper

2 tablespoons of oil
1 medium onion, diced
1 teaspoon of curry paste
1 garlic clove, crushed
1 can of diced tomatoes
½ cup of white wine
4 medium potatoes, quartered
bay leaf, few twigs of thyme and rosemary

Toss lamb pieces into flour, salt and pepper. Shake excess flour off. Fry all pieces in 1 tablespoon of oil. Drain oil with paper towel. Place lamb pieces and potatoes in oven proof dish.

Wipe out pan. Heat 1 tablespoon of oil. Fry onions, garlic and curry paste for 5 minutes. Add tomatoes, wine. Cook for 2 minutes. Season with salt and pepper. Stir in bay leaf, thyme and rosemary.

Pour sauce over lamb and potatoes. Cover tightly with lid. Bake in 160ºC (315ºF) oven for 2 hours, or until tender.

Note: I usually use Rogan Josh or Tikka Masala curry paste.

When I plonked this onto the dinner table, my two sons thought they had died and gone to heaven. WE’RE HAVING CHIPS FOR DINNER?

Ingredients for Nacho Sauce

1 brown onion diced finely
½ tablespoon of oil
400g can of red kidney beans, drained
400g can of diced tomatoes, drained
½ small red capsicum
½ small yellow capsicum
¼ teaspoon of fresh chopped oregano
½ teaspoon of fresh chopped basil

Ingredients for Nacho Arrangement

Plain corn chips
Avocado, chopped
Grated cheese
Spring onions for garnish
Sour cream, if you like

Heat the oil and onion until golden. Throw in capsicums, oregano, basil, for 3 minutes. Pour in tomatoes and beans. Cook for 5 minutes, until well heated.

Pre-heat oven to 180 ºC. Arrange corn chips on a large oven-proof dish, pour nacho sauce, throw in chopped avocado, sprinkle grated cheese. Put in oven til cheese has melted (5 minutes). Garnish with sour cream and spring onion.

I don’t know about you, but I still have half a turkey and leg of ham in my fridge.

We have been eating Christmas leftovers for breakfast, lunch and dinner! It’s driving me crazy!

Anyway, here’s my Leftover Christmas Turkey Pasta Salad Recipe

2 cups of shredded turkey
4 - 5 large tablespoons of sundried tomato pesto
375g of spaghetti pasta
handful of fresh chopped capsicums, halved cherry tomatoes, spinach and basil leaves
drizzle of extra virgin olive oil at the end

Cook and drain pasta. Toss everything. Serve warm.

ABC (Already Been Chewed) Gingerbread Men Cookie Cutters

Dinocutter for jigsaw puzzle biscuits!

Leaf Cookie Cutter Set

Christmas Ornament Cookie Cutter Set

Snowflake Cookie Cutter Set

Nigella Lawson Cookie Cutters (A-Z, 0-9 and shapes)

Another very frequent question people ask me is, “How do you get your kids to eat vegetables?”

Firstly, my kids are normal kids – they will usually choose junk food, pizza, hamburgers, meat and chocolate biscuits OVER ANY KIND OF VEGETABLE.

But the fact that they will happily eat raw carrot sticks, raw snow peas, munch on lettuce, dip celery sticks into hummus, eat broccoli florets, raw sprouts, avocados and capsicums – well, it kinda freaks people out a bit.

So I’ve written up a few tips on how to get your kids to eat vegetables :

1) Start them young
Offer them a wide variety of vegetables at a young age, and offer them at EVERY MEAL TIME, including snack time. Some of my kid’s favourites were carrot sticks, peas, corn off the cob, broccoli, cooked chick peas.

2) Limit the salty / sugary foods
This is pretty obvious. If they eat lots of salty / sugary foods regularly, of course they’re going to balk at the taste of a bland carrot stick.

3) Get them involved with cooking and preparing meals
Kids can watch you cut up vegetables and sort them by colour or size. They can wash potatoes. They can help grow tomatoes and herbs. Throw some beans into a glass with a bit of cotton wool and water at the bottom. They can make vegetable faces for a snack. Make a meal plan, then a shopping list, get them to help you buy the food, prepare the food and eat the food!

4) Eat vegetables YOURSELF!
If the kids see YOU snacking on raw vegetables, then they are more likely give it a go too.

5) Change your attitudes towards vegetables and the kids will too
Most people don’t realise it, but they have different attitudes towards different foods.

As I grew up in a Chinese household, we were brought up with notions like:
“The meat dish is the main meal, everything else is a side dish.”
“A dinner is not complete without a meat dish.”
“Meat must be served to guests, or we will look incompetent and poor.”
“Meat is tasty. Vegetables are not.”
“A proper Chinese banquette must have AT LEAST beef, pork, chicken, duck, fish and prawns.”

It took me many years to shake off those ideas!

For example.

Years ago, I never ate raw snow peas. I thought it was a bit strange. I preferred them cooked Chinese style – quickly tossed in a hot pan, dark green, warm and still crunchy.

My husband ate them raw. On the weekends, he’d take the kids to the fruit and vegetable market, and buy a bag full of snow peas. Then he’d come home and sit on the couch and MUNCH ON THEM LIKE CHIPS. Weirdo. It was like eating raw bok choy – so wrong.

But then after some weeks, I noticed the kids joining in and eating them too. They were helping themselves, and grabbing huge handfuls. They were even fighting over who had the biggest snow pea. They would clean out the whole bag in minutes – with each kid eating something like 20 raw snow peas for afternoon tea.

I couldn’t believe it.

So I started to join in. And now we have a snow pea party after visiting the green grocer. And I LOVE raw snow peas now, can’t get enough of them! I even grow them in my garden so I can eat them fresh!

I guess the point is, if you eat raw vegetables as if they are the most normal thing in the world, your kids will grow up thinking the same.

I keep imagining what would happen if my husband bought home a bag of potato chips instead!

…

I also wrote : What Should Kids Eat Each Day?

This is another one of my lazy – but healthy – vegetarian recipes.

Chop 1 medium eggplant, 4 tomatoes, 1 red onion into quarters. Put into a slightly greased oven pan. Throw in 5 cloves of garlic (unpeeled). Drizzle 1 tablespoon of olive oil. Salt and pepper.

Roast at 180ºC for 1 hour. While you’re waiting, Boil 250g of spiral pasta.

When roasting is done, toss in a handful or two of fresh spinach leaves and fresh basil leaves. The heat makes the spinach wilt a bit.

Take out garlic cloves, unpeel, squash. Whisk with ¼ cup of olive oil and ¼ cup of balsamic vinegar. Pour this into the roasted vegetable mix.

Tip in pasta, toss everything, and eat immediately!

(I personally like to throw in some marinated feta too!)

My 4.5 yo has developed a rather odd fondness for gourmet food.

Every time we pass the gourmet food section in the supermarket, his eyes light up and he quivers, “Gasp! Soft cheese! Feta! Pate! Crackers! Dip! Hummus! My favourites things in the whole world!”

Well, this morning, I stumbled out of bed, plodded around the kitchen in early morning-blurriness, turned on the kettle for a cup of tea, and mumbled to Callum, “What do you want in your sandwich for kindy today?”

He answered, “Oh! Let’s see! Some butter, two slices of honey ham, feta cheese – make sure it’s all crumbled nicely, and doesn’t have any peppercorns in it – some spinach and carrot please. Uh, and could you grate the carrot please? And don’t forget a bit of salt!”

“Hmm. What’s wrong with bread and vegemite again?”

With summer around the corner and the warm weather on it’s way, I like to throw the kids outside with some homemade icy poles.

They are always such a hit! Usually I use unsweetened fruit juice or fruit yoghurt or if I’m feeling particularly energetic, I’ll make up some Berry Smoothie to freeze.

This time I used a spoonful of peach + mango fruit compote, vanilla yoghurt and blackberry juice – using all the unsweetened and natural varieties.

It’s better than ice cream!

My kids are slightly intolerant to cow’s milk - in that, if they drink lots of it, they spend the following week wheezing and coughing fluid from their lungs.

To compensate for the lack of cow milk, I try to give my kids lots of cheese, yoghurt, brocolli and other leafy green vegetables.

But it’s pretty hard work. They LIKE the taste of milk, and they ask for the straight stuff almost every day.

So far, my best way of injecting calcium into their systems is the old smoothie trick, using soy milk.

Berry Smoothie Recipe
1 ¼ cups of soy milk
2 large tablespoons of yoghurt
1 tablespoon of honey
3 tablespoons of mixed frozen berries
1 small banana

Throw everything into a blender and whiz!
Makes about 2 cups (500ml).

Every winter, I crave meaty stews. I make it once a week. Usually I just throw some meat and whatever vegetables I have lying around into a pot, and magic happens. So yummy.

Today I thought I’d make a stew with a colour theme. I’ve always been a strong believer in eating coloured vegetables – especially the RED / PURPLE ones, for a good dose of phytochemicals and antioxidants.

I decided to go all the way and make it completely organic - that way, I could feel extra happy that it wasn’t laced with bug spray.

Red Stew Recipe 

2 medium red onions, diced
1 large red capsicum, diced
1 medium egg plant, diced
1 can of diced tomatoes
1 cup of vegetable stock
400g of lean beef, diced
400g can of red kidney beans
salt and pepper

I threw everything into a pressure cooker for 15 minutes, and damn it tasted SO GOOD with rice.

Back in April, the kids and I planted a handful of snow pea plants in our little organic garden.

It was a fantastic gardening activity for the kids. We made several climbing frames out of bamboo (collected from a neighbour) and natural twine – which looked like cute tepees.

We made labels for the seedlings. I also drew them a little plant growth chart. Explained how plants grow, why they need water and sunshine, how the flowers turn into snow peas.

Now, 3 months later, our snow pea plants are as tall as I am! Plus there are tonnes of snow peas!

Every couple of days, we’ll sit in the garden and harvest 4-5 of our juicy, organic snow peas. The kids munch on them raw and savour them like delicious chocolates.

At church on the weekend, I was intercepted by two squabbling aunties.

Aunty 1 walks up to me and says, “Hey Karen! You want some organic watercress?”

Aunty 2 scoffs, “What organic? Mrs Lee’s neighbour collects it from the local swamp in Gosnells!”

At first I baulked at the thought of eating “freshly collected” watercress grabbed from some council parkland in a light industrial wasteland. But it turns out that Mrs Lee’s neighbour has an organic vegetable farm out there.

I recently read somewhere that watercress was the newly discovered “superfood” - with lots of health benefits, concentrated antioxidants and amazing cancer fighting properties (it contains a certain compund that prevents damage to the DNA in white blood cells).

My mother used to make watercress soup all the time. I used to LOVE eating the stuff! in salads, in chicken soups, in noodles. Yum.