Crumbed Prawns on a Sweet Veggie Salad

Ahh seafood, a luxury for a student like myself. How is it that something so simple can brighten up my day in an instant? When I scurried into Harbour Fish yesterday, I was shocked to see a whole bag of crumbed prawns for five dollars. Lucky me.

Prawns. Crumbed prawns. What do people have with prawns? Being such a luxury, I had never cooked them before and rarely get the opportunity to eat them. So I searched high and low in my fridge and decided to use what I had. A few desperate vegetables and a lemon. It was going to be one of those experimental meals. I quickly ran to warn my boyfriend of the potential failure that was ahead, and then started chopping like crazy.

This is often the way my kitchen works. I have learnt to be economical and use up as much as I can whenever I cook. People often ask me how I can afford to cook so many meals that often have  expensive ingredients such as prawns, when I am a student. My answer? Honestly I am still learning but I guess I'll start by saying, don’t go to the supermarket with a strict list, buy what is in season and what's on special, and then come up with your meals. Use leftovers, create recipes, and always keep your spice rack full! You might have the odd disaster, but it is all a learning experience. And sometimes you might just have a wonderful outcome, like I did last night.

A simple cauliflower, broccoli, calvo nerco (kale), and date salad with pre-crumbed prawns. Obviously you can opt to crumb your own prawns or even keep them fresh, but like I said, I bought what was on special at the fish store. With a touch of seasoning and some lemon juice, this dish was divine.

Serves two

Ingredients

1 small head cauliflower

1 small head broccoli

Handful of calvo nero (dark kale)

Moroccan seasoning (season to taste)

Salt and pepper

Garlic

1/2 cup dates 

Rice bran oil for frying

1 lemon (zest and juice)

16 prawns (crumbed or fresh)

Grate the broccoli and cauliflower, and finely chop the calvo nero and dates. Fry the calvo nero in the oil until softened. Add the cauliflower, broccoli, dates, Moroccan seasoning, garlic, and lemon juice. Fry together over a medium heat for 10-15 minutes, stirring occasionally.

In the mean time you can either bake or fry the prawns. To bake the prawns, drizzled them in a touch of oil and lemon juice and then bake at 200°C for 10 minutes or until nice and crispy. To fry the prawns, heat some oil in a pan and fry the prawns for a few minutes on each side or until nice and crispy. 

Serve up your veggie salad, place the prawns on top and drizzle with a bit of lemon juice.

This is such a fast and easy meal, enjoy!

-Sophea

Quadruple Chocolate Banana Muffins

Chocolate, chocolate, chocolate!! I love to bake with chocolate, and to tell you the truth, I love it so much that I always have blocks of chocolate stored up just for baking. By blocks of chocolate I don't mean ‘cooking chocolate’, I mean chocolate such as Cadbury or Whittakers. I vary between the two brands (depending on what is cheapest at the time usually). I prefer to use this good quality chocolate because it gives my baking the quality it deserves.

And so, being the sweet tooth that I am, I just had to choose a sweet recipe to start with. Here is an easy favorite...

For these muffins I used Cadbury's top-deck and old gold chocolate blocks. I only used half of each block for one batch of muffins, saving the rest for another time. I love this combination of chocolate because the bitterness of the dark chocolate counters for the sweetness of the lighter chocolates. Sweet, but not over powering.

I like to bake these muffins with oil instead of butter because this makes the muffins nice and moist. Oil is excellent for making muffins (and cakes) moist because unlike butter, it is a liquid at room temperature. This plays a huge part in keeping baking from becoming dry or tough when cooled back down to room

I have already mentioned how I always have chocolate ready to bake with, another thing I always like to have handy is frozen ripe bananas. As soon as any bananas become too ripe I chuck them in the freezer. It is incredibly easy to grab a frozen banana out of the freezer, put it in the microwave for a minute, peel off the skin, and then add it to any recipe. Once microwaved for a minute or so, I find that the bananas are usually so soft they don’t need much more mashing, therefore they can be added straight into the mixture!

!

(Microwaved frozen bananas are the best!)

This is a really simple recipe to follow, anyone is capable of making these delicious treats!

 Salt you say?! Often people become nervous about adding too much salt to their baking and therefore don’t add enough, or none at all. Don’t be one of these people! Yes, it does say 1/2 a teaspoon (this seems like a lot), but never be afraid to put the whole amount in. Salt is important when it comes to baking, even in the sweet things. Salt helps to bring all of the flavors to life and to balance them all out at the same time. Don't skip any ingredients, they all matter!

 The combination of the banana, egg, and oil shows just how nice and moist these muffins are...

I love chunky pieces of chocolate and so does my man, so I always cut rough pieces (so much better than pathetic chocolate chips you buy in the packets). Whenever I am cutting the chocolate up I can’t stop my self from having a piece, or two… doesn't it look beautiful?

On another note, when the recipe says fold, it means fold. Over mixing can cause muffins to become dense and tough. All you need to do is fold the wet ingredients in until everything is only just combined. The mixture may look like a lumpy mess and not smooth at all but this is good! This helps to keep air in the muffins, keeping them moist but also light! 

One more tip, when making these muffins I always use butter (or margarine) when greasing any sort of baking tins. Butter never sticks. Not only is it non-stick, but it always tastes great. Make sure you fill each muffin tin up to the top rather than only 3 quarters fill. This way you will get ‘large top’ muffins, just the way I like them!

I guarantee that everyone will love these muffins, they are truly delicious. Not the most healthy, but hey, we can treat ourselves every now and then!

Ingredients:- 1 1/2 cups flour
– 1 cup caster sugar
-‘heaped’ 1/4 cup cocoa
– 1 teaspoon baking soda
– 1/4 teaspoon baking powder
– 1/2 teaspoon salt
– 3-4  medium mashed ripe bananas
– 1.3 cup oil
– 1 egg
– chocolate chopped up (read above)

Method:
Sift flour, baking soda, baking powder and cocoa into a large mixing bowl. Add sugar and salt. In a separate bowl combine mashed bananas, oil and egg. Fold the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients until only just combined. Do not over mix. Finally, fold in the chocolate chunks. Spoon the mixture into medium sized greased muffins tins. Fill each tin almost to the top. Bake at 160 degrees on fan bake for 20-25 minutes. They are finished when a skewer comes out clean or the  muffins bounce back up when pushed slightly.

Enjoy 

~Fee