Passionfruit...yum!

Once again this year, my self-sown passionfruit vines produced quite a few fruit. A number of passionfruit were 'taken' by possums and maybe fruit bats perhaps? but some of the fruit lower down survived intact. I've made a few batches of passionfruit icing but I was determined to have a go at making passionfruit butter. There are lots and lots of recipes on the internet and eventually I chose one that didn't have a lot of sugar in it and not 6-8 egg yolks but used the whole egg.

The recipe I chose also was cooked on the stove, not in the microwave. At the last tupperware party I went to, the demonstrator made lemon butter in the microwave and there are recipes for microwave passionfruit butter as well. As I stood there stirring the mixture in the heatproof bowl, I wondered whether I should have opted for a microwave recipe...and then the 'magic' happened after about 10 minutes...the mixture thickened. I was surprised how much passionfruit butter the recipe yielded...the recipe said to have a jar steralised ready for the 1 cup of passionfruit butter...I actually got 500mls.
DH and I have had crepes (homemade of course) rolled up with a generous dollop of the butter inside, topped with another dollop of cream and dusted with icing sugar. Next we'll probably have some more of the butter in little pastry shells. A friend suggested that using passionfruit butter instead of jam in jamdrops is delicious.

Here's the recipe I used:- (taken from About.com Australian and New Zealand Food)

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup of passionfruit pulp
• 2 Tbsp of fresh lemon juice
• 1/4 cup of castor (berry) sugar
• 125 grams (1/2 cup) butter
• 4 extra large eggs, lightly beaten
• Special equipment: Sterilized Airtight jar for 1 cup of passionfruit butter

Preparation:

1. Place a heatproof bowl over a saucepan of water. Make sure the bottom of the bowl isn't touching the water. Bring water to the boil over a medium heat.
2. Turn heat down to medium-low. Add butter and sugar to bowl and stir with a wooden spoon to melt and combine.
3. Mix together passionfruit pulp, lemon juice and eggs in a small mixing bowl. Add to butter/sugar mixture and stir continuously with a wooden spoon until mixture thickens and coats the back of the spoon. This should take about 10-12 minutes over a medium-low heat.
4. Once thickened, remove bowl from heat and allow butter to cool completely before storing in sterilized airtight jar.
5. Refrigerate to store.

A friend mentioned that she made some passionfruit melting moments....I've asked her for the recipe as I have 4 fruit left! lol

Mock chicken...

This morning I received a text from DD2 asking me what the ingredients were in a dip I used to make with the rather curious name, 'Mock Chicken'. Talk about 'a blast from the past'! I hadn't even thought about it for years so I wondered what had prompted DD's question. I tried to think where a copy of the recipe might be. I had this vague recollection that it might be in a 'moth-eaten', scruffy and scraggly exercise book that was my 'Domestic science notebook' way back in 1964. It was quickly found in the 'recipe drawer' in the kitchen and leafing through the ramshackle book, I quickly found the recipe. I decided that it would be fun to scan the pages and send the copy to my daughter, complete with my untidy teenage writing.

My scruffy Domestic Science notebook; It was ok when I used it at school in 1964, but gradually fell into serious disrepair in the late 1970s

For once, Mrs Kahl didn't write 'untidy writing' on my work! lol

Very soon I got an email saying thank you and explaining how the text request came about. At morning tea at her work DD suddenly thought of 'mock chicken' and mentioned it to her workmates. Apparently it was unknown to, not only her contemporaries, but also unknown to older co-workers. I reckon it dates back many years before 1964, especially the years of austerity around the depression and war and post war years. There's no chicken in it and it doesn't even taste like chicken...but 'mock chicken' is its moniker!  DD plans to make it ASAP, possibly to share with her workmates. It's funny what offspring remember about their childhood, isn't it??

My daughter commented that she didn't recognise my handwriting. And then I remembered and shared the story behind this. Like a lot of teenage girls I developed my own style of writing; mine was straight up and down with an occasional tilt to the left. Qld cursive was supposed to slant to the right! When I was a first year student teacher (1969), my pract teacher ordered me to change my writing, not only for the blackboard, but also for my Notes of lessons' book. It used to take me ages to write up my lessons during that prac as I had to concentrate on every letter as I wrote it!
Eventually writing in the 'correct way' became second nature. Then a year or so later, my signature wasn't accepted on the CBA (my bank) withdrawal form...the teller said it was a completely different signature. My mum talked to the bank manager (we weren't adults in those days until we were 21) and I had to have an interview with Mr Baskerville, the manager. He said that my 'new' signature was quite immature compared to my old (14years old when I opened the account) signature, but he organised for me to change the one they had on record. Co-incidentally DD2 works for the Commonwealth Bank now!.

A recipe...

Recently I came across a battered old recipe book that I thought I had somehow lost. It was a fundraising affort of our parish back in the early 80s with parishioners contributing favourite recipes. I used it so much when my girls were little and now that I'm looking for that 'simpler life', I'm tending to bake items to take as gifts to friends. Also the groups that I've joined always include cuppa and nibblies as well as the crafts and socialising and it's expected that one brings a plate of food to share occasionally. I must admit I'm not that enamoured with the 'bought' items that some people bring...so I bake from scratch...to set a good example! lol

I'm gradually recalling old recipes that I used to use and then try to find them in my small collection of recipe books. I knew a lot were in this old parish book so I was thrilled to find it! As well as recipes there are the 'people' who are 'in' this book...sadly many have passed away; others have moved away and we've lost touch. Others have grown older with me as we were young mums together. Just reading through the little book brought back so many pleasant memories. I was so pleased to have one particular recipe 'back', 'Never-Fail-All-In-Together-Cake' contributed by Isis Wilson. So what do you do if you re-discover a favourite old recipe?...make it of course. So far I've made it for my Sisters of Stitch group and yesterday I made it for the Knit and Natter group. Both times it disappeared off the plate quick smart, but best of all, it was easy to make! Because I have quite a few passionfruit, I've been indulging in making one of my favourite of all times icing...passionfruit!

Dripping with passionfruit icing! One of the ladies at K&N scraped that excess icing up...and ate it!!

Here's Isis's recipe:-
!/2 cup sugar
!/2 cup milk
125g/ 4 oz softened butter or margarine
2 eggs
1 1/2 cups SR (self raising) flour
teas vanilla
Beat all together. Bake in  orange cake tin  1 hour in a moderate oven. I bake it in a ring tin at 160 degrees C in a fan forced oven for 35 minutes. Best to check the booklet that came with your oven.

Ice when cool. Mixture can also be used for small/patty/fairy/cup cakes.

On my mind...friendships, left-overs and 'old' recipes

Last night I needed to make something as a contribution to a Morning Tea that we were having at school for a colleague who had received a 'forced transfer' and the end of the school year 2010. Being so sudden, we'd not been able to organise anything in December last year. Meg had been the Physical Education (P.E.) at the school for many years and her outstanding work with the children, her friendship and her sense of fun were appreciated by those who worked with her. I knew her for a number of years before my posting to Stafford Heights as, she was the PE teacher at the school my older daughter went to, and when I returned to work after my girls had both started school, Meg worked at 2 of my schools. Any way today we wanted to show Meg how important we thought her work has been and how much we valued her friendship. As well as telling her all that, we also got her a Pandora gift card so she can indulge herself in the jewellery she loves!  And just like Allan the year 5 teacher did for me, he also wrote a poem especially for Meg!

Our guest of honour after receiving a large card signed by all the students.

Yes we laughed...and we also cried....

Any way back to the 'plate of food'...Yesterday morning I had one of those 'remembering times past' events. I had been thinking about the number of packages of biscuits I had been given as Christmas gifts and still had in my pantry. I had 'fed' them to guests, I'd taken plates-ful to school on the pupil free days...but I still had lots left. I remembered a recipe that I had gotten from a friend's mother probably in the early 1970s. It was called 'Hiker's cakes' and it was actually a slice which used crushed biscuits. Rather than go through my untidy recipe drawer to find the piece of paper on which Mrs Hardy had written the recipe all those years ago, I thought I'd try my luck by googling 'hiker's cake'. And I found it! (plus a lot of other things which weren't what I wanted lol!) So I made it last night and iced it and cut it into squares this morning.

The biscuits I used

Unfortunately I still have lots of biscuits left, but maybe a cheescake with a crushed biscuits' base?

Here's the recipe for 'Hikers Cake'.
125g butter (about 4 oz)
1 teaspoon cocoa
125g sugar
1 cup mixed fruit
1 pkt glace cherries, red
1 egg, beaten
1 pkt wine biscuits, crushed
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 cups icing sugar
50g butter
Juice and zest of 1 lemon
Place butter, cocoa, sugar and mixed fruit in a saucepan and bring to the boil over a moderate heat
Add the egg whilst whisking and boil for another two minutes
Remove pan from the heat and add biscuits, vanilla and halved cherries
Press mixture into a lamington tin and let cool
Mix together the icing sugar, melted butter and lemon zest, add enough juice to make a smooth icing, spread over the slice then chill  (I used chocolate icing)

(my old recipe used a packet of arrowroot biscuits which weigh 250grams or just over 8 oz. This time I used a mixture of chocolate coated biscuits and store bought shortbread. At first when I added the crumbs to the butter mixture, it was still too runny so I crumbed some more biscuits. The mixture should be quite damp but not ‘wringing wet’.)

Iced and cut into squares ready to go!

Last time I went to buy cocoa, I couldn't get my usual Cadbury Bournville; this one has turned out to be a winner! 

The slice has made it to the table in the school library!