Red Wine Braised Veal & Honey Glazed Carrots

Twice cooked osso bucco, honey glazed baby carrots, parsley jelly and Pinot Noir jus, served with sweet carrot and ginger tea

1. Sear osso bucco (marrow removed) and caramelise diced carrot, celery and leek. Braise with beef stock, Pinot Noir (perfect for braising because of its deep and rich flavour), thyme and bay leaves for 3 hours on a medium simmer. The liquid should reduce by half. 

2. Pull veal off the bone, flake with a fork and combine with the raw marrow. Roll into a log with cling wrap and set in the fridge for a few hours (I was impatient so the log didn't hold too well, but it was still delicious). Fry the log in a pan with butter and olive oil until brown. Rest, slice and serve. Reduce braising liquid by half and add butter to make the jus.

3. Blanch a bunch of parsley leaves in salted water. Puree with a blender or whiz stick the parsley with about a quarter cup of the water. Push through a fine sieve and dissolve gelatine in the green liquid. Set in a shallow dish (I used a mini flan dish) lined with cling wrap. Cut into cubes.

4. Blanch baby carrots in water, sugar, star anise and cloves. Add ginger to the water and serve as a tea. Glaze carrots with a mixture of water, butter, honey and sugar. 

Saw a similar recipe on the food channel and loved that it used cheap and humble ingredients, treated with lots of love. I'm so glad it's getting cool enough to enjoy hearty, slow-braised meals. Not only does it warm up the house, it gives me an outlet for my OCD for hours at a time (is there anything more enjoyable than arranging small objects to make them pretty?). We enjoyed this with a great friend, a few glasses of wine (and when we ran out of red, we moved onto white) and a night of trashy movies.

Lavender Panna Cotta

There's a lavender bush in a small lane near my place and it gives off the loveliest scent. Even though I felt a little bit naughty about it, I had to bring some home. I've always wanted to make a lavender-infused dessert so I decided to make lavender and honey panna cotta with passionfruit syrup.

This recipe is adapted from Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's elderflower vanilla panna cotta recipe on River Cottage Every Day. (Incidentally, HFW makes me want to move to the country, grow my own vegetables and raise a family of lambs.)

So creamy and florally...

You'll need:

100ml milk
250ml double cream
30g castor sugar
1 tablespoon honey
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Some lavender heads (I used 8)
2 teaspoons gelatine powder
150ml natural yoghurt

Place milk, cream, sugar, honey, vanilla and lavender in a small saucepan over low heat. Remove from heat as soon as it bubbles. Leave to infuse for half an hour.

Strain through a sieve and place back into saucepan. Warm over low heat.

Mix gelatine in with a third of the mixture. Stir into the whole mixture. Cool completely.

Stir in yoghurt.

Pour into 4 moulds. I used ramekins, lightly greased with vegetable oil.

Set in fridge for at least 2 hours.

When you're ready to serve, dip each mould into hot water for 10 seconds and then flip out onto a plate.

Drizzle with passionfruit syrup (combine 1 passionfruit, ¼ cup sugar and 1 tablespoon water in a saucepan over low heat and simmer for a few minutes).

Enjoy!

Sticky Spicy Prawns

When you don't have a lot of time, you need to find creative ways to cut corners. For me, I slash my television time in half by recording shows and watching them in bulk with the handy technology of the fast forward button. For example, with Jamie Oliver's "30 Minute Meals", if I skip the ads and the last 2 minutes of his family eating, and watch the rest on x2, I can watch a whole episode in 5 minutes. Sometimes I slow it down to listen to his voice, but the thing that instantly makes me press play is when he's cooking prawns.

There's something beautiful in the way Jamie Oliver takes a few prawns, rubs herbs and spices on them and throws them under the grill. Not only does it save time, which is what I'm all about these days, it makes for the most tantalising snack or entree. The best part is, no peeling of the prawn! You can eat every part of the prawn - the head's the best part because you get the gooey brain liquids (mmmm).

I tweaked his recipe based on what I had at home, and even though in my head it tastes better with paprika, this is one tasty little crunchy-shelled delight: sticky and sweet with a kick of chili.

You'll need:
8 king green prawns, raw
Zest of one lemon
Juice of half a lemon
3 cloves of garlic, crushed
1 teaspoon ginger, minced
½ tablespoon olive oil
½ tablespoon honey
½ tablespoon chili flakes
Handful of parsley, roughly chopped
1 spring onion, finely chopped

Preheat grill to 200°C.

Combine all of the ingredients in a baking pan. Whack it under the grill until the shells are orange and there's some browning happening on the heads and tails.

Garnish with fresh parsley.

Enjoy!

Rice Pudding with Honey and Cinnamon Roasted Fig

Recipe adapted from Sweet Food, published by Murdoch Books.
Rice pudding
20g unsalted butter
3 tablespoons Arborio rice
3 eggs
¼ cup castor sugar
1¾ milk
½ cup cream
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Cinnamon and nutmeg for sprinkling
Preheat oven to 160°C.
Grease an ovenproof dish with butter.
Cook the rice in a saucepan of boiling water for 12 minutes or until tender. Drain well.
Beat eggs lightly in a bowl.
Add sugar, milk, cream and vanilla essence and combine well. Stir in rice.
Make a bain-marie in a deep roasting tin by pouring in enough hot water to cover half the greased ovenproof dish.
Pour mixture into the ovenproof dish. Sprinkle a light layer of cinnamon and nutmeg on top.
Bake for 45 minutes or until golden brown and a skewer comes out clean.
Rest for 5 minutes out of the water before serving.
Honey and cinnamon roasted fig
2 tablespoons honey
1 cinnamon quill
4 fresh figs, quartered
½ teaspoon vanilla essence
⅓ cup water
Preheat oven grill to moderately hot.
Place honey, cinnamon, vanilla essence and water in a small saucepan. Bring to the boil and then simmer gently for 6 minutes.
Place figs on a shallow baking dish.
Pour honey mixture over figs and grill until the fig juices just start to come out.
Enjoy!