I needed something really easy for Wednesdays with Donna Hay. REALLY easy. I am prepping for two teas this weekend and I also wanted something new to serve. I ran across this recipe for Parmesan Wafers in Donna’s flavours. (pg 147)
Simple ingredients. Grated Parmesan (2 Tbl) and shredded basil (2 tsp). 5 minutes at 400 and done.(Normally we don’t publish the recipes but this one is just so simple.) One could increase one or the other of the ingredients and they would still turn out well.
It just doesn’t get any easier. And they are so delicate looking. And tasty. They would be perfect served with soup or a salad. Or just a snack. By the way KETO friendly!!
The beginning of a whole new year. And I find myself asking what happened to the last one. It seemed to have passed so quickly. But, that seems to be the way it is as one grows older. Quick!
But the new year does mean a new beginning and mine is to get back to healthy eating. KETO to be exact. Donna Hay’s classsic baked lemon cheesecake was adaptable to KETO with very little problem.
B has been asking for something sweet. He loves lemon and I love cheesecake. Perfect.
Just a hint of lemon flavor. There is lemon zest in the filling and I increased it.
The adapting I did was in the base or crust. I used a cheesecake crust that I use for all my cheesecakes now.
Mix these ingredients will and press into a 9″ springform pan.
The filling is all Donna Hay – except for the sugar. By replacing the sugar with erythritol I made this KETO friendly.
1 1/4 lb cream cheese
3/4 cup sour cream
6 eggs
1 Tbl grated lemon zest. I used 1 1/2 TBL
1 cup sugar erythritol (and I added a tad more)
In a food processor mix together the cream cheese, sour cream, and erythritol. Mix until smooth. Add in the eggs and lemon zest and blend until well combined. Pour the filling into the crust. Bake for 1 hour at 275. Allow to cool before serving.
It took longer than 1 hour to bake. About 75 minutes total.
It had a delightful mild lemon flavor. I might add more zest and maybe a little lemon extract next time.
The original recipe is in Donna’s flavours cookbook (page 50)
This week’s theme for Wednesdays with Donna Hay is BEEF! It’s what’s for Dinner. And that is a good thing for a houseful of carnivores. We don’t eat beef nearly as often as we used to so we tend to enjoy it more and it want it tasty. Donna’s beef and peppercorn pies was perfect. A whole lot of flavor in a small package.
Well, in our case, not so small a package. Instead of making 4 small pies I made one medium {about 1/3 of the recipe} for the two of us.
Using a regular pie shell for the bottom she topped the beef cooked with peppercorns, wine, and stock with puff pastry which gave us a wonderfully crispy, flaky crust. Simple ingredients. It was delicious. Just the right amount of wine to bring out the flavor. Definitely a keeper. And if you didn’t want to make a pie it would be great over rice or potatoes.
The recipe is from Donna’s Flavours, page 140. We don’t publish the recipes. Instead we would like to encourage you to buy her books. You will not be sorry. And if you want to join us here, please do. We’d love to have you. Just make a dish from the theme, post it and add your link. Easy Peasy!
This week’s theme for Wednesdays with Donna Hay was Sweets. Not a hard theme to play with. Who doesn’t like sweet treats? Our only problem now is that we are trying to cut back on sugar. Not easy with all desserts so I had to find one that was adaptable.
And this one definitely was. No chocolate chips – Cocoa powder. White sugar easily subbed out with Splenda and a smidgen of Stevia. It does have 1/4 cup brown sugar but since I cut 16 brownies it is almost negligible in each treat.
These were great. Just sweet enough. Definitely one to be made again. Maybe by subbing in some Whole Wheat Flour for the AP.
Sorry, Kayte, I know you won’t like these, but maybe the boys……
This weekend my ladies dinner group enjoyed High Tea at “Ortigo Abbey”. We were celebrating the new, and last, season of Downton Abbey.
We started with soup. Then came the sandwiches, including the mandatory cucumber ones. Then we had some hot buttered scones, from an Edwardian cookbook, with Clotted Cream followed by the sweet treats. This is where Donna comes in. I needed something bite sized and chocolate. Something decadent seemed reasonable. I found her Chocolate Truffle Cakes in Flavours.
They did not come out nearly as pretty as Donna’s but they were very tasty, very chocolate-y and now they are very gone.
300g (10 oz) dark chocolate, chopped
150g butter
6 eggs
1 tsp vanilla flavoring
4 Tbl sugar
Glaze:
200g (6 1/2 oz) dark chocolate, chopped
1⁄3 cup cream
85g ( 3 oz) butter
Pre-heat oven to 325 degrees F (170C).
Line base of eight 1 cup (8 fl oz) capacity non-stick muffin tins with non-stick baking paper. {Since I needed bite sized I used a mini-muffin tin. I ended up with 32 minis}
Place chocolate and butter in a saucepan (absolutely dry) and stir over low heat till melted and smooth.
Place the egg, vanilla and sugar in the bowl of a mixer and beat until thick and pale.
Stir through the chocolate mixture.
Spoon the mixture into muffin tins and bake for 12-15 minutes or until the cakes are just set.
Cool in the tins and refrigerate for 2 hours.
To make the glaze, place the chocolate, cream and butter in a saucepan over low heat and mix till smooth.
Chill the glaze til it is firm.
Unmold the cakes onto serving plates and spread with the glaze.
My glaze wasn’t as smooth as I would have liked so I topped the mini mouthwatering treats with powdered sugar. They were very rich. and no one complained that they were rather ugly.
The recipe is on page 124 of Donna’s flavours. (and several places on the web)
There are a lot of peppermint and chocolate dessert recipes/posts floating in the blogasphere this time of the year. When it came my time to pick for this week’s Donna Hay selection I knew I would be chocolated out so I went for something a little lighter and more refreshing – LEMON!
This is an almond flour based cake with a really lemony curd filling. Between the three layers! Yes, we sliced this cake in thirds and then filled each space with lots of curd and then, because that wasn’t enough we topped it with more lemony flavor.
I would like to say this cake turned out nicely, but I found it to be rather dense (which is how the Hubs likes cake). The curd, however, was perfect. VERY Lemony (1/4 cups lemon juice in the recipe) and easy to make since it has whole eggs rather than just the yolks.
I will definitely make the curd again – but maybe not the cake.
I have had a bottle of Balsamic Vinegar in the cabinet for a while. Good thing it just gets better! I bought it for a recipe and then never made THAT recipe. Donna has come to my rescue with the recipe I chose for this week’s Wednesday with Donna hay.
Chicken breasts (and thighs) marinated in balsamic vinegar mixed with chicken stock and garlic then browned and cooked in the marinade. So simple. Simply serve it over couscous infused with garlic. I found some tri-color couscous at World Market that was fun to use. But it made TONS of couscous. 1 cup dry yielded 4 cups cooked.
If you are a balsamic fan then you will love this dish. I am still trying to decide if I liked it. B was definitely NOT a fan.
How did Chaya, Gaye, and Sarah like it? Check out their posts.
The recipe is from Flavours on page 102. I also found it at Food.com
Tea and Scones 