I wanted spirals but got fettucine, lucky the goat cheese and pancetta sauce was so yum!

All i need to say is: delicious
Don't skimp on the sauce. This says it serves 6 people on my inspiration site... We had it between two of us. Very generous with sauce is always the key with pasta.
A few changes made by me.. I can't resist.

Sorry that the instructions are so vague - I forgot to keep track of quantities. Just do it by feel.

Fettucine

1 garlic clove, finely chopped

About 6 slices pancetta, chopped into pieces

White wine

1 small bunch asparagus, cut into little pieces

1/4 cup olive oil

1 tbsp lemon zest

Small log of goats cheese

Large handful rocket

In a pan heat the olive oil. Add the pancetta and cook until crisp. Turn down the heat and add the garlic. Cook for a couple of minutes. Add a generous splash of white wine and the asparagus. Cook until the asparagus is bright green and tender.

Cook the fettucine until al dente. Reserve a cup of cooking water in case you need it later.

At the last minute stir the lemon zest and goats cheese into the sauce. Stir through the pasta with plenty of freshly ground pepper and salt to taste and the rocket. Season with lemon juice to taste.

This is also delicious with a bit of chilli. Add it into the sauce when you add the garlic. The kick it gives cuts through the sauce nicely.

Upside down orange cake !

Harvey oranges.

Honey.
Upside down
Beautiful tesselating oranges with sticky sweet syrup. (can circles tesselate?)

1/2 cup honey

1/4 cup freshly squeezed orange juice
2 oranges, cut into thin slices

3/4 cup soft butter

1 cup sugar

2 large eggs

1 tbsp grated orange zest

1 1/2 cups flour

1 tsp baking powder

1/3 tsp salt

1/3 cup milk

Line a 20cm square cake pan with baking paper and spray with cooking spray. Preheat the oven to 180C.

In a saucepan heat the honey and orange juice until boiling. Cook until the mixture is foamy and slightly thickened and an amber-brown colour. Pour the syrup into the base of the pan. Put into the fridge to thicken and cool. Cover generously with orange slices.

In a bowl cream the butter and sugar and orange zest. Add the eggs one at a time. Fold in the flour, baking powder and salt alternating with the milk. Dob gently over orange slices.

Bake for about 35-40 mins or until just set and springy to touch. The cake will soak up all the lovely honey and orange glaze. Cool in pan for 5 mins then turn out onto a large plate with a lip to catch all the leaky syrup.

Delicious warm, delicious cold. I'm sure it would make beautiful individual puddings. Ice cream or cream would also be a worthy addition

Mumma's Beautiful Rolled Pork Loin with Crackling

Crackling.

You need high heat for crackling. Really high heat. It doesn't seem to matter whether you crackle at the beginning of cooking time, then turn down the heat, or crackle at the end once your meat is succulent.
Rules: make sure your meat is scored through the skin.
Buy meat with a good fat layer
Dry the skin thoroughly with a paper towel
Oil and salt the skin well
High heat = good crackle
Use a griller if the crackle hasn't happened and you think the meat is cooked underneath

This is a beautiful combination of pork with rich roast vegetables.
Adapted from Gourmet Traveller.

Take the stuffing to the butcher and get them to stuff for you

Serves 6

Ingredients

1.8kg piece of pork loin

3 small pink lady apples, halved horizontally

200g peeled chestnuts

12 shallots

1/2 cup sage leaves

350mL cider

Stuffing:

4 shallots, finely chopped

4 pink lady apples, coarsely chopped

125mL dry cider

50mL cider vinegar

1 tbsp sugar

2 tbsp coarsely torn sage leaves

Butternut pumpkin, cut into bite-sized pieces

For stuffing:

Heat 1tbsp olive oil and a good knob of butter in a pan, add shallot, cook gently until tender (4-5 mins). Add apple, cider, vinegar, sugar. Stir occasionally until apple is tender and mixture has caramelised and it thick (8-10 mins). Season well with salt and pepper. Leave to cool. Take to your butcher to stuff into your pork loin.

Preheat oven to 250C. Place pork in a roasting pan, drizzle with olive oil, season with salt and pepper. Place apple, chestnut, shallot, sage and pumpkin around base of pork. Pour in cider. Roast until crackling starts to form (30 mins). Turn down heat to 150C and cook for further 10-15 mins or until just cooked through.

Rest for 5 mins. Slice into thick pieces

Banana honey cake for the nurses - success

Really moist and delicous
Thanks to my housemate for buying a whole bag of bananas and leaving them to get nice and smooshy and ripe on the table.

The kitchen I was using had nothing useful in it. I could only make something that doesn't require anything more sophisticated than a set of scales, a bowl, a cake pan and a spoon and fork.

2 eggs

80g caster sugar
50g runny honey
3-4 small bananas mashed - make sure they are extra ripe and full of flavour
50mL vegetable oil
50mL olive oil
150g SR flour

1/4 tsp bicarb soda
2 tsp mixed spice

Icing
Icing sugar
Lemon juice
Small knob of butter

Preheat the oven to 160 degrees celsius. Grease and line a 20cm square pan.

In a large bowl mix the sugar and eggs until as white and fluffy as you can get them. Add the honey, oils and banana and mix well.

Add the flour, bicarb soda and mixed spice over the top. Gently stir to combine.

Pour into the cake tin and cook for 35-40 mins until springy to the touch. Cool in pan for 5-10 mins then turn onto a cake rack to cool. Ice once cold

Icing:

In a bowl mix together icing sugar, a knob of softened butter and lemon juice to make an icing consistency. I always do it by hand so don't have any quantities for this part. Just add lemon juice slowly a little at a time until it is the right consistency.

The secret is ANCHOVIES - fettucine bolognese

Last day in Bunbury.

Not much food left in pantry...
Nothing fresh.
Found: Frozen mince, canned tomatoes, tomato paste, red wine, stock powder, onion, garlic....anchovies

Amazing

Best bolognese i have ever eaten, in less than 30 mins.
Imagine this with the benefit of another 30 mins slow simmering, a bit of pancetta, a bit of chilli to spice it up, some fresh herbs (I'm thinking basil and parsley) to jazz it up at the end. It would be unbeatable.

Buy some anchovies. Use them. Love them.

Honestly, the only secret to making this amazing is to melt the beautiful anchovies into the olive oil. It will smell really fishy. This is the flavour. Don't be scared, it is beautiful with the beef.

This will make enough sauce for about 4 people. Serve the pasta with a salad and you can stretch it further.

1/2 a large brown onion, chopped
2-3 cloves fresh garlic, finely chopped (I hate to say this but I had no fresh garlic so used a big heaped tsp of garlic from a jar!)
6-8 anchovies in oil - about 2 large tsp full
250-300g beef mince
2 tbsp tomato paste
A generous glug of red wine
1/2-1 can chopped tomatoes
1 tsp veg/beef/chicken stock powder
Freshly ground pepper

Grated parmesan cheese and cooked fettucine to serve

Gently soften the onion in a good couple of glugs of olive oil, you do not want them brown, just a very light golden, if you have pancetta add it now. Add the garlic and anchovies and turn down the heat. Mash the anchovies with a spoon and let them melt into the oil. At this stage I would add some freshly chopped chilli if I had any.

Turn up the heat and add the mince. Cook until brown. Add the tomato paste, the wine, chopped tomatoes, stock powder. Put a lid on it and then simmer gently until the sauce is thick and dark and delicious. This could be anything from 10 mins to 1 hour depending on how hungry you are. I left mine for about 10 mins and it was wonderful and thick and delicious.

Just before serving add lots of freshly ground pepper. Season with salt. Stir through any fresh herbs at this stage.

Please don't be scared of the anchovies.

Just jump in and try them.

They are the best little fish in the sea!

Tuna pasta like we used to make but better!

Tuna pasta should always be with spirals. Large spirals. I thought I had spirals, then when I got home I only had penne. Reasonable substitute but not quite the same.
I suppose if you can't get spirals you could try it with shells. (or penne was still delicious).

We used to make this as kids with just onion, tuna, tomato, oregano. We would always stir in a glob of philly cream cheese to cream it up at the last minute. I have fancied this up a touch.. but it still has the delicious honesty and simplicity of always. I had bought some spinach to chuck in to "health" it up - but decided against it because I didn't want to add too many flavours. You could add peas if you want to make it a complete meal with greens included.

I like it with parmesan cheese on top which goes against all the rules of cheese and seafood pasta. But parmesan is so salty and delicious so try it with parmesan!

This was pretty spicy. Spicy delicious. You could cut down the chilli if you want. But dinner without chilli is not so exciting.

Quick. Cupboard. Food. Delicious. Easy.

Serves 4

Ingredients

1 brown onion, roughly chopped

2 cloves of garlic, finely sliced

1 long red chilli, finely sliced

2 tbsp of chopped oregano

3 whole anchovies

150g button mushrooms, sliced

A good glug of white wine

1 tbsp tomato paste

1 can of cherry tomatoes, drained

185g tin of tuna in springwater (get the best quality tuna you are happy to pay for - it really makes a difference)

2 tbsp chopped parsley

Glug of cream, scoop of philly cream cheese, scoop of mascarpone, scoop of sour cream

Spiral pasta, cooked

Gently saute the onion and chilli in olive oil until soft but not coloured. Turn down the heat and add the garlic, 1tbsp oregano and anchovies. Mash up the anchovies with your wooden spoon then cook for 2-3 minutes. Add the mushrooms and cook until soft. Pour in the wine and reduce slightly. Add the tomato paste and cherry tomatoes. Cook for 10-15 minutes (or 5 if you are in a rush) until the flavours combine nicely. Add the tuna and break up gently, leave it in decent sized chunks. Cook for 3-5 minutes, or until the tuna is warmed through. At the last minute you can melt in your creaminess, add your remaining herbs and mix well.

Serve in a big bowl mixed up with your pasta. Sprinkle with parmesan cheese.

Highlights from sweet Paris

logspot.com/-bx53LTosfdE/TckStwnaHsI/AAAAAAAAAzI/HxvYT87b_aE/s1600/IMG_1882.JPG" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}">

Hot croissant from the oven at the Patisserie + Boulangerie around the corner from our hotel. Delicious. Mmmm the concentration - important not to drop a crumb of this croissant. So beautiful. Hot from the oven and burning your mouth but so amazing. Buttery. Flaky.

Riding the Velib through the streets of Paris. In particular riding home from the club late at night with a few drinks. The streets of Paris quiet.

The beautiful spring-time streets and gardens of Paris.

St Michel's Chapel. Remarkable. Must be seen. The most beautiful stained glass windows.

The Conciergerie - to take you back to the middle ages.

Dinner at Ave Maria - quirky ?hippie place near Oberkampf station. Mixed cuisine. Not French. Delicious food.

Moulin rouge. Strange. Tacky. Super fun :) Terrible dancing. Terrible choreography. Average food. Still good.

Opera at the Bastille. Not so fun - can't speak French or Italian so the French subtitles weren't useful. So sleepy. Actually fell asleep during it. Shall I have not included this in highlights?

Wandering through the Marais. Beautiful shopping and many Boulangerie. Need much more time here.

Markets on Boulevard Richard Lenoir (Bastille) on Sunday morning. What could beat freshly shucked oysters. 6 for 3 euros. Shucked in front of you with a good squeeze of lemon. Plenty of other beautiful fresh food. The cheeses were amazing.
>

Red wine and foie every evening at one of the small french cafes.
>>
>

>

Champagne region - Reims - gorgeous cathedral Notre Dame. Pommery - cave tour. Getting lost on the highways around Reims. This place deserves a few days to explore. The tackiness of Moet and Chandon - truly tacky. But fun to see!
>

Dinner at Chris' favourite - Relais de l'entrecote with Ange and Dan. Quite delicious. However I still don't quite understand all the hype!

>

Hotel: Rive Gauche. Saint Germain area. Basic hotel. Clean, comfortable, good value. Great area. Lots of beautiful shops and restaurants nearby and very close to metro and velib.

Malfatti with tomato and basil (minus the lemon)

I have been wanting to make these little bundles of delicious for months now.

They are beautiful. Light parcels of ricotta and spinach with a fresh tomato sauce.
The sauce was meant to have lemon in it. Which I managed to just leave on the counter and forget to add to the tomato sauce.

The recipe specified firm ricotta. I was very upset when I opened my tub and found it was soft ricotta. The mixture ended up gluggy and thick. I was not impressed. I persevered. Instead of "rolling into dumplings" I just dropped spoonfuls of mixture into rapidly boiling water. They actually worked! So if you get firm ricotta you can form them into little balls. If you get soft ricotta you can try dropping little spoonfuls into the boiling water.

Serves 4

400g silverbeet (about 1 large bunch), trimmed and washed thoroughly

500g firm ricotta cheese

4 eggs

50g parmesan cheese, finely grated (plus extra to serve)

50g plain flour

Blanch the silverbeet until tender (I microwaved it for 1-2 minutes). Refresh, drain well, squeeze out excess liquid. Chop coarsely.

In a bowl mix the silverbeet, ricotta, eggs, parmesan and flour. Season well with salt and pepper. Boil a large pot of water. If you have firm ricotta roll small walnut sized dumplings. Roll in semolina flour. Otherwise you can drop little tablespoons of mixture into the boiling water. Cook a few at a time until firm and they float to the surface (2-3 minutes). Drain well with a slotted spoon. Add to tomato sauce, gently stir to combine and serve scattered and serve scattered with parmesan and basil.

Tomato Sauce

Use your favourite simple tomato sauce. Here is the one I made. I can't resist some anchovies in my tomato sauce. A splash of wine wouldn't have gone astray either.

Large glug of olive oil

1 onion, finely chopped

2 cloves garlic, sliced

4 anchovies

2 tbsp tomato paste

4 large very ripe tomatoes, chopped

Large handful of basil

Gently fry the onion in olive oil. Add the garlic and anchovies. Cook very gently until softened. Add the tomato paste and tomatoes. Put a lid on it and cook gently for 10-20 minutes until beautiful and soft and reduced.

Add salt and pepper to taste. At the last minute throw in the basil.

You could add the zest of one lemon to the sauce. This is the step that I forgot.

Mr Marmellada Tart

I have recently had a fascination with rectangular tarts with lattice roofs. Any rectangular tart immediately captures my attention.

I wanted a longer skinnier tart but this was the only pan I could find in Bunbury.
It is much harder to make something like this in a kitchen like the one in Bunbury. Utensils missing - food processor, bowls, rolling pin (substitute spray olive oil bottle).

This tart is so easy that it is fine to make even without most normal kitchen utensils.

It is delicious. It is actually really rich. It was super nice just warm out of the oven. It would be even nicer with a big scoop of ice cream.

I needed a pastry recipe and had heard on numerous occasions Maggie Beer raving about her sour cream pastry. I realised after I had made it that it is not a sweet pastry. It was fine. The plain pastry went beautifully well with the sweet and bitter filling.

Please use either home-made marmalade or the very best marmalade you can find. It will really affect the quality of your end result.

1 double batch of sour cream pastry
120g softened butter
150g caster sugar
Finely grated rind of one orange
2 eggs
200g almond meal
40mL orange liqueur (or orange juice for me was fine)
200g marmalade

Preheat the oven to 180C. Roll out 2/3 of the pastry on a lightly floured surface to 3mm thick. Line a 13cmx36cm tart tin. Trim the edges and refrigerate until required. Roll out remaining pastry to 3mm thick, cut into 1cm strips and refrigerate on a tray until required.

In a bowl beat together the butter, sugar and orange rind until light and fluffy. Gradually add the eggs and liqueur. Stir in the almond meal. Spread filling into pastry case, fill to about 1cm below the rim (there may be left over filling). Bake until filling just sets (10-12 minutes). Remove from the oven. Stand for 5 minutes. Spread with marmalade. Arrange pastry strips in a lattice pattern over the top.

Brush lattice with egg wash, bake until pastry is golden (8-10 minutes), cool in tin for 20-30 minutes. Dust with icing sugar and serve.

Pastry

125g plain flour

100g unsalted butter, cold cut into cubes

60mL sour cream (full fat please)

In a food processor mix together the butter and the flour. Gradually add the sour cream until the pastry comes together. You may need all the sour cream, more or less than in the recipe.

Once the pastry has come together, wrap it in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 20 minutes.

Welcome Gnome

Gnomesville.

Why?
The story goes that this started when a group of Dardanup Primary School students mentioned there was a traffic hazard at the intersection during a mock council meeting. The council heard about it and started building the roundabout. A local Wellington Mills resident placed a single gnome at the site of the roundabout as a silent protest against the controversial project. More gnomes soon came to join the silent protestor and soon the site had become a large gnome community.

Amazing

We are going to buy gnomes on the internet and take them next time we go.

Wow

Welcome Gnome. Gnome sweet gnome. Gnome is where the heart is. Metrognome. . .

Also on the itinerary - Wild Bull Brewery. Nice simple lunch in a beautiful setting.

pasta in a dish with eggplant, mushrooms and bacon

Thanks to "Dana Treat Yourself" for this recipe

Delicious
Easy
Now I have dinner for the next four days
I had no wine for my tomato sauce so I used some beer - quite a tasty substitution

1 eggplant, chopped into 1.5cm cubes
4 rashers of bacon, chopped into batons
1 onion, roughly chopped
3 cloves garlic, chopped
1/2 bag of button mushrooms - between 8-10
1 quantity of tomato sauce or your own favourite tomato pasta sauce
1 cup ricotta cheese

2 eggs

3/4 cup milk

Parmesan cheese

Penne pasta

In a non-stick frying pan saute the eggplant until lightly golden and nice and soft. Remove to a plate.
In the same pan saute the bacon until nice and crispy. Turn down the heat and add the onion. Cook until soft. Add the garlic and cook for a minute longer. Add the mushrooms and cook until soft. Add 1tsp chopped thyme and 1tbsp chopped basil. Season well with salt and pepper. Remove to a plate.

Preheat the oven to 180C.

Cook the pasta in plenty of salted water until al dente. Mix the pasta with the tomato sauce until coated. Pour into a lasagne dish. Layer mushrooms and eggplant on top. Cover with any remaining tomato sauce. Sprinkle with a layer of grated parmesan cheese.

In a bowl mix together the ricotta cheese, egg and milk and 1/2 cup grated parmesan.. Season well with salt and pepper. Pour over the pasta mix. Top with extra grated parmesan. Place in the oven and cook for 20-30 mins or until golden on top.

It can be refrigerated before cooking or after cooking and reheated in the oven.

Tomato Sauce
1 brown onion, roughly chopped
2 cloves of garlic, sliced
Stems from a handful of basil, chopped
1 tbsp tomato paste
A good glug of beer
400g can chopped tomatoes
Leaves from three sprigs of thyme
Large handful basil leaves, chopped
Salt and pepper to taste

Gently saute the onion until soft. Add the garlic and basil stalks and cook until soft and delicious. Season with salt and pepper. Add the tomato paste and saute for 1-2 mins until fragrant. Stir in the beer and then reduce slightly. Add the tomatoes and cook for 20-30 mins or until beautiful and reduced and yummy. At the last minute stir in the basil leaves and season again with salt and pepper.

red wine and rabbit at mojos (in bunbury)

Wednesday night. Tired of work. Too lazy to cook. Solution = organise dinner at Mojos in town.
Looks nice from outside.
Lots of gold plates on the walls.
Boasting reviews in Gourmet Traveller ...
The rest is for us to decide.

Wine: 2008 Turkey Flat Shiraz --> delicious

Dinner: Fettucine with confit rabbit ragout with cherry tomatoes and mushrooms --> delicious
I suspect someone snuck some truffle oil into this pasta - it was beautiful

Sommelier - very helpful

Waitstaff - attentive

Price - appropriately priced

Will we revisit - yes

Tempting offers for next time:

Blue manna crab omelets
Fresh shucked oysters
Pork belly and prawn salad

and. so. on.

Chilli chilli mahi mahi spaghetti

Adam caught lots of beautiful Mahi Mahi.

Day 1: Sashimi. Fresh mahi mahi dipped in horseradish and soy sauce. Amazing. Best sashimi ever.

Day 2: BBQ mahi mahi. Beautiful.

1 week later: defrost frozen mahi mahi for chilli mahi mahi spaghetti. Super hot. Super flavourful. Super delicious. Substitute any other firm white fish (or prawns, squid, mussels...)

1 large fillet fish chopped into nice large chunks - it'll break up a bit when cooked so cut it a bit bigger than the size you want to eat

3 birdseye chillies, finely chopped

1 long red chilli, finely chopped

2 cloves garlic, finely sliced

4 anchovy fillets, chopped

2 fresh tomatoes, finely diced

1/2 cup white wine (we used beer as all out of wine! - still delicious)

1/2 cup chopped basil

1/4 cup chopped parsley

Plenty of salt and pepper

Fettucine or spaghetti - use nice quality pasta for this. Cook according to packet directions in salted water

In a pan heat a good couple of glugs of nice olive oil and about 1 tbsp butter over a gentle heat. Add the garlic, chillies and anchovy fillets. Cook nice and gently for 2-3 minutes or until the anchovies melt - give them a bit of a squash, and the garlic and chillies are nice and fragrant. Add the tomatoes and cook for another few minutes or until nice and soft. Add the wine and the fish. Cook gently for 3-5 minutes or until the fish is just cooked. Season well with salt and pepper (might already be salty from anchovies).

Just before serving stir through the pasta, the herbs and another good glug of olive oil. Don't add too much pasta for the amount of sauce you get - you want a good sauce to pasta ratio!

You will enjoy this - it is delicious.

Make sure you are generous with the olive oil and butter and seasoning!

It is actually pretty hot - so you could potentially tame back the chilli if you need to. But I like it like this.

Ridiculously rich chocolate caramel tarts

Ridiculously rich. Sometimes we need ridiculously rich food. These are richer than all the diamonds in the world. Wow. Seriously.

Not too rich. The buttery crust cuts through the rich.

They are quite fiddly. But not difficult. Just be patient with the steps and they will come together. I made cute little tarts instead of one gigantic one. What I really want is some cute little petit fours pans. These are more than one mouthful. I want pans smaller that are one perfect mouthful, maybe two 3/4 mouthfuls.

Pastry

240g plain flour

60g caster sugar

180g unsalted butter, chilled, coarsely chopped

Caramel

225g white sugar

80mL thickened cream

70g butter, coarsely chopped

Chocolate Mousse

200g dark chocolate (53% choc solids)

4 eggs, separated

185mL thickened cream

2 tbsp caster sugar

Chocolate Ganache

165g dark chocolate (53% choc solids)

60mL cream

40g unsalted butter, softened

For the pastry: process flour and sugar in a food processor to combine. Add the butter and pulse until mixture resembles fine crumbs. Add 2 tbsp chilled water and process until mixture just comes together. Turn onto a lightly floured surface, form into a disc, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 1 hour.

Preheat oven to 190C. Roll out pastry to 5mm thick on a lightly floured surface. Line your cute little tart pans with pastry (or use one 26cm pan). Refrigerate for 1 hour. Blind bake for 20 mins or until set, then remove paper and weights and bake until golden (8-10 mins). If using smaller pans keep a good eye on the cases as the cooking time will vary.

For the caramel: combine sugar and 250mL water in a heavy based saucepan and stir over low heat until sugar dissolves. Increase heat to high and cook, brushing down sides with a wet pastry brush until the mixture is deep golden - 10-15mins. Remove from heat, add cream and butter and stir to combine. Be very careful here as the mixture will spit and splutter. Pour into pastry bases and refrigerate until firm - 1-2 hours.

Chocolate mousse: melt chocolate in a bain marie. Remove from heat, cool to room temperature. Add egg yolks, stir to combine and set aside. Whisk egg whites to soft peaks. Gradually add sugar and continue whisking until combined. Fold 1/3 of the eggwhites into the choclate then fold in 1/3 of the cream. Repeat with remaining eggwhite and cream and stir gently until combined. Spoon over cooled caramel. Smooth top and then refrigerate until firm

Chocolate ganache: Combine chocolate and cream in a bain marie. Stir until chocolate melts. Remove from heat, add butter and stir to combine. Cool to room temperature. Spread in an even layer over chocolate mousse. Refrigerate until set.

Serve tart with whipped cream to the side.

naughty little Virgin's Breasts

sounding naughty. looking like little nipples. tasting delicious

Custard creme. Pastry. Perfectly white icing. Cherries.
I saw these in Gourmet Traveller a while back and wanted an occasion to make them. In the end there was no occasion, so I made them anyway.

Makes 20 little breasts

Filling
1 1/2 cups milk
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup cornflour

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1 piece lemon rind, removed with a peeler

1/4 cup coarsely chopped candied orange - use good quality peel in this case

1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

2 cups icing sugar, sifted

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Candied cherries, for decorating

Pastry

225g unsalted butter, softened

80g caster sugar

1 egg yolk

1 tsp finely grated lemon rind

475g plain flour

In a heavy based saucepan whisk together milk, sugar, cornflour, vanilla and lemon rind. Place over a medium heat, whisk constantly and bring to the boil. Reduce heat, simmer for a minute, then remove from the heat to cool. Stir through the candied orange and cinnamon and set aside until required.

For pastry, cream butter and sugar using an electric mixer. Add egg yolk and beat to combine. Stir in lemon rind, 1/4 tsp salt, flour and 50mL water. Knead gently to form a soft dough. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 2 hours.

Preheat oven to 180C. Roll out dough to 3mm thick on a lightly floured bench. Cut out circles about 5cm in diameter. Spoon about 1 tbsp custard on top. Brush edges with water, cover with a circle cut with a 6cm cutter and press edges well to seal. (This step can be quite fiddly. Keep practicing with cookie cutters and the amount of custard until you get a nice neat little breast shape).

Place on baking paper lined trays and bake for 15-20 mins or until golden. Transfer to a wire rack to cool.

Whisk together icing sugar, 2 tbsp boiling water and remaining vanilla extract in a bowl until smooth. Spoon icing over cooled pastries and place a cherry on top.

Biscuits will keep in the refrigerator for up to three days. They will not last that long.