Lemon Panna Cotta w/ bay leaf white chocolate mousse and roasted rhubarb

Every so often I’ll invite Cameron’s parents over to my place for dinner, wherein I unleash a three coarse feat upon them. Aside from just enjoying their company, it’s also a little way of saying thanks for everything they do for me in the best way I know how. I also just love cooking for Cam’s immediate family in general because they love such a wide variety of cuisine and will try just about everything, quite unlike my family. This time we moved the dinner to lunch time, as it’s the middle of winter here and the long drive between my place and theirs is less appealing of a night time. So when it came to planning the dessert portion, I started hunting for something that would feel more on the refreshing side. Dessert-induced food comas are just less fun at lunch time.

Cakecrumbs' Lemon Panna Cotta 00

I immediately decided on something citrus-ey. The rest of the dessert followed from there and focussed largely on taking quite sweet things and balancing them to make them feel much less so.

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Mini Pavlovas with Kiwifruit Sorbet

It took me quite a while to decide what to pair the kiwifruit sorbet with. I had one of those moments where you're lying in bed, trying to sleep but the cogs in your brain are ticking overtime. Amongst the jumble of other thoughts about everything from the housework to what data analysis should I be using for my Zoology experiment, jumped out a single word: Pavlova.

Pavlova? Pavlova! Seriously, I will jump at any excuse to make a pav. Given we're in winter now, there's not the same lovely variety of fruit to top them with, so this sorbet fill the gap nicely.

Break one open…

Cook Book Challenge: Week 22

Unlike last week, I was really looking forward to delving into this week's cook book. Second on the list is Stephanie Alexander's "Kitchen Garden Companion".

This is a really neat book. The book deviates from the usual entrée/main/dessert structure of cookbooks. Instead, it works its way alphabetically through a list of garden ingredients: herbs, spices, fruit and vegetables. The header of each recipe features the name of the ingredient that starts in the dish. Not only is it unique, but I find it really handy for when you have something you need to use up, but can't think of a good use for it.

I had so much fun flipping through the book that I became spoilt for choice…