Tag: basic cookbook

Lamingtons

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The Aussie classic. Rectangle pieces of sponge cake dipped in chocolate and then coated in desiccated coconut. These little morsels of delicious-ness are perfect for Australia Day celebrations, or any celebration for that matter.

You will find the traditional recipe (pictured above) in your Basic Cookbook but there are so many other variations you can make. If you’re stuck for ideas you only need to hop onto the Recipe Community and type ‘lamington’ in the search field like I did here. Continue reading →

Poached eggs with asparagus and hollandaise sauce

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 I have never been able to poach eggs by myself. I’ve tried all the tricks I’ve read about but they always ended up in disaster. In the end I had to resort to poach pods which do the trick but without the pillowy soft egg white.

But that was all before I got my Thermomix. Now I can make poached eggs with ease 🙂

The Basic Cookbook and recipe chip have a recipe for poached eggs which includes bringing the water to the boil for 11 minutes. Continue reading →

Mummy pizzas

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The pizza dough recipe from the Basic Cookbook makes the perfect dough to create your own little ‘mummy’ pizzas.

You will need the ingredients for the pizza dough, tomato paste, mozzarella cheese slices and twiggy sticks (or anything else you would like to use as the eyes).

All you need to do is follow the recipe for the pizza dough. Once the dough is ready roll it out and use a cookie cutter to cut out your shapes.

Cut the twiggy sticks into pieces and press them into the dough as eyes. Spread tomato paste to cover the ‘faces’.

Cut the mozzarella cheese slices into small thin strips and then place across the ‘faces’ in a zig zag pattern.

I baked them in the oven for 8-10 minutes and lost the ‘mummy’ look I had made with the cheese strips after the cheese had melted. I cut some more  cheese strips and made a new zig zag pattern and put them under the grill for 30-60 seconds. They looked perfect as soon as I took them out of the oven but by the time I took my photo the cheese had lost some of the pattern. So I would probably only put them under the grill for 15-30 seconds next time 🙂

Receiving my Thermomix

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As I mentioned in my previous blog about training to become a Thermomix consultant I got the news that my TM5 has arrived during my last day of training. I was so excited!!! If you’re a Thermomix owner then you know the excitement I’m talking about.

I was so excited that my Thermomix had arrived that I went to pick it up from my consultant’s house after I finished training. This is not what normally happens but my consultant had commitments that night so we arranged for me to get my delivery briefing at her house. This delivery briefing is very important and runs you through the basics of how to use your Thermomix. During the briefing you also make the vegetable stock paste from the Basic Cookbook (BCB) together. This is the first thing you make not just because it uses the main functions of the machine but also because the veggie stock paste is in a lot of the main recipes. It’s like liquid gold – it adds so much flavor to your meals! Continue reading →

Converting recipes

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On the weekend I officially uploaded my first recipe onto the Recipe Community. It wasn’t my own recipe. It was a recipe I converted for my Thermomix. You can view the recipe here.

While my recipe was relatively simple to convert I still had to think about the process. Here’s a quick guide to converting your own recipes for your Thermomix.

  • Find a Thermomix recipe similar to the one you want to convert
  • Adjust the cooking times for your quantities of ingredients
  • Start with steps for dry ingredients to limit washing the bowl
  • Start with steps for ‘cold’ ingredients before cooking sauces or soups
  • Remember some ‘traditional’ steps can be done in a single TMX step
  • Write notes as you cook your recipe in your TMX and tweak as needed

Refer to your Basic Cookbook for more tips on converting recipes.

Have you converted any of your favourite recipes for your Thermomix? What was the recipe? Have you uploaded it onto the Recipe Community to share it with everyone?

Gluten free baking powder

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IMG_7862It is so easy to make your own gluten free baking powder with your Thermomix.

The recipe in the Basic Cookbook only needs rice flour, bicarbonate of soda and cream of tartar. There’s even a recipe to make your own rice flour. So really you need rice, not rice flour.

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After milling your own rice flour you just need to place 50g into the bowl and add 50g bicarb soda and100g cream of tartar. Mix 10 sec on speed 5 and you’re done.

How easy is that?!

Salmon Veloute

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The Salmon Velouté meal is a variation of the Chicken Velouté meal in the Basic Cookbook.

The Velouté meal is an all in one meal made in your Thermomix using the Varoma. You make the soup in the bowl and steam the chicken or salmon in the Varoma with the veggies. 

The zucchini and carrots are peeled tagliatelle style with a vegetable peeler which helps them steam quickly and also adds to the look of the dish.

Then you save some of the soup to make the creamy sauce. The word velouté is French for velvet and perfect describes the sauce.

To make the salmon variation you replace the tarragon with dill and adjust the cooking time. You will find the variation under the tips in the cookbook and you can also access it on the recipe chip.

The velouté meal is a demo menu option and is a great way to really see the Thermomix in action. Contact your consultant to book a demo 🙂

Chicken stock paste

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Like the vegetable stock paste in the Basic Cookbook the chicken and meat stock pastes are great ways to add more flavour to your meals.

Use whichever leftover vegetables you have in your fridge but keep to the weight required in the recipe.

1 tablespoon of chicken stock paste is roughly equal to 1 standard chicken stock cube. Mix 1 tablespoon of stock paste with 500g of water to make chicken stock.

The stock paste keeps in the fridge for several months.The salt in the recipe is a preservation agent so if you want to use less salt then you will need to keep the stock paste in the freezer.

A great tip to freeze the stock paste is to freeze it in an ice cube tray – one ice cube equals one tablespoon 🙂

Sticky date pudding

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The sticky date pudding recipe in the Basic Cookbook is the perfect treat to make on these cold winter nights.

It’s so quick and easy to make with your Thermomix and one of the tips is to make individual steamed puddings instead of baking in a loaf tin.

That’s right, you can make steamed sticky date pudding cupcakes using your Varoma! So if you are one of those people not using your Varoma I’m sure this variation will change that 😉

When making individual steamed puddings make sure you use silicone cupcake moulds and only fill them up half way as they will rise.

Place them into the Varoma dish and onto the tray. I managed to fit in 18 moulds and didn’t need to cook in batches 🙂

Butter

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It is so quick and easy to make your own butter and it’s cheaper as well! All you need is your Thermomix, pure cream and water 😉

A great tip I was given was to buy cream close to its use by date. Stock up and freeze it until you need it. So not only is it even cheaper but you will make better butter as it separates easier.

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Another added benefit of making your own butter is that you also end up making buttermilk as a byproduct. The Basic Cookbook recipe makes approx 250g buttermilk. You can use this buttermilk for a number of recipes in the Basic Cookbook including the soft butter bread rolls I made for my Pulled Pork Sliders.

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And then there’s all the variations you can do with your home-made butter.

You initially make unsalted butter.

You can add 1/2 tsp sea salt for salted butter which also extends the shelf life.

For spreadable butter add 50g oil and whip through at the end. Check out this link for Quirky Cooking’s spreadable butter

You can add any herbs that you like to make your own herb butter, or even make your own chilli butter. I used parsley and oregano for this herb butter which is delicious on top of fish 🙂

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What are your butter tips?