However I was intrigued by a Jewish recipe I found to make Knishes with a corn beef onion and potato filling. This recipe involved making the Knish(es) pastry from scratch as well. There were other variations on this recipe such as using store bought puff pastry and different fillings but I decided on a making a simple filling of canned corn beef, potatoes, onion, spinach, cheese and peas. Traditionally it would just have been a filling of potato, onion and possibly cheese and or meat. I haven't quite finished as my dough is resting in the fridge ready to roll out and stuff tomorrow with my filling also in the fridge. I think I need a little more seasoning in my filling after having a taste of it but I will check it again tomorrow as the flavours may have intensified overnight. I hope my pastry is ok as I didn't use the chicken fat that was in the original recipe instead substituting it with olive oil and butter as I didn't have enough olive oil - again substitute where possible during hard times with whatever you have.
TBC......
Tuesday morning I woke up really early and took the dough and filling out of my fridge. The dough was a little hard but after kneading it a bit and rolling it out, it was a very easy dough to work with. I made about 10 mini Knishes and 2 larger ones. I did not egg wash the top of each as I thought they had enough fat in the dough already. They smelt delicious and I took one of the mini ones out to try while still really hot. Yummy! I will have to make these again! I have plenty of dough and filling left so will make a few more large ones later.
Apologies for the poor photo - it was taken on my backup phone. Still needs a bit more time in the oven. Oh no a few exploded but they still tasted great!
Here's a few better photos below
I rolled out the dough as thin as I could which made a big difference. The cooked pastry turned out nice and crispy and not greasy or oily at all and a coat of egg wash or a brushing of butter or oil would have made it even better. Amazing what good old mash potato corn beef and onions can do! Just yummy.
OK so it looks like people reading my blog like to see me writing more about things I bake and cook. So far I think I've baked 3 batches of brownies, chocolate tahini 'bark' cake biscuits, a loaf of bread with LSL, a version of Asian style marinated soy honey chicken wings, a few meals of congee, knishes, salmon dip, a few pizzas ( that has been put on hold since the pizza dough scare - if I ma ke pizza again I will make it from scratch like I used to do) , quite a few meals of baked corn chip encrusted salmon and roasted herb potato and carrot chips or wedges, quite a few bowls of udon noodles with various ingredients as well as made litres of various fruit and vegetable smoothies. In the fridge I am trying my hand at pickling some mini cucumbers infused with some fennel seeds apple cider vinegar and molasses ( this will be interesting as I have only fermented cabbage once in my life a few years back at a Good Food & Wine Show).
I have some pumpkin so I intend to cut it up and make a nice pumpkin soup on a colder day - still not cold enough yet in Australia but it has been quite overcast yesterday afternoon and all of today so far.
Other things I plan to make are hommus dip from scratch, some type of chocolate tapioca pudding (usually I make my famous chef tasted and approved coconut mango tapioca pudding with fresh mangos but mango season is over so it may have to be some other flavour). I am dying to make an apple and pear pie with custard or my other chef tasted and approved 4 ingredient non baked cheese cake with a stewed caramel apple and pear topping. ( I haven't really blogged about this or maybe I did at some stage but if you go back quite a few years I took both recipes for my auditions for a failed reality tv cooking show called "Recipe To Riches" (Australia) - the original series was from Canada but was discontinued after a few seasons. The Australian version of the show lasted just 2 seasons only (2013 & 2014) before getting the chop. I made it to the second round of auditions of the first series however could not attend the filming as I had to travel overseas. My work collegue also got a call back for the second round of auditions and she managed to get her ( what described as) 3 minutes of rejection fame! - I think it was 3 minutes or it could have been 5 as the camera kept panning in and out of focus on her. ) Never again will I audition for another reality tv cooking show now that I know how it all works behind the scenes and how much time and effort it takes. The only fun thing about the audition process was meeting and talking to people who had similar interests and occasionally tasting what they made. There certainly was a lot of waiting around and yes there was an awful lot of cooler bags and eskies around! There was a lot of planning as well as to what you were going to cook and present to judges due to long waiting times - it had to still be presentable and edible by the time it was your turn to present your dish therefore my cheese cake was a risk but it survived audition # 1! If anyone can remember it was Woolworths who sponsored the show and not Coles and the winner of series # 1 was the "Chococorn Man" - yes chocolate popcorn! - I wonder what happened to him after there series was over and after he signed his life ( not quite but his secret recipe) away to Woolworths. We all had to sign our lives away from the very first round of auditions it seemed! If you have any questions about what we could and couldn't do during and after auditions feel free to contact me via the comments section and I will try and answer them.
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