Last night I actually started to feel the cold and eventhough it is still all sunshine outside today, it is quite windy as I can hear the wind and see the trees outside sway from my window.
I really slept in this morning and because I didn't do the dishes last night and cooked some more things today I now have double the amount of dishes to do.
I started off this morning making myself a green smoothie made from blending together a few pears which were getting a little soft which I peeled removed the seeds topped and tailed and chopped, I added 1 banana, some water, cream ( as I did not have any non lactose milk - yes I am lactose intolerant yet I still added cream to my green smoothie, it was only a dash so I can tolerate that just not in huge doses), some dark molasses to sweeten it, ground cinnamon, ground cloves, rocket and spinach leaves, basil leaves, some thick Greek plain yoghurt and a bottle of Yakault. It was really good and I made enough to pour into a bottle for tomorrow and probably the next day as well. I love the addition of basil , it just lifted the smoothie.
It looked like a really brown unappetizing colour when I photographed it using this camera so tried my other better camera but it had the same result. It is actually a nice bright minty green colour.
I could not be bothered making a proper breakfast therefore had seaweed rice crackers with slices of light tasty cheese- did not realise how salty this combination was when eaten together as I usually eat tasty cheese with plain cracked pepper water crackers or the cheese or crackers separately.
After responding to messages from my cousin, it was almost lunchtime I estimated ( I don't wear a watch anymore so just assumed it was lunchtime) For lunch I really felt like putting together an Asian noodle soup of some sort - healthy quick and simple to make. So I boiled some water and while I was waiting for it to boil put some Australian made Udon noodles in a large bowl, added some cut up mixed seafood, some chopped up coriander leaves, some chopped up shallots, some pepper, soya sauce, 2 whole star anise , a dash of Mirin, a splash of maple syrup, ground cinnamon, ground cloves and a vegetable stock cube. I poured the boiled water over these ingredients enough to cover them and gave them a quick mix in the bowl. I let it stand then transferred the contents in the bowl which were only par cooked into a covered ceramic dish and popped it into the oven for another 15 - 20 minutes or so to continue the cooking process. I did not want the noodles to be too soggy as Udon noodles tend to be quick to cook but very stodgy. After taking the covered ceramic dish out of the oven I added some chilli flakes, spinach and rocket leaves to a bowl and mixed them into the now cooked seafood Udon noodle soup. Quite yummy but now I have even more dishes to wash! You can basically use anything you have in the fridge and pantry. If I wasn't so lazy I could have added some finely chopped ginger as well. Oops I forgot to tell everyone that I am actually also allergic to shellfish and in that seafood mix were heaps of prawns which I occasionally binge on - I am going to suffer the consequences soon! (itchy skin) - I do have my antihistmines ready.
I have run out of sweet treats that I made previously so have to whip up a batch of something else either later today or soon. Still thinking of what I should make.
4.30 pm and I am watching the SBS Food Channel again. I look out my window in the distant sky above , it is still a clear day outside & daylight but there is almost a half moon that has been out for most of the afternoon! It's quite pretty to see actually.
I have decided on attempting to make Alfajores ( I hope that's how they are spelt - there are variations on their spelling). I have always wanted to make these Argentine biscuits and found this simple recipe which had no sugar or eggs in it just all purpose flour, cognac, cream, vanilla bean, salt and nothing else. The ingrients for the biscuit recipe didn't seem right but when I mixed them all together, it did form a very smooth dough. I have put this to rest in the fridge as per recipe before taking it out and forming little discs to pop into the oven to bake and sandwich with what traditionally is a dulce de leche ( I hope I've spelt thast correctly too) which is a thick caramel concentrate made from boiling condensed milk until it reduces thickens and increases in sweetness. I am going to do a variation on it and instead making a date and rosewater paste to sandwich 2 Alfajores together. I am concerned about the biscuit recipe as most of the recipes I looked at all had sugar eggs baking powder and corn starch in them. With all purpose flour and no sugar there will be no raising agent or sweetness in the biscuits - I ran out of plain or all purpose flour so I used srlf rasing flour so my biscuits will have some rise to them but mo sweetness. I think they should be ok as the natural sweetness will come from the rosewater date paste.
TBC for pass or fail result.
Future Learn 3 short courses towards the Introduction to Coding & Design completed - Certificate of Achievement earned and shared onto my Facebook profile ( I didn't know how else to download it).
It is so late - time to sleep!
Sunday 3rd May 2020
I slept in just a little this morning ( a sleep in means 7 am).
It was another cold night but this morning it is a beautiful warm even hot sunny day outside. I roll my blind up to let the sunshine in to get my daily dose of vitamin D.
First thing I do when I wake up is wash my hands and then get my dough for the Alfajores that I made last night from the fridge , roll it out and cut some circles out and place them on a tray lined with some baking paper into my oven.
I leave them in the oven for about 15 minutes and watched them bake. Unfortunately they puffed up like scones instead of biscuits as I used self raising flour instead of plain flour. I should have placed a tray over the top of them to restrict their raise. I touch one of them and pull it out to have a taste. It was really light and fluffy like a perfect scone with a beautiful smell of vanilla - not the biscuit I was after but it did not affect my plans of what I was going to do with them. I turn the oven down really low and slow to allow the biscuits to continue baking before taking them out to cool. Meanwhile I gets some pitted dates and rosewater soaking and mixing them until a paste formed. I then get my tetrapack of remaining longlife cream from the fridge and give it a shake to thicken it to pouring consistency. ( I didn't actually realise how long a 200 mL tetra pack of long life cream could be stretched out for !)
The result of my creation is below. I couldn't be bothered pulling out my pure icing sugar to sprinkle over the top or adding some into the thickened pouring cream therefore sprinkled some cocao powder over the top of my creation ( eating with your eyes it is not as appetizing as a sprinkle of icing sugar I have to admit). It tasted so nice for breakfast and no eggs or refined sugar! Just natural sugars from the date and rosewater paste. This is part 1 of my breakfast this morning - all gone in a few minutes.
Beat that CWA scones! I'll have to tweak mine next time and cut the rounds of dough thicker so they puff up to double the height to resemble real scones!
Part 2 of my breakfast is in the oven - leftovers on flatbread. Not as yummy.
No plans for today but I have to do laundry soon as it is building up again and empty my rubbish bin.
Did not end up doing my laundry or taking my rubbish out - will have to do tomorrow.
Watching another episode of Masterchef tonight I ate my dinner of roast chicken potatos and brussel sprouts.
Searching and applying for jobs on Gumtree again although Centrelink mutual obligations are now not required until 22nd May 2020 ( originally required on 27th April 2020 which was a bit rough since I had just received my first Centrelink payment after waiting at least 4 weeks for it) before going to bed.
I think it will be another cold night tonight.
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