Hothouse!

I built a terrarium today.

My first attempt, lets hope it lives!

The Pie quest

So, my mission to myself while in the US, was to try all the different kinds of pies I could get my hands on! The American's are famous for pie - apple pie, pumpkin pie, banana cream pie....

Apple pie - New York: this was not so good as my first pie... it was cold, the pastry was greasy and it doesn't look very appetising does it? I vowed to re-do the apple somewhere along the way

Banana Cream Pie - Chicago: Yum! a custard with banana and a biscuit base, topped with *fake* whipped cream. Apart from the fake cream, this was pretty good

Key Lime Pie - Estes Park, Colorado: Yum Yum Yum!! This was probably the yummiest pie I had. More like a lime cheesecake, it was smooth, zesty and D-E-L-I-C-I-O-U-S!

Strawberry Rhubarb pie - West Yellowstone, Montana: VERY sweet, but delicious. This pie was perfect to top off a day exploring Yellowstone NP in the snow. Should have ordered ice cream instead of cream, as they love their canned cream in the States (yuck)

Chocolate Cream Pie - Twin Falls, Idaho: roadside diner pie. For a chain store diner this wasn't bad. Much like a chocolate bavarian as we know them over here.

Apple pie do-over - San Francisco: This apple pie was MUCH better! Warm, with a dollop of ice cream, it filled the bowl. The pastry was nice and short. YUM!

New York Cheesecake - San Francisco: technically not a pie, but I had to include it. This one was delicious!

Pecan Pie - The Castro, San Francisco: Pecan pie is one of my favourites, and this one was devine. Not too sweet, and a good dispersion of pecans throughout. Yum Yum!

My only regret is that I didn't get to try Pumpkin Pie. It wasn't pumpkin season, I guess, so I couldn't find it anywhere....
All in all, I think it was a successful quest, apart from the extra 1 or 2kg I carried home around my belly...

Central Park, New York

We caught the train to 110th street station, got off singing '110th street' by Bobby Womack, then made our way to the top of Central Park. We started at the top, spent the day making our way down to the bottom. Such a great day, such a beautiful place and it's great that New Yorkers all make good use of the park. Any time of the day you can walk through and feel safe. And there will be people walking dogs, riding bikes, sleeping in the sun, hanging out, playing basketball, softball, just digging this green oasis in the middle of one of the worlds biggest and most craziest cities.

Catch up on trip

Sorry! I've been slack in updating you all on our activities in the US. Here are some pics of NY to start you off.























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The long haul

Flew to New York yesterday. It was a very long haul but worth it.






















Will show you some pics of the city soon!

Ps- sorry the pics don't fit, I can't resize them on this contraption...


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Lime and Ginger cheesecake

With a long weekend here in Canberra, I had plenty of time to bake. I started making this in the morning and by the afternoon couldn't wait for it to be chilled and ready to eat! I was craving it all day long!

This cheesecake uses a basic baked New York base, with a zesty twist!

Lime and Ginger Cheesecake

1 x 250g packet Gingernut biscuits
100g melted butter
500g Philadelphia cream cheese
3 tbsp sour cream
140g caster sugar
4 eggs
juice of 3 limes
zest of 2 limes
lime zest, extra for decorating

1. Grease a non-stick spring form cake tin. Preheat oven to 180 degrees.
2. break the biscuits into a food processor and pulse until you've got a fine crumb. Mix the melted butter into the biscuit crumb. Press into the base and sides of cake tin. Chill in fridge for half an hour
3. In a large bowl, beat the cream cheese until soft. Add the sour cream and sugar. Beat in the eggs one at a time.
4. Add the lime zest and juice.
5. Pour into the chilled biscuit base, tap lightly to level the filling.
6. wrap the base of the cake tin with tin foil to create a watertight seal.
7. Place the cheesecake in a baking dish and pour 2-3cm of boiling water into the base of the dish, surrounding the cake tin.
8. Bake in the oven for about 50 mins, until set, with a slight wobble in the middle. (I like to let mine brown a little on top).
9. Take out and cool before putting into the fridge to chill for 4 hours.
10. decorate with lime zest curls.

Old film

I found a film around the house the other day that hadn't been developed. It's interesting the things that you shoot....then find 18 months later! Here are a few:

Our Goat

So earnest...so cute...

...anticipating the arrival

of my sisters bub. She is due very soon.

We threw a baby shower for her on the weekend and I was in charge of the decorations

This is the delicious cake my younger sister made

It was a great day, and we can't wait to meet the new addition to the family!

Spanish

Hey All,
Have been slowly but surely perfecting my paella, and really digging spanish cuisine. So for Xmas, Larry gave me an awesome Spanish Cookbook called MOVIDA RUSTICA. It's based around a guy that retraces his family history, etc. Really awesome photography and great recipes. It focuses on not just 'cook this food', but the whole Spanish lifestyle, the way they structure their meals and so on.

So here's my first effort.

Driving Home

More baking - Sparkling ginger chip cookies

Sparkling ginger chip cookies, originally uploaded by lauren hewitt.

These are some delicious Sparkling Ginger Chip cookies I made from this recipe: http://www.101cookbooks.com/archives/sparkling-ginger-chip-cookies-recipe.html

from the 101 Cookbooks blog.

Very yummy!