Mini Breakfast Frittatas

I don't know about you guys but I struggle to find interesting stuff for breakfast during the week. I don't usually eat breakfast until I'm at work at about 9am and I can only do smoothies and yoghurt with fruit for so long. I love eggs and sometimes a savoury fix is what I need. These mini frittatas (sticking with the mini theme here) are great as you can make them ahead of time, which saves time in the morning. And they are a good protein source - if that's important to you.

I just made this recipe up and the good thing is, you can basically just add what you want. It's a good way to get rid of the ends of veggies in the fridge. This recipe makes six, which is three breakfasts for me - just multiply the recipe if you want to make more.

What do I need?

4-5 eggs (depending on size)
5-ish tspns milk (about one per egg - you could also use water or a combo of both). I say 'ish' because you might find you need a wee bit more when you fill up your muffin trays.
1/4 red onion
1 garlic clove (or a teaspoon of crushed garlic, if you still haven't got any fresh stuff, like me)
Veggies - whatever you like and/or have in your fridge. I used a combination of a handful of chopped spinach and kale (as I had these in my garden), 1/4 courgette, 1/4 red capsicum and a wee bit of grated carrot as I had some leftover from the wraps I made for dinner.
Herbs. Again, choose whatever you like. I am a BIG fan of dill with eggs. This time I used a combo of parsley, dill and chives because I had them all growing fresh in the garden (did I mention my garden?). Dried is also ok too.
Cheese. Again, use what you like. For these I used feta, but I've previously used parmesan or just good ol' cheddar. Finely grate it you're using cheddar or parmesan, and you only need a wee bit to top each frittata.
Optional: a little grated lemon zest, a sprinkle of dried or fresh chilli and 50g-ish of ham if you have it/are so inclined (I wasn't this time)
Oil for cooking (I usually use canola)
Salt and pepper

How do I make it?

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees celsius. Chop all the veggies up pretty small and fry with a little oil (and the chilli if you're using it) for about 5-10 minutes, until cooked. I stir them pretty continuously so they don't brown or burn. Once cooked, set aside. In a jug, beat the eggs, milk/water, chopped herbs, grated lemon zest (if you're using this - and I recommend it), salt and pepper to taste - if you're using ham, don't add too much salt as ham can be pretty salty. Grab a six hole muffin tin (I don't think that's what you call it, but hey) and grease lightly with a little oil on a paper towel or pastry brush. Distribute the egg mixture between the six holes (!). It should fill each one up about half way - adjust with a bit more milk/water if you need to. Then add the veggies, distributing them between the six holes, add the chopped up ham if you're using it at this point too and top with a little cheese of your choice. Bake in the oven for about 15 minutes or until the egg is set. Cool on a plate and voilà - three days of breakfasts! Store in a container in the fridge. I usually wrap two up in a piece of foil and when I get to work, pop them on a plate in the microwave for 1 - 1 min 30 and Robert's your father's brother!

Mini Plum Crumbles

This dessert would make a great follow up to the smokey bbq pulled pork from my last post. It's pretty simple - you might already have most of the stuff at home, like I did - and it's pretty quick to make too.

Why did I make it? I was given some beautiful plums by some friends when I was visiting the Hawke's Bay a couple of weekends back. They were starting to go a bit soft and I didn't want to waste their deliciousness.
Where did this recipe come from? From my head - a bit of conglomeration of all the crumble recipes I've ever used.
What's it good for? When you've got an excess of fruit, when you want a warming dessert or just because it's delicious - I like to add just a wee bit of sugar when I stew the fruit so it's still a bit tart, which goes beautifully with the sweet crumble topping.
How many people can eat it? This recipe made two mini crumbles, but just multiply it for more
What do I serve it with? Ice-cream, cream, yoghurt....whatever you fancy really. I served it with plain, unsweetened yoghurt with a little sprinkle of cinnamon on top. I find that I need something to counteract the sweetness, so I'm a big fan of yoghurt with rich desserts.

What do I need?

It's important to stay hydrated while cooking

300g plums (stones removed, cut roughly into quarters) or any fruit you choose like peaches, cherries, apples etc
1 tsp caster sugar
10g butter
20g brown sugar
40g rolled oats
2 tblsp flour
1 tsp mixed spice
1/2 tsp of cinnamon



How do I make it?

Preheat the over to 180 degrees celsius. Pop the plums into a small saucepan. You might need to add a little bit of water, but my plums were pretty juicy so I didn't bother. Sprinkle the sugar over the fruit and gently simmer on a low heat until the fruit is tender. You might want to adjust the amount of sugar to your taste or to the type of fruit you're using, While the plums are doing their thing, make the crumble. Cut the butter into small pieces (it's easier if it's at room temperature at this point) and put into a bowl with the brown sugar, rolled oats, mixed spice and cinnamon. Use your fingers to rub the mix together until it looks like something that vaguely resembles breadcrumbs. At this point, I found my mix was a bit too melty-buttery (wasn't really complaining), so I added some flour. I could have used more than 2 tablespoons, but just use your judgement based on how the mixture looks.
Your fruit should be done by now. Mash it up a bit if it needs it and then spoon it into ramekins. Top with the crumble mixture and bake for about 15 minutes or until the crumble is bubbling and the top is a wee bit brown. Enjoy - but don't burn your tongue like I did!

Smokey BBQ Pulled Pork

Woo hoo, my very first recipe blog. And what better way to start than with MEAT!

Why did I make it? I made pulled pork a while back in the slow cooker, and it turned out...ok. It wasn't quite as flavoursome as I'd hoped, but that was probably because it was a 'healthy' recipe. I also had everything I needed to make it from this recipe, except the bbq sauce and pork (so yeah, the main ingredients). Also, pulled pork is just awesome and this recipe is nice and simple.
Where did this recipe come from? From one of those free recipe cards you get at the supermarket - so housewifey
What's it good for? Feeding lots of people or just at the weekend when you've got some time to wait for dinner to cook.
How many people can eat it? This recipe made 6 serves (a dinner and two lunches for two people)
What do I serve it with? I made a coleslaw with red and green cabbage, spring onions, coriander (super quick in the food processor) and chipotle aioli, and put it into some nice fresh bread rolls.

What do I need?

3/4 cup BBQ sauce. I used Wattie's Bit on the Side Smokey BBQ sauce because the people who wrote the recipe card get paid to put that in the recipe I guess, but I reckon you could use any sauce, but in my opinion, make sure it's a smokey one
1/4 cup cider vinegar
1 tbsp worcestershire sauce
1 tsp mustard. I used wholegrain
1 tsp dried thyme. I used fresh as I had some in my garden
1.2 kg boneless pork shoulder, rind removed and fat trimmed. y piece was just over 2 kgs and it had a bone, but it was all good - I just adjusted the cooking time.
1 onion chopped (I used a red onion, just because I pretty much always do.
4 cloves of garlic crushed. I used already-crushed-in-a-jar garlic because my garlic disintegrated into a cloud of dust when I went to crush it.

How do I make it?

Preheat the oven to 160 degrees celsius. Mix the bbq sauce, cider vinegar, worcestershire sauce, mustard and thyme in a bowl. Put the onion, garlic and pork in a casserole dish. Pour over the sauce, cover and out in the over for 2 1/2 hours or until the pork is really tender. I cooked it for 3 hours, as it was a bit bigger and had a bone in it. I turned the pork once half way through cooking and poured some of the sauce back over it.

Once cooked, take it out and shred it with two forks. Put it back in the casserole dish with the sauce and stir it up. Serve it with coleslaw in bread rolls. Nom nom nom!

Tip: If you're making coleslaw, make it as you need it, or make it without the aioli and add that as you need it.

365 in 2014: A reflection

365 in 2014...well, 356 actually. That's like 98% - or an A+ grade. I'll take it.

When I finished the year and got my final post up last month, I took a look back at why I decided to do it in the first place and reflected on the experience (or experiment?). At the beginning of the year when I started, I found that I had to be super conscious about remembering to take a photo every day but it made me look at the world in a different way – I carried at least one camera with me at all times and it was pretty much always in the back of my mind that I would take at least one photo at some point during the day....well, except for those nine days. I was always looking for interesting things or beautiful places, and I’d often go out of my way in search of them. I learnt a little about composition and what makes a good photo, mainly through trial and error, and got real joy out of taking a cool photo that I was proud of. But there were also days I struggled to find photo-worthy things - hey, life is boring sometimes - and occasionally took photos simply because I needed one for the day. I tried to keep those ones interesting, but I’m not going to lie - sometimes it was 10pm and I’d realised I hadn't taken a photo, so I had to search for something around my house that might be vaguely interesting to other people. And some days I just plain forgot. And other days I took loads of great photos, and it was hard to choose just one.

I realised just how much I like taking photos – so much so that I bought a digital SLR camera half way through the year and did a five week photography class with a friend, which I really enjoyed and hopefully it resulted in some improvement in my technical ability – although the quality of my photos depended on which of the three cameras – mobile, point and shoot or digital SLR - I had on me at the time!

I think when I decided to start this, I was also thinking about how fast time seems to go the older you get, and how quickly things can change. Over the course of the year my boyfriend and I split up, got back together, and moved in to our own place. We got a kitten, I changed jobs, went on several trips and sold my car. In some ways, it was a pretty intense year. Looking back, I also appreciate how much fun my life is and how lucky I am to have so many opportunities to take photos of new, interesting, different and beautiful things, places and experiences – and now I have a permanent record of a whole year of my life.

And I realised that I quite like taking photos of food. I've always enjoyed food – cooking it, looking at it, eating it….and so my next incarnation of my ever-changing blog will be sort of food review blog. I realise there are millions of these out there, but it’s what I love and something I can draw from in my every day. I'm going to write about recipes I've tried – what was good about them, what wasn't so good about, how I personalised the recipes or what I’d do differently next time, and what occasions they might be good for. As I also love to eat out, I am going to mix it up with some reviews of places I eat out, in Wellington....or wherever I happen to be.

I hope you've enjoyed this visual account of my 2014, and you've found something to inspire, intrigue, inform or just entertain you. And as a nice way to close it off, here are my favourite photos of the year, one for every month.

365 in 2014

So it's come to this. Here are the last three photos of the year - I've finished my 365 in 2014!

Stay tuned for a bit of a retrospective on this little experiment....and some ideas on what's next for my hodge-podge of a blog. 

Happy new year everyone! May 2015 bring you lots of fun, adventure, love and good fortune.

A sunny evening, enjoying a few drinks on Wellington waterfront

Summer time missions

What a way to end 2014 - at a beautiful wedding.
I loved these little Lego figurines on the cake!

365 in 2014

I grew these bad boys in my veggie garden!

Celebratory Christmas cocktails at The Library - last day of
work before two weeks holiday - woo hoo!

Went for a Christmas Eve bike ride around Oriental Parade and there was a pop
up caravan band on the beach. I love Wellington

Christmas Day isn't complete without pavlova as far as I'm concerned. I make
one pretty much every year - this year I used this recipe for the first time,
and it turned out great

A Boxing Day beach picnic of leftovers. And the first outing
for the rad lunch box my sister gave me for Christmas

A Mad Men themed hen party. Retro outfits, cheese on toothpicks and
cocktails. Lots of cocktails

I bought a 5kg ham for Christmas. For four people on Christmas Day. So I had
to get creative with the leftovers. This was Ham and Leek Cobbler and it was
delicious. Used some leeks my old flatmate gave mefrom her garden and added heaps
more ham and veggies. Despite that, still had 2 kgs left to freeze!

365 in 2014

For once, the Pohutakawa trees (the Kiwi Christmas tree) are blooming with
perfect timing

We've had a quite a few days lately that have been really warm AND sunny
AND not windy - a miracle for Wellington. I took a long bike ride home
from work via Oriental Bay and there were heaps of people at the beach, some
even swimming - also a bit of a miracle in Wellington

For our team Christmas 'party', we went to Social Cooking.
It was a lot of fun. We made some stuffed chicken breasts with
kumara galette, a tomato salad and beans. This was my team's effort.
Looked great and tasted even better, if I do say so myself

Just to break up the Christmas photos, here's a couch, standing
majestically on a grassy knoll. I love Newtown

The Christmas tree at the boy's parents' place. Complete with
a working train that goes around the tree. Amazing

I made some Christmas gingerbread cookies

And also my favourite Christmas treat - Candy Cane Chocolate Bark courtesy of
Hungry and Frozen. So quick and easy - plus it would make great gifts. I took some
of these treats to work but they were mostly just to have around the house
over Christmas for guests....and me