Lemon jelly

Here’s a great treat in the early stages of the GAPS diet. It’s based on my tried-and-true recipe for juicy jelly.

It’s a great palate cleanser – if you are in to that kind of thing!

1 Tbsp gelatine
juice of one lemon, discard the flesh
3 Tbsps raw honey

1. Squeeze the lemon and strain the juice through a sieve to remove seeds and pulp.
2. Add a cup of boiling water to a bowl and then quickly mix in gelatine with a fork to dissolve.
3. Add the gelatine mixture to the juice. Stir to combine and then add an additional half a cup of cold water.
4. Add honey to sweeten.
5. Pour in to molds and set in fridge overnight.

Serves 4.

Luscious lemon sago

After five attempts at making sago, I have finally found the answer. It still looks like frog’s eggs, but it’s a light and refreshing dessert.

Sago is sometimes sold as ‘seed tapioca’. The one  I used is made by McKenzie’s and they clarify the difference on the back of the packet:

A common alternative to Sago is Seed Tapioca. Sago and Tapioca are both starch extracts, sago from various southeast sago palms and tapioca is processed from the tubers of the cassava plant.

This explains my mixed results. Perhaps I should rename the recipe to Luscious Lemon Seed Tapioca? Naw, it doesn’t have the same ring to.

You may like to try this recipe with limes instead. I like to eat lemon sago alone, but you can serve it with fresh or stewed fruit and cream or custard.

1/2 cup of sago
2 cups of water
1 lemon, juiced
2 Tbsp honey
2 Tbsp golden syrup

1. Wash the sago and soak for an hour in some water.
2. Rinse off the water. Add 2 cups of water to a saucepan and bring to the boil.
3. When boiling, add the sago and stir until quite transparent (this can take 15-30minutes).
4. Add the lemon juice, golden syrup and sugar.
5. Pour into a bowl or mould and chill.

Serves 4.

Stewed rhubarb

I worked out that I’ve been cooking my rhubarb for way too long! I do like it mushy though. Isn’t this a vibrant red?

1 bunch of rhubarb
1/4 cup of water
4 Tbsp honey or sugar
1/2 lemon, juiced

1. Cut the ends and leaves off of the rhubarb. Then cut the stalks into pieces about 3 cm long.
2. Place the water, sugar (or honey) and lemon juice on to boil in a pot.
3. When boiling, add the rhubarb.
4. Cook gently with the lid on until tender, about 10 to 15 minutes.
5. Allow to cool.

Serves 6.

Note: SCD and GAPS safe if you use the honey.

Mango coconut cream pie

This dessert doesn’t have much eye appeal, but it’s yummy and very healthy.The cashews and chia seeds contain protein, calcium, iron, and essential fatty acids. We used coconut cream and diluted 50:50 with water to make coconut milk. You could even serve this dish with your morning porridge or muesli.

1 cup of cashews, soaked, rinsed and strained
1/4 chia seeds (to make 1/2 cup chia seed meal)
1/4 cup coconut oil, liquified
1/4 cup raw honey or coconut sugar
2/3 cup coconut milk
1 mango, sliced
1 Tbsp lemon juice
1 Tbsp vanilla extract

1. Soak the cashew nuts for at least 3 hours beforehand.
2. Grind the chia seeds in a coffee grinder, or similar, to make chia seed meal.
3. Add all of the ingredients to a food processor and puree.
4. Pour the mixture into a pie dish and refrigerate overnight or at least 8 hours.

Serve with fresh fruit.

 

Kefir starters

Kefir is a fermented milk drink that originated in the Caucasian Mountains near Turkey, where it was used for centuries as a healthy drink. Kefir is a probiotic – a source of beneficial bacteria and yeasts which help maintain a healthy digestive system. These include Lactobacillus, Lactococcus, Leuconostoc, and Saccharomyces kefir.

It is best to introduce homemade kefir after homemade yogurt, when healing of the gut wall has taken place.

Kefir starters are available from your local health food store, although it is best to ring and check they have some in stock first. They are sold as ‘grains’, even though they are not a grain. Alternatively, in Australia you can order direct:

• Kefir Turkish Yoghurt by Nature’s Goodness
• Kefir refresher packs by Kefir Culture Natural (also have a Starter pack that contains a dedicated kefir maker, refresher pack and book).

If you are overseas look for:

• Body Ecology Kefir Starter

If you don’t want to make your own kefir, you may like to try Babushkas Kefir which comes in plain, strawberry and honey.

Yogurt starters and yogurt makers

You can make home-made yogurt with goat, sheep or cows milk and select your own live cultures for fermentation. It is also possible to make yogurt from coconuts, soy and nut milks. Yogurt needs to incubate for 24 hours or more so that the fermenting bacteria consumes all of the lactose and is therefore easier to digest.

There are two ways to start off making yoghurt at home. The first way is to use a store bought yogurt and the second is a yogurt starter.

Yogurt

This yogurt is suitable for your first batch:

• Farmers Union Greek style natural yogurt (contains bifidus)

Yogurt starters

Yoghurt starter contains cultures of bacteria that are used to inoculate the milk and begin the fermentation. The bacteria to look for in a yoghurt starters are:

• Lactobacillus bulgaricus
• Streptococcus thermophilus
• Lactobacillus acidophilus (optional)

Here are some of the safe yogurt starters available in Australia:

• ProGurt™ Dairy Free Yogurt Starter by Gi Pro Health is available from GAPS Australia. It is sent in cold pack.
• Yogurt culture by Green Living Australia
• Natren Yoghurt Starter available from FourBody (or direct from Natren or Natren Probiotic Yogurt Starter). You can also find it in the fridge at Mrs Flannerys Natural Grocers.

Yogurt makers

Your yoghurt maker needs to be designed to maintain the ideal temperature for making SCD and GAPS yoghurt. It also needs to be able to ferment for 24 hours. There is one suitable yogurt maker available in Australia:

• Easy Yogurt maker from GAPS Australia
• Easy Yogurt direct from Easy Cook

Some people use their dehydrator to make yogurt. If you are overseas look out for the Yogourmet electric yogurt maker (available from Amazon with starters, or Lucy’s Kitchen Shop).

Note: If you are following the SCD, then it is sometimes recommended to avoid the Bifidus strain as it may cause a strong die-off reaction.

100 recipes: Trifle

Best recipe
Traditional raspberry trifle – Delia Smith

About

The basic ingredients of an English trifle are cake, fruit (usually berries), custard and cream. It is traditionally made up of sherry soaked genoese sponge, raspberries, thick custard and whipped cream. The addition of jelly is a more contemporary version. It is worth the time to make the custard from scratch.

The best trifle recipe is by Nigel Slater as featured in The Observer’s Top 50 favourite recipes. The recipe contains black currents, so it is not a traditional version.

• How to make custard with step by step illustrated instructions – Delia Smith

Multimedia

• Raspberry trifle video – Gabriel Gaté

Variations

• Apple and Calvados trifle – Fergus Henderson and Justin Piers Gellatly
• Chocolate cherry trifle – Nigella Lawson, Feast
• Rhubarb, vanilla and gin trifle – Tiffany Jones
• Trifle of pears, prunes and sauternes custard- Maggie Beer
• Winter berry trifle – olive magazine

About | 100 Recipes | Outtakes

100 recipes: Tiramisu

Best recipe
Best tiramisu – Jean-Christophe Novelli

About

Italian: tiramisu

Tiramisu was first made in Venice in the 1970s.

The best tiramisu recipe nominated by Atul Kochhar is by Jean-Christophe Novelli and appears in his Your Place or Mine cookbook, as featured in the The Observer’s Top 50 favourite recipes.

This dish tastes better the next day as the time allows the sponge to absorb the flavours of the alcohol and coffee. When dipping the Savoiardi biscuits try not to soak them completely through as it will lead to puddles at the bottom of the bowl.

You can serve also them in individual dishes.

Multimedia

• Tiramisu video – Graziella Alessi

Variations:

• Best tiramisu – Jamie Oliver
• Tiramisu – Antonio Carluccio
• Tiramisu – Pat Nourse
• Tiramisú layer cakes – Emma Knowles
• Tiramisu with strawberries and port – Gennaro Contaldo

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100 recipes: Tarte tatin

Best recipe
Tarte Demoiselles Tatin – Marco Pierre White

About

French: tarte aux pommes or tarte tatin

Aim for caramel sweet apples and a light golden crust.

This apple tart was created out of an accident by the Sisters Tatin, or so the legend goes. Apparently the tart was dropped upside down, and then pastry was laid over the top to cover it up. Others claim that it is a common method of cooking tarts in New Orleans at the beginning of the last century.

Jill Dupleix recommends Marco Pierre White recipe for tarte tatin, and Jenny Ferguson’s fine apple tart. Stuart Gillies has a apple tatin in The Observer’s Top 50 favourite recipes.

It’s good to use up recently bruised fruit, with the best apples to use are Braeburn, Golden Delicious, Pink Lady. Other fruit can be used instead such as apricots, pears, peaches, plums or quinces. Use scented honey, such as lavender, thyme or rosemary to give it an authentic Provencal flavour.

If this is one of your favourite desserts you can even purchase a dedicated tarte tatin pan.

Serve tart upside down warm or at room temperature, with creme fraiche, whipped cream or vanilla ice cream.

Multimedia

• Honey pear tarte tatin video – Emma Knowles

Variations

• Pear tarte tatin – Gordon Ramsay
• Pear tarte tatin – Shannon Bennett
• Plum tart – Gabriel Gate
• Raspberry peach lattice pie – Dan Lepard
• World-famous tarte tatin – Jamie Oliver

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100 recipes: Tarte au citron

Best recipe
Tarte au citron – Roux Brothers

About
The most talked about lemon tart recipe (above) is the one by The Roux Brothers, Albert and Michel.

There are two differing end results depending upon your palate. You’ll need to decide whether you like your tart as lemon curd or creamy custard. The two other recipes that are popular are by Pierre Hermé and Thomas Keller – although both heavy on the butter.

The aim is to get the balance right between the sweetness of the sugar and the tartness of the lemon. The crust should be rich and buttery to complement the filling.

“At first glance, you would think that the lemon cream is just another version of lemon curd—the ingredients are almost identical. What’s different is how they are treated, and it makes an enormous difference in the taste and texture.

In a curd, the eggs, lemon juice, sugar and butter are cooked together until they thicken. The result is silky, lemony and, above all, unmistakably rich and buttery. In Pierre’s lemon cream, the eggs, lemon juice and sugar—but not the butter—are cooked together until they thicken, just like curd. The mixture is then poured into a blender and allowed to cool for a few minutes. Then the butter is added, in pieces, and the cream is whipped around for a few minutes. Here’s the genius—instead of melting as it does in curd, the butter emulsifies (just as oil does in mayonnaise), so that the resulting texture is velvety and deceptively light. It is a stroke of culinary magic.”
- Dorie Greenspan, Baking: From My Home to Yours

Neil Perry sings the praises of passionfruit tart and claims it should be the Australian version of lemon tart.

Multimedia

• Caramelised lemon tart with coconut sorbet video – Darren Ho

Variations

• Kiwi lime tart – Dan Lepard
• Lemon-Lemon Lemon Cream – Dorie Greenspan (Pierre Hermé)
• Lemon Ripple Tart (includes raspberries) – Jamie Oliver
• Lemon Sabayon-Pine Nut Tart with Honeyed Mascarpone Cream – Thomas Keller
• Lemon tart – Dan Lepard (based on Marco Pierre White from White Heat)
• Passionfruit Tart – Neil Perry

About | 100 Recipes | Outtakes