Mexican Christmas March 22, 2020
Posted by andrewescott in Dinners.Tags: Christmas, dinner, Jacinta, mexican, mexican christmas, pam
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On Monday 2nd December, we took our usual Christmas theme and turned it Mexican! Pam and Jacinta cooked the dishes, and Jacinta also hosted.
Drink
Entre
Mains
Dessert
Christmas January 5, 2019
Posted by andrewescott in Dinners.Tags: Christmas, dinner, kerri, laura
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To celebrate Christmas, we had the final Recipe Club dinner for the year on Monday 17th December. Kerri and Laura made the dishes, with Laura hosting.
Drinks
Kerri made two amazing cocktails that started and finished the meal – the “ornamentini” made within Christmas tree baubles, and chocolate peppermint martinis.
Entree
Laura began the meal proper with a cream-cheese Christmas tree.
Mains
The main course was maple mustard roasted turkey with harvest rice, orange carrots with yoghurt parsley dressing, smashed crispy roast potatoes with turmeric and coconut, and southern-style sweet potato salad.
Dessert
Kerri made a gingerbread and cherry galette for dessert (together with the chocolate peppermint martinis).
Boozy Christmas January 3, 2018
Posted by andrewescott in Dinners.Tags: andrew, boozy christmas, Christmas, dinner, pam
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On Monday 18th December 2017, Andrew hosted the Christmas dinner which this time had a Boozy theme, i.e. that alcohol should be used as an ingredient. Pam cooked the savoury dishes and Andrew hosted, provided drinks and the dessert.
Drinks
Andrew served two Christmas-themed cocktails: a gingerbread martini and prosecco with raspberries and limoncello.
Entre
Pam made platters of vegan foie-gras, an onion chutney, vegan cheese, and a yoghurt dip.
Mains
For main course, Pam served up a bourbon-brined grilled chicken, potato salad and flambéd spinach salad.
Dessert
Andrew served a dessert of a two-tiered chocolate pavlova sitting on a Bailey’s marshmallow base, filled with Bailey’s whipped cream, and topped with fresh cherries and cherry syrup.
Christmas August 12, 2017
Posted by andrewescott in Dinners.Tags: Christmas, dinner, Jacinta, kerri
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Our traditional Christmas theme dinner was held on Monday 5th December 2016, with Kerri hosting and making the dishes together with Jacinta.
Entré
To start, we had maple, honey and spice-based ham with glazed pears.
Mains
The main course was pork, with parmesan & herb potatoes and cherry tomato & broad bean salad.
Dessert
There were two amazing desserts: choc-cherry pavlova and Christmas snow-globes.
Festive Punch (Christmas) December 24, 2015
Posted by Pam R in Recipes.Tags: Christmas, drink, pam, recipe
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This was one of the drinks for the Christmas dinner. This was a mixture of a couple of recipes.
Ingredients
- 1 cup pineapple juice
- 1.5 cups pomegranate juice
- 2 cups ginger ale
Christmas December 24, 2015
Posted by andrewescott in Dinners.Tags: Christmas, dinner, franca, pam
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On Monday 14th December, we had our traditional Christmas-themed get together. Unlike previous years, where we solely made Christmas sweets and nibblies, this was a full Christmas dinner. Franca hosted, and cooked together with Pam.
Entré and Drinks
To help get us into the Christmas spirit(s), Pam served some appropriate drinks: a festive punch and Christmas pudding vodka. A little while after, we then begun the meal proper with Franca’s watermelon and fetta salad (note how the melon is in the shape of stars).
Mains
The main course was a joint affair. Pam made a delicious roast pork belly, and Franca made us garlic bread, roast lamb and a mulled wine gravy.
Dessert
To conclude, Franca served up a pumpkin-spice cheese cake, and Pam presented us with a passionfruit, lychee and coconut yule log.
White Chocolate Ice-cream Pudding with Pistachio Praline (Christmas) December 7, 2014
Posted by cint77 in Recipes.Tags: Christmas, dessert, ice-cream, Jacinta
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This was the final dessert in our Christmas spread, and is based on this ice cream pudding recipe from Baker’s Corner.
To the icecream mixture I also folded in a raspberry sauce (see below).
Note: the ratio of water to sugar in the praline recipe were incorrect. I made mine with 1 cup of sugar and approx 1/3 cup water. You can stir the mixture until the sugar dissolves but then it must not be stirred.
This made a very sweet icecream – next time I would add the raspberries but without any extra sugar.
Ingredients – Raspberry Sauce
- Approx half a cup of frozen raspberries
- 1 tbsp sugar
- 2-3 tbsps water
Method
- Mix all ingredients in a saucepan until the sugar is dissolved, bring to the boil and stir until liquid is reduced by about a third.
- Cool and fold into icecream when adding the white chocolate.
Gluten-free Spice Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting (Christmas) December 7, 2014
Posted by kerribatch in Recipes.Tags: cake, Christmas, dessert, gluten-free, kerri
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One of the highlights of our Christmas spread, this recipe is based on a Southern Buttermilk Spice Cake recipe from About Food.
Instead of brown sugar frosting, it was cream cheese based. Use equal parts cream cheese and butter, with enough icing sugar to get a frosting consistency.
Also, it was made with this gluten-free flour mix, xanthan gum and extra baking powder.
Christmas December 7, 2014
Posted by andrewescott in Dinners.Tags: Christmas, dinner, Jacinta, kerri
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As is our Christmas tradition (see 2013’s or 2012’s for example), we had a Christmas supper, with Kerri hosting and Jacinta also providing tasty treats on Monday 1st December. No dinner courses – just dessert!
Dessert
Above you can see the amazing spread of deliciousness. There was Jacinta’s sweet potato tarts and eggnog panna cotta with balsamic raspberries, Kerri’s sugar cookies with raspberry jam and spice cake with cream cheese frosting, and to finish we found room in our tummies for Jacinta’s white chocolate ice cream pudding with pistachio praline.
Candied Citrus Peel (Christmas) January 25, 2014
Posted by andrewescott in Recipes.Tags: andrew, Christmas, dessert
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This was made for the Christmas supper. and was based on recipes from allrecipes.com and Epicurious.
Ingredients
- Mandarins
- Oranges
- Water
- White sugar
- Dark chocolate
- Caster sugar
- Dark chocolate
Method
- Prepare the peel first. Slice about 1cm off the top and bottom of the fruit, then cut the fruit into eight even vertical segments. Using a very sharp knife, cut the peel away from the pith and fruit so that there is basically just a strip of peel. You may need to “shave” away the pith a couple of times until it’s thin enough.
- The next step is blanching the peel, which makes it softer and removes some bitterness. Place the peel into a large saucepan of cold water, and bring to the boil. Place a colander over the sink. As soon as the water reaches boiling point, pour the contents of saucepan into the colander. Blanch the peel twice more, or stop sooner if the peel becomes floppy.
- Put 1 cup of white sugar to 1.5 cups of water in a medium-sized saucepan, and heat until the sugar has fully dissolved. (Note that you’ll need to do multiple saucepans for different batches of peel.) Reduce the heat to low, and add the peel to the sugar syrup (it should all be submerged), allowing it to simmer very gently for 20-30 minutes, stirring occasionally. When the peel turns translucent it is done. If the syrup starts to brown, remove the peel and begin again.
- Allow the peel to cool and dry a little on a wire rack for a couple of hours. Then place each segment of peel on a chopping board, and slice into thin strips. At this point you can roll it in either caster sugar or dip it in melted chocolate.
- Store in an airtight container for up to a week.
Melbourne Recipe Club 