Mushrooms?

Someone smart (not me) once said "life is too short to stuff a mushroom." I couldn't agree more.

Starting tomorrow I'm on a non-essential meals cooking strike. Tinkers food is the only exception.

So you can be sure there won't be any mushroom stuffing on my agenda this week. There are, however some super cute mushrooms on my mind. THESE HERE.

So whatever you do, don't forget to enter the giveaway this week or you will miss out on your weekly dose of mushroom love! Don't forget Tinker and I will draw the winner on Friday (Sydney time) so get in quick!

What's For Dinner Wednesday? Chicken Pot Pie

Brought to you by my favourite jailbird housewife, Martha Stewart, this low fat chicken pot pie is easy and perfect for a two dish mid week meal. I have changed it slightly just to save me some time and extra washing up. If you prefer to do things the Martha way, you can find the original recipe on her site.

Hopefully it won't go the way of my ocean trout pie after Sunday's disaster cooking day. Come to think of it, I have had more failures in the kitchen this month than I have had all my cooking life! So maybe I should have a new blog segment keeping score of disasters versus successes?

Ok so today's low fat pie sounds very easy, please let me know if you also give it a go and let me know what yours is like because at the rate I'm going even the most simple recipes are ruinable.

Ingredients

Serves 4

2 large pieces of chicken breast (12 to 14 ounces each)
Coarse salt and ground pepper
3 tablespoons olive oil
4 carrots, sliced 1/4 inch thick
1 medium onion, finely chopped
1/4 teaspoon dried thyme leaves
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
2 1/2 cups low-fat (1%) milk
1 package (10 ounces) frozen peas, thawed
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
6 filo sheets (each 12 by 17 inches), thawed

Directions

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Place chicken on a rimmed baking sheet; season with salt and pepper. Roast 20- 30 minutes. Shred meat, and set aside.

While chicken is roasting, heat 2 tablespoons oil in a large saucepan over medium.

Add carrots, onion, and thyme; season with salt and pepper, and cook until carrots are crisp-tender, 8 to 10 minutes. Add flour, and cook, stirring, 1 minute.

Gradually add milk, stirring until smooth. Cook, stirring occasionally, until mixture comes to a simmer and thickens.

Remove from heat; stir in peas, lemon juice, and chicken, and season with salt and pepper. Pour filling into a 9-inch deep-dish pie plate.

Stack filo on a work surface. Using a paring knife, cut out an 11-inch circle from the stack; discard trimmings. Stack 2 circles on work surface, and brush gently with 1 teaspoon oil; repeat with remaining circles and oil.

*I'm using one large square baking dish so I don't have to worry about the fiddly trimming, I'll just whack the ready cut squares of filo onto my pie filling*

Place pastry stack over filling, and press down about 1/2 inch from the edge so pastry fits inside rim of pie plate. Bake until golden and bubbling, 20 to 25 minutes. Let potpie cool 15 minutes before serving.


I have not bothered to translate into metric because I think most of us here in the metric world are more used to translating from imperial than they are doing the reverse. Let me know if you can't, and I'll edit this post.

Tuesday Snapshot- Stitches & Chocolate

So this is my Tuesday. An absolutely massive box of exquisite Laurent Meric's Cacao chocolates and a stunning summer dress for the Tinker made by... yours truly!

Sometimes I need to stop and pinch myself when I think about how lucky I am to have such lovely friends. For the past four days my good friend and sewing guru Theoreticgal has been my house guest. She came to Sydney laden with gifts for the Tinker and all manner of awesome sewing gadgets for me as well as a pattern and some fabric to make the little dress above.

She did a lot of hand holding to get me to make the dress and it turned out brilliantly. I will do another post showing you more detail and telling you how we put it all together. Theoreticgal is quite the house guest. Not only did she have to endure my crazy Griffon Bruxellois dogs as room mates but she had to eat my food.

Last night courtesy of a gorgeous mutual friend with connections to Australia's number 1 restaurant, I made dinner with a kilo of the most amazing ocean trout. I thought I'd whip up a yummy fish pie with Monday being my meat free day as per our new diet. Anyway I made a complete mess of the meal and it ended up being a plate of gruel.

For my most generous and most gourmet friend I served up a plate of gruel. It was a disaster, a funny one in retrospect but a disaster none the less. What went wrong? I have no idea. It tasted fine but the consistency was a nightmare. Lately all of my cooking pursuits have ended in tears. I think it is a sign. So from today forward I am on a cooking strike bar the food I make for my Tinker. Luckily I have my box of amazing award winning chocolates to sustain me for a few days until I hire a full time chef or perhaps invest in a truckload of 2 minute noodles.