Creative Children in the Kitchen

When baking, follow directions.  When cooking, go by your own taste.  ~Laiko Bahrs

I like to think of myself as a creative, experimental cook: inspired by recipes but not bound by them.  I am pretty slap-dash and rustic when baking meals and like to quickly whip together something sweet to treat my family every now and then.  I am always on the lookout for new things to try, both sweet and savoury.   Whether I am baking or cooking I really do go by my own nouse (somewhat disproving the above quote).  Having food sensitivities in my family has certainly encouraged this as I am constantly substituting ingredients in a recipe.  As my family requires to be fed (very regularly!!) and I am not willing to buy takeaway, eat pre-prepared, packaged or processed food etc., cooking is certainly one of my greatest creative outlets at the moment.

It is my intention to raise a creative family.  We make things together, bake, make music, draw together, build lego and find solutions to various fixit problems around the house and garden.

My Vintage Mixmaster, handed down to me from Mum.

I am delighted when my five year old Ess hears the mixmaster going and says, "What are you cooking Mum?" as she runs into the kitchen and climbs up onto the bench to join me.  She has told me on more than one occasion that she wants to be a chef.  So we break eggs and measure ingredients in our measuring cup, scales and spoons together.  We mix together (although she prefers that I do more of that) and lick the beaters together (I prefer that she does most of that).  How often however, have I asked her just what she wants to bake, from scratch, asked her what the ingredients might be.  Hmmm!  Not often enough and now I am inspired to do so more.

Ess's best friend came to school with a biscuit for her teacher.  It was made from her own recipe and she wanted to share.  She had sat down with her Nanna and wrote down ingredients together:

sugar

flour

chocolate

apricots

sultanas

oil or butter 

(the latter was added after a little prompting from her Mam)

She and her Mam then set to creaming together 2oz sugar and 4oz butter.  Her Mam decided to add 4oz toffuti (soy cream cheese).  Handfuls of chocolate, sultanas and apricots were added (about 2oz each).  Then 4 oz flour was mixed in.  They were set to bake in a 180degC oven for 15 minutes.  All reports are that they are delicious.   You should have seen the teacher's face as she tucked in after her day's work.  She appreciated the chocolate - who wouldn't!

Photo courtesy Ess' best friend and her Mam

As I am part of Our Creative Community who have committed to creating and being accountable, and am committed to raising my family to be creative people, I will add this style of baking to my list of things to do with my girls alongside reading together, playing with playdough and singing songs with our own made-up words.  Ess is enjoying writing also so I think I'll ask her to write her own list of ingredients and we'll see what we can come up with.

In the meantime, on with my own personal goal of collecting and creating healthy recipes which are low in gluten, sugar and dairy.  You can see the beginnings of a list in my side bar.  This week I am working on some biscuits and some muffins.  We'll see which is perfected first!

If you have any kitchen creations that were ideas of your own children's, I'd love to hear about them.  Please share them here.  And let us know what you think of the bikkies.

2009 Victorian Bushfire Appeal

Can a man take fire in his bosom, and his clothes not be burned?  ~Proverbs 6:27

The terrible devastation of the bushfire tragedy where over 1000 homes have been lost seems to deepen day by day.  It is the biggest natural disaster in our history.   I am heartened to see how our Australian community is banding together to raise much needed funds to support those who have been displaced.

Many people are auctioning items they have made by hand to raise funds.  Items are being listed on eBay such as this sweet Matryoshka doll by One Red Robin.  Melly and Me is running a private auction at their site with some very cute items up for auction.  There are more listings for handmade auctions on Handmade Help.

There are other ways to give and I am sure you'll find them in your local community.  My daughter will enjoy wearing her casual, no doubt 'pink', clothes to school on Friday as the school community commits to raising funds.

There are buskers in the streets raising money with their talents so I hear on ABC Classic FM.

You can also donate securely through The Salvation Army and the Australian Red Cross.

Do be sure that when you give it is through a secure, reputable source as sadly, just as there is likely an arsonist or two involved in this situation, there are now scammers just after our money.  This is the world be live in.

Adventures in Weather

You don't really understand human nature unless you know why a child on a merry-go-round will wave at his parents every time around - and why his parents will always wave back.  ~William D. Tammeus

This morning I woke to the unfamiliar sound of...drip...drip, drip...drip, drip, drop....pitter patter... pitter, patter.  It was rain!  Well a tiny, slight shower of rain.  No doubt it was some of the forecasted 20% increase in rainfall we are due in February, increasing our average of 10mm per month up to 12mm.  Just look at that sky of ours.  Exciting hey!!  Well it is actually, because along with it came a cool change which meant we could spend the day outdoors rather than in an airconditioned room.

We took a drive to Verdale Olive Estate to stock up on supplies and ventured towards St Kilda Beach where we explored something which surprisingly took me back to days when my Generous Gentleman and I visited the Antrim Coast, Northern Ireland.

It was fortress-like and on a beach and so much fun, climbing in through and around...

All right St Kilda Adventure Playground isn't quite Dunluce Castle but the amount of fun we had at both places was definitely comparable.

And how often do you see a tram runnning by a salt lake, almost in the middle of nowhere.

We haven't visited St Kilda as a family before.  I don't think we anticipated it would be as good as it is.  My Generous Gentleman remembers going there when he was about 10 years old so it has been around for quite some time.  It is quite a hot, dusty, windy location on the Adelaide Plains around mangrovey beaches which makes for a possibly somewhat less than enticing location.  But we will be back, now we have two growing girls in need of adventure in playgrounds.  It was very interesting to note that the one area of the playground which was plastic and resembled most school and park playgrounds was empty.  Only those made of metal and wood, those which had steep and bumpy slides and tunnels, those where the flying foxes flew were frequented.

We returned revitalised from our day out only to hear news of the Bushfires in Victoria.  My heart goes out to all of you who are in and around Melbourne and coping with the ravaging fires which have killed 108 people so far.  Click here to see just how much of the state is threatened by fire.  On top of that there are serious floods in Ingham, North Queensland.  

Know our prayers are with you all.

Gems of Nature in a child's eyes

Nature will bear the closest inspection.  She invites us to lay our eye level with her smallest leaf, and take an insect view of its plain.  ~Henry David Thoreau

Photo of our Native Fuschia Correa Dusky Bells  from Flickr

While walking to school my mere school starter lamented "Oh Mummy the "Christmas Bells" don't grow until winter.  I am going to have to wait until Winter till they ripen up and I can pick one for "Bee"!" (I particularly love the use of the term 'ripen' here don't you :)).  Yes my daughter is five going on 105.  How wonderful though that by walking all these days she has learnt to search for beauty in her surroundings, to desire to share that with her best friend, to remember which season these lovely native flowers bloom.  She was expecting to find beauty!  How often do we have such expectations?  How often is our expectation limited by our surroundings?  I will take the cue from my daughter and always expect to find beauty - whether on the tail (hopefully) of a scorching heatwave, outdoors in Autumn (soon) or in the shopping markets listening to a busker play their violin.  (After all it could be Joshua Bell or James Cuddeford!)

The flowers do look so like a fuschia don't they but let me tell you they don't require the same delicate care and specific conditions.  They are very drought tolerant.  We see both Correa Dusky Bells and Correa Reflexa on our journey to school.

Speaking of appreciating nature, do you remember that wonderful movie of 1996 that was the official selection at the Cannes Film Festival.  It was revolutionary at the time for it's technology and cinematography...

Our girls have thoroughly enjoyed watching this and when my Generous Gentleman and I sat down to watch it last evening we could not shake a curious little 5 year old, resisting being in bed yet again, saying "but it's so interesting"!  We replayed it at breakfast time where it was enjoyed by all - with a running commentary from Ess.  Here is a lovely review with some wonderful pictures from the movie, Microcosmos.

A little while ago we found that ABC was showing Miniscule.  The gorgeous little vignettes delight and enthrall all of us.  Each Saturday we race through the bathing routine to be able to catch our 5 minutes of Miniscule.  There is one on tonight - Nap Time at 6.24pm.  They are quite comical and not actual representations of nature.  Tune in if you can.  Otherwise I have found some on YouTube.

Spelt Bread

"The smell of good bread baking, like the sound of lightly flowing water, is indescribable in its evocation of innocence and delight."

The Art of Eating, M. F. K. Fisher, (1908-1992)

You will always find Spelt bread in our house.  Spelt flour is one of the grains I buy for our family's consumption.   We do just about everything we once did with wheat flour with spelt flour.  It is highly nutritious and wonderful for baking.  We find it easy to digest and, as we aim for a diet low in gluten, spelt suits us well in our bid for a healthier diet.  Sadly supply is not keeping up with demand and I am not always able to purchase it from my suppliers - Goodies and Grains or the market's Mega Health shop.   I have recently found this very well-priced supplier in Bellingen NSW so if you live near there give it a go.   My sister says she can purchase spelt for a reasonable price also in Brisbane.   Much of our Spelt Flour is supplied from Canada but I am glad to read that we are working to optimise the quality and yield of spelt under production in south east Australia.  Wholemeal Spelt seems to be more available currently, however my Generous Gentleman says white (or a combination of White and Wholemeal) bakes a better loaf of bread.  The loaf you see here is 100% wholemeal.  

My husband bakes bread for our family about every 4 to 5 days.  He has worked for a couple of years on this recipe to perfect it.  It's now very much enjoyed predominantly by himself and our two girls.  

Now, to make the bread.

First of all you'll need to activate the yeast.  Stir 3 teaspoons of dried yeast in 1 cup of warm water and let it sit while you prepare the dry ingredients.

Prepare the flour by sifting 4 cups of wholemeal or white spelt flour with 1 teaspoon of Xanthum Gum.  (Some say you can substitute Guar Gum but we haven't tried this.)  It is there to bind the bread.

Prepare the wet ingredients by placing the following into the bread pan from your Bread Maker in this order:

1 to 1 ½ cups water (depending on which type of flour you are using.  Wholemeal needs more water than white).

1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil

1 tablespoon honey

1 teaspoon sea salt

Add the flour to the breadpan.  Add the yeast combination to the pan, then set it to work.

Bake it on a Rapid or Quick Bread setting.  Being low in gluten, spelt does not need as much time to knead and rise.

You may need to change a few things here to suit your own breadmaker, they are all a bit different.  We use a Breville Bread Master Big Loaf Model No. BB380.

Our loaf is quite a dense one which is lovely for toast.  Who can resist, however, the softness of bread and crispy crust once it is directly removed from the breadmaker.  Certainly not my two little girls.

If you don't have a bread maker I have just stumbled across this recipe for a simple spelt loaf from a favourite local supplier of organic grains Four Leaf Milling in Tarlee, Clare Valley, South Australia.  I will be picking up some of their spelt next time we pass by and also searching to see what their supply of Spelt Flour is like here in Adelaide.  They have a "Where to Buy" feature on their home page which will assist you in buying their wonderful products in your state.  They also make spelt flakes, spelt bran as well as spelt flour.  Also some yummy millet flakes and fabulous baby rice, millet and porridge etc.  OK now I am raving, but really the taste is just so fresh I can't go past it.  I grew up with a family farm nearby, I know the flavour of grains nibbled directly from the plant (albeit wheat and barley predominantly), these products take me down memory lane.

All the best with your spelt bread baking.  Please pop back here briefly to comment and let me know.

Valentine Garland

For you see, each day I love you more
Today more than yesterday and less than tomorrow.
~Rosemonde Gerard

We have made a valentine garland found here via vlijtig.

I love this garland because at first glance it seems such a plain and simple garland made of hearts.  Yes, anyone could do that and probably will.

Yet this one is special because it has some sweet little cutouts, which allow light in, through and around.

Look at the interplay of light achieved when you hang it in just the right place, let it swirl in the breeze as you walk by, or even give it a gentle twirl.  Oh so pretty!

This one is for my little Valentine born just over 5 years ago - my precious Ess.  How she loves it hanging in her doorway.

Felt Bead Necklace

We have been creating again... 

Ess was drawn to these colourful felt beads in this book we borrowed from the library.

Let me tell you, they are not as simple as they look.  The insructions tell you to use PVA glue to hold the felt.  I wish I had thought first to use my hot glue gun as the PVA glue didn't dry fast enough, and left the felt feeling quite firm when it finally did dry, thus making it very very hard to thread them.  I had to make holes with a larger needle before Ess could thread them with her smaller one.  This job required me to sit outside by our water fountain trying to keep calm while I pushed and shoved the needle through, holding firmly down onto a plank of wood my Generous Gentleman lovingly found for me so I wouldn't injure myself or damage any furniture.  It was an arduous task to say the least.   Oh how I wished for a thimble - why don't I own one of those?

Don't let me put you off though.  They are very pretty and little Eee loves them.  Ess made a necklace for her which she loves wearing.  

They are also a wonderful addition to the items around our house which can be repeatedly put into and out of things such as this sweet little teapot...

... look at those sweet little toes...

...and fingers.

Need I say more!